I cried twice today.

Once when a friend was more upset than I was, and I knew my friend was the truest kind of soul.

The other was when I immersed myself in Jane Jacob's book and understood.  I know that I must find a way to explain myself clearly, with simplicity.  Without the "... plethora of subtle and complicated dogma [which] have arisen on a foundation of nonsense."

The situations are subtle.  Explanations must be clear.  Solutions must be testable and responsive.

For some ridiculous reason, this all will come full circle.  It always has, it always will.  I'm on the right path, I just have to get in sync with my environment.

A new year blows in.

It is a time for reflections, for setting goals, for renewal of your inner strengths and resolves.

I ought to be looking forward to the new year.  I ought to be loathing the old year.  I am not.  2011 was not all I wished it was.  2012 will surely come with it's own share of joys and disappointments.

As the calendar makes it's arbitrary flip, I see both change and continuance ahead.  What I value from the year gone by is the strength in my resolve to change and grow, coupled with the strength of my resolve to remain true to myself and my cornerstones.  Something happened this past year, something I don't fully understand.  I've been dragged under, beat up, hung out, let down.  I saw no options before me and fought another battle against the blackness of reckless uncaring of bureaucratic might.  But this time, I faced reason and acceptance, not the blundering stupidity of a department run on self-certitude and armed with a brush of tar a gender wide.

In what felt like my darkest of days, I rediscovered my actual darkest of days.  I reconnected the lessons I needed to survive.  I rediscovered the art of listening to the stories around me to discern the tidbits I needed to hear.  The tidbits that mean nothing to most people, but everything to me.  Loading the truck.  Skating on both sides of the ice.  Little bomb, big bomb.  The tidbits that have rebuilt and reformulated my soul.  Lessons I sometimes forget at my own peril.

One of the tidbits is "talking in your mother tongue."  One's language is primal.  When in stress or crisis or passion, one returns to one's mother tongue.  I once was assigned to watch a crumbled retaining wall through the night, to ensure no one entered the area and that it retained its structure until morning.  A woman from Quebec lived in a nearby building and brought me the tastiest coffee I've had in my life.  She was sweet, needlessly worried, and a joy to talk with to idle the time away.  I learned the lesson when I discovered she could not add in English.  She needed to see the numbers written down and then added in French.

"Talking in your mother tongue" means returning to your most primal actions.  Your visceral reactions.  When your mother tongue is to react with anger it will be the first response you turn to when you are reacting emotionally.  It will always be the first thing.  To change your primary reaction takes infinite practice and long-standing effort.

Change.  Focussed, directed change.

I don't know if a secondary language can ever become as dominant as a mother tongue.  However I know that I want a better reaction from myself than visceral anger or sullen withdrawal.  I know to be a positive force I have to keep myself in a positive place.

My new year started a while ago.  My change is continual for a while.  My continuance is to keep being a better self.  May 2012 bring along all the good bits of 2011 and build from there.

Happy Old Year.

"I kinda figured that I'd just plant myself here for the next five to ten years and not have to change."

"I enjoy that you thought you could plan that."

-----

This somewhat paraphrased and ill conceived (at least on my behalf) conversation is directly referring to my reluctance to change.  Ah, to be set in my ways, to have all the answers predefined, to have preplanned all the possibilities in advance and to have enumerated the probabilities of each of them occurring.

This post brought to you by the letter H -- maker of fine words such as Hubris and Haughtiness.

-----

Long ago I listened to Jane Jacobs speak on ideas.  It was likely the Massey Lectures, I know that Jane is well associated with them.  Jane was simply brilliant, strong in speaking and scintillating in mind to hear.  An hour vanished in mere minutes and I was rapt in the listening.  Perhaps I'll try to find them again, but not tonight.  I have too many other important tasks to do.

One of the things I intended to do over Christmas was to begin Jane's book, "The Death and Life of Great American Cities."  Christmas Day I was caught up in other tasks and yesterday, the other day I had no preset plans, I went for coffee with a friend instead.  So tonight, while waiting for one task to complete, I jumped in the tub, book in hand, and began reading.

The book is the 50th Anniversary edition and has two introductions.  The first is by James Epstein, Jane's publisher and friend over the years and spelled out a great deal of context that I simply did not know or understand.  Interestingly, by the time I finished James's introduction, I sincerely felt that Jane was a kindred spirit and a friend to me as well as Mr. Epstein.

