Just Home.

Another day, another conversation with an old friend.  This time, it was someone I went to high school with here in town (all those years ago), and who, like me, made a beeline out of this burg as soon as that time could be put behind us.

We talked about that need to get out, and the lack of desire to never come back.  In her case, it's taken her far and wide - she's lived in every province west of Ontario, and travelled extensively.  Myself, it took me to the big city two hours south, and the odd trip within Canada.

We met in a coffee shop on the main drag.  She's came from her home in Manitoba.  I came from my home just down the street.  Along with the enjoyment of good friends catching up after too long a time apart, we talked a little about this town, about our love-hate relationship with it through the years.  How we'd come back to visit family, but avoid going out.  How we'd avoid coming back to visit family at all.  (Granted, in her case, well it's not really a quick drive from Calgary, after all.  My excuses through the years have been much flimsier.)  We talked about how those years are behind us both now.

A lot has changed about this town in the twenty years since we fled it at age 18.  But so have we.  For myself, when I first decided to return four years ago, those changes were difficult.  It was not the town I had left.

And that, it turns out, has been the secret.

This is truly not the town I left.  And so many of the things I left to get away from are no longer here: most importantly, my own perceptions of it.  The experiences of the wider world let me come back with new eyes, and a new heart.  This time, I chose to live in this town.  I chose to become part of the community here.

This is no longer the town that I lived in.  It is now, simply, home.

Just Heroes.

Had a great conversation with an old friend the other day, and at one point we were discussing how each of us is the "hero of our own story".

We are our own protagonist, and everything we do is filtered through that lens.  No matter the good or the bad, the mundane or inane; the actions we take and the things we say are all the things that the hero in the story of our lives does.  (Even the best written villains on page and film are ones who you can clearly see are acting as the hero of their own story.)  And just as there are many kinds of tales, we cast our own tales to suit our tastes.

Some of us want to live in great romances, or ripping yarns of rollicking adventure.  Others prefer quiet pastoral stories, or reflective philosophical tales.  Some want the saga of their life to be a story of great drama and history.

And, sadly, some just want their own story to be a tragedy, so they can revel in the woe of their lives.

We talked about people like that; ones we know, ones we've heard of.  And we talked about where we're taking the stories of our own lives next, and what adventures and challenges lay ahead for our own 'heroic' selves. 

It wasn't until later that it struck me that there's an even sorrier protagonist than the self-made tragic hero, though; those who are still waiting for someone else to write their tale.

Unfortunately, fate is a lousy author, and when left to chance life will favour those who tackle it headlong with the great epic chronicles.  Those who don't simply end up as bystanders, forgettable secondary characters in someone else's exploits.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have some derring-do to attend to...

Just Neighbours.

For the most part, this is a great neighbourhood.  

Trudi across the street is such a sweet old gal.  Anne & Jack next door are fine neighbours; Ray two-doors down can't do enough for you.  Across the street from him Krista & Mike have a growing family, and right on the other side of us are Derek and Rhonda and their girls.

All great people; it's an honour to know them.  And they're so quiet.

It's the other neighbours that make all the racket.

The Raven family start at the first hint of dawn with their loud rawk-rawk-rawk outside our bedroom window.  Then the Robins start.  Mind you, their singing voices are much nicer than the Ravens, but still; it's so early!

Throughout the morning we'll hear Mr. & Mrs. Finch chattering away at each other.  Our neighbourhood bachelor, Mr. Redpoll often interrupts them with his cranky chirping.

We have a local street gang.  Well, branches-gang, really.  The Chickadees.  They'll sweep in squabbling and rassling and darting about and then disappear as noisily as they came.

Our local hermit, Mr. Cicada, who lives in a tree and nobody sees, loudly razzes the neighbourhood on hot afternoons.

In the evenings, Mr. Cardinal sings beautiful love songs to his wife, while the Mourning Doves sit on the wire and pour out their grief.

At night, the Raccoon's have the loudest fights, crazy laughter echoes up from the parties the Loons hold on the lake, and the Nighthawk screeches overhead.

Thank goodness the deer are quiet...

Just Sticky.

It's been too hot and humid to even think lately.

Don't know what I'd do if there wasn't that nice lake at the end of the street.  I hear it calling me again right now...

Just Concise.

Long day, nothing to say!

Just Wider.

