There is no possible overstatement of the day! After an uncommonly restful night – and following yesterday’s sudden cold front and violent soaking – we were instinctively drawn to the clarity and freshness of the midsummer azure atmosphere. We cycled what is now our customary 8 Km through the subdivision, past the library and old town hall, over the bridge then along the former rail line to Carss Street and back. The simple exercise did more than expiate guilt; it completed a rhythm of habit. The cheery nature of others was evident too – people walking their dogs or pushing perambulators or completing their own morning constitutional demanded of any day of the year. The town was alive with gusto! Even the polished black limousine parked in front of C. R. Gamble funeral home on Church Street looked strangely gratified.

At noon we launched the Aviator northwest towards Algonquin Provincial Park through Killaloe past Fish Hut Road to the Opeongo Trail Resort where my sister and her husband were perched as is their summertime tradition in a cottage on a point overlooking the Madawaska River.

We transitioned our conflab from inside the cottage to the yard outside where we gossiped about this and that for well over an hour. Naturally during our banter particulars of my nieces arose as a topic of conversation. We concluded the abbreviated summary of their collective well being by reminding ourselves that, ‘”If you do what you like, then you’ll like what you do!” This axiomatic and succinct summation of purpose and ambition elevated the status of endeavour to a high degree of overall satisfaction. Infused in the dialogue was a reference to home ownership which for me has forever been a combination of the competing elements of necessity and debt. I persist in my belief that home ownership is a deceit advanced for the benefit of the banking and insurance agencies who stand to gain from so-called investment. The project invariably proves to be a prolonged (amortized) expenditure which is but another rendition of renting with the added feature of increased liability and constant repair and improvement. The financial advisors have not yet succeeded to tout the advantage of their own worth, delivering sustainable comfort while preserving restraint and calculation. I am all for delegation to qualified professional advisors (law, tax and financial) while maintaining my own sphere of conduct. Barring an association with the likes of Bernie Madoff it captures what I believe to be the advantage of security and agency, affording a management and summary of endeavour.

The drive home was unsurpassably lovely, the sunshine warming us pleasantly as we sped along the open undulating ribbon of highways towards our treasured Almonte.