As we approach the middle of July the overwhelming sensibilities of summer are perpetually evoked. Bordering the residential lawns – seen this morning during my neighbourhood tricycle jaunt – are rampant breadths of tiny white and lemon coloured daisies. Along the country roadside are congregations of orange and black Tiger lilies. The lush green ribbons of corn stalk compete with Olympic greed for dominion of entire fields rolling to the edge of the river. Everywhere being hauled are modern trailers and motorized boats hitched to the backs of pick-up trucks all shiny and new.

It is my favour when driving to open all the windows. The day’s blue sky and fluffy white clouds were no inhibition.  The air had at times a bouquet when passing through the caverns of agricultural growth. The humidity was moderate.

While tricycling this morning I overheard people chatting about proposed excursions – involving reference to cottages. Already we have shared intelligence about tentative summer holidays to the east coast and Prince Edward Island. Indeed our own plans possibly include such a cross-country adventure – though dependent upon a number of factors yet unresolved. No matter; the authority for summer adventure is unattached to any prescription other than than the limitation of one’s physical carcass. Conveniently for the moment I am able to retreat daily to the balcony to absorb the sometimes burning rays; but paramountly I am satisfied to overlook the valley from my desk and to trace the changing mood of the clouds upon the distant horizon. While I am stimulated in this ambition by a strengthening glass of chilled espresso, I have no wish to join the river boaters. Instead I am content to marvel at their industry – and their unwitting poetic display – from the inspirational distance of our drawing room.

There is no question that our proximity to patently rural views – whether distantly upriver, nearby along the river or adjoining the intervening side road – has contributed to the constant illumination of summer’s unfolding drama. Each day we amusingly predict the evolving height of the towering cornstalks. Each day in my opinion the image of the identical boundaries is different – depending upon the size, shape and convulsion of the cumulus and the colour of the sky. Sometimes the wind is a torrent, bending the trees and exposing the delicate colour beneath their leaves.

**********

Summertime Mood

As we approach mid-July, the full sensibility of summer asserts itself at every turn. Along the borders of residential lawns—noticed during this morning’s tricycle outing—tiny white and lemon-coloured daisies grow in cheerful profusion. Along the country roadside, congregations of orange and black tiger lilies bow their heads in the breeze. The green ribbons of corn compete with Olympic ambition for dominion over entire fields, rolling to the edge of the river. Everywhere, trailers and gleaming motorboats are hauled behind equally gleaming pickup trucks, symbols of mobility and promise.

When I drive, I prefer the windows down. Today’s blue sky and scattered white clouds offered no inhibition. The passing air, funneled through caverns of agricultural growth, at times carried a heady bouquet. The humidity was moderate—enough to warm the skin, not dampen the spirit.

While tricycling this morning, I overheard conversations about weekend plans and cottages. Already, there’s shared talk of tentative holidays to the East Coast and Prince Edward Island. Our own plans may include such a cross-country adventure—though several factors remain unresolved. No matter. The authority for summer adventure resists prescription, governed only by the limits of one’s physical carcass. Conveniently, for now, I retreat daily to the balcony to absorb the sometimes burning rays. Yet more often, I am content to sit at my desk, overlooking the valley, watching the mood of the clouds drift and change along the horizon. A glass of chilled espresso sharpens the view. I have no wish to join the boaters on the river; instead, I prefer to marvel at their industry—and their unwitting poetry—from the cool remove of the drawing room.

There’s no doubt that our proximity to these rural views—whether distant upriver, nearby along the riverbank, or across the adjoining side road—deepens the daily illumination of summer’s unfolding drama. We amuse ourselves by predicting the ever-evolving height of the corn. Each day, though the boundaries remain unchanged, the landscape appears new—shaped by the size, movement, and temperament of the cumulus and the particular colour of the sky. Sometimes the wind becomes a torrent, bending the trees and revealing the delicate undersides of their leaves.

*********

Summertime Mood (with Eyebrow Slightly Raised)

By mid-July, summer in our region has taken full possession—not unlike a determined aunt arriving uninvited with an overpacked suitcase. Everywhere, nature indulges in her own brand of excess: daisies—white and lemony—clutter the borders of suburban lawns as though vying for attention. Along the roadside, tiger lilies preen like extras in a provincial theatre production. The corn, ever vainglorious, grows with such competitive zeal that one half-expects to see medals awarded by harvest time.

