Yesterday evening brought us the calm before the storm.  A weather alert had warned of oncoming high winds and lashing rain accompanying thunderstorms to begin in the evening hours of a day that had itself been windy and heavily overcast. Still, it was cool at 26C, with no sun penetrating the moving cloud cover and we had stayed out much longer than usual in the afternoon for an elongated tramp through the forest trails. Thinking the while that given the forecast, we likely wouldn't be able to get out at all today.

 

At dinnertime and beyond the clouds had suddenly disappeared and the sky was clear. When night fell, there were still no clouds in evidence, which made the urgency of the forecast questionable. By the time we went upstairs to bed nothing had changed and it seemed unlikely to. The stars were bright and nestled in a velvet-blue heaven, not a cloud in sight.

And then, around 2:00 am we heard the first distant thumps approaching. It wasn't long before they became more numerous, as they steadily approached. Following their arrival the sky tipped its storage-basin of rain into the atmosphere and rain cascaded down for hours accompanied by deep baritone voices of a heavenly choir. There's something about a thunderstorm at night when you're in bed, that's comforting and pleasant. We tend to enjoy such episodes and though Jackie and Jillie responded to the first deep rumbles, they soon began to ignore them and fell back into their usual deep sleep, and so did we.

 

Throughout the morning and afternoon today the sky was just as changeable; first heavy with dark clouds skimming the roof of the world, and finally opening with a grand flourish, sweeping rain racing across the landscape. Then suddenly, out came the sun. A repetitive drama that kept us uncertain whether we would find a window to get out, after all.

In the meanwhile, I decided to bake Brownies; I hadn't made them in ages. Irving suggested something quick and easy to make. He's always making those suggestions, as though it's a burden to me to be busy in the kitchen reluctantly committing to complex baking rituals. It's anything but, for me. I enjoy the time it takes and the thought that goes into deciding what to make as a special Friday-night treat, I always have. But preparations for this little treat are hardly demanding in any event.

Finally there was a period when the back-and-forth rain-versus-sun came to an end, and for at least an hour the sun stayed out. It seemed like a clear invitation to get out into the ravine with the puppies and we took the opportunity. Except that by the time we did so, the sky had once again begun to host dark, quick-moving clouds that looked ready to rain anew. Off we went in the hope the clouds would move on, and they did, though others took their place but not as threateningly. 

 

We were surprised to come across others out, taking advantage of a seeming pause  in the rain. In the past month we've seldom seen others from the community taking turns on the forest trails. Possibly inhibited by the presence of mosquitoes and the hot humidity that prevailed. The risk of being caught in a voluminous thunderstorm doesn't appear to have fazed them. Because the temperature was cool at 22C, we wore light rainjackets and carried along little raincoats for Jackie and Jillie. But were pleased not to have to use them, enjoying the reward of taking the chance of  getting drenched.

 

After Irving cut the grass in the backyard yesterday evening just before dinner, the aroma of fresh-cut grass lured us all outside to enjoy the cooler evening air, inviting us to sit out on the deck for awhile. And that included Jackie and Jillie, unaccustomed as they are to sitting about outside, they decided to remain with us though insisting they be noticed and their presence fully appreciated. There are times when they're not the centre of attention; yesterday was one of those. Instead we sat quietly and just absorbed the cooling air, the scents of a summer garden and the occasional bird song wafting down to us.

 

 

Today, once the laundry was done, we prepared to launch ourselves as usual into the ravine. We had seen the sky turn dark many times and angry, black clouds shifting along, an advance warning of the weather alert that has gone out for our area. We're to be inundated yet again by heavy rain and thunderstorms, and the chance of flooding is fairly high in areas prone to floods. Rain is to begin tonight and continue throughout the night and through all of tomorrow, until nightfall.

 

 

We prepared to leave the house just as the final load of laundry was completed and the washer shut off. The drier was nowhere near finished with its load and it was shut off deliberately. We never leave the house with any of those appliances in operation. Years ago an area house burned down because no one was at home when the owners' drier malfunctioned. Years ago, I experienced an unpleasant incident myself while we were living in Tokyo, when the drier in the laundry room adjacent the kitchen caught fire. I was there, to shut the machine off and the fire died down, but not until it burned itself out, charring the load it carried.

 

 

Walking up the street to the ravine entrance treated us to humid heat, even with the sun hidden. But the moment we entered the ravine and descended into the forest that changed completely; a light wind and the dense shade cast by the forest canopy, reiterated by the cloud cover brought us into a cool atmosphere. And because it was so pleasant, we decided we'd take a longer hike than we've been committing to, lately.

 

 

But first the now-obligatory stop to gather a few ripe berries for a suddenly-alert Jackie and Jillie. The wild raspberries are sweet and juicy, but very small. The newly-ripening thimbleberries on the other hand, are much larger and equally sweet and juicy. Our pups don't mind which they get, as long as they're on offer.

