Where It All Began

Just returned from spending 5 days in Vancouver where I attended the annual fuchsia show, walked around for miles and miles, had dinner with friends and generally enjoyed being in the city - one of the world's great cities as far as I'm concerned. We stay at a small suite hotel in the West End I'm very fond of, around the corner from Davie Street which is the best people watching street in town. A real neighborhood with a very colorful assortment of characters.

Only a few blocks away, down the hill at water's edge you can take the tiny people ferry across to Granville Island, with its marinas, amazing market and shops. There is a restaurant there, tucked under the Granville Street Bridge, called The Sandbar. The place where it all began...

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Some years ago I was in Vancouver on business attending the annual meeting of the organization I worked for. Checking in to the hotel the day before the (endless) meetings began, I had a few hours of spare time so I went for a walk, heading down to the water's edge. It was a sunny, beautiful October day and at Coal Harbour I stood breathing the sea air, looking at the scenery, including the boats in the marina. I reached for my phone and called Howard who was back in Ottawa. "I'm standing here looking at the sea, the mountains and boats for sale in the marina. I want to move here".

Several days later Howard arrived to join me for a few vacation days after the meetings. We ended up on the rooftop patio of The Sandbar, enjoying the fall sunshine and the stunning views of the city and mountains. And had a little chat.

A few months earlier we had put in an offer on a piece of land in Burritt's Rapids on the Rideau River, about 40 minutes away from our place in Ottawa . Our plan was to build a house there and the other part of the plan was to retire (early) in about 6 years. The deal fell through when the survey showed we couldn't build what we wanted on that particular property, which turned out to be a very good thing. Sitting at our table in The Sandbar that day we asked ourselves, "Why on earth would we want to retire and move 40 minutes down the road? Why don't we move to British Columbia, which we love, and have a REAL adventure?"

And, as always happens, once a decision is made, all kinds of things fall into place, unexpected things, unforeseen things. It all just works out.

The following spring break we brought The Boys out to British Columbia. for a look see. Number One son was finishing high school that year and we said that should he like what he saw and want to go to university in British Columbia we would support that. And it turned out that he did like what he saw and chose the University of Victoria, on the Island. However we were a little late applying and although he was easily accepted, by the third week of July, he was 142nd on the waiting list for residency. This was obviously absurd, so we went online and found a condo, close to the university, which we bought sight unseen for him to live in. There turned out to be a strange coincidence in play here. His father, many years before, had lived in that very building in the time he lived in Victoria.

Having Steve go out to Victoria first reminded me of The Godfather story when the family decides to expand their business to Las Vegas and sends Fredo out as their advance man. I had an idea in my head that if the boys would live there for awhile, even if they didn't end up staying, they would have a connection and maybe would be more inclined to come visit. (I still maintain a fantasy that one day all of us will be in the same time zone).

The following year I enrolled in the Masters program in Leadership and Training at Royal Roads University in Victoria. It was a combination program of on-site residency and distance learning along with an independent research project and thesis. For two summers during the residency I lived in Victoria in Steve's condo by myself and grew to love the city deeply especially the area in Saanich around UVic where I lived. Each evening after class and on the weekends I'd walk for miles along the coastal neighborhoods, getting to know every little beach access area, park and residential street, with gardens, ocean and woods and always the distant mountains. Those days were among the best days of my life.

I became so grounded in that geography that when it came time to sell the condo, even though I was living back in Ottawa, I resisted the idea. I had some strange thought that I needed to hold on to my place in that part of the planet, which to my mind meant having a nest there. Then on one winter visit, I went to see Haro House, a B&B suite on the water in the 'hood, and announced, "OK, call the real estate agent, let go of the condo, I've found my new home. I'm at peace now".

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In those years following The Decision we went out to Victoria and Vancouver Island and occasionally Vancouver, a couple of times a year. On a visit to Tofino on the west coast of the island one year, we found Qualicum Beach, which is about halfway between Victoria and Tofino. When we decided to sell the Victoria student condo, we bought this house in Qualicum Beach, to keep a toe in the British Columbia market. Unexpectedly, the Asian adventure came our way and we sold our house in Ottawa and moved to Manila for 4 years. But we kept the Qualicum Beach house and have had tenants in it all this time.

So now the time is now. After all those years since that decision at the Sandbar in Vancouver that bright October day, that day when it all began, our time to live here has finally come.

So far, so good.