END OF AN ERA

In a couple of weeks, this decade will have ended.  So much has happened in the last ten years, I hardly know where to begin in trying to turn it into a narrative.  First, I had to remember where I lived in 2009.

During Ivaan's final illness, we bought a house that we never intended to live in. We had quite a lot of money lying around, the proceeds of the sale of our much-loved house on Portland Street.

Our house on Portland Street

I never loved another house like I loved Portland.

We lived in a condo near Bay and Bloor, very close to my university classes. While I was at school, Ivaan was at home with caregivers to look after him. He spent a lot of time on the computer, looking at used cameras for sale on eBay. He already had a massive collection of cameras, but as he had no inventory, he could never remember what he already owned. So he'd buy more. The cameras were always a disappointment, and he'd swear he was never buying another used camera off the internet.  By the next day, the thrill of the chase had exorcized the previous day's disappointment.  Packages were always arriving in the mail, followed by his inevitable disappointment.

So I persuaded Ivaan that we should buy a house from the Arts and Crafts era (1920s) and have it restored. It was a fantastic era for houses.  They were very solidly built, often with heavy oak panelling inside. The trick was to find a house that had not been ruined by a renovation.  We found just such a house near Dufferin and St. Clair and we bought it. It had been occupied by an Italian family for 50 years and it looked like they'd cleaned it every single day. But they'd updated nothing, so it was perfect for our purposes. The project kept Ivaan's mind off cameras, and it kept our money tied up in real estate, rather than wasted on....more cameras.

Ivaan persuaded me that we should hire a couple he knew to do the restoration.  The guy was an electrician, and rewiring the house was essential. I should have been more alert: the guy was skilled at his trade, yet this couple was perennially broke.  But Ivaan felt sorry for them and thought that this might help them get on their feet financially.  "No good deed goes unpunished", goes the saying.  By the time we fired them, we'd wasted a lot of time and money.  I still feel really sad that Ivaan went to his grave knowing that Roman and Malgorzata took advantage of his kind heart.

After Ivaan's death, I decided to move into the house once the restoration was completed.  It was a beautiful house, but a few weeks after I moved in, the house was broken into.  A great deal of Ivaan's jewellery was stolen, along with my nephew's handmade violin.  I didn't feel violated, as people often do following a break-in.  I just felt angry and disgusted, even after the thief was caught, convicted and sent to prison for four years.

Our Arts and Crafts House

I miss that animal print sofa.

I put the house up for sale, and when the buyer wanted to take ownership almost immediately, I moved to a new condo in a church conversion, to see how I liked living in the west end of Toronto.  I didn't. It wasn't just the condo, it was everything.  My father was fast approaching the end of his life, one of Ivaan's relatives had gotten herself into a perilous financial state and - probably channelling Ivaan's kind heart - I decided I would do what I could to turn things around for her.  Again, "no good deed goes unpunished".  My lawyer advised me that it was the wiser course to let her reap the consequences of her actions. I chose not to follow his advice.  It's a decision I still regret.  I wasted so much time I would rather have spent with my Dad.  He died on New Year's Day, 2012.

The following month, a tiny commercial/residential building on Dupont Street came up for sale and this time my heart and my head were in complete alignment.  I could think of nothing else but how much I wanted to buy this building.  So I did, and I spent seven mostly happy years there.  In the ensuing years, much of my time was devoted to settling my father's Estate.  I have siblings who were also executors, but it's pretty well accepted that I have the organizational instincts of a border collie, so my siblings largely got out of my way.  Dad had left his Estate in good order, but whenever real estate is involved, there's going to be work.  First there was the summer house, Croydon, which sat on 92 acres of scrub land in eastern Ontario.  My sister and I put our shoulders to the wheel and in five weeks we'd transformed Croydon into a bit of a dream home - at least the interior.  My sister wanted us to try to sell it privately by placing a weekend ad in The Globe and Mail Personals. It turned out to be the right decision: the very first people who came to see the property bought it immediately for our asking price.

