tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7214830048466234672024-02-07T10:10:20.181-08:00Verbal MedicineThe verbal musings of a muddled mind.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.comBlogger92125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-74927134803239242392013-03-19T15:30:00.001-07:002013-03-19T15:30:23.987-07:00Far off places where you liveWhen I was a kid:
We had small houses and big families. We had one phone and one TV. It was Black and White. We got two channels, but my parents had four remotes, three when my oldest sister moved out. If your neighbour owned a ladder you didn’t need one and you probably owned something he didn’t. You knew your neighbours and their problems. You never knocked you just stuck your head in and yelled “You decent?” The doors had no locks. If the car broke down you called your neighbor whose number you knew better than your own and asked if the kids could stay there until you got home. They were already eating supper. We had little and shared lots. We shoveled the widow’s driveway before our own. The neighbour’s kids went on vacation with us. We made do. We stopped on the street to talk about what we had seen on TV last night.
Today:
We live in huge house on small lots five feet from the stranger next door. We have four or even five flat screens. There are one or maybe two kids, each with their own room, with a phone and a flat screen and a cell phone. Who knows what they watched on TV last night there are over two hundred channels. Lots of cars in front of the neighbour’s place when you got home last night, a wedding you supposed. But when you went out to jockey the three cars in the driveway before bed you saw a man carrying a spray of flowers, not for a wedding for a funeral. Guess you should have said hello. You drive around a while and find yourself in the old neighborhood. Some of the houses are the same. Some have been built onto. There are fewer bikes and swings in the yards. The widow is gone now. So are most of the families you grew up with. Then you see a familiar face. Raking leaves in what was his parent’s yard. He recognizes you and waves his hat to flag you down. You hug each other a little too hard. He looks at you with a knowing eye “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” You look him in the eye and he knows. “We gotta get together this weekend man. You know where I live I bought my Dad’s place.” “How is your Dad?” You ask a little scared of the answer. “He’s gone man, a year after your Dad died. I was at the funeral but I left early.” You lock eyes again. He’s trying not to tear up too. With wavering voices you both say “I’ll miss your Dad.” At the same breath, you both had to speak to swallow the lump that was growing in both of your throats. You both laugh in the same breath too. “I’ll see you Saturday night then?” He smiles “Right here at 7” Your turn to smile “I’ll bring the beer, same kind?” “Of course the same kind, nothing ever changes around here” Sure it doesn’t…
Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-63263441524943318642012-09-24T23:37:00.003-07:002012-09-24T23:37:52.221-07:00Sniderman the Record ManIf I were to tell you that Sam Sniderman died I would have only very limited expectations that you would know who I was talking about. But if you are of a certain age, a boomer or perhaps Gen X I would have a reasonable expectation of a knowing look if I told you that Sam the Record Man had passed away. Well he did. He was 92 so as they say “he had a good life”. But his death is more than the death of a man it is the death of an era. It falls on the heels of a change of gargantuan proportions in the way we look at music.
I bought my first record from Sam. Well not personally, but from one of his stores. From one of his staff who were as unique and interesting as he was. Sam; like most successful people loved what he did. He loved music. He especially loved Canadian music. He knew every album by every garage band every record that was recorded in a basement in Spadina or a garage in Winnipeg. As they say “Build it and they will come.” Sam did build it. His flagship store on Yonge Street in Toronto attracted like-minded people. Customers who loved that Sam could disappear into a stock room and come out with some obscure piece of vinyl that they couldn’t live without. The same was true of the people he attracted to work for him. Whether he attracted people like himself or whether he only hired the ones who loved music he always had staff who loved what they did and it showed. Sam hated a customer to leave one of his stores empty handed. I don’t think I ever did.
My wife and I found ourselves on Barrington Street in Halifax once. She was looking for an album that I knew was long out of print. “If you find it anyplace…” I said to her “you’ll find it at Sam’s” Sam the Record Man on Barrington was three floors of eclecticism; eclectic music; eclectic customers and eclectic staff; on the wall eclectic memorabilia. I loved the place I loved the bulging shelves; the crowded aisles, the funky stairwell and elevator that literally didn’t go all the way to the top. The warped floorboards that creaked as you passed alerting a staff member who looked lost in reveries to your presence. Not that they were inattentive ; on the contrary they were slightly doting but not like most commissioned staff who were on you like white on rice. But they loved a challenge. A tall thin man of indeterminate age approached us on the third floor he was wearing a jack shirt open to a Grateful Dead T-shirt, a sash around his waist and gold cords. “What are you looking for?” He asked with a quick smile. I told him and his head turned sideways. He obviously knew the answer. “That’s not in print in North America.” He said firmly. But I knew he wasn’t done yet so I waited. His smile broadened. “But it is still in print in Germany. Can I order it for you?” I explained that we were on vacation and only in town for a few weeks. “Let’s try anyways; shall we?” So we did. I called on our last day in town but it had not come in. The next year’s holidays found us on Barrington. I practically dragged Lina up the stairs. I went to the shelves and started my search when a voice boomed from behind me. “Blue Train, Am I right?” I turned. It was our friend from the previous year. “Yes; you have a great memory!” I responded. He deafly leafed through the plastic dividers and produced the CD with a flourish. I wasn’t surprised I had come to expect a higher level of service from Sam’s.
But times changed. As they always had. The music changed; the media that the music was on changed. Over the years I have even bought the same album from Sam’s on vinyl, eight track (god help me), cassette and later CD. Through it all Sam rode the trends and persevered. Gone are fragile vinyl disks handled lovingly by their edges. Gone are eight tracks; their chunky glove compartment eating carcasses gone to apple boxes at yard sales and flea markets. Gone are cassettes with miles of magnetic tape hanging out of them. Lastly the CD is not gone but it is going. Music today is on files and the internet; essentially on air. You don’t need to go to a store to buy air. You no longer need the guy in the funky T-shirt to tell you where to find it: you just Google it. Chances are you don’t pay for it either. Chances are you download it for free. So stores like Sam’s went away. I miss them. I don’t steal music. I didn’t steal it when it was on glossy vinyl albums with a million things to learn on the covers. I don’t steal it now that it is on air. I love music. Sam loved music. He also loved musicians. He opened his home and this wallet to struggling Canadian artists. Sam is gone and with him an era. Sam was famous for saying “I said it; I did it!” and he did. Canadian music owes him a lot. I still walk past Sam’s on Barrington with a sigh. It is gone of course but the building is still there. I think of all the music lovers who found that elusive gem in those walls; if the walls could only talk…
Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-36504532621020469532012-05-13T13:46:00.000-07:002012-06-03T23:17:47.482-07:00Feeder Fever (starve a cold)<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvASAlnqq4sR8bxa-6V_pZwSpytCHEvWyxcx9U3RWPTabNn_4TqDURe2cjDHotSoZ61xozagE9pUpNRo6uDqyrVL8lEpPVeLN1A-HG7I2c9lVZ7s59bVpuneYiQ0lQF1ZvOWMgsCcpIZAZ/s1600/squirrel+041.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left:1em; margin-right:1em"><img border="0" height="300" width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvASAlnqq4sR8bxa-6V_pZwSpytCHEvWyxcx9U3RWPTabNn_4TqDURe2cjDHotSoZ61xozagE9pUpNRo6uDqyrVL8lEpPVeLN1A-HG7I2c9lVZ7s59bVpuneYiQ0lQF1ZvOWMgsCcpIZAZ/s400/squirrel+041.JPG" /></a>
When we moved into our current home I was delighted to see that it was set among the trees. It has no yard to speak of just a lot of rock and trees. It does however have a marvelous big deck. The deck is our yard. We use it a lot. I like to BBQ out there all year around. Mind you we don’t often lounge out there and read when it is forty below. I have; in the past had bird feeders on my property. My last location was not favorable for them, there being no trees close by to shelter the little fellows. But this new place was perfect; so I bought a few and filled them up and waited; and waited and waited and waited… Nothing. I searched the internet and all the sites said the same thing. Wait and they will come. Build it and they will come I kept thinking. At first I checked them every chance I got. Then just in the morning and at night. Finally, months after setting up the first feeder I saw a lone bird on the perch and then gradually more and more. Soon the trees around my place began to come alive with twittering and chattering. I began to sit on the deck with my coffee in my hand rain or shine. I loved the sound of the birds they were like to heartbeat of the forest.
Now some of my birder friends are a bit snobbish. They love the feathered friends that visit their feeders but look down with disgust on their furry brethren. I draw no such distinction. “You can get hoods.” One particularly close minded bird fancier once told me. “Hoods?” I replied amazed. My mind raced I saw people going out to bird feeders in white robes with hoods on; a KKK of bird fanciers and kind of Avian Brotherhood. “For the feeders!” She said.” Goes on the wire they hang from keeps the Damn Squirrels out!” She sneered. “Damned rodents!” At the time I had almost a dozen feeding stations, a couple specifically designed for squirrels. I had a pair of chipmunks I had named Chip and Dale. I assumed they were a couple. Chip was bold as brass and Dale was shy. Chip would come up to me and take a sunflower seed from my hand and Dale would watch from the shelter of a log in the wall of my log house. I even had flying squirrels. I assume I had been feeding them for a long time and never knew it. The days are long in the arctic summer and the sun never sets. The flying squirrels are nocturnal and I don’t know when they feed in the arctic day when the sun never sets. But that summer I had installed motion lights on my deck and one evening the motion light came on and I watched amazed as a flying squirrel gracefully glided to one of my feeders and made a three or four point landing with amazing grace. They don’t actually fly; of course, they glide and do so beautifully. He took a cheek pouch full of seeds and glided to the ground and then scampered up a tree to repeat the process to my absolute delight.
The flying squirrel has fur that is like a cat; very soft and silky not as course as his muddy footed cousin in the vermin infantry. His eyes are bulgy; I suppose for seeing in the dark. Being nocturnal they need that advantage. I was delighted at the range of four footed fellows that frequented my feeders (pardon the alliteration). I soon noted different characteristics in different animals. The squirrels and chipmunks seemed to travel in pairs. Mated pairs I have always assumed. S o I was delighted when I saw numbers of squirrels visiting my feeders here; many, many of them. I have seen seven in my field of view at once so there are a large number of the friendly little fellows. They chatter to me when I approach on frosty spring morning with a bucket of nuts in hand. They wait patiently while I spread some out on the railing and they do not wait for me to leave. They dash about mu feet waiting for the feast. I see them crossing the street in front of our house from my neighbor’s yard. One day Lina said with some pity in her voice. “Aw that little squirrel has no tail.” I looked but as I am legally blind I could not see it at that distance. Several days later; on my day off I was settled into a yellow plastic adirondak chair sipping my morning coffee and watching my breath as I exhaled in the cool morning air. The coffee made my breath even more noticeable. I was savoring a Royal Edinburgh shortbread cookie when I heard a scampering at my feet. I looked down into two chestnut brown eyes ringed by white circles. A squirrel cocked his head at me. I broke off a piece of cookie and set it by the heel of my house slipper. Like a flash he snapped it up and held it in this paws and began to eat it with vigor. I could not help but notice that he had only the tiniest nub of a tail. When he had finished I went to the door and called Lina. “I think your friend is here.” I said. She got down on all fours to sneak a peek around the corner. When her head appeared he scampered towards her not away. He passed inches from her face and grabbed a peanut off the deck and began chewing.
“It is him!” Lina exclaimed. Over the next few days he became a regular feature on the deck and was there every time I looked. As I sat in my yellow chair yesterday I said aloud. “I must give you a name.” Lina was sitting beside me. “What do you call a squirrel with half a tail?’ I thought for a moment and a wicked smile crept across my face. “What are you thinking?’ Lina said warily. “I was thinking what else you could call a squirrel with half a tail. Bob!”Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-4674818287224649212011-12-06T13:06:00.001-08:002012-04-03T13:32:00.633-07:00A date which will live in infamy...Today December 7 2011 is the seventieth anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. As the event that brought the United States into World War II it is certainly one of the most pivotal events in world history. No American who lived through that day will ever forget it. For them it was an event so cataclysmic that it became one of those “where were you when…” events. It was one of those events so momentous that everyone remembers where they were when they heard the news; like later generations with the assassination of JFK or the events of 911. Several generations have passed since that day in 1941. Many young Americans have forgotten; if they ever knew, what happened that day. Yet there is still an understanding of how important the event was to the American Psyche. Americans have always been better mythmakers than Canadians. I don’t mean that in a derogatory fashion. They have always been good at taking events; crystallizing the spirit or essence of the event and preserving that. Americans still “get” Pearl Harbor Canadians don’t.
I was there last month; in Honolulu and there was no way I would visit Oahu without visiting Pearl Harbor. You will never get the historian out of me. You can never understand Pearl Harbor without understanding what was happening in America and the rest of the world in December of 1941. Like most world events war was at the heart of it. The world had emerged from the First World War, bloodied, exhausted, sick (Spanish influenza) and broke. The victorious Allies (including the Americans) had inflicted a punishing peace treaty on Germany and were forcing her to pay back vast sums of money spent by the Allies on the war. Germany had been forced to surrender by mass starvation and had no money to pay reparations. The whole world descended into the great depression. All nations began to look inward. They were poor and starving and had no time to think of their neighbors in Europe and no money to do anything about their plight even if they did care. America especially retreated into “Isolationism” it was felt that America had been sucked into the First War by her European Allies the French and the English and that the war had been a waste of American lives and money. American politicians began to run on platforms of “No Foreign Wars”.
While the economy was going south in America the Germans were starting to rebuild. Hitler rose to power and the world looked aside at his eccentricities because he was rebuilding the economy. When he began saber rattling the European democracies made deals backed up by vague threats that they were ill equipped to support. Had Hitler existed in a vacuum America might never have joined the war. But Hitler had made a pact with Japan and Japan had plans of its’ own in the Pacific that made conflict virtually inevitable. America remained neutral while Germany overran Poland and Belgium, Holland and France and bombed the great cities of Britain into rubble. The American President FDR knew that he should do something but he did not have the people of America behind him. He was a great friend of Winston Churchill (who was himself half American) and gave as much aid in money and materiel as he dared. In the Pacific the Japanese invaded Manchuria and were threatening the holdings of the European powers then at war with her German ally. The two great Pacific powers (the U.S. and Japan) were on a collision course. Japan had few natural resources and the Americans had gotten fed up the Japanese aggression and cut of exports to Japan. The Japanese formed plans to seize the resources that they needed. In secret they formed a plan to strike the Americans hard and fast. Admiral Yamamoto the great mastermind of the Japanese war effort had spent time in the U.S. he knew the awesome power of the industries there. He told the high command he could promise only six months of victory against the Americans.
