Tag: wet coast

Back in the Saddle Again

Back in the saddle again. Blogging, but Monday to Friday only, weekends off. I thought I would start things off again by repeating my very first post way back in September 2016. Kind of gives some raison d’etre to doing this thing. It is a hobby and keeps me somewhat sane and my blood pressure low while trying to watch the evening news:

September 2016:

“This is my personal blog. While I have had this site up in my mind and “to do list” for over 12 months now, this is day one. But hey, I live for procrastination – and sailing!

I live in British Columbia. That’s Super Natural BC. Hippie-dom’s last vestige in Canada and probably on earth. Canada’s Greenie Province of protestors and environ-mentals – the wet coast and the left coast of Canada – Birkenstock paradise – land of fleece vests, Tilley hats, granola crunchers, tree huggers, cappuccino suckers, and…Salt Spring Islanders. Long skirts and gum boots. Hoelay Cliche! And, I am also a poor speller!!

The site’s header reflects one of the island’s a great views – looking east – across the beautiful Saanich Inlet, and the rest of Canada. But don’t eat the shell fish here. It will kill you. And you can’t swim in the water. It will freeze your bollicks, and other things, off.

From this viewpoint you can see the Saanich Peninsula in the distance: Cole Bay, Pat Bay Airport, Brentwood Bay and the famous Butchart Gardens (infamous if you suffer from environmental allergies) down the way south a bit. US Gulf Islands in the near distance, beyond the peninsula, with majestic snow capped Mount Baker on the far horizon towering majestically and menacingly over us all. Just hope the big one never comes. We will be screwed. But then again winds are westerly here. Ha, whew! Vancouver and points east??…you’re screwed. Perhaps the environ-mentals can clap their hands and change the plate tectonics, tsunami dynamics and vulcanology …er.. volcanology of the area, just as they arrogantly claim that they can control the weather and climate. If only they could just increase taxes, destroy the economy and donate everything to Gaia. If only they could just…be happy.

I am a retired Naval Officer. Just about 37 years of dedicated, loyal, unadulterated, blemish free service to her Majesty, the Queen. Yes, her Majesty the Queen, I am proud that I served my Queen and my Country – Canada. By the very essence of the military’s left, right; left, right; left, right cadence I am non partisan but I am very relieved that Harper signed my retirement scroll and not Dion or Justinian. I retired as a Lieutenant Commander, or a Two-and-a-Half in the vernacular lexicon of naval life.

Writing this blog is somewhat therapeutic. Hope you enjoy it. Please contribute. You can make a comment by clicking on the Leave a Comment tab at the top left of this page or on the banner at the bottom on the post.

Nothing says nothing like hard rock at 6 am!

If you are looking for posts about my walk in France, my Vezelay pilgrimage, you can go to “Archives” and click on the posts that start around the 28 July until about 12 September, 2018.

For information about Kurofune: The Black Ships, my very first crack at penning a novel, just click on the Kurofune link at the top right.

Have a great Navy Day

Shakeyjay (SJ)…out

Rabid Dogs

Returning home I took stock of myself. Almost 21 years of age with no real prospects, no real future. I had been out of school now for 5 years and was no further ahead than that first day after graduation. My parents and most of my associates thought of me as some sort of restless loser: an undergraduate of the University of Hard Knocks and Bad Experiences. Nonetheless, I never regretted anything that I had done thus far and was quite defensive when vocational criticism was thrown my way. I just didn’t have a clue at the time and lacked direction in this very adult course called living 101.

I returned to the normal everyday grind. Jimmymum has established himself in corporate finance and accounting. Good for him. He was steady, mature and had good prospects. In that regard it seemed as if life was programmed for him. Graduate high school. Check. Now what? Get a job for life. Check. Now what? Get married. Check. Now what? Get a house. Check. Now what? Have some kids. Check. Now what? Slit my wrists. No, not Jimmymum. Me!

O’Grunts was still living the hippy life without regrets; at least he couldn’t remember any in that fogged out mind of his.  Bruce, our lead guitarist, was still caught up in self discovery only this time in Nepal, trying to find himself among the Himalayan Mountains.  Unfortunately, they had to call out the Sherpas to find him. Timmy was still asleep out west and me? Well, I found employment with a national railroad and spent the next year or so unloading freight from an endless line of box cars only to reload said freight into an endless line of local delivery trucks. Great job! And, horror of horrors, I didn’t quit right away.

