Medium Magazine
stretching our journalisM work
In 2010, amidst weekly responsibilities and a hectic publishing schedule, Alain Latour (Editor-in-Chief, Volume 36) and his Editorial Team decided to create the Medium Magazine. Latour writes in the first editor’s note: “The belief that we can all do much more than we think we can, that so many opportunities lie before our eyes, happens to be a core belief of ours.”
Since then, Medium Magazine has served as a spotlight to display the best of student journalism. Recent editions feature long-form journalism, narratives, and poetry that explore chosen themes, and are curated into an aesthetic and functional layout for enjoyable reading.
We invite you to browse the carefully crafted print editions below.
The Walk
Andy, Ayera, Ben, Selina, and I hover uncertainly at the edge of the parking lot, peering into the woods. “Okay,…
What if I want to lie down too?
“Abu? Abu!” Mama calls for her father on the phone. Her bedroom door is closed, and it muffles nothing. “Bhai!…
Finding light through life’s unpredictable challenges
Hope. With each to gain their own definition of what the word may bring throughout their lifetime, it becomes a…
I’ll be your emergency contact
It would be simple to describe the relationship between addiction, mental illness, and hope as being one where clinging to…
Introduction
“Hope” is the thing with feathers – That perches in the soul – And sings the tune without the words…
The Cedar Tree
The cedar trees on Mount Lebanon do not speak anymore. They haven’t for a long time. They used to be…
Censorship is evolving, but so is journalism
An interview with journalist Emma Paling on fostering hope in an age of distorted realities. From a young age, I…
Finding hope for the climate around the world
Winter feels like it’s getting shorter each year, governments and billionaires seem apathetic to their massive carbon footprints, and I…
The power of friendship: A Youtuber’s guide to making the most out of college
Ever since I started university, I’ve wondered about what my experience would be like. Would it be like the movies…
Written by you Not just another
Why is the sky grey again? Seated in some confined cafe, You can only focus on your terrible day. h…
What is Hope and Why Does it Matter?
Why should I have hope? How can I possibly have hope during a time of great negativity? These are some…
To Hope Means To Go Beyond Belief
Redefining hope as more than believing in a better future. Ancient Greek mythology tells the tale of Pandora’s Box. The…
The Bloom after the Frost
The instant the frost starts to melt has a certain, almost mystical, quality. It seems as though the world is…
Just a summer baby learning to survive winter
In 2003, I was born amidst a burning hot July. My mother recalls eating pounds of fresh British Columbia blueberries,…
Welcome to “Echoes of Tomorrow” — Editor’s Note
Retrofuturism is a vision of the future, from the past. Picture those iconic tales of shimmering spacecrafts on silver screens – The Jetsons, Back to the Future, Star Trek – series like these served not just as entertainment, but also, as colourful mid-late-century predictions of what our world would be…
Two Futures, One Truth
We combined wood, cloth, gears,And we took to the sky.We encased ourselves in metal and heat,And we hurtled to the moon.We ripped apart atoms,And we changed the world forever. Tell me, oh, future,What will you be?Now that humanity is on this path.One where we journey farther than ever before,Create the…
The Winds, The Watch, and The Wasteland
This place has no name. It is no longer worthy of one. Most residents simply call it “the waste.” Those who are lucky enough to live elsewhere call it “the depleted zone” or “the gap.” Once, a bustling metropolis existed here, now there is nothing but sand and rock. Sand,…
On retrofuturism and our culture of convenience
A couple of weeks ago, I was searching for a book titled The Greening of America by Charles A. Reich. I combed through bookshelves of commercial stores, searched for hours in libraries, and asked friends and family who might own a copy. I was unsuccessful despite knowing that an online…
If The Day of Judgement Dawns Tomorrow
In 2022, at the start of my second year at the University of Toronto Mississauga, I took a 100-level philosophy course: Introduction to Knowledge and Reality. Having already struggled through my first year, I felt a sort of pleasure in observing the terror of my younger classmates, mostly freshmen. I’d…
Non-human communication translator
