WILL THERE BE WRITERS TOMORROW?

If you have looked at my website, you’ll know I grew up in Victoria, five blocks from the parliament buildings to be exact. The James Bay area was full of exciting places to be with my friends. Beacon Hill Park had a swing set that today would incur the wrath of the Workman’s Compensation Board and require fall arrest harnesses. Back then my mother knew we played on it, yet was unfazed when she found out we used to shinny across the top pipe some sixteen feet above ground. I can’t remember anyone falling off, more because we’d catch hell from our mom’s than fear of breaking something.

On a recent visit to Victoria to interview some bush pilots for the non-fiction book I’m working on, Marian and I were sitting in the lounge at the Days Inn. It wasn’t always called that, but I do remember the building when the Canadian Pacific Steamship boats used to dock in the harbour.
“Out there,” I said to Marian, “we used to row around in an eight foot skiff that came off my uncle’s fishing boat.”

She looked at me with eyes of disbelief.

“Yeah. Really. Right over there,” I pointed to the big Delta Hotel, “was where Sidney Roofing used to be. They made tar paper and shingles out of old rags and comic books.”

When she picked up her drink while shaking her head, I knew this was one of those facts that a writer can’t even begin to create as fiction, but plowed along with my story as it took me back to my younger years. “Sometimes we had to dodge the big CPR Princess boats as they turned in the harbour.”
“You wouldn’t get away with that now,” she said, staring out the window.

“Not likely.” I sipped my Margarita. “Mom and dad would probably end up in jail and I’d grow up in a family like Elizabeth Redsky.” Marian nodded with a faint smile at the mention of the Native girl we created for my book, Altar and Throne. Back then it was a simple matter to row over to Sidney Roofing and tie up to one of their barges, climb on board, and the world of free comic books was open to us.
“We used to read the comics banned to us kids at the time, like Blackhawk, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern, with the odd Tales of the Crypt, showing up.” I could see she wasn’t impressed with these titles. “Bugs Bunny, Donald Duck, or Tom and Jerry we could read at home anytime, but to expand our literary horizons we needed to travel across the ocean.” I added this to show that even as kids, we had class.

About this time Marian pointed out to the street. “Now that’s choice.”

Riding by the window was a man on a bike talking on a cell phone. I wonder how long before the lawmakers decide to ban that... It reminded me of my granddaughters who continue to amaze me with their grasp of the electronic world. We had to ask one of them how to change channels on their tv. Where will the written word be in their world, I wondered over the last of my Margarita while licking salt from the rim? One in which they are never let out of sight of mom and dad.

It was answered that evening when our oldest granddaughter showed us a story she had written.
At that moment, watching her with pen in hand, I knew the next generation would still produce good writers.

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