Secure the knowledge
Correction: The print version of this story said the DMO Interim board terminated the County’s tourism marketing staff. They did not. Sorry. Hints of spring are colouring a landscape grayed by the residue of winter. Fragile shoots poke out of dirt frozen and snow-covered just weeks ago. And the light of a longer day ushers […]
Perhaps again
Last week the Hospital Foundation recognized Leo Finnegan’s tireless advocacy of the Picton hospital. Many readers will remember his unrelenting defence of the capacity and purpose of our community hospital. He rallied the community, filling community halls and buses, taking the fight to save Prince Edward County Memorial Hospital to Queen’s Park. Finnegan wielded Alan […]
Locals only
We know it’s wrong. We know that discriminating against our fellow humans is a failing—likely rooted in our primitive evolutionary wiring. We know that it is unfair, unjust, and destructive to our social well-being—that it runs counter to our fundamental ideas of a civilized society. We know, too, that generalizing about someone based on age, […]
Unravelling
If you are a waterworks customer in Prince Edward County, you need to know what-in-the-fresh-hell is going on in Wellington. The waterworks utility has just taken the first few steps toward the realization of a $100 million megaproject in this village, and already costs are ballooning. Meanwhile, one of the key funding sources has just […]
When and where?
This is the week things changed. Any illusion the invasion of Ukraine would be over quickly—that it would fade from the front pages—has been dashed. Putin’s murderous stranglehold on Kyiv, Odesa and Mariupol is tightening. Thousands are dying each week now—children, women, soldiers, civilians, escaping refugees. The atrocities are coming so fast, and frequently we […]
Regrets
It was a scrappy meeting. Backing out of the mess they had created at Lake of the Mountain was bound to bring long-simmering irritations to the surface. But there was more to this bout of irritability. So many Zoom meetings. So many reminders to “turn your mic on” or “turn YouTube off”. So many frozen […]
Fight for Ukraine
If we do nothing else, we must bear witness to the horror thrust upon the people of Ukraine. Unflinchingly. We will document, share and remember the senselessness of the violence one man has chosen to inflict upon a neighbouring nation. We must remember the terror unfolding in Europe as a reminder that our species retains […]
Municipal world
A municipal sand storage shed blew apart in a November storm in 2020— the victim of the powerful winds that occasionally whip up off of Lake Ontario and lash Prince Edward County. Situated on the sweeping bend of Belleville Road as it veers away from Ameliasburgh and toward Mountain View, the wood-frame structure had protected […]
Less is more
Our species has an extraordinary capacity for self-delusion. The category or severity may vary between individuals, but we are all vulnerable. I see a sweater in a catalogue. I imagine myself as the rugged, chiselled, well-sweatered young adventurer atop the mountain ridge with my trusty Labrador at my side, pointing into the middle distance. A […]
Data in the waste
The holiday weekend is behind us—the first in a couple of years in which we weren’t constrained by government restrictions aimed at reducing the spread of Covid-19. While some worry long-delayed family gatherings could produce another spike, others suggest the wake of fractured families and relationships risks another type of slow-burning toll on our well-being. […]