Old Places

Places you feel good in. I’m a guy who doesn’t own anything. There is nothing I can call my own. The sky can be out or not. Up there the creek is always clear. Long ago I said to my father, ‘this is my creek’. He knew I didn’t mean it belonged to me, but I felt peace there. There were places he felt the same.

Lisa and I, along with Willow, spent the night up at the top of the creek, we went high where the water runs out at this time of year. We starred skyward and felt the spirits fly through our chests. Lisa counted the piles of bear shit, noted if they were fresh, she carried bear spray and a knife with a quick release. She pointed out cedar boughs in the darkness and asked if I could cut her a few.

A mountain Martin stood stiff, eyes glowing, curious at our intrusion. A large bull elk climbed a rock slide to stay clear of us. There is still enough of my self to quicken my heart and want to go after him. When young it is simple to kill. A pellet to a birds breast. Killing is easy, now older, I even have trouble pulling the trigger on plants in fall. My edge now is not killing.

This place can punch your heart and make you cry.

Mid September

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is dsc_3441-pano.jpg — Early morning Saturday.Lake Windermere. Bright Venus, Zodiacal Light, Cancer, The Beehive, Gemini, Sirius and Orion (Wintermaker).

With luck this should be the last of the busy weekends. It will be good to get back to a regular schedule with days off. Both Lisa and I are just about of steam.

We have let a lot slide: trips into the bush, the garden, yard and the house have suffered. Also the time we have spent with Scarlett and Cooper has been limited. All is unacceptable, going forward we will have to figure out a balance.

This summer and the amount of tourists took us by surprise. Lisa and I are in the front lines and have always taken pride in being able to step up when called upon. It could be we will need to dial back facing the same next year.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is img_9695.jpg — The garden still producing.

***

The ambulance, medical helecopters and first responders have been busy this weekend with several accidents and a possible drowning in Lake Windermere. So far the young man has not been found.

I remember talking to an old-timer. He said he and his friend were diving off a raft at the mouth of the lake. He said his friend went in and never surfaced. They found him days later down the Columbia. Things can happen quick, seemingly without reason.

The water is low this time of year. The young man should be found close to where he fell off the boat.

***

We had Cooper and Scarlett over for dinner and a sleep over last night. They are such good kids. I left for work at 4:30 while they were still asleep. I went out the side door to not risk waking them. They consider our place their second home. It makes us all feel good.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is img_9692.jpg — 1lb 10oz.

***

Clear skies, still warm, the Horsethief fire flared up again. The Provincial Government has kept it going, instead of extinguishing it, so it won’t burn again. That could be the new way to fight fire. Get rid of the fuel (trees).

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is img_9697.jpg — More impressive than its size, when turned upside down it ressembles a voluptuous woman bent over exposing her ample behind!

Labour Day

Coming fast. Quite an assortment of heritage varieties. I will have to look at my notes to see what I started. There are some big ones out there!

Everyone hopes things settle down after Labour Day.

Not sure what to do with them all so put them up as an art installation. Waiting for SFMOMA to call and have it reproduced.

The garden is dry and neglected. Beans that should have been picked, broccoli in flower, zucchini the size of prosthetic rhino legs, cabbage splitting, tomatoes fallen over and growing on the ground, beets the size of turnips and onions saying, ‘get us out of this parched earth’.

The one and only Calendula that survived the grasshoppers.

It got away from us this year.

Electric lettuce. Just like ordinary lettuce, you can’t even give it away.

Why Did the Yahoo Cross the Road?

I mentioned in my last post the tourists seem to be doing crazier things. On the weekend Lisa and I saw something that made me write that.

Last Sunday we went to go for a walk in the bush. Once we started walking we heard gunshots very close to where we were. The shots were close together and continual, with no breaks too unload and they just kept going.

They were coming from above us at an old mine. People have practiced shooting there in the past until the mining company put a berm to keep people out.

We decided to turn back in case they decided to start firing below them where we were. We went back to the truck.

I wanted to continue up the road to the old mine just to see what these yahoos were doing. I make Lisa nervous at times because she knows what I can be like.

A short drive and we came upon about seven men. They were on one side of the road with their trucks, leaning on tailgates and over box walls. There was a skeet throwing machine on the other side of the road launching skeets above the berm, where they each took turns firing, explaining the reason there was no time between shots to reload.

The road they were shooting across was a bush road, but a busy one, especially on weekends as there is several popular hiking trails further along the road.

When I was a youngster my father and I used to hunt. While driving to our hunting areas we would often come across wild chicken (grouse) along the side of the backroads. When I say backroads I mean not nearly as busy as the one Lisa and I were on last weekend. Occasionally back then Dad would stop the vehicle and let me get out to shoot a chicken for mulligan stew. The rule was, you never shot across the road under any circumstance. Because it was the law. Even though we were probably the only vehicle on that road in the past week, we didn’t do it. Plenty of chicken got away because I had to cross the road to raise my rifle.

