After a long absense.......................

It has been a very long time since my last post...........there is no particular reason for this, except that the themes of my thoughts and concerns seem to have a predictable, cyclical, nature.

In a state of abject frustration, I have absconded from my role as Chair of Youth Services  in the Rotary E-Club Canada One. I simply needed to find a venue where my hard work could and would show results.  Although my 25+ years as a Rotarian  have been a delight and I have enjoyed working with the youth related programs in Ambassadorial Scholarships,  Youth Leadership and International Youth Exchange, seeing young people realising that they can both have an exciting time and grow as individuals while contributing to society, I have struggled with the "busy life syndrome" exhibited by many adults who SAY they will contribute but consistently fall down and fail to support youth endeavours which require more than contributing cash to salve their commitments, rather than engaging reliably in some sweat equity. It has now been more than 6 months since I officially resigned from my Rotary Club. The first while was very difficult. I felt that I had abandoned a concept, but I have come to realise that I am still a Rotarian in my heart and in my actions. I continue my concerns and my activities, but as my personal clock is beginning to wind down, I realised that what *I* needed out of my activity was "results" which required only things from me personally, without relying  on the co-option of the endeavours of others who may or may not perform.

This of itself is something worth passing along to young folks. Find something where you and you working alone can make a difference in another person's life and hang onto that aspect of yourself. Working in a group can have a multiplying effect (2+2=22 rather than =4) but if the commitment required by all parties is not there, there is always something you can do alone. Get yourself out of the negative atmosphere once it is clear it is not working, but do not give up altogether. Some great things have happened because of the determined and gradual actions of individuals. These can be small things... defending a bullied child, helping a senior citizen across a busy intersection, just smiling at someone and saying Hello!...Good Morning! Saving the world from itself may not be within your reach and it is grand to try, but keep being useful with small things along the way.

So, you may ask...... what did I do as a responsible adult  to keep making myself useful? At the age of 13 I joined the air cadets. A lot of volunteers gave me an experience I grabbed at and ran with, reaching the most senior rank in the Corps  and having a most exciting youth, flying, shooting, travelling, visiting other countries and getting recognition for my natural and learned skills, getting around a lot of old and new aircraft, filling my days with adventure......and along the way learning a great deal about self-discipline and about the pluses and minuses of growing up and exhibiting responsibility. During all of my adult life I kept thinking about rejoining the Air Cadets as a commissioned Volunteer Reserve officer, but circumstances didn't allow this. My work occupied my life and my service to Queen and Country in both UK and Canada was met in other ways.

However, as a retired man growing weary of the lack of progress in my Rotary Club, I saw an opening, an opportunity, to get involved again, to give back. As I have hit 65, I am considered too old to don uniform again, alas but I found a large local squadron which was desperately understaffed so I talked with the Commanding Officer and volunteered. Speaking for myself I wanted my volunteering to be useful and enjoyable, so for the first while I spent time just being there, hovering, observing seeing what blanks I thought needed filling in and seeing what the CO wanted me to do. I have to be honest I was deeply  troubled by the things I saw, results of inaction or bad action by previous program intentions and the lack of disciplined structure, much of the work falling on the CO who was becoming increasingly frustrated. I was close to packing it in myself, because it was just another example of lack of committent, lack of aware understanding and had turned to chaos. I talked with the CO and offered some very frank observations and some solutions I thought I could offer and work with to help bring things back under control.

Despite my volunteer role not really fitting this insertion, I had the CO's support to do this, despite it putting me in a strange position in relationship to the other officers and officer cadets and to some degree with the cadets themselves as they had no real idea who this old guy was who was hanging around and bit by bit pulling up the standards in all directions. After about 8 months  of gradually adding more and more of me and my involvement, I seem to have become a part of the fabric. The cadets, senior and junior are referring to me as Sir, asking questions, listening to answers and striving to improve. The junior officers and officer cadets, themselves largely former cadets and victims of the degraded organisation were at first rather unsure about my presence, I think largely aware that change was coming, but once they realised that I had the CO's authority for my actions  and words, they began to realise that they could learn from me and have included me as part of the squadron's fabric now.

