One of the essential things when moving into a new neighbourhood is the establishment of regular places to shop. Since I'm new to this area of Toronto, I'm not quite sure yet exactly where to go, haven't scoped out the best places to buy bread and cheese and milk and coat hangers.

My strategy so far has included a lot of wandering up and down Bloor Street, and even taking the subway long distances or shopping in my old neighbourhood a few miles from here.

It's surprisingly disorienting not to have this kind of thing settled: you don't really feel part of a place until you know which is your grocery store. The cut-price supermarket I shopped at before doesn't have a store within walking distance of my house. Hence, the wandering.

One of the main objections I come across when talking to non-Christians is the problem of evil (or The Problem of Pain, as C.S. Lewis termed it).

The argument is this: if God exists, and if he's good, then why is there so much evil in the world, particularly in the lives of those who love God? If God is both all-powerful and good, then surely he both can and ought to stop suffering. Because he doesn't, or doesn't seem to, then there must not be a God. Or not a good God, anyway.

My friend Lynette and I went out the other night for a drink. We were happily strolling along a downtown street, catching up on the news from the two years since we've seen each other, when we came across a very busy scene.

Heavy cables were strung across the sidewalk and big lights were set up at strategic points. A firetruck was parked by the curb with its lights flashing, and the sidewalk was blocked. We had to navigate around the firetruck and cross the street to continue on our way.

As we did so, we gasped in astonishment. Parked on the other side of the firetruck, on the corner of a major intersection, was the blackened hulk of a burned-out bus. The body and even the frame had been blown apart and the windows were gone. Most of the bus was open to the sky. It looked as if it had been bombed. "Road closed" signs and barriers blocked the street and a policeman was directing traffic.

It's the night of my move to Canada. I'm back in my city. I'm driving to my new house, someplace I've never seen or visited, much too late, in the dark and the rain with a car loaded full of my stuff. Somewhere out there is a house with three roommates who've promised to help me move it all in.

I'm numbly tired; up at 4 am, traveling for 13-plus hours, worn from the stress of the border crossing. The intersections slide past: Jarvis. Church. Yonge. Bay. Avenue. Spadina.

So, I'm back in the city where I lived for six years, and I am absolutely loving it. I had no idea how I'd take it, how I'd feel, before I moved, but I am so very thankful to be back.

People always used to ask me the differences between Canada and America, and I didn't know what to tell them. I'd lived in Canada for so long, and been so young when I moved, that I'd kind of forgotten what America was like. Then, when I moved back to America, I only had the shock of what was different about the States. Now that I've moved back again, I have a somewhat clearer perspective.

Friday, my friend Margaret and I rose early and made the 9-hour drive to the Queenston-Lewiston bridge into Canada so I could complete the immigration process by landing (entering the country).

I have to admit to a terrifying amount of nervousness as we approached the border. Border crossings are always a point of stress, and this was the biggest one of all. After so many years, so much money, so much work, and several moves, was it all going to be scotched by a suspicious immigration officer? My leg on the clutch was shaking as I frantically prayed that all would be well.

I slept badly last night, frightened gallons of adrenalin washing through my system causing my sleep to be restless and light and full of wacky dreams about futile attempts to travel. I woke after about five hours of sleep and only dozed off again for a little while a few hours later.

Today is the last day in New Hampshire; tomorrow morning I'm setting off for Toronto. I'm excited and sad and nervous and happy all at once. It feels so right, but I hate border crossings and this one is the biggest of them all. I hope I have all my documents in order.

I went for a brief walk in the field just down the road to scatter some stale peanuts to the beasts of the field. The wind was cool, a buoyant breeze washing over me both the sweet smell of summer's last wildflowers and the harbinger of autumn. The afternoon sun lit the greens of the field with gracious clarity out of a pure blue sky. The Queen Anne's lace was dried and brown and curled up on itself like an arthritic claw, waiting only to sleep through winter and be awakened again by summer's kiss. The trees were tinged with autumnal colour, a deathly orange tint creeping into their green.

And I thanked God. I thanked him for giving me this beautiful place to live in for the last two years. It has been a beautiful place, full of not only natural beauty but the beauty of people whose hearts are full of his grace. I'm thankful.

I have had a very strange life. Occasionally I get into bizarre adventures that remind me of how weird my life is, and last night was one of them.

I decided to go out for a walk. Nice and normal enough. It was a lovely evening, a bit cool with a tiny mist peppering down, but warm enough once you got going at a brisk walk.

I'd been cooped inside all day packing, so I decided to go for a longish stroll of about five miles. I swung along, my thoughts pleasantly rambling, until I came toward a T junction in a residential neighbourhood. The headlights of a car behind me picked out a small dark animal running rather frantically back and forth at the end of the intersection, looking as if it was in some distress.

Alarmed, I picked up my pace. Perhaps it was a lost cat that needed help. When I crossed the intersection, however, the animal was nowhere to be found. Assuming it had vanished into the adjoining park, I gave up and walked on. Probably it was simply a neighbourhood cat out for an evening prowl.

Yesterday was a send-off day, courtesy of my church family. Ian, my pastor, invited me up to say a few words and then to be prayed for. Afterward was a surprise goodbye party, complete with goofy t-shirts with an embarrassing photo on the front and a list of "10 things we like about Susanna" on the back. The outpouring of love was really touching, and surprising. It's funny how lonely and unnoticed you can feel, and then in moments of grace be reminded of how many people love you.

It was not only touching, but puts closure on the time I've spent here. There's something right, and satisfying, about going off with the love and support of the people you're leaving behind.

This week is finally serious packing time, with today being spent putting things away in boxes and cases and pulling out bagfuls of stuff for Goodwill. It's not like I have a lot of possessions—years of moving have kept me a transient minimalist—but there are always a few things you realize aren't worth the trouble to haul along.

I feel oddly calm and at peace, and even looking forward to the move. Who knows what lies ahead...one thing I know, or at least hope, is that it can't be worse than what lies behind, and might be better. At any rate, it'll be a new adventure. Nothing bad about that.

Today I went to Boston for what will probably be the last time during my time living here. I met my friend Gabi and we walked and talked and I gave her a lens to return to a mutual friend and she gave me some prints of her photos and we sat outside the Boston Public Library and sipped tea from an expensive cafe. I was too tired to do much more than listen to her talk. We people-watched as she chatted to me about her photography course and all that she's learning, and I realized again how much I miss living in the city.

Tonight as I was on my cooldown walk from a few miles' run, on a fairly deserted back road near home a car drove past slowly with the window down, the baseball-hatted male driver leaning out the window to make kissing sounds. Very annoying, but nothing that hasn't happened before. However, a few minutes later I heard a car and saw its headlights as it drove up behind me. For some reason, I thought it might be him again, and sure enough, it was. He'd pulled around the loop to drive past me again.

Yesterday I got to experience a bit of what I think of as the heart of New Hampshire. Liz and I met up at her parents' place in the morning and made the two-and-a-half hour drive north to the White Mountains. Our mission: to climb Mount Jefferson, which at 5712 feet is the third highest in the northeastern US. It stands in the Presidential Range of the White Mountains, topped only (logically enough) by Washington and Adams.

Liz had requested of her dad a mountain that could be climbed without hiking boots. However, I think he might have misheard that particular bit of information. As a website informed us after we arrived home, "Jefferson is also the only 5000-footer in the Northeastern U.S. (outside of Washington with its road and train) that can be climbed with less than 3000 feet of vertical gain, using the Caps Ridge Trail from Jefferson Notch. This trail, though, is steep and very rugged...and it is best avoided by novice hikers."