The Beviad–musings, mutterings and myths

In four days, we will be leaving to go on vacation to darkest Cape Breton Island. We will be staying in a cottage at Belle Cote, which has been described to me as being close to a bay where fresh lobsters can be purchased every day, and equally close to a nice beach–just across a field from it, actually. Which sounds very nice. JL’s Cheticamp relatives rent it out cheaply to visiting family members. The weather forecast for next week is for coldish temperatures–none over 20, for example–although there’s mention of rain for only two days. I hope it’s not too cold and grim.
At present, the record for worst weather on a vacation is still Pasley Island, in the islands off Vancouver, in the summer of 1975, when we were renting a cottage with no electricity or indoor toilet, and it rained buckets every day. It was so wet that the giant banana slugs that are prominent in that part of the country were drowning–or climbing the cabin walls. And we were with J’s mother, sister and nephew (age 3) with our own daughter (age 4).

All we had was a radio that got CBC, and a fireplace that kept us warm. And an oven that ran on propane. And we were basically stuck inside for a week. Well, except for at night, when J’s mother insisted that everyone but her sleep in tents that leaked terribly. Still, we managed. The kids played in the cardboard boxes we had used to bring food up in, we went for walks in the rain, all of us clad in slickers and boots, I read to the kids a lot (I recall them standing, rapt, listening to “The Golden Pinecone”, which was technically much too advanced for them and had no pictures.) And I baked 2 loaves of bread every day, bread that we all devoured in hours.

That was the summer I started reading the Agatha Christie novels that the cottage’s owners had. I had never read mysteries before, but I was desperate for something to read. (That started my interest in mysteries, which sparked a course I taught for ages called “Detective Fiction”, which later morphed into “Modern Crime Fiction.”) And now I look back on that summer with some fondness….But I don’t really want another like it.