Going Nomad |
Ellen doing a Marilyn Monroe in the surf This is my friend Ellen at a beach somewhere in The Netherlands some 30 years ago. Neither one of us can remember which beach this is nor why we were there (unlike me, Ellen has a good reason for this; early onset Alzheimer's is a bitch), but what I do remember is posing in silly poses and silly faces, and lots of laughter. Always laughter with Ellen, then and now. Not entirely what I was trying to pose at. Super woman? The Hulk? When I met Ellen we were teenagers. She was tall, lanky, and gorgeous. She wore a funky hairstyle, short and modern. I wanted that hairstyle too but was never able to pull it off the way she did. She had a wicked sense of humour and still does. We used to laugh till our bellies hurt, and some 30 year later we still do. We went to high-school together and I remember long bike rides, stifled laughter in class, heaps of sandwiches for lunch. I have an old school photo in which I now only recognize Ellen and myself. In the front row, Ellen in black (right), donning a hairstyle that was really funky at the time and me (middle) in dungarees I remember visits to Ellen's family house in the country, her mom as beautiful as Ellen. And the music! Rob de Nijs, Ellen's mom's fave. Malle Babbe, which I thought was a very sexy song. De eenzame fietser by Boudewijn de Groot. Singing our lungs out. I still listen to those old songs when I feel melancholic.
Later on, Ellen ran a hair/art business in the heart of the city of Nijmegen where she combined the display of art with a modern hair salon. I looked up to her. She was an independent owner of a really unique business. Then we lost each other somehow. Her life went one way, mine the other. Then we met again on social media, oddly enough when I had already left The Netherlands behind many years earlier. This was in 2013. In 2014 we met in the flesh and picked up where we had left off, we talked and laughed the whole afternoon. Since then we are tight, the distance is no barrier. She was also my support person when I ran the Marathon of Rotterdam, cycling around town to deliver coffee and sandwiches and wine on the deck afterwards. Happy memories. I have been in Canada long enough that most of my friendships that I had in The Netherlands and that were once close have eroded or simply dissolved with time. Not Ellen. In the 30 years we have known each other there have been good times and sad times, but regardless we make each other laugh. And American writer Madeleine L’Engle said it best: "A good laugh heals a lot of hurts.”
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Photo credit: 5demayo at morgue file I am an outdoor swimmer at heart, but after two back to back solo swim scares (a very curious sealion (see earlier blog entry) and a strong and unexpected current the very next time after that) I decided not to swim out very far out on my own until the weather gets better unless I can get someone in a kayak or boat with me. Instead I bought a three-moth swimming pool pass for distance swims. I am, after all, still committed to swimming to Texada Island this summer. Due to COVID, we need to make reservations for swims, and I reserve only 'lane swimming' slots. After not having been in a pool for a long time and as a relatively puritan outdoor swimmer, I am intrigued by what goes on during 'lane swimming'. I see people with flippers, snorkels, and floating devices, which simply bewilders me in the context of a pool. I see people moving toward the other end vertically, using arm and leg movements that are excruciatingly slow and completely foreign to me. Stranger yet, many people I encounter in a lane swim slot do not actually lane swim. They bob around, just floating around in a vertical position, some chatting with other bobbers, or, also quite popular, they make small jumps on the pool floor in the shallow end, also bewildering to my traditionalist eye. Today I got up early to work on a anthropology project before swimming, and just prior to going to the pool, I read over methodological considerations for anthropological research, about being an insider and outsider at once as one partakes in the activities of interest. Swimming lane after lane, navigating around jumpers and bobbers and vertical movers, I started to think of myself as a swimming anthropologist, being an insider in the sense that I belong to this eclectic group of lane swim participants and I share my own embodied experience of swimming with that of the bobbers and the jumpers and the vertical movers, and yet I am an outsider in the sense that I am one of the very few who uses the lane swim slot to swim lanes. Anthropologists tend to be very cautious not to let preconceived notions of how things 'ought to be' rule their interpretations. Instead they come from a place of curiosity. So I'm thinking there is a paper here. Working title: The seemingly curious decisions of lane swimmers: Alternative interpretations of lane swimming. I have been toying with the idea of swimming to Texada Island for some time now, but a my recent encounter with a sealion is interfering with that plan. But this morning I connected (at last) with the amazing Susan Simmons. We talked swimming, routes, training, and marine life; I told her, at length, about this sealion encounter and how I have not ventured out to the buoy since. "Swim back there as soon as you can; if you don't overcome your fear you'll never swim again" she said. "Get used to being around them" she said, which sounds like a tall order, but sealions, here I come. She suggested finding someone willing to kayak along with me (apparently sealions do not enjoy the sound of a paddle hitting a kayak). I committed to doing so. Secondly, I committed to going over to Victoria, come spring, to swim with her and a few members of the Spirit Orcas . Very exciting. Thirdly, Susan and three members of the Spirit Orcas are swimming from Powell River to Vancouver Island this summer. It will be a supported swim. Susan invited me to come along on that swim (providing, of course, that our pace matches) and guide the group to Texada Island, where my swim would end, and where they would carry on. I currently swim with the Pow Town Popsicles, members of which are supportive of all I do, from being a weary mother to swimming crazy swims, and a few of them have generously and seemingly without a second thought offered to be my support crew. I am very excited for my newly set goals even though I will be nervous as I swim out to the buoy tomorrow. And that's okay; I have my eyes on the prize again. After all, "obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal." –Henry Ford
Well yes and no. Still a lover of the sea and one who finds calm and peace in it, but yesterday I found something else too. Yesterday I found an enormous sealion swimming around and underneath me and nudging my calf. It happened between the pier and the buoy, where I feel a little vulnerable at the best of time; the water is deep and often choppy there, with (also often) a strong pull north bound and with no immediate 'out.' I was nearing the buoy and, as usual, very much in my 'zone.' Swimming is somewhat meditative for me, I swim away in a steady rhythm, only to break it to look for the buoy or the far tip of Texada Island when I lose sight of the buoy in the waves. So I am swimming along, feeling all peaceful and calm as per my being the thalassophile that I am, and then I watched, at first in disbelief, this enormous animal swim underneath me, so close that it nearly touched me. It swam underneath me diagonally, from my right hip to my left shoulder. I wondered, did I actually see that? Was it really there? I stopped swimming to look around and see if I could locate it when I felt a nudge on my right calf. It was really there alright.
