Cottage Daze (3 page)

The Game of Tape and Ladders

Okay, here's the deal: I'm swinging on the cabin's main log beam, looking a lot like Cheetah, the chimpanzee. Perhaps I am dating myself here. Cheetah was Tarzan's pet monkey in those 1930s black and white Tarzan movies, the chimp who was so talented at swinging on branches and from tree to tree. Maybe my audience for this column is a little younger; I should have compared myself to Rafiki, the famous blue-faced baboon of Lion King fame — or perhaps George of the Jungle.

Anyway, I'm wasting time here, and time is something I don't feel I have a lot of in my current predicament — so back to my story …

I'm swinging on the big log purloin that runs the length of our cottage. I was cleaning the large upper front window when the ladder underneath me essentially collapsed.

Swinging around, holding on for dear life, and looking down at the floor far beneath, I sense that my wife is standing there laughing at me. She seems to be asking, “What do you think you are doing?” Then, perhaps showing a tiny bit of compassion, she seems to be asking if I'm all right. It's like it is not unusual for her to hear a crash, come into the cabin, and see her husband swinging on the ceiling like a primate.

It seems like hours, but is more likely just a few seconds that I hang there speechless — speechless until I realize she is trying to coax me down with a banana. “Please hurry out to the shed and grab the old wooden ladder,” I plead.

“That old thing?” she asks. “That's dangerous.”

“Dear, my arm is getting tired here.”

She rescues me with the aged, warped wooden ladder, the one with the split rail and missing rungs, the ladder that she has been asking me to throw out or burn for years. Instead, I kept it as a backup (and I'm sure glad I did) for the more modern aluminum stepladder, the one that was held together with duct tape, the one that my father-in-law had rescued from the dump and bequeathed to me at the time of my marriage. Perhaps he hoped we would elope. Or perhaps he hoped the ladder would collapse into a mangle of metal with me on it, as it did just now.

Safe on the ground, and feeling lucky, I expect a few tears and a hug of gratitude from my darling spouse, who came so close to losing me. Instead, I find myself being chastised. “We're getting a new ladder. I've been telling you to throw those ladders out for years!” This anger comes from being truly afraid, I try telling myself, until, “It could have been me on that ladder, did you ever think of that?”

It is funny. Our cottage often becomes the retirement home for all of our old tools and furniture, stuff that has long worn out its welcome at home. When my wife says, “We have to get rid of that before someone gets hurt,” I slip it into my pickup and sneak it up to the cottage. I might find the available funds to buy some nice steaks and a good bottle of wine for the cottage barbecue dinner, I might even splurge on that bottle of rare single malt to enjoy on the dock at day's end, but a few bucks for a new ladder? I've got one that works — I even have a backup.

As she continues chastising, my wife notices that my concentration is waning. Worse than that, she always seems to know what I'm thinking. My gaze has shifted to the scrap of metal that was once a sturdy ladder — thirty-some years earlier, perhaps. I'm thinking, “With a few wooden splints and a lot of duct tape, we just might get a few more years out of” … whap. I survived the fall, only to be concussed by a ripe banana.

Forever Young

It is astonishing the sharp, distinct, and compelling memories that summer cottages evoke.

I had been living out west for more than twenty years when my parents decided it was time to sell our family island cottage. I knew, then, it was time to come home. We were a family of wanderers, never living in one town too long, always off in search of a new adventure. As we moved from place to place, the cottage remained a constant and was where I felt most rooted. I didn't want to lose it. So I bought the property, loaded up my life, and drove across the country.

Now, when I see my own children climbing up swim rock in their bathing suits, I experience a strong sense of déjà vu. I watch them and remember my young cottage days, when our pleasant summer routine had us spending our days swimming, playing board games, loafing, running in the trees, water-skiing, building bonfires, and, as we got older, flirting with young ladies.

When the low black rain clouds rolled in across the lake and the thunder and lightning whipped the water into a frenzy, we lit the oil lamps and spent our afternoons and evenings in the cabin or out on the covered porch, reading, conversing, or playing games. There was a certain simplicity to our life there: we pulled out old board games, a deck of cards, or warped jigsaw puzzles.

The cottage is a place of youth and energy.

We ran through the island's dark spruce and balsam forest, feeling that we had discovered a place of mystery and wonder. In this quiet wood we sensed the primeval and thought that no one had stood here before. We found our own hideouts and secret bases, hollows under thick boughs, mini caves hidden under granite ledges.

As the summer progressed, our tans darkened and our messy, tangled hair was streaked blond from the sun. We were like shipwrecked children with our own customs and rituals. Our parents were mere ghosts. We had no watches, and there was no clock on the cabin wall. When we were hungry, we gathered on swim rock for lunch and then returned to the water or the dark forest.

I remember our driftwood fires on the point, where we sang and laughed, told ghost stories, and exchanged intimacies — so now, whenever I see bonfire embers glowing, I am brought back to those days. At the end of the night, when silence had fallen over us, we trudged back to the cabin, feeling our way past the roots and rocks of the dirt trail.