 

There's always so much to see in the bracken of the forest floor. False Solomon's Seal with its berries, not yet red, their tiny orbs shining a brownish-green. We're beginning to glimpse the occasional mushroom, thanks to the moisture content of the soil and decaying tree roots. And shelf fungi as well are coming into play; nature's servants in the eternal work of renewal. 

 

When we reach the area colonized by wild apple trees we can see that the fruit is attaining size, but still a long way to go. And although most of the Elderberry trees' panicle blossoms have faded toward the production of berries, a few are just now coming into bloom and their wonderful fragrance perfumes the air.

 

 

We're met on one of the trails by two old ravine friends who have abandoned their humans over on another trail to rush over and say hello to us, exciting Jackie and Jillie no end. Not only are our pups happy to see their friends, they're happier yet that they've arrived since it means that Irving will hand out cookies all around. He pats their heads after dispensing the cookies, tells them that's it for today, and they dispatch themselves back to their humans.

 

 

Once home again, we sit awhile in the garden. It's my favourite opportunity to look about and assess the condition that the garden pots and garden plots are in; we haven't had to do much watering this year, given the enormous bouts of rainfall we've been exposed to. One of our favourite clematis vines is late blooming this year, but it was nice to see that though it's a month late, some blooms will still be forthcoming.

 

 

Over the years we've accumulated an enormous number of hosta plants, so they're sprinkled everywhere; the side 'shade' garden, in the rockgarden on the opposite side of the house, in the backyard, and in various garden beds and borders at the front of the house. Their graceful foliage, in various sizes and shapes and colours give shape and architecture to the garden just as the shrubs and trees do.

 

 

 

For the last while this summer, irrespective of what the weather has been like during the day -- full sun or sunny with cloudy intervals, we've had ample wind accompanying it, and seemingly every day at least one thunderstorm. The sky seems to suddenly turn to that ominous dark warning of an impending storm and before we know it, the clouds burst open. Heavy volumes of rain thicken the atmosphere, pounding down with speed and density that leave us mouth agape.

 

This is precisely what happened last evening. At dinnertime, so anyone planning on having a barbecue repast would either have to exercise patience or turn to another method of meal preparation. We exercised that proverbial patience and when the storm finally abated and then stopped several hours later we made up for lost time.

When I think of the places across the world where wildfires are raging, where people are languishing in 40-degree-Celsuis misery I'm struck by the vagaries of nature and the phenomena of its elements. In British Columbia, where hundreds of new wildfires pop up continually in a lingering drought situation it is dry (no rain) -- thunderstorms with lightning bursts igniting the tinder-dry forests that is the culprit.

 

But as is usual here, the sky turns clear, the clouds disappear and the sun sits resplendent and powerful, it and its accompanying wind make quick work of drying the atmosphere of its rain-soaked situation and in the forest it hardly seems credible that the woods were so recently inundated yet again with fierce storms. The alternating combination of rain and sun, however, have produced an early, bumper crop of raspberries.

 

We don't get very far in our daily ramble through the forest before stopping because Irving wades into the forest bracken beyond the trails, to begin plucking ripe berries. The sight of the bright red, juicy fruit is irresistible. Jackie and Jillie know delicious fruit for its status as a summer treat that can be had on summer tramps through the forest. When our granddaughter was little and we backpacked her every morning through the trails, she too became accustomed to the bright red, juicy treats.

 

It was cooler today with an even cooler breeze which failed, unfortunately, to penetrate the forest, allowing mosquitoes to settle on warm, moist skin. Aside from that summer annoyance, our tramp through the woods this afternoon was mind-settlingly comfortable. While Irving was busy once more picking berries beside the pollinating meadow, I waded into the thickly-grown forest bracken to access the area where Black-eyed Susans grow in wild abundance.

 

Last night we saw something out in the garden, looking out from our glass-panelled front door that took us back in time and left us with an almost mystical feeling. I just happened to glance out at the darkened garden, lit by the garden lantern when I saw a little flash, then another and another. At first I thought it was the eyes of a small animal, caught by the errant glare of the lantern. But those little flashing lights began popping up everywhere. And then all was still; no more lights.

 

I called Irving over but the lights stubbornly withdrew. Then after a long pause a few flickered and he saw I wasn't delusional, after all. The sight brought him back to a time when he was a young boy visiting relatives in upper New York State and he saw fireflies there for the first time. Then again, when our children were  young, say about 45 years ago, we would often take them to the Gatineau Park wilderness area for summer evening live classical music arranged by the NCC.

