Treeplanting #2: Uncles, Thermoses, Shivers, and Decapitated Falcons

One morning, I wake up starting too warm, which is strange because it’s always freezing in the morning. Opening my eyes, it’s getting pretty light out. Also strange.

Oh my god, I think, fingers grasping around my pillow to find my iPod, I’ve slept in and missed all the trucks. Sure enough, when I finally find my iPod and press the button, it says 9:00. A solid two hours after the trucks have already left. Three hours since my alarm was supposed to go off. WhatdoIdoWhatdoIdo? This is so irresponsible and inconsiderate that nobody even bothered waking me up. Slowly making my way over to the mess tent, Cathy for some reason is still in camp and she keeps giving me angry looks. Nina and Bee ignore me. Nina and Bee! Two of the sweetest, friendliest souls on the planet and they won’t even acknowledge me!

Beepbeepbeepbeep! Beepbeepbeepbeep! Beepbeepbeepbeep!

My eyes jolt open with the shrill noise of the alarm on my iPod. Grasping around my pillow to find my iPod for a second time, I press the button to turn off that godawful noise. It’s 6:00. An hour before trucks leave. I just had a nightmare about sleeping in and missing the trucks. That’s like what Uncle Jim consciously has nightmares about me doing (and has told me) and I just unconsciously had that same nightmare. That actually just happened. Cathy hasn’t been giving any angry looks and nobody’s ignoring anybody.

On my way to the mess tent (for real this time), moving stiffly in the early morning chill, Kendall hurries up to me and says, “we’re trying to get to the truck early this morning. We’re on the same block as your uncle and Molly wants to get there first so we get the good side.”

Good luck to us, I think, Uncle Jim’s crew always gets to the block first. It’s his thing. Nevertheless, I throw my bags in the truck early and pack a lunch quickly: a wrap loaded with goat cheese, Bee’s baked nut-squares, celery and carrots, a jar of nuts and candy, and a sandwich bag of sliced oranges. Then I throw it into my block bag along with my filled water bottle, chug a cup of orange juice, fill a large mug with some of Nina’s delicious breakfast, and head out to the truck. It’s already started and Molly’s there hurrying our crew to get into the truck as fast as possible.  Chad’s on our crew today instead of Jazzy and he’s the only one not in the truck by 6:50 (trucks leave at 7). Impatient, Molly leans out of the truck and stands up, turning back toward the mess tent.

“CHAD!” She screams as loud as she can muster, “CHAAAD! CHAAAAAAAD!”

“There he is,” Kendall says quietly from the front middle seat. I look past her from the back and see Chad awkwardly scuttling toward the truck with boots untied, block bag thrown uncomfortably over his shoulder, planting bags in one hand, and a thermos in the other (which looks curiously like the thermos I lost a few days ago…)

“I’m in, I’m in. Jesus.” He says after throwing his bags in the back and climbing into the passenger seat.

Molly howls in victory as she steps on the gas and pulls out of camp at 6:55, mere seconds before Uncle Jim’s truck.

The next day, we are on the same block with Uncle Jim again. I smile from my seat in the back as Uncle Jim’s truck pulls out at 6:50 but our truck still hasn’t started and Molly isn’t anywhere to be seen. By 7:00, all six of the other trucks are leaving and every member of our crew is in the truck except for Molly. We all wait patiently, hearing someone call my uncle over the radio over and over again, who apparently doesn’t have it turned on or something. Chad drinks casually from his thermos that still looks remarkably like my own lost thermos. At 7:05, Molly makes her way over to the truck and climbs in.

“Would you believe,” she says as she put on her seatbelt and starts the truck, “Stryker left without Candace!” Stryker, my uncle and my last name, is what everyone calls my Uncle Jim. He’s kind of a legend out here, but that’s another story.

“What??” we all say in disbelief.

“Yeah,” she says, pulling the truck into the driveway, “Get this: apparently he got so pissed off that we beat him to the block yesterday that he left 10 minutes early today. Candace wasn’t even in the truck yet! So I was just trying to figure out another ride for her - Vincent has an extra seat in his truck.”

