Monday, November 21, 2011

Every once in a while my Latin American relatives ask me what I find attractive about Canada and Vancouver. They know I miss them and that I especially miss the cafés, the pizza and the large family gatherings of the O’Reilly clan of which my first cousin and godmother Inesita presides. I tell them I miss the warmth of the summers and the warmth of the Latin.

As I continue telling them what I miss, they look at me perplexed. “Why do you stay in that cold place then?”

I tell them that compared to Argentina there is a tad more democracy and a tad less bureaucracy and corruption. I tell them we trust most of our police but have doubts on the ones that sometimes ride horses.

“But,” I tell them, “Vancouver, Canada is where  my daughters and two granddaughters live. It is our home.” I tell them how Rosemary and I tend to our garden and how in most days of the year we have a steady stream of 120 volts at an unwavering 60 cycles and that if I lose my driver’s license I can get a new one in a matter of weeks, no sweat. Water flows from the taps aa pure and as quickly as my Telus internet.

From here I talk of the rain, the water, the clear skies, the mountains and then best of all the air and the space of Canada.

They cannot believe me when I point out that after a year I must change my windshield wipers. They wear out. “Does it rain that much?” they ask. I explain that except for a couple of months in late summer, when it doesn't rain, the city smells fresh. During those two months if you walk the downtown back alleys you get a whiff of the underside of human presence. The rain washes it all away come fall and the crisp wet air refreshes me as I prepare for the short days of November and the coming rains.

November is the worse month. Rosemary and I adapt to the “fall back” of daylight saving time and unless we are careful we find that we have our suppers earlier and earlier during the day.

I tell my relatives that as soon as December is around the corner there is the excitement of snow (a much more frequent occurrence these years) and Christmas lights and the sudden appearance (the days wiz by) of my family for Christmas Eve dinner makes us happy as we prepare for the bleak days of January which are not so bleak as Rosemary and I peruse plant catalogues and look out at the garden at rest with its promise of spring.

Yes I miss my other family and the warmth of warmer climes but the rain, as pure as it is, cleanses the soul and washes away some of my stress. That familiar lulling noise of my Malibu’s windshield wipers somehow comfortingly tell me I will soon be home to Rosemary, our garden and our home.