Author Archives: Jay Menard

The Great Middle-Class Doughnut

Leave a reply

By Jason Menard

Why is it that in our attempts to find the best that life has to offer, we often ignore the most important aspect of our existence – our soul?

I’m referring to the underlying societal gravitational force that begets the Great Middle-Class Doughnut. No, I’m not referring to spreading waistlines. The insidious force to which I’m referring is the gravitational force that draws many of us to an inertial point somewhere between urban and rural life – the suburbs.

We have heard countless stories about how many of today’s rural dwellers are abandoning their environment and conglomerating towards urban environments. But, as our basic physics lessons taught us, every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Just as people are being drawn to the cities, a significant number are being repelled from its core in search for a better life.

Just as the planets and satellites are held in their orbits by opposing fields of gravity, so do suburbanites congregate in a swath of land that’s not “downtown” but that’s certainly not to be considered as “The Boonies.” For many of us, our aspirations are to find that patch of land, in our quite community, with our fenced-in yard, 2.3 kids, and the family pet. It’s a good life and it’s certainly not to be begrudged for those that have chosen it – but there seems to be something missing.

But that same bourgeois magnetism that draws us to these areas is the same that confines us to the four walls of our home. We reject interaction with our neighbours, we travel to the same Big Box stores, to buy our same value-sized products to return quickly to our Home Depot-inspired family rooms to gather around the TV to watch television.

And I’m no different. My wife and I have often spoken as to where we’re going to settle, and the idea of a place that’s safe for the kids is first and foremost in our minds. But, in embracing the security and uniformity that the suburbs represent, are we denying our children the opportunity to experience the beating heart of the city they live in?

As long-time Montrealers who now live out-of-province, we are afforded the opportunity to visit the city on a regular basis and look at it with a perspective that enjoys both an insider view and an outsider’s freshness of sight. We’ve watches as our friends have spread to the far corners of the island and beyond, while other remain in a more central location.

And, at every available opportunity, I try to walk the streets of the city. While I’m instantly at home in the suburbs – a place that’s eerily reminiscent of my current city of residence, London, ON, it’s the vibrancy of the core that strikes me. The streets are painted with a variety of brushstrokes, each colour overlapping and crafting an image that’s stunning for its raw beauty.

I’m instantly transported into a world that I imagine existed in much the same manner a half-century ago. While the storefronts may change, the essential ebb and flow of the streets remain the same. From the people sitting on their balcony to the animated conversations on the street, the very soul of a city manifests itself in all its glory. Instead of radiating from a TV screen, life presents itself in live action, with each of us as an active participant.

What most of us forget is that the true soul of a city – the reason why we were drawn to a location in the first place, is at its heart. It’s not a coincidence that the music that moves us to our very souls comes from the inner city. Motown, the Liverpool-fueled British Invasion, the Mississippi Blues all come from experiences forged at the heart of a city. New York City, the symbolic pinnacle of success and dreams, is represented not by the commute from Connecticut, but rather the vibrancy and excitement that resides right on the paved streets of Manhattan.

Yet, what I may be most guilt of here is romanticizing. While I can appreciate this tapestry of life, I’m not privy to the hardships that go into weaving it on a day-to-day basis. The same sense of community that I romanticize is forged not from any sense of communal support, but rather out of necessity.

So that’s why, in every step of life, it’s important to appreciate what we have and where we have it. Although often vilified, the suburbs are not soulless. They are, in fact, a place where dreams are realized. And, while the sense of community may not be as prevalent, the essential bonds of family are as taut in the suburbs as they are in the city.

Whether you choose to experience the Great Middle-Class Doughnut or sample the fare from the city’s breadbasket, the most important thing is that you take a bite out of life and savour every moment.

2005 © Menard Communications – Jason Menard All Rights Reserved

A Tale of Two Cities

Leave a reply

By Jason Menard

Apparently, winning in London depends on which side of the Atlantic you’re on.

Yesterday London, England surprised many and plucked the 2012 Olympics out from under France’s nose. And, in a cosmic balancing of franco-anglo relations, Montreal edged out London, Ontario for the rights to the Shiners Children’s Hospital.

So while they break out the party hats on Downing Street, there will be a noticeable lack of fezzes on display in The Forest City. And instead of developing a new site to help sick kids, Londoners on this side of the Atlantic will have to find a cure for bruised egos.

But once the shock and disappointment of losing what was, at one point, professed to be a sure thing passes, North American Londoners will have to realize that it’s time to strike while the iron is hot and capitalize on whatever increased recognition the city may have earned from this five-year process.