I knew there was a niche here, somewhere I could help and bring up the standards in many ways within the squadron.  There is a lot of good material to work with, both in the officers and officer cadets, the senior and junior cadets. They are strivers I think and now that there is some structure and oversight in place they are responding to it well. My goal is to teach and train and demonstrate to the point that the structure becomes natural and self perpetuating, a matter of pride and automatic. I have promised them 5 years which will take me to 70. In five years, working with the officers and the cadets, existing and incoming, it will be possible to create a culture of pride, precision and knowledge. Already this squadron outperforms others in the region in many ways and is sending many cadet on flying and gliding scholarships on the International Air Cadet exchange and sundry summer camps. By the end of 5 years this is going to be a mighty squadron full of self confident and responsible youth and be the squadron of choice within the region. Team work, leadership, knowing when to ask for and accept help and a great deal of mutual and earned respect is what it will take.

I have been asked to become a paid Civilian Instructor, an employee of the Department of National Defence and appointed Standards Officer for 637 (Arrow) Squadron in Burnaby as well as shooting instructor/Range Safety Officer....so there is always somewhere out there to pay it back after someone else paid it forwards. Volunteer!

Hopefully no-one gets lazy! (laughing)

What is an education?

Before I venture any further I think its necessary to take a survey of opinions and definitions I have heard about what an education is, or should be.

First I will add in this small piece by Shenith Jackson which for some reason broadly appeals to me:

The definition of education is an act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life.
It could be a certain degree, level or kind of schooling. It is a training implying a discipline and development by means of the special and general abilities of the mind, or a training by which people learn to develop and use their mental, moral, and physical power or skill. It is a gaining of experience, either improving or regressing. Education means to learn in every means in order to reach certain goals.

Education is very essential to everyday  be able to cope and survive whatever the difficulties and complications one  may experience. Without education, life can be hard and frustrating in every aspect. Education will help to attain a certain ambition or a dream in life and to be successful, however that may be defined.

Education can be from anywhere, school, society or home, internet, books or anywhere. It is necessary that everyone needs to go to a form of school, to learn academically and socially. It should help build up the confidence in every person, and give high self-esteem. Also, we need to educate ourself as a society, so that we are aware in catastrophic situations. To know what's going on around us, it is an advantage to be prepared. We need to educate ourselves in the Internet, as it is the biggest technology evolving around the world, for researching or communicating.

Education requires discipline, patience, time, hard-work and effort. With these important behavioral qualities, it will be easier to deal with life.
Having broad knowledge gives high intellect, a power that keeps you ready for anything.

Education can change our life tremendously.

Some good points! However obviously defining sources have a hard time with the concept of education: here are some I found:


a) An education is a packaged measure of a medley of things which should be given to all, in order to raise their consciousness of the world in which they live

b) An education is there to give people job-ready skills so that they go out into the world and contribute and raise their lifestyle

c) An education is something delivered to children so that teachers can have a job, colleges can exist and so that we can all feel good about our educated status

d) education is knowledge acquired by learning and instruction; "it was clear that he had a very broad education"

e) the gradual process of acquiring knowledge; "education is a preparation for life"; "a girl's education was less important than a boy's"

f) the profession of teaching (especially at a school or college or university)

g) the result of good upbringing (especially knowledge of correct social behavior); "a woman of breeding and refinement"

h) education in the broadest sense is any act or experience that has a formative effect on the mind, character or physical ability of an individual. ...

i) Education is a stained-glass window

I think I like the latter the most! Education is a stained glass window.... yet it should be so much more.

Watching what happens to hands-off parents...and their kids

It has been a while since I have felt passionate about something enough to write about it, at least in this theme of the old and the young. I continue to monitor and think about the previous entries and how they influence the world, but recently I have been an observer of what can and all too often does happen when things go wrong between the generations.

