When we got to the marina, the sun was shining, the winds were moderate and the car said it was 24 degrees outside. A borrowed boat was waiting and we even had gas. The requisite stuff for opening weekend was loaded without incident, including the bag full of linen, the fridge basics, the box of wine and beer, the geraniums and of course the junk food. I was even smart enough to make sure the flowers were not balanced precariously on the bow of the boat. The cats weren’t even complaining. You can probably see where this is going…
We arrived at the dock without incident. The side of the dock that was ‘fixed’ in the winter to attend to damage from the winter before was attached but listing at a jaunty angle. The other side of the dock had decided to head further out into the lake, leaving a three-inch gap between the shore part and the water part. But at least it was pretty much parallel to the water. We unloaded the stuff and uncaged the cats and headed up the hill, where everything looked like it had survived the past six months reasonably unscathed. Except for the kitchen garbage from the winter fix-it project that was left behind in the kitchen. I bundled it into the garbage can and put it out in the screen porch where it could stink as much as it wanted.
Just before dinner the sky turned dark and the wind picked up. The waves on the lake looked like ocean swells and the trees were bending in ways trees are not meant to bend. The lights flickered twice and gave up. No power, no water, no toilets. But that’s okay. We had leftovers from lunch to eat and candles.
We stoked up the fireplace to take the chill off the house. At which point it went berserk and turned into a blast furnace. I could smell the plastic on the insulation melting. We shooed the cats out the door and gathered up computers and hightailed it outside to assess the situation. It didn’t look like the house was on fire, so we grabbed the spare bottle of drinking water and managed to douse the fire logs, spewing a nice layer of ash over everything in the vicinity.
It was clearly time to pack it in and sack out in the guest room (not as smelly as the loft and not contaminated with ash) and sleep with a nose and one eye open and two cats infringing on my personal space, both north and south. The next day dawned clear and bright. The electricity remained AWOL. Apparently, the door to the screen porch was AWOL as well, as the fetid winter garbage was strewn far and wide on the front porch.
Two days later, the power is still out. The stocking of the fridge with perishables will make Mr. Loblaw happy when we replace them. But the geraniums are planted. And the beans. And the chives. And they are saying minus digits tonight. May, you are dead to me.