Evelyn N. Pollock has made the 2024 CBC Nonfiction Prize shortlist for Is Life a Tossed Salad?

She will receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and her essay has been published on CBC Books.

The winner of the 2024 CBC Nonfiction Prize will be announced Sept. 26. They will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and attend a two-week writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.

If you're interested in the CBC Literary Prizes, the 2025 CBC Short Story Prize is open for submissions until Nov 1. The 2025 CBC Nonfiction Prize will open in January 2025 and the CBC Poetry Prize will open in April 2025.

This year's CBC Nonfiction Prize jury is composed of Michelle Good, Dan Werb and Christina Sharpe. The jury selects the shortlist and the eventual winner from the longlist, which is chosen by a committee of writers and editors from across the country. Works are judged anonymously on the basis of the participant's use of language, originality of subject and writing style.

For more on how the judging for the CBC Literary Prizes works, visit the FAQ page.

Following successful careers in teaching, educational politics, and human rights consulting, Evelyn N. Pollock retired to pursue her lifelong passions: writing and painting. She moved from Toronto to Horseshoe Valley, Ont., with her husband. Evelyn was a four-time participant in the Muskoka Novel Marathon, has attended many writing retreats and any of her short stories have been published in anthologies such as: A Canvas of Words, Whispered Words, Chicken Soup for the Soul, Mariposa Exposed and Mariposa Revisited. She has published a nonfiction book, Thirty-three Years to Conception: A Voice from the Street. Recently, she collaborated with five authors to publish Pieces of Us, an Anthology that includes eight of her short stories. Evelyn is currently working on a nonfiction book, Will You Still Love Me?

Pollock told CBC Books about the inspiration behind Is Life a Tossed Salad?: "My older brother died at age 44, a victim of the AIDS epidemic. My parents were devastated. Almost three decades later we lost our 43-year-old son during the opioids crisis. Authoring this story gave me the opportunity to examine emotional parallels and consider how our family handled loss in different generations. It also allowed me to explore questions about genetic destiny versus chance.

"Many families have suffered losses during recent pandemics and epidemics. This story is a tribute to my late parents, brother and son, remembering them, while advocating for others who have suffered stigma, loss and isolation in silence, during deadly pandemics. I hope this story will dispel negative stereotypes and help others in similar circumstances go forward and embrace life again.

"I was inspired to write by my late father who lived the adage 'I am my brother's keeper.' He read philosophy, history, and biblical texts in English and Hebrew late into the night, and through his articles, essays and speeches, advocated for fair treatment of others. I was also inspired by my mother who always had a half-painted canvas on an easel in our kitchen. She taught me joy and inclusiveness, as she welcomed friends and strangers into our modest home.

"In my paintings, I express what I see and feel with a brush. In my writing, I paint what I see and feel with words."

Mom called herself a Domestic Engineer. She was my role model — respected by everyone as a talented visual artist and homemaker. There was always an oil painting 'in progress' leaning on a wooden easel in the kitchen, next to a chopping board with her latest innovative cuisine.

Chopping vegetables and transforming them into mouth-watering meals was a form of creativity she mastered without recipes. She was an expert at whipping together delicious meals from scraps. When there was no meat, she chopped multi-coloured vegetables, added fragrant spices and fresh herbs, poured in water, and made hearty soups. Mom mixed chopped veggies with leftover breadcrumbs, eggs, and oil, to make savoury pancakes, patties, and loaves. She created scrumptious eggplant and tomato ratatouilles. She layered sweet onions, eggplant, zucchini, matzoh crackers, and cottage cheese, then poured on tangy tomato sauce, sprinkled in spices, and invented a pasta-free lasagna that guests devoured. Her masterpiece was mock liver-paté made by blending eggplant, peanut butter, oil, and spices (without adding a speck of dreaded liver).

The frequency of Mom's chopping sessions increased tenfold after my older brother, Alan, died at age 45. He was her firstborn son. I was three years younger than Alan. Our younger brother was six years younger than me.

