Mid-way through our week in Ottawa. The days are filled with deck-building (Forrest and John) —
delicious meals courtesy of Forrest and Manon —
sitting in Pressed Cafe and listening to poetry (John, Pearl Pirie, and Catherine Brunet), a lunch with Andrea Cordonier (who came prepared to work on the deck but torrential rain meant we stayed inside and talked instead: a pleasure…), and walks through Richelieu Park where trilliums are blooming and some sort of native lily will be in a few weeks (a leaf not unlike the Erythronium oregonum so I’m wondering if these are trout lilies?). Vanier is a neighbourhood of great diversity — old houses and a butcher and porches meeting the streets and a little Mexican restaurant (Ola Cocina where we sat at a sidewalk table and ate duck tacos which were so wonderful). Across Beechwood is Rockcliffe, entirely different, but we went there, to Jacobsons, to buy divine cheese (La Sauvagine, a washed-rind cheese from Quebec which I could happily eat for the rest of my life) and an elk pate I bought just for revenge (see previous posts about elk eating my garlic during a period of garden reconstruction and ongoing consumption of our orchard).
And imagine violets in the grass like weeds (I have a little bag of them wrapped in paper towel to take home with me to try around our patio, the same bag that brought kale seedlings here the other day and which are happily tucked into the vegetable garden as I write…) and brilliant cardinals in the trees. Imagine every step you take in this house being observed by Matilda:
And imagine a bedside table with two new gifts, from Forrest’s workplace (The Museum of Civilization or, no, it’s now the Canadian Museum of History): Sanatujut: Pride in Women’s Work (Copper and Caribou Inuit Clothing Traditions) and The Whaling Indians: Legendary Hunters.
...Theresa Kishkan 