Decided to paint a paddle today.  Goofy, eh?  When I have had enough with the lifting and carrying and general ‘work’ stuff, I usually read or write something.  Maybe drink some wine a bit earlier, ya know?  But, once in awhile, I go paint a paddle.

Ya never know when you are going to need a paddle.

It’s an art form.  ‘Folk art’, kinda.  Actually, it is not really art at all.  It is paint therapy.  Art really should be original.  Mine isn’t.  Mine is decor, really.

People have been painting paddles and ‘junk’ for years.  It’s considered cottagy.  It is almost de rigeur to funk up the place, if you know what I mean.  So, we do that. I paint paddles.  It’s colourful, fun in a ‘kindergarten’ kinda way and it tends to make me feel better.  You see, I need a little cheering up.

My useless, idiotic, corrupt imbecile of an MP is John Duncan, probably the simplest, greediest, most nauseating sycophant to ever walk the floor of parliament and, yes, you guessed it – he recently outdid even his usual cretinous behaviour.  His limousine driver, it seems, got paid $22,000 last year.  That was not his pay.  His unionized public service pay, I am guessing is in the $60K range with government benefits.  No, the $22,000 was overtime.  That’s right, John Duncan’s limousine driver made more in overtime than most people out here make all year!  (and Parliament is only in session in Canada approximately -140 days of the 365!!!). 

He’s our area’s MP.

He is also a member of the “Restaurant Caucus” a group of MPs who have interests in the restaurant industry.  And, it seems, that is part of the reason his driver had so much overtime – waiting for him while he dined! (That poor driver must have virtually slept in the car waiting for John.  How long are his meals, anyway?)

Duncan’s riding was also influenced by the malicious, fraudulent robocalls initiated by “Pierre Poutine”.  And he won.  Of course.

Finally, Duncan helped draft the Conservative Party’s Northern policy on oil and gas.  That’s right.  He is in on the leaking edge of the Enbridge scheme to pump oil to the coast.

You can see why I need a little cheering up.  We are already up a pretty stinky creek and I am afraid to be caught without a paddle.  In fact, since we are all in this mess together, I may just go into the business!

(Warning: paddles are not effective in heavy crude). 

Back at the Q-hut.  Tís the season.  Finally.  Trying to put it all together to become the first major industrial power in the area.  Which should be easy.  The only other employer is the one-teacher school and the one person, part-time post office.

Well, OK, ol’ Sal can really crank out the bakin’ when she gets into it.  But that is sporadic at best (and my neighbours eat all the profits).

All we really have to do is make a few boxes or benches or something and we should be eligible for an economic development grant, a no-interest forgivable loan and maybe a cultural heritage grant (the Q-hut is pretty old).   Of course so are all the participants so we may even apply for a senior’s activity grant……….hmmmmm?

May even get a grant to hire the grant-writer!

Oh, I am only kidding!  None of us out here have the patience for that sort of thing.  Not much, anyway.  We’ll just do what we do and let the woodchips fall where they may.  Right now there is enough satisfaction in just ‘doin’ it and seeing it get done.

Man, have we gone simple, or what?!  And I mean simple as in uncomplicated, not stupid.  We are simplifying, we are.  Like Thoreau said, “As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness.”

“Wow, Dave!  A bit pensive aren’t you?  Gonna wax philosophical again?”

Nah.  I’ll spare you.  I was tempted, tho.  Been watching F-18 fighter jets fly overhead the last few days.  Been wondering why.  Guess there is a reason.  Not a good one, I am sure, but a reason-of-sorts.  I guess.  Whatever it is, it is complicated.  I am also sure of that.  And we don’t do complicated out here.  Not anymore.  Jus’ keepin’ it simple for as long as we can. 

And our heads down!

The W’fers came back yesterday.  For one day.  And it was good.

They had left us almost a week ago to expand their local experience by w’fing with a couple of neighbours for a few days each.  We share w’fers.  And the w’fers get a variety of experiences as a result.  But they needed to get back our way by weeks-end and then on to their next w’fing gig birthing calves in Alberta.  They came back to us because we were enroute, we needed their help with the log jam and, Sal’s cooking is worth traveling for.

And so, early Monday morning they returned, we got to work and, by the end of the day, we had pulled and stacked 42 lengths of log.  Pretty good work day!

We have 44 lengths of log but the winch packed it in!  Had to to leave two at the bottom.  Here I am up to my ankles in winches and the one I am employing fails!  What are the odds? (they are pretty good, actually, since a winch NOT working is unlikely to break).