There's nothing like a nice trip to make you appreciate home.  It may be a cliché, but it is entirely true; not only sentimentally, but on a purely mechanical, practical basis as well.

You see, travel is a great cure for tunnel vision at home.

Consider:

When you travel through a new place, your eyes are quite literally wide open.  You are trying to see everything: scenery, sights, architecture, roads, traffic, signs, lights, people, around the next corner.  Everything, and processing it all in context, too.  Not only is it vital to your enjoyment of a new place, it's vital to your being able to find your way around it.  You're also trying, since you recognize that your time there is going to be fleeting, to memorize as much as possible so that you can recall your visit again and again over the years and savour it properly.

Now at home, you've seen it all.  You know where the roads lead.  You've seen the people.  And yep, that's about the ten thousandth time you've passed by that historic building or looked out over that scenic reach.  Got places to go and people to see, and they're not usually the ones right in front of you.

So your vision narrows.  You wander around your hometown with blinders of familiarity on.

Then you come back from vacation, with your eyes fully retrained for take-it-all-in mode, your brain still in full process-the-context gear.  And pow!  I never noticed that before...

The way the hills lie on the far side of the lake.  The birds in the sky and animals among the trees and lawns.  The curve of the road on your drive to work.  The look of all the shops together on the main street.  The mix and mingle of people on the sidewalks.

And you start to realize, this is how where you live looks to a stranger.  No wonder people like to come here...

Just Canadian.

I had the pleasure last night of visiting with friends who have chosen Canada as their home.  Myself, I was born here, and on the first of July to boot, and it's likely my sense of pride and patriotism in this country is influenced by those factors.  So it's nice to find that same pride and patriotism in people who chose to make their homes here.

Happy Birthday to this great nation, and all who love her as I do!

Just Tired.

Back home.   Ahhhhh...

Arrived at shortly after 2:00 a.m. this morning, though, instead of the estimated mid-evening yesterday.  Seems that the best laid plans of mice and men...

I'd been trying to post something at the end of each day on this trip but I didn't quite feel like posting at three in the morning, and Saturday we stayed in a little cabin in an out-of-the-way motel in Edmundston with no internet access, so I have some catching up to do.

The wedding went well.  They chose a beautiful spot to tie the knot (or pour the sand in the container, as the case turned out to be) and couldn't have asked for better weather.  It was a nice, intimate ceremony that incorporated elements of both eastern and western religion, and, for the most part, the visiting Cook clan kept their irreverence to a minimum.  (Though the gentleman who officiated will forevermore be "Reverend Wal-Mart" in my mind...)  Kevin couldn't be happier, and that's what it's all about.

We had breakfast with Jen, enjoyed the ceremony and after the luncheon reception and a couple of family photos we dashed off for the Confederation Bridge - very cool for an engineering junkie like me.

Back in New Brunswick we were met by a surprising official route to Highway 2 (Note to Self: don't bother with the road signs, just look at the map and go with what makes sense, not what what the MoT have decided to post as a route), and rode over 50 kilometres of the Worst. Roads. Ever.  We were surprised to make it out unscathed.  (We thought.)

At this point, the trip was largely over, as we had selected the quickest way home: Four-way divided highways all the way.  New Brunswick 2 straight to Quebec 20/Ontario 401 all the way down to Whitby before cutting cross country on 12 north to 169 and 11 and home.

Kind of missed the drive along the river in southern New Brunswick, but north of Fredericton the new highway gets out of the endless forests and up onto the ridges overlooking the Saint John River Valley to provide some spectacular scenery.

We stayed just outside Edmundston, breakfasted at the Irving Big Stop (of course) just inside Quebec, got on the 20 in Rivier-du-Loup and started trekking west.

The St. Lawrence lowlands in Quebec are beautiful.

Losing a tire just outside Montreal, not so much.

We were coming into Montreal just after 3:00 in the afternoon, and I figured that we would be home no later than 9:00 at that point, and that was allowing for A) bad traffic and slowdowns through Montreal, B) a nice leisurely dinner somewhere, and C) a good number of get-out-and-stretch-our-legs/look-at-that/have-a-pee stops along the way.

About ten clicks south of where 20 makes that sharp left and travels along the south side of the river we suddenly noticed the vibration (which had gotten worse after those New Brunswick foot-deep potholes) that had been mysteriously plaguing us the whole trip had turned to a flapping, whumping sound.

