old places

It was a different trip this time - in June I was still dispelling the damp of the previous 7+ months and craving the open landscape and dryer air and lack of moss and slugs. But leaving the coast at the tail end of a glorious summer, hard on the heels of a home birth here in the cabin and beach days on Texada and skinny dipping in our creek with baby Coho, stained with blackberry juice, it felt wrong. I didn't need the change and I wasn't escaping anything. It was one long weekend, this summer with felix and while it was so much work, taking on the blue jobs and dealing with some minor disasters without a partner, it was also without volatility and gin bottles and male aggression. I knew what I was coming home every time and usually it was a cat, or sheep calling out to me, but never passive aggressive day drunkenness or whirlwind mood changes or a man covered in tree pitch and sawdust sitting in an armchair in the dark, mindlessly scrolling, hangry. But we went north and east and we went to beloved places and saw beloved friends. Fell asleep to coyotes singing at the ranch, antler sheds and dead flies on the window ledges, took down electric fence in the far fields with the red sun going down behind Pinatan and the full moon coming up from behind Martin Mt, crickets and swaying end of summer grasses in between. Apparently I value experiences more for my child than regular bedtimes (nap tomorrow?) and he learned to play the bugle as we made an impromptu band with melissa (bangolele) and her roommate (dulcimer) after the outdoor bath in the cast iron tub under the sunflowers and before all sleeping outside under the moon. The train went by at the bottom of the driveway just as felix was drifting off. We cleaned twelve cabins at the caravan and I showed felix the tackshed, leaning, no porch anymore, or painted name boards of clydsdales long gone. Showed him the draft horseshoes set into the cement at the bathroom building, the inside of which smelled like every winter show I'd ever done there. I did not linger in the cookshack, home of many many memories, nor did I see Shack L'Amour where John loved to stay, nor did I let old stories pull me away too much, roasting, betrayal, deceipt, a hot slap to the face, first looks and double takes and poems ripped out of anthologies and slipped into mail slots in -25 degrees. A big grey steaming percheron with worried eyes and bloody saliva and fergie drinking all the whiskey and us partying in snow pants, all the songs and lines we learned to the plays we watched half a hundred times, travelling with steve and ellen in the suburban, galloping drafts bareback with city actors in deep snow. With felix, I got to discover the caravan how it is today, some old, some new, three black drafts crowded round the cookshack porch, heads in the shade, swishing flies. Pears falling off the tree, unwanted. New plywood cabins with no character, red shack taking on the contours of the land. After the caravan, we bought steaks and a roast chicken and waited at Cameron's house for him, sitting in the porch swing in the middle of an overgrown backyard, dirty white socks hanging on the line, while his three legged pitbull begged for scraps. There's a life sized horse made of leather draft harness, hames as legs, hanging in his shed, surrounded by articles of discarded clothing, computer bits and pieces, beer cans, instruments, furniture pulled apart. Bits of armour Cameron made. Felix got shown every instrument in the music room, the only room without drifts of laundry in the corners, a suitcase keyboard, a fiddle from the 1700's, giant kalimbas, indonesian harp guitars, stand up bass's made of a drum and the neck of a guitar. When cameron put on the rest of his armour (a zorro style hat made of a saudi tea platter and a copper pot on top) felix industriously strummed the bass and told me later it was to keep the worry at bay. Nathan showed up at 9:30 at night on a weekday with a 6 pack and talked kiwi with felix who hid behind melissa's legs and proceeded to call everyone he could think of on the two disconnected rotary phones he found in a corner. A pot kept falling off the shelf. We went through a picture album of cameron from childhood onwards, and he's one of those faces that doesn't stay the same, is not instantly recognizeable through the years. He stopped flipping forward when we got to the first pictures of Maryka. We left with a child sized cowichan sweater we found under a guitar case and felix got a small black ukelele with the sweetest tone. He strummed to me as I drove. And a tender gentle slow reunion of erstwhile friends; pulling into Mahina's yard was a bit surreal and I'm glad Fergie wasn't there - we needed to just be intuitive and quiet with each other, with Felix as our focus, bringing us both closer and sparing any awkwardness. It's been ten years. We used to be so close. She moves so gracefully and before long Felix was leading a saddled and bridled Nissa to the round pen and getting his first riding lesson. It was unexpected and beautiful and the absolute highlight of the trip. She spoke flowingly and conversationally and quietly, not seeming to instruct but teaching nonetheless. Pausing to look up at a hawk, asking felix if he could hear the bees, offering for him to close his eyes as she led the horse, and how does it feel in your body? Wouldn't you like to see your mom ride the horse? as she was already pulling the saddle off and leading nissa to the mounting block. My mind went blank except for a rushing noise and I swung up bareback, couldn't wipe the grin off my face as I walked and trotted circles and figure eights and asked for leg yields and bends, collection and extension. There exists a picture I have never seen on Fergie's cell phone of Felix and I on a Fjord, I'm probably grinning and squinting like a maniac. Mahina had to go to another riding lesson and I took F to Ford Road, an old favorite. I gathered Oregon Grape root for some fresh tincturing and explained where the medicine was. We made our way a cautious distance into a field of standing corn, dry husks rubbing together in the breeze. We spent five, ten mintues at each ponderosa on the walk back to the car, pulling jigsaw puzzle pieces of bark off and naming shapes as if they were clouds. We gathered gobs of pitch. We took pictures of each other with the dslr. And of course, we went to the river in enderby. I have been looking forward to bringing F there since he was conceived and while it was very smokey and a little late in the day and not that warm, it was still magical enough, under the cliffs, with the sparkling rippled sand and clear shallow water and just enough current for a little boy to float along in two feet of water. Public concert 70's cover band enderby city park dance party afterwards. Felix alternately half slept on melissa or my back or danced wildly to ABBA inside a protective circle of adults in the sparkle of disco balls. The ranch feels like homebase to us now, we watched wheel of fortune and jeopardy with steve and ellen in the main house, gave our plates to the ancient blind dog to lick clean, I drank some wine out of the fireweed cup I have always used there since 17 years, felix ran in and out, ellen and I talked about horses that used to be there, would be again, or would never again be, or horses that were arriving, new. Steve, undeterred by living past his 'due date' by a couple years, now wears shorts or sweats, no jeans and boots anymore. We left with bouquets of peacock feathers, ellen was weed whacking around the house, around the horse femurs the dogs were gnawing on, steve made a genial pass at me, we laughed because that's steve and no one would expect any thing else, goats were gathering to make mischief and gemran girls were harnessign horses and a a barn kitten was in a crate next to me about to leave the ranch and live on the coast. I listened to all the country stations on the 15 hour trip back to powell river, drove through a wildfire, stopped at one car show and two thrift stores and had one sailing wait. We sat down with a juno nominated brazilian musician on the ferry and felix showed off his new ukelele. Upon entering powell river city limits at 11pm, a black bear ran across the road in front of me. I've seen a bear a day every day since then.