We gave our little brother a soulful send-off.  There were tears and laughter… and music and story and poem. 

And then, of course, there was the party at  Leah’s house. 

In the garden. 

We got a perfect early-summer day. 

There was food and drink and the fragrance of marijuana. 

More stories, told here in small klatches… more eruptions of laughter from this corner or that. And of course there were guitars and singing…we had competing stages at one point… and there were memories and clues and hugs in abundance… all very special moments of connection that seem, somehow, to be allowed into being only through the presence of the departed. 

There is, or was that day in any event, a sweetness to the shared recognition of the presence of Preston, to the acknowledgement of his completed life, to the embracing of the mystery. 

He was thanked by all who spoke, for inspiring them in one way or another. 

It meant a lot to hear their memories…they filled in gaps for me…for the fifty years when I lived away and usually got to Calgary for only a few days a year. 

But the time away ultimately never mattered. We knew each other at a soul level…indescribable but you believe it completely just the same. 

And we stay in touch, I mean seriously. 

We heard from Mom via automatic writing and from Preston in a poem… the messages came through two different mediums, both women in Preston’s immediate family. It’s a gas having clairvoyants in the clan. 

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So we’re back at the lake now. It’s summer hot today…the kind of day when normally I would certainly have been swimming. But alas, the lake is taking it’s own sweet time to settle down. Some septic beds were flooded at the head of the lake and the gunk has slowly moved southward. 

There is an amusing side effect to all this swampy water though. I got looking around at the jungle surrounding me, tall reeds growing in such abundance, the lushness and fullness of the foliage and the weeds…and the way the cottage at the point is still on the verge of sinking. 

It felt like Louisiana…I imagined this house on a bayou, weedy and overgrown, with a pirot tied to a flimsy little dock… and a sweaty house with a big slow fan on the ceiling. (I didn’t imagine Lori though, because she would have dumped me long before the sweaty house.) 

So, anyway… I let the heat soak in, feel the light sweat form on my skin, and suck a slow lungful of air, moist and heavy, with just a whiff of tropical decay. 

Yeah, that’s what makes it feel like ‘Looosianna’, the smell…and it’s night, and the scene is hot… and still… and sticky 

…and in black and white. 

Ok, so it’s not really Louisiana and we do have air-conditioning and are as addicted to modern creature comforts as anyone, but I must admit…every now and then I do like it a little swampy…a little too hot for most Canucks. I like to find a shady spot, get a tall cool what-ever-they-drink-in-the-movies, and read ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ over and over. 

Dave and I have finished a new song…so I’m once again looking for clues. 

‘These are the days of miracle and wonder’…so says Paul Simon…and I believe him.