Moving On #3

Duncan, at first glance, is a much more likely place to move to. The weather, while it is quite frequently grey and gloomy for what feels like months on end, is also rather glorious for even more months of the year. During the warm months there is very little humidity. No matter how hot it is during the day, by evening it generally cools down. The range of temperatures is, as compared to central Canada, fairly small. Temperatures in Duncan on average only fluctuate 35 degrees in a whole year (-6 to 30 degrees Celsius). Ontario's temperatures can fluctuate 25 degrees within a week. And no matter how wet it gets in Duncan - seldom does one have to shovel the stuff!

The housing costs in Duncan are very comparable to cities in Ontario. While I have not seen the insides of any two bedroom apartments, it appears as if $800-900 can get one a  reasonable two bedroom apartment - about the same cost as Ontario. Duncan also has a vibrant social and cultural life. There are number of open air markets in the area, there is a lot of home grown music, and if there are fewer (and less varied) restaurants in the area, there are certainly sufficient for my needs. People are more relaxed/friendly (in part I have argued because of the more benign weather). They are, for example, more likely to talk to you on the bus.

But there are no seasons here. Because there are far fewer hardwood trees on the West Coast, the fall colours are significantly less glorious. Summer sort of seems to slip into the rainy season they call winter which by February slowly evolves into summer.There is no mad celebration of spring after a winter of fighting the cold, of wearing boots and mitts and hats, of shoveling the snow from the end of the driveway or getting into a car with the vinyl seats so cold that the heat is sucked from your flesh. One wonders if the various equinoxes and solstices of the northern climates that mark either the leaving or the return of the sun were ever as important to celebrate in warmer climates when the seasons have less impact upon daily life.

The cost of living here is higher. Food is substantially more expensive, in part because so much of it is shipped across the strait by ferry, but also because there is so little competition. Duncan has three reasonably large grocery stores. All three stores in Peterborough would be seen as reasonably high end stores. There are no low frills/budget grocery stores in Duncan or anywhere else on the island.  People just seem to accept the high cost of food as being normal. The cost of getting around is also more. Gas is more expensive and if one wants to visit any where off island - the cost of the ferry makes one hesitate.

Moving to B.C. also means switching health care systems, car insurance and getting a new driver's licence. It means having to learn how the civil service/bureaucracy works. It means that my fairly comprehensive knowledge of how the courts and the social service system operates in Ontario will no longer be useful to me or anyone else. Moving means that I lose contact with some people that I have known for much of my adult life. Moving away from Ontario means that I will no longer see the hills, the river and the lakes that have shaped so much of who and what I am.

While it would be fun to watch my two youngest grandchildren grow up, and to see how they evolve ( and perhaps they need my attention more), it is unlikely that my son would commit as much energy to watching out for me as would my daughter. I suspect I would have to work harder to remain connected.

There are so many things to consider about moving. I know I have to move. I know that I will move. I suspect that whatever decision  I make - part of me will feel that it was the wrong one.

Moving On #2

There are only two options for me in terms of living closer to my adult children. Well actually there are three, but the third choice is not, more the pity, mine to make. One of my two kids could decide to move to where the other lives. Then, while I would still have to move, the choice as to where I moved would be obvious. However the possibility of my daughter moving west or my son moving east is so far removed from reality that all of us living in the land of Oz is more likely. Of course they could both move to a central point, but none of us have a desire to move to Winnipeg.

My two choices are Sudbury, Ontario and Duncan, BC. While I suspect that most people would assume that where I wanted to live out the rest of my life would be a no brainer; that any one in their right mind would prefer to live in Duncan as opposed to Sudbury. But they would be wrong.

Sudbury has a number of attractive aspects to it. It is not the dreary, scrag covered hillside,  moonscaped town it use to be. In 1972, Inco built a new refinery smoke stack. That ensured that the toxic sulfur dioxide would no longer rain upon the ground and thereby upset the pH balance of the local lakes and destroy the vegetation (the fact that those same pollutants fall somewhere else doesn't seem to bother anyone in Sudbury). Sudbury has, in the last 40 years or so, turned into a reasonably attractive city. Nothing can hide the fact that the city is built on solid rock. There are streets that twist in strange directions to avoid a sudden upthrust of rock) and there are rows of houses that look as if they are perched, somewhat insecurely on the hard, dark nickel bearing rock.

The weather may be Sudbury's biggest downside. Winter can be cold, there can be lots of snow and in general it lasts for months and months. The blackflies and mosquitoes are present for what feels like an almost an equal number of months.

There is not much of a downtown core. It is not for the lack of trying, There are restaurants, a few stores and lots of offices. I think people would like to make their downtown attractive but the buildings even when they were new, were at best, uninspired designs. Thirty or forty years of pollution later, the buildings are tired looking, dirty and quite frankly rather unwelcoming. The retail side of a vibrant downtown core has either gone out of business or has moved to one of the numerous strip malls or large indoor malls scattered well away from downtown. But on the side streets there is a glimmer of hope, a sense that things could be changing; that there are entrepreneurs who are innovative and creative; who are prepared to try something new. It could be interesting to see that process unfold.

Sudbury does have beautiful lakes, including the one at the center of the city. There is a great science center, lots of shopping, good music including some great concerts, some decent restaurants and a vibrant multicultural life for those of middle or Eastern European heritage. While their Saturday market is not large, it has some potential. The people that I have met seem to be kind, friendly people.  The hills are now  covered with grasses and small birch and popular trees. One hopes that in a hundred years much of the majesty that must have been Sudbury might be returned. There is much to look at and enjoy. If one likes the outdoors - it is perfect place to live.

Most importantly, my daughter and two of my grandchildren live there.  The kids have been a joy to watch grow up. It would be great fun to live closer to them and to be able to cheer them on as they play their sports and become the wise and capable adults I know they will become. My daughter has always been a great daughter, a wonderful teacher and even a better friend. I can't imagine a better person to support me in my elder years.

Sudbury, while it is not the ideal place has much that attracts me.