History

08.14.18

I can walk anywhere in this city and be struck by so many memories held by so many familiar places – spots where I’ve loved and laughed and cried and wondered about so many different things. How many of my own ghosts live and whisper on that stretch of Beverley and St. George that runs from Dundas to Bloor? I remember walking down that street in high school with my headphones in my ears, meandering home at some ungodly hour when all the university students seemed to be sleeping in dorms all around me, and I didn’t really have any idea what life was really like yet.

I remember sometimes feeling the whole weight of the world pressing down on my shoulders, with all my young worries making it hard to breathe. I can remember masochistically stewing in all my raw heartache, feeling every cut so deeply and gasping at the thrill of it. But I can also remember walking down that street and a lot of the time feeling so absolutely free. Everything was so new back then, and the whole world seemed so open walking home in the middle of the night. Sometimes I would walk with a friend, and we would share things with each other – mull things over and let them go. Sometimes we would wonder about the future – about where we’d end up and who we’d become – and everything still seemed so full of this echoing promise. We still had so many new experiences to look forward to, and sometimes, when it rained, we ran through those streets, ecstatic and beckoning, drenched to the bone in freedom and hope.

It never really occurred to me that we wouldn’t be talking anymore – that we would end up slowly becoming strangers with the passing years.

I never really imagined what it would be like for things to turn out this way.

But there’s still time, and it’s kind of nice to think that maybe we might end up walking that stretch of road together again, feeling the pulse of our shared history in the rhythm of an evening breeze.