Q&A WITH A BELOVED HOCKEY LEGEND

PAGE 44

The
Pickleball CANADA’S
MOST-READ
OCTOBER 2023
CRAZE MAGAZINE
PAGE 15

7 SLEEP
ZZZZZZZ DRAMA:
The Man Who
Took Down
a Deadly

SECRETS
Gunman
PAGE 54

Cleaning Up
the Earth,
FROM AROUND One Repair
THE WORLD
PAGE 30
at a Time
PAGE 84

Be Good to
Your Feet!
PAGE 76

A Day in
the Life of
a Brain
Surgeon
PAGE 90
“I know there’s
I can go anywhere and

“
no leakage
-Dolores

Boutique underwear. 8 oz of liquid.

The bladder leak underwear we deserve

 A Trusted Friend in a Complicated World

Features 44 54
portrait drama in real life
Power Player Nightmare at the

30
cover story
7 GLOBAL SLEEP TIPS
Trouble sleeping? We
gathered ideas from
around the world and
then asked experts what
really works.
BY VANESSA MILNE
The straight-shooting
Hayley Wickenheiser—
four-time Olympic gold
Nightclub
When the shooting
started at a Colorado
medal winner, assistant nightclub, a combat
GM of the Leafs and a veteran’s lifesaving
medical doctor—has a instincts kicked in.
few things to say about BY DAVE PHILIPPS
FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES
working under pressure.
BY STÉPHANIE VERGE
FROM TORONTO LIFE

36
cover story
How I Tried to Stop
Snoring
I wanted a quick fix,
even if it meant strap-
ping a glorified bike
pump to my face.
BY JORDAN FOISY
FROM THE WALRUS

44
IAN PATTERSON

on the cover:
illustration by hayden maynard
reader ’s digest

60 66 non-Hodgkin’s lym-
phoma, federal minister
nature smile
Dominic Leblanc knew
The Great Wildebeest Stretching the Truth
only a perfect bone-
Migration A squabble with my wife
marrow match could
It’s a spectacular sight taught me to see BMI in
save him.
when countless rumi- a whole new light.
BY HAROLD GAGNÉ
nants trample across BY RICHARD GLOVER
the Serengeti in search
of greener pastures. 68 76
health
BY VINCENT NOYOUX inspiration
FROM LE FIGARO MAGAZINE Be Nice to Your Feet
Blood Ties
We can be pretty hard
Diagnosed with
on them. Here’s how
highly aggressive
to show your feet a little
more love.
BY SYDNEY LONEY

84
environment
The Fix-It Revolution
DIY repairs are making
a comeback to remedy
our throwaway culture.
BY VANESSA MILNE

90
bonus read
Lives in the Balance
Real-life stories told by
a leading neurosurgeon.
BY DR. CHRISTOPHER HONEY
FROM THE TENTH NERVE

76
ELISE CONLIN
 6 Letters game’s exploding
popularity?
BY KAREN ROBOCK Humour
World of Good 17 The Scoop on 14
9 Reasons to Smile Veggie Powders Life’s Like That
BY MELISSA GREER
everyday heroes 20
10 A Very Caring 18 News From the Laughter, the Best
Family World of Medicine Medicine
These Delhi-based BY SAMANTHA RIDEOUT
24
brothers and their As Kids See It
families work long
days to help those Art of Living
who need it most. food passport
BY DIANE PETERS 21 Hoppy Hour 13 things
When it comes to 26 A Fascinating
good news from
around the world beer, the choices Fungus
12 Wheels For Pets are just about BY COURTNEY SHEA
... and other uplift- endless.
29 Quotable Quotes
ing stories. BY LEILA EL SHENNAWY
BY PATRICIA KAROUNOS
26 Brain Games
Health Digest 106 Puzzles
wellness for 108 Sudoku
body & mind 109 Trivia
15 Pickleball Fever
Everyone is getting 111 Word Power
in on this sport. 113 Crossword
What’s behind the 114 A Trusted Friend

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Bonnie Munday editor-in-chief

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4 october 2023 | rd.ca

reader ’s digest
LETTERS
Dear Reader,
As you can see from the collection of
the letters we’ve received, stories from
our Canadian edition are read all
around the world—in 43 countries, to
be exact—and are translated into nine
languages. How cool is that? We’re
proud to bring you stories, by Canadian
writers, that resonate so widely.
In this issue you’ll find the inspiring
“The Fix-It Revolution,” which high-
lights efforts of companies and individ-
uals to reduce waste in landfills; a lively
conversation with national sports hero
Hayley Wickenheiser; and a Bonus
Read, “Lives In the Balance,” that I guar-
antee you won’t be able to put down.
We hope you enjoy the October issue
of Reader’s Digest. Please let us know
what you think! We’ll publish another
roundup of letters in the December-
January issue.
Bonnie Munday,
Editor-in-Chief
editors_canada@rd.ca
IN PRAISE OF PRINT
Thank you for your open and honest
dialogue regarding today’s challenges
in publishing (“Dear Reader,” June
2023). I have been reading this maga-
zine since my parents had a subscrip-
tion, and I’m now a senior. I have
always considered it my “bible” for
current events and knowledge. What-
ever decisions you need to make to
keep publishing Reader’s Digest, I stand
behind them. I will keep up my sub-
scription, and the ones that I gift, of this
extraordinary magazine.
— DEBRA HORRELL, Mississauga, Ont.
MUSICAL HEROES
Thank you for “When Music Is Medi-
cine” (June 2023). I have depression and
music is my No. 1 coping skill. The peo-
ple who go into medical and care facili-
ties to play and sing music are heroes.
Reading about music’s healing powers
for people of all ages is very uplifting.
— BRIAN RAYMOND LESSARD, Pembroke, Ont.
TRUSTED FRIEND
When our family was cleaning out my
mother’s home in British Columbia
after she died in April 2023, I took
home nine issues of Reader’s Digest
that she hadn’t already recycled. I
decided to read them all as a small way
to honour her passing, and I was espe-
LORI-ANNE STEWART
cially pleased to read “Thanks, Mom”
in the May issue—the last one that
arrived. It was one my mother
never got to read after subscrib-
ing for probably 50 years. Thank

you for being a trusted friend in my
mother’s life.
— MICHAEL DYLAN WELCH, United States
GIVING BACK
I was most interested in your article
“Team Player” (March 2023) and why
we should consider volunteering for
clinical trials. I’ve been a blood donor
for many years and like to think I am
giving back to our national healthcare
system for all they’ve done for me
(I’ve had several operations in the
past). Now I plan to ask my doctor
about being in a clinical trial.
I do want to say that I am against
testing on animals. The pain, suffering
and death of animals is not worth the
possible benefits to humans. Animals
cannot volunteer. But I can.
— KAREN YETTON, United Kingdom
THE BIG PICTURE
“Tackling Emissions: Lessons from the
U.K.” (March 2023) asks why Canada is
so slow to change its fossil fuel policies.
I believe there are too many emissions,
too many cars and too many people on
Earth. But comparing a small, densely
populated land mass like the United
Kingdom to our country is one-sided.
The true environmental cost of wind-
mills and battery-powered vehicles
from the start to their eventual end of
life need to be accounted for. Lots of
good technology to offset hydrocarbons
is coming, but this article does not
address the realities of the whole.
— DAVID RYSDALE, Lively, Ont.
Letters
CAREGIVING ISN’T MARTYRDOM
A vital lesson for every caregiver is to
strike a balance between caregiving
and carving out “me time” (“The Acci-
dental Caregiver,” March 2023). Care-
giving should not become synonymous
with martyrdom; the demanding role
is a deliberate, joy-giving choice. Car-
ing for a terminally ill family member
and the despair of waiting for their
inevitable passing are indeed over-
whelming. But life should still go on,
despite everything.
Caregivers should keep this thought
consciously and deeply rooted in their
minds and hearts.
— BULBUL GUPTA, India
HONESTY IS BEST
I was dismayed by a joke in “As Kids See
It” (December 2022), in which a dad
implies that he tells his 13-year-old to
lie about her age at a restaurant where
kids 12 and under eat for free. A parent
who would forfeit honesty to save a few
dollars is teaching their child to be
dishonest whenever it suits them. We
rd.ca 7
reader ’s digest
should all consider how we value hon-
esty, a noble characteristic, and be an
example to the younger generation.
— NELLIE P. STROWBRIDGE, Pasadena, NL
TAKING THE PLUNGE
As a proponent of the benefits of cold
water, I enjoyed reading “Cold-Water
Cure” (April 2023). There is nothing
quite like the surge of adrenaline and
the sensory jolt that comes with plung-
ing into chilly water.
That might sound like a nightmare to
many—and as the article states, it’s not
something one should rush into, as
the body needs time to adjust to the
shock—but I notice that my mood
shifts when I indulge in this.
I have also recently begun taking
cold showers regularly. I don’t neces-
sarily enjoy them, but I’ve noticed that
afterwards I do feel more energized,
more invigoratated and ready to tackle
the day.
Sometimes stepping outside of one’s
comfort zone is the best thing we can
do for ourselves.
— JENNI WARRIOR, United Kingdom
NEW ADMIRER
I’ve only recently discovered a real
appreciation for Reader’s Digest. As an
anaesthetist, I read with interest the
article about the against-odds rescue of
13 boys trapped in a cave in northern
Thailand (“The Boys in the Cave,” Sep-
tember 2022).
It was one of the best accounts I’ve
read of the incident: engaging, emotive
8 october 2023
and comprehensive while also being
manageable to read in one sitting.
What I really love, though, is that in
this world of online algorithms and
curated content, Reader’s Digest deliv-
ers genuine serendipity.
— SCOTT POPHAM, Australia
NOT FUNNY
There is nothing humorous about “Girl
vs. Elk” (January/February 2023). To
approach a bull elk is extremely dan-
gerous. Those who do it are lucky if they
don’t get injured or even killed.
— CHERYL GENERT, Red Deer County, Alta.
A POWERFUL STORY
My breath caught in my throat with
every word of “Into the Flames” (May
2023). It was the first time in years that
I’ve had an emotional response to read-
ing a story. I was hooked from the first
line. Imagine my chills when I learned
that this man’s heroic actions hap-
pened on my 26th birthday! Thank you
for this beautiful story.
— JULIA TILSON, Gravenhurst, Ont.
 World of

GOOD
Reasons to Smile

Print and Play

s Mary-Elizabeth Brown draws the bow across the violin’s strings, a dark

A and mellow sound emanates through the room. Brown has been playing the
violin for more than 35 years, but never one like this. 3-D printed in polymer
plastic for less than $50, this violin is part of a project to improve access to music
education. A traditional violin constructed from wood can sell for thousands of
dollars. Brown, director of the Montreal-based AVIVA Young Artists Program, says
“It’s my hope that future music students will find these instruments engaging to
make, easy to play and an inspiring start to their musical journeys.”
COURTESY OF MARY-ELIZABETH BROWN

rd.ca 9
reader ’s digest
EVERYDAY HEROES
A Very Caring
Family
These Delhi-based brothers
and their families work long
days to help those who need
it most
BY Diane Peters
10 october 2023
Brothers Premjit (left)
and Kamaljeet Singh.
E
ACH MORNING AT 6 a.m., even on
weekends, Kamaljeet Singh, 57, is
up and out of the house. He starts
by spending three hours helping dis-
tribute food to nearly two dozen drop-
off locations across Delhi, India, then
checks on the numerous facilities run
by the volunteer organization he leads
with his brother, Premjit. The organi-
zation, Veerji Ka Dera (“dear brother’s
COURTESY OF PREMJIT SINGH
sacred space”), was founded in 1989 by
their father, Trilokchan Singh.
“He was charismatic and a very self-
less man,” says Kamaljeet of his father,
who died in 2010. A social worker who
practised seva, or “selfless service,” a
key element of the Sikh religion, Trilok-

chan wanted to do more to help peo-
ple. In the 1980s, he began organizing
volunteers to help him clean gurud-
waras—Sikh temples.
From there, Trilokchan and his help-
ers began supporting one of India’s most
underserved groups: the migrant work-
ers who came to Delhi from rural areas.
It started with a free breakfast, and even-
tually the group was also providing basic
first aid for minor, often job-related, inju-
ries. During this time, Trilokchan would
begin his days as early as 4 a.m., then go
to his paid job at 9 a.m., and end each
day by volunteering in the evenings.
After his death, Kamaljeet and Prem-
jit, inspired by their father’s lifetime of
service, took over the organization. “We
are continuing his legacy of helping the
poorest of the poor,” says Premjit, 61, a
retired brigadier with the Indian army.
“Our aim is that no one goes hungry
and uncared for in Delhi.”
Veerji Ka Dera now feeds about 2,500
daily wage workers and homeless peo-
ple a day, in addition to providing basic
medical care to as many as 500 people.
The group operates a main building in
west Delhi, several rented farms—grow-
ing crops such as wheat, mustard, millet
and rice—an old-age home and medical,
homeopathic and dental clinics. It even
operates an animal shelter housing a
few hundred rescued cows and buffalo.
It’s all made possible by the roughly
250 families who volunteer their time
to cook, drive, nurse, farm and clean.
“My father said you have to have
your own livelihood, that you should
World of Good
pray to the Lord and that you should
share what you have,” says Kamaljeet.
He and his wife, Raminder, juggle their
volunteer work with managing their
security-camera installation com-
pany, and they get help from their son
and daughter-in-law, too. His other
adult children, who now live abroad,
have volunteered in the past, as have
Premjit’s kids.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the
group’s farms had harvested bumper
crops of wheat and rice. With special
permission from the government and
extra safety precautions, it doubled
down to feed 5,000 people a day and
offer medical care, including oxygen, to
those in need.
In 2023, the group was named one
of the Real Heroes of Rising India by
broadcaster News18 India; the award
was presented to them by the country’s
health minister.
Premjit says that in the future he’d
like to build a medical facility for the
unhoused. Kamaljeet wants to install
more solar panels on the group’s build-
ings and foster a self-sufficient eco-
system on its farms. Importantly, he
wants to make sure Veerji Ka Dera con-
tinues even after he and Premjit are no
longer able to run things.
Despite the size and scope of the orga-
nization, the brothers claim it causes
them no stress. Premjit says spending
time with his brother and the volun-
teers—especially young people—is “the
best,” and a rewarding act of faith. “This
work is worship for us.”
rd.ca 11

Pumpkin the West
Highland Terrier
WHEELS FOR PETS
inspiration When Tammie Fox volun-
teered to foster a pet from an animal
rescue organization in Lincoln, United
Kingdom, she hadn’t planned to adopt
one. But then she fell in love with a
West Highland Terrier who dragged
her hind legs.
After Fox brought Pumpkin home,
tests confirmed that the now two-year-
old pup was paralyzed, likely the result
of abuse. To help her move around,
Pumpkin was fitted for a little wheelchair
from U.K.-based distributor Wheels-
4dogs, which sells other mobility aids.
Today, Pumpkin is a happy “diva” who
doesn’t let anything slow her down—
and now, her owner is helping other
12 october 2023
GOOD NEWS
from around the world
BY Patricia Karounos
disabled to animals achieve the same.
Last year, Fox started Pumpkin and
Friends Charity to help provide wheel-
chairs and funding for medical proce-
dures to families with special-needs
pets. Through fundraising events, such
as annual Dog Walks, Fox has raised
around $73,000.
The cost of pet wheelchairs can be
prohibitive. For example, at one U.K.
retailer rear-leg chairs cost more than
COURTESY OF TAMMIE FOX
$700. So far, the charity has helped nearly
350 dogs. It has even helped one goat
and one sheep.
“A disability isn’t a death sentence
for a pet,” Fox says. “It’s so rewarding to
see an animal get its life back.”

Friendly Checkout Lanes
community It’s normal to feel lonely
from time to time, but a lack of personal
connection is causing an epidemic of
loneliness, especially among seniors.
This is true around the world, including
in the Netherlands, where research
shows that a third of the country’s pop-
ulation aged 75 and up reported feeling
at least moderately lonely.
To help combat isolation, Dutch
grocery chain Jumbo introduced slow
checkout lanes called Kletskassa, which
roughly translates to “chat checkout.”
In these lanes, customers who aren’t in
a rush can pause for a friendly chat with
the cashier. The gesture is a simple way
to show seniors, and anyone else who
may need a boost in human connec-
tion, that they’re not alone.
Squid-Powered Light Bulbs
innovation The ocean is filled with
organisms that naturally emit light,
including jellyfish, squid and algae.
Knowing this, French entrepreneur
ROBJ808/SHUTTERSTOCK
World of Good reader ’s digest
Sandra Rey wondered: Could that phe-
nomenon be harnessed to create an eco-
friendly alternative to LED bulbs?
Rey founded Glowee in 2014 to do
just that. Using bioluminescent bacte-
ria found in Hawaiian bobtail squid,
the startup harnessed the organisms to
create light bulbs with a blue glow. While
the bacteria-powered bulbs aren’t bright
enough to replace traditional light
sources completely, the technology has
shown promise as a sustainable option.
Okra for Clean Water
environment You’ve likely eaten okra,
whether it was fried, pickled or stewed.
But okra is more than a versatile veggie.
Researchers at Tarleton State University
in Texas have found a new use for the
fibre-rich food: purifying water.
Microplastics, tiny fragments of plas-
tic debris, are removed from water in
wastewater treatment plants with floc-
culants. These chemicals clump the
microplastics together, making them
easier to remove. But some flocculants
can be dangerous as they can break
down into toxins.
The researchers discovered that
extracts from okra, when combined
with extracts from several other plants,
work similarly to chemical flocculants
when added to contaminated water. The
difference is the plant-based extracts
can be used safely in water-treatment
processes. Researchers are still testing
the extract method in hopes it could
become the industry standard.
rd.ca 13
reader ’s digest
LIFE’S LIKE THAT
“What took you so long?”
Easily Influenced
I just realized I was involuntarily
dancing the Macarena while reading
my email because a car outside was
blasting the song. That’s apparently
how easy I would be to brainwash.
—@meg_it_happen on X
Touché
While preparing to pay after getting
a haircut, I said to the young hair-
dresser, “I’m cheap like Jack Benny,
but you’re too young to have known
about him.”
I looked across the room, where an
older lady was having her hair done.
I asked, “You would know who Jack
14 october 2023
Benny was, right?” She replied, “Of
course. My dad told me about him.”
—Bruce Stratton, Salmon Arm, B.C.
Risky Business
I like a little danger. When I bought a
couch off Craigslist, I asked the seller
to deliver it for me. So not only did I
get a couch for a decent price, but I
also got a stranger who now knows
where I live and that I’m too weak to
carry a couch.
—Sierra Kratow, comedian
PHIL WITTE
Send us your funny stories! You could
earn $50 and be featured in the magazine.
See page 3 or rd.ca/joke for details.
 HEALTH Digest
Wellness for Body & Mind

Pickleball
Fever
It seems that everyone is
getting in on this game.
What’s behind its
exploding popularity?

