Cicadas and Beer

I haven’t posted here for ages. But today I’m going for a walk and carrying a notebook, the way I used to do. I’m not going to take pictures, though; instead, I’m going to try to let my words describe what I experience. We’ll see how that works. Or if it works.

I’m visiting my mother in Brantford, the city in southwestern Ontario where I was born. We celebrated her 85th birthday on Sunday. Today, she’s having friends over and I don’t want to be in the way. So after breakfast I leave to walk somewhere. I’m not sure where I’m going; I’ll decide as I go along.

I head towards West Street. A cardinal calls from a nearby tree. Already heat is prickling my scalp. Soon I’m submerged in traffic noise. I cross the highway overpass. Sumac nods in the slight breeze. A burst of perfume from flowers hidden behind a fence accompanies the sounds of birds; both are almost smothered by the exhaust and noise of passing cars.

A grackle creaks overhead. Outside the radio station, the sound of a riding mower fills the air. In the crotch of a small tree, a dark brown crow’s nest balances precariously, a mass of sticks and leaves barely keeping its shape. Cicadas herald the day’s heat. I wait to cross West Street. The parking lots on the other side are busy and weedy. I stop for coffee and buy a bottle of water. I’m not prepared for walking in this heat. Not carrying any water! What was I thinking?

Outside it’s hotter than ever, despite the cooling breeze. A sharp, chemical stink of asphalt wafts across the road, accompanied by the rattling thump of diesel engines. House sparrows chirp in a tall juniper. I pass mature apple trees, covered in green fruit, and tall white pines. A Bobcat is moving large chunks of granite: a landscaping project. A gasoline weed trimmer roars in the adjacent park; it’s operator wears a high-visibility orange t-shirt. The city makes an effort to keep this park beautiful: there are careful plantings of annuals and perennials and neat shrubbery.

I’m sweating through my shirt now. Tulip trees line the sidewalk. An angry driver sounds his car horn. There’s a smell of cut grass in the air. Most of the trees are Norway maples; now that I can recognize them, I’m surprised by their dominance. I pass a large honey locust tree and a mature cherry tree covered in fruit. Two people are walking two dogs. The leaves of the basswood trees are curling in the heat.

I pass a couple of dying spruce trees and an old red-brick farmhouse; it sits alongside aging bungalows and split-levels. A dump truck roars past. A tiny “sharing garden” sits in front of a church. A cyclist towing a makeshift trailer goes by and I wonder what cargo it carries. In front of the apartment building where my grandparents lived, more lawn maintenance is going on. The grass is cut too short for the drought and is patchy and brown. A half dead silver maple struggles against the drought nearby.

I stop at a drug store to buy Gravol for the flight home (the flight here was bumpy and left me feeling queasy). The air conditioning is on full blast and the outside air feels even hotter when I’m back on the sidewalk. The moon hangs in the cloudless sky. A heavy smell of frying onions drifts from the pizza place across the parking lot. A man on an electric tricycle passes the Wayne Gretzky Sports Centre.

My plant identification app crashes—you didn’t think I was such a botanist that I’d know the names of all these trees, did you?—and I have to reload it. Queen Anne’s lace and some kind of plantain are growing on the boulevard. It’s getting hotter. I decide to walk to the neighbourhood where I grew up. I pass a letter carrier delivering mail to houses with huge, empty front lawns; she’s clearly suffering in the heat but says hello, smiling. Near King George Road the traffic gets louder. The Home Hardware’s lumberyard gives off a strong smell of cut cedar.

I cross King George Road. The park behind the Dairy Queen is filled with annual flowers, flags, and tall callery pear trees (my plant identification app is working again). A crow disturbs 20 or 30 pigeons roosting on a power line. I’m grateful for the breeze; without it, my eyes would be stinging from sweat running into them.

Being here is generating mismatches between experience and memory. Trees that were newly planted 50 years ago are now tall and mature. On the other hand, distances are much shorter. The house I grew up in is unrecognizable after renovations, but most of the other houses on our street haven’t changed at all. I walk the route I took to elementary school. What felt like an epic journey then takes less than 10 minutes. The school is unrecognizable, too: a different colour, orange rather than black, and larger after classrooms were added. It was not a happy place for me—I was alternately bullied and bored there—and I hurry past.