“Did he know Candace was on his crew…?” I wonder aloud, already knowing the answer, “No, she’s been on his crew the whole season so far.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Chad says heatedly (he’s been known to respect but not work well at all with my uncle), “you can’t just leave without a member of your crew, even if they’re late!”

“No, you just scream their name from the truck,” Molly grins at Chad, who laughs in agreement, “but she wasn’t even late. They still had 10 minutes!”

We’re still talking about this as we see Uncle Jim’s truck pull back into the driveway. We stop to let Candace run in front of us, throw her bags into the dually on the back of Uncle Jim’s truck, and climb in. The guilty smile on Uncle Jim’s face is priceless as we start back up again and drive around them.

On the road, we see Francois, a member of Uncle Jim’s crew walking. Huh?? Apparently, rather than driving back to camp with Uncle Jim, Francois chose to get out of the truck and walk, Uncle Jim picking him up again on the way back. At 7am on a freezing cold morning, he chose to get out of the warm truck and walk. Huh?? He waves as we pass and we all wave back.

Arriving at the block first for the second day in a row, Jazzy hands me a pair of gaiters.

“Here,” she says, “I’m wearing my cork boots today, so I won’t be needing these.” I thank her and strap the gaiters around the tops of my boots and up to my knees. 

“Chad, there’s a small piece over here that’s probably small enough for two people to go and fill,” Molly says, walking over to Chad with her finger on specific point on the map, “why don’t you and Kurt bag up and head over there?” Kurt is the other greener on our crew, but he is learning very quickly and Chad is a known highballer.

“Sure,” Chad shrugs, climbing into the dually to grab his bags and corks.

“Keep an eye on him; make sure he stays on track,” Molly says, “he’s good; he’s a strong planter. He just needs a strong male role model.” Chad bursts out laughing at this, jumping out of the truck and starting to put on his corks.

“Take me seriously, dammit!” Molly cries, jumping into the dually.

“I do take you seriously,” Chad laughs in response, “I just don’t take my job seriously.”

Once everyone has headed out into the block except for Kendall and I, I walk over to examine Chad’s thermos. Sure enough, it is completely identical to the one I bought at the Sparwood thrift store days ago and only used once.

“Chad’s totally using my thermos,” I say.

“Really??” Kendall laughs, “yesterday he was talking about how it was just sitting in the mess tent for two days so he took it. I was like ‘if it was in the mess tent, then it belongs to somebody’ but he used it anyway.”

“Ahh well,” I shrug, “I wasn’t using it anyway.” Glad to have that mystery solved though.

The gaiters work excellent today. I should really get a pair of these.

One day, the one ever-changing seat in our truck has been filled by Casper, a friend of Jazzy’s who has never planted before. Our morning drive is a solid hour before we finally make it to the block. We’re planting with two crews from Marty’s camp today. Marty is another Brinkman supervisor and operates a camp outside of Fernie, where this block is. 

It’s freezing cold and raining as we all force ourselves out of the truck and begin taking tree boxes out of the back. Everyone is putting on their rain gear, but all I have are two dinky little emergency rain ponchos at the bottom of my day bag that I don’t bother digging out. I’m never going to actually use those. 

We have about a 10-metre walk-in with full bags, but the block itself isn’t so bad. It’s good dirt and would be a relatively easy block if everything weren’t soaking wet and slippery. Corks would have prevented all this slipping. Once the first 20 or so trees are in the ground, the fingers in my left hand have thawed into feeling again and my right hand is stiffly frozen onto my shovel (which works quite well for planting). After another 20 trees, my right hand has begun to thaw as well, but now both hands are becoming wet. A few shifts ago, Jazzy gave me a pair of gardening gloves to use instead of the Sol-Vex gloves I’d been using before. They’re excellent in cool or hot weather, but they take in every drop of water that touches them. This freezing rain is sinking right into them. Also, of the two pairs of boots I own, I chose to wear the least waterproof boots today. Great. 