I live in a small cluster of houses which to all intents and purposes forms a small village within the bigger city. Our little community is run as a co-operative and much to my suprise I have lived here now for almost 26 years. Over the years some families have moved away and some have been here even longer than I have, but because of its nature  and physical structure, inwardly focussed, we tend to know our neighbours and make welcome the newcomers. For sure there are some tensions here and there, but overall it has been a great place to raise two sons, a relatively safe environment where parents keep their eyes also on other people's kids, which brings about safety, security and a sense in the kids that they are not going to get away with too much. At the same time, it allows them to play and experiment with life in a pleasant and secure environment.

As a result of all this we forgo a degree of the anonimity and a modicum of the privacy which may be had from living anonimously on the street in the gridded city, where many do not know or even speak with their immediate neighbours. This latter environment is surely all a part, especially in large conurbations, of the reason why we see anti-social behaviours, territorial gang wars and a sense that nothing that goes on in your life is a concern of anyone but your own family, the isolationism of the modern city.

So in this alternate, rather socialised environment, where we run our community interests together, it is possible to see the wonderful things that happen when well-raised kids with well-adjusted and responsible parents (and their neighbours and friends) live in co-operative respect. It is possible to look at the kids as they grow up, mature and start their own lives,  and to feel proud of them, knowing that you have provided a small piece of who they are, as much as how your friends and neighbours have contributed to whom your own kids have become from the modelling they have had. This is an example of the well-worn phrase "o raise a child takes a village."

On the other hand however, this close proximity and relatively social atmosphere also allows one a window into the ongoing lives of the more dysfunctional families which one may not otherwise see, except in the final headlines which hit the local news. As one observes more, one is far more aware of the results of dysfunction.

Social dysfunction can take many forms. It is an eye-opener to live within it, because much though we are a little different here, we are also very much the same as any group of people. We are individuals and we do all carry along with us the skills which we have, or have not developed in our lives. We bring together our own "things" and we then add them together in sometimes interesting agglomerations called family units. All the families are quite different on the surface and as you get to know them you begin to realise just how different, and yet how alike. One can observe a situation and say quietly to oneself  "There, but for the Grace of God, go I..(or we).". It has been an interesting 26 years to be honest.

I can think of families which on the surface of things (and even down deep) are wonderful families who have been really hands on and yet one of the kids grew deeply troubled in the drug culture, had the fully armed Police SWAT team here once. He was eventually cruelly murdered by that culture just as he was finally trying hard to get his act together. I can think of a single Mother of two kids, a well adjusted and responsible daughter who has moved away but stays in touch with her Mother yet who has a brother who is heavily into the drugs trade. I can think of a couple with their two kids, a boy and a girl, where the Mother moved out leaving the father to look after his kids. The father was and is a hard working guy, the daughter has grown up to be a very pleasant and responsible young woman, but the son has always been a serious trouble maker and is in jail for drug-related offenses. I can think of a very respectable elderly widow with several children who come by and look after her, yet whose son has been in jail the last four years after being caught with illegal firearms, a very large amount of  cocaine, a larger amount of cash, had a large house in one of the most "elite" parts of the city and drove expensive sports cars. He is about to be released soon to his Mother's custody, which means he is moving back in, or so he thinks, but in the interest of protecting ourselves and the well-being of the large number of young children around here, we are moving to prevent it. I can think of an intact family where social drugs have been part of the culture for a while and where attitudes seem more than a bit strange and their two daughters seem to have mixed with a crowd of not so nice friends who have been welcome in the family home and who were somehow (though of course no-one knows how) mixed up in the fatal shooting on the street outside their house of one of the young men. Their house is now a fortress with video cameras attached to all approaches to the house.

