Archives for March 2018

As I was preparing to get off my bus yesterday, in order to change to a different one, I was blocked from exiting by another passenger. As I excused myself for requiring her to move, she said that she too was getting off at the same stop. And then I saw she had a two year old daughter on her other side who I hadn’t even noticed.

As we got off the bus, I held the door open for her and her child and then we entered the mall whereupon she opened the door for me and I held it for her. And then there was another door (I guess we were going the same way) and the routine repeated itself. And with each door we went through, the woman thanked me very directly and graciously while navigating the pedestrian traffic with her toddler in hand. I was so touched by her manners and gratitude that for a moment I thought I could have a really fulfilling day if I were to spend it holding open doors for mothers and their young children or seniors with their shopping bags. Of course, it was only a fleeting thought but one polite woman on a bus made me feel a bit better about the world for a few minutes.

A little while later, when I was on the next bus, I watched as another young woman exited from the back door and then had to hoist her young child over what remained of a snowbank to get safely to the sidewalk. I couldn’t hear what the child or mom was saying (and the child was also only about two so I don’t think the conversation was too complicated) but I could see the mom smile at first and then burst into a fit of laughter. I had no idea what made her laugh but it was so natural and unguarded that it was a scene I found perfectly understandable without words or music. And for some reason I pictured this mother and son decades into the future, at his graduation or wedding, and her feeling verklempt about moments they had shared like the one I’d just witnessed.

As I neared my home stop and tore myself away from my phone for a moment, I became aware of the two occupants in the seat directly in front of me. In the aisle seat was yet another mother and to her right, sitting by the window, was a little girl. The girl wore a fitted knit cap and sunglasses twice as wide as her face and instantly it put a smile on my face. She looked like a cartoon character. A ridiculously cute cartoon character.

She was looking out the window as though she were watching a movie and every few seconds, as the bus moved, the frame changed and she had an altogether different and unfamiliar picture to discover. After a few minutes, she noticed me sitting behind them and I complimented her on her sunglasses. Her mother then removed them so that her daughter could properly introduce herself. She said, “hi”. And I said, “hi”. And then she said it again. And so did I. And then it was her turn once more and then it was mine. I began to think it was the only word she knew and I felt privileged that she was sharing it with me. But my stop soon came and as I prepared to leave she surprised me by saying, “bye”. Her mother told her to wave and so she did.

While I understand that the little girl with the big sunglasses wouldn’t have remembered our exchange ten seconds after it occurred, I carried it with me for the rest of the day. And the lady who walked through doors with me, and the lady who laughed without restraint at something her toddler said, they along with the mother and child who said hi and waved goodbye to a stranger on the bus, reminded me of something I too easily forget. That although the world might sometimes seem like it’s on the verge of catastrophe or collapse when we stay lost in our screens, in some small and quiet corners of it, the world is still only beginning. And it’s doing so in the same way it always has.

I celebrated a birthday this week and part of my day involved returning to the very hospital where I was born. It wasn’t a pilgrimage. No, I was visiting my only brother, who was a patient there.  It was late afternoon and it was nearly to the hour that I’d been born within those walls fifty-two years ago.

I couldn’t help but think of my twenty-three year old mother, who may have been frightened and in pain as she experienced labour for the first time. And how she could likely not have envisioned her soon-to-be-born first son as a fifty-two year old visiting her yet-to-be-imagined second son in his hospital bed. It occurred to me that while some of us may not travel very far from our cradles to our graves, the paths we forge on the way are at the very least unpredictable, and more probably unfathomable.

The next day, while on my way home, I saw an old fella standing at the door of my bus on Rideau Street and he asked the driver if the bus went to Rideau Street. The driver told the man that he was already on the street he was looking for but the old man was nearly deaf so he couldn’t hear the good news and the driver had to repeatedly yell it at him, capturing the attention of everyone on the bus. My first instinct was to chuckle at the situation but then I remembered how my father in law, in his later years, would sometimes fall asleep on the street car and miss his stop or end up in the wrong part of town altogether.  And in this old man I recognized the same struggle to navigate a simple bus ride without the faculties most of us take for granted. And my amusement dissipated into something else I can’t quite describe. Getting old stinks.

When I got home, I was locked out of the house. My wife forgot to unlock the deadbolt on the front door and I didn’t have a way in through the garage. I had four hours to kill until she finished work and I had two bags of groceries and nowhere to go. I messaged her to tell her of my predicament and she decided to come home, being able to finish her work day in our home office. But I still had an hour to wait on my front stoop.

So I made a snowman.

