St. Barnabus Anglican Church

What a wonderful way to enjoy a Sunday morning! Christian church is so uplifting and inspiratioan.  I come through the doors jangled and rushed only to come out feeling renewed and alive.

Today I was late. Gilbert preferred sniffing to pooping so he  he can shoulder some of the blame.  My mornings are mostly disturbed by the recent sickness of my expresso machine. I’ve reverted to my old stove top espresso machine. It’s not the same.  It takes more time. Any interruption of the morning schedule seems to increase the lateness through the day.  I wish there was a reset button that would start my official day when dressed I stepped out of my home.

I arrived at St. Barnabus just as Rev. Shannon of Shiloh 5th Avenue United was beginning her sermon.  Rev. Shannon was obviously filling in for Rev. Emilie or the time had changed and I’d arrived for the United Church service that followed the Anglican.  I looked around and there were the faces of the Anglican congregation I have come to know.  

The line of the sermon that immediately captivated me was , referring to the Book of Revelations, ‘those who talk about it most often and the most insistently are all the most likely to miss the overriding message of hope and love that is at the beginning and end of it all. They almost lose the love and hope in favour of the scarey stuff, the threatening stuff and the everyone but me is in deep trouble stuff.”

From there the sermon just got better and better. I was happy again to hear the voice of a loving God not a policeman God.  I love St. Barnabus for that. Both Reverend Emilie and Reverend Shannon focus on the love and joy of Christianity and even at times the humour.  When I read the Gospel, or Good News I’m grateful.  Even the Old Testament of the Bible is positive when I’ve read it with the insights of an enlightened rabbi.

French Psychologist Piaget described the cognitive development of children, the literal, concrete stage , when everything is just as it appears. After this developmental stage comes the ‘abstract stage’ which begins for some in adolescences but sadly not all adults achieve it. A study of adults showed that only a portion of adults could abstract as late as in their 30’s. Wisdom is a slow process.
The Holy Book has a first level of interpretation which does indeed appeal to all but at a higher level or deeper level the ‘love’ message shows purest.  C. S. Lewis in his 4 Loves described this as AGAPE.  God love, beyond tribalism.  A celebration and dance, really.  As Heinlein would say, in his science fiction classic, Stranger in a Strange Land,  “grokking”.

The sermon moved through the layers of Revelations, the least understood and most mis understood book in the New Testament.  As I’ve thought before I really must study this as she has. Her discussion of Jesus on the White Horse was riveting. Like any really good sermon it has me wanting to go to the Bible and read this section.   I love how she ended . “God and hope will have the final word.  Because God is the beginning and the end. The alpha and omega. “

After the sermon we had the Peace where all move about the church and greet each other individually. This is Gilbert’s favourite part because there was a big new dog he didn’t know and they’d been staring at each other since the start.  So Gilbert visited the reverend’s dog and then met the big new dog while I said, Peace, to these folk I grow to admire more each service. Like getting to know cousins. Feeling once again,  fellow man as connected.  

There are those who enjoy the errors of Christians and claim they are Hypocrites but little do they know we are humans trying to live a more meaningful, peaceful and loving life.  We have a code above the world’s code of ‘winner and loser’ and who dies with the most toys wins.  Those without codes, are so easily offended, and are quickest to point fingers because they don’t have standards, demand perfection from others, but don’t ever apply the same to themselves.  As sinners we acknowledge that we are not perfect for only God is perfect but each day in our walk with Jesus and his teachings we hope to grow spirituality and in depth.  It’s an ‘inside job’’,. 

In the prayers of the people, Shri Lanka was included.  So many Christians persecuted.
Thanks to my friend Kirk I just watched an amazing documentary of the life of Randy Bachman, the great rock and roll genius behind the Guess Who and Bachman Turner Overdrive.  My Winnipeg friend Virginia had told me he was a Mormon Christian. I’d never known.  In the documentary they spoke of his not drinking or drugging or fornicating with the groupies lined up to serve their heroes, and how this had alienated him from other rock and rollers living the ‘lifestyle’.  He was truly focused on the music.

I loved the hymns and the piano playing at St. Barnabus,celebrating the risen Lord.  Sometimes called the Cosmic Christ. The fabric of the universe changed that awesome day. Jesus conquered death and rose from the grave.  He sent the Holy Spirit to be with us till he will come again.

After the service we all walked out of the great wooden building with stained glass windows. The lilacs by the gate are blossoming.  I smelled them as I  left and noticed others smelling them as they did too.  Mom had planted a bush by our door and the smell always reminds me of her.  The loving mother. Mother and child.  God as all loving.  First and foremost.  

I took a big breath and enjoyed the spring air tinged with the nearby ocean.  Seagulls squawked overhead.  I came for breakfast at the historic Heritage Grill in New Westminster. It’Gilbert’s favourite .  The waitress likes him.  I love the eggs and toast and coffee.  Such traditional fare with birds singing in the tree overhead.  The sun is out. It’s a great day.  New Westminster people watching is good here too.  Royal City. 

Gratitude

Thank you for the day.Thank you for the sunshine. Thank you for the surroundings.  Thank you for Gilbert. Thank you for work. Thank you for George. Thank you for family and friends. Thank you for this body. Thank you for this life. Thank you for all the blessings. Thank you for ice cream and chocolate. Thank you for the moon and stars. 

I’m thankful for my dreams. They are so much a part of me these days.  Almost like a parallel universe.  I feel the dreams are like Jung described ‘the collective unconscious’.  In my dreams the dead live and those I know and love at a distance are there as well. The message is ‘love’ over and over again in each of the interactions. There’s treasure hunt of sorts going on. I’m finding God and unwrapping bits of myself.

I”m asking to know God’swill and to have the power to carry this out.

