A siren to my soul.

Saturday was a wonderful morning for us. It’s usually a nice day all around, but last week it was like the world put on a show for us. Usually, we try to sleep in a bit, then Steve takes Josie for a walk to get the paper and I feed Beauty and Homey and make lattes, then we read in bed for a few hours. This past week, I woke up early and felt like getting Josie out so that Steve could do a few things and I could get a few things for the brunch. So I set up Josie in the stroller early in the morning, and had a walk through the neighbourhood. All along Queen street, the antique shops were opening and since I know most of them through work, we had greetings from everyone. “Good morning Josephine!” “There she is!” “Hi you two!”. Smiles from strangers, too, because Josie is very charming on her walks. She holds her feet up and babbles at them, and smiles at everyone and says “OOH!” when something interests her, and shows her Cheerios all around. So it was already a sunny and pleasant day, and that made it feel like a movie set. When we got to the park at the corner of Queen and Jones, which we used to call Needle park but is much better since it was renovated this past summer, the shade near the baby swings was just perfect for a few giggly swings. But as we walked the rest of the way through the park, I noticed how surreally beautiful it was. A Buddhist monk was playing in the sand with a small child. Two elderly Asian men were riding on the teeter-totter. A group of elderly Asian women were doing their Tai Chi, and they moved like poetry. At one point, they were doing the walking backwards in converging circles part and it looked like a ballet. One woman was pushing her son on the swings, and their grandma was swinging next to them. Everyone smiled at us in welcome, and I was so happy that it wasn’t like I was intruding on their secret early morning world. After a few swings, we left and an older black man in a very proper suit and fedora sitting on a park bench tipped his hat to Josephine and said “Good morning little lady”. At the stop light, a burly biker on a Harley (there’s a Hell’s Angels clubhouse a few blocks away from us) was blasting Patsy Cline’s “I Cried All the Way to the Altar” on his radio and singing, and when I joined in, he saluted us and waggled his fingers at Josephine. At the store which was just opening, all the employees were stocking the shelves and mopping the floors and Josephine was babbling so loud that it echoed because the store was empty, and the clerks from aisles away were “ba ba ba”-ing back at her. We got the paper and stopped at the thrift store and found red cord overalls for Josie from Baby Gap for $2.99 and a really pretty blue long sleeved tee for me, both brand-new. We came home and had the rest of our day with Steve as usual, but I was enamoured of the city once again. I’m not saying that all that couldn’t have happened elsewhere, but it made me grateful to be in our neigbourhood. Those same Asian people I’ll probably curse later this week when they totter along the sidewalk with no regard for anyone who wants to pass them, and later that day the park was full of the usual trashy kids – but that morning, it was great to feel like I live not just in a house, but in a community within a city that supports a diverse culture and has romantic elements if you just keep your eyes open. Being a pedestrian during the off-hours means entering another world entirely. It’s too easy to be busy or to drive past it. It was like a little gift of the feeling of being connected. And actually, we’ve had a few times that have captured the feeling of last Saturday morning, but it was nice to be reminded. There was a line from a Paul Mark and the VanDorens song that I ‘ve always loved that used to sum me and Steve up - “I come from a long line of late night walkers. Flashing neon is a siren to my soul.” I get that same feeling about any walk through the city – I wouldn’t feel at home unless I could stand in one place see both a green little park with kids playing and a bunch of giant buildings seething with activity glinting in the sun.