Every summer, for the past 70 years, I crossed the border into Canada to my family’s small cabin on the Madawaska River in Ontario, three hours west of Ottawa.
The river is all that Canada says it is: slate blue water, clouds that look like bulging cotton, the loons calling out their mystical cries in the middle of the night.
I have been to the beautifully seductive Victoria in western Canada and relished the images of the Pacific Ocean licking the cliffs and pines, and I admired the famous 121-year-old Butchart Sunken Garden.
I have been to the province of Prince Edward Island in eastern Canada with its lush farms that nearly spill into the ocean, and I saw the beauty Lucy Maud Montgomery saw as she created Anne of Green Gables.
Yes, Canada is known for its natural beauty, but also for its vibrant cities.
I’ve been to Vancouver, British Columbia, a city that looks like a silver bracelet dangling between English Bay and the Fraser River.
Vancouver is rightfully called the city of neighborhoods. You can walk through the world of nations from neighborhood to neighborhood: Little Italy, Greektown, the Punjabi Market, Chinatown, Japantown. The population of Vancouver is a mixture of united nations: Europeans, Asians, Latin Americans, families from the Middle East and Africa, all citizens of their heritages and citizens of one of the most beautiful countries in the world who all live under the beautiful red maple leaf flag: Canada.
I’ve been to Toronto. I’ve read that half its residents were born outside Canada, and there are over 200 ethnic origins proudly living their lives under the smart parliamentary democracy that holds that the law is the supreme authority.
You want music, theater, art, flower shows, festivals: See Toronto, one of the world’s most influential technical hubs, a world center for business and media outlets, headquarters to the largest banks in Canada, home to the internationally recognized writer Margaret Atwood, and home to the Toronto Blue Jays, who currently lead the Yankees in their division at the moment.
I’ve been to Ottawa, Ontario, the capital, a city with internationally superior museums, and the Rideau Canal that rivals Venice and the Parisian Seine, a city of lights in the evening, and the changing of the guards by day at Parliament Hill, a place where people ice-skate to work in the winter, and swim, fish and hike in the summer.
Ottawa feels like a city in a snow globe in winter and a city that seduces you in the summer with its music, top restaurants and with its warm, welcoming people.
I’ve been to Québec City, a true French city. Old Québec is just as good as Old Paris. The Château Frontenac is considered one of the most photographed hotels in the world.
Walk through Old Québec and you will think you are in a different world, in a different century. Old Québec is the only walled city north of Mexico.
Stroll along the streets in the Petit-Champlain district, and you will encounter one of the most charming collections of shops, boutiques and restaurants all collected together like dream-town Canada.
I have been to Montreal during Queen Elizabeth’s visit in 1967. The Canadian people treated their queen with love, respect and with their deep sense that a ruler who is compassionate and smart, and a leader of and for the people, deserves their support and respect. Kings and queens, presidents and prime ministers earn respect not by force and ego, but by exuding kindness and dignity, intelligence and compassion.
Each summer, while sitting on our small beach on the Madawaska River, I think back to the many people of Canada I have met in the past 70 years — local people and city people, people who love their children, and summer campfires, people who enjoy winter, laugh about their national bird, the mosquito, people who respect nature and feel a deep sense of gratitude for their natural resources, and for the freedoms that they have and that they exercise with joy.
Canada is a country with a rich history, a country where religious diversity is celebrated, where ethnic diversity is welcomed and encouraged, where people love their lives according to their own sense of personal duty and goodness under a flag that respects the individual and also clearly represents all that is good in the idea of a nation.
Every summer, I was given the privilege to visit Canada since I was a boy. Just recently, my wife and I introduced our 6-year-old grandson (who wanted to catch a lot of fish) and our 3-year-old granddaughter (who wanted to see a baby loon) to the cabin, to the river, to the giant clouds and to the citizens of good Canada. We will even introduce them to poutine, the famous Canadian dish made of French fries topped with cheese curds and gravy.
Canada, the 51 state of the United States? Nonsense. Can you imagine the prime minister of Canada saying, “We want to make Maine the 11th province of Canada. Maybe we will just take Alaska. It’s part of us geographically anyway. We may as well take that as well and call it the 12th province.” Absurd.
Is Canada going to take over Michigan and force the children to pledge allegiance to the Canadian flag? Silly.
I think the people in Washington, D.C., ought to read the lyrics in the Canadian national anthem: O Canada, we stand on guard for thee. God keep our land glorious and free!
The people in Washington are truly ignorant about the strength and will of the independent Canadian people.
The people in Washington don’t even know the difference between Putin and poutine.