A rchive Date
[ 02-07-2000 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Canada ]
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[Waiter, bring me an Order of Canada
By VAL SEARS
Ottawa Sun
June 28, 2000
Over at the prime minister's for a drink the other day but he didn't mention my Senate appointment so I didn't bring it up. I did, however, say how swell I thought the clarity bill was and how I thought Senators ought to relax and enjoy their pay and perks without making nuisances of themselves.
It may be that the PM thought it best to let the applause for Betty Kennedy's appointment die down before I stepped up on the stage. Still when I got home, stuffed with carrot sticks and wine, I did fall to musing about the honours - and various public moneys - that have so far escaped me.
Some, like a National Newspaper Award, I can blame on the post office for losing my entry. But others seem to be a sinister conspiracy to dismiss those of us who are simply modestly mediocre. I was not abused at school, nor underpaid as a secretary. I was never a wartime seamen, nor an imprisoned ethnic.
I have tried repeatedly to find some reason for being compensated by a guilty government but to no avail. So I am left to count on such long-odds rewards as winning the lottery or finding a gold bar in a trashcan. Such prizes are available to all Canadians regardless of merit. But this somehow rankles.
Take the Order of Canada, which includes a rosette some of my honoured colleagues wear on their pajamas. It is offered for exemplary merit or achievement in some field of endeavour. That's all very well but what of those of us who are lousy with merit but have not reached the exemplary level? The Order, as it presently stands, has three grades, Member, Officer and Companion and glories in the motto: "They desire a better country." Now, you and I desire a better country, God knows, so what about a category for those of us who work hard, pay our taxes on time and retire to patient anonymity? I would like to propose a fourth category - friend - for us.
Barring a criminal past, or such psychotic behaviour as voting for the Alliance, we would all be eligible to go to Rideau Hall and be greeted by the governor general. What fun.
So far I have been able to comfort my honourless life by turning to Mark Twain: "It is better to deserve honours and not have them than to have them and not deserve them." But this is wearing a little thin.
When Stompin' Tom Connors gets to be honoured with a Doctor of Laws for, well, stompin', then I must think surely my time is coming. Being honoured, of course, is no guarantee of recognition. There was once a publisher, who shall be nameless to protect the guilty, who, ablaze with honours, attended a public banquet. The waiter put a pat of butter on his side plate. "I'll have two pats," the publisher said.
"No, sir," said the waiter, "you are entitled to only one pat."
The publisher reared back and bellowed: "Don't you know who I am? I'm the publisher of the Daily Blat, I'm rich and powerful and have medals and honorary degrees. Prime ministers and princes tremble when my paper speaks ...."
When he paused for breath, the waiter said: "Perhaps you don't know who I am, sir."
"No," said the publisher, puzzled. "Who are you?"
"I'm the man in charge of the butter."
So you see in the rich feast of rewards and honours handed out each day in this country some of us (sigh) have to be content with our one pat of butter.
Until we get a new waiter.
Sears can be reached by e-mail at valsears@magi.com.
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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