My goodness, it has been AGES, hasn�t it?

I�m not entirely sure of my motivations for my absences � certainly, I�ve been supremely busy, and sadly, the writing has been less of a priority than it was this time ago last year, let�s say. I�d like to say that it�s been because I�ve been too busy living life to actually write about it, and that�s perhaps somewhat true, but also somewhat optimistic � in many ways I�ve been skating by, skimming the surface of life, definitely not plumbing the depths, but more about that later, I think. Because stuff has been going on, too � it�s not all been spinning wheels.

So, let�s see � the fun stuff first! (Life�s short, so eat dessert first, eh?) The past few months have been consumed by lots of stress � the school of social work has been prepping up for a while to move to a new building, and the past two months have been nothing but huge gobs of stress while we tried to weed through and pack more than 30 years worth of accumulated stuff. (And, oh, what stuff there was! I was going through the personnel files to clean them out and there were notes that read �Shelley, I�d like to take off these vacation days� � dated 1978! It was mindboggling to see just how much she held on to � and toward the end, I became just merciless in tossing it, there was just so much stuff.) So, anyway, the point of this � because that was certainly not fun � is that finally, we got to the point where hello, it was time to move! There were two weeks where we couldn�t be in the old building, nor the new building, so we had enforced vacation. Ah, sweet, sweet vacation!

Our original vacation plans were use our free travel vouchers to fly to Seattle, and drive to Portland or Vancouver, and spend our time in the Pacific Northwest. But by the time Ben was able to find out if he could take the time off, there were just NO dates left to make the reservations (the airline guy kind of laughed at me for thinking I could call just three weeks in advance; I guess he had a point.) So we spent a few days moping that we couldn�t go to the Northwest, then we figured, hey, we�ll just take a road trip somewhere (which I feel is sort of a misnomer, seeing that I did not one lick of the driving.) I had a travel guide that I�d gotten out of the good old NYPL on Canada, the whole country, and while flipping through it I got to perusing the Maritime Provinces (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island), which seemed like a driveable distance, and I mentioned to Ben that as a kid, I�d always wanted to see the Bay of Fundy, which has the highest tide differential in all the world, and while he was initially not all that interested (still mopey about the Northwest, I think), something about the Maritimes seemed to grab him too, and before you know it, we�d decided to take a 9-day trip to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

A 9-day camping trip. I really don�t know how it became a camping trip, in that the closest thing to camping I�d ever done was to sleep in a tent in my sister-in-law�s aunt�s backyard in New Hampshire for one night, with Marty and Neil and Chloe. It hardly counts. And I�m not much of the roughing-it type, at all. So I really don�t know how I would up agreeing to going on a camping trip. Well, okay, I lie. The price was sure right - $20 (Canadian) for the two of us a night in a national park campground was hard to argue with � and it was something that Ben was really interested in, and I figured that hey, isn�t that what a relationship is about sometimes, stretching your boundaries to trying something new?

So, well, hmm. Did I enjoy camping? I liked it less than I�d hoped, but much more than I�d expected, if that makes any sense. I will suggest something to any camping newbies reading this (hah! Like I�ve got any kind of reading audience left after all this time away!) � don�t set up camp for your very first time after driving for an entire day straight, hundreds of endless miles away from home, at 10 PM in quite a lot of darkness. Just take my word for this. In retrospect, we really could have planned this a lot better. And lots of times, it was damned stressful. Which was hard, because I�d really been thinking we�d have a glorious, trouble-free, romantic getaway, when in fact, we had some nights where we couldn�t get the campfire lit (and Ben would be trying for hours to get it going while I just grumbled under my breath, �when is he ever gonna give up with this?�), or then there was the night we got lost in Saint John, NB, driving in the fog, making wrong turn after wrong turn, and I finally burst into tears in frustration and just wanted to go home. But then Ben pulled off into a deserted industrial park parking lot and got out of the car and opened my door and we stood in the fog and he held me while I sniffled and cursed Saint John (I�m sure it�s a lovely town but I didn�t think so then, infernal twisty streets and incomprehensible intersections.)

And the entire time was filled with these moments that could sometimes be so difficult, but then would turn into some kind of unexpected loveliness, and I am clumsy with my words, it has been so long, and it�s getting late, but I wish I could somehow show you all what our time was like. To tell you how incredible the Cabot Trail on Cape Breton Island is, how we�d drive on these roller-coaster roads, flanked by rugged, craggy cliffs giving way to breathtaking plunging coast, and it was overcast the whole time, all this moody, bleak, stark gorgeousness. We spent a night at a B&B (just a room in a couple�s home) in this tiny fishing village called Dingwall, in White Point, and we watched the sun go down while the water splashed on the rocks, and it was so quiet. We ate mussels at a bar in Ingonish Beach while we drank Canadian beer and listened to a folk singer play folk covers and we�d been stressed out and a touch cranky all day long � and again, suddenly, among the mussels and the dim lights and the smoke, the day just fell away and I was there, right there in that moment. The second night we spent in Fundy National Park, the fire wasn�t sufficient enough to really cook over, and oh, it was so cold!, and we huddled around the campfire and cooked fresh scallops speared on sticks just like quivering fishy marshmallows. On our way to Cape Breton we drove through isolated stretches of nondescript Nova Scotian inland, and stopped for the night in Antigonish, and the next morning when we went to breakfast, we went to this tiny local restaurant and I spied a lovely grey cat in the parking lot, who just ran to me the moment I opened the door, and I scooped him up in my arms and just loved him, among rumbling low and delighted purrs. We would drive the Cabot Trail while we camped in Cape Breton Highlands National Park and we saw a fox by the side of the road, and I saw a bald eagle, and we went on an impromptu nature walk around Jigging Rock Lake, except that we�d forgotten the bug spray and it started to rain and our nature walk lasted all of ten minutes.

This is just the beginning � there were so many moments (oh, and as we started our drive home, still on the Cabot Trail, we listened to sea shanties from many lands, and laughed and sang along, and what fun!) � and our final day of vacation together was unpacking the car and returning it and adjusting to being back in the city, and talk about contrasts, to wind up seeing a movie in Times Square just a day after being in wilderness, and yet somehow it was just perfect, and so very poignant, to kiss goodbye and part for the first time in over a week in the subway station and walk to different trains and go home alone.

This is still all so new, I tell you, this love, I keep learning so much. That more-than-a-week together, we must have annoyed each other like I hadn�t dreamed possible � I know I couldn�t get over the ridiculous things that Ben would get anxious about, and I am sure he felt similarly about me, and sometimes we were so stressed and so distant � but it still brought us so close, and since we�ve returned, we�ll lie in bed together and kiss and talk about how much we want to go back to Nova Scotia. Saturday night we went to a party at his friend�s place in Brooklyn (it�s commercial space that isn�t zoned for residential, and just huge), and we drank gin and tonics and got ridiculously tipsy and fantasized about moving to Halifax (and then danced for hours, oh god, how I love to dance with Ben!) and I, again, can�t find the words, honest. I have never loved so much like an adult, and how different this all feels from the strum und drang of all my other relationships, and oh, how right it feels. Ben is the man I�m going to marry, I feel certain of this, and I have such a calm, still, deep joy at that knowledge.

(And yes, I know, this whole missive has been �we, we, we�, and there is more to life than intimacy with one person, a whole world and life outside of this cozy orbit, I know, but tonight I am losing myself in it and loving it, loving Ben, loving the details, loving life. I am just bursting with love.)