The loft, Croydon

The living room, Croydon

Then there was my Dad's family home, known to all as "84".  One of our brothers lived there with his wife and occasionally their young adult sons. One excellent day, an apartment in a handsome heritage building near Casa Loma came up for sale.  I saw it first and emailed my brother.  He and his wife saw the apartment almost immediately and it was exactly the "coup de foudre" I'd experienced when I first saw my building on Dupont.   They loved it and bought it on the spot. It really is a beautiful apartment and they've done an admirable job of making it into a comfortable, stylish home.  I'm extremely envious every time I go there.

But that left 84 empty. My siblings agreed to let me loose in there for five weeks.  Our family had owned that house since 1966 and it was a lot of work turning it into the "blank canvas" that appeals to potential buyers.  A lot of emotion was involved, too, and I spent quite a few hours crying to my sister on the phone.  In the end, almost all the members of the family contributed some brute labour to the project.  Our niece Justine's partner, Lorne, came over just in time to prevent me from sawing through a live electrical wire in the kitchen that would have killed me.  My youngest brother, Dave, transformed the sunroom.  My nephew Ivor painted the basement and he and his friend Omar loaded up several dumpsters with demolition waste.  In doing so, I think all of us put to rest the many conflicting emotions we had about giving up the house that had been our refuge over the years.

No shortage of space at 84.

Walt Whitman dined at this table, though not recently.

As with Croydon, the perfect buyers were the first to see 84.  The Ginsbergs were everything we wanted in new owners.  "They're just like us, only younger, richer and nicer!" I told my siblings.

I now recognize that my decision to leave Dupont Street was made long before I was ready to acknowledge it, but my decision to close my store was made in a split second last November.  I'd been sleeping in the basement on Dupont Street to take advantage of the absolute darkness.  I woke up one Saturday morning and felt a twinge of annoyance that it was Saturday and thus a working day.  That was it.  I decided on the spot to close the store and put the building up for sale.

That left me for the first time absolutely free to make any decision I wanted.  I could either go and live in an even more urban environment, or I could head the other way entirely, and live a rural life.  I am positive that - at least for now - I have made the right decision.  When I wake up on New Year's Day of 2020, I'm going to be so glad to find myself here, in the centre of my universe.

NEW IN TOWN: Where There's Smoke...

I like fire.

If you've lived in a city all your life, chances are you haven't developed the skills necessary to create a really good bonfire.  So when I say I like fire, I mean in theory.  One of the first things on my agenda when I moved to Wellington County was to learn the art of the bonfire.  I'd read about Burn Permits. They sounded impressive and responsible, and I decided I should acquire one.

I learned there were rules that must be followed.  I studied those rules so hard, I could have written a doctoral dissertation on the subject.  I drove to nearby Hillsburgh with the application and the fee.  They took my money, stamped the form, and did not ask me one single question about the responsibilities of a Burn Permit holder.  They did point out that the rules were printed on the reverse side of the Permit, in case I forgot any of them. What the rules didn't say was how to build a fire.  I wanted to become adept at fire starting before any of my city friends came to visit, so I picked up a few handfuls of dry twigs on my property, put them on the outdoor fire pit, lit a wooden match and held it up to a twig.  Nothing happened.  I tried again.  Same result.

I tried lighting two matches at once. Nothing.  I began to worry that there was something wrong with the twigs, so I looked around for other things to burn.  Pine cones?  Surely they'd burn well.  I quickly realized I was going through wooden matches at an alarming rate, trying to light pine cones.  It just wasn't working.  I tried crumpled newspaper, but the wooden matches extinguished themselves before the paper ignited.  I was getting desperate.  I remembered my butane torch.  I'd once used it to great effect, toasting the tops of crème brûlée desserts at a city dinner party.  My friends still speak of that dinner party with awe.

