My Ritual Walk In Newmarket Ontario
I don’t sleep on a plane. After I land, I crash then wake up at 5 or 6 the next morning and go for a walk around town.
After flying back to Canada from Hong Kong, I always end up in Newmarket to visit my 98-year-old grandmother. I usually don’t sleep because of jet lag, so the next morning I get up and walk for a few hours around the town when it is cool and there aren’t many people. I usually get up at six and start walking.
I usually walk down to the number of parks that connect the town (Bailey Ecological Park, Wesley Brooks Conservation Area, Mabel Davis Conservation Area, etc.), they are all interconnected and make a nice path of green.
I usually walk down to the number of parks that connect the town (Bailey Ecological Park, Wesley Brooks Conservation Area, Mabel Davis Conservation Area, etc.), and they are all interconnected and make a nice path of green.
They lead down to Ferry Lake. It is artificial and was built by the first settlers to the town, who built a mill there in the early 1800s. After almost every festive meal, my grandfather, father and others would go for a walk when I was younger and living in the area in the 1980s. The area has been restored and cleaned up. I vaguely remember a strong smell from the water, which was hard, but now it is green, lush and beautiful.
Main Street sits at the base of Ferry Lake. It is a historical area with most buildings preserved as they looked long ago. The facades remain the same as in the 1980s, although the shops are now mostly bars, pubs, and restaurants, with a few lawyers and hair salons.
My grandfather was a bricklayer in the town and built many schools and buildings from the 1950s to the mid-1990s. When we walked, he would point out some of the projects he had done, including this stone arch for a lawyer's office downtown.
There is also the old Post Office tower, built between 1914 and 1915, situated at the top of the hill on Main Street. It dominates the skyline and has now turned into a boutique hotel. They have preserved the grand building and hope it stands for a few more decades.
On the other side of the hill, going down into the quieter area of Main Street is my grandmother’s church. She doesn’t go as often but still stands and wonder how long the congregation is older.
On a sombre note, I always end up at the Newmarket Cemetery. My other Grandmother and my Aunt are interned there. The cemetery also holds many people I vaguely remember from the 1980s.
A new stop has been added to the area where my grandmother’s old house once stood, which is now overgrown with forests. The house was built by my grandfather, who had a large garden where most of the vegetables for our family dinners came from.
Then I head back to where I am sleeping