Yesterday morning dawned dark and cool. It was 9° when I got up after a crappy night’s sleep. I woke up at 1:23 and could not go back to sleep. I stayed in bed, tossing and turning until I got up at 4:00. I felt hot; I may have had a mild temperature.
When I got up, I worked on my script after feeding the pets. They I took Sheba for a walk, and I recited the part of the script I’ve memorized as I walked. I keep making little changes as I practice, and so the script keeps getting better.
After our walk, I was keen to do more memorizing. I love memorizing. I really love it. When I did my monologue, I memorized 1,900 words. My SPACE script is just under 1,000 words, so it’s a relative walk in the park. But I had to wait. I had a lot of watering to do.
Once the watering was done, I went back to memorizing. It ain’t entirely easy, but I love the work, and I love how saying it aloud reveals flaws in the tempo, and missing bits of information. Now, every day I’m a little prouder of the piece. I’ve memorized three hundred of the thousand words so far. Today, while I wait in the ferry line and when I’m on the vessel, I shall try to memorize another couple of hundred words.
In the early afternoon, we went to Elder Cedar to walk. The sun had come out and it was warmer (18°), so it was thoroughly enjoyable. As we walked, I rehearsed my lines.
When we got home, I fetched my watering jug and filled it from one of my rain barrels, and then I fell. I must have tripped somehow, but the earth is soft and I didn’t bleed anywhere this time. I’ve just got a few bruises. What was sweet, was Sheba came running and licked my face. Usually, she only wants to lick my wounds. She’s part vampire. It was so sweet of her to come to my aid.
Late in the afternoon, I had a spa, and when I went to put my terry towel robe on, I felt quite the sharp pain in my shoulder. I reckon it’s from my fall. But I don’t care. I can’t waste time on worry or pain, it is too lovely a time of year, plus I am reading a great book, and I have more great books waiting. And … I have a 55” TV that makes watching movies way more fun!
It’s a beautiful time of year. My beds are looking like they’ve run a marathon, and we have, fighting drought. A great many of my floral pals are getting ready to hibernate.
To be honest, I’ve done no gardening at all this year. I planted a few things, and Dwight helped me transplant a formerly beautiful Japanese Maple with very delicate leaves. But I didn’t do any weeding, or pruning. I didn’t do anything that requires bending. I think I will hire someone to help me next year. Not a gardener, per se, but just someone who will do things with me. By with, I mean me directing, and this person doing all the work.
Projects keep getting in the way. And in a couple of days, my white pens will arrive, and I must draw vertical parallel lines on my windows. I can hardly wait to do it. I feel sick when the little beauties crash into the large windows of the back doors. I’m going to do the studio windows as well.
Now that I’ve stopped walking with the group I walked with three times a week for eight years, so I’m an even more solitary guy now. But I don’t miss them. I don’t miss the yelling for their pets, the incessant barker, the loudness of the conversation, and the giving of treats to Sheba.
I’m feeding Her Highness less now that she is not doing long walks, and I’m walking her three times a day. She is herself, but slower. She remains my shadow. We’re always together, but when I first moved here, I infrequently left her with a sitter when I had medical appointments in Vancouver. But we have been together all day, every day, for over five years now. That was when I had my heart attack. I was gone ten days. A lovely neighbour moved in. She looked after the pets, watered the garden beds, cleaned thoroughly and left a shitload of baking and cooking here for me for when I got home.
Sheba was put on tranquilizers. It was a group decision of friends here, made to calm her. That’s how I know she loves me, and it’s all about me.
I did not know what was going to happen when I moved here. I was having, on average, six seizures a day, and unable to tolerate direct sunshine or noise. I came here to get away from the city. I knew nothing about Gabriola; I didn’t even know where Gabriola was when I bought the place.
I really lucked out in many, many ways. I’m recalling this because last night I was so exhilarated by my dawn walkabout, so full of love of my little half-acre world here with the kids. And that made recall the incredible sense of not belonging that I lived with long after I arrived.
I felt I was in a B&B. It did not feel like home. I loved the house very, very much. But the yard was shite. Building the garden made this place home. I moved from a small condo, and I sold it with my furniture. To make the move easy, I bought all my furniture from a from one store. I bought it on condition that they store it for me until my moving date. The van fetched the furniture and then came to place for the rest of my belongings.
It was the furniture that made it feel like a B&B, plus the whole foreignness of the place. And of course, I wasn’t conscious of the slow transition to bonding with my new environment.
I reckon building the gardens was, for me, as a dog pees on the boundaries of his territory. It was a lot of work to create. And a lot of money—particularly for the soil and the fencing to keep deer out. But it made Pinecone Park mine.
The first brilliant thing I did here was acquiring the pets. I wanted a family, and I knew they would thrive because my condition makes home the only place I feel safe, and I believe the best thing that can happen to pets is to always have company. And that meant I’d always be here to water the gardens I created. I built myself a paradise of flora and fauna around and inside a log home. Talk about feeling safe! How’s about sixteen inches of solid wood for walls?
I have been unable to shake my Catholic upbringing. It made me wonder if I deserved to be sick for being gay? I loved being a Catholic boy when I was a kid. I absolutely loved it. There was a constancy to the relationships, and we sang together, I was in the cub scout group of our church and we had uniforms. I was a soloist in the choir. People saw worth in me, and Don and Connie didn’t.
That Catholic mind told me last night that I must have been an okay person to get to live in a private park and lodge. This must be a reward.
Last night, as I was basking in the last rays of the sun for the day, and feeling smug about my luck in living here, my thoughts to a sudden turn unbidden. I thought of Andrea Salton. We went to elementary and high school together, but when we were in grade eleven, she died, and last night I thought of all she missed. To be as old and me and as happy as I am.
That lead to reflection on the accumulated lost days of so many good friends who are gone. I often recall these ghosts I happily bear. I’ve wished, all my life, that souls lay on soft beds in massive, beautiful buildings, and each soul has a little bell nearby, and it rings when someone thinks of them, and they know from who’s soul it comes. I still love that idea. It brought worth to missing loved ones, to think that I am ringing their bell.
Pray for rain. Praying works, right?
