Get liberal, Liberals

There’s a tall, mature maple tree about 100 metres off to one side and behind the house here at Hope Ness.

Underneath it is a large area of rough ground covered with wild grass and underbrush, and a thin layer of soil and moss. Only by venturing in, pushing aside the many small branches, would you discover the old rock pile. We started digging there for rocks last week to make a border for the new flower garden beside the house and discovered buried treasure.

I wonder if it takes a certain inclination of mind, and even spirit, to see what interesting things rocks are, each one in its own way. Did the Greigs and the Butcharts, the pioneer homestead families that cleared this land many years ago, stop as we did to marvel at the different patterns and textures?  Continue reading →

New provincial legislation to curb violence at work

The wheels and gears of government often grind and turn exceedingly slow in response to pressing socio-economic problems.

Anyone who has been in the workforce and worked at different jobs for many years, as I did, has more than likely experienced workplace harassment and violence in its various forms either directly or indirectly. I had a warehouse boss once who liked to squeeze buttocks as probationary workers stood beside his desk and he pointed out mistakes they had made. Back in those days, nobody complained, for fear of “not making” their probation. He had developed the habit during the war years when most of the workers in the automotive parts warehouse were women; and it simply carried on after the war when it became an all-male staff again, as it still was when I worked there from the mid-60s into the mid-70s.  Continue reading →