Calgary

Barclay, Sully, and I headed off to Calgary last week – Barclay had a work thing he had to be at and I hate being left behind. Besides: it’d been a while since I last went to the big city. I had some stuff to pick up at IKEA. 

The first thing we did was forget the stroller at home. Good one. We’d picked a hotel downtown specifically so Barclay could take the car to his work thing and Sully and I could explore – a plan which suddenly seemed impossible due to the length of my two-year-old’s legs. 

But let me tell you something: Sullivan is my kid.

If the whole childbirth thing wasn’t proof enough, I know it now with absolute certainty. This kid can walk for hours – literally, hours. He loves skyscrapers. He likes walking beneath them, craning his neck back at a strange angle, mouth open, pointing and exclaiming loudly. He likes watching people, he likes exploring new places, he likes escalators. He likes sharing his experiences with others – most of the time he held his stuffed bear by the neck straight out in front of him and showed it the things that caught his attention. “Look, Bear! A red truck! Look, Bear! A Schkyschreeper! Look, Bear! A guy!”

At one point, after about two hours of straight trucking, when I told him we needed to stop for a snack, he frowned and said, “No sank you. I just walk.” 

And my heart was like, “YEEEEAAAAAHHHH.” 

We don’t need no stroller. 

Anyway, it was a short but sweet trip. We got lots of coffee, found a good doughnut shop, spent way too long trying to navigate IKEA, visited some music stores, and stopped at Lindt for free chocolate samples. Ate ice cream at Village and burgers at Clive. Hit up the mall and bought three pairs of socks. Had supper with some good friends (twice!). Even ran into my grandparents and some of my cousins and aunts and spent an afternoon with them – they don’t live there; they were just passing through, stopped to eat at the mall food court and stumbled over me and Sully downing our Jugo Juice on a bench. What are the chances? 

Calgary is one of those cities I’ve been to probably a hundred times, but had never really taken the time to explore before. I need to do more of this sightseeing-close-to-home business. It’s good.