Anyway, it is a 5 ton winch being worked by a miserable little 1/3 hp electrical motor.  The winch hauls a line that carries a log that Sal blocks-and-taykles up in the air so the log section is only between 200 and 400 pounds.  It then runs on a rolling block on the highline up a gradient of about 35 degrees for about 100 feet.  This may be hard work but the winch is the strongest link in the process.

Or so I thought.

As the day wore on, the bearing/bushing in the main shaft of the winch must have been wearing itself to dust.  I didn’t notice.  Not til it was too late.  Because the motor is too little for the job, I would attach a handle to the winch and assist the motor with my own body and energy.  I found myself winching harder and harder and harder as the day wore on.  I kept saying to myself, “Dave, you are getting old!  Good thing the w’fers are here to take the log from you when it gets up the hill.  This winching thing is hard!”

No wonder.  The bearing had packed it and I was bare-metal winching!

It is truly sad when you don’t know if it is because you are too old that it is too hard or if it is really just too hard!  Turns out, it was really too hard.  All I can say is Atlas could not have hauled that last log up without breathing hard.  I was breathing really, really hard.

I will take the winch apart and put in a new bearing.  Then I will upgrade to a larger motor.  Over the next decade I will get older and the job will seem harder every year.  Every year, I will suspect the bearing is failing again.  I will be wrong every time.  It will be me.  But this year?  This year, it was the bearing!

Winch - Before Disaster Struck

shafted

PS – after writing this, I went out and dismantled the winch.  Had to hammer the spool off the shaft.  When it was open for inspection, I saw the problem…..the shaft had been worn away and it was no longer round.  It had an oblong profile with a big bend in it.  It is amazing it turned at all!

When I write a blog entry, I am basically just trying to tell the ‘everyday’ story of our living remote and off-the-grid.  It is not supposed to be an adventure story.  It is supposed to be a daily journal.  Like a mini, personal daily news report.

Of course, I want readers to like it and so I endeavour to write it with a bit of interest or a bit of humour or even a bit of real news now and then.  If anything happens.  And sometimes it does.  Adventure happens.  But it is all done on an ‘As-It-Happens’ almost-daily basis really, and some of ‘what happens’ is just inside my head……like today’s post, actually.  Just thinkin’.

The main idea is not to convey a story in any one blog but, over time perhaps, a story might evolve from the aggregate.  You know?  A story about two older folks moving off the grid?  That was the plan, anyway.

But, of course, I am very, very closely involved in the story.  This blog is subjective in the extreme.  I write it and it is about me.  I mention others now and then but it is still a mention of others from my perspective.  It’s me (and Sal, the editor). And my view is pretty narrow.  I know that.

I am definitely ‘in the off-the-grid box’ right now perspective-wise and it is hard to step outside of it to look back in.  We usually rely on visitors to give us some perspective on what we are doing. “You guys are nuts!”  But they, too, come from a narrow perspective and so it is not always so illuminating.  “When are coming to your senses and moving back to the city?”

That’s why the Shelter Homes Publishing company’s recent book on Tiny Homes – Simple Shelter by Lloyd Kahn – was so interesting.  By looking at that book, we managed to glean some ‘outside’ perspective on our own endeavours and, to be frank, I liked what I saw.  Seems we are not alone in this housing/living  experiment.  You know?  The one we didn’t know we were a part of?

Of course, we are not alone living off-the-grid.  Quite a few books are starting to show up on that.  But Tiny Homes is a bit more than just off-the-grid living.  It is about ‘out-of-the-ordinary’ living as well.  Mr Kahn writes about different lifestyles from off-the-grid homes (professionally built and home-built) to houseboats to treehouses to earth-and-mud, cob, etc.  Suburban homes to homes-on-wheels, sailboats and even kits are also included.  Often the featured home is not so extraordinary except, perhaps, in it’s remote location or even who built it or under what circumstances.  Difference shows up all over the place.

The company has put out more than this book and I am sure they have included even crazier ideas in other editions like converting shipping containers and the like.  This latest edition even features homes built from pallets.

It is all very interesting.

What I liked especially was that Sal and I had experienced many of the alternative lifestyles featured.  We have lived on three boats.  We have ‘motorhomed’ all over the place.  And, of course, we have built our own cabin off-the-grid.  Add that to living in the cul-de-sac, staying in apartments and occupying Shaugnessy mansions and we, all of a sudden, had a larger context for us and for the current iteration about what our home is.

