Municipal

The Abbotsford Blight is Bloating!

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I see from the front page of the July 3, 2007 Abbotsford Times that the NO-FUN pestilence infecting Abbotsford BC has spread to another Fraser Valley community – Chilliwack. Like a plague, Abbotsford’s NO-FUN pestilence is lowering the level of fun in our neighbour Chilliwack.

Before you know it Chilliwack will be as devoid of fun as Abbotsford. One can only speculate what kinds of panic the City Councils in other neighbouring communities are experiencing with this proof that the Abbotsford NO-FUN pestilence is contagious and spreading.

Langley, Mission and smaller communities such as Yarrow must now worry that the misery of this NO-FUN malady will infest and curse their communities with NO-FUN – turning them into lifeless, funless Abbotsford clones.

Langley perhaps can hope that being in the GRVD will result in the fun and nightlife of Vancouver inoculating them against the plague of NO-FUN invasion from Abbotsford.

Mission has no such hope for inoculation against the plague of NO-FUN spreading outwards from Abbotsford City Hall, leaving Mission’s council and citizens to desperately search for ways to remain uncontaminated by the epidemic of NO-FUN from Abbotsford.

Mission does have the Fraser River Bridge going for it in the battle against contamination, a choke point to make a stand against contracting the NO-FUN plague from Abbotsford. Strict decontamination procedures before being allowed across the Fraser River will hopefully prove effective in preventing Abbotsford’s NO-FUN pestilence poisoning Missions entertainment, nightlife and anything else resembling fun.

If this decontamination proves ineffective we face the depressing possibility of quarantine as communities scramble to protect their fun and joy in living. Finding ourselves condemned to a bleak and joyless gloomy future of NO-FUN confined to the Abbotsford Blight, a deadly dead zone of NO-FUN.

Abbotsford City Hall will discover it has spent $100,000,000.00+ on Plan A to no avail in attempting to bring back life and fun into the city. It matters not how much they spend while the city is infected with the NO-FUN virus. The only cure is to fumigate Abbotsford City Hall, cleansing it of the parasites infecting our City with the NO-FUN pathogen.

Homeless

Canada Day Musings

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I like to celebrate Canada Day by volunteering at Abbotsford’s Canada Day celebration. It is the spirit of volunteerism, sharing and caring that sets Canada so strongly, so clearly apart from our neighbour to the south. This volunteer spirit, in its mix of manifestations, I see as a key to addressing the major social issues and problems facing us as a community, province, country – as a people, a race.

And if you are going to open your mouth and comment on the behaviour of your community one had better be willing to practice what you preach. Fortunately for me, in this instance volunteering is easy, rewarding enough to bring me back year after year.

I like to get my volunteer registration in ASAP so I will get to work? play? in the zone of my choosing. There is something therapeutic in watching kids enjoying the day, playing games, listening to stories and doing crafts.

Some kids think carefully and only then take action while others are a frenzy of crafting activity. Watching them, helping them recharges one’s positive attitude battery even as the day in the sun outside leaves you physically tired.

Finished and packed up at the Canada Day celebration I had just enough time to grab a bite to eat, a shower and open the shelter for the night. Quite a thought provoking contrast between these two very different groups of people I spent my Canada Day with.

The kids full of energy and bright promise, the decisions that will affect the course of their lives ahead of them. For the clients of the shelter some of those life altering decisions have been made – poorly made, with to some extent, appalling outcomes and consequences. But like the kids out celebrating Canada Day every client’s future still holds more life affecting decisions ahead of them, holding out the promise of making wiser choices.

One of the harsh truths of our world is that some of those happy children out exploring and enjoying Canada Day are going to make bad choices and end up struggling with addiction, mental illness, misfortune, homelessness or some combination thereof. There can be no doubt that on past Canada Days some of our clients too had spent the day exploring and enjoying the day as happy children, their life altering bad decisions and poor choices in the future.

Looking across the sea of young people on Canada Day it is impossible to know which young people will make good decisions and wise choices and which ones will make bad decisions and unwise choices. All you can know is that some will end up clients in need of help.

The point of this train of thought, this musing, is that at some point in their lives shelter clients were young children full of life and promise. They were, and are, somebody’s children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, cousins, brothers, sisters and friends.

There is no way to tell which children, whose children will suffer the fate and fallout of bad decisions and poor choices. All you can do is make sure that the housing, programs and support for those in need of the help to start making better decisions and wiser choices, to begin the road to recovery, are in place.

Ensuring that when those unfortunate, unlucky kids from Canada Day July 1, 2007 make their bad decisions and choices their road to recovery will not run into the barrier of indifference. And all the barriers and obstacles that indifference throws into the path to recovery; those barriers and obstacles that deny prior generations of children who made bad choices – recovery.

Ending homelessness, supporting those in recovery from mental illness and addictions are a matter of choice. We can choose and commit ourselves to accomplishing these goals. We merely need the will to DO IT, the willingness to change from sticking Band-Aids on these wounded fellow citizens to actually dealing with the issues and needs.

We need only commit ourselves to these goals and demand that our elected representatives do what we elect them to, but they loath risking, providing leadership on addressing difficult issues and problems. We have to exercise the patience of “one day at a time” and “progress not perfection” ever remembering we are dealing with people problems, guaranteeing a certain messiness.

If we as Canadians so choose, Canada Day 2008 can hold the promise of a brighter, healthier future for our children and all Canadians and our country – Canada, whose day we celebrate.

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♪♪♪ I’ve found a strange place to dwell… …down the end of Loony Street at the Lunatic Hotel ♪♪ …

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The inside of my head can be a pretty strange place to dwell these days. Not to deny that my head space has always occupied a slightly different space-time continuum. Currently compounding my somewhat different view of reality these days is a weird and wonderful, remarkable strangeness.

I had a week or two of mental stress and upset leavened with frustration. Using tools from my mental wellness toolbox I worked my way through this period and into a more positive state of mind. The biggest annoyance was that for the final few days of this grey period for my grey matter, I had the Sleepies. Anytime I stopped moving and tried to read or write I could not stay awake – even after 12 – 16 hours of sleep.

It transpired that this following week I was at a tele-seminar for WRAP (wellness recovery action plan). The seminar reached the part of the Plan on early warning signs and when things start to go bad (downhill). As the seminar was covering these areas I was mentally reviewing those portions of my personal WRAP.

As I was doing this mental review it dawned on me that considering my WRAP’s early warning signs and when things start to go bad – I was depressed the previous week or two. At the end of that very busy day I had to sit down meditate, reflect and examine this enlightenment.

Yes, I was depressed and used the tools I have gained to work through this minor bout of depression – without consciously noticing I was depressed. Knowledge and having taken personal responsibility for my mental health had allowed me to deal with this period of depression without getting despondent, but merely annoyed at the inconvenience it was causing.

How strange is my mental landscape these days that I could pass through a period of depression that would have, just a few years ago, had me panicked and incapacitated with my major reaction having been annoyance over the interference with my writing and plans. Having invested time and effort in my mental health recovery and continuing to invest time and effort in my recovery has given a certain mental serenity – and a certain mental strangeness.

These days I am comfortable having a headspace a little weird and offbeat and gladly embrace that little bit of madness we should all strive to never lose A weird and wonderful playground for my thoughts.