And then there is "Johnny". Why have I separated Johnny out? Well its because three of the previous examples all relate to families where for a variety of reasons, there was no man in the house and the Mother was doing her best to provide. In most cases these Mothers could not be in any way faulted for their efforts, or the results they got from the way they raised their kids. In the case of the Motherless home the Father did his best to keep his son straight, so it is clearly not a matter of lack of effort or awarness of the situations. In the case of the "fortress" house I believe it can be attributed to the general anti-social nature of  the parents and their lack of guidance and discipline which brought a gun-death to their doorstep and a lack of social or personal responsibility  being taught,  in that the kids and their pals simply won't cooperate with the police in identifying the shooter.

And then....there is Johnny. Of all of these troubling social cases this one interests me and troubles me the most. The circumstances here are different, perhaps subtley, but different. Johnny has two parents and two siblings. His elder brother was in trouble with  the law and had some personal challenges and probably still struggles with some of them, but he stays away from here now. Johnny's sister lives in her own place here now and has a young child, but no husband to play the father role for the child. Johnny lived with his parents and he is now in his mid 30's. A while ago, the parents moved from their generously comodious house in the cluster to a small house. I think that everyone knew that the change had a lot to do with pushing Johnny out of the nest.

Over the years Johnny has been, at least in memory, a socially challenged kid, rude, nervous, a difficult person. He had however held some part time jobs which gave him some responsibility, working as a camp counsellor for young kids and more latterly as a support worker for kids in High School, though how he got there I am not sure as he has little in the way of formal qualifications. We, their neighbours, were always a bit surprised at him holding these positions, including driving the camp mini-bus full of kids, because Johnny was a known pot-head, a consumer of seemingly large amounts of marijuana. This grew to be more and more of a concern  when Johnny's mother made arrangements, when they moved, for Johnny to be assigned one of the 1 bedroom apartments in the cluster. Now on his own, Johnny's behaviour started to become quickly more and more erratic. Some of us took the opportunity to talk to his parents about the observations but they were in total denial about the situations and chose not to see this as a neighbourhood caring about the family and about Johnny....their response was that he is a grown man, living in his own place  and they took no steps to be involved with him, something which I believe had been the case all through his growing years. His Father is no example of strong manliness, but deep down he knows that there is a problem. He took no proactive stance to help his son, just improving his own situation by moving Johnny sideways into his own residence.

Well it became more and more obvious that Johnny was moving onto harder drugs. Some times he is seen walking like a matchstick man. His habit was becoming more and more expensive. As well as his "deliveries" from 10 second meetings with a green Honda CR/V from the dial-a-dope service, he started to bring 12-13 year old children home from his duties at school and take them into his place. His parents denied that it was possible. It seemed that everyone knew about this but his parents. Johnny was trafficing. The word on the street was that he was in debt. We grew afraid that some not very nice things may start to happen to Johnny. One night, his sister, who has the same initial, and lived two houses away, had her front door kicked in and her home invaded  by several men looking for Johnny. She fled and they left, unable to find him and not realising that he was 2 doors away.

Clearly Johnny was in trouble. He was playing in a game he was too deeply into and had no self control and his parents  still did not act to intervene and help Johnny, but remained in denial to the community that there was a problem at all. There were community meetings  and we were told what a good boy he was as he was, actually helping  another neighbour look after things. She had just lost a 20 something year old developmentally disadvantaged son to the ravages of cancer. She herself was terribly ill with resperatory disease and she shunned often-given offers of help with shopping because her neighbour Johnny was looking after her...... she had given Johnny her  bank card and her password and he took money out to pay for things for her. She had recently come into an inheritance from her Mother who had recently passed away. It was all in the one account and Johnny relieved her of  $51,000 ontop of her shopping bills to partially pay off his drugs debts, to buy a car and to feed his crack-cocaine habit.  Johnny of course crashed the car and has an off-work claim with insurance paying him a living allowance. Yes he still has his job at the school to return to! When the neighbour finally caught on she called the police and Johnny has been to court three times now  but its been put off again because "he cannot find a lawyer". Because he has a job and income, the court will not appoint one for him. He still lives here and has been arrested again for threatening behaviour to his neighbours and breaking the terms of his release, but he is now out on bail and he is still buying and using  hard drugs.