I’m thankful now for the cat and dog.My companions.  

I’m thankful for the internet. I’m thankful for Google and DuckGoDujck.I’m thankful for Apple and for PC. I’m thankful for keyboards and l;ogitech.  I’m thankful for my fingers.

I’m thankful for Randy Bachman and Lenny Bareau. I’mt thankful for Bach. I really like the Brandenburg Concertos. I’m also thankful for Handel  I love the Messiah and Water Music.

It’s 3 am.I’ve woken in the middle of the night, a pleasant inspired dream.  It escapes me now. But it was vivid and pure.  Now I’ve the dog and cat beside me.  They make this realm appealing though it’s an odd place of so many relationships. I wonder if I’m playing my part well in the great drama of life. I’m following the script in some ways. I see the writing on the wall at times. I feel I have to ad lib a lot and I don’t hear the stage prompts that well. This deafness and hearing aids gets to me, their glasses and blindness, the aches and pain.  The pain causes introspection. 

Those around me wall themselves in their victimology.  Narcissism is master in so many programs.  There’s the take program going all the time. I understand how the young enjoy the games as there are so many life lessons in the gamers.  Like the song people use you.  I wonder about my own contribution to the whole. I feel at times a great whale with parasites all over him.  I wish they would get off.  I love reciprocity.  So few have evolverd to play that game.  Fear dominates their every move and they explain their taking and hurting today with active and passive andf covert and overt attacks as justifiers by their past, this script they kerep running over and over to themselves priorizing ‘take’. Reciprocity isn’t their game despite their claim. 

I’m mired in this glue. I’m thankful for the games and plays and drama .  The gravity is a bit peculiar. There’s so much weight and baggage. 

Money is such acrntrtal gamer with little giver and a whole lot of take.  I’m struggling with my resentment to government, taxmen, tax collectors,burocrats and the corruptions.  The great casino. This metaphor gone mad.  I wait for the war and am grateful for the peace.  The squeeze is on and its called climate change or any such justification for taking money and freedom. I am thankful for my freedom.  Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose. Bobby McGee.

It’s a good life.  I. Would know God more truly.  I would win the lottery and feel the approval windfall’s must give. The universe loves mer because I’ve been given all this money.  I seer the great casino.  The tit of the bank. The great suck.  I imagine Justin Trudeau having such a lark at all our expernser.  

My greatest sorrow today is that my espresso machine died. I pulled out the old stove top but it was’t the same. I’m tempted to take this one back and leave it to be repaired but buy a new one because I don’t lnow I can go a week or two without my recent joy in Ethiopian coffee. 

I am thankful for Ethiopian coffee.  The cat is purring beside me.  lovely sound. Like a tiny throaty Harley.  The dog is sleeping beside the cat.  When I feel worthless I’mremindedf that these two critters appreciate me. I’m their world.  

If it wasn’t so late and my nerighbours asleep I’d get dressed and ride my Harley.  Night Harley riding around a sleeping city is a joy I’ve known in their past.  I’ve been meaning to get over to the beaches.  tt’s been too long since I rode the Harley along that beautiful stretch of reality.

I did clean up some of the storage lockers unloading a bit. Every bit helps. Baby steps.  I don’t really need to do anything just feel like I’m moving in the right direction. I must go through the files, so many boxes of junk that needs to go in a bonfire.   All that once important papers.  I’d throw it out but am afraid I’d miss some identifiying data so it’s the bonfire.  I could scan files but there’s so much that’s extra and unnecessary that files need to be reduced for first.  I have so much work and could pay but there’s no system to connect the buyer and seller.  Everyone wants me to do the lion’s share while they are glad to take the rewards. That’s communist Canada n my mind.  Meanwhile I work and work and work.  IT’s discernment.  I am however fairly happy and satisfied.  So I’m thainkful for that.  I could get bundles of books and take them to the church thrift store.  I’ve lots to give away. I wish I could broker some of my storage and make a profit.  There’s thousands to be made but I don’t want to meet with strangers through eBay.  

I’m thankful for these various systems of business.  

I would be more positive. More graterful. Even now I’m less thankful for this truly skookum blue tooth keyboard than I am pissy about it having a different keyboard pressure than my other.  I’d like them all ‘tuned’ to me.  Naturally I could do that but instead I adapt to what is around me as usual.  

Bullies bother me. 

I enjoy people watching, travelling, writing. I liked my brain injured patient who liked his coffee and talking to young girls.  I see the old guys like this.  A couple were doing a mechanical project near me when I was walking the dog. I have all these myriad interesting skills and I could well have joined in their game and been an appreciated contributor.  I walked the dog instead and talked with my two interresting neighbours.  

I like non judgemental people. I know judgement comes so much from fear and those who abdicate responsibility for their lives blaming others and manipulating and controlling life rather than accepting life on life’s terms .  I like knowing those who don’t sweat the little stuff.  

I’m grateful for the people. The cast of characters.  The likely suspects.

The wind just blew the awning. Woke Gilbert. He barked. The cat sneezed.  I thought of bringing in the sail. I like the writing platform of land. Sailing I ddn’t write as much but loved the boat and anchor and running before the window. Very demanding of attention.  I’d like a train trip .  I loved Ireland.   I have such fond memories of riding on the train as a child with my parents, The Rockies or the Laurentians.  

I miss my little desk.  I’d like that here. I could go looking for my desk at the storage locker tomorrow and find more to throw out.  Certainly I could taker a bunch of stuff from here too.  I need to changer the kitty litter and do the book keeping.There’s all the cleaning to do .

Meanwhile I’ve Bergeron re programming this new mini keyboard. My old one had a dead battery so I replaced it.  I was perfectly happy with the iPads pro but this is more portable thought the keyboard remains a little sticky.  I like the other keyboard because I don’t notice it. The same with the Mac and need with the keyboards at work. It’s the attempt to have full size keyboard in a miniature version. I have to be more aware of where I place my fingers.  