What the Japanese wanted on December 7th was to catch the American aircraft carriers in harbor. They knew the surface ships were there but they wanted the carriers. While the attack was a huge humiliation and blow to American prestige it was a limited victory for the Japanese. They did not get the carriers and they did not damage the naval facilities and fuel storage on Oahu. The Americans lost four battleships (three of which they salvaged and refloated). Six months later at the battle of Midway the Americans caught Admiral Nagumo’s flotilla and sank four of the carriers that were at Pearl Harbor. True to Yamamoto’s word he gave them six months of victory. Today when you go to Pearl Harbor it is still bristling with naval might. The museum dedicated to the battle overlooks Battleship Row where those four ships were sunk. You watch a very moving video put together by the U.S. Park Service then board a launch to visit the site of the USS Arizona. She is the only Battleship left at the bottom of Pearl Harbor. Aboard her are eleven hundred of her crew; they died that fateful day and sleep in her belly. When you look down from the memorial you can see the rusted hull beneath the waves. Oil still bubble’s up out of her seventy years later like the blood of the great lady. Do you remember the old joke about the plane crashing on the border and where do you bury the survivors? Well if you were a survivor of the Arizona you might have a choice to make. For if you are a survivor who was aboard her on Dec. 7 1941 you can opt to be cremated and have your ashes interred with your shipmates in her hull. If you served on her before Pearl Harbor the Park Service will scatter your ashes over the site. This day December 7 2011 they will inter the ashes of three survivors with their old comrades. This is a solemn place; a place of remembrance and reflection; of loss and of forgiveness. For out of the ashes of the Second World War came a different plan. Not to punish our enemies like the Treaty of Versailles did in 1919; but instead the Marshall plan where the Allies (largely the U.S.) helped pick her former enemies up and gave them back their dignity and helped them build two world class economies out of the dust and death of war. These men who are today being reunited with their comrades are heroes too, for not only the dead are heroes. The fact that I observed Japanese tourists on the memorial says to me that they didn’t die in vain. May they all rest in peace.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-3230219299536734672011-11-23T11:20:00.000-08:002011-11-23T11:20:36.619-08:00The miracle of flightI just came back from holidays. When you live in the north holidays involves a series of plane flights, usually on progressively larger planes on the way out and progressively smaller ones on the way back. I have started holidays in a four seater where I have sat in the copilot’s seat and finished up on a jumbo jet; where, oddly enough they did not ask me to sit in the copilot’s seat. We had a pilot who used to joke “There are two washrooms on this flight; one here in Tulita and the other in Norman Wells. The flight is too short for an in-flight movie but not to worry your life will flash before your eyes!” Bush pilots; you gotta love them. <br />
At some point in time on any number of trips I have made over the years someone standing in the departure lounge staring out at a massive piece of metal and glass and rubber that is their aircraft and will remark; “I still don’t understand how they get them to fly.” It does seem quite unlikely that this massive object can slip the bonds of earth and soar into the sky. I have had the opportunity to witness many flyers who are totally unconvinced that it will happen as they sit in their seats feet plastered to the floor hands lifting the arm rests like they were holding the plane in the air. I feel like leaning over once we have landed and saying; “Thanks for the smooth flight!” But that might be a bit cruel. I do not recall ever being afraid to fly. In fact it is a bit of a rush. I love the feeling of G-Force when you are pushed back into your seats as the plane hurtles down the runway. Where else could you hit such speeds on the ground without blue lights flashing in your rear view mirror? I love this part of flying. The lack of leg room; the sucky food and surly attitudes of fascist flight crew who have studied every rule of flying and want to make you aware of every one of them on every flight is another matter. But the sense of speed and the sheer power of takeoff are great. <br />
No; this is not the miracle of flight of which I speak. I have long ago accepted that the miracle of flight itself is a simple matter of physics; thrust and lift, weight ratios etc. Even those who claimed that it was impossible for a bumble bee to fly if you worked it out on paper are wrong. I once watched a television show where a physicist explained bumble bee flight and they are quite capable. No to me the miracle of flight is something else entirely. <br />
What I find miraculous is when the gate agents announce “This is a pre-boarding announcement only. Will those people requiring extra time boarding and those flying with small children please board the plane now?” Fifty people will surge forward with all manner of physical impairments and board the plane early. As soon as those poor unfortunates have boarded the healthy ones will stand and form a line long before the gate agents voice comes over the speakers and says “ Ladies and gentlemen thank you for your patience we will now begin general boarding of Fascist airlines flight blah , blah, blah.” The rest of us board the airline. Now I would like to point out one salient fact to all who fly. It doesn’t matter when you board; that plane aint leaving until every last mother’s son (and father’s daughter) is on that plane. We have all heard the plaintiff voice of the gate agents as they butcher people’s last names over the pathetic public address system “Would passengers Hrzelsquatch and Spuzzerby please report to gate blah, blah, blah for the immediate departure of their plane? That is passengers Hrzelsquatch and Spuzzerby to gate blah, blah, blah for the immediate departure of your aircraft.” The poor sods are probably fifteen feet away but don’t recognize what the gate agent has done to their names. If even one person misses the flight they have to remove that person’s baggage before the plane takes off so what’s the rush?<br />
So let’s say that all the passengers make the flight. You soar to twenty; thirty or even forty thousand feet on route to your destination and somewhere along the way a miracle occurs. Because lo and behold; when you reach said destination no matter how short the flight; no matter how high or low you flew, when the flight attendants come on the PA and say “Those passengers travelling with small children or requiring extra time deplaning please remain in your seats and we will assist you.” Behold the miracle; only the people flying with children remain. Somehow all the other people who limped on the plane have shaken their impediments and been cured mid flight. It’s a miracle!Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-8553011425358176542011-10-28T19:15:00.001-07:002011-10-29T11:00:53.157-07:00Wringing the last drop out of a wrong numberI wonder if Alexander Graham Bell got wrong numbers. I hope so. I hate them. There is nothing as loud as the sound of a phone ringing in a sleeping house at two in the morning. Lina got to it first on about the third ring. “Hello?” She answered weakly and groggily. “Is Wuzzername there?” Said a thick; slurred voice on the other end of the line. “You have the wrong number!” Lina replied, sounding more awake and a lot angrier. We put the incident out of our minds and went back to sleep. This time; when the phone rand Lina picked it up on the second ring “What?!” She barked. “Is Wuzzername there?” It was the same drunken voice. “You have the wrong number!” Lina answered with as much venom as she could muster. She slammed the receiver down even though it was cordless and that’s not what hangs it up. <br />
Now this was far from my first late night wrong number. I remember when I was living in northern Alberta in the 1980’s. Back in those days there were no cordless phones. There was only one phone jack and it was in the living room at the other end of my trailer. When the phone rang at three in the morning I staggered ha length of the trailer in inky blackness stubbing my toe on the kitchen table in the process. “Hello?” I said still half asleep. “This is Alberta Government Telephones; I have a collect call from Henry do you accept the charges?” The operator’s voice sounded young. It figured only someone new would get stuck working at this hour of the night. I could hear a plaintiff voice in the background. A drunken plaintiff voice “Accept the charges Dad it’s me Henry.” Now Henry was a neighbor of mine. He was a sweetheart when he was sober. As there was no place to drink or buy booze in our little town he was usually sober. But every time he went to the nearest larger town he got drunk. Three a.m. was when the bars closed. “You have the wrong number.” I said putting the receiver down. I tried to get back to bed without opening my eyes. <br />
I have had sober people call me back after a wrong number and I had barely put the phone down. I swear they hit redial. That is stupidity. Drunkenness is a different kettle of worms. Drunks have randomness to their thought process which allows their poor victim time to fall back into that deepest stage of REM sleep. The stage where young men are dreaming of waving a fly rod on a clear day in their favorite strip of trout water. A day so still and so perfect that the only flies are in your vest pockets and the only ripples on the water are trout rising to your fly. When suddenly with a deafening clatter the phone bell rends the air like the atomic bomb! I shot to my feet like I had been ejected out of bed. Again I thought I could stay asleep with the lights off so again I navigated the shoals of furniture without the benefit of the lights. I ran aground on a kitchen chair and hopped the last six feet my wounded toe in one hand as I scooped the receiver up with the other. “Hello?” I squealed into the mouthpiece. The same young voice as before; the same professional spiel “This is Alberta Government Telephones; I have a collect call from Henry.” I was stunned. There must only be one operator on duty at that hour of the night in northern Alberta. “Oh for crying out loud! It’s the same number as before lady; it’s still the wrong number!” I could still hear Henry sniveling on the other end of the line. “Well I am just doing my job! I have to put these calls through what if it was an emergency?” She sounded hurt and I immediately regretted my tone. “I’m sorry operator. But this isn’t his Dad’s place I am just trying to fish. I mean sleep.” As I hung up I made a mental note to look up Henry’s Dad’s phone number the next day. <br />
I think the randomness is as infuriating if not more infuriating than the thing itself. I had actually hooked the fish this time when the phone exploded into action. This time I made no pretense of trying to stay asleep and I turned on the hall light which seemed to be a million candle power. It blinded me so badly I walked straight into the end table the phone sat on. “Hello?” I said dumbly into the phone. “This is Alberta Government Telephones; I have a collect call from Henry.” She sounded apologetic almost pleading. “I’ll accept the charges.” I said forlornly. She seemed stunned. There was a long silence only partly filled with the sound of Henry on the other end begging his Dad to accept the charges. “It’s the same guy; the same wrong number.” She said finally. “I know; but it is the only way I am going to get to sleep. “ I said. “I owe you.” She said kindly. For the next half an hour I got Henry’s life story. Once he realized I wasn’t his Dad he asked who I was. In time he figured it out. In time to he passed out. I hung up and grabbed the skinny phone book and turned to the half page that held our town’s phone numbers. Sure enough Henry’ Dad’s number was the reverse of mine. So Henry was not just an alcoholic he was dyslexic oot. <br />
A month or so passed in which I slept well. Then; one night at three a.m.; the phone rang. I had learned a lesson and with a flashlight by my bed I walked the distance from my bedroom to the living room without incident. I picked up the receiver “This is Alberta Government Telephones;” A now familiar voice said. “I have a collect call from Henry for Greg. Will you accept the charges?” I was stunned. “Yes operator I will.” Henry and I had what would become our typical conversation. He talked about how bad his life was and I listened. We didn’t become friends but we became friendly. As the calls were only once in a while; and as they were no longer wrong numbers I actually grew to enjoy them; sort of. <br />
When I moved about a year later my replacement asked me if he could keep the same phone number. We had shared the small trailer for some weeks and his parents already had the number memorized. I gave it no thought and quickly agreed. Some weeks later and in a somewhat testy voice he asked me; over the phone, of course. “Who is Henry?” “Probably a wrong number.” I commiserated. “A pretty damned persistent wrong number!” said he. <br />
Meanwhile back in the present tense the phone rang again. I beat Lina to it this time. “Is Wuzzername there?” The voice sounded a little angry. “You have the wrong bloody number!” I thundered. Lina put her hand on my arm to calm me. “Look this is my own number; I ought to know my own number!” Said the boozy one. You should I thought but obviously you don’t. Just then an idea hit me. “Wuzzername is passed out. After you left she invited us all over and we drank all your booze and broke a few things, sorry!” There was a pause. I could almost see the look on his face as he figured out what that meant. “I am coming right home and you had better all be gone when I get there!” This time he slammed down the receiver. Lina stared at me. “So now he’s coming here?” She asked incredulous. “What do you call that?” I beamed. “Payback!” I rubbed my hands. “He isn’t coming here. He has no idea where we are. He is going home where a very surprised Wuzzername is no doubt sleeping. I’d give ten bucks to see the look on both of their faces.” I wish I had Graham Bell’s number in heaven. I’d love to ring him up and ask him if he has Prince Albert in the can.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-23984118894071531502011-10-26T18:50:00.001-07:002011-10-26T18:56:37.720-07:00The lure and lore of the northern lights<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcLwCa1ickYMIhB3cjXPC0aXPhcDtXRhXpFqfLRBMrd46JwOM3tdoNxj4WcLaaWl_1_poIEeinElhxP211EJIt2MIkx5NDFqSvW0AdDloEsQYJm4M8-ExlX7YZxDNDYmO5spBFFgXRUiIE/s1600/levels_adjust.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left:1em; margin-right:1em"><img border="0" height="267" width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcLwCa1ickYMIhB3cjXPC0aXPhcDtXRhXpFqfLRBMrd46JwOM3tdoNxj4WcLaaWl_1_poIEeinElhxP211EJIt2MIkx5NDFqSvW0AdDloEsQYJm4M8-ExlX7YZxDNDYmO5spBFFgXRUiIE/s400/levels_adjust.jpg" /></a></div><br />
Photo By Brodie Thomas<br />
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“When am I going to get to see the northern lights?” Sharon the newest member of our management team asked. Fresh from God’s country (Nova Scotia) she wanted to see the big show. I couldn’t blame her it is well worth the wait though. “Well you’ll have to wait until it gets dark at night which won’t be until late August. Some of the best lights are at the end of August and early September.” I was smiling as I said it her exuberance reminded me of my own when I first went north. I had seen it many times over the years everyone has a natural curiosity about the lights and they are magnificent; one of the great natural wonders of the world. I thought back twenty five years ago to when I first saw them on a bus headed into northern Alberta. I had asked the bus driver if the apostrophe shaped smudge on the northern horizon was the northern lights he said he wasn’t sure but if they were still there in an hour or two they must be. “Otherwise,” he informed me “it’s just smoke from the mill.” Big mill; I thought. As I got off the bus eight hours later they were still there. “Looks like they were the lights.” He said with a smile as I got. Off. They filled the horizon now. “You’re not in Kansas anymore.” I remember thinking. <br />
“What are the lights?” Sharon asked. “That depends who you ask.” I replied. “The peoples of the polar world all have their own explanation. The Finns call it Fox Fire they say that a great fox painted the Arctic sky with snow on its’ tail. The Eskimo of Greenland say they are the spirits of babies who died in childbirth.” Sharon visibly shivered. “That’s so sad.”She replied. “The Sami of Scandinavia believe they are the souls of the dead. They have an icon for them and use it in the artwork and evoke their power in their magic. My people; the Scots, call them The Merry Dancers. Closer to home the Cree I have lived among called them The Spirit Dancers. They too believe they are the spirits of the dead.” “I never knew they had such power over people.” Sharon said in a hushed voice. “Wait until you see them. You’ll understand.” I said smiling at her naiveté. “Don’t whistle when you see them.” Said my wife quietly. My wife is Dene; Chipeweyan to be exact. “Why not?” Sharon asked. “They will attack you.” Lina said seriously. “Some native people believe that the lights will take you away if you whistle or call them down or trifle with them. I think it comes from the awe and reverence in which they are held. It’s like a mark of respect; to take these wonders seriously” Sharon seemed impressed. “They crackle too.” Added Lina. “Really?” Sharon sounded incredulous. “Yeah, to the Dene the lights are a multi media event. They believe that when the lights are low the crackle and they have a smell.” “A bad smell! Don’t breathe it or it will kill you!” Lina added. “There is a legend of five hunters near Hay River who were using the light of the Borealis to hunt. The sound of their dog sleigh bells brought the lights down on them and even though they lay in the snow they were killed by breathing in the vapor.” I added. <br />
“I remember once I was hunting in the Peace country of Northern Alberta. I had just bedded down when my dog raised his head and started to growl. I looked up and the wall of my tent was lit up like daytime. “What on earth?” I thought as I scrambled out through the tent door; my dog beside me. When I got outside I realized that it was not a case of what on earth? But rather of what in Heaven? The sky was dancing with curtains of neon green waving as if in some great cosmic breeze. Then I heard what had made my dog growl. Wolves! Choruses of wolves over the distant hills were calling out to the distant lights. Answered by a lone wolf much nearer; no doubt a lone black male we had spotted earlier in the day. A shiver went up my spine. I petted my dog and stood in awe of the sight and sound. This was what I had come north for.”<br />
“But what are they really?” Sharon’s boyfriend Bart asked; always the skeptic, always the realist. “Cosmic dust carried on the solar wind.” I replied as cryptically as I could manage. “No; seriously.” He added. “Yes, seriously. They are caused by energized ions of dust carried by the solar wind. They enter the upper atmosphere and react with the elements there. The color of the lights changes according to the elements that the charged particles react with. The upper atmosphere is mostly oxygen which makes them green. Other elements make them blue or rarely red. They are often visible further south but they appear lower on the horizon. The closer to the magnetic pole you are the more overhead they will appear. It is largely a magnetic phenomenon.” Like I said you have to see them. A month or so later I was on the phone to Bart and Sharon. “I saw them!” Sharon was saying. She was ecstatic. She was on facebook right away telling her friends. A month after that she was asking me if I had seen them the night before. I had. I never get tired of them.<br />
“So tell me…” Said Bart; the skeptic. “Do you believe the legends of the lights?” I thought for a moment. “I believe there are legends about the lights.” I replied slyly. “That is not what I asked.” He replied. Another pause. It was a touchy subject. I have always believed that I am a guest here in someone else’s land; that I have been privileged to share in the culture of the people who do live here. This is their land and these are there beliefs. I do not take them lightly nor would I ever dream of mocking them. “I do not disbelieve them. I respect these beliefs and the rights of those who believe them. They are formed out of awe and respect for nature and the creator. I share that awe and I share that respect.” I said gravely. “Did you ever whistle at the northern lights?” He asked. <br />
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“Never!” I said and I meant it. “And I never will.”Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-28095734385467301052011-10-01T14:56:00.001-07:002011-10-01T14:56:41.412-07:00Lord of the MaggotsWe grew up on the edge of the city. In what was then being called by a new term “Suburbia” ; a new term for a new age. Our parents had moved to the city from the surrounding countryside. Our fathers were back from the war. “Son; I see your back from the front!” ‘Oh my God!” he replies “It’s that army food! I must be skinnier than I thought!” Cities bulged. The babies were booming and those small; post war homes were popping up everywhere. Forests were cut down. A house or two would spring up and a neighborhood grew overnight. Small houses on big lots; big families in two or three bedrooms right on the edge of the city; up against the forest. <br />
