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Fire chief sounds alarm on old batteries 

Robb Magley
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Fire chief sounds alarm on old batteries 

As lithium-ion battery packs continue to grow in popularity, many on Salt Spring Island have inadvertent collections of idle or end-of-life batteries languishing in their homes –– and that’s a safety problem, according to island firefighters. 

Salt Spring Island Fire Rescue Chief Jamie Holmes told the district’s fire board a blaze last month on Collins Road exemplified the need for precautions when storing lithium-ion batteries. A smouldering battery pack under that home’s deck was fortunately noticed by occupants who extinguished the fire before crews arrived. Had it happened at night, he said, or when no one was home, the outcome could have been quite different.  

Holmes said fire officials have seen an increase in lithium-ion battery fires –– not just on Salt Spring, but across the province, as the battery packs power everything from scooters to cell phones. And while the potential for electric vehicle fires gets a lot of attention, the sheer number of batteries in everyday devices starts to stack up –– and presents a hazard when batteries are not disposed of or stored properly. 

“Really they become problematic when they start to get old, and past their cycle,” said Holmes, briefing trustees of the Salt Spring Island Fire Protection District Monday, Oct. 21.

“A lot of times when people have an old battery pack, they’ll just kind of toss it in the basement or under the shed or somewhere –– and that’s when they can be at the most dangerous.” 

And while the presence of lithium-ion batteries can make an already-burning fire harder to extinguish, Holmes also said that as old batteries start to break down, they can potentially ignite on their own.  

B.C.’s Office of the Fire Commissioner is working on public safety messaging, according to Holmes, but in the meantime, local firefighters are trying to spread the word. 

“It’s a good reminder for everybody, that as our lives go more toward using batteries, we have to take care of them when they’re done,” said Holmes. “I know I used to have a big drawer of old cell phones with all the batteries still in them.” 

Holmes said if residents are keeping the old batteries around, they should at minimum be stored in a metal box. 

“Rather than just underneath old papers and everything else,” chuckled Holmes.

“And they do take them at the recycling depot.” 

Islands Trust hires new CAO

Robb Magley
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Islands Trust hires new CAO

After months of searching –– and nearly a year after former chief administrative officer (CAO) Russ Hotsenpiller announced his retirement –– the Islands Trust Council (ITC) announced Rueben Bronee would be accepting the body’s staff leadership position. 

Bronee will be starting in late November, according to ITC chair Peter Luckham, who also sat on the hiring committee. Luckham said he was “delighted” to announce the new hire. 

“Rueben is a trusted public sector executive,” said Luckham, noting Bronee’s extensive experience leading “high-profile transformation initiatives” and providing strategic advice.

“We look forward to working with him as we finalize and implement our strategic plan,” he added, “and as we carry out the preserve and protect mandate of Islands Trust.” 

Bronee is moving from a recent position with the BC Public Service Agency, where he served as assistant deputy minister for communications. Prior to that, he held the role of assistant deputy minister/executive lead for policy, innovation and engagement there; he has also held executive roles in the ministries of advanced education, education, and citizens’ services, as well as in the Office of the Premier, according to Luckham. 

“I have a deep appreciation for the unique role of the Islands Trust, and I am very much looking forward to playing a part in advancing this important work,” said Bronee. “It’s exciting to join such a skilled and passionate team of professionals in working with trustees to help lead the Islands Trust forward.” 

In addition to implementing the body’s policies and decisions, the CAO position at the Islands Trust has traditionally been the first line of advice for trustees. Luckham thanked administrative services director Julia Mobbs, who continues to serve as interim CAO until Bronee begins.  

Acclaimed trio at ArtSpring Nov. 3

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Acclaimed trio at ArtSpring Nov. 3

BY KIRSTEN BOLTON

For ArtSpring

Originally trained as a classical pianist, Canadian Jeremy Ledbetter has made a career of travelling the far-flung corners of the globe in search of the most fascinating and unique musical ideas, then seamlessly integrating them into his work as a pianist, composer and producer.

Once a child prodigy who then went on to the Royal Conservatory of Music at York University to study jazz performance, he strayed from his structured lessons to accept a placement as an exchange student at the University of the Southern Caribbean in Trinidad. The fire was fuelled.

While his intent was to study Trinidad’s steelpan phenomenon, he was soon drawn into the exciting world of calypso and its modern-day descendant, soca. Three months into what was to be an eight-month excursion, Ledbetter called York to say he was not returning. He would remain in Trinidad for three more years, learning from and working with the region’s best artists.

