A Place to Go

The aches of living day by day wear on us;

But not so fast - more like sandpaper on old wood.

We need something besides earning a living;

Perhaps just a sunny day or the taste of sweet water.

We are not always admitted to others' special places,

So we wander around and look for our own.

I find the places of the heart are all over;

Between the pages of unread books or in a dusty attic.

There are places we go in our thoughts and real life;

On the edge of a lake, a high spot on a mountain,

Maybe amongst the trees or in a canyon of colors,

Or a strong wind on an ocean beach.

We find ourselves there at odd times;

Sometimes alone or with friends or family.

It's a wishing place and a hopeful time;

One heals there, kneels there, and waits there.

There is no particular hurry and the air feels good;

Like a first kiss or the joy of running for the fun of it.

We hold things there like stones, or grass or memories;

We run to these places for refuge and a touch of something.

God seems more real and the earth more constant.

We smile, cry, but in a different way, almost shy;

We think of other places but in a better frame of mind;

We just feel special as we skip a stone across something.

We tell ourselves that all is well or getting better,

Even if it is not true we choose to believe it,

The tears are there - drops of pearls and sunshine,

All hooked to a rainbow that came for the day.

Digby

The Hill

I saw a hill and the cross in the distance;

There was no one on it or near it.

The silence crept over me and I listened;

I remembered the words

"King of the Jews," and I wept.


My heart never left the place;

My mind couldn't rest even for a minute.

I know so little about Jesus Christ;

But he knew so much about me.


So I pulled in all the light and the darkness faded;

Christ was now by the cross, hands outstretched.

I knew it was for all of us but I felt special just the same;

The feeling light had come and all would have access to it.


Now it was a signal to begin again;

It was a direction for the hesitant,

The shining hope of the most fractured heart.

Come follow me never meant so much.


Now the suffering is not over but we will go on;

The chains don't rattle as much when we're in the faith.

The purpose is clear and I'll stay with it to the end;

I'm heading home and taking my piece of the cross with me.

Digby

Morning

I awake each day refreshed

Sleep rubbed off by a night of peace;

The hour is early and I read.

A quiet time pushing past to present.



There are sounds just for the morning;

The scratch of a tree branch on the house;

The creaking and the rubbing of things;

Maybe my squeaky chair, a slight cough

Or is it that wonderful quiet.



A breeze sings through the open window;

My mind pauses on this or that and then,

Squanders its message for no reason,

And I just sit not caring and waiting.



Maybe it is just that any direction is fine;

Perhaps it's the warm cup of chocolate in my hand.

I sip and then sip again in complete satisfaction,

Just holding on and feeling well for the moment.


I see the cat slinking along the porch rail;

The dogs bark at something I can't see or hear;

I turn toward the sunrise and blink;

It's nice and warm and almost fuzzy.


There's a book on the table opened to a page;

It reads: "Fail your way to success."

I laugh and suck the jam off my fingers;

I hear my wife in the shower as the door bangs.


The sounds are beginning to be different;

The wind has come up and a train whistle

Sounds down the track to a given mile.

I await for the computer to warm up;

There's that funny connection sound

As I plug into the internet.


The headlines on the news are glaring

But far from sanitized or even worth reading.

The stock market is open and I check;

The stocks are down or at least mine are;

I think about that and doze off for few minutes.


I begin to stir for the new day begins;

I do my oblations, comb down my thinning hair;

I feed myself, the dogs, the cats and say prayers;

Kiss my wife good bye and stop for a moment.


I take a deep breath of fresh air as I step to the Jeep;

I'll be back tomorrow I promise myself,

And then feel that playful attitude comes over me;

I say just for fun: "Until then everybody out of the pool."

Digby

The Worst Place

I had just gotten out of the Royal Canadian Air Force and decided to go with new friends to Northern British Columbia to homestead. Well, I made the 1500 mile trip; the little money I had was almost used up in getting settled and having enough food for the month. Now I had to find a job and there wasn't much room in the back country for the skills I had acquired in the Air Force. Jobs were scarce up there but I needed a job, any job, and I found one. It was a job pulling lumber off a green chain in a Sawmill in the Chetwyn area. For those who don't know what that is - it is rather simple. Trees are cut into two by fours, 2 x sixes etc. Dimensional lumber is then placed on a green chain, which is a mechanism for moving the lumber along to men who stack it and sort it as it comes down the chain.

There were in town bunkhouses of a sort you could rent so I bunked with some guys who were raised in the north. Five thirty AM came early for me but that's the way of the north so you either go along or move away. If you are smart you can sleep until six thirty in the morning and get ready to be at work by 7:15 AM. If you were thinking, you showered the night before because in the morning the showers were quite busy and the last guy usually took a cold shower.

I reported to work and began the tedious task of sorting, stacking, piling, and lifting on the green chain. It went something like this: They sent the lumber down a long table with a chain that moved it at a required speed. You in turn pulled the lumber off the table and stacked it in piles of different dimensions and lengths. You were to slide them off the green chain and put them in stacks directly behind you. That meant you would stand sideways, pull them off, and slide them onto the different piles. Depending who you had for a sawyer, foreman or boss, he decided the speed of the chain.

So there I was, working up a sweat. I would work and think an hour must have gone by but instead, it was fifteen minutes. Time went by so slowly I thought my watch had stopped. The time not only dragged by but I dragged with it. By the time lunch came I was exhausted. I quickly found a pile of sawdust to lie down on for a little nap.

