Country Living: The Thousand-Year Darkness

For a while there even the multitude of slugs living around our house held some fascination for me. (They come in two flavors: rotten banana and Darth Vader.) But not anymore. I don’t care if the slugs put on tiny little, silver-trimmed sombreros and form their own Mariachi band. You won’t get me outside to look at them. I’ve finally reached that stage of living in a new place when the discombobulating sense that I’m just on vacation has faded completely away.

The seasonal view out the window

Salt Spring Island is right below the 49th parallel, which means we islanders enjoy the same sixteen-hour-long nights during the dead of winter that Vancouverites do. Add to that gray skies and dump trucks full of rain and you can see why practically the whole population of the B.C. coast is on vitamin D and Zoloft from November to February. This time of year feels like the beginning of a one-thousand-year darkness.

City friends who may have envied us in September are feeling something closer to pity at the end of October. The darkness is even darker in the country. And there’s not as much to do during the long nights that are coming.

When we first arrived, I got myself some tools and set up a kind of primitive shop on our spacious, partially covered deck. I may not actually know how to use any of the tools I bought, but I have a lot of fun trying. Right now that deck is getting pretty cold and damp. I keep telling myself I’m going to keep at it through the winter, but my actual behavior says otherwise.

Let’s face it: country living isn’t as much fun in the winter. The whole island clears out. I believe the population of the island drops by something like 50%. Businesses shut down. People get laid off. The newer hybrid sedans that once filled the parking lots are replaced by pick-ups and beaters.

The off season isn’t all bad, of course. The hiking trails and parks are wonderfully empty. The fall colors have made the island even prettier than it usually is. Weird, cool little mushrooms are growing all over the place, including a fungus with the unbeatable and well-deserved name, yellow brain jelly.

We’ve just got to get used to the idea that we, as islanders, now have an on season and an off season. The summer here is  as idyllic as the winters are hard, so the thing to do, it seems, is to throw yourself into long hours of work during the off season in the hope that you’ll be able to repay yourself during the on season with short weeks and big vacations.

I kind of like that lopsidedness. The work is too evenly spread out in Vancouver. They keep you at the grindstone just about the same amount no matter what the season. Winters are challenging there also, but the real challenge is summer. Some people in Vancouver actually go clinically insane after months of staring at endless, beautiful summer days from behind a plate-glass office window. They end up on the streets, which seems like a good deal—until October rolls around again.

What can I say? If you’re a city-dweller this is your time to shine. Make good use of that urban landscape. See movies. Go to new restaurants. Party it up now, because around about March or so, I expect to be once again insufferably smug about the awesomeness of country living.

[Here's the first installment of the country livin' series]