However, London’s representatives at the conference almost erased any goodwill with an inflammatory video that alleged the proposed site of a new Shriners Hospital in Montreal’s Glen Yards – next to McGill’s planned superhospital – is contaminated. That game of dirty pool has put London behind the eight ball in terms of public relations.

While all parties were making nice afterwards and saying the right things about mending fences and working together in the future for the benefit of the children, the fact of the matter is that London and Montreal’s delegations have acted more like kids themselves during this process.

Whether it was questionable accusations about contaminated land or supercilious dismissals over the status of London as a major player in the medical game, both sides haven’t come out of this unscathed. But with the right attitude going forward, London’s loss could end up being a win-win-win situation for all parties involved.

Win #1 – The city of Montreal retains the Shriners Hospital, and whether they choose to renovate the existing Mount Royal location or invest in building a new site, the city is assured of remaining a hub for specialized pediatric care in North America.

Win #2 – The Shriners, despite what Londoners may think, made the right decision. Essentially, they were taken for granted by the powers-that-be in Montreal, who ignored requests for concessions until it was almost too late. In the end, the Shriners were able to use London’s efforts to woo them to work a better deal with their existing city while continuing 80 years of tradition.

Win #3 – And this is the trickiest of all. The clock is ticking on London’s 15 minutes of fame. As it stands now, we’ve proven that our existing facilities are worthy of international recognition – so much so that we were almost able to wrest away the prize of a Shriners Hospital from much bigger competition. But the key is to be able to build on that fame and entrench it into the minds of the masses.

It’s not enough to be respected – London needs to work to be revered. Respect means that those in the industry know what your city has to offer in your chosen field. London’s got that already – our hospital system is on par with any other in the country and, thanks to the University of Western Ontario and its research facilities, we’ve earned a solid name in the medical and research communities.

But reverence? That’s something difference. To be revered means that Joe (or Jean) Average knows who you are. Reverence means that perceived transportation issues – like those that allegedly helped to sink London’s bid – are a non-factor because you’ve got that name recognition to back it up. It’s all about how you market yourself.

Londoners are blessed and cursed by our self-importance. Internally, the city’s leadership believes The Forest City is a major player on the Canadian landscape – but externally, we’re really not much more than a spot on the map. Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver – they can get away on name recognition alone. London has to work at promoting itself as a haven for the medical community.

There’s room for smaller cities to make their mark in this nation. One needs to look no further than down the 401 to see how the Kitchener/Waterloo/Cambridge region has become an international star in future technologies and research, powered in large part by RIM.

London needs to market itself less for its forests and more for its forceps. The Shriners’ decision shouldn’t be lamented as a loss, but rather recognized as an opportunity. The city has stepped onto the national and international stages, the audiences are waiting – now it’s time to make others see what Londoners believe: that London is, and will continue to be, a legitimate player in the theatre of Canadian health.

2005 © Menard Communications – Jason Menard All Rights Reserved

Hanging On for Dear Life

Leave a reply

By Jason Menard

Those of us who sit back and dwell on whether or not a player should hang up their skates, cleats, or shoes should take a moment and realize that we’d have to be pulled, kicking and screaming from the game we love.

As fans, we enjoy a love/hate relationship with our sporting icons. Many of us envy the fact that they’re getting paid to play a game we’d do for free, and then we turn around and have the audacity to want them to hang ‘em up before they’re ready. We refer to athletes as being selfish, when it’s really us who are only thinking of ourselves when it comes to where, when, and how our favourite athletes should play.

And, in the end, we forget that many athletes are only doing what we, ourselves, would do – find a way to get into one more game, on more team, for one more moment in the sun.

Sports fans and pundits alike are fond of deciding when an athlete’s finished, over-the-hill, or past his prime. We sit back in our easy chairs, passing judgment on the very same athletes that we cheered wholeheartedly for “when they were good.” We’ll look on with pity at poor Jerry Rice, desperately signing on with the Denver Broncos for a shot at a fourth or fifth receiver position, all the while lauding Barry Sanders for going out on top of their game.

Personally, I think we’re pretty darn hypocritical, because you and I both know that we’d be willing to sign as a water boy at minimum wage for a chance to stay close to the team if those were the only options left.

Yes, sports have become big business, but at their very heart they remain a game. The same game that we played on local rinks, fields, and courts – only on a much larger scale. And the pro athlete we look up to once had the same dreams – if not a tonne more talent – that we did back when we were kids and going to the pros wasn’t just a fantasy – it was a certainty.

