Saguenay, Quebec is about a twelve hour drive from our home in Buffalo. It’s one of those drives that get more beautiful as you go; you hit the Adirondacks about 5 hours in and think, “wow, we’re really up there,” and then you pass into Canada and think, “wow, well now we’re really up there,” and then you hit Montréal and Québec City and think the same each time and so on. But it’s those last couple of hours, through those mountains south of Ferland et Boileau that you begin to realize that you’re more north than most of the people you know will ever go. I think that’s always been a dream of mine since I was a child, to go as far north as I could ever go, some sort of subconscious imprint. There’s this mystical air about the place everywhere, like some deeply hidden secret, one that’s too cold most of the year for anyone to really be able to bear, but it’s in the summer months that you can really experience everything there is to experience. The firs and the pines smell gorgeous, even from in our car traveling 80+ km/h. Saguenay fjord is the lowest fjord in the world, latitudinally speaking, and it’s ridges are powerful. A giant laceration through mountains carved out by ancient glaciers, incredibly deep and pure and eerie. I stand barefoot in the fjord and the icy waters baptize me in québécois salvation and I feel as though I hardly exist. Now, Tadoussac, this lonely and foggy port town used by indigenous people to hunt seals for centuries, possibly millenia, is home to a variety of species of whales. Supposedly, you can often spot belugas from the salty Pointe-de-l’Islet on the coast, but the fog is impenetrable. Our Zodiac boat penetrates the fog and out into the Saint Lawrence, and five minutes into the fog belugas are jumping everywhere. Hundreds of seals crowd the boat and I’m astonished. We’re all astonished by the majesty of these creatures, but it’s the fin Whales we see later that bring me to tears. An animal bigger than the vehicle we’re seeing it from, putting the whole world into perspective. Here I am thinking that the world is comprised merely of my problems, my desires, my thoughts, my feelings, but that self-absorption is swallowed as that massive behemoth of the river swallows krill. And in this moment of sheer awe and reverence I realize that it’s love that does this too. It’s as if the desires of a person you love totally outshine and deluminate your own. Now, I realize that what I’m talking about here is nothing new or groundbreaking and I start to get in my head, even as I write these sentences, that for so long I’ve put up this barrier of showing the world how smart I am, how creative and original I think my thoughts are, but the truth of it is that anything I’ve ever thought has been thought a million times. Any thought that any of us will ever think has been thought a million times. Maybe it doesn’t matter, maybe none of these thoughts or words mean anything anyway because it’s completely impossible to ever be able to properly articulate any sort of abstract thought or feeling because the receiver of that information will never really know the original thought and only grasp at whatever representation you depict of the real thing. I’m off topic here but I think it’s worth noting. When the bivouac breaks and our lives cut short, comment-dit-on that “I’ll never want more” We dream in tongues but our eyelids sore, comment-dit-on “i’ll forever be sure” They fight and lose in their ironic wars, but I’ve no interest, no want of that sort When the ozone cracks, fragments crater the floor, know it’s only you the sun buoys for Oh “Gaudeamus Igitur,” so let us rejoice in brevity’s cord When the ozone cracks, fragments crater the floor, know it’s only you the sun buoys for The sun, or what’s visible of it through the saturated Tadoussac fog, starts setting and the cold subarctic air has me thinking about the changing of seasons. You sort of relive moments and feelings of past seasons when they change that you normally forget about otherwise. They keep moving faster and faster, and I lose my breath thinking about how many summers or how many falls I have left. There’s just never enough time. I appreciate you and everything I do and have is for you, but I can’t get over the thought that my time with you is limited, even in death. The clock is ticking. This song is more than halfway over and I bet that most of the people listening can’t remember at this point how it even started. We’re foggy, walking through a hazy subarctic life in a state of deluded amnesia. I’m grateful for every moment I have with you, and I hope that I have a million more, but I know it will end somewhere. Everything does. But it’s okay for now I suppose. I’m okay for now I suppose.