Hitting a milestone prompts a reflection

KAMOURASKA, QUE.—Montreal Canadiens great Jean Béliveau compared aging to driving a car: “When you’re young, the days go slowly: at 20 you are going 20 miles an hour, but as you age things speed up so at 50, it’s 50 miles per hour, and so on.” On Friday, I will be travelling at 70. It naturally prompts a certain amount of reflection. First of all, I don’t feel old. But then I realize I watched Elvis Presley's first appearance on Ed Sullivan in 1956 and the broadcast after the Springhill Mine Disaster in Nova Scotia two years later. In quick succession, there was the Cuban Missile Crisis, the American Civil Rights movement, John F. Kennedy's assassination, Beatlemania, Expo ’67, Trudeaumania, the moon shots, and the October Crisis. They are now ancient history. The generation that raised us after experiencing war and depression is almost all gone: we are now the “next generation.” Seventy is no longer elderly, given Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger are still performing. And I am blessed with good genes: my grandfather was an executive and his brother a surgeon at my age; to them, 70 was just a speed bump. Nonetheless, my grandfather told me the most difficult part of growing old was "burying your friends." I thought he meant in his 80s, but in the past 15 years I have lost my son, my brother, my mentor, my best childhood friend, close colleagues, and many others. With every knife slash of grief, I have learned to profoundly appreciate their lives, pick myself up and continue on. When I look at photos of my younger self, I see a stranger. If I could give him any advice, I’d say, “Be more confident, set realistic goals and, damn it, study harder.” And for those who offered encouragement, “don’t doubt their sincerity: these are the people you will thank decades later.” I would also suggest an appreciation for the things that are genuinely important: family, friends, music, art, travel. And those moments that take your breath away. I have made it this far with a lot of luck: I was saved from drowning in a friend’s backyard at six, kept a fellow climber from taking both of us down a crevasse in the Rockies at 21, grabbed the steering wheel when hitchhiking to prevent the driver from killing himself and me at 25. My “boomer” generation has its faults, but by any measure we accomplished a lot. I was the first person in my family to get a master’s degree; neither of my parents attended university. It is a common story among my peers, and our children are doing even better. Canada has changed enormously in my lifetime, from a small, rural, post-war country for whom Canadian culture meant the CBC and Radio-Canada, to a powerhouse that produces billions of dollars in music and entertainment. We have been blessed with some great leaders, many of whom I got to interview as a reporter, and work beside in Ottawa, Quebec City, Queen’s Park, and St. John’s, N.L. The benefits of technology, of the new economy, and the concern for our environment have transformed us as a country. We are rich in a way no one could imagine in 1952. But we face internal threats: the emergence of radical voices, of narrow-mindedness, racism, and parochialism. We ignore at our peril the problems of literacy in a knowledge economy, and we have to reconcile with Indigenous people in Canada. Canada’s role in the world has changed since the 1950s. While we were charter members of the UN and a military and diplomatic power then, we now boast of our memberships in the G7 and G20. But the current war in Ukraine should remind us to focus on core elements of defence, diplomacy, development, and trade, and not get sidetracked by fads or trends. When my father turned 90, everyone congratulated him. He humbly replied, "All I did was get old." That sums it up, but having caught COVID last week, I am grateful that thanks to medicine, I can look forward to the opportunities that lie ahead. For all of those “B-52s” who move into their eighth decade this year, I hope this finds you in good health. We are going downhill and picking up speed. Andrew Caddell is retired from Global Affairs Canada, where he was a senior policy adviser. He previously worked as an adviser to Liberal governments. He is a fellow with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and a town councillor in Kamouraska, Que. He can be reached at pipson52@hotmail.com. The Hill Times

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Hitting a milestone prompts a reflection

The benefits of technology, of the new economy, and the concern for our environment have transformed us as a country. We are rich in a way no one could imagine in 1952.

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