His travels, performances and working relationships also took him to Cuba, Brazil and Venezuela. Today, the result is an inspiring cauldron of genre-bending contemporary Caribbean and Latin jazz that pushes the boundaries of jazz and world music.

For an ArtSpring Presents concert on Sunday, Nov. 3 at 4 p.m. The much in-demand Jeremy Ledbetter Trio sees Ledbetter join forces with fellow Toronto-based heavyweights Grammy-winning drummer Larnell Lewis of Snarky Puppy and renowned electric bassist Rich Brown, who offer the perfect counterpart to Ledbetter’s iconoclastic energy at the piano.

The trio’s debut 2018 album called Got a Light? has been described as “a controlled explosion of big ideas and compelling musical storytelling.” The trio’s follow-up album, Gravity, was just released in September to rave reviews.

“An eclectic mix of calypso, Latin, contemporary jazz and other Caribbean flavours, Gravity brings together the best musicians in Canadian jazz right now,” said Jazz.FM91’s Jonsaba Jabbi. “The album is a high-powered set of new original music, brimming with fresh ideas and jaw-dropping virtuosity and musicality.”

Tickets are available through ArtSpring.

Nobody Asked Me But: Giant banana slug and Bowen Queen ferry among memorable costumes

Shilo Zylbergold
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Nobody Asked Me But: Giant banana slug and Bowen Queen ferry among memorable costumes

As we drift deeper into the autumn season, we can’t help but notice some changing colours in the landscape. Oh sure, the leaves on the maples and alders have taken on a golden hue just before they fade to brown, only to fall helplessly to the earth.

There is another colour that catches our eye. It is orange, but not the tone that seems omnipresent on construction signs and traffic cones lining our roads. No, this orange is the colour of the magnificent pumpkin. Yes, everywhere we turn we see pumpkins. This can mean only one thing: Halloween.

Yes, Halloween. Ghosts and goblins. Witches and fairies. Spiders and cobwebs. Monsters and superheroes. Haunted houses and front lawns dressed up as spooky graveyards. Costume parties and trick or treating.

Yes, trick or treating. The gateway to endless future dental expenses. But when you’re a kid, that doesn’t really matter. Each hand-carved Jack-o-lantern lighting up the end of every driveway continues to lure the mini Spidermen and petite prima ballerinas towards that motherlode of all things sweet and sticky.

Back in the day, it was me out there on the neighbourhood streets. While holding on firmly to my older sister’s hand, we tricked and treated our way from house to house on our quest for the chocolate and candy booty that awaited us. Every doorstep held out the promise of infinite sugar rushes, but it was usually too dark to see exactly what was being deposited in our paper shopping bags. Of course, Halloween eve was sure to be marked by the inevitable major downpour, which soaked our shopping bags, thereby making them tear at the bottom and leak our confectionary treasures onto the dark pathways and sidewalks all the way back to our home.

What we celebrate as Halloween is actually the eve of the real holiday, All Saints Day, which falls on the first day of November. Interestingly enough, this feast day observes the lives of all the many saints for whom no special feast day has been set aside during the rest of the year. It’s a kind of a saints “all you can pray to” buffet. Everybody wins a consolation prize!

There remains a certain nostalgia for all the old costumes of yesteryear. Who can forget those fabulous monster outfits? The mummy, the Wolfman, Frankenstein’s spare parts man, Dracula and the Creature from the Black Lagoon were all so terrifying and could often be fabricated with the help of a few torn bedsheets and some red food colouring.

Then, of course, there were the superheroes. Superman and Batman headed the list, but not far behind came Spiderman, Aquaman, Wonder Woman and the Green Hornet. Even arch villains like Lex Luther, Brainiac and Catwoman had their devoted costumed minions.

I often felt that the likes of Superman received too much glory for their acts of heroism in defending Metropolis and Gotham City. Perhaps we should be paying Halloween tribute to some of the lesser superheroes who might be doing what they can to save civilization. Pocket Lint Man, for instance collects dust that would otherwise cover your clothes. Crochet Woman does everything Spiderman can do but it just takes her a bit longer. Then there’s Magneto Man, who helps keep your favourite photos stuck on your refrigerator.