BY Karen Robock

n the last few years, pickleball has

I taken Europe and North America by

storm. There are more than 200 offi-
cial community clubs registered with
Pickleball Canada and an estimated
one million Canadians playing each
month. In the U.S., there is a profes-
sional league (ex NFLer Tom Brady is
part owner of a Major League Pickleball
team). And the International Federa-
tion of Pickleball, which has 60 mem-
ber countries and counting, is working
toward having the game recognized as
an Olympic sport. So if you haven’t

illustrations by Kate Traynor rd.ca 15

reader ’s digest
played it yourself, you’ve probably at
least heard of pickleball—even if you
don’t quite understand it.
“Pickleball takes components from
tennis, badminton and table tennis,”
says Hope Tolley, managing director of
recreational programs for USA Pickle-
ball. It’s played on a badminton-sized
court and with a net that’s almost as
high as for tennis. Players use square
paddles and a small, perforated plastic
ball that’s similar in size to a tennis ball,
but much lighter. Since the lighter ball
doesn’t bounce as much, it’s easier to
get a rally (continuous back-and-forth
play) going.
Unlike tennis, you can score only
when it’s your turn to serve. If your oppo-
nent (called the receiver) fails to return
the ball over the net, either from the
serve or in a rally, you get the point. Be
sure to hit with enough force or you’ll
16 october 2023
end up with a “falafel”—pickleball slang
for a shot that falls short of the net.
Matches can be played in doubles or sin-
gles, and games are played to 11 points
(and must be won by a margin of two
points). Lose with a score of 11–0 and
you’ve been “pickled”!
Whether you play regularly—making
you a “pickler”—or only once in a while,
it’s a very social game and a great way
to make new friends, says Tolley. “It’s a
sport that’s bringing folks together.”
Part of the appeal is that pickleball
is easy to learn and is accessible to
anyone, from kids to seniors. While
older adults were early adopters, those
aged 18 to 34 now represent the fastest-
growing player group.
It all started in the U.S. in the 1960s,
in the backyard of congressman Joel
Pritchard from Washington state. He
and two dad friends started an impro-
vised game of badminton, with
the goal of keeping their kids
busy, using what was on hand:
an old badminton court, some
Ping-Pong paddles, a volleyball
net and a wiffle ball.
Fast forward six decades and
pickleball—the name is a nod
to “pickle boats,” a term used to
describe a motley group of row-
ers who are thrown together at
random to compete—is one of
the hottest trends in sports and
popular culture.
Playing the game can improve
your hand-eye coordination and
increase your reaction time. And

because you can vary the intensity—
playing all-out from the get-go or tak-
ing a slower pace—pickleball suits
serious athletes and weekend warriors
alike. It’s a great aerobic workout, and
because it’s a low-impact sport, it’s easy
on your joints.
You don’t need to join a league to get
in on the action. “It can be played in
non-traditional spaces like gymnasi-
ums and parking lots,” says Tolley. Any
smooth surface will work, as long as
you have a net, a ball and a paddle
(available to buy for as little as $30).
The Scoop on
Veggie Powders
BY Melissa Greer
ark green vegetables are often
D considered to be the cream of the
health-food crop because they’re
particularly rich in essential minerals
like iron, magnesium and calcium, as
well as vitamins C, K and many of the
Bs. Now an array of products, from
brands like Athletic Greens and Vital
Proteins, promise all that goodness in
one simple scoop of powder—just stir it
into a glass of water. The powders are
made of dehydrated veggies such as
spinach and beetroot, plus spirulina, a
type of algae full of nutrients.
But is drinking your greens as healthy
as consuming them whole? The short
answer is no. “I consider powdered
Health Digest
People who are really into the sport
can join tournaments at various levels.
The first-ever World Pickleball Games
will be held next summer at the Austin
Pickle Ranch in Texas with teams com-
ing from around the world.
By 2030, pickleball is expected to have
as many as 40 million players world-
wide. Its popularity has also led to
increased interest in other racket sports.
For instance, padel, a fast-paced combi-
nation of tennis and squash invented in
Mexico in the late 1960s, is gaining trac-
tion across Europe and South America.
greens to be a nutritional supplement,”
says Maya Feller, a New York–based
registered dietitian and author of Eat-
ing From Our Roots: 80+ Healthy Home-
Cooked Favorites From Cultures Around
the World. “Many of these products have
added vitamins and minerals or other
nutrients that don’t naturally occur in
green vegetables, so they’re similar to
a multivitamin.”
The crucial element many are miss-
ing is fibre. Fibre is good for your gut,
helping to keep food moving through
the digestive system. It’s found in whole
vegetables, but most juices and pow-
dered greens have little to none.
Still, getting your daily servings of
vegetables isn’t always convenient—
and that’s where green powders may
come in handy. “They can help bridge
the gap when you’re not able to meet
your nutritional needs by food or bev-
erages alone,” says Feller.
rd.ca 17
reader ’s digest
News From the
WORLD OF
MEDICINE
BYSamantha Rideout
THE TROUBLE
WITH TRAFFIC
People who live near busy roads deal
with a barrage of horns, sirens and
engines, day in and day out. According
to a large study from researchers at the
University of Leicester, Oxford Univer-
sity and Peking University, this noise
puts them at higher risk of hyperten-
sion—even after accounting for the
harmful effects of car exhaust.
The study compared homes with
differing levels of air pollution and
18 october 2023
noise. The people who were regularly
exposed to high levels of both had the
highest hypertension risk of all. This
means that measures such as quieter
vehicles, noise barriers and buffer
zones around highways would
improve public health.
Lowering Cholesterol
Without Statins
For people who need to manage their
cholesterol to prevent problems like
heart attacks and strokes, statins are
the go-to drugs, and for good reason:
They typically lead to a 30 to 50 per-
cent reduction in the level of LDL
(“bad”) cholesterol. However, some
patients get side effects such as mus-
cle pain, headaches or weakness.
Another medication, bempedoic
acid, has been around for a few years
as an add-on to statins, but for a
recent New England Journal of Medi-
PHOTOGRAPH BY CLAIRE BENOIST; PROP STYLIST: JANINE IVERSEN
cine trial, participants took it on its
own. Their LDL cholesterol dropped
by an average of 20 to 25 percent. So,
although bempedoic acid is not as
effective as statins, it could still make
a meaningful difference.
A New Therapy for Leukemia
Leukemia is the most common cancer
among kids, though it does strike
adults as well. The most aggressive
forms are often caused by either a
mutation in a gene called NPM1 or a
chromosome abnormality called an

MLL rearrangement. When this is the
case, a new class of drugs called menin
inhibitors can sometimes turn cancer-
ous blood cells back into normal ones.
In an early-stage clinical trial pub-
lished in Nature, 18 of 60 patients had
a complete remission. Twelve of them
even went on to get stem-cell trans-
plants: treatments that can cure leu-
kemia but that are feasible only when
the levels of cancer in the blood are
(SLEEP MASK) PETER DAZELEY/GETTY IMAGES; (SIGN) NGIRISH/GETTY IMAGES
very low.
Sleep Boosts Vaccine
Effectiveness
Getting enough sleep around the time
of a vaccination could help it work bet-
ter, suggests a review of seven studies
in which people were immunized
against viruses like hepatitis and the
flu. Specifically, subjects who clocked
at least seven hours of shut-eye per
night produced more antibodies than
people who slept for six or less. Anti-
bodies are proteins that help the
immune system to identify threats, and
producing more of them could lead to
stronger and longer-lasting immunity.
Health Digest
A Case for the
Four-Day Workweek
What happens if an employer lets peo-
ple work 32 hours each week instead
of 40, but still pays them the same
amount and expects the same output?
In a six-month-long experiment, 61
British companies employing a total
of nearly 3,000 people tried it out.
It didn’t go well everywhere, but
most of those involved were pleased
with the results. Employees compen-
sated for the missing time by finding
efficiencies—for example, by auto-
mating certain tasks or cutting back
on meetings. Overall, company reve-
nue stayed about the same.
Meanwhile, many workers reported
being healthier and happier: 39 per-
cent felt less stressed, 46 percent felt
less fatigued and 37 percent reported
improvements to their physical health.
The businesses benefited, too, since
employee turnover and sick days both
plummeted by more than half.
rd.ca 19
reader ’s digest

LAUGHTER
The best Medicine

Tech Support cash from his bank account, went to

Dad: “What is this green thing next
to my notifications?”
Daughter: “Dad, that’s cilantro. You
have cilantro on your phone.”
—@shannonandress on TikTok
Lucky Bet?
A 55-year-old man who was born on
May 5 had been married five years
and had five children. His lucky num-
ber was five. A friend told him that a
horse named Lucky 5 would be run-
ning in the fifth race at the Kentucky
Derby. The man withdrew $5,555 in
the races and bet on the horse. Sure
enough, the horse came in fifth.
—Irishroversbooks.com
String Theory
I was going to sign up for a banjo
class but decided against it. The
notice read, “First lesson free, no
strings attached.”
—Todd Strong, Victoria
Send us your original jokes! You could
earn $50 and be featured in the magazine.
See page 3 or rd.ca/joke for details.

THE BEST JOKE I EVER TOLD

By Cedric Newman

I recently had a mouse in my house. I bought the

cheapest mousetraps I could find—sticky pads.
The next morning there was mouse fur on the pad,
but no mouse. I just gave the bugger a $13 wax. If
you see a mouse with nice eyebrows, that’s mine!

Cedric Newman is a Jamaican-born, Canadian-

EVAN DUBOIS

bred comedian who, through laughter, has warmed

hearts across Canada for more than 25 years.

20 october 2023
 Art of

LIVING
Food, facts & fun

Hoppy Hour
When it comes to beer, the choices are just about endless

BY Leila El Shennawy

very autumn, the mayor of Munich taps Oktober-

E fest’s first keg inside the festival’s oldest beer tent,

Schottenhamel-Festhalle. Surrounded by a cheering
crowd and a brass band, he proclaims in the Bavarian dia-
lect, “O’zapft is!”—“It has been tapped!”
Germany’s Oktoberfest draws millions every year; no sur-
prise, since beer is the world’s third-most-consumed bever-
age, after water and tea. It is also one the oldest, having been
first brewed in ancient Mesopotamia (most of which is now
TMB STUDIO

Iraq) around 12,000 years ago. The beloved yeast-fermented

brew of malted barley has come a long way since then. Early
beer was thick, porridge-like and flavoured with date syrup

photographs by K. Synold rd.ca 21

reader ’s digest
instead of hops. It wasn’t until the Mid-
dle Ages that Catholic monks added
hops to beer (which they sold to gener-
ate income), perhaps making them the
first craft brewers.
Modern beer comes in more than
100 styles, but most of them are sub-
sets of two basic categories: lagers and
ales. Mass-produced lagers make up a
huge proportion of the North American
market, which include famous brands
like Labbat Blue, Molson Canadian,
Budweiser and Corona. Two of the
world’s best-known lagers are from
Europe: Heineken and Carlsberg. Lagers
are brewed using a longer, cooler fer-
mentation process, producing a crisp
and refreshing taste.
Ales—like hoppy India pale ale (IPA)
and the famous Irish stout, Guinness—
need a warmer, shorter brew to give
them their fruity, floral or malty aromas
and flavours.
If you prefer your brew without the
buzz—and indeed, the health effects of
drinking have recently become clearer,
leading to Health Canada lowering its
recommendations for alcohol consump-
tion to two drinks a week—you can find
more non-alcoholic offerings than ever.
These beers may represent only a
small portion of the global
market, but people are
increasingly turning to
them. In the United States,
for example, the number of
people who drink booze-

free beer has increased eightfold since
2020. Labatt, Heineken and Corona are
just a few of the brewers that make “near
beers.” And craft brewers are producing
low-calorie booze-free options too.
There’s a beer for every palate, and
the ingredient options are pretty much
endless. Here’s a taste of some craft-
beer twists: chocolate, marshmallows,
hot peppers, oysters and mushrooms.
Despite the dizzying array, some peo-
ple still insist on brewing their own.
Sales of home-brewing kits surged in
many parts of the world during the
pandemic. Beer made at home for per-
sonal use is legal in many countries,
including Canada, the United King-
dom, Australia, Singapore, Ireland and
Hungary. (True story: Under President
Art of Living
Jimmy Carter, the U.S. legalized it in
1978—which is ironic, because Presi-
dent Carter disliked alcohol so much
that he banned it from the White House
during his tenure.)
In Canada, home-brewing clubs
have popped up in cities across the
country. There is even a Canadian
Homebrew Day, introduced by the
Canadian Homebrewers Association in
2019 and celebrated in June.
At beer festivals around the world this
month, you’ll plenty of beer options—
definitely more than the revellers of
the very first Oktoberfest had when they
lined the streets of Munich to celebrate
the wedding of Crown Prince Ludwig
of Bavaria in October 1810.
Despite the fact that the festival
now starts in September, in order to
cram more fun into the shortening
autumn days, the global appeal of
beer is clear to see at Oktoberfest.
Which proves that some things never
change. Cheers!
rd.ca 23
reader ’s digest
AS KIDS SEE IT
“A hard pass on the markers—crayon is my medium of choice.”
My two young children were watching
me assemble a swing set. Tightening
the screws was difficult for me, so I
asked their father to come and help. He
swaggered out, grinning like the hero,
and tightened the screws. My three-
year-old blurted out, “Mommy makes
things and Daddy screws them up.”
— Dale Jewett, Wasaga Beach, Ont.
24 october 2023
Me: “Where are your dirty clothes?”
My 10-year-old: “On the floor.”
Me: “Where should they be?”
My 10-year-old: “On the floor where
you can’t see them.”
— @XPlodingUnicorn on X
I told my daughter to put socks on
her baby doll. She responded, “You
cartoon by Susan Camilleri Konar

My kid just told me he needs to take 120 of
“something” to school tomorrow, so his
choices are Cheerios or my tears.
— @deloisivete on X
can’t tell people how to take care of
their kids.”
— @nyooxo on X
My three-year-old son was crying in
the car while we were driving. I
noticed a police car driving near our
car, so I said he shouldn’t cry in front
of the police. He quickly stopped.
Shortly after, the police car drove
ahead and away. My son said, “The
police are gone. Can I cry now?”
— Ruchi Prasad, Ottawa
When my daughter started elementary
school, she made some new friends
and they started to go to each other’s
houses after school. Every time I
picked my daughter up from one of
their homes, the mother would make
a point of saying what a great job I
was doing with her. It was nice of
them to say, I thought, but a little over
the top. I was just doing what mothers
do, wasn’t I?
Eventually I pointed this out to one
of them. She patted me on the arm
and said, “Yes, you’re doing exactly
what her real mother would have
Art of Living
wanted you to do.” I soon learned my
highly imaginative daughter had told
all her friends that her family had
been in a shipwreck, her parents
had drowned, and I had rescued her
and agreed to adopt her.
I had to set the record straight, but
I must admit, I miss being treated
like a hero in the school playground.
— Kay Stead, York, United Kingdom
My six-year-old daughter, to her crying
brother: “It’s okay to be sad. Some-
times we need to let our feelings out.”
Me: “Oh darling, that’s so lovely. Well
done. Why is he crying?”
My daughter: “I hit him.”
— @elspells13 on X
My grown son asked my nine-year-
old grandson, “What did you learn at
school today?” He responded,
“Apparently not enough because I
have to go back tomorrow.”
— JANIE teasdale, Antigonish, N.S.
Send us your funny stories! You could
earn $50 and be featured in the magazine.
See page 3 or rd.ca/joke for details.
rd.ca 25
reader ’s digest
13 THINGS
A Fascinating Fungus
BY Courtney Shea
1
The global mushroom market
is expected to reach US$90 billion
by 2028 (up from US$63 billion in
2022). Canada is one of the world’s
top exporters; white button and brown
mushrooms, including cremini and
portobello, account for more than 90
percent of crops—more than half of
which are grown in Ontario.
2
This mushrooming popularity
is not surprising; low-carb and
rich in antioxidants as well as
26 october 2023
vitamins B and D, the fungi are a
source of protein and an affordable
meat alternative. Grilled portobello
mushrooms make a tasty “burger,”
and now, you can even buy mush-
room versions of steak, chicken
breast and bacon. Climate scientists
in Germany found that if we replaced
just 20 percent of the meat we con-
sume with microbial protein, by 2050
we could more than halve the rate
of deforestation and reduce carbon
emissions related to cattle farming.
illustration by Serge Bloch

3 6
Still, not everyone is a myco-
phile (the technical term for a
mushroom enthusiast). Many
haters (mycophobes) cite texture as
the turnoff, but mushrooms may also
trigger disgust for their association
with mould. A 2015 Washington Post
exploration on the science of disgust
listed mushrooms among those foods
that can trigger a response that may
not be entirely rational.
4
You don’t have to like eating
them to reap mushrooms’ ben-
efits. Reishi and tremella mush-
rooms are trendy wellness ingredi-
ents, found in everything from
adaptogen supplements (which are
supposed to help your body adjust
to stress) to skin-care products
(tremella is said to be more hydrat-
ing than hyaluronic acid). And
chaga, lion’s mane, Cordyceps and
reishi have been used for centuries
in anti-inflammatory and immune-
boosting remedies.
5
Beneath the earth’s surface,
mushrooms branch into net-
works of rootlike mycelium, help-
ing break down plant and animal
waste, which adds vital nutrients back
into the soil. This network even shares
information (such as warning trees
about insect infestation), communi-
cating via electrical pulses in intricate
patterns. Some mycologists (mush-
room experts) refer to this as “the nat-
ural internet” or the “wood wide web.”
Art of Living
If “mycelium” sounds familiar,
you may be among the millions
of fans who tuned into The Last
of Us, HBO’s recent hit series about
an infectious species of Cordyceps
that causes mycelium to take over the
human brain and turn the host into a
zombie-like mushroom monster. The
premise was based on the real-life
parasitic “zombie-ant” fungus; its
spores attack an insect and take over
its behaviour. But our higher body
temperature means we are not sus-
ceptible to that infection. Phew!
7
More than 50 years after they
first dominated the funky fashion
and design aesthetic of the ’70s,
mushrooms are once again popping
up on everything from light fixtures to
wallpaper to throw pillows. Pinterest
has even named them a key design
trend for 2023. And fashion brands
like Hermés and Stella McCartney
have turned to “mushroom leather”
(made from a mixture of mycelium
and other plant fibres) as an eco-
friendly, vegan alternative to leather.
One of McCartney’s bags, launched
at Paris Fashion Week in 2021, retails
for around $3,500.
8
The largest mushroom on
earth is a single Armillaria
ostoyae (honey mushroom) that
occupies 2,384 acres (965 hectares)
in the Blue Mountains of Oregon.
Meanwhile, the Tibetan yartsa gunbu
(caterpillar mushroom) is among the
rd.ca 27
reader ’s digest
most expensive, selling for $30,000 a
kilogram. Its purported aphrodisiac
properties have earned it the nick-
name “the Viagra of the Himalayas.”
9
Foraging for mushrooms is a
popular outdoor activity. In the
fall, puffball mushrooms emerge
in forest clearings and pastures, and
in the spring, morels can be found
near ash and elm trees. But beware:
Many poisonous mushrooms can
look like familiar varieties, and
some wild mushrooms are danger-
ous to eat raw. Deaths are rare, but
you could easily end up with an
upset stomach at the least. Always
forage with an expert.
10
Poisonous mushrooms are
sometimes called toadstools.
This is slang for a colourful
yet poisonous fungi with a stem and
an umbrella-shaped cap. One exam-
ple is Amanita phalloides, known as
death-cap mushrooms, with their sil-
ver-green caps. They’re responsible
for more than 90 percent of mush-
room-related poisonings and deaths
worldwide.
11
Recent years have brought
renewed interest and invest-
ment in magic mushrooms as
a promising treatment for depres-
sion, addiction and other mental-
health disorders. In 2022, the Centre
for Addiction and Mental Health
was awarded Canada’s first federally
28 october 2023
funded grant to study psilocybin as a
potential treatment for depression.
The U.S. government also recently
funded a study on psilocybin as a
tool to help people quit smoking.
Earlier this year, Australia became
the first country to approve psilocy-
bin for treatment-resistant depres-
sion, and Europe’s first psychedelic
drug trial firm opened last year in
the United Kingdom.
12
Meanwhile, microdosing—
taking super-small doses of
psilocybin—is a popular
productivity-boosting hack in Cali-
fornia’s Silicon Valley and elsewhere.
The scientific community is still
divided on the effectiveness of this
for enhancing mood, creativity and
focus. But microdosing was recently
given (unofficial) royal assent: In an
interview about his memoir, Spare,
Prince Harry described psychedelic
mushrooms as a “fundamental” part
of his mental-health practice.
13
Mushrooms may find their
way to outer space as soon
as 2025. Researchers are
exploring mycotecture—the use of
mushrooms as architecture—for
future bases on the moon and Mars.
The stucco-like building material is
grown by feeding mycelium an algae,
which causes it to expand and fill a
mould. It’s then sterilized, ensuring
no unwanted organisms come along
on its journey to another world.
 Art of Living

QUOTABLE QUOTES

I could tell so many MISTAKES

stories about each ARE THE
of my parents that CAN OPENERS
would make them OF THE
CONVERSATIONS
(POLLEY) AMY SUSSMAN/GETTY IMAGES; (FERNANDEZ) ROBERT PRANGE/GETTY IMAGES; (NASH) JEFF SPICER/GETTY IMAGES

look like the best

WE MOST
parents in the NEED TO HAVE.
world, or the —Aparna Nancherla,
worst parents in comedian, in her book
UNRELIABLE NARR ATOR
the world. They’re
all true.
—Sarah Polley, filmmaker, I CAN
in THE NEW YORKER
ONLY WRITE
SONGS FOR
You can always win by ME. I CAN’T
challenging yourself. WRITE THEM
—Kerry Washington, actor, in THE CUT
FOR YOU.
—Graham Nash,
musician,
in A ARP THE MAGAZINE

WHEN
THE
MIND
DECIDES,
THE BODY
WILL FOLLOW.
—Leylah Fernandez,
tennis player, in FORBES
 COVER STORY

Global

having a good night’s sleep allows your body to

One of these function at its best: It boosts your immune sys-

could be your tem, lowers stress, improves mental sharpness

and may even lower your chances of overeat-
key to a good ing. But as anyone who has ever sat up at night
staring at the clock knows, getting the recom-
night’s rest mended seven-plus hours can be elusive.
There is no shortage of techniques that really
work: sleep in a darkened, cool bedroom; avoid
BY Vanessa Milne prolonged screen time before bed; get regular
exercise; and aim to wake up and go to bed at
the same time every day.

30 october 2023 illustrations by Hayden Maynard

reader ’s digest
reader ’s digest
But we unearthed some lesser-known
ideas that are well worth a try: six from
around the world, and one from right
here in Canada.
1. People in China Wash
Their Feet Before Bed
Foot massages and spa treatments that
are focused on the feet—including aro-
matherapy and wrapping the feet in
warm towels—are widely practised
across China. What could be more relax-
ing? The ritual is so beloved that many
people perform a DIY version at home
before bedtime each night.
Automatic foot spas are ubiquitous in
Chinese households. Every night, peo-
ple soak their feet in hot water; many
machines have exfoliating and massage
functions, too. The routine is done right
before bed, so that after you dry your feet,
they are still warm when you tuck in.
Beyond the hygiene aspect, putting
feet in a warm basin and massaging
32 october 2023
them can stimulate blood circulation
by dilating your vessels. Having warmer
feet may lower your core body tempera-
ture, helping you fall asleep faster.
A 2018 South Korean study of people
who wore socks to sleep, which warms
the feet, found that they fell asleep seven
minutes faster than those who didn’t
wear socks. And they slept for 32 min-
utes longer, too.
2. Germans Use
Separate Duvets
In Germany, couples have solved the
problem of one of them waking up cold
whenever their partner rolls over and
takes the sheets with them. While it’s
typical for partners to share a bed—often
two singles pushed together—each
chooses their own single-sized sheets
and a separate duvet.
Not only does that make it less likely
that your partner will disturb your sleep
when they move around, but you can
each customize the amount of bed-
ding you use to stay as warm or as
cool as you prefer at night.
“Different sets of bedding can be
great,” says Michael Breus, a Cali-
fornia-based author of several books
about sleep and a clinical psychologist
with a speciality in sleep disorders.
It’s useful when one partner is a
cover stealer, he says, but also when
partners differ in how hot or cold
they feel at night. Because women
generally have less muscle mass
than men, they may have a lower
 Cover Story

metabolism, burning fewer calories

and therefore producing less body
heat. That can make finding bed-
ding that’s comfortable for both part-
ners a problem—and separate cov-
ers could be the solution.

