We see fire hydrants every day, fortunately not often in use. But there they stand, along our route and near our homes — silent, patient reminders of our shared commitment to safety and community.

The fire hydrant, or "fire plug", dates back to the 1600s, when fire crews would prepare a water source by digging deep into the ground to reach the water table. Afterwards, they covered the well with a plug, so that they were ready. When a fire broke out they'd remove the fire plug and use a bucket brigade — a human chain — to move the water to where it was needed.

Fire hydrants are a great example of how previous problems can lead to not only solutions but commitment to our shared success. While no-one wants to experience such trouble up close, knowing that there is a chance for relief and support can give us all confidence and security.

Recently I saw a truck with two new fire hydrants, on their way to being installed. Like much of the infrastructure we depend on, including our electrical supply, the strength of fire hydrants is hidden — supporting what is visible — built on the endless river of human experience, ingenuity and compassion.

While each of us has our own walk in life, it is good to know that our families, friends and community are there to help. We are each other's bucket brigade. We are the strength around us.

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As the 2010 Winter Olympics come to a close, wonderful memories and a sense of encouragement remain from our shared experience of Vancouver and Whistler, BC.  Athletes and administrators, volunteers and fans, families and global friends — we all came together to honour excellence and commitment.

While I enjoyed the excitement of the competitions, it was the determined spirit of the people that brought joy to my heart. While even the best teams come and go, the most beautiful and steadfast human traits remain: compassion and community.

When I see people trying hard to do something good together I feel true joy. I know that joy is shared with many, including Joyce Hunnam, a Scottish woman who has volunteered at 6 Olympics, and who is pictured with the flame above.

Photo by Dave Chidley

There are many images and moments in each Olympics, but none as primal and symbolic as the Olympic flame. From humankind’s earliest days, fire has been a symbol of our ability to tame enough of nature to help us survive. The Olympic torch, topped with flame and carried with pride by a legion of runners, represents our shared determination to overcome obstacles, weather and geographic barriers — to share the good news of global fellowship and good will.

Photo by 2010 Olympic Volunteer

Designed by the famed Canadian company, Bombardier (of Ski-Doo fame), the Olympic torch was passed from hand to hand across the country, traveling 45,000 kilometers through snow, rain, hail, wind and sub-zero temperatures.

A combination of engineering, organizing and human spirit, the carrying of the Olympic torch is one of my favourite human endeavors – working together and celebrating great achievements and community.

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At the core of our lives are two powerful traits: responsibility and compassion. While they sound like lofty ideals, responsibility and compassion are actually life’s calls to action, built into each of us. We know there are things we should do, and we know when we should be helpful and sensitive to others.  Knowing these things doesn’t make us responsible and compassionate — it is acting on these feelings by participating.

When we are young, most things are done for us. Mothers, fathers and caregivers watch over us, and try to give us what we need — both physically and emotionally.

As we get older, we learn skills and develop an understanding of the needs and emotions of both ourselves and others. Life prepares us, step by step, to move beyond receiving to giving and doing.

By the time we are teens we understand the power of action, and experience the sometimes unsettling shift to our own vital role in making things work out. We become aware that there are things to do, and feelings beyond our own that are worthy of care and consideration.

While each of us needs times of rest and self-focus, being active and involved provides satisfaction and a joy of life that is felt on many levels.

As any elderly person with arthritis will tell you, there is a joy to being able to use our hands. Our bodies and minds like to do things, and there can be pleasure in simple chores — even washing the dishes or taking out the garbage. Human hands are wonderful creations, and using them to help ourselves and others is not just their essential purpose — it physically feels good!

Responsibility and compassion are essential for all successful relationships. We live in community, and though each of us needs our private time, being involved with others is a big part of our lives. When we make the shared parts of our lives better we all benefit. The key word here is “better”, and as anyone will tell you, “better” doesn’t happen on its own — making things better takes action; it takes effort.

There is a special, intense feeling of joy when we bring a smile to others. Some of the best smiles result from sharing a moment of appreciation, celebrating our shared efforts.  It is a smile that says “We are doing this together“.

When times are tough, knowing that someone cares brings strength and hope, but when someone takes action we see our situation improving, and that is a powerful inspiration for people.  Seeing progress — even a slow, small bit — can be like a train starting to move out of the station. It is exciting even if it is mundane, because action moves us forward.

Each of us has personal goals, and knows how good it feels to have something we care about work out. The same positive feelings are experienced for the goals we help others with. In fact, helping others can feel even better than helping yourself.

While ideas and knowledge are good things, it is the doing of things that makes life good.

There is a happy middle ground between exhaustion and idleness, and between servitude and insensitivity — it is being responsible and compassionate.

When we share in what needs to be done — helping each other, and being sensitive to each other’s feelings — we can get the right things done. We can help things work out.

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Stepping into my father’s workshop always takes me back in time. Not only are my parents collectors of memorabilia, but they continue to make good use of the things they already have. So when I look around my father’s garage I see tools that have existed since I was a boy, including a vice, a band saw, and various ancient screw drivers.

