The West Commences: End of summer

It’s 9:30 Sat. night and I’ve just driven home from dinner at Bert and Peg’s. Jules and Carol were there and the evening was warm. The sky is clear and full of stars, but my appreciation of them was curtailed by the harsh noise of an angry young man screaming obscenities at someone one street over. This is the last weekend of summer, so the lakes are dotted with boats, the roads lined with cars and people are out doing too much of everything. Kalamalka Lake was the most gorgeous and various shades of blue this afternoon as I drove to Kelowna.

I’ve been feeling listless this week. A lot has happened in the last 3 years, and I haven’t had time to do much other than keep my head up and keep moving, but now I’m here and fairly settled and wondering what’s next. I miss Jim almost more than ever. It might also be the season. I’m so used to going back to school in the fall, that as the weather cools I begin to wonder what I’m doing. Hiking and biking certainly keep me in motion, but … Anyway, September is planned with biking in Idaho, Bill and Paula’s visit and driving with him to Victoria. Maybe Immigrant Services will need a teacher in October or this feeling will pass on its own.

Last Sunday’s hike up Mount Beaven was the hardest yet. I now know what a 5 is on the hiking scale. For the first time my thighs were tight for the following 2 days. There was a lot of uphill, which is just as hard in a different way coming down. We saw grizzly digs about which I knew nothing before. Donna told me that when they’re after something, be it juicy roots or meaty marmots, they dig them up, at times uprooting small trees in the process. The views were spectacular, even the locals commented because this year there was no fog or fire smoke to get in the way.

I’ve gone back to studying a bit of Spanish, one of my efforts to fight off ennui. And just as I did I had two encounters with Spanish speaking people. The first was a woman from El Salvador who came to the door selling Humane Society tickets. We talked in Spanish a while as I bought a ticket. The second was on the phone. I was on line trying to update the Tom Tom maps. I saw a phone number, dialed it and ended up talking with a very helpful woman for quite a long time. In the course of the conversation I asked her where she was. She was in Guadalajara, Mexico, so we shared a few words in Spanish, but not many as trying to program a GPS in English is enough of a challenge for me.

The big success of the week was putting together the Squirrel Buster bird feeder that I brought from home. It was only in 5 pieces, but the wrong combinations I came up with were legion. Now it’s full of black oil sunflower seeds and hanging from a dead tree in the side yard where I can see it as I sit and eat. The problem is I don’t think the birds will like the location and I’m very eager to attract a pair of Steller’s Jays that have been pecking around the back yard for the last few days. They mostly hang out in my back neighbor’s blue spruce. I think I’ll have to hang it higher in the back maple. And the toilet has flushed almost every time for the last week. Milagro!