April 2017 Elkwater Outing

I wrote this a while ago, but it keeps being true:

A drive east out of my home town of Medicine Hat, about 20 minutes past nothing at all, and about 20 minutes before Saskatchewan where the nothingness is exaggerated even further, there is a hard right turn up the steepest hill around. It’s not actually very steep, but to its surroundings it’s a mountain. Large trucks have to get a head start - charging at the bottom and dying out exhausted towards the top - and everyone’s gears have to get a little lower. Once up this hill, the road flattens out but not quite completely, though it looks like it does. But it’s an illusion. And in an automatic vehicle, the gas pedal tells the truth. Drivers have to compress it lower than they’re used to. There are no shoulders on this highway and it looks like any other prairie road, drifting past farms and cows and fields. But it takes more work to drive on it. And these familiar prairie sights gradually take on a greener, livelier, and more luscious look. It’s like driving towards to the source of life.

Another 20 minutes on this road is a gradual climb up the highest altitude anywhere on the prairies. At the end of the road is Cypress Hills interprovincial park. It lies on the border between Alberta and Saskatchewan and it’s the only area on the prairies that wasn’t scraped away by glaciers. It looks as though all the glaciers ran into each other there and pushed together everything they were pushing and piled their loads on top of each other and then died. And it seems like they stashed their loads underneath what was already there, like a bump under a rug. The hills retain an outer layer of ancient forests and overlook beautiful lakes - perhaps the decomposing bodies of those long-dead glaciers.

This has always been a favorite place of mine and our family has been visiting it regularly my whole life. Day trips, scout camps, work retreats, dates, ski trips, family vacations, church activities, adventure races, parties. All found an ideal setting in those hills. My dad even took me and my brother camping with two other boys who we were never very close with. I don’t remember how the arrangement was made, but I think we loved the place so much that we figured we would bring whoever was available.

I had taken Harry there a few times before this summer. Once was in the winter when I forgot the park gets twice as much snow as the city. He had fallen asleep in the car and I realized my mistake and turned around and headed home before he could wake up. The other times he was too young to appreciate it. But this summer I took him once by myself and once with the whole family.

We didn’t have a video camera when I was growing up, but my dad sometimes borrowed one from work. He’d pop in a VHS and prop the camera on his shoulder and ask us to do things we didn’t want to do. Our family video vault contains a lot of footage of grumpy little boys telling the camera to go away. But sometimes we would be in the mood to show off, and I now recognize the tone of my dad’s voice that he would use to tell us how great we are at spinning in circles or how funny our jokes are. It’s the same tone I now use to tell Harry how interesting the rocks and sticks are that he shows me. We now have a GoPro camera that’s about the size of two ice cubes, and I bet that tone is captured for another generation. There is one memorable scene on an old family VHS of my brother and I playing on a playground and walking down a path in Cypress Hills, wearing neon sweatpants and sweatshirts, singing the Ninja Turtles theme song. This summer we took some footage of Harry playing on that playground and walking on that path and it probably caught me laughing at his jokes and being impressed by his ability to stand at the top of the playground.

The hills were formed by millions of years of erosion and sedimentary deposition. And an archeological dig near the townsite revealed human inhabitation of the hills for more than 8,500 years. Families have been a part of those hills for thousands of years, and I think this summer we preserved them for another generation.

UPDATE

This family is now deeply etched into the hills. The boy has been many times now and the Pud is starting to get the hang of things, though she spends more time in my arms than on her feet. The dude has expanded his abilities so that I am genuinely impressed, and the fake enthusiasm is a lot less fake, as I'd much rather see his favourite sticks and rocks and leaves than his favourite TV shows or iPad games.

We're lucky to have such a place nearby - a place to be in the wild and to be a little wild. I'm sure I'll return to this topic many times.

Wilderness from Studiocanoe on Vimeo.

This has been going around and it is inspiring.

Outdoor Ed.

