We’re a couple of weeks removed from Canada Day, but we can still celebrate being Canadian.
I was picking up my mail towards the end of June. As I was leaving, a man who was unknown to me entered the building. As small-town people do, we greeted one another. I asked him how he was. He gave me an unexpected response.
He went into a rant. Not the kind of rant that you might be thinking, though. He went on for a few minutes about what a great country Canada is. He talked about the woes that come with living in so many other countries around the world and how good we have it here in Canada.
I contributed a few positive comments of my own, said goodbye and left.
And was feeling much better about being a Canadian.
We do have it good here. Oh sure, we have our national problems. How we love to focus on those, rather than our national benefits. We talk about all the negative things in that country south of us and somehow come to the conclusion that we have it just as bad here. Or at the very least, it puts us into a negative way of thinking. We talk about Canadian politics and allow that to overshadow all the good things that we enjoy and benefit from.
I found that ‘ranting man’ in the post office to be a breath of fresh air and was thankful for the proper perspective that he restored to me about our great land.
We love to complain. Take our health system, for example, which is one of the very best in the world. Yes, sometimes our local hospitals close for a day or two. Periodically we do have to wait longer than we’d like to see a doctor or specialist. But at least we still end up seeing them.
Years ago, my family was in Cuba for a winter holiday. (Oh, that’s another benefit of being Canadian. We have the freedom to travel wherever and whenever we like). We were out for a walk and came across a crippled lady begging for money. She was badly twisted up – it was hard to tell how old she was. Fifty, maybe.
When we got back to the resort (where we lived like royalty), I asked around to see if I could find anything out about her. I discovered that she had been born with a disability and had been unable to see a doctor and have it treated. After all these years, she was still waiting.
We complain about having to wait a few hours…or even a few days. This poor lady had been waiting a lifetime.
And I got to thinking – “I’ve sure got it good as a Canadian!”
When we returned home (we were living in Winnipeg at the time), the city was in the midst of a ‘garbage transition’. The city was no longer picking up trash and had contracted it out to a private firm. The transition resulted in periodic delays where garbage was picked up in eight or nine days, rather than the usual five.
Some citizens sure made a stink about that! The complaining was so loud that, believe it or not, it made the front pages of the local papers.
Now, I know that ‘negative news’ makes for more entertaining reading than ‘positive news’. (That is fodder for another column.) But having to wait a few extra days for garbage collection…or having to stand in line for 20 minutes to vote…or sitting in Emergency for a few hours – I’d much rather have that than waiting a lifetime for medical care, or not being able to vote at all…or missing garbage collection for a week.
So, to that unknown man from the post office…thank you for reminding me how fortunate I am to be a Canadian.
