Starting Out in the Afternoon…A Delight!

Jill Frayne, daughter of June Callwood, tells of her personal journey into the Canadian wilderness. The analogy of Starting Out in the Afternoon might refer to her starting over again, or reclaiming and re-establishing her new life after a relationship ends, and her daughter leaves for university. One spring, she packs up her car, and starts out on a 3 month trip to northern British Columbia for a camping and kayaking expedition by herself. (I was surprised to find that she lived in Uxbridge…about 20 minutes away from my home!)

I share a passion for the outdoors--canoeing in freshwater is the best therapy for the soul. Like Frayne, solitary tenting has been a wonderful experience for me. I have enjoyed camping in Vermont and New Hampshire and tented on Long Beach just south of Tofino by  myself in my early 20's.  I have backpacked to the Isle of Skye and northern Scotland solo. Traveling alone, you learn a lot about a place, and even more about yourself. You have time to reflect on the life that you have stepped outside. You have quiet expanses of time in which you can observe your surroundings and watch life quietly unfold.  I loved Frayne's description of her sitting in a strawberry field writing. If I could choose a book to live out, this might be the book that I would want to experience (except for the failing marriage, and problematic parenting aspects!) 

Nuff about me, back to the book. This writing spoke to my soul. Frayne's novel read like poetry and effortlessly took me to the northern reaches of this great country.  Frayne's writing is like butter: smooth and delicious. The closer I got to the end of the book, the slower I read; like savouring the last few drops of an excellent wine.

As a general rule, I don't "dog-ear" the pages of a book, but I just had to mark these two passages:

"I went West in my car in 1990 like a person burned down, but I came back with seeds in my pocket for the rest of my life. To go into these last places, to go alone or to go with the companion I have found, long after I was content to have no companion, is all I'll ever need." p. 233

On discussing the Inuit culture seeing the world as entirely connected, both animate and inanimate objects sharing a concrete relationships, she revels in the culture that orients more to non-difference than to difference: "A bear and a skunk cabbage are much more the same than they are different. What would it be like, I wonder, if our first thought, regarding anything was to perceive the kinship, the non-distinction, rather than shorting out to the difference between things?" 

I was entranced by the imagery, and beautiful descriptions. A pleasure to read and I recommend it highly.