Clammin’

The walk back is full of mud.

It’s mid-July, Sunny out, a bit windy. I’m sinking in mud up to my ankles. The texture of it is beginning to gross me out after a couple of hours of walking barefoot on the beach. I know I’ll miss it as soon as I get to the shore – the rocks and shells will immediately press into my skin and make the rest of the walk back painful and slow, but I won’t put my shoes back on for fear of staining them. Every year we come here we admit we should invest in some water shoes. Every year we don’t.

We’re at the Five islands provincial park in Nova Scotia. Not always an annual trip, though the trip to Nova Scotia is – with a few (often pandemic-related) exceptions. We come to the east coast to visit my grandparents who moved back here when I was two years old after 30 years in Toronto. Growing up I didn’t fully understand why they went back but standing on the beach with spotty cell-service and borderline sunburn I think I see some of the appeal.

My family is spread out across the beach. My parents and boyfriend are several yards behind me. My brother has already ventured up onto the rocky shore. I’ve run ahead because I saw what looked like a large enough rock to sit on, which also had a convenient puddle of water at the base that I planned to rinse my feet off with. There’s a water tap back near the parking lot to clean yourself off, but the grassy walk between the beach and the parking lot is a sensory nightmare with muddy feet. It feels like walking around having just stepped in dog poop.

As I’m bent over said rock, trying to clean myself off, one of the locals passes by. I’d seen him from a distance earlier, collecting clams while the tide was at its lowest. Up closer, I see that he’s pulling what almost looks like a home-made wheelbarrow, on top of which he’s collected a large bag of clams. A successful day’s work. Unlike me, he’s not barefoot. He came prepared with a full set of rubber boots. He’s laughing at me, and he’s got a nearly-toothless smile. I don’t hear the first thing he says to me over the wind, but when I look at him he says: “You’re just going to get muddy again the second you start walking.”

Clammin’ in the Robert McLaughlin Gallery

I’m a bit embarrassed. I know that, of course. I’m not close enough to the shore to avoid getting muddy again entirely. I’d just hoped to improve my situation a bit. The mud has splashed all the way up my legs in places. I tell him he’s right, it’s useless. I look down at my mud-puddle of shame.

He says something else I don’t quite hear. As he walks off, I pull out my phone and snap a picture. It becomes the first painting I complete when I get back home from vacation. I got lucky with this one – the quality on my phone wasn’t that great. The camera was smudged with my fingerprints, and I took the picture quickly, without thinking about it. Later that month, when my mom sees what I’m painting she tells me we both had the same idea. She’d had a similar interaction with the Clammer, but she’d had her actual camera out and ready. Her much-clearer photos helped me to fill in a lot of the details.

The Clammer (Foreground) and me (Background) as taken by my mother.

Months later I look back on this painting and I know something’s missing. So while I call it “finished” for now, there’s definitely more to come.