Spending a
weekend in Vancouver, smelling the soft moist air and reveling in the blossoms
already in full flower, makes me wonder why we ever left here for the prairies.
Of course, there were good reasons, but that doesn’t eliminate the nostalgia
for a kinder climate.
To be
honest, there are times in Alberta, especially in the spring, when I wonder if
I’ll ever feel warm again. The winter refuses to let go, even through most of
the spring, until summer bursts out with heat enough to melt the soul.
Someone
asked me this weekend, why, after living in Vancouver for twenty years, we
decided to move back to the prairies. Certainly a good and perfectly natural question
for a born and raised Vancouverite. Where else in Canada matches the beauty and
climate of the west coast?
Of course,
we humans are hard to satisfy. Once back in Vancouver, I’d soon tire of the
interminable traffic, long commutes and socialist governments. Trouble is,
everyone flocks to the best places on earth, and then tries to turn them into a
paradise of their own making.
Lethbridge
has its benefits; it’s not always windy! I can drive anywhere in fifteen
minutes, and all those big box stores have settled in—everything within easy
reach. Too, we have some family nearby, and vistas of the Rockies a hundred
miles north and south never cease to awe me.
We have
moved over a score of times during our fifty eight years of marriage, and have
learned that home is where you make it. It is not a place, it is peace.
Conflict can destroy a home in the most magnificent abode and the finest
surroundings.
I’m sure we
could live in Vancouver again, or anywhere else we felt called to. But right
now we are happy where we are; we always have been wherever we were. Vancouver
is a wonderful place to visit and admire, but I prefer not to live there again.
