Monthly Archives: July 2016

Trusty Sidekick

As a young boy, I loved the Saturday afternoon matinees at our neighbourhood movie theatre.  Whenever I could earn or scrounge the twenty-five cents needed for admission, popcorn, and a soft drink, I’d be there, wide-eyed in the dark, lost for a couple of hours in the fantasies played out before me.

The matinees usually consisted of a serialized short, with a cliff-hanger at the end of every episode, a cartoon, and a main feature.  At some point along the way, all but the serials began to appear in colour.  Imagine!

My favourites were westerns—cowboys and Indians, as we thought of them in those innocent, bygone days—and I quickly developed a fondness for the rugged heroes who rode the purple sage.

In the early fifties, my parents acquired a television, black and white, of course, and Saturday mornings after breakfast became prime viewing time.  With a lineup of westerns and cartoons, it was almost as good as being at the movies.  I still remember my parents turning the TV off if I was still in my pyjamas, or if my bed wasn’t made, when I settled on the carpet to watch.

It wasn’t long ‘til I realized that every cowboy hero had a trusty sidekick.  And years before I became aware of such concepts as racism or ageism, those sidekicks were men of diverse ethnicity, many of them old enough to be grandfathers.  With perhaps one exception, there were no women.

cowboy pic

The Lone Ranger, my ultimate hero, had Tonto, an American Indian.  Hopalong Cassidy had ‘California’ Carlson, a bewhiskered, bowlegged geezer.  And the Cisco Kid had Pancho, both Hispanics with huge sombreros.

There were others, as well.  Gene Autry, with ‘Smiley’ Burnett, and later Pat Buttram; ‘Wild Bill’ Hickok, with ‘Jingles’ P. Jones; and Roy Rogers, with ‘Gabby’ Hayes, and later Pat Brady.  Rogers, the self-styled ‘King of the Cowboys’, also had the only female sidekick, Dale Evans (who, off-screen, was his wife).

The heroes were always the stars of their movies and TV shows, of course, while the sidekicks played supporting roles.  And for a long time, I—being impressionable and loving attention—imagined I was the star in a real-life ‘movie’ of my own, assuming all around me were my supporting actors.  Parents, siblings, friends—all trusty sidekicks, playing out their backup roles.

It never occurred to me back then that others might not feel the same way.  For a long time, I didn’t perceive myself as a supporting actor in someone else’s story.  Egocentricity, I learned years later, is one of the stages children pass through on their way to maturity; but apparently, I took my own sweet time on that journey.  I was blessed, I now realize, with family and friends who either didn’t care about my delusions of greatness, or simply tolerated my selfish illusions out of the goodness of their hearts.

Eventually, the truth dawned that it was a fallacy to suppose I was the lead actor in everyone else’s movies.  I came to realize that all of them were, legitimately, the stars of their own stories, and I, at best, a trusty sidekick—or, in some cases, merely a bit-player.

Getting married firmly cemented that truth for me, and becoming a father further reinforced it.  I came to know the importance of being there for those dear to me, in effect earning their support in return, rather than just expecting it.

My lingering love of movies has me glued every year to telecasts of the Academy Awards, when the year’s best performances and productions are honoured by the industry.  Oscars for Best Actor and Best Actress seemed to me the most coveted prizes when I first began to tune in.  But my perception has shifted over the years.

My grandchildren, five in all, are leading rich, exciting lives as they move from childhood to adolescence, discovering all life has to offer.  They love me, and I them, but I’m hardly relevant anymore to their everyday experiences.

My daughters are mature, liberated women, pursuing rewarding careers alongside their husbands.  They love me, too, but I orbit their stars now, not the reverse.

And my wife?  Well, she remains the epitome of an autonomous woman—secure enough to keep seeking new adventures, caring enough to reach a hand back for me, her trusty sidekick.

That egocentric world I once carelessly inhabited is gone forever.  At a point now where I have more yesterdays than tomorrows, I find security and an abiding comfort in being part of the cast in my loved-ones’ life-movies.

And I wonder how different a world we might have if every person on the planet—regardless of race, gender, religious belief, sexual orientation, political leaning—could win an award as Best Supporting Actor, or Best Supporting Actress, in the lives of everyone around them.

That’s an Oscar I would happily accept!

Oscar pic

Whose Lives Matter?