I went inside and came out with the torch.  It's the deluxe model, the self-lighting kind.  I should have that fire going in no time, I reasoned.  I unscrewed the butane release, pressed the ignition button, and - nothing.  It seems I had used up all the fuel showing off my crème brûlée skills.  I confess I contemplated throwing some gasoline and a full box of wooden matches on the fire.  But it would mean siphoning gas out of my motorcycle's fuel tank, and that seemed to go against the noble traditions of the Burn Permit.  I reviewed the rules.  

You may not light an outdoor fire if the wind is faster than 10 km/hr. How do you determine wind speed? I couldn't even tell in which direction it was blowing. It seemed like random little gusts from all sides. I recalled having seen a disposable cigarette lighter in the garden shed. I've often seen smokers hunched over, trying to shield the tip of their cigarette long enough to light it. I tried to act as a human shield as I applied the cigarette lighter to a sheet of crumpled newsprint, and to my surprise it caught fire. I fed the flame with more paper. First the pinecones and then the twigs caught fire. A twig, paper and pinecone fire burns hot, but it does not burn for long. I was throwing pinecones on as fast as I could collect them. Each flared brightly as the fire began to consume it, and with every pinecone I felt more and more like an expert fire starter. I ran around collecting more twigs. I knew it was against the rules to leave a fire unattended, so I kept my eye on the fire at all times. By the time I had a small armload of twigs, I was out of breath and smoke was stinging my eyes. I decided to drop the bundle of twigs on the fire from above. I positioned myself close to the fire pit, leaned over and released the bunch of twigs directly onto the dwindling flames. At that precise moment, the wind shifted direction.

I smelled at first. If you've ever smelled burning hair, you don't forget it. I couldn't go inside to look in the mirror because the rules said never to leave a bonfire unattended.

I went to my hairdresser. She looked at the blackened frizzy patch on top of my head. "What happened?" she asked.

"I was making crème brûlée", I replied.

NEW IN TOWN: Leave It To Beavers

No one told me about the beavers.

I bought my beautiful rural abode in the dead of winter, and moved in on April Fools’ Day.  Well, wouldn’t you pick a day like that if you knew nothing about life beyond the big city?  I’m embarrassed to say I had no idea where my property ended until a month after I’d bought it and moved in.

Whenever I described my new home to my city friends, I’d regale them with its finest features:  five acres, four bedrooms, three ponds, two basements, one swimming pool.  Most people were green with envy.  The smarter ones - those who had ever lived outside Toronto - eyed me with something between amusement and disbelief.

They shouldn’t have been surprised.  I’d been living on a main street in a busy metropolis, and I was beginning to develop what I can only describe as “land hunger”. Last year, I’d bought myself a splitting axe.  Every time I heard of a felled tree in my downtown Toronto neighbourhood, I was out there with my Ochsenkopf (it’s a German axe, and it means oxhead) practising becoming a proficient splitter of wood.  I took up beekeeping on the flat roof of my tiny commercial building.  Once the bees were established, I started growing vegetables in containers:  potatoes, leeks, peas, ginger, garlic, basil, green onions, tomatoes, rhubarb.

I was quite proud of my agricultural prowess.  Raccoons and squirrels were unable to scale the walls of my building to raid the garden, and the honeybees were only interested in the pots of lavender I’d planted.  My urban rooftop farm had an impressive advantage over my neighbours’ backyard gardens:  no known predators.  It was fun to brag about growing my own food, and my pride was only slightly wounded when a out-of-town acquaintance with on-the-ground gardening credentials tartly pointed out: “ You know, potatoes are essentially the cockroaches of the vegetable patch.”

But the beavers. 

Between Ponds 2 and 3, there’s an island.  Soon after I moved in, my brother and sister-in-law came to visit.  We decided to explore the island.  None of us had ever owned an island before and because it was unfamiliar territory, my brother decided to bring the axe, in case anything needed chopping.  

