A New Season, A New Hope

We're in the first hours of autumn, mists hang on the dewy trees in the mountain forests and the ocean breathes out the last heat of the summer into the cool early morning air.  In other parts of Canada the weather already has a sharp bite, making the warmth of houses all the more welcome and the lives of people without shelter more despondent, more difficult and imperiled.  The turn of the season in this "true north" has always required us to turn to each other; from Aboriginal villages to early homesteads and 21st century metropolises, the primordial message, to borrow from John Donne, is that "No man is an island/Entire of itself" through the longer, colder deeper nights of winter.

This is what makes the example of Winnipeg's Kris Doubledee so very Canadian.  Driving his Route 24 bus through Portage Avenue, Doubledee saw a homeless man walking barefoot through bad weather.

In Doubledee's words, "I couldn't stand seeing someone walking barefoot in this temperature like this." 

He pulled the bus to the curb, yelled "Hey, buddy!" and went to talk to him.  When Doubledee's intentions started to become unmistakeable, his passengers took out their smart phones and shoot clips that have now gone viral: the bus driver took off his shoes and gave them to the barefoot man.

The hard edge of urban life usually finds us looking the other way, sinking into a numbing hopelessness when we come face to face with the human impact of a society, a politics, a system, an economy that can leave people destitute, exposed to the unforgiving power of a Canadian winter.  What makes Doubledee's example compelling is how very natural it was to step out of this homelessness, as he stepped out of his shoes in an open, generous and profoundly personal answer to the need of the other man.

Doubledee would likely agree that this kind of counter cultural thing is actually happening all the time all across the country.  The turn to colder weather can bring a turn in each of us to tenderness, and it can come out of nowhere.

We see this every season in the Dundarave Festival of Lights.  An army of firefighters arrives at Dundarave Beach to help "plant" a forest of Christmas trees.  Families, schools and universities (actually, Capilano University has the distinction of being the only one so far), community choirs and Dragon Busters, businesses of every stripe sponsor a tree of their own for $110 and then make a charitable donation to the Lookout Emergency Aid Society's North Shore Shelter of $250 or more.  They decorate their trees at Dundarave Beach or in Dundarave Village, and the result is arguably the world's most spectacular forest of Christmas trees.  Then they encourage everyone they know to go online to their tree's pledge page, "decorating" it with more donations to the shelter.

So far right off the starting blocks, first time entrant Trimetrics Physiotherapy has set the pace with a $1,000 donation to the North Shore Shelter.  Presenting founder Arc'teryx, Clara Hartree, Darwin Construction, the Truffle House, Lunny Atmore Law, Penfold's Roofing, the North Shore Dragon Busters, West Van Optometry, West Van Vacuum Centre, 2M Events, 4Kats Studio along with West Vancouver's Mayor and Council (technically, the first group to sponsor a tree this year) have allowed the Festival to flourish.  The race is on, and there's glory enough for all.

In this way, over the past four Christmases the Dundarave Festival has allowed our community to donate over $105,000 to the North Shore Shelter.  This has allowed the shelter to double its transitional support staff.  The result has been miraculous.  Where you might have seen one person a year make the transition from homelessness to independent life, this year eight people have found the encouragement, healing and loving support to create new lives for themselves.

This season, we're celebrating West Vancouver's Centennial Christmas by raising up a forest of one hundred trees at Dundarave Beach.  Every one of these trees will be a beacon against the longest nights of the year, a sign of a hope shining all the brighter because of the darkness as each tree sponsor works a miracle every bit as Canadian as Kris Doubledee's.  One Christmas tree at a time, we knit closer the bonds that have allowed us to thrive in this country by making sure no one is left out in the cold.