2018 On the Road Again #14

There are not a lot of rules in hitchhiking, but there are, at least for me, some basic assumptions. One is that women are less likely to be pick me up then are men, secondly that women with children in the car are even less likely to pick me up and thirdly that people driving white cars almost never pick me up. While the first two assumptions make some sense - I can never explain the third one. However to the best of my memory I have only had two rides in the past 16 or so years in cars that have been white. As I ran over to the young woman waving at me, I was surprised to realize her car was white. I was even more surprised when I realized that she had her five year old son in the car.

Initially, probably because that is what my sign said, she said she was happy to drive me to Calgary. Quite frankly I was so tired of the wind that a drive to Calgary would have been very welcome. However, when she said that she was driving to the Okanogan, I flipped the sign over and showed her the other side which said "Nanaimo". My driver wasn't going all of the way today - just to Golden, but that sounded pretty damn good to me. I am grateful for all of my rides, even the shortest of them; I get high just knowing of the generosity of people and the chance to meet someone new. But a nearly 800 kilometre ride is more than most. For the first time in two days I could relax and not worry about where I was going to have to stand later.

The five year old boy (he had not started school yet) was incredibly bright, spoke about science topics in complex sentences and his math skill were quite impressive. But he had no imagination. He was also bored. His mother was getting just a little bit tired of him and he was, I think, enjoying, just a little bit, finding ways of irritating her. I like little kids and for the next seven or so hours tried to include him in our conversations. At one point when we were about an hour or so east of Golden, his attention seeking behaviour became more than a little bit annoying. We were behind some slow moving trucks and he kept on demanding that his mother drive faster and faster. In spite of the fact that he could see that it would be dangerous to pass he kept on repeating - non-stop "when are we going to get to the hotel"? I tried to play silly games, talking about flying kangaroos and other silly animals - but it was like he could not imagine such animals existed. Other little kids when I do this with them, know that I am being silly but have fun with it - not this kid. I think he was quite use to being the primary person in the vehicle and he did not want to give me anything.

We stopped at two different parks so that he could get out a run around for awhile and got something to eat at the McDonalds in Medicine Hat, but these brief stops were not enough to make up for a five year old being stuck in the back seat of a car for eight hours.

HIs mom was an interesting woman. She was originally from Chile and Columbia. She came from a reasonably affluent family but was very aware of how dangerous it was to live in that part of the world. She had married a Korean, come to Canada, entered the University of Winnipeg, had a child and then split up with her husband. She was still enrolled in school but was worried about whether or not she would be allowed to stay in Canada. Because she was not a Canadian citizen, she had to pay the international tuition rate. This meant that she needed to work almost full time to earn enough money; this in turn meant that she did not carry a full course load; which meant that it was taking her longer than she was allowed to get her degree which could put her student visa at risk. I admire her commitment to education, and I suspect she would make a good Canadian, I am not sure if she will be able to jump through all of the hoops in the right order to be allowed in as an immigrant.

We talked about most things, her life, my life, Canadian politics, kids and just about every other topic one could think of. She had been almost as bored as her son and was happy to have an adult in the car. She was off to work as some sort of manager in one of the fruit orchards. She had been there before and was looking forward to a chance to work, make some money and I think for her son to have the chance to run around a little bit.

It was a pleasant drive, my driver was a good conversationalist, had interesting stories and was at other time, quite content to let me chatter on. Some of my drivers appreciate my presence in the car and drive a bit further than they had planned to. But in this case, she had already booked a room and her son was at the limits of his tolerance. As she let me out, we agreed that if the next morning I was standing on the highway, just at the end of town, that she would drive me to Kelowna. I got out and looked for a place to sleep, and equally as important - something to eat. I had, except for some McDonald fries in Medicine Hat, not eaten since the train somewhere the other side of Winnipeg, two days before.

I Am Not a Happy Camper Part 2

I parked on the side of the road and waited. I knew that the person who had picked up the other half of the kitchen stuff would be coming by at some point and as she had been here before - she would know if I had been on the right road. She arrived sometime after 9:00 PM - and yes the road that my car could not make it up was the right road. I wished her well and decided I would spend the night there - hoping that someone else tomorrow morning would have room for the kitchen stuff and I could head south. It was dark by then - I admired the person's driving skill - I think she thought me a poor Rainbow indeed if I lacked the courage to bash my car along the road. But then as she said - she didn't care what happened to her car.

