The Light is Different Here

I was all set to write an entry about the versions of people I know versus the versions of them that I hear about... and then I took a drive. So that entry will be shelved and worked on another day.

Theoretically, my drive today was a means to an end - I wanted to go downtown to do some shopping on Yonge and Dundas, especially at the three story HMV and the gigantic bookstore. Things that I can't get back home, making the extra tax worthwhile. I took the route off the 401 that looped me along the Don Valley Parkway onto Bloor and then through to downtown to Yonge.

The Parkway loops along the side of a hill in a valley, there are these old stone and steel bridges criss-crossing the valley, there are trees and nature and warm autumn colours and I was struck with this incredible sense of euphoria and nostalgia. I know I've taken that route dozens of times before, but the strongest memory is of being sixteen and driving to Tarragon very early on a Saturday morning to interview for their young writers program.

Bloor loops through the older part of the city, so it's all rock and red brick and things that feel very Canadian and very solid. Eventually it migrates its way into city - though there are still old buildings and churches scattered throughout - and once you get to the Yonge area it's fully CITY with flashy lights and everything you see on MuchMusic. Toronto is a city, of course it is, but it's also a city that feels like it has roots. It's a city that goes deep, in a way that I never really felt in, say, Chicago or Edmonton.

The light is different here. In Calgary, the air is bright and sharp and crisp and clear. Here, it's warm (though not necessarily warmer) and golden and a little bit frosted over. It's not better or worse. Just different.

I love Calgary. I love living in Calgary. I love the art I'm making there and the art that's being made around me. I love the people in my life, old and new... in fact, some of the newest people are better than some of the old people.

But there is something unrelated inside me that makes me feel whole when I'm in Toronto. It's a different life, the path not taken, all of that cliched but utterly true stuff. I know I'd be someone different if I stayed here. But this week, being here has made me happy.



I tried to take some pictures to show how the light is different here, but I don't know if it reads. I also was sitting in the windowsill of the boardroom I currently work in and kept awkwardly jumping off of it and onto a table when I heard people on the stairs. (I really wanted to get some of the yard in the photos.) And there was a fly on my hand that could not fly. I don't know where it came from. It scared me.




You can see the yard a little in this one...