3. Guatemalans Rely
on Worry Dolls
Guatemala has a longstanding tradi-
tion of parents putting “worry dolls”
under their kids’ pillows to comfort
them if they are afraid of the dark.
Plus, children can tell the tiny dolls
their worries before they go to sleep.
The legend goes that the colourful
fabric dolls, which are only a couple
of centimetres long, can alleviate kids’
anxieties by morning.
But it’s no longer a ritual just for chil-
dren. Adults in that country and in
Mexico are increasingly relying on the
dolls, too, according to Adriana Villagra,
Mexico-based editor-in-chief of the
Latin American edition of Reader’s
Digest. “More and more, adults rely on
worry dolls at night,” she says. “They’re
like a comforting presence.”
Anxiety can make it hard for people to
fall asleep. According to a 2021 review
from researchers in Germany that was
published in the journal Sleep Medicine
Reviews, about 50 percent of people with
clinical anxiety also have insomnia. Not
sleeping enough can lead to more anx-
iety, perpetuating the problem. Express-
ing your worries before bed can help—
so why not tell them to a doll?
Writing down your worries can also
be effective, says Breus. “You can make
a worry journal by taking a piece of
paper and drawing a line down the
middle. You put your worries on one
side, and the first step to help resolve
each worry on the other.”
4. The British Sleep Naked
Thirty percent of people in the United
Kingdom sleep naked, or at least they did
when the most recent global poll on the
subject was done by the National Sleep
Foundation in 2013. (Compare that to
just 12 percent of Americans.) Not
wearing clothes to bed might be benefi-
cial for several reasons, says Breus. “The
biggest one is thermoregulation. It’s eas-
ier for ‘hot sleepers’ to be comfortable.”
He adds that there is also data linking

rd.ca 33
reader ’s digest Cover Story

nude sleeping with fewer yeast infections 6. The Japanese Nap in

and urinary tract infections for women,
and a higher sperm count for men. And
a potential bonus? Healthier relation-
ships. It’s possible that couples are inti-
mate more often when at least one of
them sleeps naked, Breus says.
5. Many American
Couples Sleep Separately
In the U.S., some couples are getting a
so-called “sleep divorce”: when one
partner gives up the marital bed and
sleeps in a separate room. According to
a Slumber Cloud poll of 2,000 Ameri-
cans who lived with a partner, nearly
one-third said they had discussed sleep-
ing in separate rooms, and 12 percent
of them actually do. The reasons range
from one partner snoring to having
different sleep schedules to not having
enough space in the bed.
“I’m actually a big fan of couples
sleeping in separate rooms,” says Breus.
He says there is a stigma attached to
it, since some people may think cou-
ples who sleep apart have weaker
relationships than those who sleep
together. But in his experience, that’s
not true. It’s more a case of absence
making the heart grow fonder.
“When I advise couples to split
apart for sleep, they actually have
more intimacy. And partners usu-
ally don’t need to stay in separate
rooms every night. I recommend it
four days a week and then spending
weekends together.”
Public—and at Work
According to a government survey, 40
percent of Japanese adults sleep fewer
than six hours a night. That’s likely why
the tradition of inemuri, or “sleeping
while present,” is practised, and that
includes in cafés and on public transit.
As long as you don’t invade other
people’s space when you nod off while
seated, it’s widely accepted—even in
the workplace. Napping at your desk
is frowned upon in other parts of the
world, but the Japanese regularly do it;
in white-collar jobs, it shows dedication.
After all, the workday often extends
well into the evening, when colleagues
are expected to socialize.
Daytime napping can be a good idea
if you’re sleep deprived. A 2021 French
study found that naps improved cogni-
tive performance and alertness. Other
research has shown that a 10- to 20-
minute nap improves your mood, too.

34 october 2023
7. Canadians Cozy Up
With Their Pets
We Canadians love our pets—so
much so that, according to a survey
of 1,800 pet owners carried out by
Purina Canada in 2019, more than
three-quarters of us who have dogs
let them into our beds every night,
and just over half of cat owners do.
Around half to two-thirds of pet own-
ers in the U.S., Australia and the U.K.
sleep with their furry friends, too.
There’s likely a good reason why peo-
ple feel comfortable sleeping around
dogs, says David Samson, associate pro-
fessor of evolutionary anthropology at
the University of Toronto and the author
of Our Tribal Future. He studies the
so-called sentinel hypothesis in rela-
tion to dogs, which argues that one of
the main ways they helped our ancient
ancestors survive was by barking to warn
them of danger during the night.
“The relationship between dogs and
humans likely goes back about 55,000
years,” he says. “Dogs and humans have
been co-evolving.” It makes sense that
some people instinctively feel safer, and
therefore sleep better, with a dog around.
A 2017 study from the Mayo Clinic
found that people who let their dogs
sleep in their rooms slept well, although
those who let their dog sleep on their
Gather ’Round the Table
One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.
VIRGINIA WOOLF
bed slept worse than those whose dogs
slept on the floor next to them.
That backs up the findings of an ear-
lier study in which more people found
sleeping near their pet to be benefi-
cial than they did disruptive. Those in
favour said that it didn’t affect their
sleep, and some reported that it even
helped them sleep better.
If you do allow a pet to sleep on your
bed, says Breus, be conscious of the fact
that they’re less clean than you are.
“Your animal brings pollen and dirt
from outside into the bed,” he says.
Some can also have a breathing or sleep
disorder and can disrupt your sleep.
But on the whole, Breus believes
animals on the bed are fine as long as
they don’t bother you—and that’s
based on first-hand experience: “My
two bulldogs sleep at the end of my
bed,” he says.
rd.ca 35
reader ’s digest
 COVER STORY

How
to
I Tried

I wanted a quick fix, even if it meant

strapping a glorified bike pump to my face

BY Jordan Foisy FROM THE WALRUS

illustrations by Hayden Maynard rd.ca 37

reader ’s digest

think of myself as a good sleeper. Give me a large

book and a horizontal position, and I could fall
asleep strapped to the top of a bullet train. Sleep
has been a constant ally, a friend. When I was
a teen, it was a refuge. I used to pray for sleep;
its temporary oblivion was a welcome respite from
anxiety and obsessive thoughts. It was a pause—not
a death, but close enough to it. Every time I fell asleep,
there was a chance of resurrection, to wake up new.
My girlfriend, Allison, however, does the guilty parties. When Allison is flip-
not think I’m a good sleeper. She knows ping my sleeping body over and plug-
the truth. At night, I thrash around and ging its nose, or occasionally smothering
scream. Occasionally, it sounds like my my face with a pillow, who is she smoth-
breathing stops. Worst of all for her, I ering? How unimportant is the self to our
snore. Badly. She’s shown me a video life when we are sleeping—something
of it, and it’s horrifying: My thin, wheez- we spend a third of our life doing—that
ing inhalations are interrupted by a it can be completely absent?
wrenching tear of a noise, like someone
ripping a carpet inside a cave. i tried treating my snoring with the
We sometimes get into little fights junk-drawer solution of buying every
when I wake up. She’s had a terrible anti-snoring device I could: nose strips,
sleep and is justifiably annoyed. She mouth guards, nasal spray—anything
can’t stay mad for long, though, because that promised snoring absolution. Noth-
who is she mad at? Certainly, it was my ing worked. Every time, there would be
body, not me, that was snoring; my lungs a glimmer of hope, when we would try
moving the air, my soft tissues. Those are to convince ourselves my snoring wasn’t

38 october 2023

as bad. But, every time, it soon became
clear the only difference was that the
top of my mouth was now shredded
from the cheap plastic of a so-called
snore guard.
Allison wanted me to see a doctor,
but it’s hard to take snoring seriously as
a health problem. It seems more like a
joke, like a problem that a sitcom dad
would have after getting electrocuted
by Christmas decorations. It seems less
like a health issue and more like a per-
sonality defect.
According to Nick van den Berg, a
PhD candidate in experimental psychol-
ogy at the University of Ottawa and a
member of the Canadian Sleep Society,
“Snoring occurs as our muscles in the
upper airway relax so much that they
narrow the airway.” This is why snoring
gets worse as we age, as our once taut
and virile inner neck muscles become
flabby and weak.
The real threat of bad snoring is that
it could be a sign of obstructive sleep
apnea, when a blockage in your airway
causes you to wake up constantly. The
lack of sleep—for you or your partner—
can be a serious health risk, as insuffi-
cient sleep has been linked to heart dis-
ease, type 2 diabetes and Alzheimer’s.
More than all of that, sleep is essen-
tial to your functioning as a human
being. “Sleep is key to memory consol-
idation,” says van den Berg. When we
sleep, our brain organizes, processes
and saves our memories. Not only that,
he says, but sleep also enhances our
memories. Van den Berg told me about
Cover Story
studies in which the subjects are taught
a basic skill before bed, and when they
wake up, they not only remember the
skill but have actually improved upon it.
Sleep, then, is where we are forged.
Every night, we throw our day-to-day
experiences, memories and lessons into
the kiln of sleep, let them bake for hope-
fully eight hours, and emerge a better,
stronger, fuller version of ourselves in
the morning.
MY HEALTH CARE
SUBSISTED ON FAITH
THAT A PROBLEM
DOESN’T EXIST UNTIL
YOU DEAL WITH IT.
so my girlfriend was right to insist I
deal with the problem, but I was resis-
tant. I’m in my mid-30s and haven’t had
a doctor since I was a kid. My health
care subsisted on walk-in clinic visits
and youthful hubris—a faith that things
will work out and a belief that a prob-
lem doesn’t really exist until you deal
with it. But what really scared me off
was that going to a doctor about my
snoring would force me to confront how
I live and its repercussions, and that
my body has limits.
It has been a tough year. A friend
passed away suddenly and tragically.
Then my grandmother followed. My
chronic knee problem turned into a full-
blown meniscus tear, dashing any hopes
rd.ca 39
reader ’s digest
of a late-life bloom into a guy who is
“surprisingly athletic.” My eyesight
became distorted, and a visit to the eye
doctor revealed I had fluid under my
retina, a condition called central serous
chorioretinopathy. It’s caused by stress.
Also, I started seeing a therapist again
and within minutes, over Zoom, he told
me I looked depressed.
It was a year of the space capsule of
my youthful fantasy breaking up on con-
tact with an atmosphere of reality and
repercussions, all soundtracked by some
of the worst snoring you’ve ever heard.
THE TECH WANTS TO
KNOW WHAT POSITION
I SLEEP IN. OVERALL
I’D DESCRIBE IT AS
MAXIMUM OBNOXIOUS.
But there are other things to be afraid
of besides aging and so, fearing a
breakup or an unexplained disappear-
ance (mine), I tried what Allison had
been asking me to do. I went to a doctor.
The doctor asked how much I drank a
week. I gave him a number high enough
that he should factor it into his diagnosis
but low enough that I could say it with-
out being embarrassed. He figured I had
sleep apnea and said I should drink less
and lose weight. He referred me to a
sleep study to confirm the diagnosis so
I could get a CPAP (continuous positive
airway pressure) machine for the apnea.
40 october 2023
A CPAP machine is a device that
shoots a steady flow of pressurized air
into your nose and mouth. It involves
a hose, a mask that covers either your
nose or mouth or both, and a head har-
ness, resulting in the wearer looking
like a cozy fighter pilot, like Top Gun’s
Maverick if the undisclosed enemy coun-
try were your dreams.
The sleep clinic was in Toronto’s St.
Joseph’s Health Centre. I entered the
hospital ready to get my sleep on. I felt
nervous and excited and blisteringly
sober. I had successfully adhered to
the guidelines sent out by the clinic: no
alcohol in the past 12 hours, no coffee
in the last two, and no naps. Free from
its usual coating of hangover, too-late
coffee and post-nap delirium, my mind
was unadorned and hungry for answers.
Next, a technician came and asked
me a couple of questions, the most
provocative being: What position do you
sleep in? I’m mostly a mix of side and
stomach, with one leg pitched like I’m
doing a hurdle. Overall, though, I would
describe my sleeping position as maxi-
mum obnoxious. My limbs are splayed
as far as they can reach, and I continu-
ally thrash and roll from side to side in
erratic and irregular movements. Basi-
cally, I sleep like David Byrne dances.
I sat on my assigned bed, waiting for
the sleep lab to begin its work. “Lab”
was a misnomer. There were no bea-
kers, or mad scientists, or stainless-
steel tanks with anonymous figures
floating in green fluid. Just a generic
hospital room: infinite white walls; a

thin, hard bed that made me feel like I
was lying on an H&M clothing shelf;
and a pillow that had all the comfort
and support of a bag of napkins. Worst
of all, something was dripping in the air
conditioning unit, producing a sharp,
arrhythmic, metallic smack.
At 10:45 p.m., the technician began
sticking electrodes to my body for the
electroencephalogram, or EEG. Created
in 1924, this test measures brain waves
without any need for your head to be
cut open. It is still the gold standard
for sleep studies. The technician also
placed sensors on my arms and legs to
measure my movement, a sensor below
my nose and a harness around my chest
to measure my breathing.
Cover Story
I don’t know what it says about my
self-esteem, but I found being a speci-
men thrilling. The thrill quickly passed
as I proceeded to have the worst sleep
of my life.
there are two types of sleep: NREM
and REM. Both are required for mem-
ory consolidation. NREM, or non-rapid
eye movement, sleep has three stages.
Stage one is drifting off: those five to 10
minutes of drowsiness where it is hard
to tell if you are asleep or not. Once you
are out, the second stage begins. It is
marked by slower brain waves and short,
fast bursts of brain activity called spin-
dles. The third stage of NREM is slow-
wave sleep. Your brain waves are now
rd.ca 41
reader ’s digest
deep, long curves, similar at times to
those seen in people under anaesthe-
sia. It is in these last two stages of NREM
sleep that the majority of restoration—
in which the body repairs itself on a
cellular level from the wear and tear of
the day—happens.
Suddenly, the second act of sleep
occurs: REM (rapid eye movement)
sleep. The brain explodes with activity;
it appears to be awake. This is when
most dreaming occurs, especially the
intense, emotional genre of dreams—
the ones that are like “I’m on a date
with a book report I didn’t finish” or “I
started playing hockey again, but I
didn’t realize my skates are made of
everyone I’ve ever disappointed.”
42 october 2023
Beneath the eyelids your eyes dart
around wildly, and your heart races. It’s
not entirely clear why this happens.
Van den Berg’s favourite theory is that
it is preparatory. “If NREM is recovery
from the day before, REM seems to be
preparation for the day ahead.”
When you have a good night’s sleep,
these different stages are a harmonious
cycle. Of course, many things can dis-
rupt this harmony: electric light, caf-
feine, a late night out or—as I found
out—being covered in wires that pre-
cariously cling to your body with every
toss and turn. Many thoughts can keep
you up at night, and in the lab I discov-
ered a new one: “I sure hope that when
I turned over, I didn’t ruin this experi-
 Cover Story

ment being performed on me.” Another
pressure point in the delicate dance of
the sleep stages is if there is an unceas-
ing arrhythmic drip of an air condition-
ing unit the entire night.
i was woken up at 5:30 a.m. after maybe
two hours of gruel-thin snoozing. The
wires were removed, and I strolled home
in the dawn light, feeling like my sleep-
wake cycle and circadian rhythms were
utterly and completely ruined.
After two months, the results of the
study came in. There was no sleep
apnea. I have what the report called
“mild primary snoring.” As far as the
study could tell, there is no particular
reason for it. Aging, drinking too much,
and rapidly deteriorating neck muscles
are all it takes. The snoring was simply
the sound of time catching up to me.
These were not the results I was
looking for. I had been hoping for a
condition, a disorder, something to
point to whenever I indulged in a self-
pity wallow. I had wanted a quick fix,
even if that meant strapping a glorified
bike pump to my face. Instead, what I
got were consequences, which coalesce
and compound and reverberate, like a
snore off the inner walls of your throat.
There is no guarantee things will just
work out: injuries worsen, tragedy hap-
pens, your girlfriend gets fed up with
your snoring. When you don’t sleep, it
takes days to recover.
My snoring has gotten worse since the
study. Louder, more frequent. Thank-
fully, Allison and I have figured out a
staggered sleep schedule that seems to
work. Also, I’m exercising more, eating
better and drinking less, because from
this study, I learned that you are an
accumulation of everything you did
before. Things aren’t just going to get
better on their own. You have to take
care of yourself and others. When you
ate, what you learned, how you slept:
These things matter. The person you
are today builds from the person you
were the day before.
© 2023, THE WALRUS. FROM “HOW I TRIED TO STOP
SNORING, FIX MY SLEEP HABITS, AND CONFRONT MY
MORTALITY,” BY JORDAN FOISY, FROM THE WALRUS
(MARCH 15, 2023), THEWALRUS.CA

Seasons Pass
Fall colours are funny. They’re so bright and intense and beautiful.
It’s like nature is trying to fill you up with colour, to saturate
you so you can stockpile it before winter turns everything
muted and dreary.
SIOBHAN VIVIAN

I cannot endure to waste anything so precious as autumnal sunshine

by staying in the house.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

rd.ca 43
 PORTRAIT

Straight-shooting Hayley
Wickenheiser—four-time Olympic
gold medal winner, assistant GM
of the Leafs and a medical doctor—
has a few things to say about
working under pressure

BY Stéphanie Verge FROM TORONTO LIFE

44 october 2023
reader ’s digest
reader ’s digest
ayley Wickenheiser
has been skating
for almost as long
as she’s been walk-
ing. She honed her
skills on a backyard
rink flooded by her
dad in the tiny hockey-obsessed town
of Shaunavon, Saskatchewan. Late-
night games of shinny at home led to
lacing up with the boys (and changing
separately, in the boiler room) and then
to joining the women’s national team
in 1994, where, at 15, she was a good
decade younger than most of her team-
mates. Despite the sacrifices hockey
required, Wickenheiser knew it was
for her—a certainty on clear display in
her 2021 memoir, Over the Boards, and
in a new documentary called Wick.
Wickenheiser’s 23 years as a pro are
unparalleled in hockey: She is the first
woman to score a goal in a men’s pro-
fessional league (in Finland) and she
has taken part in six Olympics (five for
hockey, one for softball), winning four
gold medals (twice as MVP).
After such a storied career, the
speaking circuit and coaching are the
usual go-tos for a sports star. But not for
Wickenheiser. Since hanging up her
skates in 2017, she has graduated from
medical school. She’d always wanted
to be a doctor, ever since a delivery van
hit her neighbour when she was a little
girl. Wickenheiser visited her friend in
the hospital and was inspired by the
medical team that saved her.
These days, the 45-year-old is pulling
46 october 2023
double duty as a resident in family med-
icine at a Toronto hospital and an assis-
tant general manager of the Toronto
Maple Leafs (the fourth woman in NHL
history to hold that title). Throughout it
all, she advocates passionately for girls’
and women’s hockey with WickFest, a
festival that hosts 7,000 players each year.
In 2020, when the lockdown hit, instead
of making bread you wrote a memoir,
Over the Boards.
I had already committed to the book,
and then I suddenly had more time on
my hands. I started working on it ver-
bally—I would talk into my phone as I
drove to and from rinks and hospitals.
You’re an introvert, but you also took
part in the documentary Wick, which
is all about, well, you.
I do understand that what I have done
in life is unique, and I thought my story
could inspire female athletes and, in
particular, young girls. I wanted them
to know that things can be hard but
they can also get better. I have insights
to share, which is why my book is built
around lessons learned as opposed to
being just about my life.
(PREVIOUS SPREAD) IAN PATTERSON
Each chapter ends with takeaways
for the reader. One is “Focus on win-
ning, but don’t ignore the possibility
of losing.”
Sport is regimented—it’s based on rou-
tine and process. To get from A to B,
there are certain things you have to do.
I enjoy that. A big part of sport is that you

lose a lot, sometimes more than you win.
So you’re constantly evaluating what
went wrong and what went well and
then trying to do better. Even when you
win, you’re still chasing improvement,
for yourself and for your team.
But with everything you’ve achieved,
aren’t there days when you look at
yourself and think, No self-improve-
ment required?
Oh yeah. Last night—when I was 18
hours into a 26-hour shift at the hospi-
tal—I ran out of my usual food, went to
the vending machine, grabbed a bag
of spicy dill-pickle chips and that was
that. They were good.
You’re doing a residency in family med-
icine and working toward a specialty
in emergency medicine. Emergency
departments are a mess in Canada.
Why choose something so fraught?
The last seven or eight years that I was
playing in Calgary for the women’s
national team, I would head to a
nearby hospital after games to
COURTESY OF THE WICKENHEISER FAMILY ARCHIVE
shadow a doctor friend of mine in
the ER. I knew right away that it was
my kind of medicine. It’s like hockey:
It’s very active and it’s never the
same thing twice. You might see an
ear infection and then the next sec-
ond you’re doing a resuscitation.
I also like the lifestyle. It’s shift
based, and when you leave the hos-
pital, you have nothing else to deal
with—no overhead, no staff. I need
that in my life.
Portrait
In Wick, you talk about playing boys’
hockey and the pushback you got from
coaches and parents and other players.
You say, “When I step on the ice, I’d
better be good or they’re going to say
‘Girls don’t play hockey. You can’t play.’
One day I’m going to look back and I’m
going to shove it down their throats.”
Were you always so confident?
I was always determined as a kid. I
faced so much adversity—even when
the negative reactions from other play-
ers and their parents were subtle, I
could still tell that I wasn’t welcome.
People put up with me because I was
good on the ice. I learned to bury my
feelings because I knew that no one
wanted me around. I tried to be invisi-
ble with my emotions. No one cared
except my parents, and even they are
“suck it up” kind of people.
You’ve talked about doing everything
not to cry or show vulnerability when
you lost a big game or got hurt on the
Hayley, aged 12.
reader ’s digest
ice. But when you entered medicine,
that changed. What happened?
Athletes are actors. If you’re injured or
sick or scared, you project that you’re
not. Medicine, however, is so human.
And after so many years of burying
things, I started feeling human again.
When there’s a death or a birth, you’re
in it with your patients. The tragic
moments really get to me, especially
when there are kids involved.
When you were 21, you adopted your
son, Noah. Back then, did you ever
worry that having a newborn would
negatively affect your career?
I never had a second thought about
becoming a parent. I knew that Tomas,
my partner at the time, and I would fig-
ure it out. Plus I had my parents, brother
and sister for support. I used to joke
that it was a really easy pregnancy
and that I didn’t even need to take nine
months off. In reality, Noah was born
three months premature and was so
sick for the first year that I probably lost
those nine months anyhow.
But being his mother has always felt
like a gift.
Now he’s grown up and you’ve moved
from the Prairies to Toronto. As a kid,
you cheered for the Edmonton Oilers
(CLOCKWISE FROM TO-LEFT) COURTESY OF THE WICKENHEISER FAMILY ARCHIVE; CEILIDH PRICE; CEILIDH PRICE
yet you are wearing blue and white.
What would young Hayley say?
She would definitely call me a traitor.
As a die-hard western girl, I hated the
Leafs. But wearing this logo feels nat-
ural now. Toronto has grown on me,
too—everything except the traffic.
(Clockwise from top left) The
Wickenheiser family rink with Hayley
on the right; Dr. Wickenheiser
reporting for duty; Canada’s Walk of
Fame ceremony with Grace Bowen.