I hope he does go to jail. I hope he is ordered to pay back, somehow in time, the money he stole from an ailing nighbour he befriended and deceived. I hope that there is a rehab program that may take him 6 or more years to get straight on. But most of all, I hope that his parents stop being in denial that it is their total hands-off parenting and lack of responsive action years ago  which caused the problem when Johhny started to go off the rails, when his elder brother started to go off the rails and that now another very young child is going to grow up without the benefit of a father's guiding hand.

This is a supreme example of the dysfunction of kids not being trained and educated, watched and supervised by their parents.

As a footnote to this, in case you are wondering what kind of neighbourhood I am living in......this is 6 out of 66  homes. Other kids who have grown up here at the same time have become RCMP officers, school teachers, technologists, air force pilots, contractors , shop keepers, dental assistants, nurses,  construction workers, some are working on becoming lawyers, engineers, tradespeople, physio-therapists....... doesn't it just go to show what happens when older people, in this case parents, are not there enough to keep things straight. It's hard for single parents. They deserve all the assistance they can get. Don't be afraid to help a kid who has a single parent. Check with the parent that its OK to be there, to be a friend, but do ask. If you know there is a family dysfunction, try to befriend the kids in a  non judgemental way and don't be afraid to be a friend and a surrogate. It won't always work, but if it helps just ONE.......

And finally, what happens to the hands-off parents. Well, Johnny's father, who has been in hands-off mode, in total denial, looks like death warmed over. He cannot ignore the fact that his son should be going to jail. The whole community knows it and we are glad and hopeful it will happen. Perhaps some rehab will be possible and forced upon him, something his parents should have done a long time ago..... We don't want this kind of thing happening in our community. We were willing and able to help if the parents were willing to say "Yes, we have a problem.... and any help would be appreciated". But the community was attacked as though they were attacking. The Father has deteriorated  and looks really sick. The Mother hasn't changed at all, either in her denying manner or her aggressiveness, as though we are all out to get her and her family. A lot of people who cared have reached the end of their tether and would quite happily  invite them to leave our community and find their peace somewhere else.

Somehow, deep down, I think we can forgive the parents, even now, if they can find a way to forgive themselves. The son is, alas, I believe beyond redemption.

It's good to see the years of work showing up in one's son

As a follow-on from the experience of helping out a friend which my son experienced recently (discussed previously), he gave me another example of some very sound and generous decision making last week.

He had been at work on the weekend, pursuing his part time work and when he got home after a long day, announced that he was probably going out with some friends for dinner to celebrate a birthday. He was asked all the usual questions...with whom, where to, when are you meeting and what time will you be home?

It turns out that the group were people he met through a close friend, not direct and personal friends of his, but he had been invited to go along by the close friend and he wanted to go. The promise was to be home by 10pm, which is decently early. As they were going downtown, he didn't take the car but was relying on public transit.

10 pm came and went and after a half hour a call was made to his mobile phone just to check on progress. There was no answer and the anxiety level notched up a  little. At 10:45 pm still no sign of him and another call was made. Contact was made and he said that he was on his way home now. 11:30 pm came and there was no sign of him. No call came. I finally managed to get hold of him at 12:30 am on his mobile phone and he was almost at the train station home bound. Buses are hard to find at that time of night so I agreed to pick him up at the station.

Needless to say I had a few things I wanted to say, but I just asked "what happened?" and listened.

They had indeed eaten at the restaurant which had been named, but afterwards these 16/17 year old boys had gone to a Karaoke Bar and taken a private room and started to drink alcohol. Neither my son, nor his friend, who happens to be Moslem, partook of the alcohol, but the rest of the group did and some quickly became badly intoxicated. One wonders at the license holder of the Karaoke Bar, making no effort to check the age of the persons he served excessive amounts of alcohol to. My son's friend became irritated with his friends and didn't wish to be involved with them, suggesting to my son that they leave and head home. My son realised that there was a problem as especially one of the lads was in very poor condition and needed guidance to get safely home. He suggested to his pal that he should go home if that was how he felt and that he would stay and make sure that the drunks were marshalled home.

