Living in Harperland Part 1

Originally I thought I would start a separate blog about our pal Stephen Harper and that blog would start at the time of the next federal election. However, I simply cannot wait that long. Almost daily I come across something in the paper, radio, TV or internet about how our lives are being affected by this government.  So, if you are, by any chance, a Harper fan, then you'll want to skip my upcoming Living In Harperland items. Eventually I'd also like to start another series...about life in Ottawa. There's bound to be a lot of overlap in those two series.

It's hard to know where to begin. Let's start with the enemies of the government list which came out this summer, at the time of the swearing in of the new cabinet members....a heads up for them, of who to avoid‎. Now of course I have not seen the complete list but just for the record..Mr. Harper....if my name is not on that list, it was an omission. Sign me up. There are all kinds of articles about this list. Here's Andrew Coyne's.

You know when you listen to news reports they often will say something like, "Meanwhile Ottawa says"....or "while the provinces say ...Ottawa says...." For folks not living in Ottawa, you might get the superficial impression that the reference to Ottawa refers to the citizens of Ottawa. That is ...we might all be pals of the current government. It reminds me of driving to Saskatchewan when Trudeau was the PM. We were at a gas station in a small prairie town and the attendant (yes, back in the days when there was service at all gas stations) asked us where we were from. When we told him Ottawa, he got all riled up and told us exactly what we could do with Mr. Trudeau! Anyhow, just for the record, in the last federal election, in the 7 Ottawa area ridings there were 2 Liberals and 4 Conservatives elected. I live in Ottawa Centre which elected an NDP member. Ottawa Centre reflect my own personal brand. I've always been an ABC voter..Anyone But Conservative. Ottawa Centre goes back and forth between the Liberals and New Democrats.

Since summer has just ended and with it, the season for watching Mosaika..that's what I will start with. There have long been summer evening shows on Parliament Hill. They used to be called Sound and Light shows. I enjoyed them but they were nothing compared to the Mosaika show which started in 2010. It uses the Parliament buildings as a screen with amazing visual effects. It's about a half hour long and entertaining for folks of all ages.  We have seen it every year since it started and all of our out of town visitors have enjoyed it.

So last month we took friends to see it and I was really looking forward to seeing it again. While I enjoyed it,  I wasn't as enthusiastic this time. The next day I spoke to my niece about it and she asked, "Mary Ellen, is it true... what my friend told me? that Mosaika has been Harperized?"

That hit the nail on the head...it has indeed been Harperized. (There is almost nothing in Ottawa that has been left untouched by this man.) What struck me as I watched it was the increase in military history. Of course the war of 1812 was given prominent mention. Besides the increased time with reminders of military glory I couldn't help but notice the Prime Ministers who were recognized and not recognized. If you were a Conservative you had a lot better chance at airtime than your Liberal counterparts.  I'm not sure how to check out the script but from my sometimes faulty memory.... John Deifenbaker is prominenently quoted...."the right honourable John Diefenbaker" intro, then his voice giving a part of  a speech, while Lester Pearson, winner of the Nobel Peach Prize and our flag guy, is not. Also lacking almost any mention is a certain Pierre Trudeau.

 The increase in military content was discussed in another piece in The Citizen.

“This year we’re aligning ourselves more with some of the milestones and celebrations in Canadian history,” said NCC spokeswoman Denise LeBlanc, noting the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812 and the 60th anniversary of the end of the Korean War. “Those choices were made by the NCC, of course in consultation with our partners. We went to our board of directors in April and brought that proposal to them.”

The program content would have been reviewed by the office of Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird, the federal minister responsible for the NCC, the ministry of Canadian Heritage, and the Prime Minister’s Office, she said.

“It has a very high level of government awareness,” said LeBlanc. “It’s a very visible program on Parliament Hill on one of the most iconic buildings in the country, so it’s reviewed at a high level.” That has been the case all along, she says. 

Yup...Harperized for sure! Mosaika finished its run on September 7th but it will be back next year. If you're in Ottawa next summer you really should see it. In spite of the new political slant, it's still worth seeing!

Still here !

My sincere apologies. It's been a long time since I have written. I won't bore you with mundane details but suffice it to say that I have been a busy grandma and daughter in law. Many folks worry that if they retire they will be bored but so far, I am constantly busy. Our grandson's first birthday was the highlight of the past month for sure.

As for the blog, well, I simply got discouraged. At one point I checked back and realized that many of my links were not working...how embarrassing. Happily, I visited Brendan last night and he has patiently re-taught me that skill. I think I have managed to restore all the links. So, I'm back!

train travel

I love travelling by train! Yesterday I travelled from Ottawa to Toronto and decided to treat myself and spend the extra $25.00 to take the train instead of a bus. What a difference! I love the seat and legroom, the opportunity to get up and walk around, the sound of the whistle and the scenery.

 Farmer's fields, small towns and backyards are a big improvement over the boring 401 with all its truck traffic.  Happily my trip yesterday was also totally on schedule.

