Originally published July 10, 1994
I confess I'm a closet Canadian.
My last residence in America before coming to Japan was 30 miles south of the Canadian border in northern Vermont.
If you don't count Burlington, Vt., as a big city (pop. 129,000), we lived closer to Montreal than to any other major metropolitan area. My wife and I got to love visiting Montreal.
We discovered British imports and over-the-counter allergy medicines were available across the border that could not be had in the U.S.
I had lots of fun telling people I drove a "foreign" car because our Ford Tempo was built in Canada, and we developed a kind of international feeling by constantly being informed of the exchange rate between U.S. and Canadian dollars; I still carry, in fact, a few Canadian dollars in case I have to cross the border.
Montreal, especially the old city, is the closest thing to a European city on the North American continent. As is well known, French is the language of preference in Montreal; in fact, in all Quebec, which borders most of the northeastern United States.
At our Vermont home, snug in the Green Mountains, we could tune in about seven or eight television stations, five or six being Canadian, and only two or three of those broadcast in English.
My oldest son learned to count to ten in French from watching Canadian Sesame Street almost before he could count to ten in English.
All of this is window dressing, however, to the deep-rooted affinity I have for Canada.
My parents were born in Newfoundland and migrated to the United States before that poorest of provinces became part of Canada in 1949.
Had my parents not chosen to become U.S. citizens, I could well have been born and raised a Canadian.
I have to be careful here because there's a widespread feeling in Newfoundland that becoming part of Canada may have been the worst thing that ever happened to the tiny Atlantic island.
I knew I had roots in Newfoundland, but never realized how deep my connection to Canada ran until as a professional at a convention I spent a long weekend in Toronto in the early 1970s.
It may be significant that this visit took place about a year after my father died, so what I felt and am trying to describe probably has meaning that I've yet to fully comprehend.
What happened at the convention itself hardly dents my memory; nothing of drama or significance came out of it.
In summer, Toronto is a bright, wide metropolis, built on Lake Ontario and port to a large fleet of sporting vessels, which for me was a shocking surprise in the middle of the continent.
I spent much of the time I was in Toronto for a convention meandering around the friendly downtown area and drinking in its sights, sounds and denizens. If I may borrow a phrase from John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church, speaking about his conversion to Christ -- as I strolled about Toronto that weekend, my heart was strangely warmed.
Almost every adult I saw appeared to be someone from my past, some cousin or aunt or close friend of my parents who'd come to the house for dinner or a cup of tea. So many of the working men looked like my father. Many of the ambling older women waddled from shop to shop like my mother. I hear them calling each other "maid" and "my son," and I felt transported to another time of my life.
It took me one or two restless nights in Toronto to realize I was "home." I couldn't tell if it were accent, physique, mannerisms, dress or grooming, but the majority of the ordinary citizens of Toronto on whom I gazed seemed vaguely related to me.
Growing up in cosmopolitan New York City and attending multi-ethnic schools throughout my youth, I had never clearly focused on my own ethnic heritage. Toronto was my come-uppance. That visit to Toronto cracked open a small beam of light in my personal pursuit of identity.
I wasn't ready to renounce my U.S. citizenship and jump on the first Air Canada plane to Gander, Newfoundland, but something almost imperceptible in me changed. I realized there was a hole in my being that could only be filled by things Canadian.
Now that I think of it, it's probably not coincidence that I, who've known little more than urban lights and concrete front yards, spent time and had my family in rural northern Vermont, maple syrup country on the cusp of Canada, as it were.
Soon I'll have to visit the Canadian embassy in Tokyo.
I seem to have a genetic attraction to maple leaves.
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Allan R. Andrews can be reached at arandrews@aol.com