In distance I am not too far out, but it feels far. I am close to the buoy, a ways away from the pier and even further away from the beach. Now, the sealions that we have here, Steller Sealions are huge; males weight around 1000kg and are around 11 feet long. Later that day, many of my European friends and family would wave it off, saying "Oh, he probably was just curious." I'd hiss back at them, "Well you try to be chill when a 1500lbs, 11 foot long monstrosity takes a keen interest in you! You see these animals only in the zoo. What do you know? " Anyhow, I am starting to freak out now. The sealion isn't going anywhere. He likes what he sees. I start wondering if he's thinking snack time. My swim group is far away, close to the shore, but they know something is off, I can tell. I see Sherry between me and the group, she has been watching ever since he, unbeknownst to me, started circling me. She is waving and yelling, but I cannot make out what she is trying to say through my hood. I frantically start swimming toward the pier, thinking I'll just scramble up the rocks, away from this really interested animal. I see Sherry swimming toward me, making the most selfless decision to approach me and said sealion to help me out. I feel the sealion near my feet. Sherry and I reach one another. Thankful for her presence, I swim close to her. We kick up a lot of water, trying to make ourselves look as big as possible, with the sealion still in tow for quite some time. We reach the group and the beach. Normally I feel cold and rush home to warm up after a swim but this time I sat on a log in the sun for some time, processing what had just happened. The sea cures all ailments of man. Plato I did not end up in Port Alberni or Qualicum Beach. Instead, I ended up in Powell River , a small town bordering the Pacific Ocean. I found that perfect little house and some land, so come spring I will get my chickens, my veggie patch, some more fruit trees. Maybe more dogs. Over the past months, I experienced stress between me and my ex, whom I consider otherwise a great friend, the move to Powell River, during the same time, no matter how exciting, was also stressful, and on top of that, my son was in hospital six times between May and December with overdoses, which has been gruelling. I was not myself for some time under the weight of these stressors, especially those related to my son walking a tightrope between life and death. Now, after months of agony and anxiety, a sense of renewal has come over me. My son is in treatment with a no contact with the outside world rule, which, after all the turmoil we have gone through, feels restful and therapeutic. Recently, the sealions arrived en masse for rest and food as they migrate from Alaska to California. They piled up on the beach and pier, barking, sleeping, playing. I could hear them in the early morning on my property, which I found magical. I went to see them most afternoons, just sitting on a log on the beach with a thermos of tea. Watching them and listening to their relentless barks daily was wholesome. Then there is the ocean and the group of women (aka the Pow Town Popsicles) who swim daily and who have taken me in. The combination of being in and near the ocean, the kind and gentle support from this group for my trials and tribulations with my son, and the daily laughter (the laughter! Not long ago it was a particularly stormy day and we were hooting and hollering and howling with laughter like children in the waves!) have been healing. I recently learned that there is a word for these women and myself; we are thalassophiles; meaning we are lovers of the sea and find calm and peace in it. Photo credit: Shelly Duke Rysdale Russel Indeed, as Rainer Maria Rilke, Bohemian Austrian poet (1875-1926), put it: When anxious, uneasy and bad thoughts come, I go to the sea, and the sea drowns them out with its great wide sounds, cleanses me with its noise, and imposes a rhythm upon everything in me that is bewildered and confused.
