Elyse: 283

I met this lovely person named Elyse a few days ago; we met in a coffee shop.

Guess what! She’s allergic to coffee and I’m not even kidding.

What’s a sweet young lady (younger than me) such as Elyse doing in a place like this???

Well, Bay Village Coffee serves more than just coffee! They’ve got tea and Italian sodas and baked goods and amazing sandwiches and soups!

Stay tuned because we’ll be meeting the new owners of Bay Village coffee very soon!

But today let’s focus on Elyse.

So she’s allergic to coffee and chocolate and a bunch of other stuff.

But but BUT!! She’s brilliant and lovely and she thinks Thunder Bay is a lovely place to live.

Elyse was born in Cambridge, Ontario and moved to Selwyn Ontario the summer before she started grade 9. After high school she moved to Ottawa with the intent of studying nutrition and herbalism.

She ended up getting really sick and needed to end her studying when she was about 20; she needed to concentrate on figuring out her health problems before continuing with post secondary education.

A couple of years later (and a lot of BS from the medical system), Elyse was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and a few other chronic conditions. After getting a handle on managing her health, Elyse worked in customer service and as a nanny.

After being relapse free for 4 years, Elyse wanted to go university again and completed an undergraduate degree at the University of Prince Edward Island.

Elyse and her fiancé moved here in September so she could do her Masters in Social Justice Studies. Elyse had some terrible experiences in the health care system and is hoping to use that information to further her Masters research.

I asked Elyse what she liked best about Thunder Bay and she said:

I love that Thunder Bay has the amenities of a moderately sized city, but the massive amounts of nature. I’m a huge fan of water and mountains, and there are both here.

I don’t think Elyse will like the above picture but I love it because it looks like I made her laugh so hard she cried and had to wipe away her tears.

Candid photos can be gold, I tell ya, gold!

Below you can see Elyse’s laptop is covered with amazing stickers proclaiming equality and love. We decided that laptops are the new lockers. In the “olden days” there were no laptops so you had to proclaim love and equality with stickers on your locker.

Elyse is getting married in a couple weeks to a tall dude named Matthew. In the picture below, they are holding hands because they are in love, obviously. It has nothing to do with Elyse being nervous about the height.

After the wedding, they’re going to Iceland for a honeymoon. They wanted to go somewhere neither of them have been before and they wanted it to be be spectacular.

Have a great wedding, you two! Nothing makes me happier than love and hand holding and plaid shorts and tattoos. Too wonderful for words!

I’m so glad you’ve decided to make your home here in Thunder Bay.