Columnists
Gaining perspective
I see a lot of activity in the County. Like it, don’t like it. Some of us moved out to the Maritimes, where they found the us that used to be us. And they bought homes that were priced the way County homes used to be priced. And they found friends and neighbours just like us, when we used to be us.
Can’t blame them, but I am surely not in a position to abandon ship. I’ll be here until they pry my dead body off my keyboard, and spread my ashes (probably illegally) into the wind. I’ll let my smarter kids do the ‘workaround’ on that. “What? Where’s Dad? He was here just a few minutes ago. I think you just missed him.” I taught them well.
I’ve been in the County all my life. I’ve been through hell and back, but it is Home. Can’t ask for more than that.
Changes? Yes, we’ve seen them. I remember as a kid falling asleep to the faint sound of a train whistle. Gone now, but important then.
STUCK IN NOW
You may wonder why I occasionally disappear from column writing. It’s because I get stuck in ‘now’. When I get too close to what’s going on, I lose my perspective. Then I am of no use in analyzing things—I just get angry and terrified about our future. Most of our readers and letter-writers are also stuck in now. Trouble is, ‘now’ is a moment in time. We can rant and rail against what’s happening now but, like everyone else in the County, we feel what we have to say is ignored, and is not important to our future, and we don’t know what the future will bring.
WATCHING FROM THE SIDELINES
This is where we are at. Stuff is happening. We don’t like some of that stuff. Meetings are held, in which people from some consulting company explain why this is happening. This is not a proper conversation. It does not say, “We hear you.” It says, “Hear us.”
They’ve got the ball, and they would dearly like all of us to be spectators, waiting to see how the game turns out. Sadly, that’s not how County people work. We watch; we react. If we fall into reaction, we will just be howling at the moon, about things that have already been decided, and over which we have no control.
I get the frustration. I’ve howled at the moon many times. You can only do that if you are deep into the controversy. I’ve been there. How do I get out?
PERSPECTIVE
It’s a great thing to be involved in the community. It’s a really good thing that the stakeholders, landowners and homeowners in the County rally when they see ‘something weird going on’.
I get this. This is kind of a new thing, for us old County folk. We used to just live our lives. It was simple then. Had a dog barking all night long? Call a councillor—silent night. Giant pothole on your road? Within a couple of weeks, a seven-man crew will plant a ‘Bump’ sign beside it. See? Used to be simple.
I love the road crews, and I know they work hard, but I see asphalt planted in little potholes all over the County just inches away from axlebusting potholes, which remain tire-busters. I know the directive from above did not read: “Ignore axle-busting pot holes near the little dips you have been ordered to fix.” But when you’re looking at a work order it’s “Let’s drop some stuff in this little hole … but wait, not in the big hole right next, because that’s not on the work order.”
Sorry, I’m a little off track here, because I drive a lot, all over the County. I say to myself, “Really? County Road One gets repairs? Yeah, it’s welltravelled, but it’s drive, little bump, drive another little bump,” while some roads in the County are like a video game: “Let’s go into the other lane. Nope, no good, try driving down the centre, weave to the left, look out for oncoming traffic, veer to the right and maybe take the shoulder.”
I know Council spends hours—days even—trying to spread their dollars to road repair that has been neglected for years, since the Province suddenly divorced us, and ran off without assuming any further debt to the divorcée, Us.
This is me going way off track, but not really.
GAINING PERSPECTIVE
What you just read is my rant. Everyone has one. I clear my mind by writing to you, and Times readers have their own rants to vocalize. Trouble is: Get too close to the fire, and the fire consumes you. That’s why I need to take a break every once in a while. And why you should too.
We are all aboard on one thing: Making the County as great as our crazy advertising says we should be. But no.
We are not a place created through inventive promotion. We are a place forged a few centuries ago. The things we learned then are the things we know now. Not ‘Love thy Neighbour,’ but ‘Need your Neighbour’, because we all rise together.
SO HERE’S THE THING
I am certainly a victim of losing perspective. Sometimes, most times, I put in more effort to create a good job than my client does. Because I have a stake in giving my client the best I can offer, with the skills I have.
Trouble is, sometimes the job itself creates a drive to get the proper project done. So it is with Council. After the fact, I berate myself for time spent, which I can never recover in dollars. I just have a need to carry on, blindly, to do what needs to be done.
So too with Council. They were handed a job: Create housing. They took on the job, and it seems they are doing that. But this was not the original premise. We wanted ‘affordable housing’ which is kind of a joke right now. But they barrelled along blindly, just like I do, and created ‘housing’. Not what we were hoping for. Not the kind of housing we were calling for. But lots of spiffy houses no County person could afford, much less our low-income people, and young people relying on waitress dollars to survive.
Council did not do wrong, they just lost perspective on the issue of ‘housing’. Affordable housing was never on the slate. Driving towards accommodating the expected rush of people with money was a left turn on what all of us really wanted. Affordable got lost.
No one in the County ever said: “Build us expensive houses so people with money can move here.” Show of hands? Yeah, I think I got that one right.
As a business guy, I get how easy it is to go off track. As someone who loves the County I see two things: I’ve watched great friends, and great historical researchers go the grave leaving behind their legacy. I also see new young people starting businesses. They will replace us. They will replace me. They are extremely important to our future. Anyone care about them? Like ‘affordable housing’, not on anyone’s radar. Loss of perspective. Catering to those who want super-fine housing? Yippee! Chewing up agricultural land for developments? Yahoo! Building a County that people want to come to, when there’s nothing left to see or do? Not on the agenda.
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