There's No Place Like Home

On Tuesday evening I had dinner with my mother.

She’s 65 now, and is starting to show signs of becoming a little old lady. She’s a little hunched over, a little smaller than she used to be. She putters around her old house, tending to her many houseplants, trying to keep dust from accumulating on the stacks of books that fill every corner of almost every room. She dotes on my adopted cat brothers, and laments the damage they do to her furniture. She likes a good, strong cup of tea.

We had a very civilized evening, discussing theology over homemade sheppard’s pie and roasted vegetables.

After nine o’clock, I decided I’d better start heading home. Even though it was dark and raining out, or perhaps because of that, my mom offered to drive me all the way home instead of letting me to take public transit. My home isn’t far from hers, but my mom is not a confident driver, especially at night, so it was going to be a bit of an ordeal for her.

(For anyone who doesn’t know: I don’t have a driver’s license. That’s a story in itself. Let’s just say that I inherited my driving genes from my mom.)

We set out in good spirits. My mom took her special route through a maze of winding side streets. She likes to stay off streets that are more than two lanes wide if possible, and completely refuses to drive on any highway. We made it most of the way to my house on the back streets.

Finally she had to go north on Yonge St., one of the central arteries of Toronto, in order to pass under the 401, one of the major highways. As we approached the 401, traffic slowed down. Orange signs and traffic cones directed all the cars to merge into the right lane. And then, lo and behold, ahead of us the road was completely blocked.

Traffic was being forced off to the right. At first all we could see to the right was the on-ramp to the 401. My highway-phobic mother gripped the wheel with white knuckles, thinking she’d be forced onto the highway. Then she saw that a side street branched off from the approach to the on-ramp. Saved by the skin of our teeth.

We turned onto the residential street and proceeded into the dark. We started out facing due east, but the road soon began to twist and turn unpredictably until we were both disoriented. Any intersecting streets also seemed to wind off at odd angles.

We were getting deeper and deeper into one of those fancy-dancy areas, where mature trees arch overhead and on either side there are wall-to-wall mansions with fountains and wrought-iron fences, spot-lit in the dark to look like movie sets. There was one other car on the road, following close behind us.

When we had been driving for quite some time with no apparent progress, my mom decided to pull over so that we could consult a map. The car behind us pulled over too. I guess they were following us in the hopes that we could lead them out of the maze. As I pulled out the map book and fiddled with the overhead light, they gave up on us, turned around, and went back the way we’d come from. We were alone.

In the weak light, I squinted at the map book. This book was a pocket version, which had approximately 3-point type. The tiny letters swam in front of my eyes.

“I can’t read this!” I wailed. “Can you read it?”

“I can’t read it,” said my mom.

Eventually, with much peering and frustration, I managed to find a map of the area. As I suspected, the street we were on essentially looped back on itself, as did many of the cross streets we were passing. It was all one big, elaborate cul-de-sac. Finally we decided that the best way out was to do what the other car had done: turn around and go back the way we came. At least maybe we could get back onto Yonge St., go south to the next main street, and drive around the construction.

Getting back to Yonge St. was easy. Getting onto it was not. The proximity to the highway which had just saved us was now working against us. The side street we were on came to a stop sign. Whooshing past at vigorously accelerating speeds, cross-traffic was heading up the on-ramp to the 401. A couple of cars ahead of us found brief gaps between the oncoming vehicles, and slipped through to the other side. Then it was our turn.

The rush of oncoming headlights seemed endless. Meanwhile I could see a line-up of cars growing behind us, wanting to get through the intersection. We were going to have to thread the needle.

“Holy shit,” said my mom.

Then a gap opened up. My mom reacted quickly, stomping on the gas and getting us across the dangerous on-ramp approach. We made it back to Yonge St. and, eventually, to my home.

“Pat on the back for you!” I told my mom, and spent some time praising her driving skills. I was really proud of her.

However, maybe next time I should take the underground train. That’s a heck of a lot simpler (and it would have been faster too).