Jane's introduction was utterly captivating.  She wrote it in 1992, about 30 years after Death and Life was first published.  She immediately spoke of the conflicts between what she called "foot people" and "car people" and their perspectives on city planning.  Conflicts which, to me here and now, seem silly and insignificant.  Jane's ideas seem clear and self-evident to me, not particularly insightful and I don't always agree the details, but they are apparent and well reasoned.

Towards the end, Jane dispelled the notion that her book helped stop urban renewal programs and slum-clearing.  She avers that urban renewal and the slum clearing essentially collapsed under their own weight.  They never respected the ecology of a city - our ecology as human beings.  The recycling of a city's resources into a reshaped entity that serves it's inhabitants.  She had my complete attention, I understand ecology well.

Diversity is needed to have a strong ecosystem.  What we, in our human arrogance, perceive as complexity is a fundamental necessity for forming the webs we rely upon to strengthen and enhance our entire environment and well being.

  "... when their processes are working well, ecosystems appear stable.  But in a profound sense, the stability is an illusion.  As a Greek philosopher, Heraclitus, observed long ago, everything in the natural world is in flux.  We we suppose we see static situations, we actually see processes of beginning and processes of ending occurring simultaneously.  Nothing is static."

-----

Nothing is static.  Change is a constant and inevitable process.

Apparently I'm in a period of life where I am accepting change, acknowledging its influence upon me, and eagerly hoping to tackle change on my own terms.

My mother and my daughter together taught me a lesson over Christmas:

What is the difference between anxiety and excitement?  Anxiety is when you look upon the unknown with negativity and a fearful outlook.  Excitement is when you look upon the same unknown with positive thoughts and hope for the changes which will come.

I'm excited about the change to come.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Funny, the more I say it, the more I think about it, the more it stays a constant around me.

Constant change is a given, and it's a continual process that happens all around each of us.  The irony is that we never change, we are always the same.

So which is the lie?

I'm a simple man, with simple wants and desires and an unbendable longing for stability and dependability.  I'm also a quester, a seeker of things new and intriguing, longing to reach for the stars that are infinitely beyond my grasp, one who is willing to throw away all my beliefs and values when they no longer serve me in search for a new morality which is more suited to who I have become as a person.

When others tell me that I will always be worthless and I will never change, it may be hurtful to hear at the time, but should I stop to think I will recognize it as a falsehood to be discounted.  When I'm told I must transform and become an entire new entity I feel overwhelmed and know that I will ultimately disappoint, because I am myself.  There is no other that I can be.

Change has a funny way of passing through one's life.  It's always present, here and now, and has always been a factor around me.  The passage of time alone necessitates change, I can no longer act as a child, nor would I want to do so any longer.  My growth as a person has exposed me to new and more interesting facts of life and as I learn more it has changed my perception of events and details I previously saw through a different lens.  Change is the only way we can truly adjust to our current circumstances, because our circumstances in the world are constantly changing in and of themselves.

Circumstantial change is adaptation to the world around us.  We do what we have to do to get by.  Directed change, now that is something that we control ourselves as we steer our course to where we want to be.  I've had more than my share of circumstantial changes, and will continue to have more than my share ahead.  I will, I shall, I can, I must, and most importantly, I want to take on those changes that await so that I stay ahead of the curve and not crushed beneath unfathomable pressure.

Directed change is so much more interesting to me right now.  There is no question, the past year or so has seen a vast change in myself.  It almost seems difficult for me to tally the differences, because in all honesty I simply haven't been trying to document them all.  I know on a more generic level I feel more connected with my local environment - my city, my neighbourhood, my work, even, perhaps, my family.  It's not that a year ago I said, "Hey, I want a new mayor and I want to be part of my community association and I'm going to change how I commute and connect with my city."  It was, strictly speaking, acting on the unease and dissatisfaction I was feeling, and the strict distaste I have for hypocrisy.  I wanted something better than the future I saw ahead of me, so I decided I needed to think and act and move.  As that great poem states, "And that has made all the difference."