Sweat has soaked through my shirt. The empty field next to the school is now a park, with a basketball court and a ball diamond, named after the principal who was at the school until I was 12 years old. The lines of mature trees that had separated fields when this land was a farm are gone. Under the shade of a Norway maple, I listen to children playing and house sparrows chirping. Traffic on the nearby expressway offers a constant bass rumble. A blue jay is scolding someone—probably me.

I’ve walked a long way. My plantar fasciitis is starting to complain, and it’s time to take a rest somewhere—but where? I don’t recall these streets of new houses and am not certain of where exactly I am.

Cardinals are singing at each other. A sign announces Turtle Pond Park. I wonder if the pond is part of the creek where I collected wildflowers for a class project, where the pond water containing the parameciums I studied with a microscope for another class project came from. I walk into the park. Aspens line what I take to be the dry creek bed. Once it was a graveyard for shopping carts stolen from the nearby mall; now it seems to be choked with plants, becoming a marsh. Queen Anne’s lace, milkweed, sweet clover, and thistles are everywhere. Behind me is a frisbee golf course and a bare lawn.

A sign tells me that the creek and the pond, which I can’t yet see, are part of a storm water management project. Here native plants flourish: purple bee balm and yellow black-eyed susans. I can see the pond now and hear the bullfrogs and red-winged blackbirds it sustains. The pond is surrounded by cattails and willows. Some lucky homeowners have a view of it all. I can see their back decks and picture windows.

I hear an unfamiliar bird’s song and use Merlin, an app on my phone, to figure out what it is. A warbling vireo. But Merlin identifies other birds, too: robins, cardinals, goldfinches, song sparrows. I follow the path around the pond, breathing in smells of trees and plants and damp earth. In the distance, a train at the level crossing on Hardy Road sounds its horn. I text my mother to let her know that I won’t be back in time for lunch.

I pass raccoon or skunk or coyote scat, filled with chokecherry pits, and dogwoods growing in the damp ground. A large flock of robins takes wing, frightened by my presence, and a red-winged blackbird complains. A cardinal exchanges song with another of its kind further away; I know it’s in a cedar tree but can’t see it. Beyond tall reeds and sumac bushes is a storm water outlet, where several female mallards are resting on the water and beneath cattails on the shore. I catch a brief glimpse of a male cardinal flying past. An empty sports drink bottle is floating on the pond. I see spotted jewelweed, joe pye weed, grapevines growing on willows. A massive black walnut and an oak provide shade.

I’m happy I found this place, but I’m thirsty and still need to sit down, so when I arrive at the park’s exit, I keep walking. I’m not entirely sure where I am. A cicada predicts even hotter temperatures, but the breeze keeps sweat from running down my face. It’s quiet, except for the red-winged blackbirds behind me, a lawnmower, rustling leaves, and an insistent chipping sparrow. Another train is crossing Hardy Road. Goldfinches and cedar waxwings are singing quietly.

Then the street I’m on suddenly emerges on King George Road. The traffic roars past and there’s a strong smell of roofing tar from the supermarket across the road. A restaurant is producing an even stronger smell of barbecue sauce. The sidewalk reflects heat and the glare of noon sun is pitiless. Plantar fasciitis bites at my heel. I try a Vietnamese restaurant but even though there are customers inside the doors are locked. I cross the highway overpass. None of the restaurants appeal to me until I get to a Hawaiian-themed place, where I order fish tacos and a pint of beer. It’s cool inside and I rehydrate with club sofa.

Back outside, the humidity slaps me in the face. My clothes are soaked in sweat. There are clouds in the sky now, though, which provide an occasional break from the sun. I turn on Charing Cross Street, which is quieter than King George Road but just as hot and somehow cheerless. The breeze is now a gusty wind and I wonder if the afternoon will end in a thunderstorm.

I pass the funeral home where I said goodbye to my father and youngest sister, and turn onto North Park Street, we here I suddenly realize that I could’ve made it back to my mother’s for lunch, except for my thirst; it really wasn’t very far to walk. Cicadas sound a heat warning while house sparrows chatter. I stand in the the shade of a maple tree for a moment. The heat has sapped my powers of observation. When I get to my mother’s house, she’s listening to show tunes and sewing doll clothes. “How was your walk?” she asks.