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To Integrity and Beyond

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A New Year’s social commentary

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Vizzini: He didn’t fall?! Inconceivable!

Inigo Montoya: You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

These quotes from The Princess Bride could just as easily have been about the word “integrity” – it does not mean what many of us think it means.

Integrity is defined by Webster’s Dictionary as “the quality of being of sound moral principle; uprightness, honesty, and sincerity.”

Integrity comes from the Latin integritas, meaning complete and entire. It was the word the Legionnaires would listen for when they struck the armor above their hearts to test its material wholeness. If the Centurion heard a solid ring, he would shout “Integritas” indicating that the armor was sound and that the soldier was protected in his service of the community.

According to the historical researcher J.D. Kern, the less than moral Praetorian Guard, the Roman emperor’s equivalent of the Nazi S.S., changed this ritual to a “Hail Caesar” indicating their devotion to a man and not to an institution and its code of ideals. In modern times, this bastardized tribute to integrity was replaced with “Sieg Heil” in 1930’s Berlin or “Heil Trump” in 2016 Charlottesville.  Integritas had lost its integrity.

Let us propose to take back the origins of this wonderful word. The synonym for integrity is ethics, which means “morality, morals, decency, principles, values; a code of right and wrong, a categorical imperative. Let us further propose that we demand integrity from ourselves, our family members, our community leaders, and the professionals with whom we deal for education, health care, news, and appliance repair.

Now, keep in mind, integrity can be a double-edged sword. If you define integrity as “firm adherence to a code of moral principles” then Donald Trump could be said to have integrity – he has not wavered from his code of “Lie, sue,

and attack until you win!”  From his perspective it would show a total lack of integrity if the Donald told the truth.

We often take the moral high ground with the phrase, “Speak Truth to Power!” The truth, it appears is dependent upon one’s perspectives and code of ethics, or lack thereof. Fundamentalist religious terrorists and mercenaries could be said to possess integrity, as we said of the Crusaders during the “Holy Wars” of the Middle Ages. If you were Christian, these men were heroes; if you were a Muslim Saracen defending the Holy Lands with integrity, the Crusaders were barbarian savages.

If the truth is all about perspectives, then integrity is a moving target, as difficult to achieve as going beyond infinity.

That phrase, “To Infinity and Beyond” comes from Buzz Lightyear, the Toy Story character who is shouting to everyone that he can do the impossible. Perhaps “To Integrity and Beyond” is an impossible dream. If one person’s commitment to truth and integrity may be perceived as another person’s road to hell, then everything is relative.

In the end, we can only judge those measures of truth and integrity by our own beliefs. Perhaps others do not share what we consider to be our search for intelligent dialogue and fact-based reports. Perhaps some see as “true” what we see as incendiary “Breaking News” and sensationalized gossip and innuendo and alternative facts and truthful hyperbole.

I asked a wise mentor years ago, what I could do as a young teacher to make the world a better place. He responded simply, “Teach your students First Aid. Then they will see others as people they can assist and protect. They will see themselves as people who care for others.” It sounded so simple, but he was right.

We still struggle with that level of care. Call us judgmental, but when we see a bully threatening someone, when we encounter prejudice, when we see someone in need of first aid, do we intervene or walk away? What is the shade of integrity that moves our values into action? We realize that all cats are grey in the dark, but sometimes we just want to see the world in an easy choice of light versus darkness, good versus evil, “us” versus “them”.

As my mother used to say, “Sometimes there are just bad people in the world. Karma will thin the herd.” Sometimes, we have trouble waiting for Karma. We dream longingly, every once in a while, about the hungry, impatient vulture sitting in the bare tree branches of a Gary Larsen cartoon, “Patience my ass! I’m gonna kill something.”

Perhaps when we ask our elected representatives. our media spokespeople, our fellow citizens to show us “Integrity and Beyond,” we are asking them to do the impossible. Perhaps, but it’s worth a try. I

Like the ancient Legionnaires defending Rome, it’s worth the quest this New Year 2018 to rediscover the true meaning of integritas. iAnd it would be so much easier if we all learned First Aid.