This week we are in Salmo, BC. Gary and I joined my best friend on her annual trip home there. The Friday we left was the start of a long weekend, so loads of traffic. It was then that I realized that you piss a lot of people off by driving a 1989 Mazda B2200. My little truck goes 80km an hour at the best of time. Mountain passes? Depending on how steep, between 60 and 40 km an hour. A few passes were so steep that the truck sank even below 40. Remember that many of these passes are only two lanes with the odd passing lane. That Friday I lost count of the number of fingers I was given, honked at, or profanities shouted at. First stop was Osoyoos, where it was a sweltering 41C when we got there. Early next day we left for Salmo, with a stop for food at a farmers’ market in Rock Creek. One stand had a barbeque and offered breakfast sandwiches. I asked for one and a coffee and added, ‘no meat.’ Stunned, they looked at each other (best guess father/daughter duo), then they looked at me as if in disbelief. Looking for property, I knew I would not fit in too well in this community. But a few minutes later I got my meat-free breakfast and I was on my way. I was going to use my new truck tent on my friends mom’s property, but as it happened, between my friend, her mom, her sister, and her sister’s partner, there were seven dogs, and seeing that one of those is not good with other dogs, and seeing that Gary is not good with other dogs, I thought the better of it and picked the local “Salmo overnight rest area.” There I fist met Jeff Fillmore. Jeff is from Nova Scotia, he took a one-way flight to Vancouver BC and is on his walk walking back home. Yes, that’s right. Walking from Vancouver across the country to Nova Scotia, bringing awareness to mental health. We connected and since he stayed an extra day for rest, we had a beer or two on both nights. I also met Clee from Cape Town, South Africa. Clee is a multi-sport machine who was on a long-distance cycling trip. Or let me rephrase this. What for most would be long distance (80-90km per day). For him this was a walk in the park after having cycled from Penticton to Argentina. He too stayed an extra day and he too had a beer or two with me. Turns out that, small world, we have an old acquaintance in common, and the next day, I met another Gary who was that day supposed to be in Zwolle, Netherlands, for wounded warriors, a charity and veterans service organization for wounded veterans of military actions. I had done my BA in PE many years in Zwolle. Small world again. The final evening of the long weekend we all sat around Clee’s spot, talking, laughing, enjoying some beer. Tuckered out, Gary laid with us on his blanket, content to be there. To me those evenings are such part of camping. Connecting with people and making new friends. The weekend is over and it seems like Gary and I are alone now in this quiet, peaceful “overnight rest area” in our spot under the giant cedar trees. When I was on the island for Nootka I found out, through dear old friends of mine who live in Port Alberni, that, to my surprise, I am now in a position to make a life-long dream a reality. This dream involves, of course, rescue animals. I decided to act on this surprise finding immediately. Gave my tenants notice, cleaned, renovated, and repaired the rental unit, and this afternoon it will go on the market. With this I made a few other big decisions; all that have left me feeling liberated. And as I write this I am on my second trip to the island for some property shopping. I’m thinking two, three acres, small house. Ideally a barn. Aside from dogs, I’m thinking goats and ducks and chickens. Initially I was also thinking pig, but after reading some informative and hilarious articles thought better of it. So, I am en route. Initially I was going to truck tent it with Gary, but ferries are fully booked (and I do not fancy waiting three or so sailings in the line-ups), plus it’s stinking hot, far too hot for Gary and so I left Gary at home and walked on instead. My Port Alberni friends are awesome; they are picking me up (as they did the first island property shopping trip) and joining me and the realtor for extra sets of eyes. I'll stay the night in their awesome suite, which will soon be on Airbnb (more on that later). Today, stop 1: Qualicum Beach area. Tomorrow, stop 2: Port Alberni.
Last week I took my gorgeous big blind Dane Mastiff named Nootka back to the west-coast of Vancouver Island, where he came from. He knew, possibly remembered from when he was a babe, that the beach was a wide open space, with nothing to bump in to, and he walked, ran, played with such ease and joy that it warmed my heart. We met his first mom every day and with each visit he seemed to remember that first connection a little more. We connected with old friends, had great food, good wine. He is getting old, outlived his life expectancy, but I hope there will be another visit in the cards for him, maybe this fall. We are back in the city now, longing for the island, but with happy memories.
This is Nootka, my blind, 9-year old Great Dane-Mastiff cross. He outlived his life expectancy; Danes and Mastiffs, considered giant breeds, have short lives, on average between five and seven years. For that reason they are called 'the heartbreak breed;' often very affectionate, they leave far too soon. Luckily not the case thus far for Nootka. He is aging quickly though, and recently experienced a little heartbreak when his life-time pal and helper (in case of fear/freeze response when stuck or off trail in the forest) Hunter died.
Nootka came to me from the island when he was about seven months. In those first months he spent time on the beautiful beaches of Vancouver Islands Pacific Coasts. Now that he is getting older, and feeling the sense that he may not be with me for too much longer, I decided to take him back to experience those beaches and the sea one last time. We will visit his first mom and reconnect with some old friends. Nootka loves going for a drive. Sometimes he will climb into my tiny two seater (he does not fit very well in the passenger seat; his paws and head are in my lap; it's the only way he can be comfortable) when I am just unpacking groceries, in which case I just take him for a drive around the block, just because I can't say no to him. So next week we're of to Tofino for another drive, another adventure ...
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