Black Lives matter!  So claims a vocal, concerned group of citizens here in the West, who believe their safety—indeed, their very lives—are at risk in the frightened, suspicious society we are quickly becoming.

All Lives matter!  So comes the response from other groups of concerned folks who believe their traditional culture and way of life are under siege from racial and ethnic groups whose appearance and customs are often quite different.

So who is right?  Are these two positions antithetical, as many would have us believe?

Perhaps, rather than making declarative statements, we should be asking more questions of each other.  The question I ask is, whose lives matter?  Anyone’s?  As I survey the daily news reports of exploitation, forced migration, and ethnic slaughter, I truly wonder.

To whom does my life matter, for example?  Do the nameless powers-that-be who head up multinational corporations, relentlessly extracting and harvesting the resources of our planet, really care about me?  Even as a consumer, one among millions?

Do the presidents, premiers, and overlords of so many autonomous nation-states genuinely care about me?  Even as a voter and citizen of a sovereign country, one among more millions?

Do fanatical extremists of whatever political or religious persuasion actually care if I live or die, so long as their own frenzied ends are met?

I think not.  My life and death are of supreme indifference to all of them.  I am too small to count.

Individual lives do matter, I believe, to one’s immediate spheres of influence—families, friends, neighbours, and the like.  And, thankfully, to the number of altruistic people and organizations who dedicate their time and energy to relief efforts in areas of crisis around the globe.

Consider the indigenous peoples of every continent whose way of life was essentially exterminated by ruthless invaders in the name of empire, religion, and profiteering.  Did their lives matter?

Consider the hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing their homelands to avoid terrorist activities that have killed so many of their compatriots, a number many fear will overrun the safe-haven nations to which they flock.  Do their lives matter?

Consider the millions who have died from famine, drought, and genocide in so many third-world regions, people whose plight was known but for whom so little could be done.  Did their lives matter?

And then think about the population explosion that threatens to outpace the ability of the planet to sustain itself.  According to a 2014 Living Planet Report from the World Wildlife Federation, the current global rate of consumption, if continued, will require 1.5 planet Earths to support us.

If everyone were to live like the British do, however, that number would rise to 2.5 earths; and if everyone lived like we North Americans, the number would jump to four!  Untenable!

In such a global context, it seems unlikely to me that individual lives matter.  Either mankind must dramatically slow its rate of reproduction, or (as unpalatable as this sounds) individuals must perish in order that the collective may survive.  Hideous to contemplate, yet the human race continues to take each other’s lives, anyway—savagely, often indiscriminately, and remorselessly.

I saw a photo-shopped picture recently, a scuba diver swimming near a huge Great White shark.  The caption read: This is the most feared killer on the planet, murdering millions of people a year.  Beside it, a shark swims peacefully.

shark

So I ask myself—in the overall scheme of things, on our current path—whose lives matter?

We need to answer that question together, not separately.

And soon.

The Iron(y) Lady

Many will remember the Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1975 – November 1990.  Her sobriquet, originally bestowed by a Russian journalist, alluded to her obdurate political views and leadership style.

Perhaps the best encapsulation of this approach was delivered in a speech in 1980, when many in her conservative party were calling for a policy U-turn because of a looming recession.  “You turn if you want to,” she declared.  “The lady’s not for turning!”

Nor did she.  Seven years later, when the general economic conditions in the country had turned for the better, she was re-elected.  Uncompromising to the end, she narrowly lost a leadership vote in her party in 1990 and resigned the premiership.

westminster

Now, twenty-six years on, there enters from stage right the second female Prime Minister in the long history of the UK, Theresa May, succeeding David Cameron as party leader after his hapless (mis)management of the Brexit crisis.  She has publicly agreed with a commentator’s description of herself as a bloody difficult woman, yet at the same time, has claimed to be a real Goody Two Shoes in her approach.

On first glance, those two self-appraisals would appear to be at odds.  And much of her political performance also demonstrates this same antithetical nature.  For example, she campaigned for the ‘remain’ side in the recent Brexit referendum, although somewhat tepidly, yet has already signalled that she will get on with the job of exiting the EU posthaste.

“Brexit means Brexit,” she has said, “and we’re going to make a success of it.  There will be no attempts to remain inside the EU, there will be no attempts to rejoin it by the back door.  As Prime Minister, I will make sure we leave the European Union.“

This, despite presumably voting to remain.

