Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1981-05-13, Page 2E$T, • , 7gr Tossel$ .17,!9sst A .1 ONT. Established 1072 519-887-56,41 Serving Brussels and the surrounding community Published at BRUSSELS, ONTARIO every Wednesday morning by MpLean Bros. Publishers Limited Andrew Y. McLean, Publisher Evelyn Kennedy, Editor Box 50, .Brussels, Ontario N001 Ht) Member Canadian Community Newspaper Association, Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association and The Audit Bureau of Circulation, Subscription rates: Canada $12 a year (in advance) outside Canada $25 a year (in advance) Single copies - 30 cents each Authorized as second class mail by Canada Post Office. Registration Number 0562. WEDNESDAY, MAY 13. 1981 Brussels got a new councillor last week in the person of Stuart Parker, who replaced Malcolm Jacobs when the latter resigned due to business commitments. Malcolm Jacobs did a lot for the village of Brussels in his role as councillor and if he knew he could do something for people in that capacity he tried his very best to get it done. He deserves a vote of thanks from the people of this village. Meanwhile, sitting on a village council, where people will track you down no matter what time of day or night, is not an easy row to hoe as the rules of municipal government are not easily explained to people who are too immersed in their own concerns to even think about rules. It takes a good man or woman to withstand the pressures that go along with a councillor's job and we wish Mr. Parker every success. Sugar and spice By Bill Smiley I spent the entire weekend talking to these people, feeding them, and driving them to a ferry, half an hour away, where they could embark and spread the faith on an. Indian reservation. They can talk like gurus, sleep like a bomb, and eat like horses. My son arrived on a Thursday night, and had me so befuddled by astrology and the words of the prophet, that I slank off to bed about mid-night,got up early so I wouldn't have to face him again. That afternoon a friend, Margaret, arrived from the city, at 80 miles an hour, on her motor-bike. They left for the island. At 7:30 that night, Lise arrived, 22, bright as a whip, endearing, giving up a weekend with exams approaching, to take part in the teaching mission. Fed and slept her at our place, delivered her to the ferry next day. Saturday, son Hugh and Margaret arr ived back and took off for the city, back to work. Sunday morn ing I went to pick up Lise at theferry and saw her off on the bus, ready to resume her studies for a M.A. in Statistics, of all things. O.K. An old Jewish guy can stand that. But Monday, I got a letter, courtesy of the Collingwood weekly, that reinforced my decision to fight back. It was from William J. McCormick Esq.," Chetwynd, Chetwynd Drive, Rosemont, Pennsylvania. It was the damnedest thing (pardon the expression in a religious column) that I have ever seen. On the outside of the envelope was his address, and mine, thus: Honorable Bill Smiley, (Teacher & Columnist). Down in the righthand corner was a fat green label stating: Preferential: Do Not Delay, Label 110, 19-72. On the back of the envelope was this: Dear letter, go upon your way Over mountain, plain or sea. God bless all who speed your flight To Where I wish you to be. And bless all those beneath the roof Where I would bid you rest; But bless even more the one to whom This letter is addressed. Inside were the following: a letter front the Speaker's offiee, House of Commons, London, England, thanking Mr. MeCor mick for his copy of an address given at Haverford i a letter from Bucking, ham Palace thanking him for the copy of, the "Holy Name " and an accompanying letter (the Palace letter had a grammar error); a one-inch by six-inch card, in green, blue and red, announcing "God Bless You'; and a twelve-thousand word copy of the address by Wm. J. McCormick to the Holy Name Society of Rosemont, Penn. It was all a bit to much. Somewhere in his speech, Wm. J. had a number of aphorisms about brevity being the soul of wit. As you may have noticed, I don't preach much in this space. That is, I don't preach religion. In the first place, I am not learned enough in the scriptures, whatever 'scrip- tures happen to turn you on. By the way, excuse the use of the capital "S" for scriptures. It merely means writings. It's not that I don't have a friendly .chat with God once in a while, I do, and I'm sure he enjoys it, though he • never talks back. In that respect, .he is about two hundred per cent more amiable to talk to than my wife. In the second place (see above), 1 am not pure enough or good enough to preach to others, though, by George, there are quite a few of you sinners out there who need