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The Citizen, 1994-10-12, Page 5THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1994. PAGE 5. Mt Arthur Black Oh, Canada. Suicidal or just terminally dumb? So the Quebec election has come and gone and the bad guys won and, despite all the predictions, here we are, the Rest of Canada, still joined at the hip to Quebec. Contrary to all the apocalyptic forecasts, the sky did not fall, great ragged chasms did not appear in the Canadian Shield, and at last report, not a single owl had been heard hooting in the Bytown marketplace. Haven't we sat through this movie before? I think last time it was called Meech Lake. The experts that time also promised the world would end if we didn't do the Right Thing. Elijah Harper and Clyde Wells went right ahead and did the Wrong Thing. Magically, the sun continued to rise and set, the tides did not stop rushing in and out. Chicadees continued to chirp. I suppose it's unpatriotic, but I tuned out long before Quebeckers went to the polls last month. I quit paying attention when I heard that Paul Rose wouldn't be allowed to run in the election as an NDP candidate. You remember Paul Rose, don't you? He Left handers left out I am not sure how many of my readers are left handed bur, if the current statistics are any indication, there are about 10 per cent of them. I would have thought that this was a bit on the high side but perhaps there are more people in some countries than in others who write with the left hand. At any rate we are in pretty good company; some of the more famous people of our group are Charlie Chaplin, Danny Kaye, Charlemagne, Babe Ruth and Harry Truman. I am sure that the list is considerably longer but it will do for a start. One class I was attending in high school had no less than 25 per cent and sometimes, in order to liven up the day, we would all sit in one section. The teacher would give us the dirty look that was reserved for all students who chose at any time to act as idiots and order us back to our regular seats. In those days you didn’t push your luck too far and so we did as we were told. We did have a point, however. All of the desks which we used were made for right- handed people and, in order for us to write at all, we had to make a half-tum in our desk and almost face the side board. I notice now that there are actually left-handed desks in some of the classrooms I have taught in. They arc pul along one side and 1 give any southpaw student the option of sitting at such desks any lime there is an exam. There arc also such things as left-handed scissors but some things arc still made for right-handed people, a fact you will note if you arc one of us. My research into this subject led me to discover that our distant ancestors were even handed and it is only during the last few thousand years that letting the right hand do things came into vogue. Il was not a clear- cut victory; my source says that it could entered Canadian politics back in 1970. Mind you, Rose didn't choose the conventional route of campaigning for votes an$ getting himself elected by his constituents. Rose opted for the more direct method. He kidnapped a cabinet minister, strangled him with a neck chain and dumped his body in the trunk of a car. Sure. That's the Paul Rose I'm talking about. The low grade treacherous thug who, with a couple of other back-alley vermin, kidnapped Pierre Laporte and murdered him in 1970. Canadian justice being the awesome force it is, Rose was subjected to a severe tongue- lashing and forced to stay behind bars for 12 years before being granted full parole. He seemed surprised to learned that election officials didn't think a convicted terrorist murderer should be allowed to run as a political candidate last month. Rose said he found "something fishy" in the fact that he wasn't allowed to run. I'll tell you what's fishy. What's fishy is, you'll never guess who is president of the New Democratic Party in Quebec. Yup. Paul Rose. Oh, Canada. Are we suicidal or just terminally dumb? We have an official Opposition Party dedicated to the destruction of the county it supposedly represents. By Raymond Canon have gone either way. Considerate as we are, I am sure that, if we had won out, we would have been more kind and consider of a right- handed minority. We can, to be sure, take some satisfaction that, for a time, the left hand was in the ascendency. The Greeks, who had a word for a great many things, called it "aristera," from which comes our word "aristocracy." In case you have missed the point, this contains the idea of "best" and one can only wonder how much better place the world would have been if this ascendency had been allowed to continue. The Romans carried on the tradition for in Latin, the word for "left" was "sinister" meant "fortunate." The explanation for this is interesting for the Roman soothsayers, in looking for auspicious signs, faced south and looked to the east. If you do that, you will see that your left hand is on the east. When, centuries later, they started looking north for the same signs, sinister came to mean "ill- omened." Perhaps if I were a Roman, I would look north too for it is from that direction that Hannibal, the great general from Carthage, came when he was marching on Rome. Later on the Germanic tribes, such as the Vandals, Ostrogooths and Visigoths, came from the same direction and sacked Rome. When alphabetic scripts were invented, all of them were written from left to right. Some of them, such as Hebrew and Arabic, still arc, while Latin and Greek did the same up until about 400 B.C. For a while many people wrote from left to right on one line; on the next they went from right to left and so on just as if they were ploughing a field. There have been a number of reasons given for the switch from left to right. One of the more interesting ones has been the suggestion that, since most of the people live north of the equator, the sun moves