Family Life, Hay Bay, Ontario

It was good to visit family at Hay Bay, near Napannee, Ontario.  My brother Ron and his darling wife, Adell, bought a lovely lakeside house and acreage at Hay Bay last year.  They still own another house in Ottawa where the kids grew up.  But now this house is as much a lodge and summer cottage as much as year round home.
With the lawn mower tractor for cutting grass, trees being chopped up for wood for the fireplace, canoes, sailboats and dock and beach it’s a really active place.  When I was last there Ron had just planted his large garden. Now the stalks of tomato plants were full of green tomatoes. The apple trees were bearing fruit as well. .  All the flowers he’d planted seemed in bloom. A real pretty yet quaint place with all the modern amenities.  Wifi comes in off a dish lakeside.  The house is well insulated and has an excellent water supply.
"It’s milder than in Ottawa.  Winter snow only lasts  three months though last year was unusual,” Ron told me. .
Velma and Melvine, Adell’s relatives were visiting.  We keep meeting on visits. I remember their names because they’re like a clean fun Thelma and Louise!.   Velma was a librarian cartographer archivist.  We've talked maps and navigation. She’s keenly interested in history and ancestry.  A deeply religious Christian she reminds me in many way of my much loved Baptist Aunt Sally.  They both live their love of Jesus. The grace of God is reflected in their lives.   Melvine is the older sister and worked for years with the child protection services. We share a lot of the battle weariness that comes with front line work with people and bureaucracy.  Their education, experience and character makes for  lively discussions at time.  Sometimes I just enjoy listening to Adell, a phd retired school principal and these two ladies.  It’s even more entertaining when one or all of my nephews gets involved in a discussion.  Politics, with the coming election, made some interesting fodder for the grist mill.
I was glad that Velma and Melvine were there. We all made our way to the Napannee Baptist church on Sunday.  I had a wonderful nostalgic moment remembering church services with my Mom and Aunt Sally.  Adell is a lovely soloist soprano. Singing hymns with her, Thelma and Melvine was a joy. Great Baptist classics with blood on the cross for this eucharist Sunday.
Another time Adell walked with me up to the local church on Hay Bay which their neighbour Reg and his wife attend.  I’m hoping to get to that church one day.   I met the minister with Allan.  On that walk Adell pointed out a very impressive pear tree.  I was also introduced to their neighbour, an engineer in winter,  who  market gardens in the summer. He hunts so we discussed the Ontario hunting regulations for a while while Adell got fresh eggs his chickens had just laid. While there we ate delicious corn.
Adell is a also great chef. I don’t know how she does it.  She, mostly, with help from Velma and Melvin, had some excellent meals made.  Grand breakfasts sausages,  eggs and waffles with Canadian Maple Syrup to  steak and goulash creations for dinner. I confess I didn’t do any of the preparation and was never ‘allowed’ to do more than clean my plate and put it in the dish washer.  Smoothly, like a stealth military kitchen, Adell had the whole extended family well fed.
Allan the youngest son is doing his masters in child psychology at University Ottawa.  He was working on a presentation over the weekend while visiting.  Andrew, the middle son, is married to Tanya. Tanya was with her family that weekend so I missed seeing her. My cockapoo Gilbert absolutely loves Tanya.
Mike, Andrew’s really terrific best friend from childhood was visiting with his girlfriend Tonya.  I met Mike at Andrew’s wedding.  Right from the get go Mike is a great guy. Andrew, having worked as a geologist, is now doing a master’s program in robotics and industrial applications.  He showed me an amazing magnetic scanning robot he’d developed adapting various technologies for searching for metals and other uses underground.  The ideas have been used for searching for IED’s in warzones but he’s adapting this to civil uses..  Mike and Andrew were the intrepid sailors this weekend providing lots of entertainment for their cheering fans as they got out in the Albacore’s on the lake.  They also had the quad helicopter camera out zooming about without losing it in the trees as had previously happened.
Mike’s girlfriend is Tonya and Andrew’s wife is Tanya.  What is the coincidence factor for two best friends to meet two great girls called Tanya and Tonya. Tonya absolutely made Eva’s weekend by bringing along a little fluff mutt which became Eva’s BFF.  Allan’s girlfriend is Megan but she wasn’t there this weekend. I met her on my last visit.
