The View Across the Water

There really isn't a lovelier space in the Pugwash area than the Thinkers' Lodge overlooking Pugwash Harbour. It's available for workshops, receptions, and other events like, ahem, book launches.
I spent the day there for a writing workshop with the wonderful memoirist and essayist, Marjorie Simmins, author of 2014's "Coastal Lives" and the forthcoming "Year of the Horse" (among other publications).
As soon as I walked into this room, my eyes went to this window and the view beyond for that wedge of land at the mouth of the harbour where it meets the Northumberland Strait is Pugwash Point.
I could see our old summer house. It sits on a hill so it's always easy to spot, even in the grey, misty air.
It became emotional for me being there, looking over the water and seeing the house. The longer I was there, the harder I felt the tugs on my heart, the tugs of regret that we sold it, the tugs of longing as I thought of the rooms and the memories my family created there.
I felt this pull to remember, to regret, since the illustrations for the Field Notes book arrived in my email inbox this week and the sketch of our house on the hill is lovely, absolutely lovely. As well, the house plays a huge role, could be a character all its own, in the book I'll be writing as a result of today's workshop.
Between the memories of my father and the memories of that house, I was a hot mess by the time I arrived home at five o'clock.
"How was the workshop, honey?" my husband asked after I'd walked in the door.
I burst into tears.
"It was wonderful."