to the right. Why the sun, you might ask. Well, there has been a great deal of sun worship during the course of history and decision was based on that. We have nine premiers from the other provinces who, meeting to discuss the future, go out of their way not to talk about Quebec separation. We have a prime minister who thinks the best way to save the country is to pretend nothing is going on east of the Rideau. And then there's the justice factor. A recent letter to the editor of The Globe and Mail summed it up rather succinctly. How come, asks the letter, the Americans can have O.J. Simpson in a courtroom two weeks after he allegedly committed the same crime? The mills of the Gods grind slowly. The mills of Canadian justice don't appear to be moving at all. I guess we should count our blessings. We still wake up each morning in the most wonderful country I've ever seen. A country that somehow, miraculously continues to bumble along despite the fools and crooks and cowardly swine who try to do her harm. Thank God the calibre of our enemies still ranges from mediocre to pathetic - pompous asses like Parizeau, recycled felons like Paul Rose. We don't have to contend with World Class monsters like Carlos the Jackal. Just as well. If Carlos had ever shown up in Canada we probably would have made him Governor General. There have been other reasons as well. Pilgrims at Mecca started to walk clockwise around the Kaaba; in addition the right hand was exalted above the left in the Bible. Christian priests came to give destral blessings and any old woman who was found wandering around in a counter­ clockwise direction was burnt at the stake as a witch. Muslims were told that God had two right hands since the left hand was considered to be unclean, associated with death and the devil. The handwriting was on the wall when the Bible reported that Christ went up to sit at the right hand of God, the Father. We have been fighting a losing battle ever since. I would hate to tell you in how many languages references to the left are associated with negative concepts. This century the Russians added a new one. If you want to gel something on the black market in Russia, you have to obtain it "naleva" which means "on the left." Just about every other minority seems to be complaining about some slight, real or imaginary. Perhaps we left-handed people should make a determined effort to reverse the prejudice of centuries so that we can live on a level playing field. I can hear the criticisms right now. "Just another sinister plot," people will say. In a literal sense, how true! Got a beef? The Citizen welcomes letters to the editor. They must be signed and should be accompanied by a telephone number should we need to clarify any information. The My heartfelt thanks By the time you read this, memories will be all that remain of your Thanksgiving dinner. That, as well as a few leftovers and the signs of indulgence as evidenced by the loosening of your belt. But as I write this on Monday afternoon, thoughts of Thanksgiving are still very much present in my mind. I served up our traditional family feast on Sunday, a time sandwiched between social and work commitments. Faithful readers of my column will know that I am a bit of a sentimentalist. Well, alright I can be downright drippy at times. Suffice it to say that I hold these close-knit moments dear, taking them very seriously. Unfortunately, at times it seems I'm the only one. While the two sons used the holiday to embark on a journey of male bonding, my husband took advantage of some valuable hours and spent most of the day toiling. As I stuffed the bird my eldest daughter slept while the younger one, who was suffering from the flu, flopped in front of the television. It became clear to me that this was not the kind of day from which Norman Rockwell pictures were made. Eventually, feeling just a little pouty, I too found my way to the television, curling up in the chair in the comer to watch "Butch and Sundance" yet again. (After I finished folding a couple loads of laundry, that is.) Phones were ringing, the kids had friends stopping by and then with the eldest setting a deadline for supper to be over, so he could go out for the evening, we tracked down Dad, rushed to get the meal on the table and with a collective sigh, sat down to enjoy and be thankful. Which, I insisted they do. The rest of the day may not have been a cornucopia of tradition, but this was one ritual, albeit a corny one, that I was not about to forget. For years, since having seen it on a television show, I have asked each at the Thanksgiving table to say in turn for what they are thankful. Though the answers don't usually change, except for a surprise "apple juice" this year, it never hurts I tell them to remind ourselves of the many blessings we have. Because, often, especially when things don't go quite the way we hoped, we lose sight of how fortunate we are. While some in my family are a little more imaginative — my husband is grateful for Polaris and Chrysler— I don't think my blessings are much different than most. We are part of a large, happy and healthy family, who care for us and support us. I am grateful for my parents, who pointed me in the right direction, often with some difficulty. I have friends and an interesting job. I have a roof over my head, newly shingled I might add, and live in the best country in the world. But more importantly, I have my husband, with whom I have raised four pretty terrific kids, who may not always be where I'd like them, but so far seem to have a pretty good idea about where they're headed. 1 know there will always be days when I think I have something to complain about, when there doesn't seem to be enough money and nothing seems to go right. It doesn't take long before I remind myself of what I havd and in my head I know I have little to feel sorry about. On Thanksgiving, surrounded by all that is important to me, I knew it in my heart as well.