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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2017-03-30, Page 5THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, MARCH 30, 2017. PAGE 5. Other Views Why hide from the best part of life? Most of us have probably had days when the world gets to us and we feel the urge to retreat to a cabin in the bush but few of us actually do it — which made a review I read recently of a new book especially interesting. The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit tells the story of Christopher Knight who in 1986 at the age of 20, drove down a country road in Maine, parked his car and walked away, becoming a true hermit and avoiding human contact for the next 27 years. He lived all those years by breaking into cottages, stealing only the things he needed to survive. Eventually that's how he came into contact with society again, when a police officer caught him during one of his raids on the pantry of a local camp. But the thing that made this book review in The Globe and Mail so interesting was the comparison of what Knight had done to a phenomenon happening in Japan. There, roughly a million young people, mostly males in their late teens, almost never come out of their bedrooms. Their days are spent reading books or looking at screens. Their parents deliver their meals. Some of them receive counselling from psychologists on chat rooms. Apparently a common link is that these young people reject Japan's competitive, conformist culture. But while Knight and the "hikikimori" (meaning pulling inward) as the Japanese semi -hermit kids are called, are extremes, Michael Finkel, who wrote the book, points out that this withdrawal from physical human contact is becoming more and more a part of our society in a wired world. People use their cell phones, tablets and computers to avoid the physical "collisions" with other people that drove Knight to disappear into the bush. Many people do their banking online to avoid dealing Keith Roulston From the cluttered desk face to face with a teller (they might say they avoid the lineups but so many people bank online or use ATMs that there are seldom lineups inside the bank anymore). Last Christmas local post offices ran out of room to store all the parcels waiting to be picked up by all the people who did their Christmas shopping via the internet, thereby avoiding meeting salespeople in stores. One of the most lucrative advertisers for television networks seems to be websites to match up perfect romantic partners. Many people even seek out the relative anonymity of drive-through lanes at fast food restaurants compared to having to line up with others inside the restaurant and order from a food server at the counter. As a shy country kid, I could have been one of those Japanese hikikimoris if we'd had the technology and my parents would have brought my meals to my room. They weren't that kind of parents. Knowing how shy I was, my mother had me singing for her Women's Institute meetings almost as soon as I could walk and encouraged me to compete in public speaking in school. I was able to avoid this in public school where it wasn't a compulsory activity back then, but I got stuck doing it high school. If I'd been allowed, I might have been one of those people who live with his parents until they die but I was made to understand all through high school that I was going to leave the nest, even if it took a firm parental push to do so. So I ended up going to probably the most urban university in the country, Ryerson, amid the crowds of downtown Toronto. The forced socialization of living in residence with strangers, going to class with strangers and studying a subject, journalism, which required me to interview strangers, finally forced me to move beyond that avoidance of human contact. I even met a young woman to whom I've now been married nearly half a century, a move that would have astounded an old teacher who, I had been told, at one time predicted I'd never get enough courage to ask a girl for a date. Today, if I were going to run away from anything, it would be that very technology that is allowing others to avoid human contact. I'd much rather deal with a human teller or salesperson than live through the stress of being ordered by some computer program how to go through the ordeal of ordering and paying online, always fearing I was going to pay a hefty price mentally, if not financially, for pushing the wrong key at the wrong time. How much longer I'll be able to choose to deal with real people I don't know, as more and more people want to distance themselves and companies happily replace people with machines. The collateral damage of this trend is that we're losing things like neighbourhood stores. Those heritage buildings tragically burned down in Clinton last week, for instance, are unlikely to be rebuilt because there aren't many people lined up to run retail businesses in small towns anymore. One of the pleasures of rural life is the personal connections we make every day, whether on the street, at the post office or in a local store. Those people who are avoiding human "collisions" by hiding in the woods or behind the computer screen, are missing out on the best parts of life. As the old Barbra Streisand song says: "People who need people are the luckiest people in the world." Definitely a `Here's your sign' moment At Morris-Turnberry Council's March 21 meeting, outgoing Fire Department of North Huron Chief David Sparling suggested that Morris-Turnberry aim to have every property in the municipality properly signed with 911 blades. The blades, which contain the 911 number for the property, are available for free from Huron County. Sparling made the suggestion after saying a similar initiative in North Huron saw 400 blades placed at previously unidentified property entrances. At the time I thought, "What a great idea." See, I was in the audience at the North Huron Council meeting when Luke Schilder, who Sparling mentioned during his Morris- Turnberry presentation, explained how he almost lost his son due to an unknown 911 number. The presentation was made in 2015. Schilder's son became trapped under a tractor at the back of a property and it wasn't until Schilder guided the 911 operator turn -by - turn to the property that emergency services were able to be dispatched. In this era of centralization, a recognized numbering system for properties is essential for a number of reasons, not the least of which is safety during emergencies. Schilder's 911 call, which was played at the North Huron meeting, demonstrates dispatchers are no longer located in Huron County and, because of that, they won't be familiar with landmarks or previous