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The trees are beaded with buds. The air is full of the riffs of the original jazz singers, with robins on lead. Delectable dandelion greens are sprouting on every lawn and poking through cracks in the pavement.
Too bad so many residents of the GTA choose to celebrate spring in Toronto by making smog.
We now pay the atmospheric cost of two commutes: four rush hours in and out of the core. The night smog shift consists of young clubgoers who can afford to drive downtown to disrespect an area they don’t live in.
Older, more monied loungers drive bigger, more expensive trucks to places where they, too, can be “hip’ and throw up on somebody else’s doorstep. Without their Explorers and Destroyers, divorced men in leather jackets would have no identity. Cars mean money. And money rules.
The downtown is now full of people who come from someplace where the car is king, and they brought their security vehicles with them. So forget the King Street car. Mayor David Miller is proud to pose in Vanity Fair with American city fathers, while our beggared transit system is becoming about as reliable as bus service in Los Angeles.
Low-impact living is low-profit.
I always encourage MADD advocates to drop a “D” from their acronym. Sober driving kills children just as dead as the drunken kind.
During WWII, people were told to conserve, save metal and anything useful for the war effort. They did it. Apparently, healthy peaceful survival has no such galvanizing appeal. The Depression-era saying “Waste not, want not” was ditched in the nuclear-age shopping spree. The modern regressive ideal is “Waste a lot, want a lot.”
Respect is the key. Every spring I have the unmatched pleasure of watching my older Portuguese neighbours coax glorious green gardens from small plots behind their houses.
In my Parkdale neighbourhood, garages are more for winemaking and parties than for cars. One healthy gentleman cycles around alleys and laneways that have become very dangerous for human beings easily crushed by the cars of bar patrons looking for parking.
On a walk to the store this evening I saw a bit of heaven. My neighbours have set out a blue-plastic-clothed supper table and a chair or two for the season under the little tree by the back door.
They can’t see me as I gaze down on their labours of love and respect. These are people with strong fingers and ties to the land. Everybody knows growing things is good. Everybody knows. So why are farmers as exploited and undervalued as artists in this society? We need both for health. Stop and think. Yep, there’s the catch. Gotta stop before you can think.
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