No pain, no democracy, get in the game!
It's interesting to me that Jeremy Thompson of CTV Edmonton is the second person connected to CTV News who has asked me in so many days if I thought my back & leg spasms were possibly vaccine-related? I don't believe that to be true.
2021-08-03 updated 5 PM, When I arrived at the Alberta Legislature it became surreal for me during this noon hour anti-UCP Jason Kenney protest since everyone was wearing a mask except me. I kind of stood out... About 200 plus people in attendance made up of moms, dads, teachers, nurses, some doctors, and the regular political activists you would expect at any anti-conservative rally, such as union leaders, NDP politicians, and communist party leader and her members policing and working for the crowd. They all wanted the COVID19, lockdown measures to continue. A sharp contrast to the weekly Saturday anti-lockdown, anti-mask, and anti-vaccine rallies, marches, and protests I watched from a distance while wearing a mask. Like today's rally, they too wanted the UCP Jason Kenney Government fired. Feeling a bit out of place, I decided to ignore the science and put on a mask out of respect for the pro-maskers. The rally was peaceful and well organized with Alberta Federation of Labour Gil McGowan and Friends of Medicare Sandra Azocar taking the podium and almost half the NDP caucus and many public sector workers wearing id cards were in attendance during the noon hour rally. I stayed on the outskirts and listened to some of the speeches. I appreciated one speech by a UofA professor yesterday who trashed my former employer Postmedia, which owns the Edmonton Sun, and Edmonton Journal for as he put it, lying to the public. A common theme shared by both anti-mask-vaccine protesters of 16 months and today's pro-mask-vaccine keep the lockdown going protesters. Today CBC, CTV, Citytv & Global cameras, and reporters were out in full force covering today's rally. It amazes me how much fear and division the news media has instilled into Albertans' and Canadians as a whole over the handling of Covid19. Perhaps next time in the interest of public safety our democratically elected Government in Ottawa might consider using the Emergency act to blackout the corporate news media from talking about COVID19 like the way the NHL blackout Calgary/ Edmonton Oilers/ Flames hockey games on CBC & Sportsnet. I would also prefer they leave our social media alone intact, because the people, all Albertans do have a right to express their views about our democratically elected Governments. My motto of 14 years as a citizen news activist is 'Albertans have a voice, they will be heard!' YouTube Lockdown, Democracy's Albert & Kyle
Two Weeks
Pain on a scale of 1-10
Daytime 4 tolerable, Bedtime very little rest...
2021-08-03 Day 14, back & leg pain. During bedtime, the only time I get relief from the pain is when I sit up in a chair most of the night. In bed, there is no comfort, only pain. Many challenges have been addressed during the day with my walker. Last night I was able to do some extra chores, cleaning the bathroom, vacuum, and wash the kitchen floor with tolerable pain. Looking forward to seeing my sister and her husband this week. Yesterday I walked about 4 kilometers to the Legislature with the walker with little pain.
Blog Post Introduction
Welcome! This blog acts as a diary for me, an account of my everyday experiences as a human being. The main theme of my current art project Misty HeART focuses on humanity and legacy and puts the spotlight on the world around me and on myself. I try to live my life at the moment since my thoughts are fluid and in constant change. Most blog posts on this site are in constant change with edits, added and deleted content, updates, spelling, and grammar corrections for the better or worse... On the topic of pain, I embrace it, and creativity is how I handle it, regardless of my pain is mentally or physically stressful I thrive towards and try to maintain a positive space. Currently, I'm dealing with some chronic, recurring back and leg pain, since July 20, 2021, and I'm unable to do some normal activities, such as hiking 10-15 kilometers a day, outdoor art shows at the Alberta Legislature, or setting up my easel and canvas along the river valley somewhere to paint. So for now I'll study my pain and see where it takes me.
Journey along the West Coast Trail,
1996, 1997 & 2000
2021-07-20 to 27 PAIN IN THE BUTT: For 6 days of sleepless nights, knife cutting back & leg pain with no relief in sight. Ice, & extra strength Tylenol don't help but I still got around with a hiking stick and lots of stops to rest. I visited the chiropractor Friday who rendered himself useless to me when he refused to tell me if he got vaccinated. All this BS over a simple walk last Tuesday.Pain is my friend, I kept telling myself...😉LOOKING BACK TO BLISTERS & BLISS/ It took 7 days on average 3 times to complete 79 kilometers of the West Coast Trail in my 40s, a painful experience I jumped into with both feet, perfectly willing. Here I am today at 66 and my doctor recently ruled out any heart problem I may have had, with a blood test and EKG. This after last Wednesday when the stabbing pain jumped from my back and legs to my chest area with jabs of electricity taking my breath away momentarily. The doctor thought it may have been an anomaly brought on by the stress of my pain. this after 3 hours waiting in pain inside a downtown Edmonton Clinic for 5 minutes with a doctor, who had a huge back log of paitents waiting out front.
