My Own Private Paris

Last Friday I had a nice telephone conversation with a good friend of mine with whom I had lost touch. A lot has changed since our last conversation -- most notably a move to France with his family -- but we easily slipped back into a free-wheeling exchange that touched on art and politics and culture and philosophy.
I loved listening to him talk about what is like living in Paris, and in a small way I envied him. The baguettes sound heavenly. So do the field trips to the Louvre that his daughter takes. (No visits to pig farms or the kitchen of the local McDonald's for her.) The good thing about envy, though, is that it often passes.

The fact is that I love Toronto and I love its rhythm, especially on summer-like days like today. In a quick lunch hour walk I saw a world of interesting people: a street preacher in a wife-beater t-shirt harranging pedestrians; a busker playing his bagpipes while tourists filmed him on their camera phones; young black men trying to get passers-by to buy a copy of their Black History newsletter; double-decker buses filled with visitors to the city; an outdoor yoga class held in Dundas Square; an army of attractive young women handing out sample granola bars on one side of Yonge while a smaller group of attractive young women handed out information about Ontario tourist destinations; and throngs of people happily meandering down the sidewalk.

It may not be Paree, but it's home.