HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1972-01-12, Page 2Mail Boxes In Winter
Sugar and Spice
by Bill Smiley
This is the time when pundits across
the land speculate in type about what the
coming year will bring forth. If there is
one thing we don't need more of in this
country, it is pundits.
We have political pundits, economic
pundits, sports pundits. Most of them
spend most of their verbiage disagreeing
with other pundits in the same field.
What is a pundit? It IS a person who
knows a little more • about ' practically
nothing than we non-pundits.
' Having unburdened myself of those
sour sentiments, I now propose to leap
into some punditry (pundineering?) con-
cerning 19'72. Read, carefully, now, so
that you'll have a clear picture of what we
shall face this year.
Most parts of Canada will have lots
of snow. I hope nobody will give• me an
argument on that one. Right now, outside
my window, it looks like plucking day at
the chicken factory.
The population, taxes, and your fuel
bill will increase. This statement is not
based on fact but on pure intuition. E spec-
ially the part about taxes. According to
some of the rosy statements in the new
tax reform bill hustled through parliament,
I will pay less taxes this year, about
enough less to buy an overcoat from the
Salvation Army.
But they can't fool an old tax-payer
like me. I knoW with sickening clarity
that if one level.of government hands me
a few bucks, some other level will be
digging three times as much out of my
back pocket.
The wage-price spiral will continue,•
though perhaps not as rapidly. The
reason? We're all greedy as pigs at a
trough. And the biggest pigs - the
strongest unions and the most firmly
entrenched capitalits - will get more
out Of the trough than the runts; the
ordinary Joes.
There will be a federal election; and
whoeVer wins, there will be promises,
galore, new brooms being waved in all
directions, and the country, according to
the pundits,, will still be going straight
to the dogt.
The churches will Continue to be one,-
third filled and scrambling for enough
money to stay alive. But there will be
a continuing search for some sort of
spiritual experience by our youth.
Thousands who are now merely a
gldam In somebody's eye will be born.
And good luck to them when they enter
a mighty complex world. Thousands
will die, and let's just hope you and I
are not among them. I don't want to go
until I get my mortgage paid off. Isn't
that the supreme purpose of living?
Thousands of kids will experiment
with' drugs and some of them will end
up tragic figures, shattered human beings.
But thousands of others will ignore the
chance of becoming vegetables, and will
lead happy, healthy, useful lives, loving
and learning, sad and happy.
Unemployment will continue to be a
fairly desparate situation. And the schools
will again be jammed to the rafters with
students who shouldn't be there and don't
want to be there, but for whom there is
nothing else to do.
There will be thousands of broken
homes and marriages turned .to dust. But
there will be thousands of dreamy-eyed
brides and proud young grooms, positive
that nothing could ever happen to their
love, which is something special.
There will be wars that have no
victories, and peace conferences that
go on interminably proceeding from no-
where to nowhere. The United Nations
will again announce that it is going broke,
but nobody will ante up enough to pay the
bills.
Thousands of bright young people will
emerge from college, spilling over with
knowledge, and come face to face with
that brutal edict; you can't get a job with
no experience, and you can't get exper-
ience until you get a job. But thousands of
others wilt break their backs to get into
college, where they will learn all about
Life and find the mate of their Choice.
Does this all sound sort of familiar
to you? It Should.Does It all sound rather
depressing? It shouldn't, you'll have
your downs, but you'll have your ups, too,
those glorious and fleeting tiines when you
wouldn't be anyone else or anywhere else.
Your children will change; preferably
for the better, but don't count on The
year will fly by. Make it a good one by
thinking 'positively.
-ISTAP1,104 gP
)117?
russels Post
BRUSSELS
ONTARIO
Serving Brussels and the, surrounding community
published each Wednesday afternoon at Brnssela, Ontario
by McLean Bros. Publishers, Limited.
Evelyn Kennedy Editor Torn Haley - Advertising
Member Canadian Community Newspaper Association and.
Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association.
Subscriptions (in advance) Canada $4.00 a year, Others.
$5.00 a year, Single copies 10 cents each.
Second class mail Registration No. 0562.
Telephone 887-6641.
A. Wider Calling Area
In Mullett and Morris areas there
is an increasing concern that larger
toll free telephone areas be estab-
lished. Federations of Agriculture
in the townships have been circulat-
ing petitions and approaching muni-
cipal councils for support.
Of course there are many advan-
tages to such arrangements. While.
certainly the telephone people would
require added monthly charges to
compensate for the greater number of
telephones that would be made avail-
able, the increase in convenience
would in most cases offset the cost.
In any event the cost would be re-
latively small, perhaps something
in the order of 15 to 25 cents for
private phones.
It makes common sense and perhaps
the Bell may agree to the added
service. But, as the people in this
area •have learned through sad ex-
perience, it takes a lot to move
the Bell people and once having
started them, to keep them moving.
When the Bell Telephone people
were negotiating with the McKillop
system several years ago, one of
their arguments in favour of a
union with Bell was the larger toll
free area that wou,ld become avail-
able to McKillop subscribers. It
would be a matter of only a year
before people in the Walton area
would be able to talk to both Sea-
forth and Brussels and probably
Blyth without added charges. ,
That is several years ago and
the area is still waiting. In the
meantime, Bell has consolidated its
position and now.operates out of
both Brussels and Blyth as well as
Seaforth.
Earlier still there were many
discussions with Bell concerning
the service to be provided Seaforth
and Dublin subscribers when Bell
took over the McKillop Hibbert
System. Toll free service was pro-
vided between the two exchanges but
in the meantime Bell rearranged its
administrative districts so that
Seaforth directories include ex-
'changes located nearly 100 miles
_south but omit Dublin, 5 Wes east
and Brussels, a few miles north.
With modern transportation
people today have a mobility never
before available to them. Too
frequently, however, this expansion
of interest and activity has not
been matched by communication ser-
vices. Bell has a responsibility
to provide a service that reflects
the needs of today.
(An editorial in The Huron Expositor)