It may not be about the house, after all!

We seem to be lifestyle experimenters as much as anything.  If this house and this way of living is to be taken in the larger context of our lives to date, we may just be in a phase.  Kinda.  Like the chapters of the book. This may just be temporary.  We may move on in a few years!?

Who knows?  Certainly not me!  One thing, tho, is undeniable: I have lived in over thirty different places in my life and that doesn’t include ‘temporary’ vacation places or living for months at a time in ‘modes of travel’.  Sal has been my partner for over half of them.  There is a gypsy streak showing up here.

So, the aggregate story may not be the one I expected (older couple exits urban centre for rural outback and discovers a different life living on a remote island off-the-grid).  It may be about something else.

I dunno yet.

On the other hand, none of the other places (possible exception: the last two sailboats) felt so comfortable that I would not have contemplated moving on until circumstances prompted it.  I liked living aboard.  It was good.

This place, however, feels like the largest exception to that seemingly habitual ‘change’ streak in our characters.  Of all the places we have lived – including the boats – this one feels most like home.  This one may be it.

We’ll see.

Woofer’s left a few days ago.  May come back.  Son got home after circling the globe and having a great time doing it.  Daughter calls from HK all the time.  Logs are slowly coming up the hill.  I have come to terms with my chainsaw.  All is right in my world.

‘Cept the boat thing…………………sheesh!  I am having trouble making decisions on that.  I am not so sure why.  Maybe it is an age thing.  Maybe it is a financial thing.  But I think it is a lack-of-passion thing.  Ambivalence.  I get ‘excited’ about a boat now and then but it seems to elude my grasp one way or the other.

Maybe it is rejection I am suffering from?  (Nah.  I am used to that.)

Boats are supposed to turn you on, create a buzz, make you want ém.  They are seductive by design and in their very nature.  They don’t call boats ‘she’ for nothing. We guys fall hard when we fall and many fall many times.  I am barely tilting these days. I dunno what has happened to me.

Where have all my marine hormones gone?

A neighbour friend of mine who is a marine maestro with fibreglass and is very knowlegeable about my particular boat has offered to help me ‘make it better’.  We can rebuild it.  I may just do that.  Fix it instead of replace it.  Trouble is, not a great deal of passion is generated by that option, either.

I was lookin’ for the buzz, ya know?

But maybe this is one of those things that just needs to be rationalized philosophically.  You know, if you can’t get what you want, make up a good reason for the disappointment?  Rationalization:  anesthetic for the soul.  So, maybe I wasn’t meant to get one just now?  Or maybe this is a good lesson for me?  Or, how about: the right boat just hasn’t come along yet?  Whatever……….

“Plenty of boats in the sea?”

I admit to recalling the old rock and roll lyrics:  If you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with!  (Crosby Stills and Nash).

Maybe I am already happy?

I suppose I could use: this is a great opportunity to learn good fibreglassing from my neighbour…..?  But, really, I have already learned that fibreglassing is a horrible chore.  Why would I want to get good at that?  I am already planning on getting him started and then going to make him tea or get him a sandwich or something. Fibreglassing?  Yuck.

I am not quite being completely honest with you.  I still do have some passion for boats.  I really do.  But it has changed in some hard-to-determine way.  Now the passion seems to be for the theory rather than the actual physical boat. I look longingly at long boats.  I swoon over schooners.  Aluminum is alluring.  I wanna shower with a power cat!.  But, it is not the same as actually wanting to own one.  Not really.  I think – maybe – I am just lookin’.  Flirting, as it were.  No intention of following through………?

It must be an age thing.

Still looking for a boat.  Deal fell through.  The seller decided to gift the boat to their kids instead.  Close, but no.  Such is life.  Weird.  Feeling the loss of something you never had nor ever even saw………?  So, once again on to the Craigslist Wars.  Sheesh!

The seemingly unattainable goal: 16 – 18 feet centre console powercat or welded aluminum with a 4-stroke for a reasonable price……………..or, better put: a low price.

Bit of excitement yesterday.  Seems a fishfarm float broke free and was heading down current.  My neighbour called, “Hey, Dave, there’s a fishfarm assembly floating free out in the channel.  That’s not right.  Shouldn’t I do something?”