Early in the pandemic, you put out a call
on Twitter to address the urgent need
for personal protective equipment.
In a few months, you and more than
100 volunteers raised more than $2.3
million and delivered some three mil-
lion pieces of PPE across the country.
Did you expect that level of response?
Not initially. But once Ryan Reynolds
joined the effort, I knew we’d get a lot
of eyes.
You met Reynolds in 2014, when you
both received a star on Canada’s Walk
of Fame. Did you click right away?
Yes, over our mutual dislike of awards
ceremonies. He introduced himself to
me and my guest, Grace Bowen, a nine-
year-old hockey player with osteosar-
coma whom I’d met at SickKids Hospi-
tal. Grace died a few months later. But
that evening we all spent time together.
The next day, Ryan messaged me. He
said that Grace had inspired him to
become more involved with SickKids,
which he really has. We’ve stayed in
touch ever since.
To succeed in hockey and medicine,
what’s most important: quick think-
ing, quick feet or a quick mouth?
Quick thinking. Keep your mouth shut
and your head down. I don’t like to pro-
crastinate, so it doesn’t take me long to
make a decision.
Have your quick-fire decisions ever
gotten you into trouble?
I’m sure they have. In medicine, if you
Portrait
look at a situation and you think, Oh,
it’s definitely this, you can miss things.
So I need to always check myself.
How do you counter the lack of sleep
and often unhealthy lifestyle that comes
with being a resident?
When I started in medicine, I promised
myself two things: I would get sleep and
I would continue to train and be fit. It’s
not always possible, but I really carve
out the time. Because how can I talk
about health to others if I’m not healthy?
You can’t ask someone to do something
you’re not willing to do yourself.
Do you have any vices?
Coffee. If it’s hot and decent, give it to me.
Before you started drinking coffee,
your vice was watching and rewatch-
ing hockey tapes. Were your friends
ever like, “Can we just rent a movie
from Blockbuster?”
No, because I fall asleep five minutes
into any movie. And you have to watch
hockey to get better. That’s what I tell lit-
tle girls who ask me for advice. As a kid,
I would watch Don Cherry’s Rock’em
Sock’em videos and tapes of the 1972
Summit Series. You have to love the
game to get better.
No one would question your love of the
game, but what happens when the game
doesn’t love you back? Many athletes
from marginalized groups—whether
they are Black or Indigenous or queer
or women—have spoken out about how
rd.ca 49
reader ’s digest Portrait
toxic sports culture can be in Canada.
Kids shouldn’t grow up thinking that
having a girl or a Black player on their
team is abnormal. And we should be
introducing hockey to populations
other than white, male, middle class
to wealthy. In this country, hockey has
become so expensive and so inaccessi-
ble. The women’s side of the game has
done a good job of breaking down bar-
riers, but it’s required a lot of hard work
by a lot of people.
Hockey Canada, the national governing
body of hockey, came under fire for
how it dealt with allegations of sexual
assaults against some of its players
and for using registration fees to pay
settlements. What should changes
look like?
We need to bring in people who are
visionary, who understand the game
and who are willing to make tough
decisions. [Editor’s Note: Around the
time of this interview, Hockey Canada
elected a new board of directors. In July
2023 Katherine Henderson was named
the new CEO.] And there has to be zero
tolerance for the kind of stuff we’ve
seen. Zero tolerance.
What do you love about being an assis-
tant general manager?
I love what I’m doing with the Leafs.
Not long ago, I was telling Leafs presi-
dent Brendan Shanahan how much I
loved the work and the environment.
For one of the first times in my hockey
career, the off-ice stuff hasn’t been so
50 october 2023
hard. It’s nice to just do my job.
It’s moments like a recent prac-
tice at the Ford Performance
Centre, the team’s facility in Eto-
bicoke, where we can run three
rinks at a time for development
work. There were 27 players in
the space—from prospects right
up to current Leafs. Every inch
of the ice was taken up by our
staff working with players. I
remember thinking, This is just
so cool. Whether they’re trying
to get to the NHL or they’ve
been in the league for years,
they’re still trying to get better.
And I get to be around that and
help them find their edge.
You’ve taught hockey skills to
young women in rural India
and run practices for teams in
North Korea. What makes hockey so
universal?
You can go anywhere in the world, put a
puck on the ice and body language will
say it all. Those girls in India are now
doing cool things in places where you
would never think hockey was a thing.
They’ve gone on to work as teachers in
schools and are doing sports camps.
They run clinics for kids who have never
skated. And they’ve taken on—and
beaten—members of the military who
were hogging the best ice.
You’re known worldwide as an elite
athlete. What’s the least jockish thing
about you?

I play the piano. I used to play well, but
I’m just okay now. My dad taught phys.
ed., math and science, but he was also
a drummer in a rock band when I was
growing up, so we always had music
around. Music helps me relax.
One of your more unorthodox calm-
ing tools is the freak-out session. When
you’re stressed, you give yourself 20
minutes—with a timer—of unfettered
worrying.
It started after the Nagano Olympics in
DAVE HOLLAND
1998. It’s taken years, but I’ve become
pretty good at it. I can stop the spiral-
ling by telling myself to calm down,
move on and come back later to what-
At the 2014 Olympic Winter Games
Wickenheiser and her team won their
fourth consecutive gold medal.
ever is bothering me. Otherwise I would
just be consumed by things all the time.
I knew I had to find a way to control
the anxiety, the worry and the fear. The
freak-out sessions have been a way to
settle myself down.
Team Canada lost gold to the Ameri-
cans at Nagano, which devastated you.
You credit your coach, Wally Kozak,
for helping you through that.
He passed me a note that said, “A gold
medal is a wonderful thing, but if you’re
not enough without it, you’ll never be
enough with it.” I still have the note. It’s
folded up into a tiny square in my wal-
let. I always have it with me.
rd.ca 51
reader ’s digest

Before you were assistant GM for the Hayley

Leafs, you were the team’s senior Wickenheiser
director of player development, has been an
and you hired your former team- assistant GM
for the Toronto
mate Danielle Goyette as director
Maple Leafs
of player development. A fair bit since 2022.
of attention was paid to the fact
that, for the first time in NHL his-
tory, two women were running that
department.
I understand why people want to
talk about it, but I just didn’t think
that way about hiring her. Women
working in hockey always face ques-
tions like that, even when they’re
playing. How often does a journalist
ask a female player about the game?
Instead they report on peripheral
issues rather than performance. That
frustrated me as an athlete. Yes,
discussing this stuff is important to
evolve the game and move forward. Have you snuck into anyone’s back-
But at the same time, we’re doing a job. yard lately to let off steam?
Just evaluate the job. When I was in Calgary playing on the
women’s national team and I was
Have you ever wondered whether super stressed and couldn’t find my
hockey is worth all the trouble that game, I would go to outdoor rinks and
comes with it? just fool around. Doing that reminded
No. I always knew that this was the bur- me of the joy of the game. It’s harder
den I had to carry. I understand that this in Toronto because the ice isn’t—well,
is part of the gig. You know that quote, let’s just say that it doesn’t get as cold
“To whom much is given, much is as it does out west.
RENE JOHNSTON/GETTY IMAGES

required”? I realize that this is the expec-

tation, and I’m okay with it. I love hockey.
You’ve said that backyard and com-
munity rinks are a safe haven, some-
where kids can just play shinny with
no one to instruct or criticize them.
Have you ever been recognized on
those rinks?
A few times I pretended I wasn’t very
good, but when I started trying, sud-
denly there were double takes and
“Who’s that girl with the ponytail?”

52 october 2023
 Portrait

Tennis great Billie Jean King is one of
your inspirations. One of her favourite
lines is “Pressure is a privilege.” Do
you think it applies only to sport?
Absolutely not. It applies to all indus-
tries and also to parenting. If someone
expects a lot of you and you feel pressure
from them, it’s because they believe
you can get the job done. In medicine,
when I’m overwhelmed, I take a step
back and remind myself that someone
put me here because they thought I
had it in me to be a competent doctor.
It helps to reframe things. At the Van-
couver Olympics in 2010 [when Canada
beat the U.S. to win gold], instead of
thinking that the pressure—the weight
of the nation—was bearing down on
us, we had to recognize that the pres-
sure could help. The nation believed in
us and was pushing us from behind.
At the Sydney Olympics in 2000, you
met Nelson Mandela and he asked what
you would do to leave your sport and
the world better than you found them.
You’ve given hockey four decades of
almost undivided attention. What’s
left on your list?
I want to keep doing WickFest, to con-
tinue moving things forward for girls
and continue to expand their opportu-
nities. Professionally, I want to keep
getting better at what I do. And the ulti-
mate thing would be to win a Stanley
Cup with the Leafs.
I hate to rain on your parade, but
Toronto’s been going through a bit of
a dry spell on that front.
Winning is really, really hard. It’s about
consistency, doing the little things day in
and day out, and then believing that you
can do the job because you prepared
every single day. You can’t cut corners,
and you have to go out there and do any-
thing to win. It’s not for everyone. But if
you can get a group of players together
who want to sacrifice everything for
one another to win a Stanley Cup, you
have a pretty good chance.
You had two dreams growing up: to
play hockey and to become a doctor.
Now what?
I’m done! Now, honestly, it’s less about
striving and more about just living and
enjoying what I’m doing. It’s been a
really hard grind, so I look forward to
having some more free time to do fun
things, like travel. Maybe the Maldives,
on a beach—with no cellphone.
© 2023, STÉPHANIE VERGE. FROM “POWER PLAYER:
HAYLEY WICKENHEISER”, TORONTO LIFE ( JANUARY 23,
2023), TORONTOLIFE.COM

The Blog vs. The Bard

We’ve heard that a million monkeys at a million keyboards could
produce the complete works of Shakespeare.
Now, thanks to the Internet, we know that is not true.
—ROBERT WILENSKY

rd.ca 53
 DRAMA IN REAL LIFE

NIGHTMARE AT THE
NIGHTCLUB WHEN THE SHOOTING STARTED
AT A COLORADO NIGHTCLUB,
A COMBAT VETERAN’S LIFESAVING INSTINCTS
KICKED IN
BY Dave Philipps FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES

54 october 2023 illustration by Jeffrey Smith

reader ’s digest

rd.ca 55
reader ’s digest
ichard M. Fierro was
at a table at Club Q
with his wife, daugh-
ter and friends on a
Saturday night last
November when the
sudden flash of gun-
fire ripped across
the nightclub. His
instincts, forged during four combat
deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan,
instantly kicked in. Fight back, he told
himself. Protect your people.
Fierro, 45, who spent 15 years as a
U.S. Army officer and left as a major in
2013, charged through the chaos at the
club and tackled the gunman, beating
him with the shooter’s own gun.
“I don’t know exactly what I did. I
just went into combat mode,” Fierro
said in the driveway of his Colorado
Springs, Colorado, home a few days after
the shooting, an American flag hanging
limp in the freezing air. “I just knew I
had to stop this guy.”
The gunman, Anderson Lee Aldrich,
then 22, was arrested on charges of kill-
ing five people and wounding 18 more
in a rampage that lasted only a few min-
utes. The death toll could have been
much higher, officials said, if patrons of
the bar had not stopped the gunman.
“He saved a lot of lives,” John Suthers,
then the mayor of Colorado Springs,
said of Fierro. Suthers said he had spo-
ken to Fierro and was struck by his
humility. “I have never encountered a
person who engaged in such heroic
actions and was so humble about it.”
56 october 2023
it was supposed to be a chill family night
out. The combat veteran and his wife,
Jess Fierro, joined their daughter, Kas-
sandra, her longtime boyfriend, Ray-
mond Green Vance, and two family
friends to watch one of his daughter’s
friends perform a drag act.
It was Fierro’s first time at a drag show,
and he was enjoying it. After all those
years in the Army, he now relished his
role as a civilian and a father, watching
one of his daughter’s old high school
friends perform.
“These kids want to live that way,
want to have a good time, have at it,” he
said as he described the night. “I’m
happy about it because that is what I
fought for, so they can do whatever the
hell they want.”
Fierro was trying to get better at going
out. In Iraq and Afghanistan he’d been
shot at, lost friends and seen roadside
bombs shred trucks in his platoon. He
was twice awarded the Bronze Star.
The wars were past and yet still pres-
ent. There were things he would never
forget. For a long time after coming
home, crowds put him on edge. He
couldn’t help but be vigilant. In restau-
rants he sat against the wall, facing
the door. No matter how much he tried
to relax, part of him was always ready
for an attack, like an itch that could not
be scratched.
He was too often distrustful, quick to
anger. It had been hard on his wife and
daughter. He was working on it. There
was medication and there were ses-
sions with a psychologist. He got rid of

all the guns in the house. He let his hair
grow out long and grew a long white
goatee to distance himself from his
days in uniform.
He and his wife run a successful local
brewery called Atrevida Beer Co., and he
had a warm relationship with his daugh-
ter and her boyfriend. He also accepted
that war would always be with him.
But that night at Club Q, he was not
thinking of war at all. People were danc-
ing. He was joking with his friends. Then
the shooting started.
It was a staccato of flashes by the
front door, the familiar sound of small-
arms fire. Fierro knew it too well. With-
out thinking, he hit the floor, pulling his
friend down with him.
Bullets sprayed across the bar, smash-
ing bottles and glasses. People screamed.
DANIEL BRENNER/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Richard Fierro
tackled the
gunman before
he could kill
more people.
Drama in Real Life
Fierro looked up and saw a figure as big
as a bear, easily more than 300 pounds,
wearing body armour and carrying a
rifle a lot like the one Fierro had carried
in Iraq. The shooter was moving through
the bar toward a door leading to a patio
where dozens of people had fled.
The long-suppressed instincts of a
platoon leader surged back to life. Fierro
raced across the room, grabbed the gun-
man by a handle on the back of his body
armour, pulled him to the floor and
jumped on top of him.
“Was he shooting at the time? Was he
about to shoot? I don’t know,” Fierro said.
“I just knew I had to take him down.”
The two crashed down to the floor.
The gunman’s military-style rifle clat-
tered just out of reach. Fierro started to
go for it, but then saw the gunman
rd.ca 57
reader ’s digest
Mourners gathered at a makeshift memorial near Club Q in Colorado Springs to pay
tribute to the victims.
come up with a pistol in his other hand.
“I grabbed the gun out of his hand
and just started hitting him on the head,
over and over,” Fierro said.
As he held the man down and
slammed the pistol on his skull, Fierro
started barking orders. Using a string of
expletives, he yelled for a club patron
to grab the rifle, then told the patron to
start kicking the gunman in the face.
Fierro ordered a bystander to stomp the
attacker with her high heels. Meantime,
Fierro said, he pummelled the shooter
with the pistol while screaming at him.
What allowed him to throw aside all
fear and act? He said he has no idea.
Probably those old instincts of war,
which had burdened him for so long
at home, suddenly had a place now
that something like war had come to
his hometown.
58 october 2023
“In combat, most of the time nothing
happens, but it’s that mad minute, and
you are tested in that minute. It becomes
habit,” he said. “I don’t know how I
got the weapon away from that guy, no
idea. I’m just a dude, I’m a fat old vet,
but I knew I had to do something.”
SCOTT OLSON/GETTY IMAGES; SCOTT OLSON/GETTY IMAGES
When police arrived a few minutes
later, the gunman was no longer strug-
gling. Fierro, himself covered in blood,
feared that he had killed him.
Fierro got up and frantically lurched
around in the dark, looking for his
family. He spotted his friends on the
floor. One had been shot several times
in the chest and arm. Another had been
shot in the leg.
As more police filed in, Fierro started
yelling like he was back in combat.
“Casualties! Casualties! I need a medic
here now!” He yelled to the police that

the scene was clear, the shooter was
down but people needed help. He took
tourniquets from a young police officer
and put them on his bleeding friends.
He tried to speak calmly to them as he
worked, telling them they’d be okay.
He spied his wife and daughter on
the edge of the room and was about to
go to them when he was tackled.
Officers rushing into the chaotic scene
had spotted him, a blood-spattered man
with a handgun. Not knowing whether
he was a threat, they put Fierro in hand-
cuffs and locked him in the back of a
police car for what seemed like more
than an hour. He screamed and pleaded
to be let go so that he could see his family.
Eventually, Fierro was freed. He
located his wife and daughter, both of
whom had minor injuries, and went
to the hospital with them. His friends
were there in much more serious con-
dition. They were all alive.
But his daughter’s boyfriend, Ray-
mond, was nowhere to be found. In the
dark and disarray, they had lost him.
They drove back to the club, searching
for him. They circled familiar streets,
hoping they would find him walking
home. But there was no sign of him.
Then the family got a call late Sunday
from Raymond’s mother. He had died
in the shooting. When Fierro heard, he
held his daughter and cried.
Common Ground
A thousand fibres connects us with our fellow men.
HERMAN MELVILLE
Drama in Real Life
In part he cried because he knew
what lay ahead. The families of the
dead, the people who were shot, they
had now been in war, as he had. They
would struggle as he and so many of
his combat buddies had. They would
ache with misplaced vigilance. They
would lash out in anger, never be able
to scratch the itch of fear, be torn by
the longing to forget and the urge to
always remember.
“My little girl, she screamed, and I was
crying with her,” Fierro said. “Driving
home from the hospital I told them,
‘Look, I’ve gone through this before,
and down the road, when this happens,
you just get out on the next patrol. You
need to get it out of your mind.’ That is
how you cured it. You cured it by doing
more. Eventually you get home safe.
“But here I worry there is no next
patrol. It is harder to cure. You are
already home.”
Editor’s Note: In June, Anderson Lee
Aldrich pleaded guilty to five counts of
first-degree murder, 46 counts of
attempted first-degree murder and no
contest to two counts of bias-motivated
crimes. He received five life sentences
without the possibility of parole and
46 consecutive 48-year sentences.
THE NEW YORK TIMES (NOVEMBER 29, 2022), COPYRIGHT
© 2022 BY THE NEW YORK TIMES COMPANY
rd.ca 59
 NATURE

