Irony

"Dear old Alma, may we ever look back upon your glory" is the opening of the school song. The school was my home and my prison through my later years of high school. On the occasion I look back, I do so with fondness and loathing. Today, I am simply sad.

This is the Alma College of my youth. I graduated, valedictorian, 1982:

The words of the school song echoed in my head when my blackberry went insane with e-mails, text messages, facebook pushes, and I saw this:


Well after I left, there had been a fire which gutted the inside of the old lady. In the mid-90s as I recall. I went back for a reunion (my 20th!) five years ago. It was sad, but salvageable. There were plenty of plans but no one to execute. At the time, with small children and a traveling husband, I was in no way capable of becoming more involved than simply heading up the Toronto chapter of the alumnae. Time passed and it was no longer a priority or even a concern.

When do I get to the ironic part?

Over the years, since the school closure in the mid-90s, as you can well imagine, there were some shady deals, hinky agreements, government intervention and non intervention, theft, backstabbing and lies. Too much of a jigsaw puzzle for me to figure out. In the end, there was a builder, a town council and group of concerned citizens determined to "save" Alma College which was, years ago, determined to be a Heritage Site.

It is mentioned in the news as one of the Top 10 Heritage Sites in Danger of Demolition in Canada. Eventually, among much protest, the order came down for it to be destroyed.

The irony is that YESTERDAY, the government of Ontario had put a stop order on the demolition of Alma College.

Clearly someone did not like that ruling.


NOTE:

The one thing that did not burn: