Soy canadiense

I remember reading once about a guy whose life needs included “hobbies at which I’m a rank amateur, to keep me honest.” Just after my forty-sixth birthday I played in my first football game—at least with more than a few players, and on a field. I blocked a little, didn’t throw except in warmup, dropped almost every pass. But if you thought I was bad at football, you should hear me speak Spanish.

Maybe I'll try baseball next time.

Spanish exists in order to make me feel like I speak French by comparison. Seriously, I first studied Spanish when I was in sixth grade, but having never spent significant time in a Spanish-speaking country, my lack of practice makes for very imperfect. So since we got to Toronto I’ve been back at the Spanish Centre, taking elementary lessons. Again. This past week our teacher, Carla from Caracas, played us some audio we’d listened to at the beginning of the course, just to show that we are able to understand a little more than a few months ago!

We had returned from our few days in the U.S. through the Seneca Nation, proudly signed as “sovereign land since time immemorial.” This was a good introduction to the site I visited on the last day of 2018, historic Fort York. The fort predates the modern city of Toronto and was once on the lakeshore, before the lakeshore was moved. During the battle here more than 200 years ago, many First Nations warriors fought on the side of the British, to resist the invading United States.

Of course when I was growing up in the U.S., I read that the War of 1812 was an attempt by Britain to retake its American colonies. It’s illuminating to think that the U.S., and the country that became Canada, once fought on opposite sides, and have opposite views of history. I don’t remember reading anything, for example, about the (relative) rights over their own lands that indigenous people had under British rule, which caused them to resist the U.S.

I learned at Fort York that tensions between U.S. and British North America continued through the U.S. Civil War and even after, as Irish Fenians struck a blow for their independence at Canada! And lest anyone think that modern warfare is uniquely hideous or brutal, a surgeon on duty at the Battle of York left this sobering account.

On T’s and my first visit back to Canada, in 2012, we had the pleasure of touring several War of 1812 sites. It was the war’s bicentennial, and my writing buddy Andrejs’s wife, Bonnie, was a history buff. So we enjoyed that part of our visit almost as much as Andrejs showing us Niagara wine country!

Sadly, Bonnie has since passed away, and I was afraid I’d lost touch with Andrejs. So what a nice surprise it was, at Christmas, to hear from him and arrange lunch together before we left Ontario. T. and I had so much fun catching up with Andrejs that we forgot to take any pictures—so here’s one of my writing group, in an earlier incarnation. It’s the last meeting we had while I was still a resident of Canada.

Andrejs on right

The last meeting of my stay this time takes place on Sunday, so Epiphany was my last Sunday at the Church of the Holy Trinity. The doors of the church were blessed, and we were each given a piece of blessed chalk. Marty, last seen giving instructions for the hot chocolate, assured me that the chalk was “internationally blessed,” so I can take it back to England or wherever I go. Let’s hope it doesn’t crumble into suspicious powder along the way (fortunately, it’s blue!)

All these lasts were starting to make me blue. I thought we’d been in “our” neighbourhood for the last time, but T. had another appointment with the audiologist on Roncesvalles, so I met her afterwards for lunch. We went to the Cafe Polonez, a place we’d always meant to try, but never did while we were living there. The borscht with dumplings was delicious. Another meal we enjoyed was at The Winding Road, a Chinese place in Baldwin Village. Back when I lived around the corner, I’d always wanted to eat on this charming little strip of Baldwin Street, but of course, I never had.

Our last week in town we were back at Wayne and Jay’s. There was plenty of visiting with them and revisiting other friends. Marie-Josée and Olivier took us to lunch at the University of Toronto Faculty Club. We were lucky to be joined this time by Monique, another former co-worker whom we’d have missed otherwise. Could barely recognize her in her winter gear, though—it was cold! 

But mostly, I just walked. I took advantage of the mildest day (rain!) to walk through Greektown on the Danforth, and through Riverdale Park. On a wintry day this is a great place to sled. (“Tobogganing” is what it’s called here, although when I was growing up I heard woolly winter hats called toboggans. In Canada, a wool or fleece hat is called a toque.) 

Natural amphitheatre, great for sledding downhill

Then I took the ferry over to Ward’s Island.

The Toronto Islands have a totally different feel in winter. On the beach side you can forget the city is even there, and at times, it felt like I was the only person on the island at all.

Boardwalk to Centre Island

The weather got colder as the week wore on. I set off for the Beaches (Queen Street East) in a blaze of winter sunshine to photograph the R.C. Harris Filtration Plant. I’m a fan of Art Deco so this 1930s architecture was worth seeing, although the view from where it sits is probably more striking.

Just then, it started to snow. I walked down to Balmy Beach but it was not balmy, so I made my way back west and down to Kew Beach. Couldn’t see much for the snow, except for children enjoying themselves.

Readers may remember a picture of T. and me in northern Manitoba, wearing everything we possessed (at least, I had on a balaclava). I want to point out that in that picture the wind chill was -20 C (-4 F)—the temperature down to which, in Canada, children are supposed to play outside.

Winter has truly come to Ontario now. Every chance I got, I walked in snowy High Park. 

I even ventured back to the neighbourhood of “the flophouse,” where I never expected to live for two years. It was worth it to visit with colleagues from my last job in Toronto.

 

We, or I, have explored most of what I wanted to while we were in Toronto, but a lot of cuisine remains untried. That’s probably because we so enjoyed having our own place and being able to cook in it—going out to eat loses much of its appeal when you have to do it, traveling. That’s okay. We will be back.

The last day I walked a Toronto neighborhood, it was bright and sunny, but very cold. This is the type of winter day I actually love. (Weird, I know.) Anyway, three images will remain with me from this city. I was walking along Corso Italia and stopped to take a picture of a Jamaican restaurant. A cheery guy beamed and waved at me through the window. Afterwards I boarded the streetcar with some Orthodox Jewish boys wearing ritual fringes. Then there was this bad selfie I took at the basketball game, inadvertently capturing the two young women in headscarves who filled in the last seats next to us.

Geez, I'm going to miss this place.

Now there is only one continent left of the traditional six we mean to visit, and it’s mostly Spanish speaking. One of the first questions one learns how to answer is ¿De dónde eres? Where are you from? And there are two ways to answer. I can say Soy de los Estados Unidos, I am from the United States. But one can also answer a nationality question like the Molson ad says: “I am Canadian.” 

Where it all began

I could say Soy norteamericana. As far as Spanish is concerned, everyone from the western hemisphere is from the Americas. But doesn’t North American include Canadian too? I can’t really claim to be “from” Canada, and I know by the time we fly I will be ready to move on; but I’ll do so knowing, more than ever, that I’m as canadiense as anyone else with this passport.

The heart of it all: Ohio, U.S.A.

Though we first arrived in Canada at the end of August, we’ve been back across the U.S. border a few times. First from B.C. to Alaska, of course, and back, but that was within the allotted 90 days for a British visitor. In theory, the U.S.A. can refuse entry after that until the visitor has left Canada, and the Caribbean, since the U.S. considers those places that a person might just dip into before returning to live in the U.S.! In practice, profiling and/or a flawless track record can work in the visitor’s favour, and there were no problems when T. and I returned to the U.S. for Thanksgiving.

We flew to Phoenix from Toronto. Fortunately, one clears U.S. customs and immigration before leaving a Canadian airport, so we took care of this in Toronto even though it took longer than usual. The officers were nice enough, but must have started to wonder about me. I presented my U.S. passport, but then they asked about my status in Canada. I said that I have citizenship here. “And you live in the U.K.?” “Yes.” "When did you leave home?” "Um, a year and a half ago?" “And what is your status in the U.K.?” “Well…” They also were curious what kind of work T. does that allows her to travel for so long. It was the first time anywhere that we’d been asked these types of questions! 

The bottom line is that, although we have almost never been asked for paperwork demonstrating that we would leave the country in a timely manner, we were this time, and so you should always have it. On Boxing Day (the 26th of December to Americans), we drove a rented car back over the border at Buffalo, New York, for a few days. On that occasion the officer just asked a few questions and off we sailed to our destination: Columbus, Ohio.

If people outside North America think about Ohio at all, it’s probably as one of those states which, for reasons no one can adequately explain, play an outsized role every four years in deciding the next president of the United States. (Not that we can blame Ohio for 2016.) But when I was growing up, Ohio was the place we went on trips. Outside of Tennessee, it’s the only place I ever remember traveling until I was in high school. As their accents will attest, both my parents are originally from Ohio, as are most of my relatives going back at least a couple of generations. 

When we used to drive up to Ohio every summer and Christmas, my mom and dad would sometimes speak of it as “going home.” I never understood why, since the only home I’d ever known was their house in Tennessee. Now, however, I get why they could refer to more than one place as “home.”

Our hosts, once we got into the country, were my cousin Kim, her husband Cris, and their three children and cat. When I say cousin, Kim’s dad, whose house is where the big party is held every year, is my dad’s first cousin. This makes Kim and her siblings—trust me on this—my second cousins. They don’t feel like it because my dad and hers grew up next door to each other and were more like brothers; but the Knowleses have never been all that concerned about removing cousins anyway. There were third cousins at the gathering, and by a couple of days later, when Kim’s mom’s family all came to town, most of the people in the house weren’t even related to me, let alone T.

T. calls this expression of Kim's "the Knowles." "Let me do the Knowles," she said.

Ohio’s state tourism slogan used to be “The heart of it all.” I don’t know if you can see it on this luggage tag I found in Kim’s town of Westerville, but the idea is that Ohio is kind of heart shaped, and also, is sort of in the place a heart would be, were the United States a human body. Both kind of a stretch, but the real point is that if you have been to Ohio, you have experienced Americanness in a way you can’t if you’ve only been to New York City or Los Angeles. For good or bad, it is the heartland.

One of my third cousin’s children (that’s my third cousin once removed; it’s a generational thing) was not even born the last time I saw them. When I pointed this out to her, she grinned, put the crook of her elbow to her mouth, and blew a loud zrbt! That kind of set the tone. Traditionally, there was no alcohol of any kind at a Knowles gathering and the nonalcoholic punch was still there, but I did discover a bottle or two of wine hidden behind the basement door. Too bad T. doesn’t like wine.

Through an elaborate misunderstanding over e-mail, Lezlee, Kim’s mom, had thought I might not have told my mom and dad that I was coming, so that it would be a surprise. For various reasons I didn’t think that would be a good idea; but Lez (and everybody she did tell) had done such a good job of keeping the secret that quite a few people were surprised to see us. Except Mom and Dad, of course!

One good thing about Mom knowing was that she baked me a pie for my birthday. Yes, my birthday was over, but it was Christmastime so there’s a bit of a grace period. Before I could blow out my candles, my cousins checked to make sure I didn’t have strep throat. Strep throat is what Americans call a streptococcal infection in children; they get it all the time, but people overseas have never heard of it. They call it a “sore throat.”

We stayed three nights with Kim and Cris, courtesy of their older son, who let us stay in his room. Their daughter had heard rumours that my little duck mascot has been photographed all over the world, so she wanted to see it. The duck (and his chick friend from Adelaide) like meeting other birds, as my Facebook followers may know. They were pleased to meet this ostrich marionette.

So many relatives passed through Lez and Jeff’s house that even I cannot document them all, but special mention should be made of Lezlee’s mom, Georgi. Georgi is 90 and by Christmas was doing very well, heaven be praised. It was Georgi’s clan that came into town from Indiana on the 28th. 

But first, Kim wanted to show us uptown (really) Westerville. If Ohio is the heart of it all, Westerville must be the heart of Ohio. Main Street is lined with shops selling impossibly cute things such as a cutting board in the shape of the state. Maybe Australia has stuff like this but it just seems so American.

It was high time for a cocktail, so we had one in this lovely reconstructed bar. 

Kim, T., and I got into a discussion about American things, including some of the less savoury things that seem to be surfacing now. The bartender, who was African-American, asked if he might join in our conversation, and of course we were eager to hear what he had to say. He said that he was a graduate of The Ohio State University in international relations and terrorism (!) but had still been told, by a random person on the street, to get his black n——- a** back to Africa. The point he made was that this was not surprising, but a part of life in the U.S. What is happening now is not some new surge in racism but a growing awareness of it, on the part of those who had the option of not being aware of it before.

This man was far too polite to say, but what he was pointing out to us is sometimes called “white privilege.” The term privilege is often misunderstood, so I think of it as an option. Growing up white in a white-majority society, I’ve had the option not to be aware of race very much, certainly not of my own race or the difference that’s made in my life. Often, I’ve had to choose to be aware of it or actively work on the issue. What is happening in the U.S. these days is making some people more aware of things than we have been before. It has been possible, for a white person, to work a whole lifetime and not recognize, until recently, how different the criminal justice system—for example—is or appears to people of colour. 

Many of us, especially Americans, are so defensive now that it’s hard to have these conversations, but we must resist defensiveness. To say that different people experience the criminal justice system differently is not to say all white cops are racist or that police aren’t doing a difficult job! The issue is always, as T. would say, “police with consent.” Do we feel that law enforcement is there to serve and protect us, or to protect other people and their property from us? Different people will give different answers, answers rooted deeply in the history of the country. I devoted an entire post to reviewing a book that describes U.S. policing’s origin in slave patrols, so I won’t belabour the point here. But I appreciate our bartender’s willingness to engage with us on the subject, and remind us that he doesn’t get to take days off from America’s deeply rooted problem.

And so we came to the afternoon that everyone had been waiting for—one might even say “the heart of it all.” This is when most of the female relatives present—but not all—race to finish the annual Christmas jigsaw puzzle, while most of the male relatives—but not all—participate in an American football game.

I should explain that Kim’s older sister, Kathi, and her family had arrived from New Hampshire on the 27th. So it was a full house. This also meant that the cousins exchanged gifts the next morning while we were there, so we got to enjoy a Christmas with kids opening presents—something we don’t often get to do anymore.

Speaking of a full house, the last time we were with this particular gang, T. ended up playing euchre with them, a card game she doesn’t really know. (Kathi and Kim’s brother Mark was teaching Kathi’s daughter to play while we were there, and the word tr*mp comes up distressingly often.)

Luckily, we got out of either euchre or the puzzle, because the guys asked us if we wanted to join in the football game! I am told that the guys always ask; it is not their fault that usually all the gals say no. Well, I couldn't allow that to stand, and Jeff's participation ensured that I would not be the oldest person on the field, so in I went. I had the opportunity to throw but only did so in warmup; T. toyed with the idea but ended up photographing from the sidelines (she was also called on once to rule on where someone had had both feet). 

Photo courtesy of T.

I was told later that I was the only participant who laughed the entire time. I started off on a team with Mark, opposite a team featuring Kathi’s older son, Aaron. It was generally agreed that Aaron, a CrossFit coach, is like facing two players; nevertheless Mark’s instructions to me were sometimes to “count to three and rush Aaron.” Other times, my teammates told me, “Take all the little kids,” which is not as easy as it sounds when there are three of them and they are all running in different directions. 

Photo courtesy of T.

On another disastrous occasion, I was asked if I wanted Cris or Jeff; should've said Jeff! And everyone complained that the ball was overinflated but that doesn't excuse it slipping through my hands. It was very muddy. I tagged Kim and Cris's younger son with two hands and he was so little I had a hand on either side. Then they put him on me, which felt vaguely insulting until I realized how fast he can run. 

Photo courtesy of T.

After dropping every pass thrown to me, we were lined up on 4th down (we had by this point swapped Mark for Aaron, who was quarterbacking). Aaron kept repeating, "We're very close to the end zone," with a look at me that I later realized was meaningful. On "hike" he tossed the ball a short distance, and I ran in for a touchdown, which is hilarious. 

Photo courtesy of T.

It was especially funny when we were saying goodbye later that night. Aaron said, "I probably won't see you for awhile" (compared with Andrew, possibly), and I said thank you for the pass. He looked at me quite seriously: "You helped our team today." I think he must be great at coaching, because with all our team hand-slapping each other, you would think we had been really good!

Photo courtesy of T.

The climax of our trip to “the heart of it all,” and from the comments I’ve received possibly the highlight of our entire year and a half traveling, was Skyline Chili. Georgi was treating everyone to this Cincinnati specialty that evening, even those of us not even tangentially related to her, and it was a first for both T. and me.  Skyline Chili is the Marmite of the Midwest. You either like the mysterious, cinnamon-flavored recipe (served on spaghetti), or…you really don’t. We both did. In addition to serving “coneys” (hot dogs) and various less traditional things, Skyline Chili is distinguished from other fast food restaurants by table service. Our waitress did a fantastic job, and so we were introduced to chili three, four, or even five ways. (Insert mandatory joke here.)

We could not leave Ohio without driving past Cleveland, and we couldn’t do that without stopping to see cousin Sandy. If you’re still reading, Sandy is related to me on yet another side of the family: my paternal grandmother's. We don’t have nearly as many relatives on that as on the Knowles side, so it was a special treat to catch up with her.

Second cousin, once removed

I’m really grateful to all these cousins for coming out to see us, putting us up, and putting up with us—not necessarily in that order. And to Georgi for the Cincinnati chili. At some point later on the last night, we were sitting around in the front room and Georgi reminisced about the days when there was no alcohol in her house. Then, one day (she recalled), they were out for a big family dinner and she looked down the table, and saw that each of her grandchildren had a drink. “Well,” she said, “I guess now I can finally have one!”

I gotta admit, that punch tastes a heck of a lot better with a big slug of rye whiskey in it. Thanks to whoever brought that!

A good time was had by all.

Messiah for the city: A post for New Year's Day

“I’m not looking, guys,” said I, as I raced through the back church door past attendees of a twelve-step meeting who, understandably, expected to be anonymous. O.K., maybe I didn’t say this out loud—but I really wasn’t looking. In my hands was a basket of donations for admission to the Christmas Story, Holy Trinity’s traditional pageant, and I had to get to the priest in the office before the lights went out in the church. Which was happening about—now.

But how did I attain such a pass?

I first stepped into this church twenty years ago, in 1999. Some of those years I’ve been a regular member of the congregation, and others I’ve lived outside Canada, but it always feels like home to me. Part of the reason is that the moment you step through the door, people make you feel that, as one of our visitors said on Sunday, “this is my church.” I’d never seen him before—he was with a couple of other guys, one of whom told me proudly during the peace that he’s Native, some of whom might be homeless. In any case, he’s right. This is his church, and mine.

Anyway, being back I’d promptly been asked to help serve the hot chocolate before a performance of the Christmas Story. The refreshments are sold in aid of the Alice Heap Radical Hospitality fund, named for a late member whom I remember well and who, with her husband, was a pivotal actor in the role of radical hospitality. Strangely, though, when I was given the instructions for making the hot chocolate, it was itself twelve steps long. It began, as my Grandma always used to, with stirring milk in a pan on the stove. 

Like Grandma, T. also does this regardless of whether the hot chocolate mix already contains milk. She offered to help with the twelve steps.

With T’s help preparing and that of two delightful young acquaintances selling, there was little for me to do but enjoy myself. Except when it came to the end. None of the instructions told us what to do with the money or that the church would be plunged into total blackness exactly at 7:30! Good thing we’d cleaned up as we went along. 

It was a great night. One of our young salespeople’s friends played a small angel in the pageant, and stopped by beforehand in the kitchen. I expressed gratitude that we were being visited by an angel. “Why?” she asked curiously. “Are angels better than shepherds or something?” I might have expected such a question at Holy Trinity!

If you’re ever in Toronto during Advent, take time out and go to the Christmas Story. Admission is by donation, and it’s been going for 80 years, since it was brought here from St. Martin-in-the-Fields, London. Before emigrating to Canada, Patricia Frank and her pastor husband, John, were at that church at Trafalgar Square, where attendees of the Christmas Story included the future Queen Elizabeth and her sister, Princess Margaret. 

The Christmas Story includes the classic Scriptures, of course, and wonderful carols for organ and choir. It also includes what many versions of the story omit: the flight into Egypt by Jesus and his parents, Herod’s massacre of the innocents, and the symbolic “Rachel weeping for her children.” These are part of the Christmas story too, and were certainly not omitted in the 1930s, when this production began. Refugees are an important part of Holy Trinity’s ministry and continue to be relevant in Canada today.

Something else I’ve noticed since I’ve been back in Canada, similar to Australia, is the acknowledgment of traditional lands. At the beginning of a service, concert, or other event, someone will name the indigenous peoples who lived (and live) where we are, and also note that many indigenous people from different nations are part of the living city. Nowhere was this more relevant than at Glad Day, the world’s oldest LGBT bookshop, where I attended the revival of the “Proust & Co.” reading series with Jeffrey Round. One of the readers was Anishnaabe poet Laura Kooji, accompanied by a guitarist of Mohawk origin. 

Being back at Glad Day, and reading the letters of Rick Bébout and Jane Rule as I mentioned in a previous post, really made me feel at home as a writer, as well as a Canadian. Rick wrote for Xtra!, as I later did. Jane's novels were edited by Canadian-American Katherine V. Forrest, as mine later were.

Before this tour of Toronto’s queer past, I’d been walking the snowy paths of the Don Valley. We often think of previous generations as having damaged the environment, but sadly, it’s today’s generation that has lost the use of the Don River. 

Down Pottery Road from the corner of Broadview and Mortimer (where there’s a Dairy Queen for refreshment), you’ll find Todmorden Mills. The former mill has an oxbow pond and a wildflower preserve. As I walked I had “Greensleeves” playing in my headphones.

There’s also a gallery and theatre in the former paper mill. When I visited, the display was photographs of children in the Victorian era—a fascinating glimpse into another world gone forever.

Thence to the Brick Works, now Evergreen Brick Works. A sweet-smelling Christmas tree market stood there, but on this day, it was strangely empty. The former brick works are, I am told, a centre for environmental innovation now; all I saw was a family walking on paths through the snow, leading up to the Belt Line Trail.

Another former industrial site in Toronto is the Distillery District, now full of galleries and shops. In December it transforms into a Christmas market. We visited during a weekday so it was not too crowded.

Bet they aren't nine for a pound, though!

I’ve mentioned before that Toronto isn’t beautiful. What it has, it has reclaimed, such as the man-made headland in the east of the city now containing Tommy Thompson Park. In real life, everyone still calls it the Leslie Street Spit. To get there, walk for ten minutes or so down astonishingly ugly Leslie St., purely on faith that there is something at the end of it. You will be rewarded with a narrow path between the lake on one side and the skyline on the other.

Here’s the thing about Toronto: It’s the first place I’ve been on these travels that I wanted to stay. I don’t want to go anywhere else. Some people have never had such a place in their lives so I’m grateful for it.

One of the earliest walks I discovered in my years here was along the Belt Line Trail. Certainly not as far as the Brick Works, but the part I know was once a railroad encircling the then-outskirts of the city. I meandered down it again recently.

