Anyone can touch a life – Part Two

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Today’s Blog Post


Anyone can touch a life – Part Two

The CAC and Volunteers Conference is over. Back home now… and sifting through the information that we received. I need time to look at it all again.

One thing that seems to come through at these events is simple. It would seem that others are having a great success in some areas and we tend to wish that we could have the same happening where we are. Our success is not as great.

I doubt that I will ever have all the answers. Although the answers that we have discovered are good. Our Peterborough CAC (Citizen’s Advisory Committee) has been steady with its meetings. There are times that it feels like no one knows or cares about what we do. But stuff has happened and we are moving ahead… I hope.

There is a tendency to wish we could find that illusive happiness that others have in their area.

Conferences do that to me. But conferences also motivate me to try something new.

Just as I was beginning to sort through all that had happened… I discovered a wonderful quote. Then I discovered the man that made the statement. This led me into another new area of thinking. Not sure how far it will go down this path today…

The statement simply says…
“Happiness grows at our own firesides, and is not to be picked in strangers' gardens.” Douglas Jerrold penned these words sometime in the early to mid 1800s. He lived between 1803 and 1857. He was an English Dramatist that did fairly well from what I read of him.

As I read of Jerrold, I discovered J. Petit-Senn – 1792 – 1870. His statement that caught me was “Happiness is where we find it, but rarely where we seek it.”

Then I stumbled to another one he was credited to have written. "Not what we have, but what we enjoy, constitutes our abundance."

That was a keeper. That is what our CAC is about. It is not what we have – but rather what we enjoy that makes it great.

For some of you this may be the first time that you have heard of a CAC. I should explain more.

13 years ago a fellow was coming out of prison and would be possibly living in Peterborough. He was huge… I mean really fat… tipping the scales close to 400 pounds. He was in a wheel chair. He had an attitude that was not easy to work with.

The Correctional Service Canada – CSC didn’t know what to do with him. They had no idea how to help him. He couldn’t go back to where he came from as the victim of his crime still lived there.

I was invited to attend a meeting at the Parole Office to discuss this matter. Dan Haley, our community chaplain, made the invitation to me. Four of us met with the manager of the parole office at that time. 20 minutes later we had formed the first CAC in Peterborough and we began to deal with the Ex-offender’s issues (and CSC’s)

The CAC has a mandate generally that states we are to “Observe, Liaise and Advise”. We watch what the Government’s correctional department folk are doing. Knowing what is happening and then making ourselves aware of what should happen – or should have happen, we provide a ‘citizen’s perspective’ for later questions that may be asked.

That sounds like a lot of mumbo jumbo… sorry. It should be stated more simply than that I guess. But the task is heavy at times. Men that come from prison carry heavy baggage. Parole Office Staff dealing with this baggage have a heavy task to carry. Behind all that the Government of Canada and its Correctional Service Canada – that deals with all things of prisons… is sensitive to what the public think.

The CAC monitors all of this potential tension.

And above all that the CAC locally in the community works to make sure that there are no more victims – to the best of their ability.

Now without this becoming a huge essay… I need to say that there is a CAC inside of each prison as well. What I know best is the CAC in the community and the Parole Office.

It can get complicated. If you have followed all this and understand it to this point… I would like to talk with you personally. You would make a great CAC person.

For some of the rest of us… we are still grappling with the issues that we face and the understanding that we do not have. It is a growing process.

So when I discover…
J. Petit-Senn’s statement “Happiness is where we find it, but rarely where we seek it.”
And….
“Happiness grows at our own firesides, and is not to be picked in strangers' gardens.” and "Not what we have, but what we enjoy, constitutes our abundance."~ Douglas Jerrold

It helps to make more sense.

Our local Parole Office staff is facing issues that are hard to deal with. Our Government has offered cut back after cut back. Things that should be done cannot be done because there is no money. I am watching what is happening. When the opportunity comes in the near future to report on what we have witnessed – I have to say something.

My gut tightens and I wish I could be off on sick leave somewhere else – when this has to be dealt with. But that is what a CAC has to do. It addresses the unfairness and the obstacles that could potentially put our community at risk.

The conference is over. But the title of this one is very much with us still… “Anyone can touch a life.”

Still sorting it through… and looking for a last minute vacation in Bermuda or Barbados or Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan… in the weeks to come.

Oh Boy!

~ Murray Lincoln ~
http://www.murraylincoln.com/  

Resource
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_William_Jerrold
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Antoine_Petit-Senn

Official Web Site of Correctional Service Canada
http://www.csc-scc.gc.ca/ 

Info about the CAC - Citizen's Advisory Committee
http://www.csc-scc.gc.ca/text/cac/index-eng.shtml