While I’m still warm when I bag out, the walk out of the block is freezing. My fingers are no longer working so the soaking wet gloves are no longer warm against the freezing cold weather. The rain has almost completely soaked through my cotton jacket. Looking around, I can see thick snowflakes beginning to fall between the heavy raindrops.

Eventually, Kendall and I are at the back of the block together. One of the crews from Marty’s camp is supposed to meet us back there, but we aren’t running into any flagging from the other direction. Eventually, we both bag out and head back to the truck. My toes manage to remain warm as I keep walking, toes squishing into the socks soaked in rainwater that has become warm. Once we stop planting, however, I immediately feel my soaking gloves and all the freezing air around them; my fingers turn to ice the minute I stop reaching for more trees. It’s my chest that’s really disabling though; I begin to feel the cotton jacket that is now completely soaked. It’s like a freezing, wet claw grasping tightly to my chest and piercing into every other part of my body.

Upon reaching the truck, I immediately drop my shovel, rip off my bags, jump into the cab, and slam the door beside me. I eventually gather enough energy to rip off the gloves, unzip my jacket, peel it off along with my t-shirt, and throw them over the seat. I sit for several minutes in the warmth of not wearing those freezing wet clothes. Kendall joins me in the truck for a few minutes and we enjoy a few minutes of complaining to each other about the weather. She has an extra long-sleeve t-shirt and hands lets me borrow it for the day. Kendall is honestly the biggest life-saving sweetheart. I dig through my day bag to find the old Sol-Vex gloves I used to use, which are 100% waterproof and what I should have been using all day long. I also pull out one of those dinky little rain ponchos I was never actually going to wear.  Desperate times call for desperate measures - I am actually going to wear it.

“I like your poncho,” Kendall laughs as I fill my bags and haul them up onto my waist, “You look like a superhero with your cape flying behind you.” I laugh and head back toward the block.

“Hey, Molly wants us to walk in until the line begins to turn,” Velma’s voice is exhausted as she makes her way out of the block. I nod my head in acknowledgement.

Oh fuck that, I scream in my head, Can you feel this weather?! Like hell we can handle a longer walk-in! I do walk until the line begins to turn though and it does work out just fine. The cold is much more bearable with waterproof gloves and chest protected from the rain. At one point, I pass Molly, who is planting several rows at a time beside Casper while showing him different techniques for planting. What a shitty day to start planting, I think. 

At the back of the block, the other crew from Marty’s camp is still nowhere to be seen and Molly is clearly getting frustrated.

“They must have creamed out the front,” she snaps, “instead of planting all the way into this shit in the back.” She pulls out her radio and starts trying to contact the other crew.

Two hours later, I finish my bag-up and head back to the truck. Upon opening the door, I see a large ball of clothing in the middle of the back seat that I’m pretty sure has a human underneath.

“Hey, are you done for the day?” I ask.

The shivering pile of clothing nods.

“Are you okay?” I ask, “Do you want me to get Molly?”

“No, it’s fine,” Velma’s shaky voice quietly makes its way out of the clothing pile, “every part of my body is just so wet and cold. But don’t worry, if I stay here I’ll be fine. I just need to warm up.”

“Okay…” I say. I begin bagging up again. I know that if I take a few moments for a break in the truck, I’ll never leave it again. In the few minutes it takes to fill my bags up, my fingers and toes go completely numb through lack of movement and I begin to feel the chill of the wet sleeves where the poncho doesn’t reach. Get moving again, I mentally scream at myself, hauling the bags up onto my waist again and forcing a couple sips of water down my throat. I have to start putting trees in the ground or I will turn into an ice cube again.

On my way into the block, I see a figure ahead of me fall down, then struggle back up, waving at me in the process. Eventually, we make our way toward each other and I see that it’s Kendall, who is on her way out of the block.

“Hey do you wanna check on Velma when you get back to the truck?” I ask, “she’s in the truck and she’s so cold. Her voice sounds so shaky.”