If we made it to the bigs, we’d be holding on to our position for dear life. Milking every second of it for as long as we can. But we don’t offer our sporting icons the same opportunity. We look down upon their efforts, make them the butt of jokes, and then state that they’re tarnishing their reputations.

And some folks are offended by the idea of a player signing an essentially bogus contract just to retire in their old jersey, after a few years in free agent purgatory, exorcising their athletic wanderlust.

In the end, time softens all the hard edges. Joe Montana is no lesser a quarterback for hanging on with the Chiefs, just as, for many of us, Wayne Gretzky will always be an Oiler. The fact that he had a cup of coffee with the St. Louis Blues is just an afterthought. Mark Messier? His legacy will be that of a Ranger or an Oiler – his sojourn with the Canucks relegated to a footnote.

As we look back on the sporting icons of our past, time has a chance to make the good things greater and the bad things out of focus. I grew up idolizing Guy Lafleur, but the fact that he played for the Nordiques and New York doesn’t change the fact that I’ll always see him in the Bleu, Blanc, et Rouge. And hoops fans will never be caught referring to that Wizard’s legend Michael Jordan. He will be forever a son of the Windy City.

So let the players sign their one-day contracts and retire with teams with which they’re synonymous. Where, in the end, is the harm in that? However, robbing anyone of the opportunity to play the game that they love, just one more time, if they have the interest and there’s a team that wants them – that’s just selfish on our part.

We build up our icons to untenable positions, either to watch them fall or tear them down ourselves. Their athletic superiority is unmatched by the airs of superiority that we put on in passing judgment. But this superiority just isn’t justified.

After all, we may take the high road from the comfort of our couches – but, when push comes to shove, we wouldn’t do anything different ourselves.

2005 © Menard Communications – Jason Menard All Rights Reserved

Signs Point to Excess

Leave a reply

By Jason Menard

Signs, signs, everywhere a sign. With all due respect to The Five Man Electrical Band, kudos to the Green Party’s Monica Jarabek for taking steps to bring common sense into election campaigns and trying to do something about the proliferation of unnecessary campaign signs.

Jarabek has proposed that all the candidates in the London West riding agree to do something about the insidious overpopulation of election signs that dot the landscape each and every election campaign. Under her proposal, all the candidates will publicly agree to post election signs only on private property. It just makes too much sense not to work – which is probably why it won’t.

The fact that a candidate from a less-prominent party is making this suggestion actually makes it carry more weight. Jarabek and her cohorts would seem to have more to lose than the big boys and girls of the political spectrum with this proposal. A significant portion of these smaller parties’ road-side advertising comes from campaign signs on public property. But it appears Jarabek’s willing to sacrifice what’s best for her for what’s right – although the publicity this proposal has created is a welcome benefit, no doubt.

Think back over the past few election campaigns. How many times have you driven down the street and been overwhelmed by the sheer volume of campaign signs, dotting an open land space like a field of untamed dandelions? It’s not unusual to see a dozen or two signs for the same candidate sitting side by each, covering a formerly green area with a wash of blue, red, green, or yellow.

It’s a scene that repeats itself in every city across Canada, during every election. Municipal, provincial, federal – no matter what the campaign, the prevailing wisdom is that more is better.

Actually, the abundance of political signs actually serves as a rather appropriate metaphor for election campaigns in general. Volume outweighs individuality. We’re so accustomed to see intelligent debate devolve into a shouting contest that we’ve come to accept the same from our visual campaign materials. Where one sign would actually do the trick, by plastering the landscape with multiple versions, parties end up engaging in a laminated cardboard shouting match!

Jarabek’s proposal has one significant benefit for the voters of Canada. Simply put, if candidates choose – or are forced – to abstain from putting campaign signs on public property, then they’ll have to work hard to woo voters into believing in their cause enough to put a sign on their lawn. That means that the candidates will have to explain their position better to their constituents, and more people will be engaged in the political process.

In a way, it evens out the game. The smaller guys, like the Green Party and the NDP, will be able to compete, at least visually, on a more even playing field with the big boys. It’s the message and the ability of the candidate to sell it to constituents that will play a defining role in earning the right to advertise on a lawn. The depth of commitment to the riding will outweigh the depth of a Party’s wallet.

And, as a voter, a campaign sign on my neighbour’s lawn will mean more to me than a couple of dozen non-affiliated signs on a highway turn-off. When the signs are placed by actual voters, it can stimulate conversation and engage the average voter in the electoral process by encouraging discussion and debate of political views and candidate benefits.

