Source/Credit:Calgary Herald
By Rick Hanson | December 23, 2010
On July 1 this year, I had the good fortune to attend the Canada Day event at Prairie Winds Park, hosted by the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community.
In my opinion, this is one of the premier Canada Day events hosted in this city.
It's a community festival replete with EMS equipment, fire trucks, firefighters and police officers with police equipment all in attendance. There are speeches from prominent politicians and games for the kids. The temple provides food for everyone in the community who wants to attend.
It is one of those community events which represents the best of Calgary and is replicated all over the city on this special day. It is a time when we pause to celebrate Canada as the amazing country it is, and Calgary as an incredible city. A city that can retain such a strong sense of community, even as it continues to grow to over a million people.
On that day, there were hundreds of people in attendance representing all religions, races and walks of life.
When the speechifying was finished and the party was getting started, I noticed a boy approaching me at breakneck speed using his walker to navigate through the crowd. He was so excited and when he reached me, he fell into me and gave me a huge hug. The kind you cannot help but return.
Although I couldn't understand all that he was saying, it was clear he was happy and excited with all of the events that were happening around him.
Mere seconds later, a kindly, soft-spoken woman approached me and introduced herself as the caregiver of the young lad. After talking for a few moments, I realized that she was with a second, younger child, who was shyly holding his distance and being very quiet. I went down on to my haunches so that I could engage him in conversation. I guessed that he was about five years old and slightly built.
I received consent to pick him up and realized that he was perhaps 40 to 50 pounds in weight and very calm. Although not speaking to me, his hand was carefully feeling the "bling" on my uniform shirt. His caregiver laughed and warned me that if I was not careful, I would find myself missing a tie clip or a name tag. She then advised me that the young lad I was holding was actually 16 years old, and had been born deaf and blind and with a variety of health issues, and the other "boy" was actually 33 years old.
She had become the foster mother to both boys shortly after their births, and has been their primary caregiver since then. She mentioned that the demands of caring for two high-needs youths were intense and very tiring, as the work was never ending.
At the conclusion of the event I was in my truck, reflecting on the events of the day.
It struck me that there are such incredible people who live in this city. People we would pass on the street, and not know anything about them. Rare people, giving of themselves every day, every month, year after year. People who are so profoundly compassionate and unselfish that they seldom think of the huge sacrifice that they are making every day. They are so modest that they will never see themselves as the angels they are. They are the people who will never become wealthy but who, by their very actions, make society richer for all of us, for the true worth of society is measured by how we treat the least among us.
When I was asked to write this column for the Herald Christmas Fund, my ruminations took me back to Canada Day this year and to this beautiful woman. It caused me to realize that not all of us could possibly have the patience, compassion and the special gifts to do what she does. But all of us do have special gifts of our own. And perhaps most among those gifts is to have the ability to look after our family in a way that allows them to have every opportunity in life.
Our jobs frequently cause us to focus on the day-to-day tasks that form part of our work responsibilities. But, as we enter the Christmas season, it is timely for us all to look beyond the frenetic activities of our work life. It is a time to look around us and realize that there are so many people less blessed than we are, and who can use our help.
The Herald Christmas Fund provides us with the opportunity to really make a difference to those who can benefit the most from our generosity. Let us not forget that there are those among us whose everyday life is in service to those in great need.
And like Mrs. Brubaker, with two high-needs kids, the daily demands never end.
For the rest of us, a gift today in recognition of the holiday season can make the difference for someone, of a Christmas fondly remembered or one most easily forgotten.
Calgary is an amazing city with an amazing heart. Please give generously to the Herald Christmas Fund.
Rick Hanson is Calgary's Chief of Police
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Read original post here: Time to use our gifts to better our community
2010: suicides drop by 35pc, deaths up by 1 pc
ReplyDelete"Hence, the casualties suffered by the law enforcement agencies in the 2010 suicide attacks remain 14 percent of the total deaths - 1,224. Of the remaining 436 Pakistanis killed by the human bombs this year, 151 (or 12 percent of the total killed) were Shia Muslims, 103 (or eight percent of the total casualties) were Ahmedis or Qadianis while 81 (six percent of the total killed) were Barelvi Muslims."
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