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Nobody Asked Me But: Let’s Unzip Shorts Guy Nation

Shilo Zylbergold
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Nobody Asked Me But: Let’s Unzip Shorts Guy Nation

Stop me if you’ve seen this before. There’s a man crossing the road in front of you. As he places one foot in front of the other, he exudes an air of confidence, determination, and purpose. He is not so much involved in the act of walking as he is striding. However, what strikes you the most about this man is that he is wearing shorts and it is winter.

That’s “shorts guy.” He is one of the soldiers making up the legion of men in shorts. You can find them in most geographical regions on the planet, but they are particularly bountiful here on Salt Spring.

Shorts guy doesn’t care about what season it is or the atmospheric conditions. Maybe it’s the middle of a heat wave in August, but it might just as easily be a teeming rainstorm in March or a white-out blizzard in December. For shorts guy, any weather is good weather for shorts.

How do I know this? I happen to be a chartered, card-carrying member of men in shorts. Shorts guy is me. In fact, I belong to an honoured subset of the club, known and feared by all as Old Men in Shorts. For us, attire in shorts is not just a fashion statement; it’s a way of life.

Putting someone like me into a pair of restrictive trousers would be comparable to tying me up in a confining straightjacket. Without the cool touch of the breeze lapping up against my bare legs, I might just as well be smothered in cling wrap and stuffed in a can of sardines.

Why do we men in shorts, especially the senior members of the cult, flaunt the accepted standards and mores of society? Why do we inflict the more normal segments of the population on this island to our display of narcissistic exhibitionism? Does the planet really need a close-up view of our massively burgeoning calf muscles as we glide powerfully along the earth’s surface? Certainly, they must all be checking out our strong and fit legs and nodding away in admiration.

To be honest, we older shorts guys are much more likely to be showing off our atrophied calves on bowed legs pitted with bulging varicose veins. We might even be accessorizing our attire with knee-high black compression stockings to help stave off edema swelling, gout or early neuropathy.

Although you will find that many men in shorts are employed in the fields of courier delivery and postal service, shorts guy can come in any size, shape, or flavour. He may be wearing wool socks and orange crocs, or going sockless in Mexican huaraches sandals. Perhaps he’s wearing a pair of those all-weather khaki safari shorts equipped with dozens of unnecessary pockets. (You can usually hear safari shorts guy long before you see him on account of the annoying noise emanating from the potpourri of coins jingling in his excessively numerous pockets.)

The ubiquitous question that gets asked of shorts guy is “don’t your legs get cold?” To safari shorts guy, this is a ridiculous question. Why would getting completely waterlogged or developing a severe case of frost bite discourage someone who is used to wading through quicksand lagoons while sidestepping crocodiles, boa constrictors, and pythons (if only in his imagination).

Shorts guy has nothing against long pants, really. He knows they can protect your legs from pests like mosquitos, wasps and yappy little Chihuahuas snapping at your heels. He realizes, however that nothing brings your nervous system to life faster than strutting barelegged through a field of stinging nettles.

As shorts guy, you realize that pulling on a pair of shorts over your undies is like getting into a time machine that will transport you back to the past. No matter what your present age, you will always still be stuck in that stage of life where you are getting off the bus at middle school wearing nothing but gym shorts and a T-shirt. Your backpack is stuffed to the gills with a couple of skateboards and a half dozen cans of high-octane caffeinated pop. There’s no room in there for any school textbooks or binders, so you left them strategically stashed at home under a pile of dirty laundry.

Even if shorts guy is doing something as mundane as carrying a blue box of recyclables over to the bin full of tin cans, he moves with the panache of a sun-bleached surfer dude as he hops on his board and paddles out into the oncoming waves to the cries of “surf’s up.”

It doesn’t bother shorts guy if people look down on him and consider him weirdly eccentric. In fact, he considers their disdain as a badge of honour that sets him apart from the teeming hordes. When it comes to the anatomical real estate situated between his knees and his ankles, shorts guy has nothing to hide. Shorts guy’s psyche screams out, “Here are my imperfections; deal with it!”

Recently, there has been talk on the island of forming a special republic for Shorts Guy Nation. Rumours are that this move has been initiated and welcomed by the long pants majority, who envision men in shorts being rounded up and banished to a separate NO TROUSER ZONE island. Hopefully, reason will prevail and we will all be able to coexist together whether we have our knees exposed or not.

