Art and green spaces

If you look at Sunnybrook hospital on Google Maps, you'll notice that it's right next to Sunnybrook Park.

And if you zoom out on the map, you'll see that Sunnybrook Park is connected to a larger set of parks. Many of the green spaces in the area intersect with Bayview Ave, the major street on the west side of the hospital.

I have a lot of memories tied to places along Bayview Ave and the green spaces around them. You can use this map list to follow along with the examples that I describe below.

• My mom worked as a nurse at the St. John's Rehab campus of Sunnybrook hospital. My mom got me my first job there working for the hospital kitchen when I was 14. I loved walking along the tree-lined driveway to the front doors of the hospital.
• As a child, my family would visit Edwards Gardens, which is just north of Sunnybrook Park. We wandered, played, and fed the wildlife back when I didn't know it was a bad idea. In fact, it's now illegal to feed wildlife anywhere in Toronto on private or public property. The only exception is songbirds if you maintain a clean feeder and if the feeder doesn't attract other wildlife.
• The Estates of Sunnybrook used to host weddings at McLean House, including the wedding of one of my high school friends. The venue stopped hosting weddings in 2020.
• I did my undergrad at the Glendon campus of York University. It's a small campus just north of the main Sunnybrook campus, surrounded by trees and green space. It's really beautiful in the fall as the leaves change colours.
• The main Sunnybrook campus has a bunch of outdoor spaces where you can take a moment to rest and recharge. The design of these spaces is very intentional. For me these spaces add calm and beauty to my hospital visits that help to make the experience more than just radiation treatments in a sterile building.
  
  The hippo and the bunny in the photos below are in one of the smaller wellness spaces just outside of the side door to the Odette Cancer Centre. There are a few benches tucked behind some greenery, decorated with stem and leaf artwork.

If I was doing radiation treatments at a different time of year when the UV index isn't so high during the day, I'd take more time to explore the grounds.

In addition to all the locations with green spaces listed above, notable Toronto attractions south of the hospital such as Evergreen Brickworks and the Ontario Science Centre are within the green spaces that you can travel through to connect with Sunnybrook Park.

And today, I noticed the ceiling art at Sunnybrook hospital for the first time.

A downside of being both legally blind and short in stature is that I frequently don't notice things above my head height. This often leads to situations where I'm at a store and can't find an item I'm looking for until I ask a member of the staff who guides me to a shelf above my head height.

During my radiation treatment, which was in a different unit than my usual one, I looked up and saw landscape artwork on two of the ceiling tiles. When I mentioned it to my spouse, she pointed at other painted tiles on the ceiling in the hallway.

The art is part of the Joy of Life Ceiling Tile Project at the hospital. You can sponsor a tile and optionally dedicate it to someone. I'm going to take some time to learn more after one of my remaining treatments because I'm interested in sponsoring a tile.

I love the colourful murals on the walls of Sick Kids Hospital in downtown Toronto and have always thought that artwork like that shouldn't be limited to hospitals for children. The ceiling tiles at Sunnybrook have brought the desire for more hospital art to life.

Here's an example of a tile that I liked, and the accompanying plaque by the sponsor of that tile (complete with my reflection on the plaque while taking the photo).