Galiano Island Life

Before I left Berkeley to come up north for the summer, I found a book in a Little Free Library (love them) in my neighborhood. The Laurel’s Kitchen Bread Book: A Guide to Whole-Grain Breadmaking was published in 1984 and was, according to ChatGPT, the “bread bible” of that era. I was interested largely because my mother was an excellent cook and a baker and served us exclusively home baked whole wheat bread, so it brought back warm and delicious memories for me. Her bread… Read More »An Alternate Lifestyle, plus a wedding…

As the summer draws to a close, I have had a series of wonderful experiences to cap it off. It has been a busy season of house projects and visitors with more kayaking, less pickleball, and the usual amount of cooking, eating, hiking, and wildlife spotting. In the last few weeks, we have welcomed my two close friends, Cynthia and Angela, as well as one of John’s Welsh work friends, also named John, and his wife Sue who just left yesterday. Cynthia and I had… Read More »An Electrical Bioluminescent Whale of a Birthday!

We’ve been back from Copenhagen for six weeks, enjoying our beautifully renovated house on Galiano Island in the Salish Sea (for those who read my last post and have been wondering, I did receive my backpack from Helsinki with my passport intact). It’s been a somewhat busy time with a revolving series of house projects, guests, and local events and friends. We’ve played (poorly) in a golf tournament, done lots of hiking and biking, and finally started to use our kayaks on a regular basis.… Read More »The Tide Goes In, The Tide Goes Out

We’ve been back in our Galiano house since Aug. 3 with the inside mostly finished, though the outside is not. It is an amazing feeling after 9 months of demolition and rebuilding to be able to live in it again. It feels palatial even though the footprint is the same, largely due to the removal of a couple walls, relocation of a stairwell, and changing of one roofline along with new windows and a sanded floor that is now much lighter in color. New kitchen… Read More »Back in … finally

John and I are here on Galiano Island overseeing the work on our house which was torn apart and is now being put back together. It all started as the classic “cabin on an island” dream. Speaking of which, I saw this poem/ditty on a headstone as I was wondering in the Galiano cemetery a few days ago and thought it captured some of the romance of being on an island. However, the house we bought last year on Galiano Island wasn’t a cabin. And… Read More »From Reno to Rebuild

I feel bad leaving the US in its hour of need. With the upcoming election, I feel that I should be spending the summer doing political work but instead I’m playing hooky. If I ever thought of myself as a person who makes a difference in this world, I’ll have to revise my view of myself soon. Frankly, I’ve already done so. I’m leaving tomorrow to spend the summer back on Galiano Island in British Columbia. John left almost 2 weeks ago so I’ve spent… Read More »Bay Area Blitz

This summer, John and I have had the distinct pleasure of hosting Moose (aka Mr. Moose or Moosie), the approximately 8 year old, 90 lb chocolate lab that used to be John’s but has for the past several years lived with his son, Anders, in Vernon, BC. Anders and his mother have been away from Vernon this summer so Moose came to live with us here on Galiano Island, which is pretty much a dog paradise. It’s been awhile since I’ve lived with a dog… Read More »Marvelous Moose

One of the aspects of living on an island is that it requires more self-sufficiency than is generally required in the city. In addition, islands attract those who already tend toward independence, which includes those who look askance at rules and regulations. This fits right in with John’s view of things as he isn’t a big fan of following rules and was thrilled to hear that there are no police and thus no enforcement of traffic regulations, though the many bicyclists and walkers provide a… Read More »Island Independence

I have been stuck for the past several weeks, unable to write my blog – I am getting this in just under the wire before the end of the month. I had planned, after writing about the history of Japanese Canadians and the charcoal kilns (and after that great clickbait title), to write next about our more distant forbears on these islands, the indigenous people who were here well before the white population arrived. Steve, my neighbor, had me over to see his incredible collection… Read More »Colonial Amnesia