Taking the Slow Road

South Shore Breaker - May 18, 2016

My first article with the byline "In Focus" (chosen by the editor)!  Published in the South Shore Breaker on May 18th. Here is the link to the article online: Taking The Slow Road
I have also reprinted the article below since sometimes the online version takes a long time to load.

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Last week, I said I would talk about someone else’s journey in today’s article. I ran into some roadblocks, so that plan has been delayed for a while. In the meantime, I’ll talk about a different kind of journey.

Years ago when I was young, Sundays meant church and Sunday drives with my parents. I don’t have many memories of where we went, but I do remember wondering why, oh why, did we have to take so long to get there? We didn’t we take the fast highway. What was the point of diddling along a slow road looking at a bunch of trees and fields and farms?

I’m not sure when it happened. One day, somehow, I turned into my parents. I take the slow road. I enjoy the scenery. I like seeing the gradual changes that time makes. My heart sings when I see a pheasant or a fox in the fields, or an eagle soaring high above us. I feel joy when I see a tree filled with spring blossoms, a well tended garden, children playing in a yard. I could go on and on.

My husband and I are part of the aging society, and now we can take our Sunday drives on any day of the week. The internet calls it a Daycation - touring that allows us to return home every night and sleep in our own bed. Sometimes our drives include a meal. Sometimes a picnic. Usually a beach walk. Most often we have a destination in mind, but there is never any rush.

LaHave Bakery

We have our usual haunts for a quick drive, and our favourite places to go for a day long excursion. Maybe it’s a drive along the Aspotogan Penninsula with a stop at The Deck in Blandford for some lunch. I can look up at the ceiling, marvel at all the tea towels from around the world, and wonder at the people who have passed through.

Or maybe we’ll head inland, up past the country property where we used to live and meander the country roads. If it’s summer, we can stop at a roadside vegetable stand for whatever is in season. If we’re lucky, we might find a stand with a home made pie. Yum.

The Hawk, Cape Sable Island

We could choose to drive down to Summerville Beach and walk along the long stretches of white sand and smell the ocean air. Or, because we live on the South Shore, we could pick from countless beaches. We could take a leisurely drive to Carters, Beach Meadows, or Cherry Hill Beach, or Rissers, or Crescent, or Hirtle’s. Really, I could go on and on. Each beach is a different walk and a different adventure.

We could take a short drive along the river to LaHave Bakery and eat our meals on their chairs on the wharf. Or we could order our meals to go, and head down to Crescent Beach. We could take a drive out on the beach, park, and eat while we watch the waves roll in.

Sometimes our beach picnics are not picture perfect. A couple of weeks ago, we took a longer drive to Barrington Passage. We ordered a couple of subs at Dan’s Ice Cream Shoppe and headed to The Hawk on Cape Sable Island. I suspected a wee problem when we parked the car and the windshield was immediately covered in sandflies. Ever optimistic, we took the dogs and our packed lunch down to the beach. We were hoping to sit on one of the large rocks to eat our lunch, but in the end we settled for perching our bottoms on a broken lobster trap. This was not an exercise in comfort. In the end, we gobbled up our subs as quick as possible while being swarmed by masses of sandflies. The outing improved substantially when we got moving and walked the long sandy beach and listened to the sound of the gulls and the waves.  

The Hawk, Cape Sable Island

Sometimes it seems like we go to the same old places and there is nothing new to discover. But then we remember and talk about all the things we have stumbled across by accident. There is always something new to see. Sometimes subtle changes, and sometimes momentous change that nature has brought. Some good. Some bad. Some beautiful. Some sad. But always something to focus on.