The best gift you won’t find wrapped up under the tree this year

This is a very different Christmas and holiday season for all of us everywhere. There are no Santa Claus parades, no Christmas parties, or at least there shouldn’t be and there will probably be a run on small turkeys to adorn much smaller dinner tables. Many are grieving loss. Celebrations associated with all faiths are being subdued, in some cases cancelled.

The pandemic has made it an absolute necessity to stay home if at all possible, socially-distance and comply with all the protocols to stop the spread of Covid19.  While technology allows us the means to connect virtually, it is sad that we can’t physically be with family and friends, it is exhausting for first responders and frontline workers and it is devastating for those whose incomes are suffering.

 We do what we can to support local businesses. Budgets are tight and shopping, where permitted, can be a stressful experience. But that doesn’t mean we cannot and should not adapt to a new kind of celebrating, a new kind of giving. Sociologists and anthropologists tell us that these rituals play a major role in binding communities together and we certainly could use some binding together right now.

Dimitris Xygalatas is an assistant professor in anthropology at the University of Connecticut.  In an article on the university website UConn Today, he explains that ritual, “remains a powerful tool for promoting resilience and solidarity. In a world full of ever-changing variables, ritual is a much-needed constant.” He adds that new rituals in reaction to world or life events are just as important, pointing to people in cities around the world applauding health care workers for their tireless service during the pandemic or comedian Jimmy Kimmel and his wife encouraging those in quarantine to hold formal Fridays, dressing up for dinner even if they are alone.

As a Christmas baby, I have always celebrated my birthday Christmas Eve to try to separate it from the busyness of Christmas Day.  Well that created more busyness, but hey - it’s my family’s ritual and we are still working on how to change that this year.  Everything points to Zoom. So, why can’t we change the ritual of giving as well? Or add to it? Just maybe the best gift to each other is one that doesn’t even cost a cent. (Hmmmm…since there are no more pennies, the expression should become, “doesn’t cost a nickel, dime or quarter?” Let’s just jump to, “doesn’t even cost a loonie…or two.”)

There is a wonderful short story by O. Henry called The Gift of the Magi (Candlewick Press). It’s about a poor young couple, Della and Jim, living in a tiny, spartan New York City flat in Victorian times, who skimp and save to buy each other the perfect Christmas present: she a gold chain for his prized pocket watch, he a comb for her lovely, long hair. Unable to afford either gift, he sells his watch to buy his beloved the comb and she cuts her hair to buy her beloved the chain.

In his epilogue, author O. Henry compares the three wisemen who brought gifts of wealth to baby Jesus in the manger, thereby inventing the art of giving Christmas presents, to Della and Jim who gave up their greatest treasures for each other. Yes, the sacrifice was the gift!

More than a century after O. Henry’s death, his lesson is just as relevant, perhaps even more so. The greatest gift to one another isn’t always a comb or a pocket watch chain or anything else you’d find wrapped under the tree, but the gift of sacrifice. Whether it’s for family, friends or total strangers, as we isolate, sacrifice the hugs and socializing; as we shield our smiles behind masks and endure a little loneliness, knowing together, virtually, we can hasten an end to this awful chapter, that’s the ultimate gift we can give. That’s priceless.

O. Henry said it best in the final line of his story about Della and Jim:

“…let it be said that of all who give gifts, these two were the wisest. Of all who give and received gifts, such as they, are the wisest. Everywhere, they are wisest. They are magi.”

This December, 2020 let us all be magi so that one day soon we can unmask our smiles, hug one another and celebrate our rituals, old and new, together, really together, like never before. That will be priceless!

Connie Smith is a free-lance journalist, media instructor at Mohawk College and member of the Order of Ontario, who believes in the power of positivity.

View the article on The Hamilton Spectator website here

Former first responder shares recipe for overcoming PTSD… opening a bakery in a global pandemic

When Covid 19 landed on his doorstep the very month Keith Herechuk planned to officially launch a new business, the former soldier, Mountie and firefighter refused to retreat. After all, courage and determination defined him, at least it had before the new label that almost stole it all away: PTSD.