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Skid Crease, Caledon

Fighting Fire with Fire

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This political satire was first prepared for Just Sayin’ Caledon

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There is a new horror story in Town … BEAKS! Just when you thought it was safe to walk back into the coop, it turns out that those pesky Backyard Hens are pyromaniacs at heart, just waiting for the chance to turn themselves into rotisserie sacrifices for Colonel Sanders.

In Part One of this trilogy, titled Get Crackin’, Henny Penny and Chicken Little had squawked about the Backyard Hens waging biological warfare on Caledon.They raised fears of salmonella poisoning wiping out our children and avian flu spreading to our factory farms and wiping out our economy. That turned out to be false. The proverbial Fox News in the chicken coop, so to speak.

Now, in Part Two, Henny Penny is back at it again, this time raising fears of Caledon burning to the ground from unattended chicken coop heaters. Henny Penny reportedly found a story on her favourite Backyard Chicken site on the dark web. Some person improperly heating their coop sadly lost their pet chickens in a fire that nearly spread to their house. Note to self: 1. Don’t build your residential coop close to your house. 2. Don’t heat it.

Fortunately, Rooster Cogburn researched fire safety in Ontario, Canada and found the following: zero fatalities from backyard chicken coop fires. Turns out the number one cause of fires is home cooking, especially those deep fat fryers used for southern fried chicken and chips. In fact, cooking, smoking and arson were the top three causes of house fires, with heating equipment, electrical malfunction and candles coming in at the end.

You are, therefore, in greater danger of burning down your house and the Town by cooking your chickens than getting fresh eggs from them. Fortunately, your chickens, in a properly built coop, don’t need winter heating. The exception being their water supply. That, of course, you will make sure is on a Ground Fault Interrupter (GFI) circuit.

Chickens can withstand cold winter temperatures, especially our hardy Canadian breed, the Chantecler. Also, lighting and heating their coop over the winter will only force them into egg laying in the season when the girls should be getting a break. If the nest box area is insulated, the floor covered with deep shavings, a little passive solar input for sunny days, and the ventilation properly situated, your hens will be just fine. They are, after all, wearing down jackets. Keep the door to the run open in the daytime, because you’ll find them out playing in the snow – nobody likes to be “cooped up” all winter.

In a really cold snap, like the one we are experiencing now, a single 60watt red light bulb (available from any pet store as a reptile heat bulb (about $20.00 for a 2pack) will do the trick. NOTE: Do NOT use a white light bulb which will throw off their winter diurnal cycle and force unseasonal egg laying.

Do not do stupid things, like heating the coop with candles, or a wood burning stove, or an open filament electrical heater, or a gas BBQ. It’s to be hoped that the caregivers are smarter than the chickens. Most of us in Caledon who are interested in backyard hens won’t be starting up until the spring, so we have months to prepare to do it properly. For those who need to see it in action, visit the Albion Hills Community Farm this spring where the two model demonstration coops will be open for viewing. For those wanting more information now, contact Ontario Ministry of Agriculture Food and Rural Affairs for your FREE resource kit on backyard poultry titled “Keeping Your Birds Healthy” :  ag.info.omafra@ontario.ca

Note to Self: order a resource kit for Henny Penny…

Above all, please remember the old adage: good research does not mean pressing Google on your computer screen and going to the first site that appears. If we did that, everyone with a headache to diagnose would have concluded that they have a tumour, or meningitis, or subdural and epidural hematomas, or cerebral venous sinus thrombosis. Oh, my! And please remind Henny Penny:  If you play with fire, you’re likely to get burned.

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Skid Crease, Caledon

 

 

 

 

 

‘Tis the Season

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A few weeks ago, my wife and I joined up with the Caledon chapter of the Bruce Trail Association for their annual Pot-Luck Walk and Talk. I had the good fortune to be asked to give the late lunch talk and share stories from over forty years of hiking the Bruce Trail with students and family

The morning hike included the chance to reconnect with some old friends and meet a lot of new ones on our Forks of the Credit journey that morning. One of those reconnections was with Sally Moule, a fellow teacher from North York in the heady days of Outdoor and Environmental Education when our students could actually experience the Bruce Trail.