Now I watch my children with their siblings, cousins, and friends, running through the same forest that I ran through as a child. They find the same hideouts and forts. Their imaginations lead them into similar games. They become pirates, knights on a quest, warlords, or frontiersmen. They paddle to nearby Sawdust Island, claiming it as their own, guarding it against all trespassers. They pack a picnic lunch, and we give them a cowbell to clang in case of trouble.

These little things are touchstones for cottage memories and proof that a summer home is not a place like anywhere else. It is a place of youth and energy — where we spent many happy, wonderful summers. The cottage that we visit now is not necessarily the geographical one of the present, but the one of my youth, and everywhere I look, the ghost of my old self is present.

The Breakdown and the Brat

Why is it that your boat never breaks down tied up to your own dock, but always waits until you are in the middle of the lake?

My sister's family had arrived and I ran down to the dock, jumped in the boat, and started the engine. I spun the boat around with a flourish, and then roared across the one-kilometre stretch of water towards the shore to ferry them and their gear across to the cottage. Halfway there, the motor made a loud clunk and stopped. This did not sound good.

Handyman that I am, I checked the battery connections, though I knew that this problem was worse than that. I lifted the motor and inspected the prop. I took off the cover and made a theatrical display of checking over the motor, even though I did not have a clue what I was doing. The boat drifted in the wind, destined for the far east arm of the lake. I pulled out the paddle and tried to set a course back to our island.

I imagined my sister and her husband on shore, hands on their hips, saying, “Now, what's he doing?”

I dipped the paddle and pulled hard, trying to fight against wind and wave. Why are they never with you when you are in such a predicament? I did not hope for rescue by some observant cottager on the mainland; I only wished not to be seen. I saw my wife paddling in my direction with the kayak.

“What are you doing?” said she.

“Oh, just paddling my motorboat.”

She hooked a tow rope from kayak to runabout, and then she paddled hard towards our cottage. I yelled directions to her. “Harder! More to the left. No, right. Put your back into it!”

Then I saw a boat approaching. Feeling bad to be caught with my wife working so hard, I untied her tow rope and set her free; she took several easy strokes away and then turned in surprise.

“Nothing you can do here, honey,” I shouted loudly. “You go on back to your lounger on the dock and I'll be there momentarily. Whoa, what's this? Oh, a boat to the rescue.” I saw that the rental boat was being driven by my brother-in-law, and realized that my dramatic presentation had been wasted. He was smiling — hero to the rescue. He pulled me to shore and headed back for his crew.

After we had gone over the motor and realized that there was nothing that we, in our wisdom, were capable of fixing, I ran the rental craft back to the resort to make arrangements to keep it for a few days. The owner had just pulled up in his ATV with a trailer full of kindling. His six-year-old grandson was loading a few sticks of the wood onto a remote control Hummer and steering it into their cabin to the woodbox. Sometimes the miniature vehicle lost control navigating over the door jamb and spilled its load on the welcome mat. The boy pretended to be the road crew, reloading the scattered wood.

Why does your boat always wait until you're in the middle of the lake to break down?

“That's a neat way to do that,” I said.

“Hi, dummy,” said the boy.

“Pardon?”

“Wasn't it you stuck out on the lake?”

Before I could answer, the grandpa was there, reprimanding the youngster for his cheek with a client. I envisioned him standing with the boy earlier and saying, “Look at that dummy stuck with his boat out in the middle of the lake.” I settled up for the boat and headed back to the dock in a huff. Flustered, I pulled and pulled on the cord, and flooded the little outboard.

“You don't even know how to drive a boat!” the precocious six-year-old shouted.

“Shush,” said his grandpa.

What's Eating You?

Standing on the sidelines of the local soccer field last night watching my daughter's game, I came to the realization that, here in cottage country, we enjoy a real home field advantage. We are used to the cloud of blackflies and mosquitoes that harass us; the other team is not. Our girls stand firm, used to the fog of pesky insects and prepared beforehand with a slathering of bug spray. The other team is driven to distraction. My problem is I don't like covering myself in chemicals, but I don't relish being eaten alive either.

A family friend frequently visits us in Muskoka from the Falkland Islands. I am sure not many Falklanders visit cottage country on a frequent basis, but he is partial to our beautiful landscape. In the Falklands there are no bugs: no blackflies, mosquitoes, wasps, or hornets. I think it has something to do with the South Atlantic winds, which blow constant and fierce, sending any pesky flying intruders catapulting westward to the South American continent.

Danny does not like snow and cold, so I invite him here in June with the promise of sparkling clear lakes, the smell of wildflowers, and warm, sunny days. I do not mention that the sweet gifts of nature in spring have a decidedly nasty side. First comes the cloud of blackflies, buzzing around our heads and nibbling behind our ears, arriving in mid-May and hanging out until the children are released from school in late June. As the blackfly attacks wane, the mosquitoes are out in full force, having arrived in the rains of late May, overstaying their welcome into July.

It is the time of year when these biting insects try to chase us indoors, reminding us that we may not actually be at the pinnacle of the food chain, but rather at the top of the menu. They buzz our decks and gardens, pester us at the barbecue, and ruin our golf games (or at least are blamed). They find us at the lake, accompany us over the portage, and act as companions on our hikes. For as long as people have sought adventure beyond the city, the blackflies and mosquitoes have tested our ingenuity.