dreaming

So I'm sitting at the dining room table in the boathouse, admiring the way the morning sun slants across the surface of the table. The sky is a brilliant blue, and the reflection of the sun off the lake is so bright that I can't look at it. Very blustery outside, the waves kicking up whitecaps as they hit the shore.

Behind me, birch logs crackle merrily in the fireplace, and a space heater hums nearby, struggling to heat up my corner of the cabin. I suppose I could take my laptop and sit in front of the fire, but then I know I'd get too warm and sleepy, and I actually do have work to do. Right now, it's cold enough where I'm sitting that I'm comfortable in fleece tights, a t-shirt, sweatershirt, fleece vest, wool socks. I love this time of year.





Larkin, Rick, Brittany, JBR, Ginny and their three dogs have left. Jeff and I are alone the rest of the today, Wednesday, and Thursday, then Parki and his friend Angela come up on Friday for the weekend.

Yesterday morning, Jeff's sister and her family went home. After they left, the rest of us did some cleaning up. I chopped some kindling, one of my favourite cottage chores. There's something immensely satisfying about thwacking a big axe into a piece of wood, chopping it into little pieces, and using it to make a wonderfully cozy fire.

Looks easy, but requires concentration. Jeff chopped the tip off one of his fingers while we were chopping kindling once. While we were waiting in the hospital treatment room, Jeff (who seemed remarkably perky for someone who had just lost a piece of himself) entertained me with grisly stories of friends he knew who had chopped parts of themselves off. I hadn't felt queasy until then.

After a lunch of soup and turkey sandwiches, JBR, Ginny, Jeff and I took the boat to the Joe Lake dam, then walked along the old railroad track to Brulé. Stunning fall colours; as I mentioned before, it's so rare that we're at the cottage for the peak of the colours.

The Algonquin Park fall colours are apparently popular in Japan; we saw many canoes full of Japanese tourists in the Portage Store bay on the weekend, heading out for a paddle around the lake. Unfortunately not many of them are familiar with paddling or canoes, making it a much more risky venture than any of them probably realize.

The reason: the water is VERY cold right now, so cold that if your canoe dumps and no one is around to pull you out, you stand a good chance of dying from hypothermia. Jeff and I get especially upset when we see little kids in these canoes.

Last year, Jeff went over to one Japanese family in a canoe, struggling against the winds, trying to get out of the bay, and told them to go back. You should go back, he told them, trying to make them understand. The water's very cold. You fall in, you die.

They must have understood the word "die", because they went back.





As much as I'd like to take the rest of the week off, I can't. I have two columns due next week, the Chatelaine article due the week after, my current novel to finish before I take off for OVFF at the end of the month, and my daily Market Watch publishing column. I also plan to send out a ton more queries as I continue to ramp up my nonfiction writing.

Can't really complain, though...how many people could work from the cottage? As long as I have Internet access and my laptop, I could do my writing pretty much anywhere. Jeff and I plan to spend a major chunk of time at the cottage next spring and summer to build a new sleeping cabin on the property, further up the hill.

Look like things are going to be pretty work-intensive (in terms of writing) for me over the next month or so. And it's all WRITING-related, which is probably the reason I'm looking forward to it instead of dreading it. This is such a contrast to how I felt about my work a couple years ago that I still can't believe how lucky I am sometimes.

I mean, here I am doing exactly what I've always wanted to do all my life. I spend my days WRITING. People PAY me for my writing (well, for my nonfiction writing, anyway...I eventually will sell my fiction! I will!!).

Sometimes I think this must be a dream. When am I going to wake up? But heck, I'll enjoy it while I can. :-)





Links/News:

One year ago, I was hanging out in Santa Cruz with Paul and Beckett and the twins.

Two years ago, I reminisced about childhood games.

Four years ago, I forgot Annie's pacifier while babysitting the kids and vowed NEVER TO DO SO AGAIN.

Five years ago, there was a man outside my window.

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Today's Blatherpics:

	Fall colours.
	Willi and Shirley Powell, daughter Emma, son Spencer.
	JBR, Ginny and Jeff on our walk.
	Me in the motor boat.