(Schmaltz warning)

Toronto.

Seems like I’ve been coming or going, to and from it, forever.

First time was as a kid visiting family friends who lived on Admiral Road in the Annex. This was before it was The Annex.

And then I moved there myself.

And lived in at least a thousand apartments and houses.

Then I moved away.

And back.

And away again.

And back.

Away.

Back.

Away.

I live away now.

But when I visit, and despite all the changes and the traffic and the lack of space and the changes… so many changes… I still remember the places that used to be and how the Annex was just a place we drove to on a Sunday for lunch and the kid we visited had one of the those table hockey games with flippers and levers and we played with it on the third floor and then after lunch walked around Bloor and Avenue Road… a perfume shop and a delicatessen come to mind…

And I remember so much of what came after that.

Changes, yeah. 

But this place that was never home, that’s got this reputation for being cold, where when I first moved at eighteen my (envious I wonder now) friends back home said how could I stand the way nobody spoke to each other, nobody looked at each other…

well, every time I come back, this supposedly aloof and unsociable town in flux says… even after all these years… hey, good to see you; how you been?