Given that the definition of operation is 1) an act or instance, process or manner of functioning or operating; 2) the state of being operative, should not the sign state ‘Hours of Non-operation’ since closed is a state of non-operation?

And what does it say about the state of literacy – or should that be the state of illiteracy/functional illiteracy – in our society that this sign was posted at Clearbrook Library and presumably written by a librarian? When the keepers of our literacy do not or cannot use correct language in their communications with the public – are we not Doomed to sink into a new dark age?

And while this may seem to be a little picky…….there is a reason it is said: “We think in generalities, but we live in detail” and “In the successful organization, no detail is too small to escape close attention.”

Language – or the failure to think about what the language used by politicians, pundits and the media actually means or meant*; being unwilling to search out, examine or pay attention to the details and our wilful denial of the reality revealed by the details are what have created the society and government that exist today – and have us rushing headlong off a cliff like a pack of lemmings.

*For instance: the Harper governments 6% increase in funding for healthcare is not the same as increasing healthcare by 6% or even maintaining current levels of healthcare services. When the cost of healthcare services are increasing at a rate greater than 6% (as is the case in Canada) a funding increase of only 6% is a reduction of healthcare services; since a  reduction of healthcare services is required to reduce the cost of healthcare services to the level of funding provided. Thus Harper’s and the Conservative’s election promise to increase healthcare funding by 6% was in fact a promise to cut healthcare services to Canadians.

Still………like the blank pages of a book yet to be written, the days that will make up the new year of 2012 lie open before us.

We can refuse to learn from the consequences of our actions and doom ourselves to recklessly continue down our self-indulgent path of self-destruction………

OR we can take the binders off, abandon our wilful denial of the financial, economic and ethical cataclysmic fiasco we have created the potential for – and continue to strive, through our actions and non-actions, to bring about – choosing to instead to tenaciously do what is necessary to put our financial house in order and to build a society that reflects what it is to be Canadian, rather than reflecting the values of wannabe Americans.

“To create something exceptional, your mindset must be relentlessly focused on the smallest detail”. Giorgio Armani

I am proud to be a Canadian and living in Canada, but that does not preclude me from wanting my Country, my Home, to be exceptional rather than just “we are doing better than Greece.”

Let’s acknowledge the Emperor’s new clothes for what they are – a fanciful, wilful denial of reality – and begin to do – tenaciously – what is necessary to move from ‘good enough’  and/or ‘since it’s not a disaster – yet – we don’t HAVE to do anything’  to the pursuit of not just excellence but of exceptional.