Toronto
I’m in my house right now in Toronto.
There is so much strain between me on the west coast, and me in Toronto.
I sometimes toy with the idea of moving back here, because I really do miss the familiarity.
I keep going back to this topic from Urban Geography, which was the most abstract dimension — the sense of place. Other dimensions include production, reproduction and…. I forget. I had this essay question on an exam which asked me to explain my sense of place in Vancouver. I couldn’t. I had just come back from visiting Toronto for the first time in two years and described how simple things like seeing streetcars and my familiarity with the most simple, originally subconscious, attachments I have to this city made me realize my “place”, and how Toronto is my place. In contrast, aside from my house, itself, I don’t feel like I have the same sense of place in Vancouver.
Home is where you choose to make it, and I have been trying to make Vancouver my home.
Being in Toronto is nice, but it’s really hard on me, because I miss the past, and still can’t accept that the past will never be the present again.
Conversely, In Vancouver, I don’t have a past that is holding me back, but that lack of past sometimes leaves me empty.
