After patching some real holes and cracks in the roof of the barn a couple of Saturdays ago, I realized that I didn't want to come down off the roof. The ladder was there, I was clearly abrogating my parental responsibilities by leaving Carrie with both kids while she wanted to do stuff too (whatever it might have been), ther were certainly other things I needed to do around the place too. But somehow I feel glued to that roof. Its pretty high up. There is some danger of slipping off as the surface is quite dusty with rust, and there is only the one, thin, layer of tin and then nothing until you might plunge through to the second floor inside. The tin was warm in the sun and I could feel it through the soles of my threadbare
Chucks. So I sat down - carefully - and splayed my legs out over the cooking surface and felt at home. A train rumbled by. I watched some leaves come off a grand old Maple off to the side. I lay back and watched the sky. I've done that - watched the sky - so much more since we moved to the country. In a small way I am trying to conjure up the feelings I experienced as a boy growing up in Alberta. I very closely identified with
William Kurelek's books "A Prairie Boy's Summer" and "A Prairie Boy's Winter." I knew the paintings looked awkwardedly painted, but they felt so close to me and what I and my friends were actually doing that I felt it was us in the paintings actually; that somehow we'd been secretly observed and documented.
After a little while, my conscience got the better of me, and I rolled onto my stomach and inched backwards down to the edge and the awaiting ladder. One last look at the patched cracks and I slipped over and down onto the rungs.
