Judge not that ye be not judged

In the army they say never volunteer for anything. There’s a lot of wisdom in that. Good advice. Too bad I never seem to take it. One of the things about living in the north and not being from there is that you will always be an outsider. It is the same with small towns all over, I suspect. “You’re not from here” that’s what people think. Well there are rules to living in a small northern town. Some are obvious, some are more subtle. Obvious or subtle you have to learn them all if you are to survive. It has always been so. Three hundred years ago my predecessors at work (I manage the local Northwest Co. trading post) would have learned to build a fire, or how to portage white water. Skills that meant life or death. Today maybe the risks are less. Maybe no one dies if they don’t learn these skills, still…
Let’s start with the mundane skills you need to survive, what shall I call them? How about life skills? The first rule of life is that you can live longer without food than you can without water. Now when you live in the city you turn a tap and water comes out. If you walk away while the tap is open and come back an hour later there will still be water coming out. You might have a flood but you will have water. Not so in the north. We have water delivered by truck. We have a tank of some sort in our house and; in theory; it gets filled on some sort of schedule. Like anything else in the north it is more a theory than anything. One thing I learned early on was that you never, never want to tick off the water guy. In my first posting in the north the water guy was Mark, a big affable fellow who was never without a ball cap, tilted rakishly over his left eye. My roommates and I had one water tank and we got water once a week. Three adult guys could go through a whole tank of water in just two days. Monday was water day. By Wednesday the sink would start to fill with dishes. By Friday we would be drinking coffee out of anything clean, saucers, ashtrays, you name it. Paper plates and foam cups filled our wastebasket to overflowing. Laundry piled up and the pile never went away. Even when we had water there was never enough to wash everything. I took to bathing up in the lake, but it was November and the cold water gave me a headache when I was washing my hair.
“Other people get water more than once a week.” I exclaimed one night to my roommates. “Why not ask Mark if we can get an extra load?” Darrel looked at me briefly pulling his attention from the hockey game. “I’ll do it tomorrow. Back me up O.K.?” he asked. “Sure!” I agreed enthusiastically. Darrel explained that Mark was not in favor of twice a week delivery, he wasn’t paid by the load, just by the day. The next morning we sought him out and found the truck in a neighbor’s yard. Darrel strode up confidently, he had a cocky side. “Hey Mark” he said loudly. “What do you think about bringing us water twice a week? There are three of us now.” Mark turned and cocked his head. He was looking at us suspiciously, like we were asking him to take a strange package through customs. “What are you doing with all that water? Playing in it?” he asked. “No!” Darrel replied “We take a bath once in a while you should try it!” We melted snow for water for a month.
Later on Darrel moved to a new house and my other roommate was transferred. I was alone and one tank of water was fine if I was careful. One day I was walking through the yard. I waved at Mark as he pulled in. He leaned out of the cab. “Hey you know a lot of people get water twice a week, would you like me to come back on Fridays?” I was stunned. “Sure!” I replied trying not to sound too enthusiastic. And so it was that I had more water than I needed. It was like heaven. The pile of dirty clothes went away.
Another skill that I have acquired; over the years, is the skill of not being in the wrong place at the wrong time. This is critical. Like I said we are not from here. You make the perfect candidate for a judge. A judge of anything. From science fairs and costume contests to talent shows. I have judged them all at one time or another. Diplomacy on the level of Henry Kissinger is required. Pick the wrong person and you will know it. When attending such functions arrive late. How late? Well take fashionably late and add a bit. Under no circumstances be early. Also know when such events are happening so you do not wander into the free fire zone by accident. I have spent five hours listening to off key music, forgotten lyrics and scratchy fiddles. The best advice that I can give is to stay clear. There is no worse feeling than the staring eyes and scornful gazes of the parents of some youth that was spurned in some local competition.
I am a bit pedantic (look it up, I did). I like to pass on my “wisdom” to greenhorns who find themselves in the north for the first time. I play the role of the veteran. It helps if you dress the part. Don’t overdress for cold weather. I laugh at these southerners who pile off the Twin Otter with their $700 parkas. They look like they are wearing a tent. I am standing there in a jack shirt with a hoodie under it. Unbuttoned. They are wearing boots that come so far up their legs you wonder how they can bend their knees. I am wearing sneakers. Start a conversation. Keep them outdoors a few minutes they will start to get uncomfortable quickly. This breaks down the barriers to learning that many people bring with them from the south. Call it smugness or what you will but it can be dangerous up here.
A number of years ago I got a new management trainee, or associate as we call them now. He arrived in town mid week and after a brief orientation and tour of the town I left him to unpack and settle in. The next morning he seemed subdued. I asked him if he had slept well. “It wasn’t the sleep, I think people hate me!’ he said dolefully. This was a revelation. “It usually takes weeks for the town to hate someone.” I informed him. “What happened?” It seems that he had finished unpacking and decided to take a walk. “I was walking past the arena when this lady asked me to call bingo.” He said. “Uh Oh!” I said a sinking feeling sweeping over me. “I told her I knew nothing about bingo but she seemed desperate.” He related a story of how he started calling the first game; the room was packed with more than fifty women. “It was called the letter X.’ he said in tones as if he were relating the details of the death of a close friend. “We had a winner. Someone called BINGO! So I did what I thought I was supposed to do…” his voice trailed off. “You dropped the balls back in, right?” I asked my voice showing my sympathy. “Yep!” In my mind I could picture the scene. An exultant winner standing in her seat holding up the winning card while my new clerk reached up for the handle that would dump the balls back into the hopper. Then as if in slow motion every woman in the room shooting to their feet the sound of their cries dragged out by the slow motion, “Noooooooooooooo!” The balls hanging in air briefly like Wile E Coyote hanging in air before he plunged into a canyon. Fifty women storming the stage where he was seated eyes red with bloodlust. “Let me guess, it was a Go-Go Bingo?” I asked. “Yeah and I had no idea what a Go-Go Bingo is.” He replied. I bet you know now; I thought. A Go-Go Bingo for the uninitiated keeps going after the initial winners until there is a blackout. You need the balls to keep track.”I was lucky to get out of there alive!” he said a look of lingering terror in his eyes.
Now I like to impart these skills to my new trainees. There just wasn’t time. I hadn’t anticipated a life threatening scenario like this happening on the first day. Most people don’t tread those waters for weeks after getting to the north. So I don’t feel totally responsible for what happened. He did survive and he did learn a valuable life lesson. That which does not kill you makes you stronger after all.
Like I said there are skills to staying alive in the north. Minus forty makes steel as fragile as glass. At minus fifty skin can freeze in thirty seconds. Bears can climb trees and can outrun you any day of the week. Always take extra clothes when driving on the winter road there may not be another vehicle for five days. Oh yeah, never rile a room full of Chipeweyan women when they are in full Bingo mode. I gotta get them to put that in the brochure.