Conversation turned to getting ready for the holiday season and we mentioned that we would be looking for a balsam fir tree the next weekend. Well, as luck would have it, Sally and Dave Moule run the Hockleycrest Farm on the east side of Airport Road, about 4.5 km north of Hwy.9. Beside a wide variety of cut-your-own and precut trees, they also have assorted boughs, baskets and wreaths available. And “all proceeds go towards the Bruce Trail’s Conservancy Program to secure, protect and maintain a continuous corridor containing the Trail along the Niagara Escarpment.”

Not only that, but their woodworking son, Rick, turns and carves custom wooden bowls and utensils, one of which will stirring my bourguignon this weekend. Ah, the joys of hiking outdoors – a reconnection with friends that blessed us with a tree, a spoon, and a Trail protected. All from accepting an invitation to a pot-luck luncheon.

Only one week to go until we celebrate a Wonderful Winter Solstice and a Happy New Year!  May yours be healthy and happy and filled with peace.

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Skid Crease, Caledon

Caledon’s Hens Come Home to Roost

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This afternoon, November 28, 2017, at the Town of Caledon General Committee Meeting, the rooster crowed. Well, figuratively speaking. Our Backyard Hens by-law came closer to being a reality today when the vote was carried by a majority of our elected representatives. The rooster, however, was not invited into any of our backyards – this is a quiet clucking Hens Only club.

Thanks to the excellent report done by our Town Staff, headed by Patrick Trafford, we came up with a by-law tailored specifically to the Caledon context. Drawing on the best information available from other municipalities who have similar by-laws, Patrick and his team put together an intelligent and thoroughly researched report.

Input came from local citizens, experts in other municipalities, and discussions with the Region of Peel Public Health Unit, the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. All of this was hard-boiled down into 32 Regulations for Residential Backyard Hens. This alone should curb the compulsive immediate gratification enthusiasm of the “They’re so cute! Let’s get a bunny for Easter!” crowd.

These agricultural “pets with benefits”, as one long term backyard hen aficionado has described them, have better care guidelines than most of the dogs and cats living here. Their housing, health care and safety were paramount in the design of the regulations, as well as the health of their human caregivers and neighbours. As to the fears of salmonella poisoning and the spread of avian flu, those concerns were dealt with by the Centre for Disease Control with three words: Wash Your Hands.

It seems that in the three months since we first raised this simple health solution, along with not rolling in chicken feces or deep kissing your hen, some Councillors were still having trouble processing how truly safe it is to keep backyard hens.  And the new Town guidelines have set down best practices to help us do it even better. On the other hand, after your cat buries its poop in scratched up kitty litter and then walks all over your face while you’re filming its cute antics on your cell phone for an Instagram posting, do you ever worry about cat-scratch fever, Salmonellosis, roundworms or tapeworms from your cat’s stool? Or, how about man’s best friend?

Sure, after your dog has just cleaned the private parts, that same tongue gives you a big wet slobbering kiss that just might contain Leptospirosis, Canine Brucellosis, Campylobacteriosis, Capnocytophaga Canimorsus, and our old friend Salmonellosis. Yes, a dog’s tongue does have antibacterial properties – for cleaning up its own physiology!

Cats have staff, dogs have packs, and hens have eggs – organic (depending on the feed), free run (not free-range) home grown eggs. Keep in mind that if you are ordering your chickens it is best to go with a reputable hatchery like Freys in St. Jacobs, or Cirrus Farms in Meaford. They won’t usually be selling them now, but you can call in your order in February and pick up those ready-to-lay (RTL) pullets in March as we will be doing for the Albion Hills Community Farm pilot project.  We’ll be there to help educate the public on how to do it just right.

Congratulations, Caledon! Our dreams of having the opportunity to expand our local food production just got a little more sustainable.

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Skid Crease, Caledon

 

 

 

What the heck is a SNAP Project?

