Many Happy Returns

Isn't that one of the good-cheer responses when one hears of a birthday celebration? "Happy returns". What exactly might that mean; to return year after year to the recognition and celebration of one's auspicious introduction to life? How about when one reaches the venerable age of 141? Wouldn't that be some occasion? Don't know if I'd enjoy celebrating that as a personal birthday occasion; no one has, as yet. Mind, some of those who've exceeded a century of life appear to exhibit all the hallmarks of fully functioning cerebral activity.

The 141 years of celebration accrue to Canada. That huge geography and melding of immigrant populations into a fully functioning liberal democracy, under the guise of a constitutional monarchy is marking one hundred and forty-one years since Confederation; its embrace of the geographical masses we now count as ten provinces, three territories. This land is blessed with an immense display of geological features, from our frozen northern tundra, to our rocky mountain vastness, our rocky prominences sitting on the Atlantic and everything between.

We've huge tracts of unspoiled wilderness, boreal forests that suck up so much of the world's discharge of carbon dioxide. We have clear, and pristine lakes, fresh-water sources the envy of the entire world. We have grand prairie spaces on which our farmers grow some of the very best soft- and hard-wheat in the world. Our natural resources include large storehouses of mineral deposits which the country has mined and sent abroad for the length of its history. We have the traditions and the folk tales of our aboriginal peoples, their art and their culture.

We are a relatively modest people, as vast social cultures go. We're not given to overt boasting, nor chest-thumping in avowals of superiority over others. We are not innately given to demonstrations of national pride, although we do have much pride in our nation. We have a long and proud history of friendship with many other countries of the world, many of whose values we share. We are members of the British Commonwealth, holding in great esteem our past as a Commonwealth country.

Originally a population of largely rural dwellers, a huge shift has taken place over time - reflected in large part throughout the world - and we've become urban, and suburban dwellers. The highly productive and always under-valued family farms have given way to the relentless impact of farming conglomerates, although we've recently come back to an appreciation of the reliable output of our farming communities many of which now are enclosed in the embrace of extended municipalities through a process called "amalgamation".

At the time of Confederation there were thousands of post office outlets throughout the land, to ensure that Canadians were given the opportunity to communicate with one another, and as a means by which business was conducted through mail-order operations. In our modern era, commerce and business and communications have been enlarged and improved upon, and the national postal serve has seen a steep decline in demand. There exist now 40% fewer postal outlets than a century and more earlier.

At Confederation and well beyond, the country had a booming birthrate, through its indigenous peoples and those who immigrated to the country to become new Canadians. That has changed dramatically - another social phenomenon seen reflected in many other countries of the Western world and beyond - and the Canadian birthrate has declined steadily and steeply, necessitating more than ever that the workforce be supported by ever higher immigration numbers.

Canada's immigrants originally came disproportionately from western and northern Europe - the settler-immigrants - all identifying as Caucasian. A trickle of migrants were permitted into the country as labourers with no right to anticipate the opportunity to apply for permanent resident status, and they came mostly from the far east; impoverished workers anxious to earn a living for their families and working under the most deleterious of conditions. Canada was emphatically racist in her early years.

When immigrants arrived from eastern Europe they were sent to the far-off boondoggles of the country, out west, to break the land and prepare it for farming. Their prodigious efforts in establishing western Canada as farmland, the vestiges of their original cultures, their traditional social habits yet colour the Canadian west. During the era of black slavery in the United States, the Underground Railway was established where desperate blacks were spirited out of America and into Canada through Nova Scotia, a long and dangerous journey to freedom.

Until the last half-century, Canada remained a deeply racist country, and anti-Semitism was openly practised. People of colour were viewed with suspicion and dislike, the fear being that whatever was essential about Canadian society would be irremediably tainted by the presence of "exotics" from abroad, people from other cultures, with other, little-understood traditions which held no interest for the greater population of mostly English, Irish, Scots and French derivation.

But then, between them also there was suspicion and irksome dislikes. Canada was known for its "two solitudes", a separation and distance - in culture, traditions, historical underpinnings - between English-speaking Canadians and French-speaking Canadians. Although great efforts were put forward in the last half-century to address the gulf that exists between anglo- and franco-Canadians - the two founding nations - eruptions of distrust and angst between the solitudes still occur.

But this is a country with a population now comprised of a multiplicity of origins, traditions and customs, with various religions practised freely and openly. Canadians have become accepting of others, have welcomed differences into their fold, have offered friendship to visible minority populations, and take pride in our diversity. The recognition of the enrichment of Canadian society in shared and newly-appreciated differences has made the country a comfortable fit for many people fleeing persecution elsewhere.

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantee just that; rights and freedoms. We are assured fundamental freedoms; of conscience and religion, thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other means of communication, along with freedom of peaceful assembly and of association. Our democratic, mobility and legal rights, along with those of equality are given us legally, under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. We relish and treasure those rights, hold them tight to our collective bosom.

Now - July 1, 2008 - the country is celebrating its birthday. Canadian flags, not seen in overabundance normally, are being hoisted aloft and flown as a sign of pride. Canadians are patriotic and proud of their country, its history and traditions, but we are not nationalistic. Community celebrations revolving around public entertainment and events for children, winding up with fireworks displays have been planned throughout the country.

And on Parliament Hill talented Canadian entertainers have been lined up to sing their hearts out for an appreciative public; thousands upon thousands of white-and-red clad Canadians, all happy to be involved in a giant birthday party.

Happy birthday, Canada!