He needn’t have bothered.  Clearly, we were not the first creatures who had ever walked on this island. It looked like a giant had dropped by and whittled all the trees to pencil-like points with his penknife.  We forged ahead, trying not to impale ourselves on all the sharpened stumps.   At the north end of the island, we discovered a lovely two-seater wooden bench set on some flagstones overlooking one of the ponds.  My brother and his wife sat down on the bench in the sun, and my sister-in-law enthused about what a wonderful reading nook it would be on a warm summer day. 

“Look at all that firewood beside you”, I chimed in, pointing to an enormous heap of logs with no bark left on them.  “We didn’t need the axe after all. It’s a shame they’re so far from the firepit.”  My brother glanced over his shoulder at the log pile.  He looked at the axe.  And back at the pile of logs with their sharp pointy ends.  I could hear him thinking.

Now, if you’re reading this and you’ve lived in Wellington County for a while, you can stop reading right now, because you know exactly where this story is going.   But I’m new here, and I’m going to be repeating this story to every single city slicker who comes to visit this year.  

You know how we Canadians think of the beaver as the quintessentially Canadian mammal?  It’s our mascot.  We have them on our nickel.  We regard them as industrious, shoulder-to-the-wheel type of creatures.  I confess that I was quite enthusiastic about the beavers on my island at first.  I even tweeted about them a couple of days later to Toronto City Councillor Gord Perks.

Gord didn’t mince words. You remember that phrase to which I attributed the success of my rooftop garden?  No known predators?  Gord pointed out that Canada sent 20 Manitoba beavers to Tierra Del Fuego in 1947, hoping to jumpstart an Argentinian beaver fur industry. They thrived because they had no known predators.  Today, the Argentinian beaver population is out of control.  Yes, the beaver is taking over the Americas, one small island at a time. 

Starting with mine.

     

NEW IN TOWN: An Introduction

"Where are you from?"

It's a question I'm learning to anticipate, though when I arrived here eight months ago, it took me by surprise. How did they know that I'm new in town? I'm from Toronto.  I had lived in downtown Toronto for over 50 years when I suddenly decided to pull up stakes and move to rural climes.  The tiny commercial building I owned, on a 640 sq. ft. lot on a main street in the capital city of Ontario, was apparently worth more on the bloated real estate market than a spacious house on 5.63 acres of beautiful waterfront land in Wellington County.  You do the math.  Who wouldn't want to live here?  I breathe clean air, drink delicious well water, work harder than I have ever worked in my life - and I sleep like a log, every single night.  In Toronto, everyone complains about insomnia.  In rural Ontario, people complain about invasive plants on their property.  Perhaps Dog-Strangling Vine keeps them up at night.  I'd never heard of this alarming-sounding weed before I arrived here last April.  But it likely doesn't thrive in concrete, eh?

In no particular order, here are five things I've had to get used to in my new locale:

1. Driving a car. Everywhere. In Toronto, I hadn’t owned a car since 1988. I walked, used public transit, took taxis, rode a motorcycle in good weather, and had a carshare membership if I needed to transport heavy things.

2. Strangers speaking to me. Back in the city, if a man I didn’t know walked up to me on the street and made a personal remark, he’d probably earn himself an earful, or a fat lip, depending on the comment. On the main street in Erin, when a local guy commented appreciatively on my jeans (okay, they were red jeans, but still…) I just laughed and replied I’d think over his offer to go dancing.

3. Propane. It never occurred to me that I would have to phone in a request for a fuel delivery. I’m used to an unlimited supply of natural gas, and I’m embarrassed to say I didn’t even know where my propane tanks were on the cold day I ran out of fuel. But the propane company is on my permanent Christmas card list from now on, thanks to the same-day humanitarian delivery that warmed more than my heart. I now know where my tanks are, and how to read the fuel gauge.

