I was on my way to Greenwich Village in New York in 1964 to listen to some poetry and needed to save some money for the trip, so, I took my poetry books and chessboard with me and rented a room in a tall skinny house on Yorkville Street in Toronto.

The house shared an alley with Yorkville’s well known clubs the Riverboat and the Purple Onion. These two cubs brought in some incredible talent featuring mostly folk music.

My room had a small patio that looked out into an alley and the back rooms of the cafe’s were were often left open. I could hear the music sour into the night along with the smoke. Everyone smoked in clubs back then and they opened the back doors to increase the air flow.

I could not afford the cover charges and I did not smoke, so I sat on the patio with my Molson’s Canadian and listen to Gordon Lightfoot, Ian and Sylvia, Neil Young and Joni Mitchell bless the sound of the alley.

I was able to sit outside at the Penny Farthing drinking coffee and pretending to be a laid back intellectual reading Howl.

I never made it to Greenwich because I felt Yorkville was just as cool, and the West was calling with Height Ashbury just down the coast from next destination of Vancouver and the summer of love with the Velvet Underground and the Doors.

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Joni was found unconscious in her home on March 31, 2015 and suffered brain aneurysm where she lost the ability to walk and talk, After an intense an private period where she stayed out of the public eye she made it back to the stage when she was 78 in 2022 at the Newport Folk Festival and blew everyone away. Unbelievable!

Like most things in live nothing stays the same and the Yorkville of my 60’s is long gone. It has not lost its swagger its magnetic drawing power but it is now an excusive place to live. If I could afford it probably would be a pretty good place to be.

The gentrification of many neighbourhoods is disturbing to many older people and as the worlds population continues to expand and global conflicts cause migration shifts the demand for more homes keeps going up. Not enough work has been done by the federal governments ensure there is legislation in place to force provincial and municipal government to ensure there is enough social housing and affordable rental space.

What do you think?