David Common, Piya Chattopadhyay, Matt Galloway, and Tom Power are just the latest generation of my roommates. It began, as much of my life did, in East Wawanosh, where I was the only kid on the 10th concession whose TV-less status meant I couldn't watch Saturday morning cartoons or Sesame Street. Instead, I had opinions about CBC Radio’s annoying “Fresh Air” hosts and I could hum the theme to Peter Gzowski’s “This Country in the Morning,” the program that held the coveted weekday morning spot where we now hear Q with Tom Power.

“Moules et frites,” I said, snapping the menu closed. It was Dec 30, 2023. I was in St. Veronus, a Belgian restaurant in Peterborough recalling my arrival in Brussels on the same day 20 years earlier.

I wasn’t a backpacking through Europe or Thailand kind of kid. Instead, I spent my 20s finding meaningful work that would pay the bills. So when I landed in law school in Victoria in my late 30s, I seized a chance to take a co-op work term as ‘stage’ or intern at the European Commission. While it seemed a bit reckless even then to be unpaid for four months, I also knew I was finally emotionally ready to live away from everyone and everything familiar.

“Drive faster,” I urged my father as I slunk further down in the back seat of the powder blue Ford Fiesta. There I was, decked out in my navy blue gingham bib fronted dress with the crinoline that shot the skirt directly horizontal from my waist when I was upright. When I spun, my white lace pettipants were on full display (no, I am not making this up). Prostrated on the back seat, that the bulk of the crinoline netting nearly blocked my view out the window. Because of this, the risk was low of anyone glimpsing me from the passing high school bus, but regardless, I exercised caution. Socially, I was lukewarm: being known as the 15 year old who square danced with her parents was not likely to turn the temperature down to cool where I longed to be. (Becoming hot was never in the cards). 

It’s Friday, February 9, and it’s 14 degrees Celsius. People are smiling and saying hello to one another, jubilant that winter is over. Indeed it nearly never was. I see flip-flops and my heart sinks. Flip-flops in Toronto should be three months away.

It’s as though the last 25 years of climate science is lost on people. It was April 1, 1997 when I first started working with a team who believed that humanity’s own activities were slowly changing the climate patterns of the globe. That was at the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives - ICLEI - a membership organization of municipalities around the world banding together to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adopt sustainable development practices that came out of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio. My eyes were opened to the fact the science was already clear - the way we were conducting ourselves was incrementally affecting the temperature of the globe. In the 90s, though, it seemed like experts were confident that with the right public policy measures to reduce the reliance on fossil fuels, changed commercial and industrial practices, and a tweak to citizens’ habits, we could change the trajectory that had been predicted.

I heard this from my father every time there was any hint of anyone dodging taxes. It offended his very strong sense of duty and fairness to think that others were not making their contribution to the system that we’d agreed on as a society.

I agree with him.

Canada’s underground economy in 2021 (the last year Stats Can data are available) was estimated at $68.5 billion, or 2.7% of GDP. The residential construction industry was estimated to account for a whopping 35% of the economic activities that escape measurement because of their hidden, illegal, or informal nature.* This doesn’t particularly surprise me. I think of various home repairs I’ve had done, and almost always there’s been a casual offer for me to pay less if it’s a cash deal, a way to avoid sales tax for me, and income tax, for the service provider. I decline of course, often telling them that I am perfectly happy to pay my share. I’d also be worried that the work would be done shoddily and I’d have no proof of the relationship down the road. Such an offer just doesn’t instil confidence.

The Simpsons, of course, is not pitched to the nonagenarian. Indeed, some have written about the way it skirts the line on ageism, especially its portrayal of Grandpa Simpson as entirely useless awaiting death. But perhaps that’s just a feature of the way the show delights in taking the mickey out of men. Mom seems to have turned a blind-eye to its age-related ribbing just as she does to some of the cultural references - they being pitched squarely to the GenX watcher. She does, however, appreciate its social commentary. How lucky for her too - she’s got decades of episodes to catch up on. I’m tempted to go on a binge for it myself, just to prepare for our phone chats.

You take me back to my childhood on the farm. You remind me of the house my parents retired to. You accompanied me through seven years with my husband. And you’re with me still, in the house I’ve built just for me.

Of the many things my mother offered up when she shifted to retirement home living, you were the sole item requiring a lottery for dispersal. My sisters and I each eyed you hungrily, wanting to feel the weight of your metal so lovingly cared for; coveting that weight for ourselves; knowing if we acquired you new now, we’d die before we achieved what mom had accomplished in her 60 years with you.

f you’re a regular reader, you’ll know I grew up on a dairy farm. My father was the outlier in his family - the son of a doctor in southeast London, he fantasized as a kid about becoming a farmer and after the war things were not great in England. So he packed himself up and came to Canada to be a farm hand. Those were the days when you arrived at Toronto’s Union Station after your weeks’ long boat trip and farmers would be there to hire you. He met mom in the next couple of years and by the time I was born, 15 years and 5 children into their marriage, they owned a 200 acre dairy farm near Wingham, in southwestern Ontario.

Last week I gave you some reflections on my life in the last year after giving up my licence to practise law. This week, the remaining entries on the list.