It should come as no surprise that today’s most trending Halloween costumes are still inspired by pop culture. According to a majority of surveys, the number one dress-up for 2024 is Shrunken Head Bob from the movie Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. Not having seen the film myself, I can only imagine that the look will be Scary Scary in a humorous sort of way and make the Beetlejuice franchise a whole lot of Money Money.

The #2 costume for this pumpkin season is Raygun, the alias for Rachel Gunn, the competitive Australian breakdancer/academic who scored zero at the 2024 Olympics and did not get past the first round. Although she became the victim of online bullying, she will forever remain the patron saint for losers the world over. Close behind, in most popular costume #3 place, is CatNap, the scary villain from the Poppy Playtime horror video game. From the little I learned by googling Poppy Playtime, and the less I understood, I may never want to go near my cat’s litter box again.

Additional outfits that round up the list for most popular this Halloween include Barbie, Harry Potter, pop singer Sabrina Carpenter, Lady Deadpool, Wolverine, Godzilla and the Chipotle burrito. Of course, you can add to this list most of the hero and villain characters that have evolved from the stinking rich franchises such as Frozen, Inside Out, Dune and Despicable Me.

When I finally reached adulthood, I took great pride in designing costumes for myself that I then wore at various Halloween parties and Beaver Point Hall boogies. Some of the more memorable ones were a Hare Krishna realtor, a two-headed man, an eight-foot-tall slimy banana slug, the Bowen Queen ferry (complete with loud warning foghorn) and Darth Piggy.

My favourite was when I went as Fulford-Ganges Road. As with most of my concoctions, this one was constructed mainly from foam. I wore a cloud-covered Mount Maxwell as a headpiece and had the road loop up and around my shoulder and descend back around and down to the floor. One end was the village of Ganges and the other was the Fulford Harbour ferry terminal. Neither end had any open parking spots. My torso made up the bulk of the island and I added some endearing features such as sheep standing in the middle of the road and overturned Volvos lying in the roadside ditch. Ganges Harbour had a smelly reptilian monster wading through the outfall that originated from the sewage treatment plant across the road. Ahhh, those were the days.

Nobody asked me, but there’s no law that forbids adults, even ancient ones like me, from pulling those old costume duds out of the dress-up box or tickle trunk. As far as I know, there is no “best before” or expiry date for taking another turn at trick or treating. Why can’t I be Batman or Superman for one more night? Or maybe I should be a bit more realistic and lower my sights a couple of notches. Magneto Man wouldn’t be so bad. Now, if I could just unstick this fridge from my body.

Contrasting styles showcased at Bach on the Rock events

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Contrasting styles showcased at Bach on the Rock events


CONTRIBUTED ARTICLE

Bach on the Rock is offering a rich musical experience at two concerts this weekend, featuring pieces from three notable composers who wrote music in the 20th century

Set for Saturday, Nov. 2 at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, Nov. 3 at 2:30 p.m. at All Saints by-the-Sea, the concert titled A Musical Journey from Romanticism to Modern Day
includes works by Georges Enescu, Carl Nielsen and Ola Gjeilo. Each piece is intimate and approachable and creates a blend of contrasting styles.

Enescu, a celebrated Romanian composer, spent much of his life in Paris. His work often incorporates the folk music of his homeland. Enescu’s Decet, Opus 14, written in 1906, is a post-Romantic piece written for an unusual ensemble of 10 parts. The decet doubles the traditional wind quintet — flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon and horn — producing a vibrant mix of sound. It may remind listeners of divertimentos for wind instruments by Mozart or serenades by Brahms. It has a relaxed style resulting from the way themes are presented.

Nielsen, one of Denmark’s most prominent composers, wrote his Kleine Suite for strings early in his career. This piece was first performed in 1888. From Neilson’s Romantic period, it is one of his most often-performed works. It may remind the listener of the music of the Norwegian composer, Edvard Grieg. The Kleine Suite moves through contrasting moods and tones.

Gjeilo, a contemporary Norwegian composer, brings a modern element to the program with his Sunrise Mass. Known for his cinematic, film score-inspired style, Gjeilo combines choir and string ensemble to produce deeply emotional music. The themes of sunrise and the universe in this work create a powerful experience. Its reflective tone offers a calming conclusion to the concert.

This concert, led by artistic director Jean-Sébastien Lévesque, offers a rare opportunity to experience three distinct styles in one evening.

Tickets are available at the church and from Bach on the Rock members.

