Outlook on Radio Western

Irish bells, to kick things off, to celebrate Oyster on her seventh birthday like the bells worn around her neck as she runs free at her favourite place.

It’s our post-election Mixed Bag show on Outlook this week, until the next one when sister/co-host Kerry and Regular co-host Barry can hopefully be back in studio with brother/co-host Brian. In the meantime, it’s early May and we’re looking back on the recent federal Canadian election after we discussed voting accessibility, amongst other things, on the pre-election episode from a few weeks back.

Brian kicks things off sharing about ambulance rides and stitches with his evening adventures in emerge and we share our plan to get him to wear a helmet. We’re looking back on and Brian explains what made him emotional about a recent “Blind Baseball” episode, a review of recent Elections Canada voting accessibility, and about public vs private as Canada goes forward with our new prime minister on the world stage.

We also describe double-sided ice cream cones while navigating and getting turned around (like anyone who takes a wrong turn) as we found ourselves using structure discovery at Oyster’s park, using terms like “structure discovery” or “shore lining” to explain how we, as blind people, get around (a blueprint for being blind) - our discussions this week are all about getting lost and found again including mobility, accessibility, and the multi-sensory with Oyster bells and church bells.

Fifth day of the fifth month, 2025 as we talk marking the occasion of Red Dress Day on Turtle Island and anniversaries, including it being the eightieth anniversary of Victory In Europe (or VE Day), during the same week, along with guide dog Oyster’s birthday. We’re celebrating, in Ireland, with a delicious lemon cake, which we eat to honour Oyster. Along with all that, the ideal absence of wars, the kinds which sweep disabled people up in the danger and the chaos humans perpetuate with these things, we at Outlook instead honour guide dogs and peace in this month of May.

Learn more about Red Dress Day here:

https://amnesty.ca/red-dress-day/

“Blind baseball - it’s like the great equaliser. I’ve found the experience of playing the adaptive sports just as fulfilling, motivating, and frankly competitive as the sports I played as a sighted person growing up.”

Our guest on Outlook this week was used to adversity in life, having faced both grief and treatment of a serious chronic illness as a teenager. When Zach Ship was newly blind, years later, he was wished a “Happy Disability Pride Month” by The Lighthouse Guild and he didn’t believe there was much to be proud of though he soon learned otherwise.

Zach explains to us some of the rules of blind baseball and about what it meant to him when he discovered the sport, in its adaptive form, which gave him something back of the years playing sports like baseball competitively. So when he heard a documentary on the blind baseball team was being made, he was thrilled others might see what blind baseball (difficult to imagine for so many) is like..

So from our friendly cross-border Major League team rivalry to the support group and club we three are all a part of/considering starting, Ship has been through everything( from acute/sudden and unexpected health situations/acquired disability to the loss of a parent at a young age) and shares some of the lessons on the possibilities of adaptation and the power of community.

“No way of reacting is right or wrong, but focusing on what things we do still have, the things you can still enjoy. Even if it’s just you can eat this delicious meal or you can feel the sun on your face. It could be small things or it could be big things, always keeping that very very close in mind is critical.”

We first heard Zach Ship on “It Happened to Me, A Rare Disease and Medical Challenges Podcast - It happened to me. I’m not alone and neither are you.” This is the message he both benefited from thanks to others, in his own journey, but also the message he believes as he’s become a disability advocate now himself.

To learn more about Blind Baseball and the documentary being made about Zach Ship’s team, check out this Indiegogo page:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/blind-baseball-documentary-halfway-funded#/

Watch the documentary teaser trailer here:

https://vimeo.com/963770229

“On the way to the library, I flew a kite.”

We here on Outlook decide to begin this particular Mixed Bag episode with the above quote, start to a social media status, because we on this show love libraries/love books and love the outlook of writer Leona Godin, also close friend of this radio show/podcast, but really because elections make us want to take a break to fly a kite too.

As the federal elections here in Canada approach, we’re together, just after Easter, to discuss some of the issues in our country’s politics from a disability perspective as issues facing disabled Canadians have been mostly overlooked during this election season, so soon off of the rushed Ontario provincial elections we just so recently dealt with. We’re telling about the realities of the PC Party being no-show’s at both provincial and now federal disability town halls and a still-totally inaccessible, inadequate, and inequitable voting system/process.