Change tends to pass through my life in one of two ways.  It can rumble, wielding Thor's Hammer as a pendulum that scatters it's effects to the left and to the right.  Impactful in a very real sense, and that impact spreads it's shock with little regard for bystanders or personal feelings.  It is very much the crash course of life, the Canada's Worst Driver rehabilitation centre, the place where change is hurried because hurried change has become necessary.  The other force is through erosion, the endless, relentless wearing and grating of change.  It can batter, it can build, it can erase, it can deposit.  It can be controlled, it can be unstoppable.  Every bit as full of impact, but it's the Nenshification of my life, where one change brings about another until they cascade and I've become much more than I was a short while ago.  A short while ago that's so long in the past I can barely remember it.

No matter the force, I am fundamentally myself.  I must adapt to what I have met, and react to the changes which press against me.  There is no doubt, I am wiser, stronger, more capable than I was as a child.  There is also no doubt that it was that child that became the man, and the man who has continued to grow and to shape.  What to change in myself, how to readdress issues around me, how to respond to my new circumstance, those are decisions best made willingly, with clear purpose and full intention.  I need to choose the things which are relevant in my life, which are important in my world, which align with my values.

So I'm not a different person.  And still I have changed.  And I think I have a touch more insight into what I've been thinking about the past week or so.

You'll have to trust me, this is NOT an "End of Year Wrap-Up" blog.  This is a serious attempt to answer the question of, "How?"  How must I direct change within myself to be a better person?  How can I become more effective?  How shall I be more supportive, more communicative, more open in my intentions, more respectful in my listening?  How can I ask the question, "What do you need?" when I am not prepared to actually answer?

I thought I'd be asking if I should.  That change has already passed me.  How is a much better question to be asking anyways.

I try really hard to not be an asshole.

Granted, I'm not perfect and it takes a lot for me to lose my cool these days.  Fortunately.  I know I've got a temper and I try really hard to keep control over it.

I try especially hard to stay calm around this time of year.  Line ups get long and nerves get frayed for the best of people.  I make no apologies for being scroogy right about now but I genuinely try not to be a dick to anyone else just for the sake of being a dick.

Today I was trying to ship a package of cheese buns from here to Kitchener.  I'd kept them in my freezer for a week trying to send them out as close to Christmas as I could manage.  Hopefully they'll get out there and be reasonably fresh and tasty.  They're for one of my really good buddies who introduced me to Glamorgan Bakery in the first place, it's just a way of saying thanks to him and his family and send them a little taste of Calgary.

Well, actually, I wanted to ship them yesterday but I missed closing time by five minutes so I was happy I gave myself an extra day to spare.

I know, I'm going to spend way more on the shipping than I did for the baking, but I'm doing it on my terms because it's a stupid idea and because I know there are a couple of girls out there who are going to hugely appreciate the gesture.  If their dad will share.

The problem I have is that I don't really know what it's going to cost or the best way to get it out there.  Usually when I've shipped anything it was a bushel of grain or research samples I needed for next spring, not overnight.  I'm doing the best that I can, but I'm going to need someone to help me out.

So I knew I was going to have to go up to the Purolator up near the airport to get my timing right, I knew I'd have to be up there before 7:30 and I knew that I had a client call this evening so I was going to have to hustle my butt to squeeze everything in this evening.  I'm going to need help on everything else.

Quirkily, there was a line in front of me and only one woman behind me.  I knew I was going to be a while and asked if she was just picking up a package.  She was, so I saw no reason to delay her at all, by all means let her step in front of me.

The guy behind the counter must have heard that it was going to take me a while and told me to go to the computer terminals and start there.  I felt a little put off that I was told to go do it on my own even though I knew I was going to need help.  No matter, I'm a SysAdmin for ghod's sake, I know how to fill in a waybill, I just need help on shipping options and the details that I don't know.  I start filling in the data.

My name, address, city, destination's name, postal code (that was kind of cool, it filled in the city information for me after I put in the postal code), but for the road she has "CRT" and I entered "Crescent" not "Court".  I hit backspace and...  If you know web browsers at all you'll just have figured out that I wiped out all the information as I effectively just pushed the back button.  Okay, that was annoying, but I start over.

Entered all the data, go to the next page and it's asking for weight and dimensions of the package.  I don't know the weight and dimensions, I didn't expect to have to know that.  I can estimate sizes by comparing it with my hands or arms, but the weight?  It's light enough I can carry it around all day if I had to.  I don't bloody well know and I shouldn't have to, all of that is behind the counter.

So why am I filling out the minutia when I'm going to have to take it to the counter where they're just going to re-weigh it anyways?  So now I'm stuck in a pickle.  I can't save the data partially filled in.  I can't just leave it and get measurements.  The only thing I can possibly do is write down junk numbers in the boxes and have it corrected when the guy weighs it or cancel everything out and start all over again.