Kids were the order of the day. The depression was done; rationing was done; the war was done. The time for self sacrifice and grimness was over; it was a time to be fruitful and multiply. It was a time for laughter and the joy of youth. A youthful society set free from two decades of woe and care. A society that worshipped youth that wanted to hear the sounds of childhood. It was the sixties man! We were hip and cool and free! The world had probably never known a freer society. Set free by our parents who had tossed aside tyrants and opened the doors to prosperity. We roamed the neighborhood with impunity. We were legion. No play-dates for us just a game of baseball or road hockey at the drop of a ball. We rushed from the house with a ninety nine cent Superblade© on the end of an old broken hockey stick and made our own fun for hours at almost no cost and almost no fuss or arrangements. We were like our own subculture.<br />
Like youth of all cultures we imitated our parents and our society and we formed our own societies with our own leaders and our own rules. Being that this was new ground we were like settlers or pioneers of sorts out here on the semi-civilized fringes of the city. We roamed around and explored the wilderness that surrounded our safe little suburban neighborhoods. There was adventure out there to be had; adventures that would; no doubt, have chilled our parent’s blood. We sailed the lake on an old raft powered by my swimming flippers. We climbed Miller’s Mountain and drank from a spring on its’ crest. We hunted suckers with spears in the swamp behind the school. We did boy things and had boy fun. We were like kids on a deserted island. Like “Lord of the flies” until we went home to our safe suburban one and a half story houses and were folded into our clean sheets. <br />
One thing that boy society worships above all else is courage. There were many unwritten rules to this effect. Never let them see you cry would be number one. A tear or a crack in your voice could bring endless teasing; caustic rebukes and even the dreaded “Nyah nyah: nyah nyah nyah nyah!” the highest form of mockery! It was not uncommon to belong to different gangs of boys at the same time. You might be a junior member of an older boy’s gang or a senior member of a younger boys club at the same time. Important life lessons were learned while lighting firecrackers or climbing trees. <br />
“What is it?” Jed asked as we approached the still form on the edge of the woods. Martin took a long stick and poked the animal gingerly; it didn’t move. “It’s a dead Bobcat!” Phil said with exuberance. ”Cool!” . Said many. We had come across the dead body of a Bobcat on the edge of the woods where it met the highway. We spent some time speculating on how it had gotten there. These woods were no longer connected to the greater forest where there were Bobcats. By consensus we determined that it had come from the nearby forest and been hit by a car and wandered here to die. It was a find of some importance. It was necessary to determine what to do with so sacred an object. There was only one recourse; we retired to the meeting rock. The meeting rock stood in a nearby clearing; it was enormous. In our primal world things of the natural world; things that stood out, were important. The rock; because it was huge had its’ own inherent power. It was a natural place to meet and to decide on things of importance. <br />
We gathered in the lee of the rock safe from prying eyes and ears and sat in a circle in the clearing. “It’s splendiferous!” said one. “Its’ super cool!” said another. Choruses of “Cool!” resounded. It had been decided the Bobcat was officially “Cool!” There was some mumbling then a brief silence. Even brief silences among a group of boys are weighty things. There was some shuffling and then a cleared throat. “All right it’s cool; what do we do with it?” More shuffling; more silence. Then Phil opened his mouth “Why don’t we mount the skull on our clubhouse?” Pandemonium broke loose Shouts of “Skull!” and “Cool!” resounded in the little clearing in the woods. Phil lived on the other edge of the wood. His backyard held an old shed his Father had turned into a clubhouse for us boys. It was Phil’s home turf; of course so he was lord and master within it’s’ walls. A Bobcat skull would; it was decided look very cool over the door of the club house. We all saw it in our mind’s eyes; open jawed and yellowed with age (or maybe some varnish) emitting some silent roar that would instill fear into our enemies; foreign and domestic! It would be a symbol of our bravery and unquestioned badge of honor. Who could doubt the courage of boys who had bested such a creature? “It’s a little small; don’t you think?” said a voice from the back. Silence of a different sort fell over the assembled group. Not a silence of thought but a silence of disapproval and disdain. All heads turned in the direction of this lone voice of discord. It was Lorne one of the smallest of our crew but one who had won favor by being new to the neighborhood. No doubt it was this that saved him a pummeling. “It has been already decided that the skull is cool!” came the reply. <br />
It was therefore decreed that the Bobcat would be placed in a garbage bag and be buried in a most memorable spot where it would later be dug up when nature had run its course and the bones had been picked clean. So we went about our normal summer routines; playing ball and road hockey and having adventures. The Bobcat was forgotten. Then one day, when the wind brought the first hint of fall one of the members remembered the Bobcat. A meeting was struck and the shovel was borrowed and with due pomp and circumstance we trooped down the path from the meeting rock along the trail already strewn with the first golden leaves of fall. Whether it was the leaves covering the ground or the passage of time; but the spot did not prove as memorable as we had first supposed it would be. Eventually the shovel stuck the shiny surface of the garbage bag and the bag was removed from the earth. It appeared unchanged. The bag was heavier than we thought it would be. We stood around it in a close circle as we awaited the first look. Like Carter opening Tut’s tomb or Geraldo opening Capone’s vault we waited with baited breath while the bag was torn open. What happened next was not spoken of in the club’s circle. I personally evoke images of the “Great Skedaddle”. The torn bag revealed a mass of maggots seething and writhing with no sight of the Bobcat whatsoever. Boys flew in every direction there was to flee. Bigger faster boys ran over smaller slower ones. The panic was universal. It spread like wild fire. Boys ran through the woods in all directions. As the mad dash subsided and cooler heads prevailed our societal rules returned and we all wandered back to the meeting rock. The crowd was hushed now and subdued. No one looked at each other. There was an uneasy silence. We were all waiting for someone to speak. No one wanted to bring up the subject of our behavior. This symbol was supposed to announce our bravery to the world. We stared at our feet and there was more shuffling. Then Lorne’s voice could be heard from the crowd. “It was kinda small.” He said meekly. “Yeah small!” repeated the crowd. “Kinda puny!” The poor Bobcat was reinterred and funnily enough the subject of the symbol of our great bravery was never brought up again.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-81814950775023334232011-09-19T14:05:00.000-07:002011-09-19T14:05:01.415-07:00It suits me to a teaAs I sit here writing this my cup of hot water is slowly; magically being transformed. Floating in it is a tea bag; orange pekoe to be exact. There is no doubt a science to making a good cup of tea; but there is also an art and a touch of magic. There is alchemy in the simplicity of the chemical reaction or whatever it is that turns hot water and some leaves into the steaming; satisfying beverage that seems to brighten the day and soothe the soul. Keep your chicken soup; give me my tea. <br />
Now when I have coffee I must have it white with sweetener. That’s because I hate coffee. I have to kill the taste because that’s the only way I can get it down. So why do I drink it? Coffee; to me, is the Buckley’s Mixture of the beverage world. It tastes terrible but it works! But tea I can drink in almost any of its’ forms. I can drink it black. I can have it black with sugar or white with sugar. It depends on the circumstances. Half of the thrill of tea is the circumstances in which you drink it. Tea is very versatile. It can be had with sleeves rolled up, in Styrofoam cups on a busy workday. It can be had in a favorite mug on a sleepy Sunday morning, sunlight streaming in on my pajamaed legs and slippered feet, chez moi. It can be sipped from fine porcelain at five pm for high English tea. It can be drunk from an old melmac mug while seated on a stump replete with embers from the fire and a pine needle or two and none the worse for that. I have had tea on the running boards of a fire truck at five in the morning brought by some blessed angel of a citizen for us haggard firefighters who had been fighting a fire since three. It was the best cuppa’ I ever had. Sweaty; tired and coming down off an adrenalin high, your throat dry from breathing bottled air; there is nothing better than a cup of tea. <br />
There is variety in the way you whiten your tea too. Whether it is milk or cream or powdered whitener or canned milk each has a place. A splash of milk is always welcome. Cream is nice for dessert tea, sweetened with sugar of course. When you are not well black tea with a little lemon and honey is most efficacious. When in the bush; clad in mackinaw jacket with felt lined boots against the cold and damp a bit of powdered cow or better yet canned milk is nice. It reminds me of the tea my Dad made; strong and thinned with canned milk. It creamed into your stomach with warming tendrils. A little apricot brandy didn’t hurt either. <br />
As varied as the ways of preparing and serving tea are the myriad forms of the beverage itself. Whether green or black; Oolong or Darjeeling; Orange Pekoe of Earl Grey. There are many types of tea as there are types of people drinking the beverage. I have tried many and liked most of them. But for the most part just give me an old fashioned Orange Pekoe. But on a cold day when I’ve stolen an hour from the month give me a hot cup of Blueberry Ice wine tea first given me by my best friend. Delicious; just like a warm summer breeze. <br />
I am not fussy when it comes to the preparation of tea but here is what I do know. Good water makes good tea. Aeration is good too, stream water it better than lake water. The water should be boiling just before adding the tea. Let the water just come off a boil and then add the tea. Let it steep for a couple of minutes until the desired strength is reached, this is a matter of preference, I like mine strong. It should be drunk before it goes too cold and remove the tea bags once the desired strength is reached in case you want a second cup; and who doesn’t? <br />
I am from the east coast and I think the tradition of drinking tea is still stronger there. I now live in the north where the tradition has survived the scourges of the automatic coffee maker (shudder!). I will always associate the smell of the tea kettle with my Aunt Violet’s kitchen, warm and sunny, her parlor empty her kitchen table packed. Whenever the screen door slammed another tea bag and some fresh water went into the kettle it was seldom dry. Tea; in my deepest lizard brain is always linked with laughter and friends, with warmth and joy; with sharing and contentment. One lump or two?Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-90971190222947123152011-08-22T15:41:00.001-07:002011-08-22T15:41:48.083-07:00The tipping pointThis October 3rd will mark a milestone in my life. It will mark the point where I have been away from my native Nova Scotia for as long as I lived there. Exactly half my life spent in the north. I left Nova Scotia on a sunny morning with $150.00 in my pocket and three bags. I had never flown on a plane and had never been further from home than P.E.I. I guess it was the final rite of passage; I was leaving the nest and flying on my own. One thing for sure it was a long way home. I started as a Management Trainee for the HNC for the princely sum of $10,500.00 B&L (board and lodging) which meant that after the cost of my travel was taken off my first six months wages I took home just under $100 a week. Airfare to Halifax in those days was nearly $2,000 so going home really wasn’t an option. <br />
But the weather was nice for early October in northern Alberta. Within a week I had made some friends, met some people from home and caught my first pike. I called home every week. I had a lot to say in ten short minutes that first week. Ten minutes was my ration. We often think that things have gotten so expensive over the years, but not everything has. A phone call in 1985 cost $1.70 a minute at the cheapest rate. Ten minutes a week was all I could afford. Saturday night was my time to call home. I hated when you couldn’t get a line out. The exchanges were crude and “all circuits are busy please try your call again later…” Was a frequent response; in that cold, business likes voice. Still; God bless A G Bell because there is more you can hear in the sound of someone’s voice than can be written in the most eloquent letter.<br />
I wrote letters too; they were way cheaper. I sent pictures home of my new surroundings. When I got a part-time job doing guard duty for the RCMP I bought a truck. I proudly sent pictures home. I wanted them to think I was fine and doing well, prosperous even. I think I even believed it. Until Christmas eve I heard Stan Roger’s “First Christmas” and melted like a snowflake I felt every inch of the nearly three thousand miles between me and home. I may have gone over my ten minutes that first Christmas day; and what a job getting through; I think it took more than four hours. I wanted to thank Mom for the gifts; but most of all for the Santa Bag. She had always put together one as a stocking for us. It was a cornucopia. When opened it revealed a mixture of the practical (combs, toothbrushes and shampoo) the fanciful (Quality street chocolates, Candy chicken bones, and candy canes) and the sublime ( a small toy of some kind, no matter how old we were just to remind us I guess that we were still her little boys and girls). This continued for many years until I met my wife. Our first Christmas together my Mother sent us each a Santa Bag, I was delighted as it meant that Lina was officially “part of the family”. The only thing was I knew it was my last stocking from Mom. From now on Lina and I would fill each other’s stockings. At about the halfway point of the time since I left the little blue house on Third Street I had crossed another bridge; severed another apron string. <br />
Back home communities are small and tight. Move into one and you will always be a CFA (come from away). No matter how long you live there you will always be “from away”. It is like that up here too. Small towns have that dynamic no matter where they are. Nova Scotia will always be the “away “ that I am from. But home we always be wherever Lina and I are together. <br />
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Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-796098132618367382011-06-25T20:30:00.000-07:002011-09-10T16:44:04.203-07:00Watch Dog<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_6Ro33MErnOaJudNzSly3L-9WvbdqTAUD09t23ezp4eqKCksBEykURICJENSs5pGsKIBBBQ9TlyK17spnHGMLhx6Sj1ohosHNoxEKeQ9rUSv1w5utH20gdKr0uWGcMocTeLej9A4i_VeM/s1600/File4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left:1em; margin-right:1em"><img border="0" height="316" width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_6Ro33MErnOaJudNzSly3L-9WvbdqTAUD09t23ezp4eqKCksBEykURICJENSs5pGsKIBBBQ9TlyK17spnHGMLhx6Sj1ohosHNoxEKeQ9rUSv1w5utH20gdKr0uWGcMocTeLej9A4i_VeM/s400/File4.jpg" /></a></div><br />
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He came into my life slowly, almost by assimilation. When I first met him he belonged to my boss, Nigel. He was in his prime, a fully grown Golden Retriever, though you might have been forgiven if you mistook him for an Irish setter; from a distance at least. He was very dark; which is, so I am told, not uncommon in the breed. His name was Seiko. “He’s a watch dog; get it?” Nigel told me when I looked at him askance when he told me the name. “More people would get the joke if you named him Timex.” I said and over the years when I explained the name to others the joke had spawned at least four dogs named Timex. But Seiko he was. Tall and proud and immensely strong; he was gorgeous. I was new to the north and a long way from home and loved ones. The transition was made a little easier by the fact that Nigel’s wife Anne and I were from the same home town and I knew her family. We had attended the same high school but did not know one another. It was made easier too by this gregarious Golden Retriever.<br />
We struck up a bond right away. Golden Retrievers are notoriously friendly and Seiko was the rule not the exception. He followed me everywhere. When I was working in the warehouse he would come in to get some attention and I was always glad to see him. On my days off I took to asking Nigel if I could “borrow” his dog. Seiko went fishing and hunting with me. We went on long walks together on every trail and back road that there was in the surrounding area. He was good company. If I ever had to go somewhere without him he would follow my vehicle for miles. The speeds he could reach and the length of time he could follow were prodigious. Three kilometers from home I could still see him in my rearview mirror. I spent a happy year and a half in Wabasca but then was transferred in the spring of 1987. I bid Seiko a sad goodbye and thought I would never see him again. <br />
Happily that was not the case. A few months later Nigel called to say they were moving and they would not be able to take a full grown Golden Retriever with them. Would I be interested in taking him? It took about ten seconds to make the decision. I was about to own my first dog. I only had to get him there. Wabasca is over 500 km away but fortunately Nigel was coming to Fort Vermilion. Fort Vermilion was only a short flight away by Cessna 206. I just had to find a pilot willing to fly an eighty pound bundle of muscle and energy in a cockpit the size of a loveseat. I thought I’d better talk to the pilot in person so the next day I met the mail plane and when we’d finished loading my truck I said offhandedly “By the way I wonder if you could help me out. My dog will be in the Fort on Monday and I need to get him in here.” I looked at the pilot with my most pathetic look. “Eighty Pounds!” he exploded when I answered him how big the dog was. “Is he part horse?” I decided to go all in and play my trump card., I pulled a photo of Seiko from my pocket, one taken on one of our many walks. The pilot took it dubiously but a smile crossed his face as he looked at it. “A Golden Retriever; well why didn’t you say? My daughter raises them. He’s a beauty. Look how red he is! Is he a good flyer?” The question caught me flat footed. It hadn’t even occurred to me to ask Nigel if the dog had ever flown. Of course I couldn’t tell him I didn’t know so I stammered “S-S-S-S-rue he loves to fly!” I had to lie as anybody up here who owned a dog any length of time would have had to have flown with him. I called Nigel that night to let him know that arrangements had been made. “How’s Seiko in an airplane?” I asked “I guess we’ll know next week.” Nigel answered. He had never flown before. I was waiting with baited breath the next Monday when the little plane taxied to a stop, I waited for the prop to stop spinning then I ran over and opened the passenger door. “How was the flight?” I asked when the engine noise died down. “He was my Copilot.” Said the pilot with a smile. “He never moved, just sat in the copilot’s seat and stared out the windscreen.” I was worried that he might not recognize me after so long apart but once out of the plane he planted his hind feet on the gravel runway and put his front feet on my chest and licked my face. He was not a dog who did this often so I knew he was saying “Hello; sure I remember you!” <br />
We embarked on a new life together both off us adjusting to a changed existence. I could not have been happier, I know he felt the same. As before we went everywhere together. He slept by my side. He seldom slept on the bed but when he did he took the whole bed, lying diagonally across it stretched out to his full length; I was forced to sleep diagonally too. Usually he slept on the floor by my head. Occasionally I would hear him vocalizing in his sleep his legs would twitch like he was dreaming of chasing rabbits. I would hang an arm over the side of the bed and pet him. His tail would thump, thump thump against the floor in his sleep. I wonder what he was dreaming and was he picturing me petting him? In the mornings when he was ready to go out he would stand between the bed and the wall and his tail would make an arc from the two objects. It would whack the bed frame and then the wall in a whack, ting, whack ting that became my alarm. I woke up every day to his smiling face. No one could roll over and go back to sleep after looking into those brown eyes. <br />
My bass Andrew had a border collie named DeeDee and the two dogs became inseparable. Seiko picked up any number of habits from DeeDee including her habit of sticking her nose under your hand and kind of flipping your hand into the air when she wanted to be petted. Seiko also took to rolling in mud puddles, one of DeeDee’s favorite things. The maddening thing is that he would go for a three mile walk and stay totally clean. Then; less than a hundred meters from home he would drop into a mud puddle like a stone. I kept a garden hose at the back door. He loved the water. Being a retriever that is only natural I suppose. When we went walking by the river which was almost every day; he would plunge in and swim usually grabbing a piece of driftwood. But no matter how far from the river I stood he would inevitably walk to within ten feet of me before he shook himself dry; thus soaking me. It was a game we played and he loved doing it. I pretended to be mad but he always saw through me and I could not help but hold him he was so charming. <br />
