September 10th
Land of my birth. Alas, forty-one years of life in Upper Canada has altered the eyes with which I view her and the same period of change and growth transformed the land they see. It truly is impossible to go home. When I reached Lake Fletcher my sister greeted me as her closest blood relative. It's not a matter of liking or disliking, we just don't seem to be able to achieve a meeting of minds on any subject—our brains seem to be wired differently—and it's not simply a issue of gender. We do agree on one thing though, I have always loved my brother-in-law as the male sibling I lacked growing up. Halifax continues to grow and spread amid the blue-grey slate upon which it is built. Not only as a result of amalgamation but also as a result of growing housing subdivisions, shopping centres, and industrial/commercial parks.
Fortunately for us Hurricane Hanna blew up the Bay of Fundy missing us save for a few hours of heavy rainfall. The most intense rain sluiced down the windows during church service. As in Upper Canada everything here is green and vibrant. Joining the latest Nova Scotia trend we indulged in some Sunday Afternoon Shopping. What can I say? By mid-afternoon the sun was out and after an exchange of picture viewing which included views of my Liverpool Bobby Nephew and Eva, her grandparent's pride and joy we went for a long walk around the subdivision to work off our dinner.
Monday Morning, September 8 saw me headed toward Midville Branch, Lunenburg County, Nova Scotia. The roads are still in the same place—though the back roads are in remarkably good condition—someone must have voted for the correct party¿? The landscape I remembered is irrevocably changed. The home I grew up in is completely obscured behind a forest of unchopped brush and trees even from the graveyard which fronts it. That cemetery is now home to virtually all the adults among whom I was raised and I toured it with a distinct feeling of numbness and loss. At the Corner I stopped to spend a couple hours with 95-year-old Herbie Mailman—related to me as I recall from my Mother's side, not through the Mailman's, (yes, that is correct English.) On the crossroad I went to look at the Hirtle Hill and the Falls—rapids really—on the Lahave River, property I still own and pay taxes on. The road that runs past it was reconstructed some years past and the sections of the old highway that are no longer in use have been completely reclaimed by Nature. Save for a few depressions in the soil, a few rocks that formed foundations, and fast disappearing clearings; little remains of the half dozen or so homesteads upon which my ancestors eked out a meagre living.
My nearest neighbour lives in the Ancestral home of my Great-Uncle Otto. It seems strange to see a pole with electrical transformer planted next to the cellarway; my Uncle never had power. The task of maintaining the myriad out-buildings and 100-foot barn would tax all but the wealthiest landowner; the struggling artist who lives there is overwhelmed. The house I wandered as a favoured grand-nephew is barely recognizable save for occupying the same location.
Somehow I managed to back into a narrow woods road and park on my own property for the night.
The next morning camera in hand I walked up over the old hill and down to the waterfall.
It was with nostalgia I photographed and then parked myself on the Mailman fishing rock which fronts the back-eddy pool below the falls.
Toward Noon I drove down to Oakhill and spent the remainder of the day with my 89-year-old Aunt Muriel; my oldest living relative, my Father's Sister. It seems strange to be told I remind her of her father, Harbin, who died before I was born. After Supper I drove in toward Lunenburg and parked myself at Little Lake Campground and spent the night listening to an overnight shower. This morning I sit at my rear table watching a Downie Woodpecker get his breakfast while I write this blog.
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