Ted Barris

Earlier this week, I hosted a Black History Month event in Toronto. The guest speaker was fashion designer, actress and filmmaker Linda Carter. A couple of weeks ago her latest production, a film called “The Making of a Judge,” documented the life of her father, George E. Carter, Canada’s first native born black judge. Following her short talk about the film, several journalists posed questions. They ranged from her thoughts about her career to the importance of Black History Month to her feelings about Afri-centric schools. Then she got this one:

“What are your thoughts on the causes of such things as the Jordan Manners shooting in a Toronto school?” the young journalist asked.

Linda Carter has faced tough moments before. She’s dealt with neglect from the media about her African-Canadian film projects. She’s turned the other cheek when told, “a particular magazine wasn’t ready to feature a black fashion designer on its cover.” She even watched advertisers choose photographs of white models modelling the same clothes in which she’d just been photographed moments before. But suddenly she was facing a much deeper race question. She didn’t flinch.

“There’s a lot of angry black men with no black mentors,” she said. “More black parents have to take on the responsibility of their boy children.”

She pointed out that the province had just celebrated Family Day. She wondered aloud just how many families – African, Asian, Caucasian – had actually taken the time to share the day with family, to offer time and advice from parent to child, mother to daughter, father to son. She pointed out that she had been a single parent and that she got help from her family, principally her grandmother to get through.

“In this society, we need people who’ve been there before,” she said.

Carter made me think about how my own family had just spent the long weekend. On Friday, my wife and I had made babysitting arrangements so that our older daughter could get away and share an event with our younger daughter.

On Saturday, my wife’s plans included a trip to a barn where she rides her horse. We suddenly realized that our three-year-old granddaughter, who’d often expressed a wish to see the barn, the horse and everything in between, might get a kick out of tagging along. It took a bit of organizing – we had to swap our vehicle for the one with the child car seat in it – but it all worked out. Granddaughter got all she wanted in a farmyard immersion and then some.

And then on Monday – Family Day – we shared a dinner out with the entire family – with parents, uncles, aunts, sisters-in-law and kids. I admit that sometimes making our family events occur requires the skills of the D-Day planner, but for us it always seems the right thing to do.

I guess it’s a habit I learned from my own parents. I recall the hectic nature of my own father’s schedule. Dad was a columnist, a reviewer and a radio/TV host. His life consisted of chasing performers, lounge acts, stage shows and movie times from one end of the day to the other. Seven days a week.

Still, as best he could, he always ensured that whenever the opportunity arose, we should do things as a family. That’s why as kids, my sister and I got to see name acts at the Royal York Hotel or jazz greats at the Town Tavern (somehow Dad even persuaded the club owners to let us in underage). And though we rarely sat down to Sunday dinner as a family (because of Dad’s crazy schedule), most times my mother and father, instead of going to events as a twosome, made sure we went as a foursome.

I realize there’s a big difference between the relatively privileged experience my sister and I knew sharing time with our parents. It’s not the same as immigrant parents working at several jobs all day – for minimum wages at best – and then hurrying home to keep a household functioning. But I hear Linda Carter’s call for the need for parents (and grandparents) to be in the lives of their offspring. And not just as distractions and pinch-hitters, but equally as nurturers, mentors, and, yes, disciplinarians too.

Monday night, at the end of what amounted to a Family Day weekend, our family members went separate ways. And as we drove one daughter and the grandchildren home, our daughter said that it had been a full weekend – full of activity, full of excitement and “really full of family.”

She meant it as a compliment. I can only imagine that if more families had the opportunity and made the attempt to be involved in each other’s lives as participants rather than as spectators, how different (and perhaps better) things might be in their lives.