Graeme, Ron and Adell’s, oldest son, a chemical engineer, previously working with the waste fusion project, translating garbage into fuel with the aid of focused sun rays is now starting a new position with a nuclear plant in the north.  He visited with his girlfriend Eyse, the two heading off Florida for a two week vacation with Elyse relatives.  Graeme hadn’t seen the Kennedy Missile Centre.  Having been there I sang the sites praises and encouraged them to read Carl Hiiansens’ Sick Puppy or Bad Monkey while they were in Florida. Also to avoid walking near any ponds where there were no ducks on the water.
At some point there was 11 of us but mostly there were 9.
Mike, Allan and Andrew had me playing board games.  I didn’t win.  I don’t think the object of board games is winning. A lot of laughter and camaraderie occurs instead.  There was a croquet game too. I think I missed out on that because Ron went for a nap and I thought that an even better after lunch idea. I really am coming to appreciate the simple afternoon nap as one of life’s great pleasures.
With Ron I did minor home repairs and with Adell and him began the assembly of a weed catcher.
In the evening we all read novels in the living room or watched Murdoch Mysteries on the tv. We had various outings to town. Allan and I had a shopping trip to Canadian Tire and Walmart so I could get a fishing and hunting license and buy some walkie talkies for the boats.  Then Ron and I visited the Loyalist Cove Marina in Bath to see the yachts that ply the local lakes.  Outings naturally involved stops at Macdonald’s for burgers and fries.
Adell took Velma and Melveen on a tour of local antique shops.  Meanwhile Ron and I were buying pear trees which we later planted with Adell’s last minute adjustments.  I loved this.
Throughout the visit, Eva the Cockapoo was forever nearby ready to roll on her back to get her chest rubbed. She was precious.
The big event though was a trip to the Napannee Fair with the mini tractor races and demolition derby.
I find when I visit Ron and Adell there is a whole lot going on.  This property reminds me of their Fort Garry house by the University. The lawns there came down onto the red river.  Andrew and Graeme were rug rats and they had the dogs Tartan and Rainy. That had been a pretty busy household with Mom and Dad visiting and me staying over after my time in India.  With the kids all grown and with girlfriends this is a whole other level of complexity.  Grand central station in the country.

Hay Bay Home

My brother, Ron and Sister in Law, Adell have bought a second home near Nappanee on Hay Bay. I confess, I love that family are living on a place called Hay Bay.  Driving through the Ontario country side with fall colours of red and orange and yellow we see a sign Hay Bay Women’s Society.  I don’t think it’s narcissism to appreciate the location by name but a sense of deep belonging. Next year I’m hoping to get back to Scotland to the Aberdeen area from whence grandad came, where a Hay is apparently a dime a dozen.  One of my brother’s realtors was a Hay too.  Makes it feel all sort of right in an odd way.
Last time I was here I was attending my nephew Andrew and his bride Tanya’s wedding at the Canada Club wearing the blue Hay Hunting kilt.
When I flew into Ottawa to attend the Canadian Society of Addiction Medicine Conference my brother met me and Gilbert my cockapoo at the Ottawa Airport.  Great to be with family. Nephew Allan , just completed undergrad psychology waiting to begin masters program.  Over delicious Italian at Poccopazzo family owned restaurant I got to catch up on the latest doings of chemical engineer movie making nephew Graeme and geologist nephew Andrew and his beautiful  publisher wife Tanya.  Graeme’s horror movie Ragnarock Cabin has opening to coincide with Halloween this year.  Tanya and Andrew were on a pumpkin hunt in preparation for a Halloween party. It all seems so civilized.  I feel like I’ve descended from alien planet out in the wild west when I come home to this happy normalcy.  My brother and sister in law are both retired so we no longer commiserate over the challenges of work with all it’s attendant frustrations.  My stories only serve to remind them of their past.  Ron continues his investing from home while I’ve never seen my high school principal Adell not bustling about with home making.  Her primary student this visit is Eva, Allan’s little brown Chewy the wooky  looking cockapoo.