Nobody asked me, but I can’t really say how much longer I can continue on with my shorts guy ways. Maybe there will come a day when I turn my back on that middle school bus and graduate finally into a more mature late adolescence. Then again, maybe not. After all, it could be worse. I could be short kilt guy.

NASH, Marjorie May (version #2)

Driftwood Obituary
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NASH, Marjorie May (version #2)

Marjorie May Nash
1921-2022

Marjorie Nash (nee Court) passed peacefully in her sleep on Thursday May 19, 2022.

She was born in Portland, Oregon on October 18, 1921 and moved to Hamilton in 1922 where she attended a one room brick school. During WW2 she served in a munitions factory working 12 hour shifts. Her entire family attended St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church and then Chalmers Presbyterian Church where she was married to Nathan Nash in 1949.

That is when her life as a farmer’s wife began on the Nash Farm in Stoney Creek.

Their 4 children, Willard (Rose), Malcolm, Charles (Lynda) and Linda (Jim Gagnon) were the 6th generation to be raised on that same United Empire Loyalist farm.

Raising 4 kids and keeping up a house and helping on the farm kept her very busy but not too busy to serve countless volunteer hours.

Marjorie was a Commissioner for the local Girl Guides for 23 years, school PTA member for 10 years(two as president), United Church Women for 35 years, Boy Scouts Den Mother for 15 years and part of the Womens’ (Farmer) Institute for 30 years when she received a lifetime member pin from the Stoney Creek chapter.

Competitive square dancing was something Marjorie and Nathan both enjoyed and they travelled the world for competitions and just for fun. They even danced on the Great Wall of China!

In 1975 they sold the bulk of the family farm and in 1985 they made the big move West to Salt Spring Island. There they moved in to a house they had designed by their son Charles and built to lockup by a well known local family. Nathan worked on the finishing details of the build while Marjorie busied herself with decorating and creating a flower garden.

Not one to sit idle, Marjorie became very active in their new community and volunteered thousands of hours for several Island organizations. She was part of the Lady Minto Hospital Auxilliary and helped out in the Thrift store. She joined the SSI Women’s Institute and, among other activities, was one of the well known and respected Pie Ladies, making hundreds of fresh pies for the Salt Spring Fall Fair every year. She served tea and cookies to the (usually much younger) residents at Braehaven every week.

She and Nathan stayed active together enjoying travelling and continued to square dance at the Fritz Hall as members of the local Salty Wheels Dancers. As a Legion member she also enjoyed the regular Friday night dinners at Meadon Hall and would flit from table to table chatting with her many friends and colleagues.

Marjorie also enjoyed collecting tea spoons and tea cups from around the world on their many adventures and, in quieter moments, enjoyed cross stitch and petty point.

She loved animals and regularly donated to several animal rescue and protection groups. Her Border Collie, Skippy, was a constant source of joy and a great companion to her. She also became rather fond of Charles & Lynda’s cats as well as their Newfoundland dog, Sumo.

With the rare exception of the coldest of winter days, Marjorie would always dress in a skirt and blouse and heels whether she was out for dinner or puttering in her garden.

Marjorie was predeceased by her son Malcolm in 1975 and Nathan in 2002.

She eventually started slowing down and hung up her square dancing crinolines when she was 94 but continued assisting with lighter tasks for the Thrift store and Women’s Institute for several more years. Dinners at the legion continued as a Friday night staple and Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy were evening favourites as well as any animal documentary she could find.

Charles and Lynda moved in with her in 2011 to assist with maintaining the house and caring for Marjorie as her health gradually deteriorated.

In 2019 she returned to Ontario and lived her remaining years with Willard and Rose in Severn Bridge.

She leaves behind 10 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren.

There will be a family celebration of life in Ontario later this year.

Islands still recovering from Wednesday windstorm

Gail Sjuberg
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Islands still recovering from Wednesday windstorm

Thousands of households are still without power on Salt Spring and the other Gulf Islands following a windstorm that whipped through the south coast on Wednesday.

An Environment Canada weather warning for winds of up to 70 km/h and gusting to 90 km/h came to fruition, with power outages occurring largely when trees fell on power lines.

According to BC Hydro’s outage info website, some 2,500 customers on Salt Spring and a further 4,600 on Pender, Mayne, Saturna and Galiano islands are still without power as of 12:30 p.m. Thursday.

Bc Hydro stated at the same time that it has brought in additional resources to restore power to the Gulf Islands and Vancouver Island, but “some customers may be without power for another night and potentially longer in some cases.” Hydro added that it had already restored power to more than 167,000 residents on the south coast.