Picture this: It’s 2070 and your dog is quite literally your best friend “I’m hungry,” says Luna, pawing at her food bowl in the kitchen. The silver bowl clinks against the marble floor as she noses it forward. Her dinner isn’t until another half hour. “It’s 5:30 right now, we…
Growing Pains
I saw my old house once again as we made the familiar turn—so sharp, that I was pressed to the side of the door, clinging to the seat in front of me, terrified that the car door would open from the force of six people pushed against it. It had…
Welcome to “In With The New” – Editor’s Note
“Out With The Old,” the first Medium Magazine of Volume 49, welcomed you into the world of nostalgia. Now, with “In With The New,” we’re ready to look towards the future. Writing about “the new” meant pondering over what is to come, what happens next, and what might be. Nothing…
Dear Future You, You Are Art: A Letter in Four Parts
Dear future you, You are art. Each intricate detail—every thought, belief, expression, and movement—sculpts who you are. With each brushstroke on your canvas, gliding in pure harmony and smoothness, your masterpiece awaits. So, who are you? The painting. The sculpture. The sketch. The visions in your mind that you rework…
Painting Love: A Reflection on Love and Museums
Shortly before the first time I fell in love, we were standing in front of Alex Colville’s Soldier and Girl at Station. The couple was in embrace. He and I faced the painting, hand-in-hand, my thumb comfortably curled inside his palm. “He threw his bag to the side to catch…
Pop Culture is Dead—But It’s Probably for the Best
No modern band receives more undivided praise than The Beatles did in the 1960s. No fashion trend decorates the current cultural landscape like hairspray and high-waisted jeans did in the 1980s. No music genre dominates popular interest like rock ‘n’ roll did in the 1970s. In fact, even trying to…
Performance Anxiety: The Pressures of Performing Queerness
Performing queerness is an unending endeavour. It always seems to creep its way into my mind. It starts when I open my eyes and catch a glance at myself in the mirror and concludes with the final glimpse of my raw cuticles clutching my pillow right before my eyes shut….
The New Meaning of Octobers
Octobers have a new meaning for me now. I realized this when I answered “October” to a work meeting ice-breaker question, “What is your favourite month of the year?” When, I wondered afterwards, had October become my favourite month? Four years ago, Octobers, to me, meant the monsoon—cool, drizzly days…
Holding Hands with Grief
Funerals have never really fazed me. From the age of eleven, I remember packing up my violin, slipping on a black dress, and marching my way over to the church. I would tune my instrument, adjust my microphone, and arrange my sheet music on the stand. My fingers would glide…
Renew Through Life
Heavy footsteps fall down the hallway and stop at the end, where three closed doors lead into three bedrooms: the twins’ rooms and mine. Leaning back against my headboard in the dark, balancing a Sleepytime Tea on my closed laptop, I forgo further movement. He is standing outside my room….
I Am Not My Sister’s Mother
March 2021 I did not want to be in the emergency room of Trillium Hospital, but I had to be. Hand in hand, Haidi and I entered the waiting area. I had already told her of the Covid-19 protocols; I asked her to sanitize her hands, draped a mask on…
Brushstrokes of Tomorrow
Sadly, not all seeds grow in an environment nourished by warmth and security, and when neglected, they are left to wither in the harsh winds of trauma or loss. A tiny seed of vulnerability planted during the tender years of childhood can branch out crooked and tangled, growing into a…
Concussions, Compulsions, and Car Crashes
By the time my body was thrown from the windshield and plastered to the pavement, I was already relatively confident I wasn’t dying. Good. That’s the first step, I suppose; I’ve never done this before. Gratitude for my continued existence quickly gave way to embarrassment. I must have crossed the…
Mind | Body | Soul
“The mind can never find the solution, nor can it afford to allow you to find the solution, because it is itself an intrinsic part of the ‘problem.’” – Eckhart Tolle in The Power of Now Sitting on the floor of my room, a space that appears to have grown…
Love Me, Love Me Not
13 I sneak out of the classroom minutes before my English class. I sprint to the girls’ bathroom, turning off the light as I stumble in. I wince at the sight of my reflection in the mirror. The bathroom window lets in the dim January sun, my face is bright…
What Happens Next is Up to You
