It’s cold. Minus degrees with a very strong wind chill factor.  The neighbourhood ‘fiords’ dump cold air down our channel during their ‘outflow’ moods and the temperature just plummets.  Locally these winds are referred to as a ‘Bute’.  We sit up on a rocky ledge on our beach so as to maximize the cooling effect – in summer.  In winter, we crank up the little stove til it’s a-hummin’ so as to minimize the cooling effect.  Aah, the yin and yang of life, eh?

It’s pretty nice here, tho.  Cosy.  Warm.  Very beautiful.  It’s good.  We have 8 coming for dinner tonight and Sal is trying to get six for lunch next Tuesday.  I am not as keen to entertain when it’s minus 10 and the guests have to come by boat but Sal has a ‘social accounting system’ to reckon with and so we all convene whether we want to or not.  Whoopee!  I asked her about the logic of this and she said, “It’s almost year-end.  We still have some payables!”

She may be missing the hospitality concept a smidge.

The problem for me is that the plumbing is frozen.  Or wants to be.  I have heat tape on it but I have to run the genset to keep it functioning and that seems a bit silly.  So, last night I drained the system.  Tonight, I’ll recharge it til everyone has gone home and then, in the dead of night, drain it again.  Heat tape and genset on while they are here.  Party preparations are different out here. 

Q-Hut is nearing completion.  Looking good.  Turnout for the work-party this week was excellent.  We’ll be done in three or four more sessions.  But, as you may recall, we don’t work in the rain.  We stopped work in the summer (everyone had personal projects to complete) and we are disinclined to work when it is really cold.  Projected completion date – sometime in 2011.  Maybe.  2012 for sure.  But we don’t care.  We like doing it and, if stretching the job is required to prolong the enjoyment, we will do just that.  This task may never get done!

Just for the record: the Liberal govt. is imploding in ways uniquely spectacular, don’t you think?  “Here a tax cut, there a tax cut, whoops, sorry, only kidding!” And – just for interest sake – the NDP are tripping and falling at the same time!  Carol James is struggling to remain upright what with all the daggers stuck in her back.

My God, there is such a dearth of style and poise let alone leadership in this pathetic province you have to wonder how and why all these people got to such a position.  It is no wonder that apathy reigns and disillusionment prevails amongst the electorate.

I’m going to encourage Sally to run.  I’d vote for her.  She’s right once in awhile (don’t tell her I said that!) and is really cute.  Way cuter than Carol Taylor.  That’s a better track record than most of our elected governments who, it seems to me, are wrong virtually all of the time (and look bad in the process).  Hell, on that basis, I’d vote for either one or both of our dogs!  I’d even vote for a ‘broken clock’ on the basis that is right at least twice a day!

Just before I quit this rant: The Liberals were likely the worst government we ever had (and we have had some really bad ones) – selling off our rivers, eviscerating BC Hydro, huge spending over-runs on the convention centre and now the Olympic village debacle – just to name a few (and there are many, many more, especially the criminal BC Rail/Basi/Virk issue).  But where was the opposition in all this?  The only voice of dissent I ever heard (other than the echoes of my mind) was Rafe Mair.  And Bill when-it-comes-to-a-buck VanderZalm.

Honestly, we really have to do better next time.         

‘Birthday wishes’ to Fran got handled thanks to an early morning reminder from reader Sid.  Whew!  Thanks, buddy.

Town day was postponed.  Blowing 25 with gusts.  We had whitecaps and sizeable waves.  Normally this wouldn’t deter us but lacking the big boat (motor dead) meant reliance on Sal’s boat, the equivalent of a Miata.  Imagery: imagine a large helping of mashed potatoes heaped on a plain white saucer, maybe with two bits of broccoli on the side………..that’s me sitting in her little boat and the little broccoli bits are her and her outboard motor.  Not a seaworthy picture, really, is it?

So, we’ll go another day.

Dogs are starting to bug me again.  I suppose I should blame the local otter – the dog perfume dispenser. Nothing seems to please the dogs more than a few rolls in fresh Otter poop.  Then they come in and sit at my feet in front of the woodstove.  “They love you, sweetie” says Sal.  I know it is silly of me, but I am not keen on steaming dogs reeking of Otter poop and, strangely, I don’t care if it is a sign of affection.  I am not impressed.