Tam was driving, and got us across two lanes of typically insane Quebec traffic onto the shoulder.  At first we couldn't even see the problem - all the tires were still inflated and firm, so it wasn't a flat or a blowout like it felt like - but a closer inspection revealed that a large bulge on the inside of the back driver's-side tire had worn through and a large section of steel-belted radial tread was slapping around.  Another two minutes on it and the tire would have blown; who knows how that would have gone over in that traffic.

So out comes a week's worth of luggage for two couples onto the side of the highway, and the jack and the idiot-tire spare.

Changing it mere feet from the heavy racing traffic was a bit harrowing, let me tell you.

By the time we were done, the Quebec Highway Surveillance vehicle had showed up to put some extra flashing lights behind us.  Not that they slowed anyone down or even caused a soul to switch lanes and give us room to work.

After getting the doughnut installed and the wrecked tire back into the trunk (and all that luggage back in on top again) I went over and thanked him, and ask him where (on a Sunday afternoon in Montreal!) we could find a place to get a proper new tire installed.  (Friggin' idiot-tires.  Can't drive on them for long, and never fast, so we needed to buy a new full-sized one and get it on pronto if we were going to keep on schedule.)

"Parlez-vous Anglais?" I asked.

He held up his thumb and forefinger, measuring the tiniest bit of space between each.  So I went for the direct approach:  "Wal-Mart?"  Canadian Tire or Costco would have done just as well - I figured where there was one the others wouldn't be far away.  We'd just passed a whole box-store paradise about twenty klicks back: surely Montreal would have more.

He told me we'd find some on Hwy. 20 the way we were heading.

He also told me he wasn't from the area.  Shoulda paid more attention to that.

There wasn't a single place-that-might-have-a-tire-department-open-on-a-Sunday to be seen anywhere from 20 all the way through Montreal and its suburbs.  We finally spotted a Canadian Tire on Boulevard Cardinal-Legér in Pincourt at about quarter to five (did I mention that not only we were driving slow because we had an idiot-tire on, but we were held up by a ton of construction work in Montreal?), but by the time we reached the next open exit to turn around (more construction complications) we were practically to Ontario.

So we decided to cruise along at the 80 that the doughnut would allow until we got to the big Service Centre on the 401 just this side of the Quebec/Ontario border.  Someone there would be able to help, and language would be less of a problem.

Except that Service Centre is closed for renovations and "redevelopment".

So we stopped at the Ontario Information welcome centre, and had the young woman in there call the Wal-Mart in Cornwall (now only twenty klicks away or so) and see if they'd have someone who could help.  She assured us that they had assured her that the tire department was open 24-7 like the rest of the store.  Considering that it was now well after five that was most welcome news indeed.

When we arrived shortly after 6:00 we discovered that the tire department was indeed open.  You can buy as much vulcanized rubber as you want on a Sunday evening in Cornwall.  You just can't get it installed until the service department opens again Monday morning.

The best I can say about my conversation with the Tire & Lube manager at the Cornwall Wal-Mart was that he was astoundingly unhelpful.  Indeed, he flat out refused to do a single thing to help, or even sympathize.  It was essentially a "ha-ha, suckers" response where he managed for the most part to keep the "ha-ha" to himself.  For the most part.  Very professional of him.

So we went and grabbed dinner and called CAA to see if they knew anyone in the area who could help.

Turns out that Cornwall Tire, who we had been told by Mr. Helpful at Wally World would be closed and wouldn't be able to help anyway because the definitely don't do any kind of roadside assistance, let alone 24-7, were more than happy to help out.

In fact, their 24-7 roadside guy, who should have just come and did it where we were, took us over to the shop, opened it up (even though it was closed until Wednesday due to the long weekend) and did the work inside there so that we wouldn't have to stand around outside with our luggage in the rain.  He was above and beyond the call all the way.

Fed, 'tired', and relieved (it's amazing how much one helpful person with a good attitude can completely turn around a dark day), we headed home.

And as good as it is to be here, I can't wait to pack up the car and head off for some far away reach again soon.

Just Goofin'.

Ferried over to PEI today and had dinner with my cousins tonight.  Kevin is getting married tomorrow, and his sister Jen flew down to Summerside today from Ontario for the big event.