The sickness returned, eventually. Believe it or not O’Grunts convinced me to head back west yet a third time.  Only this time in my own car – a 64 Chevy Impala. I loved that car and it survived that west coast excursion returning safely to this shit city of a city only to be impaled by another good friend of mine on a brick wall.  I needed some money so I sold it to him for a song. Shortly thereafter he came by my place in my old ride, which now resembled an accordion, as the back end of the car was thrust up and back in mangled folds almost to the back seat. “What happened” says I, incredulous? Seems he drove home in the early hours quite inebriated from a night a drinking and debauchery, parked the car in the lane beside his flat, turned off the engine, managed to find his bed, passed out with sweet alcoholic dreams to a reality of a throbbing headache and jungle mouth a few hours later. He desperately required some hair of the dog and with cupboards bare he decided to head to his local for the requisite nourishment. Going down to his car he found to his astonishment that the car wouldn’t start. Being the industrious lad that he was he popped the hood and seeing nothing really amiss decided to jump – start the car. Now those cars may have been ancient relics of a distant past and different era but they reflected mechanical simplicity, technical beauty and dependability through their classic, masterful and graceful lines and design.

The car came to life, jerked momentarily, and then thrust itself in a backward motion, reverse as it turned out. That beautiful Impala took on a mind of its own. Technically challenged as it hightailed itself out of the laneway in full reverse, where it crossed the adjoining roadway before becoming impaled into the brick wall of a building that was across the road, all the while with my friend in hot but panicked pursuit. Fortunately for him, unfortunately for the car, the brick wall won the day. Luckily, except for his wounded pride, no one was hurt. It was a miracle that the car still ran. Turned out that when my friend arrived home, pissed to the gills, he didn’t realize that he shifted the car into reverse and not all the way into park. Of course it wouldn’t start in reverse and being heavily hung over he didn’t realize this simple fact of car life at the time. He just instinctively opened the hood and crossed the ignition wires at the starter. The car came to life immediately and the rest as they say was automotive history. Imagine my dismay as he came by to pick me up a few days later in that accordion styled sedan. Sadly my friend had to put that car down and take it to the car cemetery….

I Can’t Wake Up…5

…Just like Woodstock there was the requisite pond. There were already fans playing in the water, peeing in the water, shitting in the water. I decided to avoid the water. There were also tents, conveniently called pavilions scattered willy nilly about the grounds. Hippy entrepreneurs sticking it to the man by charging exorbitant prices for the basic necessities of living in a farmers field with twenty thousand of your closest friends. There were craft pavilions; classes on how to make tie dye pavilions; bong pavilions; know your grass pavilions and not the garden variety type either; the ever popular oxymoronic sounding pavilion on how to take acid safely. It was at one of these pavilions that I ran into Sandy, who was already stoned out of her mind. I think she recognized me as she came over to me and stood in front of me looking studiously at me and at me face. Studying every facet of my facial expressions, I could only imagine the contorted psychedelic images rummaging and racing through the dark and warped cornices of her mind as she inspected the blackheads on my cheeks. She smiled, then grinned, then grimaced, all of the time about five inches separating me from her bulging eyeballs with their dilated pupils.

“Hmmmm” was all she could muster in profound conversation.

I asked her if she brought her bodyguard with her, y’know, the guy with the sawed off shotgun.

“Hmmmm,” was all she could say. Still looking at my facial expressions. Head bobbing from side to side.

“Hmmmm” She lifted her fore finger, pointing it at my face, making imaginary circles in the space in front of my face from my forehead down to my chin.

“Hmmmm” then she giggled, started to laugh then in flash, stopped, grinned and ran off with one of her cohorts.

I turned to Timmy and said “Let’s get the hell out of here. There’s going to be trouble”

We left immediately. The hippy lifestyle just wasn’t for us.

That weekend was something of a turning point for Timmy and I. I don’t know why but just as our business was about to take hold Timmy turned weird on me. He began to stay up very late at night, which was a toxin to our particular line of work. It became increasingly difficult to wake him up in the morning. Night after night he would be up, later then later, sometimes staying up all night long.  I’d ask him where or what he could be doing at that time of night but all he could say to me was, “you know how it is.” I didn’t.