“Yeah.  Go save it.  Tie it up wherever you can.  I’ll call Marine Harvest.  If it is not theirs, they’ll know whose it is!  You should be entitled to a salvage fee or something.”

They have an automatic phone tree.  Press one, etc.  No one in.  No answer.  Phone three times.  Get a guy.  “Assembly posing threat to navigation.  Might wish to secure that thing.  Neighbour has it in tow.”

They come out in a huge and beautiful aluminum water taxi-type vessel and pick us up and we take them to where it is temporarily lashed up.  We crack jokes, get along, help each other  Tie it up better.  They take us home.

“By the way, we’re leaving the channel.  Too much algae bloom.  Takin’ all the floats out.  Forever.  You might like that….?”

I didn’t answer right away.  I was too busy dancing and high-fiving.  “Wahoo!  This is great news.  I mean, you guys have been good community contributors and every staff person has been polite, considerate and the very spokesmodel of public relations but…..sorry…………..we believe Alex Morton and…………well, we think fish farms should be self-contained.  So this is great news!  Fabulous.  I kinda like you guys and all but, Damn!  Glad you are leaving.  Really glad.”

“Well, you know, there are two sides to this………….

I interrupted.  “Yeah.  And you represent the dark side of the Force, don’t you Luke?” He laughed and the politics of fish farming ended right there.

The truth is (as I believe it) fish farms, as they are currently run and where they are currently placed, are detrimental to wild salmon.  Extremely so.  And, given the corruption and incompetence of the Federal Dept. of Fisheries, these two actors combine to decimate natural salmon stocks.

Frankly, the DFO should be taken out and shot and the fish farms relocated to their then empty offices in Ottawa. Wouldn’t even notice the change, really.  Fish and DFO have the same IQ, don’t feel pain and both tend to stink up the place.

But that doesn’t mean that Mike and Jamie and Sarah and Mary Ellen are bad people.  They are simply workers who may have imbibed the Kool-Aid a bit too much.  But still people.  And, to a person, they have tried to be ‘nice’ to the community.  They helped us put down the float at the end of the road.  They are offering some of their old equipment to us.  They respond politely and quickly to any complaints (usually noise) and they are generally good people to deal with.  I have liked every one of the individuals I have met.

But I am glad they are leaving.  And I am not alone. Too bad.  It would be much better to have them here but self-contained.  Why is that so hard?

Chainsaw repair: $400.00.  New Chainsaw: $429.00.  Hmmmm…………..?  ‘I should be able to do this.  It’s only small engine repair, right?  I can rebuild engines…can’t I?  How much are the parts?’ 

“$215.00.”

‘Hmmmmmm………..the system seems almost designed to make this a throwaway saw, doesn’t it?  Never mind.  I’ll take it home, take it apart and see what I can do.  In the meantime, please bring me in a new saw.  I’ll get it in a week or so.  Even if I manage to fix the old one, a real man should have two chainsaws, right?  One for each hand….?’

I handled that well, I think.  Mature.  Sensible.  But I was cryin’ on the inside.

I hate it when my words come back to haunt me.  I said in an earlier post that you have to know how to fix things and such challenges are inevitable and, voila’, I instantly have a chainsaw to fix.  There is a God and He has a wicked sense of humour!

Both Sally and I know that a year from now, I will have a plastic bucket o’ chainsaw parts complete with the replacement bits all stored under the workbench that somehow seems invisible to me.  Probably for all eternity.  And yet, I will continue to write off-the-grid philosophies like ‘Fixin’ Things’.  

That is embarrassing.

Maybe I should write less and learn more?

And you should take all my stuff with a grain of salt or, if you had any sense, a good single malt scotch.  I mean, who needs a grain of salt when your mentor on going feral turns out to be a poseur?

Once again I relearn the main lesson in life: do not aspire to high standards – lower the old ones!

I have nothing but good intentions and I try not to procrastinate ’cause the jobs really do just pile up if you do.  Ya gotta stay on top of the job heap.  Having said that, I am never on top of the job heap.  It is always on top of me.  Hard to maintain the pose when you are under a heap of chores.

I decided to ask for help.

W is a retired chainsaw repair guy.  Key word: ‘retired’.  It is not right to invade the privacy of a man with your chainsaw problems when he has formally renounced such work.  That would be disrespectful.  I called anyway.

“Hey, W!  How ya doin’?”

“Good.”

“Listen.  I know that you are retired and all and I respect that, I really do…………….”

“What’s broke?”