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Note: This SNAP West Bolton Project article was first written by Skid Crease on 17/10/25 for Patti Foley’s Just Sayin’ Caledon’s online community news!

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ON Thursday, November 23, 2017, at the Glen Eagles Golf Club. a group of “Thought Leaders” were called together by the TRCA, the Town of Caledon, and The Region of Peel for a day of inspired community planning.

The Project is called the Sustainable Neighbourhood Retrofit Action Plan, or SNAP. Our thoughts this day were focused this day on our own community in West Bolton. SNAP has a very simple goal: to focus on working with the community to achieve measurable environmental and neighbourhood improvement. This project is one of six SNAPs happening across the GTA examining municipal priorities, neighbourhood-specific issues and a variety of watershed and regional objectives across a range of theme areas that include:

  • Long-standing drainage and erosion issues in Jaffary’s Creek and the surrounding catchment.  Historical note: this Creek used to run past a slaughterhouse, carrying the effluent downstream – the smell used to be so bad that homeowners would have to close their windows and doors!
  • Improved water balance and Low Impact Development (LID).
  • Watershed regeneration (or, How to Mitigate flooding 101).
  • Regional urban forest and public health priorities.
  • Energy consumption hot spots.
  • Increased active transportation (walk, bike, board, zipline).

The Day opened with a captivating with a musical Red Heart beat accompanying inspiring visuals of the human community enjoined sustainably with the natural environment.  From there, facilitators Hilary, sister Lesley, and _ took us on a journey through our past, present and preferred futures of Caledon and specifically the West Bolton area.

The “Past” room was set up with an informative timeline, data charts and photographs that took us from our paleo past in 7000 BCE (Before Common Era) to the present. The “Future” room had us stretch our thinking to create a wish list of projects – economic development, healthy living, re-creational playspace, and resource efficiency – that would help us develop a healthy, sustainable, environmentally responsible community into the twenty-first century.

Of course, sandwiched in between was the “Present”, and rather than enter into the usual suspects discussion, Hilary took us on a right brain storytelling curve, left brain organized by the traditional plot development sequence for a good short story. We divided into groups of five and were given character cards that outlined each of the “characters” that we were to bring into our story, including one character designed to twist the plot.

I had no idea how this related to the present day West Bolton, but I trusted Hilary’s ability to choreograph a creative design approach. It was not until after lunch that we saw how it all came together – the stories turned out to be a metaphor for the current state of our West Bolton community. I was so taken with the brilliance of the approach that I expanded my group’s story and it is now on my blog at skidcrease.com, endorsed by Hilary, titled The Gardens of a Beautiful Mind. It will appear under “Stories” to make way for this report.

The Glen Eagles provided a nourishing lunch to the participants and demonstrated their environmental responsibility by keeping the thermostat turned down to what felt like 15ºC – the chilly rooms brought everyone closer together after lunch. That was when we found out the metaphorical nature of the characters in our stories.

For example, poor down and out Raju in my story, a character who had given up hope and was about to turn in the towel, turned out to be … no, you’ll have to read the story to get it. But what a mind-shifting exercise to get the participants looking at their community in a totally new way! Suddenly, giving the real “Raju” hope and a new lease on life took on the human dimensions of community care.

In conclusion, the group discussed the need to ensure that the community of West Bolton all knew that they were part of this opportunity, and to use their expertise in establishing a baseline of existing community benefits and needs. We were reminded of the KISS principle – Keep It Simple Stupid. Like when all that the children really wanted in their playground was a swinging rope with a tire on a tree, but what the “experts” designed was a cantilevered mechanical monstrosity on which no children ever played.

These thought leaders were humble enough to know that their ideas were part of a process, evolving through 7000 years of history to the Bolton of the future. Rejuvenated parks for play and just plain relaxing in nature, safe walking/cycling paths, networking of home businesses and the “love economy” provided by volunteers, retrofitting for energy and budget efficiency, education for wiser resource use, and working with the topography of the land to connect neighbourhoods – these ideas and more were left with our facilitators and the SNAP team. Stay tuned, West Bolton, it’s only going to get better!