WHY?

Annoying me further, another customer beside me is asking if I need help.  No, I'm fully capable of filling out everything in front of me.  I need a scale and a measuring tape and advice on the best way to ship my package to get this overnight.  I need to talk to the person behind the counter, not someone who does not understand my situation.

So I cancelled it and got back in line to the counter where I should have been in the first place.  Only a bunch more people had come in to be served and I ended up in the back of the line again.  And I still didn't have a waybill filled out, nor knew how I'd ship it, nor the final cost.

I got back to the front of the line and was determined that I was going to wait until I get the same agent that sent me off to the computers in the first place.  When he comes to the counter he starts talking to the guy that just walked in through the door behind me.  If I didn't feel shucked away before I definitely did by now.  I got pulled out of the line, left to flounder entering data that I couldn't provide, and now this guy is pushing me aside again for someone just getting into the building!

I planted myself in front of him at the counter and pointedly asked if there was a scale or measuring tape at the computers.  He rolled his eyes and said no, they were behind the counter.  I said, probably louder than I intended, "Then what am I doing over there?  I'll go find another solution."

On my way out the "helpful customer" said that I was being rude.  Yes, yes I was.  I was intentionally rude specifically to the person who sent me on a wild goose chase and then ignored me when I reached the front of the line.  I'm willing to bet each and every person behind me got better service the remainder of the night.

I have other options for couriers.  I waited about the same length of time at FedEx as I did for one trip through the line at Purolator.  I reached the front of the line and the agent took my package, weighed it, and told me I needed to fill out an Intra-Canada Waybill while he prepared my package for shipping.  By the time I got to the counter, I know the package weighed 1.14 kg and he apparently didn't care about the dimentions.  (The box previously held a case of microwave popcorn.)  I didn't have much for shipping options, it's going to arrive in Kitchener early in the morning, and I paid a whopping $55.27 for $10 of buns.  Still worth it because I didn't suffer the aggravation.

So I truly apologize if I appeared to be an asshole for the sake of being an asshole.  I genuinely feel bad if other customers thought I was simply being rude.  But if I'm expected to fill out information for the waybill on my own would you please provide a scale and ruler that I can access?

And never, EVER ignore the customer at the front of the line hoping he'll go to some other agent.  Especially when you've already blown him off earlier in the evening.

Look where you want to go.  We've established it as a good idea for driving and a good idea for life.

For all the looking you do, it will not be helpful unless you have the skills to take you where you're looking.

Canada's Worst Drivers regularly smash into obstacles in front, behind, and to the left and right of themselves.  Sometimes the show gets criticized for putting the drivers into an impossible situation that is far and beyond the capabilities of a typical driver.

How often do you think of yourself in a situation you feel you can't get out of?  How often do you worry about being stuck in an impossible scenario with no solutions in sight?

During the show, we occasionally hear the bad drivers say that the lane is too narrow, there's just not enough space to drive safely, it's too tight to turn around.  The beauty of the show is that Andrew Younghusband drives each challenge first to prove that it can be done, but also that it's just a condition that any driver may find themselves in while driving.  When you're driving in the real world, you don't always have the choice of just pulling over and quitting.  You're going to have to drive and adapt to the circumstances on the road at any particular moment.

During the show, I just wish that some of the drivers would stop the car, walk around it and look at the obstacles, think about the best way to escape the allegedly impossible scenario.  Rather than sit in the car and frustratingly struggle for an hour, if they'd think about it for an hour and perhaps come up with a way out it may happen safely and smoothly when they succeed.

Oh, but don't I just know what it's like to sit behind the wheel and feel there is no way out at all.  The frustration and desperation of being willing to try anything to escape masks the better solution of analysis and figuring out what gives the best chance of success.

That really is the best approach, though.  Take the time to figure out your situation.  Make a plan.  Follow through with your plan.  Analyze your results, think about what happened and how to apply it the next time around.

So those impossible courses and scenarios the Canada's Worst Driver team sets up:  Remember that they're done in a safe environment with trained professionals to both teach the drivers and keep them safe.  You and me on the real roads, we don't have that luxury.  We don't want to get in over our heads and have to struggle to get out of a bad situation.  Instead, we need to learn early and often.  Every moment you get behind the wheel of a car, you should be thinking about what you're learning about how to control a vehicle better.