I was passing the Forest Hill community arena and decided to stop in and use the facilities. As it happened, a girls’ hockey game was just beginning. I’d never actually seen a hockey game live (the Maple Leafs, bad or good, are ridiculously expensive), so I sat down in the bleachers and enjoyed myself thoroughly. I had a great view of the net in which a goal was scored each period (the home team won). And a young man chatted to me about the flag patches on my daypack. Only when he took his seat did I realize he was the visiting team’s coach!

While I was there, I also saw some older players—that is, older than I—coming out of the locker rooms with all their gear. A seniors’ league, I guess. It was great to see both sexes and all ages participating in Canada’s favourite sport!

The trail then took me to Mount Pleasant Cemetery.

Diversity, in death as in life

As I walked there, I spotted a coyote loping past. It reappeared a bit later by the cremation memorial wall, then disappeared again. I passed two women who said “There’s a coyote” and there it was a third time, popping up behind one of the gravestones.

One of the things that happens when you live in a city is that you fail to appreciate its museums and other attractions. For example, I haven’t been to the Natural History Museum in London since 1994. I’d only been to the Royal Ontario Museum once, too, but the two cooperate each year in presenting the Wildlife Photography of the Year finalists. T. and I dropped by the ROM to enjoy it. I have to say the photographs were much more impressive than mine of the coyote!

Mix architectural styles much, ROM?

Thirty-odd people in a downtown church can feel like a small group, not really filling the space with our voices. Thirty-odd people at a shape-note singing, in the music room of Blood Street United Church, has a totally different feeling, not to mention sound. It was the annual Christmas potluck of the Toronto Sacred Harp group, and some, though not all, of what we sang were carols: “While shepherds watched,” etc. A young man wearing a kipa and ritual fringes led “David’s Lamentation.” I felt at home there too, even with people I’d never met before. Someday I’ll publish my third novel and you can read all about it.

Somewhat less expensive than Leafs tickets are Raptors tickets. Toronto’s pro basketball team is also better than it used to be, and it is no longer possible to pay $15 to sit in the “Sprite Zone”! Still, T. and I sprang for tickets, and thoroughly enjoyed a home win. 

The guy in the turban is "Superfan" and can be seen at every Toronto Raptors home game.

Last December, when we didn't yet know where we’d be spending Christmas, we took a poll on Facebook. Marie-Josée said “Canada, please!” but it was not to be until this year. She’s been following our travels around the world, wondering if she would ever see us—but what a spread she put on when we finally got there! 

With Olivier and Albert

I also ended up spending my birthday with Marie-Josée and Olivier. It happened this way. Back before I ever moved to Toronto, members of the symphony orchestra wanted to take their music beyond Roy Thomson Hall and share it with the larger community. In particular, they wanted to give highlights of Handel’s Messiah, the baroque oratorio, to the city. The late and much-lamented progressive politician Jack Layton, the Cathedral Church of St. James, and the United Way became their partners in this effort, and this year Messiah for the City was performed at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church by the Toronto Beach Chorale.

Through a friend of a friend, I was given three (not sure why) tickets to this free concert, and T. suggested I ask Marie-Josée if she wanted to go. Her answer was an ecstatic “Oui!” It turns out she loves Handel and used to go to the sing-along Messiah, but hadn’t been in years—tickets cost more than the Raptors nowadays. 

It was for exactly this reason that Messiah in the City was started. Like the grace of God, this music is not for sale. Many of the people in St. Andrew’s had never heard these magnificent choruses before. And the orchestra, choir, and soloists were as good as I have ever heard at any performance. Afterwards, walking in the freezing cold, I learned a new French word, peculiar to Quebecois: frette. “It’s colder than froid,” Olivier explained. 

During my favourite chorus, “And the glory of the Lord,” I’d looked up at the choir and seen one woman wearing a bright dress, standing in a sea of dark suits. I realized then that she was singing with the tenors. It brought back memories of my own choir experience: “Jacqui and the men.” I see you up there, sister.