Something different for your morning coffee today.

Remember the piece I did about MPP’s not having retirement pensions?  Within that piece was a mention of a former MPP, Lorenzo Bernardinetti, who had fallen on hard times and was now essentially homeless and attempting to revive his law firm out of a public library.

Bernardinetti was the victim of something called life, and perhaps the more crueller aspects of it.  His fall from grace could be well identified by many of us who have fallen victim to a number of debilitating things, like job loss, marital loss, health loss, investment loss, political loss, reputational loss, and all the rest of it.  Any of these things on their own is a challenge.  Dealing with many or all of them simultaneously is overwhelming.  Not everyone living on the street or out of their cars is a fentanyl addict.

As the story of Bernardinetti and his plight circulated, a number of current and former MPPs jumped to action, and a Go Fund Me was created in Bernardinetti’s name.  This fund reached its goal of $25,000.00 in two days, as donors piled in to help, among them two former provincial premiers, none of them named Mike Harris.  The assistance crossed party lines, which is a feel-good story right there, but also may reflect the fact that all of these people share one aspect of Bernardinetti’s story, the absence of a retirement pension, courtesy of you-know-who, the self-styled Mr. Common Sense who never had an altruistic thought of his own, much less one that could be legitimately called common sense.  Mike would rather choke you out with cigar smoke than offer you any kind of help.

Of the money raised, Bernardinetti will not touch a penny of it.  Some of the donors have taken on the task of finding and renting him an apartment from which he can operate his law business.  In effect, they’re taking on the task of getting Lorenzo back on his feet, not bank-rolling his future.  Because that’s all a lot of people need, to simply get back on their feet, to find their footing, to get their legs back under them, however you’d like to have it put.

But doing that can require some seed money.  In a day and age where the wealthy among us increase their wealth, it’s a feel-good story when a bunch of people with no pensions despite service chip in to get a good man going again, a man who will one day hire others, and keep their dreams afloat.

Even the wealthy need to be reminded that we, and they, all have a life expectancy.  It’s really cool when people among the rest of us step in to prolong that in the life of someone fallen on hard times.  In this case, those MPPs rallying to Lorenzo Bernardinetti.

Well done to everyone involved.