“Unh, my chainsaw.  No compression.  I wasn’t calling you to do it, tho.  Honest.  I was just callin’ to get a source for parts.  Really.  Honest.”

 “Yeah.  Right. Bring it around.  I’ll fix it.”

“Thank God!”

So, here’s the homespun wisdom for the day: No man is an island.  This is especially true for men who live on islands.  We are all ‘on-the-grid’ in some way and, it seems that I am on the ‘repair shop’ grid in more ways than I care to admit.

But I am working on it………..(I just gotta get out from under this pile of chores!)

Gawd!  We are so seasonal.  We’re like bears.  Things this spring have been just dragging along.  People have been out and about, of course, doing what they have to do but the weather put a virtual dampner on everything.  We all went about it slowly and wearing a lot of weather-cover.  I feel as if I know the burka better than I should.

This weekend, however, turned out to be the turnaround.

A smidge late but better than never.

The ad hoc grill at the dock opened for business, more people worked on the bunkhouse.  Three of us went to the Q-hut.  Wwoofers are showing up.  More small boats in the water.  A few summer residents reappeared.  Parking at the end-of-road is getting full.  Folks are starting to talk about projects again.  This time with enthusiasm.  I think we have finally gotten started this year.  We’ve turned a mental corner.

Emphasis on the word mental.

There is even an event planned for the not-yet-completed-but-close-enough renovated bunkhouse the first week in June.  Now that is commitment.

BY THE WAY.…………..One of our neighbours has their land for sale.  48 acres of very good soil, well-treed waterfront property.  Tiny, tiny cabin.  They are asking around $550,000 and that is just a smidge over $10K an acre.  A good price, I think.  And I feel obliged to mention it.

They are not  – I don’t think, anyway – marketing it very well.  They are selling it because they are in their 70’s and they are thinking they should ‘move on’ while they can still move on.

The problem, of course, is that they are very good community members.  We all like and care for them.  So, consequently, no one is talking it up.  The message is not being sent.  No one outside really knows about it.  And that suits us just fine, thank you.

But, that is not fair.  I came to realize that this weekend while working with them on the Q-hut.  They want to sell and I should help.  Thus this advertisement.

And, anyway: If you feel you have to go, you have to go.  A truism in all sorts of situations.  Right?  Anyone interested, let me know.  I’ll put you in touch.

“Geez, Dave, can we do it?  Can we make a cabin and retire to the woods and all?  I mean like………will you ever get a ferry or a Starbucks?  Ever?”

No to the ferry.  Probably NO to the Starbucks.  I’d say that if you are under 55 and healthy, you can pull it off.  Over 55, you have to start ‘helping’ such a dream along with large dollops of money.  Really.  If you are over 60 and have to pay to have it done, building and equipping an off-the-grid cabin today is at least $500.00 a square foot.  But, if you can do a lot yourself, you can do it for less.  But not a lot less.  Off-the-grid ain’t cheap.

Bear in mind: even if you are useless with a hammer and a chainsaw (not at the same time…most of us have trouble using those two things at the same time), you will have to get good at some of it.  At some point.  And I am talking about after the building is built!

Unless you are a millionaire or better you simply cannot pay to have 80% of what needs to be done for everyday living done for you.  Impossible.  There are not enough ‘workers’ for that.  You have to put on jeans and clean your own gutters, paint your own house, move your own furniture and fix your own everything.  You have to know how everything works and, believe me, that will be tested.

Service?  Fuggedabout it!  Help?  Yes, of course.  Some.  When you really need it.  But only then.  Advice?  Plenty.  We are knee deep in advice although the excellent advice pool is a bit shallow or at least not running free and clear.

“Can I do it cheaper if I get creative?”

Absolutely.  Renovate and re-model four or so shipping containers down in the city and then have them ‘barged’ or ‘helicoptered’ to a pre-built deck and you have a great place for the summer.  May to mid October.  But it might lack a little in being ‘homey’.  And ‘systems’ are systems whether they are for a fancy tent or a mansion.  You need water, gas, electricity, etc. And that is what it is.  Hard to make your own generator from scratch.  Yeah, you could make a place for less……….but not a lot less.

“You are not selling me very well!”

Sorry.  But first, I like them.  I hope they stay.  Secondly, no one should take this on without knowing what they are taking on.  We, however, did.  And it was hard and we are very thankful that we were healthy and determined.  And remained so for the entire time we built.  But I must admit; being ignorant helped.  We didn’t know how hard it would be.  I can’t really recommend doing it the way we did it.  Planning better would make it easier.

