This is the day to answer the call, in more ways than one

This is a very big day for all of us. A day when we have to think very carefully about things, about what’s most important.

In short, we must think about plumbing.

Oh, you were thinking Election Day. No, it’s bigger than that; it’s World Toilet Day.

On this day (and I’m not making this up), we celebrate the loo, the head, the john, the latrine, the privy, the throne and, yes, the porta-potty (shout-out for Occupy Kamloops!).

In other words, this is a day for potty humour. (Guy walks into a bar, asks, “May I use your washroom?” Bartender says…)

Oh, there’s a serious message behind World Toilet Day. An estimated 2.6 billion people do not have the convenience of Thomas Crapper’s invention. (Actually, there’s some dispute about whether Mr. Crapper should really be given the credit.)

The 10^th annual World Toilet Summit starts next week in China. It’s going to talk about public sanitation. Lots of people will be there.

Still, we should spare a moment to go vote. The campaign is over, the promises have all been made, and by late tomorrow morning our highways and byways should be sign-free, or close to it.

Looking back over the past few weeks, I’m of the view that the election campaign demonstrated our maturity as a community.

For example, though I’ve spent much of that time happily bashing the candidates, listing the ways in which they don’t measure up, they’re still talking to me. They understand it’s not personal. Or, more likely, they don’t give a damn what I have to say about them.

Many people say it was a humdrum campaign, that the candidates didn’t have enough ideas, that they didn’t get mad enough, that it was the same old political talk we get from politicians at all levels.

But, rather than thinking of the campaign as dull, think of it as civil. We are, after all, Canadians. The forums were mostly quiet, uneventful affairs. Even the media-sponsored forum — though, as always, the most raucus of the bunch — was marked by a respectful non-tension between candidates and the audience.

One candidate told me he would like to have seen the candidates “out of their polite skins, and having some fun with it.” Canadians, he said, “are far too polite to ‘debate.’ Ripping into someone might have been seen as negative.”

True, and we Canadians would not want to be negative, but at least the campaign wasn’t marred by anything nasty. The roughest it got was a little lawn-sign vandalism.

One can draw from the campaign a conclusion that Kamloops is a more united place than it used to be. No longer is Kamloops defined by the feud between the North Shore and the South.

And not once did I hear mention of ward systems. Finally, it would seem, Kamloops has come to realize that the at-large system of electing councillors works, and that a ward system would take us back to the pre-amalgamation days of guerilla politics that make any current-day disagreements look like a Ms. Manners workshop.

So, today, as you answer the call to vote, or the call to Nature, think about how civilized we have it here in River City, where almost every toilet flushes, and the politics are oh so civilized.