Getting pregnant is a lot like breaking glass. It’s easier to do by accident than on purpose. Glass breaks for different reasons. Bottles shatter against the hulls of brand-new ships when christened before their maiden voyages, casting spilled wine and slivered pieces for years of safe journeys across an unpredictable…
Welcome to “Out with the Old” – Editor’s Note
All throughout our unique, individual journeys, we seek ever-lasting familiarity—a special person, a long-lived passion, weekly Sunday brunches with the family. But in reality, the only constant is change. The only feature that will always be part of our existence is nature’s need to alter its course—often when we least…
Plasticity
I never knew the hands that made me. They pour hot liquified plastic into my metal mould. I am one of the millions of malleable bodies solidifying inside the water-cooling tubs that rest on top of the concrete factory floors. We stand next to each other—identical soldiers in formation—waiting until…
Babcia
Women are often the managers of Polish households. They raise the children, cook, clean, control the finances, and create welcoming atmospheres for all friends and family who visit. With elegance and etiquette, Polish wives tend to act as delicate dictators around their husbands and tough mothers towards their kids. Their…
Tangible Keepsakes of the Past
Tangible keepsakes. Pictures, letters, and old mediums, no longer in use. It is an unaltered repetition of history to leave the old in the past and seek what is simpler, newer, and faster. Tech fanatics and social media stars flock to their nearest Apple stores in chilly September weather to…
Between an Atom and a Star
I lost my grandfather on July 19, 2022. For the first time, “I’m sorry for your loss” took on a new meaning—and so did the essence of living. As I attended the funeral, the wake, the celebration of life—as I looked through his room and read his diaries, I desperately…
Back in Style
When I was three years old, my parents bought me a Fisher Price cassette tape player. This was their first mistake. My radio, as I liked to call it, was white with bright blue speakers. It had a red handle that I decorated with all the best puppy and princess…
Searching for Awe in a Digital World
“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.”– W.B. Yeats Antoine Hennepin was the first European to witness and recount the commanding magnificence of Niagara Falls. In today’s age of TripAdvisor and Trivago, it is nearly impossible to fathom what this experience could…
Brushstrokes of the Past
The University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM), once Erindale College, began its history in the early 1960s when a timid building, set upon the valley of the Credit River, was constructed. The story commenced on the lands of the Huron-Wendat, and most recently the Mississaugas of the Credit River. From new…
Fallen Leaves
It’s that dreaded time again—summer cleaning. I sit at my desk and slide open the top drawer, exposing its faux-velvet-lined wooden interior. Amongst the numerous pens and paperclips, my hand-crafted acrostic poem from the third-grade peeks out from the colourful mess. I smile as I run my hand over the…
The Open Casket
Seated on a taupe couch, I search the room for imperfections. I find none—not even a crack in the off-white enclosed space. Blooming greenery and vibrant artwork cover the walls and fill the corners of the room. The smell of honey wafts from a lit candle on the coffee table. …
Reimagining the 9-to-5
The 9-to-5 workday is a relic. For decades, people hailed the 9-to-5 as an ideal—satisfied to work 40-hour weeks with only two days off. So did I. However, the world is changing, and workers are demanding more. Although I shied away from questions related to my future post-graduation, I always…
Welcome to In Touch — Editor’s Note
When life rushes by, it’s easy to feel a looming sense of disconnect—between our families, with ourselves, and with the world around us. Sometimes, all we need is a reminder that connections exist everywhere. Whether it is the bond between two atoms, a kiss between two lovers, a story passed…
Etch
And there it is. A cold piece of bone staring at her. So soft and small—she doesn’t know it is a child’s bone when she retrieves it from underneath her bed. Her muscles tense. She doesn’t know what to do; her hands itch to drop the decaying bone back to…
Art is Water
Sargy Mann, a British painter of portraits and landscapes, began to lose his eyesight in 1973. Mann saw spectral haloes and suffered from oedema of the cornea—corneal swelling that causes a buildup of fluid in the eye. Undeterred by his failing vision, he devised alternative methods to experience his surroundings….
