Humph

[flemmings]

A patient man am I, down to my fingertips,
The sort who never could, ever would,
Let an insulting remark escape his lips.
A very gentle man.

BUT

whenever I'm out in the neighbourhood shovelling snow, say, or clearing ice from drains, or as today, raking a mat of sodden leaves from the street gutters so they'll dry out before Thursday's scheduled downpour creates the lake effect at all corners the way Saturday's did, there's always one bloody oyaji who comes up to tell me that The City Ought To Do That. Yes well, say I mildly, the city has twenty square miles of streets to clean and a limited budget and I don't expect to see them this week for sure. At which oyaji solemnly declares, 'Well, *I* wouldn't do that.' And I smile Buddhistically and continue raking and do not say 'No you wouldn't, because you're a lead-assed tits on a bull layabout and the term 'individual responsibility' is not in your vocabulary.' I say it here, and feel much better for having done so.

(Women who talk to me at such times just say thank you. Or offer a basket to put the leaves in, as signora down the street did today. To be fair, so do a lot of the guys. But there's always that One Oyaji.)

There was a poem in one of my grade school readers that starts

A MAN! A man! There is a man loose in Canada,
A man of heroic mould, a 'throwback' of earlier ages,
Vigorous, public-spirited, not afraid of work!
A doer of deeds, not a dreamer and babbler;

It's very long and over-written and can be found here. It's about an anonymous man who moves a large stone that's sat in the middle of the road forever:

Dug out the stone and made it a matter of laughter,
For it was no boulder, deep-rooted, needing dynamite,
But just a little stone, about the size of a milk pail.
A child might have moved it, and yet it had bumped us
For three generations because we lacked public spirit.

Even in grade school, I was convinced it was a woman moved that stone.

Comments

[incandescens]

There's a line in one of the Father Brown stories somewhere along the lines of, "iIf you say to a woman that a thing ought to be done, there is always the danger that she will do it."

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

My automatic reaction being 'why say it ought to be done if you don't want it done?' Because it's more fun to sit around and grouse about it not being done and how someone else should do it and how remiss of someone else not to do it etc etc etc?

That mindset makes me very tired. Especially when it shows up at work. Which of course it does.

[incandescens]

If I recall correctly, the context is that one character (male) has been repeatedly saying that a particular gate should be locked, and then another character (female) actually locks it, which throws off the burglary plan of a third character. The story title involved golden fish, I think.

[paleaswater.livejournal.com]

really? around here in residential areas the sidewalk abutting your property is maintained by the property owner ( excluding resurfacing, of course), and you get slapped with a fine if it's not kept clean and clear. seems to be just the sort of law designed with the oyaji in mind.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

The sidewalk is theoretically the owner's responsibility, at least for ice and snow. Doesn't mean people shovel their walks in a timely fashion, which is why I sometimes do it as an alternative to walking on glare ice for a week. AFAIK leaves aren't covered by the by-laws.

This case was the actual street: leaves accumulate in the gutter, blocking the rain flowing to the drains and often enough blocking the drains themselves. Hence deep puddles which wet my poor poor feet. The city sweepers occasionally come by and do the other side of the street, which is no parking; but my side gets done only where there are no cars. Hence my public-spirited tidying.

I also weed the gutters when the plants grow big enough to block rain flow, which happens quite frequently.

[i-am-zan.livejournal.com]

Yes it is long and over written, and probably overthought as well for I looked to see the meaning of "polyphloesboean" but found that only "polyphloisboian" exists. Truly a bombastic word and needless I thought. It could be just me.

The poet must indeed have had a guilty conscience if he wrote to such a length about not moving said obstacle. ^__^

And go you for your public spirited-ness.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

19th century. Has to show off its learnings, in case you think it's no gentleman, what never learned no Latin nor Greek.