Vagabond Photography

One morning during my last visit to Toronto, in June 2013, I met for a coffee with a Canadian friend, Patti Henderson, known as @GingerPatti on Twitter. She also works in publishing and is a very fine photographer, curating an excellent blog, Vagabond Photography. Patti and I had met only once before, at BookCamp in 2012, so we immediately began asking each other about our personal stories and background. Patti asked me about my affinity for things Canadian. I explained the origins of this lifelong affection, citing examples noted in this essay. Following our conversation, I later decided it was time to write something definitive on the topic, since American–not to mention Canadian–readers may understandably share the same curiosity as Patti had. I should add for the record that following our meeting Patti put up a lovely blog post in part about our conversation, in which she discusses Neil Gaiman, and her own quest to find and make meaningful and creative work. It is gratifying to be thought of by Patti in the same context as the bestselling writer, and to learn that my own life and process serves as a kind of example for her. I invite you to her visit her blog and read that post, “Make Good Art”–Neil Gaiman.