At one point on Wednesday, some Beddis Road residents were cut off from the rest of Salt Spring Island due to trees across the road in two different areas. As of noon Thursday, one lane was open in the trouble spot to allow traffic to pass on Beddis, according to one area resident.

The Salt Spring fire department issued a statement on its Facebook page yesterday afternoon noting that “We are very busy trying to keep people at a safe distance from all the downed hydro-lines today. Please help us out by staying well back from any downed power line, and never, ever, apply water to a hydro fire!”

Bc Ferries cancelled the 10:50 a.m. sailing from Vesuvius and the 11:25 a.m. from Crofton due to adverse conditions on Wednesday, and schedules on that route and in the Southern Gulf islands were also affected by a lack of on-shore power.

Daycare services get hopping again on Salt Spring

Emelie Peacock
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Daycare services get hopping again on Salt Spring

Movement is happening in the world of early learning on Salt Spring Island as one daycare is set to re-open and another is working on opening for the first time. 

Tree Frog Daycare, which closed Nov. 30, 2021 due to combined staffing and housing challenges, will re-open part-time on June 1 and is anticipated to return full-time in July. The Little Rainbows Early Learning Centre is working on the final pieces of licensing, staffing and set-up to open at its Rainbow Road centre. 

When the decision was made to temporarily shut the doors due to staffing and housing shortages, the Fulford Harbour Child Care Society began focusing on recruitment and retention to staff up Tree Frog Daycare. With staffing shortages solved, the daycare is now looking for community support as they prepare to re-open in a few weeks. 

Together with the two staff members remaining at the time of closure, the daycare will also have on board a previous staff member, another local early childhood educator (ECE) and an ECE from Vancouver who is being housed with the help of a family whose child is an alumnus of the daycare.

“From the moment we went public about closing, we have felt the outpouring of support from our community, especially our alumni families,” chairperson Danielle Taylor and coordinator of the daycare Lisa Bleskie stated via email. 

The daycare is licensed for 20 children, including four infant and toddler spaces, which are some of the most needed on the island. Staff and the board are now busy filling spaces with the families who had their children at the centre when it closed. The board stated they will not be accepting any new registration requests or visits to the daycare until they have completed this process.

“Without the dedication and hard work of our parent board of directors, who remained committed and optimistic throughout this process and all the ups and downs, we would not have been able to do this, and as the last of the original staff of Tree Frog, I am so grateful they fought with me to reopen this place I love so dearly,” Bleskie stated.

Tree Frog families, staff and community were also given a big thanks by the board in their re-opening announcement. 

Both Tree Frog and Little Rainbows have appealed to the community to support their efforts to provide early learning and care to Salt Spring’s youngest citizens.

A GoFundMe campaign is running for Tree Frog’s reopening, with $4,535 raised of a $25,000 goal as of May 16. The society is also raising funds through people allocating their bottle returns at the Island Return-it depot, through personal donations and through Country Grocer’s Save-a-Tape program. 

“Tree Frog has a solid business model and has not needed to rely on community donations in the past few years,” the GoFundMe page stated.

The daycare did, however, incur a financial loss during the time it was closed and needs help with re-opening costs that include maintenance and repairs, supplies, furniture, payroll, utilities and other fees. 

Community members have already stepped in to help, including daycare parent Sean Hart and his Salty Builders crew spending a day sprucing up the building. A work party is also planned for Sunday, May 22 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the daycare.

“Anyone who would like to help is welcome to show up that day with gardening supplies, shovels, wheelbarrows,” Taylor and Bleskie wrote.

Soil and plants have been donated by Country Grocer, and Forsyth Farms Gravel Mart has contributed sand to refresh the playground. 

The daycare is also in need of a paint job inside and out, a new or used washer and dryer, and a new office desk. Email the daycare at treefrogdaycare@shaw.ca for questions around how to support reopening efforts. 

With capacity for 12 children up to age 36 months, the Little Rainbows centre is in the process of opening, said executive director Janice Shields. The centre is continuing to actively recruit up to four ECEs, one to two with infant toddler certification on top of their ECE credentials, as well as an ECE assistant. Shields said there are some promising leads, and the centre has done outreach to nearby colleges, yet some experienced ECEs will also be needed. 

Little Rainbows has appealed for monetary donations as well as resources, books and playground equipment in March. These needs still exist, Shields said, and with a playground being installed they are also appealing for donations of a shed and a gazebo for the outdoor space. 

