No trip to Montreal is complete without passing by the buildings I lived in and the church that was such a big part of my life. I'm not sure why. Is it to see if they're still there? Or if they've changed?
I still have the urge to revisit the two Alberta villages I lived in as a child:
Hay Lakes (where my father owned "Dick's Repair Shop," which burned down years ago, leaving this empty lot where it stood...)
(Here we are, a few years ago, standing on the only part that remains. The only two who remember the original place are my mother's older brother - in the center - and me, standing to his right.)
...and Kingman (where my mother was the first home economics teacher in a new district high school - which was no longer standing the last time I was there). I'd also like to go to Camrose where I was hospitalized for 10 days at the age of 6. I have never been back.
A few years ago, I went back to Israel - where I had lived for 10 years. A few living "sparks" of my life there remain: a neighbor who still remembers me and friends who welcome me back. A lot has changed, of course: the school I taught in, the shops I knew.
William Barclay notes, in his commentary on the gospel of John that Jesus, towards the end of his time on earth, returned to the place where he had first been baptized - just as Jacob had gone back to Bethel, where he first met God in a dream of a ladder to heaven.
Barclay then adds: It would often do our souls a world of good to go back to the place where we first found God.
We gain strength from remembering... But what about the significant people, places and events I can't return to?
Those I revisit often in my mind... (Sometimes I sharing them in my blog!)
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