I think there are so many things I don’t do enough.  Swim. Cycle.  Dance.  Hike.  Sail,   I’ve a couple of little boats and I could take them out but I don’t. I’m glad I’m using the motorcycle. The adult toys. Shooting the rifle last week was fun but I would like another day of target practices.

There’s never enough time to do the things we want to.   The singer song writer who wrote that died young.

I’m grateful for this life. Thank you.  

9 years old: library, microscope, bicycle, fieldmouse.,

1960 had been a big year.  A decade had passed on the calendar clock.  I’d learned my letters and numbers in school. I was learning a lot. 1961 was going to be an even more important year. Now I could read and print.

Mom would take my brother Ron and I to the Fort Garry Library on Pembina Hwy every week.  It was a lending library. As kids we’d pore over the books and choose those we would read that weekend.  We’d leave with 3 or 4 a piece.  It began with books with pictures and writing like the proverbial Dick and Jane books but later it would branch out to everything without pictures. I began in the children’s section, moved onto the teens and then read the adult books. It was a suburban library.  By the time I was a teen I’d read every science fiction book in that library. All the adult ones too.  Asimoth. Poulson, Heinlein.  I also liked nature books, westerns and even history at a young age.

I received a small mail order microscope that year.  With my brother and dad’s help I prepared my first slide of puddle water from the back yard. It was teeming with life. I was amazed.  I loved watching this Lilliputian world for hours.  Fabrics fascinated me, the interlocking threads . It was miraculous to me this deeper layer of reality that could be accessed with a microscope.

I don’t know that binoculars held the same fascination. My brother father and I would lie on the front lawn looking the Milky Way, identifying the Big Dipper, Little Dipper, the North Star, Cassiopeia, Orion. In later years we’d study UFO’s. We’d use the binoculars to look at craters on the moon.Dad had big 10 x 50 Power ones.

They came with us hunting and fishing. It helped us identify birds.  I began to carry pocket field guides to birds ,stars and trees. Roger Tory Peterson’s with his coloured detailed bird  drawings were the best . Much  later in life I’d enjoy the Audubon field guides with coloured pictures.  I was an amateur ornithologist at a young age. My brother and father identified and named birds in our neighbourhood and later on our travels. I ticked off each bird I’d seen and identified in the list at the back of my first young person’s field guide.

I had a bicycle. My brother had one already. I remember mine as if it were yesterday. Other kids had bicycles with training wheels at the back but Dad took this 2 wheeler he’d brought home and me out front on the sidewalk across North Drive. I got on the seat and began to pedal wobbling along with him walking beside me holding my seat and the  handle bars. I was gripping the handles for deer life terrified and exultant. .  He ran beside me a couple of times up the street and back down the street. When I got balanced he let me go. Like a little bird leaving the nest. I rode free. I might as well have been a glider being released from a mother ship. It was such an incredible feeling of motion. I was so proud. I had only needed help a couple of times on that pint sized blue second hand child’s bike. Now  I could ride by myself. My father was beaming. 

After I found my balance I could ride. Now  I rode everywhere. I explored the world of Fort Garry then Winnipeg on a series of bicycles.  I don’t recall a tricycle just that first little bike and then as a teen the big bike that my world revolved around all summer. Years later I’d bicycle across Europe in my early 20’s with an actual state of the art new Raleigh Touring Bike. But it all began on a little second hand bike with my Dad holding me up.

With that little bike I’d ride mostly with my brother who’d accompany me though I slowed him down.  I remember being devastated one day when he took off with his older friends and I simply couldn’t keep up. My little bike wasn’t big enough to stay with the big boys for more than a block. I
sure wanted to be bigger then. My brother and I had been constant companions as children but now he was becoming a teen and spending more time with his friends. Kirk was my friend and sometimes Ron hung out with Kirk’s older brother Tommy. Carter sisters.  He was a total cyclist as a teen and even when I’d eventually get a bigger bike we’d rarely ride together. He’d move onto a Yamaha 150 motorcycle years before I got into Harley’s I ride today. 

Kirk and I rode bikes together but he’d go to the family cottage at Minaki in the summer and Garth went to golf camp.  Though we didn’t spend much school year time together, Jamie, the banker’s son, a few blocks away would become my summer friend.  A bicycle expanded the friendship circle. Bicycling was a true joy.

The field mouse died that fall.. I killed it. My dad had been against my bringing it home but I cried and insisted. I’d found it in the woods and captured it while my brother and my father were hunting. Mom wasn’t too pleased but I promised I’d care for it. I made a wood chip nest for it in a plastic box. 

  I’d developed a game in the back yard sidewalk where I’d let it escape and run around free would but stop it with a handled metal whisk.  It would then stay on the sidewalk and not run away into the grass where I might not be able to catch it. Only I misjudged the distance on one reach with the which the whisk edge came down and decapitated the little field mouse. It happened so quickly. It was there alive and then dead and gone.  I think I wanted to put it back together. Humpty didn’t prepare me for this. I was devastated and inconsolable. I was also filled  with guilt and shame. To the mouse it didn’t matter that I didn’t mean to kill it. Mouse slaughter was the same as murder to the dead mouse. I really had killed the little animal, my pal, without meaning to but having done it. 

My parents came to my cries and dad said, « It’s a wild thing. I told you we should leave it.  It was never meant to be brought home. It wasn’t to kept in a cage. It wanted to be free. ». 

I never got over the guilt of killing that little mouse. It really did trigger a lot of thought and feeling about death and intent and fate.  Later I’d meet men and women who would enjoy killing small animals.  I knew I was different.  It didn’t even give me much relief from the feeling I’d wastefully unconscionably killed that innocent field mouse. I felt very alone. 

