June 25th, 2008 writerspice
Today is the last day of school in my neck of the woods. And what that means is that my dear husband will soon be wandering around the house, watching DVD episodes of long-cancelled TV shows in the middle of the afternoon and generally attempting to find something to do. By August, he’ll be hanging around my office – I’m b-o-o-o-red… – as I struggle to maintain my fledgling career.
If he wasn’t a Luddite, I might expect some trouble from those comments, because the truth of it (what can I say? I’m a writer, I make stuff up) is more like this: canoe to be patched in the backyard, sailboat to be painted and polished, summer course to take, solo camping trip to embark on and a whole number of other things that, really, aren’t all that bad at all… I’m sure he’ll still find some time to catch those afternoon naps, closing his eyes against the glare on the TV screen.
And more power to him, I say. After all, who can resist the pull of the season of sun, when a few short months ago the view out our front door looked like this:
Now, instead of snow-shovelling, you might find us plowing through a medium of a different sort. One more watery, more blue, more relaxing, more like this (Lake Simcoe, a couple weekends ago):
HAPPY SUMMER, EVERYONE!
Posted in Orillia, Pretty Pictures, Seasons | No Comments »
May 23rd, 2008 writerspice
Last week, I went to the countryside town of Uxbridge, Ontario on assignment. While there, I wandered into Bredin’s Bakery, bell jingling and old-fashioned porch door slamming behind me.
Inside, as a fourth-generation baker toiled away in the background, I tasted some cookies I’m pretty sure they are serving on simple china plates on a fluffy white cloud in, um, heaven.
Here’s a photo of a baked-goods buyer, perplexed over what delicious bit of paradise pastries she should purchase.
Either that, or she’s wondering what I’m doing, bent over, aiming a camera at her face. Ah, well. It made for a good shot of this simple bakery with delicious fare.
I’m glad I went. Who can argue with contented crumb-fingered sighs?
(And, yeah, okay, I guess this is me officially coming-out as no longer gluten-free – a long, controversial story that can be summed up by saying, nobody knows one’s body like the person who has to live in it).
Posted in Food, Ontario, Pretty Pictures, Recommended | 1 Comment »
May 8th, 2008 writerspice
Busy, busy, busy. Working ten-hour days this week, while the world outside shifts between grey skies and sunshine, edged in cold and warm, air weighted in moments with humidity. Off to Uxbridge tomorrow for an assignment, while another lies all over my desk like an exploded bomb.
In the midst of it all, bum sore from sitting on the hard chair, shoulder aching from moving the mouse too much, I take a break and wander over to Flickr, to look at some of my friend A.’s photographs.
They make me happy – these moments she snaps – how she can stop the everyday rush and grab the beautiful, the humourous, the graceful, the elaborate, the simple image out of the obliteration of time and freeze it into something extraordinary.
She certainly has the eye.
Posted in Art, Pretty Pictures, Recommended, Writing Life | No Comments »
May 5th, 2008 writerspice
This Saturday, J. and I took advantage of a break in the rain to head out to Grant’s Woods, a 52-acre section of forest protected by the Couchiching Conservancy, a land-trust organization that oversees the maintenance of several important acreages in and around Lakes Couchiching and Simcoe.
With Ollie on leash, we wandered the 1.5 kilometre Trillium Trail, stopping at several numbered spots to learn about bittersweet vine, yellow birch, salamanders and other facts of the forest. Most of the trilliums are just about to bloom, their tightly-wrapped white flowers waiting for the sun, but we did see a few of the rarer red variety, wide open.
But what I love most about being in the woods on a wet spring day is the smell. Sweet and spicy, that heady aroma of freshly melting mud mixed with sprouting cedar and other awakening wild stuff always reminds me of the very best times in my life – living in a B.C. rain-forest, wandering through the woods behind my childhood home.
And this forest is especially special. Says the website:
“…it is the woodlands on this property that are its true value. Except for the removal of a few dead trees for firewood, this upland forest has not been touched for over a century. The result today is a fine old-growth stand with towering hard maple, white ash, red oak, white pine, and hemlock. The soils here are deep moist sands, ideal conditions to produce tall, straight, healthy trees. They also produce water – lots of small cool streams in shallow ravines, which collect together to form one of the headwaters of the North River. Indigo buntings occur along the woodland edges. In the shade of the forest, Christmas fern and spring wildflowers are abundant.”
With several more trails yet to explore and the changes of the seasons to watch, Jason and I will be back there soon. Maybe even for Mother Earth Day, this coming Saturday (May 10) when local bands will be playing in the gazebo, accompanying a native smudge ceremony by Mnjikaning First Nation elder and storyteller Mark Douglas, a spinner who works with husky fur, snake and turtle demonstrations and bird-nesting-box building for kids, alongside lots of other activities… (for more information, go to the homepage of the Couchiching Conservancy website and scroll down). A great way to celebrate mother’s day, if you’re in the area.