We really need more weddings or something in this family, because every time we get together we have more laughs than is likely legal.

All I can say in polite company right now is that I'm going to be real disappointed tomorrow if the minister isn't dressed up in a lobster suit after all...

Just Talkin'.

Two days in Nova Scotia with my mom's brother and it's already happened:  I've picked it up.  The Nova Scotia lilt.  

Mom's has barely changed at all - it's still so faint you can hardly hear it even if you know what you're listening for.   But my Uncle Al's is so strong, I just can't help it. 

The long vowels.  The lilting rhythm. The phrasing.  The not-so-silent 'i's that sneak in to hang around the 'a's and 'o's and 'u's.  The clipped words.  

The sayings...

"That hill's so steep a steer goin' down it would crap on his own horns" was today's favourite.

Boy, it sure is some good to be here, eh?

Just Sparkles II.

Travelled around the Bay of Fundy today from Saint John to Bedford, where my namesake uncle lives.  We'll be here for the next two nights before we head to the Island for the wedding that spurred this trip.

I'm travelling with a bit of unfinished business - a story that is already past deadline - so I spent some time this evening sitting on the sun deck of his condo building, high atop one of the Bedford hills, looking out over the Basin and Halifax harbour in the distance.  Sailboats by the score crisscrossed the basin in the steady evening breeze, and I marvelled at how green the city hills are as I watched the birds flit from treetop to treetop.  I even got some work done...

Later, I rejoined my parents and my wife visiting with my uncle.  Dad thought he was seeing lighting flashing in the distance - summer heat lighting, sheets, no bolts, and we wondered if we were in for a storm tonight after such a beautiful day.  Al, Dad and myself decided to head down the hill to the nearest Tim's for a 'nightcap' (decaf, coffee with enough cream to turn it the lightest beige, and a tea, respectively) when we realized that anywhere there was a gap in the trees or houses people were lining the sidewalks looking out over the Basin.

Turns out that today is part of "Bedford Days", and a major fireworks show was being held.  Spectacular.  So that was the 'lightning' Dad saw...

Too bad the ladies missed it.

Just Similar.

Another day of travel, through New Hampshire and Maine, and back into Canada at St. Stephen, New Brunswick (home of Ganong chocolate...)

Much nicer day for travel today, and much fun was had by all.

Yet crossing the border after our brief stint in the US somehow felt like a homecoming.  Sure, familiar highway signage and conventions were part of it, but there was also an subtle layer of unease that was not noticed until it vanished as we passed through the customs gate in our homeland.  

Perhaps it was just that sense of 'almost'.  I found myself watching the scenery along the way, all breathtakingly beautiful, and noticing time after time how similar it was to so many places in Canada.  Similar, but not quite.  These hills almost look like the ones from...  These farms almost look like the ones from...  This river almost looks like...  Even the woods in Maine were so close to the woods at home.  But subtly different.  Not quite the same mix of trees and ground cover.  Signs of not quite the same forestry practices.  

But almost...

Of course, New Brunswick is different from the little part of Canada that we call home too.  Yet as we drove Highway 1 along the coast from St. Stephen to Saint John during that golden hour before sunset, it all felt so right.

As we rounded Spruce Lake the sun shot between the low clouds above the rollicking hills, haze in the middle distance silhouetting the impressionistic outlines of the spruce forests, rough islands painted on the bronze surface of the lake, and it felt good to be home.

Just Sparkles.

It was dusk before we were making our way through Vermont this evening, on our way to a planned stop (and booked motel rooms) in Gorham, New Hampshire.

A tremendous summer storm was wending its way through the mountains, silhouetting their shapes against lightning-lit skies.

The grassy embankments along the roadsides were lit with miniature lightning of their own: thousands of fireflies.  Sparkling in the rain, they flew past our windows like glitter in the wind, fireworks writ small in the grass and glades.

Mingling in the mist rising from the roads, it was like driving through hot green embers of some mystical fire...

Just Panic.

Leave for the east coast in 60 hours.

Have at least four days worth of things to do in that time.

Yikes!

Just Working.

I had one of those "I love my job" days today.

See, the best part of what I do is meet interesting people.  Today I started my morning by sitting with a man with a deep and abiding love for the area that we live in, and a vision for ensuring that the work that community organizations do to make this area so special is preserved and supported in perpetuity.  The kind of person that just meeting makes you feel proud.