As we would wait for the artists to arrive, and people about us were seated on blankets, quietly whispering in the dark, we would see flickering lights popping up here and there among the vegetation on the forest floor. Our two older children at that time played in their school orchestra at a specialized art-focused high school, while our youngest was a self-directed, budding biologist. He caught a few of the bugs and displayed them, blinking, in the palm of his hand.

 

Last night I awoke to loud claps of thunder directly overhead and Jackie and Jillie offering the loud claps in canine translation back in kind. Rain lashed the windows, and I got up to close our bedroom window and those at the front of the house. Very dramatic, looking out on the darkened street, glittering with pounding rain, the ominous sound of clashing rain-heavy clouds above. Also comfortable, as I snuggled back into bed.

In the morning an email awaited me. I had already been prewarned last night with an initial email. My sister-in-law had been admitted to the emergency department at North York General Hospital. Today I learned she had suffered a stroke, and bleeding on the brain. She is fourteen years younger than Irving and me. News like that leaves you emotionally floundering. Emotions seem to close in and they're all dark and foreboding. You want to comfort her husband, but his role now is one of enduring patience.

Irving made himself busy today. Out came a stepladder so he could replace burnt-out bulbs in one of the outdoor lanterns. Then he located a small can of the dark green paint he had used for the outside trim of the house to touch up a few areas here and there. Keeping busy helps a mind dealing with a confused series of thoughts and memories.

 

In the afternoon we went out with Jackie and Jillie for their usual hike through the forest trails. They had been running amok through the house in happy anticipation of that event, occasionally sliding with an excited whack into one of us in their rambunctious glee. After last night's heavy rain, the air remained saturated as though a fine mist remained. But there was a cool wind and the sun had emerged and a pleasant walk awaited us.

 

Watching Jackie and Jillie concentrate on everything around them, careful not to miss anything at all that might seen unusual, attracts our attention to them and moves our minds elsewhere. Their high spirits seem to lift ours. Their exuberance and dedication to living life to its fullest yet another metaphor, like replacing a light bulb so light can pierce the darkness, just as medical care has the potential to ameliorate a life-changing adverse health situation.

We tend, at night, to keep our windows open when the exterior temperature falls below the indoor temperature. There's often a light breeze that enters the window and wafts across to our bed. We also have a floor fan on until final 'lights out' when our reading for the night is declared over and we turn to sleep. Jackie and Jillie tend not to stir throughout the night. If either of us gets up to the bathroom, they sleep on. But in the morning with the window open, if there's a dog barking somewhere in faint hearing, up they get and return salvo after salvo.

 

 

Although from early morning forward the air was thick with humidity and a level of haze, the sun remained behind clouds and a freshening breeze made up for the humidity ... almost. Wandering about the backyard with Jackie and Jillie, the overnight temperature inversion left the grass fairly drenched and it took its time drying, given the absence of sun.

 

 

We decided for a ravine hike early in the afternoon after reading through most of the day's newspapers. There were several items that were too recent to be reported in print, and that we saw on line from the CBC. One, of a 19-year-old firefighter in British Columbia, a young woman who made it a personal priority to help in efforts to control unusually wild forest fire breakouts, who lost her life in the effort.

 

 

Another, a story about a young man employed by a British Columbia energy company, driving a pick-up in a remote forested area when he came across a young moose in desperate straits. He opened the passenger side door of the truck and the young animal leaped in, just evading being caught by a bear that was stalking it. The man drove with the moose in the truck for four-and-a-half hours out of the bush, where the two became very well acquainted with one another. For his quick thinking the man's reward was loss of his employment for flouting the company's policy on wild animal neutrality.

 

 

When we headed out for the ravine, we came across no wild animals other than the two we brought in ourselves, but we did come across a delightful sight we haven't seen in years. A delicately beautiful clump of Indian Pipe had emerged from the forest floor, a result of the heavy rains of the past week. 

 

All the forest vegetation, in fact, is thriving. More ragweed, taller and thicker in numbers than we've ever before seen, as well as milkweed in great numbers, both now flowering. And the proliferation of Black-eyed Susans grows year over year in the forest's pollinating meadow. Flowers of a size and differentiation well beyond their cultivated cousins in our garden. In the meadow, there are great clumps of beautifully ruffled triple-row petals, as well as bullseye flowers, none of which variants I've ever seen other than in the forest.

 

When we returned from our forest foray, we focused on the gardens, to do some clean-up, including removing the weeds that grow with such zest alongside the curb next to our property; their presence looks unsightly. My eye wanders from time to time through the lush green foliage of the garden to espie now and again, a weed that has grown thick and tall, almost resembling the plants that we've been long familiar with, surprising us with their presence and for their impudence, being yanked out.

 

Later, Irving went out on an errand, and while he was out I prepared a batch of cookie dough for ginger snaps. The house was redolent with the fragrance of ginger and molasses on his return home. 

