Jan 7 - Theory of mile dependency - Ottawa

My taste for traveling may be due to a geographic tongue. I didn’t ask for it. I came with it. That’s what my dental hygienist said tonight during my regular teeth cleaning session: “Did you know you had a geographic tongue?”. Apparently, it runs in families and the cause is unknown. I also have a sore arm for a non natural cause. My travel doctor shot me twice this afternoon for tetanus and meningitis. That’s what traveling does to me. I am not only genetically predisposed to it but also addicted in the kinkiest of ways to the extent of becoming a pain-seeking masochist. The idea of vaccination is to obviously immunize me from greater threats, but one has to like it, I must admit.

I am a nomad. Tracy Chapman sings it beautifully in “I used to be a sailor”: I don`t like being stationary, she says, I like the rocky wavy motions of the sea… By definition, nomads cannot stay in one place. I may be a pastoral nomad, often looking for better pastures. But the industrialized era has made us sedentary and war has forced people away from their land, often again their will. Being a nomad becomes a spiritual metaphor, a desire more than a fact. I like to move trying not to become an island, not to park my boat, not to get used to my padded walls.

Jean Barman is a Canadian Historian from British Columbia and my chosen author of the day. Her book is the first non-fiction one I have recommended since the start of the year. Stanley Park’s secret is an eye opener, the bones and flesh underneath the perfectly mowed pastures of a graveyard. Every big family has a best-kept secret. The city of Vancouver has its own, and it lies along one of the most beautiful evergreen parks in the world.

Tip of the day: walk, jog, bike, skate along the 22 k (13.7 miles) of Stanley Park’s seawall… It’s amazing!

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