It was hard sleeping in the car. The back was so full that I could not adjust the front seats. I would adjust my body - get it to feel as if I was comfortable (after all I have slept on trains, buses and planes, how hard could this be?), almost fall asleep and then realize that I really wasn't comfortable and wake up again. I know I slept for a few hours because around 4:00 AM I was woken up by a terrible noise. I opened my eyes to see these two bright lights in a haze of fog shinning right at me but getting smaller at the same time. It took a few seconds before I realized that the log trucks were running. The two very bright lights were spot lights on the side of the trailer so that the driver could see his load, the fog was dust and I was in no danger. It was, however a rather abrupt awakening. The log trucks running in one direction full and the other empty continued until noon. There were also lots of pickup trucks running back and forth - A couple of them stopped to wait in my little parking area for a log truck to go by. When one of the drivers found where I wanted to go - he agreed that my car would never make it without being damaged.

I hung around that spot- moving only to stay in the shade until mid-afternoon. No one came by to get the kitchen stuff. Around 3:00 PM I slowly made my way down to the beginning of the road and found a good spot with a cool breeze and lots of shade. Finally after being on the logging road for 24 hours someone came by. We - and his 4 passengers chatted for a bit, moved some of the stuff in his truck around and made room for at least the food. We hid the rest of the stuff in some tall grass. I said I would hang around until dark but then I would head south. Someone else would have to come back and get it. Fifteen minutes after the first vehicle left, someone else came by and got the rest of the stuff. I headed south and was home by around 10:00 PM.

I arrived home feeling like a failure . While it was great to see some friends going in, it made fell even sadder. Being at the Gathering was/is important to me. Everyone else would make it. Perhaps I had wimped out. It was depressing. I did a brief post on the Family's Facebook site talking about being careful of the trucks etc. Two people posted that they had room for me in their vehicles on Friday and I could go up with them. But as I had to be back by Monday - I could not take a chance that I would not find a ride south.

Another post on Facebook talked about how the Gathering was coming together. I know in other times, when there is a bit of a journey to get there - it really brings people together. I miss being there - I can imagine how wonderful it feels.

I Am Not a Happy Camper

I am not a happy camper - in fact I am not a camper at all this week and I was supposed to be.

I have been participating in Rainbow Family Gatherings for a number of years. On most years I just make it to one Gathering, on a few I made it to two and in one exciting year, I attended three Gatherings. They are important to me - they are times and places where I get to hang out with my chosen family, people with who I am comfortable with, people who are comfortable with me.

I may not like all of the people at a Gathering, but I do love them. As a collective of people they cover the entire range of possible type of personalities, body shapes and attitudes -I even have known a Rainbow or two who said they were Republicans. Like all families there are good times, great times and times that are not as great. There are times where the folks who have decided to make supper have done an extraordinary job - with there being lots of it, perfectly spiced and inventive; I have had other meals that have been served very late and the taste was not so great. There have been times when there appears to be such perfect harmony within the circle that one could almost weep for the sheer joy and beauty of it all; but there are times (thankfully very seldom) where people disagree on a particular issue or two and their discord affects the whole Gathering for a while. I look forward to Gatherings; I look forward to going home. I am sad that I was almost there and had to turn back.

I had planned to go - I was packed, the car was loaded and I was on my way. On my way up island I dropped in on a brother and picked up a car load of kitchen stuff (pots and pans, a propane burner and tank, some tarps etc.). The car was definitely just as about full as it could be.

Like so many of the Gatherings on Vancouver Island, this year's Gathering was down some logging road. One can dislike clear cut logging with passionate hatred but still have to admit that without the extensive network of roads built by and maintained by the logging companies, most of us would not have access to much of the Island. The first part of the logging road was not too bad, it certainly was relatively smooth with only a few potholes. Logging truck are large, the weight of the vehicle constantly wears and tears at the roads, therefore replacing culverts, strengthening the bridges and grading the roads are a constant activity.

