Last night, as I was falling asleep, I wrote my column in my head. It was witty, brilliant, succinct, insightful.
This isn’t that column, of course. Who can remember all that stuff when waking up in the morning? In younger years, I would get up and make notes. I used to have a pen and notepad on my night table. Then later a Palm personal assistant – remember those?
Now I just go to sleep, hoping for the best, and start over when I sit down at my computer in the morning. Much easier. Less stress. Less complicated. And it will still turn out just fine.
I find myself taking a more mellow approach with a lot of things in life as the years progress. Used to get wound up about politics, and things happening around me, and business, and family issues. Used to get angry. Used to lash out occasionally. Okay, regularly.
When I first set foot in Yorkton – that will be 50 years ago next spring – I worked at the old Yorkton Enterprise newspaper. The publisher and editor was a hulk of a man by the name of Chuck Wadge. Hard drinking and hardline right wing politics were his hallmark. His version of contributing to the community was to patronize the Legion lounge.
The advertising sales manager was a smallish, funny, laid back fellow by the name of Henry Beauregard. A funny line for every occasion. His contribution, among others, was to chair the Catholic school board during some acrimonious times.
The two could not have been more different. As a young reporter, I was drawn to the brash style of my editor, but I appreciated, and maybe even envied somewhat, Henry’s ability to keep an even keel at all times.
My attitudes and opinions have changed as I’ve grown older. While I have never belonged to any political party – not the right thing to do when you’re in the news business – I have moved from right of centre on the political spectrum to a much more social democratic view. If I had been voting in the USA this fall, I would have voted Libertarian: fiscally conservative, socially liberal.
That change has come about by closely watching the world unfold, and deciding there is more to be concerned about than the pursuit of wealth and power. It has come about through the influence of family and friends, and the realities of life presented by them.
That influence works both ways: some came by way of positive example and discussion, some by negative rants fueled by bogus fears and rumours. Let’s put it this way: some by Trudeau, some by Trump.
I’m not a Trudeau fan by any means, but I am giving him a chance, primarily because I have no use for Trump, Kellie Leitch, Brad Trost, Brad Wall and their ilk, their regressive world view, their penchant for pitting people against each other.
If an aging curmudgeon like me can embrace the fact that the world is changing, that 2016 is nothing like the working world I entered almost 50 years ago, and more importantly, that there is no way to turn back the clock, I hope others will enter the new year open to change. Give it a chance. You may find happier, more peaceful, more productive times.
Merry Christmas, and may the new year find you sleeping well at night and waking up mellow, with an open mind, even if you can’t remember all those great ideas you had as you were dozing off.
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