Metamorphosis

I have always been afraid of cities. I'm not sure when the fear developed, or how it progressed, but it was there. Constant. Low Grade.

I would go to Boston, but only under certain circumstances and I always had to be with someone else.

New York? Hah! Scared the shit out of me. I had to be dragged there by a friend the summer I lived in New Canaan, CT. One of the reasons I turned down Columbia for my Masters degree? Yep. I'd have to live in the city for two years. I went and got pregnant instead. That seemed to end the discussion.

Terrance grew up in Detroit. He lived in New York for many years. He attended Howard in D.C. This was a man who thrived in cities. He adored the pace, the options, the People.

Then, he met me. The woman who refused to leave small towns. Small town New England. Because he loved me and wanted me to be happy, he stayed in small New England towns. Towns where there were no street lights. Where we JUST got home mail delivery two years ago. Where there were no people.

He waited. At every career change, my offers got better. Being the big fish in the small pond had it's benefits and I was able to attain access to levels that would have been harder for me to break into, where it not a small New England state. And the baby, I wailed. I want the baby to see Green, to know the country, to grow up on a lake.

And he waited. I got my master's degree. He waited some more. Then, he could wait no more. He had to go. His soul was being crushed. He could not live in this place any longer. I could stay or come with him, but he had to go. Wait, wait, I put him off. Till the end of the school year, until the dance recital was over. Wait just a little bit longer.

While my fear of cities had lessened, it had not disappeared. I would never be happy in a city, I just knew it. I would be lost. I would be afraid. I would be...nobody.

And then we got here. To Montreal. A city.

And I am blooming. As if the very thing I needed was that which I feared the most. The joy that sweeps over me as I walk down the street is so unexpected, so surprising that I am overwhelmed. I explore every day, walking or driving through the streets of Montreal.

In less than a week, I can navigate a good part of the city with ease. I know how to get from place to place. And today? Today, I found a place that made me so happy, I can barely write about it.

Marche Atwater.

See? Look.



I wandered the plant stalls, mesmerized. Blissful.

Then we found the fish shop, and the frommagiere, and the bakery, and the olive oil shop and the wine shop (where they had a young man giving samples out on the sidewalk).

I have become a Montreal shopper, now that I have my official wine bag. For citizens of Montreal buy lots of wine. They carry it in these bags.


Next to the wine, was the bakery, where the smell was Indescribable.



And finally we wandered the fruit and vegetable stalls, looking for tomatoes and avocados for our dinner tonight. For, unlike the country, where your market is 30 minutes away and you stock up for a week at a time, you purchase fresh every day. Because it's there.



Because I'm here.

My fear has evaporated. I can taste the lingering dregs far on the back of my tongue, like slightly burnt coffee. Julie said that my happiness is showing...And it is.

I hope you'll all forgive this giddy, gushing Dawn. She is not one you get to see much of, as the cynical Dawn tends to rule the roost. I have no doubt she will re-merge, as the PhD work comes down in August, and the reality sets in. But for now?

For now you get this Dawn. The one who lingers over her cup of coffee at de la Gare in the morning. The one who wanders the Marche Atwater, sipping honey wine in a small glass. The one who smiles at elderly French Canadian ladies as I carry my bag of wine and holds her daughters hand as we stroll through the flower market.