Photograph by Lauren Carter
Posted in Orillia, Pretty Pictures, Recommended, Seasons | 3 Comments »
April 14th, 2008 writerspice
This morning I loaded a mix of Yo Yo Ma and Danny Michell on my MP3 player and walked Ollie, our dog, up the hill to an old pioneer cemetery, stuck in a quiet corner a stone’s throw from a gas station and busy grocery store. In the east, the sun was climbing the sky over the slowly sinking skin of the lake and this is what I found:
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March 3rd, 2008 writerspice
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a photojournalist for National Geographic. Last year I managed to somewhat fulfill this life-long ambition, when a story I pitched to their travel mag, National Geographic Traveler, was accepted.
In August, J. and I jumped in the car and headed back to that little bit of Europe, that pastoral paradise (pictured above) where we honeymooned in 2003 – Ile d’Orleans, Quebec. And this month, my brief piece about the island is making its public appearance, on page 114 of the March issue. Check it out!
Photo by Jason Mills
Posted in Other Places in Canada, Pretty Pictures, Writing Life | 1 Comment »
December 10th, 2007 writerspice
The Festival of Lights is on right now in Niagara Falls and that’s where J. and I spent the weekend. The town sure has changed since we were kids. Back then, the two grand waterfalls and the amusement park atmosphere of Clifton Hill were the main draws. These days, the casino brings in countless visitors. As we took in the glittering light displays along the Niagara Parkway and wandered around during the day, we looked for signs of an even older Niagara Falls, one that drew 1950s honeymooners rather than visitors handing over coin at the casinos. This motel on Lundy’s Lane was one such sign: a perfect classic of kitsch.
Posted in Ontario, Pretty Pictures | No Comments »
November 26th, 2007 writerspice
I’ve been going through my pictures recently – you know, that ubiquitous crate full of matte paper snaps left over from pretty much every moment before digital cameras came of age – and found a bunch from my trip to Ecuador in 2000.
A remedy for a broken heart (I left on Valentine’s Day), this trip was a whirlwind two weeks in the cheapest, closest country I could think of. Mostly I stayed in Baños, a small town in the central-south region, with hot springs and hardly any people around. Tungurahua, the active volcano nearby in the Andes, had erupted in the fall and kept threatening to go again so many people had evacuated. Weirdly festive banners showing the proper route to take should the crater start oozing still hung in the streets. In the town’s cathedral, murals painted over hundreds of years showed scenes from the previous 15 eruptions – think women in old-fashioned dress running from fire-tongues while frightened angels looked on. But by then, with the last eruption five-months past, the town still bustled a little bit with tourists and locals who ran restaurants, hotels and bars.
What a trip that was! In Quito, I met and immediately clicked with a Spanish-speaking French Canadian woman and the two of us travelled together for pretty much the entire time, basing ourselves in one spot, lolling about in the steaming hot springs, getting to know the locals and even helping some Ecuadorians open up a nightclub, where bands played folk music and the wait staff served deadly traditional drink in clay jugs. Our hotel room, our home away from home for the fortnight, cost us each $2 US.
I also did a five-day trek into the jungle. The picture above was taken during that excursion. Andres, from Brazil, is standing closest to the camera. Despite a total language gap – no Portuguese for me, no English for him – we got along famously. A kindred spirit, he reminded me so much of my dear friend Darrin, a happy-go-lucky traveller who once wandered his way from Vancouver, B.C. to Panama and back.
This trek was tough and beautiful, with lots of rubber-boot-sucking mud and hard uphill climbs and one particular fruit that seemed to come from a fairy land: it tasted exactly like vanilla ice cream. When I complained, using plenty of miming and sneezing and blowing of the nose, about a nagging sinus infection, Eduardo, our Shuar guide, peeled back the bark of a tree, scraped some of its fleshy green insides into a rolled up banana leaf, mixed it with water and gestured that I snort it up my nose. I did. It was a bit like combining some illicit drug with super-extra-strength nasal spray. Apart from the minor fire that flared in my brain (or maybe because of it), my breathing passages opened right up.
But that was then. Things have changed a lot since this pic was snapped. Tungurahua has not been quiet, causing the local tourist trade to die down. The country’s decision to adopt the U.S. dollar has also created some chaos. But still, Ecuador remains a beautiful and compelling country, well worth exploring and extremely photogenic.
Posted in Pretty Pictures, World | 2 Comments »
November 23rd, 2007 writerspice
A peaceful morning moment in Orillia, Ontario. One thing I love about this town: how the streets turn into an old-fashioned tableaux as soon as the first snow arrives.
Posted in Orillia, Pretty Pictures, Seasons | No Comments »
November 11th, 2007 writerspice
Yesterday J. and I went over to Collingwood for the day. On the way home, we stopped at the Edenvale Conservation Area and watched as the setting sun turned the Nottawasaga River into a lovely portrait of the identical world.
Posted in Pretty Pictures, Simcoe County | No Comments »
