“…I’m dating myself when I say that. Actually I dated myself for quite a while. It was fun at first, and certainly the sex was great. And regular. But after a while I began to find myself a bit, I don’t know, ‘needy’. So I broke up. But as I said to myself at the [...]
“…During an era of free love and expensive war, Quyon was a safe sensible and moral oasis. And, aside from one evening just before Christmas, Father tried to keep it that way…” I wrote The Words That Never Hurt Us as a Christmas gift for my maternal grandmother. It also won first prize in the [...]
“After walking for about an hour on the road that runs north from Adare in County Limerick, I pulled out my harmonica and played a few tunes…I stopped in mid-note–a man ahead was fishing from a stone bridge…” [One of my best travel pieces for the Toronto Globe and Mail (January 1997). Whenever I play [...]
“…Politics is a social science. That’s what political scientists will tell you, as they labour over intricate models and theories that explain the exercise of power. But sometimes the social is more instructive than the science. Sometimes you see that political screw-ups, governmental overload, even power brokering aren’t confined to the legislature. Check out any [...]