Then I spent my afternoon at a hundred year old cottage on Browning Island, meeting the brother and sister who are its current guardians.  I say 'guardians' because that is truly what they have been part of here; helping lovingly preserve it much as it was since their grandfather built it in 1908.  It has been a hundred-year task, handed down through generations, and involving regular maintenance and care.  But it's not the heritage of the building that matters most, it is the heritage of what the place has been to four generations: home.  The place where all come together and are at peace.  And in the face of an attitude in the region of "tear it down and replace it with a carbon-copy of the modern, urban home", the simplicity of a building where the only amenity of value is the closeness of family and friends it nurtures is a treasure indeed.

Of course meeting these people and being touched by how much they care for their communities, small and large, is only part of the job.

Now I have to sit down and go through notes and reference materials, listen to the interviews and transcribe their words.  That's the part that feels a little bit like work.

Fortunately, it's always followed by the telling their stories part, where I get to share a little bit with the world what is so interesting and moving about them.  That part, the writing part, is work too, but always rewarding.

But today I'd have skipped it all just to have sat and chatted with each of them a little longer.

Just Lines.

We're planning a trip down east next week - first time since 1992 that I've been back to the ancestral home.  My cousin is getting married in Summerside, PEI on the 28th, so we're taking Mom & Dad and heading down through Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia before going over to the Island for the nuptials.

We'll be staying with and visiting relatives in Saint John and Bedford, and stopping in at all those places significant to the Cook and Shortliffe families.

I'm looking forward to seeing family that I haven't seen in a while, and revisiting all those summer standbys from my youth.  Having a Sussex Golden Ginger Ale and eating a Pal-0'mine bar.  Walking on the ocean floor when the tide's out, and seeing what's stranded in the pools.  Highways lined with lupins.  Fresh fish dinners.  Ferry rides.  The smell of K.C. Irving in Saint John.  That sense of being far from home but almost being home.

Planning the trip, we've ordered current road maps from all the States and Provinces we'll be visiting.  I love maps.  I've been studying every road we'll be taking, and imagining and remembering the scenery along the way.  They may be just lines on paper, but each is a route to memory and anticipation.

Can't wait.

Just Whispers.

Yesterday was a beautiful day.  Blue sky accented by snow white clouds.  Green everywhere.  Wildflowers and gardens and cut grass scenting the air.  A steady, gentle breeze.

I lay in bed last night with the window open and listened to that breeze.

Even the gentlest breeze through leaves makes a rustling sound, a moving about, a restless fettering.

But through the pines, a breeze merely whispers.  A quiet hush, a low murmur, wordless yet full of sound.  It is the same sound as waves on a distant shore, recorded in a shell and played back when held close to your ear.  It is the sound of the world, breathing.

As my own respiration matched its rhythm, I fell to sleep, with only the whispers of the world on my mind.

Just Dad.

Took dad for a drive around the lake yesterday, hoping his favourite place for a bite to eat in Bala would be open.  It wasn't, and we proceed on undeterred.  After considering Tapps in Port Carling, he decided Father's Day for him would be just as good at Swiss Chalet in Bracebridge.  That's my dad.

It was a beautiful day, but a little early for much wildlife, so after the turtle rescue in Torrance (Tam stopped and helped a poor fella get across busy 169), Dad pulled out his ever-present crossword puzzle and we set about trying to fill in some of the stumpers.  (Mom rides up front and Tam usually drives on these little outings, so Dad & I had the backseat to ourselves for crossword pursuits).

Dad always has a puzzle or two on him, tucked in his shirt pocket along with a passel of papers with names, phone numbers, appointments and reminders.  And a pen.  A necktie is a requisite as well.  We've seen him mow the lawn wearing a tie.  He sat in the back seat with a pale blue tie clipped against a crisp dark blue shirt and his shades on and I was struck once again how much he looks like a retired cop.

Later, as we sat in Swiss Chalet chatting and enjoying our dinner, I watched his hands as he talked.  They looked large on his thinning arms, heavy and gnarled, and I could see the spectre of age lurking near.

It struck me that a franchised chicken dinner and a crossword puzzle was exactly how I wanted to spend this Father's Day.  It may not sound like much, but in that moment, it was perfect.