t’s the last couple of days of my initial foray into the Great North. I say initial because I will damn sure be nomading in the other provinces of this fine country.

Canada, you have been the perfect launchpad for my new life. You’ve given me so, so much in these past 8 weeks. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

Firstly, a few things I learned…

Canadian roll-on deodorant is a no-go. Not long ago I had to purchase some Norwegian scentless roll-on deodorant in a pinch and, to my shock and delight, that shit worked like a charm. Or I should say, worked like a Toyota.

Because Toyotas always work…but when have charms ever actually worked? I’m not a fucking leprechaun.

So I confidently purchased a roll-on product with no aluminum to bring to the aforementioned music festival…and I rocked it for a solid week and a half. Until it became abundantly clear that this mystery liquid was actually enhancing an unpleasant body odor instead of masking it.

I was suspicious at the music festival, but there were so many sweaty, smelly humans milling about that I couldn’t pinpoint my own stink.

The rub is that I continued to wear it for a solid week AFTER the festival and ignored the telltale signs. Namely, that I didn’t like my own musk.

But why give the $5 investment another week? I blame the Dutch in me. Or perhaps the apathy?

It’s like when I didn’t wash my single towel for a couple months sophomore year of college and couldn’t discern the mildewy smell following me around for 3 days. Everywhere I went I encountered an off-putting stench and was bewildered.

“Why does it smell everywhere I go? What the fuck smells?”

Then I ventured to take a whiff of my own skin and lo and behold…I was the source of the pungent odor!!

Believe you me, there are few things in life more humbling than discovering you’ve been smelly for any length of time.

Future state: first sign of any smell-masking agent fail? Abandon ship.

Atlantic Standard Time exists! I’ve lived my whole life under the assumption that PST, MST, CST and EST cover all of North American time zones. Then on August 2nd I crossed over from Quebec into New Brunswick and magically lost an hour. Father Time, you’ve bamboozled me again…you ol’ son of a gun.

Despite all signs of technology doing its best to render it useless and obsolete, the campfire acoustic guitar player/singer has not been put to pasture. I grew up a choir boy and picked up a guitar my senior year of college and started to teach myself.

To pick up girls. Shamelessly.

I may have peaked as a performer playing Skimbleshanks the Railway Cat during our middle school’s rendition of Cats in 8th grade. My voice hadn’t changed. I looked like a Care Bear in a train conductor’s costume.

Through the years my guitar strumming and yodeling has not always registered happy-go-lucky feels from those in the immediate vicinity of it. I’ve had many ups and downs and admittedly have had many periods of inappropriately pushing it out into the world.

But I brought the ol’ girl (I feel like my guitar is a girl) to a getaway in Salmon Beach this past weekend with the family of the man who has graciously offered up his home for me to lay my head. A lovely little beach town tucked away in the northern reaches of New Brunswick on Nepisiguit Bay.

Friday night we were gathered around a fire on the beach when the Bluetooth speaker died mid-Billy Joel lyric. I saw my chance and took it.

I started jamming and folks were bopping their heads, tapping feet and swaying to and fro. I may have seen a lighter or two aflame… The singalong and requests commenced, and Saturday night was a repeat.

I wasn’t seeking validation, but they sure made me feel like my music enhanced their experience and that it mattered.

Canada also deserves its flowers for filling me with appreciation for rivers. Montreal and Fredericton are both situated on them, impressive, large bodies of water. I’ve not spent too much time on or near rivers in my life. There is a glorious simplicity to them: the constant forward flow.

A river doesn’t second guess what it moves forward. Enter the water and, if it’s not too heavy, it gets whisked away without hesitation. A river never looks back. Stepping into a river and allowing all the emotional heaviness to flow out of me and into that current has been oh so healing.

Oceans have a push/pull and lakes can be rather stagnant. Rivers are gold.

Of course, the greatest gift from Canada has been the people. I’ve said it before and I’ll sing it from the top of all the Quebec mountains I climbed: seeing cool shit is all fine and good, but I love to be on the move because of the awesome characters I encounter.

