Cancon on the Beach

I wanted to make a little right-hand column playlist out of this idea, but it's not working out with any of my song selections. I guess Canadian=obscure as far as iLike is concerned.

The thing is, we went camping a couple of days ago, at Thomas Raddall provincial park on the south shore, near Liverpool. It was beautiful and great to be out in the woods. The air got intensely cold at night, though, and it was hard to stay warm enough. Add to that the fact that we were using only thin yoga mats as padding between us and the rocky ground, and you've got a night full of crazy dreams punctuated by long bouts of staring into the blackness.

But so anyway, that was fine, and the campfire and hike in the morning warmed us up. We also went to one of the three beaches the park boasts, thinking we might go swimming, but there were no waves and it wasn't hot enough for that idea to seem refreshing. After we left the park, we drove to Carter's Beach in Port Mouton — and I know I keep digressing a lot but I simply have to tell you that it's pronounced muh-TOON, even though there's no way any English OR French person could possibly derive that pronunciation from that particular string of letters — which beach we'd been told is possibly the most beautiful in all of North America. Which caused us to temporarily wonder whether Hawaii is in North America, since it's part of the USA, but then we realized that continents, unlike countries, are not political areas but geographical ones, effectively dividing the world into its major land masses. Except then what's up with Europe and Asia? How does that division work?

So we went to Carter's with our swimming trunks and towels, and it was, in all fairness, quite beautiful. We couldn't even see all of it because you had to wade across a medium-deep stream to get from one section to the other, but there was a lot of bright white sand sheltered by gorgeous grassy dunes and descending into a clear azure pool the likes of which are usually only found behind high-priced tropical hotels. However, there were again no waves. I don't know why waves make a swim in the ocean so much more appealing as a prospect, but they do.

Then we noticed that a) there was no one else swimming, and, perhaps more tellingly, b) all the little kids at the other end of the beach with their youthful determination and their high insulating-fat-to-body-mass ratios were running full speed into the water, getting in just above their knees, hesitating, and running back out at least as fast, flailing their arms in a sort of panicked, shocked, and also disappointed way. A toe into the edge of the old crystal blue confirmed that there was no way in hell we would be approaching even that level.

So, we sat in our foldable Canada Day chairs (red with Canadian flags on the back, bought at Canadian Tire) and looked out at the icy water and the dense, scruffy evergreens populating its rocky shores, and I started thinking about what a different experience the beach may be to Canadians than it is to Americans. Our childhood television heroes are not the tanned and lovably spoiled youth of Beverly Hills 90210, but the nature-wise, pensive old scavengers of The Beachcombers. We have no Beach Boys singing about fun in the sun with their California Girls. Instead, a soundtrack to the Canadian beach would be a list of sad, introspective, and somewhat lonely songs:

Neil Young - On the Beach
Now I'm livin' out here on the beach
But those seagulls are still out of reach

Jane Siberry - Mimi on the Beach
If they pull you away from your bleaching pink surfboard
And stretch you across the wind
You'll make no sound

Martha and the Muffins - Echo Beach
On Echo Beach waves make the only sound
On Echo Beach there's not a soul around

The Inbreds - Whitecaps
Well I went to sleep
On the ocean floor
And I began to weep
My tears washed up onto the shore

Pukka Orchestra - The Cherry Beach Express
My ribs are broken and my face is in a mess
And my name on my statement signed under duress

The Super Friendz - Ocean Death Song
Remember when we walked along the sand
The castles washed away

Bruce Cockburn - Planet of the Clowns
As the waves roar on the beach like a squadron of F16's
Ebb and flow like the better days they say this world has seen

Gordon Lightfoot - Triangle
The mermaids have all gone to Davy Jones' ball
And it seems their first trip was their last
They had so much fun they don't wish to return
To the beach where they lay all day long

Sloan - The N.S.
We're following signs to the sea
So take your time
If you're leaving before me
And say goodbye

Honeymoon Suite - Wave Babies
When they lie with their tops undone
Cold water means a little bit of fun

OK, maybe that last one is a little more American in nature. Can anyone think of any others I'm missing?