Our neighbour Judith is the ‘go-to’ dog sitter for us.  The dogs (especially Fiddich) really do love her.  And it seems mutual (but she won’t take them permanently no matter how much money I offer).  Judith dropped by the other day with fresh deer offal and bones.  For the dogs.  There was about 25 pounds of still-meaty bones, spines, noses and other organ meats and the dogs have taken to it like wolves.  It’s a good thing.  I think.

It is also interesting to realize how ‘citified’ I still am.  I am shocked at all the deer blood.  I know that blood is involved in all the meats we eat.  I am not quite that insulated.  But, when you buy a steak from Save-on, they have taken special care not to have the item retain any sense of the ‘real-life/real-butchering/real-death’ process as possible.  Wouldn’t want the customers to really know what they are part of, I suppose.  A Save-on steak has no blood. Neither does a chicken, a piece of swine or a lamb.  They are clean, dry and you can put one on your sore, recently punched, black eye if you need to without worry of staining your clothes with bloody evidence.  Our meat has been sanitized. 

Not so the local slaughter.  Of course, the local hunter hangs and bleeds his dead ruminant and all that but the pieces that are hacked off willy nilly (so to speak) are not wiped 100% clean and wrapped in plastic with a styrofoam tray as background.  Get a deer roast from a local and you get a brown bag with a bloody lump in it.  Feels pretty primal.  And it is.

I am disinclined to becoming vegetarian.  I tried it once and it didn’t work.  But I must admit that more people would consider it if the meat they bought was handed out like the deer offal was.  Makes it pretty real.  You get closer to the deer, closer to the dogs and somehow closer to everything. 

It’s bloody profound is what it is.    

The day before Fran’s birthday.  Sheesh!  Fran is a good friend.  Abnormal and whacked in all the usual suburban ways but especially so when it comes to her birthday.  DO NOT FORGET BIRTHDAY!  That is not a reminder, it is a threat and comes very close to a curse.  It has worked that way on me, that’s for sure.  For years!    

I have been living in fear now since November started.  I usually remember Fran’s birthday because it was also my parent’s wedding anniversary.  But my parents are gone and the double-trigger, it seems, was necessary for me to remember either/both.  So, I remember for virtually every day except, of course, the ACTUAL day and then all Hell breaks loose when it comes and goes.  Tomorrow, we’ll be in town doing some shopping.  I’ll forget.   

I am doomed!

Sal’s gone postal for the day.  It’s her turn at the Post Office.  Plane comes in at noon-ish and Sal sorts mail and gets to spend the next four or so hours greeting islanders as they come in to get books, bills and cheques.  Seemed like a good way to meet everyone when she signed up but well, she knows everyone now and so it is a bit more of an obligation.  “Oh well”, she rationalizes, “I get away from that stupid Dave for a few hours.”

Those five or so hours are pretty hard on me, though.  

This time the benefits for the postal worker are almost outweighed by the negatives.  It is pouring with rain.  Visibility is poor.  A storm is scheduled for later and she is in a 12 foot open boat coming home in the dark.  For most people, that is a daunting prospect.  Not Sal.  Flying over waves and getting soaked is all part of the fun.   Sally manages to make ordinary life into an extreme sport – and I stopped trying to keep up a decade ago. 

But I’ll stand on the deck and look worried starting at about 4:30 pm.  I am the overly concerned ‘responsible one’ in this situation but I’ll play that role from the comfort of a dry, warm home. 

Maybe pour myself a glass of wine to help with the stress.    

Looks like it will an ordinary day in paradise, just a bit wet for the ol’ pudding.    

People come and go.  We expect that.  But when a young couple with two small kids leaves the island, it is somehow worse.  Feels symbolic in some kind of way.  Sad, actually.

H&K are the parents leaving.  Today.  Very nice.  Two little daughters.  R-May is just a few months old and A is barely 2…whatever……and, OMIGAWD is she cute!  (Tons of strawberry blond hair and a giant smile.  Full of beans.  She’s breaking hearts already (mine, for sure).  And she likes me.  Calls me grandpa or Santa whichever is her mood for the moment.  I always get a big hug. And then we ‘play’ at nonsense stuff and have goofy conversations for a few minutes before she heads off for something better.  Sounds crazy but I’ll miss her.)