“Aww, okay,” Kendall says sympathetically, “it’s such an awful day. I just fell flat on my face. And I’ve already poo-ed six times today. That’s insane! Sorry, you probably didn’t want to hear that.”

“It’s all good, girl,” I say.

Carrying on, Molly passes me on her way back to the truck as well. She is moving quickly and clearly not in a good mood.

“Finish your bag-up and then head down to the block below the road,” she says, “We’re done with this block. We’ve been walking in the entire day while the other crew creamed out the entire front of the piece, so now there’s this massive hole. So they’re gonna fix it; we’re done with this block. Just head down below the road on your next bag-up.”

“Okay,” I say and keep planting. While bouncing back and forth at the back of the piece, I run into Velma, who has full bags on.

“Velma!” I say happily, “You have risen! You came back out!”

“Yeah,” she sighs, “It was either freeze my ass off in the truck or freeze my ass off out here. May as well be out here.”

The block below the road is much easier to walk through and is way less slashy (which means much less slipping for those of us who haven’t purchased cork boots). At one point, I’m planting right next to Molly.

“The worm count is so high today,” I laugh as my shovel slices another worm in half on its way down. “I must have beheaded hundreds of them today!” The rain has just about quadrupled the number of worms we usually see.

“Huh,” Molly replies, clearly not as amused as I am, “hey, plant along the other side of this burn okay? I’m filling up to this side.”

I nod and planting along the far side of the burn pile. Goodness, I think, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Molly this pissed off before. Molly heads back up to the road and starts the truck a few minutes before 4:30, so we plant quickly to bag out and back up.

When we get back into the truck, Molly is clearly still upset about the other crew creaming out the front of our piece, especially on such a crappy day like this. Lemme tell ya, it’s damn strange to have the crew boss more upset about the day than the crew, especially when that crew boss is the fantastically spunky Molly.

The other super cold day was memorable for a very different reason.

This day, Molly had leant me an extra merino wool long-sleeve t-shirt for the day because it was too hot to plant in the wool jacket but too cold to plant in a normal t-shirt. This is the second time I’ve had to borrow a long-sleeve t-shirt from someone, so it’s definitely been added to the list of things I need to buy: gaiters, cork boots, long-sleeve t-shirt. On this day, it wasn’t raining (although it snowed a bit), so the cold didn’t sink into your skin. This actually worked to an advantage because, after 50 or so trees, the body was thawed and warm enough to keep planting but would freeze upon stopping. So it was great for motivation to keep planting.

However, at one point in the day, Kendall found a dead falcon on the block. I saw her crouched on the block in front of me and planted my way toward her. She’d taken off her bags and was picking out feathers to store in her back bag.

“Cool!” I say, approaching her, “what is it?”

“I think it’s a falcon,” she says, still plucking feathers, “Do you want some feathers?”

“Sure,” I say as she hands me few.

“I want its head.”

Before I have a chance to ask, Kendall picks up her shovel and slams the tip of it hard against the long-dead bird’s neck. She pulls, but nothing happens, so she picks up her shovel and does it again.

“It’s too tough,” she says, dropping the shovel and grabbing the bird with both hands. Looking away and cringing, she begins twisting. I just look in disbelief as she sits crouched on the ground, twisting off the giant bird’s head with both hands. Eventually, it gives way and a giant crraaacckkk releases the bird’s head from its body.

“There we go,” she says, holding the bird’s head, “I’m gonna crystallize it.”

Super impressed but still quite shocked, I keep planting. Kendall left the bird on the block with a lot of flagging so she could find it later. After bagging out, with the help of Dave (a sweet old man who helps out with the camp), she collected as many feathers as she good, its head, a foot, and a wing. She has a truly beautiful and wild soul, that one.

Cool bonus: Jazzy has a spare pair of gaiters that she gave me in exchange for a Palm Bay. Wooooooot! Tree planters are da best!!

