A long cold walk.

I took my thirteen year-old brother downtown to do his Christmas shopping last night. The trip started in a fairly standard fashion for when I spend time with my younger brothers, we sat and talked about comics, only this time it was on a streetcar across town instead of in the backyard.

Getting off of the streetcar at Younge and Carlaw we started walking south, ducking into a game store along the way so we could look for something for our youngest brother, debating between getting him cards and an action figure I suggested that maybe we should hit another store or two first. David, my brother, agreed, and we were back out into the cold. Still moving south we hit the gigantic record store north of Dundas, if you live in the city you know the one, if you don't it has a big pink sign with it's initials over the doors. We weren't in there for very long, I had wanted to order something but since all of the staff seemed lost in helping someone or doing something I supposed that it would be best to come back if I can't find it elsewhere first.

Walking past the north end of the Eaton Centre David got stopped by one of the guys selling the Black History Month pamphlets and before I could get my brother away from them he'd already given him a five and we were back on our way south. David was still staring at the four sheets of paper he'd just paid five dollars for, and I tried my hardest not to laugh, but told him it was a lesson and that the best of us can be hit by people trying to talk us out of a few bucks at his age. I told him about how when I was fifteen I once gave someone five bucks for what they said was for a charity, I didn't care what it was for I was trying to get them to leave me alone, a few weeks later the same lady I gave the five was on the news. She'd been keeping all the money she'd collected that way, and was living in a better place then I was off of it. I also added that my best friend, who had been there, got a good laugh out of it when the story ran.

A few minutes later we were walking down a flight of black and white stairs and David was seeing the Black Market for the first time, and he didn't seem quite sure what to make of it. I'd already told him on the way we were going to a vintage store, and then explained what exactly that was. After we had been browsing for around fifteen to twenty minutes David said to me "I get it, it's like Value Village.", I laughed and said "Yeah, but with punk music and better clothes." The dawning I saw in his eyes clued me into the fact that the music playing, and I can't for the life of me remember who it was, was the first punk he'd ever heard that wasn't from a Green Day album recorded in the last ten years.

After the Black Market we went across the street, I had coffee, he had hot chocolate, and we sat and warmed up. The sun had gone down while we were underground and the cold had become a little more unbearable. Feeling sufficiently warmed we ran down the block and into the Silver Snail, inside David found the exact same toy he'd been looking at over an hour ago, for a few dollars less. He snatched it up, then started looking around to see if he could find something for our little sister.

There were a few more stops along the way, but from there out the pattern of going to a new place and giving the awe a few minutes to wear off before the conversation resumed, after the surplus store, the skate shop, the book store and the "anything with a band logo" store we went underground, into the PATH. Wandering through the network of tunnels lined with shops we made our way to where our Dad was finishing work in a few hours. We found a good place to sit and hung around until security kicked us out so they could close the food court up. With ten minutes to go we wandered out onto King to stand near Bay and wait for Dad to finish up work. For the millionth time I told David, "Anytime you want to go to any of those places again, just call and ask." then we were in the car and our trip was at a close.

TL;DR, I hung out with my kid brother.

-James