Yesterday was a beautiful day for a parade . Bright blue skies and a perfect cooling breeze.
Crowds, decked out in red , tended to cluster on the shady side of the street.But a fraction of the crowd out for Santa .
Sharing notes and memories,, it seems the parade is but a shadow of former glory.
Missing was community participation.
Were it not for outside participation it would have been a small show.
Six years ago, staff reported to Council insufficient interest to bring a parade to-gether.
You can't buy excitement, enthusiasm and willingness to work until the wee small hours to create magic from imagination.
I thought of the children years ago.
Decorated bicycles. doll prams and strollers.
Theme costumes Funny, dramatic.on wide-eyed toddlers.
Baton twirlers. Dancers, Acrobats. Boy Scouts and Girl Guides.
Float competitions in umpteen categories.
They were spectacular.
The work represented many hands. Finished scant hours before .
It had to be that way.
At the heart of it, a handful who knew how to generate fun and excitement.
It was so successful a Santa Claus Parade was launched..
It was hoped town commerce would take that over.
I feared two parades a year were too many.
It's too much to expect. Town employees,who were also residents, were the vanguard of the volunteers.
Enthusiasm and eagerness to excel are not commodities..
Council is planning to celebrate sesquicentennial next year.
People should be talking about it in neighborhoods now.
Sponsors need to be solicited.. Budgets set.
Don't be waiting for plans to get through the bureacracy.
Do it now.
There should be skateboard gladiators.
Field bike warriors.
Singers, dancers who spin on hands or heads, cartwheel turners and children by the score.
In costume, riding decorated bicycles, tricycles,carriages and carts
Maybe the route should be around the town park instead of Yonge Street.
Exhibitions held in front of the band stand and prizes awarded with fanfare.and price of admission, wearing a costume or a beard grown to significance.
Maybe at some point in the celebration a doubledecker train filled with Aurora Revellers could take us to Toronto and back Colored paper streamers floating from the windows and the whistle blowing all the way.
This post is not intended as a criticism of Sunday's parade.I'm sure everyone there enjoyed it
It's more like reminiscing about how things used to be and how they need to be again to make the sesquicentennial a meaningful event.
Monday, 2 July 2012
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2 comments:
It wasn't just us who pooped out on Canada Day. The flags flown in Big Smoke were of the football teams . It is good that a whole lot of people were not shot. Too hot & too much on offer - people took a hike....mostly up the 400 highways.
Sunday was a day for us to visit family in a small town on the south shore of Georgian Bay.
The day began with the need to get gas for the car. As I tend to patronize Esso, I had to get to the station on Yonge across from Greystones. Of course Yonge was closed for the parade. As I made my way through the back streets to the Esso we noticed the parade was just reaching that point. We watched for a few minutes, the "crowds" when scarce.
90 Minutes later driving into Thornbury, the traffic stopped. In the distance, you could see their parade had reached the corner of Bruce St. and Hwy 26. We had to wait the better part of 30 minutes.
One thing I noticed was the differnces of the two. The Thornbury parade was very community oriented. Decorated bikes, people with flags.
Who decided that the parade should take place at 10am?
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