The road, especially until noon can be a dangerous place - the logging trucks, loaded with good size logs drive like they own the road - because they do own it . The truckers assume that people will get out of the way. Those trucks, some of which are driven faster than I would ever drive, could not stop quickly if they had to- there is just too much weight. If one needs to drive on the road when the big trucks are active, it is best to get behind one of the multitude of pickup trucks driven by service crews and follow them. They have radios that tell them when a log truck is coming and so get off the road. All of the traffic makes everything, the trees included, covered in a fine dust, a dust that sticks to everything.

The last 16-20 kilometres of the road were horrible. The road was no longer in use and therefore the forestry company was not maintaining it. It was relatively steep in some spots, it had either large potholes or numerous medium rocks on the trail (sometimes both). Every ten or fifteen feet I would hear a loud clunk on the bottom of my car. I had visions of crushed brake lines, broken tie rod ends and smashed mufflers. After two-three kilometres I stopped and turned around. It was just not worth the risk. There was also the possibility that I had somehow got on the wrong road. Surely the scouts did not plan on me going down that road!

To be continued.....

2018 On the Road Again #13

I have done a fair amount of hitchhiking across Canada. In the past 15-16 years, there have been a few windy days where I found the wind annoying or even tiring, but usually the wind was restricted to a specific local. It may of been windy in Portage, but the time I got my next ride a few hours down the road, the wind would have died down. This year, perhaps because I had had only short rides, it felt as if the wind was far stronger than normal and that it was spread across the whole of the Prairies. Regardless of why I was so aware of the strong wind, it was annoying, tiring and made a mess of my hair. Normally my braided chin strap is enough to keep the hat on my head, but not this time - I frequently had to hold my hat down with my hand else the hat would lift up and the strap would choke me. However, the next day in the same general area, there were tornadoes so I guess I should be grateful that the wind was not any worse.

It was still very early in the morning just outside that small truck stop in Swift Current. My spot looked to be a good one in terms of the width of the shoulder and visibility but cars were going by too quickly. Once one eliminated the big trucks, local traffic (people going to work) and cars and trucks belonging to various local companies from the vehicles streaming past me, there were not a lot of options. But the business of hitchhiking is in part to be grateful for the possibilities, to take joy in the knowledge that the next ride will be the best ride ever. Hitchhiking is always about being grateful for the present circumstance and always looking forward to the next opportunity. So I stuck out my sign, held down my hat and slipped into the semi awake, not really conscious of how much time you are spending standing there mode and tried to remember to look at every vehicle as it passed me.

It takes a lot of energy to stay focused. It is so easy to stand on the side of the road and just let the cars move on past without any real awareness. If one believes that eye contact, or at least looking at the driver may be one of the ways to get a driver to slow down, then one has to work at it. To remind oneself to do it. Sometimes after an hour or two or three, I need to mentally kick myself as I realize that I have been lost in my thoughts, not paying attention to the task at hand. I always wonder if I have missed a drive or two because I was day dreaming or whatever it is that I do when I stand on the side of the road. In fact I almost missed my next ride because I not paying attention.

The truck stop was not a large one but it appeared to have a decent sized restaurant that looked to be fairly busy. The trucks that were coming and going from the parking lot were not at all interested in me, and the cars seemed to be driven mainly by local people stopping by for some gas or a coffee before they started their day. I eventually stopped paying a lot attention to the coming and goings of the parking lot. However, after standing there for a couple of hours, by sheer chance or the grace of the hitchhiking Gods, I looked at the parking lot and saw a young looking woman waving at me. I was not sure that she was actually waving to me but I saw her doing things that looked as if she was moving stuff around to make room in her van. I took the chance, grabbed my bag and hurried over to her.

Yes - she had been waving to me and she was going to Kolowna .

Missing Ontario But Not its Politics

There are, contrary to the opinion of almost everyone living in British Columbia, a number of negatives about not living in Ontario. I miss the seasons, I miss the lovely spring days and the cool, crisp smell of autumn. I miss the streams and rivers, the deep dark lakes and of course I miss the majestic maples not just for their colour in the fall but for their long burning heat in the depths of winter and their glorious shape. But right now I do not miss their politics. It is tempting to delight in the fact that I not have to get up every morning and read about the destructive force that is Doug Ford. On the surface, I don't need to think about him or his poorly thought out "policies" (it may become a 21st century oxymoron to use Doug Ford and policy in the same sentence). But the sad truth is that Ontario's policies do affect the rest of Canada - and so I do need to worry.

