Today was a day of exploration.  A day to escape the bar-less apartment and see the sun shining in the sky.  After returning a few movies to Rogers, I hopped onto a red rocket and blasted towards a not-so-distant subway station.

My day of mini-adventure started when I set foot on Queen Street.  I knew there was some sort of “green” festival going on, just a little further ahead on Yonge, but wasn’t too sure on what it was all about.  Live Earth and beeps of SOS flashed in my mind.

I saw large yellow barriers and police cars blocking access to Yonge – they had turned the street into a pedestrian-only zone.  A fitting tribute.

The street itself had been transformed into a temporary exhibit.  With the largest stag-shop I had ever seen (and I haven’t seen many) towering high above all, I walked the street.  I walked from tent to tent, peeking in and seeing what was for show.  One tent promised free energy generation – so much so that your hydro metre would spin backwards.  Another talked about the concept of an Environmental Footprint, while others recited from the good book about the benefits of recycling.  Petitions were scattered about like the exhausted homeless on the side streets.  I signed one – a strong statement to rid Styrofoam from industry and use viable and biodegradable products.

The sun beat down – I should have worn a hat.

As I walked further, the tents remained the same but their chosen leaders did not.  Suddenly there was jewelry and petty trinkets to buy.  Free information was no more and the language of money was universal.  But a voice echoed further on.  Familiar, at that.  I ventured forward.

The white tents still stayed the same, but were reclaimed by the environmentalist as more information and industry sprouted.  Electric scooters, tree planting, and environmentally friendly pesticides crept onto the scene.

At Dundas and Yonge there was a square; the surrounding buildings witness to much over the years.  A huge screen bore the image of the mayor, David Miller, and speakers blasted his encouraging message of Toronto and the environment.  People took turn on the stage to inform and educate, and then Al Gore appeared on the screen to lay claim and rights to Live Earth.  I sat and watched for a while and, even though the message was old and burned into my brain from when I was a child, the delivery was different.  Very different.  Environmentalism had become a religion.

Cast down the ways of old and embrace the new, embrace the future and you shall be saved!  Fear the almighty deity of Global Climate Change, for it hath no mercy and will scorn you.  Listen to the music; go home and spread the word!  Tell all what you have seen and be relentless; change the future – a future of environmentalism, a future of living with the earth and not on it!  And so the messages went on.  It was actually the only thing that truly impressed me.  In a day and age of lost hope, lost purpose and meaning, it seems to hold ground.  Turning environmentalism into a religion may be key to its acceptance and practice.  I’m still too analytical.

Unfortunately, the content had not changed.  Things that I knew 18 years ago are still fresh in my mind.  I, like those walls, am now bearing witness to a change that I have been expecting for years.  I always said that if you want to do well in life, in my generation and those to come, then find a niche with the environment and market it.  Perhaps Mel Brooks was sending us a message in the 80’s, too, with air in a can.

And so I left.

I walked back to where I came onto Queen Street, and then headed west.  Another event was on, just down the road, at Nathan Phillips Square.  An art showing.  A free one, at that!  And more white tents, of course.

I walked past old city hall to get there, and smiled at a little girl clapping her hands to a man playing the bagpipes in front of a war memorial.  I stopped to take in the memorial, and then gazed up to the gigantic clock tower that shot up from the building as if suffocating.

The curved buildings of NPS reminded me of the last time I was here, on New Year’s Eve, some years ago.  A woman from the Bank of Montreal handed me a boxed electronic gadget, and then started asking me personal question so she could fill out a rather official looking form.  I gave her my name and my birth date before realizing the scam.  Not wanting to be inundated with phone calls and emails to switch to “BMO” (I hate that name, btw), I told her I wasn’t going to give her any more information.  She promptly took back the gift bestowed upon me just moments before and left me alone.

I set out to view the tents.  It was eerily quiet for what, in essence, was a market setting.  You’d almost believe you were walking through an army’s camp after a fierce battle.  In some tents were artists talking with other artists, or with potential customers; but for the most part the artist just sat there, slumped in a chair and looking quite sad.  The price tags averted many eyes and hastened many footsteps.  I simply took my time, taking in all the interesting sites and sounds.

I only talked with one artist.  Her tent was full of canvases that portrayed gate hinges and handles; most of them rusted and old looking.  I wondered what intrigued her so much about something so simple and forgotten.  I found out that she lives in Hamilton and confessed to living there myself, for a good while, during my studies.  From her voice it was obvious that it was not her favourite place to be.  A potential buyer came in.  She looked to them, then back to me and smiled.  I smiled, and she walked towards the buyer.  “Good-luck, with everything,” I said.  She watched me a moment longer – I felt an awkward tension, but the sea of people walking past took me in and I didn’t see her again.  I should have stayed and talked more with her.

I came across some tents full of crystal artwork.  It was quite impressive.  I’d like to buy some, I thought, but can’t afford any right now.  I passed by many more tents and wounded artists who sat there, licking their wounds, and too uninterested to make small talk in any language other than money.  There were few paintings of nature, and no photographs.  Ironic, I thought, considering the Live Earth festivities just a few blocks away.

I gazed up to the old city hall clock tower on my way back to the subway.  Across the street lay a homeless man, in the shade, and spread out on the sidewalk like a perfect subject for a policeman’s chalk.  A living petition that no one would sign.

Here ends my tale of an adventurous day.  The lunch break and ride home was uneventful, aside from two guys – middle aged and overweight – who were dressed and acting like immature teenagers.  They tried to invite themselves to the head of the line at the bus station; ignoring those who had been waiting for the past 15 minutes in hopes of getting a seat.  I said to one, “Don’t you think you should go to the back of the line, like everyone else?  It’s the considerate thing to do.”  He said nothing, but as I boarded I heard his friend say, “I don’t want to get on this bus.  Too many assholes.”  And so they stood on the platform, sadness written on their faces, as the bus departed like a cruise-ship into the sea of the city.