In praise of the ponies
Earlier this week, someone at work asked if I’d seen “the show about PEI” on Sunday. I hadn’t, but I was curious. All I knew was that it had come on after Coronation Street, and it was all about horses. Easy find.
You see, the only place that CBC (it was their schedule) would put up something about horses, more specifically harness racing, is Land And Sea. And in our world of online resources, it wasn’t hard to get a second chance at watching the documentary. A balanced report on the topic, in retrospect.
I’m not a “bet on the ponies” kind of guy. My money is too hard come by to turn it into worthless scraps of paper. I don’t have the fever. Not what a race track owner (Atlantic Loto Corporation) wants to hear. And yet, you can’t be from around the Island without coming into contact with the industry.
Everybody knows where the racetracks are. Everybody knows somebody who races. Heck, everybody knows the voice (it is still Boomer, isn’t it?) And the biggest holiday parade of the year has nothing to do with Santa Claus, or Irish background and everything to do with the big race at the end of Old Home Week. I’ve come into contact with it over the years, although I’ll never own my own set of silks.
Times are tough in the harness industry. Ask the horse owners here in Quebec City, who have lost their track. Still, the Island government has found millions of dollars in that same tough economy, and the minister of Finance still claims that it’s a sound investment. I’ll bow to his greater knowledge of the field. Without ever laying down a bill for a bet.
