Sixty-something Solo

Having missed out on a European gap year in his 20s, Wheeland goes on a walkabout 40 years later.

It’s time to get off the couch

I have lived in Montéal, Canada, for just about all my life, and as I reach the end of my full-time work career, I have decided to take this show on the road. A journalist by inclination and training, I know the importance of story-telling as a means of connecting others to our experiences, our emotions and our understanding of the world. And as someone who has limited most of his travels to two-week chunks here and there over the years, I have decided it’s finally time to take a big bite of the apple.

The decision was made as I sat on my couch one evening watching the finale of an excellent series on one of the many streaming channels to which I subscribe. Whether we are talking drama, comedy, documentaries or re-runs of shows from every decade since 1960, you could easily spend the rest of your life happily nibbling on the many tasty offerings of Netflix, Disney, Prime, Crave, Tout.tv etc. And since I am approaching the big 65, I realized that parking in front of my TV and getting fat(ter) was all too realistic a future if I didn’t do something to shake up my life.

The death of both of my parents in 2020 (one from covid, the other from a broken hip/heart a few months later) and the end of my last relationship left me feeling truly rootless for the first time. Montréal is a city I know extremely well, but I began to feel that I knew it too well. That I was too comfortable here. Too set in my ways, too ignorant about too many things in the rest of the world while I fretted about the pettiness of the Québec provincial government. I hated its hostility towards “the others” here, whether we are talking French-speaking Africans, hijab-wearing women, or anyone who fails to master French within 6 months of landing here while simultaneously studying or working full time. The new wave of ethnic nationalism embraced by two of the main political parties here has targeted visible and audible minorities with repressive legislation that seeks to strip them of their identities by forcing them into molds that better reflect the values and culture of the pain-blanc majority.

J'en ai marre, as we say. While most French-speaking Quebecers I have known in my life are extremely open, friendly and welcoming people, the government now reflects the pettiness and ignorance of small-town minds that think newcomers are a virus to be cleansed as they enter the body politic rather than flourishing bacteria that will nurture the body (and the economy) and make it more resilient.

Anyway, as I said, I have had enough. For my entire adult life, I have worked hard and happily to adapt to the many changes in language laws and attitudes here. But this latest wave of nationalism, an Upside Down version of the philosophy of Parti Québécois founder René Lévesque, is the real virus, the real threat to the community that I have grown to love here in Montréal. I feel unwelcome here for the first time in my life. So like many of my generation of anglo Montrealers, I am finally leaving, albeit 40 years later than most.

Mais où, Peter? Well, France of course. I don’t want to waste all those years I spent learning French. Tho I will of course have to learn to speak it more slowly and not mash the words together like I’ve stuffed a Banquise poutine down ma gueule. Tsé?

Photo: Peter Wheeland

Touching the gods at 3,000 metres.

My friends are curious about how easy or hard it will be to adjust to my new status as a virtual vagabond. For some, I am the trailblazer who will either light the way or prove the folly of acting like a student on a post-Uni walkabout at an age where some of us are close to getting fitted for our first walkers.

I am keenly aware that the freedom that comes with the end of full-time work is often offset by the declining ability to enjoy it. In the spring of 2022, I climbed the mountain that gave the ancient village of Machu Picchu its name. I got to experience how it must have felt to the Inca who built the steep stairs up the mountain to reach out and touch the gods. Five hours up and back, passing a few 30-year-olds on the way, my knees aching at the end. On the train ride back to our Sacred Valley starting point, I saw an overweight man who could barely walk the length of the train car as sweat poured down his face. What could possibly have brought him to this mountainous place where even the trip from the train to the hotel might leave you breathless?

I want to see the world while I still have sight, to walk down cobblestone streets without needing to catch my breath or rest my knees every 10 minutes.

I am starting this new adventure in Toulouse, France. I could very well end it there too, if La Ville Rose seduces me the way Montréal used to. For now, all I know is that the Toulousain accent and climate has whispered to me from across the sea. From there I plan to explore other parts of Europe and North Africa, but always returning to regroup in my new foster home.

I’ll use this blog to entertain anyone who’s interested with the lessons the road teaches me. As an initial goal, I’m looking at publishing every Wednesday until my flight on Aug. 30, 2023. After that, twice a week, likely Sundays and Wednesday, with occasional snapshots whenever inspiration strikes.

Next: Visa, what visa? I don’t need no stinking visa!

Photo: Peter Wheeland

No guns? I didn’t think we needed to say that in Canada.

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