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Our remarkable youth
?There seems to be a very strong theme running through this week’s Cosmos. It begins on the very first page, with the fascinating story of a 26-year-old local university student who, thanks to his computer skills, has made an important contribution to a program which will assistant medical researchers in finding important answers.
It concludes on the last page, where another 26-year-old has reached his own milestone in a field of endeavour light-years different - professional golf. Although we didn’t ask them, there’s probably a good chance that Andrew the computer wizard and Jacob the golf magician went to school together. Interesting to speculate what they talked about when they met in the hallways.
On the pages in between their stories, you’ll see other clues as to the remarkable young people we have in our midst. Like the ad on page 9, for instance, which tells of a campaign spearheaded by the Uxbridge Youth Centre which will see teams of youth this Saturday cleaning up some of the worst hot spots of graffiti marring our streets.
Or the story on the same page about some of our most talented youngsters teaming up to sing and play in benefit of the Uxbridge Music Scholarship Fund, which will help many of their colleagues pursue their dreams in the performing arts.
Or the column on page 7, Far From Home, written for more than two years now by an eloquent and determined young woman who is chasing her own theatrical dreams thousands of miles away from the comfortable environment of Uxbridge.
Or the 65 high school kids mentioned in Ted Barris’ column opposite, and pictured on page 10, who left this week (at great expense to themselves and their families) on an odyssey to discover why the 65th anniversary of the liberation of Holland is so important to their own country’s history. In next week’s Cosmos, you’ll read some of their own reflections on their preparations for this journey.
Or the children pictured on page 16, who woke up early on a chilly Sunday morning and came down to Elgin Park to run for a cause they sensed was important, though few of them might not know just why quite yet: the Uxbridge Cottage Hospital.
Although their activities and accomplishments might shine a little brighter in our pages this week, the fact is that every week in a community newspaper like ours, you don’t have to read very much between the lines to realize how amazing our community’s young people are. On a daily basis, they take our breath away with how creative, how committed, how comfortable they are with blazing their way in an adult world. They make the odd bad apple (like the bozos who sprayed all the graffiti in the first place) pale into insignificance.
And here’s a tip of the hat to all the adults who give them an arena in which to shine: the teachers who guided Andrew Schoenrock, or organized the Holland trip, or lit the fire in Jennifer Carroll; the people who created the Music Scholarship Fund or the Youth Centre; or the people who organized Huck Finn Day, and gave the lad in our cover picture a chance to chill out with his dad beside the pond. On Saturday he was fishing, he’ll be brilliant some other day. We’re sure of it.
