Karius and Associates Blog

Top: Icy Streets, Remembrance Day 2008
Bottom: Grandpa, Mike Turchak

We woke to grey skies and slick streets. Remembrance day has been an event we’ve attended for as long as I can remember. Even back to age five in my slick new red velvet coat. Sometimes it’s been cold, sometimes warm, sometimes there is snow, sometimes there isn’t.

Traditionally the ceremonies have been held outdoors. City Hall, and the Cenotaph is just half a block away from my home. We would stand in rain or shine and pay homage to the veterans, and to those still fighting. We would peer to find grandpa in the group of marching veterans. Grandpa was quiet, but revelled in his family. He spoke little of the war, perhaps feeling that he needed to carry the burden alone. But Remembrance days were always jolly…we ate too much, and we drank too much, and we laughed…and remembered.

About six years ago, they moved the ceremony indoors. A testimony to the aging of the veterans. We woke up this morning to shiny streets, slick with ice, and thoughts of how this wasn’t going to be good for all the elderly folks who would be about. Sure enough the Remembrance Day Ceremony garnered about half the attendants that it usually does. But you can bet that most of those who had to stay home were observing thier moments of silence at 11:00 

Since Grandpa died in 2004 a few more tears are shed each Remembrance Day in our family. We bring pictures of grandpa and put them on the table and we eat, and we talk and we drink, and we remember. The young adults in our family feel it’s important enough to return home for Remembrance Day. And that’s important. We all need to stop and remember and think about the return of peace.

I’ve just finished re-reading Black Like Me. I read it when I was young but it’s had a very different effect on me this time around. It’s the story of John Howard Griffin, who, in 1959, changed the pigment of his skin and went into the South as a black man.

I believe that so much of the racism and prejudice still remains. In Saskatchewan, we see it primarily towards First Nations people, but the concept is the same in many races and cultures. When we believe a stereotype, we engage in the behaviors that follow. Mr. Griffin talks about the “hate stare”; a concious or concious look of hate thrown at people with different skin colors. He talks about the sets of beliefs that frame people’s perceptions, disallowing them from seeing others as they are.

Most poignantly for me, Mr. Griffin talks about seeing the people who hate, in other contexts; sitting down for dinner with their families, talking to their grandparents. When someone is hating us, for whatever reason, if we can see them as human, then there’s a chance that they might see us as human too.

Heroes small and large overcome racism. A smile, a handshake, finding out the answer to “What’s life like for you?”, without assumptions and regardless of color will help to disintegrate these stereotypes.

Please share your own stories of yourself or people you know making strides, large and small, to know people as they are - rather than as they might be perceived to be.

Have a thoughtful Friday!

Taliban escaping from a Kandahar Prison, discussion of boycotting the Olympics in Beijing, the cyclone in Burma and the controversy and conflict involved in nations offering assistance, Canadian political conflict (read Maxime Bernier), the US elections…the list can go on and on.

Does world conflict create more anxiety for us in the present than it has in the past? I think that for many of us, it does. A sense of not being able to control any of it can lead to increased anxiety…or a tendency to ignore larger issues. We’re exposed to - and can seek out - more information about world conflicts and tragedies. Gone are the days of families gathered around the big radio waiting for news of thier loved ones fighting wars. In our present world, the news is available at a click of a mouse button. Anxiety can lead to avoidance, avoidance can lead to increased conflict. On the other end of the scale, extreme anxiety can come to feel like compulsion. Anxiety is best faced by making a plan - figuring out what I can do as an individual. This is true for both small and large anxieties, global and personal.

Face it, make a plan, follow your plan…and let the anxiety go.