Over the Hill and Through the Woods to Gramma's House We Go......

Photo Courtesy of Saxony Record Company

Actually not. Its more like fight your way onto the Spadina streetcar, get a two minute respite on an empty subway going to St.Clair West (try not to miss said stop) and then haul ass to get a seat on the St.Clair west streetcar and hope that nobody runs over you with a stroller or shopping cart. Then you hop out gleefully at Arlington, skip across the road (again not getting hit by any oncoming four wheeled types; the kind of the mechanized and gas guzzling variety) happy that you're free of mass transit for at least another eight hours and know that the rest of your evening is going to be spent in the madcap company of delightful beings who think (and tell you) that you're the niftiest thing since the Victrola played Fannie Brice singing "My Man".

(Hint, that's Fannie in the picture. Just in case you're wondering. I don't really need her in this blog, but I do like the picture.)

We're not going to visit Gramma. For one thing, both of my grandmothers have long since passed on, and besides, I doubt they even knew WHO Fannie Brice was, having grown up rurally, vaudeville being rare in King City, and I'm sure the Ziegfield Follies or Miss Brice never played there or Bracebridge. No, we're going to visit Nadia, who in many ways IS my Fannie Brice. For one thing, she has excellent taste. She's erudite, well read, shrewd, phenomenally knowledgeable about many things, is an excellent mother, and her friends to her are not friends, but FAMILY. Unlike Fannie however, she doesn't sing torch songs and again unlike Fannie, she has excellent taste in men; to wit, her husband John.

I've known Nadia since I was twenty-five years old and while I don't write blogs about my friends (you do one, you'll have to do them ALL) I was visiting Nadia last week and I realized that I had known her for close to fifteen years. It shocked the both of us. WERE WE THAT OLD?!?

I was working a horrid job in framing shop (underground in the CIBC Concourse) having to look at awful artwork of golf courses (paintings of golf courses, I shit you not!) and listening to goggle eyed bankers and lawyers drool over this tripe while my sociopathic boss went on and on about how it was a "limited edition" when all any fool had to do was look in the corner of the print and see that it was only 392/793. And in a faux mahogany frame no less....

But I digress.

I found out there was a job opening up at the Book Company up at Yorkdale Mall. I went up for an interview and was met by this incredibly warm, big brown eyed, tiny person, who was a BALL of energy. She sat down and asked me what book I was reading. I can't for the life of me remember, but it must have satisfied her, because we were chatting like old friends inside of two minutes. We've been friends ever since. (Needless to say, she gave me the job, and I quit the framing shop toute de suite!) Even when I moved to Ottawa for two years, we stayed in touch, and when I got back to Toronto it was like I never left. We try and get together, the four of us (this includes Nadia and John's brilliant five year old, Matthew) at least once a month for dinner and talk and a movie, and I must say, its a balm for my nerves. Mattie, (as we call him, for now, I imagine when he's a teenager that term will be off-limits) is this wide-eyed juggernaut of a kid. He's tall, has a mop of thick sandy hair, he's as sturdy as a rock, he READS, he writes, he's stunningly well mannered, and he calls me Uncle Trevy and greets me with a bone crushing hug whenever he sees me. He's five. (The same age, interestingly, as MY Matthew....)

The closest thing I can compare visiting the whole experience to, is going to visit your grandparents, IDEAL grandparents. You know, the kind that encourage you, and feed you, and tell you you're fabulous? Those kind? Like that. Except that they're younger than I am.

We sit, we talk about everything, life, death, movies, plays, what's childrearing and marriage like, what non-existent boyfriends are like, career ambitions, and we eat. My God, DO WE EAT. Or I eat. I pig out when I'm there. Especially at Passover. Nadia has a tradition that she has a Goyim Passover for all her non-Jewish friends, and we sit there, TRYING to read the prayer book backwards (in English), and wishing we could read Hebrew, because its such a snazzy sounding language. And its a lovely time, and people bring their kids, and the last two passovers, at the end, I drew funny pictures for Mattie and Nadia's friends Monz and Rick's little boys Nando and Ethan. Nando is a sports nut, he's ten, fearless and sensitive all at once, with killer eyes. Ethan is an elf. I'm convinced some sprite has taken the real Ethan's place and Monz and Rick have a changeling in their midst. He's quite magical. He also has a voice pitched high enough so that I'm certain only dogs can hear it. Both boys are great, except that they have a predisposition to eat sugar cubes whole. This I find vaguely disturbing. For some reason they think I'm kind of neat too. God knows why, I've never been any good with kids that I could ever see, even when I WAS one. But, if they like you, they like you, so you shut up and accept it and be grateful.

And I am grateful. Nadia and John have been unique in my circle of friends in that I've kept them almost exclusively, selfishly, to myself. I haven't shared them. The rest of my friends I dole out like Toffeefay because I want everybody to see how brilliant they are. (You don't believe me? I throw everyone I meet on poor Stephanie!! SEE MY FRIEND!??! She's a GENIUS!!! The girl will change her name to Crookshank if it doesn't stop...) With Nadia and John and Mattie, its selfish, but I keep them just for me. Maybe its because they're a family, and they're solid, and my faith in families have been shaken in recent years, and they give me faith that there ARE happy, contented people out there who struggle through each day, and WANT to be where they are, and don't feel TRAPPED in it. Maybe its because I feel safe there and I laugh a lot, and I forget my worries in a household of people who honestly enjoy each other's company. They expel loneliness, just by their very presence, which sounds redundant, but isn't. When I'm there, I'm a part of them. When you haven't felt like a part of something for a long time, its a lovely feeling, it gives you a broader vision of the world, of what life might be like. It alters your view and makes you feel as though you ARE connected after all. I don't know. All I know is that I love them and cherish them and I'll keep coming back for as long as they want me. There may come a time when I might have to share them with somebody, stranger things have happened. Until that time comes however, I intend to keep them, solely and exlusively for myself. Just for me.