I heard some very good news today. The Police apprehended a 19 year old male with a handgun at Dufferin and Lawrence, right near my work. I feel so much safer now that I know he’s been put in jail or at least driven to the jail and then undoubtedly released on bail after a good talking to.
So what is going on in this city right now? Is it a gun epidemic? Was it too hot this summer? There has to be some reason for all the gun violence lately. Or is it a deeper problem that has yet to be identified? Could it have anything to do with the violent TV shows and video games that our youth have grown up on? Have they become hardened by the constant barrage of violence that now they are acting out what they have been watching for years on TV and it seems natural to them?
I certainly don’t have the answers but I know that the violence is real. I hear about it every day on the Television and Radio and calmly think to myself, oh that happened in Scarborough or that happened in Rexdale, but twice this summer it has happened close to my work. That is starting to make me feel a little uneasy. I’m not concerned that I would ever be a target because I do not run in those circles, but I could easily be a victim or a stray bullet, or someone I know could become a victim.
How many people are like me though? That shut a part of themselves off from the horrific news and rationalize that they are safe because it happened in another part of the city? I’m sure there are many people that do that, not only here but in other parts of the world where they have to live in dangerous times. It must be a natural survival instinct to allow us to carry on. It allows us to live our day to day lives rather than becoming prisoners in our homes, too afraid to venture out. But I do wonder about how long it will take for the violence to take over the natural ebb and flow of peaceful living? How long before we find ourselves living in a Mad Max, Road Warrior type of world?
I hope its a long way away and not just around the corner. I don’t like having to bury my head in the sand to cope but I’ll do what I need to do.
Sunday, August 28, 2005
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Clouds and Day Dreams
My very first book that I remember owning, was bought just for me, instead of the usual books that were for both my sister and I, and it was titled Isabelle and The Pink Teddy Bears. I still own the book.
It is a large, hard covered book with an enchanting picture on the front of a little girl in a dreamy night gown with a handsome Pink Teddy in a tux on her arm. They are stepping gingerly onto a huge, fluffy, white cloud that the Pink Teddy uses as a mode of transportation.
I couldn’t read the book myself when my Dad bought it, but before long I had memorised the words and pretended to read them for anyone that would listen. I was 4 years old and I think this is where my fascination with fluffy, white clouds began.
Later on when I was in elementary school, I was often scolded by the teacher for day dreaming rather than listening to the lesson that was being taught. I could stare straight ahead but be miles away in seconds. Usually it was the clouds floating slowly past the window that would catch my eye.
They still make me stare. I can’t help it. I caught myself staring out the side window at the monstrous wonders on my way home from work last night and I was kicking myself that I didn’t have my camera with me. They were fabulous specimens. The kind that demand more than a mere glance. These were the ones that were worthy of a full uninterrupted, staring session.
If I were still a child, I would have succumbed to that thought and plopped down on the grass somewhere to stare and dream at the clouds floating above. Unfortunately, I’m not a child, but a busy adult racing somewhere important in her car, with little time for such frivolous ideas.
I miss being a child.
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