Post Traumatic Disorder is described as a normal human reaction to abnormal situations and it had been an abnormally life-crushing career for this self-proclaimed “ultra, ultra competitor”. “More than 30 times I almost died, been beaten up, lit on fire, attacked by dogs, threatened at gunpoint”, not to mention, almost crushed by his police truck.”

But people close to this young dynamo and dad only saw his sense of humour, his empathy for others. There is a TV news clip showing him rescuing a kitten from a fire.

Then came job loss and a close encounter with suicide. Today this 35-year-old former first responder has found a new source of courage and determination through his new bread and butter, literally.

After graduating from Hamilton’s St Thomas More Secondary School, Keith joined the Canadian Forces, following in the footsteps of his father, grandfather and great, great grandfather, a member of a Six Nations platoon, killed in WW1.

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Mom Teresa, remembers her son from age three, always drawn to anything with a uniform. “I knew he would always do the ultimate”, recalls dad Ed. And he did, starting with four years as an aviation technician. The RCMP followed. “Any team I tried out for, the most specialized and elite details in the RCMP, I made it. No one can stop me.”

He welcomed a secondment to a Tribal Police Service, in northern B.C., embracing the chance to improve the relationship between the reserve and police. His partner Mitch Thevarge, describes “stabbings, spousal assaults with axes, suicidal and violent people who just want to fight us…we are not prepared to see what we see.” Office manager Tammy Wallace says while she always tried to be supportive of the field officers, they hid their feelings, " very well.”

When Keith made it into the Toronto Fire Department, out of four-thousand applicants, it was the fulfillment of a high school dream. His captain, Mike Barrington says he was impressed with this former soldier and Mountie but when he heard what this new recruit had been through, he couldn’t believe he was still standing. Then came those calls.

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“What these calls tend to do is shake our sense of security. You think my God this could be my child. That’s the horror of our job.” Keith’s voice trembles today describing two calls in one week: a badly burned three-year old and a 16-year-old drowning victim. “You’re the guy that people go to for help. You’re not the guy upset about seeing that dead kid…You’re not the guy who is going to cry about it. You’re going to suck it up and go back to work.”

Looking back Keith remembers bouts of anger, once over a sock that fell on the floor doing laundry. He didn’t realize PTSD was starting to rear its ugly head. “Never in my life did I think I would be that guy who went off…I always felt I was exactly the right person for the job and now I get told that’s it, you're done”.
The following year Keith struggled with alcohol, drug abuse. “You’re a loser now. You’re nobody”, he told himself, describing months when he couldn’t leave his bedroom, “staring at the wall, crying mad... I couldn't talk, I wanted to die.”

After calmly planning to take his own life, it was an ordinary interruption that day by his wife Monique that saved his life. "I called anybody who could direct me to the right path,” explains Monique Herechuk. But even as public health nurse, navigating the system was daunting. “It was frustrating to see somebody you love suffer so greatly.”

If the professional help that was out there failed to connect with Keith back then, his Aunt Trish did. “Who is this man? He didn’t physically look like my nephew anymore”, describing that first visit but within six months of working with her at her Port Dover Bakery, “he was coming back to life.” That’s when she suggested partnering with her “favorite” nephew to open a second bakery in Hamilton.

When the pandemic hit, the search for suppliers led him to Mercury Foodservices of Hamilton, at the time, in need of customers. “We were in a tough situation due to Covid shutdowns,” explains Mercury’s George Papalazarou, “and any new business was welcome.”

So, just over a year after contemplating taking his own life, Keith donned a new uniform, an apron and opened the doors to Trish’s Gluten-Free Bakery Hamilton, May 25, 2020. One of his first customers was Victoria Baker (yes, Baker), a PhD student in Criminology and Social Justice at Ontario Tech University in Oshawa, studying the health and wellness education of police officers in Canada. Keith is now one of them. She contends it’s not just about prioritizing your own health but, “if you’re not healthy on the job, the interactions you’re having with the community will also suffer.”

