Moguls

As the downhill skiers wait for the opening of Jack Pine Hill next week, I recall my one effort at skiing down Nipissing Ridge, too many years ago. I had only cross-country skied before that and was not familiar with moguls. I naively thought only oil barons were moguls. It was a learning experience that would keep me on the cross country circuit for many years. Now my knees hurt just watching people ski moguls.

Slip sliding down the slope of life we are challenged by moguls, those inconvenient bumps on the road - some man-made others simply constructed by nature to keep our knees limber and our minds alert.

Our inevitable destination, death, can be a looming frightening mogul, but we poets, ministers and spin-doctors avoid the death mogul by using our well-waxed word-skis.

Aunt Martha is not dead: she passed over, she assumed room temperature, she bought a pine condo, she danced her last waltz.

Uncle Jim is not only deceased but he’s sleeping with the fishes, having rode off into the sunset,
crashed and burned, or experienced a negative patient care outcome after a diagnostic misadventure of high magnitude failing to experience his wellness potential -
Yep, he’s tits and toes.

That man-made mogul, taxes, inevitable it seems as the aforementioned death, can be avoided by malfeasance and prevarication, but the government side-swipes us by hiding taxes as access fees and charges, burdens us with carbon footprint contributions and civic assessment fees. Or diverting our dollars by redistribution of wealth alternatives and income shifting options combined with social support subsidies that come with the restructuring of budgets for revenue enhancements by said government.

Our security personnel, formerly known as soldiers, may make a pre-emptive strike that is an intervention, not by bombing but using air support and aerial ordnance, hopefully not inflicting collateral damage on non-combatants or subjecting our own troops with friendly fire which may raise the body count of those sent to heaven.

After securing the area, that is, deleting all of the enemy, the boys and girls in uniform will use area denial munitions, not landmines, as deadly moguls for residents and their children for years to come.

Other minor moguls on the life slope may be avoided by using the politically correct euphemisms that have crept into our lexicon. One need not admit to adultery only to having an extra marital affair, indeed even deny fornication by only sleeping together.

Those who constantly partake and enjoy a relaxing joint may be passed off as an illegal substance abuser. Young criminals are simply juvenile delinquents or a problem at-risk-child who needs to be housed, not in a jail, but a secure facility. Objecting to the ways and means of the Police Force, make that Police Services, may result in your being held in protective custody, a euphemism for being incarcerated without due process of law.

Business word-skiers have long employed phrases such as downsizing, outsourcing, job-flexibility, job-counseled out and restructuring when they fire workers.

We all know that political bribes are called donations and campaign contributions. Toilet paper is bathroom tissue, false teeth are dental appliances, hospitals are wellness or health centres, drunks are intoxicated, inebriated or tipsy.

There are occasions when we can use our word-skis to smooth the transition over life’s moguls, however if you have mastered the technique of obfuscatory language I suggest you consider
a career in politics
or poetry