4. Rubber boots. I hadn’t owned any since I was five. Nowadays, I’m worried that my well pedicured city feet, more used to elegant footwear with heels, are going to take on the size and shape of my rubber boots from Budson’s Feed Store. These boots are excellent, and I wear them all the time.

5. Neighbours who come right over to talk to you. I love this. In Toronto, if someone knocks on your door without a formal invitation to do so, it probably means your building is on fire. Here, your neighbours know when you’re home. How do they know? Because your car is in the driveway. And if you don’t answer the door right away, they just assume you’re out on your property somewhere and they go and look for you.

“Aren’t you going to feel isolated?” That’s what all my Toronto friends asked when I told them of my decision to move away from what I’d always believed was the centre of the universe. “I’m hoping so”, I’d quip, but in fact I’ve only been here a month and I already have a social life. My immediate neighbours have been generous and welcoming, and I’ve met several other neighbours while selling surplus items on Kijiji. Last week my motorcycle broke down while I was putting air in the tires at a service station on Main Street. While I was waiting for CAA to come to my rescue, a very nice couple showed up and offered to help me get the bike started. Five minutes later, my bike was revving nicely and I’d learned a valuable lesson from Scott and Sandy: “We look out for each other here”.

Did I mention I got another essential item of clothing for my new life? Yes, I bought myself a blue plaid flannel shirt at Budson’s. It’s the perfect fit and I love it….but to be honest, my red jeans look absolutely terrible with it. I won’t be going dancing in that outfit.

NADIA

On November 4th, I dropped by the house of Ivaan's sister Nadia and brother-in-law, Nick, to drop something off. Nadia has been chronically ill for several years with a complex array of medical conditions.  Nonetheless, she's far outlived her parents and her brother.  That's because of her secret weapon: her husband Nick.

Nick - or Kolya, as she calls him - was Nadia's first and only boyfriend. Legend has it that he used to see her every Sunday in church. Nadia was 14, and she sang in the cathedral choir. Nick was a newer immigrant to Canada, about three years older than Nadia, and he used to say to himself, "That's the girl I'm going to marry one day".

This is the girl he wanted to marry one day.

Fast forward a few years. Nick was already working, and Nadia was still in high school. On Sunday afternoons, Nick was allowed to take Nadia out for a drive, if she was accompanied by a chaperone:  her younger brother Ivaan. Years later, Ivaan used to joke that Nick was his first employer.  They'd all go out for a drive to Sunnyside Pavilion for example, and Nick would pay Ivaan two bucks to take a walk and come back in an hour or two.

Nick used his time wisely, persuading Nadia to marry him, and by the time she graduated from high school the families had come to an understanding that she'd work for a year or so, then they'd get engaged and get married when she was 20. Nick was, and still is, a persuasive guy, so he turned on the charm and eventually Nadia's parents agreed to move up the wedding date by a few months, so the newlyweds could get a start on their lives together.

Nadia absolutely adored Nick, and the feeling was mutual. She was the biggest supporter of his career and he worked incredibly hard, so determined was he that Nadia should want for nothing.  Within a few years, they had bought their first, and only, home in the west end of Toronto.  Soon Nadia was expecting their first child, and two years later, their second child.  Martha and Anna. In Ukrainian it was MAPTA i AHHA, and nobody ever said the name of one child without immediately saying the name of the other child.  They were treated exactly the same and, despite the fact that they had totally different personalities, they were essentially one unit when they were growing up.

Nadia was in her glory.  She had her girls, she had her own home, and best of all, she had her beloved Kolya. Nick was the dream son-in-law. He called Nadia's mother, "Okay, boss" and he did everything he could to make her life easier.

The years went by.  Martha and Anna finished their education, got married and had children of their own.  Nick and Nadia gloried in their three grandchildren.  Nadia loved her brother, Ivaan, dearly and was at the hospital with him when he drew his last breath. They had an unbreakable bond.

