I am back in Canada. Briefly. It took a week to reunite with the Eastern North American time zone, unpack the remains of two and half months, launder those remains, open mail, toss most of said mail into the recycling bin, pay bills, restock fridge and catch up with family and friends. Leaving in the winter and returning to spring felt good, even if I did miss much of the ski season.

I should then have put up my feet and savoured the fact that I no longer have to head into the office each morning. Instead, during the following two weeks it became abundantly clear that I don’t know how to slow down.

Without an crazily busy job to go to each morning, it still seems important to have a plan when I wake up. Ridiculous, I know. I am hoping this will change but right now I have a need to feel purposeful, to accomplish things. Traveling masked the ants in my pants. New places and faces, new cultures and food and drink when combined with cycling and walking used up that extra energy. Now back at home, for the last two weeks I’ve filled every second with…well….stuff. Stuff, which for reasons that remain obscure, seemed critically important to do immediately.

I painted three bedrooms and a bathroom, dug and planted the garden, re-potted indoor plants, washed and polished my kayaks, cleaned winter out of my car and extended a garden bed (not from a desire to do more weeding but because I needed the sod to build up and re-slope the ground under the downspouts to better move water away from my house). I’ve cycled and spun and clog danced.

Fortunately, a burning need to plan more trips put a stop to this madness. I’ve spent the last two evenings pouring over maps of rocks and lakes and trees.

I am scoping out kayak/canoe routes for July and August in Ontario’s wonderful Canadian Shield back-country parks.

And I am planning more cycling and hiking. In mid-June I’ll drive to the Finger Lakes region of upstate New York for 5 days of hiking and biking. And so as my wanderlust continues so will the blogs. But before I go I really should make and preserve a batch of rhubarb chutney and have some of my faithful blog readers over for dinner……I wonder if there is also time to paint the front entrance and the den? And what about the fall? Where shall I go then? Groan…help.

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