absent.canadian

We had a fantastic trip to Toronto. Despite making record time (13 hours and 20 minutes from Sunderland, Ontario to Raleigh, North Carolina - door to door), there was still the tremendous sense of sadness that the trip had to end. I don’t know about you, but the worst part of any trip is the last hour or two of travelling. The only thing there is to look forward to is sleeping in your own bed. And in our case, we had to get up the next morning for work. Not fun at all.

But back to the trip. This was my first trip to Canada with a digital camera. Despite all concerns, I still managed to take over three hundred photos - some as ridiculous as a shot of my locker in my old high school. The school was being cleaned, so I walked in, pretended I belonged there, and relived old memories. And it’s amazing how little has changed.

On this trip, I learned that the things that change the most aren’t the buildings or the street signs … it’s the people. Places that were once a part of my life were still the way I left them so many years ago; the difference is that the people there don’t know me. At all. In a way, it’s fun to be anonymous in your own hometown.

I visited the graves of two old friends. Brooke McDonald was killed in a car accident in 1995. Two years my junior, she was the daughter of a family that rented a room to one of my close friends. I also visited Les Smith - a kind hearted farmer that taught me more than he could imagine. Les’ passing last year hit me really hard, but I’m glad to have known him, and glad that I made the time to visit his grave.

My public school from 1987 was also open, and I was amazed to see pictures of the kids that I went to high school with, now working as teachers there. Kind of odd to see people that I remember as immature teenagers, doing things with their lives.

I visited Beaverton for two reasons: Lake Simcoe and one of my favorite antique stores in the world. I learned to love Lake Simcoe when I dated a girl whose parents owned a home on the lake. We would go out in her father’s little boat and 5 horsepower Johnson outboard.

The antique store I love is full of Canadiana. And if you know who Foster Hewitt is, you’ll appreciate that I’m now the curator of the Key to the City of Winnipeg that he was awarded. As some of you may know, I have a deep respect for Canadian broadcasters (there was once a time when I lusted for a job at the CBC, and I still harbor faint hope), and Foster Hewitt is nothing short of iconic. If you have heard the phrase “He shoots, he scores!”, you have heard Foster Hewitt.

Rather spontaneously, I opened my sunroof when I was cruising down the Gardener Expressway towards downtown Toronto, and captured this scene. Perhaps it wasn’t the wisest thing to do, but it made for an interesting perspective of a road trip. And I strongly encourage you to drive to Toronto sometime. It’s a wonderful city.