Having just bought another house, all the talk is about landscaping and decorating. They’d just moved the weekend before.  When my conference finished Adell and Allan picked me up with Gilbert already on board and we drove the two hours from the city to their new rural retreat.  I loved seeing the quaint hobby farms along the river. The red barns of Ontario are so picturesque with the red leaves of autumn sumac. Cattle and horses were interspersed with hay fields and corn. Graeme and Andrew have seen deer in the forest on the way here.  Adell pointed to the white swans in the marsh nearby.
The house isn’t visible from the road.  Nearly 5 acres of waterfront.  Down a short road between spruce and pine is the garage  at the first level. The roof of the large two level home sits next to the parking at the lower level.  We entered through the great veranda on the second floor. “I hope to screen this all in next year, “ Adell said as she showed me the upper rooms, a regular Marriott guest suite where I’d be staying.  Bamboo hardwood floors throughout the upper guest area.  Down the bamboo stairs is the music room. Adell sings soprano with several choirs still.  When I told her about attending Carmen recently she said, “I love singing opera but don’t much like attending it anymore.”  I’ll always remember her as the beautiful young girl solo in the church whose voice touched the heavens.  Ron’s veritable collection of guitars was in the music room.  The great living room had a heated cement floor and large fireplace. Dining room and kitchen were part of the pattern with the glass panel doorway looking out on the huge expanse of front yard opening onto the lake. From there I saw Gilbert and Eva running wide circles about the property at breakneck cockapoo speed.  Everything is large, large walk in pantry, large cupboards.  “There’s no basement ,” said Adell .  Of course that explains the need for the storage spaces.  Ron has a couple of sheds in addition to his garage.  The master suite is beyond the large two person whirlpool tub. It has lots of walk in cupboards and another elegant bathroom. It opens onto a a patio where no doubt the Lord and Lady of the house can take afternoon tea and contemplate their apple tree orchard.
Allan and I bought day fishing licenses at the Napanee Canadian Tire.  With Ron’s kevlar canoe and fishing gear, fishing rods, an Adell packed picnic and Gilbert in a life jacket in the middle of the boat, Allan and I, like countless coer de bois before us, set out on the great fishing adventure.  Ron had taken a break from driving his tractor pulling his rotor tiller through his planned potato garden to push out his wheeled aluminum Fendock.  We pushed off from shore before he figured how to lay down the wood flooring.
Allan paddled in the bow while I j stroked in the stern.  For a guy who at his age was white water canoeing the Winnipeg River, I couldn’t recall the last time I’d paddled.  The technique is never lost but the muscles sure weren’t happy.  Neighbours further along the shore waved and spoke to us as we passed.  They were all out doing yard work, burning leaves in fires,  chatting on lakeside decks.
“How far are we going, Allen?"
“Getting tired already, Uncle,”
“No just wondering,” I lied.
“There’s a marsh a long the shore up ahead, where mom sees the swans,"
At last we stopped paddling and Allan put a Canadian Wiggler on my line.  I began casting. “This was dad’s favourite lure, “ I told him and then went on to tell about Dad taking Ron and  I fishing in Northern Saskatchewan, catching pickerel and cooking the fillets over a driftwood fire on the shore.  We casted either side only once tangling lines and the wind pushed us along the outside of marsh.  Allan told me about his research interests in early child education.  He’d applied for research grants and was waiting to hear.
When the wind picked up and it looked like we’d be blown too far away we paddled back into the lee of the point coming aground in the weeds.
 “My hands are freezing from the water, “ said Allen.
“I put my gloves on an hour ago,” I said.
Gilbert was sleeping in the middle of the boat. I was enjoying the cup of thermos coffee and sandwich Adell had packed.  A flock of Canada Geese rose up from the marsh and flew back to Vancouver British Columbia.  That’s where all the Canada Geese from all over the world congregate for seminars on how to avoid being shot by hunters in the rest of Canada.
We talked some more. Allan changed my lure from the Canadian wiggler to the Red Devil. "I always catch a jack whenever I fish with a red devil,” i told him then cast.  Immediately a large fish caught the hook and tugged. I watched the disturbance on the surface. “I’ve caught one, “ i shouted.  “It’s just a rock,” Allan said.  Gilbert rose to the excitement.
