A big regret was that the Monkeys and us didn't get to go camping. We were going to head down to Bear Falls and I went so far as to book a spot, but it poured rain that weekend, so we did the city break thing of coffee shops and book shops and spent time in Doulls buying second hand books, and then spent more time sipping cappucino in the PaperChase. Which was cool because they had the front of the shop down (it's all glass) and there was an almighty thunder and lightening storm which we got to watch from a sofa.
As usual in Doulls, I went in with nothing particularly in mind and got some great books just by wandering around a bit:
Jonathan Raban's Coasting, and his Passage to Juneau.
Colin Thubron's Behind the Wall (I have nearly all of his work now).
Wayne Johnston's The Custodian of Paradise (I have everything of his now).
and Mrs. Monkey bought me Ahab's Wife.
Added to that, I got Vikram Chandra's Sacred Games, and Orhan Pamuk's Snow for my birthday.
Also, I got an Amazon voucher which I used to buy Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policeman's Union, as well as some books on Costa Rica which I am going to use to whet my appetite and try to get myself organised to go there sometime.
And I also bought Michael Ondjaate's Desiridata.
So the last four weeks have been mainly about trying to get all these books read.
I got through Sacred Games in about ten days, despite its size. Great book. Great great great. A most wonderful description of Mumbai. I spent most of the time I was reading dreaming about Indian food, to the extent that I broke off one day and cooked a biryani because I wanted one so badly. Well, I tried to cook and read at the same time, so it wasn't the best biryani in the world, and then I didn't have any yoghurt so I had to put the book DOWN and drive to the supermarket to get the yoghurt. And then because I had growled at Himself for being in the same world that did that to me and I had to leave the book down while we ate and be nice to him, the break actually kept me from the book for an entire hour, the biryani was probably a mistake.
You always know when you have a great book because the only time you stop to eat is if you can prepare the food while reading the book. That's why I always have cheese and crackers in the house.
Nevertheless, I got through the next part of the book with a lovely full tummy and the slight taste of yoghurt and cumin in the back of my throat so it was nearly as good as being in India.
Great characterisation, and a great description of the politics that nearly tore Mumbai apart in the nineties, and which will probably nearly do so again sometime soon.
Very strange ending though. The book ends. And then there's this totally random epilogue, which creates a sense of 'oh yeah, how interesting'. But I felt the ending was not expanded enough and the epilogue was a bit of a rush job on a sub-plot that the author insisted be left in.
It would be interesting to know whether his editor agreed with him.
After that I tackled Raban.
Coasting first.
He took off on a converted fishing boat to coast around the UK coastline while Thatcher broke the miners and declared war on Argentina over the Falklands.
Coasting was pretty easy. It's only a small thin volume, so I started using the lovely yellow organic cotton bag that my friend Barbara sent me for my birthday and just took it out every time I had a minute.
In fact, the bag is now my handbag of choice because I can fit my book and my camera and my coffee mug and all the rest of my crap in it and I am SET for the summer.
I will cry when I wear a hole in the bottom of it, as I will do because I wreck every bag I love through overuse.
Think small girl trailing dirty one-armed teddy bear through mud, fast-forwarded thirty years.
So the attempt to read the book in between the chaos that is my summer went off pretty well and I still managed to get enough time to sit around and think about Raban's views on life, love and the importance of being in touch with the ocean. Which is an important part of life.
If you are interested in politics, or English people, or class structures, or the sea, and you ever find a copy of this book buy it and bring it home and treasure it.
I was so energised by Raban's writing that I decided to head straight into Passage to Juneau. I reckoned that I would be sorted for this one, even though it's a lot longer than Coasting, because Himself and I were having OUR WEEKEND.
It had been a long time in the coming. Since January, we have been raising a teenager. Then when she went home for the summer, we have hosted innumerable barbeques, backyard parties, camping trips, evenings in, evenings out, worked pretty solidly and kept the cogs of life going.
We sat looking at each other one evening over the dinner table and said:
HOW ABOUT WE SPEND THE WEEKEND TOGETHER, DUDE?
Enter Syd.
I work with Syd.
We did a two day work trip up the Eastern Shore a few weeks back and on the way home I told Syd that Himself and I love to camp.
