Hey Pop!

Hey Pop!

Not sure how I'm supposed to do this but here goes…

At the end of June a letter was delivered to the house.

I, honestly no offence, left it on the credenza for a day or two ‘till I came back across it looking for my keys.

I guess you know that part. Well your letter, not the lost keys.

I'm a teacher, you may not have known that. I teach grade 8 math and science at a little school just outside the GTA. It's a good gig. Kids at that age are pretty happy-go-lucky and as long as you’re the smartest guy in the room, they respect you.

It doesn't pay all that well and the wife’s job is for passion, not money.

Things are tight, but we’re happy! Maybe moving into an apartment soon. Sell the house.

The kids will adjust.

After a three hour car ride, four if you include the slow hay wagons, unmarked roads and the cows that escaped from the field, we got here at noon.

I found out that fishing rods are great for cutting cows!

Farmer Jed was impressed with our wranglin’ skills!

He, “ain't never sin nutin’ lik’t!”

Took a good half hour to get ‘them steer’ back off the road. I assume cows are either afraid of fishing rods or those long poles made ourselves bigger, wider maybe..

I could’ve listened to Jed talk all day.

Matthew and Nikolaus giggled every time he said literally anything.

Janice was the only one who knew what she was doing. I guess any born and bred equestrian barrel racer, worth her weight in salt has had to deal with herding a bovine or two.

Hope I’m not embarrassing myself with these “farm terms”. I'm feeling out of my league. Maybe the GTA has made me stale.

The sign at the end of the driveway, as tattered and partially hanging as it was, still reads “Reesewood”.

I'll tell you, I haven't seen that sign in some time. Enough time to get an education, family, a job and a picket fence. I remember as a kid, you’d always tell me, when you get a white picket fence, you've landed!

I never knew what you meant until I got one.

Busy day full of old memories.

It's midnight.

Your clock is bonging!...10...11...12. I've missed that sound!

Wife and kids are asleep. A great family day!

I've got your old kerosene lamp going on the table in front of me.

I love the stillness. It's so quiet here. The frogs are singing.

I'm sitting in your chair.

I'm using your pen. I'm enjoying 2 fingers out of your bottle.

I'm pretty sure this bottle was sitting on the clock shelf last time I was here.

I'm writing on your oak table. The one you called “tornado proof”.

“If there's ever a tornado, get under the table!” you’d yell, “ ...ain't never been a tornado in these here parts, but you never know” and then you’d shake the table like we were all doomed and laugh. Jon thought you were serious.

He sends his best.

He really liked you.

Farmer Jed kind of reminded me of you when he was yelling about his escaped beef.

You’d think it was the end of the world!

You would’ve enjoyed that.

Jimmy’s looking at me!

I'm not sure if his eye patch makes him more or less terrifying, like a pirate!

I remember when you and I picked up Jimmy at the dump. I told you that Nana would never let you hang a one eyed stuffed dump deer head on the wall.

Somehow you sweet talked her into it.

I always wondered how you convinced her.

Then she started hanging her wet tea towels on his antlers.

I noticed now your old polaroid hangs from it.

We're heading back to reality in the morning.

I used to hate that as a kid. Just as you really started to have fun and settle in here, the rug would get pulled out and you'd be packing to go home.

Mom and Dad would be fighting about something. I’d be in the way no matter where I was. The dog would end up in the lake and someone would start yelling about a wet dog in the car.

We’d sing stupid songs, count red cars and play "what's that smell?" all the way home.

It wasn't until I became an adult that I realized, no one was yelling because they were mad at someone else. They just didn't want to have to miss this place. Mom would always say “you wouldn't want to live here, you’d get sick of it”.

Could you imagine?

Lanterns for light, fishing till the sun goes down, card games until all hours of the night and Dad spending the last hour before bed killing all the mosquitos to keep us safe, as we hid under the blankets.

Sick of this?

A little cabin with the most amazing screen room looking over your lake. I spent hours in there. Drawing, reading and playing.

Coffee was always on. You always smoked your pipe. I miss the smell.

Mom and Nana were always chattering about something and there was always a dog under your feet. There's a picture of Duke in the book.

He was a great dog!

Sorry we lost touch. Sorry about Nana.

That couldn't have been easy.

I saw you briefly when dad died.

Mom doesn't recognize me anymore, but I still visit her every other day.

We brought some really nice steaks. We cooked them over that fire pit you and I made years ago. I can't believe it's still standing. I remember that day like it was yesterday. Brick and mortar, brick and mortar, brick, rattlesnake and mortar. I screamed, you screamed. Duke and I jumped on the hood of your old Dodge truck. You got the snake into a bucket, yelling about how every time you turn around the wildlife is ,“tryin’a getcha” I stayed on that hood for hours, convinced I was going to live up there!

