On Moving Back to Brockville

 This was the first article I wrote for our local paper. It's the first in a series of four about local people who had moved from Brockville only to return. Hope you like it.
One evening as we watched the Victoria rain pour past our window, my husband, Erik, and I discussed our shared past in Brockville. I had lived there for about seven years back in the 60s and early 70s; Erik had been born there and left for university in 1972. We both admitted to having a hankering to return. It would have to be some years down the road, though, since we had not yet reached retirement age. Then we received an invitation to attend the fortieth wedding anniversay of mutual friends in Brockville and, as newlyweds, we were thrilled to be going back there together. We discussed it and analyzed it and as we talked we realized that we could do it - we could move back to Brockville. After all, housing prices were one-third of what they were in Victoria, we had a good base of friendships and family, and it was something we both had individually thought about when retirement came.

The anniversary party became the catalyst. Our two week vacation, spent in a rented cottage on Lily Bay, was wonderful as we fished on the beautiful St. Lawrence, watched the tall ships at Blockhouse Island, and generally enjoyed all that the area had to offer. We contacted a realtor and within three days found the perfect home; before our two week vacation was half over we had a house to come back to.

All we had to do was return to Victoria and sell a home that we had owned for less than a year in a declining market. Needless to say, that happened. Everything worked in our favour. We sold our house, put our three dogs in a rented RV and drove across the country to our waiting home.

We arrived in early May to see the new leaves, a delicate shade of green, sprouting on the maples on our front lawn. It was our first Ontario spring in many, many years and we loved it. We lived through a hot, humid and mosquito filled Ontario summer that found us, most days, on Graham Lake in our little fishing boat and loving it. We knew it was summer because the maple trees were so full of leaves we couldn’t see through them.

Fall came and the leaves turned their glorious shades of gold and burgundy, the mosquitoes left us and a slight chill in the air took the place of the humidity. It was wonderfully beautiful and we loved it too.

Winter came and brought the snow - something neither of us had experienced in over twenty years. The leaves dropped and we could see clear across the fields to the lake beyond. We got ourselves some cross country skiis, bundled up, and slid across the new snow, the dogs running behind. We loved that too.

We go into Brockville to the ‘new’ areas - where the big box stores are and marvel at how we lived in Brockville without them. We go downtown and point to the storefronts and remember “that used to be Walkers” or “that was the Beamish store” and marvel at how it is all so different and yet all so much the same.

People on Vancouver Island thought we were crazy to leave what they considered to be paradise on earth. The mountains, the ocean, all so close, all at your fingertips. But to us this is paradise. While driving along the TransCanada Highway, our huge beautiful country passing by, we were in awe. Each place we passed had its own particular kind of beauty. We passed through the magnificent mountains of British Columbia; the understated expanse of the prairies, stretching out, unblemished as far as the eye can see; the ruggedness of Manitoba and northern Ontario filled with lakes and forests. Coming into the home stretch we saw the familiar beauty of this area; limestone cliffs, rolling farm lands, charming little towns. When we reached Brockville, there it was, the magnificent St. Lawrence River stretching out before us, the landmark that is Brockville. We knew we were home. We’ve been here for nine months now and have not looked back.