Viewpoint: The future has to change

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Viewpoint: The future has to change

By BILL MAIN

Minority governments have one tremendous advantage over majority governments: more of the ideas of the electorate are tended to than is the case with majority governments.

It’s one — and perhaps the best — reason for abandoning the first-past-the-post — us and them —electoral system, which for a very long time now has handed power to parties supported by significantly less than the majority of the electorate. In our case in Canada, our current system of choosing governments has resulted in power centralizing to an enormous degree in the hands of the prime minister and the premiers and their offices. A kind of oligarchy has evolved. Minority governments prevent this by essentially diluting the unchecked power of these central offices, as would proportional representation, which would result, often, in coalitions much more reflective of the voters’ choices and wishes than our current system. 

Clearly, parties, themselves, are coalitions. But the management of these coalitions is in the hands of the central authorities (prime minister, premiers and their central offices). The electorate never gets much of a glimpse at this management — really a set of compromises developed behind closed doors. Minority governments are much less opaque in their management, as are coalitions, and this lessening of opaqueness is hugely desirable, because it makes the sort of dictatorship of the oligarchy which we currently have less possible. 

There are those who say that we have to have clear winners and losers in order for our governments to function, but there is no evidence to support that. It’s what Aristotle would call a belief rather than the truth supported by facts. And while it’s true that enormous centralized power in the hands of some people can result in very good government — Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lynden Johnson, Teddy Roosevelt in the U.S., Lester B. Pearson and Tommy Douglas in Canada, and Winston Churchill at least for a time in the U.K. — the odds are great that this power will end up in the hands of other people (Donald Trump, Pierre Poilievre, Boris Johnson, etc.) or, at the least, ideologues (Ronald Reagan, Maggie Thatcher, Stephen Harper, etc.).

Anyone with the time and interest and willingness to think it through will realize that our current, first-past-the-post electoral system has led to the us and them world we currently have to live in. This is the simple, binary world that has caused us so very much grief, has confounded reason, has eroded our belief in the world of fact-based truth and has unleashed the tribalism that threatens our very commitment to democracy. It’s the world we’re handing to our children and grandchildren — a sad, dangerous and utterly destructive world that we can’t seem to see a way out of. Poor children, poor grandchildren, poor world. 

Our propensity to tribalism is something that we must create bulwarks against, and proportional representation can be one such bulwark. Adam Olsen is right: the Green party’s price for supporting an NDP minority government in B.C. has to be the imposition of this electoral system. It isn’t the complete answer, but we have to start somewhere limiting the binary, tribal world that prevents rational thought and action, and this is likely the simplest start we can make. 

The writer is a Salt Spring Island resident.

Renowned contra-alto joins Victoria Baroque concert

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Renowned contra-alto joins Victoria Baroque concert

CONTRIBUTED ARTICLE

Salt Spring Baroque is excited to present contra-alto Vicki St. Pierre with Victoria Baroque this weekend in Spirit and Song, a program featuring Bach’s Cantata BWV 170 along with works by Buxtehude and members of the Bach family.

The concert is at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 2 at All Saints by-the-Sea.

St. Pierre is a renowned contralto whose voice combines clarity of expression and beauty of tone. She is also one of Canada’s most spirited musical leaders – an esteemed choral conductor and Dean of Arts at Mount Allison University.

Recent and upcoming engagements for St. Pierre include the role of Nutrice in Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea with the Academy of Ancient Music in London, U.K., the role of the Sorceress in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas with Les Violons du Roy at Carnegie Hall, Messiah with Orchestra London and Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater with 13 Strings and Splendors of the Emperor’s Chapel with The Toronto Consort.

Victoria Baroque brings together early music specialists from Vancouver Island and beyond for explorations of chamber, orchestral, vocal and choral works. Playing on the instruments of the 18th-century, Victoria Baroque brings audiences closer to the sound world of the period, embracing the dance-driven rhythmic vitality, as well as the lyrical and conversational aspects of baroque music. The mellower tones of the baroque instruments — gut strings on string instruments, shorter bows, mellifluous wooden flutes, oboes and bassoon with fewer keys, natural horns without valves, etc. — respond in a more intimate, conversational manner than their modern equivalents.

Tickets can be purchased online through saltspringbaroque.com, through the ArtSpring box office (artspring.ca) or the door before the performance.

