Black Days in May

The beautiful Minneapolis Art Institute. Photographed during a visit in 2014.

As I’ve been observing the violence and anger erupting in Minneapolis I’m remembering all the good times we have had in that city.

At a Vikings football game in Minneapolis

We have seen plays at the Guthrie Theatre, cheered at professional basketball, baseball and football games, visited the city’s fabulous free art gallery and enjoyed meals at amazing restaurants. We had so much fun with our boys when they were little at the Mall of America’s entertaining Lego Land.

With friends at a wedding in Minneapolis

We attended the wedding of friends in Minneapolis a few years ago which was held in a lovely little historic church and had such a special weekend.  

Minneapolis is a marvellous place but the New York Times this morning reminds everyone that while Minneapolis does have a rich cultural scene and one of America’s highest standards of living, decades of government decisions have discriminated against black citizens. Loan programs for buying homes have favoured white Minnesotans. In order to facilitate new infrastructure black neighbourhoods have been razed. The police force is predominantly white. According to another article in the New York Times, disparities in employment, poverty and education between people of colour and white residents in Minneapolis are among the worst in the country. I worked for the Mennonite Church as a volunteer in a Minneapolis inner-city playground program one summer more than fifty years ago and know first hand those injustices are long-standing. 

Police and Rioters, 12th Street, Detroit, July 23, 1967
Photo from  Walter P. Reuther Library, Wayne State University

The last few days I keep thinking about something my husband told me about the race riots in Detroit in 1967 during which some forty people died, thousands were injured and thousands of building were burned.  

Dave’s Mom picking tomatoes in their fields the 1960s

Dave’s family had a vegetable farm just across the border from Detroit in southern Ontario and when they were working in their fields they could see the smoke from the burning buildings in Detroit billowing in the sky.  It reminded them of just how close they were to a place filled with anger over racial injustice and inequality. 

Reincarceration by Kent Monkman- The building in the background is Manitoba’s Headingly Penitentiary

I think we would do well to let the ‘smoke’ we are seeing on our television and computer screens and in our newspapers remind us of how ‘close’ we are here in Manitoba to the same kind of injustice and inequality that is fueling the current violence just across our border in the United States.  Injustices like……

Manitoba indigenous men represent 15% of our general population and 75% of our prison population. Source

90% of the children in foster care in Manitoba are indigenous.  Source

Indigenous children living in Manitoba are the most impoverished in Canada  Source

There are Manitoba First Nation reserves with no indoor plumbing and no clean water supply. Source

Gordon Lightfoot wrote a famous song about the riots in Detroit in 1967 called Black Day in July. Sadly lines from the song still resonate more than fifty years later. 

And the people rise in anger
And the streets begin to fill
And there’s gunfire from the rooftops
And the blood begins to spill

And you say how did it happen
And you say how did it start
Why can’t we all be brothers
Why can’t we live in peace
But the hands of the have-nots
Keep falling out of reach

Other posts…….

Improving Education in Manitoba

My First NFL Game

Minneapolis Wedding

 

Kindred Spirits

Last week I spent a morning in Carmen Manitoba talking to a group of some twenty -five women about my life and travels.  Susan Mooney had invited me to speak. She and her husband Tom are long-time residents of Carmen, but Tom’s parents Isaac and Lottie Mooney lived in the Steinbach area from 1944-1980.  One Christmas Lottie gave her son Tom and his wife Susan a gift subscription to The Carillon and they have been subscribers ever since. Susan has been reading my newspaper column Viewpoint since I first began writing it in 1985.  She had always wanted to meet me and decided inviting me to Carmen, as a speaker for her women’s group, would be a way to do that.

I was interested to learn that the group, which meets at the Carmen United Church, has been in existence for almost forty years. Every Wednesday they invite a speaker to make a presentation and then they ask questions and have a discussion. In the weeks prior to my October visit, Theresa Oswald, a former Manitoba Health Minister had been a speaker as had Jean Friesen a university professor and spokesperson for the Treaty Relations Committee of Manitoba. The week following my visit Nilufer Rahman a Muslim community builder and filmmaker was scheduled as the guest and after her retired Canadian senator, Joanne Buth was speaking.  I was told authors Miriam Toews and recent Governor General award winner Joan Thomas had presented in past years.

