So, what would you call this item?

Looking it up, I find several choices: singlet, tank top, sleeveless undershirt. And sadly, I also still find the unacceptable 'wife-beater'. 

The term apparently came about as the result of a case of domestic violence that dates back to 1947, which means it has been around far too long. Last I heard (though I don't patronize them) Amazon was still using this ugly terminology to describe sleeveless undershirts. 

Especially today, the first day of an extended observance that seeks the Elimination of Violence Against Women seems like a day to call a singlet a singlet (or one of the other terms that don't seem to extol violence).  

We here in Canada will also be observing this theme on December 6th, the date we remember the mass murder of 14 brilliant women at the Ecole Polytechnique. 

It's not even four o'clock and it's just about dark here. Dark times indeed when women are harmed -- or even killed -- pretty much simply because they're women. 

Remembering

My little vase of winter roses looks pretty sad. But then, today is a day they have reason to look that way. It's the anniversary of the day when a shooter murdered 14 women, all because he decided that feminists were ruining the world. 

For many years Montreal has shone 14 beacons to memorialize those women who were killed, but this year they've added a 15th beacon--this one on behalf of the many women who continue to be victims of violence. 

Maybe those brave little winter roses that reign on the ledge above my kitchen sink (where yes, I spend plenty of time) have reason enough to look a little sad. 

Down by the river

Winnipeg. That's where I spent this past weekend. Aside from hurriedly changing planes at the Winnipeg airport, I'd never been there before. What a place, a city that reached into my soul.

In between meetings and sessions for The Writers' Union of Canada and the League of Canadian Poets, I made it to the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the Legislature Buildings and the Canadian Museum of Human Rights. All of these visits were well worthwhile, but even more important to me was the visit I paid to the banks of the Red River.

The reason for visiting the river was so I could place a 'memory rock' there.

The memory rock was a shiny stone I'd found, in of all places, on the floor of a downtown dollar store.

The store was crowded, mostly with First Nations people -- singles, women, families with beautiful kids. It was a messy shop, with more security guards than ordinary staff, and I suppose the security guys weren't into tidying the shelves.

It made me sad that the food choices there consisted of nothing but chemmy-flavoured junk. I could only hope that there was another grocery store in the neighbourhood, one with at least milk, bread and some kind of produce selection.

But then, at my feet, was the perfect shiny stone. I knew it didn't belong there and rescued it.

It was later that the idea came to mind: I knew I wanted to take it to the river and toss it into the water, my small way of remembering Tina Fontaine.

Yesterday, my last day in Winnipeg, was the day I made my way to the river. But the River Walk was closed, owing to the height of the water, almost in flood. I tried a couple of spots where I might access the river -- in a park, beside a playground -- and got close enough that I could have thrown it in. Even though I tossed in a few small stones (ones I picked from under trees on the bank), none of those spots felt like the right place to send out the special one.

Then, when I'd almost resigned myself to keeping the stone, I found the special place.

Here I'd spent the weekend with writers and what did I find but a park bench with a book on it -- a hardcover one at that.

The book's title confirmed that I'd found the right place and I said a kind of prayer/dedication and let the stone fly. For Tina.

Tomorrow the official Report on Truth and Reconciliation will be released -- the aftermath of the horror of the residential schools with their hideous agenda, to "..take the Indian out of the child."

I'm hoping that one of the steps our government will take towards true reconciliation will be initiating an official inquiry into the missing and murdered Aboriginal women. I hope the ripples of my special stone for Tina will radiate into something positive so we don't have any more women thrown into the river -- and not just in Winnipeg, but anywhere.

A time for change

Last night, a friend and I went in to Vancouver, to attend an event celebrating a remarkable new book, Walk Myself Home.

The venue, the Carnegie Community Centre, certainly felt right. It's a heritage building that, like the sign above says, serves as the heart of the community.

Early evening, and the building seemed packed. People were gathered around tables, playing cards or mah-jong; several quieter tables focused on chess. Moving to the library, nearly every seat was taken, heads bent to books or taking notes.

But back to the reading, that took place in the centre’s theatre.

Readers offered short memoirs, poems, even an account of a court challenge with long-lasting benefits to victims of abuse. Although the event was sponsored by the Vancouver Public Library, the setting was anything but library-like.

Hosted by Elee Kraljii Gardiner, who runs a Thursday afternoon creative writing program at the Centre, she spoke of how the book’s contributors have formed their own community – providing accommodation and meals for out-of-town contributors, supporting each other in many ways.

I’m sure I’m speaking for everyone who attended when I say that we felt included in the circle of communities this book has engendered.

I especially loved the fact that most of the questions at the end came from men. And that with the questions came thanks and other hopeful words.

As the book’s subtitle explains, Walk Myself Home is “an anthology to end violence against women.” I’d like to believe that the ‘end’ part of that phrase is correct and coming true.