I reall I did bring home birds with injured wings. With Mom’s help I d  nurse them back to life.  They knock the selves out flying into glass. I remember keeping one black bird around for a week or so and then having to let it go because because my Dad told me it was well enough.  I honestly can say I did that in this period of my life. I was fascinated with healing and even how worms could continue after being cut in two.  My disappointment in the death of the field mouse was all reaching.  It couldn’t come back to life and we’d buried it in the back yard.

Easter Monday

Easter Monday. Holiday Monday. My alarm went off set for work five days a week.  Gilbert cried to be in bed. I rose to the task. The little licky squirmy rolly bundle of cockapoo got right between beautiful Laura and me, belly up,  intent on getting dual pets, We indulged him. I fell back to sleep. Napped another hour.  Got out of the camper bed because I love coffee.  Stove top expresso.  Cream and honey. A cup for me and a cup for Laura.

I was reading a Griff Hosker Men of Sword “Blood on the Crown” novel, medieval historical fiction.

 I’ve read 3 novels this weekend. I had a new little neurology text I opened then quickly shut.  G.Michael Hopf, the Lawman.  Great fast read.  I love a good western when I’m camping. I read a Greg Loomis Thriller with his ex CIA,  Husband and wife, Lang and Gurt  team and their vulnerable  young son. The Chinese trying to put missiles in Haiti, the superstitious Creole president wanting the remains of Alexander the Great, Atlanta, Port Du Prince, Venice and Egypt shoot outs and chases.  A well crafted intrigue easy to read with good characterization.

The last was a WWII Battle of Britain Spitfire book with alternating chapters one of the English pilots the other of the German pilots. Sad tales of young warriors and men in love with pretty girls in time of war. Such waste. Good action. Sweet romance.

I was reading on my Ipad and hadn’t downloaded more from Kindle. We’re without wi fi so was fortunate to have those to read. I also had to use the generator to charge our phones and ipad.  During that time I read the paperback, Trudy Turner ‘s  Packtrains and Airplanes, memoirs of her and her parents homesteading Lonseome Lake near Bella Coola, BC.  Great read. Hard life but good fun.  Laura has read others of Trudy Turner’s describing the simple but robust isolated life the family had.

The first day here we just set up. We’d arrived late afternoon so I just heated up Stag Chilli to have with the  the fresh buns I’d bought at Superstore.  We read and sat about outside. no mosquitos. But ants bit both Laura and Gilbert. I saw there was an ant hill nearby.  Both of them must have frightened or irritated the ants  Gilbert yelped once. I assumed it was an ant. Laura startled and stepped on the ant that had bit her, probably in self defence.  She just put her feet up on the picnic table after that.  Gilbert lay down further from the ant hill. There weren’t any flies either. No hornets either.  Saturday was an easy day. I had the lawn chairs out and we sat and read in the sunshine and warmth.

We had a neighbour with a dog. From the distance we couldn’t tell if she was a he or he was a she.  Slim short haired androgynous looking with pink running shoes. Girlish face from a distance but tomboyish mannerism.  She’s been alone camping.  I felt like My Favourite Martian’s neighbour, just curious.  It had all started because at first we thought there were two.  A boy and a girl. Because of the clothing changes.  In the end it seemed the was just one.  And the dog.

Our other neighbour was an old couple with a satellite dish. I wondered if it was wi fi or tv, especting the latter because they were white haired and old. No ageism here, and they at most have a decade on me. Probably have satelite phones and high tech in the bus.   

Things were so slow at our site that I actually suggested I get out the binoculars to study the neighbours. Some bikers on Harley’s had a pup tent out one night. Another very fat couple in a van sat by their fire all day. I saw them roasting marshmallows. I must remember to get some marshmallows to roast.

Laura read Reader’s Digest and did crosswords.

I unloaded  my KTM 690 from the front of the truck.  Laura wanted some flameless candles she bought each time we were here at the really terrific Princeton Home Hardware. She also wanted some liver treats for Gilbert she’d got there the last time we visited. He’d really liked them. I had the rifle in the hard case but decided I should have a soft case to make the rifle even more politically correct when I’m riding the KTM.  I carry it on my motorcycle with a trigger lock. But nowadays with so many fragile urban Huffington Post readers I didn’t want to trigger an offended screamer.  I love visitting the hunting store in Princeton. I’ve got knives, ammunition, guns, fishing gears and cammo hunting gear over the years. The couple that run it know their stuff.  

Our toilet seemed full but we hadn’t used it then I realized it was just plugged a bit as the water line descended.I’d decided I needed a bucket to drain off the black and grey water a bit if a problem like this arose. As it was there was lots of capacity. All it took was a stick to plunge it but “I needed” a pail for the future.  We don’t drain the black water though I did once dumping it in the outhouse year’s back with a pail when some of us guys stayed a week in the trailer.  We have run off the grey water , just from washing, under the RV, soapy smells, but a pail would do better.  

The fact is I love the ride into town along the winding Old Hedly Road. It’s beautiful scenery, wild wilderness along the Similkameen River then cattle and horse country.  I’ve loved riding that rode every time on an enduro.  It was just made for the KTM.  

In the town I even got a Nexteck power bar to store power to use later to charge the iPhone’s and iPads.  I like running the Honda 2000 generator a couple of hours a day. The  double RV  batteries on the Adventurer  would last a few days with the little power we use, mostly furnace and lights but I just like using the sweet little machine.  I carry a jerry can of fuel back up but it runs for hours on the fuel in the tank.  I filled it  at the gas station while Laura was selling a spare kidney to buy Trudea Carbon scam Canadian gas. It’s advertised as kissed by Sophie to justify the extortion.   I have the jerry can to top up the KTM too.  I had to give my left testicle to fill that. 