I only wish that the federal government was putting more emphasis, planning and dollars into train travel. While yesterday's train  made good time, it is a turtle compared to the ones we travelled on in Germany and Holland last year. Canadian trains aren't even in the same game as their European counterparts. In Canada we continue to tear up track instead of laying more down. I wonder when and if ever, train travel in Canada will get the cash infusion it deserves.

Education

Well, I'm feeling lazy today. It's the first day of school and as a retired teacher I feel lucky. I have time to attend to family and house jobs without the stress of schoolwork crowding my thoughts. My day started off well. Jian Gomeshi's opening  essay on CBC radio Q was called Unbottling our water. Amen Jian! 
Because I am in a lazy mood I will cheat and post a piece that I wrote a while back. This one appeared in the Ottawa Citizen  on September 6, 2011. They called it Education is a long road. This time around I'd like to dedicate it to my darling grandson who just went to daycare for the very first time. The journey commences!

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It’s the first month of school and for the first time in twenty seven years, we do not have a child in school. In 1984 we put our first born on a school bus.  Up until this past spring, we have had kids in school ever since. Two years after him, his sister followed him to St Mary’s School in Brampton. Their little brother  joined his siblings at Elmdale Public School, in 1989, after our move to Ottawa.

When you enrol your little one in kindergarten, you don’t envision the long road ahead for them and you. You concentrate on this year’s teacher and classmates. When you attend that first parent /teacher meeting, you don’t realize that this is the first, of possibly 14 such meetings, 18 if you go again in the second semesters of high school.  That’s just the night you meet the teachers. We’re not even talking about parent /teacher interview nights – probably about 84 for us. It’s probably a good idea not to think about the big numbers – just take it a year at a time.

We don’t regret spending any of that time and energy going to those meetings, helping with homework, going on class trips, or volunteering in the classroom. Is there any better way to be involved in your child’s life than to become a partner in their education? We were always eager to meet the people with whom our children were spending their days. Although the news was not always positive, we appreciated the frank feedback that we received on interview nights.

There have been bumps and detours over the years, but the “kids” have emerged from the process as a teacher/small business owner, a social worker and a translator.  We know that we are very fortunate that our children were blessed with the ability to succeed in school and that they were motivated to work diligently to achieve their goals - lucky us!

It has often been said that it takes a village to raise a child; we had such a village. Our extended families have provided care, interest and enthusiasm from the very start. Our neighbours have been patient with ball hockey and other games that spilled onto their properties. These neighbours were friendly customers when our children were delivering newspapers or selling Girl Guide cookies. They served in countless volunteer roles:  making ice at the local rink, serving on school committees and acting as Cub leaders, Brownie leaders, or Sunday School teachers. Every adult that a child meets has an impact on a youngster, whether it is the compassionate doctors who have served our needs or the instructors who guided them through tennis, swim, music and other lessons.

But it was at school where they spent the bulk of their time away from home. Kids are affected by everyone on staff, whether it is a welcoming secretary in the office, a friendly caretaker or a compassionate guidance counsellor.   

Of course their teachers played a major role in their formation. To all those who  taught  our children- at St. Mary’s,  Elmdale, Connaught, or Fisher Park elementary schools, Nepean or Canterbury High Schools, the University of Guelph, SUNY at Potsdam, Queen’s, Carleton or Ottawa U  – a sincere thank you. We are very grateful for your diligence and encouragement. Thank you for your patience with us. Like all parents, we have made our fair share of mistakes over the years.

School has changed tremendously since that fall of 1984. Laptops, Smart Boards and the internet were not a part of classrooms then. However, in spite of all the technological advances, today’s students mostly require caring adults in their lives; they need actively involved parents, attentive and informed teachers, and an encouraging community.

When our children were babies, I naively thought that parenting was about a twenty year job. Of course I now realize that it’s a lifelong vocation; we will be parents for the rest of our lives. However, this school portion of our journey is over.  Many thanks to our supportive community. Good luck to those just starting out.

You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar

Perhaps it is because I started off my comments in a positive manner,  that The Ottawa Citizen printed my letter to the editor today....another chance to vent about the infill housing issue in Ottawa. I must remember to use this strategy more often.

Dear Editor

A big thank you to Anita Murray for her article in Saturday's Homes Section, (Aug. 24) titled Uncovering a Jewel. This piece describes how interior designer Ulya Jensen and renovator Noel McGinnity revamped a heritage house in Sandy Hill. "We talked about what we should preserve, what is popular now and what's going to show some of the history and the age of the actual building." One photo shows a contemporary kitchen with the home's original oak pocket doors.

It was a pleasure to read that people have recognized the value in one of Ottawa's older homes. Years from now, this city will wake up and realize that we have thrown away so many of these gems..houses with unique features, with character and charm. In many neighbourhoods, these older homes are being replaced with boring, box-like structures. These doubles  are cheap to erect and bring the city twice the taxes so, in the name of intensification, the older gems are being dumped into landfill.  If Ms. Jensen and Mr. McGinnity are looking for projects, please run right over to my Kitchissippi neighbourhood.

