Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Death of the Gentlemen

OK enough with the jibber jabber and banter from my travels, because I want to take a moment to have a rant about something that gravely concerns me.

My parents came to visit me in Canada over the past week, and it was such a blast. You see I don’t consider my parents as normal. They are the kind of parents who you can get drunk, tell rude jokes, and just generally have a laugh with. In fact we had a really great time playing Buckaroo with my dad after he had passed out on the sofa, and for those of you who don’t know what ‘Buckaroo’ is, allow me to enlighten you. It’s basically a toy horse which you attach various items to in the hope that you won’t be the person to make it buck, because if you do, hilarity ensues and you loose the game. So with my amazing explanation in mind, consider a passed out father who is getting wine boxes, pizza boxes…and even a chair stacked on top of him. He certainly had a shock when he eventually came to.

So like I said, with my parents you can just relax and enjoy their company. But now I come to the main point of this article, because you see, my mum is currently hobbling along on crutches after tragically breaking her leg about two months ago. In fact it was quite worrying at one stage because the doctor feared she may have to sacrifice coming to Canada altogether. But luckily she managed to get her cast off and head on over for a little holiday.

During their week we rented an apartment in a central location, so that everything was within a short tram ride away. So often we would face a tram full of people. They would watch as my mum struggled up the steep stairs of the old fashioned but still effective streetcar. To my horror…they would look down as she approached, so much so that in one incidence we had to walk to the back of the tram and she had to stand for duration of the journey!

This is a woman on damn crutches…technically a disable woman, whom is, or at least could be, in any amount of pain. Yet these people had the nerve to sit there and pretend they hadn’t noticed. Just as if that news alone wasn’t bad enough, I specifically remember that most of the time it was women who were sensitive to the plight of my mother. Now I’m not sexist, but I think it’s important for men to remain men damn-it. We should be the ones to relinquish our seats before women even have a chance to react, why? Because that’s what men should do. They shouldn’t just sit there whilst multiple women offer a disabled woman their seat, it’s wrong, it’s immoral…it’s damn-right selfish. And don’t think I haven’t notice you turn your heads and pretend you were always looking out the window, because I can see that you just want to keep your weak ass firmly where nature didn’t intend.

I don’t mean to come across brash or offensive, or maybe I do to those people whom are guilty of this. Maybe they genuinely hadn’t noticed the woman in crutches struggling to keep her balance as she made her way cautiously down the carriage. Maybe I’m getting it all wrong, I just think that even though we live in an equal world shouldn’t there still be things that men just do…open a jam jar for instance, change the punctured tire in the rain, carry the majority of shopping bags so the woman doesn’t have to. Maybe I’m a bit old-fashioned like that, but I hope that the majority of men are to.

Rant over.

The victim of Buckaroo!

Mum and Rheannon at Niagra on the Lake

Trip to Niagra Falls

3 comments:

  1. That's Toronto for you. The shame of Canada. I bet you will find Ottawa more compassionate.

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  2. Next round of Buckaroo, might I suggest, babypowder. Lots of layers of gently sifted powder. :)
    Hey wait, who does the clean-up?

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  3. It happens here to dan, and why I hate public transport. When a tube, train or bus if full very very few people with five up there seats for some one with crutches. And to be told your in the way if in a wheelchair. Xx

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