Modern man, too, is seized by the seasonal affliction. Shiny trailers and gleaming boats trail behind shiny trucks in a kind of mechanized migration, all heading vaguely somewhere to achieve what they are told is “relaxation.” The sheer volume of chrome on the move suggests a festival of capitalist pilgrimage, where the object is less repose than performance.

When I drive—windows open, of course—I prefer to sample the terroir. The air is thick with the scent of corn, diesel, and optimism. Clouds parade across the sky, as if employed by the Chamber of Commerce. The humidity hovers politely, neither oppressive nor absent, like a well-trained butler with moist palms.

This morning’s tricycle jaunt provided the usual eavesdropping: discussions of cottage invitations, road trips, and vague threats to “head out East” sometime soon. We ourselves may yet undertake such a venture—though I reserve the right to defer all decisions until the last possible moment, which I consider a hallmark of true summer philosophy. The only real plan, after all, is to surrender daily to the balcony, to the shifting light, and to the quiet pleasure of judging the river-goers from an appropriate distance, espresso in hand.

These boaters fascinate me—not for their skill but for their choreography. They launch and load with military precision, as though something crucial hangs in the balance. They wave to one another, all wearing identical sunglasses, enacting a floating pantomime of leisure. I observe this ritual from the drawing room like a Victorian invalid—disinterested, superior, and mildly amused.

Rural proximity has its advantages. Each day brings a new interpretation of the same scene. The corn appears taller—whether by fact or force of suggestion, it hardly matters. The sky changes character like an actress in an amateur drama club, aided by clouds of varying temperament. When the wind rises, the trees perform their best impression of vulnerability, showing off their pale undersides in a flutter of faux modesty.

It’s summer. Everyone is trying very hard to have a good time. I, for one, prefer to watch them try.

*********

Summertime Mood (as Told by a Waugh Protagonist Who Forgot to Pack His Patience)

Mid-July, and the countryside is once again in full vulgar bloom. The daisies—those insipidly cheerful little things—have established a kind of ground-level insurgency along the borders of local lawns, aided and abetted by lemon-coloured allies. The tiger lilies, meanwhile, continue their annual masquerade as something rare and important, congregating with all the subtlety of debutantes in borrowed couture.

Beyond the foliage, the corn fields—drunk on chlorophyll and ambition—are in the midst of a grotesque land grab, vaulting toward the heavens with all the self-importance of second-rate opera singers. One expects to find them issuing manifestos soon, or at least forming a committee.

On the roads, the peasantry has mobilized. Trailers, boats, coolers the size of sarcophagi—everything that can be hitched, dragged, or displayed is now strapped to the back of a gleaming pickup truck and hurled toward some idyllic destination in the wilderness, presumably to commune with mosquitoes and tell stories about propane.

As for myself, I opened the car windows in an unguarded moment of optimism. The air, when not redolent of manure or diesel, occasionally carried a scent that might have been charming if it didn’t remind one so insistently of other people having a good time.

This morning I ventured out on the tricycle, an apparatus which continues to render me an object of both pity and admiration in roughly equal measure. Along the way, I overheard snatches of conversation: cottages, canoes, cousins. There was mention of Prince Edward Island, which I gather is still fashionable among the sort of people who mistake remoteness for refinement. We too have contemplated a trip east, though as always our plans remain mercifully unconfirmed. There is something especially liberating in declaring one’s summer unbooked.

My days are divided between the balcony and the drawing room. From either vantage, I observe the river-bound masses—red-faced, over-accessorized, and intoxicated by the illusion of escape. They jet past in watercraft of varying vulgarity, shouting at one another with all the sophistication of invading tribes. I sip chilled espresso and wonder vaguely what they imagine they are escaping from.

To be fair, our immediate surroundings offer a kind of rustic pageantry. The view upriver remains surprisingly unspoiled. The daily drama of the corn’s growth is a minor diversion, though not one I’d admit to enjoying in company. The sky performs its little changes—clouds, light, wind—like a provincial theatre troupe staging Chekhov with uneven funding.

