Life As Performance Art 179

I tend to shy away from trying to solve all the world's problems, even if I try to come forth with some of my own brilliant ideas from time to time. But it's really all too complex, I am one person, and only one person, with almost no influence, and poor single persons of a certain age living in social housing, like me, are always going to live at the bottom of the hierarchy and we are going to be treated by almost everyone else like those who live at the very bottom and we will be always regarded as such. I write this blog in the hope that at least someone who has even just a little more influence than I will take just enough interest in what I am writing, will come to recognize my unmatched brilliance and originality of thought, get a lovely aha moment with my deft turns of phrase, and perhaps could bring my written brilliance (or tiresome screed) to the attention of others who might have even just a little more influence, or at least that their own thinking and way of seeing things will be so tweaked or inspired or challenged that maybe this will help send them in a certain direction of life that will be both redemptive and impactful to themselves, people in their circles, and maybe even in this world. Or maybe it will just give them something to laugh about. Better than nothing, I suppose, since this world could often use all the laughter it can get. I can only hope, Gentle Reader. On the other hand, there are also the daily annoyances that can make life a constant slalom. For example, the elephant who lives on my ceiling. All apartment dwellers who are not blessed with living in a penthouse or in a top floor unit have to cope with rampaging elephants that walk, run, dance, skip, stampede and jump up and down in erotic joy and unfettered delight every single day on top of our apartment and condo ceilings. This one decided to get frisky at six this morning and she has been a constant irritant for years. There is also the fledgling seagull with its rusty hinge squeal, a chronic constant and nagging squeal at its poor tired parent birds to keep feeding it, and he lands on the roof or ledge of the building next door (which has a lovely selection of problem tenants) where he squeals and squeals and squeals day and night and this is one of the many sounds of autumn in Vancouver. If there is ever a case for a truly ugly bird, it is going to be the fledgling seagull, mottled brown, fat and squat, with none of the grace or legendary elegance that it will eventually grow into over the next year or two. If ever I find myself forgetting that I am a vegetarian, if ever I would love to have a shotgun handy, Gentle Reader....Ah, the sounds of nature! but these are such as the trivial quotidinal annoyances that we all have to live with, while wishing, or presuming that we could solve all the problems of the world. Because this is not just the voice of the powerless, but the voice of powerlessness itself. We can scarcely solve our own daily annoying little problems and yet with a couple of shots of caffeine in a nice little coffee shop, or worse, a Starbucks, or even more abominable, in a Tim Hortons or a Mcdonalds we can sit around all morning with our coffee shop friends, as if we are high ranking elected government officials solving all the problems in our community, our city, the province, the nation, the world. We ought to be working for the UN. We ought to be running the UN! If this is how retirement is going to look for me, sitting around all morning in coffee shops with other old farts carping and postulating as though all the world is hanging on our every inspired word and utterance, then, I don't know what I am going to do. Maybe just keep writing this dreck and otherwise shut up, go for long walks, keep making friends with nice neighbourhood cats and dogs and practice my Spanish with the squirrels and the crows. Here is my idea de jour for solving the problems of my nation. This is an idea for restructuring government in a way that no single party can enforce its agenda on the seventy percent of Canadians that neither voted for them, never would vote for them, nor want them in power. How about limiting partisan politics only to the election of MP's or Members of Parliament. They can go on representing their electoral districts to their hearts' content, but they will not, nor should be allowed to make or set or enforce public policy. For the most part, they are politicians, and usually only qualified to be politicians, because that is all they are good at, and should not be permitted to come anywhere near the portfolios of economics, housing, health, the environment, justice, etc. It is the way the prime minister and his cabinet are selected that is problematic. When we had a Harper Conservative majority for most of ten years, the seventy percent of Canadians who could not stand him or his government or policies had to cope while his hand-picked cabinet ministers basically set this country back decades. And no one could do anything to stop him. It's been somewhat better under Junior and his Liberals, but his arrogance, his spoilt white rich boy privilege, and lack of ethics have been problematic. So, here's my brilliant idea, Gentle Reader: let's do federal voting more or less the way we do city and municipal. That's right. In every city council you have often councillors of diverse political stripes and philosophies and ideologies having to work together, especially in a City Hall so politically diverse as the current administration here in Vancouver. The prime minister should be independent, nonpartisan, and voted for specifically and individually by the electors. Likewise, each cabinet portfolio should only be filled by a candidate who is independent, nonpartisan and carries all the skills, the CV and the resume and related experience, education and professional expertise that would make them the ideal pick for said position. And each cabinet minister would have to be elected, like the prime minister, by the people. I think this kind of reform would do much to break the stranglehold hegemony of majority governments elected by a minority of voters. Worth a try?