There is an article in the most recent issue of Outside magazine about a school in North Carolina for kids with ADHD. The curriculum covers the standard academics but takes place completely outside and integrates traditional school learning with outdoor skills, adventures, and sports. It is an experimental program but the early results are more than encouraging. Kids who struggle with - and downright hate - traditional school are thriving in the outdoors. As the article puts it,

“The fact is, all human children learn by exploration, and we are tying their shoelaces together - not just with medication, but through over-structured, over-managed classrooms and sports teams, less freedom to roam, and ever more dazzling indoor seductions. Modern life has made all of us distractible and overwhelmed.”

When kids are given the freedom and space to wander they end up focused, concentrated, and - most important - happy and successful.

I don’t think Harry has ADHD (I think it is over-diagnosed these days and I don’t really care if he has it or not). But he definitely has some of the symptoms, though I think a lot of us do. He can get very irritable, easily frustrated, restless, and anxious when he spends long periods of time indoors. And our early attempts at formal school study have been miserable for everyone. He’s still very young and we’re not worried. But all his issues - whether it’s normal 4-year old behavior or unique to him - disappear when he’s outside. Whether it’s yard work, hiking, helping Grandpa build something, treasure hunting (geocaching), going to the beach, or other adventure and exploration, he locks in with a focus that his grandparents have said is very unusual for someone his age. He comes alive and fills with joy. If he gets hurt he doesn’t cry, if he gets tired he doesn’t complain, if he gets hungry he doesn’t whine, if something bothers him he doesn’t get mad, if he can’t do something the way he wants to he doesn’t get frustrated, and if the activity goes on for hours he doesn’t get bored.

I took him down to the lake today. I didn’t bring my watch or phone, but we left in the early afternoon and came home when the sun was almost down. He spent the whole time exploring the driftwood, building a driftwood building, finding driftwood swords, climbing rocks and logs, finding and hiding treasure, and enjoying being an adventurous boy. At one point he slipped on a log and hit his face pretty hard. It looked like it hurt. He almost cried but then remembered he was trying to walk across a 40-foot log without touching the ground and so dusted himself off and carried on. We had a wonderful time and I had to bribe him to leave.

When we had been home for a little while he became irritable and bored. He got a tiny cut on his toe from stubbing it on a chair and he went bananas - milking the cry for all it was worth and using the cut as leverage to try to get extra snacks. I think it was normal end-of-the-day toddler behavior but the contrast was amazing.

I don’t know that he’ll ever need to be in a special school, but I think some after-hours tutoring from Mother Nature will be a must.

Snowshoeing at Sun Peaks

The latest adventure: Snowshoeing in Sun Peaks, about 45 minutes outside Kamloops, BC. It was fairly impromptu so we weren't dressed properly and they rented us some giant 1980s clunkers with barebones straps that were starched stiff with years of absorbed snow and that dug into the tops and back of our feet. But it was a great time. We went as far as we could go and ended up at a frozen lake at the top of the mountain. Three of us were alone in the forest, clumping up the mountain, but when we stopped moving and the snow crunching stopped there was complete silence. There is a quote from the book Hatchet that has stuck with me since I read it in grade 6. I couldn't have quoted it but I think of it often when I'm outside, especially where it is quiet. I found the quote:

"I'm hungry." He said it aloud. In normal tones at first, then louder and louder until he was yelling it. "I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm hungry." 

When he stopped there was sudden silence, not just from him but the clicks and burps and bird sounds of the forest as well. The noise of his voice had startled everything and it was quiet. He looked around, listened with his mouth open, and realized that in all his life he had never heard silence before. Complete silence. There had always been some sound, some kind of sound. 

It lasted only a few seconds, but it was so intense that it seemed to become part of him. Nothing. There was no sound.

I don't think I had heard complete silence before. There's usually something - wind, leaves, birds, vehicles in the distance. But in the forest on that mountain there was complete silence. We paused a few times to bask in it and it felt like a spiritual experience. Freshness in the soul to go along with the fresh smell of trees and snow and water.