Meeting People

I’ve been very impressed with the people we’ve met here so far. For example: There’s Su, who met me for coffee once and then invited me to two parties - one was at her house, where she made gourmet pizzas (she’s a foodie) but I had to miss that due to snow. And Su’s sister Lee, who made me feel so welcome at the party I did attend. There’s Tracy, who works in marketing and invited me over to share all her job-search contacts. Tracy also lent me her car booster seat on very short notice (I needed it to take some friends and their daughters on a tour of the city). There is Majie, the French psychologist and his roommate, Art, who invited me over for coffee and we chatted for two hours about a very cool new type of art he has developed. There is Cathy, who works in HR and invited me to an HR association meeting to help me start networking. There is Camille, who picked me up at our condo and treated me to coffee, as I grilled her about what it’s like to be an American living here. There is Carol, whom I’ve known since 2005. She’s always on the lookout for possible connections for us (she sent a possible job lead to Kurt). And Rolly and Kathy, whom we haven’t met yet but they’ve already invited us for dinner at their home on nearby Gabriola Island. There’s Beth, another American who has put up with my questions about her transition here. There’s Lisa, the 20-something woman who has offered to help me start a branch of the “Transplants” here (and we’ve already got an article coming up in the local newspaper). There are Tracy and Duncan, the couple from whom we rented a basement apartment on our last two trips. They kindly invited us to their holiday party, which we hope we can attend despite the ongoing snowstorm. And - of course - Karri and Gary, the Oregon couple I met on election night. After only meeting me once, they invited us over for Christmas dinner! Ok, ok, I won’t go on and on here, but there are even more people I haven’t mentioned (Jerry and Jeanne, Sherry, Elly, Gail, Julie, Darlene, Colleen, Pamela and Steve, Dirk, Lexis, Mel, Fitnat and family, Glynis and Jordan, Cathryn, etc.), all of whom I also look forward to getting to know over time. Our luck in the social arena has been very good … now let’s just hope that work can follow, if we decide to stay here! (Why do I feel like I just gave an acceptance speech at the Oscars? “I want to thank some of the people who made this all possible …”)