Mr. Speaker, I had no idea this was coming, that is for sure, but I am grateful. I want to thank my colleagues for talking about being skewered; I will continue to do that, maybe not from within these walls, but my colleagues know that I am an equal opportunity heckler. I heckle my own guys as much as I do anybody else. They understand that.
On my tribute to my mother, let me say thanks to the hon. member for Willowdale. She is deluxe and I appreciate her and my whole family. My colleague from the Island talked about 1867. I know I have been here a while, but in fact the only thing I share with our actual Confederation is that I was born on July 1. Although some days I feel like I have been here since 1867, in fact I share that anniversary with it.
I wish to thank my colleagues from the NDP and the Bloc so much. It has been just a great run.
Agnes Macphail was mentioned. She is one of my all-time heroes. Colleagues will know this and every now and again pages ask me about this. Every time I walk into the chamber through the foyer, I see that bust of Agnes Macphail there and I give it two pats on the head just to say thanks for what a wonderful job she did as the first ever woman in this place.
She was here in the 1920s when there were not the wonderful sound systems we have now. One of my favourite lines from my mentor, Agnes Macphail, is that some fellow, a parliamentarian, came up and asked her , “Well, Agnes, have you ever been mistaken for a man?” She said, “No, have you?” I will tell members there is a great way to get things across, is there not?
Mr. Speaker, let me just wind down because I know we have gone way too long, but I think what is important for us in life is to reproduce ourselves in other people, some physically; I have never given birth to children, although I may have grandkids some day through my stepchildren, Kari and Lane. I think it is important that we have the ability, whether it is in the House of Commons, physically, emotionally or spiritually, to reproduce ourselves. When I was first elected, Doug Campbell came to a banquet. He was one of the original Reformers, and a Progressive as well, and went on later to become the premier of Manitoba. Let me finish by saying for everyone who hears this that they should fancy themselves a reproducer of themselves in other people. This poem is called The Bridge Builder :
An old man, going a lone highway, Came at the evening, cold and gray, To a chasm, vast and deep and wide, Through which was flowing a sullen tide. The old man crossed in the twilight dim; That sullen stream had no fears for him; But he turned, when he reached the other side, And built a bridge to span the tide.
“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim near, “You are wasting your strength in building here. Your journey will end with the ending day; You never again must pass this way. You have crossed the chasm, deep and wide, Why build you the bridge at the eventide?”
The builder lifted his old gray head. “Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said, “There followeth after me today A youth whose feet must pass this way. This chasm that has been naught to me To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be. He, too, must cross in the twilight dim; Good friend, I am building the bridge for him .”