Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Huron Expositor, 1983-10-26, Page 2• OS I1,01Plrtn dib ult ft / r ; IfY (+t r t ., fnpolporr(tlnst; �tl'D�%CIs Post' foo tf 1i�72 a 521.4210'' Publl$hod at SEAFOPTPI ONTARIO uvsry Wadni ldsrrbornlna Brun whit.. Managing Editor s, , Jocelyn A. 8hrlar bila C . cps Memtt rCtfnadlnf opoy nl !(lrty Nw p•tporAeaoc -Ontarl000mmunityN.w ion,er`Aa tion tndsti. lldltBura(, ot:Clrcdlrijt tin" W Am•mbercfthaOnfalfloe1tound I ' Subsoript1onra s , Canads=1E 75 aYear (itiittlata) Outelde Canada 855..00 0fot,(11* advt(nge) , SIngli''Copt s-50,,Centra t'' r ' SEAFORTH, ONTARIO, WEDNESDAY, OCTODER 28, 1983,. Second class mail registration Numtiit' )596 ffllNTER8 heva'be.tt hpntlfg ducki and Deep near, Saaforth Ono Supt. The hunting Isn't all that 'aaar be(:au4a of a :01400.no hunting "anion at the Hallett swamp. The birds er, 1ed'bt Doug Claire, right. Duck; rind qp NON? htiNO a eafa haven at the Cor Da Corte"isnot la Ms 1(loptaiva0lptbrMfre '_ " (Wasslnkphoto) Say yes to our youngsters An 18 -year-old girl from Mississauga, critically injured In,a car crash ' that killed her mother, fights her way back from near -paralysis and learns to walk, talk, read and write again. She hasn't given up her goal Of becoming a creative writer. An all-round super helpful kid from Seaforth gives freely of her time as a volunteer in her school and her community., She's 13 -years -old.. These are Just two of the 13 Ontario young people who last year were named Junior Citizens of the Year. The second, of course, is Seal orth's own Lisa Andreassl. The Junior Citizen program honors a group of carefully selected youngsters each year, sorting through hundreds of worthwhile. nominations to do so. 'CP Air and the Ontario Community Newspapers Associations (OCNA) sponsors 'the awards; •lieutenant -governor, John Black Aird gives the program his support too. By honoring a few of their number, the Junior Citizen award honors all Ontario's kids. The program and the fuss that surrounds It are a way of saying kids matter to us, kids do' great things, kids are heros. The thing that struck any observer at last year's award ceremony at the OCNA convention was the ordinariness of all the winners. Sure some had handicaps, sure'some had mind-boggling accomplishments. But they were all just kids, illustrating the good, the positive that all kids can do. The Ontario Junior Citizen of the Year program says yes to our kids and their potential. We heartily endorse it and suggest you do too. Send the names of Seaforth and area kids you think would be worthy to The Expositor. A -pamphlet with details about the program is on our front counter. And already, more than one reader has nominated David Cronin, the young St. Columban boy who saved a life at the Lions Pool this summer. From what we've seen of Junior Citizen nominees and winners, he's in very good company. - S.W. What do, they have to hide? Is Huron County Library Board engaged in subversive activities? Are there,international spies hidden under the table -when the board meets? Are the members plotting dangerous schemes or using awfully bad language? I am suggesting these ridiculous possibilities in jest, of'course -t thihtt. The fact is that one does not really know. In Htirtm Gtiunty the 'Library Board meets in closed session and Is sternly determined to fend off even a single stray taxpayer who makes the mistake of showing some interest by wishing to attend a meeting simply as a quiet observer. 1 experienced this sort of rejection on September 19th. Having telephoned the County Chief Librarian, Bill Partridge, for the date df the meeting and to have confirmation of my understanding that such formal meetings of a Library Board are open to the public, I sat down politely and quietly in the county chamber where the meeting was to take place. - Perhaps 1 had expected some board meatier to say how nice and encouraging it is to see that at last there is one person who takes the time and comes to (earn something about the work the members are doing for the benefit of our public library system. Much to- my astonishment, my presence had exactly the opposite effect. The Board members went into a dither over it and Mr. Hanly (County Administrator and Secretary to the Library Board) nearly hada fit, particularly when it was suggested by Mr. Partridge that the Library Board is a separate body under the Public Libraries Act and perhaps it could be at least mildly closed -Meeting policy for committees automatically applies in this case. Mr. Hanly rejected all this as nonsense and firmly and quickly established the fact that, as the County