2021-07-26 Pain on a scale of 1 to 10/ 9, Bitchy on a scale of 1 to 10/ 9, Sleepless in Edmonton Day 6 of lower back pain that started from a simple walk last Tuesday. Early morning 4AM, I scared our cat into hiding, after I gave my right leg a self-inflicted beating with a shoe, to compare how real pain feels to the week-long phantom pain caused by a complicated lower back nerve system issue. I'll see my chiropractor one last time this morning. I thought over the weekend how he shamed me during our first visit for not taking care of my back as most do with teeth, brushing after every meal, flossing, and visiting the dentist twice a year. He also refused to tell me if he got his 2 vaccines, saying that was a private matter, so this will be my last visit today with the doctor since I did not spend 16 months protecting myself, my wife, family, and my community from COVID19. Afterall, I don't know this guy, he might be one of those anti-masker, anti-vacciner guys who could be COVID19 variant infected. The reality with the pain is I'm old, and my back like most of my body is noticable failing my young spirit, that lives inside this old house, my body. This morning I developed a resentment and disconnect to my body, which was known once to run marathons as a teen, hiking the West Coast Trail 3 times in my 40s, and most recent, walking 10-15 kilometers a day, now in my late 60s. Getting old might be the next chapter to this 2021 Misty HeART project that focuses on humanity and legacy including my own. So I'm going to paint about it, but I'm not sure what just yet. The tinnitus that lives in my head has been screaming bloody f@%king hell ever since this back pain started, it screams like that everytime the weather changes. I got the ringing in my ears from 42 years working in the newspaper industry. Thankfully for WCB, I've got hearing aids that help reduce the tinnitus. Not going to cut that ringing out of my head with a knife for the purpose of my art project like Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh did, cutting off his ear. I'm sure my back pain will one day end soon one way or another. I'll enjoy my week regardless, because pain is still my friend...
Art is freedom from pain
November 6, 1954 - I was born. I began to crawl and soon learned to walk. In 1979, I drove from Toronto in a Ford F-100 pickup, made a right turn off Highway 1, towards Edmonton my home. I gave up driving and e-biking 5 years ago. Nowadays I walk, with a walking stick right up until I purchased a walker, a walker generally used by my Dad, who had stroke some years ago. He'll be celebrating his 90th birthday next month in August. He worked as a Ford parts manager all his life.
Want to see pain? Say hello to my AKA Semi-Automatic Leki.
My response to a University student who thought my stick was a weapon.
On the 6th day, I traded in my Leki stick for a walker with wheels
Special thanks to the friendly ETS bus driver and staff at Aspen Healthcare.
$500. Walkers: Check out my new wheels boys, by the way, got any more beer? Doug McKenzie says my new wheels are okay but he would rather be cruising around Edmonton in a flatbed Ford pickup truck. Bob says those hog town Globe & Mail guys are all hosers... #Ableg #Yeg Citizen #FreePress.2021-07-26 Pickup Trucks: The Toronto Globe & Mail is having a temper tantrum about pickup trucks. I’m happy to say that ~40% of the vehicles on Alberta roads are pickups. Maybe Toronto columnists should try getting around this province during a prairie blizzard in a Smart Car. - Premier Jason Kenney.
On the 7th day, I found rest...
2021-07-27 Some people think that to be strong is to never feel pain. In reality, the strongest people are the ones who feel it, understand it, and accept it.-Unknown. #outsiderart #artisfreedom from pain...
2021-07-29, Pain on a scale of 1 to 10/ 7, Bitchy on a scale of 1 to 10/ 6, Day 9, 5 am the back leg & pain has gone from severe knife-like pain a week ago (the worst day) to a mid-grade pain I'll describe as uncomfortable and annoying. I laid on my side on 3 pillows deep to ease my pain and was reminded how my mother was like this in an easy chair for weeks when she had painful spasms in her feet and could not sleep in a normal bed. Seems to be a Brinkman thing with our odd-looking feet and painful phantom spasms. Been thinking about my dad lately who has described similar pain affecting his right arm. Hope he's okay.❤I love them both.
NDP era Quickdraw, Alberta Legislature public gallery. Alberta health care wait times.
2021-07-30 Pain on a scale of 1 to 10/ 6, Bitchy on a scale of 1 to 10/ 4, Day 10, Taking charge of my back pain, less reliance on the Alberta Health Services, more on private health care: I began my new pain management treatment yesterday with a highly competent massage therapist who was okay at first telling me she got fully vaccinated before we started our treatment together. A trust was established and we both felt safer. Earlier I did my part with friendly front desk staff, by filling in a COVID19 questionnaire. Early this week I let my chiropractor go after 2 visits because he did not want to share his personal information about vaccinations. I respect his privacy but a mutual trust could not be established. After today's treatment, I visited my most trusted health care worker in the health care industry, my Shopper's Drug Mart pharmacist. He helped me choose an over the counter anti-spasm pain medication that has since lowered the pain and helped me sleep better at night. My Shopper' Drug Mart in our downtown Edmonton neighbourhood. long before the COVID19 pandemic was already a trusted reliable source of healthcare in comparison to most of my experences with government-run healthcare systems, where long wait times is the norm, doctors, nurses, and union leaders band together to play politician demanding raises while over taxed Albertans pay off the interest on healthcare debt. Bankers are getting richer, laughing all the way to the bank, while Albertans get poorer health care as a result from greed.