The Mental Health Commission of Canada’s Working Mind program offers training to first responder organizations. Director Mike Pietrus says the reluctance to ask for help remains a major barrier to destigmatizing mental illness and for the past few years, more and more organizations are adopting the course as part of the job.

Peter Bloemendal of the Canadian Mental Health Association agrees the ultimate goal is to make all workplace wellness programs mandatory. The Hamilton chapter served 11-thousand clients last year and that figure is expected to continue to climb through what he calls an echo pandemic.

As for Keith Herechuk, he’s thinking big again: about taking over and growing the bakery business one day and if he can an inspire just one person by sharing his story with the message that reaching out is a strength, not a weakness, he’s happy and as his mom says, “That would be the icing on the cake.”

Connie Smith, “Always Good News”, is a free-lance journalist and media instructor at Mohawk College. Reach her at Conniesmith.ca

View the article on The Hamilton Spectator website here

We need to smile more than ever…..

I miss the real, unshackled, unbridled random smiles

Sept. 9, 2020

“It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald

They are the subject of so many famous paintings, songs and poetry. They are smiles and I miss them.

We see them in magazines, online, on TV and in old movies. Marilyn Monroe is quoted as saying, “A smile is the best makeup any girl can wear.” We can now see them through those clear masks that hopefully are helping people living with hearing loss by allowing them to read lips and some of those fashion mask-makers have added painted-on smiles but they are kind of creepy, no? All too often we see them in crowded places when we shouldn’t see them. We do see them in our little family or friend bubbles but not as much since COVID-19 came to live with us.

I miss the real, unshackled, unbridled random smiles. Smiles between co-workers meeting at the coffee machine, strangers passing in a hallway, stepping into an elevator, strolling through a park or in checkout lines in the store, smiles of students as we share a light moment in the classroom, smiles as committee members brainstorm ideas for the best charity fundraiser ever or rejoice with a ballroom full of supporters coming together to make a difference!

Behind the masks we are held hostage by our negative thoughts and emotions as we lament our losses: of life, health, work, joy, normalcy and hope. We are pushing through the changes in day to day life and trying to adapt to our new normal. I’ve written about this before in this space. My Purple Suitcase that I vowed to leave intact and ready to go on that vacation we cancelled the day our government issued the travel ban (I must confess I have taken a few items out since March 14 to get me through the summer. Who knew it would last this long?).

The smile is also something I’ve written and lectured about in the context of the power of face to face human interaction. Technology, as wonderful and magnificent as it is, allowing us to reconnect virtually, has left so many of us, especially the younger generation, alone together: texting instead of talking, gaming instead of playing. In an article written just a few years ago, academics I interviewed warned of a time when technology could eventually rob us of our ability to empathize. They hadn’t factored in how a global pandemic could further threaten the most basic and fundamental human experience, the exchange of a few intimate words, an arm around a shoulder, holding a hand, meeting eyes in a smile, the ability to feel for someone.

When I begin my journalism classes, we take a few moments to stretch, breathe and smile. Science tells us that the act of smiling, triggers the movement of certain muscles that cue the brain to release endorphins, happy hormones, a “Runner’s High.” Yogis tell us to picture your heart smiling to fill the spirit with positive energy. But smiling doesn’t just make the smiler feel happy. It is contagious, infectious! As inspirational author Roy T. Bennett says, “It’s hard not to feel happy when you make someone smile.” Today we stand apart, gather on Zoom, touch through gloves and sanitizer and mask our smiles.

Humanity has learned so much by embracing the change brought about by the pandemic. It has motivated scientists, engineers and first responders and, fingers-crossed, political leaders to help move us forward, strengthened, protected and enlightened by this experience. And what can the rest of us do? Be considerate of each other. Wear our masks, socially distance and keep smiling. Mother Teresa famously said “We shall never know all the good that a simple smile can do.”

What we can and must continue to do is find other ways to smile at others.

Connie Smith is a freelance journalist, part-time professor at Mohawk College and presentation skills specialist. Contact her at conniesmith.ca