Cobblestones

Cobblestones, originally uploaded by susanvg.

I like the feeling of walking on history - to step where others from a different time have stepped. With our modern roads new asphalt covers over the old with history's footsteps obliterated. This cobblestone has been witness to a longer history, back in Montreal's past. As I waited to get in to a concert, I snapped this photograph. The car lights flooded the street, testimony to the layers of time in this place.

Yet even this street has only borne witness for a few hundred years. In travelling I have walked on roads much older and stepped where famous people of history have walked.

Here in Montreal, I walk in the footsteps of the people who settled here, leaving their homes an ocean away to live in what was sometimes a very hostile environment. I walk where the sailors have walked as they entered the church where the concert was held, offering prayers for safe journeys. I stroll where the merchants of Montreal walked on their way to Bonsecours Market. Each generation has left its imprint on the city and each generation has, at times, erased the past to make way for the future through demolition and new structures. It is nice to have a part of the city where we can still connect with the city's past.