Current Events – Page 3 – KINETIC MOTIONS

November 10, 2017November 10, 2017

Maternity Leave is not all that it’s Cracked up to be

I have three wonderful children who are the loves of my life. Like many women, I dreamed of being a mother for many years and consider myself lucky every day that I was blessed with such an incredible family. My third child, Nessa, my little miracle, did not come so easily, and I am thankful every day for her being in my life. I chose to take maternity leave with each of my three children, which I feel is a privilege given to Canadian women. However, while many people see maternity leave as a great benefit, it can also have damaging consequences to a woman’s job and career aspirations.

I also firmly believe that the new expanded parental leave, announced yesterday by the Federal government, will potentially cause further damage to a woman’s career.

Under the current system, a person (or couple) can take a leave from work for a total of 12 months following the birth of a baby (or start that leave up to 8 weeks before the child is born). During that period, a new parent (or parents) qualify to receive up to 50 weeks of employment insurance from the Government of Canada. I believe that comes out to up to $543 per week. Some employers top up pay for some or all of that time as well. Under the expanded leave, a total of 18 months can be taken off, but the financial benefits are not increased (just spread out thinner over a longer period of time).

I want to put the financial benefits of maternity leave aside. What I want to focus on is the job one “leaves” and what happens the next day after a woman has left the workplace to focus on her new baby. This has happened to me three times.

Each time I had a new baby I chose to go on maternity leave from a full-time job. I was at one place of employment when my first two children were born and another organization when my third child was born. As a communications professional, I worked in fast-paced demanding jobs with a lot on my plate. And I loved it. I knew that with the massive workload I had that someone else had to either take over my job or a group of people had to fill in for me while I was away. Life went on and work had to be done whether I was there or not. That’s the case for all women who go on maternity leave.

So, what happens when a woman is away from the office for just a few weeks, a few months, 12 months or now as many as 18 months? As I said, life goes on at work, people fill in and the organization creates a new normal. When my son was born in 2007, I was away for 8 months. When my daughter was born in 2010 I was away for 11 months. And the organization where I was employed went on and my colleagues worked hard and filled in for me.

After my first maternity leave I returned to my same job and went on with my day-to-day responsibilities. In fact, a few months later I even got a promotion. I worked hard and did my best to balance the demands of my job with the needs of my baby. I assumed the same thing would happen in 2011 when I returned to the same job after my second maternity leave.

But I was wrong. The organization where I worked was planning massive changes and a rebranding while I was away, and those changes were implemented weeks after I returned. I was told my job was eliminated.

I had just come off 11 months of maternity leave and had received almost 50 weeks of employment insurance benefits. I did not qualify to receive any more and thought that in Canada there was a system in place to protect young mothers who chose to take a leave from work to care for their young children. Our jobs, we were told, were protected, so that we could go away for a year and return to work. I understood that my exact job did not have to be given back to me but that a job equal to mine had to at least be available to me. It was, for a few weeks, then it was gone. Why? Because if an organization, for or not-for-profit, does a massive reorganization, it is not required to retain women on maternity leave. It is allowed to eliminate those jobs.

I was lucky that I quickly secured another job in 2011, one I loved very much. I received a number of promotions over the next few years, and by 2016, when Nessa was born, I managed a team of people and oversaw many files and projects at the company. While I did not make a final decision on how long I would be away from my job, I knew I wanted to take at least 4-5 months of maternity leave to spend time with my new baby.

When the baby was not quite 3 months old I was informed that my job had been eliminated. This time there was no company reorganization that I knew of. Various people had filled in for me, there was a new normal and they didn’t need me anymore. It didn’t matter that I was respected by my colleagues and made contributions to the organization over the previous five years. Out of sight, out of mind. So what if the Government of Canada had a maternity leave program? My employer didn’t care. My job was gone.

According to some research I found from Statistics Canada, which looked at the increasing maternity leave benefits from 1971 onwards, I read that “one aim of the 2000 amendment was to enable working parents to care for their infant longer and still allow them secure re-entry into employment” It added that “after the extension of parental benefits, all provinces and territories revised their labour codes to give full job protection of 52 weeks or more to employees taking paid or unpaid maternity or parental leave.”

