Tall Man, Small Tub, No Shower

The last time I took a bath, I played with my little green army guys. The tub, in our suburban split level in Hillsdale, was a pinky beige, as I remember it. Somewhere along the line of fifty years since, I gave up baths for showers. For good. Until now at the Doris McCarthy house, where on my third day here after four days on the road, I gave up my array of wipe-downs, lake dips, hose frolics and sinkwashes and turned on the left hand spigot—hot!—of DM’s tiny tub to sit down in there.

Haven’t I seen movies in which characters lie full out under a blanket of suds? Here I couldn’t even straighten my legs. 75% of my legmass extruded from the water like some crude and ancient outcropping along lake Superior. And I heard a Jerry Seinfeld voice say, Why would anyone want to sit in a tepid pool of his own filth?

I’d already pegged DM as a short woman who needn’t have ducked through doorways as I have to do. (I’m going to insert a callback here to my note about the Picts, from ’10.) She built her kitchen cupboards so low that I stash my Bran Flakes on top of them.

But I’m clean and, on a rainy morning like this, still warm. 
Here's the tub, actual size.

Bluffing

If I get too close to the top of the bluffs, I might fall over, I'm told. The word cliff is sounded, as in straight down. In fact it's not quite that dramatic, but to play it safe I view the bluffs from below, looking west. 

While down there, I take a look out to the lake.

After a while, individual bluffs assert themselves.

Pleistocenery, we might call them.

As you see, the forces that create the attraction of the area would destroy it.

Doris McCarthy took an active interest in projects designed to protect both the bluffs and the ravine, two of three sides to her 13 acres.

The area between tree mass in that photo is a six-foot buffer of weeds and wildflowers at the edge of her property, as we see here back up on top.

First in a Series of Daily Entries as Artist-in-Residence at the Doris McCarthy House in Toronto

At first I offered a bitter laugh at the status of Canada Goose as cherished visitor to DM's pond and grounds (on which, we Reginans know, the primary figures will be shit and feathers). Seeing no point in that, I took a stab at chasing them off, succeeding in casting four of them into flight over the bluffs and lake Ontario while the others simply shuffled further away. Seeing no point in that either, I began to enjoy them enjoying the light, the sipping of pond, the airing-out, even the tap-tapping of my pen on the glass table in the porch/gazebo/geesebo. 
I'm humbled by the opportunity to live here, where Doris McCarthy worked well into her 90s. Lately I've been chanting to myself about doing what I'm on this goosey planet to do: write. Here, it's about keeping faith with DM.

100 Words to Fool's Paradise

The drive south across Manitoulin island to the ferry took 90 minutes, just the sun and a handful of stars cars and me congratulating myself on the tea and peanut butter sandwich combo. Three hours later, on board the Chi-Cheemaun, I napped and admired lake Huron from my synthetic deckchair on the upper starboard lounge. This planet is nothing but giant rock on which trees grow and water crashes in! Thus eased, I passed the next four hours to Toronto—the local route, not the express—in a blur of maps and lights and traffic. I got here after dark.

100 Words to Espanola

I know I'm on the road when I reach a town called Espanola. In a hard rain that wore me out, peanut butter sandwiches or not. This stretch east toward Sudbury would be busy if the season hadn't turned -off, as in off-season, starting today. I can check into the Clear Lake Inn without a reservation (69 bucks) and ride the ferry from Manitoulin island to the Bruce peninsula tomorrow ($27.75). The season is just right, too, for setting off at sunrise and shutting down, if the Jays are done, when the sun goes down.

100 Words to Rainbow Falls

Though I read "everlasting" on a sign, it's Canadian Shield, mythical creature of grade six Geography, that sticks today. In particular, the stretch from Nipigon past Rossport on highway 17. Eastbound, any Labour Day afternoon. You have to live with construction. (No wonder everyone else turned north at Nip.).
This puts my feet in Nipigon Bay by three o'clock.
I love the nearness of rock here, pink when exposed for a new bridge, all of us waiting in ridiculous stillness for the green light to let us find our lakeshore, a hundred shades of green.

100 Words to Rushing River

More rain, prairie, lake and river than rush, I took 8 1/2 hours for 800+ km. Jays-Orioles and Angela Hewitt playing Bach took care of most of it, Mexicali Rip-Ls the messiest part. For the first time I drove east of the longitudinal centre of Canada (on the straightaway east of Winnipeg). I bypassed Winnipeg, bypassed Kenora, but hit the heart of Portage la Prairie (a city my dad pronounced as if French), looking for a Shell where I could use my coupon (pronounced coup-ON). Packing Crown Royale, I'm trying it out now, campsite 115, with my squirrelfriend, Saucy.