GREAT THE
WILDEBEEST
MIGRATION
60 october 2023
 reader ’s digest

It’s a spectacular sight when countless

ruminants cross the Serengeti
in search of greener pastures
BY Vincent Noyoux FROM LE FIGARO MAGAZINE
reader ’s digest
It starts like
a scene from Out of Africa. Leaving
Mount Kilimanjaro behind, the bush
plane flies over the gaping Ngorongoro
Crater, casting its shadow over tawny
land that resembles lion skins sewn
together with the rivers’ green thread.
We’re in the Serengeti in Tanzania, in
the northern part of the national park,
near the Kenyan border. We’ve yet to
set foot on the ground, but the safari is
underway. Herds of elephants bathe in
the Mara River. Half-submerged croc-
odiles come into sight, and on the bank
sit masses darker than boulders, the
hippopotamuses.
It’s all wonderful, but we’re here to
see something else: the blue wilde-
beest. With its spindly legs, grey-blue
coat, wild mane and a long, bumpy face
that gives it a stubborn air, this rumi-
nant is not the elite of the African safari.
Wildebeests live in herds of about 30
that assemble in huge numbers during
the great annual migration.
“The cycle starts early in the year in
the southern Serengeti and moves
west, then north to the Masai Mara
(Kenya), east and back south,” explains
our guide, Erasto Macha. “Wildebeests
follow the rain, which provides green
grasslands. They remain in the north-
ern Serengeti from July to early Octo-
ber, but August and September are
when we see the most.” He estimates
there are 1.5 million here.
If it weren’t for the Mara, which is
62 october 2023
subject to massive fluctuations depend-
ing on rainfall upriver, their migration
would be smooth sailing. Rising on the
Kenyan side of the Great Rift Valley and
flowing into Lake Victoria, it’s the longest
and only perennial river in the Serengeti.
It’s also the most dangerous to cross.
THE LAND CRUISER we’re travelling in
crosses an acacia savannah, and there’s
a parade of animals: elephants, giraffes,
warthogs, buffaloes, ostriches, ante-
lopes and topis. Crocodiles and hippo-
potamuses soak in the water as vultures
fly overhead. All of the actors are in
place: On the opposite bank, a black
line forms at a spot at the river’s edge,
and the growing horde congregates.
The wildebeests are about to cross,
but they seem to hesitate. And who
(PREVIOUS PAGES) PHOTOSTOCK-ISRAEL/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/GETTY IMAGES
could blame them? The waters are
crawling with crocs and hippos. When
one wildebeest makes its move, the
entire group follows. “Their best strategy
is to cross in a line rather than head-on,”
Macha says. “In a compact group, the
young wildebeests would inevitably end
up crushed and then drown.”
Several hundred thousand zebras fol-
low them, he says, but the more cautious
zebras never cross first. “One theory is
they remember dangerous places. But
what we do know is they share the grass:
zebras graze the top of the grass and
wildebeests eat the rest.”
The group at the edge of the Mara
still hesitates. Will they or won’t they?
We place our bets. The wait can take
hours. Sometimes, the wildebeests turn

back. That’s what happens today. As the
light shifts from gold to glowing red,
they scatter sheepishly in the bush.
Defeat in such a glorious setting.
We head back to Sayari Camp, the
first of its kind in the northern Seren-
geti. Unlike other lodges, it’s just a
stone’s throw from the Mara River,
which is very practical when a river-
crossing alert goes up. The decor
blends South African design and Tan-
zanian handicrafts that distill into a
subtle safari-chic atmosphere, and it
isn’t uncommon to see zebras and
wildebeests roaming between the tents.
AYZENSTAYN/GETTY IMAGES
To come and go after dark, guests have
to call a staff member by walkie-talkie.
The nighttime savannah rustles with
a thousand sounds. A hyena’s high-
pitched call sends shivers down your
spine as you lay in bed. Step out onto
the terrace, and your flashlight will
Nature
Wildebeests set out
to cross the Mara River.
illuminate a myriad of wildebeest eyes,
glimmering dots.
At dawn, we take to the sky in a hot-
air balloon. Like the sun, we slowly rise.
The basket skims the tops of the acacias
and glides low over impalas, antelopes
and zebras. The spitting burner sends
large herds of wildebeests into a panic,
and they gallop off into the vast
yellowish-green plain. In a few weeks
they’ll have reached the Masai Mara,
whose hills peek out in the distance.
We watch as the hyenas’ limping run
clashes with the graceful leaps of the
oribis—the ballerinas of the savannah.
From the sky, the wild wonder calls to
mind an earthly paradise, but the ani-
mal bones that litter the ground tell the
story of the struggle to survive. Here,
there are the hunters and the hunted.
A lioness lurks in the bushes. Wilde-
beests graze a few dozen metres away,
rd.ca 63
reader ’s digest
unaware. A more alert zebra catches
sight of the large cat and remains on
the lookout, ready to flee. The lioness
stalks them. What is she waiting for?
But animals are on their own time.
The Serengeti teems with life. On the
banks of the Mara, mongooses leapfrog
the rocks. Standing in the water, Masai
giraffes nibble acacia leaves. “They spot
danger first, and the zebras understand
that,” Macha says.
Further on, there’s a group of chubby-
cheeked hippos with bulging eyes. But
we aren’t fooled by their aura of serenity.
These territorial animals charge without
warning, killing nearly 500 people a year
in Africa—far more than all the big cats
combined. Two teenagers quarrel and
growl, opening their mouths wide to
bare their frightening teeth.
The radio crackles: Wildebeests have
been spotted a few kilometres away.
The SUV sets off down the track. On the
other side of the river, lines of wilde-
beests arrive from all over as the group
swells. But no one wants to go first.
Their hesitation forces them to post-
pone, and they disperse.
The unexpected occurs elsewhere. As
we observe a group of impalas, one of
them makes a loud whistling noise.
“Something alerted it,” says Macha. We
all turn our heads. Lying on a branch,
hidden among the leaves, a leopard
looks on. It coolly unfurls its tail beyond
the foliage, betraying its presence; if it
hadn’t been for the impala’s warning,
we’d never have seen it.
The leopard climbs higher and sets
64 october 2023
its topaz eyes on us in an imperial gaze.
Leopards often pounce on their prey,
usually an antelope or an impala, in
one bound. They’re powerful enough
to haul it into a tree so they don’t have
to share with other carnivores. This one
will wait until night to attack, some-
thing its eyesight and patience permit.
SAFARIS START
IN THE EARLY
MORNING, WHEN
THE WILDLIFE IS
MOST ACTIVE.
SAFARIS START IN the early morning,
when the wildlife is most active, and as
the Land Cruiser crosses the savannah
under a sky dotted with clouds, we
watch lion cubs play under their moth-
er’s watchful eye. Then they quickly dis-
appear into the tall grass. “The wilde-
beests are going to cross,” Macha says
with certainty. Soon enough, an epic
scene unfolds right before our eyes.
Thousands of wildebeests stamp on
the bank of the river, the depth of which
can fluctuate quickly. The most danger-
ous 100 metres of their lives lie ahead.
Pressured by the group, one decides to
cross. And then the flow is unstoppable.
Water sprays as the wildebeests jump in.
It’s a dark and nervous army, an ava-
lanche of horns on the Mara River.
Crocodiles are ready to attack as the
hippos fiercely guard their territory. The

smaller wildebeests are the easiest prey,
but the mass of moving legs complicates
any assault; a crocodile slowly moves
forward and propels itself in a flash, its
jaws just missing the target.
The wildebeests that make it to the
other side climb out dripping wet. A
youngster stands alone, a few metres
behind them. Crocodiles loom, and we
bury our eyes in our binoculars and
hold our breath. The safari becomes a
thriller—a cruel and fascinating death
scene that plays out right in front of us.
But the little wildebeest survives,
barely, and we think back to one we
saw yesterday whose flanks had been
slashed. “A crocodile attack,” Macha
had confirmed. “A hyena will finish it
off when it gets too weak to run.”
Yet the biggest threat to the wilde-
beests is drowning. Sometimes hun-
dreds of carcasses float in the river. “In
just 15 minutes, 3,000 to 4,000 wilde-
beests cross it,” says our guide.
Drowned wildebeests are a feast for
scavengers. Bare-necked and wrapped
in their sinister cloak, vultures perch
on the branches of a dead tree. These
gravediggers play a vital role in the eco-
system. By removing remains, they help
prevent the spread of diseases and pre-
serve the savannah’s ecological balance.
Afterwards, we park under a clump
of trees among the impalas and set
breakfast on the hood. The sun splat-
ters warm colours over the Serengeti. A
zebra foal nudges its mother. Elephants
silently cross the landscape in single
file as their calves play games with their
Nature
trunks. This is the way of the wild: from
fear to tenderness.
THE SUN SETS on our final outing, and
we’re on foot for the first time. A ranger
armed with a .458 Winchester Magnum
is with us. And that’s a good thing. As
simple bipeds without fangs or claws,
we’re more vulnerable than a baby ante-
lope. We tread cautiously, quietly, in an
eerily deserted savannah.
Suddenly, Macha freezes: “Behind the
rock, 30 metres away...” And we see the
wisps of a lion’s mane behind granite.
We feel a quiver of fear, but we don’t
run or the lion will assume we’re prey. In
any case, we’d be too slow. “Stay together
and walk away slowly,” Macha says. The
lion sticks its head out and follows us
with its eyes. What is it thinking?
“You never know what an animal was
doing 30 minutes ago,” our guide adds
in a low voice. “Maybe it ate, maybe it
had an unfortunate encounter, maybe
it was injured.”
In the evening, before dinner, as is
the custom at the lodge, we sit around
a blazing campfire and talk about our
day, just as Ernest Hemingway, who
wrote extensively about hunting and
fishing, might have done. About leop-
ards perched in trees, lions ready to
pounce, crocodiles on the attack. Our
stories sound like tall tales, except
they’re absolutely true. The sky over the
Serengeti witnessed them all.
© 2022, LE FIGARO MAGAZINE. FROM “EN TANZANIE, LA
GRANDE ÉPOPÉE DE LA MIGRATION DES GNOUS,” BY VIN-
CENT NOYOUX, LE FIGARO MAGAZINE (10 OCTOBRE 2022).
LEFIGARO.FR
rd.ca 65
 SMILE
STRETCHING
THE TRUTH
BY Richard Glover
jocasta and i are sitting at the kitchen
table. My wife has decided to calculate
my body mass index (BMI) so she will
know, based on the ratio of my height to
my weight, whether I should lose some
weight. “How tall are you?” she asks.
With a slight swagger of pride, I sup-
ply the required figure. Immediately,
she disputes it.
66 october 2023
“Well, you used to be 185 centimetres,
but you haven’t had your height mea-
sured for years,” she says. “People get
shorter as they get older. I’m going to
knock off five centimetres, maybe 10.”
Jocasta often comes up with these sci-
entific observations. In her career as a
screenwriter, she has written a couple of
medical dramas and now lives under
the misapprehension that she’s a doctor.
“The discs in your spine settle over
the years,” she continues. “By the time
you get to 90, you’re basically half the
height you used to be.”
I find this hard to believe. “If that
were true,” I tell her, “people would
need to lower their kitchen countertops
as they get older.”
illustration by Sam Island

Jocasta sighs, as one might do when
dealing with a recalcitrant child. “By that
age, people have been doing things for
so long, they don’t need to have a direct
view of every task,” she says. “If they
want to make toast, they do it by touch.”
To illustrate her point, she butters a
slice of toast above her head in a way that
does, admittedly, look quite credible.
Next, Jocasta quizzes me about my
weight. I suggest a figure that she regards
as fanciful. When she asks me to weigh
myself, I decline on the grounds that I
am “currently retaining water.”
MAYBE I COULD
HANG FROM A TREE
BRANCH, MY SPINE
LENGTHENING BY
THE MINUTE.
Jocasta says this is unlikely: “What
you are retaining is tuna casserole. I’m
going to add three kilos.”
Sensing her resolve on this point, I
focus on upgrading the figure she’s
using for my height. It may be my only
hope of avoiding a life on half-rations.
“I don’t feel any shorter,” I tell her.
I walk around the kitchen, my neck
stretched, my chin raised and my nose
tilted upward in the style of a young
woman in a deportment class. “I’m get-
ting taller by the moment,” I say.
Jocasta flashes me a derisive look.
“Putting your nose in the air doesn’t
reader ’s digest
make you any taller. You just look like
an aristocrat trying to avoid the smell
of his own fart.”
Ouch. As I sit down, I can feel my
vertebrae settling; maybe I am getting
shorter.
There must be some way of regaining
my height. I could buy a medieval
stretching rack and ask Jocasta to
tighten it until I scream in agony. She
might even enjoy herself.
Or I could hang from a tree branch,
my spine lengthening by the minute.
Maybe the orangutans of Borneo are
just trying to improve their BMI.
I seek advice from Jocasta, since she
considers herself a medical profes-
sional. “We’re all taller in the morning,
compared to the evening,” she con-
fides. “A whole day of walking around
leaves the discs compacted. Then they
stretch out during the night, when we
are lying down. Plus we get heavier
during the day because of all the food.”
Struck with an idea, Jocasta goes back
to her calculations and emerges with
two figures for my BMI: first thing in the
morning and in the evening. “You start
the day as merely overweight before tip-
ping into clinical obesity at about 7:30
each night, after your second beer.”
I decide to accept her adjudication.
After all, I find it quite optimistic.
Because even if I end every day as a
clinically obese leprechaun, I start each
morning in a much better place: a tall
man, holding obesity at bay, shaking
his fist at the heavens and daring grav-
ity to do its worst.
rd.ca 67
reader ’s digest
 INSPIRATION

Diagnosed with highly aggressive

non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma,
federal minister Dominic Leblanc knew
that only a perfect bone-marrow
match could save him

BY Harold Gagné

illustration by Meredith Sadler rd.ca 69

reader ’s digest Inspiration
THE YOUNG MAN being greeted by a
staffer from the Office of the Minister of
Intergovernmental Affairs, Infrastructure
and Communities is neither a politician
nor a foreign delegate. Jonathan Kehl,
23, is a student from Bad Hersfeld, a
town in Germany. Travelling with his
friend Dennis Bolender, he’d never set
foot in Canada before he deplaned in
Ottawa on September 25, 2022. He was
whisked to a hotel where Minister
Dominic Leblanc was waiting. Emo-
tions were high as the two men hugged.
Though they’d never met in person,
they felt close: Jonathan Kehl’s blood
had been coursing through Dominic
Leblanc’s veins for three years.
IN 2000, LEBLANC, the son of former
Governor General Roméo Leblanc,
70 september 2023
graduated from law school and began
what would be a long political career
when he was elected the Liberal MP in
the New Brunswick riding of Beausé-
jour. He has since been re-elected
seven times, led various government
departments and served as the presi-
dent of the Queen’s Privy Council for
Canada.
Brimming with energy, he’d never
shied away from a heavy workload. But
on Saturday, April 20, 2019, Leblanc, 55,
felt so under the weather—exhausted
and feverish—that he consulted a phy-
sician at Dr. Georges-L.-Dumont Uni-
versity Hospital Centre in Moncton.
He was convinced he’d caught a flu
bug, but a biopsy of the lymph nodes
in his armpit said otherwise: He had a
rare and very aggressive form of non-
Hodgkin’s lymphoma. And it had
started to attack his liver. In a Hail Mary
attempt to control its progress, he
underwent strong chemotherapy.
“We weren’t sure he’d make it,” says
his hematologist-oncologist, Dr. Nich-
olas Finn. Adds Leblanc: “I found out
later that if the treatment hadn’t
worked, I would have lived only a few
more weeks.”
His wife (Jolène Richard, former
chief judge of the Provincial Court of
New Brunswick), and his stepson
Shelby remained by his side through-
out the ordeal. Fortunately, the three-
week cocktail of drugs put the cancer
into remission. Leblanc returned
home for a short time, but the battle
was far from won. Still, he was con-
 Leblanc (left) invited
Jonathan Kehl, his donor,
to visit him in Ottawa in
September 2022.
vinced he’d be cured. After all, he’d
already survived chronic lymphocytic
leukemia in 2018.
The medical team knew that the non-
Hodgkin’s lymphoma would return if
Leblanc didn’t have a stem-cell trans-
plant. It was his only chance of survival.
The procedure is relatively simple in
theory: kill all the tumour cells in the
bloodstream and then introduce stem
cells from a healthy donor’s bone mar-
row to regenerate the immune system.
“We had to work fast, while he was still
healthy,” says Finn. Stem-cell transplants
DAVE CHAN
aren’t done at the Moncton hospital, so
in June 2019, Leblanc was sent to Hôpital
Maisonneuve-Rosemont in Montreal
for tests. “He was as yellow as a lemon
because of the liver failure and had lost
a lot of weight,” remembers Dr. Sylvie
Lachance, who oversaw his care. Still,
doctors believed he was strong enough
for the transplant.
One of Leblanc’s younger sisters vol-
unteered to donate her stem cells, but
she wasn’t a match. And so began the
search for a donor in Héma-Québec’s
stem-cell bank, which has more than
55,000 registered donors, and in the
international bank, which lists 40 mil-
lion donors in 55 countries.
“For a transplant to work, you need
an HLA match,” explains Susie Joron,
manager of donor-search strategies
rd.ca 71
reader ’s digest
and stem-cell distribution at Héma-
Québec. Human leukocyte antigens are
genetic markers that are essential to a
healthy immune system. In August 2019,
the perfect match popped up on a screen
at Héma-Québec.
TWENTY-YEAR-OLD Jonathan Kehl lived
with his parents and two sisters in Bad
Hersfeld, a small town in the German
state of Hesse. He’d registered as a
stem-cell donor two years earlier, in
2018, when the German National
Bone Marrow Donor Registry brought
“I WANTED TO SAVE A LIFE! IT WAS A REALLY
EMOTIONAL MOMENT FOR ME, AND FOR MY
FAMILY, WHO ENCOURAGED ME TO DONATE.”
its awareness campaign to his high
school. “Back then, I didn’t even know
it was an option,” he admits. A year and
a half later, he was a university student
doing his teacher training when he got
a surprise call from the German stem-
cell bank. His cells were fully compati-
ble with those of a potential recipient.
“I could have said no, but I agreed,”
says Kehl. “I wanted to save a life! It was
a really emotional moment for me, and
for my family, who encouraged me to
donate.” The donation was anonymous;
all he knew was that his stem cells
would go to a Canadian man.
On the other side of the Atlantic,
Leblanc was elated when Lachance
72 september 2023
told him the good news—especially
because the chance of finding a perfect
match is only one in 20,000. On August
31, 2019, he was admitted to the hospi-
tal for 10 days of intensive chemother-
apy that wiped out his immune system
and blood cells.
Meanwhile in Germany, Kehl made
the 150-kilometre journey to the Frank-
furt Red Cross to receive injections
meant to stimulate his stem-cell pro-
duction prior to donation. On Septem-
ber 16, 2019, it was time to harvest the
cells. “I felt weak,” he says, “but they
told me it was normal because of the
cell stimulation.”
Sitting in an armchair, he watched as
blood was drawn from his arm and sent
to a centrifuge to separate the stem
cells (a half-litre in total was collected).
The rest of the blood’s components
were put back into Kehl’s body. As soon
as the procedure was over, the life-
saving stem cells were put in a cooler
and jetted to Canada. The transplant
was scheduled for 48 hours later.
AT AROUND 2 P.M. on September 18,
2019, a nurse clad in head-to-toe protec-
tive gear walked into Leblanc’s Montreal
hospital room and carefully connected

the small tube containing the stem cells
to a catheter in an artery just above his
heart. It was a moment of profound
solemnity. Leblanc’s wife, both anxious
and happy, was by his side as events
unfolded.
The beige substance was adminis-
tered intravenously for two hours.
Though the infusion went smoothly, it
was followed by a period of uncer-
tainty. It takes 14 to 21 days for the new
blood cells to regenerate, and another
week for any to appear.
“I was afraid it hadn’t worked until
LEBLANC EXCITEDLY ASKED AN AIDE TO LOOK
UP HIS BENEFACTOR ON FACEBOOK. HE WAS
ADAMANT ABOUT GETTING IN TOUCH WITH HIM.
Dr. Lachance came into my room with a
smile and told me the neutrophils—the
white blood cells—had materialized.
That was proof that the transplant was
a success!” says Leblanc.
He remained in isolation and was
administered daily infusions of blood,
platelets, antibiotics to fight infection,
magnesium and potassium. “The che-
motherapy was so powerful that I had
ulcers in my mouth and was fed intrave-
nously for five weeks.”
To pass the time, he read a lot and fol-
lowed his team’s campaign to get him
re-elected. On the eve of the French-
language TV debate on September 30,
2019, his old friend Justin Trudeau paid
Inspiration
him a surprise visit. Says Leblanc, “I
was really touched to see him. He sat
there with me for two hours, gloved and
masked, discussing politics and laugh-
ing despite the serious circumstances.”
THREE WEEKS LATER, glued to the tiny
TV screen in his hospital room, Leblanc
whooped with joy when voters in his
New Brunswick riding of Beauséjour
re-elected him for a seventh term. Still,
his biggest win came on November 5,
2019: Every single cell in his blood-
stream was from his donor. He could
finally leave the hospital, more than two
months after he’d been admitted.
But he wasn’t out of the woods yet. He
would have to remain in Montreal for
another month to undergo tests three
times a week at Hôpital Maisonneuve-
Rosemont. “The day I received my trans-
plant, the doctors told me it was like
being reborn,” Leblanc says.
High on his renewed lease on life, he
wanted to thank his donor personally.
And so he filled out a document that
would be given to Kehl—but only when
two years had passed since the trans-
plant. “That’s an international rule that
exists to make sure the transplant really
worked,” explains Joron.
rd.ca 73
 In January 2020, after Jonathan Kehl (left) donated bone marrow, Dominic Leblanc
returned to work in Ottawa.
IN JANUARY 2020, Leblanc returned to
Ottawa to the applause of the members
of the House of Commons. Only his lack
of hair, which had fallen out due to the
chemotherapy, hinted that he’d been ill.
He was starting to feel healthy again, but
“I have the immune system of a four-
month-old,” he jokes. “It’s coming back
slowly, and I have to be careful. It’s get-
ting better and better.”
But he often thought of the man who
saved his life. In 2021, two years after the
transplant, the politician was on his way
to the Ottawa International Airport
when he got an email from Hôpital
Maisonneuve-Rosemont: They had his
74 september 2023
donor’s information. Leblanc was
dumbfounded. He had the donor’s
name, Jonathan Kehl, and some infor-
mation about him.
“I was struck by his age—he was born (DOMINIC LEBLANC) REUTERS/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO
in 1999,” says Leblanc. He excitedly
asked an aide to look up his benefactor
on Facebook. He was adamant about
( JONATHAN KEHL) © PRIVAT/DKMS ;
getting in touch with him.
Stéphane Dion, then Canada’s ambas-
sador to Germany in Berlin, suggested
Leblanc write his donor a message in
English and have it translated into
German. “You saved my life, and I am
extremely grateful for your generosity,”
Leblanc wrote.
 Inspiration reader ’s digest

When Kehl received the note, he was
stunned. He and his mother searched
the internet for Dominic Leblanc’s
name, and all signs pointed to him being
a Member of Parliament. “It was unbe-
lievable!” exclaims Kehl.
Four days later, Leblanc’s heart
pounded as he read the reply. “After all
this time, I am very happy to know you
are well,” Kehl wrote in English, which
he’d been learning since he was nine.
They set up a virtual meeting two weeks
before Christmas.
“I was so touched when he said he
felt responsible for my health,” says
Leblanc. The men spent time talking
about what they’d been through, and
Leblanc invited Kehl to visit him in
Canada when the pandemic subsided.
“THIS YOUNG MAN saved my life,” said
Dominic Leblanc as he proudly intro-
duced Kehl to the correspondents and
photographers on Parliament Hill in
Ottawa on September 28, 2022. Kehl
was overwhelmed by the welcome,
which was usually reserved for foreign
dignitaries. Prime Minister Trudeau
extended his heartfelt congratulations
for the young man’s generosity.
Kehl’s whirlwind trip included a quick
stop in Montreal and then a few days
of salmon fishing on New Brunswick’s
Miramichi River, where he revelled in the
majestic landscapes (despite not catch-
ing anything). “Everything was beauti-
ful,” says the young man.
Though he was happy that his host
promised to visit him in Germany, Kehl
felt heavy-hearted as the parliamentar-
ian drove him to the airport to catch his
flight back home. He had the strange
impression that he was leaving part of
himself behind.
“Jonathan’s extraordinary gesture
gave me a second life,” says an emo-
tional Leblanc. The chances of his can-
cer returning get lower and lower with
time, but if he ever needs another stem-
cell donation, Kehl has promised to
come to the rescue of the man he now
feels forever connected to.
“I consider Mr. Leblanc to be my
genetic twin,” he says.

The Spirit of Giving

If we’re not put here for anything else but to help each other get through life,
I think that’s a very honourable existence.
TOM BROKAW, JOURNALIST

In charity there is no excess.