Your driving today is teaching you more skills that will serve you tomorrow.

We know this, it's obvious!  As we get more experienced, our insurance goes down.  Teen aged drivers have a terrible record that we expect to improve over the years.  The best drivers tend to be the people who are driving the most.

We know we can't stop.  As we get older our reaction times increase while our vision and strength decrease.  We need those better driving skills for when our bodies start to let us down.

Move it from the background of your driving to the foreground.  We don't have a Canada's Worst Driver Wonderland where we get to practise our skills.  But we do get a chance to improve our driving each and every time we get behind the wheel.  Put that into the forefront of your driving and intentionally think about how your driving can improve when you're behind the wheel.

And if "Look where you want to go" is an analogy for life, isn't this entire entry an analogy about how we ought to live?

When you are driving safely, you are looking to where you want to go.

You should not look just in front of your vehicle.  Surely you want to go farther than the 20 or 30 feet ahead of you.  The faster you travel, the further you have to look ahead.  You need more time to accumulate data and you require time to process that data into good decision making.

Nor should you be fixating on your final destination.  It may not even be in sight.  You can't even focus entirely on a spot a full kilometre down the road - that's foolhardy when a hazard could be just ahead of you.

You cannot be locked into tunnel vision, staring solely ahead.  Hazards may exist in the ditches or coming out of alleys at the side of the road.  Nor can you neglect your mirrors for hazards racing up behind you.

"Look where you want to go" still holds as the primary rule of safe driving.  But it's not an absolute rule.  You need to take in data such as your speed, your direction, road signs, other drivers, pedestrians, cyclists -- the sum of your environment.

"Look where you want to go" as a life's lesson is much the same.  Recently I got all hell bent for leather on a course of action, however lunch with a friend suddenly snapped into place that I haven't finished driving my current road yet and there is much for me to do before I'm ready to switch life's highways.

When you're driving, it should be somewhat obvious where you are heading.  More or less in front of you, far enough ahead to spot obstacles and hazards, not so far ahead that you are oblivious to things that are near you.  Setting your goals and choosing one's path through life is less clear cut.  There are many directions you can choose and many goals you can set for yourself.

The choice made should, in my mind, still be somewhat obvious.  Your destination as a person needs to begin from your values.  Everyone's core values are serious, personal and valuable beyond counting.  You need to consider what your values are and how they impact you as a person.  Although I have a good standing on what my personal cornerstones are, it's clear that I can lose my focus and forget the things I most want to accomplish.  Lose that focus and it becomes much harder to achieve your goals.

Let me tie my thoughts into a circle.  If you truly value all life on earth, you must do what you can to care for life and ensure life is not taken without good cause.  Unless you are a plant or a bacterium, we must continue our existence by sacrificing life for our own sustenance, but life is not to be taken carelessly.  When that's your primary value, you ought to be driving carefully, applying what you know about safe driving each and every time you get behind the wheel.  Look where you want to go.  Travel with confidence.  Stay calm when things don't smoothly go your way.  Tenaciously practice and improve your skills and abilities.  Never stop learning.

I wouldn't consider telling you what your core values ought to be, but I highly encourage you to think about your core values and your goals and how you intend to achieve your goals while staying true to your values.

I can't help someone else until I've prepared myself.  My drive right now has to be to improve myself, but also value a bigger role which awaits me and need to simultaneously prepare myself.  I have to remain true to my cornerstones or risk losing my values.  I have to care for my health, my teeth and my jaw -- the choices over how I get there are fast becoming interesting and compelling.

In the end, you need to ultimately decide for yourself which route you shall take.  We all face the choice of Robert Frost, and regardless of the road taken our choice shall make all the difference.

Here's the blog I'm dedicating to Sly.

I loathe "Reality T.V."  From it's tenuous grasp on reality to the puffed up ego monsters that tend to be attracted as stars for their hideous 15 minutes of fame, to the ridiculous assumptions that I have to watch and I have to have an opinion about people and events I couldn't care less over.

I do, however, love Canada's Worst Driver and Canada's Worst Handyman.  The latter because I'm likely a prospective wretched renovator, and the former because I see nothing but relevance in the show for each and every driver on our roads.