While my mother prepared our lunch, my father showed me his latest project – to add a second door to the front hallway, to keep the cold air out, but with a window to keep the light flowing in. Their front door already has a window in it, so a second door with a window would let my parents keep the natural light.

Being a resourceful person, my Dad took an unused door, removed a wooden panel, and was busy inserting a Plexiglas window into its heart. It was at this stage of the project that I arrived – to help my Dad nail in the Plexiglas.

As he prepared to starting hammering, a big smile came to my face – he was using the same finishing hammer that I had used as a boy. It was a bit more worn now, but it was still the same light-weight hammer I had used, before I was strong enough to use a regular hammer.  But in my Dad’s case, he knew that this job required a finishing hammer, so that is what he was using.

My role turned out to be supplying my father with one inch finishing nails, one at a time, while he hammered them carefully into place. He has a steady, practiced hand and not once did he bend a nail or dent the door with an errant hammer blow.

As I watched him working carefully and skillfully, I remembered my own hand on that hammer, and him helping me on projects. To be working together, with the simple job of handing him the next nail, was a sublime and satisfying joy – one that transcended the moment — connecting the two of us through years of building and sharing time together.

One hammer but many moments together – the joy of working side-by-side is not secondary, but the most important product of my father’s hammer.

If you enjoyed this article, please read my poem about cleaning my son’s workshop area.

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	Make a big deal of everything. Sure, we all have things we really care about, but what do we gain by insisting it’s our way or it’s no way? Stress. It’s amazing how the tension evaporates from our shoulders when someone says, “I’m fine with that”, or “That could work.”
	Have the wrong pet, or be the wrong owner. If you think your pet always looks like this, or perhaps that your pet would like to kill you, then it’s time to think outside the litter box. Your style might not work with this pet, and changing how you spend time with your pet might make you both happier. Or maybe someone else might love the little scoundrel more.
	Make your mother look like this. Everyone wants to be treated with respect, or at least with courtesy. Know when you’re having a bad day and don’t take it out on those closest to you. They love you, but hey, you have a lot of say over what words come out of your mouth.
	Eat a lot of junk food. Eating a lot of fatty snacks is a wonderful luxury, and a growing source of grief and grumpiness. When we put on pounds we lose the spring in our step, and like it or not, feeling heavy is a drag. When did we forget how fantastic fruit is? Be an emperor and eat some grapes!
	Insist on doing life on your own. We all need some time to ourselves — even extroverts (such as when they vote). Everyone needs to have friends, to share good times and get through bad times. When we think that two heads aren’t better than one then we’re also saying two hearts aren’t better than one. People need community, and it’s often just a smile away.
	Don’t get enough sleep. This is an excellent way to make not only yourself but lots of people around you grumpy. And unlike eating too many fatty snacks you can generate gallons of grumpiness very quickly. There are some types of fun that require staying up really late and listening to either drunken people yelling or long-dead actors on TV. But surprisingly, most things in life can happen within our usual sleeping cycle.  Cut out a bit early and wake up feeling refreshed.
	Drink more than you know you should. What are we, still 15 years old? Bio-chem students might seem a bit nerdy but they do know an essential secret: that alcohol at high levels is toxic, messy, and a great source of vitamin G (yes, G is for Grumpiness). Don’t be like this pumpkin — all orange and dumping their insides. You’ll still have fun.
	Try to do too much. This isn’t just about work, but about all areas of our lives. When did overdoing everything become a national contest? There will always be more things to do than we have time for and the skills for. Working together on projects is a great way to make headway and to share the joy of progress. We need to be able to say “no”, ask for help, and find a new balance of quality and quantity. If your life is a parody of a soccer Mom then it’s time for a time out.
	Treat small mistakes like the end of the world. Things go wrong — every day — but rarely will they bring down the sky. We have a vested interest in the current moment of our life and when it goes wrong it can surprise us. People can get frustrated and defensive. They can even go beyond grumpy to all-out anger. Be kind and forgiving to yourself and those around you. Instead of making a big deal, try a shrug and say “Oops” when things go wrong. You’ll find most mistakes are quickly forgotten.
	Take all the credit. We all contribute, but in different ways. Each day is part of a long term project called life, and the task that just got done is threaded through the lives of people who helped along the way — whether you know or appreciate them or not. Celebrate victories with gusto, and small successes too — prevent grumpiness by acknowledging shared efforts. We aren’t living in cold caves like smelly cavemen. Enjoy sharing the spotlight, and be thankful for living in community.

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As the stage designer for an 1100-seat auditorium I get to spend a lot of time up a ladder, reaching for things. Drapery, fishing line, cable ties and scissors are just some of the items I carry, tweak and twist while 10 feet off the ground.  I have a great respect for the stage, especially when I get to stand on it instead of looking down at it from a ladder.

A recent stage design was based on the community theme of “Being Connected”, and used gears and steel trusses to give a mechanical representation of people being connected in many ways. With LED backlighting it came to life, and I really enjoyed it.

When it was time to take it down, I was back up the ladder. Sometimes I have an irrational worry that I am taking the stage apart when there is still one show to go, but I have yet to make that mistake. It is amazing how quickly we can take something apart that took a lot of time and effort to create!