In the town after the little shopping I did, the excuse for the glorious sunshine day ride, I filled up the bike and headed back, my new poop pail bungee corded to the paniers.  After I dropped off the pail  I drove to the nearby wood supply paying $5 each bundle and carried these back bungee corded to the panniers.  The meat store that had been there was moved, a dissappointment because we so like their sausages.

I barbecued beef hot dogs for our dinner.  I’d made a fire and the combinations of  wood smoke and barbecue smells were as good for us as they were for Gilbert.  He was rolling around on his back in dog heaven. Taking him for walks has been another big event in our tedious days.  

Fresh air and Pink Moon sleeps in the camper are awesome.

Prayer and meditation Easter Sunday.  

More bacon sandwiches for breakfast.

I actually got my rifle out and cleaned it then loaded up the KTM for an afternoon backwoods ride, target practice and supposed bear hunting. I waited till noon to head out since that was the least likely time to encounter bear.  I am a serious grouse, deer and even moose hunter but I’ve only shot bear rarely.  Other than the ham I’m just not that great a fan of bear sausage. I have a rug with the head mount of the first bear I shot bullseye in the forehead when it suddenly walked onto the same log bridge I was crossing at Knights Inlet.  I’d had a taxidermist fix it up  mostly for that hole in the forehead. I had it on my wall for a number of years too.  Not that I have ever succumbed to vanity. 

The drive up the gravel logging road was a pleasure.  Each year I’ve a period of time when I’m relearning. Sliding gravel.  Balance. Not to fast.  Not to slow.  I did a dozen miles up to the top of the mountain then headed off on a muddy side road.  I found a great place to stop and set out targets.  50 and a hundred yards.  I had the Winchester Coyote with 300 win mag shorts. I shot off 3 shells at 50 yards all grouping 1-2 inches around the bull’s eye.  At one hundred yards. I put two shots side by side an inch apart a couple of inches from the centre. I adjusted the scope but found I had only a dozen more 300 win mag shorts as I’d brought the 30:06 shells by mistake. Not too smart. I could have shot more and got more accurate but after a year not shooting then shooting that accurately I was confident I could hit a bear well if needed. I’d a good excuse now to go back down and get more shells and have another coffee.

That’s just what I did.  Returning I decided to take the Creek road and met a couple of the local ranchers I’d met previously driving down the rocky hill on their quad’s.  They said they’d not seen any bear but I’d already seen some sign on the other logging trail so would go back to that one.  Ranchers are generally happy to have bear hunters take care of a threat to their spring calves.   

I saw a grouse on that road and bones of a calf which I guessed had died in the fall, it’s bones stripped white. I startled a Mule doe when I came back down and headed up another logging road. It turned on the road and began heading back down the hill, thought better of that, turned and ran back up the mountain, crossing in front of me at most a dozen feet away.  I could see the nostrils flaring and the strong muscles propelling her uphill. Nice encounter with nature. 

There seemed like a lot more magpie, the black and white bird with long tails than I remember. I saw another Mulie out in a field a ways off.  I was delighted to come across the rose grosbeak.  I’ve only seen a few over the years. A Badger was sitting by the side of the road as I passed.  I love the wildlife I see just driving around the back woods. The streams were up high and there was still old snow in the valleys here and there. It got colder as the day got on and I rose higher in the mountains.  Coming down the mountain took all my concentration with the gravel.  The quad really was the best hunting platform. On  two wheels coming down I only had eyes for the road.  I sure was tired and chilled when I got down.  Coffee never was better, just for the warmth.

Barbecued steaks and Caesar salad with another big fire for the evening.  Laura had turned off the furnace but I’d cranked it back up to get warm after riding.  Now after a feast eating a chocolate Easter bunny reading my Kindle book I was warm and content again.  

Laura told me that the girl next door had been wearing a pink tank top and had a definite girl figure and was dancing with the dog.  “She’s definitely a girl.” She said. The great mystery of the weekend solved.  I still don’t know for sure if the satellite dish is for tv or wifi. The old couple might be CIA too with a satellite dish.  Reading Loomis I considered that.

Another great sleep. Though I woke at 1 am for some unknown reason. Gilbert and I took a walk about then. Laura in the morning said she’d not even noticed.  I had some yoghurt and Perrier and gave him some bacon treats before going back to bed. 

I’ve had great dreams. I ‘m on my peninsula with my boat in the harbour and am meeting friends in the church. Loved running into Art. Normally we hug but in the dream in the church surroundings we bowed namaste style.   I joined a Bible study but didn’t know what page we were on.  I had that embarrassment in church recently ,slow to get to the communal readings.  Family were in the dream and others.  I wake so refreshed and happy, comforted by these after death images, the future beyond the grave.  The place I’m going to in my mind at least.  Mansions in heaven.

Now we’re doing more nothing.All I have to do is load the KTM and we’re be nearly ready to leave, Laura stowing the interior, Gilbert observing.  I’ve made a couple of cups of coffee and may have more. We’re out of bacon.  The plan was barbecued steak sandwiches. There is just too much to do on these camping vacations. The stress of decision making and neighbour watching is just overwhelming. We’re have to get back to work tomorrow for a vacation.  

Easter Sunday

Hallelujah Christ has risen!

Life after death. God is great.  God anthropormorphized, sent his Son Jesus.  Jesus was born in Bethlehem, escaped to Egypt  when King Herod was killing children. His birth was prophesied, espicially by Isaiah.  Wise men from the East, one from Ethiopia, came to celebrate his birth.  Miracles and awe. 