a little touch of hellfire to frighten you. And in the third place, it's none of my business. If you want to bang your head on the ground in the general direction of the East, do a Holy Roll on the floor, speak in tongues, lie on a bed of nails, or slurp wine and eat dry biscuits at Christmas and Easter, that's your problem. I am basically a Jew at heart. If you believe that you are going to join, the Great Spirit or some other form of It, Her, Him, after you conk out, and meet all your loved ones again, and. float around on that big Sugar Candy mountain in the sky, and .not ever work again, bless you, and good luck, So. Generally I mind my own business about other people's beliefs. But this past week has made me strike .-back, in desperation. First Of all, I got caught in a welter of da-ha-i's. My wife, son and daughter are adherents of this comparatively new faith. Its beliefs you can't fight with. They're the best of the older religions. Their purpose is to spread unity, the one-ness of than, it our world. To battle that would be like condemning Motherhood. They have no wild or bizarre ceremonies. They have simple meetings, variously called Feasts, Fasts, Deepenings. They harm nobody, except Old guys like me who are dragooned into driving people to such events, Then he took off for another ten thousand words. though religion. I'm going to look up a rabbi tomorrow. Man has invented few things that have been more helpful to him than the automobile but one wonders if sometimes it isn't man who was created to serve the automobile,not the other way around. Slowly but surely, like the camel easing his way into the tent, the automobile has changed our Jives to the point that, like the camel that took over the whole tent, the automobile runs us today as much as we run it. Things aren't too bad yet, in rural Huron County, but look at the country as a whole and see what the automobile does. North America is in a recession today basically caused by one thing: the higher price of oil due to the. OPEC price increases has made people think twice about driving the gas- guzzling monsters that ruled North Ameri- can roads for the last -quarter century. People turned instead to smaller, fuel-effi- cient cars made mostly in Germany and Japan. in Detroit, Windsor and other cities dependent on auto production across North America, thousands found themselves with- out jobs. Many cities that had 'no idea they were dependent on the auto industry saw their unemployment lines lengthen too. The auto industry reaches far deeper into the country than Windsor and Oshawa and Oakville. It hits Stratford and London and so many cities where plants depend on making brake pads or door mouldings or hub caps for the auto industry. When these people are laid off, the money they aren't spending ceases to grease the wheels of local commerce. Store clerks get laid off, real estate values drop, people don't have extra money for new purchases and soon all industries are in trouble, even those not directly related to auto production. Being in the city for a few days, as I 'was recently, you get another perspective of how the car runs our lives today. The car boom of the fifties and sixties sent people scurrying farther and farther out from the centre of the cities. To serve these people who still had to get downtown to work, super highways were built in the centre of the cities but today the car boom has been so large that the Don Valley Parkway, for instance, is now more parking lot than parkway during rush hours. Once you get your car downtown, (if you get your car downtown), it will cost you at least It is one of the greatest blessings that so many women are so full of tact. The calamity happens when a woman who has all the other riches of life just lacks that one thing. ***** The Brussels Legion Pipe Band continues to be in demand for functions in other centres. They made an appearance as part of the parade at the BlythLegion Zone Rally on S'unday, May 3rd. People everywhere enjoy the music of the pipes and drums. They also admire the swing of those handsome kilts worn by the members of the band. ***** Keep lighters and matches well out of the I 'reach of children. Too often fires are set by youngsters playing with these. They are great imitators and the flame of a match and the flicking of a lighter fascinates them. Unaware of the danger they are quick to try them if they are given the opportunity. Take care! ***** North Americans have become a society obseised with extravagances. Money, ma- terial things, status, leisure living has become the way of life for many. There has been a breakdown in morals -- divorce, increase in promiscuity, Many of us are all too determined to fulfill our own selfish