The trees, that ocean, those people — all of it shaped who I am today without my ever knowing. I can still feel the ocean breeze and smell the salt air when I think about my childhood. I can see the pretty pink roses growing wild along the roads that curved softly with the shoreline. I can look over the blues of the boundless water and watch the red and orange beams of the descending sun pierce through endless purple clouds. The crimson rays made the water sparkle for miles and miles.

To me, Cape Breton Island is a reflection of the Creator, an extension of love. My life found its first roots amidst all this beauty, and that life was so very good that it led me to identify them — beauty and goodness — with each other.

If culture has a cadence, the Island’s unifying heartbeat was surely music. When my mother rocked me to sleep, she often vocally mimicked fiddle tunes, a skill we call jigging. On one occasion, I started crying a little because Mom wasn’t home to put me down for the night. Dad came in after a few minutes and said, “I’ll rock you.” I wasn’t very confident he’d do a good job.

After some instruction and a good while with me wriggling in his arms, he couldn’t get the positioning just right, so he put me in a new position. Well, I came to love it so much that when Mom rocked me the next time in her regular fashion, I stopped her to say, “No! The new way.” I must have been three or four. Even now, I can close my eyes and feel the long stride of the rock and Mom’s vibrations while she jigged a fiddle tune with me in her arms.

As a young girl in Cape Breton, taking trips down to the ocean was always wonderful. The rugged shoreline of Creignish Beach was only a couple kilometres down the road. People didn’t go away on vacation as much in those days. We made our own fun. There were countless places to explore, and I was fascinated by the coarse sand, the varieties of shells and sparkling rocks, the trickling brooks and moss-covered stones, the little crabs and minnows, and the seaweed and jellyfish washed up on the shore. It was nature’s playground, a biology classroom in the wild.

Occasionally, I was so sick of my brothers teasing and poking at me that I’d turn wild and chase after them. How they’d run! One time I chased after David with a guitar over my head! I never did find out what I’d do if I caught them. But I’ll tell you, as much as I screamed for Mom to rescue me from their antics, I also savoured the attention.

I loved my brothers very much despite their constant provoking. We didn’t share many common interests, but that was okay. I remember Kevin once took me to the office at the end of the hall where we sat down to talk for a minute. I think I had my first crush at the time. He said he was always looking out for me, that I could tell him anything, and that he loved me. He just needed me to know that. We weren’t ones to say, “I love you,” so this was quite a big deal. I’ll never forget it.

I often wandered around our one-acre yard, singing songs and pretending I was a famous vocalist. We had a hidden passage behind our house that led to a neighbour’s unused property. The path crossed a section of rock, perhaps the foundation of something from long ago, over which we had to navigate ever so carefully before weaving through a section of overgrown bush.

To me, it was just the most magical experience. The path led to a clearing in the woods with magnificent chestnut trees and one oddly shaped cherry tree which grew sideways, not up but out. I called it my airplane tree because I could crawl to the end of one long, sturdy limb about ten feet long but only three or four feet off the ground. Bouncing at the end of this branch, I imagined that was how a real airplane might feel.

The chestnut trees provided a hefty supply of ammunition. My brothers and I, and sometimes our neighbours too, flung chestnuts at each other, although I seemed to be the only one who ever got whacked. My aim back then was just as it is now… terrible! I didn’t play an ounce of sports. But I never flinched.

My parents were always such good and hardworking folks. Dad was employed for thirty-four years at the local pulp and paper mill, Stora Forest Industries, and had a pretty gruesome back shift schedule where he worked from seven at night until seven in the morning. Mom would often whisper, “Shhh, your father is sleeping,” before chasing us outside to play. Dad worked alternating day shifts and night shifts through the decades. He never complained, was always appreciative, and constantly had other projects on the go to improve our property. Whether it was adding on to the house, rearranging the gardens at the front and back, or renovating some part of the place, there was always a better way to have things.

Mom stayed home to raise us. She put her heart and soul into being the best mother and was always the first one up and the last to bed. She nurtured us in so many ways, and our cupboards were always stocked with her fresh baking. The house was, without fail, clean, tidy, and pretty. There was no one more committed or on top of it; she never stopped. I remember asking her from time to time, “Mom, can you sit down with me?”