Healing Moment

Vancouver, BC, Canada, September 16, 2007
It's my last full day in Vancouver before I head back to Waterloo. My brother Pete picks me up from Scott and Judy's and takes me to his home in White Rock. This is Pete with two of his daughters; Millie (holding) Sasha. I make a point of spending a bit of time with Millie. She and I have both studied the same Spiritual path and I always enjoy the chance to talk to her since we share many of the same beliefs. As we're outside in Pete's back yard, I am drawn to this statue of Saint Francis of Assisi, who is mentioned in the Eck Teachings. He reminds me of a blog story Melbah wrote a while back about a Saint who showed up in a tree trunk. While I'm talking with Millie it's like we're in a different world. All these elements make up something greater than the talk we're having. It's a magical meeting and I have a strong sense of healing around us.

Happy Birthday To Us

Waterloo Ontario, June 24, 2007
My brother Pete is visiting from White Rock BC and since three of us have our birthdays so close together, Mom decided to have a birthday party for all three of us here in Waterloo. I'm holding the black forest cake with Mike at my right and Pete on my left. (Is that a balloon growing out of my head?) There are a total of 14 family members here, including all the kids. Mom put together a wonderful spread including ham and potato salad and Mike's wife, Lorrie made sushi. Melbah Toasty made her famous chick pea Indian Currie. Since I just got back from India this dish made me feel nostalgic. I even taught my family to do the head 'wobble' that you use when speaking about Indian food. It's great to be part of a family who genuinely like being together and sharing, without feeling any kind of competition; although there is the one bone of contention with the others. They all know (but don't really want to admit) that I am Mom's favorite. Happy birthday to Us!

Hiking With Pete

I am visiting my brother Peter, in White Rock BC for a few days. He’s just one year younger than me. Pete is a professional musician and has done gigs all over the world. He is an environmentalist who not only talks the talk (don’t get him started) but he also walks the walk. He supplements his music income by doing landscape work. He keeps his life very simple; doing landscape work part time, doing gigs in the weekend, leaving himself days during the week to peruse his passion of ‘scrambling up mountains’ and exploring alpine ridges. He also does ocean kayaking and has gone all around the Islands here in Southern British Columbia. The amazing thing about Peter is that he does all this wilderness exploration and yet is an asthmatic.

I was thrilled when Pete offered to take me for an overnight hike in Golden Ears Park, in the Coast Mountains, Northeast of Vancouver.
We put our packs in his van and headed to the Albion Ferry, which launches from Fort Langley to take cars across the river to Albion.

We arrived late in the afternoon to the parking lot at Golden Ears Park.

This is a narrow gauge rail bed that was used for logging in the 1920s and 30s. These are Hemlock cedar and fir trees along the path.

We took a twelve-kilometer hike on this day. You can see alder trees that have fallen in the river because the river is always changing. You can see the smooth rock bed here that is left as the river changes course over the years.

I posed in front of a Douglas fir tree that is a hundred and fifty years old. Pete told me about a stump he found on one hike. When he counted the rings he realized the tree had been twelve hundred years old.

We passed trees on this hike that have been here since the time of Columbus.

We camped on a gravel bed in the river’s flood plane. We were in a valley surrounded by the mountains and forest.

As night approached, the clouds moved in over the mountains bringing rain to us just after we made camp.

The next morning we relaxed in the tent as we listened to the rain and the sound of the river nearby. When the rain stopped, Pete took out his camp stove and we had a cup of coffee and some pasta with cheese.

The rocks on this riverbed were gorgeous. I was just glad you were not here Squiddy. I just know you would have told me to load some up for your Waterloo pond.

We had a feast of salmon berries near where we camped.

You can see the lush vegetation on the path here. The best thing was the combination of alpine bird calls and the incredible scent of the forest along with the powerful oxygen atmosphere.

We stopped for a warm drink and some sweet corn chowder.on our way back. It was so wonderful to travel with Pete. I learn so much about nature and he taught me so much about how to travel in the wilderness safely.

I have been on many treks in Thailand, with expert guides, but Pete is the most knowledgeable guide I have ever traveled with.

AHA 606

It was October 1976. Four of us had the same dream on the same night to move out West. Diana, who later became my wife, was one of the four. She agreed to share the gas in a 5 year old Renault, on our trip from Toronto to Vancouver. I loved the license plate. I still have it. It was just like me; Wide eyed and adventurous, and dumb as a a sack of hammers. That's what I love about that age. When I was 20 I thought I would live forever and had no fear. When I left my home in Richmond Hill, I only had my Learner's license so I had to have Diana in the seat beside me just to legally drive the car. I knew nothing about cars. I just got in and drove it. This picture was taken just minutes before I left on my trip. My brother Pete is standing with me here. I'm the one in the white sweater.

After travelling for two days through Northern Ontario, the idiot light (named for a reason) went on suggesting that I was low on oil. We drove 500 more miles to Regina before I bothered to have the oil checked. The woman who checked it was a large burly thing. She reached over the engine and put the dipstick in once. She pulled it out. She put it in again. She pulled it out and looked very puzzles and shook her head. Then she put it in again.

“You got no 'ole' ” she said.
Smiling, and quite unaware of the ramifications of having driven thousands of miles with no oil in my engine I said: "well, go ahead and put some in I guess". She put in four quarts and it was still barely full. We drove on through Saskatchewan and Alberta until we reached our first stop; my brother’s place in BC. We were about to turn off into Chillewack when we heard a bang and the lights on the dash lit up like a Christmas tree. We crept along for 2 blocks until we came to a place called Valley motors where we parked the car. I popped the hood and saw that the engine front had blown off and the cooling fan propeller was sitting against the radiator. Not only had we stopped exactly at a Renault dealership, it turned out it was the only Renault dealership for 600 miles. We had managed to break down in the one place in Canada where we knew someone. My brother picked us up and we stayed there while the mechanic fixed our car. A year ago, Kahlin and I went to Chillowack to visit some friends when we stumbled across Valley motors. It still looks exactly the same now as it did in 1976. On a whim, I took this picture. Twenty-nine years later, in November of 2004, I was moving back to Ontario when an almost identical thing happened again. I wrote about it in Calgary To Thailand In 2 Minutes . When that incident happened I immediately thought of this day.