MonkeyPants

Village.

No, not the M Night Shalamalamathingie fiasco. My village. My home.

Yesterday I had lunch wih my father, and he happened to touch on one of his favourite subjects, which is how much he likes the small village he lives in on Vancouver Island. He loves the closeness of stuff, he loves the folks. He really digs it. Sometimes I think he is trying to sell me on it so that I will move over there and live the pastoral life. Beekeeping or something, I guess.

I had a momentary pang. It would be a lovely thing to wake up to the rosy dawn and look out over endless clover fields and stands of cedar, but my life is here. E is here. Work is here.  And as I looked in the window of the bookstore we were walking past, I saw my friend Steve, and I realized that my village is here, too.

In a flash, I saw how the elements of my life, my friends, my neighborhood, my work create what amounts to a village right here in the heart of a busy city.  I have a go-to person for all my needs. If I need a specific book, or to ask how to make a dish of food, or how to say something in a different language, I have someone to go to. And I’m a go-to person as well, for these people whose lives I touch, whose lives touch mine.

Part of it is running into Rachel on her errands. Part of it is knowing that I can borrow some butter from Tom at the local cafe. Part of it is impromptu Rainy Sunday movie days with Steve and Sandii and Colleen.  Part of it is holiday baked-goods swaps, and trying to kill Nigel with butter tarts. Part of it is Arwen’s and Genevieve’s children’s growing.  But all of it? It’s all mine. This is my life in my village.

I belong here.