Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1994-04-27, Page 5Arthur Black THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 27, 1994. PAGE 5. Thanks ... to a lady with a lot of class Thank you. Now there's a phrase I wish I heard less often. Not because I'm against gratitude - I'm not. It's just that we use the phrase too loosely. It doesn't mean much any more. "Many thanks!" I burble to the sales clerk who hands me a fistful of nickels and dimes. "Thanks a lot!" I crow to the bus driver I will never see again as I hop out the front door of the Greyhound. "Thanks for everything" I hoot at telephone voices, receptionists and other sundry passing strangers whose lives touch mine with the slightest of gossamer jiggles. I'm not saying these people don't deserve to be thanked - only that it leaves me with nothing to say when I fetch up against something for which I am truly grateful. Like my health. My family. My friends. I mean, Jake's a great buddy, but if I ever went up to him and said, "Hey, Jake - many thanks for being my friend, eh?" - he'd probably wrestle me to he ground and take away my car keys. As a rule, women handle this sort of thing much better than we strutting, grunting, sensitivity-deficieat studs. With most men Rating the airlines Given the fact that so many people fly today instead of taking the train or boat, I try to issue an up-to-date assessment of various airlines which will have as its purpose a reduction in the number of surprises that you will encounter on a specific airline. While I can't vouch that I will note all the idiosyncrasies that manifest themselves in the course of a year, I do my best and I am sure that you will feel a great deal more comfortable once you have read this. All other things being equal, let's start with the Canadian airlines that have international flights. AIR CANADA: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome on board Flight 1062 from Toronto to Frankfurt and Berlin. We welcome especially all the MPs travelling first class with their wives. Due to budgetary restraints, we will be serving only one entree during the flight - fiddlehead stew. We will be taking up a collection to help our armed forces purchase new bows and arrows. One special announcement - all separatists will be required to deplane 10 minutes before we land in Frankfurt. CANADIAN INTERNATIONAL AIR­ LINES: Good evening, fellow travellers. We would like to give a hearty welcome to any passengers who have "defected" from that other airline. The people you see riding in the luggage racks are MPs of the Reform Party who are not allowed to take regular airline tickets. So that we can keep up with that other airline, our mechanics have agreed to work on Lhc right outer engine during the flight. Could we have some volunteers to hold the flashlight? AMERICAN AIRLINES: Welcome to the it's just "hey how about them Maple Leafs?" Women, on the other hand, have a thousand ways of saying Thank You with their eyes, their hugs, their phone calls and their random notes. What got me ruminating on this gratitude kick was an item I spied in the paper. The story concerns Julia Sommers, a struggling single mother who puts in 14-hour days as a waitress and a motel maid to put food on the table and clothes on the backs of her two little kids. Well, Julia's luck changed last week. She was crossing a shopping mall parking lot when she spotted, among the dixie cups and the beer cans and the leaves - a necklace. A very beautiful necklace. She took it to a jeweller and asked for an appraisal. The jeweller sighed, screwed his jeweller's loupe into his eye, squinted, stiffened, then reverently handed the necklace back to the woman. "Off the top of my head" he told Julia Sommers, "approximately $200,000." So Julia's on easy street, right? And she's going to cash in the choker and quit her two jobs and move somewhere nice and quiet and spent the rest of her life being grateful to Lady Luck for making her cross that shopping mall parking lot, right? Wrong. That's you and me. What Julia did was dig into her handbag and fork out about $50 to pay for newspaper ads. The ads read FOUND: ONE NECKLACE IN THE FOUR WAY SHOPPING MALL PLAZA. OWNER CALL AND DESCRIBE. And Julia's telephone number was printed By Raymond Canon finest airline of the country that invented free trade, MacDonald's, Coca Cola, and everything else of any importance. All our planes will be leaving on time today except to Japan, Canada, France and Tajikistan, all of which are guilty of carrying out unfair trade practices with the United States and have to be punished. Please note that we are carrying members of the Philadelphia Phillies who should have won the World Series last year. SWISSAIR: Gruetsi, Bon jour, Buon giomo. Welcome on board Flight 1291 from Zurich to Toronto. There will be a slight delay in Raron while our pilot does his military service. In the meantime we will be giving all our passengers Alphorn or yodeling lessons. Our meal will be a delicious bowl of Birchermuesli with a piece of Belgian chocolate just so you can see how much better ours is. LITHUANIAN AIRLINES: Welcome on board our initial flight from Lithuania to Moscow. Our meal will consist of borscht left over from the Russian occupation; it will change as soon as we can find a suitable substitute. We have borrowed a plan from the Germans and a crew from the Swedes. A note has just been handed to me. Our navigator reports that he is not quite sure where Moscow is; he has never flown there. If there are any passengers who recognize the city, could you point it out to us as we fly over it. AFGHAN AIRLINES: Welcome to our attempt to fly out of Kabul without being shot down. We will be issuing each passenger an AK-47 and instructing them on how to shoot at any hostile aircraft. We would expect that all American passengers have brought their own guns. Please do not get into religious or political arguments and shoot each other. We are sorry to report that our only below. It wasn't long before Julia's phone range and a woman's voice - quavering with