Food for the starving
So I haven't written in a really really long time... but instead of actually writing I am going to post some thoughtful editorials that I meant to comment on but unfortunetly got busy... The first one is just because he seems like a good writer.
Heaven's Gates
By RICK MORANIS
Published: February 19, 2005
I had a dream last night. I was 5 years old. It was summer. There was no air-conditioning in our little bungalow on the small crescent-shaped street in the suburbs of Toronto. And so to cool ourselves, we ran through the freshly hanging sheets on the backyard clotheslines. I had no idea that every one of my neighbors had the same apricot-colored linen that we did. Towels too! It was beautiful; as far as the eye could see, rows and rows of shimmering golden-orange fabric dancing in the light.
I hoped it would stay like that forever, or maybe another week or so max.
I heard my mother calling me. In a French accent. She was much older now, with bright red hair.
"Come 'ere," she said. "It's time to unwrap the house!"
Our tiny home was covered in 9,000 square meters of ivory woven polypropylene tied with 35 kilometers of 1.5-centimeter diameter steel cables and blue polyamide rope, anchored to 325 tons of concrete foundation. A team of 23 professional mountain climbers and 275 laborers, volunteers and students of architecture from my Hebrew school class had toiled for some 17,000 man-hours to complete the installation. Our neighbors thought we had an earwig problem and were spraying. But many, except for the Applebaums across the street, could appreciate the beauty and majesty of the project.
For years the city had told my parents this would never happen and then, boom, one day my Uncle Manny gets elected mayor! The documentary crews were filming everything. My mother was doing yet another interview explaining how she'd come up with the idea and paid for it by selling pictures of my father wrapped in 312 square meters of tinfoil bound with 400 kilometers of waxed polyethylene 390-filament nylon amine-fluoride mint-flavored dental floss.
It was time. The helicopters roared overhead, narrowly missing a confused homeless family of red-tailed hawks. The street was clogged with 1,000 cars. No one had ever seen this many New Jersey license plates in Canada.
Finally, I took the long extension pole and hooked the tiny partly hydrogenated trans fat ivory loop that an army of seamstresses and chefs had prepared for the unveiling.
The crowd roared in astonishment. The chrysalis had been shed. A new beginning! A rebirth!
I went inside what had been my tiny childhood home. My bedroom was now an enormous luxury skybox. The floor was covered in 300 square meters of celadon tufted colortec synthetic broadloom from Carpet Liquidators on 14th Street, marked up like crazy by the architect, contractor, installer, union and the city so that what should have been $5 a yard was costing a fortune. The house was massive, completely dwarfing the entire neighborhood. There were 100 more skyboxes, a retractable roof, convention facilities and 80,000 seats overlooking the most beautiful ice surface I'd ever seen.
But, sadly, no hockey was being played.
I asked my mother how we could ever afford to pay for this. She smiled and took me outside, unwrapped my father and then pointed to a perch at the top of the mammoth structure.
The family of hawks had quickly begun building a nest out of tiny pieces of the orange sheets and towels, paper tubing, vinyl covering, hats, T-shirts, buttons and other discarded licensed and copyrighted merchandise.
"See those birds?" she said. "Someone bought them the penthouse."
Rick Moranis is a writer and actor.
Heaven's Gates
By RICK MORANIS
Published: February 19, 2005
I had a dream last night. I was 5 years old. It was summer. There was no air-conditioning in our little bungalow on the small crescent-shaped street in the suburbs of Toronto. And so to cool ourselves, we ran through the freshly hanging sheets on the backyard clotheslines. I had no idea that every one of my neighbors had the same apricot-colored linen that we did. Towels too! It was beautiful; as far as the eye could see, rows and rows of shimmering golden-orange fabric dancing in the light.
I hoped it would stay like that forever, or maybe another week or so max.
I heard my mother calling me. In a French accent. She was much older now, with bright red hair.
"Come 'ere," she said. "It's time to unwrap the house!"
Our tiny home was covered in 9,000 square meters of ivory woven polypropylene tied with 35 kilometers of 1.5-centimeter diameter steel cables and blue polyamide rope, anchored to 325 tons of concrete foundation. A team of 23 professional mountain climbers and 275 laborers, volunteers and students of architecture from my Hebrew school class had toiled for some 17,000 man-hours to complete the installation. Our neighbors thought we had an earwig problem and were spraying. But many, except for the Applebaums across the street, could appreciate the beauty and majesty of the project.
For years the city had told my parents this would never happen and then, boom, one day my Uncle Manny gets elected mayor! The documentary crews were filming everything. My mother was doing yet another interview explaining how she'd come up with the idea and paid for it by selling pictures of my father wrapped in 312 square meters of tinfoil bound with 400 kilometers of waxed polyethylene 390-filament nylon amine-fluoride mint-flavored dental floss.
It was time. The helicopters roared overhead, narrowly missing a confused homeless family of red-tailed hawks. The street was clogged with 1,000 cars. No one had ever seen this many New Jersey license plates in Canada.
Finally, I took the long extension pole and hooked the tiny partly hydrogenated trans fat ivory loop that an army of seamstresses and chefs had prepared for the unveiling.
The crowd roared in astonishment. The chrysalis had been shed. A new beginning! A rebirth!
I went inside what had been my tiny childhood home. My bedroom was now an enormous luxury skybox. The floor was covered in 300 square meters of celadon tufted colortec synthetic broadloom from Carpet Liquidators on 14th Street, marked up like crazy by the architect, contractor, installer, union and the city so that what should have been $5 a yard was costing a fortune. The house was massive, completely dwarfing the entire neighborhood. There were 100 more skyboxes, a retractable roof, convention facilities and 80,000 seats overlooking the most beautiful ice surface I'd ever seen.
But, sadly, no hockey was being played.
I asked my mother how we could ever afford to pay for this. She smiled and took me outside, unwrapped my father and then pointed to a perch at the top of the mammoth structure.
The family of hawks had quickly begun building a nest out of tiny pieces of the orange sheets and towels, paper tubing, vinyl covering, hats, T-shirts, buttons and other discarded licensed and copyrighted merchandise.
"See those birds?" she said. "Someone bought them the penthouse."
Rick Moranis is a writer and actor.