Moaning in Toronto

You know the silly season is here when the death of a racoon on a city street makes the obituary columns. I would probably not have taken much notice of the reports myself except that the creature apparently died just round the corner from where we live.

In the nature of things, racoons everywhere die all the time, whether they enjoy an urban life or reside in their country habitat. Also, few would normally shed a tear when a racoon passes on, least of all for city-dwelling racoons. These are animals that do not normally endear themselves to city humans, principally because of their habit of upsetting our garbage bins during the night and leaving the mess for us to clear up.

But July is the month when public sources of entertainment dry up. Politics, especially, is at an ebb, with Parliament in recess and politicians find themselves at a loose end, with fewer opportunities to keep their mouths shut except at the traditional constituency barbecue. True, there could be music entertainments of all kinds, jazz, pop, classical, etc. Besides, every weekend sees some street party or the other in celebration of the city’s cultural diversity.  And of course, there are the staple shootings, stabbings, road rage and other fracas that keep the police busy. All predictable, but apparently not quite enough to satisfy our desire for something out of the ordinary. Even something as big as the Pan-American Games coming to town was, initially, not enough to get residents animated, leading to no less than the New York Times harrumphing that, “most Torontonians seem to be greeting the event with a shrug” (NYTPanAMGames) And, not until the country’s athletes started winning shedloads of medals did the city wake up to the possibility that something special might be going on on their doorstep.

But it seems that when it comes to dead racoons, we get pumped up enough to send messages around the world through the internet.  How else can one explain the sensational spread of an inconsequential story of a racoon dying at a street corner in mid-town? (DeadRacoon) Of course the term “viral” has acquired a whole new meaning in the last few years, perhaps without a full appreciation of the word’s provenance or of how the original can be a potential killer not to be trifled with.

Tell Fren Tru