FRANCIS BACON, PHILOSOPHER

After the verb “to love,” “to help” is the most beautiful verb in the world.
BERTHA VON SUTTNER, NOVELIST

rd.ca 75
 HEALTH

We can be
pretty hard
on them, so
let’s show
our feet
some love

BY Sydney Loney

76 october 2023 illustrations by Elise Conlin

reader ’s digest
reader ’s digest
Walking.
Hiking.
Jogging.
Biking.
Unaided, we can’t do any of these
things without our feet. So why, when
our quality of life is directly related to
being active, do many of us ignore
these two vital parts of our body?
Spanish scientists expressed concern
over a rise in foot issues in their 2021
study of how poor foot health affects
everything from physical activity to the
overall health of able-bodied people
(participants ranged from age 15 to 69).
“Foot problems can reduce quality of
life, lead to loss of balance, make it dif-
ficult to put on shoes and increase the
risk of falling,” the authors wrote in the
78 october 2023
journal Scientific Reports. “All of this
can affect activities of daily living,
including the desire to go outside.”
Meanwhile, a 2017 study, also in
Spain, of able-bodied university stu-
dents found that poor foot health not
only prevented them from being physi-
cally active but also increased their risk
of becoming socially isolated as a result.
The Bunion Blues,
and Other Woes
If foot pain limits your activity and
lasts more than a week, says Paul Langer,
a Minnesota-based sports-medicine
podiatrist, it’s time to see a podiatrist or
an orthopaedist. Adds Hartley Miltchin,
a Toronto podiatrist who has dubbed
himself “the Bunion King,” if feet—the
body’s foundation—aren’t performing
properly, they throw everything else off.
“They’re like the base of the Tower of
Pisa. When they’re off, the tower leans.”
Bunions are one of the most com-
mon foot problems preventing people
from being active. Almost a third of us
have one. It’s the bony bump that can
form when the big toe becomes mis-
aligned; that causes the tip of the toe to
move inward and the joint at the base
to stick out sideways. Bunions don’t go
away on their own.
Troy Gubb had always been active,
but about a decade ago, in his early 40s,
he developed a bunion on his left foot.
When the Toronto-based manager for
a communications and media com-
pany removed his skates after playing
hockey, his foot was red and inflamed.

After a round of golf, it throbbed. Even-
tually, he had to give up hockey, then
golf, then running. He couldn’t even
take Carl, the family bulldog, for a walk.
“The end of the line was last fall,” he
says. “I was limping around with a cane
and I couldn’t put pressure on my foot.”
He began looking into how to deal with
bunions.
The condition is generally caused by a
combination of genetic predisposition
and footwear, says Dr. Kathleen Gartke,
senior medical officer at the Ottawa Hos-
pital and an orthopaedic surgeon who
has performed many bunion-removal
procedures. “Fashion is not kind to feet,”
she says, adding that wearing tight or
narrow-toed shoes, high heels or shoes
with no support is okay now and again,
but “not all day, every day.”
If you notice a bony bump forming at
the base of your big toe, try spending
more time in shoes that don’t crowd
your toes. Gartke also recommends
wearing a toe spacer (available at most
pharmacies) between your first and
second toe to help keep them straight.
It can also help you identify shoes that
you shouldn’t wear—any that feel tight
when you are wearing the toe spacer.
Bunions tend to worsen over time.
If they become so painful that they
interfere with your daily life, consider
having them surgically removed. “All
bunions are not created equal and so
there are dozens of different procedures
available,” Gartke says. “An X-ray will
help your doctor decide on the one that
best addresses your problem.”
Health
The most common are exostectomy
(or bunionectomy) and osteotomy, and
they’re usually done in tandem. The
surgery takes from 45 minutes to an
hour. Exostectomy involves shaving off
the bump of the toe joint. Then an oste-
otomy is done to solve the underlying
issue. A surgeon makes cuts along the
bone to realign the joint and inserts
pins or screws to hold the bone in
place. Sometimes a small piece of the
big toe’s bone might need to be
removed to help straighten the toe.
HAVING STRONG
MUSCLES IN OUR
FEET AND ANKLES
REDUCES OUR RISK
OF FALLING.
The good news is that the procedures
often require only a local anaesthetic.
And what was once a painful recovery
can be better managed with a continu-
ous nerve block. That’s when an anaes-
thetist puts a small tube into the back of
the knee that delivers freezing into the
nerve that connects to the foot in the
bunion area.
“The tube can remain in place for a
few days and provides excellent pain
control,” says Gartke. Full recovery—
when there is no more swelling or ten-
derness—takes from four to six months,
depending on the procedure and the
severity of the bunion.
rd.ca 79
reader ’s digest Health
Gubb had Miltchin remove his with
a surgery the podiatrist developed that
is quicker, less invasive and has a faster
recovery time. He trains other podia-
trists, as well as orthopaedic surgeons,
in the procedure, during which he uses
precision instruments to make small
cuts in the bones to bring the big toe
back into alignment.
Six weeks after his surgery in April
2022, Gubb was golfing again. By sum-
mer, he was running (and winning)
races, and he returned to playing
hockey and skating with his daughters
a few months later. He only wishes he’d
addressed his foot pain 10 years earlier.
Apart from bunions, Langer says, the
other common causes of foot pain that
drive people to his clinic include plan-
tar fasciitis, Achilles tendinitis and
osteoarthritis.
Plantar fasciitis is a stabbing heel
pain common in runners and dancers.
It is caused by inflammation of a band
of tissue—the plantar fascia—that runs
along the bottom of your foot, connect-
ing your heel to your toes. It’s not a
muscle, tendon or ligament, so it’s rigid
and can’t stretch.
Over time, microtears develop on the
tissue, causing pain. In people who
overpronate (roll their heel inward when
they walk), it’s worse because that cre-
ates even more tugging. Langer says
that an off-the-shelf insole may help to
relieve strain on the plantar fascia. If
that fails, orthotics may be considered.
Stretching, physiotherapy and icing the
area can also help relieve symptoms.
80 october 2023
Achilles tendinitis is an overuse
injury that causes pain in the Achilles
tendon, which connects your calf mus-
cles to your heel bone. Resting and
over-the-counter pain medications
help, as do physio stretching and
strengthening exercises. Orthotics that
elevate the heel can also relieve strain
on the tendon.
Another common culprit for foot
pain is osteoarthritis, which is typically
attributed to wear and tear. “One in six
people over the age of 50 have arthritis
in their feet, and, with 33 joints in each
foot, that can be an issue that limits
activity,” Langer says. Treatment
includes medications (such as acet-
aminophen and nonsteroidal anti-
inflammatory drugs like Advil and
Aleve), physical therapy, cortisone
injections or even joint replacement.
Keep Your Feet Happy
Sometimes, taking care of your feet and
preventing problems begins elsewhere
in your body. Dahlia Fahmy, a physio-
therapist and owner of Sports and
Ortho Physical Therapy in Chicago,
describes the body as “a kinetic chain.”
Every move we make creates a chain
reaction in our muscles, tendons, liga-
ments and joints.
“The foot is the driver of all move-
ment,” Fahmy says. “When the foot hits
the ground, everything else in the body
changes, and if a foot is dysfunctional,
it can drive everything up the chain to
be dysfunctional, too.” The key to a
healthy, stable foot, says Fahmy, is
strength in the glutes and mobility
through the hips and calves. “Our feet
need help from their friends above to
keep them working properly.”
Langer agrees, and frequently sends
his podiatry patients exercise informa-
tion and referrals to a physiotherapist
to work on strength-training calf mus-
cles, quads, hamstrings and glutes, as
well as the upper body. He points out
how important it is to strengthen the
muscles of the foot and ankle. “Numer-
ous studies show that having strong feet
reduces our risk of falling and helps
offset the natural deterioration of mus-
cle that starts around age 50.”
Scientists at the University of São
Paulo in Brazil concluded that strong
feet can reduce your risk of running-
related injuries by more than 50 percent.
To keep his own feet fit, Langer trains
the large muscles in his legs and the
small muscles in his feet with hill run-
ning and something called toe yoga.
“The idea is to first activate the muscles
of the foot, then progressively integrate
the muscle activation into more chal-
lenging movements, like going from
sitting to standing, then standing on
one foot, then hopping, then running.”
A good pose to start with: Stand so
your weight is evenly distributed
between your big toe, pinky and heel.
Then lift all five toes off the floor, spread
them as far apart as you can, and then
lay them back down, one toe at a time.
Langer, who has run more than 25
marathons, has long been fascinated by
rd.ca 81
reader ’s digest
how our feet carry us through the world.
“We don’t often think of our feet as sen-
sory organs, but they send a tremendous
amount of information to our brains to
help us maintain balance, adapt to dif-
ferent surfaces and move efficiently.”
He compares what happens when we
walk on a soft, sandy beach versus a
concrete sidewalk: Sand is unstable and
requires much more energy to move
over than a firm, flat surface, such as
concrete, he says, so “Our feet provide
the sensory input that allows our brains
to change the limb stiffness of our legs,
helping us optimize our movement pat-
terns for various surfaces.”
Walking outdoors has several health
benefits for our feet, one of the most
important of which, says Langer, is the
variety of terrain. “Uneven terrain
forces our joints to bend and flex to
adapt, and it requires our muscles and
neurologic system to work harder to
provide power and balance.” All of this
helps us maintain our range of motion,
strength and balance.
So it was welcome news last year that
Parks Canada joined PaRx, the coun-
try’s first national nature-prescription
program: doctors can now prescribe
time in national parks and conserva-
tion areas.
Regardless of the surface you do it on,
walking offers myriad health benefits.
Canadian researchers found it’s one of
the best—and most preferred—forms of
exercise for people with osteoporosis.
Plus, a study published in September
2022 in the Journal of the American
82 october 2023
Medical Association Internal Medicine
analyzed activity-tracker data from
78,500 people and found that brisk
walking for 30 minutes a day led to a
reduced risk of heart disease and cancer.
The Right Shoes
Despite research touting the benefits of
extra cushioning, Langer says there is
no magic shoe that is ideal for most
people. One of the biggest mistakes
people make, he says, is relying on
reviews or salespeople for recommen-
dations on the “best” shoes.
“Comfort is extremely important, but
comfort is complex and can’t be quan-
tified,” he says. “For example, I like a
cushy—but not too cushy—forefoot
and a wide, round toe box.” Trial and
error, and gut instinct, are his secrets to
successful shoe shopping.
Helen Branthwaite of the Royal Col-
lege of Podiatry is a senior lecturer in
clinical biomechanics at Staffordshire
University in the U.K. She has based
much of her research on her own pas-
sion for shoes and her interest in the
impact they have on foot mechanics
(sneakers are her favourite, though she
does own a pair of heels or two).
“Research shows that shoes affect
how we function,” Branthwaite says,
“and influence our movement and how
much pressure we put on our feet.” If
shoes aren’t comfortable the moment
you put them on, they’re best left on the
shelf. “The concept that you can wear a
shoe in, or that it will stretch, is non-
sense,” she adds.
 Health

Branthwaite, who has a podiatry
practice in Macclesfield, England, rec-
ommends that shoes match the shape
of your foot. So if you have a square-ish
foot, for example, look for similar-
shaped shoes. And arch support is key.
Some brands are developing styles to
accommodate common foot issues,
such as bunions.
Branthwaite also advises patients on
what to wear to solve foot problems,
whether it’s more cushioning for heel
pain or smooth inside seams for bun-
ion sufferers. “Sometimes the shoe
becomes the treatment,” she says.
One of Branthwaite’s patients was
suffering from such severe arch pain
that she could no longer walk her dog,
so Branthwaite had her replace her
flimsy ballet flats with sturdy, support-
ive boots.
In 2021, French researchers studied
the use of shoes specifically designed to
improve balance and stability in every-
one from athletes in training to people
over 65. They noted that more than 30
percent of people older than 65 fall each
year, and falls account for 90 percent of
hip fractures. The researchers con-
cluded that the shoes not only improved
balance but made people feel safer and
more stable when walking.
Gillian Parkinson, a retired speech
and language pathologist in Wilmslow,
England, can attest to the difference a
change in footwear can make. Parkin-
son recently turned 70 and was finding
walking increasingly difficult. She had
developed Achilles tendinitis and was
also rolling over on her ankles.
After a few unnerving falls, she went
to Branthwaite for help. The first thing
the podiatrist did was have Parkinson
switch up her shoes (replacing slip-on
loafers with shoes that had a Velcro fas-
tening and a sole with more contact
area to help with stability). Then she
added a heel-raising insert so Parkin-
son would be better balanced.
Not only did her Achilles tendinitis
disappear, but Parkinson began walk-
ing outside again, even tackling the
occasional hill. “Within about 50
metres of our home, my husband and I
can access a country lane. Or we drive
to a historic site where we can walk for
a couple of miles and reward ourselves
at a little café at the end,” she says.
“Therapeutically and psychologically,
walking does me good.”

Creative Expressions
Every child is an artist. The problem is how to
remain an artist once he grows up.
PABLO PICASSO

College isn’t the place to go for ideas.

HELEN KELLER

rd.ca 83
reader ’s digest

Paul Magder, co-founder

of Repair Café in Toronto,
fixing a humidifier.
 ENVIRONMENT
The
Revolution
BY Vanessa Milne
flora collingwood–norris was play-
ing with her new puppy, Stitch, while
wearing a favourite second-hand find:
a coral cashmere sweater. Stitch, an
excitable black poodle mix, jumped up
and grabbed her sleeve—and tore sev-
eral holes in it with her sharp teeth.
Collingwood-Norris, now 37, wasn’t
photo by Kosta Bratsos
DIY repairs are
making a big
comeback as
a remedy for
our throwaway
culture
about to toss the item out. “I can’t
bear to throw away nice clothing just
because of a hole,” she explains. As a
knitwear designer based in Galashiels,
Scotland, she was used to making her
own sweaters, but after she was left
with a handful that had Stitch-inflicted
holes, she decided to tackle a new skill:
mending. She began by reading a book
called Make Do and Mend, about the
innovative thriftiness that emerged
during World War II.
rd.ca 85
reader ’s digest Environment
Instead of trying to make the repair as
small as possible, she turned to “visible
mending,” a trend in repairing clothes
that leaves an intentionally obvious fix.
Sewers add flowers, bright plaid squares
or other small designs to damaged
clothes. “Every time you do a repair,
it’s like having a new garment in your
wardrobe,” says Collingwood-Norris.
She’s even started to repair other
things—including a hole in the uphol-
stery of the wide red sofa chair she’s
sitting on during our video interview.
Sadly, we have become accustomed
to replacing things instead of repairing
them—and the garbage is piling up.
Worldwide, we toss out 92 million
tonnes of textiles every year. Electronic
waste is another growing problem: An
estimated 50 million tonnes of it is cre-
ated each year around the world. In
Canada, e-waste has more than tripled
in the last 20 years, reaching nearly one
million tonnes in 2020.
The good news is that fixing things
can help solve the waste problem. It’s
part of a larger shift toward a circular
economy—the idea that instead of toss-
ing out items once they are broken or
out of date, we reuse, repair or refur-
bish them, keeping them out of the
landfill for as long as possible.
Approximately one-third of green-
house gas emissions come from man-
ufactured goods and consumables.
According to a 2023 report from Circle
Economy, a Netherlands-based NGO,
if the world switched to a circular econ-
omy, we could lower the amount of
86 october 2023
material we need to extract from nature
by a third.
Here’s how governments, grassroots
organizations and everyday people are
taking things into their own hands.
Right-to-Repair Legislation
While mending clothing is a skill any-
one can learn, repairing things like cell-
phones and appliances isn’t so easy. In
fact, some products are made in a way
that prevents consumers from doing
so. Companies such as Apple and Sam-
sung have even been fined for “planned
obsolescence”—designing products
that break easily or become outdated
quickly, forcing consumers to buy new
ones or purchase upgrades.
But a global “right to repair” move-
ment is pushing back against our dis-
posable culture. Consumers want to
be able to fix what they’ve bought—to
reduce their environmental footprint,
to save money or just on principle.
Governments are also playing a role
in shifting corporations from a use-it-
and-replace-it business model to one
that’s more repair friendly. In March,
the European Commission adopted a
right-to-repair directive, demanding,
among other things, that companies
sell replacement parts for five to 10
years after their products are sold.
Right-to-repair legislation has now
been filed in more than half of the U.S.
states; Australia passed a motor vehicle
right-to-repair law; India has pro-
posed a framework for mobile phones,
tablets, cars and farming equipment;
 Flora Collingwood-Norris
and some colourfully-
mended sweater sleeves.
and Canada has a proposed bill to
amend a copyright law that restricts
access to necessary repair information.
Legislative measures like these both
follow and fuel the public’s desire to
repair, says Ricardo Cepeda Marquez,
technical lead for Waste and Water for
C40, a global network that helps cities
fight climate change. “Repairing is a
great opportunity to become aware of
our collective consumption and the
urgent need to reduce waste.”
COURTESY OF FLORA COLLINGWOOD-NORRIS
Online Repair Manuals
There was a time when people fixed
things themselves or called their local
repair shop. But as more items were
manufactured overseas and prices
dropped, replacing even a big purchase
like an appliance became more conve-
nient than repairing it.
That’s changing, in part due to
information now available online. The
popular how-to site iFixit.com has facil-
itated more than 100 million repairs.
iFixit began in the early 2000s, after its
co-founder and CEO, California-based
Kyle Wiens, dropped his Apple laptop,
breaking it. He discovered there were
no repair instructions available. With
help from his classmate and iFixit
co-founder Luke Soules, Wiens, who
had spent his childhood taking apart
radios and appliances with his grand-
father, managed to fix his computer
through trial and error. He and Soules
wrote a manual based on that experi-
ence and posted it to a website they
created called iFixit.com.
Twenty years later, iFixit has grown
into a database with nearly 100,000
repair manuals for everything from
electronics to clothing to appliances.
And its mission has gone mainstream.
rd.ca 87
reader ’s digest
“We’re now seeing manufacturers
show interest in making it possible for
users to repair things,” says Elizabeth
Chamberlain, director of sustainability
for iFixit. Companies like Google, Micro-
soft, Samsung, Motorola, HP, Patagonia
and the North Face are selling official
parts and sharing their repair guides
through iFixit.
“We have this vision of a world where
repair is the expectation for all things
that are made,” says Chamberlain.
Repair Cafés
The first Repair Café opened in 2009 in
Amsterdam, offering in-person fix-it
help. The volunteer-run network now
has more than 2,700 locations—includ-
ing in Belgium, Canada, Germany,
France, India, Japan, the U.K. and the
U.S. Organizers set up events, and vol-
unteers with repair knowledge bring
their toolboxes, 3-D printers, sewing
machines and bookbinding equipment
to places like libraries and community
centres. They will try to fix whatever
people bring in, for free, and teach vis-
itors how to do repairs themselves.
“It is a very social event, with lots of
discussions about what is being fixed,
and about the whole idea of repair,”
says Paul Magder, the co-founder of a
Repair Café in Toronto, adding that he
thinks a big draw is the sense of com-
munity. Magder, who has been organiz-
ing Repair Café events for a decade, has
seen the demand for repairs and the
number of volunteers steadily growing.
While interest among all age groups
88 october 2023
is on the rise, there is a shortage of
repairers in their 20s and 30s. “Repair-
ing requires skills that younger people
don’t have, simply because they lack
experience,” says Christophe Gatt,
president of Repair Cafés Paris. “This is
why we try to share our knowledge.” In
late 2022, the group launched the first
Repair Café for children ages five and
up, with workshop themes such as
tools, soldering and sewing.
A WHOPPING THREE-
FIFTHS OF CLOTHING
ENDS UP IN A
LANDFILL WITHIN A
YEAR OF PRODUCTION.
In addition to going home with a
coffee maker or toaster that’s working
again, visitors to Repair Cafés leave
with a better understanding of how
things function, says Gatt. “And when
we understand how something works,
we use it better. We ‘consume’ in a
more responsible way.”
Fixable Cellphones
Cellphones are one of the most dis-
carded electronic items. That’s why
Fairphone tried to disrupt the industry
starting in 2013. The Dutch social
enterprise wanted to show that it was
possible to produce an ethical smart-
phone that could be repaired.
Their smartphones sell for €579 across

most of Europe. Customers can fix their
own phones with replacement parts—
such as cameras, batteries and speak-
ers—purchased from the company’s
website. Installation guides are readily
available, and the only tool required is
a small precision screwdriver (the kind
used for glasses or watch repairs).
Some larger companies are now fol-
lowing Fairphone’s lead. In March, Finn-
ish telecom company Nokia released the
G22, a smartphone designed to be easily
repairable at home. It sells for less than
$240, with repair parts starting at $32
(it’s currently only available in Europe
and Australia.) Since the phones can be
disassembled, they’re easier to recycle;
materials like batteries, which can’t be
recycled, can be separated from com-
ponents like metal cases.
Last year, technology giant Apple
introduced self-service repair options.
Customers who want to fix their own
device can go online to rent a repair kit,
check out repair manuals and buy the
part they need, be it a new screen, bat-
tery or camera lens. And to help facilitate
DIY repairs, newer smartphone models,
like the iPhone 14, are designed to be
easier to open than previous models.
Soon all smartphones might have
longer lives: Once approved, the EU’s
right-to-repair directive will include a
mandate that batteries be easier to
remove and replace.
Responsible Fashion
A few decades ago, “fast fashion” came
into vogue, encouraging consumers to
Environment
keep up with changing trends by offering
cheaper clothes. It has been disastrous
for the environment. A whopping three-
fifths of clothing ends up in a landfill or
incinerator within a year of production.
Plus, clothing production requires a lot
of water—it can take 7,500 litres to make
a pair of jeans, for example.
Responding is “slow fashion,” which
celebrates high-quality handmade
clothes created locally. As well, more
consumers are choosing to buy “pre-
loved” clothing via social media groups,
consumer websites or vintage stores.
And, like Flora Collingwood-Norris,
people are increasingly mending their
own clothing so it lasts longer.
The coral sweater her dog Stitch tore
into was patched with bright polka-
dots, and the elbows were mended with
circular sunsets and flying-bird silhou-
ettes. The sweater has become part of
an exhibit at a museum in Devon, U.K.,
about clothing repair throughout his-
tory to the modern day.
Collingwood-Norris now runs mend-
ing classes on Zoom for people around
the world. She also shares advice with
her 100,000+ Instagram followers, and
published a book, Visible Creative
Mending for Knitwear, in 2021.
She’s happy that repairing one’s
own clothes is becoming popular
once again.
“It sort of skipped a couple of genera-
tions, but it’s really exciting to see it com-
ing back,” she says. “It gives me optimism
for the future that there is a willingness
to change and reassess habits.”
rd.ca 89
 BONUS READ