The Dinner Table
Cloaked in a quiet suburbia, survivors slice into medium-rare steaks and sip red wine at the dinner table. Mothers swoop back and forth like trained servers, fathers make a parody out of politics, and the young swipe across tiny screens, slouching behind handheld barriers. With flushed cheeks and gruff voices,…
My name is Aroni
“अरोनि” is what I wrote as my name on the top of my third grade Hindi test paper. It was a bold choice. You see, a few months before this test, my Hindi teacher taught everyone in the class how to write our names in the Hindi alphabet. My name,…
Monotoned Me
I waited two years to go back in person because I was going crazy at home. I was tired of my every- day routine; wake up, eat, sit at my computer for twelve hours (maybe more), study and sleep—only to re- peat it all over again the next day, and…
Our world through rhythm
I never paid attention to the sound of footsteps. The rhythmic thuds of feet patting against dry concrete, crunching through heaps of snow, or gliding between blades of fresh cut grass. These sounds are often mundane, muddled and missing within the noise of everyday life. In between the crowds of…
Seventy Years of First Dates
Jeannette – 1952 “I do not know how I’ll survive dancing in these shoes tonight,” I say, crouching down to rub the back of my ankle with my thumb. The backs of my brand-new blue kitten heels dig into my skin with each step. Amelia, my best friend, laughs and…
Soundless Vibrations
It took me a while to understand the preciousness of communication and the beauty of being understood. It took watching two of the people I hold closest to my heart—my cousin Maddy and my brother Noah—struggle with endless frustration. Their divergent means of communication obstructed their thoughts, leaving friends and…
Skin Against Our Fingertips
A year without summer,A night without stars—the constellations aligned,Perched high above the sky’s radiant stunner,Life without connection is stumbling through the darkness blind, Connection, a delicate force of the human heart,Giving meaning in a world of conformity,With universality that does not hinder progression, prejudice falls apart,The distinction between harmony and…
Welcome to Moving Still — Editor’s Note
Media often tells us one side of the story, teasing answers to life’s uncertainties. Fairytales give life lessons through stories of riches and royalty, social platforms display a performance of reality, and journalism collects facts to document a situation, but bias is still unavoidable. As we crawled out of our…
Meeting Madam U.R.
Four concrete walls with wooden faces,Stare back at me, dull and lifeless.11 p.m., the coffee spill cleaned to leave no traces.White light; letters on keys, flickering, blinding; keeps me timeless. Staggered attempts at escaping this black mirror-boxOf empty hellos and goodbyes and incomplete mornings and nights,Created Unknown Resilience and she…
A New “Normal”
Sydney “Sydney! Breakfast!” Mommy calls up from the kitchen. I put on my fuzzy princess socks, say goodbye to my teddy bear, and race down the stairs. The smell of fresh waffles welcomes me into the room. I pull myself up into a chair and kick my feet back and…
The Other
“Just breathe.” White snow blows across my computer screen as these words appear: “Why are you so nervous?” A soft piano tune opens a pixelated scene of dirt platforms, some covered in snow, and white flakes continue to fall against a background of trees under a dark, cloudy sky. Madeline—my…
Silent Interactions
Bà nội uses one swollen foot to pull herself around in her wheelchair. That’s the image I see, the sound I hear, when I think of home. Most people probably think about their dog—something we’ve never had—or stories around the dinner table—which we rarely ate at—but not me. I think…
Diary of a Fatherless Daughter
The English Oxford Dictionary (OED) defines grief as “a very sad feeling, especially when someone dies.” Featuring up to six hundred thousand words and a rich thousand-year history, the OED is universally reputed as the established guide to the English language. But that doesn’t mean there is only one definition…
Campus in Limbo
Despite my classes being online, I chose to spend my second year in residence at the University of Toronto Mississauga. I thought it would help me stay motivated and connected to the campus. But the stark reality soon settled in. Upon setting foot outside my 3-by-3 metre bedroom, I realized…
I Wish This Didn’t Have to Change
On May 31, 2021, I, along with the rest of the students at the University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM), received an email from The Bulletin Brief about our upcoming school semester: As Canada ramps up its Covid-19 vaccination campaign, the University of Toronto is busy preparing its three campuses for…
The Grey Divide During Covid-19
We shuffle them up like a set of old documents relegated to the storage unit. Just important enough not to shred up and discard, but still not worthy of display in our most prominent filing cabinets. The Covid-19 pandemic was a stark reminder of how we treat our elders. We…
The Epidemic of Social Media
At the height of the pandemic, almost half the world spent 18 hours a day in their homes. Thrust into this foreign world of mandatory masks, physical distancing, and panic, the government ordered us to stay home and away from our friends and colleagues. During the moments we weren’t in…
You’re More Creative Than You Think
The start of summer 2020 was a bumpy one for me. Two months of online school and ten pounds later, I was finally free. Since everything was closed and we were forced to isolate, I figured I’d have time to do the one thing I’d always wished I could do:…
A Car Headed for a Cliff? Health Care in Rural and Northern Ontario.
