White Sideburns

This was the first Saturday in two weeks when I didn’t have to go and do bike repairs after the food bank. I was able to relax at home, though I was a little too relaxed to sit down and work on updating my journal as I’d intended.

In the afternoon I took a bike ride. It was not a sunny day, though there were patches of blue and some quite dramatic cloud formations in contrasting shades of grey. On Bloor Street just past Spadina I heard a familiar voice speaking a familiar request over and over: “COULD you spare a nickleorapennyoradimeoradollar?” It was the blind guy that has been panhandling in the area for decades. I remember chatting with him back in the 80s and I learned that like most legally blind people he can see a bit and cherishes the things he can see. He loved to watch TV and told me that he had a thick magnifying screen in front of his television so he could watch shows, movies and videos. As I passed I noticed that the only thing that has drastically changed about him is that now he has two long, thick, bushy shocks of white sideburns.

I was pretty much on my own as I rode across the Bloor Viaduct and along the Danforth. I rode past Woodbine and rode north on Oakpark and explored all of the streets that run west from it. North of Cosburn I shot down the hill of Haldon until it ended near the Taylor Creek Trail and then I got my heart rate up by climbing back again to Cosburn and then east to where it turns into Westlake, which I rode down, making right turns on each side street. There were a lot of them because the blocks are very tight in that area. It was a bit too time consuming for one ride.

Back on the Danforth I stopped at the first Starbucks where I unravelled some toilet paper from their roll and shoved it into my backpack because I had none at home.

At Bloor and Sherbourne I have lately seen a young man and woman trying to revive the squeegee industry. This time it seemed it was just the guy cleaning car windows for tips. As I crossed the street I imagined how I would describe how broke I was if one of them as a joke offered to squeegee my bike.  Just then I rode over a loonie that was lying on the street. I stopped and went back for it. Now I had $1.65.