Today was the first beautiful day of Spring here in Montreal. It was definitely plus-something-or-other... I was out with only a t-shirt and light wool sweater bought during our honeymoon. Went for a walk around the park in front and read The Economist while I was at it. (Reading while walking, and not running into telephone poles or street signs is one of my specialties. I am one of those weird sights in the neighborhood.) Later I studied out front for my microeconomics exam.
This was the kind of day where the bars in Place-Jacques-Cartier in Old Montreal would put out their chairs and tables. I worked down there for three summers and it was the surest sign that spring was close by, Punxsutawney Phil and Wiarton Willie notwithstanding, when the tables came out. A few weeks after that, they would start building the terraces out. One visitor to our offices at the time remarked that Montreal was the only place he knew of where people would sit outside in their winter coats just to drink beer!
I am writing and posting this from my porch which opens on to the cosmopolitan Beaubien Street using my laptop and my wireless connection. A first time for me.
I love hanging out my porch, or as I like to call it, my stoop in the summer. My favorite thing is practicing balcon de ville, the time tested activity of sitting on your porch and watching people and dogs go by and smiling and waving. My usual partner for balcon de ville is my hound-dog, Boy. He couldn't be with me today as he is getting his usual dose of tough love from his big black girlfriend. Those of you who grew up in a big old city, like say Winnipeg, know how much fun this can be. I like hanging out and reading and watching the sun go down. Marie-Claude often comes and joins me after her evening walk with Boy. Sometimes she'll head inside and work or relax, coming back every once and a while to watch me and Boy on the stoop.
Having a hound dog like Boy around means that old ladies and mothers with babies tend to stop a lot. They all take a moment to say how handsome he is or ask if they can give him a pat.
Time seems to slow down during those moments of balcon de ville and I love it.
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PS: Boy isn't a hound-dog for real; he's a handsome pure-bred Golden Retriever of American lineage with nice square features. His mom loves him very much and misses him a lot right now. Those two were meant to be together for ever.
PPS: About.com has a site with a long list of world famous groundhogs, or marmottes as we say in French. Ma belle petite marmotte is one of my other nicknames for M-C.
PPS: When saying hound dog, you have to do like you're from the South. Like houndog... slur the words together with a nice drawl...