Ivaan and Nadia, 2008: an unbreakable bond

After Ivaan's death, Nadia's health, never robust, started to fail.  Luckily, she had Nick by her side every step of the way. Whatever she needed, Nick got it done. This went from the small things (lifting a bag of potatoes when they went shopping) to the big things: driving her absolutely everywhere because Nadia had once tried to learn to drive a car, hated it and never tried it again.

And that's how I came to be over at Nick and Nadia's house on November 4th. I was dropping off the spare set of keys to Nick's car.

As I turned to leave, I was seized by a sudden, very unsettling thought: "This could be the last time you see her alive". I still don't know why I had that disturbing thought at that precise moment, but it was alarming enough that I turned around and said to her, "I love you lots." "I love you too", she replied, and I drove away.

At eight-thirty on the morning of November 23rd,  my phone rang.  It was Nick. He sounded breathless, hesitant, and then he summoned his courage and blurted it out: "Nadia passed away this morning".  She'd felt ill during the night, Nick called the paramedics who took her to hospital.  She was admitted to Intensive Care, and in the early morning hours, with Nick beside her, she drew her last breath.

This afternoon, I attended the visitation for her.  I almost never cry in front of other people, but I cried this afternoon.  Tomorrow morning is her funeral. She'll have her girls around her, her beautiful grandchildren, and she'll have the man she adored - her beloved Kolya - with her every step of the way.

In Ukrainian, they say "Vichnaya Pam'yat", which means "memory eternal", when someone special dies.  As the years have passed, I've gotten used to the fact that Ivaan is deceased.  I often laugh, still, at the funny things he used to say.  I have known Nadia for 36 years, and somehow I can't imagine ever getting used to the idea of my life without Nadia in it.  We've been through thick and thin.  She had lots to look forward to, and I have lots to be grateful for.  One thing she did was teach me how to make really good borshch. I used to say I made the second best borshch in the world, because hers was the best.

Now I'll have to put on the crown every time I make it.  Thanks to Nadia, I'm the Queen of Borshch.  I'll think of her with gratitude every single time.

Vichnaya Pam'yat.

WOODSHEDDING

One of the goals I set myself when I moved here was to become as self-reliant as possible.  My unofficial motto was:  "If you're only going to hire a guy to do it, you might as well have stayed in Toronto".  Truth be told, many of the things that we do to keep a property in good repair are things we can do ourselves.  We might decide to hire someone else to do something for us, but what we are actually doing is spending money to avoid learning something new or doing something unpleasant.

If it involves plumbing or rerouting electrical cable, I call a professional.  Apart from that, it's my job.  And sometimes my job entails roofing. In the entrance to my property, there's a small grey wooden shed, about 10 by 10 feet, with a cement floor.

This shed, honestly, looks like it's tired of living.  But it houses the well, and the snowblower too,  so it's very useful.  It's dark and spidery inside.

I suspect a tree branch had crashed through the roof and one wall at some point.  Luckily I had some plywood in another shed, so I decided I'd first replace the broken section of wall.

That went very easily.  On closer examination, I noted the roof had pretty much rotted through, so I decided to remove the entire roof and replace it.

A professional would have had that old roof removed in half a day, but I decided to work at it more slowly.  Removing layers of asphalt shingles is harder than it looks, especially when you realize there are multiple layers of them in places.

It took me two and a half days to get that roof off.  One of the ribs supporting the peaked roof was missing, but I had some two-by-fours and I was impressed how quickly I managed to replace it. Once the roof was off, the entire shed was flooded with light and looked far less spidery.  My neighbour Liz snapped this photo of me, which she entitled Local Roofer In Action.

As there's no electricity in the shed, I realized that if I installed a transparent roof instead of a plywood and shingle roof, I wouldn't have to light it.  Because it was about to rain, I got out my roll of transparent vapour barrier and covered the roof with two layers of vapour barrier which I attached with a staple gun.