Part way through taking down the pieces I came to the horizontal truss, which ran between two sets of gears. It was a heavy structure and had many pieces of 40-pound fishing line making sure it stayed up. I stood at the top of the ladder, looking down at the truss and fishing line, trying to figure out how to get the thing down without it crashing into the stage.

And then it hit me — my perspective was wrong. I was looking at the problem the wrong way. I climbed down the ladder to the stage floor and laughed — the truss was only five feet off the ground, and I could easily take it down from the safety of terra firma.

I had gotten so used to doing things while up the ladder that I had missed the easy solution.  My focus had been reduced to what I could do from my usual position.

It’s a good reminder of how we can get in a rut — doing things the same way — when a better, perhaps easier way, is within reach.

Some of our challenges can be solved by changing our position physically, and others by changing our position mentally or philosophically [also known as learning something new]. When something seems hard to do, or outside your usual patterns, try taking a look at it from a different perspective, and see if you can see it differently.

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“Alone, on my own, no-one’s there, and I’m scared” – these thoughts should only happen to each of us once.

Our first moment of feeling that we are doing life on our own should be our last. When our parent hugs us that first time should be the start of a lifetime of knowing “I am part of more.”

People need people. People love people. People love being with people and it shouldn’t be a peep-hole but a full view, with laughter and singing and hands helping — together. That is what people love. That is what people crave. That is when people shine.

Even those who seem to be distant want someone to be closer.

Take everything that we have ever owned and balance it against friendship, hugs and working together. Distill the lifetime of a person to its purest essence and you will find the joy in relationships. You will find people caring about others. People caring about you.

We are all different — that makes life interesting. But we are all the same — linked by a web of friends and co-workers, of shared interests and efforts.

We can’t turn everyone in the world into our friend today, but we can make a start — by reminding each other with a smile or a helping hand –

We are all connected.

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Every child fortunate enough to learn about our solar system has been amazed by the rings of Saturn. Dusty rings encircling a planet is a strangeness exactly out of this world — very alien, and very isolated.

	Recent photographs of Saturn and its rings were taken by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, and published by The Smithsonian Magazine. They show more extensive rings than have been seen before, with many amazing patterns reaching out and circling back around.
	But while Saturn and its rings stand as a marvel, it stands as a lonely marvel, separated by millions of miles from its nearest neighbors. It turns out that other planets have rings, including Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune.  But they are so very far away from each other. It is as if these planets are reaching out — surrounding themselves with bits of themselves, but unable to reach far enough.
	Back on Earth, every school child has learned about water, that amazing life-enveloping molecule called H2O. Instead of rings of dust, a water molecule has rings of electrons. And instead of isolated, useless rings, water has shared rings that both strengthen and calm it. The components of water — those 2 Hydrogen atoms and the Oxygen atom — are highly reactive on their own, and not always in good ways. But when they come together they become much more than they were apart — they take on a new form with amazing capabilities — they become the key to life.

Around each of us are rings of energy, hopes, skills and love that we can share with others. When we join together in community we become more than we can be on our own — stronger and calmer — and things become clear.

Don’t be a planet on its own. Become water. Become community.

Be rings around the rosey. Together we won’t fall down.

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During times of change or struggle you can often hear someone say that “things will even out”. It is a conflicted catch phrase in that it sounds optimistic but doesn’t assign any responsibility.

It is usually uttered when something bad is happening now, or we suspect that things will be less than perfect later on.

Often the people who say “things will even out” are either not the ones being directly affected by the situation, they have struggled and lost in a similar situation in the past, or they have yet to experience a positive team experience.

Working together on mutually beneficial tasks is at the core of society. Despite our seeming individuality, most people share common goals and  needs.

What is often hidden in our current culture is the joy and satisfaction of helping others. Very strong marketing efforts are made every day to convince each of us that we are unique and need to think primarily about what we want and what we desire — right now!

While it is essential for each of us to try hard to work through our problems, we need to know when we need help.  We can be humble and accepting of our own limitations because we know that together we can do more.

Most people like helping others, and if asked to help they will.

The next time you hear someone say “things will even out” please recognize the moment for what it is: someone needs help and you might be the person that can help them.

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We are all multi-faceted and unique. You and I are complex people, living in a busy world that often misses the simple joys of life. As you walk down the street, know that inside each person you see is more than what they are showing.

We can’t have time to know everyone, but we can know that everyone has a story, and that each hopes that tomorrow will be good.

A photography project called Being Toronto (www.beingtoronto.com) has John Beebe and Michelle Gibson taking their cameras to the urban streets, to capture some of life and community.

John and Michelle are setting up their temporary photo studio at various locations, and encouraging people to have their photos taken at no cost.

Says John Beebe: “As photographers we are fascinated by people – complex, varied, part of a whole and absolutely individual. By building a studio on the sidewalk in a wide-range of neighborhoods we are allowing chance to create a portrait of this city.”

A big part of getting a portrait of someone is earning their trust. This is true whether we are taking their photo or being part of their life.

When we let others know we value them, they can more easily give of themselves.

We are all more.

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