Canada Day always sneaks up on me. One minute it’s June and the next there’s a red and white flag flapping from the neighbour’s porch, and kids chalking maple leaves on the sidewalk, half-finished and lopsided.
There’s something sweet about it. And also something heavier, if I’m honest.
I used to think celebration meant perfection. That you could only be proud of something if it was spotless, polished, and untouchable. But that’s not how people work, and it’s not how countries work either.
We’ve made mistakes. We’ve taken wrong turns. We’ve said the right thing and done the wrong thing. And sometimes we’ve just gone quiet when we should have spoken up.
But here’s the thing: a country is not frozen in place. It’s not a painting hanging on a wall—it’s a living, breathing thing. It grows. It learns. And sometimes, if it’s willing, it gets better.
And even now, there’s so much worth celebrating.
The long summer stretch of a cottage dock, and the loons calling across the lake at night.
Small towns where the rink is the heart of the week, and someone’s uncle still drives the Zamboni.
Kids building snow forts in January like it’s a competitive sport.
French and English on cereal boxes. Inuktitut on the school wall in Nunavut.
The quiet pride of a fiddle tune played at a kitchen party in Cape Breton. A Ukrainian dance recital in a prairie community hall. A dragon boat race in Vancouver’s False Creek.
Neighbours shovelling each other’s driveways without asking. The way people say “sorry” even when they’re the ones getting bumped into.
The sound of “eh?” at the end of a question, like a little flick of friendliness.
The Terry Fox Run. The smell of campfire in your jacket days later. A fresh bag of ketchup chips ripped open on a road trip across a province with more trees than people.
We don’t have to choose between celebration and reflection. It doesn’t have to be one or the other. We can love something and still wish more for it. We can wave a flag without pretending everything underneath it has always been right.
The truth is, I love this place. I love the vast skies, the quiet lakes, and the way people still hold doors open for each other in Nova Scotia, Nanaimo, and Nunavik. I love the conversations we’re having now that we didn’t use to have. I love that we’re still trying.
And maybe that’s enough to celebrate. Not perfection—but effort. Not a spotless past, but a hopeful future.
So today I’ll stand with the crowd, hand over heart, and sing the anthem.
Not because we’ve always gotten it right.
But because we still believe we can do better.
And because, for all our flaws, this is still home.
And home, as we know, is never perfect.
But always worth celebrating.
The CJBuzz 