And therein lies the point of this entry: seems islands are for old people.  The dissonance with that thought is that you have to be young to handle the physically tough living on the islands but only the older, more established people can afford to live here.  Island living ain’t cheap or easy.

As a side note: this older-person-being-physical phenomena shows up on the women more than the men.  Both genders are in good shape out here (I am the exception that proves the rule) but a man in good shape in his 60’s is pretty shapeless.  A chunk of muscle, gristle and covered in grizzle.  But the women out here still keep their feminine shape.  I can think of several (I just counted up 7 without trying) older women out here whose figures rival that of much younger athletes or even models.  Of course they age as does everyone but they are so active that they can swap clothes with their older grandchildren.  Really!

City living is harder stress-wise and even more expensive when you really consider the situation but, on a purely physical and cashflow basis, island living is just too much for most younger people. That sounds contradictory, doesn’t it?  But, in the city, you can factor in financing and specialization.  Plus they lay on the ‘systems’.  Financing makes it both easier and more enslaving.  Specialization makes all the numbers bigger – you get more and you pay more.  And the systems – well, we know about the systems, don’t we?  Efficient but dehumanizing in the extreme. 

The reason the young can handle the city: energy.  The reason the old can handle the country: money.  

Even tho the country is a cheaper place in which to live, there is no financing.  Not for everything (gensets, runabouts, tools, solar panels, etc.).  And, where you can finance, you can’t earn a steady enough income to pay it off.  Still, I’ve looked at the picture from both sides and I am convinced country living is a much better deal – if you can afford the entry fee.  It costs less, you work less, you live healthier and everything is better.  But you need to ‘enter’ debt free. 

Financing a rural life just doesn’t work.  And young people just getting started need to mortgage themselves to the hilt as a rule and then run as fast they can to keep up with all the payments.  That is hard enough to do in the city but it is almost impossible in the forests these days.

They have to go.  We know that.  It’s inevitable, I guess.  But sad.  To have the systems like school and day care and Starbucks and convenient shopping, you go to the city and sell yourself into servitude.  To have fresh air, trees, wildlife and physical work, you go to the country but suffer from lack of work and socializing with your peers.  Tough choice when you are old.

Even tougher when you are young.      

Engine died.  Not good.  One day it was running and doing it’s job happy in the water and just enjoying being an outboard motor and the next…….well, it started with a nasty cough.  Went on for a few days.  But, it seemed to carry on – more or less like normal – once a few minutes were spent hacking and spewing.  Then the cough got worse and finally, it just couldn’t get out of bed, as it were.  Couldn’t plane.  It could go.  Slowly.  It just couldn’t go well.  There was no joy.

At times like this, I take the old mix-master into Sonny-the-outboard-mechanic and he works his magic.  Usually I am, once again, reunited with the heavy, powerful inanimate object with which I have an intimate and co-dependent relationship.  Not this time.  “Engine’s dead!”, said Sonny sensitively. “Gotta get a new one.”  I reeled. 

“Oh, Gawd!  Tell me it isn’t so!  What happened to the old gal?”  

“Well, they’re outboard motors, ain’t they?  They break.  Yours followed that tradition faithfully.  It broke.  Water got in.  Went all over where it shouldn’t.  I just closed it up when I seen the rust, eh?  No point.  The outboard is dead!  Long live the outboard!”

Sonny is not much for sentiment.  Especially outboard motors.  And, it seemed at the time, outboard motor owners.  He likes me, I am sure, but Sally’s accompanying me doesn’t do the relationship any harm.  He likes cute.  But now he just looked at me like a repo man or tow truck driver rather than the life-giving doctor I had hoped to see. 

I may be a bit harsh in this observation.  He may have looked a smidge more sympathetic like the driver of a limousine at a funeral but, whatever, it was somewhat detached.  Ya know?
 
Basically Sonny was saying, ‘”It is your problem now.  An hour ago, I was kinda interested.  But not now.  Now I am bored of you”.   It felt awkward.  I didn’t belong there anymore.  I left.

But where does one go?  What does one do?  I was lost, aimless, confused.  Alas and woe overwhelmed me for a minute or two until I drove up the street and saw new outboard motors all shiny in the shop window.  ‘New’ might be good………….?