Financial benefits aside, maternity leave was created, in-part, so that women could feel confident that they could walk away from a job to care for a baby knowing their job was secure and protected. But that is not the case. And the longer a woman is away from her job, potentially up to 18 months with the new expanded leave, the less security and protection she has.

If the Government of Canada is going to expand its parental leave program then it also needs to put in place strict rules that protect those parents’ jobs when they choose to take a leave to care for young children. As long as employers can eliminate a job during or soon after a maternity leave then it is not a true benefit. Canadian women need to know their careers can grow and their jobs are secure when they become new mothers and attempt the very difficult task of a balance between work and home. Until that happens, there is no such thing as a true maternity leave.

October 26, 2017October 26, 2017

Keep your Head up and no more Distracted Walking

Are you going to be a zombie for Halloween this year? Or are you a zombie every day and maybe you will make a change on October 31 and wake up. If you live in Honolulu, Hawaii, you may consider going as a giant ticket or a traveling smart phone this year because zombies are not welcome in this city anymore. We have all heard of distracted driving, but have you ever heard of distracted walking?

It was all over the news yesterday. Honolulu is the first city to formally pass a distracted walking law, also known as the “Zombie law.” The city wants people to wake up and pay attention when they cross the street. A person can be ticketed and fined if a police officer deems that individual to be distracted while walking,

Let’s be real. What does distracted walking really mean? It refers to people who are more engrossed in whatever it is on their smart phone than what is on the road ahead of them. As I wrote about earlier this week, we all share the roads, and we all need to respect the others around us.

It is easy to picture the distracted walker. The person could be male or female, 25 years old or 65 years old. The smart phone is held tightly in one or both hands. The body is slightly slumped forward with both eyes fixed on the screen. Sometimes the fingers are typing away some inane message to a friend or colleague. The person is totally unaware of the busy street – or world – around him or her.

This person bumps into other people on the sidewalk, crosses the intersection when the light is about to turn red and does not check to make sure a car is not coming. Whatever is on the screen of the phone is clearly more important than staying safe as he or she cross the road.

I will admit that once in a while I become a zombie when I walk down the sidewalk. I try to avoid this behaviour unless I need to contact someone urgently, but yes, sometimes I am guilty. Admit it – you are guilty too. We are becoming a society of zombies. You don’t need to waste money dropping $15 at a movie theatre anymore to see the latest zombie flick. Just head downtown and watch the zombies cross the street.

But do we need laws that actually ban people from checking their smart phones while they cross the street? I would say no. As we embrace technology and change our lives each day to include it, we must adjust our behaviour and be responsible. It’s great that I can text my family who live in New Zealand while I am in downtown Toronto. I love that I can check the score in the baseball game no matter where I’m walking. And it thrills my mother that she can call her three children no matter where we are.

But I can send that text when I sit down at the local coffee shop. While I am a big sports fan, I don’t have to know the score in the game while I’m walking along the sidewalk. I can speak to my mother on the phone later. What I – or anyone around me is doing on the smart phone really is not urgent. Whatever it is I or those around me are doing really can wait.

Let’s face it, distracted walking is dangerous. It’s dangerous to the distracted person and to everyone – the pedestrians, drivers and cyclists – on the street as well. It even seems to be dangerous to “motionless objects such as street signs, doors or walls,” according to a warning in the United States from the National Safety Council (I have never walked into a street sign, door or wall while using my smart phone. Have you?!).

Be smart when you use your smart phone. When you are walking to your car, running for the bus or crossing the street to get a coffee, drop your phone in your purse or pocket for a few minutes. Don’t be accused of distracted walking, especially if you live in (or are visiting) Honolulu.

July 10, 2017

I Planned to Salsa on St. Clair but Ate Italian Instead

Today I am writing another installment of “Being a Tourist in my own City.” Summer in the city, especially on the weekend, can often be warm, muggy and oppressive. It’s easy to laze around the house or pull up a chair in the backyard and do a lot of nothing. Instead of that, this weekend we decided to take advantage of an annual event in our neighbourhood, and on Saturday night, with only one child at home (the baby), we stepped outside and walked over to Salsa on St. Clair.

