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Like many Pointe-Claire residents, I grew up in a Magil Split, specifically the three-bedroom, bedrooms-on-the-left variety. Along with the bungalow and the four-bedroom variations, these houses made up the vast majority of our neighbourhood. It seemed like you could walk a mile in any direction and still be walking among these models of home, repeated ad nauseam. The houses were perfectly serviceable: modest but well-built, smartly laid out, except maybe for the bowling lane-shaped space we called a “family room.”

But our neighbourhood wasn’t our real community. The real community was our church (Lakeside Heights Baptist) and Emmanuel Christian School, where I went to elementary school and where my parents taught high school. In fact, with a few exceptions, I felt like I didn’t fit in with the kids in our neighbourhood. I didn’t play the same sports or video games. Sometimes, I had no idea what they were talking about, especially when it came to music. New Kids on the Block? There are no new kids on the block—it’s just the same old kids. (This may have something to do with the aforementioned, somewhat insular, institutions.)

But then high school hit, and for various reasons, I went to Loyola, which we thought at the time was “downtown.” It was my first real exposure to the world beyond the suburbs, and I was hooked. Towards the end, we could go out for lunch on foot—the New Moon Restaurant, Monsieur Hot Dog, Souvlaki George. The choices were… well, those were the choices. And we could take the bus—to friends’ houses, to our sister schools, to the guitar shop. Life was good. 

Growing up in Pointe-Claire was a privilege, but I started to resent it all the same. It was a half-hour walk to the 211, and the same again before you could even get anywhere. Though I hadn’t read her at the time (what high school kid does?), I sensed what Jane Jacobs critiques in The Death and Life of Great American Cities: the alienation that comes with vast swaths of single-family homes laid out in car-dependent cul-de-sacs. I swore I’d move out as soon as I could and never come back.

Before long, I made good on the first part of that promise. It was 1999, and rent on a four-and-a-half by Vendome metro was $475, well within the reach of a couple of university students working part-time jobs and work terms. I signed on the dotted line for the first apartment I visited. I loved NDG, its bike paths and cafés, bookstores and parks, and I stayed for the better part of 14 years. 

In 2013, child number two came along. With two kids in strollers, the stairs to our upper duplex suddenly weren’t so charming anymore. And our laundry closet of a back bedroom started to feel claustrophobic instead of cozy. So we did what I swore I never would: we moved back to Pointe-Claire. I had my reservations—what about all the driving and the greenhouse gas emissions that go with it? And the monotony—what will we do for fun?

It is what it is, I told myself as we packed our U-Haul and drove out to our new home in Cedar Park. Fast-forward twelve years. I still miss the old neighbourhood, but I also love the new one. Strangely enough, the best part is the sense of community—exactly what I thought was missing in Lakeside Heights, or at least, felt that I wasn’t fully a part of. 

A community is a community to the extent that people's interactions go beyond mere transactions, and that’s exactly what I’ve experienced since coming back. Our neighbourhood friends participate in each other’s fundraisers, come out to family funerals, and invite us over for Christmas Eve. They organize movie nights in their backyards and Thanksgiving bocce tournaments in the park. During the pandemic, we all walked the kids to school together, albeit with the requisite six feet between our family “bubbles.”

Downtown (which, by the way, starts at Atwater, not Montreal West) is as far away as ever, but the commuter train works reasonably well. And waiting for the train on any given morning, I may well see a friend from my dragon boat team, a mom from the pool, or various professional acquaintances—again, a sense of community.

If there’s a moral to the story, it’s this: whether you live in a Magil Split or a townhouse, a condo or a seniors’ residence, get out and get to know your neighbours. If you need an in, join the pool, get a dog, find a book club. Whatever your thing is, there’s a community out there waiting for you.