The Shovelling Man Series

 In Cape Breton, there are two kinds of people: those who curse the snow and those who pick up a shovel and get on with it.

Frank belonged to the second group.

He had spent a lifetime clearing driveways, sidewalks, paths to woodpiles, and the narrow trails that connected one winter day to the next. He had shovelled before work, after work, and in storms that buried cars to their mirrors. He had shovelled in moonlight, in blizzards, and in the blue stillness that comes just before dawn.

Like generations of Cape Bretoners before him, Frank knew that winter was not something to conquer. Winter was something to live with.

There was a rhythm to it.

The scrape of steel against packed snow.

The lift.

The toss.

The whisper of crystals drifting on the wind.

The steam of breath rising into the cold.

The deep silence that follows when the work is done.

Most people saw a chore.

Frank saw a conversation.

The snow fell.

He answered.

One shovelful at a time.

When Julie died, the world lost its shape. Friends spoke of moving on. Books spoke of healing. Time was supposed to help. Yet none of those things offered the certainty of a shovel in his hands.

Snow was honest.

It arrived.

It accumulated.

It demanded attention.

And if you wished to get through it, you picked up your shovel and began.

So Frank shovelled.

He shovelled through winter.

He shovelled through memory.

He shovelled through grief.

And somewhere beneath the drifts of loss, he began to uncover a path forward.

He shook his head at his silent chaos and the unsettling feeling of death still alive in his mind, a feeling often echoed in the Cape Breton Stories of grief and healing. When he stepped outside, he raised his shovel like a sword against the icy air, a tool for his life after loss. Julie was probably watching him from above. "Keep the light on for me," he said to the pale grey sky, as he began his work in the Shovelling Man Series.

As he backed the truck out of the garage, he looked at the blue shutters with the cutout hearts─Julie’s choice, a small piece of their Cape Breton home. Everything was her choice. Frank followed the plough tracks down the road, reminiscing about the Cape Breton stories they had shared. When he reached for his sunglasses, he ignored her gloves on the passenger's seat, her sunglasses in the cup holder, and the statue of St Christopher she hung from the rearview mirror to keep them safe. How could she have passed and left so much behind? Every inch of their home was hers, and now he was navigating life after loss while grappling with his grief and healing. This was all part of the Shovelling Man Series of challenges he never anticipated.

On the nights when Frank couldn't sleep, he would shovel and then head to the backyard, where he would sit in the snowbank behind the garage and beneath the big spruce, hidden from the neighbors. In those moments, he often reflected on his life after loss, recalling how Julie had pointed at him and said, 'You can do this!' Frank wished to be nearby while she worked in the kitchen, just in case she needed him. He looked out their back window as she prepared their supper, with the trees casting deep black shadows, reminiscent of the winter nights in Cape Breton. Since Julie had returned from her three-month hospitalization, Frank had taken on the role of the Shovelling Man, cooking every night except for that one night when she had insisted on doing it herself. Their journey through grief and healing was a series of small moments, much like the Cape Breton stories he cherished.

He awoke, startled by the bizarre dream of a shovel in his eye, reminiscent of the themes in the Shovelling Man Series. "Shovel in my eye?! Shovel in my eye?!" he thought, bewildered. "See what?! Am I supposed to see something?" The ambiguity of the dream bothered him like a message only half heard, much like the stories of grief and healing that often emerge in Cape Breton. He had zero patience for anything that wasn’t as straightforward as death, especially when reflecting on life after loss.

Frank watched the sunrise over Cape Breton, reflecting on the beauty that surrounded him. He had not slept because his mind was ablaze with the possibilities of his life and the Cape Breton stories he yearned to tell. His ideas were beyond his ken, as though he had stepped through a gateway—a portal to the places of his imagination where adventures awaited. 

He and Julie had done everything together; they were a good couple. But now, as he grappled with grief and healing, Frank found himself alone, and time was ticking away on his clock. 

The Tibetan Book of the Dead's descriptions of the Bardo’s states between death and rebirth resonated deeply with him. He felt caught between the states—between life and death, following the passing of his wife of fifty years and contemplating his own rebirth into... that was the question he feared to pose. He did not know what life after loss looked like or what would mark the beginning of his new life. Perhaps in the stories he would share about the Shovelling Man Series, he could find the answers he sought.