I remember stopping by this event a few years ago, as it wound down on a Sunday night. We had only checked out the perimeter and I recall that it was busy. This year, at 7:00 pm on a beautiful Saturday evening, we decided to try it again. I had checked out the event’s website and expected to find loud lively music, some dancing on the closed off street and a mix of Latin American and South American food.

We found all of that, and I also found dense crowds and long lines. I should have known better. After weeks (or was it months?) of rain in Toronto and so many washed out weekends, people were desperate to get outside and party on such a gorgeous evening. As we approached the Eastern edge of the event, I could hear the music, I could see the crowd and I could smell the sumptuous food.

No doubt the event delivered on its promises – there were blocks of music and dancing and a huge variety of food for sale. But it was impossible to move, never mind dance, and I did not have the patience to wait in snaking lines just for a taste of a tomatillo, plantain or churros. I don’t doubt the food was delicious, and the music was so vibrant that I could feel myself wanting to dance, but I (or my husband or my parents who joined us) did not have the patience nor the stamina to stay, so we kept walking.

It was slow moving, but we crossed the Salsa, from one end to the other and passed people of all ages enjoying the event. There were families with babies and young children, teenagers and 20-somethings out for a night on the town and even an older crowd enjoying the scene. We just kept on walking.

If you keep walking along St. Clair West in Toronto you arrive in one of the many “Little Italy” neighbourhoods of our great city. With our stomachs rumbling we checked out a few places and eventually decided upon a modest but sweet looking place that had a quiet patio and space to accommodate us and the stroller. Big Slice Restaurant came through with a tasty meal and friendly service. On our walk home, as a bonus, we stopped a for a treat at Punto Gelato, where everyone (including the baby, of course), enjoyed a couple of scoops of this Italian treat. I highly recommend the Caramelo flavour by the way!

To get home we chose to dive back into the Salsa again to see how it looked at night. The music was lively and there was some great dancing. The crowd had thinned somewhat, though I didn’t see too many young families or the older crowd from a couple hours before. We definitely brought the average age up while we walked through!

I am fortunate that I live in a city that has such a vibrant mix of cultures that are celebrated throughout the year. Whether it is a street festival or a parade, and whether the event is small and quiet or crowded and lively, I love them all. My family and I participate in our own special way, and I look forward to the next time I can be a tourist in my own city.

June 9, 2017

Who Elects our Leaders

When I created Kinetic Motions I decided to focus on various topics, including sports, travel, family and general musings. I thought I would avoid more hot-button topics like politics. I am not politically active, I don’t support a particular political party and I consider myself someone who has an open mind. Countries like Canada, United States, Britain and France are all democracies (though they are different kinds of democracies, such as a Republic or Constitutional Monarchy) and all have held federal elections in the last couple of years. I read a lot of news, watch a lot of coverage on TV and listen to many debates on the radio and today I ask myself, who elects our leaders?

The quick answer is simple – we, the people, do. That’s common sense as at the end of the day, the citizens who are the age of majority directly or indirectly decide who elects our leaders.

But, in reality it’s not that simple. Shaking hands at community events, knocking on doors, dropping leaflets in mailboxes and even personalized phone calls will not get you elected in 2017 (or 2015 or 2016). Maybe that was never enough to get you elected. While I think that mass media has always played a role in influencing political campaigns, never before over the last few years, have I seen media – traditional, online and social – play such a huge role to determine who elects our leaders.

In a democracy, it’s not just important it is imperative that we are educated about politics, that we vote and that we question our government’s actions. But have media become obsessed with doing that? For the last few years I can’t turn on the news on TV, check my Twitter feed or log on to a news website without finding headlines about the American political leadership in particular but also about scandals or battles between politicians in other countries around the world.

Without any statistics to back me up, I would say that a majority of journalists, bloggers and political analysts spoke out strongly, forcefully and often against one candidate in particular in the American Presidential election in 2016. Words such as liar, arrogant, buffoon or egotistical are some that I remember hearing and reading in their bid to discredit this individual. But could it be that their obsession with this candidate, their derogatory attitude and comments pushed a large number of disenchanted voters in the opposite direction and that these said journalists, bloggers and political analysts may actually have helped this individual win the election?

