Warmth on a cold day in Ottawa

Ottawa is home.

It is for three of the founders of this blog. And it’s the city in which we all met.

As Canada’s capital, it is home, symbolically, to an entire nation.

If you look to a standard definition of the word “home”, it is one’s place of residence. But, I disagree.

The bricks and mortar that make up a house—that’s a residence.

But, a “home” is something different. Home deals with the heart.

Yesterday, a horrific and surreal thing happened in Ottawa. A soldier, guarding one of the most sacred monuments in Canada, lost his life senselessly. Our parliament was attacked. Our sense of national security was questioned. And, for the citizens of Ottawa, our home was in danger.

Ottawa is a small town masked as a big city. There is not one person who lives here who did not know someone in lock down. The people that were within the area of danger were our friends, parents, neighbours, colleagues.

It was our very own downtown apartments, our government offices. Our usually serene life.

No matter how close or how far you were to the chaos that was happening at Parliament Hill yesterday, you heard the news and did one thing: make sure your loved ones were safe.

For those of us who live in the city’s centre, the images flooding Twitter, television screens and international news reports were not of some security breech happening within the confines of an untouchable Canadian Parliament.

They were of the streets we walk every single day.

The journalists capturing the story were friends. The policemen risking their lives were ones we know by name.

Parliament Hill is where our government meets, but it is also a gathering place for all citizens.

It is where I’ve laid down my yoga mat. Where we’ve watched fireworks since childhood. Those iconic steps are where Kate & I filmed our Amazing Race audition. In 2010, it’s where we all spontaneously gathered to celebrate Canada’s gold medal in hockey—beers in hand, security making an exception for a truly patriotic moment.

In the future, that may need to change. Those moments, so innocent in nature, more closely watched. But it won’t change the principles by which those instances were allowed. Canada is meant to be peaceful, equal, free.

And as tragedy descended on the capital yesterday, so did heroism. As one city was threatened, an entire country responded. And as an innocent man was targeted, we were reminded of the fragility of life and the sacrifices others make to protect our own.

Despite incomprehensible circumstances, as Ottawa took the international stage, I couldn’t have been prouder to call someplace “home”.

I speak for everyone at in a nutshell, a blog that so often celebrates the greatness of the capital and of the country, in saying that today we are remembering Cpl. Nathan Cirillo, we are thinking of his loved ones, we are thanking our first responders and security forces, and we have never been more honoured to be Canadian.