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HomeMy WebLinkAboutZurich Citizens News, 1973-11-08, Page 4PAGE 4 ZURICH CITIZENS NEWS THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 193 emembrance ay! Bands play, veterans march, crowds watch as wreaths are laid on Cenotaphs to honour the dead of two World Wars. But how few remember the living, confined the veteran's hospitals across Canada! Are the only ones who care the wives, mother and sisters, mostly older women, who day after day and year after year visit their husbands, sons and brothers? One of these women (God pity her) has been corning to the hospital for the past ten years. Others are obviously prepared to tread the same Via Dolorosa. Many of the older patients are paralyzed, senile or in a state of near -coma. They do not really know who has visited them, yet their wives make the daily pilgrimage. Love does not rec- ognize these changes, but ft cannot abandon the loved one. These are the women who endure, as Shakespeare says: "Like patience on a monument smiling at grief." Others, the wives of younger and physically -disabled patients who require constant nursing care, come daily to provide the companionship all of us need, especially in ill -health or old age. Day after day, you see these women pushing the chairs of their legless, armless, crippled, near -paralyzed men down the hospital's long corridors. Over the heads of their husbands, the eyes of "the Colonel's Lady and Judy O'Grady" meet --- there's a faint smile of recognition for they've grown to know one another. Above all there is a sense of silent communicat- ion --of sympathetic understanding. They know how to be kindly and encouraging to their men without ever committing themselves. How does one answer a man when he asks, "Am I going to be here for the rest of my life?" Quite a number of the patients are without families and without visitors. There can be nothing so lonely as old age with- out loved ones. The years pass for all of us. We, too, may need friends when old and alone. On Remembrance Day, we honour the dead of two World Wars. Wouldn't it be better to honour the dead by remembering the living? (contributed) The list st! Sometimes it seems that so many things in this world have gotten out of hand that we might just as well give up and let the world go by. We don't like what is happening but we don't know what we can do. It is claimed that science went ahead about five hundred years during the war and that the character of the people may be centuries behind in development. We do not know how to handle the power that has been developed. But life seems to have certain rules and we either go forward and build the world around us or we live for our own selfish interests and drag the world down with us. We need the sense of going foward to meet the challenge and the needs of the whole community of the world. There are many who are going forward. There are the par- ents who meet the needs of their children and work to create the kind of community that will help them develop. There are teachers who give much of themselves to build character as well as teaching. There are friends who never cease to exp- ect you to live at your best; school principals who maintain high standards of conduct; employers who demand the best workmanship and workmen who give more than the bare require- ments if it will help out. This is all a part of building the nation and it could go for- ward much faster if we all began stretching ourselves to meet the challenge of building wherever we see a need. (by Frances M. McRae) ZURICH Citizens NEWS PRINTED BY SOUTH HURON PUBLISHERS LIMITED, ZURICH HERB TURKHEIM, Publisher Second Class Mail Registration Number 1385 Member: r I e�lt 11. Canadian Weekly Newspapers Association� Ontario Weakly Newspapers Association ,olgroe Subscription Rates; $5.00 per year in advance in Canada; $6.00 in United States and Foreign; single copies 15¢ MY SOLUTION TO RAKING LEAVES A number of deep and troubl- ing questions are puzzling me this fall. Perhaps if I get there out in the open, those stabbing cramps in my stomach will ease off. Leaves, I have six maples and two huge oaks on my front lawn. That produces leaves to the knees. My neighbour across the street has four maples around his property. Also a fair crop of leaves, but nothing like ours. My neighbour rakes up his leaves. At least his wife does. I contemplate mine with a jud- icious eye, waiting for the right moment to strike. "Might as well wait till they're all down." My neighbours are godly and righteous people. I am an acknowledged sinner. Yet every fall, about this time, we get one of those howling north winds that make you shiver in bed, glad you're there. I get up the next morning, and my front lawn is as clean as the cat's dish. 1 look out the other window in dismay, and sure enough, my neighbour's tidy lawn looks like the Maple Leaf Forever. My leaves. Why? I've thought this time of telling him he should put up a snow fence, but I think I'd better give him a couple of weeks to cool off. And get those leaves raked up. There. I feel better already, getting that off my chest. As good as the confessional. Football. In my youth, I dearly loved the game. Played five years in high school, two in college before I went off to play another kind of game. Every night I'd draggle home in the dark, after practice, aching in every limb, drinking in the sharp fall air, complet- ely satisfied. During the genies, there was the heady knowledge that every girl in the school was out there watching you. This, of course, was a two-edged sword, You might catch a pass for a touch- down. You might also drop it, for a red face. We had some great teams in high school, because our princ- ipal was a football nut. When I think over the names, I have more than a sense of nostalgia. Half a dozen were killed in the war. We didn't have much going for us besides lots of spirit, There were about four helmets on the team. Our uniforms were ragged. We made our own pads of felt obtained at the local felt mill, Some had cleated boots, others played in sneakers One of my great thrills was when my big brother took me to Ottawa for the Grey Cup final. In those days the Grey Cup game wasn't the silly- assed spectacle it is now, with beauty contest, marching bands parades and such foofawraw. It was serious business. You were there to see a football game, not to get drunk and make an idiot of yourself. You could get good seats for seventy-five cents. I sat bet- ween two voluble French-Can- adians who, quietly and with dignity, passed a mickey of rye (85¢) back and forth, but only to keep off the chill. Today they'd have a twenty- sixer each and be glassy -eyed by half time. It was a great game. Those were the days of giants: Bumme Stirling, who could boot a ball the length of the field; Bunny Wadsworth, who was like a tank in the line. This day, the centre of attention was Fritz Hanson, who was as hard to pin down as a dragon -fly. But for all his scampering, the bigger Ottawa team won 7-6 on the last play. At any rate, in those days I knew the game. From there it was all downhill. The Yanks took over, and, as usual, we adopted their,terms. Outside wings became ends. Middle wings became tackles. Inner wings became guards. And the flying wing, my own favourite position, vanished into limbo. Today, I am as baffled by the terminology at the recent fighter pilots' reunion in Ott- awa. What is a tight end, for example? Is that what we see when the players go into a hud- dle, and stick those extremely tight pants into our faces on TV. What is the opposite of a tight end? Is this someone who has the skitters? Is that why they are always running off the field? What is an offensive tackle? Is this someone whose langu- age or behaviour you find off- ensive to your sensibilities? Is the familiar phrase, "1 gave hima pretty good shot." an indication that the players are now carrying concealed, not to mention offensive, weapons? One of the universities is giving an extension course at its night school. It's for girl friends and wives of football players, so that they can enjoy the game more. I think I'll sing up for the course. I'm dying to know what a middle line -backer does for a living. use,;.,, ss k. %d Professio OPTOMETRISTS J. E. Longs' OPTOMETRIST SEAFORTH MEDICAL CENTRE 527-1240 Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Sat- urday a.m., Thursday evening CLINTON OFFICE Flo issac Street 402-7010 Monday and Wednesday Call either office for appointment. Nor on rtin OPTOMETRIST Office Hours: 9.12 A,M. — 1:30-0 P. 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