On the day of Ms. Murray's piece, I attended an estate sale in a lovely home that will be demolished this week. For a home that was built in the twenties, it has many outstanding features. Besides the loss of these houses I am concerned with the environmental sin of dumping perfectly good materials into landfill. Why should we bother to sort our plastic, paper, and compost if developers are allowed to deposit priceless wood trim and doors, glass, brick etc. into the dump?

I Have a Dream

Today is the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s I Have a Dream speech in Washington. All the media coverage has got me thinking about my visit to the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis. I have been working on a book...a family travel memoir. Today I will post parts of the chapter titled Motherhood and Mayhem in Memphis, along with a few photos.

Who knows where parenthood will lead us? At one point in the spring of 2007, I found myself sitting alone on a plane heading for Memphis, Tennessee. I was on my way to visit my twenty-five year old daughter, who was living in Memphis for three months while she trained as a social work intern at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

From the safety of our home in Ottawa she had arranged to rent an apartment in a secure building, close to the hospital. However, upon arrival in Memphis, she discovered that the “secure” building wasn’t always locked, she was the only occupant of the top floor, and locals advised her that the short walk from her building to the hospital was very dangerous.  During her first weekend, there were seven murders in the downtown core. The four years she had spent living in the Queen’s University “student ghetto” had not prepared her for the perils of living in downtown Memphis. In Kingston, she and the five women she had shared a house with, had never bothered to lock their door! After her first three weeks in Memphis, she still sounded downright scared, so I arranged a visit.

..........

It was worry that brought me to Memphis. For the first time in my life, I arrived alone in a strange city, rented a car, and drove in the dark, without a phone, towards an unfamiliar downtown. Like a riled mother bear, I was ready to do anything to protect my daughter.  With my arrival safely accomplished, we both relaxed and put the reason for the visit on the back burner.  I did the usual things that we all do when visiting our university-age children – I took her out for dinners and we went grocery shopping.

This weekend was the first time that we had been together, just the two of us, as tourists. Memphis offered many attractions that we both enjoyed, among them Graceland and the National Civil Rights Museum. Although Elvis Presley and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. were icons of my youth and not hers, she too was both entertained and moved by the displays in both places.

Memphis is a city of contrasts, with its reputation of being both the Mecca of American music and yet one of its most dangerous cities. A walk along Main St. on that sunny Saturday, gave us another example of the duality that is Memphis. While trolley cars and horse drawn carriages ferried tourists along this thoroughfare, we were otherwise alone, with no other pedestrians. It seemed as if we were walking through a ghost town, with its abundance of boarded up storefronts.

At one point, we turned a corner and it seemed as if I was walking into a history book. There, at the bottom of a grassy hill, was the Lorraine Motel; the scene of that famous balcony photo; the site of Dr. King’s assassination. 

The National Civil Rights Museum’s architects have kept the motel as the facade of the museum, complete with a couple of old, white Cadillacs parked in front. 

The displays and exhibits chronicle the significant milestones of the civil rights struggle. The climax of the tour comes when you find yourself in a hallway, with a vantage point into both Dr. King’s hotel room and the famous balcony. 

From there, you proceed across the street to the former rooming house, where the shots originated. 

This too is now part of this powerful museum, a continuation of Dr. King’s legacy. We left there, profoundly moved by what we had experienced.

Pride Week in Ottawa

I don't usually pay too much attention to Pride Week activities. This year however, it was brought to our attention at our church's Sunday mass. The homily, the songs and the intentions all emphasized the theme of inclusion.

What I have not written about yet is the fact that I am a Roman Catholic. There are days when it is difficult to feel  much pride about that because of the many scandals in the media. However I think it is safe to say that many of us remain Catholic, not because of Vatican dictates but because we have found a local parish that really does follow and encourage the central teachings of Christ...the lessons of compassion, inclusion, love, mercy and generosity. For us, St Joseph Catholic Church in downtown Ottawa is such a parish. St. Joes, with its Women's Centre and Supper Table is a special place.

Anyhow this Sunday the homily, or reflection on the readings, was given by a young woman who reflected on her experiences as a lesbian and how she had overcome her feelings of guilt and shame. In her moving message she spoke about our diversity and unity. It's not often that you hear clapping in mass, after a homily, but that's what happened. It was the visiting priest who started the clapping.

Perhaps she was encouraged by our new pope's recent message, who am I to judge? More about him in a future post.

As we walked to the car, I wondered what my elderly mother-in-law thought about it all. After all she is no spring chicken. When asked about her age, she likes to say that she's "a pair of eights." As we left the parking lot she piped up, "Well, I never thought I would hear that in a Catholic Church." There was a pause and then she added, "and it's about time." Amen.