Winnipeg Free Press | Newsletter
|
Science is amazing
|
|
Today, April 7, is Green Shirt Day, an organ-donation initiative named in honour of Logan Boulet. When the defenceman for the Humboldt Broncos hockey team succumbed to his injuries after a horrific bus crash four years ago, his parents agreed to donate his organs.
Their generosity of spirit in the time of unimaginable grief inspired a Canada-wide reaction now called the Logan Boulet Effect. About 150,000 people registered to become organ donors in the weeks following his death.
Through Green Shirt Day, hIs parents, Tony and Bernadine Boulet, continue to be tireless advocates for organ donation; my colleague Dan Lett wrote about their dedication last month.
Advertisement
JAMIN HELLER / WINNIPEG FREE PRESSToby, left, and Bernadine Boulet are the parents of Logan, one of 16 members of the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team who died following the April 6, 2018, collision between their team bus and a semi-trailer near Armley, Sask.
It’s a sad fact that although a majority of Canadians say they are in favour of organ donation, only a fraction actually sign up to the official registry (it takes about two minutes to do so with your medical card at signupforlife.ca). Last year more than 200 people died waiting for organs; Manitoba has the unhappy distinction of having one of the country’s highest number of patients with kidney failure.
I’ll admit to being a bit of a bore when it comes to the topic of organ donation. I did a lot of research before I donated a kidney almost three years ago (you can read about it here) and I love to talk about it, because I think it’s a goddamn medical miracle that more people should participate in, whether they do so when they’re still living or after they’ve died.
Think about this: a doctor detached my left kidney, pulled it out of a small incision in my abdomen and put it into a stranger, where it immediately started making urine. That person no longer required dialysis and I was drinking beer on a patio six days later. Science is amazing.
Three years later, I have no ill effects and the scars (it’s a laparoscopic procedure) are all but invisible. It’s the best thing I will ever do with my life — and if they’re not too withered and worn-out by the time I die, you’re welcome to the rest of my parts too. (I also think we should have an opt-out system for organ donation — I wrote an editorial about it back in 2019 — but that’s a lecture for another time).
I promise I’ll be back to writing about arts and entertainment next week, but in the meantime, if you have any questions about the organ donation process, feel free to ask me at jill.wilson@winnipegfreepress.com. And sign up today!
|
Jill Wilson
|
|
|
|
If you enjoy my newsletter, please consider forwarding it to others. They can sign up for free here.
Did you know we have many other free newsletters? You can gorge yourself on food and beverage news from my Arts & Life pals Eva Wasney and Ben Sigurdson, who write the bi-weekly Dish newsletter, or you can follow a weekly exploration of Indigenous voices, perspectives and experiences in Niigaan Sinclair’s Biidaajimowin | News from the Centre.
You can browse all of our newsletters here.
|
|
|
|
Advertisement
|
What’s up this week
• The Winnipeg Baroque Festival is a collaboration among three local choral groups: Canzona, Polycoro and Dead of Winter. The fest sees each choir performing individual shows and then teaming up for a three-choir finale of J.S. Bach’s St. John Passion, accompanied by Vancouver’s Pacific Baroque Orchestra, on April 15. This week sees Canzona doing the music of England on Friday, April 8, at 7:30 p.m.; Polycoro performing Italian early music on Saturday, April 9, at 7:30 p.m.; and Dead of Winter taking on German baroque compositions on Sunday, April 10, at 3 p.m. All concerts are at Crescent Fort Rouge United Church; tickets are at deadofwinter.ca.
• He’s not 18 anymore: Alice Cooper has been making music for more than 50 years and the shock rocker, 74, isn’t slowing down. The School’s Out singer brings his latest tour to the concert bowl at Canada Life Centre on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. Tickets range from $50 to $137 at Ticketmaster.
Alice Cooper is bringing his latest tour to Winnipeg. (Eduardo Verdugo / Associated Press files)
• Winnipeg photographer Colin Corneau’s exhibition Faith & Rituals opens today at the Gas Station Theatre, 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Corneau spent the past four years photographing ceremonies and moments of reflection and joy in different faith communities. The show runs through May 2022 as part of the Flash Photography Festival. Admission is free and open during theatre hours (ring bell for admission).
• I’ll be hosting a virtual Q&A — in collaboration with McNally Robinson Booksellers and the Winnipeg Folk Festival — with Martha Wainwright on Monday, April 11, at 7 p.m. The celebrated singer-songwriter has just released her memoir, Stories I Might Regret Telling You, and she’ll be playing a few songs in addition to taking audience questions. Sign up online. (In other not-so-good Wainwright news, Martha’s brother Rufus’s Centennial Concert Hall show, slated for April 15, has been cancelled.)
Recommended:
TV: I’m only two episodes in, but so far I’m hooked on Dopesick, the Disney Plus miniseries about the opioid crisis, specifically the rise of OxyContin and the swath of death and destruction it left in its wake. It’s an eye-opening look at the way Perdue Pharma’s Sackler family hoodwinked the FDA into giving the drug a “less addictive” label and family doctors into prescribing it at ever-increasing dosages. Michael Keaton is lovely as a caring doc who just wants to help his patients in a Virginia mining county with their pain.
|
|
Advertisement
|
NEW IN MUSIC
Alan Small:
Permanent punk
North Graffiti marks eight years together with debut album Modern Relics and a return to the stage
Read More
Holly Harris:
A tenor forged in a metal fire
It’s safe to say that the musical genres of opera and heavy metal don’t exactly go together like bread and butter. Yet Newfoundland-born Canadian tenor David Pomeroy, 48, credits his forma...
Read More
David Friend, The Canadian Press:
Joni Mitchell, the Weeknd pick up Grammys
Joni Mitchell took a victory lap at the Grammy Awards on Sunday as the legendary Canadian singer-songwriter picked up her ninth career trophy at the event, closing out a weekend that toasted her timel...
Read More
Winnipeg Free Press | Newsletter
|
NEW ON SCREEN
Alison Gillmor:
Film fest really ties the rooms together
Winnipeg’s Architecture + Design Film Festival, now in its 11th year, is still the only Canadian fest dedicated to the importance of architecture and design in everyday life. Of course, the COVI...
Read More
Sadaf Ahsan, The Canadian Press:
Baichwal film to open Hot Docs festival
TORONTO – Veteran documentary filmmaker Jennifer Baichwal will open the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival with a self-described “David and Goliath”-style tale that...
Read More
|
NEW IN BOOKS
Reviewed by Morley Walker:
Family matters
Singer-songwriter Martha Wainwright recalls rifts with parents, exes and more in new memoir
Read More
Reviewed by John K. Collins:
Feeding a movement
From postal systems to chat rooms and beyond, how we talk can shape how we change the world
Read More
Reviewed by Reinhold Kramer:
Splice of life
Synthetic biology’s past, present and future explored in timely new account
Read More
The Canadian Press:
Five political books shortlisted for $25K prize
Canadian Press international affairs writer Mike Blanchfield and Carleton University professor Fen Hampson have been nominated for the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing for their book on C...
Read More
Reviewed by Kathryne Cardwell:
Fit for a king
Stachniak’s historical fiction mulls motherhood, betrayal, exploitation and more
Read More
Reviewed by Faith Johnston:
Determining destiny pondered on ice
Chinese-Canadian writer Xue Yiwei was born in 1964, just before the chaotic 10 years of the Cultural Revolution. The China he left in the 1990s was well on the road to capitalism, with those hoping fo...
Read More
|
|
Share:
|
Download our News Break app
|
|
|