I consider myself an above average driver, which is not surprising because we ALL would call ourselves above average in our driving skills.  The difference is I am comfortable driving in vehicles ranging from subcompacts to three ton grain trucks, automatic or standard transmission vehicles, with or without trailers - the trailer empty or filled with dirt, grain, furniture or a small combine.

There are skills featured on CWD that I would desperately love to try.  I could really learn something from the Eye of the Needle and I have never attempted a Reverse Flick but I think I could gain much from that level of intuitive knowledge of weight transfer between your wheels.  Until I get proper instruction at a track where it's completely safe, I'll probably never attempt it.

There are skills you can try every single time you get behind a wheel.  For instance, can you drive in a straight line?  In a real straight line?  Can you drive in a straight line with a curve in the middle?  Can you perform an S-turn?  Can you do one intuitively, without thinking?

These are skills that are essential for good driving.  They don't require special equipment.  They don't require a tunnel made from styrofoam cutouts.  You only need to turn your brain on, then pay attention to the road and your driving.

The number one rule of driving - at least according to CWD - is look where you want to go.  They can't say it enough, they can't teach it enough, it can't be emphasized and shared too much.  Look where you want to go.

You drive towards where you look, you react towards where you're looking, you are only observing the hazards where you are looking.  When you drive, you must look where you want to go.  It doesn't mean tunnel vision - you have to be aware of your entire environment.  However your eyes need to be primarily upon your target and you will head towards where you're focused.

So last week, one of CWD7's drivers, Sly, noticed a great insight.  "You know, I think that's an analogy for life.  'Look where you want to go.  Look where you want to go.'  My gosh.  One of those things that the Dalai Lama would probably say."

He's right.  It's more than just driving.  "Look where you want to go."  "Keep your eyes on the ball."  "Keep your target in sight."  "Keep your goals in front of you."  We say the same thing constantly in so many ways.

We, as human beings, need a direction.  We are best when we're striving, we are most accomplished while achieving specific goals.

You can't be a good driver if you're not looking where you want to go.  Can you be a good person when you wander through life without focus?

However, life isn't just one success after another.  We have failures, we take tangents, we go down wrong roads and sometimes travel in the wrong direction.  We have to recognize the whole of the environment around ourselves.  Success comes down to focusing those experiences into lessons that eventually guide us toward our goals.

I'm trying harder to apply it every day.

Look where you want to go.  Travel with confidence.  Stay calm when things don't smoothly go your way.  Tenaciously practice and improve your skills and abilities.  Never stop learning. 

Now that's reality.

Hey Glenn,

 You know, I really look forward to seeing you, and I know it's always going to be the quick "hi and bye."  I know you got the basic gist that I've had a very full day today and we caught each other at the end of it.

 The funny thing (for me anyway) is that tonight a hi and bye was probably the exact thing I needed today.  Let me explain.

 If you know me -- and you kinda do -- you know that I'm generally not known for flying off a handle.  My thoughts get scattered often, when they do I try to gather them and think things through in my brain very methodically.  Actually, when I have too many thoughts in my head they all come out at once and I feel embarrassed about my lack of clarity.  I find that a very personal embarrassment which is part of the reason I prefer laying my thoughts out in a blog while I tend to be a listener in public.

 Today I felt really spun up.  In reality this has been a week long event, but it's particular today.  Work's been busy and I've felt like I've been working on tangents and not core duties.  In reality I'm a little afraid the tangents are becoming core duties and I'm just not smart enough for that.  I've been trying hard to tackle my chores and get some noticeable accomplishment happening around me to mixed results.  Getting more community involvement happening around me has really been a shock to my system.  Block Watch?  C'mon, I'm not a Block Watch guy.  Am I? 

I feel way over my head and stretched way too thin and I get scared that I'm going to collapse like a house of cards and get absolutely nothing accomplished.

I know we talked about Alison and the burr that's put under my belt the last little while as well.  The little side stories I was telling you was all aiming towards the endpoint where the people most affected are the ones who are most ignored.  Meanwhile the self-congratulatory feel good laws are unenforcible and nothing has really changed at all in our day to day lives.  There's been a change in the window dressing, but let's be honest, we need new insulated windows in this joint.

Glenn, the hi and bye tonight was a touchstone for me.  For me, this is a journey that's one lifetime and two years in the making.  It's taken the lifetime to establish my values and over the past two years I've started making the most of them.

"I used to be a quiet, unassuming complainer who did nothing..."  Well, I'm not any more.  I'm definitely trying to make a positive impact around me.  Trust me, I'm not all sweetness and light, but I've got a good set of values and I deserve a fair hearing when I stand up for them.

