Creating In The Still Of January

 By Maryanna Gabriel


One of the nicest things I get to do these days, besides feel indignant about winter as though it isn't supposed to be here, is read other people's stories and contribute input. This gives the editors a sieve when it comes to what they want to publish with the sheer volume of submissions. It is tons of fun contributing to Geist this way, a Canadian literary magazine. If I am feeling depressed about my own lack of progress, reading the submissions and giving commentary helps me feel connected to a writing community. It is not so bad. We are all in the same sea trying to do our best with word-smithing.  

I have a file called "Rubbish" on my laptop. Two versions of where I want to head next have just been dumped into it (learned a long time ago not to throw stuff out because it might circle back around). Right now I am on a third version. It is somewhat scary, like jumping off a deep end, and it is also exciting. Maybe it will be another dead end, but so far so good. 

If a person needed quiet, lack of interruption, clarity, and time to process to write, then I can say I have this now from my mountain aerie. When I am stumped, I draw. 

When I am stumped, I draw. 

Lunching With Caryatids

 By Maryanna Gabriel 

 "If you choose not to find joy in the snow,
you will have less joy in your life, but still the same amount of snow." 
- Unknown

Caryatids in the Hume Hotel   

Just as I was studying the varying snow implements used by the inhabitants of this fair town, we are in a thaw. I took advantage. There was no arguing with myself. I was walking and that was that. Besides, I wasn't sure if my legs still worked. Donning my Camino boots and socks for encouragement, I set out. 

Over the Slocan, low clouds hung, the lake a steel gray. Cute homes with Victorian porches had carefully shoveled walks. I was determined to get to the post office, visit the library, and take myself out for lunch. When I saw that a restaurant called "The Library" in the historic Hume Hotel had reopened, I was sold. A recent flood caused by a guest was finally repaired. The waitress plied me with tales on how balmy Nelson was compared to Northern Alberta. It was a lovely lunch - the special, a codburger with slaw, accompanied by an apple cider made in the Okanagan and served with lime. Seated next to a gas fire, I admired the Victorian achitecture that surrounded me and surveyed the caryatids. Good word. Not many restaurants have them. 

I also wanted to know if the Nelson Public Libary had my book. Turns out they do (it was checked out), and not only that, there is access to a number of copies. Yeah, to Nelson for supporting Canadian writers.

What has really cheered me up is a post I put on the community page has been inundated. How wonderfully unexpected. Thank you to this lively community. 

  

Lunching with caryatids. 

The Weary Are At Rest

 By Maryanna Gabriel 

 "It was so wonderful to be there, safe at home,
sheltered from the winds and the cold. Laura
thought this must be a little like heaven, where the weary are at rest."
- Laura Ingalls Wilder, The Long Winter

Am lost now in a dreamy cloud, in a hazy world of white... there is a reason I am here, I tell myself. Like most mysteries, the reason will be solved, after the fact. Patience. 

Who knew? There are fashion statements one can make with hat, scarf and gloves and articles on what to wear when housebound. Sort of a combo pajama and leisure number. Have been madly knitting. Then there is the problem of cookies. What kind to make and how often? It's a good thing I like to write, I tell myself. The hours vanish when I am working. 

Life was so busy last year. Now I am stilled. A fresh blanket of show has fallen and there is no way I am driving. I find myself going over a short story that is making me crazy. It has almost been accepted twice. When I rework it, I wonder if I am just making it worse. Like a painting, there is a point where the image loses freshness and as I add words it seems a balance is lost. But by now I am stubborn. So much has gone into it. I suppose if writers gave up, a lot less would get published. I think today, though, I am done. It has been too long since a good read. 

Reading on a snowy day. 

Warmer In Whitehorse

By Maryanna Gabriel

 "That's what winter is:
an excercise in remembering how to still yourself
then how to come pliantly back to life again."
- Ali Smith

Speaking of prudent, and blinking at the weather report, I wasn't exactly sure, just how prudent I was. Excuse me? Minus 25? It was warmer in Whitehorse. Pinch me.

Back home, videos of cars swishing helplessly confirmed the harsh condition was not local. It also validated why I felt terrified. Over decades of coastal living, I had adapted and survived winter driving by staying off the roads, mostly because of other drivers and the dangers they pose. I once watched a snowplow slide into a ditch from my sidestreet into a treacherous blind corner and that was enough for me. I was out.

