Goodbye Barney

Stepping off the skytrain, I took the route right through my old neighbourhood, where I realized that the Barney is gone. I was hit suddenly by a wave of nostalgia. Every year a group of stupid grade 9s would venture into the hotel in search of the fabled cheap alcohol and strippers. Every year this expedition party of grade 9s either gets chased out because they're underage and giggling too much or they sneak back out with some sort of proof that they were there.

One year it was a cinnamon stick. It's not like you can't get cinnamon sticks from other places. Regardless, their tales of heroism lived on in the collective consciousness of the school population, to be retold every time a class graduates.

But no longer. The sleezy strip bar is gone and there will be no more stories. Somehow or other, visiting the Starbucks down the street just isn't the same.

"Are you going into Vancouver?" she asked, as I got into the car.

"No, I'm going east. You can just drop me off at the skytrain station," I replied, trying hard to figure out exactly how I knew this woman, something that I probably should have done before getting in.

She said some other things, and then motioned to her gimpy looking son in the backseat. Paul. It was Paul's mother. At least I knew who it was this time.