The important guardrails of life

(Thomas Froese Photo)

Travellers navigate a curve on a dangerous stretch of road in Yemen.

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(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, November 23, 2024)

One day on a mountain pass in Yemen I took a wild photo from behind two beater pickup trucks, two shaky vehicles with too few safety features moving way too many people and household items. It was at a curve on this two-way road when one of the overloaded pickups, incredibly, passed the other.

I suppose it also wasn’t the safest manoeuvre to hang out of my car – I wasn’t driving, mind you – to get the photo. But in the developing world, that is the majority world, nobody really cares.

Especially in mind, then, is the road’s guardrail, a necessary and helpful stretch of curved metal that might keep the entire show from careening horribly over the edge. Yes, thank God for the world’s wheels – my first set was a sporty 1979 red-and-black Ford Pinto – and thank God for the world’s guardrails.

Of course the dictionary people who think up their annual winning words never call me to ask, but it seems to me that “Guardrail” could at least contend for 2024’s Word of the Year. Like “Post-Truth,” Oxford’s Word for 2016, given when Donald Trump was handed his first American presidency, “Guardrail” is in time for Trump 2.0

Before I say more, let me note that this rumination is not about American politics, not entirely anyway, because our stomachs are only so strong. I get it. I also realize that every so often some big orange tiger, some big, striped political cat, will get loose somewhere in the world. It’s not entirely uncommon. Even so, briefly, let’s look to our southern neighbours.

The most effective, yet imperfect, guardrail in any democracy are its voters. And, completely fairly, a majority of Americans have chosen the tiger, not the lady. They’ve chosen the pathological criminal, not the blousy prosecutor.

Main Street wanted to see the money, so to speak. And it wanted protection from certain fears. Wall Street, meanwhile, was apparently out of touch with struggles of everyday Americans. Warnings from the chattering class about the tiger were met with a shrug. Danger? Meh.

But Trump’s autocracy will surely test the boundaries, America’s democratic guardrails like its courts and constitution, recently already weakened. And the US will devolve further as a “flawed democracy,” a formal ranking that global democracy watchers gave it in 2016, that year when “Post-Truth” first became an elevated word.

Which brings me to our own personal guardrails. Because this is what this is really about. Yes, tomorrow will always bring enough worry with it, even with good governments, never mind those of tigers or bears or you name the autocrat. Government, remember, was never meant to fill the holes we have inside us as humans.

True, bad governments can screw things up quickly. Even so, don’t put too much of your life stock in any human governance, but rather in what’s more lasting. Guard – there’s that word again – your mind and heart above all, because this is really where life’s treasure is.

So turn off the screen. And news. And influencers. No, really. Nourish yourself first on other things. It’s what I tell myself. Guardrails. Then take in only reliable news. In doses. Don’t get jazzed up. Augment news with other sources to make sense of our wobbly times. For one, I’ve recently opened Marilyn McEntyre’s book, “Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies.”

Because we become, for better or worse, the choices that we surround ourselves with.

So let’s teach the kids (I’m talking to myself again) the value of truth. With any luck they’ll teach their kids. Then you’ll leave behind something worthwhile. If enough people do this, an entire neighbourhood values truth. Then a city. And so on.

Then enough men and women who understand guardrails, who know authenticity, emerge to be the sort of quality politicians that can be appreciated. Because you know the old saying, “We get the government we deserve.” Just saying. It’s sometimes true.