Where the sidewalk ends

Click on image, enlarge, read the sign.

I changed this post after hearing from a reader. I'd forgotten the children's book, Where the sidewalk ends, by Shel Silverstein. They wrote to say I'd found the place made famous by Silverstein in his book and in his poem of the same name.

How I forgot the late Shel Silverstein's book and poem, it a question. He is one of my favourite children's book authors. I'll have to go to Chapters for a couple of his efforts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Where the Sidewalk Ends 

by Shel Silverstein

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.

Storm-water pond

It was barely daybreak when I drove by the new subdivision separated from a major thoroughfare by a wet storm-water pond. These ponds retain rainwater and act to prevent flooding. For more information on these ponds, which are very numerous in London, read the story in The London Free Press.

The growing city

New commercial additions are clearly in the offing.

Construction continues.

On land that was open farmland when I moved to London, a massive shopping district is taking shape in southwest London, Ontario. The plan is to make Wonderland Road a major and welcoming entrance to the growing city.

The major gateway I can see but the welcoming part may be a stretch --- unless rows of fairly standard box stores with acres of black asphalt is your idea of welcoming.

Still, it is a clean, modern area offering everything from groceries to banking to eye care and much more. Like an ice cream? It's here. Looking for wine? Or beer? Yes, these stores are here, too.

This area offered the city a wonderful chance to showcase the city's planning department. If the city was going for the gold, someone fumbled it, in my opinion.

It's a good shopping area but very, very ordinary. It lacks magic.

Orchids flourish in London, Ontario

An orchid blooming in a London, Ontario, home.

When I think of Ontario, I don't think of orchids. But they are found in the province. Mostly in stores and the homes of orchid lovers but they are also found growing wild. Gosh, I've got to go looking one of these days.

What got me thinking about orchids was the beauty blooming at a friend's North London home. I may be wrong, but I believe his wife bought it at Costco. It's a discount orchid, although I don't think that is its official name.

Painting a face doesn't paint over the problems

The young girl doing the face painting was very friendly. In fact, she was busy cleaning up for the day when I approached with Fiona. She didn't have to but she took out some paints and brushes and readily agreed to paint Fiona's face.

As she started I asked about the cost. "It's five dollars," I was told. Now, that's not that much but yesterday I paid something like $140 for a season pass to the park plus the right to unlimited rides on the merry-go-round and other park attractions.

For more on Storybook, click the link. Read the comment.

There's nothing like forking over a payment in the three digits to make one immediately aware of a park's shortcomings. Today I noticed that the operator wasn't playing the music during the carousel ride. The kids road the merry-go-round ponies in a quiet punctuated by the grinding of well greased gears.

One horse was broken, at least one seat was torn, and the entire ride looked generally poorly cared for.

When we rode the miniature train I noticed that the engine was covered in dust. One would think it only reasonable to give the little engine a wash and a shine now and then. The park didn't shout pride.

But as I paid my five dollars I thought I might shout: "Storybook! Get your act together!"

Storybook Gardens in trouble

Wearing a pink train engineer's hat bought in Ely, Nevada, Fiona was alone on the Storybook ride.

Storybook Gardens is located in Springbank Park in London, Ontario. Storybook is aimed at kids, little kids, but it is having a hard go at attracting crowds and this should come as no surprise to anyone.

The list of what's right with the place is offset by a list of what's wrong. Sadly, the wrongs trump the rights.

Decades ago the park was filled with classic storybook references designed by local cartoonist Merle Tingley, well known right across Canada as Ting. From what I saw yesterday, the majority of Ting art, if not all, has been stripped from the park.

The other thing the park was famous for was its small zoo. Small, '50s-style zoos are no longer in vogue --- and that is not a bad thing. Too few animals kept in too tight enclosures often resulted in too many sad animals. Today the exotic animals are gone. Just recently the last seals were removed.

So what attracted me to the park? Why did I take my granddaughter to Storybook Gardens? Well, for one thing I wanted her to enjoy the Pirate's Island toddler play area. Fiona loves a well designed kiddy park. Sadly, we discovered the Storybook Gardens park wasn't particularly well designed. The toddler area was closed due to safety concerns.

We did find some small amusement park rides. A pleasant young woman helped Fiona make giant soap bubbles with a huge oval wand. Fiona held a pretend little tea party in a children's play house. This entertained both Fiona and another little girl.

Fiona had a good time. She liked the park. She checked out the splash pad and today with the temperature climbing to a hundred Fahrenheit we will definitely be going back. But, we are not going back because of the splash pad. There are other pads almost as close to my London home as the one at Storybook.

We are going back because I bought a season entry pass for both Fiona and me. I also bought us both passes for the park rides. The fours passes cost $140! That's crazy. The only reason I bought them was that entry to the park for the day, plus the cost of tickets for riding the park train and merry-go-round would have come to about $35. That's even crazier.

I'll take Fiona back to Storybook at least four more times in the coming weeks. We'll ride the carousel and take the train throughout the summer. But the cost of this fun leaves me a little angry. These charges are way out of line. If the city wants to charge for a first rate park, a quality facility, charge for something special, the city has to provide more, much more.

With some of the highest unemployment numbers in the country, an awful lot of London children (those with unemployed parents or underpaid ones) are being essentially denied access to a park supposedly designed especially for them.

Seeing London with '60s eyes

The Daily Photo thing is about fun. Kaleidoscopes are about fun. When I found one of the cardboard toys in my basement on the weekend I immediately wondered what would happen if I tried to shoot pictures using the old thing.

The toy of the psychedelic generation pumped out some really neat shots. I learned that if you have an iPhone, there is an app for taking pictures that emulate my kaleidoscope. And of course, there is always Photoshop.

Still, there is something cool about using the real thing: a fun blast from the past.