O Canada!

David and I have been in Toronto (or really, outside of Toronto) for a few days. He is attending some conference – I’m hanging out and enjoying the cool weather.

Years ago, Dave and I were attending a wedding in the Detroit area and decided it would be fun to cross into Canada just to say we'd done it. We got into Canada, drove around a couple of blocks, and then got back in line to cross the bridge into the US. The US Customs person wanted to know how long we had been in Canada. We couldn't help chuckling. Obviously, we did that long before 09.11.01. Today, you wait on the bridge forever to get into the US.

Since that excursion, I have spent some time in Vancouver for a conference of my own, we have driven across part of Canada (Detroit/Windsor to Niagra Falls) on one of our roadtrips, I visited Canada for my bachelorette celebration, and we used Canada as a thruway to Michigan recently after attending a wedding in Rochester, NY – when we waited in line for a couple of hours. And here we are again.

We got here the night of our first anniversary – making it two years in a row that we have stayed in a very nice hotel suite. While Dave attends import/export talks and works to avoid insulting the hosts when not toasting the queen (?!), I have been heading out into the area to explore.

We're east of Toronto proper in an area called Markham. It's like most areas on the edge of urban sprawl – big roads, big new houses, the occasional farm field, large corporate campuses, strip malls, and one or two small, old communities. So now you know where I was headed.

Historic Unionville is not far from the hotel. It was founded in 1794. It has a Main Street with ancient, beautiful homes and quaint shops and trees that are the height of their autumn glory. I spent a good part of yesterday there and made some purchases at a neat little shop that had paper stars in the window that light up. They are exactly the same as the stars Dave and I saw all over Dresden on our honeymoon. I looked into buying some there – but they were expensive and had German electrical plugs. When I stepped into the shop in Unionville, I was afraid they were for decoration. I started a conversation with the two owners about them.

You might be able to guess how that went. My crooked pinkies are not the only proof that I am my mother's daughter. I talked with the owners for some time. Topics ranged from the paper stars, their use for decoration in parts of eastern Germany and among Christians in India, the length of the drive from Chicago, the Cubs, the Blues, the Hull family of hockey fame, etc. I had a great time – but I am still amazed when I walk away from an encounter like that that I actually talked so long to and learned so much about strangers. The friendly Canadians succeeded in selling me one of the very cool paper stars (including the light fixture), as well as two glass stars that hang from chains and hold tea lights.

So this trip to Canada has been fun. I’m still fascinated by how much the same and how different Canada is from parts of the US. I've gotten more of a feeling of a love/hate relationship that some Canadians have with the US this time around. I'll have to blog about that some other time. I need to get packing so that we can head out on time for the next leg of our journey: Urbana, Illinois!