If only I could speak french.
There is something undeniably special about Montreal.
It is, at first, difficult to put a finger on. It's a vivaciousness in the air, crisp and clean and fresh. It's in the way the people walk and talk. It's the kid yelling out and dashing across the street to a friend, the motorist leaning on the horn for a full thirty seconds trying to clear the way for his illegal turn. It's the buoyancy and laughter and energy put to performing even the most mundane, everyday tasks.
There is no real way to pin down the thread of liveliness that pervades that city, but this is the closest I could come. Everything is experienced to the fullest in Montreal, all emotions allowed to be just as they should be. It is a city that nearly thrums with the ardor of its inhabitants. It is a city that holds festivals on practically a monthly basis for no reason other than the simplest; festivals are fun. And sitting there with a cup of hot chocolate (that was definitely not just hot chocolate), I watched countless people stop in their tracks to throw up their hands and exclaim at the beauty of the fireworks and the lights and the city around them. In the voice of each was untempered and uncontainable delight and joy. And, well, after that? It's hard to believe that anyone would choose to live differently.
But I do.
Montreal is amazing. But I am too simple for it, too quiet and too reserved. I loved being in it. I will go there again. But me being me, I could never live there. I'm pretty sure if I did I would succumb to peer pressure and become a ranging alcoholic, seeing as I have the willpower of a 500 pound cigarette-smoking drug addict.
Excuse me, I'm off to go eat a whole cake.
It is, at first, difficult to put a finger on. It's a vivaciousness in the air, crisp and clean and fresh. It's in the way the people walk and talk. It's the kid yelling out and dashing across the street to a friend, the motorist leaning on the horn for a full thirty seconds trying to clear the way for his illegal turn. It's the buoyancy and laughter and energy put to performing even the most mundane, everyday tasks.
There is no real way to pin down the thread of liveliness that pervades that city, but this is the closest I could come. Everything is experienced to the fullest in Montreal, all emotions allowed to be just as they should be. It is a city that nearly thrums with the ardor of its inhabitants. It is a city that holds festivals on practically a monthly basis for no reason other than the simplest; festivals are fun. And sitting there with a cup of hot chocolate (that was definitely not just hot chocolate), I watched countless people stop in their tracks to throw up their hands and exclaim at the beauty of the fireworks and the lights and the city around them. In the voice of each was untempered and uncontainable delight and joy. And, well, after that? It's hard to believe that anyone would choose to live differently.
But I do.
Montreal is amazing. But I am too simple for it, too quiet and too reserved. I loved being in it. I will go there again. But me being me, I could never live there. I'm pretty sure if I did I would succumb to peer pressure and become a ranging alcoholic, seeing as I have the willpower of a 500 pound cigarette-smoking drug addict.
Excuse me, I'm off to go eat a whole cake.