A Radical Grief
In 1985, Cliff and Wilma Derksen’s daughter Candace was abducted and left to die in Winnipeg’s severe cold. While they did not yet know the killer’s identity, they made a decision to forgive — and to save themselves and the good left in their lives. Now, 32 years later, the suspect in the case awaits his verdict in a second trial.
The Graffiti Kids Who Sparked the Syrian War
Mark MacKinnon tells the story of Naief Abazid — who, at the urging of some older boys, graffitied a school wall on a lark in Daraa, Syria, at age 14. The “writing on the wall” enraged Syria’s Baathist dictatorship, and became the source of ignition in the Syrian war — a conflict now nearly six years old — which has claimed over 400,000 lives, displaced nearly 5 million refugees, and has had lasting repercussions the world over.
Off-Time: Becoming a Widow at Age 36.
Christina Frangou writes on becoming a widow at age 36, after her husband Spencer died of kidney cancer, 42 days after diagnosis.
Zika’s Ground Zero
At the center of the outbreak in Brazil researchers are painstakingly trying to unspool a medical mystery that some say is reminiscent of the early study of the AIDS virus.
Unpregnant: The silent, secret grief of miscarriage
Alexandra Kimball on the isolation of suffering a miscarriage, and the missing language of grieving this loss.
Canada’s Chronic Asbestos Problem
India has a voracious market for asbestos, which is used to make a cement composite used in low-cost building products. Canada sent 69,575 tonnes of asbestos to India in 2010, according to the United Nations Commodity Trade Statistics Database, with a value of $39.1 million (U.S.). The leading supplier to the country, by far, is Russia. In 2010, Canada ranked third after that country and Brazil.
A small network of activists and aggrieved workers across India argue that there is no such thing as safe use in a country where there is no tradition or practice of occupational safety, no enforcement of regulations, no monitoring of workers’ health—and such severe poverty that Swami went on showing up for work for years, long after he was winded by a half-block walk and had been diagnosed with asbestosis. He knew full well his job was killing him. “In Canada you have all these safety measures,” he says. “In my country they’ve left us to carry it and die.”
Last Stand at American Apparel
“I’m not sure. I certainly think I can talk to you. Can you call back in an hour? We have this meeting at 9, but I’m pretty sure I’ll be free in an hour,” Dov Charney says genially. An hour later, he says, “I’m just not sure I’m in the right headspace. Can I call you back—how late are you going to be up?” (It must be said at this point that I sense no lecherous intent in his tone.) “Ninety-per-cent sure, I’ll call you by about 11. If not, tomorrow.”