pays by far the larger portion of the Library Board's budget (in 1982 roughly one quarter of that budget was paid by the Province), the Board members better do exactly what the County wants - or else. And what the County wants is to have all Library Board meetings closed. Nothing to question. "It has always been like this There were no crowd of people rushing to get in. There never would be. There was one single solitary taxpayer in the audience, the first in all theoe years, judging from the fuss. Somehow I found it difficult to visualize that the representatives of the 26 municipalities who form the county and collect their taxpayers' money to finance it, could entertain the thought of some sort of financial retaliation over the spectacle of a taxpayer showing an interest in the system. fvlr. Hanly's stand did not surprise me, as we have always frankly differed on the philosophy of closed meetings of public bodies. Without hesitation I continue to have great respect for the dedicated efficiency with which Mr. Hanly keeps the county system running smoothly and I have found him courteous and helpful whenever 1 have needed information. However, when Mr. Hanly holds up the shield of "county policy made by county council", 1 beg to wonder politely how much of Mr. Hanly's own determined guidance has gone into the formation of that policy. The by far outdated closed -meeting policy (never discussed at an open meeting) stands In startling contradiction to the modern attitudes with which the Huron County keeps in step in other fields, for Instance computerization. What did surprise me greatly was the attitude of the Board members, particularly the citizen appointments (as opposed to elected representatives) whose almost eager, instant and absolutely unquestion- ing acceptance of the pressure was quite extraordinary. One member meekly suggested that perhaps they should not even receive advance copies of their own Minutes carrying the stamp of county secrecy. No member seemed to be interested in what the Public Libraries Act says about the Board being a corporation or that the Municipal Act requires that formal meetings of "local boards" (specifically mentioning a "public library board" be open to the public. The almost sad thing Is that a simple gesture of Interest of a single member of the public can be regarded as a dangerous attempt to "rock the boat", thereby bringing presumably the whole system down. The Huron County boat Is in,safely charted waters; It does not leak. The County is well run. Why could It not be seen to be well run? -Elsa Haydon The Goderlch Signal -Star The perfect house 5offigabong ao god is a big lie There's a technique well known in political and propaganda circles called the big lie. it's based on the idea that if the untruth you want to put across is enormous enough, and repeated often enough, everybody will believe it. As I clean my , way through our Aver -cluttered house. ((old you about that a ecluple.of.weeks ngo, d .these .things tithe time), l get more and more certain that the image of a perfectly tidy, scrubbed and dusted, everything -in -order -house is the biggest lie of them all. From all sides — TV commercials, the` backgrounds in TV ads, the glossy colored photos in the glossy magazines. — we're assaulted with images of the perfect house. It's trendy but neat, color co-ordinated but restful. Nobody ever reads a newspa(ier, takes off a sock or fails to hang up a sweater. Nobody ever drops crumbs on the floor when eating or spills coffee on the counter. The treasures kids bring -home from school,. including every nut from the three chestnut trees along the route are nowhere in sight. The groceries disappear into cupboards and fridge almost before they tome in from the car. The laundry miraculously gets from the washing machine to the dryer to neatly by Sue©w W i @ folded opiles 'on shelves. -and in drawers, without anybody tieing anything. ELEGANT DISHES Dishes are seen in two states only, perfectly clean and shiny on a table elegantly set for dinner for six or coming out of the dishwasher with a few too many hard water spots. They're never dirty and piled on the kitchen counter, and nobody is ever wet up to the elbows and all across the front, Washing them. Dish detergent, the big lie tells us, is' used for manicures, not cleaning up after the family meal. Kids never wreck the furniture by jumping co it. Dogs and cats are never sick on the rug. And mud, dust and dog hair stay out in the big, bad world; if they get into the perfect house, they're cleaned up before anybody sees them. Now you and i know the places TV people live in,..from the humble