It turned out that the worst of the drunks did not want to go home and face the wrath of his parents and this left my son with a dilema. He could not leave this lad to stagger around the city, so eventually he discovered that there was an older brother who could be reached by mobile phone. He was at a party and didn't want to leave but offered that if my son could get his sibling to the party location, he would see to getting his drunken little brother home.

So my son took this lad to the party location by public transport, guiding him along, and handed him over to his older brother and then had to make his own way home from an unfamiliar part of the city.

I have to admit that I was impressed by this action, looking after the wellbeing of someone he barely knows because he knew someone had to. However I did have some issues with it all, but at that time of night felt it best he just sleep and it could all be discussed later  in the morning.

The conversation next morning opened up with wanting to know why he hadn't called home to let us know that things had gone awry and say that he may be a bit late. Also reviewed was that they had no business going into a licensed premise under-age in the first place, should not have been drinking underage, and all of the implications of that to them and to the owner of the licensed premises. Next was a review of the fact that these kids were friends of his friend and that if his friend had the smarts to realise that the best thing to do was  to vacate a bad scene before it became worse, then perhaps he should have followed  the example.

However, a mightier cause became evident. He saw a potentially very bad situation which could quickly become a lot worse. Finding himself the only competent person in the group he took the responsibility upon himself  to marshal this large number of kids into a safer situation and to personally take the worst case to a place of safety. A lot can be said about not being responsible for the stupidity of others, about not getting dragged into situations like that, but at the end of the day my biggest criticism was that he didn't answer my calls and didn't initiate a call for help.

I always get nervous in this big city when my kid is late home late at night when transit is scarce, if still running, and this conversation has been had enough times to have sunken in by now. I resent the tension and the rising fear when things become very overdrawn and I resent the loss of sleep, but this time I think that the responsibility of my son was exceptionally well met (except for letting us know what was happening) in what was a very irresponsible situation all round, where self responsibility was non existent, brotherly responsibility was not really picked up, leaving my son and eventually us in a  supporting role, to sort out the mess irresponsibly created by some other kid's parents. Had that drunken child been left to his own devices, he may well have ended up under the wheels of a car, or beaten up...or worse.

However, the point was made that you cannot save the world from itself, all the time. Its a hard lesson to learn, but an important one. None of us are totally alone on this planet. We have some responsibility to ourselves and to others around us. In this instance he evaluated the circumstances and made the right decisions.

Believe the memories of older men

My Grandfather was born in a small Cambridgeshire village in 1891. He was one of many children and when 1914 came along he volunteered for the Cambridgeshire Regiment of the Territorial Army and went off to war. His brothers also went off to war. One, his favourite older brother Captain Alfred Langley, was to die near Hollebeke, Belgium on September 20th 1917, successfully taking a German machine gun post which had his men pinned down near a railway embankment.

He went through the trenches for all those years and fought in many of the ugliest major engagements. At the end of the war he was one of only 11 men from the original Regiment who was still alive.

He saw a great number of things by 1919 when he finally came home to stay and unlike many men of that era, he didn't mind too much talking about them with his grandson. He was always descriptive, amazingly not bitter, sometimes critical and analytical, but because I asked questions he always gave me very complete answers. I learned a great deal from him.

One of the things he talked about with me was about the fledgling air force, the Royal Flying Corps, and their role in the conflict as he saw it from the ground. He mentioned to me that the majority of the pilots were officers and that they were accorded a very special and rather glamorous status, flying above the filth and degradation of the trenches, but was honest enough to say that their lifespan was often short and once shot at, they had no means of escape from their burning aircraft, as parachutes did not exist at that time.