gratitude - described how she'd lost the necklace while shopping. She was a banker's wife and she described the necklace perfectly. Julia agreed to meet her. At the mall, because, well, Julia wasn't all that proud of the apartment building she had to live in. At the mall Julia saw a woman climb out of a car - a Rolls Royce - and hurry towards her. She identified herself as the banker's wife and took the necklace from Julia with trembling hands. She thanked Julia profusely, gushing that words couldn't express how much it meant to have it back. And then pulling a wad of bills out of her handbag, she said "And Julia, your honesty should not go unrewarded." And the banker's wife handed Julia two dollars, thanked her again, and drove away. Leaving Julia Sommers 48 bucks in the red for those classifieds, and very sorry that she didn't pawn the rocks, right? Wrong again. "I never thought about keeping it, even after the jeweller told me what it was worth" she says. "I teach my daughters to be honest and I'm no hypocrite." That you aren't ma'am. But you are a lady with a lot of class - something the "lady" in the Rolls Royce with the diamonds and emeralds winking out of her neck wattles will never be. And for that Julia Sommers, I say thank you. And I mean it. refreshment is goat's milk. LUFTHANSA: Guten Tag, meine Damen and Herren: Now that you are all seated, following are our orders, oops, requests. You will all fasten your seat belts as instructed, you will be precise when you order your meal, you will clean up after you so that we will arrive with a neat plane. You will all remain seated after the plane has landed until we give you the signal. You will sleep for one hour after the meal has been completed and you will all have a good time. Danke. But I am fast running out of space which precludes me from giving you a complete run-down of the various airways. After what I hear about accidents in Russia and China, I hesitate to say anything about those airlines, but on a serious note I would guess that the safety standards are somewhat higher in the places you are most likely to fly. Some of the charter airlines should be checked out but, if your travel agent is as good as mine, you will be able to get a good assessment. Happy travelling! Letter to the editor Continued from page 4 people in Huron County, I feel there is a need for a local chapter to be set up in this area. Are you someone who is concerned about future living accommodations or life style for a loved one or perhaps the concern is with future employment. The time to speak up is now. I would like to invite you to an information meeting to be held on May 18 at 7 p.m. at the Clinton Christian Reformed Church. During this meeting we will discuss what your needs are and what we can do to assist. Please call me (during morning hours) at 523-9691 for further information. Linda Renkema. The Short of it By Bonnie Gropp | Too little maturity or too much testosterone? I would have swom last week that I had stepped into an episode of the sitcom Home Improvement. For anyone who doesn't know, that's the show where the woman is raising three 'typical' boys — and a husband. A conversation with a couple of 'real guys' recently brought up some interesting views on the fine macho art of fisticuffs. The conversation began after hearing of two male children scheduling a rumble in reaction to a situation that had occurred at school. They didn't react with an immediate confrontation. They actually made an appointment, to pummel each other's angelic face as a way to settle a trivial little incident. The men I was talking to assured me that this rough and tumble play is just a phase, a normal part of growing up for a guy. Really, a few cuts, scrapes and bruises are no big deal, they said. After all, you can't walk away when someone calls you chicken. I hope my stand however, is the normal attitude. I believe that fighting, even though I have been known to involve myself in the verbal kind, is essentially a worthless pastime. And physical abuse is just plain stupid. It endangers people, it solves virtually nothing and requires very little intelligence, as can be attested by the number of brain dead boxers out there. Sorry fellows, but to condone aggression as a normal developmental process implies to me a certain stunted development on the part of the supporter. Is it a result of too little maturity or too much testosterone? Why do some consider aggressive behaviour as a sign of manliness? Don’t get me wrong; I know females have their own particularly painful form of fighting. As a television character once said of girls' caustic verbal cruelty, "Girls just call you names until you develop an eating disorder." (But, that's a topic for a whole other column). Men use their fists, women use the venomous tongue. Words, however, are just that. There is no question they can hurt, but if you arc strong enough to believe in yourself and realize that the abuser is the one who really has the problem, you'll survive quite nicely. On the other hand fighting with your fists, feel and whatever else you think might inflict pain on a person, can result in serious injury at worst and at best is a sad commentary on how you deal with problems. This viewpoint provided a great deal of humour for the males with whom I was discussing this bone of contention, however. They felt I was overdramatic, exaggerating a harmless situation by blowing it out of proportion. However, I feel that a cautious person should consider the 'what ifs' before jumping head first into a situation. One friend told me of a young boy, who had his eye poked out during a 'harmless' boyhood fight. These things do happen and only a fool or a child would ignore the risks before proceeding. Perhaps it’s just one of those many differences between the male and female of the species, but it is one I know I will honestly never understand. Avenging the wrongs by doing battle should be the last alternative. I know of few circumstances when violence has been the answer to a problem. I do know of many when it has added to it.