The women began their meeting by introducing themselves and then answering a question posed by Susan Mooney. She said since she had always wanted to meet me she wondered who might be a person the other women had always wanted to meet. A number thought they would like to meet Queen Elizabeth while several named favorite childhood authors like Lucy Maude Montgomery, Beatrix Potter, and A.A. Milne. Others mentioned the Dali Lama, Michelle Obama, Margaret Atwood, and Eric Clapton. One woman was looking forward to meeting a refugee family that would be arriving in Carmen shortly. Hearing the women’s answers was a great way for me to get to know the group a little better. I told them I already felt like we were kindred spirits. 

In my talk, I used examples from my own life to expand on an idea I was first introduced to at my son’s university graduation many years ago.  On the journey of life we have a choice to be pilgrims or tourists.  Which will we be?   After my presentation, the women asked questions and made comments and their ideas and contributions were thought-provoking and meaningful.  During our lively discussion, I learned more about the women’s families, travels, reading preferences, community work and faith affiliations.

The women take turns bringing soup for lunch each Wednesday, so I was treated to a hearty bowl of hot vegetable soup and some fresh bread before beginning my drive back to Winnipeg.  The women in the group are busy with all kinds of other interesting things.  The woman to my left at lunch had come to our meeting from her yoga class and the one on my right told me she was headed off to a community choir practice.

Before I said goodbye the women posed for a photo with me.  I wanted a reminder of my morning with them. I gave Susan Mooney a hug and thanked her for inviting me. Two other women who also happened to be near the church door as I left gave me hugs too.  I left Carmen enriched, blessed and delighted to have spent a morning with such a group of caring, engaged and intelligent women. 

Other posts…………..

Strong Women

I’ve Been A Newspaper Columnist for Decades

Women Were Honored?  Think Again John Kelly. 

Why Do We Have To Blame Someone?

This is my Carillon column this week. 

Who is to blame?  Last week the headlines of provincial news media featured a story about a car accident that occurred during a funeral procession. Thomas Novak a pastoral worker for the Catholic Church was in a procession to a cemetery, when his car was hit on the passenger side at a busy Winnipeg intersection. Novak was shaken up but not injured.

However as a result of the accident he is calling for an end to funeral processions.  He thinks they are just too dangerous.  Funeral processions are a tradition still practiced in some rural Manitoba areas, but infrequently in Winnipeg, and consequently many drivers simply don’t know the protocol surrounding them. That invites accidents. I tend to agree with Novak.  If funeral processions are a hazard why have them, particularly at high traffic times of the day? Most families now lay their loved ones to rest in private services before or after the actual funeral. Often cremation has taken place and ashes will be scattered later so no trip to the cemetery is required.

One argument made for continuing funeral processions is that people might have a hard time finding their way to cemeteries without them.  GPS technology and Google Maps make that argument a moot one. 

This plaque near the Provencher Bridge in Winnipeg pays tribute to Lyle Thomas a worker who died while it was being built.

Another reason given for funeral processions is that they are a way to show respect for the person who has died. But there are many other opportunities for doing that, including publishing obituaries, making a charitable donation in the person’s name, planting a tree in their memory, erecting a plaque or carrying on traditions they started. 

What really surprised me about this news story was how it became such a big issue and how commenters on media sites immediately looked for someone to blame after reading articles about the issue.

The first targeted group was young people, who according to many commenters don’t have proper respect for traditions like funeral processions. Young people cause accidents because they are so busy texting they don’t pay attention.  Parents were also targeted for failing to teach their children proper respect for the law and for letting their kids spend too much time on their devices, so they become socially isolated and don’t understand social norms.

Another targeted group was elderly people who according to some commenters don’t quit driving when their health no longer allows them to drive safely, and are generally a hazard.  Manitoba Public Insurance was also targeted for not having stringent enough protocols for awarding licences and not making people retake their driving tests more frequently.  The RCMP was blamed for not enforcing laws more strictly to get bad drivers off the road and for not providing police escorts for funeral processions.