The snow was perfect. It was freshly fallen and wet and heavy and the boulders practically rolled themselves. I probably hadn’t made a snowman since I was a teenager and I’d never made a snowman by myself. But I wanted to reward my wife with some laughter as she drove up the driveway. As I was creating my masterpiece, I quickly came to understand why people make snowmen in groups. It’s meant to be a social activity and making one by myself, though kind of fun, wasn’t quite the same. It took about twenty minutes and though the hat and the scarf I dressed it with remained damp for the rest of the day, seeing my wife’s laughter was worth it.

It’s Sunday morning now and the week is coming to an end. It’s early, before seven, and it’s cold enough outside that only the occasional dedicated dog walker can be seen on our quiet street. The kitchen smells like coffee but I haven’t started on the bacon yet because I suspect the smell of it cooking might wake up my wife and she needs her sleep.

I can see the snowman from the kitchen window and it acts as some kind of inuksuk for my week, reminding me that I was there. And it’s clear to me that playing in the snow had very little to do with playing in the snow because as soon as I decided to recapture a sliver of my childhood, the worries of the previous days melted away. I’d forgotten I’d spent part of my birthday in a hospital. I worried a little less about my brother, knowing he’d just been discharged. And I felt confidant that the old man somehow was able to find his way home.

In a week when I’d been left out in the cold, I knew it wouldn’t be for long. And though my clothing had been cold and wet, I knew I’d soon be warm and dry. And in a week when I eschewed celebration and thought I didn’t want any attention, I got just right the amount.

And I think that’s all I’d ever really want for my birthday.

I stood on Elgin Street, in the falling snow, waiting for a bus on a Thursday night. It was the second week of March and though there was no one with me, I didn’t really feel alone. It seemed like I was surrounded by ghosts, both living and dead.

I sought shelter beneath the overhang of a burger restaurant and for a moment I was reminded that the spot where I was standing was once the entrance to an old downtown movie theatre. Where I saw Rocky in 1976. Where I saw an Indiana Jones movie the first time I skipped a class. That building was an important part of my childhood and now there’s no trace of its history except for those who were there and for those who remember.

Nearby, sitting on an overturned milk crate, was a homeless woman of about fifty.  She had a coffee tin in front of her that collected coins and snow. She greeted most of the people walking by, mostly twenty-somethings going to or coming from busy bars and oyster houses and comedy clubs. Couples holding hands, carrying on conversations about subjects that are relevant to twenty-five year olds who wear thousand dollar parkas. Some were friendly to the homeless woman and some ignored her and some didn’t notice her at all. She said to me, “if you believe in God, please say a prayer for me tonight. I’ve slept in a stairwell six nights in a row”. I promised her I would. She then told me that she hoped I wouldn’t have to wait too long for my bus in such nasty weather. That made me smile and be sad at the same time.

Across the street from where I stood was a hundred year old Presbyterian church. It has been an integral part of this downtown neighbourhood for years and within its walls, generation upon generation have been both christened and eulogized. It may well have been the most important building in the neighbourhood for countless families for nearly a century. I’ve never been through its front doors and I’m not aware that I know anyone who attends church services there but I’ve been in that church a few times nonetheless. And I know many people for whom it is still the most important building in the neighbourhood. If you walk along the side of the church to the back door, which leads to the basement, every Monday night you’ll find nearly a hundred people attending an A.A. recovery meeting. There they share stories, embrace one another, support one another, laugh and cry and pray together. The door to the most important room in that church for many people is nearly as invisible from the street as the entrance to the movie theatre that hasn’t existed in twenty-five years.

A block from the church stands my old high school. I graduated thirty-four years ago but the building itself has stood for a hundred and forty-five years. And while I marvelled at the age of the building where I once spent some of the most formative days of my life, I came to realize that the place where I now stood is a place where I’ve stood for parts of five decades.

A block in the other direction stands an impressive old house that was once my family’s ancestral home. My great-great grandfather had been one of the preeminent jewellers in all of Canada and his success was reflected by the grandeur of his mansion. The family wealth was gone within a generation or two and few of his descendants would even be aware of their connection to this once proud home. But I’m aware of it. Now it is an apartment building and where there had once been stables and a servants’ entrance, there are locked bicycles and recycle bins. And I am reminded of the impermanence of it all.

The last person I spoke to on my commute home was another woman of about fifty. She and her male travelling companion looked like they might also have been homeless, wearing ragged clothing and looking more than dishevelled. We shared a shelter as we awaited our buses. The woman was missing teeth in spots where you’d notice and I wouldn’t have given her a second thought until she approached me and began asking me questions about the book I was reading. She spoke of the different characters in the book and told me who she liked and didn’t like and we discussed the merits of another book by the same author. It was a brief but altogether pleasant and unexpected encounter. When my bus arrived, we said goodbye. We may never see each other again, and if we do, we might not even know it.

Yes, I travelled by myself on my way home that night but I was never alone. I was kept company by the ghosts of my ancestors, the memories of my classmates and friends, the nearly invisible homeless, and the souls who are re-born anonymously in church basements on stormy nights. I was reminded that much of the world remains hidden from me until I allow it to be revealed.

