My Slushy, Gravelly, Grey Hometown

Winter in my hometown is great, well, winter in the mountains is great. In town, it's grey; the trees, sky, streets and snow are all grey and it's only at altitude that you can break through to blue sky some winter days. Sure, the first snowfall always elicits a certain electric anticipation and Christmas is nice, but the highlights of my adolescent winters, if I wasn't skiing at the local hill, consisted checking out neighbors' Christmas lights, cross country skiing on the old railway tracks, reading a good book, and sledding down the steep unplowed Uphill alleys.

This segment from Whistler's Sherpas Cinema proves me wrong; apparently winter is grey and great in my hometown and it's nice to see some familiar alleyways too.

Carma

The farm at the end of the road

All packed to go for a snowy weekend with friends in the mountains when we woke up to a completely flat tire. And because it's been snowing all week the tire shops are jammed with wait times of at least three hours and we can't borrow a car from anyone because they've all got appointments with their tire guys to put winter tires on. This never happens to us... until it does. It's like we were due for some bad car luck. It's like how I'd never been in a car accident... until I was. Now there's a story for a snowy day. I've got my cup of tea and hours until the hubs is home with our new tire.

A few years ago I was living in Northern California, 16 miles up a dirt road from the nearest small town. I'd been using a friend's car for the summer, a little VW cabriolet that was Hell to find the reverse gear in but better than nothing for cruising around listening to the one cassette tape I had to play in the car's tape deck (a nicely nostalgic movie soundtrack - I just can't remember which one). It epitomized summer for me to drive with my favorite emerald green sunglasses on and the top down.
On my days off from farm work when I didn't spend all day in the river, I'd explore the maze of back roads lured by ideas of catching a glimpse of my dream house, or an amazing view, or a long-forgotten cemetery, or some backwoods landed gentry that I could marry into. Most often I got a whole lot of poison oak, gated driveways, 'no trespassing' signs, and dust in my teeth.

One mid-summer evening, when everyone else had the day off I decided to join friends in town after my work day was over. The leaves of the oak trees that lined the road were coated in the dust that re-settled after every passing vehicle. By August the road was hard-packed dirt that could use a good grading, but I always took it pretty slow, putt-putting up the hills with the music blaring.

On one particularly steep and curvy section I shifted down into second gear to get traction up the bumpy incline just as a black Toyota 4-Runner came shooting around the corner, going way too fast to keep control over the wash-board. As the driver saw me (slowly making for the shoulder to make way for him) he braked hard and his truck slid sideways on the ruts and right into the Cabrio.

My sunglasses went flying over the windshield never to be seen again as I was stopped in my tracks most of the way onto the side of the road. The cassette tape played on at full blast. Without thinking I growled like a mama bear and swore something awful before I removed my hands from the steering wheel and my seat belt from the clasp. The other driver, a chiseled Anthony Kiedis type with board shorts, long hair, and tattoos was next to his truck swearing up a storm but he ran to me upon hearing my growl and asked if I was alright. I told him I was fine but that the owner of the car, which was now nearly half the length it should have been, wouldn't be so cheery.

Buddy was apparently in quite a hurry to get somewhere; he was all over the place, worried about the cars, about me, and, most of all, about his rendezvous with an important someone. He suggested I stay with the car and he'd come back to pick me up in an hour. Right! There was no way that was going to happen I assured him. As I climbed into the passenger seat of his truck I insisted he take me wherever he had to get to since my car could no longer drive anywhere. Seeing as he had no choice he reluctantly started up the engine and we took off at top speed. It was then that I noticed that he too had been blasting his music, Red Hot Chili Peppers to be precise and coincidental. There were surf stickers adorning the dashboard and he drove in flip flops, not slowing down a bit despite the recent crash. He quickly sparked a joint to calm his nerves and offered some to me upon seeing my general good nature about the whole situation.

By now we had turned off the familiar road and up some winding rutted roads, past a few deserted, unmarked intersections, and pulled up and parked outside a locked gate at the foot of a driveway. I knew there was no way I would ever intentionally be able to find my way back to this unremarkable location, but his paranoia was rampant. He prattled on about having to change the locks now that he was taking me by his place and how he hated to be late to meet his "distributor". He left me alone in his truck for five minutes while he disappeared up the driveway to leave a note. I remember thinking to myself, 'I bet he has a gun. This guy should not have a gun.'


Once he returned I directed him to the end of the main road and the farm where I lived. Upon hearing that the owner of the car's given name was Buffalo, surfer dude lost an iota of his swagger and offered up everything in his wallet to pay for the damage and to keep his name off the record. In the end we made more than the car was worth and I got a glimpse behind one those gated back roads and that was enough to persuade me to look elsewhere for a husband.

Falling into Winter

It's fall and we're falling into winter
but we're still camping in the alpine.
It's cold but we hardly give a shiver...

That's about all I can remember of a little ditty composed while hiking in the Valhallas one September many years ago. At that time of year it is technically still summer (though school children will argue the fact) and up here in the Pacific North West (AKA: the Canadian South West) we may have a day warm enough for swimming but the green leaves are tinged with gold; you can smell Autumn in the pine needles and leaves that have already fallen and there is a hint of winter in the slight change of temperature.

I've spent two partial years in different tropical climates and on both occasions, despite great fun and adventure, the endless summer did in fact lose it's shine and I found myself craving the change in season, the warmth of Thanksgiving, nighttime neighbourhood Halloween revelry, the darker days of Daylight Savings, raking leaves, and the excitement of the first snow.