My new environment astounds me. People clean off their cars and go to work, calm as you please. Streets are plowed and sanded. Everyone carries on. I thought for sure the garbage guys wouldn't come for my bear-bitten bin. But they did. 

Scanning the news, I can see on the coast, schools closed, mail stopped, warnings to work from home posted, and power failures. Basically, travel is dangerous and difficult. So, I wasn't imagining things. It's just different. The snow is wetter by the sea, sloppier, and melts quickly. Cold weather is so intermittent that putting on snow tires is often considered not worth the cost. 

Given my new life, I know snow tires are a necessity so these I do have. What I don't have is confidence. Eventually, needing supplies and with a break in the snowfall, I have dug out my car, and bravely exited from a precarious driveway only to steer, with my heart in my mouth, straight up a vertical incline. Better, I reasoned than the direct plummet down. To my great joy, the tires work, and a shop went splendidly. How many years has it been since I have driven in snow? I hate to think. 

From my window. 

Prudent To Rent Pt. 8

 By Maryanna Gabriel

" The ache for home lives in all of us.
 The safe place where we can go and not be questioned."
- Maya Angelou

I was right about one thing. The answer was a complete surprise - one I would never have come to on my own. Nelson was a beautiful little town with a heritage feel in the mountains of the Kootenays, which someone on social media was calling Whoville, sometimes referred to as the sister city of Salt Spring Isand. It was a place I had been to often and enjoyed. Maybe I was overreacting to the crowding I had experienced on the Southern Gulf Islands, but I knew it would give me access to the wildness of British Columbia that I so loved. After absorbing the implications in stunned silence for a time, I noticed a furnished place for rent in the area that was reasonable. It had a view, a fire, and a bathtub - the bathtub being a big selling point. The next thing I knew, doors opened and with questions happily behind me, I packed my bags. It would be an experiment, I decided. One never knows until one tries, right? 

Pencil sketch- "a little town with a heritage feel..." 

I could only bring what my Toyota would hold. Packing was a mess. Half my things were irretrievably buried in my storage locker. Usually organized, I was unable to find certain items I might need and had access to items that were not terribly relevant. Oh well. 

Decades of coastal living had trained me. Snow is something I fear when it comes to it. But it turned out my fears were needless. The weather was unseasonably lenient, and the trip beautiful, with hardly any of the white stuff. I could even see out the rear car window. 

Prudent To Rent Pt. 7

 By Maryanna Gabriel

"What you see and what you hear depends
 a great deal on where you are standing.
It also depends on what sort of person you are."

- CS Lewis The Magicians Nephew

I know I'm a boomer and possibly spoiled by an era where such issues were easily manifested, but basic shelter? It doesn't seem too much to ask. Apparently I have this wrong. 

If I was Generation Z, or X, or whatever else, I would know, but I'm not, and I don't. Clearly, I'm out of touch with the skinny on the streets. So being me, I would resort to... well, I would resort to - not exactly magical thinking, but a technique I used long ago for accessing the unconscious. If I prayed enough, what I was about to do might even access the superconscious. Given that I was completely stymied, heck, I would take anything conscious. 

Basically, Holotropic Therapy is breathing with music. It was developed by Stanislav Grof who is considered the "Father of Breathwork". I knew it would bypass my busy brain and access new solutions. By using natural means it might give me a jump on meditation which so far, was not getting me anywhere. I needed a break through. Where do I sign?

I made the trip to Victoria one more time. With a roomful of people and working alongside a trained practitioner who had a doctorate in psychology, maybe I would look at my questions in a new way. 

Prudent To Rent Pt. 6

 By Maryanna Gabriel 

"I have learned that if you must leave a place that you have lived and loved and where all your yesteryears are buried deep, leave it in any way except a slow way, leave it in the fastest way you can. Never turn back and never believe that an hour you remember is a better hour because it is dead. Passed years seem safe ones, vanquished ones, while the future lives in a cloud, formidable from a distance. The cloud clears as you enter it. I have learned this, but like everyone, I learned it late."
                                                                     - Beryl Markham, West Of The Night


Waking out of a sound sleep, I dreamed of returning to a family property, an old cottage. Good decision. Except upon waking, there wasn't one. The dream seemed so real. This home thing was getting to me.