Kerry shares about experiencing a new holiday, Irish style, after being in Ireland for Halloween and now Easter, along with being in Ireland last time during the presidential elections in the States and now, being back this time during our Canadian ones. Also, she and Barry celebrated Easter by having KFC fried chicken for their Easter meal, coming to the conclusion that KFC in Ireland seems better to her than eating it in Canada. Parades, Irish Sea gulls, and Kerry cuddling with an Oyster guide dog as we talk traditions, whether holidays or looking for change (but not necessarily only for change’s sake) when voting for politicians who often ignore the concerns of disabled voters.

Kerry also shares about a plane ride conversation with a generation z stranger, about the multi-sensory experience of taking guide dog Oyster to her favourite park again, and Brian’s revisiting previous voting attempts and their inaccessibility as he’s off to try again himself.

So, it’s Canada’s federal election on April 28th and we’re doing a mixed bag edition, one co-host in studio live and the other in Northern Ireland. With a bit of distance from the anxious Canadian citizenry, sister/co-host Kerry hasn’t flown a kite, but instead has flown like one into the future of the UK time zone five hours ahead of brother/co-host Brian and yet modern technology makes it possible to open up a bit of a pre-election mixed bag of discussion topics, both silly and serious as one voted already while the other is on his way after this show and we will continue with a post-election wrap-up shortly.

Speaking on the Canadian (Can lit) literary scene and on April/May’s The Festival of Literary Diversity (FOLD) specifically, Canadian author and accessibility advocate Amanda Leduc says: It’s impossible to have something that’s 100 percent accessible all the time. We’re always working towards a more accessible world, working towards making those adjustments, bit by bit by bit. And that’s where I think having a sense of humility about this and an openness and willingness to learn and to change and grow, for all of us, is really important.

This week on Outlook we’re talking with Amanda and learning more about Cerebral Palsy and her own experience with the neurological condition causing everything from muscle weakness to fatigue to pain. Leduc tells us about her time getting her Masters at St. Andrew’s University in Scotland and something she calls “a monument to exclusion” when it comes to the inaccessibility of heritage buildings and old cities.

From the built environment of capital Edinburgh to the natural environment of Canada’s winters, Amanda is speaking to us on the show about her own accessibility needs plus considering other’s accessibility considerations after being bullied for a visible limp in childhood to her practice of valuing rest and energy preservation (recharging and rejuvenating) in order to be at her most creatively as a writer.

For Amanda Leduc, it’s about reimagining what storytelling can mean. Check out more on Amanda’s work by visiting her website:

https://amandaleduc.com

Leduc tells us about her previous role as the Festival’s Communications and Development Coordinator, about the origins of FOLD for filling a void in Canada’s literary and festival spaces as far as diversity and representation are concerned, and about some of the events being offered (both virtual and in-person) such as the Friday night Literary Cabaret and the Sunday High Tea and her involvement in some panels from April 27th to May 4th.

And so as The FOLD celebrates its tenth year here in 2025, we’re talking bringing people of all experiences and perspectives into the fold with creativity and innovative opportunities for diversity, just as we do every week on Outlook On Radio Western.

For more on FOLD go to:

https://thefoldcanada.org

Taking a big bite out of life, brother/co-host Brian has returned from a birthday celebration trip to New York City and he’s back and telling us all about it.

He shares about his accessible travel and airport experiences at Toronto Pierson, JFK, and LaGuardia, the music show “An Evening With Ida and Tsunami” at Bowery Ballroom he attended with friend/Outlook guest Nefertiti Matos Olivares on Birthday Eve, and another round (after his experience in London, England) and again he set up an exploration of a city with greeter organisation Big Apple Greeters to be shown around by a local along with meeting up with friends from around the state, including sushi with an upcoming Outlook guest.