From Fox Lake I moved to beautiful Ft Liard. Seiko loved the river and the mountains. He loved walking the trails and chasing the rabbits. He was getting older and he began to appreciate the wood stove as he got quite arthritic, especially in his hind quarters. Golden Retrievers are prone to that. I used to take him for runs on my bike so I could tire him out better. That became less necessary. Soon our normal walks became too much for him. One night in late February I knew he was not going to see another dawn. I had been talking to a friend who was a wildlife officer. He had told me that he could give Seiko an overdose of Nembutal which he had for tranquilizing bears. I wanted to put it off until the last possible moment. The last night I called Jerry but it was too late Seiko did not make it until he arrived. With a loud sigh he passed. I let out a scream of his name and he momentarily opened his eyes and looked right at me as if to say “It is O.K. Old friend it is my time,: amd then he was gone. I wrapped him in his favorite comforter and put his favorite toy a pink “My Little Pony” that Jerry’s kids had given him,. I picked up the toy and remembered how he had gotten it. One night we ewre visiting Jerry and his family. When we got home I noticed that Seiko had the pony in his mouth. I took it back the next day but the kids were adamant that they had given it to Seiko and his tail wagged furiously when I returned it to him. It had no tail and was one the girls no longer wanted. He loved it. He carried it everywhere. Once when he lost the toy he was beside himself. I have never seen a dog so despondant. The girls again came to the rescue with a “My Little Pony” unicorn. He loved that too nut not as mush. That spring under the snow I found the original and he never touched the unicorn again. <br />
I got my friend Rick to pick me up a pick at the hardware store and I buried him in the back yard that Sunday. Rick was going to help but I was finished before he got there. We sat and had coffee. “It was brutally cold today you should have waited for me.” He said . “It was the only trouble he ever caused me. He was worth all that and more.” I put a cross over his grave and nailed his dog tag to it. I buried him with his pony. I thought I was doing well after he died. One evening while walking home from work about a week later I met my friend Elizabeth; the social worker. She was walking her dogs. We had walked dogs together many times. She looked at me askance and asked “Wherever is Seiko?” In her British accent. I tried to get the words out but nothing would come. I stood there like an idiot and she instantly knew. She hugged me and said “I am ever so sorry. I didn’t know!” It must have been five minutes before I could tell her what had happened. Nearly twenty years later I have tears in my eyes. He still stares out at me from a thousand pet food bags. One day I walked into the store and there was a wet Golden Retriever in the porch. The smell is like no other breed. I got down on one knee and petted him. “Sorry, he’s a mess.” said one of my Mountie friends. “He is beautiful and he looks just like a Golden Retriever should look.” I said. I have had a number of dogs since; each one of them as different as each person is. The one common thread is the unquestioning love that I have had from each one of them. I never came home to find them grumpy or ungrateful or not understanding. They have only been a source of undying love. No matter how much it hurts to lose one I will never regret the commitment.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-35692391442427920262011-06-04T14:41:00.000-07:002011-06-04T14:43:28.818-07:00Ask a stupid question...Steve Martin the comedian once said “If you are studying geology; which is all facts, as soon as you get out of school you forget it all, but philosophy you remember just enough to screw you up the rest of your life.” I minored in philosophy. A light bulb is going on for a lot of my friends right now. “Ahhhh….” They are saying to themselves. “That explains a lot!” I blame Rene Descartes. “I think therefore I am!” He taught me to question everything; shook my belief system right down to it’s’ bones. I used to think I knew that I existed because I was hot or tired or hungry, “I crave a big greasy donair therefore I am!” But that wasn’t good enough for old Rene; no sir he said what if I just think I am craving a big greasy donair; the one from Revanna Pizza on Portland with the works and extra sauce on the side? In spite of the fact that I can almost taste that donair; with its’ toasted pita shell and donair meat glistening with that crusty skin on the outside. He stripped away all the unessential, all that was not pure philosophical logic. He said to himself “I might only think I am hot and tired and craving a donair! But I know this. I know that someone is thinking that they are hot and tired and craving a donair. So stripped to its’ logical essentials. I think I am hot and tired and craving a donair; therefore I am!” Existentialism in a nutshell. I just saved you three years of class time, not to mention tutorials and tuition and books and all that money spent on beer in the student lounge. I cannot however save you the cost of a large donair with the works and a can of Pepsi as they are the essential tools of the philosopher.<br /> But now you see my dilemma. I constantly question everything. If you have to question your own very existence then what about; why do Ketchup chips have to be red they don’t have real ketchup on them and that dye gets your fingers all red. Why is suicide illegal? I mean if the guy dies what are you going to do to him? Why don’t they just lower the nets so that short people can play basketball too? If you ran a school for suicide bombers the only ones getting jobs would be failures and dropouts. What’s with those stupid commercials for automatic soap pumps? You wouldn’t want to touch a germy soap pump so it dispenses the soap automatically. You are about to wash your hands for Pete’s sake! What difference if there are germs on the pump; there are germs on your hands; that’s why you are washing them. The soap will kill all the germs, not just the ones on your hands but the ones from the pump too!That new sugarless gum, the one that brags that its’ flavor lasts forever why does it come in packs of five? Remember those deals on the packages of popsicles when you were a kid? Send in 200 wrappers and a dollar and get a Frisbee or something. Do you suppose they actually had people counting the wrappers? Imagine sitting in a room trying to prize apart 200 sodden sticky wrappers to see if some seven year old was trying to rip off some poor little multinational food corporation. <br /> You can see what deep philosophical issues I grapple with every day. I like to share these issues with those around me too. No sense suffering in silence misery loves company. So it is for my long suffering wife and my employees at work. They get the distilled wisdom of four years of university and thirty years of experience on a daily basis. Sucks to be them. But every once in a while one of the great questions of life gets answered. One of the great mysteries of the universe is revealed; even to a pillar of dust such as I. But of course I shared it with the other human being who was there when it was revealed. It happened while in Winnipeg that center of the Canadian universe last month. I was driving along in a cab when one of those tow trucks with a flat bed on the back passed us with a brown cube van parked on it. I leaned around the Plexiglas shield and said to the cabbie “Well that answers a question I have always wondered.” He looked into the mirror and we made eye contact; in a fashion. “What question is that Sir?” he intoned politely. “Who delivers UPS trucks?” I said. Now if I could just figure out why there are no shocks in any of the cabs in Winnipeg?Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-40859052291550865292011-04-25T08:37:00.000-07:002011-04-25T08:38:14.418-07:00Universal RemoteThere were just four of us in a passenger van designed to seat ten. We were scattered through the seats; as you do when the chance presents itself. Edmonton was streaking by the tinted windows of the van. Edmonton was bathed in splendid November sunshine. Little or no snow but little or no leaves too. The woman who had joined us last was asking the rest of us where we were going. She had; apparently only half understood our driver, though his second language English was very good. “Are we going to the west end?” She asked tentatively with a southern accent. “Yes.” I replied. “We will stop at the West Edmonton Mall, among other places.” I added. “Oh good I wasn’t sure what he meant by West Ed. I’m from Sacramento.” She intoned. “Not originally, with that accent.” I added with a chuckle. “I always forget.” She laughed. “Is it that bad?” “I like it.” My wife Lina added. “It reminds me of our trip to Nashville.” The lady turned and added “Close, Tupelo.” We might have sped through Edmonton without a word, as I have done dozens of times. But a chance remark had broken the ice and soon the lady in the back of the van was speaking of her home in Edmonton with an English accent. We were all, even the driver from somewhere else. The conversation wound as conversations do through different subjects; it started with Elvis who was also from Tupelo and went on to Graceland where we had all been. Then the lady from the south revealed that she had once dated a fighter and the conversation went on to the great fighters and great fights of the past. Lina faded out a bit as this was not her forte. I love boxing and know a lot about the fighters of the late seventies and early eighties.<br /> We remarked on how, in the old days even the great fights were carried on network TV to be enjoyed by everyone who was inclined to watch. Nowadays you have to buy a ticket to a private screening or pay per view it on cable or satellite. We lamented the loss of the universally shared experience. “I remember the day after a big fight. We would stand around the schoolyard and everyone would have an opinion.” By virtue of the fact that it was free and on network TV meant that even the poorest of us could watch. Even the poorest and most ill informed could have an opinion and could voice it to all. “Something was lost…” she agreed “when great events became pay per views.” The conversation went on until we reached our destination. We parted; not as friends but at least as friendly and wished each other well as we parted. <br /> I never fully forgot that conversation. It dovetailed with some thoughts I’d been having for weeks. You see we have satellite TV at home. One of the big Canadian ones. We have a big package, one of the biggest. I have long since given up on sports so we don’t have a sports package. But darn near everything else. We work long hours and often six days a week so when we get to watch TV I want choice. Even so; on a Sunday night recently I was regaling Lina with the available channels from the built in guide feature on the dish. “There’s never anything on when we have time to watch TV!” I protested. I was; as my boss was fond of saying “preaching to the choir” Lina felt as I did and needed no reminder of the fact. I was seeking commiseration. I wanted to have my opinion backed up; after all misery absolutely adores company. “You aren’t kidding. Even the game sow channel shows poker, POKER!” She replied dryly. “Watching poker is like watching paint peel.” I replied. “I thought the saying was Watching paint dry?” she replied. “Nah, these are reruns of poker games, that paint was dry a long time ago.” I turned off the TV and went to sit in the room where I do my best thinking; a windowless room with a large amount of porcelain. I had Bruce Springsteen’s 57 Channels ( and nothing on) running through my head. Two hundred channels of garbage! I kept thinking. Springsteen didn’t even know the half of it when he wrote his prophetic song. I pondered in my inner sanctum for a while.<br /> “You know what is missing in society?” I asked as I returned to the room of the living from the room of the bath. Lina put down her magazine and was; I am sure, well and truly grateful for my minor in Philosophy. She knew better than to answer this rhetorical question. “We are missing the universal experience. “ I allowed sufficient pause to befit the depth and pithiness of this statement. “When I was a kid the school ground conversation was very much dictated by what we had seen on TV the night before. Mondays meant Hockey Night in Canada. We would stand around and discuss the one game that was on TV Saturday night. When there was a Wayne and Shuster special we all retold every joke the next day. Now we all go home to an entertainment extravaganza every night. There’s a channel for everything; game shows, cooking, shopping, religion, women, men, cartoons, you name it. Everyone goes into their little world and there is no commonality of experience. We are universally remote. Distant from each other; separated by the very medium that used to unite us in a common bons!” I was in full flight now.<br /> “So you think we should have only one channel like the old days?” Lina said with a grin. “Remember when we had only CBC North?” I asked. “What are you talking about? I was born up here! I remember when there was no TV at all. I remember when we got four hours of TV a day, taped from earlier and replayed! Don’t tell me about CBC North!” Justly chastened; I continued. “Well back when we had only one channel we would all get together at the teachers place and watch Dallas.” I retorted. “The women watched Dallas,; you guys stood around the kitchen ate snacks and talked hockey.” She replied with a sarcastic tone. “Yeah but we shared an experience, that’s my point!” Just then the house gave a sort of shudder. The furnace sighed to a stop. The TV made a popping sound and went black. The water pump stopped and there was total silence. I looked at Lina; she shrugged. “Power failure!” I said. “Looks like it.” Lina replied. I flipped the light switch just in case. “Well I guess what’s on TV is a moot point now.” Lina said moving her chair over to the window and picking up her crossword.<br /> The next day at work Gerry walked up to me “I was right in the middle of watching an interesting show on the Discovery Network when the power went off. I thought it would never come back on.” As he was speaking Darren walked into the room. “Yeah it sure was boring with no power I wanted to watch the Riders game.” “Count on the power to go off just when a good fishing show is coming on!” Piped Danny from the next room. I guess it just goes to show; be careful what you wish for…Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-61264686023709106002011-04-24T13:24:00.000-07:002011-04-24T13:25:15.867-07:00My memory's good but short...“I’m going senile.” I said in disgust. My wife looked at me puzzled. I was standing in front of the office with a blank look on my face. “I just walked here from my office and I can’t remember why.” She looked at me and laughed. “Everyone does that; silly. Just walk back in your office and you will remember why you came here.” She was right; of course. I am sure everyone has those spells. You walk into a room for a specific purpose and you go blank. You cannot remember what the heck you walked in there for and that was the only reason for going into the room; whatever it was that you were supposed to do or get. A simple trick of the mind. But it certainly is frustrating. I swear sometimes I am going senile. What was I doing? What was I looking for? I walked back to my office and it hit me the minute I walked through my door. I knew instantly what I had set out to get. I was mortified.<br /> “I can’t go out there and let them know this is what I forgot. I will never live it down.” I thought to myself. Whatever can I do? I leaned against my office door and glanced sideways at the general office. It was a beehive; as it usually was at that hour of the day. Damn; how am I going to do this? There was a lineup at the office and two people working there; my Wife and my Assistant Manager. There was a lineup at both checkouts. It never fails when you want to do something surreptitious there is always a crowd.” I should just be a man and walk boldly up and do this!” I thought. Then my cowardly alter ego said “No way dude; you are going to make a fool of yourself. Do it later.” But I had promised my boss to do this ASAP. I crept out of my office trying to avoid customers. But of course that didn’t work. “Hay Greg do we have a meeting tonight?” One of the guys on the Fire Department called out. “Yep, second Wednesday of the month.” I said as nonchalantly as I could. “You O.K.?” Roy asked, sensing my furtive movements. “Yeah; sure, fine.” I stammered. As soon as Roy was gone I worked my way closer to the general office. I tacked back and forth from one shelf to another. By now there was a lineup at the office and I took advantage of the distraction to make a dash for the showcase.<br /> I fumbled with my keys. Why is it when you are in the biggest hurry you can never get the key to go in? There are two identical keys on my ring that fit the various showcases. Now the rules of probability state that there should be a fifty fifty chance every time I try them of getting the right key the first time. Balderdash! I have never gotten the right one first time. Finally I had my prize; now all I had to do was get through the checkout without my wife spotting me. As I stood up she was right in front of me. “Remembered what it was?” She asked. The words were like an exploding bomb. I stammered and stuttered and mumbled “Buzzerererahhhhhst” I said half under my breath hoping she would let it be. “What?” She repeated not letting it drop. “Mumble mumble wassisname.” I intoned. ”You are making no sense.” Lina said louder this time. I motioned for her to lean over and I whispered it in her ear. A grin split her face from ear to ear. “HEY EVERYBODY!” She yelled. I was making waving motions with my hands and mouthing the word NO over and over. “Greg forgot what he came out here for and had to walk back into the other room to remember it! Guess what he forgot?” She took the package from my hands and held it over her head. “A MEMORY CARD!” The whole building erupted in laughter simultaneously; both customers and staff alike. I walked to the till and paid for the memory card. There were people slapping my back and some people were holding their sides. I remember it like it was yesterday…Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-61916338909879679382011-04-19T11:42:00.000-07:002011-04-19T15:51:05.094-07:00Just like Mom used to makeDid you ever notice that some things taste better when someone else makes them? Seriuously; I think this is one of those things where If I were sitting down with a group of friends right now they would all be nodding and agreeing. I am alone at my computer but I am betting that you are sitting out there somewhere in cyberspace nodding and going “Yep.” Well all right maybe you’re not a “Yep” person; I sure am “Yep, indeed”. My Mother once remarked that salads always taste better when someone else makes them. I rest my case. You may argue with me but my Mom is always right. In many cases the thing that always tasted better is made by our Moms. They always know how to make stuff. What I don’t know is how they know all that stuff. Is there some kind of school for Moms that they go to? Is it genetic? Do they learn at their Mom’s knee? Rest assured that it is a universal truth right up there with “We find this truth to be self evident: That all men are created equal.” <br /> But it need not always be your Mom; it could be your partner, or a friend or even a stranger at a church supper. Now I realize that there are those who will argue that the reason that it tastes better is that you didn’t have to make it. I like to think of this as the sheer laziness argument. Sure it tastes better you didn’t have to slave over a hot stove to get it. There is some logic to this. I used to work in a fast food restaurant I was good at what I did. I took pride in turning out a tasty hot, fresh burger. But when I sat down on my break I really didn’t feel like eating what I had been cooking and smelling all day. I would go miles out of my way to prepare something different. We would scrape all the breading off the filet-o-fish™ and pan fry it on the grill. We would cook the McRib™ patty and put Big Mac™ sauce on it, anything for some variety. We even worked out a scheme to take advantage of the proximity of competitors to our restaurant. I contacted a friend who worked at KFC and one who worked at the Pizza place. We all had similar benefits where we paid little or nothing for out food while working. So we would meet surreptitiously in the parking lot with bags of food under our coats and our uniforms hidden and we would swap our lunches. By Golly, it did taste better! <br /> This worked fine until we got caught and the management of all three businesses got involved and kyboshed the whole scheme. Thos guys have no sense of humor. So maybe there is some merit to the laziness theory but I still don’t buy it. There is something to be said obviously for the effect of not smelling what you are cooking for hours and simply being tired of it by the time you have to eat. All these factors have merit but that doesn’t cover all the facts. Case in Point: even the simple things taste better when someone else makes them; even a bologna sandwich. I made one for my wife today which is the reason why all this ink is being spilt. Alright I know that computer screens don’t have ink on them. I am not like the person in the blonde joke with white out on my screen. But you cannot argue that a bologna sandwich is so time consuming that the making of it makes the sandwich taste bad. Now my Mom makes the best potato salad. No offense to my wife or others who have made me potato salad over the years, but Mom’s rules. It wicked cool! Is that expression still in? I never know anymore. I do know that groovy is dated, right? A potato salad is complicated there are many steps and many ingredients. Each salad may not have many ingredients but there are many different ingredients you could add. My Mom adds mustard. My Wife adds pickle juice, see what I mean. But bologna sandwiches are simple. Bread and margarine, mustard and bologna; not a whole lot of ingredients. Not too much wiggle room. Albeit the amount of mustard you use or type of margarine or bread will make a difference but let’s face it not that much difference. <br /> I think I have solved the mystery. I think I have unlocked the secret that has puzzled mankind for years. I think the missing ingredient is care. That’s right care. I think when we make a sandwich or salad for ourselves we do it haphazardly. We slap the mustard on we give no thought to presentation or getting the coverage just right. We press too hard on the bread with our thumbs. We do not use a clean plate nor do we bother to present it with a pickle (when I make sandwiches for my Wife I often add little “eyes” made of olives on tooth picks that I stick into the top of the sandwich so that the ingredients form a face with a bread crust forehead and bologna tongue). We don’t take the extra measure of care for ourselves that we would for someone we loved or a total stranger at a church dinner. In fact I will go one better. Instead of calling it care, I will call it Love. What is missing when we taste our own sandwich is the Love that Mom put in. She always added just the right amount and she never ran out and had to go next door to borrow a cup. Thanks Mom; Bon apatite!Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-38341055523368064832011-04-18T14:25:00.000-07:002011-04-18T14:29:03.058-07:00The Blob that ate Fort LiardNo good deed goes unpunished; they say. I know it is true. I once scraped the side of my new car on a telephone pole when I was giving a friend a boost. “What’s a telephone pole doing in the middle of your driveway?” I asked as I surveyed the damage. “Holding up the telephone wires.” Eddy answered sardonically. Ask a stupid question… Another time I delivered some groceries for a customer and when I came out the company truck wouldn’t start and I had to walk back to work two miles in the pouring rain. Another time; well you get the point.<br /> “Hey Barry; the bottom half of the pallet isn’t ours!” I said as I removed the last box of frozen foods. “What?” Barry said angrily. It was nearly midnight and he was tired. “This bread dough is for the IGA Bakery in Ft Nelson. I’m not going back that way. I am headed to Ft Simpson to drop this trailer and then I am Bob tailing it back to Edmonton. I knew his switch (the other driver who usually drives while Barry sleeps) was MIA so I knew he was tired. “Can I leave it and have the other driver pick it up on Thursday?” I looked into his eyes they were underlined by dark circles. We depend on these drivers in the north. We depend on them and we take care of them. “Sure Barry. I’ll keep it here, it will stay frozen like a rock. “Here meant the unheated loading dock at the back of the store. I could close the inside doors in winter and use it as an emergency freezer. Barry helped me pile the cases against the outside doors. At forty below they would be frozen better than in a commercial freezer. The boxes were about two cubic feet. That is to say about as big as an ottoman. There were a dozen or more of them. “Thanks man, you rule!” said Barry as we finished. “Yes.” I replied “But only here in my tiny kingdom!” I wished him goodnight as my assistant Ron and I went home for a few hours sleep. We had to be back here in less than eight hours. <br /> “You ever hear of a comb?” I asked Ron next morning as I knocked on his door. This was our routine. Each morning I walked past his door on the way to work. Each morning I knocked d and waited for him to get ready. He never combed his hair and seldom shaved. “Only in legends” Ron added laughing. He was a cheerful kid. I say kid but in fact in calendar years he was only two years younger then me. In temperament he was light-years younger than me. He was like Peter Pan, he never grew up. We walked the short distance to the store in the crisp morning air. Ron was shivering. “How come you never wear proper clothes?” I asked for the hundredth time. “I want to look cool.” He replied. He looked very cool in a spring baseball jacket, unzipped with baggy jeans and sneakers to finish the ensemble. He was shaking like a leaf. I unlocked the deadbolt and pushed the front door in. As quickly as I had entered I ducked out and flattened against the side of the building. “What’s wrong?” Ron asked his eyes wide. “It’s as hot as the fire of hell in there!” I said loudly. Doubting me or wanting to see for himself Ron walked in. He was back out like a shot. He dropped to his knees and gasped for breath. “You weren’t kidding it’s roasting in there!” He was panting for breath. “What happened?” He looked at me like he looked at me for all things. I felt like a Father to him sometimes. I looked at him, my mind racing. “If I had to guess I would say the high limit went on the furnace.” I replied. Wait for it, I thought. “What is a high limit?” Ron asked. I knew it. “A high limit is a safety feature that shuts the furnace down when the thermostat fails.” <br /> I was working out in my mind what to do next. The thermostat and emergency cut off switch were in the back room. To get to them I would need to shut off the alarm which was in the office. The place has very hot and the air was not breathable. “You stay here and keep the door open. I will crawl to the back down low where the air is cooler. I will shut off the alarm and kill the furnace. “I took a deep breath and made my way in. I shut off the alarm but had to make my way out immediately. I was bathed in sweat when I hit the minus forty air. I gulped huge lung full’s of air and sat on the step. “I can’t even hold the door open.” Ron said. He too was bathed in sweat. I made another dash and this time I killed the furnace. I returned outside, hugely relieved. “That’s killed the heat source. At least there is no more risk of fire.” We sat on the steps and cooled off. “It will take hours to cool down in there.” Ron said unhappily.” I have orders to do today. “I thought for a minute. “We could open the front and the back doors and turn on the fan.” I replied. The store was equipped with a huge fan that was meant to keep the place cool in summer. It didn’t but it kept the flies busy. <br /> We waited twenty minutes for the temperature to drop a bit and walked in. It was like there had been a fire or something. I hadn’t considered what the high temperatures would do. There was a pool of molten shortening and lard on the floors in the grocery department. I picked up an Aero bar it was liquid inside the wrapper and dripped from the ends of the packaging. My mind paced. Every item in the store that had chocolate in it would have to be thrown out. Granola bars; chocolate bars, cookies lots of styuff went into the bin. But the shock I got when I opened the front door that morning was nothing compared to the shock I got when I opened the receiving doors. I had forgotten the favor we had done the night before.. I was trying to ventilate the place when I swung open the inner doors only to be confronted with what can only be described as “The blob that ate Fort Liard” for there in the previously unheated porch was a blob of bread dough eight feet high, ten feet wide and eight feet deep. As I opened the door it surged forward like a living thing. Which; because of the millions of yeast in it; it truly was. It flowed toward Ron and I; albeit it was a slow flow. We dashed back as a wall of dough slumped into the room and surged across the floor. We were up to our wastes in the stuff. The empty boxes stuck out of the mass like flotsam in some giant flood. “No one in head office is going to believe this!” I said looking at Ron. “I don’t believe this!” He said holding one foot in the air and picking dough out of his sock. <br /> Our eyes met in one long glance and we realized how ridiculous each of us looked. We both began to laugh. We were standing up to our waists in bread dough roaring with laughter when my friend Rick, jack of all trades whom I had called to help fix the furnace, walked through the door. He looked at the two of us. He looked at the sea of bread dough. He shook his head. He turned and left. Ron and I laughed louder. Rick returned to the room. “I just had to be sure I wasn’t dreaming!” He added and he too began to laugh. Then we got snow shovels and dug a path to the receiving doors. We dug them out and opened them. The store was cooling off now. We pushed the bread dough onto the snow where it froze. Rick filled a dump truck with it using his Bobcat loader. We hauled “The Blob that ate Fort Liard” to the dump. Like I said no good deed goes unpunished. But look at it this way I am still telling that story over twenty years later, so it may have been worth it.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-91919476536805287472011-04-15T15:50:00.000-07:002011-09-28T18:16:37.241-07:00I am my own grandpa<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirMfbwW5OYmA4YDS02TUMc2waEMKg9uczNJxjr_-BFnUNtbNBJbKGNnA7-cPN-Os1Zb2TXhwctkkpnf7KgP_Ji2by4o3xBZ3y7jJBqqU5B-MNUcSQ1iNRgcvHi04qrx6P6PdJIxa1m0Jwl/s1600/File23.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left:1em; margin-right:1em"><img border="0" height="399" width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirMfbwW5OYmA4YDS02TUMc2waEMKg9uczNJxjr_-BFnUNtbNBJbKGNnA7-cPN-Os1Zb2TXhwctkkpnf7KgP_Ji2by4o3xBZ3y7jJBqqU5B-MNUcSQ1iNRgcvHi04qrx6P6PdJIxa1m0Jwl/s400/File23.jpg" /></a></div><br />
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Like most people I had two grandfathers, my father’s father and my mother’s stepfather. I had two very different relationships with these two men. My grandfather Turnbull, my father’s father is my own blood relative. I am named after him. My middle name Earl was his first name. I am very proud of that. I have very fond memories of him; on one knee holding his thumb between his forefingers saying “I got your nose.’” Somewhere there is a photo of us; taken on my parent’s front lawn. He is leaning on a rock hammer and I am pulling a plastic dump truck be bought me, on a string. Granddad had just demolished a boulder the size of a Volkswagen with that hammer and a bucket of water. He first built a fire around the rock (something you could never do in Halifax today) then he threw a bucket of cold water on the hot rock and it split into pieces. He broke the pieces up with the hammer and the huge rock went away. He was not a big man but he could take a big problem and make it go away with that kind of determined effort his generation took for granted. He was a gold miner so it was second nature to him to go right through solid rock.<br />
I haven’t seen the actual photo for years. I have searched for it every year when I am home. But the image goes with me everywhere I go. We distinguished (my siblings and I) between the two men by what we called them. Grandfather Turnbull was granddad. Grandfather Lewis was grampy. Even though there is no blood between us I am proud of him too. He built boats with his bare hands. In his younger days he built thirty to forty footers. Cape Islanders they were called. He built them in shops barely big enough to hold them. I never saw him work on big boats but I watched my Uncle Andrew build similar boats and I was in awe of these me who turned living trees into living boats that would flex with the waves and bring their crews home safely on those savage north Atlantic storms. <br />
But there was always a distance between Grampy and me and my siblings. In his old age he built little boats, many in glass cabinets. They were models of boats that he had built for real when he was young. Just like he had years before; he built the smaller models with care and patience. True; no one’s life depended on it any more, or did it… Maybe his life somehow depended on it. The detail on the good ones was incredible. He would look for tiny pieces to fashion the rigging; the davits, the life boats and the portholes. He sculpted and painted window putty the exact color green of an angry Atlantic. The models seemed to pitch and roll as their bigger brethren had. He breathed life into these tiny models as he had built flexibility into the full size boats that allowed them to survive the gale. <br />
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When I first typed the moniker “grampy” it came up in red. Windows™ did not recognize it as a word. It suggested some possibilities; the first among them was “grumpy”. Now this is particularly poignant and this was a nickname we used for grampy sometimes, under our breath of course, me and my siblings. It was not meant in mean spirits but it reflected our frustration with him as he dealt with his frustration with us. In the summers my parents would take a week and we would drive to Yarmouth; where my grampy and grammy lived. My mother’s mother was a wonderful lady. She was short and round and we loved to visit her. She always had ice cream for us from Cook’s dairy in two quart bricks that you sliced with a knife usually strawberry and served with fresh berries. In those days ice cream was still made with cream; it was wonderful. I remember her eating lemon wafers and drinking what she called “White Rose Tea” which was hot water and milk. When we stayed with them grampy would stay in the porch and build boats. We were not allowed to move. He would get agitated if we broke his concentration. In time we took to camping when we visited grammy and grumpy.<br />
The problem with grandparents is that they tend to leave you before you are old enough to truly appreciate them and I think this was the case with grampy Lewis. I now have a hobby; an avocation (writing) that takes a good deal of concentration… Oh bother what is that noise. “Hey you kids, why don’t you play in someone else’s yard?’” Where was I … Oh yeah, writing takes a good deal on concentration, train of thought you know… “Oh for Pete’s sake… Hey you kids I’m trying to work; don’t you have parents?” I think in time I would have grown to understand grampy and his need for peace and quiet. “HEY KIDS QUIET!!!” I mean he was just a guy who had worked hard all his life who wanted to make a statement about his life and values and … <br />
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Oh my God! I am my own grandpa!Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-86330417708733258762011-04-13T19:23:00.000-07:002011-07-19T06:20:19.115-07:00Will eReaders Kindle a need to read?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFDrK6F8N14QA-WOKMHrv0LQX1he3GHkpkIwKeOduTLYXZYpUgpGKM9-Jdp5ggWw3E15MsrKLg9GXGvok3Ac2LWPpCrd1caalIHLNK3l4KMXZ1b27BFBDNke2ZmaflZ3lNZ0WTxuNiB6Fs/s1600/haifax+039.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left:1em; margin-right:1em"><img border="0" height="300" width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFDrK6F8N14QA-WOKMHrv0LQX1he3GHkpkIwKeOduTLYXZYpUgpGKM9-Jdp5ggWw3E15MsrKLg9GXGvok3Ac2LWPpCrd1caalIHLNK3l4KMXZ1b27BFBDNke2ZmaflZ3lNZ0WTxuNiB6Fs/s400/haifax+039.JPG" /></a></div><br />
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John Doull's in Halifax<br />
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First of all I am not a Luddite. What is a Luddite; you ask? Why you young whippersnappers. When I was your age I had to walk to school eight miles, uphill both ways. What is a whippersnapper anyways? Luddites were 16th century textile workers who often threw their sabots or wooden shoes into the wooden gears of the looms they were forced to work in order to intentionally damage them. This became known as sabotage. They were fighting the progress that was stealing the need for their talent and forcing them to accept a much lower standard of living. But I embrace change. I love gadgets. I own an eBook and an IPad and an IPod. I love them for what they are and what they can do. I love that you can download the latest book in seconds and often the old masters like Conan Doyle or Hemingway can be bought cheaply or even downloaded for free. I love that you can change font sizes, switch from single page to open book format and turn the backlight on and off. I love that you can have many books in one small device, eliminating the need to carry many heavy tomes. If you were; for example a businessman who enjoyed reading Harlequin romances you would not have to endure the disapproving glances of your fellow subway riders as the eBooks cover is totally generic. There is much to love about the new format. It’s shiny stuff attracts the jackdaw in me.<br />
The eBook and the Kindle is only the latest format to come along in the modern; build a better mousetrap race to improve everything. There have been books on vinyl, books on tape, and books on CD. All of which had their followers. There may have even been books on 8 track, I don’t remember I was too busy blow drying my hair (yes I had hair) and gluing shag carpet onto the back dash of my Gremlin. I must confess that as much as I like to be thought of as the cool Uncle with the IPad. I also have a collection of books that fit into a different category. It has a lot going for it too. It requires no batteries, is recyclable, can be read in the bathtub and will not crash on you. They are called books on paper. <br />
All right so I might be a bit of a Luddite. I once threw a pair of red plastic Crocks in the fan belt of my F-150 when it refused to start. I love BOOKS! I love the feel of a paperback in my back pocket, to be whipped out while riding on top of a wagon full of hay so I wouldn’t waste the five minute ride back to the barn. I loved leaning against a giant Oak on campus and stealing a few minutes from a busy school day to spend with anything other than required reading. I love the smell of new books their spines still tight and their pages crisp. I love the smell of old books their pages like cloth from repeated use. Used books and; ooooooooh, used book stores. I am drooling thinking of their cluttered stacks. Give me a good honest used book store any day. Like John W. Doulls on Barrington Street in Halifax. It is everything a used book lover could want. There are book shelves; to be sure, miles of them spread over two floors. But the books don’t end there. Books are over door frames and in piles in the aisles. There are boxes of new acquisitions in the front window, still unfiled. John is a man well suited to his calling he is bearded and bookish and ask him, just ask him for that coveted volume; that treasured tome. He will know exactly where to find it. In the world of used books I am a man with tunnel vision. When I approach most store owners cringe. They want customers with wide and varied interests. They wantmen and women who search the stacks with binoculars not a magnifying glass. They want multiple sales and wide interests. But they also need the guys like me. Guys like me who will shell out often more than a hundred bucks for the right book; albeit a very specific book. <br />
I first crossed John’s path a fair many years ago. I had leant a copy of my favorite book to a friend and that friend had not returned to book. Now before you think my friend some sort of cad, some unfeeling bum let me explain. The book was what you might say less than great condition. It was a paperback copy of Fishing With Gregory Clark by the reporter and correspond ant Gregory Clark. It was the Totem Press edition and it had seen better days. Better days when it had been bleached by summer sun and soaked in spring rains. In battered my hip pocket while hiking back to the lake. It was stained with bug dope from days when the fish weren’t biting but the flies were. It’s pages were soft like cloth and it sort of wilted in your hand when you held it. It was tired but like I feel at the end of a long day, it must have been satisfied; proud, fulfilled. It had lived up to the promise of its’ author. It had provided me with countless hours of joy. I knew every story in it by heart. Stories like Bick’s Crick, The Purist or A Sportsman is One. When it was gone it was like a piece of me was gone. <br />
My hopes were not high when I walked into Doullls. I made my way to the second floor where the sporting section was. I had spent a wonderful twenty minutes lost in the stacks of books. For books are everywhere here. They are on window sills and on door frames; in piles on the floors. The place smells, but not of must or even dust but of venerable age. It smells just the way a used/rare/antique book store should. When I handed my books to the lady clerk she said; matter-of-factly. “Did you find everything you were looking for?” “Well, no actually.” I replied a little hesitantly. She allowed her eyes to rise from the fly page she was penciling a selling price on as is the habit in the trade. “Oh?” she asked cocking an eyebrow. “I was looking for Fishing With Gregory Clark” I stated as if it were a can of Campbell’s soup. “Do you know it?” I asked. She did not; from the look on her face. It was then that I noticed John. He was standing behind her and he was beaming.”I do!” he said with some pride. I like a man who loves books. “Do you have it?” I asked hopefully. “I do.” He replied without the exclamation point. “There!” He pointed to a stack of boxes by the door. “Just arrived.” He whispered conspiratorially. “A widow clearing out her husband’s treasures.” He took the top off an apple box full of hardbound books. The revelation that it had come from a Widow did not surprise me. Clark had been a veteran of the First World War, a correspondent in the second and was one of the most widely read Canadians in the thirties, forties and Fifties. He had never retired not officially anyways. He died in his eighties about the time that I had discovered him. “First edition, hardcover with dust jacket.” John said proffering the book. I took it from him with reverence. It was like being handed the family Bible. I opened the cover. There was no notation yet on the fly leaf. John noted my glance and quickly added “I haven’t marked it yet.” “It is for sale?” I enquired. “They’re all for sale.” He said with a grin. “Seventeen dollars sound fair?” It did indeed and I nodded. John wasn’t finished. “You might be interested in these. He took three more books out of the box all hardcovers and all in as good condition. “I’ll do the three for forty five.” “Done.” I replied. He had sold four books in less than a minute. <br />
