It all started with a kitchen.
While searching and gathering everything I could about Quebec and Ottawa, Vancouver and Toronto, learning about cities and schools and neighborhoods my husband sent me a link to a house for sale with a kitchen that stopped everything.
The house was nothing to look at, but this kitchen, THIS KITCHEN was everything.
The kitchen was in a house on an island.
“Honey, where are the Gulf Islands?”
“Off Vancouver.”
And then the rabbit hole opened up….
…I found a writer who wrote an article on the island…
…I searched for her on FB and messaged and she kindly returned….
…She wrote me of the beauty, the quirkiness, the diversity. She wrote of a school in the middle of a forest and would I like the administrator’s number who has 2 adopted boys from Ethiopia…
…and I kept falling and falling and falling.
The Gulf Islands.
But it was so far. And so isolated. My husband was worried I would be too alone. I was so scared to be so alone. But something was pulling me there. Something was telling me to go. Something so much stronger than worry or fear.
We made the plans, found a summer rental for 2 months, and traveled across the world.
My husband settled us into a cabin on a lake, said goodbye, and flew back to Africa.
As I watched him sail away on the ferry my heart stuck in my throat, and I was shaking all over.
I was on an island, with my 3 year old son and 8 year old daughter, where I did not know a single soul, with 2 months to find a home….
…and build a life.