Also, we’re gonna have two days off soon when we switch camps and move to the Flathead. Jazzy’s heading back to Nelson for the time, so I’ll be going with her to visit James in Crawford Bay. Another wooooot!


PS - don't forget about the Palestine delegation in which I am participating in August 2017! Around $200 has been raised so far - lots more to go! To donate, go to http://cpt.org/donate and follow the steps to donate. Toward the end of the process, there will be a box that says "donation inspired by". Be sure to enter my name in this section to ensure that the donation goes to this delegation.



Peace and love, friends!

Treeplanting #1: Return to the Bush

*Note: I’m changing every single person’s name in here because I don’t know what’s okay to publish and what’s not. Also, this post was written roughly 2 weeks ago, but I'm very late to posting it.

It’s the very start of my second year tree planting on Cathy and Rainer’s crew. I feel extremely blessed to have started planting at this camp; I’ve met so many people who come here after working at several other camps and talk about how wonderful this camp is. It’s mostly veteran planters here and very few greeners, so everybody generally knows what they’re doing. It’s also known for being relatively chill camp. Other camps have massive blowout parties almost every night off, but this camp only has a party every few shifts. Granted, they are still treeplanting parties; alcohol, drugs, sex, and wildness ensue. However, most nights off, people just relax and read or pass a joint around the fire. 

I PB my first day back, meaning I beat my personal best from last year. I plant 1510 trees on a 17 cent block; definitely not bad for my first day back. I’m even remembering where each tree goes; spruce in wet or shady ground, larch in dry or open ground, and pine basically everywhere else. I’m using the technique Uncle Jim taught me last year; to hurl the shovel into the ground using momentum to save time, rather than stepping on the shovel every time. I dig deep enough, cover the holes, and remember to drop flagging quickly while looking for the next spot to plant. I slowly begin to remember how to find dirt instead of mounds of red rot and duff. Molly, my crew boss this year, says my trees are good. The only slight issue is that we’re planting 5s instead of 7s here, which means the trees must be spaced out nearly twice as far as last year. This makes it a little difficult to readjust my steps to the spacing, but it slowly comes along. I start by packing around 180 trees at a time into my bags, then slowly move into my full 250 bag-ups. This is by no means considered a “heavy” bag-up, considering my uncle’s 400-500 bag-ups, but it’s the one that works best for me. This year, I’m on the same crew as two other girls from last year who I’d really looked up to, and two greeners; one girl and one boy. Together, along with Molly, we make a pretty good team. So far, so good.

I feel like it’s necessary to explain a little bit about Molly before going on any further. I chose this pseudonym for her because she reminds me so much of Molly from the animated film The Last Unicorn, both in terms of wild brown hair and general fiery-but-sweet personality. Last year, my crew boss was Uncle Jim. An incredible and wise veteran planter guaranteed and I’m proud to be his niece, but I’m also incredibly glad to be off his crew. He can be a bit of an old grump sometimes and I don’t think he was too fond of me on his crew either. Fiery and fierce Molly is 100% different from Uncle Jim. According to Nina, the camp cook, Molly walked into the mess tent one evening during the first year they were working together and, after searching through all the different teas for a few seconds, shouted “Where the fuck is my Sleepy Time tea?!” I feel like this is a pretty accurate representation of Molly. Sweet and cuddly enough to drink a nice, warm cup to Sleepy Time tea every night before bed but DON’T YOU FUCKING DARE GET IN THE WAY OF THAT TEA. 

The rest of the people in camp are just as friendly and kind as I remember. Nina gives me a big hug, saying “oh I’m so happy to see you again, Anneke!” Nina is the sweetest and bubbliest person I’ve every met for someone so tiny and who works so hard. She works longer days than any of us and spends her days off buying groceries for the next shift; in other words, she has no days off. Her work days start at 4 to begin early breakfast and end at 9ish when she gets the kitchen packed away. She has some time for naps during the middle of the day when everyone is off planting, but it’s not too long before she’s back in the kitchen preparing everyone’s dinner. Yet she is still incredibly kind and sweet, always planning the most delicious meals that everyone loves her for. According to the other planters here, she is the ideal planting cook. Her assistant, Bee, is equally lovely. She has the most interesting, hobbit-like fashion sense and always has an interesting opinion on everything. Last year, she brought her wooden flute to camp and I had brought my pennywhistle, so we’d had a few jam sessions. This year, she’d brought a tin whistle as well, while I’ve also brought a wooden flute. Also, Bee makes the most incredible energy squares. This year is off to a fantastic start.

