Helloooo my starlings! Many days have passed since last we met. I went up to the cottage for a slightly elongated long weekend, but after two months of confinement, it feels like I went further, and longer. We were SO excited to go! A new place! Close to nature! A chance to see friends and family (from a distance)! A chance to feel normal again! An excuse to use too many exclamation marks!

 

It wasn’t a total disappointment. The best part was seeing Aidan and Jamie, as we agreed to extend our household to include them. They have only been seeing Jamie’s parents, who themselves have been seeing no one else, so we feel pretty confident that the circle is unbroken. Also, in the interest of full disclosure, we did visit with John’s sister at her cottage, in her huge screened-in porch, with her household (my nieces and their boyfriends) and ours at opposite ends of the room, with a bench in between. Every single person works from home, so again, a closed circle, more or less. We brought our own cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, and never crossed the line. It was … okay. Wonderful to see everyone, but it was noisy, as everyone had to raise their voice to be heard, and, well, distant. If this is the new norm, it will take some getting used to.

 

The weather wasn’t bad, but every time the sun came out, the bugs did too. The trees were barely in bud, and, as many cottagers elected to stay home, the lake was very quiet, and a little bleak. We spent an inordinate amount of time deciding where to build the new tool shed, playing an inordinate amount of games (Ticket to Ride, Monopoly, Cathedral and Screw Your Neighbour), and drinking an inordinate amount of Cottage Springs Vodka Soda (Jamie’s brother’s company). After a day or two, the novelty wore off, and I found myself wanting to go back to the city, to the same four walls I’d been staring at since early March. So we did. We left Monday, a day earlier than planned. The trip home was a little hellish, as we were loaded down with garbage, debris, and two dogs, who are not lap dogs, on our laps. Normally, we would endure this until we got to the dump, about 20 minutes from the lake, but guess what? The dump was closed. So was the next one. They all were. Covid hours, closed on statutory holidays, because that makes PERFECT SENSE. We had to drive two and half hours home, surrounded by stinky garbage and stinky breathed dogs. Also, Aidan and Jamie, who left earlier than us, got a speeding ticket, Aidan’s first, doing 100 in an 80 km zone. Aidan says he got the feeling the officer was not happy to see him, although he DID have a gun in his pocket. All to say that cottage country is not ready to welcome us back with open arms, and maybe it shouldn’t be.

 

One other result from our country weekend: Ronan has taken to whittling. He and Katherine like to play chess, and we don’t have a set at the cottage, so he decided he would whittle one, with one of my paring knives. Of course we made fun of him, because a chess set has 32 pieces, of various complexity, and oh, by the way, Ro has never whittled anything before. Well, wouldn’t you know that by Monday, he had made 5 pieces: a bishop, a knight, a rook, and 2 pawns, and furthermore, they weren’t half bad. He’s improving daily, so much so that he’s now whittling in the city, leaving little piles of sawdust and wood shavings wherever he goes. I will show you some of his work, once he lets me. I’m not sure this is the right career path for him, but it’ll do for the moment. One has to have goals.

 

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