Although a long-time conservative party member, and Home Secretary for the past six years, her approach has been defined as more liberal than many in her party, almost non-ideological in its pragmatic approach to dealing with issues of governance.  In her recent leadership campaign (unexpectedly ended when her last rival dropped out), she clearly enunciated policy directions that one mainstay of the media described as going further than the Labour Party’s own positions.

Might that be a strategic move to stage left?

At the same time, another media pillar declared the new PM to be staunchly more conservative, more anti-immigration, and more isolationist than Boris Johnson (he being, admittedly, a moderate liberal conservative), a once-presumed rival for the party leadership, who campaigned aggressively for the ‘leave’ side.

Perhaps this dichotomy in the perceptions of the new leader demonstrates nothing more than the long-standing shibboleth that successful politicians, whether campaigning from the right or left, govern from the middle once elected.

We shall see with Theresa May whether that will be so.  But wouldn’t it be the epitome of British irony if, instead, we see a leader who picks and chooses her own path, regardless of that prevailing belief.  If such proves the case, given her shifting positions and statements on key issues and policies to this point, Prime Minister May may, mayhap, earn her own sobriquet, echoing Thatcher’s own—

The Iron(y) Lady.

 

 

The Games

The Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro will soon be upon us, that quadrennial gathering of the world’s best athletes.  But we are hearing from so many of them that they plan not to attend, citing a host of reasons—their health, fear of terrorist activity, unfair competition because of doping, or the unpreparedness of the host country.

I remember a different set of games, played by girls and boys in the schoolyards we frequented.  No one was obliged to take part but nearly everyone did, in one fashion or another, because it was fun.

There weren’t a lot of specific rules involved because the games varied tremendously from one day to the next.  There were always a few standard guidelines that everyone was familiar with, but usually nobody bothered much with them—unless, of course, someone violated the sense of fair play that was commonly shared.  Whenever that happened, which wasn’t too often, arguments would flare up, each side would proclaim its case, and finally—perhaps so as not to waste too much of the playing time—a consensus would emerge and the games would continue.

Winners predominated, but only because the games allowed more opportunity to win than to lose.  And since nobody made any effort to keep track of scores and points once the contests ended, every kid in the schoolyard could be a winner in retrospect, a champion in classroom reverie.  Every participant could find some measure of satisfaction in the play, some joy in the sport of it.

kids-playing

After a while, though, those games changed.  Some of the adults in the schoolyard, for the purest of reasons, decided to contribute their time and energy to help the kids organize.  They offered the advice and assistance that comes with experience; and out of the chaos the adults thought they observed in the schoolyard, they brought order.

The vague and tenuous rules that previously governed the games were sharpened and recorded.  And all the girls and boys were made to learn them.  No disagreements were tolerated, and some of the adults volunteered to serve as game officials to ensure fair play.  Many of the games—those that didn’t lend themselves easily to such organization—were dropped in favour of those that did.

A lot of the kids were dropped, too, because there were no longer as many opportunities to compete for those whose game-playing abilities were not as fully developed.  These children were kept in the schoolyard, but off to the side where they could watch and cheer the others at play.  They became onlookers, hero-worshippers, only able to enjoy the experience vicariously.  And gradually, the games became The Games.

The Games, remember?  They were played by the very best girls and boys in every schoolyard.  But because there weren’t enough top-calibre kids in any one yard to sufficiently challenge their skills, the adults arranged for them to play against girls and boys from other schoolyards.

They played hard.  They did themselves proud.  In their various sweaters and uniforms, decked out in colours unique to their own schools, they vied with one another to see who was truly the best.  The purpose was not just to compete, but to win.  Records became increasingly important, first to establish and then to shatter.  And over a period of time some schools gained reputations as powerhouses in the competitions.

Winner, Winning Stairs, Olympic Games, Silver Medal

In order to attain such heights, or to remain on top once there, some schoolyard teams resorted to additional measures.  They enticed the best of the younger children to attend the big-name schools; they lobbied for changes to the rules of the contests to favour their own talents and skills; and they began to heap criticism on other schools who engaged in the same sort of tactics.

Eventually, one schoolyard team had had enough.  Perhaps because of an inability to compete at the highest level, or a sense of futility when playing the better school teams, a decision was taken to stop competing in The Games.  The other schools protested loudly, but to no avail; the boycott held.  And then more of the smaller, less successful schools made their decision to drop out, too.  In just a short time, The Games were reduced to a shadow of their former glory.

