I’m looking out my office window right now, on the morning of Oct. 27 where I’m watching the Canadian flag across the street waving at half-mast.
You know, there really isn’t ever a day when I am not proud to be Canadian, but I have to say I felt pretty choked up last week after hearing the news of the deaths of Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent and Corporal Nathan Cirillo.
Vincent was run over as he walked through a Service Canada parking lot in St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec on Oct. 20.
Two days later Cirillo was shot in the back as he performed sentry duty at the National War Memorial in Ottawa.
On Oct. 25 I finally had the chance to sit down and reflect on what happened.
I come from a military family. Ever since I can remember I’ve known members of the military or police. When I was a kid, my older sisters and I were members of the cadet program and some members of my family are still serving in the military. Many of my friends are serving today.
Remembrance Day is only three weeks away and that’s also part of why the events in Quebec and Ontario felt so raw for me this week. I kept trying to find bits and pieces of news on what was happening in Ottawa or Quebec. Later when I found out that two members of our Armed Forces were killed I was sick inside. I asked myself, ‘what is happening to my Canada? Where have our values and respect gone?’
I was visiting with my aunt, a retired army captain, we sat down and talked about it.
I felt sad, let down, angry, confused and hateful all wrapped up into one. I heard the absolute loathing in my aunt’s voice as she called the gunman a coward for shooting Cirillo in the back. I raged about the fact that the sentries had no bullets in their weapons. As she is older and wiser than myself, she reminded me that bullets wouldn’t have mattered as Cirillo was shot in the back and had no chance to defend himself.
In the case of Vincent, we debated the type of person that would run down a stranger leaving a Service Canada building.
In the end I came to the realization that you can’t understand the mind of a terrorist.
I think the thing that made the shooting so horrible for us was that we live in Canada. We expect to be safe in Canada.
Those soldiers have to deal with a lot in their everyday lives. They have to give up a regular civilian life, become trained and get shipped out all over the country and over seas.
They are sent to fight battles all over the world. They put their lives on the line and then what? They get back to Canada and some disturbed person kills them. It’s just not fair.
At that moment I felt like a child, stamping their foot in anger, but the feeling of salt in the wound was exacerbated for me by the fact that these were no foreign-born terrorists. These were Canadians killing other Canadians.
Those soldiers expected a war zone overseas, not here at home. They probably never imagined it would be one of their own people shooting them in the back or running them down with a car.
Something’s got to be done to stamp out this kind of behaviour.
I don’t exactly know how, I’m not an authority on the subject. We shouldn’t be killing our own, especially not the ones who are out there fighting for our freedom.
