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THE HERALD OUTLOOK Saturday Septembers Page Steamer chugged away from truant officers If you have been reading this col on a regular basis by this time you know I can hardly read write or spell Ask the editor He knows The mistakes of spelling writing and addition are so ingrained there little that can be done Now don t get on the band wagon about it never too late to learn or point out many a senior citizen has earned a degree through adult learning centres or cor respondence courses If they have truant officers count me out My problem is I m a truant and I m afraid of truant officers Starting in Grade at old Chapel St School I had tall slender bobbed hair Miss Hume I watched her age overnight as she struggled to pound two and two into my head She met her match when I arnv ed that first day Horsemen would say I was rising six Stones by Steamer My interest in school was not the same as hers She wanted me to learn I wanted to get out and I often did If I was placed in the hall for disobedience I took off for home Then the bell was rung to signal the end of recess if I didn t feel like going back into my cell I didn So you see I don wont to get in volved in some program of higher learning where I might come face to face with a truant officer One Miss Frewer was enough for me She even pulled me out of a steamer truck in the back kitchen of our home and marched me off to school Miss Frewer could put any SWAT team to shame and her only weapons were her tongue and an old fashioned umbrella I can still remember my relu cant surrender when she tapped on the lid of that old truck and ordered me to come out with my hands up I didn t give up without a fight My backside was still smarting Economic growth a root cause of our disposable society By DIANE VANDE VALK Today s perception of economic growth is one of the root causes of our present day disposable society If a blender breaks after five years of use we are told that it will cost more to repair than to buy a new one So we discard the old one and head off to the store This injects money into the economy by pro viding jobs for the store keepers as well as the factory workers who assemble the components the peo ple who extract the resources and to make the components the ad ministrative people and so on We are now only just beginning to understand that there is more to the cost benefit analysis than simp ly jobs and economic growth The true costs and benefits of our disposable society are being felt but not yet measured through dwindling resources and en vironmental contamination We understand these issues in a broad sense but have not yet linked them directly to the way that we live With POWER from my mothers hand as Miss a step behind me poked and prodded with the metal Up of her umbrella at any sign of reluc tance or tardiness as I was march ed to school It must have been all of three days before I forgave my mother for revealing my hiding place Naturally in order to punish me for my absenteeism some sort of restraint was often threatened but never carried out Miss Hume knew and all the others who lived m dread of me passing into their classes a bait and chain held no mystery or fear They knew I pick the lock One punishment I remember in Grade 8 made me feel like the win ner Even the principal Howard Wriggleworth gave me the benefit of the doubt Once I was returned to school it was discovered I had not written one single solitary line of a com position on Mt Edith Cavell My punishment I would have to give it orally Duck soup un daunted I launched verbally into the majesty and history of the grand old lady with the hyperbolic lingo of a side show barker Howard let me go on The kids were rolling in the aisles They knew I didn know if she was located in the Rockies Andes Ap palachian or Himalayas I don know to this day If I had know then the old gal was shot by the German army in World War I I would have done another ten Once this connection is made peo ple will begin to change their behavior patterns and we will be on the road towards sustainable development The question is then What will cause people to make fun damental changes necessary to reduce our impact on environ Don t misunderstand me residents have readily ed the blue box program but residential recycling is just one of the many steps needed So far there are only two ways that I have heard of to affect this change 1 Education a proactive ap proach which will ensure that all of the costs and benefits of our NORTH END NISSAN 610 MARTIN ST 8784137 MILTON ONT Main Street South Downtown Georgetown 8731470 WILLOW LANE NATURAL FOODS 8533051 Willow St ACTON DENTURE THERAPY CLINIC TH Denture Therapist Mill St Georgetown 8778974 102Eat0r Caret tutor minutes When Chapel school was to be closed a chap by the name of Doug Price was the principal and had taken over from Val Stein for the remaining two years of the schools life He called on me to act as master of ceremonies at the official clos ing and good bye ceremonies I agreed I told him I was more familiar with the office than he was His exuberance in organizing the demolition party brought out the All of a sudden it dawned on me I would be up there helping to dismantle a lifetime of memories of people who taught me guided me even loved me Miss Hume Miss Lindsay Miss Young Miss Scott Miss Harrison Miss Miss Giffen Miss Frank Mr My classmates like Nora Williams Doris Armstrong Peggy Hornby Jose Kay Boyle Jean Harlow Faram Lois Neilson Margaret Harding Theresa Doyle Ron Latimer Don Early George Walker Vic BUI Kelly Betty Paul Chas Laws Eddie Doyle Kay Pearl Webster and I m sure I ve forgotten one or two would be my characteristic self at our last time at school I did exactly as expected I played hooky that day Miss would have turned a blind eye if she had been living choices as consumers are known Knowledge and common sense will then guide us to make the right choice 2 Crisis a reactive approach where change becomes essential and not simply a wise choice At this point significant damage will have already occurred Let s not wait for a crisis we must become informed and make the right choices now If SHOPPING SPREE VALUE STORE LIMITED EDITION MOSSY BRANCHES SPOTTED OWL by ROBERT BATEMAN 1 24 Main St S GEORGETOWN 8777654 meet TOP DOGS AT 1 PET CENTRES TURTLES KM THAI MB M flea collars 20 OFF 7 PET CENTRES BRINGING PETS AND PEOPLE TOGETHER BIRO TREATS 20 OFF PINE SHAVINGS NUTRIENCE PETFOODS SOLD HERE JSJHAGEN WICKER PET BEOS puisne NO 1 PET CENTRES Moore Part Plaza Georgetown 873 2666 Town Centre lap Brampton 840 And Over 21 Other Stores Across Southern