That nap was pretty good as it was the middle of winter. It seemed to me the sawdust I was laying on barely got warm when the back to work horn blasted me out of a place too far off to get back from, but I did. The afternoon was no better. By the time five oclock came around every muscle in my body was screaming at me. I had worked hard all my life but this required eight or nine hours of heavy lifting. However, my new friends were as chipper as could be. I went straight to the lodgings, almost fell asleep in the shower, and started toward my bed. My buddies asked me if I wanted to come along to the movies. I just stared at them in unbelief and promptly fell asleep.

I died in that bed for twelve hours and then was resurrected by a miracle called Jake who brought me back with some severe shaking. The same ritual went on that day and the days thereafter. Finally I could feel something else besides pain, and actually went to the shack we called home, read a magazine, had conversations and saw the odd movie. The days ahead were agony beyond tired muscles. I thought I would go out of my mind with the boredoom. Pull, stack and pile. Sort, stack and pull. My expression was always the same. I have no piano on my arm so what am I doing here?

My eyes were not blood shot but they seemed to have lost the light in them. I know I peeked out from them only to satisfy my craving for living.

The mill would shut down for various reasons during the week. Sometimes to realign or adjust the equipment or any other need that arose. They tried to do all of that maintenance in the off hours. There was no rest for us for we could then clean out the bark and sawdust bins but at least the screaming motors and other noise was still.

I found out some things about a sawmill and how it works. That's how I filled my empty days with anything that would take the mindless time to a tolerable step. The loggers cut the trees then send them to a sawmill by diferent ways -- by water they are put into a log pond, by truck to the mill or by railroad. The mill where I worked trucked in the logs. They store them on dry land and use loading equipment to load them onto a moving conveyor chain to the log debarker, or jets of water to remove the bark, or sand, or dirt, or small bits of metal. Next the carriage looks like railroad flat car and moves the log into the head saw. The saw makes a screaming sound as it tears into the wood. It is cut up into real rough pieces then the second saw called the edger trims up the board. This is done by highly skilled men who get the most and best boards out of a log. Next the boards go to a trimmer where they are cut up into exact lengths and the weak spots taken out. Now the green boards slide slowly on the green chain where a grader looks them over and gives them a grade. Size, quality and kind of wood are considered. It is well to note we cut softwoods in the Northwest -- evergreen fir, pine etc. They use a crayon to mark the lumber. Classifications are one to seven and stacked accordingly. Next the lumber is taken to dry kilns to get the moisture out of them. Specially heated buildings where instruments control the temperature and moisture of the air or in smaller mills by air drying. Now, aren't you glad for that information?

The seasoned workers at that time seemed to smoke or chew tobacco. The chewers had spitting contests and I swear they could hit a penny at ten feet. They didn't mind where they spit in the mill and a sweet sort of rancid smell came from their mouths. It was really a disgusting habit because it was, at best, looking at a puffy cheek loaded with chewing tobacco and a mouth with a constant need to spit.

Well, every day the excitement was hard to contain. What to do today! Shall I be completely numb or just half numb. Half numb was better because one needed to feel to work. The day took so long to end that the mind shut down and monotony hung over your spirit, plunging its dampers into your very being until you automatically did your work, unfeeling, unthinking and uninterested. You couldn't talk to the guy next to you! Why? Well the ringing in your ears was from the screaming saws. Shouting soon made you hoarse plus I was too tired to talk.

Two months went by and madness had taken over my mind. Minute after minute the boards came down. They seemed to never stop. The fierce cold made you bundle up and the hard work made you unbundle some. There was a light in the tunnel however. They had Chinooks up in that country. Chinooks are warm dry winds that come in from the south after dropping their moisture along the way. The temperature can go from thirty below to forty above in a matter of hours. Oh, sweet heaven when they came. We peeled off our jackets and felt warm enough to move without rustling.

My thoughts were interrupted when the foreman turned up the speed of the chain. The lumber came out faster than the two of us who were there could handle. Normally three or four did the work. We couldn't keep up, of course, and so the excess lumber went over the table to the ground. The foreman came out and saw the lumber on the ground and screamed and shouted and swore like a muleskinner at us. He asked who the "blankety-blank" let the lumber go over the chain. I told him he was the one who sped up the chain and walked away without a care in the world. He fired me on the spot.

I picked up my things and walked over the the planer mill where my buddy was the foreman. I told him the story and he laughed and said I could work here on the planer mill. He just had a guy quit and he could use me. It wasn't an hour later that the Green Chain foreman came over to the planer mill and saw me and said, "Didn't I just fire you?" "Yes," I said, "but I found this other job." The two foreman had a conversation. The old foreman was waving his arms around. My buddy just shook his head, grinned and said: "He stays." I would have to watch old spittle in the mouth for he was not happy. Several times after that when we were caught up for the day I would go over and help at the green chain. The old foreman skulked around but I kept my mouth shut and eventually we tolerated each other.

Well, four more months went by and I had finally saved enough money to move on. I packed my gear, took a deep breath and shouted for joy. I'm back from the dead, back from tortured turtle slow moving days. I looked over at the sawmill and the buildings and the logs. I saw the faces of some of the older guys whose yellow teeth and brown spittle leaked out of the corner of their mouths. For them it was ok. They drank enough to keep going and chewed enough to deaden their senses. For some this was life but for me life stood still for six months. I left with a spring in my step and a thirst to get more education and training. It was like a real bad tooth had been pulled and the ache had finally gone away. My old car seemed to surge ahead and the road never looked so inviting. I remember thinking,"If that was bit of Hell, then Heaven help me."

Digby