I’m Done Letting Rage Decide Who I Am as a Canadian

A clear-eyed decision to trade outrage for clarity — and start acting like this moment is real.

I didn’t start here from calm reflection.

I started here from rage.

The kind of rage that hits when you read something that treats your country like inventory instead of a neighbor. The kind that makes you want to type in all caps, hit “post,” and dare anyone to argue.

I’ve felt that rage more than once lately… and I don’t pretend it isn’t justified.

But I’ve also lived long enough to know something else:

Rage may be honest.
It is not a strategy.

And right now, Canada doesn’t need more honest rage.
It needs clarity.

When powerful people in the United States put their thinking in writing — when plans and doctrines start treating Canada as a resource colony instead of a sovereign country — that isn’t theatre. That’s homework.

The U.S. political and economic machine doesn’t benefit from our outrage.
It benefits from something quieter and more dangerous: confusion, division, exhaustion.

A neighbor arguing with itself is easy to manage.
A country that can’t tell venting from preparation is easy to sideline.

So I’m changing my job description.

At 73, I don’t want to be “that Canadian who yells about Trump.”
I want to be the Canadian who keeps pointing us back to who we are — and what we can actually do.

Here’s what that means, for me.

Rage is allowed. Panic is not.

I’m not going to pretend this isn’t dangerous. It is. But I refuse to show up as if Canada is helpless. We are not.

I will treat written plans as serious threats — not as reality television.
When something is documented as doctrine, it stops being a joke. It becomes intent.

I’m done with Canadian circular firing squads.

Provinces, parties, personalities — all of that matters. But not more than the fact that we’re one country being sized up as inventory. If what I write doesn’t make us clearer and more united, it’s not worth publishing.

Less venting. More building.

I’m going to spend more energy talking about what Canada can build for itself — alliances, industries, resilience — instead of just screaming at the neighbor for being a bully.

No more denial dressed up as optimism.

If a plan says “America first, everywhere, including over your resources,” I’m going to believe it and respond accordingly. Naïveté is a luxury we can’t afford.

And I will always separate Americans from the machine.

I have no interest in hating everyday Americans. My issue is with a political and economic system that treats other countries like convenience stores. Those are not the same thing.

From here on out, every post has to answer one question… does this make Canadians clearer and stronger?

If it only scratches my itch to rant, it stays in my drafts.
If it helps us see the game and stand up a little straighter as a country, it goes live.

I’m still the same Geezer who says what’s in his head.

I’m just choosing to point that fire somewhere useful.

Not toward helping anyone turn Canada into a quiet, compliant “51st state in everything but name” —
but toward helping Canadians see what’s happening and remember that we are more than a strip mall for someone else’s empire.

And if you ever see me sliding back into pure rage with no direction?

Call me on it.

That’s part of how we keep each other sharp.

—
Fred Ferguson
GeezerWise

Filed under: #ThePorch