{"id":17742,"date":"2017-07-05T16:44:30","date_gmt":"2017-07-05T20:44:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=17742"},"modified":"2017-07-05T16:44:30","modified_gmt":"2017-07-05T20:44:30","slug":"politics-as-usual-canada-day-reflection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/politics-as-usual-canada-day-reflection\/","title":{"rendered":"POLITICS AS USUAL: Canada Day reflection"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Alison Collins-Mrakas<\/strong><\/p>\n

I hope everyone had a lovely long weekend.
\nI certainly did.
\nI enjoyed a wide variety of events in celebration of Canada\u2019s 150th birthday; from the somewhat odd giant duck in Toronto (my rowing team rowed across the harbour to get up close and personal with it \u2013 and get some very good shots. Suffice it to say it is enormous…and quite weird) \u2013 to the truly spectacular fireworks display at home in Aurora in Lambert Willson Park.
\nIt was a wonderful few days. We will leave aside the matter of the bloody rain.
\nI did have a different column planned for this week, but after a resident reached out to me I have changed tack somewhat.
\nThe resident expressed a desire that I consider a column about being grateful, and in light of the fact that we have just had a nation-wide celebration of being Canadian, I agree that it is an opportune to time to have a larger discussion of giving thanks for how fortunate we are.
\nIt is patently obvious that Canadians are very fortunate. Apparently the second best place in the world to live, according to a ranking released this spring. And why not? We have a stable government, a stable economy, good publicly accessible schools, Universal health care, gun control laws, a free press, an orderly judiciary, and a wealth of natural resources \u2013 most important of which is our water.
\nCanada is home to nearly 20 per cent of the world\u2019s fresh water. When fully 1\/6 of the world\u2019s countries have some kind of water scarcity, our abundant water supply is something we should not take for granted. So, please stop \u201cwashing\u201d your driveways with it.
\nBut, it\u2019s not just what we have that makes us fortunate, it\u2019s what we can do as well.
\nAs Canadians, we have tremendous opportunities \u2013 for employment, for education, for enjoyment. That little pep talk we are all given in school \u2013 that we can do anything we set our minds to \u2013 is true in Canada, but it isn\u2019t true for everyone.
\nThose opportunities are not equally accessible or equally accessed.
\nIn the midst of all our abundance there is a significant portion of our population that does not or cannot share in the Canadian dream.
\nThe starkest example of this fact? Homeless people.
\nVisit any major city and you will see homeless people on the streets. Under bridges, in transit shelters, and atop of subway grates. Think about that. There are people in our community who quite literally have nowhere to go \u2013 day or night. There are clearly a variety of reasons why people are homeless \u2013 from mental health issues to economic ones \u2013 but regardless of why they are homeless, the fact is that they are.
\nAnd it isn\u2019t just the big cities. Here in Aurora we have homeless people as well. I am sure we have all seen the folks that spend their days and nights just wandering around our Town.
\nThey are not unseen.
\nFrom private citizens to various community agencies, many people have offered assistance. Unfortunately, for reasons that are not always known, assistance is not always accepted.
\nThis isn\u2019t meant to be a sanctimonious sermon. Just an acknowledgement that as Canadians \u2013 as Aurorans \u2013 we are very fortunate.
\nHappy Canada Day.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Alison Collins-Mrakas I hope everyone had a lovely long weekend. I certainly did. I enjoyed a wide variety of events in celebration of Canada\u2019s 150th birthday; from the somewhat odd giant duck in Toronto (my rowing team rowed across the harbour to get up close and personal with it \u2013 and get some very […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[29,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-columns","category-opinion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-4Ca","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-03 04:23:57","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17742","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17742"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17742\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}