It was then I turned my attention to the familiarity of Victoria, a place where I have lived and worked and also where I have friends. Driving down the Vancouver Island coast is a long and tiring journey that requires concentration through the narrow, winding, Malahat. Despite this, I pursued showing after showing. Working through rental agencies was a dreary excercise I was discovering, one gives intimate personal information, and then, well, it disappears into a void. One apartment reeked of urine, another was strangely laid out and expensive, another in a house without privacy.

One serious nibble got my hopes up. The actual owner of the apartment building was in communication with me. The apartment was as cute as could be with vintage lights and a Betty Crocker kitchen, all freshly painted with eau de fresh rug shampoo in the air. In short, I loved it. With one day to the first month's rent being due, the agency still hadn't let it. I was on pins and needles. Pick me! Then nothing. It was rented to someone else. Something in me broke at that point. What exactly was going on? 

This headline crossed my feed. "Asking rents jump 8.6% in December..." What was it with this Canadian economy, anyway?

 

Prudent To Rent Pt 5

 By Maryanna Gabriel

This was all very well, but where was I supposed to live? The question of what was home swirled through my beleagured brain. Which took me to where I grew up. A very expensive place. Now that is. 

Where I grew up - nostalgia seeps in.  

Every time I go to West Vancouver, I make the trek up Sentinel Hill and stare at our old house. We had been transferred from Toronto and my father, an ad man, was a new hire with a local television station. West Vancouver was just a sleepy suburb in 1967 when my parents were out house-hunting. One place caught my artistic mother's eye; it had been on the market for months. In fact, the agent did not want to show it. The soaring glass windows, and wood ceilings reinforced with tremendous beams, were too avant garde. My parents loved it, it had wonderful views, and made the purchase for $33,000. Moan. Our course was set, and it was a happy time. The house suited us perfectly and we had many adventures as a family. 

As nostalgia seeped in, I thought to myself this was a past I could reenter. Friends I cared deeply for lived nearby. There was a housing co-op, and I thought maybe I would give it a go and apply. Geez, I would come full circle with my life. How poetic. Maybe I would grow younger and age backwards. And maybe I could work at the racetrack again, the job that funded so much: university, my first apartment, and travels. What a jolly idea.

Home. No worries. I got this. 

I filled out the forms. My friends were on board as reference. The reply came all too soon. It was so polite it took me several moments to understand I was being turned down. Not a fit, then. Well, fine. Probably for my higher good. I had been asking for guidance after all. Who knows how these things work? 

A blow, nonetheless. Sigh. Maybe I could earn billions and buy our old house back. Wouldn't that feel weird. Now there's a plan. Sure, Mayanna - while you're at it, ask for another billion to pay the taxes. Alright already, back to the drawing board. 

Prudent To Rent Pt4

 By Maryanna Gabriel 

Xuwtluqs turned to stone. 

She was terrified of water. Moreover, it wasn't that she couldn't drive; she was afraid to. Talking incessantly, she peppered me with questions as we returned by foot along the ocean. 

She wanted to know where I had been and what I had seen. Although it was late, her loneliness was apparent, and I hadn't the heart to hurry away. She showed me her guest home with an ocean view. She had many houses, it turned out. I roughly calculated the wealth from the rentals and sold land she described and it was extensive. But what good did it do? She was trapped in a prison of her own making. Longing to travel and having the means made no difference. The fear she lived with had her in lockdown. The tendrils of this longing wrapped themselves around me, and I was a brief respite from her conundrum, an entertaining diversion, as I anwered her questions and spoke of travels far away.

There is a legend. On the shoreline where we had walked, the First Peoples once lived in villages. Xuwtluqs, a supernatural being of power was a protector. One day Xexels came along and asked that he control a storm which was raging, but Xuwtluqs refused. Xexel was also a being of power, and he turned Xuwtluqs into stone and now he is frozen in the rock, visible to all who walk the shore today. A nearby sign posts that storms come up suddenly and many have died unawares along this coast. The moral of the story is to ask nicely, I think. At least that is what the sign said. Undoubtedly, there is something lost in translation. 

Finally, the light was fading, and it was getting too dark to linger longer. My stomach was rumbling, and it was past time to go. I unraveled the tendrils of her longing wrapped around my spirit and managed to say my goodbyes to this woman who was frozen. Frozen with fear. 