“We have quite a few families on our list, we’re not surprised, [it’s] great. It’s just that waiting for it all to come together,” she said.

To reach the Little Rainbows team, email littlerainbows@giels.org. 

Fundraiser started for Salt Spring artist who lost his home and artwork in boat fire

Emelie Peacock
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Fundraiser started for Salt Spring artist who lost his home and artwork in boat fire

Community members are coming together to help Salt Spring artist Sav Boro after a boat fire left him without his home and without much of his artwork. 

Boro’s houseboat at Burgoyne Bay went up in flames at 3 a.m. on April 23.

“Sav lost everything, including his 30 years’ worth of original paintings. Luckily, he was able to save his beloved Maine Coon cat,” a GoFundMe online fundraising page stated. 

The $30,000 online fundraising goal is meant to help Boro purchase another boat or home and continue his artistic practice. A naturalist and wildlife as well as landscape artist, Boro has been a part of the community for 20 years.

“Sav started to paint at a young age in Kenya, where he was born and raised,” organizers stated. “He started a seven-year painting apprenticeship at the age of 18 and sold his first painting soon after at 20 years old.”

His boat was both his home and art studio, the fundraising page explained. Money raised will go to a new boat or other home for Boro, as well as art supplies and canvases, studio rental, basic supplies and the obligation for coastal clean-up of the boat. 

Organizers are also asking anyone with an original Sav Boro painting on the island, and a willingness for prints to be made, to get in touch via kayah.ziraldo@outlook.com.

As of May 17, the fundraiser had raised $9,360 from 91 donors.

The GoFundMe page is found here.

First Invasive Weed Drop-off day set for May 28

Contributed Article
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First Invasive Weed Drop-off day set for May 28

By JANE PETCH

Driftwood Contributor

It’s springtime and Scotch broom is in bloom along our roads and fields. Now is the time to make Salt Spring fire-safer by removing this invasive flammable weed as well as its prickly fire-loving cousin gorse.

Dispose of broom, gorse, Himalayan blackberry, holly, spurge laurel, ivy and more at this year’s first Invasive Weed Drop-off on Saturday, May 28 at the Community Gospel Chapel from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Saturday, June 4 at the Fulford Community Hall from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. will see a second drop-off event for these invasive introduced plants that are spreading across the island. Volunteers will be on hand to help unload and to collect donations to cover disposal costs.

It’s no surprise that Salt Spring firefighters are welcome volunteers for the drop-offs. Broom and gorse, covered in volatile oils, are fire threats. A patch of broom can turn into a racing fire, almost impossible to extinguish, especially in hot dry summers. Removing these plants is one way to make the island safer in times of climate change. Native plants benefit as well with the introduced competition gone.

The effort to remove broom on this island has been highly successful. It is a common sight now to see residents removing this invasive plant as it goes into bloom. Last year, over eight tons of invasive plants, mostly broom, were collected. Half of these were chipped and the others were composted or used for energy generation.

Community partners have grown to include local media outlets, the Community Gospel Chapel, Salt Spring Conservancy, Transition Salt Spring, Fulford Hall, Emcon Services, Fisher Road Recycling, DL’s Bins and the many community volunteers who cut invasive plants every spring.

For excellent tips on how to remove broom by cutting plants at the base, not pulling, visit the Broombusters.org website. Remove all rocks and dirt to save the chipper blades. And no giant hogweed, please.

For more information about the drop-offs and the Native Plant Stewardship Group that organizes them, call 250-537-0880, or check out the Transition Salt Spring website.

Editorial: Change is on the table with LCC discussion

Driftwood Staff
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Editorial: Change is on the table with LCC discussion

Unlike many similar-sized communities, local governance is often on a Salt Spring Island “hot topics” list.

Trying to understand who is responsible for what in our rural unincorporated system in the Islands Trust Area and Capital Regional District is not for the faint of heart. A proposal to consolidate some current CRD commissions on the island and elect four or six individuals to oversee those as a “local community commission” (LCC) might not make it any easier to understand, but it is an idea worth discussing, at least.

The LCC idea has been floated by current Salt Spring CRD director Gary Holman. Looking into it was an election promise he made back in 2018. A discussion paper on the subject written by a handful of knowledgeable individuals (but not Holman) was released last week.

The paper asks islanders to consider a relatively simple change in local governance.

