By Maryanna Gabriel
I knew it would be the last chance for me to get out for a bit of a break. I have just gone walkabout. It was only three days but it felt like a long time. From being home, the longest ever, to a drive north up the big island, I made a run for it. I slept in an old inn that had a lovely room with a slanting wood floor and a
view of the ocean. Later I watched an Orca break water and breach. That was glorious. I felt the spirits of the forest, reveled in driftwood, and the lovely rounded granite rocks that graced the shore.
The smell of smoke had been in the air before I left. As I returned, the entire sky was gray. The smoke has spread for miles, not just up the coast but across the interior of British Columbia. The pain of the people and of the land to the south of us is making itself felt. It is hard just being with it.
Clams I bought, grace my kitchen. I am making chowder and linguine. I am thinking of smoke over water and of the beauty of this wonderful world that is so fraught.
