The view of Oosoyos just before entering the KootenaysIt would have been a swifter route to make my way South to Salmo, but I mistakenly took signs towards Kaslo in a lateral direction of some sort. Maybe east. Trying to feel better about my sub-par set of navigating skills, I told myself the two towns are different only by one letter. Unbeknown to me that I was traveling in an unexpected direction, I was already in a state of tears. It wasn't that I was unhappy. Torn between wanting to know everyone and reverting to a desire for solace, missing my deepest loves all at once, feeling worn from writing exams and moving out of my home in one week -- the heaviness of it all I felt in my chest and my throat and my shoulders. Not five minutes after the tears had dried from my cheeks, I realized I was headed in the wrong direction, corrected my travel plans by taking a ferry across Kootenay Lake, and then... I met Collin.
He asked so politely if he could ride with me to Cranbrook and I had been feeling all crazy and something about him made me feel calmer and maybe I did it in part because my mother would keel over if she knew I was picking up a hitch-hiker. Be careful the men you cross paths with, she warned me before I left on this trip, You never know who's just gotten out of prison. I asked him half-joking as he jumped into my passenger seat if he was going to kill me. I felt half ashamed when I looked in his eyes. He is the gentlest soul I have met in a long, long time. The next four hours we spent so sincerely and happily, sharing carrots, lemons, cherries and wasabi peas. He left his business, an organic grocery store in Victoria BC, and his partner for the summer to travel over the water by kayak and to live simply. He said it's made him really happy and his partner is thrilled for him. I love that.
Collin
Kootenay Lake in the Valley of Lost Souls
We lost an hour just as we arrived in Cranbrook, where I dropped Collin off to be reunited with his lovely family. After visiting with the mom and dad and that wild encounter with Collin, I was super wired for the night. It was after 9 o'clock, but I thought I'd drive at least until midnight. I slipped through the Rockies by cover of night, which I lamented on one hand because they're so magnificent, but accepted readily enough because they're full of memories from other days. It was when a car further ahead slowed suddenly that two semi's went off the side of the road to avoid colliding with each other and I had to slam on my brakes and my heart and knees got all electric on me. Definitely more confident when I can see what's going on in front of me, I decided to call off the drive to Lethbridge and settle for Fernie around 11 o'clock.
Waking up in the Rockies took me by surprise, but it wasn't long before I was out of there into the Canadian Badlands. Upon first seeing the prairies, I got really hyper with a trill of excitement up my spine, which is exactly what I predicted would happen. But as I headed east along southern Alberta I found myself slightly put off with how rather hilly yet oddly flat these lands are, but alas, patience, for as soon as I began heading north it all got very flat and the sky opened up.
I drove past The Landing and turned my car around to snap some shots. The hills of this valley are ringing with energy. A place that makes the hairs on your skin stand up, everything's magic and watchful. The Landing, I was told, is a place the Natives revered and kept sacred for healing circles.
The Landing
Taking my last highway, the #7 to Saskatoon, I took the wrong turn and ended up by a little hill on top of which were railway tracks and beyond, the great expanse. I set forth in my flip flops, but got scared when I heard a snake or a rabbit or a weasel in the weeds, so I ran back to my car. I unrolled the driver's seat window and perched there on my toes over the rooftop to take a picture of what was beyond the hill.
It had been a long day of driving and I was 40 minutes from Saskatoon when I started thinking about that part of the past. It was some lovely memory of ours that triggered it all, something I want to keep secret for myself. Out there in the middle of all those fields and space, this deep forgotten mourning came over me and I just wept and wept and wept. A rich sense of loss and sorrow and intensity to it all, and I came to know just as deeply that I have to let go of this too. People say they can't let go, but they can. You just have to get hell-bent in that direction. After all this time I could still say, I never stopped being in love with you. But sometimes the people you love are just gone and that time of your life is done and all you can do is be grateful to have known that kind of living and hope that wherever they are in this life, they are whole and so happy and loved and at peace. But I can't keep this up and I'm getting pretty done with it, this half offering my love to the world and pretending like I'm offering all of it while hoping to just be loved again by that one person.
And now I'm here in Saskatoon. And I'm 24 today. And I think my life is going to be amazing. And I feel in this chapter of my life that I'm constantly riding a crest of change. And that I'm afraid, but that it's good because it's thrilling this business of facing your fears and maybe even owning up to your shit.
My driving song love song: July Flame by Laura Viers
It's incredible and it's my new favourite song.
Waking up in the Rockies took me by surprise, but it wasn't long before I was out of there into the Canadian Badlands. Upon first seeing the prairies, I got really hyper with a trill of excitement up my spine, which is exactly what I predicted would happen. But as I headed east along southern Alberta I found myself slightly put off with how rather hilly yet oddly flat these lands are, but alas, patience, for as soon as I began heading north it all got very flat and the sky opened up.
I drove past The Landing and turned my car around to snap some shots. The hills of this valley are ringing with energy. A place that makes the hairs on your skin stand up, everything's magic and watchful. The Landing, I was told, is a place the Natives revered and kept sacred for healing circles.
The Landing
Taking my last highway, the #7 to Saskatoon, I took the wrong turn and ended up by a little hill on top of which were railway tracks and beyond, the great expanse. I set forth in my flip flops, but got scared when I heard a snake or a rabbit or a weasel in the weeds, so I ran back to my car. I unrolled the driver's seat window and perched there on my toes over the rooftop to take a picture of what was beyond the hill.
It had been a long day of driving and I was 40 minutes from Saskatoon when I started thinking about that part of the past. It was some lovely memory of ours that triggered it all, something I want to keep secret for myself. Out there in the middle of all those fields and space, this deep forgotten mourning came over me and I just wept and wept and wept. A rich sense of loss and sorrow and intensity to it all, and I came to know just as deeply that I have to let go of this too. People say they can't let go, but they can. You just have to get hell-bent in that direction. After all this time I could still say, I never stopped being in love with you. But sometimes the people you love are just gone and that time of your life is done and all you can do is be grateful to have known that kind of living and hope that wherever they are in this life, they are whole and so happy and loved and at peace. But I can't keep this up and I'm getting pretty done with it, this half offering my love to the world and pretending like I'm offering all of it while hoping to just be loved again by that one person.
And now I'm here in Saskatoon. And I'm 24 today. And I think my life is going to be amazing. And I feel in this chapter of my life that I'm constantly riding a crest of change. And that I'm afraid, but that it's good because it's thrilling this business of facing your fears and maybe even owning up to your shit.
My driving song love song: July Flame by Laura Viers
It's incredible and it's my new favourite song.
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