Could the same be true in other democracies? Has the obsession with certain candidates, whether they are liked or despised by media, influenced the outcome of the election in an obvious way? And does that obsession continue even after an individual is elected? In the case of the American elections I would say yes. Let’s continue to hold our political candidates and elected leaders accountable, but let’s also be responsible about how we do that – so that we, the people, can make a fair, educated and reasonable choice.

June 8, 2017

Inundated with Requests to Sell or Renovate my Home

It’s been headline news across Canada for years that real estate prices are soaring in a number of markets, most notably Vancouver and Toronto. Everything from fixer-upper tiny bungalows to remodeled three-story mansions have seen their values increase exponentially. Salaries have not increased at the same rate as real estate in cities like Toronto, where I live, which poses a frustrating challenge to both first-time buyers and people looking to move up to the next size home. With prices so out of control, real estate agents and professionals in the building and renovating industry have seen nice profits and are aggressively going after more and more business. It leaves home owners like me inundated with requests to sell or renovate my home.

I do want to state publicly that I am not looking to sell my home nor do I want to renovate it. Responsible home ownership requires regular maintenance and light renovation, but right now I’m happy with my home just the way it is. But that does not stop the daily onslaught of flyers, postcards, letters and even knocks on my door asking me if I have an interest to sell or renovate my home.

Yesterday my mailbox was stuffed with junk mail, including seven oversized postcards from local real estate agents. The cards boasted about everything from news that a charming home sold in my neighbourhood, that a “magnificent family home” was just listed or that they have the most spectacular home available for me to purchase. I particularly enjoyed the small print that asked me, “Thinking of selling? Now is the time, as the Toronto housing market remains strong,” or “NOW could be the time to list your home for sale.”

I also received a stack of pamphlets, flyers and cards full of home renovation ads. Do I have a wet basement? How about a leaky roof? Has my air conditioner seen better days? How about my tired looking backyard? It goes on and on, page after page.

Maybe I am just cranky because I really do not want to sell or renovate my home and have had enough of dumping a seemingly endless pile of junk mail into my oversized recycling bin. Everyone is trying to make a living and when the real estate market is hot there are more people in my city getting a real estate license or becoming a roofer, landscape designer or general contractor.

Now that the Government of Ontario has brought in housing reforms, will the market calm down? Just from my own observations, I see that homes in my neighbourhood that were snapped up in days are now sitting on the market much longer. But is that because the market has cooled or are there other factors such as an asking price that’s too high or a challenging location such as one or two houses in from a major street?

I do see many homes for sale in my neighbourhood right now and even more homes undergoing various levels of renovation. I know that my area is clearly ripe for the picking for real estate agents and renovation professionals. But I love my home, I love its location and I love it just the way it is. So, maybe calm down just a bit about asking me to sell or renovate my home. Thanks.

June 5, 2017

What has this World Become?

I returned home safely tonight from a wonderful few days in New York. As I have written in previous posts, I love to travel, and I also try to see the best in every person I meet. Everywhere I have traveled I have come across some of the most kind, friendly, generous people, from New Zealand to Hong Kong to New York to London.

I firmly believe that a large majority of people across the world are just that – kind, friendly and generous. They want to live and raise their children in a world where they feel safe, where they can succeed and where they can love and be loved.

But I am also not ignorant – I know that there are many people in this world who are hateful, angry and murderous. History has shown us just how terrible humanity can be, as millions of people have been killed through the centuries in the name of nationalism, racism and religion.

So why is it any different in 2017? Is it because those of us living in the West felt safe at restaurants and concerts and that false sense of security has been shattered? Is it because we live in a time with mass media, where hatred can be spread quickly and efficiently through the Internet and social media? Or do we see a new kind of fanaticism emerging in our societies, that is rooted in a twisted interpretation of sacred texts?

I don’t have an answer to this question, and I believe this and other questions are on the minds of many people across the world. How can someone blow himself up outside a concert hall that is packed with young girls and women? How can anyone drive a vehicle through a crowd of people enjoying an evening out? How can someone pull out a gun and shoot and murder people dancing at a night club?

These questions often haunt me, and if I allowed it, they would overtake my thoughts. I can’t allow it and I won’t allow it. I am going to focus on the kind, friendly, generous people I have met around the globe who, like me, are trying hard to see the best in everyone. If the majority of people can do that, then in the words of France’s new President, Emmanuel Macron, we can “make our planet great again.”