When I checked BlueSky this morning one of the first posts I saw was from Canadian History Ehx:
In 2002, I was in journalism school at Loyalist College in Belleville, just a short drive away from CFB Trenton. In fact, I had been on base on the day the first forces said goodbye to their families before they left for Afghanistan. You walked into the room and you could feel the emotions. When this incident happened, the school year had ended, but I had been kept on to help run the student newspaper. This was my first assignment – go to CFB Trenton as the Prime Minister and the soldiers’ families welcomed them home.
Of course, all the national media was there as well, and it was really the first time I experienced being a part of that. Something bigger. Of course, the fact that I started journalism school in September 2001 made everything something bigger.
Despite my success in and enjoyment of journalism school, my journalism career never really got off the ground. I worked long hours at two papers for bad pay and decided to go back to school.
I chose political science and ended up working on the Hill for the NDP. I used to say I worked for Jack Layton, but a colleague told me once “we worked with Jack for the party.” I’m not a very good partisan, but I believed in Jack. Working in the war room definitely felt like being part of something bigger, but perhaps my most memorable moment came after.
Jack died in August of 2011, after the most successful NDP campaign ever, followed by a very busy party convention in Vancouver. I was off work, but quickly went into the office because I just needed to be with my people, but then when I got there I felt useless.
What I really remember, that one moment, was that night. There was a candlelight vigil around the centennial flame and at some point I ended up in the middle of hundreds of people, face to face with the team from the leader’s office. I’m not sure how we all ended up there together, but I remember the feeling of just looking at my people and feeling the connection and the loss.
At work recently there was talk of ‘being part of something bigger.’ I have had that privilege – of playing the smallest part in Canadian history. My time on the Hill stands out as consequential as we faced two elections, the coalition crisis, prorogation, Jack’s death, and I was an observer for it all. (Literally, my job was media analysis, so I was an observer).
Right now, as a Canadian, I feel that a bit of that as well. It feels like we’re inching towards a watershed moment, but I don’t know which way the chips are going to fall.