my neighbourhood

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Today's Blathering is part of a WordGoddess collaboration project. The assignment: to post photos from around our neighbourhoods. As those of you who regularly read my journal know, I've already posted a lot of pictures of my neighbourhood in past entries. Here are some more, all taken of locations within walking or running distance of our apartment. I took the photo above during a recent morning run.





I love Toronto. I used to live out in the country, grew herbs and wildflowers in my rock garden, woke to the sound of birdsong instead of fire engines and honking traffic. A pastoral setting, I know, but I started getting cabin fever by the time we decided to make our move to the city.

Weird, I know, especially just after waxing eloquent about how much I love the cottage. I do love the cottage, and I love the outdoors with a passion that rivals my adoration of all things chocolate...but at heart, I'm a city girl. I love the bustle and action of downtown Toronto, the easy access to bookstores and coffeeshops and theatres, the underground subway and network of shops, the hum and rattle of streetcars along King Street.





Our condo straddles the entertainment and financial districts in downtown Toronto. On one side is Roy Thompson Hall, home of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, as well as the Princess Of Wales Theatre and the Royal Alexandra Theatre. From my home office window, I can also see a plethora of nightclubs, the neon-lit Rubiks cube of the Paramount Theatre and Chapters complex a few blocks away, MuchMusic television station headquarters.

If I step out the front door of my building, I can see the CN tower and the Skydome, both minutes away by foot. Streets in my neighbourhood tend to become gridlocked with taxicabs just before and after games and theatre performances. Finding parking can be an (expensive) nightmare. I never drive in Toronto; I walk, run, or take the subway or bus system most of the time. Some opt for four-legged locomotion:





When the World Science Fiction Convention rolls into Toronto next year, I suspect that I'll be the closest resident, with the Metro Convention Centre being a 3-minute walk away. (To those thinking of asking: sorry, crash space has already been spoken for :-)).

I love standing at the base of the CN Tower on a sunny day and staring up all the way up the tower to the top, shading my eyes and gawking like a tourist. I think the Skydome's pretty cool even though I've only seen one Jays game (they lost). I hate the bizarre sculpture of sports fans, which, to the appropriate eerie soundtrack, would make a great thematic focus in a horror movie:





On the other side of our neighbourhood is the financial district, with its towering office buildings and sea of suits and cellphones during rush hour. Weird to think that I used to be part of this surging throng when I worked as a programmer/analyst for TD Bank's head office about fifteen years ago, working in one of the black monolith towers designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

I love the hodgepodge of architectural styles (anywhere from very cool to downright ugly), the juxtaposition of old and new. I really like the Royal Bank Plaza building, whose mirror-glass facades contain real gold and are gorgeous in the sunlight. You can see it in the second photo on this page, the building second from the right.

The interior of BCE Place is another of my neighbourhood favourites (see photo below), which houses Toronto's oldest surviving stone building and oldest intact streetscape.





I could write far too much more about my neighbourhood, so perhaps I'd better stop here. Besides, I've already Blathered and posted photos about my visit to Kensington Market and Chinatown, local grocery stores, people-watching along the harbourfront, and too many photos I've taken on various neighbourhood runs.


And hey, even the Pope's coming to visit my neighbourhood this week. :-)