owners of properties. Sparling, using Schilder's tale, called on North Huron in 2015 and now Morris- Turnberry currently, to make sure that all driveways in the municipality, especially rural ones, are marked. Morris-Turnberry Council was also informed Denny Scott Denny's Den of how important it is that farmers and farm staff carry cards with 911 addresses of the fields they may be working on. So, as I said, at the time I thought it was a great idea and, while it is a good start, it's just the beginning of the changes that need to happen. I've only had cause to call 911 twice in my life (okay, three times, but in the third instance, someone else called before I could). The first time was when I was a passenger in a vehicle and I saw another driver in distress. The second time, I was in the Goderich Courthouse to cover the beginnings of a charged court case involving wind turbines. The subject matter of the case had drawn out supporters for both sides of the case — those in favour of turbines and the Green Energy Act and those against them. As I was waiting for the case to start, one of the protestors fainted and hit the ground with a sickening thud. People gathered around quickly and, after seeing the person wasn't getting up, I called 911 for an ambulance. Let me preface this by saying I know Goderich pretty well. I grew up there. I know for a fact that, by the time I dealt with the skeptical 911 dispatcher I was connected to, I could have driven to the ambulance bays (then by the Goderich Hospital) and brought them back myself. The conversation, which I won't recount in its entirety, consisted of me trying to explain that the Goderich Courthouse's actual address is 1 Courthouse Square. First off, I had to repeat "Goderich" about four times. Then I had to explain the person who had fainted was at the courthouse. Then I had to explain that, yes, 1 Courthouse Square is an actual address and no, I'm not a prank caller. Finally, I told the person to look up what street intersects the four cardinal direction streets in Goderich, North, West, South and East streets. The dispatcher finally figured out where we were after that. Suffice to say, centralizing dispatchers didn't really help the person who had fainted that day. As I said before, I could have gotten the paramedics faster on my own. By the time the dispatcher had worked out where we were and the ambulance arrived, I probably could have transported the person to the emergency room myself, grabbed a medium coffee and a donut and put my feet up for five minutes. While some might see this as me arguing for a redesign of the whole system, I'm not. I'm just saying that I can't believe there are still properties out there, even properties with no buildings on them, that aren't properly identified with a 911 number. Not only is it free, but it's something that could save someone's life someday. With dispatchers who don't know the areas they are servicing, we need to have every possible advantage in trying to get emergency services to the right place. Having properties identified with numbers for people in an emergency to direct emergency services, seems like something that should have been done a long time ago. If you own a property that doesn't have the 911 blade, call the county and get it installed. The life you save might be your own. Shawn Loughlin Shawn's Sense Above and beyond When hard-working people like you and me pay taxes, we like to think that we're getting something for our money. We also like to think that those spending the money we give them are being as responsible with it as we are with the money they so graciously allow us to keep. Historically this has not always been the case. Corruption has been, is and likely always will be part of our everyday lexicon. When people have power and money flooding in and there are few checks and balances, the temptation can be there to misuse money you didn't have to work for in the traditional sense of the word. One example in the news right now is the U.S. Secret Service reportedly asking for $60 million in additional funding to follow the Trump clan as they jet -set around the world. Nearly half of this money, $26.8 million, is reported to be earmarked for First Lady Melania and her and Donald's son Barron, who, in a strange turn of events, will continue to live in Trump Tower in Manhattan, rather than in the White House. That's said to be a hair under $150,000 per day when Trump isn't there and a hair over $300,000 per day when he is. There are then additional costs associated with protecting Trump's grown children as they continue to do Trump Organization business. Trump himself also goes to Florida nearly every weekend to play golf, something for which he criticized his predecessor. Yes, when the money isn't yours, it becomes a lot easier to spend. Paying for various Trumps to travel the world and live in palatial second homes likely isn't what Trump voters signed up for when their leader assured them he'd "drain the swamp" of corruption. This, of course, is a new level, but Canadians are no strangers to spending and corruption. One of the biggest scandals we've had recently though revolved around a $16 glass of orange juice and a refusal to stay in a $200 -a -night hotel provided by a conference (about immunization for poor children!), but opting instead for three nights at a nearly -$700 -per - night hotel. (She also smoked in the non- smoking room, so that was another $250.) Yes, Bev Oda, a Progressive Conservative MP from my old stomping grounds of Durham Region was known for her spending habits — which would eventually lead her to resign. Not too long ago there was the FIFA scandal that saw money being spent hand -over -fist in the world-wide soccer organization, but not necessarily for reasons of expanding the beautiful game throughout the world. No, it was to furnish someone's lavish lifestyle at Trump Tower in Manhattan (must be a nice place!). Yes, Chuck Blazer, an official with FIFA, had his digs at Trump Tower paid for to the tune of $18,000 per month. I believe, however, that the kicker was the $6,000 -per - month adjoining unit for his cats, which he classified as "unruly". Then there's Dalton McGuinty, Kathleen Wynne (of the 12 per cent approval rating variety) and their $1 billion gas plant scandal. I won't even get into that. We're almost beating a dead horse at this point. Even in my new municipality of North Huron, taxes are a frequent topic of discussion. They're high. Everyone knows that. But, what do we get for them? It's unlikely that $6,000 -a -month cat apartments or millions in personal protection are factors, but asking questions and ensuring your tax dollars are being spent efficiently can't be a bad thing.