The beach close to the main cabin was pretty much left alone by others; they tended to go to the bigger one that was farther away from the cabins and boat house. Good thing, too - morning wake up was going to the beach and diving into the water - COLD! One morning, when I was underwater, a loon dove past me, going after a fish. Henry said there were 6 nesting pairs of loons on the island; I heard them every night and wish I could hear them again. Their calls fill me with an indefinable longing.

Henry told me that one time, when he was checking below the boathouse, a beaver swam under and past him - scared him right out of the water! He said it was really large. I would have vacated the premises, too. 

Since Henry and his father, Gordon Adamson, enjoyed boating so much, there was a variety of boats; not just Lambda, there was also a rowboat and several canoes. With the rock ledge just in front of the boathouse, a rite of passage for boaters seemed to be hitting it. Apparently, it also protected the boathouse from much of the ice that formed on the lake, by breaking it up. Since I didn't wear glasses at the time, I declined learning how to drive Lambda. Also, I have to admit, Lake of Bays is complex! It shows how much time the Adamson’s spent on the water that they always knew where they were and how to get back to the island.  Henry took me out at night one more time. That night, fog was spiraling up from the water's surface, looking like ghosts on the water. Beautiful, eerie and disorienting for me. So very glad that Henry knew where we were going.

By staying in the guest cabin, I was right on the water and could not only hear the louder calls of the loons, I could hear the quieter chatter between the families. To me, it sounded like a cocktail party from a distance. I had a hard time falling asleep; not only due to loving the sound of the loons, but someone was walking on the porch! AND several other someone’s were using the window screens as a trampoline! The next morning, we figured out the footsteps were a porcupine walking about and the flying squirrels were bouncing off the screens! 

The other sound I associate with the island is the pockta-pockta of the generator. The island was pretty much self-sufficient for energy usage - propane for the kitchen and the generator for the rest of the power needed. It would charge up a bank of glass batteries. Daily Henry (and his father before him) would go to the powerhouse and test the batteries with a baster-like item. Then the excess would be squirted out onto the large granite rock in front of the generator house. The granite was pretty well pocked from the battery acid.

I still have one of the battery cells. It is a bluish glass container, with a lid that has 2 holes in it. It's pretty big - probably about a gallon in size. I knew that it was totally night when the generator went silent and the night critter sounds took over. 

Henry was an amazing cook. One day, he lit the stove to make dinner; when he went to put it in, the oven was cold. He took a match, lit it and BOOM! He calmly brushed the ash that used to be his arm hair off, took another match and lit the oven. That was a huge lesson for me - once the gas burns off, you are safe to start the oven. I have used that lesson in many ways throughout my life since then.  That was pretty amazing, though!

Since Henry played the guitar, we had music at night. If he wasn't playing, we listened to records. Nothing loud and when the loons started up, that became our music and we would shut the man-made music down.

In a way, there really aren't any stories of the island; it was a place of being.

I felt such peace there, an inward quiet that was sorely lacking in my life (did I mention that I was in my late teens/early twenties when I went there?) I still go there in my heart when life is just too much. I can't even tell you if I went there once or twice, it filled my heart so. I miss it terribly and by extension, Henry, since the two were one – Langmaid’s was his heart's home, too.

I know his father fought hard to keep the island in the family. Canada at one time decided that it didn't want foreigners to own properties like that and tried to take it by eminent domain. The Adamsons were fierce in keeping it, since they considered themselves stewards of the island, not owners. They treasured the land and the animals that lived on it, watching to see what animals made it home and which ones simply visited.

Henry's sharing of his heart's home gave my heart a home too.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak of my memories.

- Johanna Henning