Alan had a flair for living in the moment. He competed high school early, winning full scholarships to university. He excelled at almost everything he tried. He taught himself to play the piano by ear. He taught himself to read and speak fluently in French, German, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. Alan graduated from Oxford University with his Doctorate in Philosophy and became a Professor of Philosophy and Theatre Arts in Ontario. He created The Magic Circus Theatre Company and directed performances of his modern adaptation of Shakespeare's 'Hamlet' (Hamlet in a Hurry) in England and Greece. The performances were filmed by the CBC.

To me, a vibrant aura of neon lights sparked around my brother — orange, red, yellow, fuscia, lime-green — as he bounced from one creative endeavour to the next. He was like a bolt of electricity, next to you for one second, then gone in a flash.

In early 1990, Alan told us he had tested positive for HIV. In less than eighteen months, he was dead from the devastating side effects of AIDS.

After his death, Mom's vegetable chopping became a compulsion. When I visited, I often observed her — cutting board teetering over the kitchen sink, sharp knife in hand — with tears streaming down her plump cheeks. Whenever I reached to comfort her she turned away, blaming her tears on the pungent onions.

***

I am now seventy-four, the age my mother was when she lost Alan. Today marks the fifth anniversary of my own son's sudden death at age 43. This morning a vision of my chopaholic mom popped into my mind as I stood at my kitchen sink mindlessly chopping cucumbers, sweet peppers, green onions, garlic cloves, and vine-ripened tomatoes. I dropped the chunks into a super-sized, stainless-steel bowl, dribbled in tangy apple cider vinegar, virgin olive oil, ground pepper, kosher salt, a squirt of honey, and squeezed in zesty lemon juice, then tossed like crazy. I didn't feel satisfied, so I added a can of chickpeas and a jar of stuffed green olives. The aroma was tantalizing, but no matter how much I threw into that bowl, there was still an enormous void in my heart. I wondered what it all meant: Synchronicity? A parallel universe? Was my mother watching over me? Had I become my mother?

As I sliced through a purple onion, my watery eyes settled on a small, oval stone lying next to a hand-painted, blue ceramic duck on the windowsill above the sink. The stone was etched with the words Time Heals. My shoulders tensed. My gut wrenched. Who invented that pat cliché?

Teeth clenched, fingers gripping the handle of my serrated knife, I continued chopping until the refrigerator vegetable bin was empty: Did chopping vegetables help my mother fill the void in her heart and soothe the echoing silence in her life after my brother died? Could it do the same for me?

My mind scanned back through the years to October 7, 1990. I did the math. My mother was seventy-four and my father was seventy-seven when my brother was admitted to Casey House, the first hospice for people with end-stage Acquired Immune Disorder Syndrome. It was a welcoming hospice created through the dedication of humanitarian, June Caldwell - a retreat full of love - the final stop for so many innocent victims of the AIDS epidemic.

October 7, 1990, is etched into my mind forever like the words on the oval stone on my windowsill. It was the day our fiercely independent fifteen-year-old son, Daniel, dropped out of school and left home. He told us he was an adult, had a full-time job in a skate shop, had paid his first month's rent for a bedroom in a rooming-house shared with his older co-workers, and could look after himself.

October 7, 1990, was the day I not only lost my son for the first time, but also the day I became my parents' parent. Every day, for the next four months, until my brother died, I picked up my parents and drove them downtown to Casey House to visit Alan.

We sat with him in his room, or the main floor lounge. I remember the lounge — green-brocade sofas and love seats — pristine, elegant, inviting, but often empty. We brought treats he loved. Sometimes Daniel took the bus over to join us. When others celebrated Christmas, we brought potato pancakes and apple sauce and listened to classical music together. We organized a family gathering in the lounge to celebrate our daughter's Bat Mitzvah (her thirteenth birthday). We still treasure the family photos from that day — everyone grinning as if looking forward to a wonderful future together.

Guilt stuck to my soul like glue. My confession? After each visit, I went to the sink in the hallway and scrubbed my hands with soap and hot water, hoping to cleanse myself of any remnants of that dreaded disease.

When my brother died on that frigid winter day in February 1991, I stood in his room waiting for a sign. He appeared to be resting peacefully. I waited in disbelief for his chest to rise again, his eyelashes to flutter, his breath to fill the room, but there was only stillness and silence. I watched the nurse remove his watch, a gift from my father. Then I left the room, trudged to the sink in the hallway, and scrubbed my hands for the last time.

