Love
By Marie Wilson
13 February 2008
In the movie White Christmas Dean Jagger is about to lose his beautiful country inn because there's no snow to attract guests. I'm at an inn as beautiful and bucolic as that celluloid inn right now only there's plenty of snow and Dean Jagger is a cat. I'm sitting on a plush sofa in the lodge expecting Bing Crosby and his pipe to show up to do some crooning by the big stone fireplace. He doesn't. But a Dinah Washington CD fills in quite nicely lulling Dean Jagger to sleep on the back of one of the many sofas.
It's Valentine's Day and my man and I are celebrating our anniversary at the Domain of Killien in the Highlands of Haliburton. I'm watching him now through a small window by the main fireplace as he trounces through the snow snapping pictures. To most eyes there is nothing much to shoot out there. White all white. But my beloved has a seventh sense when it comes to these things. He can hear music in silence and he'll find the hidden heart of you.
I met him at a dinner party three years ago. We spent the evening alternately flirting with and ignoring one another. We played a guessing game with the multitudes of chocolates and ended up walking home together in the snow, he bourbon soaked like the ham we'd had for dinner and me with my arm hooked through his for safe negotiating of icy sidewalks.
Deep connections were forged on that wintry night, melting candy hearts in our pockets, magic and mystery beneath the cold stars and gleaming icicles. And he has stayed with me through the seasons.
There are ten or so cabins scattered about the grounds here and they all have women's names such as Ophelia and Angelique. Our cabin is called Roseline and it (she?) has a fireplace, a Jacuzzi and a vast uncluttered view of the snow covered lake and hills beyond. Out there, there's cross country skiing, snowshoeing, skating. But our pleasure is mostly found indoors: lounging in the whirlpool, making love in front of the fire, reading, writing, shooting.
We slumber like babes in Roseline's arms and in the morning we rouse ourselves to crunch through the snow, arm in arm, to the lodge for a breakfast of fresh-baked croissants, homemade jams, dried fruit, fresh fruit followed by courses of eggs, ham, bacon, sausage, pancakes, waffles. The dining room also has a big stone fireplace where a fire constantly glows and crackles. We sit by a window and look out at the skating rink. I put jingle bells on my skates this year reviving a childhood tradition but it is no loss to me when I find that the rink is unlikely to get cleared. I'm a more fire than ice type.
At lunch I sit in the lounge by the fire and eat a chicken sandwich on fresh baguette. While inhaling the warm scent of burning wood I jot some notes commemorating our union: on our first date, three years ago today, we ate 48 Oysters. Yes! Four dozen oysters followed by lobsters, sardines, crab, and lots of wine. He picked a hyacinth bloom from the centrepiece on our table and placed it in my decollete. And I showed him how my fishnet stockings stayed up. Intoxicating.
I drink coffee and daydream out a window that admits a stream of bright winter sunlight. Through my reverie my intrepid shooter traverses the white landscape. Even though everything out there is endless glaring whiteness I know he will find a revelation of texture, a miracle of shape. He sees and captures a world that lies beyond our senses but which is revealed through them. Last summer he shot a shadow on a brick wall of an unseen woman watering plants: a quiet moment etched in gold sunlight and red brick, a bookend shot to these hushed winter takes through glittering icicles.
He comes in to shoot me and Dean Jagger (not his real name) who is a commanding puss with a stub for a tail. Legend has it that he lost it to frostbite before being given refuge by the innkeeper. But I learn from the receptionist that he was in fact born that way. He's a Manx and a rather surly host - I've got the scratch to show for it - but mostly he just sleeps.
At Roseline the day passes in relaxation and inspired work. The occasional bird twitters outside and a guy comes around to leave firewood by our door. My shutterbug paramour heads out again into the boundless and glaring panorama. And I write in my notebook: "I love him like I love orange blossom honey, tea, sunlight in water, oysters, Van Gogh's sunflowers, Paris, diamonds, Christmas in New York, babies, Lou Reed's music, hyacinths, hats, children, aquamarines, kittens, lavender, Picasso's shades of blue..."
At dinner we sit by our window in the dining room and gaze at the sparkly lights that adorn the gazebo. Inside the dining room it is all amber and gold, good service, and extraordinary food. Against one wall is an assortment of liquor bottles on an antique bureau glittering in golden light. I remark to our server that there should be seltzer bottles on that bureau. "And ashtrays and Zippo lighters," she adds.
After dinner I play a game of chess in the lounge with my lover while the handful of other guests chat, sip liqueurs and coffee, read, or nod off. Three tall, grey, regal sisters play Scrabble. Amiably they quibble about this word or that. The place is too wonderful to mind getting romped at any board game and so I simply smile at my man when I lay my king on his side in defeat.
Dean Jagger stretches out by the fire as we head off to Roseline in snowbound bliss.
written 2007
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