It’s a concept that on paper seems to have some merit. We would have more elected people sitting down at one table to discuss some island matters. It could reduce the current “silo” effect of governance if, for example, LCC members can consider overlapping parks and transportation issues at the same time. Members of the public might be more likely to attend a bi-monthly meeting of elected officials where more than one commission topic was on the agenda.

But how much power an LCC is ultimately granted will be an important consideration, and one that won’t be apparent until an establishment bylaw is created and made public by the CRD.

If LCC commissioners don’t end up having any power to effect change, then it hardly matters if they are elected to an LCC with a stipend or appointed to the existing four commissions as volunteers. The “accountability factor” that goes with an elected position will be much reduced. It would be interesting to know why community members in at least two other places in B.C. that used the LCC model — Olalla and Bear Lake — apparently did not want to serve as commissioners there.

It is much too soon to either embrace or dismiss the LCC concept. Everyone will have to look carefully at the establishment bylaw produced by the CRD and try to get from it a realistic sense of how effective a change it would be in practice, and then decide whether it’s worth the effort and cost.

$1 million CRD gas tax contribution to future fire hall confirmed

Emelie Peacock
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$1 million CRD gas tax contribution to future fire hall confirmed

If the referendum to build a new fire hall passes this June, $1 million of the cost of the new building will be supplied by funds from the Capital Regional District (CRD) gas tax fund. 

A May 16 news release confirmed that an agreement in principle had been reached between the CRD and the Salt Spring Island Fire Protection District (SSIFPD) to have $1 million from the CRD’s Community Works Fund go towards the $13.7-million proposed new hall. The referendum, to be conducted at the end of June by mail-in ballot, will ask ratepayers if they approve of the department borrowing $9.7 million to build a new Ganges fire hall. 

If the referendum passes, the CRD will work with the fire department to transfer the federal funding to support construction of a proposed 11,500-square-foot building, Salt Spring CRD director Gary Holman stated. 

“This agreement will allow us to reduce the cost for ratepayers of creating a much-needed new fire hall and illustrates how the CRD can work effectively with our fire district in a way that benefits the community,” Holman added. 

Chair of the SSIFPD board Rollie Cook called the confirmation of funding a win for the community. 

Fire chief Jamie Holmes reiterated that the current Ganges hall #1 is no longer fit for the purpose of being a fire hall. He added that by working with the CRD to get access to federal funding, the SSIFPD can build a new fire hall “without increasing property taxes.” 

In addition to the $9.7 million in borrowing and the $1 million Community Works Fund contribution from the CRD, $3 million in reserve funds will be used for the project. The fire district has been placing $600,000 of its annual property tax requisition over the past few years into a reserve fund for this purpose. 

The proposed new fire hall will be located north of Ganges on Lower Ganges Road, on land donated by owners of Brinkworthy Place. 

  • With files from Gail Sjuberg

Tsunami Circus show Beyond flies this weekend

Emelie Peacock
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Tsunami Circus show Beyond flies this weekend

When the Tsunami Circus show called Beyond premieres this weekend, the circus artists will likely be more excited than usual to perform since Covid has stymied them for the past two years.  

Circus students come from elementary, middle and high school on Salt Spring. With a variety of ages comes collaboration, mentorship by the students who’ve been in circus longer, and playing off of each other’s strengths in performances. Some of the 30 artists have wanted to be in the circus program since they first saw their predecessors perform, some even before they started school.  

To get into circus, mindset and determination is more critical than talent, the coaches explain. But everyone has to know how to juggle. 

This year’s circus performers have spent 12 weeks moving from six weeks of conditioning — “acrobatics, handstands aerials on the trapeze but also aerials in the fabric,” coach James Cowan said. Then eight weeks in, the students began to specialize. 

Behind the performers are volunteers, often parents of eager circus kids, who pour thousands of hours into the endeavour. Tsunami Circus has been running since 2015. It was, and possibly is, the only public school in Canada with an aerial circus, James said. 

Jaqueline Wightman saw her mom and founder of the program Tiffany (Fanny) Wightman spend hours and hours on circus, then she herself got involved at age 12.

“I was here all hours and I became really fit and able to do things and I got past my fears. It was a hard journey but it was so much worth it,” said Jacqueline, who has floated from hammocks to hula hoop, to stilts, and now she’s now in love with the dance trapeze. “I’m so proud that my mom’s doing all this, and I’m happy I get to be a part of it.”  

Steph Cowan has been with the circus for five years. She started training on stilts, then went onto aerial hoops and for the past three years has been training on the aerial cube.