Context In Ontario, 90 per cent of the population resides within 160 kilometres of the American border. The remaining ten per cent of the province’s population, 1.46 million individuals, experience drastically different living environments. Differences between rural and urban health systems exacerbate inequalities and render it difficult to access care…
The Growing Poem: A Day of Life
a day unfolding in its own shapeless way. by noon the world will hum into shades of flame all will be baked brown. leaves will tumble to the earth and decay; senseless to the white water that weighs upon them until morning springs. an endless cycle of growth, decline and…
Letter from the Editors
Windows are a staple of The Medium office. There’s some meaning to be derived from them about transparency and the search for truth. But really, they’re just nice to look out of. On a regular weekday a year ago, we could have looked down at the first floor of the Student Centre…
Homecoming
“Don’t worry if you can’t recognize them,” my dad says to my sisters and me as we push our luggage carts around the masses of people gathered by baggage claim. “We left when you were all young, so you might not remember.” Dad starts listing the names of aunts and…
Finding Home
It takes me a while to acclimate to Russia’s white nights. As light peers through the windows and drapes across my face, my eyes stay wide open. I breathe in the air redolent of home. I can’t pinpoint the smell, but it gives me comfort. The ceiling is coloured with…
Growing Through Expectations: Taking Back Ownership of Our Own Lives, Successes, and Challenges
The names in this piece have been changed to protect individual privacy. “Do you want to prove them right?” When I was in high school, struggling to get out of bed in the morning, mental health issues aside, I asked myself almost every morning some version of the question above. …
Trapped in an Unrelenting Mind
It’s 9:22 a.m. A frail adolescent boy sits crossed-legged on his bed. His polo shirt, once soft and bright red, is ripped and stained grey, draping over his limbs. His hair hangs over his eyes, clumped with sweat, shielding his hollowed, acne-ridden cheeks. The open doorway is just a few…
Puppy Parenting: The Joys and the Sorrows
On a cool October morning, I repeat today’s plan to my mom as we drive to pick up Tuco. “The book said I need to bring back something with the mother’s scent. This will make the puppy’s transition from his den to our home a lot smoother.” Over the summer,…
The Oxymoron of Unsustainable Growth
Growth is a part of the human condition. We must grow to survive in an ever-changing world where new technological innovations are conceived almost every day, simplifying our daily lives. However, if growth is unrestricted and executed through unsustainable measures, we might not have a future to grow into. Nonetheless,…
‘Going Abroad Really Changed Me’: The Year I Chased a Cliché
“Going abroad to France really changed me,” she says. Who is she? I don’t know, because she’s different now. I stand in front of the table of my last two customers for the night. My serving apron is already ripped off and my closing duties are done. These two ladies…
Preparing for the Front Lines
When we imagine a career in art, we might picture someone holding a paintbrush and preparing a wooden easel and white canvas in his small studio apartment. Alternatively, we might see a musician in a black leather jacket and bright red lip, strumming her guitar at the back of a…