IN THE
BA L A N C E
R E A L - L I F E S T O R I E S BY
A LEADING NEUROSURGEON
BY Dr. Christopher Honey FROM THE TENTH NERVE

photographs by Jackie Dives

 reader ’s digest

E
reader ’s digest
FOR MOST
PEOPLE,
neurosurgery is a mysterious, high-stakes
profession—but that’s part of the rea-
son I was drawn to it as a curious child
and, eventually, as a medical intern and
PhD student.
And while surgeons are trained to be
detached and rational, some patients
have left an indelible mark on my soul.
Here are the stories of two who pro-
foundly changed my understanding of
both medicine and myself—and of what
it means to be human.
Jeff
In the fall of 1986, I was an intern at St.
Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, having
just finished medical school at the Uni-
versity of Toronto and begun a one-year
clinical rotation to complete my quali-
fications. My internship was designed
to provide exposure to a variety of spe-
cialties. I had spent two months each in
emergency, obstetrics, pediatrics, inter-
nal medicine and psychiatry. I was now
trying the field of surgery.
As a naive 10-year-old, I had found
neurosurgery appealing, but now, as an
intern at age 25, I was learning its real-
ities. I was on call for the first time, work-
ing all night and the next day. I began
to question if it was right for me.
That doubt was allayed one night in
the ER when a patient named Jeff arrived
by ambulance. Jeff was a 19-year-old
construction worker who had fallen 20
feet from scaffolding while installing
windows in a new hotel. The paramed-
ics had found him on his back, uncon-
scious but breathing, and had trans-
ported him to St. Mike’s on a spine board
with a neck collar.
My pager beeped and I headed for the
trauma bay. The physician in charge
was Grant Drysdale*, an emergency doc-
tor in his early 50s, short, lean, with
grey frizzled hair. Wearing a white lab
coat, its pockets filled with instruments,
he was being briefed by a paramedic.
“No medical history. Vitals stable.
Glasgow score was three at the scene
but 14 in the ambulance.” The Glas-
gow Coma Scale is a numeric repre-
sentation of the level of consciousness:
from three (deeply comatose) to 15 (fully
alert). Our patient was a 14, meaning
alert but confused.
In obvious pain and moaning loudly
through clenched teeth, he fought with
everyone. His eyes were squeezed shut
from the pain. The board he lay on
and the white cervical collar around his
neck were to keep his spine immobi-
lized. He was moving all four limbs,
suggesting he did not have an obvious
spinal cord injury.
I stood behind Dr. Drysdale, waiting
to be told what to do.
The orderly ran large, orange-handled
scissors up one pant leg and a moment
*NAME HAS BEEN CHANGED

later Jeff’s shirt was open. Two nurses,
one on each side, pushed intravenous
(IV) lines into his arms. Then they stuck
electrocardiogram leads on his chest and
put a small white pulse oximeter on his
finger. The monitor began to beep with
each heartbeat at a pitch proportional
to the amount of oxygen in his blood.
The beep had a reassuringly high pitch.
A blood pressure cuff was wrapped
around his upper right arm; the reading,
105/55, was lower than it should be, but
not alarming. His heart rate was 130
and his respiratory rate was 26—both
higher than normal but not surprising
for a patient in pain.
DR. DRYSDALE WAS
VISIBLY SHAKEN.
WE HAD ONLY FIVE
MINUTES BEFORE THE
PATIENT WOULD DIE.
Drysdale assessed the victim’s air-
way, breathing and circulation. Every-
thing was okay. He spoke to him, “Can
you tell me your name?”
The patient spoke through his
clenched teeth, “Jeff …”
“Jeff, where does it hurt?”
“My back, my back … my f—— back.”
The words were muffled, but it was
clear to everyone where the pain was
and how much he had.
“I’m going to examine you to make
sure you don’t have any broken bones,”
Bonus Read
Drysdale said. He moved quickly through
Jeff’s scalp, face, jaw, chest and abdo-
men, before methodically squeezing
up and down each arm and leg.
“We need to roll him,” he announced,
and all the players took their positions.
Everyone stood on Jeff ’s right side
except Drysdale. One nurse held the
head, another reached across his chest
to hold his left arm, the orderly reached
across his legs to hold his left thigh,
and I stood motionless not knowing
what to do.
Drysdale looked at me and said, “Grab
his legs.” I moved beside the orderly and
held Jeff’s ankles. Drysdale counted,
“On three. Ready, one … two … three.”
Everyone rolled Jeff toward them so
Drysdale could see his back while keep-
ing the spine straight.
After palpating Jeff’s back, from below
the collar to his tailbone, Drysdale said,
“Wait a second. What’s that?” He was
looking at Jeff’s back. “There’s a one-
inch cut between the ribs on the left.”
Reaching into the thin wound, he found
a piece of glass and started pulling it
out as Jeff moaned louder. It was out,
and Drysdale stood up and held up the
bloodied shard. It was as long as a steak
knife and slightly wider.
“Roll him back, and call thoracics!”
he yelled out to the charting nurse. The
volume of his voice underlined the
urgency of his request for the thoracic
surgery team, who dealt with serious
chest injuries.
We slowly rolled Jeff back. The
moment he lay flat on his back, he went
rd.ca 93
reader ’s digest
limp and stopped moaning. His arms fell
to his sides. I was still holding his ankles,
but now his feet, which had been point-
ing straight up, were flopped open.
“What’s his pressure?” barked Drys-
dale. The nurse inflated the cuff and,
after what seemed like an eternity, said,
“I’ve got nothing.”
Drysdale demanded two litres of
saline and four units of O-negative
blood, the blood type that can be given
to anyone. It arrived in the hands of a
breathless orderly and soon was flow-
ing into Jeff’s left arm.
Drysdale was visibly shaken. The
patient was in trouble, and there were
only about five minutes to figure out
the problem before he would die. Jeff
was deeply unconscious, motionless
and unresponsive. Drysdale, standing
on the patient’s left side, grabbed his
shoulder, squeezed it and yelled at him,
“Jeff, open your eyes!”
There was no response. He grabbed
Jeff’s left nipple, squeezed and turned
it, and yelled again, “Does that hurt?”
Nothing. Without any blood pressure
to perfuse it, Jeff’s brain had stopped
working. “We’ll tube him,” Drysdale
told the nurse.
Drysdale was going to intubate the
patient because in an unconscious per-
son the tongue can relax into the throat
and cut off air to the lungs. He opened
Jeff’s mouth with a metal-bladed laryn-
goscope and slid an endotracheal tube
down his throat. Then the tube was con-
nected to a ventilator to breathe for him.
Four minutes left.
94 october 2023
Drysdale listened to Jeff’s chest
with his stethoscope. With each
pump of the ventilator, he could
hear air filling both lungs. There
was no airway problem. Circula-
tion, however, was catastrophically
impaired. “What’s his pressure?”
“Nothing,” the nurse responded.
I stepped away from the foot of
the bed to stay out of the way but
be ready to help when told what
to do. This was no longer a learn-
ing moment where a mentor would
stop to teach you some important
point. A life was slipping away and
only Drysdale could save him. We
were his extra pairs of hands, not
his partners.
Three minutes.
“Why’s he got no pressure?”
Drysdale said aloud. He glanced
up at the electrocardiogram (ECG),
seeing what looked like a flat line
from where he was standing.
“Start compressions,” he commanded,
and the team immediately moved to
begin CPR—cardiopulmonary resusci-
tation. The bed was lowered and the
nurse on Jeff’s right side stood up on
a footstool and leaned down on the
patient’s chest with both her arms
straight, hands on top of one another
with her fingers clasped. She leaned the
heel of her hands hard into the middle
of Jeff’s chest and counted, “One and
two and three and four, and five and six
and seven and eight ….”
Each compression pushed Jeff’s chest
down against his spine and squeezed

his heart, mimicking a heartbeat. The
compressions forced whatever blood
was in his heart to move out into the
aorta and around his body, thanks to
the heart’s one-way valve system.
After 15 compressions, the respira-
tory therapist squeezed the ventilation
bag and pushed two large breaths into
the patient’s lungs. The endotracheal
tube had been disconnected from the
ventilator and attached to a bag of oxy-
gen so the breaths could be coordinated
with the chest compressions. After 30
compressions, another two breaths.
“Hold compressions.” Drysdale
Bonus Read
reached for Jeff’s neck. He tried to find
the carotid pulse to see if his heart was
working and moved his fingers around
above the neck collar in several places.
Drysdale looked up at the ECG rhythm
and saw a flat line. No heart activity.
Two minutes.
“Restart compressions.” He still could
not find a pulse. “Give me a shot of ‘epi’
and be prepared to shock him.” The
nurse injected into the IV one milli-
gram of epinephrine—the injectable
form of adrenalin, the powerful hor-
mone that gives the heart a boost of
energy. The defibrillator was brought
rd.ca 95
reader ’s digest
in, but Drysdale knew that someone
with no heart activity (“asystole”) would
not respond to its shock. He wanted it
ready in case the rhythm changed to
something shockable.
The nurse pushed down on Jeff’s chest
and the respiratory therapist squeezed
air into his lungs. Drysdale held Jeff’s
wrists to measure the degree of pulsa-
tion in his radial artery. “Deeper com-
pressions,” Drysdale commanded. The
nurse put the full weight of her shoul-
ders into the compressions, but the doc-
tor could not feel much pulsation.
THE GLASS SHARD
HAD CUT INTO JEFF’S
HEART LIKE A DAGGER,
BUT IT HAD PLUGGED
ITS OWN HOLE.
“Deeper!” Drysdale was not pleased,
but the nurse was maxing out her effort.
“Chris! Take over compression.” He
flashed a glance at me. I moved next to
the nurse, ready to crush Jeff’s chest.
My own adrenalin had charged my mus-
cles. I began, counting aloud up to 15
and then a pause for the two breaths. I
was standing on the footstool and star-
ing straight ahead at the ECG monitor
only a few feet in front of me.
After a few cycles Drysdale said,
“Hold compressions!” and we froze in
position. I stared at the monitor and
saw a faint tracing of a pulse. It had
96 october 2023
the characteristic shape of an ECG trac-
ing, but the amplitude was reduced
almost to a flat line.
“Asystole,” Drysdale called out.
“Resume compressions.”
“No!” I shouted. “He has a rhythm.”
“What?” Drysdale was as surprised
that I would contradict him as he was
that I thought there was a rhythm. The
room was silent. The protocol does not
allow for discussion or dissent. Every-
one was staring at me, but I just looked
at Drysdale and spoke directly to him.
“There’s a rhythm, I can see it,” I
assured him.
Drysdale hadn’t been able to see it
because the monitor was above his head
and his bifocals showed him only the
details below his nose. Now, he moved
right up to the monitor, lifted his glasses
and tilted his head way back.
“Agree,” he announced. He was calmer
than I was and emotionless in his tone.
There was no “Congratulations!” or “How
dare you?” It was just the right answer
and now the protocol changed.
“EMD!” Drysdale called out. “Another
shot of epi.”
Electromechanical dissociation (EMD)
occurs when there is electrical activity
in the heart but no coordinated pulsa-
tion to push any blood. The chance of
survival is 20 percent.
One minute.
“Resume compressions,” Drysdale
ordered, and I leaned down hard on
Jeff’s chest. We had begun another cycle
when the doctor yelled “Stop!” In a flash
of intuition, Drysdale had suddenly

understood exactly what was happen-
ing to Jeff. He pulled open the stiff cer-
vical collar around the patient’s neck.
Jeff’s neck veins were engorged with
blood, standing out like ropes under
his skin. Drysdale was directly opposite
me. He turned to look at me over the
top of his glasses and said, “Cardiac
tamponade!”
The diagnosis explained everything
and, more importantly, it had a treat-
ment. The heart is surrounded by an
empty sac called the pericardium,
which allows it to beat without rub-
bing against anything else. If the sac
fills with blood, however, the heart is
squeezed smaller. It can still beat but it
cannot fill with much blood between
each beat. The output of the heart, its
pulse, gets weaker and weaker until the
heart cannot fill at all. The glass shard
had cut into Jeff’s heart like a dagger
but had plugged its own hole. When the
shard was removed, the ruptured heart
began squirting blood into the pericar-
dial sac, choking the muscle closed.
The cure was to relieve the pressure
around the heart by draining the fluid
in the pericardial sac.
“Cardiocentesis needle,” Drysdale
ordered, and the nurse flew to the
shelves at the back of the trauma bay
and returned with a small rectangular
box wrapped in sterile green cloth.
Drysdale looked at me and said, “Ster-
ile gloves. Prep the belly.” He opened
the tray and put it between Jeff’s legs as
I gloved and rubbed his lower chest and
abdomen with brown iodine, which
Bonus Read
pooled in his belly button. I wondered
why Drysdale was asking me to be
involved at this crucial stage. Perhaps it
was a small reward for seeing the rhythm.
Drysdale connected the cardiocen-
tesis syringe to a needle that was at
least a foot long. He attached one of the
ECG wires to the needle with an alliga-
tor clip and then turned to me. “Stand
here. Enter here. Aim for his right shoul-
der.” Drysdale was pointing to a spot
just below Jeff’s lowest left rib.
“I THINK I GOT IT,”
I SAID, AND STARTED
PULLING ON THE
PLUNGER. EVERYONE IN
THE ROOM WAS SILENT.
I was stunned that he wanted me to
do this but immediately walked around
to Jeff ’s left side, took hold of the
mother of all needles, then pushed
the tip in exactly where Drysdale had
pointed. The skin puckered inwards,
then gave way as the needle plunged
through. I was aiming for Jeff’s shoul-
der, and his heart was somewhere
along the way.
“When you feel the heart, stop and
suck back.” Drysdale’s instructions were
simple, but I had no idea what the heart
would feel like at the end of a long needle.
“If the ECG fires, you’re in too deep,”
he added. That made sense because the
needle would cause the heart to fire,
rd.ca 97
reader ’s digest
and the ECG wire connected to the nee-
dle would detect that electrical impulse.
Unexpectedly, I did feel the needle
push on the pericardial sac and then
pop through. “I think I got it,” I said and
started to pull back on the plunger.
Everyone in the room was silent and
staring at the syringe. I pulled harder
on the plunger. It stuck momentarily
and then gave way and glided back.
Dark red blood flowed easily into the
barrel. After 30cc, the plunger stopped.
It was sucking against something and
no more blood came.
Jeff sat bolt upright.
98 october 2023
The needle was still six inches into
his chest. I let go of the blood-filled
syringe and jumped back, lifting my
arms like a criminal at gunpoint. Jeff
reached up to the endotracheal tube in
his mouth and ripped it out.
“I’m Jeff Sageman* and my back is
killing me!” he yelled. No one moved.
We were dumbfounded and frozen in
disbelief.
Only Drysdale remained calm and
knew what to do.
“Okay, Jeff, just lie down and we’ll take
care of you,” he said, as he put his hand on
Jeff’s chest and pushed him to lie flat. I

was still standing with my arms up in sur-
render when the senior resident in tho-
racics arrived and announced himself.
“Hi. Mike Phoenix *. Thoracics. What’s
up?” he asked Drysdale.
Drysdale summarized the case suc-
cinctly. Phoenix looked at the needle
with the blood-filled syringe still in Jeff’s
chest. “I’ll call the OR,” was all he said,
and started to walk backwards towards
the phone, still looking at Jeff.
Then Jeff fainted again. Drysdale felt
for his pulse at the neck. Nothing.
“Chris. Once more,” he looked at me.
I pulled on the syringe, but no more
blood came. I moved the needle
in and out, still pulling, but noth-
ing came. Phoenix was suddenly
beside me, pushing me away. He
pulled the needle right out of Jeff
and squirted all the blood onto
the blankets between his legs,
then pushed the needle back
through his upper abdomen but
it banged up against his lowest
rib. Then he angled the needle
downwards and slipped it under
the rib, pushing the needle to its
hilt. A foot of metal pierced Jeff’s
chest. Keeping suction on the
syringe, he pulled the needle
back slowly. No blood squirted
into the barrel.
Without hesitating, he pierced
Jeff again. Nothing.
“Open the thoracotomy tray,”
he called out, and the nurse
rushed over to the shelf. The
*NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED
Bonus Read
rarely used tray was right at the bottom.
“We have to crack the chest,” he told
Drysdale. “He won’t make it to the
OR.” Drysdale moved to the head of the
gurney and Phoenix moved to the left
side of the bed. While Phoenix put on
gloves and poured iodine on Jeff’s chest,
Drysdale intubated him again. Then
Phoenix took a scalpel and cut deeply
between Jeff’s left fifth and sixth ribs;
the incision curved around his chest
from below his nipple towards his side.
He then pushed his hand in between
the ribs and inserted a rib spreader—
two flat metal blades with a crank that
allows them to be ratcheted apart.
Phoenix then pushed Jeff’s lung away
with his left hand. There was no way to
see inside the deep hole in Jeff’s chest, so
Phoenix used his fingertips to feel for
the heart. When he found it, he reached
for the scalpel with his right hand and
it completely disappeared into the hole.
Phoenix cut a window in the pericardium
to relieve the tamponade on the heart.
“Okay,” he said as if the problem was
solved, but Jeff remained motionless.
“No pulse,” Drysdale said from the
head of the bed with his fingers on
Jeff’s neck.
“Let the heart fill,” Phoenix responded.
“No pulse,” Drysdale returned, not
waiting very long. Jeff was dying again.
Phoenix reached back into Jeff’s chest
and held his heart in his left hand. He
squeezed his fingers towards his palm
and rhythmically squished Jeff’s heart.
Open cardiac massage—I had never
before seen this done.
rd.ca 99
reader ’s digest
“I need to call the OR,” said Phoenix
and looked at me. “Squeeze his heart.”
I moved behind Dr. Phoenix and
waited for his instructions. He just
pulled his hand out and walked away.
No instructions.
I pushed my gloved left hand through
the tight space between Jeff’s ribs and
it popped inside. His ribs squeezed my
forearm and I could feel his heart like a
chicken breast. I reached around it and
pressed it against my palm. It refilled as
I let go. I squeezed again and it refilled.
This was working.
“Good compressions,” Drysdale
reported, his finger on Jeff ’s carotid
artery. Emboldened, I squeezed harder.
Each time, Jeff’s heart refilled with blood
and swelled larger, moving more blood
forwards through his aorta and around
his body. Suddenly, I had a horrible
thought—what if I put my fingers through
his heart? I squeezed more gently and
looked up at Drysdale.
He nodded reassuringly. “Good com-
pressions.” I think he knew what I was
thinking.
Then I felt Jeff’s heart come alive. It
started to beat inside my hand. I held
still and felt it move with a twisting
power, beating on its own. I had flushed
enough oxygenated blood through to
feed his heart and get it started again.
I left my hand in place, scared any
movement would undo things. I looked
at Drysdale and said, “I’ve stopped, but
he’s going,” and waited for instruction.
He said, “Out.” I pulled my hand out.
Drysdale said, “Good pulse,” and
100 october 2023
covered the gaping chest wound with a
wet green towel.
Phoenix returned and said, “The OR
is ready. We’re taking him.” With that
the orderlies wheeled Jeff away to the
operating room, surrounded by nurses
scuttling sideways with the stretcher
and a respiratory therapist squeezing
the bag blowing air into his lungs.
I looked at Phoenix and called out to
him, “Will he be okay?”
IT WAS THE MOST
EXHILARATING THING
I’D EVER EXPERIENCED,
THE MOST REWARDING
HOUR OF MY LIFE.
Phoenix looked at me and changed my
life forever. “Yeah, he just has a hole in his
heart.” The surgeons would suture the
hole in Jeff’s heart, and he would leave
hospital 11 days later. Problem solved.
There was no team debrief. The charge
nurse simply handed me another chart.
I have no idea who that next patient was
or what their problem was. All I could
think about was getting home and tell-
ing my wife, Karla, about the drama of
my day. The brief surgery that allowed
me to massage Jeff’s heart was the most
exhilarating thing I had ever experi-
enced, the most rewarding hour of my
life. This man had died twice, and lived.
This was how I wanted to spend my
life. Surgery was the right path for me.