I haven’t found the path to wisdom and I likely never will but if I ever do I wouldn’t be surprised if it begins on a sidewalk I’ve walked my whole life.

 

I woke up just before six this morning. I always wake up around that time these days. I don’t use or need an alarm clock anymore. I don’t stay up late often and I haven’t been hungover in five weeks because I haven’t had a drink in five weeks. I usually look forward to climbing into bed sometime between ten and eleven, reading for a bit and then falling asleep either to music or a podcast.

The person sharing my room is not my wife but my room mate in the rehab facility where I currently spend my days and five nights a week. He doesn’t say much, which is okay. I’ve gotten used to it. He’s much more accustom to sharing a room with a stranger than I am seeing as he recently told a group of us he’s been in jail thirty-three times in the last eight years. And he’s heading back soon. Maybe it’s okay that he’s quiet. I don’t want to disrupt his style.

Today, Friday, is typically an easy day in treatment and an easy day to look forward to because it’s the day when I can go home for the weekend. Like every day, breakfast is at seven-thirty and then it’s chore time. This week my duties included cleaning all the classrooms, a TV room, a weight room, a meditation room and a small bathroom. Each room requires vacuuming but because it’s done every day, it doesn’t take too long. Maybe forty minutes for the whole thing. Then I have to make my bed so that it looks crisp, sweep and mop the floor of my bedroom, wipe down all the bureau surfaces and empty the garbage. I do this every day. Somehow, I almost enjoy it. Or maybe I just enjoy completing the tasks more than the tasks themselves but after a while it all amounts to the same thing.

Next, we all take our turns blowing into a tube for our carbon monoxide test. If you smoke, you are expelled. We also take periodic urine tests. If you drink or use, you are expelled.

The fifteen residents then gather in the family room, read a couple of passages from AA-type books and then go around the room and share our thoughts and feelings about yesterday’s experiences and today’s coming challenges. We then gather in a circle, recite the Serenity Prayer, group hug and then we’re free to go for the weekend. We sign out our phones from the office, grab our gym or book bags and head to the bus for points unknown.

I’m one of the few residents who has a home to go to. For that I feel lucky every day. And so I bade farewell to my housemates and headed home. But before I could get there, I needed to get some blood work done at a nearby clinic and then I had to pick up dinner for my wife and myself. Braised chicken with a creamy leek sauce and Lyonnaise potatoes. One of my favourites, though it doesn’t taste quite the same without the white wine called for in the recipe.

I also went to the liquor store and bought some supplies for my wife. It wasn’t a chore by any means but visiting a liquor store isn’t as much fun when you know cranberry juice is all that awaits you.

My trip was going well. The first bus was on time, the blood work took only ten minutes to complete, the second bus was there right away, all my shopping was in the same spot and my bus home arrived almost immediately. I actually texted my wife to tell her how great things were going. I was happy and light-hearted and I knew I would be home for lunch in about half an hour.

But then my bus started smoking and we passengers were forced to evacuate. Some were actually running off the bus and shouting with panicked fear. God dammit, I thought. Things were going so smoothly. As I later sat stewing in the cold bus shelter, ladened with my groceries and the wine I wasn’t going to drink, waiting for another bus, which took thirty minutes before it arrived, I started to feel a bit sorry for myself, upset by the circumstances that had unfolded. And then I began feeling angry with myself for being so easily frustrated. God dammit, I felt stupid and petty.

But then when my bus did come, and I wasn’t cold anymore, within twenty minutes I was on my street, walking to my home with my front door key in my hand two hundred yards and two minutes too early. And I had already stopped feeling sorry for myself. In fact, I was feeling very fortunate. Even grateful.

I felt grateful that I have a home to return to whereas many with whom I share a roof during the week don’t. I felt grateful that I haven’t been to jail every season for almost a decade like my room mate has.

I felt lucky that I didn’t get arrested as an eleven year old while robbing a drug dealer with my father as my twenty-six year old addict housemate did. I felt fortunate that I didn’t find my alcoholic father in a barn after he hanged himself like my housemate who cooked me breakfast this morning did a few years ago. No, my frustration was triggered by spending another thirty minutes on public transportation that was taking me to a home that provides me with safe shelter and to a woman who loves me. What more could I want or need and what more could I justifiably ask for?

So that was my Friday morning. I spent three hours trying to get home. But really, I think I’ve spent my whole life trying to get home. I think we’re all mostly trying to get back home. And the fourteen other men I now often share a house with, what we most have in common are not the walls and the roof that shelter us. It’s not our chores or our testimonials. It’s not even our different addictions. What we most have in common is our desire to somehow find our way home. And today, on this first Friday in March, I was able to find my way home.

We should all be so lucky.