He would sleep in till noon, then two, then three in the afternoon. I couldn’t wake him up. And I was shit out of luck as he had the car and that car was central to our business. I tried and tried to get him out of this funk but to no avail. Finally, after about a month of this, I had had enough. I told him that if he didn’t turn this shit of his around that I would have to go back home. He just shrugged his shoulders, turned over and went back to sleep.

Saying goodbye to Mrs Redfern, Robert and Mr Johnston, I was gone the next day, taking the train home to my shit city of a city.

Timmy stayed on the wet coast for the next forty five years. He is currently retired, unmarried and still stays out all night long. Or so I am led to believe. I have barely spoken to him since. To this day I don’t really know what happened to cause him to act like this. Perhaps it was those tie dye shirts and skirts, or those hippy hippy shakes.

Sandy eventually returned home. Today she is somewhat of a recluse, suffering from various mental disorders. She never married. Perhaps it was the drugs or the drug counterculture that set her off. So sad!

Madness man!

I Can’t Wake Up…4

…A tie dye convention was suddenly before us. Young women in their tie dye ankle length skirts, gum boots, tits hangin out of their tie dye tees, smiling, waving, weaving and smokin, laughin at no one in particular. Bare chested, long haired men, dirty faces, filthy fingers and knarling nails quaffing booze, smokin joints, hauling ass – literally and figuratively.  It was a lice lover’s paradise. Dante himself would have been impressed but challenged to describe this scene. He must have had Strawberry Fields in mind when writing his Divine Comedy and its depictions of Heaven, Purgatory and Hell, especially hell. Strawberry Fields must have played an important part of his allegorical travels through hell.  Whatever, St John’s volunteers were sure to have a busy two days, and, Johnny on the spots, while well dispersed throughout the grounds, would be sorely lacking with an estimation of about twenty thousand visitors expected per day. Shit everywhere man! And lots of it! I made a mental note to get the hell out of here before darkness set in.

We made our way toward the large staged scaffold. It was impressive: large amps everywhere, lights strewn about the structural framework, drum sets, guitar racks, mics, black staging curtains and men and women scurrying about like ants on the stage itself. Organized commotion in disarray. It looked as if they knew they were well behind schedule. Timmy and I must have looked a sight standing there before the stage watching all of this unfold.  Here we were, two guys with relatively short hair, conservatively dressed, prepared for the inclement weather. We were square. We knew it. Pat Boone like. Completely out of place…man. We did take a gander at the musical playlist beside the stage. Never heard of any of these bands. Locals no doubt but it didn’t really matter as no one would be able to hear the music anyway. And just like Woodstock they would be too stoned…

I Can’t Wake Up…3

…Speaking of the hippy lifestyle, Woodstock had just occurred this very summer. August 15-18, 1969. It was all the buzz among the hippy counterculture, but even more so with music fans like Timmy and I. Not to be outdone by the East Coast, some copycat festivals began to spring up here on the wet coast, everywhere it seemed, every weekend, on some non descript farm in the farmland east of here.  It had to be on a farm you see. Such originality! Most were abject failures, but it provided hippy food for thought and something to talk about.  It must have been tiring for the hippies to talk about the alphabet all day long.  As it turned out that there was a music festival planned for a farmstead not too far from this coastal city.  I believe they were calling it “Strawberry Fields,” or something equally profound like that.  Timmy and I decided to check it out.

We drove out to the prospectus. And just like Woodstock it was automotive gridlock. We decide to park our car a few miles away and walk in. Turned out to be a good plan as many of the autos became bogged down in the mud and sludge. Yes it was raining, just like Woodstock.  There was a great deal of cussing, yelling, pushing and shoving going on among the various drivers and bikers, especially the bikers. It was automotive pandemonium, definitely a frightful, fitful, love-in man as the fists came out from every which way from Sunday. And this was only Saturday.

We skirted around the problems, found the main gate, paid our fee and walked in. And what a sight to behold. Utter chaos. The end of the world as we knew it. This must be what Armageddon is going to look like. A sparse, barren, rain soaked, mud caked, garbage strewn landscape. Passchendaele couldn’t have been worse. Probably around 10 thousand hippies all gathered together in one place. All smokin, all tokin, all jokin, all smilin with their coke-ins and love-ins.  Stoned out of their ever lovin minds. And the music hadn’t even started yet….