When we moved to Napanee in 1981, I had never before lived in a small town. I laughed - affectionately (and probably condescendingly) - at some of the small-town idiosyncrasies: stopping the car in the middle of the street, rolling down the window, and passing the time of day with another driver, similarly stopped; taking two plus hours to grocery shop at the A&P while visiting with everyone you knew in town.
By the time we left in 2006, we were part of that scene, and I loved it. I never thought we would find this small-town-feeling in a big city.
But we have.
Yesterday I ran into Allison and the Baby Grands outside John's greengrocer and, later, our server, Bradley, from Tea at the Empress. Today I ran into our upstairs neighbour outside Russell Books, and another neighbour outside Cobbs Bread. And we run into Bryan everywhere!
But what really brought that feeling home was the local evening news. We watch the Vancouver Island CTV News at 5 with Joe Perkins. Now, we've run into Joe twice: once on the ferry from Vancouver, and once outside our condo as he jogged past on a Sunday morning. Both times we've stopped and had a conversation with him. He remembers us.
The 5 pm newscast is very casual and friendly. The various contributors - Joe, Adam and Louise - engage in a fair amount of personal banter, like good friends. The studio faces Pandora Street, and we can see pedestrians and cars passing by behind the anchors. Tonight, Joe tells us that the cameraman saw, through the window, a man putting money in the wrong parking meter - the space behind his car - so the cameraman ditched his post to run outside to help (in the middle of the newscast!). Turns out the guy knew it was the wrong meter, but someone had fed his, so he was paying it forward.
What a guy. What a crew. What a city. What good neighbours!
No comments:
Post a Comment