This creation of ours, the Alberta Party, it's been a reminder to me of why I'm trying.  Once again I was surrounded with great people who share a passion for fresh ideas, for openness, for welcoming a bigger view and a finer dissection of the issues within Alberta.  People who are willing to look at both the problems we wish to solve as well as the consequences of our actions.  People who have a constant drive to make things better, people who have the energy to act upon the change we believe in, people who have the courage to act for what's right in the long term.

Me?  I felt overwhelmed and harried tonight when I arrived.  It took me a bit to put it together, but it's just the anxiety before tackling a big project.  Being together tonight reminded me that I'm well on my way to creating something better around me.  To use a metaphor, I'm looking up and only seeing a steep path ahead of me while forgetting the mountain I've already climbed.

So to answer you're question properly, I'm doing fantastic.  I'm sticking to my personal plan and doing the things I can to make positive changes I can tackle.  I'm surrounded by some the best friends a guy could ever ask for and live in a community I'm intensely proud of.  I'm impatient, though, and have to remember Rome wasn't built in a day.  We're going to get there.  We're going to get there together.

Already looking forward to the next time you pass through.

  - Mark

Remembrance Day is always special for me.

Quite often I've worked at a place where it's just a day off.  If it's in the middle of the week, they'll swap days around so you can get an extra three day weekend or something.  It is a day that means much more to me and I've been blessed to work at companies that understand that.

I made certain that I'd be able to take my kids to commemorate Remembrance Day together every year.  When my daughter was very young, we went down to the Jubilee.  Her eyes went wide as the HCMS Tecumseh Naval Reserve Band played before the ceremony.  I have a strong memory of her enjoying the moment, then snuggling up to me as the speeches wore on.  I remember feeling mortified when my newborn son cried during the two minutes of silence.  In my mind it was a piercing shriek the entire time.  In reality, a very kind person came up to me after the ceremony and thanked me for bringing my kids along.

We have always held to our tradition of finding a person in uniform and shaking his or her hand to say thank you.  It seems like a little thing, but it strikes me as an important thing.  Two incidents are coming to mind that I can't shake without telling.  The first was when we shook the hands of a younger fellow and as I explained our tradition he promptly pulled us over to a giant of a man, shriveled with age, and the younger gentleman stated point blank that we needed to shake the hand of the older veteran.  I don't know why him in particular, I simply felt blessed that our gesture was appreciated and we certainly shook the hand of a great man that day.

The other moment was just before the Jubilee was renovated.  I remember my kids were shy that year.  I scanned the crowd after the ceremony and I approached a man in uniform turned away from me.  I touched his arm and as he turned I believe he filled in the definition of "regimental" for me.  He was taller than I was and looked gruff and serious.  At that moment I wondered if I had chosen the wrong man and should just leave him be, but I pushed on instead.  I told him our family tradition was to shake the hand of someone in uniform and he turned formally and engulfed my daughter's tiny hand.  He held his hand out to my son, who ducked behind me for cover, then turned to me.  He shook my hand warmly, I choked out a thank you, he straightened and said, "You're welcome," and both rigidly and gracefully turned as if to say, "Well that's that then."  We would see him again when the ceremony was held at the Round Up Centre where he and I smiled at each other, but I didn't shake his hand that year.

I wonder if he's still alive.  I wonder what his recollection is of that day.  I hope he felt my hand was offered with the greatest of respect.

The past couple of years we've attended the ceremony at the Museum of the Regiments.  It seems to me the weather's been cold but not frigid, this year the weather promises to be rather nice.  I long to return to my memories at the Jubilee, but I'm torn - I would like to save the seat for a family with young children or the elderly veterans who deserve to commemorate in comfort, yet those are the people I most wish to see as well.  Of course, I haven't yet attended the ceremony at Central Memorial Park since the renovations there, and I hear that the Calgary Highlanders have done a great job with the service they put on there.

I have no idea which location I'll commemorate right now.  I will guarantee that I will be at one of them with my children beside me and I will think of family and friends serving in the armed forces present or past.

For an excellent list of ceremonies in 2011, please visit Mr. YYC's list of events and absolutely spend a moment of your day looking at Some Special Places of Remembrance in Calgary.

Most importantly, attend a ceremony and give your respects to our veterans.