It is an immense privilege to share that I have been invited to deliver this year’s Northrop Frye Centre Distinguished Lecture at the University of Toronto.

The story is the spice, it’s the seasoning, the salt, says one chef. It is stories that flavour food—something to think about every time a recipe instructs you to “salt to taste.” But salt does not season food alone. Salt spikes the water. It lines the rocks. It thickens the air. Salt behaves and misbehaves in terms of where it shows up, and how much of it. Just as climate change is largely a story about water—too much in some places, too little elsewhere, and temperatures that are too high—salt traces environments past, present, and future. Braiding together salt, stories, and other survival skills, I will present a lecture about preservation, time, and environmental futures.

If you’re in the city, one that I am lucky enough to call my hometown, please join on 6 October for Salt, Stories, and Other Survival Skills, at Victoria College at 5pm, followed by a reception.