His father was a carpenter and he learned the carpenter trade. As a boy on return to Israel he debated with the learned men of his day and was clearly a gifted genius with profound depth and insight. His first miracle was to turn water into wine.  He was loving and kind.  In his 20’s he began to teach with knowledge of scripture that amazed the learned men of the day. He debated the most powerful. He was a threat to the status quo. He collected disciples, 12, fishermen and other working men, who followed him and who he taught. He cured the sick. He cast out demons which to the best of our understanding today would be curing mental illness.  His specialties were dermatology, ophthalmology and psychiatry. 

He was inclusive of all humans denying caste or outsider.  He appeared to know his personal future. He had a Last Supper with his disciples. He said the bread was his body and the wine was his blood and that human sacrifice must end as he was the last, freely given.  He would right the error of the world.  The error of the world was that it denied God and denied the spiritual nature of reality.  His message was Love. 

He said all Scripture could be summed up , Love God and  Love thy neighbour as thyself.  The government, local and international of the day, crucified him ,based on false allegation and lies.  His disciple Judas betrayed him for money.  Given the last chance to free a man, the people chose to free a warrior revolutionary rather than a peaceful man of God.  He said that if one accepted him he would be saved.  To be saved was to go directly to heaven. No hell. No purgatory. No lost soul. No ghost existence.  From this life to heaven.  

There were two other men being crucified. One was saved. Repenting, or acknowledging their error of thought,  ie putting their faith in the material world rather than the spiritual, he changed and accepted Jesus. 

 “Forgive them for they know not what they do.” Jesus said on the cross.  “Why God have you forsaken me?’  “It is done.”  

He was buried in a tomb and the women came to find the stone moved from the tomb.  An angel, gleaming white, told them he was gone.  The ladies went to tell the disciples.  Jesus met them in life one after another. Resurrected. He showed them the wounds on his hands. feet and side. Even doubting Thomas who would go on to lead the church of the Middle East and to India accepted the evidence.   Jesus rose into heaven.  

He had done miracles on earth, the loaves and fishes, healing lepers, curing the blind.  Now he had overcome death. He’d already saved a Centurion’s son and resurrected Lazarus. Now he was himself alive despite everyone seeing his death.  He had further told them what would occur.  It was as Isaiah had prophesied. He said he did this all for his father’s sake, that men would know God.  

The story of the life of Jesus was told in the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. 

Now the disciples went forth and carried this message of Love to the world.  Love and Truth.  As Christians we celebrate Easter Sunday as the day of Resurrection. 

Hallelujah! Christ is risen!  

Age 8:baseball, ice fishing, shooting, and bobsled

I remember ice fishing with my father and brother.  We’d drive out of town to Lake Winnipeg an hour north.  Dad had a pick and Ron used a spike. Together they’d cut a hole through the ice which was usually a foot or two thick. I’d bring the rods and tackle from the truck while they did this. Others would be out on the ice sitting around holes fishing rods in hand.  Not many. A half dozen or so die hard holes.

For Dad I think it was more the expedition and adventure in the middle of winter. Something to do on a Saturday to break up the monotony of prairie life. We never caught a single fish ice fishing. We saw the fish deep down the hole.  They never bit. It was awfully cold. In later years Dad would make a folding hut he’d hook together on the ice. We’d have a little oil heater then and sit in the warm out of the wind.  We never caught a fish then either. Not with the better accommodations but the cocoa in the thermos tasted better and we stayed out on the ice longer. More of an outing.  

What we did most in winter was toboggan.  As a family we’d go down to the banks of the Red River and slide down to the ice.  It was a big slope for a little kid. Later my brother Ron would take us.  Kirk and Garth would come along then.  We’d have this great exhilerating slide that lasted a few seconds then we’d trudge for half an hour back up to the road and slide down again.  The slope was hardly more than a ditch but to us it was a great tobogganing hill.  It was a block away from home along Riverside Road.  

Dad made me a bob sled one year.  He made it out of wood in the basement.  It was the best present a kid could get even though it was way too fast and way to dangerous for me. Ron had to try it out first.  He literally whizzed down the slope.  You had to lie on your chest with your face inches off the ground holding onto the wood handles either side, legs trailing out behind, boots serving as rudders.  I think Dad tried it once and decided it was way too crazy though Ron liked it.   It.was a while before I could get up the courage to try it. All the other kids teased me because it was something no one had ever seen in Winnipeg. I imagine Dad found the design in the wood working book and decided to make it. He enjoyed carpentry when he wasn’t working on his truck or car.  

Once I got the hang of screwing up my courage to get on that bobsled I really did streak by everyone else on the hill. The only thing that could keep up was the silver saucer some kid had.  We’d race each other him turning circles like mad and me with my face smashing  through snow clumps.   Sometimes that kid would win. As often he would twist out of control and fly into the trees along the slope.  The tobaggans and other sleighs didn’t stand a chance against us. 

My brother would  come along and have a go on the bobsled again and again. Mom only rode on the long toboggan.  She’d sometimes be in the middle with me in the front and Ron behind her. Sonny the dog would run down the hill beside us with Dad staying at the top watching. We’d finally come to a stop and all of would fall over sideways. The dog tried then to lick everyone’s face equally.  We’d trudge back up the hill pulling the toboggan behind us. 

When my Aunt would come out for Christmas we’d all go tobogganing. She and Mom were so funny together laughing and shouting. The dog would be barking, jumping up and down, us kids milling about to be part of the adult fun. My aunt and mom would tease Dad relentlessly and he’d take it in good humor. On those occasions we’d usually go out to the longer hill that went down to the river by the university. It was a 2 minute run and my Mom and Aunt would take the toboggan and both fall over when it hit the frozen river edge.  They could hardly walk back up the hill laughing so hard. Mom had a camel coloured cloth coat and Aunt Sally had this black wool coat more appropriate for the city.. She’d always look ‘eastern’ , fashionable  ‘sophisticaed’ while Mom was more practical in her dress for anything but church.  