There have been other memorable finds in Doull’s “Fun with Dick and Jane” for my wife. He would save many other copies of Greg Clark for me. I look for them every year. John has an inner sanctum where he keeps the good stuff. I have never been able to walk in but I have seen in when he has fetched a pricy piece of antique or collectable prose. The book is also an artifact. It has a story to tell that is writ large on it’s’ pages but not in ink; not leastways in the publisher’s ink. Books often bear inscriptions. Most are by their authors but also by people gifting a book to another. I have often found these moving or puzzling or both. An endorsement from a parent wishing that a child get as much joy from a book as they had; which begs the question “Did they?” An endorsement of a special book given on a special day; a graduation or a wedding or anniversary that leaves me feeling voyeuristic when I read it. There are sometimes student’s notes and underlined passages and I love to read these to see if the reader got the same thing out of the book or passage that I did. I often think of the widow who sold her husband’s books and how his once loved copies of Greg Clark had found a new and welcome home. I wonder what he would think of a second generation falling in love with the author’s works and would he be happy that they had found a good home. I once had to pack up the books and music of a deceased colleague and I could not help but feel a connection to a man I had never met because we owned so many of the same books and CDs. How that apple box was like a biography of that woman’s lost love. I wish I could have looked through it with more detail. <br />
Very often I come across other artifacts in used books. So many things get used as book marks. I have found letters and bills, shopping lists and a photo of a child. I have found movie and theater tickets. One day I ran across Barrington in the rain while waiting for the bus. I bought a book from Doull’s and returned in time to catch the number ten Dartmouth which was always late when it rained. Inside the book was a bus ticket from exactly ten years earlier. It was for the very bus I was sitting on. Had someone read this very book on this very bus ten years ago that day? It sent a shiver down my spine. I once paid five bucks for a book only to find a ten dollar American bill inside the book. On another occasion in Doull’s I spotted a copy of “The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes” the exact edition that my beloved Grandmother had given me as a child. I had read it until it fell apart, and every other Holmes book that Conan Doyle had written. I scooped the book up with great joy and it still graces my bookshelf. It is a treasured memory of my Grammy. <br />
None of this will ever happen with a Kindle or eReader. No one will hand their IPad to a friend when they are done with it, like they do a book. There will be no story written in the flyleaf of a Kindle. No tear stains on the pages. No poignant notes as bookmarks. I doubt the electronic media will kill the paper book no more than vinyl or books on tape did. They will do what they do best and hopefully spread the good word of great writers to a new generation. There is always a price for progress. The phone can keep you connected but it costs you some privacy. The jet plane gets you there faster but you lose some of the leisure of a trans-Atlantic voyage. Progress is good but I hope the new mousetrap does not kill the old one entirely. We still have the option to take a cruise or write a letter. Hopefully when I am dead and gone someone will walk into a used bookstore and ask for my copy of Fishing With Gregory Clark. Maybe there will be an owner like John whose eyes will sparkle when he opens the box. I promise the new owner not to cackle too loud when he or she opens the cover. There is nothing like good, old fashioned progress.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-75487895120968183472011-01-27T18:19:00.001-08:002011-01-27T18:22:04.828-08:00If ifs and buts were candy and nuts...Nothing marks the passing of time like Christmas. It is the exclamation point on the sentence that is the year. Each Christmas, like each year has its’ distinguishing features that mark it from all the rest. There are, for most of us the magical Christmases of youth. Defined and frozen in memory with the joy of the season. But in each passing year there is some moment which recaptures; or comes close, the magic of youth. The unspoiled promise that catches the spirit of the season. Even now; with childhood a distant memory I still seek out that moment. I usually find it too. Though not always where I might expect…<br /> Being the manager of a former HBC post on the banks of the Liard River in the southern NWT I found myself living in a house that I have lived before and since. In corporate lingo it is colloquially called a DB12. I do not even know what the DB stands for. I do know they come in several different layouts. Most have four bedrooms. It was such a house that I lived in on the banks of the Liard. We also owned a tiny dilapidated trailer which the local children called the leggo block because of its’ blue color and the fact that it had virtually no windows. A flood had left the trailer somewhat the worse for wear and the company decided to build a new house for my assistant. When I heard how much they were going to spend I told them they were crazy. I could get them an existing house with land for less than half that much. They called my bluff. I knew of two houses for sale and about what the owners wanted for them. I put it in writing and sent it off to headquarters at the center of our universe and coincidentally, the center of Canada at Winnipeg. In due course they asked me to get a professional involved. I found a real estate agent who had always wanted to come for a visit I offered him a bed and a decent meal and he looked at the two properties and set a price. <br /> We ended up buying a two story log home nestled in the woods. It had belonged to an old friend and helped him out of a scrape so it was a good deal all around. I would take the cottage in the woods and my assistant would have the venerable DB12. I loved the change. My first day off I wandered out onto my deck, coffee in hand and turned to my left to see a bull moose not thirty feet away. There is something surreal when you are half awake about staring at something that huge. I took another sip of java. I closed my eyes. I opened them again, he was still there, chin resting on my clothesline. “Cheers!” I said raising my mug. “Thanks for the welcome to the neighborhood.” As I walked the deck I planned where the bird feeders would go. I hung my black powder rifle on the wall, my Bearskin rug. It really was starting to look homey.<br /> Summer had fled the arctic when one evening my friend Scott and I were sitting around the open plan living room a birch fire crackling in the woodstove. He pointed at the front wall with the neck of his beer bottle “You know you gotta have a big tree this year!” I was floored. I hadn’t even given Christmas a thought yet. Scott was famous for his trees. He too lived in a log house. A beautiful log house. He too had an open plan living room with a loft. He too had twenty foot ceilings. “There aren’t many of us who can. It’s your duty!” He said this like we were facing the Carthaginians at the battle of Zama. “My duty?” I repeated meekly. “Say it properly, MY DUTY!” he repeated. I was warming to the idea, the concept if not the logistics. “MY DUTY!” I declared and we clinked bottles. As I swallowed I was running the logistics through my mind. What had I gotten into?<br /> Christmas approached as it always did, not on kitty cat paws like the fog, more like the piano or giant anvil in a Roadrunner cartoon, just boom a swirl of dust, the Roadrunner sticks his tongue out at you a few times and it is there. To tell the truth I had not figured out any of the what, where when and how of getting an eighteen foot fir tree into my living room. Scott was undaunted. At our every meeting he raised his thumb and gave me a surreptitious wink. It was like we were part of a fraternity. He would whisper to me “two weeks to tree day” then “Ten days to tree day.” It was like the doomed man watching his last hours ticking down. On tree day minus one Scott came over again. We were sitting in my living room like before so I came right out and asked “How the heck do we get a twenty foot tree into my living room?” He laughed. “I am the master of the Christmas tree. Do not worry grasshopper you are in good hands. I have it all worked out .We use my truck.” It was a 16 foot body job. “How does that help, won’t it be too short?” I queried. “Oh ye of little faith, am I not the master?” he said with a smile that some could have seen as a little bit twisted. “Yes master, but how do you get an 18 foot tree into a 16 foot truck?” I replied. He was glowing now. He seemed to take on the demeanor of a mad scientist. “The same way I got that 18 foot canoe in, remember?” I did in fact remember. I remember the same look on his face when he opened the door that time too. “Alright master how do we stop all the needles falling off in the cold?” We both had been up north long enough to know that in the extreme cold up here trees get very dry and can lose all the needles when suddenly warmed up. “Grasshopper, grasshopper, you have no faith in my powers. We put the tree in the truck. TWO FULL DAYS before we bring it in. We warm it up gradually with the space heater. We then bind the limbs when they are supple and we bring it in butt first through that!” He said this with a smile snapping around and pointing to the sliding patio door with a flourish like the prosecutor at the Salem trials yelling “Witch!” <br /> I had to admit it sounded good. I couldn’t think of a rebuttal. As we parted he added “When you can snatch the pine cones from my hand it will be time for you to go.” I was shaking my head as he started his truck. I slept fitfully dreaming of giant evergreens busting holes in my roof and knocking over appliances. When I awoke Scott was already at the door. “What are you waiting for? I thought you were going to sleep all day!” he said brushing by me. “Just how long have you been out there?” I asked pouring us both a coffee. “Travel mugs, grasshopper!” He said handing it back to me. “We are burning daylight!” He added this last part in a very bad John Wayne impersonation. I dressed while he paced. He seemed a man possessed. When I came down stairs he looked me straight in the eye and said “I love the smell of balsam in the morning, it smells like; VICTORY!” He spun on his heel and fled. I followed as quickly as I could. He nearly bounced into the cab. I swung in beside him. “Do you have any place in mind?” I asked holding my hands out to the defroster. “Any place in mind?” He replied mockingly. “I have thought of nothing else since the night we hatched this crazy scheme!” He said his knuckles white on the wheel. We rose out of the valley, still shrouded in winter ice fog, its’ residents still asnooze in their beds as we left Whoville behind. “We are just cutting a tree.” I replied calmly. “We are not pulling off the great train robbery.” “But not just any tree!” Scott added with what can only be described as a maniacal laugh. “This will be a tree that people will talk about for years!” The truck reached the junction and Scott turned left towards Fort Simpson and punched the gas. <br /> Now Scott brings our freight some weeks as he and his partner are our freight handlers. But he drives the road to Fort Nelson B.C. not the Fort Simpson road. If he had found a tree here then he had to have made a special trip to find it. At this point, half frozen and only half awake I wasn’t sure if I was impressed or scared by this realization. We drove quite a ways. The highway follows the contours of the valley, the land to the driver’s side falling off quite dramatically giving us a beautiful view of the picturesque valley the tree tops capped with marshmallow snow. Scott’s eyes followed the contours out his door. We came upon a stream, now just a strip of still white snow passing under the bridge we were crossing. “THERE!” Scott breathed more than spoke. “See it! THERE!” In fact I did not see it. But Scott had not waited for my reply. He had parked the truck set the brake and slid from the cab in one motion. He already had the back door open when I rounded the rear of the truck. He appeared above me in the box of the truck with the biggest power saw I had ever seen. He already looked huge as I stared up at him. The power saw made him look like leatherface from Texas Chainsaw Massacre. “That’s not saw mate!” He said in an even worse Crocodile Dundee than his previous John Wayne. “That’s a saw!” I had to laugh. It was a saw alright!<br /> We followed a winding trail down the slope a piece. He leaned against a tree. “Look up, way up.” He said with a smile. “And I’ll call Rusty!” I added. “Is this it?” I said in awe. “None other grasshopper.” He replied readying the saw. I had to admit it was beautiful. He notched it and felled it expertly. He really had done this before. As I looked at the thing on the ground I said to Scott “Uh, Scott…” my voice trailed off. Scott got serious for a moment. He squeezed my elbow. “I am way ahead of you, buddy! I was a silviculturist remember? This tree is going to open up this area.” He said making an arc with the blade of the silent saw. “See these three little guys? Soon there will be three trees using the sunlight that just one tree was taking before. Trust an old hippy.” He had read my mind. We put the tree in the truck from corner to corner and damned if it didn’t just fit. <br /> He dropped me at my place. “I can’t wait to see it up!” I said from the ground as he leaned across the cab to close the door. “Patience grasshopper, patience.” He said tossing me my mug. Two days seemed like two years. I had almost forgotten how time could slow down at Christmas. Like it had when I was a boy. But true to his word two days later Scott returned. When he opened the back door of the truck I could see he had been busy the tree was trussed up like a hostage. I had already prepped the living room and shoveled a path to the patio doors and shoveled the deck. We carried the tree to the back door and straightened it out to its’ full length. We had to take the door off the track as it wouldn’t quite go through but eventually we had the tree in the room. Steve untrussed it. I stared at it in awe. It was magnificent. Huge. “How do we get it to stand up?” It had just occurred to me that the butt of this tree would never fit the tree stand that I had. It had to be six or eight inches wide. “Oh ye of little faith.” Scott chided me. “You are thinking backwards. We will not stand it up.” He said cryptically. “What then? Lay it down?” I asked. He wagged a finger and tut-tutted. “We will not stand the tree up we will hang it!” I thought for a minute. The top of the tree would be less than two feet from the roof log. “Brilliant!” I exclaimed. “I bet no one will even know!” “Yes.” Scott replied “But this must be our little secret. I have done it this way for years and no one was the wiser.” It certainly fooled me. We dummied up the base and put the tree in a wash basin full of water. We then took braided wire and put an eye screw in the roof log and secured it to the trunk mid way down the stem. The tree would actually swing if you pushed the base. It was a thing of beauty. Scott held out his hand. There were two cones in it. “From the top of your tree.” He said. “Only fire will open them up. I will show you the seeds when we roast them open.” I took the cones... “My work is done here grasshopper, you have snatched the cones from my hands it is time for me to go.” I laughed. “You tricked me!” I said. “It’s late.” He said and turned to go. <br /> I went to sleep with the whole house filled with the smell of evergreen. The reason that Scott had left early became apparent the next day. I called him. “As we speak I am staring at the pathetic box of decorations that usually fills my seven -footer.” I said. “Ah yes, there is one more rite of passage before you can be initiated into the two story tree club. That is the opening of the wallet ceremony. Good luck!” That night my friends gathered around and helped me decorate. I bought every string of lights and ornament in town. It still looked a bit Charlie Brownish, but everyone brought some decoration. Nothing new and nothing valuable I told everyone. There were hand-made decorations of paper and plastic balls of all sizes and colors. We hung all my Christmas cards on the tree. Dozens of candy canes, one of the nurses baked cookies with yarn in them that could be hung as ornaments, although a few did not make it to the tree. When we were done all gathered proclaimed it a good tree. Scott was the happiest of all. He got to turn on the power bar that lit the tree. Everyone oohed and ahhhed. <br /> I stepped back to take it all in. Not just the tree but the whole tableau. Scott on the couch with a Santa hat on, beaming; he had just initiated me into his club. The nurses admiring their handiwork. My golden retriever curled up in from of the wood stove. More friends pouring punch from a bowl. There it was, the moment I was waiting for. In that room in that moment, thousands of miles from family. Thousands of miles from the Christmases of my youth. In the laughter of my friends; in the peace of that inky arctic night, snug in that wonderful house so far it seemed from the icy winter winds outside, there was what I had been looking for. The magic of Christmas. It is always the last place you look.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-85600184982726151302010-12-08T19:33:00.001-08:002011-06-25T20:51:52.776-07:00I am a Marxist LennonistI am a Marxist Lennonist. Groucho Marx and John Lennon. Yeah. I know; it’s an old joke. But today when I awoke and sipped my morning coffee while reading my emails; I hummed along to a John Lennon tune on the radio. Moments later another Lennon tune was played. By the time a third tune was playing it occurred to me that something was up. Hearing an artist that you don’t hear everyday; say, three times in one hour usually means one thing: he or she is dead. Thirty years ago today I was driving in my tiny red 1978 Honda Civic when; like today, I heard a third Lennon song. I was on my way home from Dalhousie University. I hadn’t been paying attention to the D.J. I was pulling in my Parents driveway when I put two and two together. I dashed upstairs and turned on the 12” TV in my room. There was a reporter standing on the New York street in front of Lennon’s apartment where he met his tragic end. I was stunned. I sat on the edge of my bed and felt the horrible irony of that moment. <br /> So today’s playing of his songs made me flashback to that event. I remembered too the following summer when I was in the same car driving home from the Mall. When I had gotten into the car a Harry Chapin song was playing. A huge fan of his; I was delighted. But when I turned through the busy intersection towards home and another song came on the radio, I didn’t need to hear the D.J. say the words. I pulled off the road and rested my forehead on the steering wheel. I knew he was dead. When I was ready to drive; I went to work. Misery loves company. I sought out my friend Dave whom I had infected with the Chapin bug while we were unloading freight. I would play tapes on my boom box. “Did you hear the news?” I asked. “Harry Chapin is dead.” Dave was saddened to hear the news. I was busy that afternoon; I had a dozen things to do and this sad event was on my mind. When I returned to work for my nightshift I saw Dave again. Forgetting that I had already told him I called out “Hey Dave; did you hear? Harry Chapin is dead!” Always fast on his mental feet Dave called back “What: still?” <br /> But the death of John Lennon had the added twist of his being shot down. The man who asked a generation to “give peace a chance” had been shot down in cold blood. To top off the irony was the fact that Lennon had just released a new album; Double Fantasy only three weeks before his death. It was his first work since his self imposed withdrawal from the business five years earlier. I had just bought the album a week earlier. I had only bought it because a guy I knew told me it sucked. He was a terrible judge of music so I felt safe in spending twelve bucks. In the aftermath of Lennon’s murder songs like “Starting Over” and “Watching the Wheels” tugged at our heartstrings and drove home the immensity of what we had lost. <br /> Today when I heard the back-to-back Lennon songs I flashed back to that day thirty years ago and I understood what was happening. They were marking the thirtieth anniversary of Lennon’s murder. I say I understood what they were doing. It doesn’t mean that I condone it. I don’t think we should honor John by remembering his death. In his tribute song “Empty Garden” (Hey, Hey, Johnny) Elton John refused to mention the name of the man who shot Lennon. I agree with this. There is no need to immortalize him. In the song Elton says “its funny how one insect, can damage so much grain…” So much grain indeed. But I don’t think Lennon would have called him an insect. Only the day before he had signed a copy of Double Fantasy for him. Lennon would have understood that he was sick. In his diminished mental state it was almost no different than Lennon having been struck by a car. Lennon would have seen that they were both souls, both equals. If this man had been well he would not have done this terrible thing. <br /> If you want to honor a man like Lennon, honor his life and what he stood for not his death and what it says about humanity. Celebrate his birthday not his death day. Celebrate his birth not his death. Today when I heard those songs it was a bit like he died all over again. It made me terribly sad. I never met John Lennon. In a very real sense he only ever lived for me on a speaker, on the TV and on the printed page. I can still listen to him sing and when I do he is alive for me. He will never write another song but no one can take away the ones he did write. For me that means part of him is still alive.