Kora master and trio perform

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Kora master and trio perform

Salt Spring Islanders can discover the unique sound of Sophie Lukacs when her trio performs in concert on Wednesday, Oct. 30 at Salt Spring Island United Church.

A Budapest-born, Montreal-based artist of Jewish Hungarian descent, Lukacs began her musical journey with the violin and Western classical music. Inspired by her grandmother, Holocaust survivor Eva Fahidi, Lukacs’ passion for music led her to study international development and music at McGill University.

Her path took a transformative turn in Burkina Faso, where she discovered the kora, a traditional West African instrument.

Despite the kora being traditionally reserved for men of the griot caste, Lukacs pursued her passion. After a fateful encounter with kora master Malang Jobarteh in New York, she immersed herself in kora studies, eventually learning from legends like Toumani Diabaté in Paris and Bamako.

Living in Mali for seven years, Lukacs mastered the kora and began composing her music. Her debut album — Bamako — released in 2023, received critical acclaim and won the Global Roots Album of the Year at the 2024 Canadian Folk Music Awards.

Singing in English, French, Hungarian and Bambara, Lukacs will be joined by Laszlo Koos on bass and Noel Mpiaza on percussion.

Next Wednesday’s concert, which begins at 7:30 p.m., with doors open at 7 p.m., is presented by Caravan World Rhythms.

Tickets through caravanbc.com or at the door.

Halloween activities abound on Salt Spring

Gail Sjuberg
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Halloween activities abound on Salt Spring

Islanders of all ages have plenty of options for celebrating Halloween this year, with a variety of events planned for the week leading up to and including Oct. 31.

On Thursday, Oct. 24, the library’s Teen Zone is the spot for an afternoon of “ghostly, eerie and even spine-chilling crafting” from 1 to 3 p.m. on an early dismissal day. Library staff explain that “paintings of classic artists such as Vincent van Gogh, Francisco Goya and many others will be provided along with various supplies to make a petrifying re-creation of a classic artwork.”

The Haunted Forest Walk continues at the Salty Bonez Shack at 606 Cusheon Lake Road on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 25-26 from 6 to 9 p.m. People are invited to bring a reusable mug for hot chocolate, and cash, food and supplies for the BC SPCA. While the event is for all ages, it may be scary for some. 

On Saturday, Oct. 26, the Salt Spring Island Rod and Gun Club on Long Harbour Road hosts an all-ages Halloween Spooktacular with fun events like a pumpkin smash, spectral trap shooting and a zombie shoot. It runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Sunday, Oct. 27 sees craft activities for ages five to 12 from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. at ArtSpring when a special Halloween Party with mask-making and a costume parade takes place. A guardian must accompany kids under the age of 10. Snacks are provided but bringing a bag lunch is recommended.

The event is from the ArtSpring Roundtable Committee in partnership with StageCoach Theatre. 

On Halloween night, StageCoach Theatre presents the Monsterpiece Theatre Haunted House downstairs at the Salt Spring Island Multi Space from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Entry is by donation. The event is made possible with support from the Salt Spring Island Foundation, PARC and Country Grocer. 

Fireworks in downtown Ganges are on tap at 7:30 p.m. courtesy of the Salt Spring Island Firefighters’ Association, with hot dogs and hot chocolate served at the Ganges fire hall afterwards. 

This year the Brinkworthy Estates community is not giving out candy to trick or treaters but is collecting some for the Maliview and Wildwood neighbourhoods. They are also having a costume-optional dance party for residents only from 2 to 4 p.m.

Country Grocer has once again set out boxes to accept donations of candy for distribution to residents in the popular Maliview and Wildwood neighbourhood trick or treat destinations.

Adults can take in costume parties at Moby’s Pub (with The Coalition) and the Legion with a Halloween Open Mic with Rough and Tumble. 

On Nov. 2 at Bullock Lake Farm, the Dia de los Muertos: Community Ofrenda will take place for the fourth year between 5 and 10:30 p.m. Pre-registration is requested through dosamorestortilleria.com. Donations are not required but appreciated to offset costs. 

More events or details may be announced closer to Oct. 31. 

Guest column: Memories of early morning from the paper route

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Guest column: Memories of early morning from the paper route

By CHRIS RIDEOUT

Earlier in this space, I wrote a piece about my boyhood experiences as a paper boy. I left some things out, which I now realize was a mistake.

My paper route memories are so indelible, who knows when I will finish talking about them?

