Ordinarily at this time of year Jan and I would be reveling among the mosquitoes and blackflies of Boularderie Island, Cape Breton. I’d be going on about my renewed acquaintance with eastern warblers or regaling my tiny band of readers with the joys of hiking swamps and bogs with my darling gumbooted identical-twin cousins Lynn and Louise. Or perhaps I’d be rhapsodizing about the culinary delights afforded at the Big Bras d’Or wharf by my lobstermen cousins and friends who are out and about at 3:30 a.m. these days to capture comestible crustaceans for crusty curmudgeons such as myself.
On Sunday, lured outside by a great street commotion just
outside my window, I got myself a lifer – my first-ever pride parade. It was a
jaw-dropping sight for the likes of me: bearded men wearing pink brassieres,
chartreuse knickers and precious little else; young women with purple hair,
topless but for bits of electrical tape forming Xs across their nipples. And
much, much more. There may have been ten thousand people jammed into Oswego
Street between Belleville and Simcoe, who knows. I have every confidence that I
may have been the oldest, certainly the squarest of them all. I departed
wondering just when it was that life had passed me by.
So why am I on the west coast, not the east? Well as it
turns out in early March I discovered, quite by accident, that my old nemesis –
kidney stones – had reared its ugly head again. I first experienced the
questionable delight of renal calculi at age 22, my first kidney stone surgery
a year later at 23, in India. I have a marvelous right-side scar as souvenir of
my experience with the renal surgeons of Punjab. In the ensuing 46 years I
doubt twelve months have ever passed without some sort of nephritic adventure. But
in March I reached a new pinnacle: both kidneys ‘shot through’ with stones, as
the physician in charge so charmingly expressed it. Since then I have been a
gross and sprawling charge upon the coffers of Her Majesty’s British Columbia
medical plan – right-side surgery in April, left-side a couple of weeks ago. I
am not yet out of the woods: a third, urgent surgery is mooted in the next
short while. It seems certain I will not return to Cape Breton before the
mid-July end of lobster season.
But I count my blessings. Between surgeries I relished
three days of hiking in the mountains of Washington’s Olympic National Park
with Jan and pals Mary and Mike. It was a glorious time: oceans of wildflowers,
infinite alpine vistas, a good soak in one of the park’s natural hot springs.
Having
not spent a July in Victoria since the last century I discover that there is
plenty to keep one distracted: neighbourhood ceilidhs, frequent concerts in the
park, the July 1st fireworks extravaganza. I get up early to
photograph the sun impersonating a red rubber ball in the smoke-filled eastern
sky. One needn’t sit at home pondering whether the living room needs a fresh
coat of paint.
Meanwhile, I rely on the Cape Breton Post to keep me informed of the comings and goings my
lobster-fisher pals at Big Bras d’Or. Environment Canada freshens my Baddeck
seven-day weather forecast. When I fire up the computer I am greeted by a
lovely image of the cabin, in sunshine, reminding me in no uncertain terms of
what I love about the wrinkled old place.
I cannot say just when I’ll be unlocking the gate at the
end of my road but be assured of this: it will be no later than circumstance
allows.