“And I also really like unicycling,” she said. “I’ve spent so much time in this gym devoting myself to this training. This is really what I love to do,” she said. “The shows are just an incredible experience.” 

Jacqueline and Steph agree that the hurdles in circus are often a matter of “beating down the mental blocks of saying, ‘Oh, I can’t do this.’ It’s, ‘I can’t do this yet.’ But if you work hard enough you can do anything.”

Some parts of circus are harder than people think. For example, with stilts you are up there for three-and-a-half minutes holding your own body weight and doing all the movements with stamina and grace. 

Eighteen-year-old Nicole Gent started circus in 2015 and fell in love with it. For Gent, it’s been an outlet from stress around school, friendships or any life drama going on.

“You leave it at the door, you come here, and it’s just your outlet,” she said. “You can express yourself and you just forget about all your problems and you just have fun. And you end up making something really amazing.”  

Thirteen-year-old Teagan Hunwicks, who is nicknamed “Bendy” at Tsunami Circus, said hammocks and contortion are her main focus. “It’s just like your other family, kind of, where you totally click,” she said of the circus community. “You get teamwork and get experience for when you’re older, how to work around people, and you get to meet new people . . . in the hallways, you see all your circus people, and you have more friends.” 

Volunteer administrator Michelle Bennett said many things, above and beyond the circus arts, are taught here. They are summed up into “the five Ps” of the community’s culture code. They include pass it on, persistence, pain (the good kind), positivity and patience. 

Tyrel Domingue decided to join the circus during his first year of middle school.

“I came in here and I instantly saw all the wacky things people were doing here. All the silks and the cradles and the trapeze, and so I thought this seems really cool.” 

Domingue said the program has led to the majority of the middle school knowing how to juggle, with students practising and working on their craft in the multi area. The school also has a circus class, which Piper Wightman, Rachel Skinner, Arawyn Steeves, Bryn Pyper and Lola Rosborough are currently in. 

With Salt Spring Island Middle School (SIMS) closing this year, the future of Tsunami Circus is up in the air. The school’s gymnasium is specially kitted out with rigging for aerial circus arts, a space which doesn’t exist elsewhere on the island. James said they are working with the Capital Regional District, which is taking over the operation of SIMS, to see how the circus could continue to operate.

“Ideally, we would have our own facility, and the appetite on the island is huge,” James said. “We turn away many, many, many . . . hundreds of people each year who want to do circus but we don’t have the space for it.” 

Tickets for the May 13 and 14 shows, from 6 to 8 p.m., and the May 15 show from 1 to 3 p.m. are available at West of the Moon and the Salt Spring Elementary School and SIMS offices.

The Beyond show poster explains that “Adults and Aliens” pay $10 a ticket while children and students pay $5. A concession and merchandise table will be set up with T-shirts and juggling balls for sale.

Fulford Harbour post office reopens later this month

Gail Sjuberg
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Fulford Harbour post office reopens later this month

Fulford Harbour residents will be glad to hear that village postal services are resuming this month after a hiatus of more than two years.

Andrea LeBorgne, a familiar face in the Ganges branch since 2018, has accepted the position of Fulford postmaster, operating in the same location at 101 Morningside Rd. (adjacent to the Rock Salt Restaurant). The target soft opening date is Tuesday, May 24.

In a press release Canada Post confirms that the office will “once again provide shipping and receiving services, philatelic offerings, Express-Post envelopes, flat rate shipping boxes, mailing supplies, lock boxes, general delivery and Canada Post virtual mailbox services (flex delivery and deliver to post office).”

The post office will be open for 30 hours a week with service Monday to Friday.

“Many things need to align to reopen the office,” said LeBorgne. “During the first week we will be training and reorganizing in preparation for full services beginning May 30.”

She thanked customers in advance for their understanding as everything comes together for the reopening.

For example, south-end customers are encouraged to read their delivery notice cards carefully and collect parcels at the correct location through the transition.

The Fulford office has been closed to walk-in customers since March 2020, although people with post-office boxes were still able to receive letter mail. When the Fulford office is open, south-enders should be able to pick up their parcels there instead of having to get them (or mail them) from the Ganges post office.

LeBorgne commented that since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic Salt Spring has seen a huge increase in parcel volumes.

“It’s like Christmas every day!” she said. “It will be interesting to see how things work out in the small space in Fulford.”

She noted that all Salt Spring customers can help by collecting their mail and parcels daily.

“If you wait to pick up a parcel or notice card from your community mailbox, it has a ripple effect as the volume builds up.”

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