Dark clouds float across the lake like giant, inflated elephants. Rain skirts around us. Thunder roars. And we sit at the card table unconcerned, playing Settlers. The rain stops by, briefly, for a smoke, but doesn’t linger. We win the argument.

Bacon, bagel, eggs. Potato, pepper, chicken. Chili. Mike’s twenty-inch catch: fresh lunch. As always, we are well fed. Laughter carries across the water, a letter delivered and opened. Clarity, calm. We camp lakeside, washing our dishes in the water. The light dips and swirls. I sit on water’s edge, languid, forgetting myself.

On Sunday the wind is drawn around us in parallel lines. Then, late in the afternoon, it picks up: the tent flips, the tarp rips and is pinned against a tree. I scramble to collect scattered cups and bags, shoving them into the jeep and finding my coat—which I’d been looking for all weekend—tucked in a corner. The guys are caught out on the lake, the wind bending their b-line home like an arrow’s bow. But by the time they arrive the wind has settled. Water is boiling, ready for hot chocolate and coffee. The sun is out, the lake is placid, returning to it’s first-light state: a mirror to the sky.

I love this quiet city.
The flip flop of sandals passing by
like paperbacks closing one by one.
Somewhere a bagpipe has lost direction
and the mimes are calling out for his whereabouts.
I spot a native selling wool mittens.
It’s the middle of August and she is unawares.
All the while the sun warms my face
like the outside of a teacup,
like a woman’s side,
like a dream what assures what you’ve always known:
the line between soil and flesh dissolves
in time, if you let it.

“This reminds me of all those years of soccer: showing up to games and thinking, Really? We’re playing in this?”

One of the great things about calling Vancouver home is that you’re always carrying a forest around in your back pocket. A few hours drive out of town and Justin, Mike and I hit up an adult playground along the sparsely occupied Skagit River. Keep in mind this is August long weekend, arguably the busiest camping weekend in BC.

Never mind the dust, the mosquitoes or the bee sting; never mind the brawl we nearly got into with our hick neighbours—grandpa flying in with fists raised, mom swearing her head off, “Don’t use that fucking language in front of my kids!”—cooler heads (ours) eventually prevail.

Despite a few imperfections, this is still my kind of paradise: four o’clock lunches, bridge jumping and greasy camp food. We carry chairs into the middle of the river and smoke while I glance at the suspiciously single-looking lady down the river (she’s not, nor is her friend, we investigated). The guys fish while I read, but we are united in our love of Kings of Leon, Settlers, and sleeping in.

All this is marked by the absense of time. We live by feeling, by fancy—our stomachs’ direction and the heat on our skin.

In the evening the light dissipates on the water, perfect for film. All is quiet. In the long pauses between sips of beer and drags on our cigars, silence is more than acceptable.

At work we paint strategically, braving the not-quite-yet-ridiculously-hot sun in the morning, then switch to the shade after lunch before we die of dehydration and sun stroke.

We talk about the most efficient use of A/C indoors. I rave about my basement.

I put a rag under my hat to shade my ears and face and am called “the Prince of Egypt.”

Frank’s shoes fall apart. No one blames the sun.

At lunch our boss brings us all slurpees—thank you!—but they don’t last very long.

In the afternoon I see two teenage boys walk by with large freezies. Fifteen minutes later they walk back the other way with slurpees.

On the way home the bus drives right past us without stopping, making the wait 40 minutes instead of 15, but I don’t care because I’m sitting in the shade—shade is my new favourite thing in the world.