“It’s the sweetest thing I know of, just spending time with you.” It’s a line from a John Denver song from the 70s. A love song. That line represents now a different kind of love song. One for Connor. It started the day we met, the day he was born.

He’s been coming to spend the day since he was about a year old. Almost four years of fascination. Watching him learn: to crawl, walk, talk. Play with trains and Lego. Colours, letters and printing his name. When did he learn the whole ABC song? Endless questions. Why? What does that mean? When? How do you do that? Can I try? Can we go to the beach? Will you play with me? Where does that come from? How is it made? Can we bake? Can I do it? Can I?

The intensity on the small face as he attempts something brand new. Stirring, mixing, stacking, cutting with scissors, chopping fruit with his own special knife. The joy of digging in sand and dirt. Planting things and waiting for them to grow and then picking and eating them. Cutting flowers for his Mama – she won’t mind 1″ stems will she? (We’ve had a lot of roses that had to float in bowls.)

Making cookies and pancakes and biscuits. Muffins, fruit salads and gnocchi. He knows where everything in the house is and when we moved he helped unpack. I am sure I will find it all one day. Picnics on the floor, on the grass, on the deck.

I tell myself that being a glorified Lego Assistant (sorting and searching for parts being my allotted tasks) is keeping my brain active. Lego is better than crossword puzzles isn’t it? But the best part is the ongoing talking and questioning and planning. Or sometimes we don’t have to talk. He just wants company. And when he isn’t talking he sings to himself.

Sometimes he doesn’t listen and we have to have words. He is allowed sleepovers now. So there was the time he was up for 2 hours in the night waiting for morning so he could play with his new dinosaur Lego.

After that experience his parents bought us one of those magic clocks that’s set to turn green when it is time to get up. It works fine but the first morning we had it he came to get me. He told me we weren’t allowed to get up yet but if I didn’t mind he had a few questions and we could talk until it was time. “C’mon Grandma, you can get under my covers and be warm.” (It was so early even he was chilly.)

Am I boring you? Alright, so I am fascinated with watching small children grow and learn. Developmental Psych was at the top of my favourites. Along with language, which is another side of the same coin. It doesn’t do it for everyone but for me this is another chance at the best time of my life.

There is continuity in this, a comfort that feeds my soul. I look at him and see absolute proof that I was here in this world. He has some of his mother, some of his father and his Farmor, and his Grandpa, odd glimpses of aunts, uncles, and great-grandparents and probably someone from the 17th century. (And Spiderman, some hobbits and maybe Buzz Lightyear; there’s “culture” as well as genes.) His hair is his Dad’s. His eyes are his mother’s and now his baby brother’s. The fine motor skill that makes him able at four to do Lego for 12 year olds. Is that all his Dad or is my precious mother-in-law’s talent for detail and precision emerging too? There’s a long list of endearing and sometimes eerie characteristics. Do you see these things in your grandchildren?

But it is true that in spite of getting tired because I am no longer thirty five, and in spite of the need sometimes for “discussions”, since the day my last child left for the first day of school it’s the sweetest thing I know of.

I am still waiting for someone to ask me why the sky is blue though. I looked it up so I would be ready. I sure hope Google is right.

I love this story. My friend is nothing if she is not a survivor. She believes in herself deep inside but has had many ups and downs to contend with, abuse, loss, lots of difficulties.  In December she replaced her very old microwave (I envision my faithful but rickety old white Panasonic). She and her kids were so excited by the shiny new stainless steel that she rashly stated that by the New Year she would have an all stainless kitchen. Instead of feeling hopeless she wondered where it would all come from. Four days before New Year’s a client took possession of their new home. They asked her if she knew anyone who would like the appliances, all stainless steel – they were going to do a reno. She said they were very good appliances but they were adamant and asked if she wanted them. So on the last day of the year she met her deadline.  Even better she paid it forward by donating the proceeds of selling her old appliances to a deserving charity. She is all about giving back.

The Real Canada is in the diversity of its places and its people. It is not ice and snow and myths about snowshoes and mosquitoes, although those are in it. It is not just about the major urban centres or the social elite. Nor our exported or retained celebrities. Those too are part and parcel of our country but not the real thing. It is the people in all the cities and the small and middle sized towns that support one another in adversity and bad weather. It is farmers and fishermen and fire fighters and folk singers; it is parents and grandparents and kids and dogs. It is on the outdoor rinks and frozen lakes in the Maritimes, on the prairies, in the Rockies and in Quebec and Ontario  where kids and adults gather to play the Canadian game, whether they are good at it or not. It’s pond hockey and street hockey. It’s northern lights and southern lakes.It’s the accent of Newfoundland. It’s the Celtic music of the Maritimes and the songs of the western cowboys. It’s the accent of Quebec which makes me glad my grandchildren will be able to speak more than one language. It’s the railroad running from sea to shining sea. It’s the highway running from Victoria, B.C. all the way to St. John’s, Newfoundland. It is the people who grow the real food, not in labs or on factory farms with chickens in cages or pigs in small pens, but in beloved fields under the rising sun where they run the soil through their hands hoping for a better tomorrow for themselves and their children. It is the beauty of the lakes and streams and mountains and oceans. It is the wild places where the moose and bear and wolves still roam. It is a myriad of rocks and trees and alpine flowers. It is people who save seeds and grow what their grandmothers grew. It is people who care about nature and peace. And technology that allows us to share all these things with others. It is the ocean that smells of life, the glacier that smells of eternity and the wild rose that smells of tomorrow. It is the scent of ripening grain, the taste of a tomato just picked from the vine and the aroma of a rainbow trout freshly cooked beside an unspoiled stream. It is people whose ancestry includes so many different nations that we could only be Canadian. One picture cannot do Canada justice. Nor can one person’s view. Tell me about your Real Canada.