On the Road Again 2017 #13

 

Just past the gas station/restaurant the shoulders were wide and there were lots of cars coming out of the gas stop. It was a nice day, it was still fairly early in the morning and I felt good. I felt even better when a large pick-up truck stopped and the driver offered me a ride. I threw my pack in the pack of the truck and we were off. I felt even better when I found out my driver was bound for Revelstoke which meant that for the next 400 kilometres I could sit back and enjoy the scenery.

It was an interesting ride. I can't say it was always enjoyable - there were times when the conversation was frustrating, when my driver's attitude about some people was so annoying  I thought about getting out more than once but there were other times when the conversation flowed along nicely or we just drove, quietly enjoying the scenery. My driver was, I would guess, in his mid 30s, He had been raised by a dad - who by any definition sounded like a man was tough on his kids. He was a father who expected his sons to work hard. Consequently my driver grew up believing that he was at least partially if not entirely define by his capacity for working hard, of giving as he put it- 100% all of the time. He had no patience for anyone who could not or would not work as hard as he. He had had a number of careers including working on building  the high tension electrical towers that criss-cross our nation; doing some construction and most recently sand blasting the inside of railroad oil cars. According to my driver, some of the jobs were very dangerous and required both a lot of skill and the capacity to work hard for long hours. Personally, I could not imagine being on one of the high towers assembling the last bolts. Someone has to do it, I am just glad it is not me.

My driver told me stories of how he verbally bullied (there was no other word for it) employees who could not or would not work flat out all of the time. He made it absolutely clear that he would do whatever it took to force someone who was not working up to his expectations to resign.  When I said to him that his tactics were illegal - he said he did not care. He also said that his bosses knew what he was doing and they were happy with him. I tried to inject into the conversation the fact that all he was doing was increasing the profits of the companies he worked for - he said he knew that, but that that was okay. That is what workers were suppose to do. He was the perfect employee. It really was frustrating. It became a little bit more frustrating when he decided to stop for a hamburger somewhere along the way. I wanted to get to Revelstoke as soon as I could - only so I would have lots of time to continue my trip west. But abandoning this drive before I had to made no sense, so I hung around as he picked up his lunch at Wendy's.

The weather was great, the scenery gorgeous and I was with a driver who had gone out of his way to make sure there was room for me in the truck. I learn so much from my drivers, about their lives ,their jobs , their philosophies of life. I do not have to agree with them all of the time, they don't have to be people I would want to emulate. My job is to entertain them, to get along with them so that they drive me as far as they can.  And he did. He drove me to near the end of Revelstoke - we wished each other good luck, we shook hands and I got out.

On the Road Again 2017 #12

I have, in the past, suggested that the bus drivers in Calgary were less than helpful. In fact I may have suggested that they were intentionally mean to anyone who wanted to leave their fair city. In spite of how I looked with a full pack on my back, at least some of the drivers have had a hard time understanding that all I wanted to do was to get out of town. On other occasions Calgarian bus drivers have deposited me in some strange places.  I have had to do a lot of walking up steep hills or across long, not very friendly-to-pedestrian  bridges. I have cursed Calgary bus drivers more than any other of their profession. On this trip however, the Calgary bus drivers were great.

During my sleepless night at the Husky gas station, I had asked the clerks in the store as to how to get downtown to catch the C-Train that would get me to the right station so that I could get a bus heading in the general direction of west. Their directions sounded very easy - the next morning, as soon as I saw a bus go by, I grabbed my pack, said a not very sentimental, silent goodbye to the parking lot where I had spent the night and walked a couple of hundred yards to the nearest bus stop. I got on the bus, paid my money (if I had not had enough change the driver would have let me paid less), got a transfer and then told the driver what I wanted. He promptly told me that I was going in the wrong direction or rather that there was a faster way. He stopped the bus, assured me that the transfer would be good and that a bus going the opposite direction would be along shortly. I crossed the road and as promised, a bus soon arrived at the bus stop.

I told my new bus driver what I needed, she assured me that I was going in the right direction and that was it. It was a long ride and when I got to the large bus/train stop I had a very long wait for the next bus. There are, I guess, just not that many people going out past Olympic Park at 6:00 AM from downtown Calgary. However, a bus did eventually come - the driver promised me that he could get me to a good place on the Trans-Canada outside the city limits. And he did. The only problem was that I had to cross over the Trans-Canada. If the traffic had been any busier - that could have been a problem. The good news was that I did not have to walk up the long upward inclined shoulder to get outside of where I have always supposed the city limits were. The only bad news was that by the time the cars were passing me, most of them were going 100 kilometres an hour.  It was, without a doubt, my easiest trip heading west through Calgary. It feels as if I have finally mastered the Calgary bus system.

My first ride came fairly quickly. He was not going very far but he promised to get me to the turn-off to highway 22 where there was a restaurant and a gas station. I have been there before and I knew that there was a reasonable shoulder and that from that point on, almost everyone who would be going past me would be heading into the mountains. So often drivers tell me that they are going to get me to a better place - so often they do not have a clue what they are talking about  and I end up in a worse place. But this time it worked out great. It was still early in the morning, I was out of Calgary and on the road again.

All I had to do was to stay awake for the next 18 hours or so.

Apologies?

For me writing, contrary to a trend discussed in an article in the summer edition of the Walrus, seems to be a solitary occupation. It is something that I only feel the urge to do when I have spent a fair chunk of time alone. I only write when I have had time to think about what I want to write about. I also think I only write when I am a tiny bit bored.

