The lawnmower starts on the first pull. He must have fixed it. The sweet scent of fresh cut grass drifts down through the holes in the lawn. Jeffery aerated yesterday. He is a conscientious gardener. The flower beds are meticulously weeded, the trees are trimmed, and the house plants are tendered like the babies we never had. I wish I’d been a rose or an elm or even a cactus. Perhaps, his eyes would have fallen on me with the love he shines on his earthy passions.
​
It was a jackrabbit morning in Calgary the day he 

​Water lapped against the craggy shore as Thalia stared at the weathered dock. She could see her sister still, a moment trapped in time, unmooring the lone boat, turning toward her one last time, winking, pretending everything would be all right, that she was all right.

​A respected elder, a survivor of the lake, had spoken to Thalia then, “If she’s strong enough, she’ll return. She should be given the chance to try.” Always so calm, these survivors were, confident, charismatic, returned better than they were before, changed. Enviably so. “But at what cost?” a still grieving family member of a soul lost to the secrets of the lake shouted in reply. A 

“I bet you were as snug as a bug in a rug in your new sleeping bag.” I cringe as soon as the words leave my mouth.

My teenage stepdaughter rolls her eyes. “Oh god. That’s so cliché. Can’t you at least be original?”

​It was a mistake to engage with her this morning, so I finish filling my travel mug and escape out the cabin door. My breath puffs in the mountain air while I take mincing steps down the frosty ramp to the kayak. Its molded plastic seat is unpleasantly cold against my bare legs when I settle into the cockpit. It is chillier 

The canoe bumps and skitters. The tide is low and Ronald drags it first over rocks (screak), then sand (swoosh) and finally through muddy sea grass (squilsh). He debates putting his headphones on but decides against it.   In the morning, early in the light, the sounds are mostly singular, an echo only of themselves. He feels he can handle any discordant noise. If he turns on the noise-cancelling, he will miss the sounds he loves – the squelch of his crocs in the mud, the squawk of the gulls in the distance, the squidge of water displaced by clams, shooting up in miniature fountains. Still, it is only when the canoe is afloat and he steps inside, pushing off the mud with his paddle that he loses the jittery nerves. He is alone,