The morning papers were dropped off at 5 a.m. in front of a gas station about two miles from my house. Every morning when I rode down I hoped they would not be there. No papers. No paper boy. What a relief. If that happened, I had to call my manager. There were no phones in those days, so I had to ride my stupid girl-bike to the nearest all-night restaurant and ask to use their phone. There I was, an eight-year-old kid, asking to use the phone at 5:30 in the morning. I’m surprised they didn’t call the police. Or social services, had such an organization existed.

Every customer had a particular way that they wanted the paper delivered. One house wanted the paper inside the screen door, another yelled at me to never open the screen door. Some houses wanted the paper on the front stoop, which is where I faithfully left it, even during freezing rain. I saw a paper that I had left on the porch during freezing rain: it was four times its normal size and weighed 10 pounds. The customer showed it to me days later and asked me what I expected him to do with it. Many years later I had an answer for him.

The problem was that I never had a clear idea of what a newspaper was. I knew the route was important, the money I had to collect was equally so, as was the delivery time. But I failed to see why this little stupid bundle of paper was important. I just wanted to go home and make oatmeal for my Dad’s breakfast. As a kid, I had no idea how necessary the morning paper was to people. For me, then, it was just one more mysterious thing about adults.

The paper had regular circulation drives. They wanted me to increase the number of papers I had by canvassing those houses who didn’t get a paper. This, I thought, was a terrible idea. Who in his right mind would want more heavy hard-to-fold papers? I had too many already. It was a goofy scheme designed to hurt paper boys. The company even offered prizes. No thank you. I was not tempted by prizes like BB guns and stuff like that. Even though I wouldn’t have minded a BB gun.

And then there was the other part of being a paper boy: the collecting. Every Friday I had to collect money for the week’s paper. It was 25 cents. The problem was, customers didn’t know who this kid was at the front door asking for money. They had never seen me because I was at their house at 6 a.m. I would hear people hollering, “There’s a little kid at the door asking for money.” They didn’t seem to connect the paper with money and with me. I had no ID. Kids, as a rule, didn’t carry ID in those days.

One of my customers was the local Legion. When I walked in on Friday after school, I caused an unexpected sensation. The place was full of men and they were all looking at me. The smell of beer and cigarette smoke was so powerful it left an indelible impression on me. And of course they teased me: offering me beer and asking if I was old enough to drink. It was comic relief for them. Not for me. When the bartender finally paid me I made a run for the door with the sounds of laughter following me.

Paper boys had to collect the money because there was no other way to do it. There were no credit cards, no e-transfer, no way for the subscribers to pay except to give it to the little kid who came to their door every Friday just at supper time. It had to be then because the kid was otherwise in school and his manager wanted the week’s money on Saturday. I didn’t wonder why then. At that age I didn’t wonder at much. The whole world was incomprehensible to me then, and still is a little.

The absolutely best part of collecting was sorting the money on the dining-room table on Saturday morning. It was exciting because at my age, not much real money ever came my way. My grandmother gave me a dollar bill on my birthday and I spent hours just holding it.

In a week I would collect around seven dollars. Mostly in quarters. I got to keep three dollars. These numbers sound ridiculously small today — it amounted to around $150 a year – but keep in mind you could buy a pretty good used car for a hundred bucks. I bought a real bicycle with three speeds and finally got rid of the stupid blue girl-bike.

When my mother got me the paper route she said it would make a man of me and also teach me the value of money. It did neither of those things. You can’t make a man out of an eight-year-old boy. And as for the value of money, it taught me that money is hard to come by and you have to make it in all kinds of weather at all times of the day and night. And most people don’t really like to part with money unless they have to.

But it gave me things that surprised me then and things that still do. The smell of a fine morning in June when the sun was up with me and my papers. The smell of the neighbourhood’s coal-burning furnaces on the crisp December mornings, pitch-dark and wonderfully silent. The thrill of being up and out when everyone was asleep, riding through the dark streets like being on a secret mission. Even the early morning smell of fresh newsprint was special to me. And even at that age, the absolutely clear delight of solitude, of being in charge of myself with a real responsibility, has stayed with me and in some ways, consoled me for a childhood that few would envy.

And some mornings, like Mondays, when the papers were thin, I finished the route fast and got home early enough to make breakfast for me and my Dad.

Chris Rideout is a Salt Spring Island resident.

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