In the past month or so, I have not been bored, I have spent more time talking to people than I usually do and lord knows I have been busy. It is the weaving that is at fault. I have had great three or four weeks at the Duncan Market. I, at just halfway through the Market season, am close to earning 2/3s of what I earned in my most lucrative year. Not only that but I have had some great conversations with some folks who like what I do and want to talk about it.

However, while it may be obvious to everyone, when one sells a lot of stuff - one needs to make more. I have been working six days a week trying to produce more work. Normally I would do three rugs at time - now I am doing only one or two; when I have more time - I weave ten or so small bags - now I am doing three. Just to replace what I have sold. Rather than spending a whole day dyeing wool for a number of projects, I am just dyeing enough wool for one. It is not efficient to work in such small lots, but it is what I need to do to keep my booth look full. So in spite of the fact that I am working at it almost full time, I am not getting a lot done. Perhaps most importantly, I am not being as creative as I would like to be. I have a couple of projects that I would like play with - both may not produce anything saleable but I want to experiment anyway.  It is time for a change.

So after this weekend, I think I am going to take a few weeks off. Hopefully I will get some time to do those things I need to do and to get back on track. Hopefully the writing urge will get a chance to rise to the surface and I can continue writing about my trip, politics and life.

On the Road Again 2017 #11

One would think that by now I would realize that a night spent under the lights of a Husky truck stop will probably less than fun. But every time I get to one, I feel excited - as if something magical is about to happen. It is good to be an optimist with especially thick skin. I was about to be disappointed again.

It was a fine truck stop. The restaurant was closed but the convenience store had all kinds of junk food, juice and coffee. The two young guys working there were nice and helpful. Some of the local people stopping for gas were friendly and even some of the truck drivers gave me a polite, if disinterested nod of the head. One in fact even suggested where I would have a better chance in getting a ride. He didn't however offer to give me a ride there. But it was a bit windy, there was nowhere to sit, the view was particularly uninspiring and it was boring. When I got there somewhere around 11:00 there were a few young guys hanging around picking through the garbage cans looking for bottles ( and who may have seen me as competition) and someone else trying to charge and set up a cell phone he had just purchased - but they were not interested in talking to me. The two folks inside were polite when we talked about when the restaurant would re-open and about how which direction to go in to catch the right bus, but they saw hundreds if not thousands of people a week passing through the store. They were not at all interested in my story. So I hung around, paced looked at people and in general tried to keep myself awake until the restaurant opened at 4:30 or so.

Until well past midnight I saw the odd city bus go past. I thought about getting on one but I had nowhere to go. As boring as was the Husky, I thought that downtown Calgary at 1:00 in the morning would be no better, and perhaps much worse. So I stayed, making eye contact with the odd truck driver who passed by me, occasionally changing where I had my pack and the sign on top to what may or may not have been a better location to catch someone's eye. I don't think it mattered. It was a long few hours. I am not too sure how I filled it. But the time did pass, the restaurant did open. It was normal breakfast of toast, scrambled eggs and homefries. I was hungry enough and had been thinking about it for so long that almost anything would have been good. Shortly after I finished and then had brushed my teeth - I saw that the buses were running. It was time to get on the road again.

On the Road Again 2017 #10

It was just after 9:00 when Francois and I got to Calgary. I was frustrated at getting to the city so late. If we had not stopped to eat, we could have gotten there an hour or two earlier and maybe, just maybe I could have gotten to Canmore in time for a hostel bed or room at the municipal campground. Arriving at 9:00 PM, on a Sunday in Calgary left me with very few options. I did not know what I was going to do. Francoise debated with himself whether or not he would drop the trailer and then sleep in his rented room for the first and last time that month or if he would just sleep in his truck. I perhaps somewhat selfishly suggested that he might has well sleep in a real bed - as it would be his last chance. He had promised me that if he did drop his trailer then he would drive me to the Flying J truck stop where I could get a meal and hang out for the night. He wasn't offering me a spot in his truck for the night. Sleeping outside a warehouse was not my idea of a good plan - I needed him to sleep in his own bed that night.

He eventually decided to drop his trailer where it could be unloaded the next morning and then go to his room. Neither he or I had a clue as to where to go but with the magic of GPS he found the warehouse easily. It was somewhere close to the airport but if he had let me out there I would have been totally lost. The thought that I could catch a plane to Nanaimo certainly crossed my mind, but it didn't stay there very long. It would have been an easy but I suspect rather expensive solution to my problem of needing a place to sleep. After dropping the trailer Francoise asked me for directions to the Flying J. I did not have a clue. I was surprised that a trucker did not know of it - it is, I think, the biggest truck stop in southern Alberta. GPS again came to our rescue. Of course it was in French so I could not always follow the instructions - but then I didn't have to - I was not driving. Perhaps I should have listened more closely. We were directed to a Flying J - but it was the wrong one. We ended up at a small, un-serviced set of fuel pumps. There was no one around and I was totally lost.

I asked if he could drop me off at a Tim Horton's or somewhere like that. After a few more twists and turns I saw a Husky sign and directed him there. As we drove up the street I saw a bus stop so I knew that the next morning I had a way out of town.

I profusely thanked Francoise. While it had be a long and somewhat verbally tiring journey - he had gone out of his way to get me to a reasonably safe spot to spend the night. Driving through Calgary at night, looking for a place for a relative stranger would have been a lot to ask of anyone. For a trucker who had just spent 13 hours driving, and who, while he had dropped the trailer, was still driving a big truck - it was well beyond what I could have expected. Once again I was in awe of the generosity of strangers.

 It had been a good trip and there I was, a bit late, a bit tired but in Calgary. Once again I had made it across the Canadian Prairies in one day. All in all it felt pretty good.