He also mentioned to me that there were also Sergeant pilots, many of whom were mechanics who fixed the aircraft and who were required to fly repaired aircraft before they were returned to active duty to ensure that the mechanical and physical repairs had been done properly. He told me that when they flew, they flew unarmed, and that many were in fact caught in the air by German raiders, and many were killed because of this.

I never had any cause to doubt any single thing that was told me by my Grandfather. In fact I relied heavily on the truths the man taught me. The undeniable fact that Sergeant pilots existed in the RFC was an absolute truth to me.

After the turn of the 21st century, 90 years after this vile conflict, as a collector of military aviation  history, I tried to make contact with the Royal Air Force Museum in London and with the Imperial War Museum, also in London, to discover some more facts about these enlisted pilots. I received a simple denial that such enlisted men had ever been awarded their flying badge. At first I was puzzled and queried this statement and received some apparent ridicule for my insistence that an eyewitness account had verified their existance. I contacted another Canadian who "wrote the book" on the history of the development of flying badges  in the RFC and early RAF and asked what he knew. He also denied that there had been enlisted (Sergeant) pilots and referenced "many conversations with the curatorial staff at the RAFM and the IWM" and said that there was absolutely NO EVIDENCE of sergeant pilots having existed in the Royal Flying Corps.

I must confess that I took this as an insult to my intelligence and to my Grandfather. I knew that there must be evidence. I knew it must be that there had been Sergeant pilots in the RFC, simply because my Grandfather told me so.

This simmered inside me. Time passed and I knew that something would materialise if I kept raising the question and kept the thought alive.

Then one day on Ebay I found an old photograph for sale.....a photo of a man wearing the enlisted uniform of the RFC, wearing the rank of Sergeant....and undeniably wearing the pilot flying badge. I immediately copied that image and mailed it out worldwide to a very strong network of collectors, with my story and quickly I was contacted by a man in the USA who had MANY old photographs he had collected of Sergeant Pilots wearing RFC uniform.

He copied all of these images to me. I must confess to a very excited self satisfied sense of rightness. I had known that my Grandfather would not have created these men. I sent some of the images to the two official recording museological institutions and what happened next was amazing. Absolutely NOTHING happened. Silence.

Next, with this material in hand, I asked a fellow who lived near Kew in UK where the National Archives are kept, if he would join with me and undertake a detailed search of written documents (of which there were many thousands to be searched) and soon we found official War Ministry correspondance referring to Sergeant pilots and regulations referring to NCO pilots. This again was sent to the official museological bodies and still there was no response.

By now I was flabbergasted at this reaction. I was also very happy because I knew that my trust in my Grandfather's word, which was absolute, had proven true.

However what pleased me the most was that these obviously forgotten men, who had served their nation so loyally and at great cost to themselves, were finally acknowledged, at least by the evidence if not by a grateful nation.

I know that my Grandfather would be totally delighted that his tales told to a small boy were remembered and used to bring back these long gone warriors. Its worth listening to the words of old men.....there is truth in them.

The negative power of hypocracy in religion

I have no desire to offend a soul in this rant. However something happened today which raised my ire and I have to write it.

First let me say that I am a strong believer in tradition and belief. I am far from being a despiser of a faith in a  greater being than ourselves who has some power over our existance. I was raised a Christian and substantially still follow my faith on a one-to-one basis of relationship with my maker. I love some religious observances, I love spiritual places (which are certainly not just found in churches). I am fascinated by the observances and beliefs of others and to some degree critical of much of the man-made dogma which seems to surround all religious faith groups. I keep myself outside of dogma.

This rant involves people of the Jewish faith, but do not let that raise and red flags. As you read this you will see that it doesn't matter to which faith block they belong.

Tonight my almost 18 year old son came home from school. He has been visiting various post secondary institutions to get a feel for them and for the programs they offer. He has been heavily encouraged and assisted and guided at home to ensure that he has a selection of reserves and can pick a path for himself.

