I was braver in the 80’s. A community activist. Physicians for Social Responsibility, Mayors’ Campaign for African Famine Relief.A Leche League Leader. I wrote letters to the editor. I volunteered as a low-level producer at a community television station. I wore bold colours, put henna in my hair and danced like a whirligig. The only conservative thing I did then was the Jane Fonda workout.
By happenstance, on May 28th, 2017 I was watching Canadian broadcaster, Charles Adler accept a Lifetime Achievement award from the Radio Television Digital News Association with a speech that made me cry.
I don’t know Charles Adler. I know I should but I don’t. Now I want to after hearing him speak. Google his speech and then I think that, you too, will want to know his work if you do not know it already.
He spoke about the late Barbara Frum.
That was a surprise tear trigger and I sat for more than a few minutes weeping on our sofa trying to figure out why.
Barbara Frum was important to me at a particular, sensitive point in my life. She was significant to me during my long, long, long childbearing decade when I was pregnant with child number 2…and 3……and 4.
I was breastfeeding and puking then for the better part of 7 years. My social activism dwindled to hassling my parents about recycling.
My world contracted. Bam! Daughter number two had the sleeping genes of a bat (still does at the age of 32). Completely, utterly, nocturnal and only 11 months old when daughter number 3 was conceived. (Don’t even. Story for another day.)
Daughter number 2 also produced teeth like in sci-fi movies where monsters force themselves out of mammals from throbbing, erupting giant blood blisters.
Much to the chagrin of my mum, I did not accept the advice of her time – to drug myself or my kid. And so, I spent hours of my third pregnancy dry-heaving first trimester with a distressed baby/toddler who would only be consoled with pacing in my arms or at my breast.
Who consoled me then was Barbara Frum. Barbara kept me company when I thought I did not have the stamina for one more nocturnal minute.
But more importantly, Barbara Frum was a trusted connection to the outside world.
Do you remember Barbara Frum? She was a CBC radio and television journalist. She hosted the CBC newsmagazine, The Journal, which aired 22 minutes after The National. She died of chronic leukemia in 1992. I mourned when I heard. I thought she looked tired on TV but like most Canadians did not know why. She kept that secret well.
She had her own controversies to be sure. But I connected with her. I connected with her when social media did not exist.
Barbara Frum reported with a balanced and sometimes uncomfortable view. She did this with context. CBC liberal bias aside, I trusted her. In 1986, Barbara Frum seemed to capture and distill the muddle and triumphs of current affairs in a way that I could not, given the constraints of the all-consuming but beloved fruit of my loins. She was a trusted world wide angle lens when I did not have the energy to rely on my own personal resources to try capture and understand the big picture myself.
I was thankful for that. I was grateful for that. I miss it today.
The world is different now. I get news alerts on my apple watch. No context. No trust. The stories are too complex and perplexing. It takes forever to wade through today’s complicated truths.
When Charles Adler gave Barbara Frum a shout out maybe I was crying about the memory of the loss of a perceived late-night friend. Maybe I was crying the loss of a perceived trusted journalist. Maybe I was crying for the loss of journalistic context today where our attention span is measured in tweet units. I still haven’t figured that out.
But my take home after the fifteen tissues soaked during and after the Charles Adler speech is, be braver. To seek truth, no matter how uncomfortable, in today’s reporting in whatever form. And to seek the same truth within my soul. And to honour the people who made that their own life’s purpose.
Shout out to Barbara Frum.
Postscript
Recently I have been watching Judy Woodruff on the PBS Newshour. From a Canadian perspective a fresh and balanced view of US and world politics. Try watching it.
Corporate Midwife 