Sometimes the wind becomes almost thrilling. Trees bend and shiver with undisguised desperation, exposing their pale undersides like Victorian matrons caught in a gust. It is the sort of spectacle that makes one long for a stiff drink, a comfortable chair, and the absolute certainty that one needn’t participate in any of it.

*********

The Midsummer Lease

It was the second week of July and already the local population had taken leave of whatever faculties winter had failed to dampen. Across the valley, pop-up awnings, inflatable flamingos, and portable grills had begun to appear in numbers suggesting either a music festival or a refugee crisis at a garden centre. The postmistress, who had once studied anthropology in Guelph, declared it the annual “retreat to ritual.” She said this while wearing Crocs and counting stamps.

For my part, I had resigned myself to observing it all from the safe distance of my study. I had inherited the house from a cousin whose tastes ran to the Flemish and the impractical. It overlooked the river in the way only a house built before municipal planning could—entirely without apology. From the drawing room one could watch the drama of human migration play out daily on the water: men in sleeveless shirts bellowing into the wind, women attempting to uncork rosé on paddleboards, and children flung about on inflatable rafts with the carefree cruelty of soft fruits in a blender.

My tricycle—a German contraption designed, I suspect, by someone who resented the concept of ease—stood beside the umbrella stand in the foyer, ready for deployment should I wish to collect “supplies,” a term that covered everything from ground espresso to medication to hard cheese.

It was on one such errand, just before noon, that I encountered Mrs. Dalrymple, my neighbour and chief source of misinformation. She hailed me from behind a hedge, carrying what looked like a jar of pickled onions and wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat which gave her the appearance of someone auditioning for a period drama set in a vegetable patch.

“Have you heard,” she said, without waiting for confirmation, “that the McBrides are renting their place for the summer?”

“Which McBrides?” I asked, adjusting the brakes on the tricycle with what I hoped conveyed mild alarm.

“The loud ones. With the jet-skis and the dog that barks at shadows.”

“Ah,” I said, as if that clarified everything.

She leaned in. “They’re leasing to city people. From Toronto.”

There was a beat of silence, long enough for a dragonfly to regret its life choices.

“Toronto,” I repeated.

“Yes. I believe they work in branding.”

I suppressed a shudder. Few things unsettle me more than people whose professions are syntactically vague. “Branding,” in my experience, either meant marketing shampoo or attempting to monetize personality flaws.

“I do hope they won’t expect anyone to interact,” I said.

Mrs. Dalrymple gave a look of solemn understanding. “We’ve stocked up. Tony’s installed the security lights.”

This seemed excessive, but one never knew with people from Toronto. They had been known to bring acoustic guitars to dinner parties and to describe wine as “accessible.”

That afternoon, from the safety of my balcony, I watched a sleek black SUV nose its way into the gravel driveway across the lane. The McBride house—a faux-rustic monstrosity with delusions of farmhouse charm—stood yawning open. Two adults emerged, both wearing sunglasses indoors and white trainers so pristine they might have been issued by a cult. A third figure followed: a child of indeterminate gender carrying a smoothie the size of a bowling pin.

And so, the season began.

*********

Chapter Two: The Dinner Party

The invitation arrived by email, which I regard as the social equivalent of carving a monogram into a cold sausage and leaving it on the neighbour’s step. It was addressed to The Honourable and Mrs. D––, which was strange, as I am neither titled nor married, and the only woman with whom I share a roof is a ceramic bust of Queen Victoria that currently holds my reading glasses.

Nevertheless, the invitation was clear: cocktails at six, dinner at seven, “casual chic” attire suggested. I am always alarmed by phrases that pair style with suggestion. They presuppose not only interest but compliance. After some deliberation, I chose to wear what I always wear to events involving strangers and potential lentils: navy linen, a pocket square with sufficient irony, and shoes old enough to suggest I once had principles.

The McBride property had been transformed since their departure. What was once a house shaped like a cereal box with aspirations was now strung with lanterns, echoing music curated by someone deeply committed to saxophone remixes, and scented faintly with something that recalled an overambitious candle shop.

