Autumn

'Fall, leaves, fall'

Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;
Lengthen night and shorten day;
Every leaf speaks bliss to me
Fluttering from the autumn tree.

I shall smile when wreaths of snow
Blossom where the rose should grow;
I shall sing when night's decay
Ushers in a drearier day.

Emily Jane Brontë

The Best and Worst

I came across a couple of news articles this morning that provide a graphic illustration of the best and worst of human nature. I thought I'd share.

On the positive side, Bangladeshi microcredit pioneer Muhammad Yunus and his Grameen Bank were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for advancing economic and social opportunities for the poor, particularly women. The economist and the bank he founded have been instrumental in helping millions of poor Bangladeshis, many of them women, improve their standard of living by letting them borrow small sums to start businesses like buying cows to start a dairy, chickens for an egg business, or mobile phones to start businesses where villagers who have no access to phones pay a small fee to make calls. Click here to read the press release.

The mirror image here showing the worse side of human nature is this story out of Uniontown, Pennsylvania where a youth baseball coach was convicted of offering an 8-year-old $25 to bean an autistic teammate so he couldn't play in a playoff game. The player hit the mildly autistic child in the groin and then in the ear to try and knock him out of the game. How sad is that.

It's so sad to think that humans have such a capacity for good yet display such selfish and evil actions that tear so many down. Are you lifting people up or tearing them down?

Beautiful Thanksgiving!

We were pleased with warm temperatures and gentle breezes for our Thanksgiving Day weekend. I spent much of it outdoors combining work and pleasure. Whether is was visiting the Kingston Farmer's Market, mowing the lawn or hiking the paths of the Fundy Trail, everything experience was awesome.

Sunday afternoon we spent walking and driving around the Fundy Coast following the Fundy Trail Parkway. If you've ever been to the Cabot Trail in Nova Scotia you'll experience similar vistas taking this road. Only Phase 1 has been built to-date. Future phases plan to connect this trail with Fundy National Park. I was somewhat sceptical of this initiative when it first started, perhaps more for selfish reasons than anything.

I've had many the two and three day hikes through this remote vista without help of even a trail let alone a road. My friends and I enjoyed the remoteness and beauty of this location. I was concerned that an auto road would open it up too much ruining the wilderness with inconsiderate ATVers, 4-wheelers et al. Would people respect nature as it was intended?

I can report so far so good. I'm sure there have been incidents but as far as I can tell they've been few and far between. Instead of necessitating a major excursion one can now jump in the car and access this beautiful spot with ease. I think the convenience and accessibility is worth the risk. This can be wonderful tourist destination if promoted and supported properly. I hope everyone supports it. If you haven't been there yet make it a point to do it. You'll be glad you did!

Why the kids?

Another school shooting. This time a gunman kills 3 Amish girls in a 1 room school house in Pennsylvania. This violence is the third US school shooting in less than a week that has killed a student and the killer in a Colorado high school and a 15-year-old boy is accused of killing his principal in a Wisconsin school on Friday. In Las Vegas on Monday, two schools were shut down after reports that a student was seen carrying a gun.

We have not escaped this outrage in Canada either. In September a 25-year-old Quebec man killed a young woman after he went on a shooting rampage at Dawson College in Montreal. The shooter left 19 injured and shot himself in the process.

What the heck is going on? Why are these disturbed individuals going after children? The shooters were various ages with some of them being students but others were outsiders. Yet they all chose schools in which to make their statements and take lives, including their own. Why?

Schools are supposed to be places of learning, of personal growth, a safe place to grow talents and gifts. Now parents, kids and teachers are living in fear that the next person coming through the door of their school will be carrying a gun and a chip on their shoulder. Is the answer really to turn our schools into armed camps with guards at the doors?

I really hope not but are the options? I don't see many. The number of disturbed individuals ready and willing to carry out their retribution on some real or imaginary adversaries appears to be increasing. Without a basic change to our society I don't see this improving on it's own. Reaching out to the disadvantaged, the outcasts, the uncool ones does not come naturally. God calls us to reach out in love to everyone around us including, and perhaps especially, these unloved people. It's only when enough of us take this message to heart that real basic changes will happen.

I haven't given up hope but in the end it might require divine intervention. I hope not.