#93- Losing My Bus Pass

Last Friday morning could not have started any worse. 

It was horribly and and unseasonably cold for a summer morning and I sat shivering at a table on the patio of a coffee shop. I was tired and still had to work that day. As I got up from the table I patted my pocket, a reactionary tick I have to check if I have everything. Where there was supposed to be a bus pass there was only a piece of crumbled paper and the feeling of utter despair. I desperately rifled through my backpack only to come up empty again. I had lost my bus pass. 

So much for T.G.I.F.

After a violent mood swing that featured more cursing than an R-rated movie and exaggerated "why me" moments fit for the stage, I accepted that losing my bus pass was not that big of a deal. It was in fact a blessing in disguise.

Losing my bus pass meant less sitting on crusty, blue seats watching the world go by and more walking around in the sunshine, taking in the world around me. 

I explored my new neighbourhood, I noticed interesting new nooks in a city I thought I already had completely figured out. I stopped to look at books at the little, independent bookstore around the corner from me. I saw a lady sing about an American privateer, whatever that is.

I had been stuck, stuck on buses, going about the daily grind and not noticing all the beauty that summer in Ottawa had to offer. Losing my bus pass was a ticket out of this rut.

So I am grateful for losing my bus pass. I am grateful that life made me stop and realize its beauty when I refused to do so on my own. And even though I know I will need to get a new bus pass for next month, I will always remember that part of summer my own two feet were the best transportation around.

#87- Garage Sales

You know what they say: one person's junk is another person's afternoon of browsing in someone's front lawn for that final piece to their living room.

Well maybe that's not quite how it goes. But as far as garage sales go it sounds pretty accurate to me.

Garage sales are the product of the annual spring binge of useless, but suddenly sentimental junk that you naturally try to con other people into paying you for. So it obviously makes for grand old time of treasure hunting and haggling for the best price on a singing moose head or those Pokemon cards you know are fake because they are purple instead of blue.

Stumbling across a garage sale is like actually coming across something with a metal detector on the beach; surprised euphoria mixed with an immediate downgrading of other priorities. I can root around in a garage sale for hours, trying to find hidden gems of books or toys or posters or you name it. Where else can you find a bowling ball for sale next to a blender going for $5? Maybe half a block down the street, but nowhere else.

I would even like to believe garage sales were the cause for my early education in business. At the age of eight I came across a set of long cabin-esque building blocks at a garage sale that I really wanted. I was told by someone that you should never pay the asking price at a garage sale and successfully haggled the price on the blocks from $5 to $3. Yep, Toronto Stock Exchange here I come!

So I am grateful for garage sales. I am grateful that they bring people out to enjoy the age old practice of bartering with their neighbour. I am grateful that they signal summer and they provide me with reading material or hours of play or, if nothing else, a few minutes of amusement as I look at the treasure trove in front of me, the objects telling a story about someone's life lived and a future full of hope.

#86- Ice Cream

The ringer on my phone went off yesterday and it sounded like celebratory trumpets to my ears. That's because it signalled an email I received telling me I got a job at an ice cream store.

Finally, paid employment!

So while last week at this time I had zero jobs, now I have two. So in honour of that, I decided to write about the very thing I'll be dealing with for hundreds of hours over the next few months: ice cream.

I love ice cream. Some of my best memories of childhood include ice cream, from getting Superkid as a treat with my mom, dad, aunt, uncle, siblings and cousins to hanging out and eating soft serve ice cream on the grass at Ribfest with my friends. Yes, ice cream is a powerful force, bringing people closer together and, if you're not careful, closer to being overweight.

But I never worried about that because ice cream was a special treat for me and it still is. It signals the end to a good day, a special summer afternoon or a family outing.

Ice cream also lets you express yourself. That may seem a little weird to think about, but as a guy who thinks about food more than is probably healthy, I think many foods do let you define yourself. But ice cream even more so. There are so many flavours that you are not limited to what someone else wants or what you always have. It allows you to be adventurous, or traditional or both. It lets you mix and match and lets the world know if you are zany or classy or whatever you want to be.