I arrived to find a small congregation already forming in the back garden. The hostess, whose name was either Lainie or Raine (I never did catch it properly), approached with the zeal of a junior account executive. She wore a jumpsuit made of some determinedly sustainable fabric and greeted me as if I were a treasured childhood drawing rediscovered in a box labelled “miscellaneous trauma.”

“You must be the local writer-lawyer-person!” she exclaimed.

“I must be,” I agreed, offering a hand that she chose to hug instead. It was like being embraced by a sun-dried tomato in chiffon.

Her husband—Jared, or possibly Gareth—was introduced soon after. He had the glazed expression of a man whose career involved PowerPoint and therapy. He asked me if I was on “the socials,” which I took to mean drugs, but later understood as a reference to media platforms. I told him I was on something called Beta Blockers, which he said sounded “cool.”

The guests were a fascinating cross-section of modern archetypes: a woman who sold high-end olive oil “experiences”; a man who described himself as “post-corporate” but wouldn’t stop mentioning his MBA; and a young couple from Montreal who insisted we all speak French even though they were from Oakville.

Dinner was served on reclaimed wood boards, naturally, and featured what was referred to as “deconstructed lasagna.” This turned out to be a series of ingredients presented in separate piles, like an Italian family mid-divorce. The wine was biodynamic and tasted like something that might eventually become vinegar, if given time and therapy.

Conversation, such as it was, orbited the usual satellites: artisanal things, rental prices in Lisbon, and some kind of festival involving immersive theatre and goat milk. At one point, someone asked me how I “engaged with nature,” and I said mostly through my windows. This was met with a silence so pure it could have been bottled.

I made my escape after the third course—a beetroot medley described as “unapologetically earthy”—claiming an urgent need to administer medication to my tricycle. The hostess clasped my hand and murmured something about forming a writer’s circle. I murmured something back, probably in Latin.

As I retreated up the lane, I could hear the sounds of group laughter, the clink of cutlery against stoneware, and the gentle creak of reputations being constructed out of compost and bravado.

*********

Chapter Three: Cultural Exchange

It began, as such calamities often do, with a flyer. Printed on ethically sourced hemp paper and distributed via a cheerful teenager on a scooter named Finn, the notice announced a weekend event titled “Rural Reverence: A Cultural Exchange.”

Subtitled, with an alarming lack of irony, “Bridging Traditions, Building Vibrations,” it promised two days of “connection, co-creation, and corn-based cuisine,” featuring events such as goat yoga, barn rave meditation, and a panel discussion on “Indigenous Storytelling Through Artisan Ceramics,” moderated by a woman named Skylar who, I later discovered, had once studied pottery in a converted garage in Hamilton.

I had no intention of attending, of course. But Mrs. Dalrymple, who had taken to wearing linen ponchos and using the word “resonance” unprovoked, insisted I accompany her to the opening ceremony. “You need exposure,” she said, as if I were a sickly Victorian child in need of mountain air.

The event was held in the McBride backyard, which had been transformed—again—into a pastoral parody of itself. Hay bales were arranged in a loose circle meant to suggest intimacy. A canopy of prayer flags flapped overhead like surrendered underwear. In the centre stood a low platform of reclaimed barnwood upon which a young woman in flowing robes played the hang drum with the grave intensity of a hostage blinking in Morse code.

The hosts, Gareth and Raine (confirmed now by nametags reading “They/Them // Hosts with the Mosts”), took the stage to welcome everyone to “this sacred intersection of urban intention and rural wisdom.” They spoke of the land, of journeying inward, and of seasonal vegetables. Then Gareth rang a bell made from recycled bicycle parts and invited us to “set an intention” for the day.

I intended, rather urgently, to leave.

But the program was relentless. First came “Yoga Among Friends”, which involved clumsy poses on damp grass while a rescue goat named Camembert wandered through the crowd, leaving tokens of his emotional journey in the form of small droppings. My downward-facing dog was quickly revised into a seated expression of discomfort.

Then came “Circle Sharing”. Participants were encouraged to pass around a stick wrapped in feathers and bits of hemp twine. When holding the stick, one had “the floor.” I was handed it by an unshaven man named Brett who smelled faintly of patchouli and disappointment.