His snapshot of NYC and most of its boroughs includes a tour of NYC transport including a tactile map of the subway system and its history (one puzzle pieced put together at a time) found Brian checking out the tactile further with an exhibit of subway station turnstyles through the years and an accessible touch tour of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. For us at Outlook though, it wouldn’t be the same without audio to tell a fuller tale along with hearing about a few wild New York City encounters with security guards, allowing Brian to get a broader, more personalized feel of the place he’s in. Check out audio from the live show he attended, his latest subway and other NYC transport and being live at Grand Central Terminal, and his special time spent on Roosevelt Island and The East River. And time in New York wouldn’t be the same, especially a first visit, without stopping in Central Park to listen to some live saxophone music. Brian shares both audio and Be My AI image descriptions of some of the photos he took for sighted family and friends to see what he did, it’s a full multi-sensory glimpse of the landmark New York City as we meet Brian beneath the big clock.

At one point, he stands with his NYC local guide at FDR’s statue there on Roosevelt Island, with The United Nations right there and the words of Roosevelt clearly underscoring some of the dangerous changes sweeping the States these days. Plus, also on The Island, they make a brief stop at the Accessibility Services booth to find out if they have any information for that spot available in braille. Stay tuned for the answer.

Along with a sharing of some comforting cuisine prepared by a dear friend, plenty of King of the Hill watched, and a homestay at a Manhattan apartment, with the added benefit of getting to explore NYC with the blind leading the blind, he won’t ever forget his first Big Apple experience shown to him by its locals.

Book your own personalized tour with Big Apple Greeters:

https://bigapplegreeters.net/visitor/register

Check out a segment from Ida’s Bowery Ballroom set:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUTcW325GT4

We’re running to keep up with the train of time, yet through slivers of memory, on this yearly audio diary looking back on the year that was. It’s our original podcast, Ketchup On Pancakes, and we’re recapping 2024 as 2025 rushes forward in a blur. On this one, we’re joined by friend/boyfriend Barry Toner from Ireland, someone who’s joined us in the past, down in the basement where it all took place. We’re looking back, on this annual By The Fireside with a tribute episode, dedicated to our dear friend Andrew. As we sit, beers in hand, by the crackling fire, Andrew’s very own drums nearby. We share a few songs featuring or in tribute to Andrew, as well as looking back on travel to Maine (for a drama club camp arts residency) and Ottawa (Kerry and Barry joining the parents on a road trip), and to the things we’re proud we tackled, in fitness and in mental health for instance. We keep up the silly and imaginative with feature Cassette Clip of the Week and new feature Word of the Year, while lamenting the loss of a once-in-a-lifetime sort of fellow, a friendship lost. So farewell, 2024 (with your last taste of security in the wider world), and to friends gone along the way in the march of time. That’s how that was. That’s how it was. That’s how it is.

Find Fowler’s Meaning No Harm on streaming services and Bandcamp:

https://fowlercanada.bandcamp.com/album/meaning-no-harm

Check out Barry’s first appearance, down in the basement, on Ketchup On Pancakes from 2018:

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/ketchup-on-pancakes-episode-14-orange-so-it-is-feat/id1527876739?i=1000633134110

And take a listen to our two-parter Outlook show where we visit our new friends in Mount Vernon, Maine, for Drama Club Camp:

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/outlook-2024-10-14-our-week-in-maine-well-figure-it-out-pt-1/id1527876739?i=1000673780980

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/outlook-2024-10-21-our-week-in-maine-well-figure-it-out-pt-2/id1527876739?i=1000675516532

Records sound better than t-shirts. Today we’re talking literature and CanLit, sports, and music around the theme of accessibility as we continue to promote women in the arts for the remainder of Women’s History Month.

Well this week on Outlook we’re discussing wearing our message on our clothing as The Festival of Literary Diversity’s (FOLD) schedule of events and festival sign-up has gone live on their website which we’ll share at the end of this episode’s description. It’s an eight day long event (first, half virtual and the second four days in person) as we discuss the importance of both options for events and gatherings, workshops, and festivals of all kinds, for people with disabilities which make in-person attendance more difficult, something we’ve sadly moved away from since coming out of the worst of the pandemic.

A friend told sister/co-host Kerry about a recent online author talk, put on by the FOLD, from their FOLD Academy, with Amanda Leduc called “Building a Life as a Disabled Writer” which included topics such as managing energy for writing when living with disability or chronic illness and information on applying for arts grants which are geared to creators with disabilities. (The next FOLD Academy takes place on April 19th at noon Eastern.)

