Canada Memoir #1

I need to share something more positve after this spate of reactions and despair reguarding the execution of the boys in Iran.

So where better to turn than Canada?

I grew up in a little town in southeastern Michigan only a few miles away from Canada. With my parents, I explored, as a youth, the sights and attractions of southwestern Ontario on occasion -- most notably a place called "Jack Miner's Bird Farm".

So it was that in 1990 I persuaded my dearest friend in the whole world to take a trip to Canada with me. The Canadian leg of our vacation took place after spending a week on the Cape in Massachusetts. The entire journey was about 3 weeks long and all together we visited and stayed in places in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Maine along the way. This memoir happened on our first day in Canada in the little town of Hudson, Ontario on the provincial border with Quebec.

We arrived in mid-afternoon and set up camp and then took our bikes and rode into the little Hamlet of Hudson in search of food. It was Saturday evening and unbeknownst to us, the eve of the Feast of St. John the Baptist (a major holiday in and around Quebec). As we enetered the town we approached a small market only to discover that it was closing even as we tried to enter it. Frustrated, we looked around and noticed a women tending her gardens across the street from the store. So we rode over to where she was, introduced ourselves, and inquired about a market where we might obtain some victuals.

She was simply delighted to engage us in conversation. As our discussion unfolded we discovered that she had a son about our age and was preparing to leave for a week long visit with him in Connecticut where he was attending college. She then asked us if we had a place to stay. We said, "Yes," but she persisted to offer us her home for the week. WHAT?! We were dumbstruck by this. And she reiterated the offer saying that she felt much safer knowing that her home was occupied in her absence versus empty. (Are you getting this? A single women has offered her home to two strangers...NO, foreigners -- men from another country after only a brief and cursory introduction.)

You can't imagine our incredulity at this invitation. Needless to say, we declined it. Our itinerary was not geared to a prolonged stay in Hudson, Ontario, but I have NEVER forgotten this moment. Who could? Such blind faith and trust in strangers (me!) is a gift that no one can expect. And nothing likely to ever happen in this nation....."O Canada!..."