Syd had a camp.
Way back in the woods.
Would we like to stay there sometime.
Would we what!
I went home and told Himself.
Himself didn't talk about anything else for the ten days it took to get three days off and the key from Syd.
We drove ninety minutes up the Eastern Shore and inland to Mooseland.
Yes, boys and girls, there is a place in Nova Scotia called Mooseland.
Syd got out his four wheeler and we drove down a back road for a couple of miles and met him and his wife Nancy at a crossroads.
Yes, boys and girls, I work with a Syd who is married to a Nancy.
Then we drove down an old logging road for forty kilometres.
Poor Albert is scratched to death.
Then we hiked in another mile.
And then we were at Shelbird Lake. At the edge of the Grand Tangier Great Lake Wilderness.
Syd and Nancy showed us the cabin and helped us unpack and then they left.
Me. Himself. A cabin with no electricity. A lake. The fog rolling in. A thunderstorm in the distance.
I was out on the rocks by the lake calling loons before you could say Canada's national bird.
After about four minutes one started calling me back.
Another thirty minutes later, Mr and Mrs Loon came to visit me.
Oh joy...... I just love loons.
Himself was on the other rock fishing.
Before we arrived, we had struck a deal. I would read. He would fish. When it was too dark to do either we would sit in the night air and watch the stars come out one by one. When it was too damp to do that we would sit in the cabin and talk in the candlelight. When it was too late to do that we would sleep in the FANTABULOUS new double sleeping bag that the Monkeys donated to the Himself and Queenie camping equipment fund.
Next day we struck off on a hike and got EATEN by horseflies. After that we confined ourselves to the lake. We had a little rowboat and we paddled around the entire circumferance of the lake, explored every nook and cranny, cast for trout in every deep pool, punted up every brook that led to the Great Tangier Lake that loomed on the far side of the trees.
A very dangerous lake for wind apparently. We stuck to Shelbird.
The first day was foggy and mysterious and we couldn't see past the trees on the side of the lake. But it was very warm so we didn't care. Raban was travelling up the Inside Passage from Seattle and telling me about Captain Vancouver's trip to map it for the English Crown. He had a miserable time, old Vancouver, but Raban's empathy overrode the nasty character he seemed to be. I felt sorry for him, hemmed in on all sides by trees and fog and water. Himself and I talk constantly about what it must be like to have been the first white man to explore Canada. I suppose our little trips into the woods are an attempt to recapture that feeling somewhat.
I spent the day in a delicious fug of Canadian wilderness fear disorder.
Unfortunately, the bear I was hoping for (they are still roaming the Tangier) didn't turn up.
Jonathan Raban saw lots of them of course. I think he is as scared of them as I am.
On the second day the sun blazed and we spent most of the day in the boat. Two men passed by on the far side of the lake in a kayak. Four ducks came and swam in our brook for a while. A family of woodpeckers took up residence in a tree and bored it for about an hour.
Busy day.
We went skinny dipping in the lake and fished some more and I travelled up the Inside Passage from Seattle to Juneau with Jonathan Raban as he tried to make sense of his life. At night watching the stars we tried to do the same.
Same stars.
By the last day Himself had, understandably seeing as it was thirty degrees and August, not caught a trout. Jonathan Raban had lost his father to cancer and been dumped most heartlessly in Juneau by his wife.
I didn't know who I felt worse for.
I do know that despite the fact that I was eaten alive by horseflies on day one, gave myself a black eye on the bunkbed frame on night two and hauled a hundredweight of gear in and out a narrow woodland path, I wouldn't have missed this weekend for the world.
Pictures under the heading.
When we got home I headed straight into Thubron's Behind the Wall, which is a portrait of China circa 1988 I think. It was very interesting too, a very deep meditation on the why of the Chinese personality's ability to take part in the Cultural Revolution.
And I just finished Pamuk's Snow.
I am going to have to read it again. I have a feeling it is the Ulysses of Turkish literature. Far too much in it for me to absorb in one reading. Especially the way I devour books.
He definitely deserved his Nobel Prize.
More about that anon. Hands are tired now.
1 comment:
Sounds like a great weekend. Beautiful photos, too.
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