It is times like this that I hate government even more than usual.  Firstly the motor costs more than my first ten cars did — in total.  OK, first 15.  The price is in excess of $10,000.00!!  For that, you don’t get a car or even an umbrella to keep off the weather.  You just get the motor.   Period.  And then the government adds HST. 

They do this as if they haven’t added any taxes to any other part of the transaction already.  You know, like, “We have to tax this engine ’cause, like, it hasn’t given us anything!  Not lately, anyway.  And, like, even if it did when we taxed it coming into the country and then when we taxed the transporting of it and all that……….well, that was then and this is now.  Now we want more”.

I just can’t do that.  I know that outboards are the ultimate metaphor for life – death and taxes – but I will not go easily into that sweet darkness.  I may have to go but I am going kicking and screaming all the way.  I’m gonna look for second hand.  OK, maybe third.  

The only good part is that my undertaker is called Sonny.  Gives me hope for the after-life.

Some people have been able to comment on this blog, others couldn’t.  The Blogger settings allowed comments so I thought I was covered.   I wasn’t.  So, I have just rearranged the Firefox settings to doubly allow comments – that may have been the problem. 

So, if you are so inclined, please try again.  I have mild existential problems and your comments (or donations) help me to believe I exist.  At this particular time, I am having some doubts.   

‘Comments’ are tricky things.  The ‘commentator’ is writing to me but the comment content is going public.  Most of my friends want to say things to me that they would be embarrassed to think others would hear about.  “Stop writing this!”  seems an OK thing to say directly to me (a very common comment) but may seem odd when made public on a blog. 

And, “don’t forget you owe me $20.00” is kinda off the topic and makes the commentator seem petty  (You are! Get over it.  Move on, already!). 

Of course, I have a lot of friends who have trouble with their mother tongue and can’t, won’t or otherwise withhold their opinions on the basis that their comments are probably stupid (healthy perspective).  I hope I have set the bar low enough so that only the goofiest amongst you still feel that way and, if you still do, then you are probably right – your comments are likely stupid.

But I still want ém.  Existentially, they still work.   

The rants and cuss words are just vulgar and I think when the author/commentators see what they have written in print, they are a bit ashamed.  Don’t be.  You should be but don’t be.   I understand emotional outbursts, so it is OK to vent your spleen on my blog if you must.  I kinda feel the need for a bit of cleansing, myself now and then.  I just may write about Gordon Campbell for a submission or two – that should get the joint a-hoppin’.  A few dozen pages of vitriol just might make me feel a bit cleaner. 

But all comments are useful to me.  They tell me what interests you about our lives out here.  I was delighted to hear from Ginger and Sid on the ‘salvage’ piece.  Seems we are birds of a similar feather in that respect.  And Annette always sympathizes when things go a bit awry.  I like that.  

One of my favourite comments (unpublished) came from a friend and it said, “Gawd, I hate getting and wading through this drivel.  I would ‘spam-block’ you if I didn’t think you’d just find a more effective way to intrude into my life.  At least this doesn’t require seeing you in person!  And, I must admit that a 5 paragraph missive now and then is a helluva lot better than a 51 page e-mail monologue on your apartment in China.  If this is what it takes to help you feel as if you exist, it is the lesser of two horrors!” 

Can’t you just feeeeel the love? 

It was that time again yesterday.  Go to the Q-hut to work on the transformation of an old one-room school made out of a Bailey building just after WWll into a community woodworking shop stopping at lunch time to hobnob with neighbours down at the dock.  That and Sal’s yoga session is part of our weekly routine.

Before and after the lunch-break, we guys work slowly and crack stupid guy-jokes.  It’s quite fun.  Plus we are getting something done.  Doesn’t get much better than that.  Well, it did, actually.  It was a beautiful day and it was additionally graced by two young public health nurses trying to flog vaccines on a paranoid rural subset of humanity.  They had encounters.

I decided to be one of them for the time I was with the nurses.  It’s kinda fun acting like a curmudgeon from the sticks.  “Wouldn’t be doing this if t’weren’t for wife, you know.  She’s the big cheese ’round these parts.  Resistance is futile.  Still, I don’t usually have what the government is offering.  It’s all a trick, you know.  You gals have trouble sleeping at night knowing that you are injecting that nano-robot, mind-control chip technology into the people?  Or did they inject you two first and now you think it is all good?”