Thirdly, if you do it and have trouble, I want to be able to look you in the eye and know that I told you the truth.  So, here’s the truth (as I see it): you should buy it.  You really should.  And then let our neighbours live in it for a few more years.  That would be nice.  And, while they are there, give the property to your kids.  Let them build a nice cabin!  And then our old neighbours (after helping your kids) will leave.  Then you go up and stay in the little renovated guest cabin that your kids built and maintain for you.

Now THAT’s a plan!

I have never been one much for shopping and what little I did, I liked to do personally.  I prefer small shops, individuals and small companies ’cause I like to connect with the person and make the transaction more personal.  Within reason, of course.  Price is always an issue.

My Opthalomogist seemed to have the same feeling.  He suggested I buy glasses from some local guy he knew but, it seems, he also knew we lived up the coast, he knows what that means and he knows what that means to cashflow.  “Or, you could go to Costco.  They are the least expensive.”

I laughed.  “Hey!  We may be a bit skint living as we do and all but if the little guy is just as good and much the same price, I’d prefer to go there!”

“Sorry.  Just sayin’.  I feel the same way.   But I have lived up the coast.  I know what that means.  And sometimes the big box stores are the only way to go.  Plus, I happen to know that there is a 1000% mark-up sometimes in the little shops.  That is just silly.  Especially for…….un, well, unh……..people living out of the mainstream.  You folks just don’t get to dip into the moneyflow much.”

He was being sensitive, considerate and, surprisingly, knowledgeable.  And he obviously knew of the two economies.

Almost the whole of the economy of the city is dollar-based.  You exchange goods or services and do so with currency.  This saves time, helps maintain consistency in markets and values, makes things competitive and is a more natural form of transaction amongst those who do not know each other and are unlikely to have a relationship.  Money works there.

But it is also impersonal.  It is one of the reasons that we, in modern society, say, “Buyer beware.”  And that is simply because there are fewer social safeguards against cheaters and strangers.

But in rural communities relationship is inevitable and so few transactions are merely exchanges or impersonal encounters.  When people out here need and want and others fulfil, it is often at least partially personal.  It is relationship.  And, as a consequence, it often has less to do with money.  We still need money, to be sure, but it is lessened and it is greatly lessened the closer within the community the transaction is made.

Is this all due to niceness and altruism?  I think it is partly.  People come here, to some extent, for that very thing.  But, essentially, it is more pragmatic than that.

If I have a winch for sale (and I do), there really is no market.  Hell, we barely have any people!  And if someone does want a winch, it is unlikely they are looking for exactly what I have to offer.  So, should someone be in need of a winch, I am more inclined to say, “Here.  Take my (excess) winch.  See if you can make it do the job for you.  See if it works.  If it doesn’t, bring it back.  If it does, well, you know……………just pass on something sometime and we’ll be square”. 

The value of the winch cannot be readily determined by market forces so the value just ‘floats’ in space until the recipient has something else of value that is no longer needed and they might then say, “Hey, Dave.  I still have that winch.  Workin’ good.  I just milled up a bunch of nice Fir and Cedar.  Need any?”   And, if I do, I will get some weirded-out value exchange for my winch.  And, if I need more wood than the winch was worth, I’ll say, “Well, I am gonna need a lot of wood.  Why not use the winch value as some kind of ‘coupon’ and I’ll pay for the rest with real money?  Or I could send over some more winches?”

And it just works out.

And, if it does not work out right then, there is always more time for another opportunity to arise to ‘settle accounts’. We aren’t strangers.  We are neighbours.  “We know where you live!”

Of course, over long periods of time, the ‘fairness of it’ can start to feel not quite right and some members of the community may carry a grudge or a feeling of discontent but, largely speaking, that is rare and usually temporary.   Most of the time – if there is a feeling of responsibility or obligation or debt to the transaction – it is on the part of the recipient.  They do not want to feel beholden.  They are looking to pay it back.  They want the accounts settled.  We rarely encounter freeloaders.

99% of the time it is just forgotten.  And that is because we have an ‘economic leveling device’ built into the community.  People just give and share freely on so many small items that it doesn’t take much or a long time to feel ‘fairly done by’.  Free fish, oysters, a trip to town, a bottle of wine and a regular flow of goodwill and considerations tends to blur the books just the right amount.  After awhile it all just feels right.

