Beans Coming Out of My Ears
Part 25
I am so lucky. I think this is the way I’ll start every post from now on. I just can’t get over how lucky I am. I live in a beautiful place. I have wonderful friends all over the place. I have a kid whois the light of my life and to be able to watch her grow is a gift beyond any I ever thought I would have. She makes me a better person. This place where I live, this house, it may seem mundane, ordinary, everyone has this, don’t they? I think most people do. They have a home where they are happy enough to stay for the rest of their lives. A life where they are content. This is something I’ve dreamt of for a long, long time. And now, apparently all of a sudden, though it has been many years of visualizing this very thing, I am here. This is my home, and I am so lucky to have finally found it.
I was driving to Shelburne today, down the 103, a two lane highway where it is common to not see another car while driving. The leaves are still green on the trees, the air is humid and hot, but there are one or two indications that Fall is on its way. Wildflowers going to seed. Berries on bushes, replacing summer flowers, the nights come earlier. I was remembering the golden larches as I drove at the end of last October, through New Brunswick and Nova Scotia towards my new home. The larches are still a dark green, and I will know I’ve been here a year when they’re golden again.
I have never walked around Shelburne, and I was there for the live music, something Celtic. As I walked, I took pictures like a tourist. This is still a new place to me and different from other places I’ve lived. Every time we moved, I experienced a moment of forgetfulness now and again. I would be driving and not know if I was in Arizona, or Calgary, or BC. I’d see someone I knew, and then remember that person did not live where I currently was and was only a lookalike.
Since being here, in Nova Scotia, I have not felt that once. I know I am here. I marvel at everything that is around me, and know that I will come to a great familiarity with it one day and that makes me happy. I actually have that place where I will be able to watch the trees grow. My grandchildren will one day play in the yard and sleep in these bedrooms. It is sort of unbelievable to me, a free spirit and one who cannot be pinned down for too long, that I would be dreaming of a future in the same place I am now.
The best part of it is, that I can travel to all of the places I want to see (post vaccine passport requirements of course. Shouldn’t take too long, I imagine), and come back home again. Already, my daughter and I are talking about when we go to see the land of my forefathers/mothers. A place that bears my name. I know we have no immediate ties to the place. It doesn’t show up in our known family history, but honestly, with a last name like mine, to find the town in eastern Europe bearing the same name, seems like too much of a coincidence to not have some connection.
Smerek is a village currently in Poland in the the foothills of the Carpathian mountains. I say “currently” because the border in that area has moved around quite a bit. Smerek is a mountain, as well as a village in the in the southeastern corner of Poland that is close to the border of Slovakia. At one point in history, it was all a part of the Russian Empire. And then it bacme part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until World War 1 caused an economic collapse and the states were then divided. Czechoslovakia became its own country. The country where my father’s parents were born. It wasn’t until 1993 that Czechoslovakia split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. A new country with centuries of history of belonging to someone else.
I’ve never been there, but the call to go is loud. I know that I will recognize my people. Interestingly, Slovaks have been described as often red-haired and of a ruddy complexion. The culture and language is unknown to me, as when my grandparents moved here to Canada (actually, I believe many Smereks landed in Pennsylvania first.), they wanted to assimilate and never taught their children the language. It is a shame when that happens. As I research Slovakia, I come across such a unique culture. The fujara, a musical instrument unique to Slovakia, was used by shepherds to call their sheep. Its sound is somewhere between a didgeridoo and a flute. Beautiful and haunting. Here is a glimpse: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1_lBpN4AGw
In the meantime, while waiting to travel, I play the guitar. Not well. But I’m not horrible either. I know the very basics and have decent rhythm, I think. Really, I wanted to learn to play in order to accompany myself singing. Dreams of being a star… this was something I knew would never happen because of my huge need for time alone. I could not imagine always being surrounded by people. Somebody always wanting a piece of you. Nope. Not for this loner girl. I’d rather work in my studio, alone and choose my social activities carefully so that I am not overwhelmed.
I love being here. Nobody really knows me. I have all the time in the world to myself. I knew this would be the case, and I honestly wondered how so much alone time would impact me. Would I become lonely and depressed? Surprisingly, I think I am happier now than I have ever been. I often find myself dancing and singing around the house. Laughing out loud at things I think or hear. I love the freedom of no judgement.
I love my little plot of land, though it is quite exposed. I am dreaming of ways to cocoon myself so that when I am in my garden, I can’t be seen. Fences are an anomaly here, so I don’t want to be seen as the one outsider that came in and built a fence around her property to keep everyone out. It’s not at all that I want to keep folks out. I want this to be a place that people love to come. But I also want it to be my sanctuary. A place where when I walk outside my door, I am enshrouded in a cloak of invisibility until I am ready to be seen.
My vegetable garden is very visible as it is right beside the road. When I am inside the chicken wire walls, I am an animal in a zoo. Nowhere to hide. The corn is growing taller. The beans are climbing the wire, the tomatoes are still green, but on the verge of ripening. Already I have harvested more zucchini and scalloppini than I can count on my fingers and toes. Many of my neighbours have been introduced to the scalloppini squash (also referred to as “patty pan”) through me and I have a feeling it will end up in many gardens next year.
I’ve tried fermenting and canning for the first time ever. My ferments, now almost two weeks old have been burped every day and the lovely sour smell tells me it’s all working and I’ll shortly have some beautiful, homemade probiotics. Next to come are the beans. The first batch of beans were the black beans, that I pick when they are green, before the pole beans start to form. Now that the pole beans are beginning to produce, I leave the rest of the black beans to dry for ease of storage and to save some for seeds for next year.
I have such limited freezer space that I will need to preserve just about everything else that comes out of the garden that doesn’t end up going to neighbours. Jars at the ready, I am prepared to deal with them when they all come at once.
I went for a long bike ride yesterday morning, down Shore Road past Port Saxon. I made it to North East Harbour in the fog before heading back home, marking the location of some evening primrose in bloom so that I might come back to harvest seeds in a couple of weeks. The fog was so dense. There was no definition between the water and the sky and only slightly visible was a red buoy, bobbing in the distance. I could not help but laugh, exclaim out loud on my ride how lucky I am to live in such a place. Only two cars passed by the entire time was out. A 25 km round trip, I was soaked from the fog when I got home, my legs wobbly from the sustained workout.
Home again, I marvelled at the house that is mine. The cat waiting inside at the top of the stairs, greeting me with his unconditional love. The shower in my big old clawfoot tub, with water from my well, unfiltered and untreated goodness. The coffee I drank sitting by my dining room window where I read and watched the deer eating apples fallen from the old trees. My life is full and rich. I am so lucky.
ext: Whining about Windows
Notes from the Edge of the World 