Sure enough I pulled in a large northern pike alongside the canoe shouting at Allan to get the net.  Untangling the net from Gilbert’s feet doing twisting pretzel contortions behind him Allan had the net and put it under the fish. “It’s too big for the net,” he said.  He couldn’t get it under the body but the head and hook got caught in the top of the net.  Gilbert was looking the fish right in it’s glassy eyes threatening to jump overboard then suddenly the hook was free in the net and the fish was lying across the opening.. “Quck grab the gils, “ I said.
“I’m not putting my fingers near those teeth, “ said Allen as Gilbert whined and the fished impatient took a massive flick of it’s whale sized tail to Jonah into the reaches of Hay Bay.
“I wanted to eat that fish. “ I said to Allen, “I never knew you were a catch and release sort of Eastern guy.”
“You didn’t pull it up beside me where I could get the net under it. I should have just used the camera to show it wasn’t all that big.”
“Admit it, you’re too weak to lift such a mighty fish."
With all that excitement and all following casts catching weeds we paddled back to the dock.  Ron had again left his tractor and rotor tilling to stand on his now decked dock with Eva waiting for the return of the Canadian couer de bois.  Eva and Gilbert were ecstatic with the reunion and yet another excuse to run wild circles all over the property.  Exhausted I collapsed in Ron’s great leather chair and watched pink finch and blue jays avail themselves of the feeder outside the main window.  I love looking out on the lake between the wedge of forest.  Every once in a while Ron came by on his mini  orange Scots by John Deere tractor to deposit wood by the door.  Allan collected it and stacked it by the fireplace. I enjoyed the warmth while Adell made a roast beef dinner which we all enjoyed later at the dining table.
That night we drove to Kingston a half hour or so away to watch Judge the movie my friend Dr. George Chalmers emailed a recommendations for.  We both love Robert Downey Jr and Duvall. Their performances in this incredible drama of family and small town America should get Downey at least an Oscar.  It was incredible acting that had me in tears at one point. My brother took care of my elderly father at times and the compassion the movie showed of son caring for dying father was very much like the sensitivity that had been shown in On Golden Pond.
Back home Adell handed me pumpkin pie for a snack,.  After that I collapsed in bed with Gilbert the cockapoo climbing up to lie on a pillow beside my head.  This morning it’s raining.  Adell made us all bacon and eggs.
Next Ron called out that we’re all going for a drive in the country side. Adell and he were discussing earlier that they’d not explored their neighbour hood and wanted to see what’s on the other side of the lake.  By the time I caught up with the plans Ron was in the Suburu with Allan, Gilbert and Eva.  Adell was waiting to lock the door behind me as I slipped on my shoes.  There was a drizzling Vancouver rain till we got to a ferry which took us across to higher land.  There we drove up to Lake on a Mountain where the dogs had a jolly time on leash exploring this ancient mysterious lake.  What they call here a mountain though wouldn’t cut muster in BC.  There was a great view of the waterways and I saw where Lake Ontario became the Reach.
Picton was the town and harbour we landed in.  A quaint little place with old stone houses here and there with the red brick two stories. Pretty little tourist site. We drove on from there to Desronto in the Mohawk territory then on to Napanee, the little town I really liked. It’s 20 minutes from their home but we’d gone all around the backside of Hay Bay to get there from the other side.  We stopped for burgers and fries at Shoeless Joe’s Napanee.  Great food and great service.  Ron and Allan were happy with the sports scores on the telly at each booth.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had such a fine cheese burger with mushrooms remembering times I’d taken Dad for burgers, something he really enjoyed in his last years.  Of course, Cheeseburger in Paradise by Jimmy Buffet will always be a favourite sailor song of mine. Gilbert and Eva shared a charbroil barbecued burger paddy between them and just wanted more.
After a couple of shopping stops, Cartronicpowersports for Honda 3000eu generator and Marks for socks,  we got back home where the dogs ran the length of the yard and back, glad to be free.  Ron’s been playing Four Strong Winds on the guitar with Adell singing.  I’ve just finished an after burger nap in the guest room.  It’s so relaxing in the country.  I love this house and  family. The dogs are simply the best little characters happy as can be with each other and their surroundings.