Or it doesn’t.

But it usually does.

I mention all this because, as you know, I am looking for a boat.  But doing so is essentially an exercise in the impersonal and distant – money exchanges with strangers.  Difficult and not fun.  I go to Craigslist or some website to find something that is suitable and then contact the seller.   Going to see it is almost always prohibitively expensive so I endeavour to learn more about the item by way of the e-mail.  I explain my circumstance when required (they almost always say, “just come see it tonight, why don’t you?”) and, sometimes, the seller is intrigued by the answer.  Or is at least curious and asks questions.  And so we exchange e-mails.  It becomes a bit more personal.  It starts to ‘feel’ better.

I have made a few purchases this way and all of them have been great.  Human.  Personal.  Relationship.  Better than going to a small shop actually.  Similar, anyway.  The lady from whom our community bought the woodworking tools will be coming to visit in the summer.  It feels like a friend coming.  The old fellow who used to build wooden boats and sold me his bronze fastenings met my son (who picked up the stuff) and, liking him, threw in a few extra tools and things.  This is good.  This is really good.

And it is a good deal.  This is way better than getting a ‘deal’ at Costco.

I am sitting in the Opthamologist office down island.  Seems I have cataracts.  I am looking at the folks in the waiting room and it is filled with old people.  I glance at the reflection of us all in the window.  We are all old, Sally and me, too.  Damn!

The next old geezer leaned over to me, “Yeah, just got me a new cane.  Hip surgery, ya know.”

“Wow!  You just had hip surgery?” 

“Nah.  Not religious, myself.  Why?  As soon as I get my eyes straightened out, I may have to have hip surgery, ya know? Sorry if I am yellin’.  Can’t hear a thing.  Didja say something?  I’m 77.  Had my house paid off since I was forty.  Why’d you ask?” 

Since I hadn’t asked, I was stuck for a reply.  “Well, unh…..you know…..like, how does a guy with a bad hip get around his house……?”

“Couch?  Yeah, I gotta couch.  Trouble sittin’ in it, tho.  Bad hip, ya know?  Just got me a new cane. May need hip surgery, ya know?”

I sensed a circularity coming on.  You know, a circularity, right?  Like a mental whirlpool.  Old people are good at ém.  I had to find a way out quick or I’d be sucked into the centre of this one and I’d go down.

“Hey”, I yelled into his face, “did the nurse just call ya?”

“Huh!?  Nurse call?  Where?”

I screamed, “You may want to check with the receptionist.  I think I heard them call your name.  I’ll go do that for you.”  I get up.  I go to the receptionist.  Look at her typing for a minute and then come back.

“Nah, wasn’t you.  You’ll still have to wait.” And then I head off as if it were me who was called.  I go around the corner and sit down out of his sight.  Man, I have good survival instincts.

Now, if I could only see.

“David!” I am called in.  The woman yells at me in simple sentences, mostly pleasantries.  “How are we today, dear?  You get here alright?  Now just you sit here and don’t move, OK?  I am just gonna do some simple tests, OK, dear?  And then, we’ll wait a minute or two and then I’ll take you back to the waiting area.  Dr. Smith will be right with you after a few minutes.  Alright?”

She’s my age, for Gawd’s sake!  She does the tests.  Speaks to me a few more times like I am mental and starts adding ‘dearie’ to the sentences.  I look up over her desk and there are two pictures of young women looking much like one another.  Sisters, I am sure.  And likely her daughters.  “Those must be your daughters”, I say. “I see the family resemblance.”

“Yes, they are, dearie.” she yells.  “Those are my daughters.”

“Pretty sexy.”

The air leaves the room.  There is a horrible silence.  She looks at me.  I can’t help myself.  I am grinning from ear to ear for the first time since I walked into that hell-hole.  I was thinking of elaborating on that theme but I knew my grin already looked like a leer and that was about as far as I could push it.  Political correctness was hovering in the air.

She looked at me.  And.  And.   And…………burst out laughing………..“Sorry.  I tend to talk to everyone as if they are geriatric.  Hahhahahahahah.  Then she leers at me.  Are you always so naughty?”

Not quite the same as a circularity but definitely a vortex into which I did not want to be invited.   I changed the subject to lenses, cataracts and perhaps my pending hip surgery once I get my eyes straightened out and, thankfully, the moment passed.

I have a knack for getting into trouble but, thankfully, I also have a knack for survival.  I really do.