I knew it was coming in the way one knows these things. The next day, she wrote and ask if I wanted the house with the view should she decide to rent it.

The metaphor of being caught in stone was too powerful. I was already thrashing through metaphor enough.  My reply was sincere. No, thank you. 

The moral of the story is to ask nicely. 

Prudent To Rent Pt 3

 By Maryanna Gabriel

The nearby coastline was impressive. I loved it. I would need to move quickly. 

The pictures were of an all wood house set in the privacy of an apple orchard. The owner had squeezed me in as the last viewing. Not so good. The budget for the rent was already a huge stretch, but I decided for an entire house, it would be worth it. Damn the expense. Now there was a lineup? She had been interviewing prospective tenants for two days. Yeesh.

When we entered, the smell was an assault on the senses. The low dark rooms were cramped and reeked of wet dog and something else. The next room was worse and apparently the dog was allocated the entire space. Then there was the kitchen. Words failed. The owner pointed to a tussle of grass. "Here is the garden." What? No fencing? Oh boy. The deer would have a heyday. It was nothing like the pictures posted in the ad and I had come such a long way. It would take me weeks, maybe months, to bring it up to standard. If at all. 

She turned and faced me. I was not a candidate; she was looking for someone who wanted the house for years.

Right. Thank goodness. No worries, I could contain the disappointment. Turning to leave, she stopped me. She did not want me to go... 

Prudent To Rent Pt 2

 By Maryanna Gabriel

We docked. I eagerly followed her up the path to the house. She was retired and having trouble making ends meet. I would need to volunteer to ingratiate myself with the community, she said, then looking me over more closely added, "Maybe not the fire department". Had I imagined it or had the rental price just gone up. 

I handed her a cinnamon bun from the famous Ladysmith Bakery, and after tea I was led downstairs to the suite. 

My heart sank. The internet could not play a movie, I was told, sketchy at best. There was to be no lock on the door for she needed to access to the washer. My eyes swept over the tasteless decor, the map hiding a hole in the wall, the uncomfortable dated furniture, and stared outwards. As pictured in the ad at least. Maybe it would be enough. Outside, we walked a forested path. My route for supplies would have to be the dock further along, I was informed, quite a hike with a wheelbarrow. I began to hesitate. Oh. And the water taxi was no longer in business - it had sold. Did I think I could buy a boat? She knew of one for sale. I shook my head. 

When I understood how heavily populated the island was the situation finally sank in. No escape on land or sea then, Basically, I would be trapped. It would be a beautiful prison; this would never do.

Trying to smile my way to the end, the romance was wearing off. She in her turn, had gauged my responses and also cooled. It was clear to both of us that we were wasting each other's time. Still, it took coming home and thinking about it before I sent off my email and simply stated, no thank you, and that I needed more independence.

Her answer? A wise decision. Indeed. So much indeed for Maryanna's island adventure. But wait. There's more...

Prudent To Rent Pt 1

 By Maryanna Gabriel

I admit it. I am a real estate refugee. 

A bear has punctured holes in the garbage can lid since I arrived. This is just outside my bedroom window. Today the temperatures in the mountains are minus twenty and plummeting - all very Swiss Alps. I stare out my window, a little wild-eyed, and retrace my steps as to how I got here. 

From the thought "I want to sell my house", and actually making this happen, there has been a glacially slow interlude, wrought with change. The change I am referring to is the volatile Canadian economy and unknowingly being caught in a housing market u-turn.

Be smart, Maryanna, I told myself, wait for a house. Wait for it. It seemed prudent to rent.

I began innocently enough by answering an ad. A woman on a small island in Sidney Harbour had a waterfront home with a furnished suite and was looking for a tenant. The ad stated there was no ferry but there was a water taxi. Being a writer, a small island sounded ideal. Most of my belongings were in storage, I could handle the taxi. Besides, not only was the apartment affordable, the photos consisted of stunning scenes of sunlit rooms with sparkling ocean waters alive with the movement of ships and sea life. Perfect. Maybe I would write a few novels - move over Margaret Atwood. Hah. 

She replied enthusiastically and would pick me up at the dock. I felt terribly adventurous as warning blasts sounded and ships maneuvered. In her little boat, we dodged marine traffic as wind whipped my hair. What a terribly exciting person I was, how fabulous a day, and how glorious to be alive.