If one is a resident of Ontario, it is easy (and important) to get upset about his decision to do away with Ontario's new sex education outlines. It was, without a doubt in the forefront of such educational policies. It was designed to not only help students talk about difficult topics at age appropriate times, but it also was designed to encourage discussion as to what does consent means. It clearly was not perfect and it did offend a number of people who do not like or realize that we live in a society that generally accepts a broad diversity of gender preferences. But if parents and educators do their job properly, the damage in the short term may be negligible.

Mr. Ford's policies on climate change vs. saving money in the short term is another matter - one that not only will affect Ontarians for the foreseeable future, but could as well affect Canada's capacity to reduce our collective carbon footprint. It would appear that Ford, without ever saying it, is a denier of the truth about climate change. Not only has he vowed to cancel the carbon cap and trade system - that process that is designed to recognize that the release of carbon into the air does cost money to society - but he has also cancelled 758 renewable energy deals (Financial Post) - including developing new wind farms, eliminated all of the homeowners grants to upgrade their houses with better windows, heat pumps and solar panels and done away with rebates for those who buy electric cars. Wide sweeping changes that yes will save millions of dollars in the short term but will add billions of dollars on to the budget in the years to come. Ford has made these announcements without one suggestion of what he will do to replace these programs. His goal is to save money - for the taxpayers he says- but he has cost those same tax payers millions of dollars

Canada is already far behind in its promises to do its share to reduce humanity's carbon footprint. With Leaders such as Mr. Ford denying that they have any responsibility to become part of the solution, the gap between what we need to do, what we promised to do and what we will achieve will only get larger.

One of the great lessons that people like Mike Harris, or Stephen Harper taught the voters is that when populist conservative leaders make election promises - when they get elected they do what they say they will do. I wonder how many of those home owners who will now lose the government's support to replace their windows or air conditioners voted for Mr. Ford - assuming that when he said he would cut government spending - that he meant cut funding to programs that only affected other people
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2018 On the Road Again #12

Lord but that ground just outside of Morse was hard! But it didn't rain, it got just cool enough that the bugs went away and the wind finally died down almost completely. With the exception of the freight trains that passed a few hundred meters away from me and the quiet hum of trucks making their way across the prairies, it was a quiet night. I woke up just as the sun started to show light in the east. I lay there, trying to find a soft spot of dirt to rest my hips when I thought I heard the first drops of rain. I did not want to pack up in a downpour so I quickly got up, got dressed and start to roll up my sleeping bag and bivy sack. Only then did I realize that it was not rain that I heard but the gentle flapping of the nylon flags above me. The wind was coming back.

It was still only barely morning when I sat down, all packed and ready to go but it was still too dark to stand on the road. I felt a lot more relaxed than I had the day before as I had called a friend and got her to cancel my appearance at the farmer's market for the Saturday. I was pretty sure that I could be back in time but the sense that I might not was always in the back of my mind. Hitchhiking is not fun if one is in a rush.

There was not a lot of traffic on the road at 6:00 in the morning but I had nothing else to do so I went down to the highway. There were a few trucks parked behind the gas station and I was mildly optimistic that one of those trucks would give me a ride to somewhere. And one did. It was a grain truck and he was just going to Swift Current but at least it would be near a major population centre. My driver said that he would let me off at a truck stop. Perfect! A bathroom and perhaps some breakfast. - things were looking up.

It is only about 60 kilometres from Morse to Swift Current and so we did not have a lot of time to talk. My driver was from the old school of driving where he took a six week course ( three weeks in class and three weeks driving practice) before he got his license and then on his first job was paired with a more experience driver for two weeks before he was let out on his own. My driver talked about the truck driver in the Humboldt bus accident and the fact that he was an immigrant from Pakistan (he used cruder words than that to describe him). He was sure that he had had, at best, only a few days training, that he had been allowed to cheat on his written test and that a more experienced driver had not been paired with him once he got his license. He was reasonably sure that the driver, because of his poor English skills was not paying attention to the road as he tried to determine what both his maps and the road signs said.