“Uh, sir, you don’t have to have the shots, you know.  It’s a public service.” “So, they say.  But I hear tell them nano-things are in all of us nowadays.  The only real reason to get another shot is to get your nano-things updated, you know, like an update from Microsoft.  Once you are into the system, you gotta keep up or else your programming will go all whacked.  That’s where Alzheimer’s came from, you know.  Old people forget to update.  We’re all programmed by Bill Gates, you know!”

By this time their professionalism is kicking in and they are going with the flow.  “Yes, sir, but you know Bill and Melinda are into eradicating diseases, right?  And so this may just be part of that plan.  Now that would be good, wouldn’t it?”  She says that with a lovely smile in an obvious effort to keep the customer calm and relatively relaxed while she and her assistant start doing their task with amazing speed.  They are going to keep this encounter brief.

I take another tack.  “Can I have this shot in my butt?  You know, I get to drop my drawers and bend over?  It’s always more fun that way.”  “NO!” They say in unison getting that worried look on their faces and working even quicker.

Sue, one my neighbours shows up just then.  And I say, “If you’re wanting one of them nano-probes here, Sue, you gotta get ‘neckid’ first.  These here nurses want to see you in your altogether ‘fore they’ll stick you with the new technology.  Don’t you worry ’bout me, I won’t look.  But they sure do!”  The nurses fix me with cold stare and a sharp jab and tell Sue that it is not necessary to disrobe and that I am just some sort of old trouble maker. 

“Can I get the shot in my butt?” Sue asks.  “It’s always more fun that way.”

Welcome to Surge Narrows.

We are salvagers.  Kinda.  Not really.  Partly.  It is not like we get into our old truck dressed in old, dirty clothes and go about looking for junk we can utilize or anything.  It is just that we are always in old dirty clothes and our truck is also kinda beaten up and we do notice things that can ‘come in handy’ as we drive along.  It is a subtle difference, I know, but there is a difference.  It is basically one of commitment.  We are not committed salvagers, we are just opportunists.

Mind you, we are committed opportunists so it is a slippery slope.

Over the past few weeks we have accumulated plywood.  We need plywood.  Bad. And so, when the opportunity presented itself (Sal’s dad wanting rid of some.  Doug Fleet generously donating to the community woodworking shop) and the other odd source (they don’t get much odder than Doug or Sal’s dad), we took it.

But plywood is heavy and awkward and we have enough barnacle and kelp covered slopes to climb with loaded arms as a rule and so we left it to accumulate in the utility trailer we have at the end-of-the-road for a while.  We had a haul.   

And Sal, of course, had plans.  “Sweetie, it is time we went over and got all the plywood.  Get out of your housecoat, stop drinking tea and playing on the computer now.  Now is the time to schlep plywood.  Come along, sweetie.”  

I don’t know what power has been harnessed in that ‘sweetie’ word but shortly thereafter I am transferring plywood on the beach into Sal’s small boat.  It is 11.5 feet long, 4.5 feet wide.  Plywood is frequently at least 8 feet long.  There is not much room in the boat for dancing when it is just her and me.  We were getting pretty crowded in the vessel and the two saw horses we had also obtained didn’t make it easier.  I’ve been in bigger hot tubs.  Once loaded, we headed over the bounding main to our house.  And then we unloaded over the aforementioned barnacle and kelp covered slippery slopes.

We wrestled the ply under the boat-shed and, when done, considered it a job well done.  It is also a portent of things to come.  As I look back on my last six years, I realize that I have been salvaging almost from the beginning.  Indeed, salvaging without a purpose was the way I started.  I was roaming junkyards a few years before I ever thought about building the Read Island home.  Maybe junk is my destiny? 

I am a junkman, coo-coo-ca-choo.

It is a strange feeling, this one.  I am now old and stale, I am now out of it.  No longer hip.  A fuddy-duddy in a cardigan sweater (I just got one awhile ago to Sally’s chagrin).  I am simply not cool.  Not anymore, anyway.  Who woulda thunk that?!