“I’m mostly here for the beer tent,” I said, which was taken as a joke and applauded.

After a lunch of corn chowder “reimagined as a foam,” we were treated to a spoken word performance by a local youth who recited a poem titled “Monoculture is Murder.” It began with the line: “This soil has a memory and it’s tired of your boots.” I found myself oddly moved, though I suspect it was gas.

Mrs. Dalrymple, having consumed two mugs of cold-pressed beet elixir, began referring to herself as “an earth vessel.” She asked if I wanted to join the group crystal alignment near the lilac bush. I told her I was already misaligned enough, thank you.

By dusk, Gareth had donned a kimono and was encouraging everyone to chant “Hooooome” into the valley. I lingered at the back of the group, sipping chamomile and staring toward the river, where I imagined the boaters—blissfully unaware, beer in hand—laughing at one another’s jokes and emitting not one syllable of sacred breath.

On the walk home, Mrs. Dalrymple said she hadn’t felt so connected since Expo ’67.

I said I hadn’t felt so alienated since law school.

*********

Chapter Four: The Conflict

Peace in the valley, as expected, did not last.

It began, inevitably, with a hedge. Not a large hedge, nor an especially offensive one, but a modest row of overenthusiastic boxwood dividing the Dalrymple property from the recently leased McBride compound. The McBrides, having vacated for the season and left their tenants in charge, had apparently included no guidance in the rental agreement regarding topiary diplomacy. A critical oversight.

The tenants—Gareth and Raine—had taken it upon themselves to “reshape the perimeter,” citing both feng shui and a recent podcast on “sacred sightlines.” The hedge, according to Gareth, “interrupted the flow between their energy centre and the moonrise.” It had to be trimmed. Not “destroyed,” mind you. “Opened up.”

What followed was less a trim and more a shearing. Half the hedge disappeared overnight, leaving the remaining greenery looking like a nervous debutante who had only committed to a fringe but awoke with a buzz cut. Mrs. Dalrymple discovered the desecration during her morning compost inspection and responded as one might upon finding squatters in her pantry.

“I warned you about the city people,” she said, standing on her veranda in tartan slippers and armed with a pair of gardening shears, the blade glinting with pre-litigious menace.

Within the hour, the situation had escalated. Gareth attempted mediation by offering a basket of hand-cured olives and a brochure for something called “Restorative Arbor Therapy.” Mrs. Dalrymple countered with a formal letter printed on parchment, quoting a 1978 municipal bylaw regarding hedgerows and referencing her late husband’s cousin, who once clerked for a judge.

By the following afternoon, two vehicles from the township had arrived—one marked “Mediation Services,” the other unmarked but driven by a woman who wore a clipboard like a badge of office and smelled faintly of frustration.

I watched from the drawing room, naturally, having positioned my chair with military precision. The espresso machine hissed approvingly as I documented the affair with the solemnity of a war correspondent.

Later, Raine appeared on my doorstep with a concerned expression and what I can only describe as a placation basket—contents included: vegan butter, artisanal salt, a pamphlet titled “Conflict Is a Teacher”, and a sprig of lavender bound in natural twine.

“We’re just trying to cultivate dialogue,” she said, gazing at me with the sincere desperation of someone who’d paid too much for a healing retreat in Tulum.

I assured her I was fully in favour of dialogue, preferably conducted at a distance of several properties and without the involvement of landscaping.

By evening, the affair had reached the local Facebook group, where battle lines were drawn between Traditional Land Aesthetics and Progressive Green Expression. Someone named Meadow accused the township of “enforcing colonial hedge norms.” Someone else, calling themselves “Burt G.,” responded, “Get yer hands off our fences or move back to Rosedale.”

Mrs. Dalrymple, no stranger to digital warfare, replied with a GIF of Winston Churchill.

*********

Chapter Five: The Town Hall

The special meeting was called with the sort of pomp normally reserved for royal abdications or bridge collapses. Officially, it was listed on the community bulletin as “A Forum for Open Dialogue Regarding Shared Green Space and Harmonious Coexistence.” Unofficially, it was referred to by most residents as “The Hedge Debacle and Other Nonsense.”

