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Saturday 8 September 2012

At long last!

Tonight I sit at my window and look out over the finally-finished park that houses the Canadian Firefighters' Memorial.  It is lovely.  Just the peaceful, thought-provoking place we hoped it would eventually become.  I know I've moaned about it before---it seemed to be so noisy in growing, and so dusty and unpleasant to the eye.  Then, in a matter of weeks, everything fell into place.

This afternoon there was a practice of the ceremony that will happen here tomorrow.  Four hundred firemen, in all manner of dress, and in a windy heavy rain, marched down from Parliament Hill to the gathering place near the bronze fireman and pole, while their families, their bus-drivers and people in our building watched them move through their parade procedures---some of us, and I imagine some of them, tearful.

The ceremony tomorrow will feature our Governor-General officially opening the site, and a memorial service for those firefighters that have died since the ceremony they had on the barely-turned turf last year.

I'll post some photos if I'm not overwhelmed.  I don't know why I find this so emotional---I was 68 before I actually met a firefighter.

3 comments:

  1. When we went by a few weeks ago or a month ago or whatever, we noted that it was still a work in progress, and we weren't too sure about the progress part ... or the work part for that matter.

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  2. Sounds great!!! And yeah -- what Fran said!!!!

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