I grew up in a mountain town with a thriving snow sport culture where the first snow was always met with hoots and hollers, a tangible electric excitement at the thought of the piles of snow to come, and people taking to the steep streets on their rock skis. Now, living on the coast, where we don't see nearly enough snow (in my unpopular opinion), I've come to terms with a brief winter; it's not long after New Year's Eve that the snowdrops and crocuses pop up in the sunny spots. But I still look forward to those few days when everything will be white and I'll see kids trying to slide down hilly alleyways on dustpans and garbage can lids.

The Best Part

The best part of most magazines is the unassuming editor's note at the beginning. Likely due to it's placement at the beginning, I approach these introductory columns with the leisure, patience, and focus to see them through to the end. These factors, while integral to the act of reading a magazine, are all at their height at the moment one flips open a magazine and they dwindle at varying rates as you turn the pages despite advertisers best attempts to keep you from thinking about the looming laundry and dinner while trying to sell you stain remover and frozen food.

I also favor the editor's note because editor-in-chief is a job I covet. The editors of magazines always seem so well established, well-read, well-connected, well-spoken, well-heeled, and well-informed. Despite that many editors cop out of actual writing by elaborating on the table of contents, I wish I could be on a first name basis with thousands of readers and scrawl my name across the bottom of a page every month or even better, get paid to write intriguing, seemingly effortless articles (the equivalent of a non-fiction prose-poem I think) that get top billing and in turn, readers' fresh eyes.

One of my first favorite magazines (after Owl and Sassy, respectively) was Powder, where, as a teenager, I discovered the charm of the editor's column, called "intros" in Powder. Steve Casimiro, editor of the magazine for most of the 90s, had a way of relaying simple truths veiled in gritty and poignant skiing metaphors in approximately 500 words (www.thepowderintros.com). I was so impressed by these poetic vignettes that I tore them out when my magazine arrived in the mail each month and stuck them on my wall in the classic teenage decorative style involving blue sticky tack.

Now that I've grown up, it's somewhat appalling to me, as a writer and reader, that I can't be bothered to get it together to read a full length article very often, but magazine subscriptions seem to be a childhood indulgence replaced by dinner, laundry, and Mad Men. And so, in an ode to Casimiro and to busy moms everywhere who don't have enough time to read entire articles in one sitting, I shall strive to style my postings after editor's notes, that is: concise, sometimes humorous, sometimes bittersweet, but simply truthful and hopefully they can be one of the best parts of your day.

Hot Springs I Have Known and Loved

The hot springs in my life have gotten progressively harder to get to and yet my fondness for them has only increased with time. Here they are in order from first visited to last.

Ainsworth: Anyone who has lived in the West Kootenay region of BC's interior knows Ainsworth Hot Springs. It's the place to be on a snowy winter evening (especially after a day of skiing). The horseshoe-shaped natural cave is filled with waist-deep water and has a couple stifling pocket caverns at the back of the "u" where the the real hardcore heat-seekers sweat it out. The rest of the leisure soakers meander through the cave and settle in the outside pool overlooking Kootenay Lake. The cave thrilled me as a child in the 80s. I'd doggy paddle the whole way, refusing to touch the sandy floor with my feet, shrieking and gulping until we'd emerge from the oppressive heat to the cool night air and I'd beg to do it again.

St. Leon's

St. Leon's: I discovered these springs in high school on a trip to my municipal library to find out about natural, hike-in hot springs in my area. St. Leon's quickly became my favorite and I frequented this paved pool in the woods as often as I could get my hands on a car and friend willing to camp out with me. Hot water comes straight out of the mountain into an upper rock pool and is piped into the lower pool (shown here). These springs were once a destination for the original tourists in the area who would come up the lake in a paddle wheeler, stay at a long burned down hotel, and ride to the springs to take the waters for their curative effects.


Yellowstone: I spent a summer on a 20,000 acre organic guest farm in southwestern Montana; the property borders Yellowstone National Park, which means grizzly bears galore and plenty of petrified wood. Montana speed limits being what they are, a whopping 75 miles an hour in rural areas, allowed me and my fellow co-workers to make it to the park between shifts to hike the trails around some of the springs. They're far too hot to soak in, but a technicolor eyeful for sure. The tales of unfortunate tourists straying from well-trodden paths and ending up boiled kept us from searching for soaking springs.


Pagosa Springs: After spending two weeks in the Utah desert in 2001, I found these springs to be a welcome roadside attraction in southwestern Colorado. In the change room shower the water ran red with 14 days worth of desert dirt and the warm tap water felt like a novel luxury. Therefore, the numerous pools (all set at different temperatures) and the view over the river felt downright extravagant. I remember wishing we could wash our clothes there too. 


Puna Steam Vents: A few years ago I was spending time on an organic noni farm on the big island of Hawaii. I had no electricity, no vehicle, and only one friend for company. Needless to say, doing laundry in catchment barrels and heading down the road to the steam vents were the highlights of our evenings.  The vents are like small claustrophobic crevices in the hilly ground. The eastern side of the island gets a serious amount of rain (over 200" annually) and the steam occurs when this rainwater soaks through the rocks and is heated by lava flowing beneath the surface. Depending on the cavern, there may be a ladder to climb down, a plank to sit on, red cockroaches, male tourist couples, or lone locals to contend with.

Hot Springs Cove

Hot Springs Cove: I am somewhat partial to this spot in Clayoquot Sound on the northwest coast of Vancouver Island as I first visited these springs on the week-long trip where my husband and I got engaged. Accessible only by boat, these are the only hot springs I've been to that are right on the ocean. The water runs out of a steaming creek, over a small waterfall that you can stand beneath, and into successively cooler pools all the way down to the sea.