It was held, naturally, in the basement of the community centre—a space designed, judging by the acoustics, for interrogations and amateur oboe practice. Rows of collapsible chairs faced a plastic table draped in something approximating municipal authority. Behind it sat our long-suffering township moderator, Carol MacPhee, who had chaired everything from curling fundraisers to a failed initiative to ban leaf blowers on Sundays. She now approached the proceedings with the resigned air of a woman expecting both drama and gluten-free snacks.

I arrived precisely seven minutes late, the better to avoid informal chit-chat. Mrs. Dalrymple had already taken up a position in the front row, flanked by her bridge partner (Madge, ex-military) and a quiet man in a bucket hat who hadn’t spoken since the mulching scandal of 2012.

The McBride tenants—Gareth and Raine—sat near the back, hand in hand, radiating ethical discomfort and citrus essential oils. Gareth wore a linen shirt bearing the logo of a podcast called “The Mindful Outburst.” Raine had brought a singing bowl, “in case vibrations got toxic.”

Carol called the meeting to order by tapping a recycled wine bottle with a cheese knife. “Let’s keep this constructive,” she said, in the tone of a veteran hostage negotiator.

The early proceedings were dominated by what I call the grievances of the partially informed. Several longtime residents took to the floor to recall instances of noise, trespass, and, in one case, an incident involving scented candles and livestock.

“I’m not saying your rosemary diffuser killed my hens,” said Mr. Gubbins, rising unsteadily, “but ever since that solstice thing, they haven’t laid a bloody egg.”

To this, Raine offered a reply involving ancestral vibrations and the overstimulation of avian chakras, which did little to mollify Mr. Gubbins, who muttered something about “the pagan menace” and sat down hard.

Gareth attempted a more conciliatory approach. He read aloud from his blog—an entry titled “Hedges and the Architecture of Exclusion”—in which he proposed the creation of “a borderless garden ethic,” punctuated by quotes from Rumi and Noam Chomsky. This was met with the sort of silence usually reserved for dental X-rays and distant thunder.

Mrs. Dalrymple, rising with the elegance of a retired duchess, produced a folder of documents laminated for drama. “This,” she said, brandishing a map from 1954, “is where the hedge was. This—” she paused, letting the room fall breathlessly still—“is where it is not.”

There was scattered applause. Gareth coughed into his kombucha.

Tensions rose. A man in cargo shorts demanded to know whether “these people” paid the same property taxes. A woman in turquoise leggings responded by threatening to “decolonize his mindset.” Someone threw a gluten-free biscuit. It missed.

Carol stood, arms spread, her voice rising above the melee. “This is a town hall, not an uprising!”

The crowd stilled, chastened by the sound of someone finally meaning it.

Eventually, a compromise was proposed: the hedge would be replanted in a slightly modified shape—a sort of “ecological curve”—designed by a local artist and funded by a grant that nobody had yet secured. A committee was formed, which meant nothing would happen until October.

We adjourned, bruised but intact. As I stepped into the cool evening air, Mrs. Dalrymple muttered, “We used to solve things with gin and fencing. Now it’s feelings and forms.”

I nodded and lit a cigarette I didn’t have, simply for effect.

*********

Chapter Six: The Harvest Festival

It was billed as “The Great Autumn Embrace”, a title so self-congratulatory one expected it to arrive with a TED Talk and a line of scented merchandise. According to the flyer—now laminated, web-posted, and inserted with righteous glee into every mailbox—the festival would be “a celebration of rooted community, regenerative abundance, and intergenerational reciprocity.” It would also, more practically, feature pie.

The event was held in the central green, a lumpy field usually reserved for dog-walking and illicit badminton. A large banner fluttered overhead, its hand-lettering announcing, “Harvest Is For Everyone.” To my knowledge, no one had ever suggested otherwise, but in this climate, preemptive righteousness was the norm.

Raine and Gareth had outdone themselves. The festival map (printed on seed paper, naturally) showed multiple zones: a Mindful Maze constructed from corn husks and intention; a Locavore Lane for food stalls; a Community Altar for “offerings of gratitude”; and something labeled Soil Whispering Station, which I deliberately avoided.

