It's 8 a.m. on a cloudy October morning, and hundreds of students are on their way to school at Oakville's St. John Paul II Catholic Elementary School. Some of them are walking, many are on the bus, and others are driven by their family.
But all of them have one thing in common: they start their day by seeing a heart from Terri the crossing guard.
Theresa Jensen - or Terri, as most of the students know her - has been a crossing guard in Oakville for 13 years, and she's been posted at the corner of Postmaster Drive and Kingsridge Drive for over a decade.
Every morning and afternoon as hundreds of pedestrians and cars pass by the school, Terri does something genuinely special. As she waves goodbye to everyone on their way, she makes a heart with her hands and tells people she loves them.
Terri doesn't just say it either - she really means it.
"I love people, and I love to talk," says Terri. "I’ve gotten to know everyone here at this corner, so they’ve become my family. They all should know that there's someone who really loves them."
Over the course of her day, Terri spends hours making sure students and neighbourhood locals alike cross the street safely. She even has a second intersection she helps at most school days, and she gives everyone hearts all the same.
Oakville News got to spend an afternoon with Terri as school let out for the day, and on average, she would give someone else one of her signature hearts every 5-6 seconds.
With that math, by the end of her two regular shifts each day, she'll make around 5,400 hearts to cars and walkers. In a typical school year, that's over 1.2 million hearts - that's more than five times the population of Oakville.
"And that’s important," says Terri, reflecting on the numbers. "I've never thought about how many before. I just think of them one at a time."
So why does she do it? Why stay so committed to sharing love with her block?
"We've become a society that tends to point out the negative more than we do the positive. If we would approach things with love instead, then we would get further than we do with all the negativity."
After reflecting for a moment, she smiles and says: "If we can find ways to hate for no reason, I can love for no reason."
Sharing that love has made Terri a neighbourhood staple, and popular among hundreds of locals. Kaelyn and Ayla, both students at St. John Paul II, say passing by Terri is a highlight of their day.
"She always makes us happy," says Kaelyn. Ayla adds, "Terri is never sad. Every single day we see her, she has a radiant smile."
Both of the girls mention they've known Terri for years, and they shared how meaningful her influence is to the community: "She's literally been doing the hearts to all the cars for years. Everyone knows her and it means a lot to us."
Terri's community outreach extends to the neighbours too: in less than an hour, she chatted with parents, gave a heart to a delivery truck, and even said hello to multiple dogs on walks. (In one case, with golden retriever Queenie, she even asked how a recent vet office visit went.)
No matter who it was - a student, parent, teacher, passerby, or just someone in the neighbourhood - she greeted almost everyone by name.
Talking about first coming to Postmaster and Kingsridge in west Oakville, Terri says her daily greetings started as just a wave.
"It started as a wave. Drivers were notorious for not stopping at the four way. Then I thought, let’s kill them with kindness."
That all changed, however, when the COVID-19 pandemic broke out. It was in the early days of 2020 she switched to making the hearts.
"We needed to be kinder to each other, and you could never know if someone was smiling behind the mask. This way, with the hearts, people would know that someone loves them."
Outside of being a crossing guard for the town of Oakville, Terri is also the superintendent of the Bronte apartment building she lives in. She says her work at the intersection "is my stress relief for the day."
"I get the people who come by, and you can tell they don’t normally hear words like 'I love you' every day. Sometimes they look at me like I have three heads, and that’s okay too."
"Once I had a cancer patient stop after I gave them a heart on the street," she recalls. "They stopped and gave me a hug because they were scared about going into their treatment. It goes to to show you can't know how important a little gesture might be for someone."
In a world where sincere greetings may seem less sincere, it's inspiring to meet someone like Terri who's giving conscious, ongoing effort to make people feel valued. And she's not slowing down anytime soon.
It's not every day you can see someone say "I love you" to almost a thousand people as they pass, and have them really mean it. Many students even say “I love you" back to her. And they mean it too.
"The best thing every day is seeing smiles, knowing you’ve changed someone’s bad day into a good one. You never know how you change someone’s day by talking to them."
