Last Saturday Evening

I sat at the waterfront in Tacoma for a while and enjoyed the view. There were boats on the water and a fine hotel to my right that seemed to be built on a pier.

The waterfront walk was behind me . People passed by with children and strollers, lovers with arms entwined , couples with dogs, quite often two, enjoying a relaxing evening in a pleasant place.

The railroad track runs between the town and the water. The docks are industrial. While I was there. trains shifted leisurely this way and that. They crossed roads short distances apart.Bells and whistles clanged in unison with the clickety-clack of iron wheels on the tracks.Everything seemed exactly as it ought.

Nothing could be more different than we know in Aurora.

Except for the waterfront, roads are neither straight nor level. They wind up, under. and over like gigantic ribbons. The traffic is constant. It's hard to imagine how they got built.

Tacoma is not as old as Aurora.The first house was built in 1869. The "old town" downtown block is certainly prettier. The stores are occupied by services rather than retail operations. The short busy time I was there was hardly enough for more than impressions. Contrasts were strong but similarities were as well.

Two "waterfront' condo buildings appeared to be complete but not occupied. The view
from three sides certainly overlooked the water. But they were surrounded by industrial buildings. From the highway, neither the landscape or street scape were visible.

Many houses for sale were vacant and unkempt. James said the economic downturn didn't seem to have affected their area. Average house prices seemed to be a hundred thousand less than Aurora.

Individual styles and designs of above average homes were spectacular. They bore no resemblance to house designs in Ontario.Slopes and terraces and high stairs made me feel exhausted just looking. But the plants, trees and variety,colour and size of blossoms were breathtaking. They were pretty much the same flowers as grown in Ontario but Oh My!! how they grow.

I didn't feel any yen to live there. Yet, coming home, when I looked down from the plane on the GTA, at eight o'clock in the evening, it occurred to me , how flat, how dull, how regimented,how totally predictable.

It's good to be home. But it's good to go away and get a sense of how people live in other places.

Forty years ago when I was in Vernon,B.C. I saw a house being built on a ledge literally chiseled out of the side of a mountain and marvelled at the steep inclines of the roads. As a site for a house in Ontario. it would simply be dismissed.

Going away makes one realise. People will do what they must They always have. Some just have more courage, imagination and determination than others.