I arrived shortly before noon, dressed in what I refer to as “rural diplomatic garb”: tweed, scowl, and sunglasses that allow me to appear engaged while mentally composing indictments. Mrs. Dalrymple, now fully committed to her role as village Joan of Arc, was stationed near the pie tent, armed with a clipboard and a trowel.

“Careful,” she muttered as I passed, “they’ve hidden interpretive dance in the cider queue.”

Indeed they had. A woman in a crushed velvet bodysuit was, at that very moment, performing what appeared to be a reenactment of the pumpkin’s inner journey. Children watched with the detached interest usually reserved for insects on windowsills.

The food was worse than expected, which in itself was a comfort. There were beet fritters served with “courage sauce,” dehydrated kale tapas, and a curry so fragrant it summoned several concerned wasps and one uninvited goat. I found sanctuary near the baking competition, where Mrs. Dalrymple had submitted a walnut tart she referred to, ominously, as “non-compliant.”

Inevitably, there was a speech. Gareth took to the wooden stage—painted in water-based hues of community—and began to speak of “harvest as a metaphor for shared inner growth.” He quoted Thich Nhat Hanh, Wendell Berry, and—somehow—himself. Raine followed with a land acknowledgment that took eleven minutes and three breath breaks.

At some point, a group of middle-schoolers staged a “food justice flash mob,” during which they marched in solemn silence, then threw biodegradable confetti shaped like turnips. A man in a Carhartt jacket muttered, “I just came for pie,” and was promptly handed a pamphlet on “seasonal trauma.”

Things might have continued in that gently surreal vein were it not for the incident with the maypole. Designed as a gesture of pan-cultural harvest solidarity, it had been constructed from recycled hockey sticks and decorated with slogans in multiple languages. Unfortunately, someone—possibly a Gubbins cousin—mistook it for a firewood pile and set it alight during the potluck.

The resulting blaze was modest, but it proved too symbolic to ignore. As the maypole smoked and sputtered, Gareth tried to lead a chant of healing vowels. Someone shouted “Insurance!” and fled. Children burst into confused interpretive movement. A vegan tripped over a pumpkin. Raine stood rigid, eyes closed, repeating, “This is release. This is just release.”

Later, as the embers cooled and most guests migrated toward the cider tent to recover, I sat on a folding chair with Mrs. Dalrymple, who handed me a sliver of walnut tart.

“Well,” she said, watching a compost bin being dragged away by someone named Skylar, “we’ve survived another cycle.”

“Barely,” I replied.

“Next year?”

“God forbid.”

*********

Chapter Seven: The Quiet

Winter came like a discreet visitor—no fireworks, no parades—just the slow retreat of light and the hush of snow settling over fields and fences alike. The frenetic pulse of summer, with its lanterns, debates, and misguided maypoles, was now memory, and the valley lay blanketed in a patient white silence.

The McBride house stood shuttered, its occupants vanished back to the city, leaving behind the echo of biodegradable confetti and a half-repaired hedge. The township’s “ecological curve” was, for the moment, a curiosity rather than a battleground. The compost bins rested dormant, and the “cultural exchange” posters had been folded into a drawer, where they might be rediscovered next spring—if one were lucky.

I settled into the drawing room with the same ritual that had become my refuge through seasons and squabbles: a glass of espresso, a worn book, and the window framing the skeletal trees against the low sun. Outside, the river moved with an ancient patience, indifferent to human ambitions, quarrels, or art installations.

Mrs. Dalrymple visited occasionally, now trading linen ponchos for wool scarves and fewer references to “resonance.” We shared quiet moments of agreement: that the hedge was, in fact, just a hedge; that human nature was both more tender and more obstinate than the best-laid plans; and that some battles were best fought with a trowel in hand and a sense of humour.

There was a kind of peace in the stillness, an acceptance that life’s cycles were measured not in festivals or Facebook posts, but in the slow growing and dying of things beneath the earth. The valley held its secrets well, and in their keeping, I found a modicum of grace.

Summer would return, no doubt, with its tricycles, its tentacled conversations, and its well-meaning disasters. But for now, there was only the quiet—the patient, enduring quiet—and the knowledge that even in the uproar, one could find a place to stand.