Why oh why do I get the best/worst sinking feeling in my stomach when I check out the Canadian forecasts on the Weather Network? Or how I still feel intensely proud and local when I read about the restart of the NHL overnight - hell, I was based most of my time there in Ottawa, not Vancouver, why am I a Canucks fan?
I think about how the period 2000 to 2003 shaped me, and how, following on from my time in London, I feel that it helped me grow as a person. London was testing my overall independence, Canada was testing out relationships. Even though in the end they failed, and there were intensely negative patches in there, I still feel I learnt a lot from my experiences.
Things have changed irrevocably from when I was there. It will not be 2002/03 again. My Ottawa ex is still bitter towards me and how I left, my Saskatoon friend is now in Florida, married, and my Victoria ex is half a world away again in suburban Britain.
But the relationships angle doesn't even begin to explain why my stomach goes funny when I think of Canada as the country. When I flew into Vancouver in March 2003, I had the funniest feeling of coming home. We may disregard that perhaps by cabin fever brought on by a trans-Pacific flight, and a step into the unknown, but that was a real feeling I felt.
Vancouver Island, both in 2000 and 2003, simply gorgeous. The crispness of November air in Victoria, burrowing under the covers and sleeping in - the wonder and excitement in her eyes as she assessed me. An artist she was, against my logical brain, it was never going to work. The earnestness of a junior hockey match, a quiet cafe afterwards, pumpkin pie for the first time.
Leaves, coating the front lawn, and seemingly the entire island - the wet crush of them underfoot, as we walk in a five hundred year old forest. The salmon, exhausted, dying, after climbing the rivers to spawn. Back to Victoria, shopping, the Inner Harbour, Parliament, the Empress Hotel. A tourist shop, Anne of Green Gables on the complete opposite side of the continent. Finding the perfect book, released in North America months before the publishing date back home.
The club, feeling out of my depth, with her friends swarming. The pizza bar at the end of the night, just as good if different to the cafe the other night. Perusing a 7/11, being very similar to those 'back home'. Having a full body cast done in plaster as her artistic senses took over another night - listening to Radiohead's Kid A. Haunting. Her eyes looking in the rear view mirror at me as we drive back home from an up island trip. I'm sitting in the back, falling asleep, smiling to myself. Kid A on again.
Moby's Play on the radio as we head down to the beach. In a British Columbian November. The beach is still gorgeous though, if in a windswept, cold way. We are both wearing our jackets as we lay down for two, perhaps three minutes. I take a couple of photos, and then look at her. Really look at her. She squints her eyes, screws up her face.
She was an artist, it was never going to work.
More Canada musing soon - very inspired here :)
Paul
I think about how the period 2000 to 2003 shaped me, and how, following on from my time in London, I feel that it helped me grow as a person. London was testing my overall independence, Canada was testing out relationships. Even though in the end they failed, and there were intensely negative patches in there, I still feel I learnt a lot from my experiences.
Things have changed irrevocably from when I was there. It will not be 2002/03 again. My Ottawa ex is still bitter towards me and how I left, my Saskatoon friend is now in Florida, married, and my Victoria ex is half a world away again in suburban Britain.
But the relationships angle doesn't even begin to explain why my stomach goes funny when I think of Canada as the country. When I flew into Vancouver in March 2003, I had the funniest feeling of coming home. We may disregard that perhaps by cabin fever brought on by a trans-Pacific flight, and a step into the unknown, but that was a real feeling I felt.
Vancouver Island, both in 2000 and 2003, simply gorgeous. The crispness of November air in Victoria, burrowing under the covers and sleeping in - the wonder and excitement in her eyes as she assessed me. An artist she was, against my logical brain, it was never going to work. The earnestness of a junior hockey match, a quiet cafe afterwards, pumpkin pie for the first time.
Leaves, coating the front lawn, and seemingly the entire island - the wet crush of them underfoot, as we walk in a five hundred year old forest. The salmon, exhausted, dying, after climbing the rivers to spawn. Back to Victoria, shopping, the Inner Harbour, Parliament, the Empress Hotel. A tourist shop, Anne of Green Gables on the complete opposite side of the continent. Finding the perfect book, released in North America months before the publishing date back home.
The club, feeling out of my depth, with her friends swarming. The pizza bar at the end of the night, just as good if different to the cafe the other night. Perusing a 7/11, being very similar to those 'back home'. Having a full body cast done in plaster as her artistic senses took over another night - listening to Radiohead's Kid A. Haunting. Her eyes looking in the rear view mirror at me as we drive back home from an up island trip. I'm sitting in the back, falling asleep, smiling to myself. Kid A on again.
Moby's Play on the radio as we head down to the beach. In a British Columbian November. The beach is still gorgeous though, if in a windswept, cold way. We are both wearing our jackets as we lay down for two, perhaps three minutes. I take a couple of photos, and then look at her. Really look at her. She squints her eyes, screws up her face.
She was an artist, it was never going to work.
More Canada musing soon - very inspired here :)
Paul
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