Another targeted group was newcomers to Canada who according to some commenters don’t know the traditions and cultural habits of their adopted country and haven’t become accustomed enough to driving here. The federal government was also targeted for letting too many immigrants into Canada.

Organized religion was also a target of blame. Some commenters said without the religious traditions and trappings surrounding funerals these accidents wouldn’t happen.

I was struck by the fact that finding someone to blame was uppermost in many people’s minds.  Why do we do that?   The funeral procession issue is just one of a myriad we could use as an example of how finding someone to blame and ranting about them seems to be the first response.   Why instead of laying blame can’t we have meaningful conversations, look at data, weigh possible options, propose alternatives, and find solutions?  Why do we always look first for someone to blame?

Other posts………

Pallbearers

Apartments for the Dead

Dead Yard Party

 

 

 

A Serendipitous Coincidence

I have a book review in the latest edition of The Manitoba Historical Society Journal and the magazine couldn’t have come out at a more serendipitous time. 

The book I was asked to review was No Man’s Land- The Life and Art of Mary Riter Hamilton, by Kathryn A. Young and Sarah McKinnon.  Mary Riter Hamilton a Canadian artist working in the first half of the 1900s led a fascinating life and was instrumental in helping to establish an art gallery in Winnipeg in 1912. 

Easter Morning-La Petite Penitente by Mary Riter Hamilton- c. 1900

The serendipitous thing is that an artwork by Mary Riter Hamilton, painted when she was studying in Europe at the turn of the century, is part of a new show that just opened at the Winnipeg Art Gallery called Defying Convention. That means I will have the perfect opportunity to share everything I learned about Mary’s interesting life story while writing my book review, with the people I take on tours at the gallery. 

What a wonderful coincidence!

Other posts……….

Talk About Defying Convention

Women Painting Men

A Serendipitous Sail

 

Bison Safari

My brother-in-law Paul and sister-in-law Shirley are visiting us here in Winnipeg.  We took them on the Bison Safari at Fort Whyte. 

Our guide was excellent, a veritable walking encyclopedia of bison knowledge. He hypothesized  that the near annihilation of the bison on the prairies in the late 1800s was actually a way to try to annihilate the Indigenous  people since they depended on the bison so completely for their way of life. We rode in a bus out to the large bison enclosure and followed the herd while our guide told us more about the bison.  We learned the difference between bison and buffalo.  Did you know bison are the largest mammal that can jump and get all four legs off the ground or that they can keep up a 60 km. running pace for more than an hour? We got to touch bison fur and learned it is so warm in winter bison don’t seek shelter even at 40 below temperatures. 

Dave is taking this sharp bison horn seriously.  The guide told us that competing males at Fort Whyte had once fought and one died after the other bison rammed its horn into his body. Bison horn was used  by the Indigenous people to make musical instruments,cups, powder horns, spoons and toys.         We saw the wallows that dotted the field, where the bison roll around on the ground in summer to get rid of biting insects

Our guide told us bison aren’t that smart and have a real herd mentality. Herds are led by cows not bulls. The bison’s sense of sight is poor but they have a great sense of smell and hearing.    

On previous visits to Fort Whyte the bison have been more frisky and we’ve been allowed out of the bus to take photos. That didn’t happen this time but hopefully our guests still enjoyed learning a little more about the plains bison the official Manitoba animal.

Other posts about bison……..                                            

Killing a Bison is Hard

There Must Be Fifty Ways to Use a Bison

Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Bison

 

I Golf For the Scenery

On the long weekend we went golfing in Pinawa and Lac du Bonnet with our friends Rudy and Sue. I don’t keep score when I golf. I’m there for the visiting and the scenery. And some of the scenery on the Pinawa Golf and Country Club course and the Granite Hills Golf Course was gorgeous.

I also discovered this really cool sundial in Pinawa across from the hotel where we spent the night.  It was designed in such a way that you could learn a lot about eastern Manitoba by walking all around it. 

Despite the fact our second round of golf ended abruptly after 12 holes because of non-stop rain I still had a great time enjoying the scenery and visiting with our friends. 

I golf for the scenery and the visiting. 

Other posts……

Visiting the Nikkels in Sarasota

Golfing at a Hudson’s Bay Outpost

Frank Lloyd Wright in Arizona