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-74903796510471349352010-09-28T21:21:00.001-07:002010-09-28T21:30:17.462-07:00Riparian entertainments<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilzEwJpLpc1RVkWNVo-bvjUP3uyfY8jAmzz9Fs34Y_PvBMs1gUKCUO4-1rv87R1cYIIEVsFT_nkKUa7Gbpelz_SFlUfsUEvF8S3pz3m61UeA3gNAfNwan_wYuknGG9sGX86hJxyIGb_Y6a/s1600/DSC07679.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilzEwJpLpc1RVkWNVo-bvjUP3uyfY8jAmzz9Fs34Y_PvBMs1gUKCUO4-1rv87R1cYIIEVsFT_nkKUa7Gbpelz_SFlUfsUEvF8S3pz3m61UeA3gNAfNwan_wYuknGG9sGX86hJxyIGb_Y6a/s200/DSC07679.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5522187965579444578" /></a><br />Riparian (r -pâr - n) adj. Of, on, or relating to the banks of a natural course of water. There that’s your educational tidbit for the day, kind of a vitamin for the brain. That is of course if you did not know what riparian meant. If you already knew I apologize for being so pedantic. What’s that; pedantic? Oh for Pete’s sake pe•dan•tic adj.: overly concerned with minute details or formalisms, esp. in teaching. Right enough of the Merriam Webster stuff. Where was I? Oh yeah, riparian. I must confess that I have only known the word these ten years past. I came across the word from that sage source of learning and culture Hyacinth Bucket; ah sorry, Bouquet. From the TV series Keeping Up Appearances. In typical Hyacinth fashion she had arranged a “Candlelight Supper” to take place on the river bank. Also in typical Hyacinth fashion it turns into a debacle. But the word has stuck with me. Where you live shapes your life in many ways; both subtle and obvious. You cannot live beside the ocean without it changing your day; your weather and your outlook; likewise the river. The Deh Cho or big river as the various native nations that dot its’ shores call it. Three weeks ago a retired Firefighter from Germany came paddling down the river. He showed up at our store a bit haggard. I engaged him in conversation and he informed me that he had been on the river for two and a half months. During that time he had been attacked by bears no less than six times. His tent was shredded as was some of his gear. He needed to call home and wanted to know if there was a pay phone in town that worked. Our phone was out of order so I offered him the use of my office phone. But first I had a treat in store for him. “Where are you from in Germany?” I asked. He replied that he was from a small refinery town twenty kilometers from Cologne. “I have someone I want you to meet.” I said as I walked him into our staff room for coffee. I introduced him to Gerry our Grocery guy who is a jack of all trades and was born in Cologne. It was like magic. The haggard look was gone. So too was his English which was very good; but not being his mother tongue I could see he was struggling. You don’t get a lot of practice on the river talking to bears. His face lit up as the two men talked. I excused myself and returned to work. I was smiling too. Every now and then I eyed the phone lines to see if he was using the phone. An hour later he still was not. I walked past and knew that the conversation was flowing from him like water. Having no one at all to speak to he was happy to tell someone of his experiences. Even better, it was in his first language. <br /> Eventually he used the phone and talked to his wife. A very different man greeted me when he was done. He was at once elated and energized by talking with Gerry but also chastened by his wife’s concern. He was to have been done by now but the setbacks and bear attacks had cost him time. “How far to Inuvik, please?” he asked. “Well; I think it’s just over 700 kilometers. If you need to do laundry or anything you could use my place.” I offered. “You Canadians are so kind. Since I started in Jasper I could not get over how kind you all are.” He was very grateful. I told him to bring his water jugs and that Gerry would take him and his food back to the river. Gerry went one better he gave the man some warm dry clothes and his own compass as the man had lost his in a bear attack. He would leave by night as the days were still twenty four hours long. That evening I took the dog that I am looking after for a walk on the beach. I spotted his canoe and gear and made for it. Not surprisingly Gerry was there. “You all seem to congregate on the river”, he noted. It was true people in town use the river nearly as often as they use the roads. It is; in the most literal sense, a highway. It brings in the food and fuel that sustains the community. It is also the cheapest way to travel to adjacent towns. The town owes its’ existence to the river; or more accurately to the two rivers; the Bear and the MacKenzie. The community was built as a fur trading post and in those days the Hudson Bay Company chose the confluence of two rivers for purely mercenary reasons. It doubled the traffic and was an easy place to find. <br /> In the evenings and on our days off my wife and I love to walk the banks of the river. Our riparian entertainments change as the seasons change. In the spring there is the breakup. When the river sheds its’ mantle of ice and snow and burst forth with crusting awesome fury. Huge sheets of ice weighing as much as a freighter crash into each other and the shore. The sound of boulders rolling along the river bottom sounds like thunder. The open water brings the ducks and geese and swans by the hundreds of thousands. Life is returning to the north. As we walk the banks we watch overhead as honking flocks of geese sing to us. The banks of the river are at that time piled high with ice. Huge plates blacked with mud soak the strengthening sun and melt into melodious “candle” ice which is ice melted into tapered icicles by the dripping melt water. The elongated pieces are tapered like candles. They break away and fall to the ground with a soothing tinkle. Then before you know it they are gone. About this time the trees begin to bud and the color is breathtaking. More neon yellow than green. Every year I take a hundred photos and none do it justice. One day perhaps I will pick up a paintbrush and try to do it justice. Summer brings wildflowers to the banks and children and pets. The laughter of playing children is music too, The river is shallow here and they play and gambol in the water when summer climes are here.<br /> This season too brings a change of sound and color. The trees will go from the dark green of the arctic summer to the vibrant yellow of fall. The sun begins to set again for the first time in months and the near horizontal light comes through the yellow willows and poplar and gives the banks of old man river a glow that is so enticing that it is hard to resist. Lina and I took a long walk one Sunday and decided then and there to return the next week to spend the entire day on the river. We watched ducks playing amidst the drift wood. We listened as a flock of over one hundred and fifty geese flew not thirty feet overhead. We built a driftwood fire and roasted hot dogs. We lie on a blanket on the sand and let the river; the driftwood and all of our cares go by. We saw boats and barges. We looked up at a contrail in the sky. A rare thing in these parts and we wondered where it was going and dreamt that we were going somewhere exotic. We napped on the cool sand and let the last warm rays of sun warm our faces. Soon the giant that runs beside us will sleep too.<br /> Today our old warehouse which once housed the store rises above the town on the highest ground. This is typical. It offers a great view to trappers paddling the river and was dry in times of flood. Smart guys those early Bay Boys. Even now the communities along the Deh Cho are few and very far between. The old buildings are still there still serving the purpose that there white walls and red roofs were meant for; to mark the existence of civilization. Our German friend was right the river still is the center of activity. I for one shall continue to take advantage of its’ riparian entertainments.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-87012329190051414732010-09-27T22:28:00.000-07:002010-09-27T22:29:16.212-07:00The ovationDistrict tour. The words struck fear into the heart of a Hudson’s Bay clerk. The district tour was the semiannual time for the big boys to visit the chaps out in the trenches. We imagined them descending from ivory towers in the clouds to join us muddy footed peons at the front lines. The tour was their chance to see if we were toeing the line. Now I may be biased; but I feel we were toeing the company line. Whether they would have seen it that way depends on where in the sand you think that the line is drawn. We worked hard. Long hours in trying conditions. Doing stock checks and inventory in unheated warehouses for hours on end at minus fifty five. It was mind numbing work at hand numbing temperatures. Unloading freight planes on windy winter runways. Going home to ancient housing where the furnace worked when it felt like it. Putting up with power failures and brown outs; being eaten by flies; while you were working indoors! They; of course saw none of this. To them we spent the days skylarking; young slackers wet behind the ears. Not like in their days when it was ten miles to work; uphill both ways; blah, blah, blah… <br /> Now of course while we were doing all this; unloading planes, putting together snowmobiles, bikes and BBQs. Delivering sofas to houses with doors too small to get them through. Carrying refrigerators up two flights of stairs that hadn’t seen a snow shovel all season. Doing all this in dress slacks, dress shirts and a smart tie. At least according to protocol. In fact; the first day on the job I had my best dress shirt practically torn off my back by a swinging door in the grocery department that had a jagged piece of sheet metal covering it. On another occasion the door tore the shoe off my foot. All I was left with was the laces tied round my ankle. The District Manager had been partly responsible for letting the door go when I had an eighty pound television in my hands. He did tell me to go charge out a new pair as it was the only pair I owned. I was making the princely sum of $10,500.00 per annum. No we were supposed to buy fur and mop floors in a shirt and tie. You know from the way I said it that we bloody well didn’t. But here’s a trick. Taught me by a canny older Manager whom I held in some esteem. You do wear a shirt and tie occasionally, randomly not every day; but perhaps on a day when you are not busy. You do it for a reason. You do it so the customers see you in them often enough that they do not walk up in the middle of district tour; in full earshot of the high and mighty and say “What the hell is that around your neck? Are the bosses in town or something?” Nothing changes the demeanor of a tour like such an event. Hours of waxing floors and filing paper can be flushed away in a minute by so hap hazard a remark. You must; in life, endeavor to learn from the mistakes of others so you do not have to suffer the feel of the lash yourself. The lash I refer to is not literal; but rather apocryphal. Although I have heard rumors…<br /> You must remember that the Hudson’s Bay Company (or to be precise: The Governor and Company of Adventurers of England trading into the Hudson’s Bay) has a long and storied history. With that history comes a lot of baggage. Bags and more musty old bags full of traditions; protocols and precedents. The managers ate on red chine, the clerks on blue. You couldn’t fly the company coat of arms unless the Governor had visited your post. There were many rules going back into dusty antiquity. The district tour was no exception. There was a definite pecking order to these things. The lead would be taken by the Vice President, who was to be referred to by the affectionate moniker of “Mr. Vice President”. Next would be the General Manager who could alternately be referred to as “Mr. General Manager” as his wife did; or Mr. Insert last name here. The District Manager was likewise referred to as Mr. So & So. Then came the Store Manager; in those days a position of some importance and respect in the eyes of the locals but not in the eyes of head office to whom you were just Ralph or Peter or whatever. Me; I was at the bottom of the pecking order and was generally not referred to at all. Now there is a saying in plumbing; stuff runs downhill and pay day’s on Friday. Believe me the stuff really does run downhill. <br /> The V.P.: as I will call him to save time, would turn to the G.M. as I will call him to save time and say “Wah Wah Wah.” (just think of it like the muted trombone sound from a Charlie Brown cartoon). Then the G.M. turns to the D.M. as I will call him to save time, and says (even though we all heard the V.P. as we are all five feet away) “Wah Wah Wah!” . The D.M. turns to the S.M. as I will call him to save time; and says “Wah Wah Wah!!” (Even though we already heard the V.P. tell the G.M. and the G.M. tell the D.M.)Then the S.M. turns to me whom I shall call me to save time and to protect the innocent; and says “Wah Wah Wah!!!” Even though we already heard the V.P. tell the G.M. and the G.M. tell the D.M. and the D.M. tell the S.M.) I then turn around and as there is no one lower than me on the totem pole I say nothing. There you have now experienced a District Tour of The Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading into the Hudson’s Bay whom I will call the H.B.C. to save time. <br /> Now I remember one particular time when we were being graced with the presence of the V.P. on a district tour. Some days prior to the tour starting the D.M. (not to be confused with the G.M. or the S.M.) was visiting the store on routine business. We had an elderly gentleman who ran the gas station. It was the perfect job for an elderly gentleman. The hours were short and the pace was slow. Now I should give you a little background on this gas station. If you were thinking concrete with a roof and fancy pumps; forget it. The gas station was a flat space in front of a fenced tank farm. It featured a tiny shed big enough for a cash register and some oil. Inside that shed on any given afternoon were half a dozen elders. They sat on cases of oil and smoked (yes smoked) and played cards. The number of cases of oil on inventory in that shed had everything to do with the number of men playing cards and nothing whatsoever to do with sales. Around this on all sides was a morass of mud. Wheel ruts more than a foot deep carved through it. In spring and fall only the bravest or most fool hardy ventured in there on wheels. Most sensible folk carried gas cans in and filled their rides themselves. Silas our venerable old gas man frequently wore hip waders to work at this time of year. Oddly no one complained. It was how things had always been done. Now that evening when the D.M. saw Silas making his way into the back door of the store with his cash drawer to make his closing deposit he thought he would lift Silas’ spirits with the words he was most likely to want to hear. “We will be here next week for District tour!” The D.M. piped cheerily. Stony silence greeted him. “Don’t forget to dress for the occasion!” The D.M. meant it as a joke. But it is hard sometimes to frame a joke when you lack one crucial ingredient; a sense of humor. Silas turned in his deposit and left without a word. <br /> On the appointed day the V.P. the G.M. and the D.M. arrived in the morning. They did the usual tour of the facilities. When we were ready to tour the outside of the property we filed out V.P. followed by G.M. followed by D.M. followed by S.M. followed by me. When we got there we were greeted by a sight that none of us would ever forget. There was Silas; all six foot four of him resplendent in a three piece blue serge suit with white pinstripes. A gold watch chain draped from vest pocket to vest pocket. On his head was a black homburg hat. On his legs was a pair of filthy green hip waders! He was slogging through the mud with a full Gerry can of gas in each hand. The suit on closer inspection smelled of camphor and I fancied I could see the bulge of a couple of mothballs in the breast pocket. I fancy that it was his demob (short for demobilization) suit that was given each vet when the returned to civilian life after the war. What could they do? The V.P. stood without so much as a “Wah Wah Wah!” He in his blazer and tie was totally outclassed. Silas would not have looked out of place on the cover of Gentleman’s Quarterly (albeit the 1946 edition). He was a magnificent sight. With his erect posture and grey temples he looked like a bank manager (from the waist up). Then the strangest thing happened. The V.P. looked at the G.M. and began to clap his hands. The G.M. looked at the D.M. and although the D.M. could hear the V.P. he too began to clap. The D.M. turned to the S.M. and although he could hear the V.P. and the G.M. he too began to clap. Then the S.M. turned to me and although I too could hear the V.P. and the G.M. and the D.M. he too began to clap. As there was no one else to look at and as the V.P. and the G.M. and the D.M. and the S.M. were standing there clapping I made it unanimous. Silas got the first standing ovation in the long and now even more storied history of the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading into the Hudson’s Bay.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-84511051719149196772010-09-25T22:50:00.000-07:002010-09-25T22:52:23.381-07:00Taken for grantedThe things that you take for granted always surprise you; because, well, you take them for granted. Gumball machines for example. When I was growing up they were everywhere. Every grocery store had them often a small bank of them. They also popped up anywhere that people had to wait. The Canadian Tire had one in the service department where the auto bays were the room smelling manly like grease and cigarette smoke. I remember dad giving me a nickel to get a shiny blue gumball while we got the winter tires put on the Austin one year. There was one at the KFC except they didn’t call it KFC in those days just Kentucky Fried Chicken.; the advertising gurus had not yet thought up that nugget. You could stare at the brightly colored gum while waiting for your order. The Koolex Cleaners had twinned ones that had peanuts in it; barbeque and regular. <br />I remember once when I had found a dime in the K-Mart parking lot. Not a bright shiny dime, but an old dirty one with sugar from cotton candy on it, that is why everyone else failed to see it. Now a dime was a lot of money back then. My allowance was a dime twice a week. One on Dad’s payday; for he was paid every week, and one on Saturday so I could go to the corner store after baseball or road hockey with my friends. So an extra dime was a fortune to me. Plus it was found money. Now your weekly allowance was like your weekly wages; hard earned money anticipated for days. You had spent it many times in your mind; imagining how good the Popsicle or bag of chips would taste. Your allowance had to be spent on something of substance. Maybe the tiny black licorice flavored jaw breakers that were three for a penny at Leo’s store. Never around the corner where the other store only gave you two. What a rip-off! Mint leaves were two for a penny. Mojos; the tiny ones were three for a penny too. A licorice pipe was two cents and was a special treat when you were really flush like when you had a quarter. Those were rare times. <br />We could raise extra money by combing the ditches for pop bottles. Two cents for a small one a whole nickel if you struck the mother lode of a quart bottle! But found money was a different thing altogether. You had carte blanche! You were free to spend it foolishly; even morally obligated to use it for something you would never normally buy, not with your own money anyways. When I looked up the filthy, sticky dime in my hand I saw them, shiny chrome; glass and red painted metal. A bank of maybe six gumball machines. But not just gumballs. There were toys. Toys in tiny cunning capsules small enough to fit through the chute with the chrome door that read “Thank You” on the front. I made a beeline for the machine before my Mom could get through the checkout. She would not approve; would not understand the moral imperative of spending found money foolishly. She had grown up in the depression and knew the value of a dime. I dropped to my knees in front of the capsule machine and stuck the filthy dime in the slot. The machine had a picture of its’ contents on a cardboard card. There were soldiers and cowboys, plastic cars a lucky token and a tiny baby bottle. I turned the mechanism and opened the door expecting my treat. At first nothing came out so I began to jiggle the knob. The door was supposed to be closed to allow the toy to slide down. I did not understand. I began to turn harder and the wheel began to spin I kept turning. Nothing! I was appalled. My face got hot and I dropped the “thank You” door. I heard a clink as the toy hit the door and I opened it and removed it; stuffing it in my pocket without a look. Then I heard the same sound. I opened the door and another capsule was sitting there. I stuffed it in my pocket too. This happened perhaps a dozen times my pockets bulged with the booty. <br /> I stood up and my conscience smote me. I went into the entrance where a lady stood behind a dais stapling shoppers other bags as they entered to prevent shoplifting. I stood there politely waiting until she was free. “I think your machine is broken!” I said with as much authority as I could muster. “That one!” I said pointing. The store was busy and she had more adults waiting to have their packages stapled. “Thank you dear.” she said patting my head. “I will put a sign on it when I get a minute.” I was frustrated; I stuck a hand in my pocket to show her all the capsules full of God only knew what. Before I could protest I heard my Mother. “Come on your Father’s parked out front.” She wasn’t mad but she was serious so I slipped away from the smiling lady who was waving at me. I put my hands into my bulging pockets to hide the toys. <br /> It was like I had won the lottery, if they had lotteries in those days. My best friend Jed was totally jealous. There was a car and a truck a plastic ball glove of leather colored plastic with a baseball on a beaded chain that was for keys. I shared the duplicates with Jed to buy his silence not that he would have ever squealed. We were in hog heaven. We filled the capsules with fine dust and threw them at each other like they were grenades. The puff of dust like a puff of smoke. We had hours of fun. <br /> So when we got the first gumball machines in the store in Fox Lake I wasn’t ready for the reaction; even madness that ensued. When the salesman called we placed what we thought was a big order. The machine arrived on the winter road. We bundled it into the store and set it up right in front. It was huge! Six candy machines and four capsule machines. We filled them all. There were gumballs and jelly beans and hard candies. There were capsules with toys and rings and one mix which contained digital watches. This was the most popular. Our office was overwhelmed with kids wanting rolls of quarters and dimes. We had to empty the machines sometimes three times a day as we ran out of coins. We spent hours wrapping and counting coins. At the end of the first day our janitor swept the empty capsules into a pile and filled a garbage can with them using a snow shovel. You were wading through empty capsules ankle deep. I watched stunned as an elder kneeled in front of the machine and fed quarters in until he had the digital watch for his granddaughter; it was like watching someone play a VLT. <br /> After school the first day the teachers came to the store en masse to see the phenomenon for themselves. All day they had heard the stories of the wonderful new machines. Even the Nuns had to see it for themselves. The whole town was talking about the life changing event. By the second day we knew that the six month supply of candy and capsules would be gone before the end of the week so we placed a much larger order. The six month supply was gone in three days! It took more than a week for the fresh supplies to come. I thought that the ardor would be gone by then but the initial taste and the sudden famine only whetted appetites for the craze. But when supply kept up to demand the demand eventually slowed. We enjoyed the ride but were secretly relieved when the machines took a back stage to normal retailing. <br /> The first week we got phone calls from head office asking why sales were up so dramatically. Imagine their disbelief when we told them it was because of a gumball machine. Until they processed the invoices I still don’t think it sank in for them. But like the hula hoop and the Cabbage Patch kids this fad too subsided. Shortly before I moved a year later I heard a local youngster talking to a kid from nearby Garden River. “Oh wow! A gumball machine. When did you guys get that?” the out of towner asked. “Oh; that?” replied the homey. “We had that since I was a kid!” Like I said its funny the things you take for granted.Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-87286805212841874902010-09-25T00:20:00.000-07:002010-09-27T11:05:33.589-07:00You have to be lucky.It is the old argument; nature or nurture. Are true fishermen born or are they created? I have known both. I myself was born with a spoon in my mouth; not a silver one, more likely a Len Thompson #4, probably a five of diamonds. My Dad had me fishing as soon as I could walk. I was; pardon the pun “hooked”. But not all men and women are so lucky. Some were so deprived as children as not to be raised as piscators. (Pis`ca´tor n. A fisherman or angler) It has been my mission to convert some of these heathens, to bring some of the unwashed, the unholy into the inner circle of true anglers. To bring them to the light. But one must handle the unsaved with care. For if you leadeth them upon the waters of the Dead Sea (or dud sea) where the fish do not see fit to bite; you risk losing them as a convert. <br /> Gerard was one of my fellow employees at the restaurant. He was young and enthusiastic. He came from a large family and I had known all his siblings who had cycled through the place over the years. I; being somewhat older than Gerard must have cut a more senior figure. A wise old veteran. A Yoda-like figure. He was as clay and I was the potter. I did not choose some easy venue for his first outing. I chose a lake I had found while researching gold mining in my father’s hometown of Mount Uniacke. The lake had appeared on several aerial photos I looked up in the science library. I found it on a map. “Any fish in there?” I asked my Dad one day. “Lots, I used to fish for them when I was floating log booms down the lake to the mill; there.” Dad said pointing to a foot shaped cove at the south end of the lake. “Looks pretty remote.” I said. “Batter fishing. We built a corduroy road back to it in the thirties” I studied the map and figured it a good seven mile hike. The only thing that worried me was a series of lateral lines with three vertical lines splaying out of each. Designed to look like lily pads the indicated a swamp. The road ran straight through it. “Bound to be fish. No one goes there.” Dad said reassuringly. <br /> I planned the trip for late April, after exams. I thought it would offer a good chance of him getting his first fish. “You have had a deprived childhood. Depraved really. Your father never took you fishing! I should report him to child protective services!” Gerard’s father was in fact a fine man. A school teacher who went on to become school principal. ”Will we get fish?” Gerard asked wide eyed with anticipation. I tried to appear sage and inscrutable. “Ah well; there are no guarantees you know. Fishing is a sport of luck as well as skill. Even the best sportsmen are sometimes skunked.” I think I saw reverence in his eyes, but it could have been caused by the cigarette smoke in the break room, everyone smoked in those days. “Pack some garbage bags to keep your clothes and stuff dry. I had lent him a pack as he had none. How does one reach adolescence and not own a decent rucksack? <br /> We left super early. The sun was still abed when we took our gear out of the trunk. It was a perfect day for a hike in the woods. When the sun rose on a clear sky the horizon was pink as a salmon. “I don’t like the look of that.” I said to Gerard, pointing to the horizon. “There’s not a cloud in the sky.” He answered cheerily. “Red sky at night is a sailor’s delight. Red sky in the morning and the sailor takes warning.” I said sagely. The day stayed clear as we trekked our way along the trail. The old mine road was firm and good going being built virtually on the bedrock. When we turned off it the terrain began to change. What had appeared on the map started out as a broken line which indicated gravel road. This part was a dotted line which indicated a trail. The lily pads on the map soon became a full blown bog. Dead trees stuck up out of it. The place had strange echoes and one could see why swamps figure so prominently in horror movies. You could hear birds calling but never saw them. Every once in a while a great splash; just beyond your vision. There was no question of pursuing the splashes as stepping off the trail by so much as a foot meant sinking to your chest as we both soon found out. The old corduroy road; a road made by laying tree trunks across the roadbed had long since been claimed by the mire. Beavers had dammed streams and the water covered the old road a foot or more deep. What was left of the logs was slippery and rotten so they often broke underfoot and caused you to slip and slide. We were soon soaked. <br /> Gerard was a trooper he pushed on with no complaint. In fact I began to have remorse for dragging so innocent a young man on what was looking like a fool’s errand. I began to think of my act as the wise veteran and was racked with self doubt. But still the lake was there and we were going to make it. Eventually the road became higher and drier. We stopped and changed pants and socks. “Use the garbage bags for the wet clothes.” I told Gerard. We made good time the rest of the way and arrived at the lake before lunch. Gerard was keen to fish but there was something I did not like in the wind that had picked up. Nearly all the new leaves were upside down; a sure sign of rain. And there was something in the way that loon was calling that made me think rain. “Let’s pitch the tent and put up some firewood first.” I said. “The sky is clear, not a cloud.” Gerard said chipper as a schoolboy. He was in fact a schoolboy. Truth be told so was I; being a university junior. Gerard stood staring at the lake; an idyllic scene, water so clean you could drink it. Loons were swimming and diving in the cove. Beavers were carrying alder limbs to and fro. I unpacked the tent and put it up by myself. It was a poor excuse for a tent. One I’d had since junior high. Patched with thread it leaked like a sieve. The skies darkened as I finished. Gerard was not as chipper as he approached. ”You were right it looks bad” he said; a little quaver in his voice. “There’s a saying about Mount Uniacke weather. If you don’t like it; wait fifteen minutes. It will change.” I offered. We stored the gear and began to gather firewood as the rain started. It came down in sheets. We put what little wood we had under a tarp and went into the tent. We put on our rain gear and opened the food. “How about a cold lunch?” I asked. “We’ll build a fire when the rain eases and have some fresh trout!” Gerard brightened. We ate and made our way out in the rain to fish. We used floats but found the rain was hitting so hard that you couldn’t even see them so we just took to casting. The wind unfortunately was in our faces so the casting was impossible. We retired to the tent. <br />I produced a deck of cards and we played cards for a few hours. The rain lashed the tent mercilessly and the walls began to flap in the wind. It was hard to hear yourself talk. Water was constantly seeping in and I used a towel to mop it up. “Make sure all your dry clothes are in a good garbage bag.” I told Gerard. I began to regain some of my confidence as a woodsman. We used sterno to cook the supper as the wind was too strong for a fire. The warm food hit the spot and we lay out on our sleeping bags. The early start and long hike made for a good sleeping pill. We were soon asleep. <br /> I awoke with a start as peals of thunder rent the skies. The tent floor was wet and so were the sleeping bags. I mopped up and went out and tightened the guy lines. The lightening lit the sky steadily. “Right over head!” I yelled as I re-entered the tent. “No space between the thunder clap and the lightening. There would be little sleep now. The storm went on for hours. The lightening quit before dawn and the rain slackened to a steady heavy drizzle. I used the sterno to cook eggs. “Sorry the bacon is rubbery.” I said as I handed Gerard his plate. “Sorry about the weather too.” I added. “Just wait fifteen minutes it will change.” He added smiling. What a trooper I thought, “Let’s fish!” I said and grabbed my rod. I baited up and cast my line. The lake was calmer now and my bobber hits the water with a splash. The line dropped and tightened as the bait descended. The float slid across the surface as the weight of the bait pulled it directly over the line. But the bobber kept sliding across the surface. I raised my rod tip and yelled “FISH!” Gerard came running. I was into a good fish and the water boiled. When I finally landed him I put him in Gerard’s hands. We stood over it like it was the crown jewels. “Look at that! Did you ever see anything more beautiful?’” I could tell by his eyes he hadn’t. It was a symphony of color. Its’ back so green it was nearly black. Its’ upper sides green yet gold at the same time, smattered with those dots with the iridescent blue rings like inset semi precious stones. The belly creamy with two fins at the throat as white as alabaster and tipped with blood red. What a sight! Three quarters of a pound of animal fury. So electrifying as to make all this worth it. A pang of guilt hit me. “This should have been your fish.” I said as I lay it in the creel. “There really is a lot of luck involved.” I said to reassure him. Not that there isn’t skill. The way you cast, where you cast. How fast you retrieve. What lure to use, what line to use. There are a thousand factors. But I have seen expert fishers with ten thousand dollars worth of gear bested by a kid with a willow pole and a bare hook with a piece of bacon on it. Go figure. <br /> “Luck is huge. Without it; nothing, nada, zilch. Two guys fish together and one guy gets them all, the other guy often gets nothing. Even with my regular fishing partners. Same gear same technique, different results,” Gerard looked at his line hanging slack in the water. “How do you change the luck?” he asked. “I don’t believe in rabbit’s feet, the rabbit had four of them and look how he finished up! No; you want to change the luck? Spray fly dope on the other guys lure when he’s not looking. Step on his reel accidentally of course! Break his rod tip off in the trunk. Budda boom budda Bing; his luck changes!” I said this last part in a very bad Italian accent. “Thanks Don Vito but I meant how do you change your luck?” He was still laughing. Good kid. “There is one secret to fishing. You can’t catch a fish if your line is not in the water so keep casting.”<br />He did but his luck didn’t improve. Mine did I got a couple more. As darkness fell I put the truth to him. We had planned another night but I knew we were running out of dry clothes and sterno. “We gotta make a call. Do we leave in the morning?” I asked. “I have one more set of dry clothes thanks to the garbage bags.” He said. “Told you! Well we’ll see hat morning brings.” The rain stopped sometime in the night. We slept like babies. The lake was like glass when we awoke. We put on our dry clothes and flaked the wet ones on some bushes. I scoured the shore for beaver wood, stripped of bark it dries faster. I smeared some of the remaining sterno on the soggy wood and lit it. “An old boy scout trick.” I said. “Really?” he asked incredulous. “Yes, as soon as the scoutmaster turns his back!” U said with a chuckle. I soon had a lovely fire going. Hot food and hot coffee further buoyed our spirits. We finished the trip and still no fish for Gerard. I felt I had failed him. We took staffs of beaver wood and made our way home. <br /> A couple of weeks later I suggested another trip, this time to a few places I knew not far from the highway. Gerard gratefully accepted. That morning at the first pool we reached he landed a lovely half pounder. As beautiful as any I had seen. I showed him how to clean it said “You are now a member of the fishing fraternity.” I didn’t need to ask him how it felt it was written all over his face. “See, I got nothing, all luck!”That afternoon we drove down the highway until I came to a place I often catch fish. It is literally right on the highway. There was an old man standing there with a piece of bamboo with an old rod tip jammed into it. He had tied thirty feet of line to the tip. At his feet was a bucket full of fish. “How many can I keep?” he asked when I stopped. I looked at the bucket. “Not that many.” I said. “Damn I am going to give these away. I will be right back, watch my rod!” He vanished with a shambling gait. The water looked unusual like it had been stirred up. The old man quickly returned. “What’s the deal?” I asked. “Lands and forests was just here they dumped a whole tanker truck full of stock trout. They are confused and the cove is full of them. I get one every cast, can you spare some bait?” I obliged and Gerard began to cast. It was like magic he had one every cast. We tried every lure in my box and got fish on all but one. I even tried the old man’s rig, at his insistence and caught fish. We had a magical afternoon and Gerard learned a lot about setting the hook and fighting a fish. On the drive home I thought I would drive home the point I had been making. Our success had re-inflated my ego. “See what I told you, all luck.” He looked at me with a new look in his eyes not of a student but of a peer. “What luck, it was like shooting fish in a barrel, literally, all we had to do was cast.” He thought he had outwitted the old master. “Nah, I've been to that spot a hundred times and this is the most I ever caught. Showing up right after a hatchery truck, now that’s lucky!”Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-721483004846623467.post-70738979618671747322010-09-14T21:45:00.000-07:002010-09-14T21:46:35.871-07:00O Christmas tree“YOU ARE TELLING ME…” <br />My friend said in disbelief. “THAT YOU; MAN OF THE NORTH, LIVING THOUSANDS OF MILES FROM ANYWHERE, HAVE AN ARTIFICIAL TREE?” I was showing him photos of life in Old Crow during my annual holidays. “An honest to goodness, painted, piece of Chinese imported plastic? You gotta be kidding me. Aren’t you surrounded by thousands of trees? Real ones?” He was right there were trees out there, thousands but there was more to it than that. In my childhood it had seemed simpler. I suspect that most things do.<br /> When I was a kid my Dad and I would venture forth to pick the perfect tree to decorate the house for the festive season. Like most rituals its origins were lost in ancient mystery. What was involved was the donning of the dreaded winter attire; layers of scratchy wool. Wool sweaters, wool socks and hand-made wool mittens. By the time we were ready to go I was bundled up like an Egyptian mummy. We would head down the highway for one of Dad’s hunting spots where “I know there a good one!” he would assure me enthusiastically. We would drive down some icy snow covered country road that had never seen a snowplow. We would wade through drifts up to my chest. We would shake the snow from tree after tree until we found the one we wanted. The amazing thing is that there was actual magic involved. No seriously. For when we picked the tree, flushed with fresh air and brilliant sun the tree appeared perfect. An archetypal Christmas tree perfect in every way; devoid of flaw. However when it arrived in my parent’s living room to be presented to my little brother and the women folk who formed the judge and jury a transformation had taken place. The tree no longer seemed perfect. A bald patch or two appeared, the trunk seemed bent. The top askew. “That…” my Mom would say “is the best you could do?” Now I swear that it looked different when we tied it to the roof rack. Maybe more snow had shaken loose or maybe we had been victims of some state of euphoria brought on by the clear air and the exertion of the chase. In any case there was little doubt this was not the tree we thought we had.<br /> Now if tree hunting in the south had its’ drawbacks the search for the perfect specimen in the boreal forest was another kettle of fish. I remember my first Christmas in the Northwest Territories. I borrowed a snowmobile and toboggan from a trapper friend of mine and set out to comb the hills for the quintessential Christmas tree. I found a beauty. Eight feet tall if it was an inch. I tied it to the toboggan and made a beeline for home. Now I’m sure that to people from the southern hemisphere the snowy hills may appear to be white fluffy clouds of cotton candy. In fact they are frozen hard as cement. When I arrived home I was the proud owner of an eight foot stick. It was nearly bereft of needles and the canvas skirt of the toboggan was full of them. The tree, seared by the forty five below zero cold and the constant pounding of the trail had shed its’ beautiful fir coat (pardon the pun). Hi I’m not only the president of the hair club for bald trees but I’m a member too. <br /> I once cut down my Christmas tree with a rifle. No I didn’t beat it down with the butt. I was driving a winter road in Northern Alberta when I came across the most beautiful tree. There were two small problems first I had no axe. Second the tree was thirty feet tall. I sure wanted that tree; though. It was splendid. It had grown up taller than the trees around it which allowed it to be fuller on all sides. I coveted this tree. I knew if I did not grab it now I would probably never find it again. I searched my truck and racked my brain. Then it hit me. My rifle! If I started on one side of the trunk O could shoot the tree down! As a bonus I could shoot off only the top seven feet or so. I had only the shells in the clip but with a few good shots the top fell just as I planned. It must have been meant to be. As an additional bonus; without even additional shipping and handling, the tree was covered in cones. They looked great when the tree was decorated and people thought I added the cones. <br /> But the further north you go the harder it is to find the perfect tree. Life is hard up here. The arctic is virtually a desert in winter cold and sere. It stunts the trees. They work very hard to cling to life. It takes them many years longer to reach the size that you would drag home and stand in your living room. A Christmas tree sized northern spruce or pine could be one hundred and fifty years old or more. Imagine cutting down anything that old to put up in your living room for a week. Sorry but it just aint happening. Yes I may be surrounded by trees but I would also like to stay that way. I do pick out a tree each year; though. I look for it when I am out walking. I find a nice one; whose imperfections are smothered in snow. I just don’t cut it down. I just watch it where it stands and think of what the Christmas tree once stood for. Originally the evergreen tree was associated with the celebration of the winter solstice not the later Christian celebration which adopted the symbol. It was chosen to represent the time of year when the days would start to get longer and life would return to the hibernating winter world. It was chosen because it was green and full of life when all the trees of the world were brown and apparently lifeless. Now we kill them and drag their carcasses into our living rooms and then throw them out with the trash. My living room may have a plastic tree but my real Christmas tree will still be alive next year and the year after. She may not have the curves of your southern manicured tree farm models; but she looks pretty good for her age. She may be one hundred and fifty but she doesn’t look a day over a hundred and twenty!Gregory Turnbullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01113791161773323622noreply@blogger.com0