Where's Vajso?

Where is he, indeed? Sometimes I wonder. Until recently, he was in a car returning from an idyllic three-day cloistering in a cabin on a private lake 100 km west of Ottawa. He is currently to be found trying his damnedest not to slide into a total slump at the reality of being back in this loud, ugly, shit-coloured city...although, to be fair to said loud, ugly, shit-coloured city, I think I would be describing most cities if not all that way right now. I think I have the soul of a country dweller. I know: it's all lovely and serene for a few days, even a few weeks, but living there is quite another thing. Yes, this may be true...but how do I know? How can I know until I try? I've spent my entire adult life living in cities, and yes it's OK, but shouldn't I try the other too? I can't begin to tell you how spectacular this place was: a tiny cabin perched on the edge of Sugar Lake, a private dock with two chairs facing the water, a canoe and two oars for idle jaunts on the water, and everywhere you look, maples and birch trees and sassafras in an absolutely indescribable palette of autumn golds and reds and purples and limes. And quiet. Oh my god, so quiet. T and I sat on the dock listening, I shit you not, to the sound of birdwing 200 feet overhead! We came back to the sounds of streetcars and honking delivery trucks and a tethered dog yelping and the blaring radio of Ali and Ali, shoe-sellers, downstairs. I wanted to run all the way back to Lanark County. This is typical of me, though: this idealizing of vacation locales. I suppose I would go mad if left too long in the country; at the very least, I'd lose my tenuous hold on the social graces. This is a larger problem, I fear, than a simple yearning after arcadia; this goes to the heart of my dissatisfaction with wherever I live. I felt it in L.A., for what seemed to be justifiably mitigating reasons; I feel it here, the set of mitigating circumstances eliminated to make way for a different set. The common denominator is me. Well, me and a city...which leads me to believe in conclusion that maybe I have, after all, the soul of a country dweller. As Hamlet says when asked his thoughts while resting his head in Ophelia's lap: "Country matters."

OK, this is a bit strange: we were there for three dinners and three breakfasts, and we ate nothing but pork products. Hmm, and at Ramadan no less. Not like that should matter to us, but still, we didn't plan an all-pork holiday or anything, it just fell out that way. But did I mention we canoed on Sugar Lake? Well, we did. T did most of the work, I being preoccupied with sitting in such a way as not to capsize us. No, my balance settled itself after a bit, and I pitched in with the rowing. But mostly we just sat on the water, drifting through that perfect silence, watching the skeletons of old trees float by under us.