Three's Company apartment to palatical Falconcrest..:bear about as much relation to reality as The Newlywed Game does to early married life. And that if any of us really lived in rooms like we see in the background in advertise- ments we'd not be concerning ourselves with either housecleaning or the latest miracle product. We'd be rich and we'd pay people to do it for us. But, though we know it, most of us still accept these' perfect environments as the ideal. They are the mental image we carry around. And we berate ourselves because our house is so far from perfect. Yup, as far as housekeeping is concerned, we've swallowed the big lie. Then we drive ourselves crazy trying to live up to an impossible ideal. RARE I used to think our house was the only messy one around. But the Iohger 1 look. the more i realize that it's the perfect houses that are rare. Face it. if you have a choice between a walk through the leaves with your daughter or scrubbing the Floor, which do you do? Or if you either let the dishes sit until tomorrow night or miss your son's hockey game, what do you decide? Neglecting; kids.. (or just aaout anything else) in favor of getting the house closer,to perfection is a -waste of time. I'm a victim of the big lie like everybody else. It's a major effort for me to relax, and not apologize for the mess that is after all only a result of the usual family living. When i visit other peoples' houses I see they're relaxing too. It's a terrific trend, - SLOB CiTY Now, I'm not talking slob city here. Our house is usually clean enough to be healthy, cleared out enough -that you can sit on a chair without moving -,10 things first. But I am talking about abandoning that push for perfection. Nobody's house really looks like that impossible media image. Or if it does, their priorities aren't mine. When the commercials and the TV show sets include the debris of daily living, and ' when we start apologizing when our houses look like furniture show rooms instead of when they don't, we'll all be saner. Those potholes in the lane keep the pests away Remember those times when you were a kid: you wanted to wear shoes in -the spring when there was two inches of snow still on the ground or you thought you were too grown up to wear long underwear and you told your mother "but everybody else is doing it". Wise old mother said, "1 don't care what anybody else is doing. You're my son/daughter and i won't have you catching cold/pneumonia." It was a great argument. Don't worry about what other people do or say. i use it myself now that I'm a father. So how come it didn't sink in? Oh I'm not completely a fad follower. 1 may grudgingly admit there might be-sdmething to a new fad about the time all the trendies have decided it's boring. My clothes look like something you'd donate to Goodwill (which some trendy person would then boy and make very "in"). 1 don't eat at the chiaestaurants when 1 go to the city. In fact, I'm about as out as 1 can be, and i like it that way. STiLL VULNERABLE But I'm afraid I'm about as vulnerable to 13@hfind en@ 3C@fiGg by Kcv6a01 L uOzittOr those very opinionated people who instantly know what is right and what is wrong as i was when 1 tried to convince my mother that "everybody" wore white sox to the high school dances and I just had to have some. it's just the subjects of my vulnerability that have changed. 1 protect myself from my vulnerability in devious ways. Nye in the country at the end of a laneway that hasenough bumps to cripple one of those tough pickups that climb dnderblock mountains on the TV ads. In the winter it's even more discouraging to door-to-door'insurance salesmen and prose- lytizing religious zealots unless they come equipped with snowshoes and the kind of adventurous spirit that leads people on polar expeditions. it keeps the opinionated world at a safe distance. But there are times you have to go out in the world: to earn a living. to buy food, perhaps, heaven forbid, to go to a cocktail party. You come face to face, elbow to elbow with the perfect ones. You make some innocent remark and they let you have it. You mention going to a certain restaurant and having a great meal: Well, they explode, that place should be condemned. The food is horrid, the service worse. There's gum on the bottom of the tables and who knows what goes on in the washrooms. ARTWORK? You admire a piece of artwork on the wall. Well! they spit. it's a cheap imitation by a no -talent fraud of an artist who should be selling shoes at a cheap discount store for all the taste he has instead of earning a -comfortable living as a. painter. Isn't it horrible that shlock