I attended the Art Gallery, while my body repaired
11 Days of back pain. The best investment I have made so far with my pain management is my walker. It has kept me mobile, moving to places I can take my mind off the pain like walks in the evening with my best friend, wife and soul mate Sarah. During the day while she works, another place that helps me get my mind off pain is the Art Gallery of Alberta. The art gallery is where I staged my first protest picket against the NDP Government after the Ministry of Infrastructure banned me in January 2016, from painting and showing my art anywhere on the 57 acres of Legislature grounds. They refused to believe me when I said my art was not for sale. According to the Government, they were concerned someone might be injured by my art and they did not want to be held responsible financially if sued. The art gallery acts as my second art studio, away from my home studio, the Alberta Legislature that acts as my gallery, studio, and home office for my citizen free press work inside the Legislature. Both beautiful locations are public, paid for by Alberta taxpayers, equipped with washroom facilities surrounded by beautiful inspiration and beautiful people. Two perfect locations for an outsider artist to practice creativity and connect with others. Today I studied 4 paintings and created a sketch study combining all 4 into one drawing of Judy BL Robinson's abstracts with themes that include God, fire, sunshine, the history of capitalism, and the slave trade. The name of the 2nd-floor gallery show is called Black every day. Afterward, I would take my sketch home and use CorelDRAW to turn my sketches into a colourful graphic displayed on this mock-up of a t-shirt. Perhaps an idea for another speaker Banned Speech & Wear. See more sketches studied on this blog.
My Speakers Banned Speech and Wear was created to respond to the Alberta Government's 4th ban, this time the ban was over the art I created and wore on a t-shirt while sitting in the public gallery of the Alberta Legislature, June 2019. The idea came to me when my wife and I explored the art galleries in Chicago July 5-8, 2019 where I saw the works of the famous American designer, entrepreneur Virgil Abloh's 'Figure of Speech' inside the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art. Abloh is also the chief executive officer of the Milan-based label Off-White, a fashion house he founded in 2012. For two years I created my own designer line of t-shirts, baseball caps and toques of Alberta winter wear to challenge the Alberta Government's hate towards the arts by nonestablishment artists like myself. It was in Chicago I learned that I was an outsider artist who is regarded as scum by some in Canada's arts establishment, big governments, bankers and corporate elite, I fondly regard as 'The Man.' See outsider artists as described by Chicago's Intuit art center of outsider artists.
2021-07-31 Pain on a scale of 1 to 10/ 4 tolerable, Bitchy on a scale of 1 to 10/ 1, Saturday date inside the Art Gallery of Alberta, I did a 20 minute sketch study of Judy BL Robinson’s MAAFA 2012, Art Gallery of Alberta. MAAFA is Swahili for Holocaust, terrible occurrences. Studying MAAFA, seemed to take my mind off my own pain. There was a film crew inside the gallery that was filming a promo for an upcomming vertual Carawest Festival.Tomorrow my wife and I are considering a hike in the river valley, using my walker. Perhaps being out on the trails in nature will deflect my pain like Judy's MAAFA did for me.
13 days back & leg pain, meet my new walker Hal
2021-08-01, Pain on a scale of 1 to 10/ 4 tolerable, Bitchy on a scale of 1 to 10/ 0, Day 13, A much happier Sunday was enjoyed by me and my wife Sarah who is also nursing a sore foot with phantom pain. We completed over 12 kilometers today while using my new walker. Temperatures were hot, so we brought lots of water for our trek. We started down the funicular, across the river into Millcreek ravine. Sarah did some shopping in Old Strathcona at the Antique Mall and I picked up some donuts for later. After crossing the High-Level bridge, we entered onto the Alberta Legislature grounds and had just missed a protest. Protesters plan to rally each day at noon until the 18th of August when the Alberta Government plans on lifting all the pandemic restrictions. Protesters want the restrictions left in place for fear of another COVID19 wave.
Local painful memories linger
The plaque of Oliver remains covered in red paint in a small park in our downtown neighborhood. No one has touched it for weeks. Photo by Doug Brinkman, Citizen Free Press.
August 1, 2021 Today CBC reported Edmonton's Oliver Square has changed its name after community consultation to Unity Square. A member of Parliament and federal minister first elected to office in 1883, Oliver is known for drafting discriminatory legislation, including policies that pushed Indigenous people off their traditional lands. He also wrote an order-in-council to bar Black immigrants fleeing persecution in the American South from entering Canada.
Democracy, The future looks bright for Alberta
with the leadership of the people like Albert & Kyle
A special pain relief request
to Daryl Katz for the City of Edmonton
A request from Daniel John Kornak to Mr. Daryl Katz, owner of the Edmonton Oilers