Tonight he said to me "Dad, you know how you have been helping me to get out to these post-secondary functions to figure out what I want to do and where to do it? Well one of my friends at school is doing the same thing and tonight he needs to attend a local presentation by some Quebec-based University. His parents are Jewish and because its Passover they cannot leave their house to take him and they are asking me if,  as I have a driver's license, I could take him. Its out in West Vancouver (far side of the inlet then a long way west). They are saying I could drive their car...."

Well..........my back went up immediately and I needed to work out why, so we had a conversation which started out with "You have only just got your driver's license and it makes me nervous enough when you head out into traffic in our car, let alone someone elses that you are not familiar with and have not driven before, so No, that is not going to happen.

Then out came the story that "He cannot go by bus because he won't be able to get home; the buses don't run out there after 8pm." To this my only reply was "and this is therefore your problem.....why?"

Next came a discussion that my son is days away from his International Baccalaureat and Provincial exams to graduate High School, and needs every minute to study, uninterrupted, at this time. The other lad is apparently a "brain" and a "nerd" and doesn't need to study to guarantee a good performance. Again I tried to point out that my son's exam success is more important than being someone's taxi-driver.

The next discussion was part of the other parent's well laid plans. "well if you don't want me to drive their car they have offered to "pay for gas" if I drive our car" !!  I see, I thought to myself...suddenly finding that we are now involved in getting their son to his post-graduate information session. I have NO clue who this family is, by the way.

It was at this point that I brought up the subject of abjectly stupid religion. If this parental couple care about their son's further education, then surely for this one time abberation they could alter their observances and look after his needs without inconveniencing someone else? The night slashers of 2011 probably wouldn't be hunting for them if they showed their faces outside this evening. It also dawned on me that if they are so devoutly religious, then why is their son being allowed out to attend something his parents do not consider vital or worthy of supporting? Then I thought... Taxi?

There is a hugely hippocritical double standard here being applied to the life and standards of this young man's formation and expanded by the inconvenience, at a bad time, of  innocent bystanders.

My son is a generous kid. He understood all my points and said he realised that they were all very good points, but knowing that his friend really wants to find out about this Quebec based University, he thought he may be able to help him out and wanted to do so.  That, as I told him, is an admirable thing and cannot be argued with, but I wanted him to be aware of the construct under which this has grown, and to reason through it and recognise the hippocracy of the entire thing. I hope that he also will have the guts to discuss this with his friend. I certainly intend to take it up with the other boy's parents.

 So, based on his final words about helping out a friend, which at the end of the day is the only real and valid issue here for me, we got the address of the location, entered it into the GPS so that he can drive in this totally unknown area to him and find his way home easily in the dark. We set it up in the car and asked him to call on arrival and again before leaving. I am still waiting for the arrival call.

The lesson here is don't use people and don't be so slavish to the formalities of your religion that they bind you into a state of servile uselessness. Be responsible.

I hope we have dealt with this lesson responsibly.

Educationally topical.....

Interestingly there was a large spread in the newspaper today saying how a degree is really needed for an entry level position these days. On seeing that, my wife commented that the receptionist in her office has a degree. There was also a full page article on why its a good thing for society that people need degrees to get entry level jobs.

My blood boiled. On leaving school at 18 you have to go into debt to pay into a system for 4 years  and make no money for 4 years, just so that you have a chance of getting a slightly above minimum wage starter job which doesn't pay you enough to pay back the debt, or set up a modest home for yourself in overpriced rented accomodation, let alone plan for any sort of a future.

This is a criminal conspiracy!

You'd do better at the age of 18 to go steal something, go to jail for 4 years where your accomodation and living costs will be met, where you will be encouraged to better yourself and where your tuition will be paid , then graduate with your diploma and criminal record  (frame them both and display with pride) and go out and join all the rest of the criminals out there. Any employer should be happy to have you. You have shown early initiative and you obviously think just like them!

Wake up people!!!!!

I definitely have more to say.