a certain je ne sais Quanada

a chill at the chillest border

Growing up, my cousins’ house was a tantalizing yet familiar paradise. I knew its layout, had pretty free reign to wander around, and they had stuff that I never got to have in my own house — a Sega Genesis, a pool table, pumpkin-cream cheese rolls.

That’s what going to Canada is like to me: going to a cousin’s house where you don’t necessarily know where the paper towels are stored, but you can get yourself a glass of water. And they have different cable channels.

Looking back, I realized I’ve double-dutched around the Canadian border a decent amount. At twelve I spent a summer at a sleep-away camp in Parry Sound, ON, on Lake George. It was a good camp summer, if not an especially groundbreaking diplomatic mission. However, the girls in my bunk did introduce me to new clothing brands, one of which even had a French name: Petit Bateau. I later realized that style-wise this is basically what the French call “Le Old Navy,” but nevertheless I absorbed that name-dropping a brand “you’ve probably never heard of, it’s Canadian” could give a middle schooler a chic air. Same with music, like the 90’s girl group British-Canadian All Saints.

You can tell they were aiming for crossover success because when Shaznay sings “vocabulary runs right through me/the alphabet runs right from A to Z” she pronounces it “zee” instead of “zed.”

Incidentally, the camp handoff in Toronto yielded some lasting positive memories of Canada for my whole family. My mom still speaks with awe of the moment when, as we walked into a Toronto Blue Jays game, two men in front of us used a bit of profanity, then saw a family with young kids behind them and apologized to my parents.

In high school, my Reform Jewish youth group region encompassed Cleveland, Buffalo, Rochester, and Toronto.¹ For a girl from Ohio, this was as cosmopolitan as it got. Riding a chartered, chaperoned bus to a Shabbat retreat in Mississauga was my version of hopping the Eurorail for a weekend in Amsterdam. Ah yes, I am tres internationale. I’ve had breakfast at a Tim Horton’s, Canada’s most beloved brand!

quick fun aside there is a wwwhhhhhoollle thing going on rn about whether or not Tim Horton’s is in fact Canadian because as of 2014 it is owned by a multinational conglomerate. In an interview, Professor Florian Muenkel of St. Mary’s University in Halifax remarked, "I think to a certain extent we are anthropomorphizing a company here…a company is not a human being for which you can basically assign something like a citizenship." and like, hahahaha buddy have you even HEARD of Citizens United? Get in loser, we’ve been anthropomorphizing companies for a quarter-century now. must be nice to live in a country where that hasn’t fully poisoned your consciousness!

In adulthood…well, a wedding here, a conference (and conference fling) there, a weekend trip paid for by a woman I met on a plane (story for another time) with Friend of The Schill Naomi A. A real high point was the very special trip to Nova Scotia with my husband last year, where we took an evening cruise along the Lunenberg coastline and listened to a dreamy Cape Breton fiddler and singer — and hoped to go back to PEI together in honor of Anne of Green Gables, Canada’s gateway drug for many a bookish young lady.

Living in Burlington has made Montreal² a fixture in my life — I pop up for flights, for breakfast at Beautys, Jewish deli of my and my husband’s dreams, for an evening concert, sometimes, ideally with FoTS John M., expert handler of all Montreal logistiques. Most recently, I spent a spectacular weekend divided between Montreal for shopping, meals, and snowy strolls, and Magog in the Eastern Townships for the transcendent Nordic Spa, with FoTS Melissa Y.

This is a very nice trip down memory lane, but why am I humble-bragging about how much I’ve been to Canada?

Even before I moved to a place 45 minutes from the Canadian border³ and got an “enhanced license” which enables me to go back and forth without a passport, I took for granted that there was a relatively easy border to cross, that visiting another country could feel like visiting family.

Living in Vermont has only underscored that idea. There is a true warmth and interwoven-ness between the two countries up here. The French colonial history is still palpable in the names of towns like Vergennes, Charlotte, and Montpelier (even if the pronunciations have devolved into their clunkiest Anglofied forms.) Quebec moviemakers participate in local film festivals, including one this weekend specifically called Made Here, which showcases films from New England and “our neighbor, Quebec.”⁴

A lot of businesses have clientele on both sides of the border; many people have vacation homes on the “other” side, or, like me, take frequent day trips to one of the most magical cities in the world. This really is a region where the border is a light and arbitrary demarcation, easily outmatched by deep regional history.

