Young friends

All of my swim buddies are at least 15 years younger -- some as much as 30 years my junior -- and I have always wondered why?  Why do they want to hang out with -- or at least tolerate -- an old lady like me?  "A sense of humour erases age," said B yesterday.  Ah, it finally hit me!  How brilliant, yes, that's right, if one has a sense of humour -- preferably a self-deprecating one -- people like to hang out with you.  Of all the gifts and flaws bestowed upon me, a sense of humour is definitely one I treasure.  B also has a lot of more youthful friends and acquaintances and trust me, his sense of humour is very well-developed. 

But that's not what's on my mind today.  What I want to blab about are residential schools.  Again.  Reading 'The Globe and Mail' this morning, I caught an obscure piece about residential schools in a small town in India and how they are transforming the lives of impoverished children of the "untouchable" class.  They are being hailed and lauded for educating these unfortunates and teaching them English to give them a chance at life outside their birth lot. 

The natives here in Canada denounce the very schools that taught them skills they otherwise would not have acquired -- skills that have enabled those who embraced them to become anything they wanted.  If they wanted to return to the reserve, they could, but if they wanted to become lawyers, doctors or teachers, they could do that too. 

I call them "boarding schools" everyone in B's family attended from the age of seven on.  Was their sexual abuse?  Of course, but research on Canada's boarding schools for natives has now proven that the perpetrators were mainly other native children, not necessarily teachers or priests.  Child sexual abuse tragically goes on everywhere.  Look at that Canadian "Order of Canada" recipient now being held in an Asian jail for abusing children under his care.  Many of us have been raped or sexually assaulted.  The trick is not to dine out on it forever and allow it to ruin your life.

That's why I have no time for the MMIWG enquiry going on across this country.  What good does it do to cry and re-hash it over and over?  Just get on with it.