Black River Diamond

For Christmas, my sister-in-law Renée gave me an astrocartography reading. She asserted that while I was stimulated by cities, my nervous system suffered: instead, the stars said that I would thrive in a damp, forested area close to a body of water.

I mulled it over. I am drawn to forests and water, it’s true. But despite this I realized I’d rarely spent much time in the wilderness unless in the company of others. So I started to scheme, and thought of my friends who lived up in the woods, Sasha and Sean.

(Sean and Sasha were city-dwellers until the pandemic, but unlike many COVID fleers, they had a very considered approach. They moved, but kept their place in the city for the first year, so they could hit undo if they needed to. They also regularly invited friends from the city to come stay with them — once every couple of weeks. This way their pals (myself included!) got a little Muskoka getaway, and they got a shot of Vitamin C (ity). I had unconsciously assumed that moving to the woods would mean cultural isolation, but their approach proved me wrong.)

As it turned out they were heading on a vacation out of the country and since I was already familiar with their place, I asked if I could housesit for a week — and presto, a forest hermitage was secured!

A change of scenery alleviated my February blues: it was restorative in a way I didn’t know I needed restoring. I tended the wood-stove fire and kept it alive for the week, gazed up at the Snow Moon, made sourdough bread, sipped port, shoveled snow, hung out with the cat, had a powerful therapy session, went for long walks and even wrote a short audio drama script.

It’s been a while since I have written any fiction, so it was nice to take a few thoughts from my time there and weave them into something. I specifically imagined the characters being voiced by two friends from my men’s group, who have fantastic voices, Rex Hagon and Mario Palasciano. They were gracious enough to accept the parts and we recorded it soon after I returned. I made a few field recordings of my footfalls through the snow which Adam Axbey made much better with his audio engineering — I haven’t gotten to work with him since Wonderland! My creative urges these days are often relational — it inspires me to get to work with people I like. 

I hope you enjoy this listening to this little thing, slight as it is. If you did, let me know what you think of these two characters: what’s their deal? Who are they? When are they?