There are a number of other benefits to this proposal as well. A sea of campaign signs can, in fact, pose a hazard to drivers and pedestrians alike, obstructing views and creating new blind spots. As well, there are the environmental and financial concerns that this overkill creates. By adopting Jarabek’s idea, we’d not only be reducing the amount of redundant campaign material that ends up in the trash, we’d help to reduce the exorbitant cost of elections. Those signs have to get paid for eventually – and it usually comes from the tax payers’ wallets.

But why just stop in London West? Why not make this a country-wide endeavour. What’s stopping the parties from either entering into a gentleman’s agreement to only put campaign signs on private property or even enacting legislation?

It’s an idea that makes sense. In fact, the writing’s on the wall – only the view’s been blocked by far too many signs. When it comes to the next election, let’s just hope that less really will be more.

2005 © Menard Communications – Jason Menard All Rights Reserved

Fear and Loathing in Lloydminster?

Leave a reply

By Jason Menard

Canadians aren’t ignoring the threat of terrorism in this country. We’re just facing it in our uniquely Canadian way – and doing ourselves proud in the meantime.

Anne McLellan, the federal Public Safety Minister, wants to remind us that Canada is not immune to terrorism, and that The Great White North is a target in the cross-hairs of extremists both internal and external.

And while she’s under the impression that Canadians are living with our heads buried in the sand, we’re actually fighting back with the best weapon we have – living our lives in the best way we can.

There is more to terrorism than just shock and awe tactics. As we should, we get caught up in the immediate tragedy and emotion of an event. The graphic images of the London bombings tug at our heartstrings and we weep for the loss of innocent lives. And, for many of us, the events of September 11, 2001 will always be our Kennedy Assassination – a moment in time when we’ll always remember where we were and how we felt.

But these moments, no matter how shocking and tragic they may be, are just the initial wound. The true goal of terrorism isn’t to spill blood – it is to infect the very lifeblood that we cherish and destroy us from within.

A bomb blast turns the cameras of the world towards their cause. But once the cameras have moved on to the next story, that’s when the true effects of terrorism are felt. When an act of terrorism forces you to change the way you live your life, that’s the moment when terrorism wins.

No matter how tragic, a bomb blast is a moment in time – a means to an end. How we deal with aftereffects are what will determine whether or not we win the war.

The goal of terrorism is not the mindless slaughter of innocents – it’s a strategic tactic designed to destabilize a country. If a bomb blast can destabilize an economy and precipitate conditions to bring down a non-sympathetic government, then the terrorists’ job is done. It isn’t a question of fearing when biological weapons will be used – the recognition should be that they have, in a sense, already been deployed. If you can infect from within, sowing the seeds of doubt and fear, then eventually the body will fall. If our country succumbs to fear, then the insidious effects of terrorism will have taken effect.

Does that mean we’re turning a blind eye to terrorism? Do we blindly continue our lives believing that Canada’s a Utopia free from the threats and risks that plague the Western World? Not at all. Due diligence is need to ensure that we protect ourselves against the threats of terrorism as best we can.

But that doesn’t mean we need to live in fear. The moment someone in Moose Jaw sees a person of Arabic descent walking down the street and wonders, even for a passing moment, whether they’re a terrorist, then we’ve already started losing the battle. Yes, we need to do a better job monitoring our ports and borders, but the best weapon the average Canadian can wield is the ability to enjoy our freedom.

Just like a common cold, there is no immunization from terrorism. Sure, you could shut yourself up in a hermetically sealed room and avoid all contact with the outside world – but what kind of life is that? Similarly, do we need to live in a Canada ruled by fear – a police state wherein suspicion, not compassion, is the governing tactic?

As Ben Franklin said, “those who are willing to sacrifice essential freedom for security deserve neither.” Can we really say that our friends south of the border are winning the war against terrorism when there is a constant heightened sense of alert issued by the government? Even after a terrorist attack, the best way to fight back isn’t to restrict our lives (with a Patriot Act for example), but to go back to living our lives the way we were before it ever happened.

Despite Ms. McClellan’s beliefs, Canadians aren’t oblivious to the danger posed to this nation by terrorists. However, we’re not willing to change the way we live our lives and to spend our precious days on this Earth living in fear.

The moment we change the way we live our lives is the moment that the battle has been lost. Canadians don’t believe we’re invulnerable to terrorism, but we’re certainly not going to let fear be the driving force behind our lives.

2005 © Menard Communications – Jason Menard All Rights Reserved