At the east edge of Banff National Park is the town of Canmore, at the east edge of which stands the Alpine Club lodge. We were “getting away from it all,” and a high school group was there too, with the smell of green nettles drifting in the open windows, the feel of earthy zephyrs, the pretty sounds of chirp—“SHE LOVES YOU Ya, Ya, Ya” and “I can’t GET no, sat-is-FACT–ion” The teens had brought a radio. I looked at my unsatisfied companion, grinned my biggest, stupidest grin and like talking to a baby I said, “When people go on vacation they want to do the same thing they do at home.”
I was only joking off the cuff, but now I think I accidentally said something philosophical. For example, South Florida has a wonderful green ocean for swimming in, surfing too, and long hotels like a dotted line along the shore road, and each hotel has a long swimming pool, just like tourists can enjoy at home… Similarly, back home I like books, so during my stay in Fort Lauderdale I entered the library… Actually, I needed relief from the ongoing low-grade atmosphere of crime, and I knew delinquents with switchblades would have no interest in books. Now I know why so many American tourists remark on Canada feeling safe.
What if I was a travelling salesman, driving off the highway into a strange new town, with a culture festival going on to the right of me, another to the left of me? If back home I watched football, then surely I would steer into the parking lot of the local bar and catch all the excitement on the big screen. Alright, maybe I’d do a teeny tiny bit of culture—but then I’d hit the sports bar!
I’m sure that if I were an avid golfer—but I’m not, I’m sadly missing out—and if I was staying in a new city, then I would go straight to a tourist information booth for a map showing all the golf courses. I suppose it would be too much to ask for a map to the local libraries… unless maybe I was in silicon valley.
In other words, I can understand if some teenagers forgo rustic camping in favour of glamour camping, “glamping” they call it. I can’t describe it; as I’m more of the “old school” myself, but I can forgive others for glamping at the tent site next to me, at least as long as their portable radio has headphones.
In fact, call me a sensitive new age guy, SNAG for short, but hey, it’s part of my sensitive, high self-image to be more accepting than most people. Yes, I can pat my self on the back, a good self righteous pat, for being nonjudgemental… of those who can’t leave their familiar town to try “roughing it” in a new world, or new civilization… except… I just can’t stand the progressive anti-capitalists who will boldly go line up in the Moscow cold for hours to see Lenin’s preserved body…
(Incidentally, half of those lined up are tourists, as the locals aren’t as enthralled by communism)
…Because I know full well: Those same socialists can’t “rough it” by “traveling” in space-time by reading a book set way back during my boy hood, or, more recently, during my young man years. Apparently my people in that time, my un-rich, un-middle class peers, “being of our time,” are too horrible for activists to be around, in a book.
Of course I am glad our culture has discovered the horror of war and racism and sexism and phobia and transgenderism—queerly enough, all within my own lifetime—but that shouldn’t stop me from visiting, with respect, my relatives still marooned back on the old homestead. I mean, I wouldn’t have a lifetime if they hadn’t given birth to me: So I could grow up, grow my hair out, and educate them that war is bad and we should give peace a chance. Why our parents didn’t know that already is something I never figured out.
I would tell the progressives: Let’s not forget all those outer space shows, and the Twilight Zone, where they land and find a town set in the past, complete with music from a carousel. Are the astronauts supposed to sniff judgementally at the folks being “of their time,” and turn around and leave again, before they even say hello? I wonder how the woke folk can be oblivious to their (non-dialectical) contradiction: They enjoy the glee of being self righteous justice “warriors” but they won’t be tough enough, warrior enough, to read a book where an invisible observer is surrounded by the milieu of, the bigotry of, Tom Sawyer’s world. They won’t respect Huckleberry Finn enough to read about him; they won’t go with Finn on his river voyage to get racially liberated.
You may recall that in the end, amongst his God fearing culture, Finn decides to go down to hell rather than betray his grown up friend, “N-word Jim.” I sure wish male activists, fully respected within their little niche of fellow woke warriors, would display even half the guts of Finn, who was able to stand alone.
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Sean Crawford
Somewhere above the rainbow,
February,
2024
Blog notes:
~Actually, nearly all the nasty, judgemental, woke warriors are ones I have encountered not in books or magazines but on blogs and social media. Maybe they are not at all representative of activists in the real world. You think? If you know any good ones in real life, let me know.
~A couple posts back I wrote a review of the movie Poor Things. Since then I have not only added a couple of current equal rights footnotes, but I’ve added a footnote for film critics, because I am getting more hits on that post from Britain, possibly from folks I met at the Curzon art film theatre in London’s Bloomsbury district.
