Not a Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Late August, 2019
Wakefield, Quebec

I went out the other day to check out the milkweed patch in the third field.  It was a golden afternoon.  Because of the recent rains, the cricket population had exploded, and I could see them jumping in the recently mown hay and hear the trilling chirps all around me.  It's funny that such a monotonous sound could be so pleasant, but somehow it accentuates the peace of this moment. The air is crisp, the sun is warm, the trees a sussuration of wind.  Clouds float in the blue, and I am out looking for monarch caterpillars.  We found three on my first day here, but they went away with S:  one jar to her father's house, the other to her grandfather's.  S travels among three households:  my host refers to herself as the unofficial mother, replacing the one S lost close to five years ago, when she was only a year old.  While my host is gone, S is mainly in the care of her grandfather, who also tends to the horses and other details of the house, such as transporting me to the store, a mile away, and to the swimming dock on Lac Bernard.  He and S are due in another hour, and I hope to greet them with the news of a successful caterpillar hunt.

The third field has also been mown, but a small circular patch of tall milkweeds remains in the center of the field.  I have climbed through the long iron gates, rather than attempt to unchain them.  Susha, the husky/shepherd mix, ranges about the fields, coming back occasionally to check on me.  This is the closest we get to a dog walk:  there are no trails here and I don't want to walk her along the roads, quiet though they are.  They are potholed from the freezes of a long winter, and clouds of fine white dust rise from the graveled areas.

Last time, S had her Strider, a pseudo bike my host brought her from the Netherlands.  S propelled herself with her feet padding along the hummocky ground, before abandoning the bike in the second field, where she found the first caterpillar of the day.  Today, I look carefully at the small isolated stalks before approaching the clump, but either it requires 6-year-old eyes, or the caterpillars have gone to ground.  I circle the clump, stopping at each likely spot.  Is there poop?  Are there munched-out holes?

I did not find  caterpillars that day, but a few days later I found two.  I carried them carefully on the broad leaf but lost one climbing through the gate.  I put the other in a tall glass jar, along with milkweed and a long twig reaching up to the screen at the top of the jar.  Within a day the caterpillar had climbed to the screen, secured itself, and created a beautiful iridescent green chrysalis with dots of gold gleaming along the top edge.  I tried unsuccessfully to take pix of it:  the screen fuzzed out the details from the top, and the glass did the same from the side.  But S was happy with it, and I left it for her and my host to enjoy after I left.

I had a lovely sit on this farm near Wakefield, Quebec.  My days were simple and meditative.  I did Tai Chi Chih and read books in the sunny loft apartment above the barn.  I walked the dogs over to the milk weed patch and watched an otter run across the meadow into the safe darkness under the woods.  I spent a fair amount of time with S and D.  The almost daily swims in the deep green waters of the lake were fabulous.  One day I saw a family of loons swimming in a line towards the reeds at the end of the lake.  Another day I floated down with the current, arms curled around the float tube, head propped at the curve, watching the treetops, feeling the cold drifts of clear water brushing along my body.  It was very cold, but did not take long to get acclimated.   After a few hours at the dock, D dropped S off  with me while he went home nearby to cook dinner.  S set up her "stuffies" (mainly stuffed animals, but some dolls) as an audience and played my mini piano.  I think we became friends, and on my last night she slept with the scarf I had knitted her.

The garden was full of cone flowers and other beautiful plants, the sky was a beautiful blue, and when it did rain I sat on the screened-in porch reading and listening to raindrops, feeling the cool dampness coming through the windows.  My host's father was an artist, and her home was full of his paintings (some of her as a child) and other beautiful objects. I sat listening to Agatha Christie and A Gentleman in Moscow, while one of the cats lay along the back of the couch and the dogs lay under the coffee table.

I did explore a bit.  I visited Wakefield and checked out the rebuilt covered bridge over the Gatineau River and McClaren Cemetery.  I walked past the old mill, under the highway, and up into the Parc Gatineau. I took a picture of a graffito on the underpass:  "1st Thing we climb a tree."  I attended evensong at the church in La Peche, next to the general store, enjoying the simple lines of the building and the designs in the tin ceiling.  I bought some marvelous ginger jam there as well. I drove for an overnight in the Eastern Townships (my Louise Penny pilgrimage.)  The evensong at the Abbaye de St. Benoit du Lac was less than wonderful, but the setting itself, on Lac Memphremagog, was peace personified.  I sat listening to the service, which was in French, watching the play of light as the sun set. I'd like to go back and stay over and meditate.  It felt a lot like the Monastery of Christ in the Desert, if not quite as isolated:  there's something about being in a place that is dedicated to prayer, meditation, and good solid work.  You know that where there are people, there is conflict, but somehow it gets transmuted into serenity. 

I spent an afternoon in Ottawa, the day I picked up my car, mainly at the art museum, which had a nice Rousseau and Friends exhibit and a lovely cafeteria.  A service was in session at the cathedral across the way, so I need to return for another look at the splendid stained glass and other artwork.  I also need to return to Quebec to visit Quebec City and Montreal, but that isn't really in keeping with my travel plan, such as it is.  My preference is to stay in one place and get to know it slowly and carefully, as Annie Dillard did at Tinker Creek. Although I lack her philosophical bent, I do find a quiet sort of delight, and when I think back, I realize that my time was well-spent.  At the very least, I found a Monarch caterpillar.