So, let's just pick an item and see where it takes me. . .

Hm. . .

Okay. I've got one:

My mother came to visit. That was neat. I see my parents maybe once every couple of years, so it certainly stood out for me. We drove around in a rented car and visited beaches, and because my family is predisposed to loving rocks, we walked around the stoney sea shores looking at our feet, picking up interesting bits of stone. --I was primarily interested in collecting the tiny water-polished gems which are common out here. They look like mermaid's teeth, white and pearlescent. I've done a bit of jewelry making in the past, and I find myself thinking about taking up my small pliers and bits of brass wire once again. Perhaps investing in some silver solder working tools. --My mother is more into big smooth rocks which sit nicely in the hand and look good on a bookshelf. I think you can probably learn much about a person by observing the type of rocks they collect on a beach. She wound up at the end of her ten day visit with several grocery bags filled with stone, and the difficult decision of which to leave and which she would be able to take home with her. (The airlines have those pesky weight limits on baggage!)

My favorite beach is a rather peculiar one. It's got that 'picturesque' thing down cold. It is a very small, very sheltered harbor which is reached by descending a very steep and trechurous hill. When you get to the bottom, you find yourself in a hidden notch along the coast line which is dotted with a tight collection of small buildings. It is home to a handful of little commercial fishing boats and thirty foot tides which mean that at various times during the day, the boats will either be bobbing at the dock sides, or settled thirty feet below you on the rocky harbor bottom. A little bridge spans the river flowing into the harbor and you can stand there and look at the ocean. There's also a resturaunte built right on the dock which serves lobster delivered directly from the fishing boats. It's a very tiny operation, which sees a trickle of tourists. The whole place is very quiet and very pretty in a blustery, weathered maritime sort of way. But these things you can see anywhere along the Nova Scotian coast; the thing which catches my attention is something else entirely.

It's the reality of the place. Nobody warned me! Let me explain. . .

Every time I visit, I am taken with a powerful sensation, rather like having my brains stuffed with. . .

Hm.

Let me explain in a different way. I've heard the sensation described thusly. . .

Squeeze your finger hard. Hold it like that for a few seconds, then let go. The effect of blood rushing back in and the tingling nerves returning to a normal state creates a feeling. That feeling. --But in your head and all through the back of your neck, and it doesn't go away. In fact, if you focus on it, the sensation only gets stronger. If you stand quietly and let the feeling expand, it does so until you shiver and have to move. But if you manage to master that impulse and stay focused. . .

Well, your mother will say something about the photographing of whales and drag your attention back to the normal world. This is what the harbor and beach are like, and it's like this every time I go there. I've made the trip numerous times, and it's always the same, (up to and including the distractions which don't allow me to explore odd sensation properly. It's like only getting a sample on the end of a tooth pick, and then being hustled off to the next attraction.)

The first time, I thought my senses might have simply been addled by the result of the higher oxygen content of the air out here. Having traveled at that time only recently from across the nation and the city where I lived with the smog from the hundreds of thousands of cars, dealing with more oxygen can create a very real effect in people, and I certainly felt it during the first two days or so of that journey all throughout Nova Scotia. --Though that was different. Having excess oxygen is more like having too much wine. In any case, I didn't think much of it when it hit me the first time.

The next time I visited, it was a year later, some weeks after I'd moved out here. Same feeling, but I figured perhaps it had to do with low blood sugar, since I was half starved at the time. A few months after during another visit, I'd twisted my ankle quite badly, so I thought maybe it was some sort of endorphin affect. The brain's natural pain killers. But on the rest of the occasions. . . I was neither oxygen starved, nor food starved, nor limping. Just me, standing on the shore, swaying in my boots as the reality of the place swelled in my mind and made me feel like my head would burst. Something is definitely going on out there!

So I started asking people about it, and as it happened, some of them already knew. --The girl at the cash in the gift shop/sea food resturaunte knew. I swayed up to the counter, feeling clear but dizzy all at once. It was very strong that day.

"It must really be something to work here!" I said.
"Oh, it is," she replied.
"No I mean. . , this. . . It's like I'm in a dream. . ."
She nodded with a grin. "I know what you mean."
"Do you get used to it? Do you live here in this?"
"No. I have to come over the hill to get to work. But it's the same every day." She leaned close and lowered her voice. "You come down the hill and it's like you're in another reality."

We nodded at each other in understanding while the world swelled with the surf outside.

Then somebody clattered behind me against a rack of tacky plastic souvenirs, and a group of tourists loudly contemplated either the lobster or the fish and chips for their lunches.

Out on the beach, you stand and drift. Distance behaves differently. Walk along the beach a ways and you're a dot on the horizon without realizing it. But it's entirely possible to not notice all of this; to be too distracted to realize what's going on. --If your head is swirling at city speeds with a thousand thoughts a second; with which destination is next on the tourist map and will the cheese stay cool enough in the car and is there a pay phone and is there somewhere to develop film, etc., etc. Keeping up with people in their rattling headspace and rattling dialogue I find pulls me away from the moment; worrying about when they might want to leave or what time the stores are going to close while I stand and swoon; all of the static keeps you anchored, prevents you from drifting away.

I was hoping to get out there this summer alone on my bicycle and camp for a couple of days, just to explore. Maybe do some drawing with my portable drafting kit. I bought a small tent and fixed some touring racks to my mountain bike. I was coming home from the next town over with my newly purchased supplies and realized with an excited start, "Wow! I actually have everything I need packed right now. I've got groceries to last a couple of days, a tent and even a second pair of socks and a new tee shirt. There's no reason I couldn't just turn around and head for the coast right this very moment!"

And then POW, hopping a curb, my back tire blew out, weighed down as it was under me and the fifty pounds of groceries and extra gear in the new side baskets.

Darned lucky, actually. From there I was able to throw my bike in the trunk of a cab and get home for fifteen bucks. If I'd popped a tire after cycling for five hours, then the story would have been quite different! A couple of days later I bought a new inner tube, (and a spare), plus a bicycle pump. But then it rained for two days. And then, one of several deadlines was coming up and one thing led to another. . .

And now it's getting cold and I need to put together the 5th Collected Volume. So next year. I'll do it next year. Three days camping by myself on that coast, away from distractions. I wonder what it must be like to sit and contemplate within the massive influence of that ocean. . ?

Well, next year. I'll find out next year.

Right now, the sun is dimming in the sky, and the air is cool. I've got a fragrant apple core on the corner of my desk and I am happy it is turning Fall! Cheers to you all, and do try to enjoy the season if you are able!

Mark Oakley
September 16, 2004
Wolfville, Nova Scotia