“would you like a hug? it’s free hug day today!”
we must have said that at least 500 times today. and hugged at least 100 people.
seniors, children, big people, small people, shy people, exuberant people, vancouverites and vacationers, sweating people and people in their sweaters. we hugged ’em all.
yes, we joined the free hugs campaign and celebrated was free hug day today
the weather co-operated fully: another day of blue, bluer, bluest skies, a light breeze, and sun, sun, sun. september in vancouver is awesome.
so i guess we could say we were hugged by the weather.
we started off at the vancouver art gallery, where we were soon joined by a bunch more people with free hugs placards. oh, “we”, by the way, were my daughter, my grandson and i.
then we slowly wound our way towards english bay, via davie street. good choice. an “old hippie chick”, as i was once called by a ridiculously young dancer chick friend, i feel quite a bit more at home on the rainbow-flagged, slightly seedy, sometimes commercial, sometimes residential asphalt of davie street than on robson street, vancouver’s shopping highway (or, um, “boulevard”).
not everyone wanted our hugs, understandable. so we exchanged waves with quite a few people.
i’m really quite beat. apparently hugging people for an afternoon is quite exhausting. hopefully i’m still managing to make at least some sense in this blog post.
and i’m trying to wrap my head around the idea that i just held close to a hundred people in my arms.
one remark keeps coming back to me: one person said that they reserved hugs for people for whom they feel special affection.
i totally respect that.
still – what would it be like if we had special affection for everyone?
maybe too lofty a goal for now. in the meantime, wouldn’t it be nice if free hugs day on september 10 became as well known as 9/11? too lofty still? how about if everyone who read this post got up and hugged someone?
yeah, i think we can do that.
let me know how it goes.
isabella mori
counselling in vancouver
(this post appeared in the small actions to change the world carnival)