I'm in Winnipeg right now. Still operating on BC time, though so I am awake and everyone else is still sleeping so I am here blogging. Ronni and I concocted this trip last summer when I visited her in Calgary for some fun non-kid time. We met and became friends here and neither of us has been back here in a very long time. She left almost a year before me for another teaching position at another University.
I came to Winnipeg in 1991. Kaetlyn was a babe in arms. I had just graduated from University and I wanted to see more of Canada. And I wanted to be out of reach of a certain troublesome person from my past. So we packed up and left beautiful Sidney for this prairie town. It was a decision conceived of and executed within days. It was an adventure.
And I loved Winnipeg. The people, the city, the culture (the ballet!). It was a time of huge growth for me. I did my first counselling for a women's group. I started to really become myself. Its what you do in your 20's I think. I started homeschooling here and I had Andrew at home with an amazing midwife. And I left the church. All that in a space of just less than 3 years. We left just as suddenly in the spring of 1994. Andrew now a babe in arms. Another hasty decision.
Hard times followed and everything changed again. Bitterly hard times followed when I lost almost everything. And emerged much wiser and with greater understanding of myself.
Standing here is like visiting my other life. A life that started before I came here, flourished here and then petered out to nothing. My life is so different now that it is hard to find the threads that are stitched through them both. They are there, of course. It is like seeds planted when I was here are the trees in my life now. I had no idea at the time how it would all turn out.
A rather dull and philosophic post, I suppose. But it is what I am thinking about. What could have been. What was. What is. It is a wonderful city. So many things I have missed about this area.
It is so fun to be here with Ronni and Megan and Andrew and Rhiannon. It is just so easy to be together. Andrew, Rhiannon and Meg - all 'onlies' or 'babies' of the family to some extent are all so secure that the world revolves around them that there is no jostling for position. Andrew remembers how to play and Meg and Rhiannon are old enough these days that there are actually lots of things that they enjoy together. It just flows. The time together is easy. Its a magical time. All too soon these times will be memories. Our daughters will be teenagers and Andrew will be grown up. Times to hang on to.
What I love most about these vacation times is to watch my children together - with no other distractions, they play with each other. I see the love and affection they have for each other and it warms the cockles of my mother's heart. These little stolen moments out of everyday life that give me the chance to see that when you strip all the extraneous stuff away, what is there - what is true - is the love they have for each other. Andrew's kindness to the younger girls. Their adoration of him. Laughing. Goofing. Fun.
6 comments:
i really wish i could have come. i loved that place. i think part of the fondness that i remember it with is because of, like you said, it was before our family fell apart. things were good there. i have always wanted to go back.
this post wasn't dry, it was super interesting, to me at least. Especially since I just made a sudden move conceived of and carried out in days, I can sort of relate. Winnipeg sounds like it was an important place for you. I'm glad you're having such a good time there.
it sounds wonderful, like a perfect vacation. I'm glad you're enjoying it so much. You make me think that maybe Winnipeg would be a place I'd like to see.
yes, not dry. if it wasn't for you and your glowing views of winnepeg i'd have dismissed it long ago. now i always tell people who are dissing it that it's supposed to be a cultural city with super friendly people.
yep not dry at all. In fact, the only dry part about it is you saying it was dry...:)(sound familiar?)
I'm glad to learn good things of Winnipeg, especially since there's a very real possibility of us moving there. And maybe if we do end up there, I can have the same midwife as you (if she's still around) because I know I'll really miss mine!
And will you visit me???
Here's a funny thing... I never said it was dry. I said it was rather dull. But thanks, anyways.
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