When these tourist yahoos saw us they stopped shooting, a fat bastard, looking annoyed, walked out and tried waving us through.

To go through would have meant driving by seven dip shits holding loaded shotguns at window level. Now, they may have been the safest guys in the world with tons of firearm experience, however I doubt it. They didn’t seem to know you don’t shoot across a road. Regardless, I am not driving, walking or flying in front of someone with a loaded gun no matter who they are.

Plenty of people would have had to drive by them, however.

We turned around. I wanted to have a word with them, Lisa talked me out of it. I could tell she was scared how that might go. She was right of course. Arguing with tourists while they have guns in their hands, especially right wing Albertans who figure it’s their God given right to do anything they want, is never good policy.

When I relayed our experience to a friend, they said we should have reported them. The reason I didn’t was it would have done no good. Law enforcement, I believe, turns a blind eye to tourists breaking the law, unless it is something extreme. A bunch of tourists shooting skeets would have not even registered, the RCMP members might have even joined in shooting with them.

A few years ago the Province of BC implemented a law that if you are going 40 KMS over the speed limit your vehicle would be impounded.

The RCMP patrolled the highway through Kootenay National Park and caught one after another. They had several tow trucks there to take the vehicles to impound. It was like shooting fish in a barrel.

Cripes, what an uproar, our local politicians went on CBC radio to say this was no way to treat the Calgarians coming to the valley to spend their hard earned money.

The patrols stopped, I never hear of anyone, from then on ever after, having their vehicle impounded.

During the summer, each day, coming home from work, I am passed continually by folks in red and white plates, plenty going 40 over the posted speed limit.

I also see plenty of RCMP on the road. Sometimes they have someone pulled over and it is always a vehicle with BC plates.

I believe they don’t bother with the tourists to keep the local politicians at bay. As everyone says, we need their money.

A bunch of yahoos with guns shooting at clay pigeons is the last of their worries. For Lisa and I, we have to find different places to go.

The joys of living in a tourist trap.

Hope

The smoke has returned. We have had several wind storms that have caused the local fires to flare up. The Horsethief Fire has caused Panorama Resort and surrounding homes to be put back on evacuation alert. Still we are better off than many parts of BC and the Yukon where cities have, started, or been evacuated.

***

Last week during the Perseid Meteor Shower the skies were free of smoke. Shortly after smoke rolled back in. Lisa is finding it hard to breath.

***

The valley bottom, including the town of Invermere, historically was grasslands. Due to fire suppression and development it is now mostly trees, shrubs and buildings. Drought has become commonplace. The trees and underbrush is dryer by the year. It will burn again as it previously has done even without the added effects of climate change. We won’t be able to prevent it.

+++

Meanwhile the tourists continue to travel here and can be found at every back country lake, on every gravel road and on every smoke filled patio. Recreating, hard, like everything is fine. I don’t understand. Maybe they are trying, like Jim Morrison said, ‘To get their kicks in before the whole shithouse goes up in flames’. It doesn’t encourage me to hold out hope for where we are heading.

take the duck

I’ve made a terrible mistake. In the spring when the grasshoppers were eating the garden I started planting things that they didn’t seem interested in. They ate every carrot so I didn’t replant them figuring it was pointless. The grasshoppers left the small zucchini plants alone. So I planted more of them. Now I am overrun with yellow, green and patty pan zucchinis.

It has become impossible to manage. I can’t give them away. A small one today is a wooper tomorrow. I’ve made a terrible mistake!

***

The skies cleared last night. It’s the first time in weeks the mountains have made an appearance. It lifted everyones mood.

***

It is busy at the resort. Everyone is frazzled. Moral is good. It is an amazing bunch of workers. Most are young adults from throughout the country. They are expected to work hard and without exception they all put in a full shift.

I have worked in places, including the government, that that wasn’t the case, and the people there were getting paid twice what these kids make.

***

A coworker showed me a photo they took of four woodpeckers in the same tree. Two woodpeckers in the same tree means a cold winter.

Wasps, this year, have been building nests under ground, that means a cold winter.

My good friend Scotty from the Secwe̓pemc First Nation used to say, it will be a cold winter because the white man has a big woodpile. Damn, we used to laugh.

Shit! My woodpile is over flowing.

It could be a cold winter.

Scotty, if you are listening, kick me in the nuts and take the duck!

Travel

If someone asked me what has changed with the weather, I’d say, it’s windy now especially when it is hot in July and August. You can almost feel the moisture being sucked out of the ground. I can’t remember it that way when I was young.

I may be wrong. I am often called an imbecile by plenty of folks because I’ve never travelled. I can’t argue with them. However, I know what I see, the garden backs me up as well as the lake and mountains. I feel sorry for them, they are changing, some would say dying or even burning. I feel sorry because of the abuse. Still, they will be here much longer than we will.

