Bittersweets

Farewell 2010. Welcome 2011. We greet the new year in Los Angeles, escaping northern climes for a couple of weeks.

We did the same last year, too. To welcome 2010 and to celebrate my father's 80th birthday, my extended family gathered at a restaurant in Santa Barbara on New Year's Eve. We all went round the table and shared our wishes for the coming year. I hoped to become less afraid of dealing with money. (No success yet. I shall try again for 2011.) One of us hoped to drink more water. My husband's wish was that the move to Toronto would go smoothly, and would make us happy. Has it, and has it, I wonder? It's so difficult to answer. Yes, I acknowledge that we are, for the most part, quite happy in Canada. Happier than we would have been had we stayed in England? I don't know. Which is the best, or even the better, place for all of us? The tyranny of the path not taken...

A seeming tangent, but one that has occupied my mind and heart for the past few weeks: on December 30, the Brighton and Hove Coptic Church held a funeral for Tony Magdi, a greengrocer in Portland Road, Hove. An angry idiot of a cyclist beat Tony to death one Sunday morning as he parked his car outside his shop, above which he lived. He sold fresh, delicious fruit and vegetables, at low cost, beautifully displayed in white ceramic bowls. Tony dealt out advice on food preparation (I learned how to deal with beetroot from him), on cooking, and on holding your children dear. I used to take my youngest with me to his shop on Fridays after nursery; I would buy as much as I could stow in her stroller and then Tony would press on me an extra bowl of his tomatoes (so tasty), or a bunch of bananas, and (usually) a lollipop for my then- toddler. She adored him. Many many years ago Tony had lost two babies to a horrible congenital illness and would brook no scolding of children (my own, I mean) from me. Tony always closed the shop for a couple of months in January and February so he could visit his native Egypt for warmth and family, and again in August to relax at home. As my kids grew older and I went back to work I visited less often-- shopping at Tony's was enjoyable, but not quick. I never said goodbye to him before we left and imagined stopping in when we returned to visit, explaining that we'd moved to Toronto. I regret it now.

There has been a huge swell of grief and anger from the local community (I know from the news online, and from the website that friends of his organized). The perpetrator has been arrested and the trial is set for Lewes Crown Court January 7. Such a horrible act. Such a waste of lives of Tony's but also of his attacker's. On the day of the funeral I went for a bike ride in Tony's honor, and to try to atone for the sins of that other cyclist.

But it's the path not taken that haunts me. What if we hadn't moved to Toronto? Might I have been driving past Tony's shop when the cyclist attacked? Might there have been a different outcome? I know, I know, the world doesn't revolve around me (more's the pity); I'm a speck of grit, insignificant; I don't have such power. But I wonder, nonetheless.

I conclude that life is random; death a certainty. To repeat: bittersweet.