We laughed so hard that day.

Funny, I own an old Dodge truck too!

I found the notice in the journal from the Stokes Bay Gazette when the bear broke into the bakery and ate everything!

He did it 3 times. I'll bet that bear was diabetic after that! We figured it was the same bear that tried to break into your truck when we were fishing. He wanted your half bag of chips, wildlife trying to “getcha”! Or your chips at least!

We cooked marshmallows on the coals tonight.

Janice took your letter’s advice and brought a s'mores kit.

Not sure but I might be diabetic at this point too!

They are tasty!

I will say that I was confused about your letter. As much as we really appreciate a weekend away, it was a bit of a surprise.The $200 you gave us was a bit much but we wouldn't have made it here without it.

Thank you again.

More confused about this little black book I found on the table.

On the last page written, you wrote to me that you want a new story.

I’m kinda worried about that.

Funny how it continues the book, maybe not from where we left off, but I get to write about a new adventure here... with my family.

Wish you were here to help.

I had a story from the drive up, but a disastrous canoe trip trumped Jed and his jailbird cows.

Here goes…

We went to investigate the canoe tree. I'm impressed that three canoes stacked between four trees could weather as well as they did!

The wife took to your aluminum canoe. She damn near pushed me down when she ran to it. I can't believe that old Princecraft is 70 years old. What a nice boat and so light!

We got her in the water first and she was gone, across the lake with her dog.

Nikolaus, the youngest, took your little runabout. He spied your trolling motor and boom, he was gone too.

Matthew and I found your old Marathon canoe!

I remember it was fast.

We were looking for fast!

Paddles, life jackets and a dog. Sam never misses a ride in anything.

If you're going, he's going!

You'd like Sam, he's a beagle, a tall beagle. Lots of personality and has a penchant for frogging apparently.

I think he spent all day on the shoreline chasing them around. A water snake grabbed his favourite frog and he barked at him for half an hour! Was pretty funny!

I got a picture of it!

So we got in the long, tippy canoe. Sam too!

The gunwales just off the water line. I remember canoeing like riding a bike.

​We decided to leave all valuables behind. Smart move!

We went down the shoreline, not brave enough to venture in open water.

Then I heard the noise. I asked the boy, "Why do I hear running water?".

It was the lake pouring over the stern.

In an attempt to fight physics, I ordered my second mate to paddle... fast! Whatever I yelled had distress and angst but, he had already figured out the severity of the situation in the less than ideal location. He was facing me and paddling backwards for him; it was also not ideal. As we watched the train wreck unfold, we were "goin' down!"

Your limestone lake is fairly shallow with a solid rock bottom, but not where we were.

The water was a foot deep and the black silt was the other four with an uncertain bottom that you'd imagine in horror movies.

As the boat reached its maximum filled-ness and left the open air above, Matthew instantly stood up, lost his balance and fell in the sludge. The dog became a floating and surprised swimming dog. I'm sure he was confused by the whole thing. Canoes aren't supposed to leave from under you. My focus, besides hoping that the bottom would come soon, was that my boy made it to shore. After a painful display of swimming in goo, and his cries of "AAAHHH...I LOST A CROC!!”, he made it. His paddle floated away with his croc.

Sam was not as daring. He stayed with the ship and the captain. Treading water, above the wreckage, staring at me like I just betrayed him.

100 yards from the cabin, four feet of silt, sun's going down, boats gone down and we’re looking at each other defeated. I guess I did betray him a bit, or at least his trust in canoes. Poor dog!

I stood up out of the sludge. After an hour of getting the canoe out of the silt and piggy backing it home on Nikolaus’/your boat, we made it. A lot of silt in sunless places.

I taped a polaroid to the book like you always do.

A story ta-daaaa!

Your instructions were to put the journal in the kitchen table drawer before we leave.

I haven't forgotten.

With all your stories and funny happenings, I never noticed that you wrote them when I was there. I never knew you cherished our time together as much as I did.

The childhood fun I had with you here made me well up more than a few times.

I rest the journal on my knees at the campfire. It came alive with pictures and stories, pressed leaves, my childhood drawings and the old Garter snake skin from a million years ago.

I told my kids that I had something in my eye...

But they knew.

They hung on every word.

I liked the time we had.

You kept it all in this little black book.

Thank you.

The book is going away now, to its drawer.

- Christian

PS. I'm in tears, speechless. I found the $20,000 and the cottage deed to me in the drawer.

How’d you know?

Thank you...love you...miss you!