Oh Canada . . . Our Hopes Had Been So High

*** continued from previous post ***

"Our area really has more in common with British Columbia and Western Oregon than we do with Wenatchee or Ritzville. There was even a movement a few years ago to break off the western portion of the two States into a new State called 'Cascadia'. I think northern California may have been in there too. Not a bad idea, but it never really caught on. And we are very different than Florida. Or Maine. Shoot, even Kansas and Iowa for that matter. So to say that Texas is representative of anything other than Texas isn't really right."

I was hoping I was getting through to them, because the effort of genuine communication, with nary a smart-ass remark nor highly amusing bon mot to pepper my speech was making me nauseated. It's not the way my brain works. I hope they appreciated the sacrifice I was making on their behalf to further international relations.

There were contemplative looks, confused looks, but none that I would really call convinced or even with a glimmer of understanding. Dammit! I would have to relate this in a more Canadian way if I wanted my point to be accepted.

"Look, here we are in Alberta. But do the people that live here have a ton in common with British Columbia?"

"Actually, quite a bit," Terrence said.

Oh Terrence, don't make me take back all those wonderful things I was thinking about you.

Then inspiration struck! Oh, I knew exactly how to make myself clear! I had an ace up my sleeve.

"Okay, that may be. But how much do you share in common with. . . Quebeckers? You know, French Canadians?"

And then - as they say in the vulgar - boom went the dynamite.

This was no building of emotion. No small dissent that grew into a chorus of contempt. No, this was a gasoline tanker and I had opened the hatch and threw in a match. And a blowtorch. Then poured on lighter fluid for good measure. Our group went from polite, grinning, laid-back nature lovers to a raging mob. A mob complete with red faces, torches, pitchforks, and horrible pent-up resentment for difficult childhoods. The transformation happened in flash. About as fast as a Tele-evangelist repents when caught with his hoo-hoo somewhere it's not supposed to be. Rumblings and growls sprang forth round the table like awful dandelions in spring. For a moment I thought we would have to flee the room lest we become the target of their repressed northerly rage.

Bicycle guy, who I would later find out was named Charles, was the first to make his voice heard over the din.

"Fuck the Quebeckers!"

Whoa!

Rather than ostracize the man for dropping the f-bomb and having a non-politically correct viewpoint, everyone, much to your mom's and my surprise, jumped on the bandwagon.

"Oh God," Jackie said, "don't get me started on the Quebeckers."

Now I had always had a certain amount of disdain for the French Canadians because . . . well, I'm prone to carry a grudge and they're French. But I figured this was my own particular peccadillo, not one shared by - if this group was representative and I had no reason to doubt they weren't - the entirety of Canada outside of the city of Montreal and the Province of Quebec itself.

I looked at your mom who sat there with a stunned expression on her face.

Oh you Canadians! How dare you dash our deeply held stereotypes! Have you no shame? Where are the gentle, easy-going, polite people that we have made up in our heads? How dare you make us suspect that you are NOT the only sane nation on earth, but populated by humans just like everywhere else.

Oh Canada . . . our hopes had been so high.

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