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4 the tbibune thursday april h ltfj if ms james thomas edhorinchlef established 1838 charles hl nolan publisher barrebeacock advertising manager eoitor1al deft ed schroeterjfai holt display advertising oept lob widemen mali emmerson business office joen mvshmaa ooreeo deacon ebeen glover pubhshed eery thursday si 54 iltin st stourfrme ont tsl 6402101 toronto phono 5811680 stnglo copies 20 c subseripilons s1000 per year in canada 2600 elsewhere member of canadian community newspspes association and ontario weekly newspapers association second class mall registration number 0896 tha tribune is ono of tho inland pubushing co lhnitad group of suburban newspapers which ta- dudee lbs ajaxvhttbypickaring mews advertiser brampton guardian burlington post etobieoke gazette marfcnam economist and sun newmarket aurora era oakvjve beaver oshawa this week missis ta uoa news oshswa this weekend acton free press milton canadian champion and the georgetown independent 6402100 3611680 editorials quiet in yorkpeel riding the upcoming federal election has scarcely raised a ripple so far on the home front while there is some quiet interest little more than a shrug is visible and most seem to feel that the campaign is much too long were going to be sick of it by the time its over is a common comment only a few people seem aware that our local riding has become yorkpeel rather than yorksimcoe and has taken in additional territory west of yonge street the addition has been traditionally liberal and whether this will have a bearing on the usual outcome here remains to be seen t the riding has been held now for two terms by conservative sinclair stevens and in the last contest in july 1974 he polled ap proximately six thousand more votes that his nearest liberal rival mike willinsky and seventeen thousand in front of the third place ndp candidate wally gustar whitchurch- stouffville gave mr stevens a wide margin over the other contestants financial restrictions on this years election spending have tended to make the campaign less visible and will force can didates in ridings such as ours to lean on more personal visits to make themselves familiar to the voters this process of mainstreeting is expected to be increased as the campaign nears the final weeks few of the big issues being pushed by the leaders cut too deeply in this riding and familiarity with the candidate remains the big votegetter bus rides to sunday school a tour of stouffville on any sunday morning will reveal one maybe two buses parked outside several of the local churches in town the same in markham and unionville too what are they doing there people have asked us this the honest truth is and we should be ashamed to admit it theyre transporting our children to sunday school l what a sad commentary on the times in which we live that churches at great expense must go doortodoor and pick up our kids because parents are too lazy unconcerned and irresponsible to do it themselves its not that these churches want to do it theyd much rather have the mothers and dads bring the children and stay or bring them and comeback depending on the churchschool schedule but this isnt the caseby not reaching out dozens of boys and girls wouldbe missing out missing out on moral and religious instruction they badly jieed v iiw ave commend churches for their concern were appalled at parents lack of the same ingredient the childa town eyent so 1979 has been proclaimed in ternational year of the child fine we all say without the slightest idea what the proclamations all about then sit back on our collective hands and wait for something to happen to date as far as we can see little has happened why because the authority by which special days weeks months and years became law are so far removed from the grass roots of society the hopedfor benefit is lost so we all raise our hands and say amen to the idea then we open our eyes and wonder what it all means here in whitchurchstouffville more than just lip service will be paid to this event something visable is in the works that with the cooperation of the entire community will meet with success our day is june 9 selected locations are the arena and latcham hall but the program in its entirety must go far beyond the boundaries of two buildings it must touch every school every church every man woman and childin this town if a true un derstanding of the program is to be achieved and it will if we let it editorial we heartily agree this commentary by stephen lewis was broadcast over radio station ckey on april 19 1979 we heartily agree with mr lewis comments and are proud to publish them j x the publisher one of the most extraordinary news stories about a canadian politician which i have read in a very long time appeared in todays globe and mail the headline tells only a small part of it drea battling alcoholism will quit if davis asks him to frank drea essential character after a volcanic career as journalist champion of the underdog sometime trade union pr man general roustabout and backbench tory mpp is now on tarios minister of consumer and com mercial relations hes been inthe legislature almost eight years always combative tern- pestuous unpredictable but with a kind of straight from the shoulder to nonsense candor that can leave the opposition and on occasion his government colleagues gasping he is deceptively bright tough and open a nice nose for coverage too always walking that fine