Thanks to these past 8 weeks in Canada I now have friends from Senegal, Singapore, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Quebec. These are friendships that may endure. I will certainly try to keep them alive. In fact, I’ll see the gentleman from Singapore in Boston next month.

I’ve said before that I’m incalculably grateful to have finally discovered a life that I belong to. The constant inflow of new people is exactly why the belonging hits me harder than a large poutine with roasted meat on a hot summer day.

Can we agree poutines are best for cold weather? I’m probably forfeiting my Canada card for saying so. I generally avoid meals that sit above melatonin on the sleep-aid scale in warm weather climates.

Poutines aside, I try my best to take the time and care to make all folks I encounter feel seen and heard. I want them to know that they matter to me in that moment and beyond.

I’m rewarded for my efforts by indications that I matter to them too. Smiles from roommates in Montreal when I walked into the kitchen. Messages from them telling me that I’m missed. Playful pouting from Regus office managers and fellow coworking colleagues on my last day. Those little warm fuzzies add up and power me up faster than the Care Bear Stare.

Yes, I would like a cookie for making 2 Care Bear jokes in the same post. Oatmeal raisin will do.

What I’m really getting at here is that impermanence does not make connection insignificant or fleeting.

Nor does the length of a relationship determine its value. There are people I’ve known my entire life that I’m not sure I truly matter to. There are people I’ve known for a few weeks in Canada that have shown me that I do.

The counterpoint, and my area of growth within this magical container of summer camp-esque friendships, is that while the relationships themselves don’t have to be short-lived, the time they can grow face-to-face is limited by design.

In Montreal I befriended a man called Max at my office who I was sure would be a great add to my network. We sat near each other daily, both worked in marketing and had oodles to chop up in conversation.

I put off swapping Insta handles with him, assuming I’d catch him before I left.

Erroneous! Max up and disappeared like a fart in the wind with his family to France before I had the chance.

Moving forward I will act with more urgency. Ask for the Insta handles. Schedule time for coffee or a walk. Go out of my way to visit the bookstore, restaurant, pharmacy or grocery store to crack another few jokes with whomever I’d already shared a couple with.

Because the very nature of this life puts a definite end date on the possibility of sharing space in the near term. And there is no better way to demonstrate another human’s value to me than to put effort into seeing their face again.

Like all things in life, there’s a price to pay. For every hello, there is a goodbye. The goodbyes may be fraught with loneliness and longing, but they’re worth it to me.

Candidly, at the start of this journey I was trying to find where I belong in the world. And to whom.

Now I know that I belong to a path that allows me to engage with people from all walks of life. People with their own stories and journeys. People who have also experienced life’s crotch kicks and potholes and still live on. People who light up when they can feel that I care about what makes them tick.

I’m finding my tribe of misfits, black sheep and castoffs, labels that I can very much relate to. I’ll tell you a secret: they aren’t all covered in tattoos, goth clothing or sporting brightly dyed hair.

Stuck in traffic? Look to your right or left. There they are.

At the coffee shop? The barista.

Out to dinner? Your server.

I have yet to find someone who doesn’t feel unseen or unheard on some level in some aspect of life.

It’s universal. I’m not trying to solve it. But I am curious and listening. I love truly seeing people. Whether it’s for an hour, a day, a week or a month.

I am still on the hunt for where to drop anchor in the future, where to plant my flag and grow roots. But I don’t wonder if or where I belong. I’m not fretting about not finding my people. I’m not scared of people dropping from my network. That’s how this fucking rock twirls.

I belong to a life of impermanence and movement. Not a town, city or country.

Someday I’ll find a place to call home. (Come on Norway! Any Norwegian ladies in the market for an American husband for rent/citizenship?) But that’s not in the cards now or soon.

The cards I’ve been dealt play anywhere and everywhere and with everyone.

Thank you, Canada, for shining light on this for me. And thank you for the maple syrup, bagels, blue toenails, raccoon tattoo, orange Hokas, Yemeni food and much, much more.

Canada, you’re a peach.