Lögberg-Heimskringla - 15.11.2012, Síða 4

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4 • Lögberg-Heimskringla • November 15 2012
a small correction
Dear Joan,
Thank you for including
my article in the literary issue.
It was an honor to see our
names on the same page. But
I did make a big error. The
Icelandic national holiday is
17 juni and not the 14th. I have
been in Iceland on several 17
juni holidays. I ought to know
better. For the US it is 4 July,
for Canada it is 1 July and for
Norway it is 17 mai.
Now that I have established
peace among our nations, I
remain, yours ever truly,
George Hanson
Port Townsend, WA
recommending a Family tree
program
In the early stages of our
current 58-year marriage, we
were looking for a “Family
Tree” type program so that
I could identify my wife’s
many cousins vs. my six. I
found a program for about
$95 and she found one for
$29. Guess which won? And
how fortunate it was, since
it has a feature which I have
never seen on other programs.
Photos and documents, for
everybody on the tree, are
linked to the person. In other
programs these are embedded
in the database file and this
becomes huge and slows
down. I think some programs
may even limit the number of
photos per person.
The linked photos and
documents reside in separate
folders on the computer.
Each folder holds a myriad of
photos of any person on the
tree. I make new folders when
the latest one gets so full it’s
hard to find the photo I want
for a new link. There are about
70 folders for photos and 20 or
more for documents: letters,
diaries, obituaries, newspaper
articles, etc.
The current file status
is 7,602 people, 2,980
marriages and 4,281 photos
and documents. I continue to
scan, edit where necessary
and save new (to us) photo
jpg and document files to
the computer. We also have
backups and complete “Tree”
data duplicates in separate
computers. I think the earliest
photo we have is of my English
great great-grandfather, prob-
ably taken about 1860 when
he was searching for a second
wife in Canada. In the Tree
we have my wife’s 33rd great-
grandfather, Ulf the Fearless,
circa AD 800.
Beside all that are the
boxes and envelopes still full
of family photos of recent
years. All our own, (kids,
sailing, vacation trips), my
parents’ photos (Dad was an
early Leica and later a Zeiss
enthusiast), my late sister and
her family’s photos; photos
by the ton! I have a wonderful
scanner that can smoothly
handle photos, slides,
negatives and printed text.
I don’t get a fee from the
company of choice but will
cheerfully give this out to
any interested person. Not
expensive as well.
Don Young
Sudbury, ON
ddyoung@sympatico.ca
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ASSOCIATE EDITORS
Like everyone else on Planet Earth, through the last days of October
I watched countless images of
Hurricane Sandy footage, read
yards of print coverage, listened
to days of radio reports. I have
been left in awe by the power of
the storm, bereft over the lost of
life – things can be replaced but
humans cannot – and left, beyond
feeling the horror of the unfold-
ing events, with a question. Why
can’t we do it all the time?
Do what?
Here’s one what. Almost
400 workers are heading
to the north-eastern area of
the USA, from the western
states, from Canada, and from
Mexico. They’ll be helping
to rebuild power lines, poles
and transformers to get power
back to the millions – literally
millions – of people who lost
power during Hurricane Sandy.
That reminds me that in
1998, hundreds of Canadians
from across the country rushed,
generators in hand, to Ontario
and Quebec to get power back to
people who were living with the
aftermath of the giant ice storm.
In 2002, when the Canadian
prairies were deep in drought
and cattle producers were in
desperate need of hay, eastern
Canadian farmers from across
Ontario and Quebec sprang
into action. There were truck
loads,full train loads of hay that
came from the east. I remember
that one because I was in Quebec
at the time. My daughter, Inga,
and I were pulling our kayaks
out of the Ottawa River when
we met a couple of French
Canadian fellows, neighbours
of Inga’s, people she knew
slightly. Inga introduced me as
her mom from Saskatchewan.
They both promptly asked me
about the hay situation, and told
me that, as urban dwellers, they
had donated money to cover
shipping hay to Saskatchewan.
Yes, they were fully informed,
and more than willing to help.
“We have to work together,”
they said.
So, is it surprising that
now, when Ontario is facing
the drought, that Saskatchewan
prairie farmers are shipping hay
bales east? Not at all.
But perhaps the most amazing
image was the President of the
United States and candidate
for re-election as president, a
Democrat, with his arm around
the Republican governor of
New Jersey, the man who had
introduced Mitt Romney at the
Republican convention. Neither
man playing politics. Both of
them praising the other for
non-partisan helpfulness. The
two of them working together
and brushing off reporters who
wanted to know what their secret
agenda might be. The reporters
and pundits worked very hard
to find some offensive motive,
to suck the joy and goodness
out of the moment, but the two
men stuck to what they believed
– that in the face of a disaster of
monumental proportions, there
was absolutely no room for
politics or politicking.
Three tiny churches in the
Vatnabyggð area – Wishart,
Wynyard, Foam Lake – raised
more than $4000 over one
weekend, with no advance
warning, when the earthquake
hit Haiti in 2010, all because
they knew someone from
Saskatchewan who was involved
in working for an orphanage in
Haiti, knew he was going there
and could deliver the money
personally, and wanted to help
in a personal way.
So, here’s the question. If
we can do it during disasters,
if we can be loving, generous,
thoughtful, caring, in times of
great need, if we can become,
truly, one world-wide family
during tragedies, why do we
become a bunch of Grinches,
Scrooges and Wicked Witches
of the West the rest of the time?
What propels us to do good in
times of great stress, when we
could achieve much more if we
could learn to spread out our
time, our efforts and our cash
when times were good, when
we could help to build up, to
mitigate some of the situations
that cause the problems, rather
than devoting all our efforts to
rescue?
If Barack Obama and
Chris Christie can take off
their political personalities and
see each other man-to-man,
why can’t the rest of us do it?
Why do we expend so much
energy in hating “them” (pick
a social class, an ethnic group,
a religion, a language-group,
a profession, an economic
class, a gender – your choice)
rather than looking for ways,
as Obama and Christie did,
to work together to facilitate
positive change?
What eats away at us? And,
more importantly, how do we
stamp it out, get vaccinated
against it, find a screen to keep
it out? That isn’t even a selfish
wish. The polling people and
doctors all agree – people who
are involved in positive ways
with other people, volunteers,
donors, people who reach out to
other people, are the ones who
are healthier, happier, and more
contented with their lot in life.
Joan Eyolfson Cadham
Editor
Reflections Why not all the time?
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