Steak
Baked potatoes
Caesar Salad
Vin Rouge
So Bud arrives at my site,
saying that seeing it was such a beautiful
day he thought I may wish to stay
one more night.
I am ecstatic.
We stow his (quite large) backpack of
supper makings in the treetop kitchen,
then return to the water’s edge, strip,
and spend a glorious hour, floating,
treading water, and talking.
After a meal of cheese, crackers,
trail mix, and a bag of fresh crudités,
which he has gifted to me,
(the best gift after nine days),
we take my cedar stretcher frame
out into the water.
Bud gathers up the unused cedar poles
and lays them across it, lashing them
to the frame with some of my fine
strong rope, and creates the best sort of
impromptu raft.
Like two eleven-year-olds, we play on
this, paddling it out into the lake.
At one point, Bud heads for shore and
retrieves two still quite cool bottles of
Steamwhistle from the bow of his canoe.
And swims them out to the raft.
When I am too cold to stay in the water
any longer,
we get a good cooking fire going and,
bundle up in hoodies, trackpants,
red wool socks.
Later, he pours me a cup of wine,
and proceeds to single-handedly
concoct dinner.
It just doesn’t get any better than this.
*
“I love you not only for what you are,
but for what I am when I am with you.
I love you not only for what you have
made of yourself,
but for what you are making of me.
I love you for the part of me you bring
out;
I love you for putting your hand in my
heaped up heart
and passing over all the foolish weak
things
that you can’t help dimly seeing there
and for drawing out into the light all the
beautiful belongings
that no one else has looked quite far
enough to find.
I love you because you are helping me
to make
out of the lumber of my life not a tavern
but a temple;
out of the works of my every day
not a reproach but a song.
I love you because you have done
more than any creed could have done
to make me good,
and more than any fate to make me happy.”
- from the writings of the Jewish poet,
Martin Buber
*
August , 2014
On a windy late-August morning, a day
with clouds scuttling across the sky like
banners, a dark blue Ford rental car
pulled up at our door.
I could see the slightly apprehensive
look on the driver’s face even
from the kitchen window.
She took a minute to organize things
then stepped out,
her long-legged seven-year-old
climbing out of the back.
We were outside before they needed to
figure out which door to go to.
Bud went to Meg, took her hands in his,
had a long moment of eye contact and
grinned like a new father.
It was a meeting with only a moment of
awkwardness.
As he described later, as soon as they
were face to face,
he could see himself in her.
She was very like Wren, with Bud’s
colouring and facial features, but her
manner, the way she moved,
her expressions, were Wren.
I felt the unstoppable tears
and laughingly hugged her.
The child, Elle, was unbelievably like
Ginny.
As the visit progressed, we told Elle
about 'Aunt Ginny’, and about her
unknown Windsor great-grandparents.
Elle was keen on drawing,
and I hauled out markers and paper.
She showed interest in my studio,
in my paints and brushes, handling them
carefully.
I suggested that next time she visited
perhaps she could paint.
Her response was to turn to her mother
and say:“Can we come back here again?”
I was stunned by how comfortably Meg
and Bud chatted.
While Elle and I drew, Bud took Meg
outside to see the canoe shed and
his latest canoe refurbishment.
When they returned,
we had a buffet lunch.
We had a gift for Elle, but waited for
the right moment, not wanting to
overwhelm anyone.
She unwrapped it carefully,
and gasped in delight when she saw
a mini watercolour set which folded out
to reveal paints, brush, a small water
container and a wee pad of paper.
She examined them all,
then replaced everything and
closed it up again,
at least six times.
We talked about Wren.
While Elle was busy drawing, Meg told us
about her illness, but also about her work,
her success as an editor and publisher,
her marriage to David.
She was keen to know about her mother
when we knew her. I heard myself describe
the Wren I first knew and loved -
about camp, canoe trips,
a mutual love of Trinity Lake.
I thought this would be difficult for Bud,
but looking directly at Meg, he added:
“Trinity Lake was wilderness back then.
The three of us did the Loop in ’74,
a pretty rugged route.
Your mother was a star on a canoe trip…
a much better canoeist than me.”
They left mid afternoon, heading for an
overnight in Ottawa before returning to
Montreal.
We made a tentative plan to have them
come and stay with us for the
Thanksgiving weekend,
with the hope that Ginny and Margie
would come as well.
As they were leaving, Elle spotted our
collection of paddles,
hanging in the hallway.
She gently touched the smallest one,
pointing out to her mother
the burnt initials.
D. B. B. 11 1966
Me: “That was my paddle when I was
at camp.”
Elle: “What’s zipaya….?
Me: “zip adee doo dah.
It’s from a song. A happy song.
It reminds me of someone I loved
very much.
Elle: “Oh.”
And then,
“What should I call you?”
Bud: “How about Bud and Beck?”
As they turned the corner on the
laneway and were no longer
in sight, me to a smiling Bud,
saying the only thing left to say.
Wow.