My first inkling of this happening was my lack of interest in the gene pool.  I found that I didn’t care to even walk the pool deck to look anymore.  I mean, a prime breeding sample can still turn my head but it’s mostly out of habit now.  I am simply not a participant.  Not even part of the audience, really.  And it is the gene pool competition that keeps you on your toes, so to speak (well, elbows and toes to be more precise).  One becomes less ‘with it’ when there seems no point. 

I also seemed to lose interest in gadgets.  I mean, I still like them and all.  Gimme lots of toggle switches…………….mmmmmmmm, boy!  But, if you are really in the gadget game, you follow the latest news, the latest models, the new inventions.  I don’t even have a TV anymore.  There are all sorts of things out there that ‘connect’ me to faces, tubes, text and  tweeters and I just don’t care.  How does one stay hip when one is so apathetic?

All this slapped me upside the head when I went into Vancouver for the first time in almost 18 months.  Cost me $75.oo to get on a ferry and it was one I had never even seen before!  It used to be that I knew each and every ferry better than members of my own family and I found myself on one that doesn’t even look like the others.  The floor plans were different.  I didn’t like that.  Fussed a bit.  You know?  Like an old grump?  Sally and I even ‘lost’ each other when we agreed to meet at a certain location.  Default result: met at the car.  Man, that is sad!

Then there was the Canada line.  Too much for me but Sally took it.  Bought tickets willy nilly not having a clue as to how much she really needed or even where she was going.  Don’t forget: the skytrain stations are in locations that we didn’t use to hang around before.  She once found herself at the foot of Cambie!  A few short years ago, the foot of Cambie was nothing.  Empty.  Nada.  Now there’s a loop and a station and things go off in different directions.  We didn’t know.

I suppose being hip is less about things and novelty than it is about attitude.  I still have a ‘hip’ attitude but, to be fair, it is all about being ‘hip’ in other things now.  I was ‘cool’ when it came to talkin’ wood.  I know something about wood.  More than the average urban guy, that’s for sure.  So, I could talk ‘trusses’ and stuff, edge-grain, heart-wood and things of that nature.  But, I confess that there were few overlaps in the urban/rural conversation and it was painfully obvious that I was listing more to the rural side. 

I am really glad I left my gumboots in the truck. 

I am embarrassed to admit this but I am not as hip as I used to be.  In fact, I may be ‘out of it’ as so many of my friends have alluded previously.  This is hard to accept but I think it is true.  First off – before the rumours fly – I do know (of course) what an I-phone and a Blackberry are.  Honest.  I have no idea how they work, what they do or why I would want one but all that was clearly illustrated for me during my recent week of work.  Seems I can’t function in the city without one.

This truism first manifested when I picked up my old friend, Larry McFarland, to go see the old building I was involved with.  Like most guys, I drove out to the unfamiliar area of Queensborough confident that I could find the site.  After all, it was 80000 square feet on ten acres.  Not easily missed.  I was just going to ‘feel’ my way there, you know, like guys do.  Larry looked at me like I was insane and, utilizing his I-phone, instructed my driving right to the front door.  Hell, with Google, we didn’t even really have to go in.

But we did.  The building is amazing.  Built by Boeing in 1943 to repair airplanes, it has some considerable history.  But is no longer useful in any other way.

Boeing built the structure using old, first growth Fir beams.  Some of them huge!  There is somewhere in the neighbourhood of 1 – 2 million board feet of clear-grain, non-heartwood, rock-hard, perfect Fir in the trusses.  Of course, like most things, it costs almost as much as the wood is worth to dismantle the structure and salvage it.  But there may be a way to end up on the plus-side of the ledger after the dust and rubble have been cleared.  And that is what I was asked to figure out.

As most of you know, I am not much good at anything in particular.  My main assets are my friends and, of course, Sally.  So, I worked them.  Called ém all.  Told them stories, bought some lunches, dished out hugs willy-nilly and pumped them for their knowledge.   They were great!  Everyone I called helped out and, after a week, I had some idea what I was going to do.  

Get me a Blackberry for starters!

We’ll take the building down and go from there.  I’ll likely have to come back to the city for a bit but I am hoping to minimize that.  I loved seeing people but just didn’t warm to the traffic and the rules and the stresses…….you know?   Still, I will come back.  I am not so sure that I can drag Sal back with me, tho.  She did her token ‘shopping’ thing and had had enough of restaurant food for the year. 

She likes it on Read.