Then she’d eventually wear the fur coat my father bought her. That was an important gift for him to her and a sign of their increasing affluence during my later teen years. She was very proud of that Mink.  They were more serious and reserved when they got older. I still remember us all tobogganing and it was just jolly good fun, little kids, big kids and the dog.

In the summer we’d play baseball.  I cherished my baseball glove and bat.  Ball caps were important too. But that was all the equipment we had and one of the reasons baseball was so popular. All a parent needed to get a kid was a glove and he could be a part of the league or all the pick up games that ran all summer in the school yard.  Because of the equipment costs Hockey was a bit more exclusive. It’s no wonder the Canadian invented game of Basketball became so popular around the world.  Like soccer all that was needed was a ball. Every kid wore runners so there wasn’t any need for special shoes in my day.  Runners hadn’t evolved into luxury fashion back then.  Cloth, laces and rubber soul.  Just as there was a back stop net as a fixed structure in playgrounds and school yard there was always a hoop hanging over some patch of flattened ground or cement.  

There was also sometimes the net up which would be used for badminton or volleyball. There wasn’t much tennis in my day and certainly no cricket. Lacrosse appeared in my high school years.   We did play horseshoes when there was a pit and metal horse shoes.  These were more often in campgrounds.  In a few  playgrounds there was merry go round with horses to ride on. In Fort Garry we had the merry go round without the horses. Kids just spun around till they puked or fell off.    There was even a ball on a pole some places which we could punch in attempt to hit the other kid in the face with with it. I think this came later. We did have croquet sets at home and set these up on the lawn when we had visitors, mostly my Aunt.  A couple of neighbours had croquet sets. The Laidlaw girls were big on croquet.  They made lemonade and played croquet with pretty dresses and hats.   My brother liked to play croquet with the older girls. Kirk and I back then preferred to make spears down by the river which we used to try to kill birds with. We never hit a bird but we threw our spears a lot.  

As a family Dad would take us out to play miniature golf.  That was one of his favourites. Though my friend Garth wanted to be a golf pro and my brother and his wife would play golf all their adult years I never played golf till I was in my 20’s. The same was true for curling. My brother and his wife were curling for years, Ron began to curl in his early teens.  I think I tried it once back then and concluded sweeping ice  was for losers.

I much preferred when my Dad took my brother and I to the gun range and we shot our 22 rifles. I started shooting 22 rifles when I was 8 and got my Bronze award for lying down marksmanship back then. My brother went on to get his Silver and Gold, one for kneeling and shooting bull’s eyes and the other for free standing and shooting bull’s eyes. We’d shoot of a box of shells as an evening outing whenever Dad had the time to take us out  to the range. I was 8 to 12 then.   Rifles were just on the racks in the store back then but the ammunition was kept behind the counters. 

For board games we had Monopoly and Scrabble. We also learned to play card games, the favourite being cribbage.  When my aunt came we played Canasta and I loved the piles of round plastic chips we’d tried to accumulate.  

8 years old and a childhood hockey star

8 years old. I was in Gr. 3 at Viscount Alexander School a city block from home.  The Fort Garry Community Club was another couple of blocks further than that. Maybe four blocks from our home. You can’t imagine how far that is when it’s freezing cold and you only 8 years old and are walking through chest high snow drifts, the adults step over hardly noticing.  You are bundled like the Michelin man in parkas and long underwear, snow pants and carry a hockey stick and really heavy skates.

Mom enrolled my brother and I in the Fort Garry Hockey League at a young age.  We all loved hockey.  I’d play in the leagues from age 7 to 12  before I moved on to other organized sports. We’d continue to play hockey in pick up games till late teens. Then again I’d play “old timer leagues” in my thirties. I think Canada and Hockey are like butter and bread.  The last time I was on skates was a decade ago for an LGBT Recovery  fund raiser event.  My friend Brian, the forester convinced me to come out.  Not surprisingly one of the gay fellows was a magnificent skater who had performed in the Ice Capades.  A lesbian girl was also semi pro.  The two of them stole the show.  Brian and I by comparison, now in our 50’s made tottering rounds of the rink proud that we’d not fallen over. I even skated backwards all the while these two young wonders were twirling and leaping like they were ballet dancers.  I never skated like that.

As a kid I needed my hockey stick as a crutch tripod to maintain my upright balance.  I was 16 when I was telling a girlfriend about my great hockey playing years.

“I”ve got movies,” my Dad surprised us.  He must have overhead us in the living room then was all a bustle to put up his screen and bring out the projector.  He loved an opportunity to show off the home movies. The girl was delighted.  I would soon be mortified.  

In my memory I’m Billy Hay of the Chicago Black Hawks. I’m Rocket Richard. I’m in the NHL. I’d played on the big rinks.  In my mind’s eye I was a star.  Our hockey games especially with the feats of Boris Tyzek, our local star, should have been on national tv.

Now my father provided ‘fact’.  I can understand why the postmodernist irrational emotional generation of today doesn’t subscribe to fact. I definitely preferred my memory and the story I had been telling to the visual evidence provided by father. There on the screen was me with at least one or two yards distance between his skates holding desperately to the hockey stick while slowly, ever so slowly, weaving backwards before the onslaught of a very slow moving Boris Tyzek, the terror of the Fort Garry rinks of the day.  Boris is bearing down on me while I’m eying him. A couple of slow moving dwarfs bundled to the max in oversized parkas, togues, scarves and mittens. You wouldn’t know it was Boris if you hadn’t been me and seen the steely terrifying eyes as he bore down on me preparing at any moment to deak about me and score on the goalie behind me.  There is the move. He goes one way. I go the other. Definitely a ‘ice snake’ grabbed my skate that day.   I fall over like a sated bunny.  Boris skated around me. He shoots! He scores.! It helped that the goalie was out of his net getting gum from another kid in the stands.  My girlfriend couldn’t help giggling. 