Spring has sprung )or is trying to) and that means baseball so brother/co-host Brian is ready, with his fantasy league and with the real thing, as we highlight the usefulness of listening to games on the radio for those of us who can’t see the visuals of the live thing. It’s like audiobooks or podcasts, an audio method of listening. He’s traveling to New York City shortly, but only time will tell if he ends up attending a New York team’s live game, as Kerry remembers the experience of attending a Bluejays game in the Sky Dome, as we forever refer to it.

We talk the creative projects we’ve worked on together and the factors which make them more or less possible, about the need for diversity in literature and art, and even about the ignorance of certain authors who don’t understand the value of authenticity reading or even what it is. Proud to be woke on Outlook, it’s part II of a March Mixed Bag pile of topics, including the FOLD, and sister/co-host Kerry will be attending the online portion next month and sharing more come May.

So many books, so little time, but check out more info on The Festival of Literary Diversity, from April 27th to May 4th, by going to their website here:

https://thefoldcanada.org

“When I was a little girl, I used to dream as a man, because I wanted to do things that women didn’t do back then such as traveling to Africa, living with wild animals and writing books," said Dr. Jane Goodall. "I didn’t have any female explorers or scientists to look up to but I was inspired by Dr. Dolittle, Tarzan and Mowgli in The Jungle Book — all male characters. It was only my mother who supported my dream: 'You’ll have to work hard, take advantage of opportunities and never give up,' she’d tell me. I’ve shared that message with young people around the world, and so many have thanked me, and said, 'You taught me that because you did it, I can do it too.'"

(Jane's quote is excerpted from a 2018 op-ed with Time magazine.)

March - It’s a lot of things really. It’s another Mixed Bag, a Mid March Mixed Bag, along with it being a St. Patrick’s Day Monday special when we aired live and we on Outlook are also still celebrating Women’s History Month.

We’re looking back and reflecting on what was the five year anniversary of the start of the “stay at home” orders and lockdown and the start of Covid. Speaking of medical things, and spring, sister/co-host Kerry shares facts about the lotus flower and its symbolism of rebirth in nature and science, which leads to celebrating March being Kidney Health Month as she and her dad recall the rebirth and fresh start of the kidney transplant Kerry received from him, a rebirth of sorts. Kerry shares a health update with her kidney and levels being as stable as ever.

Kerry in blue and our International Women’s Day edition guest Jane Piper in red, like the Radio Western sign in the background, brother/ally/co-host Brian starts the second half of the show reading the Be My AI image of the two ladies posing in the lobby of the studio after, as we like to take photos with our live and in-studio guests when we are lucky enough to get them, as we look back on the previous week’s episode and the discussion with restorative justice activist Jane. We’ve managed to post the actual photos even with the accessibility issues that come along with social media these days.

The second half is dedicated to what’s going on in politics, both provincially and nationally as we share concerns about our premier receiving a third win last month, even with his silence and lack of action on matters concerning the disability community. Last week’s guest Jane spoke a lot about accountability and the lack of it in our society, these actions or lack of that politicians often are modelling and still being voted in by those who don’t consider marginalized populations.

Also, we finish up talking about the Canadian Disability Benefit set to come into effect this summer and a federal election on the horizon, we share more about the CDB and provinces like Ontario which has not yet promised not to put in clawbacks and Alberta which has put in the barrier of clawbacks to the already set provincial benefits. Organisation Disability Without Poverty is working to pressure politicians to live up to the promises to combat disability plus poverty across the country.

“Green alligators, long neck geese, chimpanzees..

We begin the show with a song about these animals, including the ones Jane Goodall worked with, the featured woman in history for the month of March and finish off talking the spring promise of an upcoming baseball season.