My younger brother recently described his memory of those last moments, "The window in the room was open and I heard a cardinal singing its distinctive song. It reminded me so much of Alan — colourful and flamboyant. Everything in that moment felt sharper, more vivid in colour. Now, whenever I see or hear a cardinal, I feel Alan's presence."

As Jewish tradition required, our family sat Shiva at my parent's home for seven days. Hundreds visited to pay their respects. The following week, both of my parents had heart attacks. With no time to mourn my brother's death, or our son's decision to leave home, I held back my grief and respected my father's wish to keep secret the cause of my brother's death. When those who did not know him asked, my response was, "He died from side effects of cancer."

That secret ate at my soul. I wanted Alan remembered with respect, but I also knew my father was correct - it was an epidemic, a time of fear and dread. This was confirmed just before Alan died when the University where Alan taught denied his seniority as a professor because of the nature of his illness.

When my parents returned home from the hospital the silence between them was deafening. My mother wanted to talk about Alan. My father couldn't. Dad retreated into his private world, believing that his silence and the constant smile he wore could protect his firstborn's reputation from the nasty stigma of AIDS — a worldwide epidemic feared more than death itself.

At the time, a diagnosis of HIV infection was a death warrant. Many families suffered but there was little compassion. Not long after Alan's death, a powerful concoction of drugs was created to slow the disease and extend lives. But it was too late for my brother.

It's difficult to grasp that he has been gone for three decades. How did my parents manage to survive the years following his death?

***

When our son, Daniel, died at age 43, I pledged to tell the truth. There would be no secrets eating at my soul. He died instantly from an unintended opioid overdose (poisoned with toxic fentanyl) – a victim of the Opioid Overdose Epidemic that has killed a generation of young people, just like the AIDS epidemic killed my brother and many in his generation.

This afternoon, as I reflected on life, my eyes rested on the blue-and-white ceramic duck sitting on my kitchen windowsill. It was a gift to me from 15-year-old Daniel when he returned from his grade-nine spelunking trip to Kentucky. Spelunking? Why didn't they just use the word 'caving'?

During that trip, Daniel rescued his injured school principal — carrying him on his back out of a dark cave to safety. When he returned, Daniel repeatedly talked about his horror at seeing an enormous, burning cross - the emblem of the racist KKK — outside that cave in Kentucky. A few months later, Daniel dropped out of school. He declared he was an adult. He could take care of himself. A long cycle of addiction, homelessness, and rehabilitation followed.

At age 33 he began to change. He dictated his memoir for us. At age 40 he took up stone sculpture and discovered his creative passion. He was in recovery and happy when, at age 43, he became an unwilling victim of the Opioid Crisis — an epidemic of toxic synthetic drugs sweeping across the country and taking the lives of thousands of young people. We inherited Daniel's beloved, ten-year-old cat, his taped memoir, and his stone sculptures. His cat brought us great comfort for four years, until he passed away last year at age 14. Daniel's memoir is now a book and we continue to treasure his stone sculptures.

My husband and I and our beautiful daughter miss Daniel every day. There is a gap in our lives where his heart once beat. How will we survive the loss of our only son? How will our daughter survive the loss of her only sibling?

I often find myself at the kitchen sink daydreaming while chopping vegetables. Sometimes, I catch the reflection of my mother's face looking back at me through the window and realize it's my own aging reflection.

This afternoon, I emptied the vegetable bin in our fridge, resulting in a vegetable lasagna, vegetable soup, and a chopped salad. While I chopped, my dear husband stood beside me smiling, with one hand on my shoulder and the other lifting chunks of fresh vegetables into his mouth.

Tomorrow will be a new day. We will go vegetable shopping together. Then I will go into our sunroom to paint at the wooden easel I inherited from my mother.

The winner of the 2024 CBC Nonfiction Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and win a two-week writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. Four finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.

The 2025 CBC Short Story Prize is currently open until Nov. 1, 2024 at 4:59 p.m. ET. The 2025 CBC Nonfiction Prize will open in January 2025 and the CBC Poetry Prize will open in April 2025.