Gone So Fast

Today, on the first Sunday after Labor Day, the Point Roberts’ streets are empty: no horses and riders, no walking families, no runners, no cars full of kids going down to the beach. When I drove down to the beach this morning, there was only one car coming the other way up from the beach, and that one was towing a boat away to wherever the boat spends its winter. The Blue Heron (an art and gift gallery which largely caters to tourists) was deserted and the cross-the-street gallery, The Maple Studio, was closed ‘4 birthday' despite the fact that it was a beautiful, sunny, touristy kind of day. I passed four gas stations, and none had at that moment more than one car pumping gas. The plant nursery is closed for the season. At the International Market, there were two check stands working when I came in, but only one when I left, shortly after noon. And that’s where we are: end of summer.

Point Roberts is what in Canada is called cottage country. Most of the maybe 3,000 summer residents (as opposed to the maybe 1600 permanent residents) fit themselves into snug little cottages that usually don’t have or need all-year heating systems. When we bought our 700-square-foot cottage house, it had two bedrooms, neither bigger than 7’x 8’, both accommodating at least two people, and one of them sharing the bed space with a water heater. I imagine there was a makeup bed in the front room, as well, and that six people would have been populating the cottage at some point in the summer.

The ‘cottage’ now has transformed into a house, with only one bedroom and all-weather, propane tank heating, as well as rather more insulation than it used to have. But it still has cottage qualities: a roof without an insulation space; precious little sub-flooring over the bare ground; under-the-house pipes that have to be wrapped and heated in the winter to keep from freezing, and a somewhat limited foundation. But there’s a phone now and an internet connection and double-glass windows to keep the heat in during the winter and double-glass transom windows to keep the heat out during the summer. It doesn't feel or look like a cottage anymore. We are clearly in residence all year round.

Today, it was cool, the kind of cool you don’t get in the summer but that reliably appears around September 1. It’s crisp, smart, accompanied by a clear but pale blue sky. It’s windy too, with the wind coming not steadily as it does in late fall, winter, and early spring, but in short gusts, so that when working outside, I am repeatedly brushed by a cascade of dry leaves careening through the air. The leaves show up suddenly and, in my peripheral vision, it’s as if someone is throwing something at me, over and over again, trying to get my attention. Saying goodbye.

So, Goodbye to the Cottagers for awhile, as well as to the formerly green leaves, and the long summer days. We won't be lonely without them, but we will be aware of their absence. I wish they would be accompanied in their departure by the adolescents (whatever their age) who gun their cars every time they plan to move down the road. Once it gets pretty quiet, I tend to want the perfection of that quiet and it doesn’t co-exist easily with young men in their cars or motorcycles peeling out of their parking spaces. But they too will grow older, will grow up and learn to treat their cars with some respect and their neighbors with the same. Or, if not, they will just grow up and leave.