My Cabin

It’s quiet. I’m alone. A rarity when we’re up here. I smile and close my eyes. I take a deep breath. Tangy, buttery, warm pine seeps in and fills up my heart. My hair tickles my face as it dances with the fresh breeze coming in off the open lake. Birds sing, waves lap, the dock creaks, critters rustle leaves, the flag flaps.  The sun slowly burns off the mist and brings warmth to my night-chilled skin. Loons fish out on the water, barely visible through the mist, as they float along across the mirror before ducking down under, sending gentle circles rippling out. 

I sit on an old wooden bench. Rot has devoured one side but it’s still sturdy enough. I’d rather sit here than the fancy new benches with their backrests and treated and sanded wood. This is where we’ve always sat, overlooking the lake, perched atop this steep hill. The old cabin rests behind me and the new one looms behind that. My parents sleep in the new one, my siblings in the old. My younger brother will be up soon, but he likes this quiet too. Especially since I established the rule “no politics before breakfast.”          

I keep pushing off breakfast later and later. I wonder if he’ll notice. Two sides of a coin we’ve always been with his logic and individualism and my compassion and idealism.

He’ll probably head down to the beach beside the dock when he wakes up. It’s barely a beach, only a few meters wide, but it’s nice and he builds fires there. Logs encircle the makeshift fire pit where he’ll carefully stack logs, lighting first the kindling I’ve collected. He’ll bring his laptop down there and work sometimes, internet access through our phones a new luxury for the past few years. But he mostly codes which luckily doesn’t take much internet, since it’s not very good out here anyways.

So much has changed at our little oasis on the lake in Ontario. When I was a kid, we’d go up with extended family, all crammed into the old cabin together piling on the pull-out on the porch, sleeping bags on the floor, the queen bed in one back room, and the bunk beds built into the cabin in the other. Easier when most bodies are tiny; much harder as we all got taller. 

My Grandad would wake up nice and early with us when we were young and take us out before we woke the adults. He never minded spending time with us. My favorite was when he stood by the hammock and rocked and rocked it while I laid. He’d sing and wouldn’t stop til I was done. The hammock trees are gone. We had to cut them down a few years ago. 

He’d take us out on the lake in our “trusty” boat as old as my mom but somehow still going… most of the time. But if it ever broke down, Grandad would get out the oars and pull strong against the water. He’d always get us back to our cabin, and he’d never get angry or frustrated, his calm reflecting the water as the oars sliced through. The lake is huge, the biggest in North America after the great lakes. Lake of the Woods it’s called. A mistranslation from what the native nations around called it; more closely, the Ojibwe’s name Minitig is “Lake of the Islands.”

And there are lots of islands. Many of the ones around us are spotted with cabins these days. The newer cabins ARE staunch and gaudy and stick out. The older ones like ours are harder to spot, built simply and quietly. These often started out as fishing cabins, like ours did. They sometimes grew sturdier and multi-use as families accompanied along on an escape to the great, peaceful outdoors. 

Our cabin’s like this, the old one at least. It has running water and electricity, but that’s it. The walls are insulated by shelves of books brought up over the 5 generations. That first generation set up the bare bones on their escapades up from Nebraska. They built the cabin’s porch as the second generation came too. A family friend brought his new wife up for their honeymoon, who, distraught, asked that he at least build a shower. 

When my Grandad was a boy, they built the outhouse. The men all dug the hole and drank warm beer and held up the structure to plop it down atop the hole when my Grandad had to intervene. In their buzzed bliss they’d dug the hole too big. They eventually got the outhouse set up and we used it until my tween years when we built the new cabin in front of it. When the new cabin first got built, I refused to use the flushing toilet in it. 

But the outhouse started to crumble, and I got older and pickier. The new cabin’s got the toilet, a nice clean shower, heating, insulation, and a washer and dryer. There’s a loft and main room besides the bathroom. A light wood ladder goes up to the loft, the same light wood as that cabin. The first time I used it I slipped and tore open my leg. I don’t go up there much anymore. Besides, the old cabin is better. Memories cover the dark log walls in pictures, books, maps, hats, red gingham curtains, and rusty old pails for the berries further up the hill; the memories seep into the carpet and floorboards where I’ve read and danced and swept.  They’re crammed in every dark corner, filling up every shelf. I want to tell all those I know and want to learn all those I don’t. 

The screen door creaks open softly behind me. My brother’s careful not to let it slam. I take a sip of my coffee and cast a smile over my shoulder. He nods back, laptop in hand, and heads down the middle path to the beach. The mist is almost gone now. I look over to my left along the shore below me, to where my great-great grandad would sit on mornings just like these. He’d fish and sometimes his granddaughter would sit with him. Then, out of this same mist, canoes would silently appear. They’d wait and take turns coming up to him. A doctor and one of the few colonial doctors who would treat members of native nations, he stayed true to his oath and served any and all in need. 

He’s the one who set this all in motion, who gave me this place. My Grandad was the one who made this place so special. His sister, my Great Aunt, shows me a new hidden memory of this place every year. Grandad’s wife, my Grandmom, shows me the peace of this place. I hear the new cabin’s door slam shut. It’s not all peace and perfect here, but it’s worth it. One day, I’ll bring my partner up here, if I have kids, them too. To this place, tried and true. As footsteps bring voices, I close my eyes and breathe. Tangy, buttery, warm pine seeps in deep and fills up my heart. My hair dances slowly in the breeze. Birds call now more than sing, but the dock still creaks, the waves lap, the flag flaps, and critters rustle the leaves.