The film has raced on through several years of family events. Dad, being Scottish, cheap,  and not quite grasping the concept of moving pictures, having just switched from photography, used the movie camera like a prolonged snap shot. One film lasted a year and everyone’s birthday, vacations and the antics of the dog.  The clip of midget me on the ice falling over was probably one of his longest shots.

Most of our games occurred weeknights.  The play offs occurred on Saturday which was why dad was able to be there.

“Why can’t Dad come to our hockey games,” I’d whine to our mother. We’d go out, Mom, Ron and I leaving Dad and the dog at home.  “He works all day so we can have a house and you can have skates and play hockey. Don’t you ever criticize your father. He loves you very much. He just can’t be at home all the time because he’s working very hard to make money to pay for all the things you kids just take for granted.”

There was never a time when I was growing up that each of my parents didn’t defend and promote the other. They were an unassailable wall that stood against the kids.  Even as a teen when I was trying to stay out later by asking one then the other what time I had to be home, they’d ask ‘what did your mother, or what did your father say’ then agree.  I tried.  God knows I tried but I could never get a wedge between them so I could be in charge and dominate the parents.  They were indomitable.

In the dark of the Winnipeg winter nights with snow falling and wind chill making the temperatures 20 degrees below zero we’d trudge to the Fort Gary Community Club. If it was 40 below the game would be called off.   Then the rink was outdoors but there was a shack with a wood stove. It was hot in that shack. We’d put on our skates there. I’d need mom’s help.  We’d play and then my brother’s team would play or vice versa.  There may have been two rinks too.  I remember watching my brother play hockey and thinking he was the greatest because he really could skate and stick handle. At 8 these were still developing skills for me.  Staying upright on skates and walking to the rink, then stepping over the wood edge onto the rink, that was an accomplishment. Not alone many a kid at my age including myself wiped out as we passed through the gate onto the rink.  Ice snakes waited to trip you up there.

The coach, who usually did double time as the referee,  would then gather the 12 of us kids together and disperse us around the rink in approximately the right places before he’d drop the puck and blow the whistle. This was the cue for several us us, usually myself included, falling down.  Getting up again in skates and wrapped in parkas was a challenge that might take long enough for the 3 or 4 upright kids to skate around a bit and score.  Then we’d line up again in our designated spaces. I was right defence.  I got that place because I was one of the only kids who could skate backwards. My brother taught me and I thought that was so cool. 

In addition to the games we’d go to the rink on the weekends and have free skating and pick up games. The girls were dancing about the rink then. They always could skate better than we could doing those twirls and not falling over.  We just prided ourselves as guys thinking they probably couldn’t handle the stick or deal with the speed and danger of the puck.  They sure could skate though.

Some years when the winds blew the snow away we’d skate for.miles on the Red River. That was the best, skating forever on a Saturday morning. 

At the weekday evening games there was almost always just the two coaches twelve kids and Boris Tyzek father and my mother.  Rarely another parent would stay. Mostly they’d drop their kids off from their cars and pick them up later.  Boris’s father was Ukrainian with a thick accent scream, “Go Boris. Go.” My mother Irish was screaming across the rink from him . “Go Billy Go.”  Years later I’d look back and know why Boris became the Rhodes Scholar and one of the most impressive men our my generation.  Boris went onto greatness and I stayed out of jail thanks to our parents being at those hockey games.

I don’t think the coaches and parents kept official times. Maybe for my brothers game when it occurred before ours. But not for us. We were on the rink and off the rink in 15 minute stretches. It was just too cold and we were all thoroughly exhausted from falling down and standing up in no time at all. The rink itself was an infinite expanse of ice and I was glad I was defence because I almost never had to skate more than half of it. The centres who were the best players skated the most and the goalie got cold quickest standing around. The kids whose parents bought him the most defensive gear got to be goalie by default. I loved when I got knee pads. My father used to brag , “In my day we just rolled up newspaper and wrapped it around our legs.”  I had a blue Toronto Maple Leaf Sweater I pulled on over my parka. My brother had a  red Montreal Canadians sweater. 

We would have quick intermission and I think our game must have only last three quarter of an hour to an hour. We were never gone from the house more than a couple of hours. I remember my feet always being so cold and crying at times when my mother helped me get my skates off by the fire.  Mom was helping other kids get their skates off and I wasn’t the only kid crying. Parents would arrive and pick up the kids while Mom and I and Ron would walk home through the snow drifts  down the back lane and across the expanse of the Viscount Alexander playground.

I was so tired slogging behind these two tall people, my perfect super man brother in the lead breaking trail. Mom would pull out a chocolate Wagon Wheel then.  I’d walk along in the dark trudging through the snow nibbling on that Chocolate Wagon Wheel held in my mittened fingers  following my mother and brother’s trail my stick in my other hand and my skates over my shoulder. Sometimes Mom would carry my skates for me.   I still cry remembering those nights knowing my mother was the greatest mother in the world and wondering why the other kids parents didn’t come to their sons hockey games like Boris’s dad and my mom did, night after night throughout the cold winters.

Often the sky was clear and Ron would point up at the Northern Lights or call out that there was a shooting star. I’d look up then from putting one foot after another in the trail and see there was more to the night than that ever so long and cold tired  trail home. . When we got home Mom would undress me and I’d go straight to bed.  I was never more tired as a kid.  The great Arctic expeditions to the Community Club, the powerful masterful unforgettable hockey games and the walk home nibbling on a Chocolate Wagon Wheel treat, sustained me for decades.  I cry now remembering my mother’s love.