Behind the Glory

Featured Posts

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  Through the fog of the Pickering Airport

  It happened one morning a couple of weeks ago. I was driving down Brock Road in the southbound rush-hour en route to the city. In the stop-and-go-traffic just below the village of Brougham – near the intersection of Brock and Hwy 407 – I pulled up beside a pickup truck with a construction logo on the door. I had my window down. So did he. “Construction season’s started, eh?” I said so the guy could hear me. “Oh yeah,” he said and smiled. He seemed glad to be working. “Big time 407 overpass?” I asked.

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  When heroes let you down

  It was a new idea at the time. In the late 1990s, students in college were certainly used to attending classes during which experts lectured them. But perhaps not quite the way I envisioned such a thing. I was interested in having the journalism and broadcasting students I teach at Centennial College meet contemporary media figures, who were highly visible in the profession. One of the first to agree to come to engage my students was quite eager. “I truly enjoy, and still feel flattered when I’m asked to chair a symposium, referee a debate, or give a speech,” she told me in March 2000. My guest speaker was Pamela Wallin.

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  Doing it all at once

  I was on my cellphone several times during a recent trip to Ottawa. I had a couple of conversations with family while I was in the National Capital attending meetings of The Writers’ Union of Canada. I also texted several of my colleagues back at the college about some of the writers’ workshops I attended. But once, last Thursday, I was doing something completely unrelated when I took a cellphone call from a newspaper reporter. “I’m doing a story about a veteran friend of yours,” the reporter said. “Do you have time for an interview?” “Yes,” I said, “but I’m in the middle of something.”

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  Kids in the line of duty

  The ceremony was about to begin. Most of the dignitaries had assembled. The sound system was live. The pipe and drum bands were tuned and ready to go. But the MC of the proceedings held off until just before 11 o’clock. “We’re awaiting some guests of honour,” Colonel Bob Chapman, the MC, said. “They’ll be here momentarily.” Then a transit-sized bus pulled up to the curb on Simcoe Street in Oshawa. The bus was resplendent in poppy insignia and Remembrance Day slogans and when its doors opened, out came about a dozen veterans, most under their own power, but clearly needing some assistance. That’s when this heart-warming thing happened.

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  Getting things done Italiano

  It began innocently enough. I wanted to mail some postcards home. I’d done the hard part – composing some thoughts and finding the addresses. I’d even discovered that postage stamps were available in tobacco stores here. So I searched one out and asked for “francobollo” in my best, fractured Italian. But the tobacconist waved his hands. They didn’t sell stamps anymore. I’d have to go to the post office. There, I found what I thought I needed – wickets, line-ups and clerks – until I reached the front of the line. “No. No,” the clerk said. He too was waving his hands at me, as if I was contagious. And he shouted at me, “You need ticket!” “Oh, a first-come first-served system like a bakery,” I thought. “I can do this.”

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