I’m in Tofino.

I rented a small cabin on the beach for my birthday. Birthdays are for assessing the state of the corps, and the way to do that is to peel away responsibility until there is only that one thing.

It doesn’t count as a retreat if you can get there quickly or have been there many times before. That is too easy, and it is too easily confused with events that have not fostered reflection or other soul-searching events not to be confused with the current one. Thus, eleven hours of travel yesterday, by car and ferry, one international border crossing, and that barely road that traverses the island. I arrived at midnight, following directions that assumed daylight. But Tofino is small, and there is no getting lost.

I’ve been here less than a day and it is already night again. The tide returned just in time for moonlight to dapple it; and the waves, they lap and lap and lap outside the open window. I thought I would listen to music but this is too sweet.

I slept long into midday—sleeping off responsibilities. I never thought I would be one of those people that needed to flee livelihood to rejuvenate. I never thought it could be true simply because it never occurred to me that I could be that busy or that home could be anything but a sanctuary—or that my life would be so pedestrian. Yet, here I am, clearly having needed to leave town just to rest and regroup. These past three years have been hard—the path of premature aging and obesity for results-driven Americans; a deathtrap. And, that bit about needing to flee home, well, that’s sad. It says that home too is infected with responsibilities that engender restlessness and distraction.

I’m on Chesterman Beach, which is a ways out of Tofino proper but not too far. I rode my bike into town today for a coffee and groceries. (Not bringing coffee to make guarantees that I’ll ride into town at least once a day.) The skies were clear and the sun hot, but the northerly air sharpened everything with coolness. The last time I was here I was with Andrew during one of our Novembers. We stayed at the Inn in town and the town was deserted and for the most part closed. Most of the things we did we did at the Inn or in the Pacific Rim National Park because there was nothing else. But now the town teems with visitors. The beach in front of my cabin hosts surfers and in town surf shops abound. There is enough traffic to clog 4-way stops and a girl can’t get a moment alone in the small city park overlooking the bay. I watched float planes land and talked with the hippies minding the stores. One of them admired my AG bag and another said he’d never made an Americano with chocolate before.

In the early evening I made dinner and then walked out onto the beach and out onto the spit and Frank Island, and then when the tide rushed over the spit I waded through it to dry sand and walked back up the long sandy beach past the surfers and past families settling into Adirondack chairs before the beach fires that would be used to cook their dinners. Back at my little cabin, I set up the cello and played for an hour and a half, until the sun set and my fingertips were swollen from pressing the strings.

Now the firmament ticks past. I’ve no reason to leave this chair; the whole world passes before it.