As I have a number of times before, I had a discussion about immigrant drivers. While I agreed that the newer drivers are poorly trained and may lack of the necessary skills and training to be the best drivers, I argued that the fault does not lie with them as much as it does with the owners of the companies. Those companies who hire drivers who they know have received inadequate training, employers who do nothing to ensure that those drivers get the needed training, and those employers who pay poorly and in fact prey upon the immigrants. My driver did not disagree with me but yet still resented the immigrant drivers who were taking lower wages (and therefore lowering the rates for all drivers) and I suspect resented those new drivers for lowering the public's general impression of all truck drivers.

It is a debate that I will never win. The truck drivers who pick me up are good people. Men who work hard doing a job that they think is important. They are frustrated with the lack of regulations at to training or support for new truckers. They see themselves as being under-valued members of their community who are underpaid. They, like any other profession, get angry when they see their position being diminished. They get angry at the people they can see, not the owners hiding in the corporate offices.

Interestingly - as my driver was complaining about people not following the rules, he told me that his truck was significantly over-weight and that if he got caught he would be fined thousands of dollars. He was not worried as he knew how to get around the scales. A friend of mine later told me that these big trucks are causing a lot of damage on the secondary roads of the province as they are hauling far heavier loads than the roads were designed for.

MY driver let me out on the west end of Swift Current. It was a small truck stop with not a lot of traffic. The wind was back in full force.

No More Greyhound Buses

Greyhound Canada have just announced that as October of this year, all of their Western routes will be terminated. There will be no Greyhound buses running in the four western provinces. It is hard to blame a corporation for cancelling a product line when it is no longer profitable, but the consequences of Greyhound's decision is far reaching and, it could be argued, affect the well being of Canadians. While I generally dislike the government bailing out for-profit corporations, I think an argument could be made that someone needs to do something.

I am not a fan of Greyhound buses. It is true that on a couple of occasions finding a seat (at least twice in the middle of night) on the Greyhound has, if not actually saved my life, made it substantially easier. But the buses are cramped, sometimes dirty, frequently smelly and no one I know has ever said they were fun. Going across Canada on a Greyhound bus may be the worst possible way to travel. But they are cheaper than any other form of travel and go through towns that larger systems (e.g. Via rail or airplanes do not). For a number of Canadians it is the only way that they can afford to travel and to get to where they need to be.

Take for example a gentleman I met in Golden at the Husky restaurant late one evening in June. He lived in Cranbrook - (the southern end of BC) and needed to get to Salmon Arms (about 500 km away) for his father's funeral. He had no car. Greyhound was the only way for him to get there. Not the best way or the cheapest way - the only way. This time next year, that man would not be able to go home for his father's funeral. Young people travelling out west to pick cherries or to do tree planting, young moms going from one city to another to visit family or people travelling to find a better job will no longer be able to do so. Yes there are airplanes or trains and if one books months in advance they are fairly economical - but for many people, booking four months in advance is not an option. And even if booking ahead was possible - Greyhound is still cheaper.

I am not sure how people will travel from Calgary to Edmonton, or Revelstoke to Calgary or Portage to Brandon if they don't have a car. There are thousands of Canadians who at least on occasion need to use an intercity buses to get to where they are going. Ideally smaller bus lines will fill the vacuum for the shorter routes but on the trans-country or near trans-country routes I am not sure if anyone will.

While I am sure it is not intentional, Greyhound's decision affects only poor people, people who cannot afford a car, people who if there was any choice would not ride the bus. People with access to money drive or fly or if they have lots of time, take the train. By limiting access to jobs, visiting family or any of the other reasons why people travel on buses, we are ensuring that our society remains divided between those who have and those who do not.

The Canadian government has ignored the steadily worsening state of our Canadian passenger train system and now they will (and perhaps can) do nothing to help maintain a bus system. But the cynic in me wonders if someone wants the poor folks to not communicate/socialize with others like themselves. It is so much easier to both divide and conquer and ignore those folks when they can't share their stories.