Today though, we’re unfortunately celebrating St. Patrick’s Day without our Irish co-host Barry and Oyster the guide dog with us live, but they’ll be back, but so we’ve started off the show with a silly song from our childhood - The Unicorn Song, The Irish Rovers version proving that spring is on it’s way to green things up in honour of our Irish connection. We love all things Ireland, but we at Outlook are Canadian and proud to be so.

https://www.disabilitywithoutpoverty.ca

“You don’t know what you’re doing, you’re basically recreating your life, and there’s no map for it. I just went through the motions for a long time, I was just a shell of who I once was, but by talking about my experience I realised I could help other people and I began to share my story in front of audiences.”

Power, control, empowerment. Rebirth, trauma, healing, and even forgiveness and on finding the places, the spaces to talk about hard things, in life changing communication and accountability terms with our fellow human beings.

As spring once more approaches during March is Women’s History Month, with March 8th being known as International Women’s Day, it’s time for another one of sister/co-host Kerry’s annual IWD featured spotlights on a woman she knows who is doing important work in intersectionality and gender equity spaces.

This guest can be an ally, but does not necessarily need to be blind or even disabled, but rather a woman that’s making an effort to foster human connection…with conviction for a more equitable world, as it meets the themes of diversity, intersectionality, and interdependence that make up the crux of this show.. This week on Outlook for International Women’s Day 2025, the guest is Jane Piper, (performer, artist, and restorative justice lived experience advocate) local and live in studio.

Kerry and Jane look back on how they met in the autumn of 2018, how they very nearly attended a Bernie Sanders rally together, and Piper shares more about what sharing her own story means and does for her each time she tells it. She shares openly about the brutal attack she faced in 2003 and about how she handled the trauma and life afterward, leading her to take on surrigate victim/offender dialogue. Piper runs storytelling workshops with both women in abuse shelters and with the men who’ve been incarcerated for violent acts against women and she talks to Kerry about cultivating empathy for others, even those who have committed unspeakable acts, and on what it means to offer/find forgiveness in a world more divided than is good for any of us.

Women’s History Month/International Women’s Day this year’s theme is “The Strength In Every Story” and Jane Piper has both worked to facilitate that in others (like she did when Kerry took her storytelling workshop locally in London) alongside showcasing the same in her sharing of her own, in the work Jane’s done on herself and with/for others such as her work with abused women (as a peer support worker) and inside correctional facilities doing accountability workshops with men imprisoned for violent crimes against women. Jane shares with us what it was like the first time she stepped foot into just such a facility for one of these accountability workshops, what restorative justice has meant in her life, and what it’s like working with these offenders.

To find out more about the public speaking she does, as she’s progressing on the book she’s written (Coming Out of The Fog) about her rape survivor experience, check out her website here in the meantime:

http://janepiper.com

Heading toward International Women’s Day on March 8th, our guest this week says:

“Listening to live music for me is just such an incredible experience because I’m not someone… I don’t personally enjoy the nightclub spaces, that stuff overwhelms me, but when it comes to listening to music, I could do that for hours. That’s good audio stimulus.”

This week on Outlook we’re speaking with Amanda Shekarchi, a musician and someone who works in media, about music, perfect pitch and its multi-sensory elements, and community/campus radio stations like the ones all three of us broadcast out of.

We talk family and sighted siblings, about working collaboratively with community whether sighted or not, and how collaboration involves everyone, including the essential role a mentor can play.

Amanda tells us about her radio experience, including working with Met Radio. (Her university station at Toronto Metropolitan), then onto the CBC with her work on shows like Day 6 and the doc she both produced and hosted “Playing By Ear”, and also her work as a monthly on air contributor and host for AMI (Accessible Media Inc.).

It was Family Day, just last month, when both us siblings happened to be listening to the CBC when Amanda’s “Playing By Ear” came on and speaking of family, we’re talking Amanda’s experience growing up in Toronto with hers and so much more on this first of multiple International Women’s Day episodes. So check out her radio show on Met Radio (12 80 AM) on Monday, March 10th at noon in Toronto for a Met 30 Special IWD Show.

`listen to Amanda’s CBC documentary “Playing `by Ear” here:

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/audio/1.7110160

Find her interviews with musicians on Met Radio’s YouTube channel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dx_HD2TZjQc&list=PL0t7bx4aRZ25qxBBq1rWly3scN5gl4S6S

And follow her on social media:

https://www.instagram.com/amandarayaofficial/