Columns
"Do we really need the Christmas music playing already?" Dave Winston asked Molly Whiteside when she delivered the menus the other morning at Mabel's Grill...
A few weeks back, the missus and I made a short trip from Dresden to Thamesville, passed over the Thames and made a sharp right turn...
Talk to anyone who thinks about such things and you will probably hear that the autumn of 2024 has been unprecedented. The sun just never stopped shining. Instead of fighting mud, frost, and engines that need to be plugged in for the night...
It's so easy for us to think we are well-read and knowledgeable about other parts of the world and suddenly we can understand that we know so little...
As you would have read in the last issue, Lisa Boonstoppel-Pot has said a fond farewell, and decided to retire from editing the Rural Voice...
"I hate to see all the beautiful leaves fall from the trees," Cliff Murray said the other morning as the guys gathered at Mabel's Grill. "Soon they'll lose their colour for another year." ...
I'm late to the game, I know. By the time you read this, the date for South Bruce's referendum on hosting a Deep Geological Repository (DGR) for spent nuclear fuel will have passed....
I recently attended a meeting with all the Community Forest Managers of Ontario. This group gets together once a year to listen to speakers, tour a few sites, and discuss issues that have or may arise. This year we met in Aurora and toured some of ...
If we are to have honest governance in Canada it must necessarily begin at the municipal level. If we cannot manage to positively influence municipally-elected officials, how can we impact affairs within the province, nation, or even dream of...
Determining which season is more stressful - planting or harvest -has been a discussion topic over the years. For me, this changed when we improved our grain handling system, which has made harvest much less stressful. But there is one day, every year...
As I write this column, our neighbours to the south are approaching their presidential election in November with analysts suggesting it's too close to call...
What is a farmer, really?
That's a question I've been exploring the past 10 years as editor of The Rural Voice...
You get these moments as a journalist when you see the real heart and soul of people.
A connection is made, you're in deep with the questions, fascinated by their knowledge/ experience/ personality and they forget you're a reporter...
Though this is for the October issue, it is written weeks previously, with the soybeans still ripening in the fields around our house, and the corn still green. Still, as I look ahead to October, I think of Thanksgiving.
This summer has provided several interesting history lessons for me, right in my own backyard. Most recently, seeing the play at the Blyth Festival, Onion Skins and Peach Fuzz, helped provide greater understanding about the Farmerettes and other ...
A list of most influential women in the world of English literature in Canada would not be complete without the names of Margaret Laurence, Alice Munro, and Margaret Atwood.
Manitoba-born Laurence is best known for her 1964 novel, The Stone Angel and ...
"Sometimes," Cliff Murray said as he and the guys opened their menus at Mabel's Grill one recent morning, "I think the U.S. election should be Oct. 31, not Nov. 5."
"I'm with you," chimed in Dave Winston. "Anything to get them to talk about something ....
In Indigenous communities, the ongoing tenure of land was relational and inter-dependent over generations, bioregions and species. In nation states, specific areas of land, often rectangles, are parcels owned by an individual, family, corporation ...
This past July I had the wonderful opportunity to attend a tour with the Southern Ontario Section of the Institute of Forestry. These tours are amazing learning opportunities for all attendees as not only are they led by outstanding professionals...
I was asked to preach the sermon at the church service at the Sunday morning session of the Huron Pioneer Thresher and Hobby Association Reunion (a long, convoluted story in itself) and it got me thinking about my long history...
One of the great things about living in Huron County is that there is never an opportunity to be bored. There is always so much going on -- from all the amazing outdoor activities, to sports, festivals, rodeos, live theatre, and music...
In 1974, I began working on a tobacco farm a few miles east and north from Woodstock. When I drive along Highway 401 today, I think of the days in August and September I spent there among the deep sand fields.
My uncle talked about his own...
"It's coming up to September already," said Cliff Murray the other morning, shaking his head as the guys sat down at Mabel's Grill for their morning coffee. "Where did the summer go?"
"Yeh my wife's already going...
"Tillsonburg, Tillsonburg .........My back still aches when I hear that word."
Those are, of course, the famous words in the song bearing the same title, sung by that great Canadian, Stompin' Tom Connors, describing his tobacco-picking experience ...