Nothing illuminates this better than the Haskell Free Library and Opera House, a beautiful Victorian building that straddles the border and has addresses in both Derby Line, VT, and Stanstead, Quebec. The library embraces its cross-border communion, using a strip of thick black tape runs diagonally through the building to delineate the border, which visitors can hop across, and displaying books and signage in both French and English. It was deliberately built on the international border. Patrons on all sides celebrate it a physical expression of friendship and the spirit of collaboration. The biggest sign of trust is that while most of the building’s square footage is on the Canadian side of the border, the entrance is in the U.S. For decades, Canadians were allowed to cross the border without a passport to get to the “American” front door. (Yes it DOES give strong Donna Moss being-born-in-Warrick, MN-which-is-actually-in-Manitoba vibes!)

that black tape marks the border, which as you can see, patrons cross constantly as they search for children’s books and stuffed turkeys. Photograph: Christinne Muschi/The Canadian Press via AP

As you can probably guess, the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol recently announced new restrictions, effective starting in October, wherein Canadians will have to present themselves at a port of entry in order to use the front entrance to the library, “in keeping with CPB’s goal of 100% border security.” Never mind that most of the building is IN Canada, never mind that both Canadians and Americans share responsibility for its financing and upkeep,⁵ and never mind that this is possibly the most wholesome border encounter imaginable. Nope, the American doorway is our sovereignty, our excuse to control the means of accessing even shared resources — a huge betrayal of trust and respect that otherwise define these communities. The library DOES have a GoFundMe to fundraise for a Canadian access point, including ramps and additional entryways. Even though library leadership fully acknowledges these are duplicative and unnecessary measures, they are completely committed to enacting them, because they “refuse to let a border divide what history has built together.”

This is by no means the most visceral cruelty enacted in the name of border security. No one is being beaten or forcibly removed or deported to a prison that seems like more of a death camp. But in a way, the fact that even the lowest-stakes opportunities for porousness, for connection and cooperation, have to be shut off, is profoundly depressing in its own way.

This past week our local NPR show, Vermont Edition, did a joint call-in episode with a Canadian Broadcast Company host and invited people to chime in with their reactions to tensions around border crossing with the current administration’s arrogant and hostile remarks about Canada becoming a 51st state, and threatening massive tariffs. I was moved by how many people feel genuinely upset at the idea of insulting Canadians, disincentivizing them to travel here to visit or conduct business, and the abrupt betrayal of the deep respect extended to all parties for decades.

Again I go back to this being our easiest, lowest-stakes, most collaborative border relationship. It’s one that people on both sides seem to genuinely treasure. Of course it’s much, much worse — violent, chaotic, truly scary and grotesque treatment of people seeking to enter the U.S. And I am heartened by how many people are naming the damage to friendly cross-border relations as a real loss — it is remarkable to see peace defended with such vehemence. It’s a reminder that there is no oasis of calm that this current regime won’t try to disrupt, no matter how unnecessary those actions might be.

Conversely, the lesson that follows is — we cannot allow the smallest infraction of indecency, nor should we permit isolationism to poison our true connections to our friends. We’ve gotta stick together, hey? That’s what it’s all aboot.

1. Shout out to NFTY-NEL, a group where the joke “I wish you could meet my girlfriend/my girlfriend who lives in Canada” was actually true for some people.

2. This is not the time or place for me to get into Anglophone-Quebecois separatist stuff and I realize I am using Montreal and the rest of Canada interchangeably, please know that I know it’s a little more nuanced than that and also that Quebec feels REALLY different and genuinely European and cosmopolitan in a way that I love but honestly have no idea how to translate vis a vis sovereignty and stuff.

3. Readers are welcome to file this fact away for any reason one might want proximity to a border crossing.

4. I attended the awards reception, where Quebec’s regional emissary remarked that it was important to “support our Vermont friends during difficult times,” right before we feasted on some outstanding imported cheeses.

5. I don’t actually know how all that works and please believe I am beginning my inquiries to figure it out.