line between things which sound innovative and things which are patently outrageous a hard hat wearing a will rogers jacket he also has a drinking problem a serious one its been known around quels park for years sometimes darkly hintedat sometimesopenly referred to but earlier this week for a couple of days he apparently fell off the wagon with a reverberating thud he attended a meeting of condominium representatives drunk he cancelled a dinner speech at the last minute in the premiers own riding because he was intoxicated and he failed to appear before a legislative committee for the same reason well clearly armed with this heady whiff of scandal two globe and mail reporters confronted frank drea and he handled it in a fashion so un characteristic for many a politician that you just have to have a sneaking or explicit admiration no cover up no excuses no guile no inaccessibility just straight confessional politics in fact drea used language to recount and recant his behavior which leaps from the page in its honesty if you want it straight about 6 pm i got skunked he knows what he did to the groups involved he admits to letting down the premier and he says he will offer mr davis his resignation if the premier wants it well bill davis wont want it hell be enormously concerned as he had every right to be you cant countenance that kind of thing from a cabinet minister for very long but frank drea is fighting a courageous battle with alcoholism he is deeply involved with alcoholics anonymous and he is hiding nothing- it is one of the most wrenching and painful of personal struggles g have never understood frank drea very well but he is a talented and able politician he deserves time and support and hell get it practice night april 5 ofxtwrleelerj toe twsune music mania 79 opening night april 26 a sugar and spice aprils the bottom side of winter april is the cruellest month so said ts eliot a transplanted american who spent most of his adult life working in a bank and writing poetry in england as far as england goes he was full of baloney april in england is delightful it rains only every second day and the coun tryside is green with grass and as colorful as a patchwork quilt with flowers now if hed been writing about canada id agree april is no bargain in these parts its one of those nothing months like november you have staggered through the last of the march blizzards barely and suddenly in theory its spring in reality its the dirty bottom end of winter and the weakest possible whisper of a hope for summer april is mud treacherous piercing winds that give you that racking cough you avoided all winter rusted fenders changing snow tires and surveying your property and all the detritus deposited on it and around it by the recent winter just checked mine today on the side lawn there is a dirty brown hump that resembles something from the paleolithic age eyeless shapeless but somehow menacing it is made up of one part ice two parts sand and one part salt all courtesy of the snowplowing department this lump will have melted entirely by the fourth of july and will leave a 30 square foot patch of pure sahara scattered about the back porch are bits and pieces and whole shingles removed without charge from the roof when the man was knocking off the ice at the end of january mingling with the shingles are portions of brick knocked out of the wall by the man who removed some of the shingles while he was removing the ice lying on the back porch itself is a pile of glass shattered from a storm window that didnt quite get put on last november and was leaned carefully against the house to wait for a nice day for installation a december wind caught that one leaning limply is the storm door which will no longer close- because the ice got in around it and it was forced shut so many times it lost its shape and all desireto keep out the weather and the mosquitoes a month from now when it becomes a screen door lying in the back yard leaning on one elbow is one of the great old cedar chairs looking as though it had just been mugged in a back alley by a particularly vicious gang of punks beside it stands the picnic table practically swaybacked from the load of snow and ice it carried all winter but all is not drab theres a nice touch of color here and there a green wine bottle tossed over the fence by some passing con tributor here frozen into the ice a newspaper wrapped in yellow cellophane over there another paper wrapped in blue emerges from its winter retreat both bear decemberdates theres a frisky grey squirrel scuttling up the dead vines on the house looking for a soft spot to gnaw through and deposit her kits in the attic chasing her is a dog probably the same one who left his calling cards all over the back yard during the winter which are now melding nicely with the mud and the stench of dead earth coming back to life by bill smiley and the clothesline is sagging like an ancient stripper the back stoop is just that stooped from the ice falling off the roof onto it all this is normal enough a typical april scene and im not complaining but wouldnt it be nice if you got through one april without your tailpipe and muffler suddenly starting to sound like a bull breaking wind its enough to break a man were he not a sturdy canadian who has been v same performance in the same arena year after year but this april is going to be the one that broke many a man stronger than i on top of all the usual crud of april will be piled