Watching an Election from Across the Border: Canada

The border is a short drive, and yet you feel on the wrong side of a window.

By Neil Solomon · 2 min read

Picture a couple named Joan and Mike. They are Americans who settled in Montreal. They like the streets, the food, the mix of languages. Then comes election week back home. Joan finds herself up at two in the morning, phone in hand, refreshing a page. Mike is in the next room doing the same thing.

I think this is a feeling many people do not expect. They imagine that moving away will give them distance from the noise. It often does, up to a point. Then a big event arrives and the distance turns out to be mostly on the map.

What stands out to me in what people describe is that the anxiety is not about politics alone. It is about being far from the place where the result matters most to your family and your old friends, while still feeling tied to it by citizenship and history. You may be unable to do anything. You may even wonder whether you have the right to be this upset, having left.

Living so close can add to it. When the country next door is the one in the headlines, the news reaches you from every side. Neighbours ask what you think. Shops have the same screens on. The border is a short drive, and yet you feel on the wrong side of a window.

Joan might say at the breakfast table, tired:

"I thought we'd stopped caring this much."

"We moved house," Mike says. "We didn't move our hearts."

I find that honest. People do not stop belonging to a country because they changed addresses. Some find this a comfort. Others find it a weight.

There is also a gentler side. Many people in this position say a neighbour, a colleague or a new friend simply sat with them on a hard night. Someone offered tea, or a walk, or just a patient ear. Being listened to by people who live somewhere else can make a worry feel smaller.

If you are thinking about moving, it may help to picture a night like this. Do you want to be near the news or far from it? Would being abroad make you feel more at peace, or more helpless? There is no right answer. It is simply useful to know yourself.