Canada's a huge country, so to be able to unite the country

Host: The night had fallen over the northern sky, stretching its blue-black curtain above the snow-clad city of Ottawa. The wind carried a faint whisper, like the breath of an ancient giant, across the river’s frozen veins. Inside a small observatory café perched near the hill, Jack and Jeeny sat by the window, their reflections flickering in the glass as the aurora danced faintly above. A radio on the counter murmured the voice of Marc Garneau, replaying his words:
“Canada’s a huge country, so to be able to unite the country through communication satellite technology or to be able to observe it through remote sensing technology from space is a natural fit for a country like Canada.”

Jack: (leaning back, his grey eyes fixed on the sky) “You know, it’s funny. We call it communication technology, but what it really means is—machines trying to replace what people have forgotten how to do. Talk. Listen. Connect.”

Jeeny: (her voice soft, her hands wrapped around the warm mug) “That’s not fair, Jack. The satellites don’t replace us. They extend us. They let a fisherman in Newfoundland talk to a doctor in Vancouver. They let families see each other’s faces from thousands of kilometers apart.”

Host: The steam from her cup rose like a small ghost, curling around the light above them. Jack’s jaw tightened; he looked away, his reflection merging with the darkness beyond the window.

Jack: “Maybe. But it’s all so... sterile. Wires and frequencies. People looking at screens instead of faces. You call it connection—I call it substitution. Canada’s vastness used to mean something real. People crossed it, built railways, froze together in the same winter. Now? We just beam signals and pretend that’s unity.”

Jeeny: “You’re mistaking the tool for the intention. The railways you mentioned—they were technology too. Back then, they connected the east and west for the first time. The satellites are just the new rails, Jack. Only now, they’re made of light.”

Host: A faint hum filled the room, the sound of an espresso machine in the distance. The lights flickered, and for a moment, their faces were bathed in a pale blue glow from the screen that showed a satellite map of the country.

Jack: “Light rails… poetic, but naïve. Those ‘light rails’ also make it easier for governments to watch, for corporations to mine data, for people to retreat into curated little bubbles of comfort. Communication doesn’t always mean unity—it often means control.”

Jeeny: (leaning forward, her eyes glimmering) “And isolation doesn’t mean freedom either. Look at the Northern communities—some only reachable by plane or satellite. When the satellite dishes came, so did education, healthcare, and weather forecasts that saved lives. Doesn’t that matter more than your nostalgia for discomfort?”

Host: The tension thickened, like frost forming on glass. Jack’s fingers drummed against the table, his voice dropping to a low, deliberate murmur.

Jack: “It matters, yes. But at what cost? You give them screens and lose the stories told around fires. You give them connection and lose presence. We’ve become a nation united by signals, but separated by silence.”

Jeeny: “Maybe the silence is changing form, Jack. It’s not absence—it’s distance filled by new voices. When astronauts like Garneau looked down from space, they didn’t see a divided people. They saw a single, shimmering landmass connected by rivers of light. Maybe unity isn’t about being in the same room anymore. Maybe it’s about remembering we share the same sky.”

Host: Her words lingered in the air. Outside, the snow began to fall—slow, deliberate flakes that seemed to descend in time with their breathing. Jack’s eyes followed one as it landed on the windowpane and melted away.

Jack: “You speak like unity is some inevitable truth. But history tells a different story. Look at the fall of empires—their roads, their communication systems. Rome had its messengers; Britain had its telegraph cables. Every connection became a leash in the end.”

Jeeny: “You’re right about history. But you forget the reason they built those connections in the first place. To understand. To feel less alone. Canada’s not an empire—it’s a mosaic. And a mosaic needs threads of connection to hold its pieces together.”

Host: The wind outside howled, brushing against the window like a distant voice. Jeeny’s brown eyes softened, but her words carried a quiet fire.

Jeeny: “Think of the Apollo 17 photo—the Blue Marble. The moment humanity saw Earth as one. That image came from a satellite, Jack. It didn’t divide us; it humbled us. It made us realize how fragile our borders really are.”

Jack: (with a faint, almost mocking smile) “Beautiful sentiment. But that same image led to nations racing for control of space, for dominance, for power. Every unifying symbol gets corrupted by ambition eventually.”

Jeeny: “So you’d rather we not look at all?”

Jack: “I’d rather we look inward first.”

Host: A silence settled between them, heavier than before. The clock on the wall ticked—steady, mechanical, indifferent. In that stillness, the northern lights outside flickered brighter, painting faint ribbons of green across the sky.

Jeeny: “You sound tired of hope, Jack.”

Jack: “Maybe I am. Hope feels like another broadcast—loud, persistent, but too far away to touch.”

Jeeny: (whispering) “Then maybe that’s why the satellites matter. Because even when we’re too far to touch, we can still reach.”

Host: Jack’s gaze lifted to the screen again, where the satellite map pulsed—tiny dots representing towns, cities, outposts scattered across the endless white of the North. For the first time, his eyes softened.

Jack: “You really think this—these machines, these beams of light—can give us something like belonging?”

Jeeny: “Not by themselves. But they remind us how small we are. They let us see ourselves from above—every heartbeat, every forest, every storm. Sometimes, to love something vast, you have to step far enough away to see it whole.”

Host: Her words carried a stillness that filled the room like snowfall. Jack’s shoulders eased; he let out a quiet breath, almost a laugh.

Jack: “You always make it sound so damn poetic.”

Jeeny: (smiling) “Maybe poetry is the last kind of connection we can’t send through a satellite.”

Host: The café grew quiet. The radio clicked off, leaving only the soft hiss of wind and the crackle of the heater. Outside, the sky shimmered, the lights shifting like waves across the frozen horizon.

Jack: “You know what’s strange? For all my cynicism… when I see those lights up there, I feel something. Maybe it’s pride. Maybe it’s loneliness. Maybe both.”

Jeeny: “That’s what unity really is, Jack. Not everyone thinking the same—but everyone feeling the same distance, the same longing. The satellites don’t erase that—they echo it back.”

Host: A single tear traced the edge of Jeeny’s cheek, catching the light before it vanished. Jack reached across the table, his hand resting over hers—not as an answer, but as an acknowledgment.

Jack: “Maybe you’re right. Maybe the real connection isn’t in the signal—it’s in the silence that follows it.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. Every signal fades, but the intention remains.”

Host: Outside, the aurora flared—brilliant, shifting hues cascading across the dark northern sky. For a moment, it seemed as though the entire country, from ocean to ocean, breathed under that same glow. The light was both distant and near, both human and celestial.

Jack and Jeeny sat quietly, their reflections blending into one on the windowpane, their faces illuminated by the same soft green shimmer that had traveled light-years to reach them.

Host: And in that quiet northern night, as the sky unfolded like an ancient map, two souls—divided by doubt, united by wonder—finally understood what Marc Garneau had meant. That in a vast, scattered land like this, only by reaching beyond the earth could one truly see how close everything already was.