Also ice cream just tastes good. There's no two ways about that.

So I am grateful for ice cream. I am grateful for the way it can bring people together over something so delicious. I am grateful that it can be a special treat on the hot summer days or to cheer up cold and drizzly ones. And I am grateful that it is around or I may still be unemployed right now.

#85- Shade

We've been riding a minor, spring heat wave here in Ottawa which would be the great if I had air conditioning at my house.

Instead I must enjoy the warm, sunny days choosing whether to slowly melt outside or inside. At least I have a choice, right?

But then there is a third option: bask in the early summer days while sitting beneath a giant oak tree in the park, its shade creating the most comfortable of environments.

I chose that option a couple days ago and sat in the shade in the park, reading a good book and enjoying the blue skies without being roasted by them.

Shade has saved me a few times before. Last summer I was working at the golf course and the heat in the early afternoon would become almost unbearable, but getting that sweet, sweet assignment to tend to the trees meant an afternoon with slightly cooler temperatures.

Shade provides refuge, comfort and a reprieve from the sun without having to waste a beautiful day inside or freezing your fingers off in an over air conditioned building (that's when irony isn't so funny). Shade gives us a place to relax, a perfect picnic spot, a reading nook or a nap area. In short, shade can be whatever you want it to be except boiling hot.

So I am grateful for shade. I am grateful for the trees or awnings or the other things that create shade. I am grateful for way shade allows me to enjoy the summer at the height of its heat without suffering from heat stroke or sun burn. You can have your air conditioning and your fancy fans, but I'll take the shade of a good tree any day.  

#83- The Smell of Freshly Cut Grass

Today is the start of May 2-4 here in the land above the 49th parallel and that means one thing: the start of summer.

This is the weekend when patios fill up, cottages open up and fireworks light up and for many this marks the beginning of a few months of glorious sun, or, if you live way up there, a few months of bad skiing season.

But for me there is something else that appears around this time that puts my head in a summer place and that's the smell of freshly cut grass.

When I walk down the street and get a blast of that newly chopped green in my nostrils I can't help but think of days spent playing soccer, swimming in pools or just reading a book on a lawn chair as dusk sets in.

For me the smell of freshly cut grass marks a beginning. It is like nature's version of a ribbon cutting for a new building. It is a rebirth of sorts where the old is taken out and the new brought in. It means the grass is growing and the winter has been left far behind.

Last summer I had my fair share of days where all I did was cut grass, but that smell still makes me think of care-free times and has me looking forward to more in the near future.

So I am grateful for the smell of freshly cut grass. I am grateful for the thoughts of good times it can provoke. I am grateful that the sound of a lawn mower can be the starting gun for summer, but hopeful that we won't race through it, but enjoy whatever comes and all the fun times, sunny days and summer nights that follow.

#58- The Longest Day of the Year

I know this is the first day of summer, but to be honest it has felt like summer for at least a couple weeks if not a month, especially when I'm down in the sand traps burning up for my job at a golf course. It's like a beach without the water.

But what is special about today, what is so unique and amazing is that today is the longest day of the year. 

Yes, this is the day when the sun stays up and parties the hardest, allowing us to bask in its rays, its warmth, its beauty and its life for more time than any other day of the year.

Today is the day I can sit outside on my porch and sip on a nice cold drink without having to fold up and go inside early. Today is the day when I can use one of my corny, but reliable jokes; oh man, this is going to be one long day!

So I am grateful for the longest day of the year. I am grateful for the sun shining, the warm weather and being able to enjoy these wonders of nature long into the night, or rather day. And I am grateful that in six or seven months when I'm surrounded my snow and heading home at 4:30 in the dark, that I can remember this day and make a little sun shine out with the warm memories.