Niagara citizens turned out in force this year to remember NOTLers who put their lives on hold to defend democracy, often in distant parts of the world. We gathered around the refreshed Cenotaph on Queen Street, with perfect weather swelling the crowd.
Coun. Gary Burroughs noted it was grand to have a live bagpiper, telling me how Norm Haig often struggled bravely with frozen chanters and pipes.
My pal Randy Klassen, a dedicated member of our local Civil Search and Rescue Association, told me he had just returned from the Thunder Bay area after searching for a missing hunter in the wilderness. The lost hunter was wearing a camouflage jacket. Huh?
It was chilly and overcast. I always think of the lonely Canadians who spent endless days and weeks with no known “going home” date. Far from home, eating cold and basic rations, losing mates on drizzly days, receiving only an occasional letter from home.
How did they possibly keep their morale up? Lest we forget.
Too many had their lives cut short, or suffered life-altering injuries. Or invisible mental wounds that would never be understood back home. One lost life was one too many.
The ceremonial parade was enlivened by the presence of a good number of military veterans of Polish background. Proud, well-drilled and colourful. Then, four dramatic members of our Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
This year, regional councillor Andrea Kaiser recited the list of Niagara area citizens who made the supreme sacrifice after volunteering for overseas service. The length of her list was shocking, from a relatively low-population area like Niagara.
So many familiar names: Dietsch, Nelles, Grimwood. Some families lost multiple loved ones.
I thought that Andrea was the perfect reader. At a measured pace, with a strong voice amped through an excellent sound system, hesitating appropriately after she read each name. Dignified. Respectful. Strong.
The list continued. Every single name was a family tragedy, rivers of tears, sleepless and lonely nights back here in Niagara, mourning the deceased. Some still teenagers. Families ripped asunder.
Lord Mayor Gary Zalepa spoke emotionally about one Mr. Wright, the local Niagara High School principal, a husband and father who felt compelled to enlist and serve our country.
Mr. Wright went off to war and he didn’t return. We must not forget.
My mother had two brothers from Cochrane serve in the army in the Second World War. She told me about the awkward, pregnant pauses that made so many conversations awkward for the few years following the armistice.
She would meet a friend on the street, and after the normal small talk about the weather and sports and their jobs, people would be hesitant to ask her about her brothers, Bob or Joe.
Too often, the reply would be heartbreaking, news of a death or an injury or a new address in a veterans’ hospital.
Did we learn the necessary lessons? Only two decades after the end of the First World War, the war to end all wars, we decided to do it all again. Young men who didn’t know each other fighting the wars for men who knew each other. Why?
Millions of repetitive headstones, now in military cemeteries around the world. Have we learned anything?
Indeed, this year’s Remembrance Day ceremony in our town had a good feeling. Are we giving the necessity of war more thought as the years slide by? We seem to want to gather with friends to reflect on the necessity and the futility of sending people to die in overseas combat.
Let me now awkwardly ramble over to a completely different thought process. Understand that I love and respect the folks who work for Canada Post here in Niagara. Over the past 30 years, I have observed and admired their efforts to deliver our mail. Through rain, snow and hail and on the hottest and sunniest days.
But may I ask them to carefully consider their potential Canada-wide strike action. Do they have rocks in their heads? The times they are a’changing.
Their organization has been on life support for many years. Thousands of millions of dollars in losses, with an unsustainable business model.
Think long-distance telephone operators. My aunt Agnes up north was a supervisor, one of the thousands of people deftly transferring our calls across Canada and around the world.
Technology changed, and I don’t pretend to be an expert. But I do know that there are no longer any long-distance telephone operators. Aunt Agnes got out with an early retirement package.
The good employees of Canada Post are risking it all if they elect to go on strike. There must be a better idea because public sentiment will not be on their side.
Have at it, and I will delicately ramble to this week’s conclusion.
