MOTHER NATURE, ON DECK

Another week of weather, work, and wow. A sweltering heat wave with mega-humidity lasted the five days of the latest project at Wineva  in Toronto. I had built the second-floor back deck 25 years ago and the winters and summers have taken their toll (oh, and a previous tenant had also set it on fire with a neglected candle---note brown section). So the partial demolition, rebuild, and sealing all took place in 90-plus heat and tropical-plus mugginess. Talk about sweating the small stuff!

But Mother Nature allowed enough time for the sealer to dry before unleashing a brutal storm of gale winds, snap-crackle-pop lightning, and more heavy rains, like an encore of the previous week. Ominous cloud formations, then rainbow, then pink all-clear. A hike along the boardwalk revealed cast-up driftwood, flooded parks, and downed heritage trees.

Like traveling to a parallel universe, we returned to Kemble and immediately the air became clean/fresh and the temperature sleepable. Mother Nature stacking the deck in favour of the country?? The veggies and cherries have never been healthier. The pond's water hyacinth blossomed for the first time ever. But to balance it all out, the ash trees are showing the inevitable and oft-predicted death throes from the invading emerald ash borer.