MY NEW FRIEND NATALIE
...where no beaten path exists
AUGUST 28, 2005

A Beautiful Woman

The last night in Lunenburg, at our driver's briefing, we had guests Natalie Corkum, age 90, and her 65 y/o son Hugh Jr. In 1955, Natalies' late husband was then Lunenburg chief of police and the 100 trailer caravan was parked here on this same community center parking area.

She entertained the crowd with her recollection of the caravan, told how she stills walks two miles each morning at six a.m., and regularly rows a boat, her favorite sport, for 2, 3, or even 4 hours at a time.

Natalie is trim, energetic, and does nothing differently now than when she was 30, 40, or 50. She attributes longevity to her interest in nature, faith in God, and singing in the church choir, each Sunday, for the last eighty years.

In an irony too stark to be ignored, Natalie, a lifelong Canadian, related that in 1955, although the caravan had several members adept at the piano, she was the only person who could play the Star Spangled Banner at the special dinner for the American guests. So with this entry, on a tangent thinner than an eggshell, I've decided to examine political demeanor.....

How many of us can name a Canadian prime minister, past or present, any provincial governor, or even a single political figure ? The flamboyant and charismatic Pierre Trudeau is exempt, a darling of U.S. TV, having died five years ago and last serving in office 21 years ago.

After six weeks and interviews with > 50 citizens, I've yet to find a Canadian who could not name our president, vice-president, sec. of defense, junior senator from NY, or the governors of Florida and California. Without exception, they genuinely embrace Americans but malign the leadership that they perceive has distinguished us as the world's boorish, imperialistic brute. We may be doing things right, but our PR is not working.

A good essay should strike a subtle but often inexact balance between description and self-portraiture. The difficulty for this writer is to be sure that the country described is predominant, that Canada and I unobtrusively unite. The joint must be seamless, so that you, the reader are left with the feeling that you have been exploring a single subject.




Dockside






My essays travel through Canada from midwest to east....a trip you can follow on flat pages or computer terminal without getting lost. How do people survive in remote villages ? Why does their food taste so good ? Who stacks their woodpile ? How do they counter economic despair ?

A traveler is always comparing one place to another. To suggest that Canada has good bread and bad roads is to imply that my own country has bad bread and good roads. A Canadian may find that this opinion says as much about my world as it does about theirs. They may be right.

What interests me most is this:
In Canada, the full cycle of humanity fits onto one small stage.
Their descendents have fought, fished, farmed, trapped, irrigated, emigrated, and deported. I aim to catch the spectrum. It is, I suppose, spread too far to have dramatic unity, but at least it makes time travel convenient. Parts of rural Canada are still ages away. You think you are moving on an east-west axis and find, instead, that you have been transported through the centuries.




Rusty anchors







I saw Canada stage-lit once. I have climbed the hills of Lunenburg under clouds blown in from the sea. What passed below was a random scene, not a logical countryside map. Every year, they perish.

Fisheries in the foreground, sustained by the mortal danger to seamen, came to life only when spotlighted by moving columns of sun and stationary granite. The walls in the village gleamed a symphony of color and melted back into obscurity. Along the shoreline, car windows flashed like pink diamonds. Homes distinguished by the architectural Lunenburg 'bump' are peculiarly pregnant with pride.






The five-sided two to three
story facade










Time was compressed, human works created and extinguished, all at the whim of a cumulus overhead. I looked up and saw clouds stacked in the same fanciful shapes as the boats below. For a dizzying moment, everything in time and space was vapor, layers of silky water in the shadows below and reaching higher than my imagination.

To Hugh, thanks for sharing your BlueNose collection, Nova Scotia's most storied sailing ship, the reverse on every Canadian dime, and Lunenburg's very own.




Sunset at the Peggy's Cove lighthouse







Thank you, Natalie, for taking me into your home this morning, sharing intimate thoughts, and unknowingly helping me to compose these fragments into a whole. You were, without hesitation or equivocation, a most gracious host. Even with wet hair.

Someday I hope to be worthy to sing in your choir.