merchants like this make a living while great artists like (they invariably know somebody in this category) have to struggle away painting part -tune from their jobs as university professors. You say something innocent about poli- tics, something motherhood like, wouldn't it be nice if the world could live in peace. Well! they say, and take off on a IS -minute lecture on the ills of the Americans (if they're left-leaning) or the wicked Reds, (if they're good patriotic business -types), You steer away from abortion to the point of jumping out a third story window if the subject comes up. NOTHING IS SAFE You even, try not to sag, "nice day isn't You can't think of a single thing that's safe to talk about so you sit in the corner and pretend you've just come back from a visit to your dentist where yen had two root -canals done. 1 keep a mental list of people like this, 1 record the color and make of car and the license plate number. And if I ever see their car coming down our concession 1 run out and -dig a few more potholes in the lane. Going out on a limb is a learning experience There's nothing more exhilarating than going out on a limb. it begins when you're very little, when you eat a worm to see if he'll really stay alive inside you, or pick up a toad to see whether you'll wind up covered with warts. Later, it might be climbing out on a long, shaky tree limb over a deep pool, when you can't swin. Or it might be caught up in a tree, shirt stuffed with apples, while the voice of Geo. J. Jehovan thunders from beneath. "Come down, ye little divils; 1 know yer up there and I'll whale the tar out of yez and the police'll put yez away fer life." Or it might be caught in the act of swiping corn and racing through backyards and over fences, with the cobs dropping and your heart thumping and the shotgun going off into the sky. Or It might be, about age 12, smoking butts with the hoboes hi the jungle" beside the railway tracks, and having a drunk with a gallon of wine come up and start terrifying yon with all sorts of Obscenities you don t understand. 5pga i cad zp*@ by B000 5i al®y Or it might be, about 14 and spotted like a hyena with pimples, having to ask a girl to a party, knowing that you are the most repulsive, awkward booby in town. This e rotten limb to be out on. It could be saying, "Don't you say that about my mother!" to the bully of your age and sailing into him, yourself outweighed 20 pounds, but your fists and feet and teeth goinlike a wml. Org it could beinda swiilmming! exhilaratingg moment, like the day when 1 was in high school and kissed my French teacher up in an apple tree. She was a spinster and six years older than 1, but if 1 recall, it was a swooning experience and I think we both wound up hanging by our knees from the limb. These are. some of the limbs I've been out on. Lots of other limbs. You've had yours; round limbs, crooked limbs; rotten limbs. smooth ones, brittle limbs, sturdy ones. We have all gone out on a limb. When you're young, you don't really know the difference, or you just don't care. It's climbing out on the thing that matters. Even at 20, i was climbing out on a limb. trying desperately to make the grade as a fighter pilot, sweating blood so that i could climb out on the fragile wing of a Spitfire and be killed. What an irony! Those who didn't make it were broken-hearted. And then there's the limb of marriage. Most males will climb out on the first limb that is endowed with long eyelashes or trim ankles or a big bust. Even though they know it's a very green one, or a very brittle one. out they go. i was lucky. The limb 1 climbed out ori was firm but yielding, green but not brittle. And oamn soon discovered that when you climbed out on that particular limb, you didn't carry a saw, but a parachute and an iron -bound alibi. However, what 1 started out to say was that. as we get older, we climb out on shorter and shorter. safer and safer limbs, until we are finally left. clutching the tree -trunk, even though -we're only two feet off the ground. The old limbs (or the young limbs) creaked and swayed and cracked and dipped. They are replaced by the limbs of safety and conformity and security and enough life insurance. And -the sad part is that these are the limbs we want our children to climb out on, no farther the two feet from the trunk and no higher than twb feet from the ground. While they want to climb on the swinging limbs that will tail them to the skies or break and let them, fail. Alt thisdcourse, is a preamble to the fact that l'm stilLwWing to go out en a limb. if somebodyt'vili fetch a step -ladder to help me get started tip the tree. A