The kids, of course, were rather confused by it all.  After being told by the officious adults to work and train and practise, and just as they were beginning to take their exalted status for granted, they discovered that it had all been in vain.  There would be no more competition.  The Games were finished.

So they returned to their respective schoolyards, disheartened, disillusioned, downcast.  And there, to their surprise, they found that no one else in the schoolyard cared.  All the other girls and boys had long since lost interest in what the more skilful of their peers were doing in their more highly-organized competitions.

Back in the schoolyard, the other kids, the ones  left behind, had begun to play on their own again.  Free of the interference and regulation of the over-zealous adults, they had rediscovered their games.  There weren’t a lot of specific rules involved because the games varied tremendously from one day to the next.  There were always a few standard guidelines that everyone was familiar with, but usually nobody bothered much with them.  They just played to the best of their abilities, and enjoyed the freedom and the exhilaration of being included.

The games.  Nobody was obliged to take part but nearly everyone did.

Because it was fun.

Tracks in the Sand

One long-ago February, when winter’s white enveloped the north, one of our daughters came with her family to visit us in Florida.  The favourite activity for our grandson and granddaughter (the third of the clan being still an infant, unable to express her opinion) was going to the ocean, to the beach.

Our usual routines were fairly standard.  We’d park and unpack the car, each of us carrying the beach necessities according to our age and abilities.  We’d trudge the access path, through the dunes adorned with sea oats, pass through the rickety snow fence, and pick a spot that suited us all.

In short order, the umbrellas would be unfurled, the chairs unfolded, the blankets spread, and the toys strewn across the sand.  Peace would reign for Nana and Grandpa, watching the sleeping baby while her parents and older siblings hit the water.

beach-sand-grass-sunshine_tn2

On one such occasion, a small incident occurred which didn’t have much significance at the time.  In retrospect, however, it has become quite meaningful for me.

My daughter, my wife, and I embarked on a walk along the beach after the kids had finished splashing in the ocean.  Their dad stayed with them, helping build grand castles in the sand.

We decided to hike through the dunes on the way out, and come back along the shoreline.  I led off, sinking ankle-deep into the soft sand, feet clad in sandals to protect from the heat and the sandspurs.  After a few minutes, we came upon tracks in the sand, apparently made by some small creature, perhaps a mole.

What made the discovery unusual was that they suddenly stopped in a small depression in the sand, as if the mole had simply vanished.  The tracks ended without a trace.

My daughter suggested what might have happened.  The mole, she reckoned, had been taken by a predator, likely one of the falcons that frequent the area.  Indeed, on closer inspection, we could detect brush-marks in the sand, caused by the beating of a bird’s powerful wings.

We wended our way slowly, backtracking along the poor victim’s trail.  It occurred to me that, a scant few yards before the depression in the sand, the mole would have had no inkling it was about to die.  It was alive until it wasn’t.

Apparently, though, it knew it was under attack, for we found another, earlier depression in the sand where the bird had struck unsuccessfully.  The mole had jumped sideways, scurried under the protection of some sea-oats, then emerged again to flee along the sand.

Our backtracking ended when the trail curled away from the beach, into dense, long grasses, whence the mole had come.  We soon forgot about it as we continued our stroll, eventually heading back along the water’s edge to our grandchildren.

A few days later, I chanced to hear someone on the radio airily proclaiming that, if we all discovered the world was to end tomorrow, telephone lines everywhere would be jammed by people calling home to say all those things they had forgotten to say while there was still time.  Social media sites on the internet would crash from the traffic.  It made me think again of the mole whose tracks we had seen in the sand.

When it left its burrow for that final time, did it have its life in order?  Had it said all those things that matter to those who matter?  Or were there things it had left undone that should have been looked to sooner?

And I thought of myself.  Does my journey through life leave tracks in the sand for some other eye to see?  Am I subject to a mortal strike from some hidden foe?  And if, or when, it happens, am I prepared and at peace with those who care about me?

When I got right down to it, I didn’t see much difference between that mole and me.  Except one.  I’m still making tracks in the sand.  I still have time to ready myself for whatever is to come, and to be at peace with all who matter.

Such are the thoughts that arose as a result of a stroll along a sunny beach in Florida.