Sometimes I get a little hopeful.

Despite my inability to focus for the past couple of days (and my low work-output for the week), I’m feeling pretty good at the moment. For those of you who aren’t on my tribe, I should point you to the photos I took last Saturday in Victoria which are posted on my flickr account under the People-Victoria album. The colour is much truer on a Mac (as usual – what is it with colour correction on PC monitors?).

I have a ton of writing crammed up in my head at the moment, but been having trouble finding the time to put pen to paper in the midst of work and social and political life. In a way, the upcoming trip to Ottawa feels like a bit of a respite as my evenings will be largely free – so perhaps I’ll get myself caught up while I’m there. I’m also going to start taking my camera on these trips as the weather warms up and hopefully find some time to practice in the evenings. I have been besotted with HDR techniques lately and think the Parliament buildings would make an excellent subject to experiment with. I’m also working on a birthday present for Darren which consists of photos of East Van since he’s pining to return at the moment.

Last night I went to the CCPA fundraiser where Naomi Klein was speaking – my union is a supporter and thus bought some tickets to the sold-out event. Talk about a packed house – I saw most of the labour folks I know and ran into people I haven’t seen for years. And of course Naomi’s talk about the rise of disaster capitalism was excellent. Mostly though, I was glad to go and see that at least there is some left alive here and that we are still coming together to support our institutions even in the face of the Campbells and Harpers of the country. No – it’s not radical – but it’s people talking to each other, and doing the work of upholding basic civil society institutions, and making sure that kids get educated and sick people get health care, and that workers still have rights.  And it’s good to go sit in a room with those people once and awhile because it reminds me that our work is not only relevant but essential.

This morning the national news is leading with the story of the Supreme Court striking down the security certificate process in Canada as unconstitutional. The unanimous decision will bring an end to the secret courts and illegal/indefinite detainments of suspected “terrorists” unless the government re-writes the law (and I highly doubt any re-writing of the law will pass Charter scrutiny in any case). While the mere fact that this country allowed such a law into place is an embarassment, it is heartening in a small way that we’ve come to our senses. Or at least our courts saw right through it. No wonder Harper is trying to exercise more control over judicial selection.

It is scary, this world and where it’s going, and every day I struggle a bit with this reality – sometimes more than others. I don’t think though that it’s naive to find small hope over reforms or wins – and I’m trying to cultivate that where it appears.