#fireflyshitposts

The year is 2001. I'm six years old, 9/11 just happened, and I'm starting to learn what America is. My father pulled no punches in teaching me about world issues, and as he's walking me to school he explains that America is very powerful. It's the most powerful country in the world, in fact. If it really wanted to, it could take us over in the span of a day and no one would be able to do anything about it.

"Why don't they?" I ask him.

My father explains that we're friends, and because we're friends the Americans have no reason to try to hurt us. Besides, says the cynical old man, Canada isn't worth much anyways, and America already owns most of it. Who cares about us?

I care about us, I remember thinking, but I was too young to articulate this thought further. Canada and America were friends, and that was comfort enough to me. Canadians after all are taught from a young age to value being kind to their neighbours, so it only made sense that America would do the same in return. I didn't know much back then about what it was like to lose friends, or what factors - sometimes completely outside of anyone's control - could drive friendships apart.

I can't say for certain, but I would hazard a guess that every born Canadian at some point becomes aware of the existential threat America has the potential to be in their childhood. Like me, they learned that Canada and America are allies. Why?

Because we share the same values - or we used to, at least.

I think that quote from Jim Goldberg's book was partially right: there are some people on this Earth who are too selfish to have any values. Sometimes those people attain power. Those are the types of people I like to refer to as "evil."

I hope that everyone who reads this takes it upon themselves not to become that person. My work always has been and always will be political. I will always be critical of Canada, because any good patriot should be critical of their nation, it is their responsibility to be. Anyone who thinks their leadership can do no wrong is falling into the honeytrap of blind authoritarianism. However I also find myself even more critical of the American administration than I am of my own country. America's president is threatening to economically destroy and then annex us - why wouldn't I be?

So here we are, Canada, a nation that sits within 100km of the American border, with ailing national defences and our elbows up. A nation whose prime export, when you really peel back the surface of it all, is soft power. If I can use that soft power to offer any advice to my American friends reading this (and yes, you are still my friends, even if your president is not), it would be the following:

Care about things besides winning and losing. Care about things besides revenge and punishment. Care for your neighbour. Care for the veteran. Care for the elderly. Care for the sick. Care for logic and reason, for quality education, for the environment. Care for the oppressed and for the poor, because while high social status may be aggrandizing, and while money may be helpful in the short term, it is real, human people who will care for you when your pride is gone and your money runs out.

Perhaps you don't need this lecture. Then again, maybe some of you do - I learned it for myself once. 18 years after that conversation with my father, I was homeless. A friend from high school let me couch surf until I got back on my feet. To this day, she hasn't asked for a cent.

She was my neighbour. She was my friend. She cared.

I know it's hard. It's exhausting. It's easier to turn away and pretend nothing is happening. It can be painful to care, but apathy is equal parts cage and jailor. To give in to it is to swallow the key.

People are only too selfish to have any values when they make the choice to be.