Posts with the Bill Doig tag

Barris Beat

Mad dogs and snowstorms

Written by Ted Barris on . 1 Comment
On my morning constitutional, warmed by a toque & scarf (gift from a long-time friend) and surefooted springer spaniel Jazz.

As a general rule – remembering obedience training sessions I’ve attended with most of my canine companions over the years – when I walk a dog, I try to keep the dog on a leash and at my left side. I use the universal command, “Heel,” to keep the dog loping along at the same pace I’m walking. My current canine pal, Jazz, is still learning that command.

But for the first time since I got him about seven months ago, during Monday’s snowstorm, I didn’t care if he heeled or not. In fact, along our walk through the early morning darkness and whiteout of the storm, I encouraged him like Sgt. Preston of the Mounted.

“On Jazz!” I called out to him. “Away you go!”

In the storm, I cast the obedience to the wind because the sidewalks had blown in. There were no footprints for us to follow. I had no footing in the blowing snow. So, I chose to depend on Jazz’s instincts to guide us onto solid surfaces and quite frankly to help me keep my balance. (more…)

Barris Beat

Value of people in the know

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
Bill Doig had a solution to most problems.

Everybody says it at one time or another. They grapple with a personal issue, a mechanical problem, an unsolved mystery and then they toss and turn instead of sleep all night long. Well, I said it to a writer friend I called on Tuesday morning.

“I didn’t sleep a wink last night,” I said to Phil Alves.

“What’s the problem?” he asked considerately.

“I’ve lost a big file.”

And he moaned a knowing moan, because he’s done it. You’ve done it. We’ve all done it. But in my case, I’d really done it. (more…)

Barris Beat

A brother’s keeper

Written by Ted Barris on . 2 Comments
Bill Doig at the wheel of his favourite pick-up, Muriel, about 1977.
Bill Doig at the wheel of his favourite pick-up, Muriel, about 1977.

I think I can pinpoint the first time I ever felt self-confident.

It didn’t come on graduation day. It wasn’t contained inside that rolled-up education degree. I can’t even say I felt self-assured when I got married or with my first steps as a professional. You’d think a guy who had his first newspaper column published in high school, his first radio show as a teenager, his first book released in his twenties, would have loads of confidence. But no. The day I think I realized I had found my niche in the world was the day my brother-in-law Bill Doig gave me a friendly poke in the shoulder.

“You know,” he said, “you’re pretty good at what you do.”

I had only just left my hometown of Toronto for work a few months earlier in 1976. My wife – his wife’s sister – and I had only been married a year or so. She and I really had no car of our own (my folks had given us one). We didn’t have a roof over our heads (Bill solved that; he invited us live with them). We had very few possessions. Heck, we didn’t even have a credit rating. But somehow because I was (overnight) Bill Doig’s brother-in-law and working in the same city as he was, I suddenly became a somebody.

(more…)