I found I liked being in the shed with the rain beating down on the vapour barrier.   But I noticed I was doing everything possible to delay putting the new roof on.  I knew what the problem is:  I don't like doing hard work in the cold.  So I've started painting the exterior of the shed.  I chose a colour called Gossamer Blue, which looks really different depending on the light. Sometimes it's dove grey, sometimes it's robin's egg blue.  But it looks fresh and somehow that sad little shed is beginning to show some spirit.  Of course, as soon as the painting is done, I'll have to start putting on the new roof, so I'm dragging my paintbrush as slowly as I can.


I was feeling quite proud of myself, and we all know what happens when you start to feel proud.  I had left my eight foot A-frame ladder inside the shed, and I wanted to move it to a more auspicious location, so I grabbed hold of it and started to drag it.  That's when a hammer I'd inadvertently left on top of the ladder fell off.  The business end of the hammer hit me on top of my head, flipped over, and the claw end of the hammer hit me on the forehead just before knocking my eye protection off.  I could feel blood streaming out of my forehead and into my right eye, down my clothes and onto the ground. Honestly, I looked worse than the shed.

I'd better go to the hospital, I thought.  Then I realized:  I can't go to the hospital.  I have no idea where a hospital is, I don't want to get blood in my new car and anyway, I can't even see.  So I went inside, found a bottle of isopropyl alcohol, cleaned up my head wound, then had a bath and a long nap on the sofa before the fire.   And, since my other unofficial motto is, "You can do as good a job as a professional if you want, but it's going to take you a lot longer", here is a photo of my progress to date. Luckily the next couple of weeks are going to be mild and dry, so I'll have no excuses not to finish my roofing project.  Stand by.

LUCILLE

One Monday morning in late June, I saw what appeared to be a moss-covered dome-shaped boulder moving at the base of a hill just south of the main gates to my property.  I'm not saying that boulders never move on hilly terrain such as this; it's just that I've never seen one move uphill of its own accord. So I paid attention.

Quickly I realized this was no ordinary boulder.  I watched in fascination as a head, arms and legs and a tail came into view. I began to suspect this was a snapping turtle.

Is this the way to Mt. Everest?

There are lots of signs warning of TURTLE CROSSING in the neighbourhood, so I wasn't totally surprised, but I couldn't understand why it was trying to walk up a steep hill.  It could have come up the driveway if it wanted an easy route.  This was at the same time an enormous influx of people were trying to scale Mount Everest, so I was tempted to name the turtle Sir Edmund Hillary. I thought the better of it when my neighbours pointed out that this snapping turtle was digging a hole in which to lay her eggs.

Early the following Saturday morning, my neighbours emailed to say the turtle was now in the very middle of the entrance to my driveway.  They were watching it dig a hole.  They explained that snapping turtle eggs need to be protected from predators until they hatch.  They lent me a dog crate to tide me over until I had time to build a screened cage as recommended by Credit Valley Conservation.

Once the turtle had laid her eggs, I presume she headed up the driveway towards one of my ponds.  I didn't see her again, as I went to Toronto for the day, while my neighbours kept a close eye on events in my driveway.

I read up on snapping turtle eggs and learned that my driveway would be the site of a turtle maternity hospital for basically the entire summer.  I'm conflicted: half of me is proud to be the birthplace of an endangered species.  The other half of me is extremely irritated that I have to drive around the screened cage.  And this latter half of me is indignant that any parent would be so careless as to effectively dump her kids by the side of the road and leave them for someone else to raise.  I'm expecting the eggs to hatch any day now, and I'll be very eager to get rid of the turtle cage blocking the entrance to my driveway.

Who leaves their kids by the side of the road?

Now, every time I drive past that screened cage, I instinctively burst into song, and now the title of that song has become the name of the mother snapping turtle.  I call her You Picked A Fine Time To Leave Me, Lucille.