the even cruddier crud of an election campaign it wont be so bad for the kids who dont mind april at all as it gives them a chance to get soaked to the knees and covered in mud with some excuse they dont care about politicians nor will it be too tough for the elderly who greet april with a kind of jaunty triumphant grin because theyve made it through another bonebuster of a winter and they are perfectly aware that politicians are pernicious whatever their outer coloring but for the honest decent middleaged canadian who sees no more difference be tween the parties and their promises than he does between his left hand and his right its just too much april by itself is bad enough but to go through 30 days of it huddling under a barrage of political poop is the utmost pits i agree with the poet this april will indeed be the cruellest month window on wildlife striped pussycats deserve respect by art briggsjude of all thesmall mammals that inhabit the backyards and back forties of ontario none is more familiar than that black and white pussycat the common skunk its a regular nighttime visitor to many city streets and gardens and a frequent resident of country barns and outbuildings along brushy hedgerows or woodfringed meadows its equally at home while rock piles and stream banks seem particularly attractive to this slow moving member of the weasel family actually its this nonhurry attitude that often causes its downfall especially when its nocturnal travels take it across the roadways of our busy society for here we see it all too frequently in carcass form its penetrating odor fouling up the surrounding area the fact that it has this obnoxious per fume which it uses only in self defense gives the animal a sense of security and little need for speed only the great horned owl flying on hushed wings above has mastered this potent defense as for all the other potential enemies such as the dog fox and coyote the skunk is a painful revolting experience but never a meal and unfortunately for many household pets a lesson they never seem able to remember i have known dogs that time after time would try to catch a skunk off guard only to end up whimpering and rolling in the dirt s one large fox terrier we had almost succeeded it happened early one saturday morning as we made ready to go to the city market the old buick with its back seats taken out was loaded with eggs freshkilled chickens fruit and honey i went ahead to open up the barn doors for mr campbell and was in the process of undoing the inside latch when a commotion erupted a few feet away the dog had somehow reached down between a space in the barn floor boards and grabbed a skunk by the backfor a moment it was a toss up as to who was the most surprized the skunk or me then for another agonizing few moments it seemed as if the terrier had overcome the lethal defense but alas the skunk proved too heavy for the stalky dogs jaws and as soon as its feet touched the boards it blasted off well i ended up being sick under the apple tree the dog disappeared for two days mr campbell lost his suit and a neighbor took the salvaged produce to market a since that day ive had an awful lot of respect for skunks and fortunately havent oeen sprayed since i have seen others get the evilsmelling treatment though remember when the garbage men used open trucks a man stood up on the load dumping the con tainers that were tossed up by his companion well this particular day a can was thrown up and lo and behold out of the refuse scrambled one very mixed up skunk and over the side of the truck went one very messed up man and in somewhat of a hurry too but apart from this awful odor skunks are interesting and useful creatures that for the most part benefit man their constant diet of grubs and other insects are a great help to the agriculturist as is their appetite for mice and young rats around the neigh borhood of course they tjo have a strong appetite for eggs but included in these em bryos are those of the snapping turtle too so while they often destroy a clutch of duck eggs their presence in the same area keeps the snapping turtle population down thus the overall waterfowl survival rate is greatly enhanced n although skunks hibernate they are active on the warmer days of winter where their tracks may be noticed in a fall of fresh snow these past few weeks these striped pussies have been busy foraging in the frostfree earth for white grubs and other such larvae recently we noticed a large skunk near king city busy rooting in the moist earth approaching it cautiously with the wind at my back i was able to get within good picture range at first it moved away and i followed at a safe distance then it turned and came in my direction and i moved away it seemed as if it was playing some kind of a game until it stopped at the entrance to a large burrow here it turned and faced me in a curious manner its ebony eyes glistening in the bright sunlight its forward position reminded me of another curious skunk i had encountered a few years ago this particular individual came sauntering up to- the beam of- my jj flashlight one night while i was on my hanox and knees catching dew worms i tried to retreat but found my back end up against some rose bushes quickly i shut off the light and at the same time yelled aj the skunk to get back fortunately it did and when i picked it up once more in the beam of light it was heading across the lawn with four striped youngsters trailing behind t t lv 4