desires at all cost. What has happened to the time when people took pride in their job. They did it with all the skill of their command without clock-watching or • ever increasing pressure for More rewards. Where are the people who are content to make the best of what they have without striving to gratify all their whims and wants with no regard for others: If we look back in history we must be shaken by the realization that much of what We see today resembles, dangerously, what went on in the days df the Itornang. We know to what that led-, the downfall of the Roman Empire, Are are falling into the selfsame pattern? We think about it but we Canadians are &MA 4-,‘A• complacent to reverse the trend. We tend to think that if we ignore What is • $3 to park it for the day. Even at that price space had become so precious that they're building multi-storey parking garages that are big enough to hold one of our. Huron county villages, Looking at it objectively, it's all absurd. For every week of work most Torontarians put in, they spend the equivalent of one day's work fuming and cursing behind the wheels of their cars in traffic jams. For some, public transportation is the solution. Others, of coursei think there's something subversive about the subway, a plot against the all-American way of life of driving your car .slowly through jammed streets morning and night. Even for these transit users, however, the automobile has its effect. For one thing the automobile spread the city out so widely that urban transit becomes inefficient. Subways need high-density population so they can run only downtown. Buses have to travel too far to pick up too few passengers to make them as efficient as they could be. Then of course there's the fact that there are so many cars clogging the roads that/buses and street cars are caught in the same traffic jams the cars are. Cities would be a lot more human if people stuck to riding the subway, or walking, or riding bicycles. Pollution would be eased, (both air and noise), there would be much more space for the people without having to give over huge amounts of land for roads and parking lots, In short, things might almost be liveable in the cities. But there comes the rub. If it happened what would happen to the country's econ- omy. If people didn't use their cars to get around the streets of Toronto or Montreal or New York then a lot of people wouldn't buy cars at all.' If they didn't buy cars at all then the whole vicious circle of economic stagna- tion would take place again. People would lose jobs which would mean less money was being spent which would mean more people would lose jobs. The question to be asked then is will we ever get off this merry go round with the automobile? Will we ever get to the point Where ,once again the automobile serves us and not we the automobile? You have to ask a wiser man than this one. going on the tide that could carry us to disaster will eventually turn and everything will be as it should be. Even in this age of electronics we cannot leave our problems for the "all-wise computers (which are expected to evolve) to solve. We must turn the tide ourselves or drown in our excesses. ***** Anyone who has a chronic illness, drug allergy or other health problem, should wear a Medic Alert bracelet; In an emergency it can save lives. ***** The Wednesday, May 13th meeting of the Majestic W.I. should be an interesting one. Mrs. Edwin Martin will show travel pictures. The guest speaker on this occasion will be Mrs. Margerie Humphries of Walton. Plan to be there at 8:30 p.m. and enjoy every minute of the program. ***** Anyone who watched the 1981 Bursary Awards skaters during the weekend could not fail to realize that Canada has many outstanding young figure skaters who we will, no doubt, hear more about in therPigure Skating world in the years to come. Congratulations to the London Supremes, Of which group Michelle McCutcheon, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J. L. LcCutcheon of Brussels, is a Member for their excellent presentation on the program. * * * * * The week of May 10 to 16 it Police Week with the slogan of "You and Your Police Working Together". As has been the custom for many years police forces across Ontario have extended a warm invitation to Citizens to visit the police facilities. Take your children to see first hand the. efforts • being made by police officers to protect the community, * * isi * * Encourage safety consciousness in yout children. The I.A,P,A. says "Teach theni the basics Of safety. Praise theM for looking both ways before they cross the street instead of scolding them when they don't. M#A a .ArCn 4". Behind the scenes by Keith Roulston Short Shots by Evelyn Kennedy