Loss of Freedom

September 11th has come and gone again. We will never fully return to the freedoms we enjoyed before the terrorists attacks in 2001. It is not just the loss of all the people who lost their lives in the attack including the 24 Canadians, we have lost freedoms we took for granted. One loss is the ability to travel with ease across the American border. Prior to the attacks, Canadians enjoyed travel with only a birth certificate or driver's license as ID to the USA and many other countries including Mexico and Cuba. This was prompted by this event. Currently we can still cross the USA/Canadian border by land transport with this type of ID. This ends in 2009. We will need to show a current valid passport to cross the border which is now only required for air travel.

Our passport office in Whitby has staffed up to accommodate the surge in applications expected to meet this criteria. Recently I had to attend the office to apply for my new passport and was surprised to see how efficient this service has become by receiving my new passport delivered to my door by post, just over a week after completing the application process in the office. This was not the same quality of service I received in the Scarborough office six years ago. Folks, take advantage of this opportunity now and miss the lineups and delays later.

My partner Gary and I were driving around our neighbourhood down by the lake in Whitby the other day, when Gary commented on recent observations he has made about our neighbours. We are both in our late 50s. As children we enjoyed the freedom of walking, playing and riding our bikes around our neighbourhoods without supervision. This is not the case now. Children are accompanied by parents or caregivers and taught that strangers are bad people. We have always cautioned children about strangers but now we rarely allow them to put to the test what we have taught them, afraid they will be kidnapped or worse, never to be heard from again.

What can we do to install trust and confidence in one another again?

Until next time.