Finding a path from Nov 19th 2020

 “Do not go where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” 

Ralph Waldo Emerson

I've been doing a little searching for ways to connect with real people and let them know I care. I donate to charities and organizations that are helping people in many ways, but it seems to me that, while necessary, this is very impersonal. I write letters and send messages to the people we have elected for our government and yet while they always say they care the issues seem to take forever to get resolved. Coping through this pandemic is hard for all of us, and yet there are many people who have it much harder than the rest of us. While there are all kinds of untenable reasons, the specific issue I have been thinking about is the fact that many communities in Canada do not have access to clean water for drinking or washing. I try to imagine how difficult it would be to wash my hands 20 times a day if I had to boil water each time. If I had to boil water to bathe my children, to wash clothes, to prepare food.... and then if there were a Covid outbreak how much harder would it be to slow the spread?

It seems crazy to me that in this country of lakes and rivers, with great expanses of inhabited land there are communities with unsafe water. A simple search of "boil water advisories in Canada" led to this site: https://www.watertoday.ca/map-graphic.asp 

And a little reading into the site led to the not unsurprising statement:

"While transparency regarding water conditions in some provinces is poor, First Nations communities are in a worse situation, many of them living with the kind of sewage and water conditions seen in developing countries. Status updates on problem areas were not available until 2014, when Health Canada's website started publishing a more detailed list of advisories in First Nations and Inuit communities across Canada..."

So once again I write to our Prime Minister, to my MPs to the Minister of Indigenous Services urging them to do something now. I try to find charities and organizations to support and donate what I can. But I wonder... how do the people in those communities who are isolated from the rest of the population, and have lost faith in the government ever taking action after so many promises of help have been broken... how do they know that we care? We, and I'm assuming that many of us feel the same as I do, who feel helpless, who feel that if the government can't or won't do anything all we can do is complain.

I've only started my search and I don't know where it will lead me, but I do know if I stay on my narrow path of waiting for the government to take action I will be living small and that is a waste of the privilege and opportunity I have been fortunate enough to have been given. If anyone knows any individuals, organizations or resources that might help me connect or create an opportunity to personally show I care please send them to me.   I cannot promise that I will connect with all of them, but I know that if what I follow is what touches my heart, that will be the best guide marker for me to head off in the direction that I want to travel.

I think the quote above was from an impact statement from this website, and if it wasn't there are stories here that are worth reading and I'll track down the source again sooner or later.

https://reconciliationcanada.ca/resources/impact-stories/

Martin Luther King Jr. said: “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

Let us find a way to belong to this time and place together. Our future, and the well-being of all our children rests with the kind of relationships we build today.” – Chief Dr. Robert Joseph, O.B.C.


Cheers
Jeanne