 

I won't hesitate to admit that I'm an unregenerated worrier. One of those people who at times, imagines dire events and then builds a case in one's mind for panic. From time to time my mind turns on a faucet of concern for which there is no real cause, but for which one can be readily manufactured on the whim of a concern. Today was one of those times. I called our daughter on her cellphone, our granddaughter on hers, and called their landline as well as sending an email.

 

 

Leaving no message of urgency, just as casual, 'give me a call'. The cell lines for both seemed really faint, and out of that came even more nagging imagination. I thought there was too long a gap between our last having spoken, to the present. I convinced myself I was experiencing this very strange conviction that something was wrong. To the point where I was almost ready to contact the OPP which services their area, to do a 'wellness check'. You never know...

 

I tried to set my concern aside. I'd mentioned it to Irving and he calmly opted for the explanation that they weren't home, could be out shopping. I couldn't convince myself, but thought I'd better get busy doing things. I found it hard to concentrate, my mind sliding back to possible, though hardly credible scenarios of disaster of some kind. But eventually as I got busy, calm resettled, and the automatic actions of familiarity in the kitchen took over. And I relaxed. 

 

Irving was doing the vacuuming with a new stick vacuum he had bought two days earlier, a really hefty piece of equipment that soon proved its value, showing me what he had gathered in the dirt collection cup. Where does it all come from?!! Just two adults, two little dogs, in a house that's kept as immaculate as possible, where does all this detritus, that grey fluff emanate from?

 

While I was rolling out pastry dough to form the cups of butter tarts, Jackie and Jillie began that shrill barking that informs us someone has the nerve to be at the front door; their response to the doorbell. Irving was a while at the front door, and then he appeared beyond the kitchen door, in the family room and two people, a man and a woman I didn't know, were with him. Looking around, looking in particular at the stained glass.

 

The woman was our elected municipal councillor for the newly-restructured area and she had decided to do a walk-about to introduce herself to the public she represents on city council. She and her companion were going door-to-door to introduce themselves. And on our porch they began by talking about the gardens, then switching to the windows. Their curiosity so enthused that Irving invited them in to show them around. 

 

A short while afterward we left the house with Jackie and Jillie for our afternoon trek through the ravine. A much cooler day than what we've been exposed to of late. The sun was mostly absent in the morning  hours and there was a light, cool breeze. It was, the morning newspaper explained, the hot and humid air of this week meeting a cooler front that had caused the tornado that ripped through the West end of the city, damaging about a hundred homes.

 

Our hike was pleasant enough to convince us to stay out a little longer than on the really hot days. And the sun came out now and again, illuminating a forest sufficiently irrigated to the point where its vegetation resembled summer's conclusion in the thick richness of its green glory and flowering wildflowers. 

Soon afterward our granddaughter called: 'What's up, Bubbie?'

 

A comfortably uneventful day, though an inconvenient one for us, but an entirely different story for people living in a community west of the city centre, today. This has been an uncommon day of totally restive weather conditions. From early morning the wind has been harshly wild. But even before that, there were heavy downpours throughout the night, and although the temperature is the lowest it's been in weeks, the humidity is so thick it hangs drippingly hot and heavy over the atmosphere.

 

It took little time while the landscape was drying itself out from the overnight rain, aided by the hot wind, before the cloud ceiling of an innocuous pewter turned to an angry grey-black extensive bruise of a threat in gathering storm clouds. And we certainly knew the weather meant business when soon enough thunder rumbled overhead and Jackie and Jillie began challenging the thunder god.

 

Apart from the house turning dark as night and the approaching storm, a severe weather warning went out that included a tornado watch scheduled for the Ottawa/Gatineau area; Ontario and Quebec, an area known as the National Capital region. Until a few years back we'd never known that tornadoes could touch down here. They have, and the results have been spectacularly bad for those living in the paths of those grey whirling funnel demons.

 

It soon enough became obvious as one thunder storm after another clapped its way through our landscape that we weren't likely to get out in the ravine today. In between storms we were able to take Jackie and Jillie out briefly for relief trips, but they had no inclination to spend any more time than necessary on the sodden grass of the backyard. 

 

We heard at about 2:00 p.m. that a tornado had touched down in a community to the west of us and fifty homes sustained damage. One person ended up in hospital. Homes had holes torn in their roofs, shingles were peeled off roofs, and siding off the sides of houses. Windows were shattered by the force of the raging wind. For those in the midst of the maelstrom the terrifying experience didn't last long, but the impression they lived through certainly will.

First responders like firefighters and police and paramedics were quick to respond to the effects of the tornado. As they did, they found that people were driving into the area to ogle the damage imposed by nature on the urban landscape and those who inhabit it. Police and municipal authorities appealed to people to retreat from the area where they don't live, and for people generally to take shelter from the wild elements of today's weather scene.