We had word a fire was threatening the power supply to the valley. I thought about the food I have in the freezer. I thawed a leg of lamb and made vindaloo for the clan. Not a summer meal, but cooler than roasting it in the oven.

Several fires have started near by in the past couple days. The Horsetheif Fire came over the ridge this afternoon. It looks to be moving quickly. Edgewater, a community 25km north of us, is reporting burnt ash and needles falling on decks and vehicles.

The wind driving the fire is blowing south/east while a thunderstorm came in heading north/west. A double whammy.

Meanwhile, I am on my perch, where I’ve always been, the imbecile that I am, listening to tourists from Alberta race up and down Main Street in loud cars, RV’s and motorcycles.

This weekend I encountered a group of old bastards about my age, there must of been thirty of them, riding Indian Motorcycles all dressed in chaps and leather vests with the Indian insignia. I couldn’t help but think looking at these dip shits that we are all doomed.

It won’t be coking coal making steel that is our demise. It will be rich fuckers getting on planes, entitled to do as they please, without consequence, that will catch up to us.

Not that anybody’s listening, if you want to make a difference, stay home. Don’t bring millions of dollars worth of toys into a place you know nothing about just because you can. Stay home and make a life there.

Early Morning

We call it smoke but it’s smog and we better get used to it.

Up early. Tough week. I let my temper get the better of me a couple times. Luckily I am only caustic with my tongue, not like before.

It would be easy to say they got what they deserved. Tourists, rich, entitled, put in their place. But it makes me sad. So it can’t be good. I used to love putting a bully in his place. Punching up has hurt my family immeasurably. I am a fool not to go along. Look how good the people who punch down do.

The garden is up. Plenty of smoke on the horizon and on the water, early morning. The spuds could be ready, who knows for sure, the grasshoppers have eaten the blossoms.

July Garden

Even Willow was powerless against the grasshoppers.

The garden is doing it’s best after being ravaged by grasshoppers. The grasshoppers are still around in abundance but not eating as much as when they were small. When we have vegetables from the garden for dinner I remark my thankfulness that the grasshoppers were kind enough to leave it for us. They were ravenous bastards.

No carrots this year. Almost everything had to be replanted. Strangely they didn’t like peas, which are about 6 feet tall and covered in pods. The tomatoes, they mostly left alone. Same as the zucchini. Everything else was at their mercy.

The cannabis is coming and I’m about to trick it into thinking it’s dying so it will flower. The grasshoppers ate it as well, but it fought back on its own. The grasshoppers who indulged were last seen, wearing dark glasses, listening to jazz, riding vans, driven by a ladybug, down to SF, Haight Ashbury, to find themselves. I’m happy I could, at least, convert a few. The stoned grasshoppers remaining are degenerates, happy to listen to Led Zeppelin overflowing from the gardeners earbuds. They are hard to motivate, but great to have a conversation with once you get them going, unfortunately they still like to snack.

We will miss the carrots. I planted zucchini in many of spots in the garden that the grasshoppers destroyed. We are going to have ‘chini coming out our ears. I won’t be able to give them away. My friends will see me coming and scatter.

Canada Day

Lisa and I were up early and heading for the bush to miss the tourists and second home owners, who are out in force.

Once we made the corner after the first bridge on the Kootenay we were free and never saw a soul, except the most important, a black bear, a murder of crows circling something dead, plenty of deer, bucks in velvet, a shiny muskrat and birds singing songs, so beautiful, that I will never understand no matter how hard I try.

We picked up a load of wood. Tomorrow I will split it. It is birch so the sooner the better. It will keep us warm. Summer is when you should think of winter.

Picked a litter of lettuce in the garden. The grasshoppers have wings but aren’t eating like they were when they were small. As far as I can tell they don’t like peas or tomatoes. Everything else has taken a shit kicking.

We sure have a good country. I may bitch at the folks running it. The country and citizens are so strong even the politicians haven’t been able to screw it up. 🙂 Aboriginal people are seeing a future where injustices are acknowledged. There is no making things right. There is no returning justice. MY small spot on this land belonged to someone who didn’t agree to sell it to me.

Our future is dependant on immigration, that’s a good thing. The ideas and hard work coming from abroad will make us strong.

Whenever I meet someone wanting to make Canada their home I think of my Grandfather coming from England in 1912 looking for a better life.

I live in this time in history when immigrants made my life easy in my youth and will help me in my old age. How lucky is that?

Most of the creeks are still high. I followed a spring, out of nowhere, a hundred yards through a grove of birch, then disappeared underground to cripes knows where.

The country is alive and beautiful. I can’t contribute like I used to. I don’t expect much. That’s how it is when you are happy.

Somehow we have to grab rocks, but instead of throwing them, we have to lie down on them and feel the warmth.

Palliser Pass

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Tag: writing