I forgot to bring my camera on today's hike. When I pre-hiked it last Tuesday, I named the hike, "Canton Art Walk". There are many beautiful stone homes on this hike route just west of Canton and many of the homes have cool outdoor art installations.
17 hikers joined me this morning in the cool sunshine. And, as luck would have it, one of the hikers (Bruce) brought along a book about the history of the homes we would be walking by. Don't you love it when a plan you never had falls into place?
We walked by the entrance of Batterwood Estate on Massey Road, the home of former Governor General Vincent Massey. Bruce told us about the Masseys, founders of the Massey Manufacturing Co. which became Massey Harris which became Massey Ferguson. And, how Raymond Massey, Vincent's brother, was the famous Dr. Kildare on TV in the 1960's. Massey's were instrumental in the founding of the Royal Ontario Museum too.
Further along the way, we stopped in front of 3 English-style homes built in the early 1900's. At that time Anglican pastors did not receive a pension. The homes were built for them to retire in. The homes have steeply pitched roofs and lovely gardens around them.
Circling around to Kellogg Road, we stopped across from a winding driveway that seemed to disappear into a hedged and wooded property. As Bruce began to tell us about the family who lived there, a man in a white pickup truck drove slowly out of that driveway and stopped to chat with us. He wondered who we were? And this is where the story changes and our day got very interesting.
That man, who claimed to be "the gardener", invited us to wander the gardens of his estate on our own. Just 3 requests: 1. Only one person on the bridge at a time, 2. close each gate that you open and 3. No photographs. Hence, the title of this story.
We timidly set off, all 18 of us, walking along a very long 10? foot yew hedge, trimmed to look like it came to a peak. Somehow, we found an entrance to a series of formal gardens that would rival any English estate. Huge hydrangeas everywhere. Perfectly place seating here and there. It was like we were little kids in a wonderland of alleys and gardens. At one point, we were on a large plane of lawn where there was a pavillion with a table under it that probably sat 40 people. One of our hikers said, "I could picture a huge party with ladies dressed in finery and gentlemen in tuxedos having picnics with baskets filled with delicacies......."
To give you an indication of how large the gardens were, our walk through them added 1.1 km to our hike. It took us some searching to figure our way out and we ended back on Kellogg Road, just north of the estate.
And, we weren't done with serendipitous gifts. A passing hiker (the same woman we met on the pre-hike) had passed us earlier and mentioned that the bald eagles were circling around again today. You know what I am going to write next. Yes. we saw 3 of them, an adult and two juveniles.
Looking back, I marvel at the kindness of that "gardener". He'd never met us, yet he freely shared the beauty of his estate with us.
I'll end with a poem that intersected with my day this morning:
Kindness
Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to gaze at bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
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