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Return not as weird as I feared
I’ve done the drive so many times I couldn’t even guess at the number.
Not counting the times I did it as a passenger, I’ve driven the Cranbrook-to-Invermere-and-back honk roughly 3,000 times since 1991.
Many of them have been weird trips. Some were intensely sad. Others were intensely fantastic, while many were both, depending upon the direction headed. Rain, snow and ice, elk, seas of red license plated speeders and weavers, thick palls of forest fire smoke, construction (but never enough of it, which is another rant altogether), as well as a few swooping bats, wayward and charging buffalo and zombies. Always with the zombies.
But none were ever as weird as my last trip to Invermere and the Columbia Valley.
First off, I must explain my particular geographic preference for the referencing of the beautiful northern third of the East Kootenay. It is called the Columbia Valley for the best of reasons. It is. It is the headwaters of the great Columbia River, around and near which scatter a series of unique, and in the same breath, typical communities. When I leave Cranbrook, I never say I am heading to Invermere. I say I am heading to the valley, even when most of the time I am heading to Invermere.
At any rate, I was heading to Invermere this particular day and my hand gripped the steering wheel tighter; the coffee had to sit in a holder. The tunes were cranked. A mixture of ear-scratching metal, classic rock and mellower ditties soundtracked the 140 km ride.
I was heading to my first District of Invermere council meeting in over two years. I lived in the valley for 18 years. It’s always ‘going home’ when I’ve headed back there since I departed in 2009. Not this time. This time it was… work. It was going back.
And I fretted. Can an old editor be led back to drink? I mused, my brain slightly indented from Television’s Marquee Moon. Yes, of course he can.
More to the point, I said to myself, sweeping away a light attempt at distraction, will I be run out of town on a rail by a mob of pitch-fork clutching and snarling Invermerutions?
I suddenly felt grateful for the ax in the back of Ointment 2, my faithful albeit a tad slow pony.
After pulling into Invermere I called a friend to enquire about a rampaging souse up after the council meeting, as per the norm in the ‘good old days’ when Alberta money flowed like money from Alberta and life was merry in the land of milk and honey.
That settled, I drove to the old, crappy restaurant that is now home to the district offices and council chambers.
Relieved not to be parking in front of pulsating yellow wall (thanks Sidney Ann for ridding Invermere of that shriek on the eyes – which I know you inherited when you bought it), I took a deep breath and realized I was… nervous.
Nervous about going to an Invermere council meeting. Now that is weird. I’ve sat in on… cripes, 400 or so Invermere council meetings.
Walking in the door, I stumbled into a mob.
“Christ almighty!” I shrieked and tried to leap out the door. But a human mountain named Tom stepped in my way. I was trapped.
Then a friendly voice said “hello.”
My moon-eyes caught sight of Buzz Harmsworth. Always a friendly face. The human mountain was Tom from Invermere Fire Rescue. Past them were other friendly faces, most of whom I recognized, including Meredith Hamstead. I wondered if Jumbo was on the agenda and secretly hoped it was.
Alas, it wasn’t. I secretly screamed inside, “THANK GOD.”
See, I was really conflicted and rattled.
And again I wondered why?
Once council had finished secretly divvying up the town deer for sausage, roasts and burgers and let the mob (seven or eight people, including two young reporters) into their chambers, I stepped in, tentatively and perhaps slightly flinching.
“Mr. Cobb!” Shouted district chief administrative officer Chris Prosser. He smiled.
I was shocked. Prosser is a terrifying, commanding presence who rules with intimidation, two silver-plated pistols and barbecues. I’m kidding of course. Chris has done a great job operating a town that was flooded with debt and the woes of shoddy earlier infrastructure work and people looking for rental properties, long before he assumed command.
I said a few small hellos and went straight to my old seat – tucked in the corner, next to spare chairs, which I can use as a table and to hide my drinks.
Buzz sat in his seat, a couple down from me. Like always.
Then I looked at council.
There was Bob Campsall, smiling and friendly as always. Spring Hawes was there, showering the lot of them with grace. Al Miller was there, I was happy to see. I thought Al may have been moved to some central palace by the ruling overlords of Home Hardware by now. And Ray Brydon was there, too, tanned and smiling.
Seated in the middle of them was Gerry Taft, the young mayor of party town. The hippest director at the Regional District of East Kootenay board table (with apologies to Jim Ogilvie), a sound voice of reason and important youthful wisdom, a maker of gelati and brewer of fine coffee – had been replaced by a raging lunatic with filed teeth and a tattoo across his forehead declaring “mom.”
Again, I’m kidding. There was Taft, perhaps the only one of the five Invermere council members who looked older than the last time I’d seen him (a week earlier at the RDEK meeting), but also more distinguished and seasoned than he appeared when I stole away into a Cranbrook night and fled the valley two years earlier.
And just like that. The nerves were gone. A friendly young reporter, having overheard me telling Steve Ostrander, a fine gent who is working to create jobs and good things in the valley, that I was ‘working again,’ and asked if I was from “The Townsman.”
I believe her nose will heal. It was just a reaction, is all. Kidding.
Buzz, one of the most civic minded folks I’ve ever known, in terms of keeping up to date and being involved in the processes available, that the vast majority of people take no part in (unfortunately), asked me if I was “back?”
“Yes, and no,” I said, swatting away the urge to start going on about how it all depends if you mean ‘home,’ because home to me now is the entire region, though I lay my head down and follow my lucky heart in Cranbrook, a place far more beautiful and groovier than most folks give it credit for.
The best part about Buzz asking me if I was back, as well as Meredith and a few other people was their voices weren’t laced with terror or disgust or tamped-down hysteria.
‘Weird,’ I thought, driving over to my friend’s, ‘not a single shot fired nor howl of lament heard or finger jabbed in the eye.’
The trip home was delightful.
Ian Cobb/e-KNOW
