I'm in Toronto, Ontario today. And for the next 7 or so. This is my holiday.
I try to take a week off every three months and go live somewhere else for a bit. I'll rent a spot, go exploring, take in the city and see what that part of the world is like. I've written about this before.
Toronto is a cold, snowy, windy place. My place is simple. A small and quiet room in The Annex. Probably the size of my first apartment in Akron.
I've come here without much direction or intent. Unsure of what I'll make of it. This can be a profound experience of possibilities at times. No schedule to stick to and all my obligations put on hold. I can wake up when I want and just /go/ be part of another world.
For my first day, I shopped for my week and had some local coffee before venturing forth. I've got an awesome superpower of always forgetting nail clippers before going for a week, unintentionally leading to a large collection of international nail clippers at home. Not a weird hobby, ok?
Afterwards, I'd decided to go for a wander for breakfast downtown. I ended up at Eggspectation, a local chain producer of egg-based puns as names for food. Following that, an adventure through Canadian Tire for gloves.
Canadian Tire does not just sell tires, I learned.
The rest of the day was filled with photography around the city in various spots. Queen's Park, CN Tower, City Hall, and more. Photos will need sorted through.
Now its evening. The sun's gone down and the snow that began earlier is starting to pile up thick.
I am currently 143.50 miles from where I grew up in Jefferson, Ohio. The weather here is what I remember as a kid, except that I know we don't get this in Ohio anymore. How's that for climate change?
I grew up in the rural countryside, somewhere between Kingsville, Ohio and Jefferson, Ohio. The current population of Sheffield Township is 1,639. For 20ish years I lived on farmland with my family. In winter, the farmland lay fallow and was full of white fluffy snow. We had ATVs and would tie an innertube sled to the back of one and do loops until we were tired. I'd build snowforts with 5 gallon buckets for bricks. Drive a truck onto a frozen pond because the ice was a foot thick.
Or sit inside by the wood burning stove. And listen to how quiet it was. Watching deer from the back porch. Snow angels at midnight. Moonlit roomances.
By 2009, I would no longer have snowy christmases. It was always too warm. The ski slopes of Peak and Peak, New York had been producing their own snow for some time. The summers I'd lived in akron afterwards were the most humid I'd ever experienced.
Our planet is dying. I'm watching it happen. This terrifies me more than anything right now. I don't want to feel helpless, so I work to make change. I want humans to coexist with this planet so I want to put everyone in houses close to where they live. I want less energy spent on moving people around. Our impacts can be consolidated into dense cities where even if you do need to get around, there's a quick way to get there that you don't need to keep in a garage and fill with an energy-dense material to use.
This weather is creepy.
But I can still appreciate the snow for its beauty. It muffles sounds from far away. It blankets the city in a white powder that in turn gets pushed aside to be dealt with later, unless later never comes. Nobody seems to mind the futility of that. Nobody ever does.
My holiday is to spend a snowy week in Toronto. Exploring the city and my response to it. Writing some of it down and photographing the rest.