Yesterday I cried about Nova Scotia. Or rather, I cried about the very real prospect that this summer, like last summer, we won’t be allowed in to Nova Scotia.
At this time of year, I would usually be humming a happy song while I plan the move to our cottage up there—which is not just our summer home but our happiest of happy places. But this summer, like last summer, the Canadians are reluctant to open the border. (Probably sensible, given the behavior of many U.S. citizens this past year. But massively disappointing.) Even if the national government opens the border, Nova Scotia just announced a cautious plan for reopening the province, even to other Canadians. An email sent to us by friends outlined it: Each of five distinct phases will take at least two weeks to happen, which means that it will be at least ten weeks before visitors from outside the province are allowed into Nova Scotia. Ten weeks–at a minimum! It’s theoretically possible that, if all goes perfectly, we might get to our cottage by mid-August. But when do things ever go perfectly?
As I read the email, I had a vivid memory of bicycling along the road close to our cottage. Off to the right, the Bay of Fundy glinted in the sunshine. Wild roses and Queen Anne’s Lace lined the road. I was whipping downhill, breathing sea-air as fresh and heady as a good white wine. It was glorious. From the mere memory, I felt alive and happy.
So I cried–a storm of happy/sad tears. Tears of longing and mourning but also of gratitude.
It wasn’t the only time I’ve cried over Nova Scotia. The first time was at the end of our very first visit there. We’d spent a week, which is all we had off work in those days. We’d rented a cabin on a quiet, pretty lake and had dinner with the friends who lured us up there and met their friends, who already had found or built little houses there. I knew I liked it very much. (That cool, fresh air. The starry skies and immense quiet. The distance from turbulent U.S. politics.) Then, as the ferry pulled away from Nova Scotia, a pod of dolphins began to leap and play around the boat, and suddenly I was crying. I was surprised by the tears. (So was my husband.) I wasn’t resenting going home or starting back at work. I was just overcome by a desire not to leave this place. Obviously, Nova Scotia had struck a deep chord inside me.
I’m not asking for pity here. Believe me, I get how lucky I am to have an airy, light-filled, little house for summers. It’s a dream that took years for my husband and me to create. First, scraping together the money to buy the land when we still had kids in college. Then designing a cottage under 1200 square feet (because that’s what we could afford to build–we calculated square footage costs very carefully). Getting the driveway put in one summer and the septic system the next. Watching the walls and roof go up two summers later. Planting daylilies and hedge roses and hydrangeas the following summer. Spending a couple of weeks, then five weeks, and then the whole summer. It’s been a fabulous adventure. And when we’re there, we relax there in a way it’s hard to do here. (It’s always seemed a bit precious to name the cottage, but if we did, we’d call it Dolce Far Niente–a sweet doing-nothing).
Of course I’ve cheered up since yesterday. I’m a grown-up, and I know perfectly well that not getting to go to our summer home is not exactly like being bombed in the Blitz. Our house here has air conditioning and big maples that shade the terrace. I’ll walk or bicycle first thing in the morning, when it’s coolest. I’ll see my friends, read some good books, write a little every day. I’ll nudge myself back towards the prospect of self-publishing my novels, however embarrassingly frothy they are. Because Massachusetts had done so well vaccinating people, we’ll even be able to go to restaurants for our birthdays or our anniversary. It will be okay. In fact, it will be good. We will choose for this summer to be good.
Yet our cottage on the Bay of Fundy is the home of our hearts. We’ll miss our flowers, our friends, our cute town, our summer rituals. I probably won’t cry about it again, but I’m sure that, on muggy days, I will feel the ache of missing it in the deepest parts of my heart.
You put this perfectly, my dearie. And the photographs are perfect. Brava! M.
Fingers crossed that you will be able to spend time at your cottage this summer! We have reservations for the whole month of August on Vancouver Island and we still don’t know if we’ll be able to go (thank goodness for generous cancelation policies). Like you said, there are definitely worse situations, but I think we are all anxious to get out and about again.
Oh, I’d love to go to Vancouver at some point. I’ve been to Victoria and really enjoyed it. I don’t know if the province of British Columbia is being quite as cautious as Nova Scotia, but I sure hope you get to go!
Hi Nancy! Like Janis above we too hope to go to BC this summer (and yes we are friends and have other friends there) so we are watching the Canadian news carefully. I surely hope you are able to get to your cabin and enjoy everything that makes it so special to you. And good luck on things opening up in Mass. Here is California things have been opening up for several weeks now and supposedly EVERYTHING will be open on June 15th. Just the chance to start returning to a “new” normal feels good. I hope the same for you. ~Kathy
Yes, things are open here in Massachusetts. The state has done an excellent job of vaccinations, and about 70% of adults are vaccinated, with young people getting vaccinated more and more all the time. I’m enjoying that sense of freedom immensely (though I still wear a mask at the grocery store!).
You’ve done a wonderful job of capturing the pleasures and meaning of Shore Road and Annapolis Royal, Nancy. Indeed, such a good job that I found myself saddened after reading your post about probably not being able to go there this summer. But then the thought occurred to me that the fall is beautiful there as well, though in a different way. Maybe Nova Scotia will be open by then? And I’ve heard that Christmas in Annapolis is something very special. Something to think about as we await the decisions by the Canadian authorities!
You would know about beautiful autumns in Nova Scotia better than I do! If the border opens right after Labor Day, we’ll probably go up for a couple of weeks. But we have a wedding in early October and then leave for a month in Italy. If quarantine is two weeks, we may or may not go, depending on what’s allowed during quarantine. (For example — can we ride our bikes?)
Have you been watching Kim’s Convenience? It gives me a little, charming glimpse of Canada….