Temporary Permanence

  

Labyrinth under leaves outside of Buddhist temple, Terrebonne Avenue;
this Buddhist temple used to be a part of Rosedale United Church

There is no real permanence to life, there is only change and impermanence. The opposite of change and impermanence isn't permanence, it is not a duality; we fool ourselves thinking things are dualities when they really have nothing to do with each other; is good the opposite of bad or are they totally different states of being? Writers have a claim on permanence, a temporary claim, and this lies in writing things down, this gives a kind of permanence to what we think or say. Of course, it is also a kind of folly, but who really cares? We prefer illusion over truth; all writing is illusion and impermanent and one day even Shakespeare's plays will disappear. Writing is folly if we think it will give us any permanence; life is not constituted to be permanent. So we vote for a temporary permanence, and we love irony.  

Labyrinth at Rosedale-Queen Mary Road United Church on Terrebonne Avenue in NDG

If, one summer day, you wander along Terrebonne Avenue in NDG, you might find yourself at Rosedale United Church where there is a labyrinth that is open to anyone who wants to walk there. It is a truly incredible experience, it removes you from everyday life and you find yourself in a world of archetypes. There is something about walking a labyrinth that immediately alters one's consciousness; the bigger issues of life, one's place in the universe, take over one's thinking. Life is seen for what it is, a journey, and on this journey there are many twists, turns, reversals, new beginnings, success, failure, and redemption. This labyrinth is free, open to the public, and one of the places in this City of Mary--Ville Marie--that I highly recommend. 

A walk in NDG (three)

Here is the labyrinth outside Rosedale United Church in NDG.

A walk in N.D.G., Summer 2008

A walk in our neighbourhood, Notre Dame de Grace, is always interesting and fun. Here, beside the apartment where Artie Gold used to live, is a painted billboard from the 1920s-1930s, pristine and clear after being protected and hidden for many decades by another building that was destroyed by fire a few years ago. The debris has now been removed from where the old building used to stand. I see others have posted photographs online of this same painted billboard. 

Montreal isn't Ville Marie--the City of Mary--for nothing. Here, a few blocks east of the Turret cigarette advertisement, is a statue of Mary (to the left of the huge statue of Jesus), in someone's back yard. 

A few hundred feet east from the statues of Jesus and Mary, on Monkland Avenue, is the former home of poet Irving Layton; it has been renovated by the new owners. I remember visiting Layton here, with CZ and Noni Howard, in his living room. Sometimes, when I would walk or drive by Layton's place, I'd look at his home and see him sitting at his dining room table writing poems, smoking his pipe.

On the Loyola Campus of Concordia University, near where Irving Layton used to live, is this statue of Mary, with a water fall and water circulating around the statue.

Next, we walk down Elmhurst Avenue from Sherbrooke, cross the railway tracks, and then walk along St. Jacques by the old Griffith-McConnell nursing home; the building has fallen in disrepair and neglect since they moved to their new location in Cote St. Luc. The old place is still standing, but since these photographs were taken, in 2008, construction has begun behind the building and I suspect it will be demolished.

Poetry, spirituality, lilacs blooming in spring, lanes that are like the country, history and people, they all make N.D.G. one of the nicest neighbourhoods in Montreal.




On the way home we stop by Rosedale-Queen Mary Road United Church, at Terrebonne and Rosedale, where they have constructed a labyrinth outside of the adjoining community centre. I gave a reading here once, all very nice people. The labyrinth is open to the public and has an amazing affect when walking on it. You are almost immediately plunged into profound questioning on the meaning of mortality. I never expected this but it certainly had this affect on me. As you walk the labyrinth, you are removed from the everyday, you find yourself in the spiritual.

There is a lot more to see than this on our walk in N.D.G.; this is just a part of the less trendy western part of N.D.G. For instance, there is a miniature Chinese garden directly across the street from the labyrinth; this is a wonderful creation someone has lovingly made and maintained in their front garden, it is a city and landscape all in miniature, with Oriental statues, running water in a little river, and tiny houses.