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southern Canada and I wonder what that’s about. The minute you talk
about the North, people seem to get annoyed, and when you mention the
aboriginal people there seems to be trouble on the horizon.”
“A lot of mistakes have been made,” she said. “And there’s a lot of fixing
to do.”
“But, that’s one of the things I would like to help to do,” Ken said. “But,
I’m afraid it’s going to be perceived as the newcomer messing around in
something that’s none of his business. In fact, I’ve already been told so.”
“I think you’re a fine candidate to get into the middle of it and do
what you have to do. I’m very glad to have met you and congratulations
on becoming a Canadian. I have every confidence you will benefit the
country.”
To celebrate his new exalted status as a Canadian citizen, Ken went
to Nile Creek to fish for salmon. He unloaded his boat from the back of
his pickup and pushed off into the ocean. At Northwest Bay, he tied up
to a kelp bed, rocking up and down with the long seaweeds. He cast his
line, but his mind was not on fishing, so he stowed his gear and let his
thoughts coalesce, as he watched the waving fronds of kelp moving gently
in the current.
Sitting in the dinghy, tied to the silky kelp, he pondered the strange
twists his life had taken. It seemed to him, that no matter where in Canada
one was, government took place far away. It had started in England,
and although the job of governing had gradually been turned over to
Canadians, it was still as distant in the minds of the citizens as Ottawa
was from the farthest eastern, western and northern regions of the land.
People appeared to wait for instructions from some distant place. Was
this because Canada had only recently emerged from colonial status?
The clash appeared to be not between two nationalities, the English
and the French, but between two diverse cultures – that of city people
who had been swallowed up by bureaucracy, and that of country folk,
such as farmers, loggers, miners, and fishermen, who were the real risk
takers. Ken still had a great deal to learn about his new home but of one
thing he was sure, telling people his stories about the Arctic pushed them
away. Until he knew how to approach them properly, it was best to keep
quiet. But, to accomplish what he had in mind he would need a lot of
money, and in Canada, the words money and art were rarely spoken in
the same sentence.
What parent in this new world would want their offspring to marry an
artist – someone who was probably a combination of self-indulgent, unbalanced,
insecure, a daydreamer and quite possibly effeminate? A creature
who lived in an attic somewhere with the dust and spiders, and who could
not fight his way out of a paper bag if his life depended on it? This, to my
mind, was the prevailing idea of an artist and everyone believed it
Libros Libertad 