Saika
By 2014, I’d been a neurosurgeon for 25
years. No patient of mine had died after
an elective operation, and I was proud
of my winning streak. I saw my goal as
operating without complication, not
necessarily improving a patient’s life.
But a baby boy in Africa taught me to
see purpose in helping the patient yet
losing to the disease. To see that medi-
cal learning and discovery is not just a
science—it’s also an art.
In the spring of 2014, I landed in
Monrovia, Liberia’s capital, as part of
an international aid mission that would
perform the first neurosurgical opera-
tions in the West African country.
The Korle-Bu Neuroscience Founda-
tion was supporting this effort. A group
of nurses and physicians, initially from
where I worked, Vancouver General Hos-
pital, had helped set up and equip a
neurosurgery service in nearby Ghana.
Now the foundation’s director wanted
to put a satellite clinic in Liberia.
The foundation had sent an African
neurosurgeon from Nigeria to the Jack-
son F. Doe hospital a month earlier to see
patients and identify some for surgery.
The hospital, in Tappita, a six-hour drive
east of the capital, had Liberia’s only CT
scanner. At least a dozen people were
now waiting for neurosurgery if condi-
tions were right for me to proceed. This
would be their only chance for the sur-
gery they needed.
The hospital was a white, square two-
storey structure with a red tile roof and
Bonus Read
a paved courtyard at its centre. It was
hot and humid; there was air condi-
tioning in the operating rooms and the
staff lounge, but not on the wards. At
the back of the compound was a large
locked shed humming with two diesel
generators that provided the hospital
with electricity. They ran one at a time,
12 hours each.
Among the cases we would operate
on were two infant boys with massively
enlarged heads characteristic of hydro-
cephalus. That’s a condition where
the flow of cerebro-spinal fluid (CSF)
through the brain is blocked and the
fluid builds up. CSF is a clear, water-like
fluid produced within the ventricles
(cavities) of the brain, and flows around
the organ, allowing it to float inside the
skull. If there is a blockage en route,
fluid builds up and the ventricles dilate,
crushing the brain against the skull.
A baby’s skull is made of separate
bones that, to allow the brain to grow,
do not fuse for several years. The gaps
between these bones, called fontanelles,
feel like the soft spot on the top of any
baby’s head. If hydrocephalus begins
before their skull has fused, the infant’s
head will balloon in size. Before the
1950s, the condition and its treatment
were often lethal.
But the two babies had very different
prognoses. A CT scan of Joshua, nine
months old, showed enlarged ventri-
cles that were pushing outwards and
enlarging his skull. He would benefit
from a ventricular-peritoneal shunt,
which regulates the flow of CSF, and I
rd.ca 101
reader ’s digest
had brought one from Vancouver. He
seemed otherwise healthy and happy.
The second baby, Saika, was far worse
off. Also nine months old, he could not
lift his enlarged head off the crib. The
brown skin of his scalp was stretched
paper thin, and every vein was visible
beneath its translucent surface. His
young mother lived in a small village
with no running water about three days’
walk from the hospital.
A nurse told me that Saika had been
treated by the local healer. When his
head began to grow, the healer wrapped
it in a plaster of mud, manure and
straw. The mixture turned rock-hard in
the sun, and the helmet limited skull
growth. But the pressure inside Saika’s
head eventually broke the plaster. It
must have been excruciatingly pain-
ful. I knew, as an outsider, that I held
Western biases and should not judge,
but when I heard this story and imag-
ined the child’s unnecessary suffering,
I could not regard the traditional healer
with equanimity.
Saika’s CT head scan was so abnor-
mal that it was difficult to pick out the
normal structures. Most of his brain
was compressed by a grapefruit-sized
cyst of fluid on the right side. All the
ventricles were enlarged, and pushed
into the left side of the head. There was
a small ribbon of abnormal brain sur-
rounding everything, and the combina-
tion of the cyst fluid and enlarged
ventricles had pushed the skull bones
open, causing the massive head. He
could not be saved.
102 october 2023
When we met to choose
which of the boys would be
operated on next, the decision
was clear: Joshua. His surgery
went well, and we were done
by lunchtime. The follow-up
CT scan showed the shunt was
in an ideal location and had
begun to decompress his ven-
tricles. Joshua could go home
in a few days.
Our team met that evening
to discuss our plans for the
next day. To my surprise, the
Nigerian neurosurgeon sug-
gested we operate on Saika.
I outlined why this would
be futile. Saika had a serious
infection and we had no way
of culturing the pathogen to
choose the correct antibiotic.
The infection probably came
from the manure that had been
wrapped around his head, the bacteria
having entered through his thin scalp.
We didn’t have strong enough antibiot-
ics to handle an infection from bowel
bacteria. Even if we did, we couldn’t
provide a long-enough course.
A closer look at the images of his brain
showed multiple smaller abscesses,
and we had no way to drain them all.
The infection would have already
damaged his brain, and it was highly
unlikely he would survive in his village.
I was categorical in my conclusion. We
were not going to operate on Saika.
This child was going to die and there
was nothing we could do about it.

My Nigerian colleague patiently
explained why it was important to try:
“We can fail. Africans are used to med-
icine failing. There is no cure for Ebola,
for instance. But the village needs to
know we thought it was a medical prob-
lem. If we stand back, they will think
we believed there was something else
wrong with him. They will cast the
mother out of the village. They will think
the boy has been possessed and that
there is some evil in his mother for her
to have a child like this. Even she will
believe she has done something wrong.”
Everyone in the room was nodding
while he spoke. I was dumbstruck. I had
Bonus Read
never formulated a treatment around
how society felt about a patient and
his mother. They all looked at me. All I
could say was, “Wow. I’d never thought
about it like that.” It did not take me
long to agree that we should try to help
this boy. The details of how we would
do so, however, were unclear. It was
medically unsound.
I looked at Saika’s CT scan again, and
eventually concocted a far-fetched but
plausible plan.
“We could try to drain the main fluid
collection on the right side of the brain,”
I said. “He might get temporary relief
and we would be more certain of the
rd.ca 103
reader ’s digest
diagnosis. If it is an abscess, we will
know the prognosis is lethal.”
Saika arrived at 9 the next morning,
washed and changed by his mother and
the nurse. Too weak to cry, he was laid
on his back on a small table covered in
green towels.
I explained the plan to everyone in
the room. First, we’d put some anaes-
thetic in his scalp; he was too weak for
a general anaesthetic. “Then I will push
a large needle into the part of his skull
where I think the abnormal fluid is,” I
said. “Then I’ll withdraw the syringe
plunger to pull out whatever fluid is
there.” The brain doesn’t feel pain when
it is touched. Saika would not suffer.
I took a number of measurements off
the CT and marked the spot on Saika’s
head where I thought we should go
through his scalp. I studied the images
again to understand the depth and direc-
tion of the needle and how the fluid
would then distort the brain after I began
to remove it. Brain shift, with a needle
deep inside the skull, could be disastrous.
When we were ready to begin, I gently
washed Saika’s scalp with warm water
and soap. The skin looked very fragile,
so I did not scrub hard. Then I applied
dark-brown iodine solution, and after
it dried, I put a small amount of local
anaesthetic underneath the skin with a
tiny syringe. Saika did not cry. A nurse
handed me a syringe attached to a
thick, two-inch-long needle. I bent
over the baby, resting the back of my
left hand on his head and holding the
syringe in both hands.
104 october 2023
“Okay, here we go,” I announced, and
started to advance the needle’s sharp
tip towards Saika’s skin.
That’s when the lights went out, sub-
merging us in darkness. It was early
morning, but the operating room had
no windows.
“What the hell?” the anesthesiolo-
gist blurted. I pulled back. I had not yet
pierced Saika’s head. All the monitors
started to beep as they switched over to
battery power. The noise was deafen-
ing, particularly in the dark.
I WENT TO SEE HOW
SAIKA WAS DOING.
HE WAS MORE ACTIVE,
AND COULD NOW
CRY WITH STRENGTH.
Four or five minutes later, the lights
came back on. Shortly after, someone
in dirt-stained overalls peered around
the doorway of the operating room and
said, “Don’t worry. We just switched
over the generator.” The alarm on each
monitor was eventually turned off, and
gradually the operating room returned
to normal. Saika continued to breathe,
oblivious to the near disaster.
I leaned over Saika again. The needle
pierced his skin and penetrated deep
into his brain. At the one-inch mark, I
paused and pulled back the plunger.
The syringe filled with a thick green
fluid. It was easy to get 50cc. I twisted

the syringe off the needle and emptied
the fluid into a kidney basin. It was
definitely an abscess.
I reconnected the syringe and pulled
out another 50cc. Then another 50, and
another. I had estimated that the volume
of the cyst before surgery was at least
half a litre (500cc). Saika’s head began to
collapse. The next pull of the syringe had
resistance—something was blocking
the flow of pus into the needle, proba-
bly the brain collapsing into the evacu-
ated space. I repositioned the needle
further backwards and deeper, pulled
out another 50cc and then stopped. I
did not want a huge brain shift, which
could tear some of the blood vessels.
I put a small bandage on Saika’s scalp
where the needle had been. We would
let the infant recover and then reimage
his brain. He was swaddled and bundled
off to the recovery room and was back
in his mother’s arms a few hours later.
That evening I went with the medical
team to see how Saika was doing. His
mother burst into tears of delight when
she saw us. Saika was much brighter
and more active since the surgery, she
told me. He could cry with strength,
and his cry sounded more like it did
when he could lift his head.
Everyone on our team was beaming
and the mood was joyous. Everyone
except me was truly happy. I knew Saika
would die in a few weeks.
I spoke to his mother through a nurse
who translated. “We are proud of how
strong Saika is and how well he did
during surgery,” I began. “An infection
Bonus Read
made his head grow. I’ve removed some
of the infection, but it’s strong and he
is very young.” Her eyes pierced mine
when she asked, “Can you do more?”
“No,” I replied.
She bowed her head and turned away.
She sat down in a chair beside the crib
and looked at Saika and then up at me.
“Thank you,” came the translation. She
did not cry. She picked up her son and
held him, rocking him back and forth
in her arms. She understood.
Saika and his mother were welcomed
back to their village a few days later. The
nurses covered my small bandage with
a very, very large dressing that wrapped
around his head like a turban. It was
clear to everyone that he had had a med-
ical procedure—a brain operation.
Normally I get to see my patients
after surgery in follow-up and learn
how they did. But Saika was a three-day
walk away—I would not hear anything
further about him.
Back at home, I thought about Saika
a lot. His brief time in this world was
painful, but he would surely die in his
mother’s arms, surrounded by members
of his village who no longer believed he
was possessed by evil spirits. Social
progress was made. A life was saved:
Saika’s mother’s life. My co-workers had
made the right call.
I could not put into words why I felt I
was a better doctor for having met him.
I only knew it was so.
EXCERPTED FROM THE TENTH NERVE BY DR. CHRIS HONEY.
COPYRIGHT 2022, DR. CHRIS HONEY. PUBLISHED BY
PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE CANADA LIMITED. REPRODUCED
BY ARRANGEMENT WITH THE PUBLISHER. ALL RIGHTS
RESERVED.
rd.ca 105
 Brain

GAMES
Sharpen Your Mind

Pic-A-Pix: Hayloft
Medium Reveal a hidden picture by shading 4 2 2 4
in groups of horizontally or vertically 4 1 1 1 1 4
adjacent cells. The numbers represent how 1 7 1 1 1 1 1 1 7 1
many shaded cells are in each
of the corresponding row’s or 2
column’s groups. (For 4
example, a “3” next to a row 2 2
represents three horizontally
adjacent shaded cells in that 3 3
row.) There must be at least 10

PIC-A-PIX: HAYLOFT BY DIANE BAHER; IT ALL ADDS UP BY FRASER SIMPSON

one empty cell between each 2 2
group. The numbers read in
the same horizontal or 1 1 1 1
vertical order as the groups 1 2 1
they represent. There’s only 1 1 1 1
one possible picture; can you
shade it in? 2 2

A+B=C
B+C=D
It All Adds Up
D+E=G Difficult Each letter from A through H has
one of the eight values: 1, 2, 8, 9, 10, 12, 19
C+G=F or 21. No two letters have the same value.
Determine which number goes with each
E+H=F letter to make the equations correct.

106 october 2023

 reader ’s digest
SORTING APPLES BY EMILY GOODMAN ; MUSEUM TOUR BY DARREN RIGBY; (APPLES ILLUSTRATION) YULIIA KONAKHOVSKA/GETTY IMAGES

Sorting Apples
Easy One of these
apples is not like any
of the others. Which
is the odd one out?

Museum Tour
Medium On a visit to the Museum of
Stubbornness, Alex picks up a guided audio
tour that leads visitors through the rooms in
a prescribed order. In the spirit of the museum,
Alex decides to pick his own route. Both the
official route and Alex’s route go through
every room once, with no backtracking and
no rooms skipped. Using the clues below,
reconstruct both routes on the map. (North
is at the top of the map.)

1. Other than room #1, Alex doesn’t visit any

room in the intended order of the tour.
2. The recording tells visitors to head east
from room #1.
3. Alex’s fourth room occupies a corner of the
building. He left this room heading south. 1
4. The guided tour’s fourth room has more 1
doors than its fifth room.

For answers, turn to PAGE 108

rd.ca 107
reader ’s digest

BRAIN GAMES
SUDOKU ANSWERS
FROM PAGE 106
BY Louis-Luc Beaudoin

Pic-A-Pix: Hayloft

1 8 4 5 3
7 9
2 6
3 4 6
It All Adds Up
9 7 A = 8, B = 1, C = 9, D = 10,
E = 2, F = 21, G = 12,
8 5 9 H = 19

2 7 1 Sorting Apples
The apple on the upper
right. It’s the only one
1 4 with two leaves on its
stem.
3 5 8
Museum Tour
The numbers represent
To Solve This Puzzle the guided tour, and the
Put a number from 1 to 9 in line follows Alex’s path.
each empty square so that: SOLUTION 8 7
9 2 8 5 7 6 1 3 4 4 8
) every horizontal row and 4 6 7 3 2 1 8 9 5
5 7 9
vertical column contains all 5 1 3 9 4 8 6 7 2 9 5 6
nine numbers (1-9) without 3 4 1 2 9 7 5 6 8
10
repeating any of them; 8 7 2 6 1 5 3 4 9 10
6 4 3
6 9 5 4 8 3 2 1 7 3
) each of the outlined 3 x 3
7 8 4 1 6 2 9 5 3
1 5 9 8 3 4 7 2 6 11
boxes has all nine numbers, 11
2 3 6 7 5 9 4 8 1 1 1 2
none repeated. 2

108 october 2023


TRIVIA
BY Beth Shillibeer
1. What Canadian actor, who made
his feature film debut in Youngblood
(1986), was babysat as a child by rock
singer Alice Cooper?
2. Pumpkins are berries. True or false?
3. What former American astronaut,
now a U.S. senator, chased a co-worker
around the International Space Station
while wearing a gorilla suit?
4. What nocturnal bird found in South
and Central America is nicknamed the
CREATIV STUDIO HEINEMANN/GETTY IMAGES
“ghost bird” due to its large eyes and
haunting call?
5. Which Australian city briefly held the
names Batmania and Bearbrass before
settling on its current name in 1837?
6. In which Central Asian country is the
Darvaza gas crater, a geological forma-
tion also known as the“Gates of Hell,”
discovered in the 1970s?
Brain Games
7. What kind of leaf fried in tempura
batter is an autumn snack in Osaka,
Japan?
8. For security reasons, baristas who
work at a Starbucks located in Langley,
Virginia, do not take customers’ names
with an order. In what U.S. federal build-
ing is it located?
9. The Indian subcontinent moves
northward about five centimetres a
year, causing what landmark to grow
even taller?
10. How many time zones exist in China?
11. Only three World Series in Major
League Baseball history have ended
with a walk-off home run (when a team
scores a winning home run at the end
rd.ca 109
reader ’s digest

of the final inning of the game). True
or false?
12. Which agency of the United Nations
was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
twice, first in 1954 and again in 1981?
13. What beat soccer and rugby for the
title of Ireland’s Favourite Sport, accord-
ing to the 2022 Teneo sport index?
14. A new rock formation first dubbed
“plastiglomerate” in a 2013 research
paper is made up of sedimentary gran-
ules and what else?
15. What historical figure is said to have
posted an influential statement on a
church door in Germany on October 31,
1571, now known as Reformation Day?
University professors in 1999, states that
the least skilled individuals are the most
likely to overestimate their abilities?
20. What chemical element within a
star’s core gradually decreases, causing
the star to appear brighter and increase
in size, and become what is known as a
red giant?
19. The Dunning-Kruger effect. 20. Hydrogen.
Saskatchewan. 18. Luddite (after Ned Ludd).
16. The Titanic. 17. Manitoba and
Games. 14. Plastic. 15. Martin Luther.
Commissioner for Refugees. 13. Gaelic
Toronto Blue Jays in 1993. 12. UN High
two: The Pittsburgh Pirates in 1960 and the
9. Mount Everest. 10. One. 11. False, only
6. Turkmenistan. 7. Maple leaf. 8. CIA HQ.
Kelly. 4. The great potoo. 5. Melbourne.
Answers: 1. Keanu Reeves. 2. True. 3. Mark

16. Among what famous wreckage was

the rust-eating bacteria Halomonas CROSSWORD ANSWERS
titanicae discovered in 2010?
FROM PAGE 113
17. On the border of which two Canadian
provinces would you find the city of Flin F A I R P I A F
Flon, named after a fictional character P O P D U O O S L O
in the 1905 novel The Sunless City? S A R A H P O L L E Y
S L O R E L I E V E
18. What term, which today describes
T S N N A T T E R
a person averse to new technology,
was inspired by the likely fictional B U F F Y
leader of a group of textile workers who R A M O N A S O S
revolted against industrialization in A V A R I C E O P T
early 1800s England? S A I N T E M A R I E
T I D E D U S T U P
19. What psychological phenomenon,
first written about by two Cornell A L S O S H A M

110 october 2023

 Brain Games

WORD POWER

This issue, we’re getting all verklempt 9. shanda n.

over the many expressive words a assistance
b star
English has borrowed from Yiddish. c scandal
You likely know klutz, chutzpah and
schmear, but these are only the 10. plotz v.
a misunderstand
beginning. So enjoy our quiz, but skip b burst with emotion
the schmaltz. Whether you’re saying c hide
“Yay!” or “Oy vey!” by the end, you can
find the answers on the next page. 11. shtick n.
a weird idea
b ditty
BY Mary-Liz Shaw c comic routine or
gimmick

1. schmutz n. 5. nosh v. 12. schlock adj.

a dirt a explain a shoddy
b joke b snack b entertaining
c deli meat c forget c funny

2. schlep v. 6. bubbe n. 13. kvetch v.

a run a grandmother a complain
b haul b little one b laugh
c pass through c hot drink c rush

3. meshuggener n. 7. kvelling v. 14. mishegoss n.

a cute child a walking noisily a craziness
b foolish person b crying b bundle of papers
c important date c rejoicing c worrying trend

4. mensch n. 8. bissel n. 15. schmooze v.

a payment a little bit a play
b talent b letter b chat
c person of integrity c secret c introduce

rd.ca 111
reader ’s digest

Schlemiel, Schlimazel
Any fan of the 1970s sitcom Laverne & Shirley can recite
the little opening ditty chanted by the show’s stars
Penny Marshall and Cindy Williams: “Five, six, seven,
eight, schlemiel, schlimazel, hasenpfeffer incorporated.”
Schlemiel and schlimazel are Yiddish words for an
unlucky person. Hasenpfeffer is a German rabbit
stew, but it may be there just because it’s fun to say.

Word Power 6. bubbe (a) 12. schlock (a) shoddy

grandmother
ANSWERS Every year, Gordon
makes his bubbe’s oat-
1. schmutz (a) dirt meal cookie recipe.
Only after my job inter-
view did I realize I had 7. kvelling (c) rejoicing
schmutz on my shirt. Tova was kvelling when
her daughter graduated
2. schlep (b) haul at the top of her class.
The heavy rain made
schlepping the groceries 8. bissel (a) little bit
several blocks to my Clara had a big breakfast
house even harder. so she just wants to eat a
bissel for lunch.
3. meshuggener (b) fool-
ish person 9. shanda (c) scandal
“He must be a meshugge- “Did you hear about that
ner if he thinks he can bank manager who stole
park that truck there,” deposits?” David asked.
Maria scoffed. “What a shanda!”
Dad bought all these
schlock souvenirs during
our family vacation to
Myrtle Beach.
13. kvetch (a) complain
“No matter how hard we
try to please Alexander,
he always manages to
find something to kvetch
about,” Sue said.
14. mishegoss (a)
craziness
Amid the mishegoss of
rushing to catch her
flight home, Sofia forgot
to pack a toothbrush
and toothpaste.
SILVER SCREEN COLLECTION/GETTY IMAGES

15. schmooze (b) chat

4. mensch (c) person of 10. plotz (b) burst with Company management
integrity emotion went to the convention
Being called a mensch is Don’t plotz, but the dog to schmooze with indus-
a huge compliment. soiled the carpet again. try bigwigs.

5. nosh (b) snack 11. shtick (c) comic rou-

Every weekend, Sophie tine or gimmick Vocabulary Ratings
and Ellen meet at the Marie-Anne quit touring 9 & below: Meh
coffee shop to nosh and is doing her shtick in 10–12: Mish mash
and gossip. Vegas now. 13–15: Mazel tov

112 october 2023

 Brain Games

CROSSWORD

Some Notable Canadians 26

28
Greed
Make a decision
29 See 18-Across: Hyph.
31 A laundry detergent
BY Derek Bowman brand
32 Big scrap: Hyph.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 33 In addition to
34 Pillow cover
9 10 11
DOWN
12 13 1 Baby horses
2 Protective wear
14 15 3 Boise’s state: Abbr.
4 A German industrial
16 17 region
5 Organized society
18 19 6 One of many you’d find
in Fiji
20 21 22 23 24 25 7 Advil competitor
8 Entrance hall
26 27 28 9 “Hey, over here!”
10 Like some sandwiches:
29 30 Hyph.
13 The snowman in Walt
31 32
Disney’s Frozen
18 Where Brunei is
33 34
19 Metre or litre, e.g.
20 Believer in Jah,
ACROSS 15 Take over for, as a informally
1 Carnival baseball pitcher 21 To no ___ (in vain)
5 The Very Best of Édith ___ 16 CFL on ___ (TV show) 22 Hotel employees
(2002 collection) 17 Talk incessantly 23 Kinda maybe
9 Tegan and Sara, for one: 18 With 29-Across, she 24 Important drug in
2 wds. famously played the Chinese history
11 Capital of Norway mouth bow on Sesame 25 Part of a Fitbit count
12 She sang “Courage” for Street 27 Large, flightless birds
the film The Sweet 20 Sister of Beezus, in 30 Volcanic residue
Hereafter: 2 wds. children’s literature
14 ___-pitch league 23 Big hit for ABBA For answers, turn to PAGE 110

rd.ca 113
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