A love letter to Cape Breton… and doing nothing
Written on May 21st at Corney Brook Campground in Cape Breton Highlands National Park.
Sometimes when I’m in an exceptionally beautiful place, I feel inspired to work. I am focused and energized and “productive”.
Other times, I just want to be.
Isn’t that enough?
I sit in bed with the back van doors thrown open. Scout rests her chin on my legs, behind my laptop, breathing steadily. The waves are thunderous — more chaotic than yesterday — beneath deep blue clouds fixed on the horizon’s edge. From my perch inside our tiny home I see grass so lush the green is nearly neon. I think it’s no accident that dandelions are the exact color of joy, of bringing my mother home bunches of “flowers” from the yard, all that yellow looking nothing like a weed to me (it still doesn’t).
I have looked for mink whales again, but the waves make their backs and superscript dorsal fins hard to see. That’s okay. I know they’re here. Yesterday Sean and I kept up a chorus of “look!” and “a little to the right!” and “WHALE!” until the sun went down, at first hardly able to believe our luck and eventually a little dumbfounded that we could ever grow desensitized to an experience so remarkable.
I want to write, I want to take photos, I want to document this moment so it never leaves me even as years and decades and a whole life goes by. When Scout is gone I want to close my eyes and feel her warm weight atop the blanket, see the way she curled into a donut this morning at our feet, remember how eagerly she leapt off her step stool at the promise of a hike, remind Sean she led the way for four miles even after yesterday’s six. (“She was wearing out,” he might say, “but still happy.”)
But I don’t want to think big thoughts right now. I don’t want to do anything “important”. Nothing is more important than this nostalgia for exactly where I am — tempesur, thanks Amanda Montell — in awe and with my little family, contrasting all this surrounding color with that impossibly dark ocean, breathing so deeply this fresh air.
And I do not have to earn every minute of rest.
I have a strained relationship with down time. It is so lovely. It is so natural. I also do not deserve it, I convince myself. Others — people better than me, more meaningful contributors, kinder souls — aren’t able to have it. Here I am traveling in a van because I want to, because I am so lucky, and the least I can do is work my ass off for it.
Right?
It’s hard to let myself sit still without drafting blog articles in my head and envisioning a new reel I could make and worrying about replying to some brand’s partnership inquiry and underneath it all wondering if I should be doing something else entirely — not writing about dogs, not spending time on the internet, making a more tangible impact.
Scout sits still all the time. It is one of my greatest points of pride. Here is this dog, who came to me scared, now sunbathing across the continent, pressing her snout against my side, wanting nothing more than the present moment. Taking it for exactly what it is. Relaxing, properly, muscle tension gone and satellite ears on pause and whiskers moving only in the breeze.
Have I given her this ability to rest? Have I helped her feel braver, steadier, more trusting, able to s l o w down with contentment?
Yes, I think, I hope so.
Can I give myself the same permission?
Yes, I think, I hope so.