Then wham. Treeplanting reality sinks in. By the end of the second day, I slam my hard against a rock, thinking it’s dirt. This has happened before, but this time I had been swinging it full force and can feel a fiercely sharp pang jolt up my arm, but centring on my wrist. Twenty seconds later, I can still feel it in my wrist, even after I take off my gloves. Shit. That’s tendonitis. Well, almost. I’m prone to tendonitis and, while this is definitely not full-blown tendo, it is very clearly the start of it. The next day, I wrap my wrist up in my old tenser bandage from last year and squeeze it into my glove so it can hardly move, hoping this will prevent the oncoming tendo from worsening.

At one point, I can feel myself slipping down a log with no way to catch myself. In a split second, I thrust my shovel out to where I intend to plant the tree, close my eyes tight, and let myself tumble forward. Corks would have prevented this. A branch scrapes across my closed eyelid and sharply pierces my eyebrow. Upon opening my eyes, I see that my body weight has pushed the shovel into the ground, opening a hole in a thick area of dirt. Perfect.  I shove a pine into the hole, close it, flag it, then move my arm upward, rubbing the sleeve of my t-shirt against my pierced eyebrow. Only a little bit of blood; it’ll be fine. Keep planting. A few hours later, a speck of dirt flies into my eye for a third time. They should really have goggles for this job, I think as my eye blinks and waters, trying to get the dirt out without interfering with the planting. They really shouldn’t have goggles for this job; it’s hot and sweaty enough already.

By the end of day three, my legs have assumed last year’s image of a battlefield. Cuts and bruises all the way up, but the only ones I remember getting are the ones where the bruise was so hard that there is a cut on top of it.

“You need gaiters,” Sophia, a fellow planter, says to me at dinner, upon seeing my legs. 

Jazzy, one of the girls on my crew, has said the same thing to me but in relation to something entirely different. The material on the top of my boots had begun tearing with all the slash we’d been walking through. “You need gaiters,” Jazzy had said to me when she saw me covering the top of my boots in duct tape. They were both right; I do need gaiters. Unfortunately, gaiters are like $70 and only two reasons are not yet enough for me to actually go out and buy a pair of gaiters. Third time’s a charm.

My wrist is still sore, but not getting worse.

Max is the checker-guy this year, which is strange because that was James’ job last year. James. That’s an entirely different story all on its own. Basically, I met him at camp last year and he completely changed my life. This is going to sound wishy-washy, but he really opened my world up to entirely different realities. The first man to push me to the point of finally revealing myself to him, the first man to give me a taste of real independence, the first man I slept with, the first man who I felt comfortable sharing everything with without fear of him judging me, the first man who invited me into a whole new world of sustainable living, free thinking, and just freedom in being. After the season ended last year, I ended up moving in with him and his four-year-old daughter for July and August, where my world opened even further. We went on kayak trips, had sex, worked on building his house together, dropped acid, had long discussions into the morning, had dinners with friends, made meals together, built fairy houses, went to several festivals, swam naked in the lake, went on a road to trip to the west coast of B.C., and challenged each other all the way until I left for school at the end of August (obviously his ever-sweet four-year-old daughter was not involved in the first five of those things). After the summer ended and I was back in school in Ontario, we Skyped for hours nearly every night and I flew back out to B.C. a few times to visit them. Then both James and his daughter took the train to Ontario for New Years, where we went skating, visited the Toronto Aquarium, went to my favourite Thai restaurant, made croqetten for New Years, walked along the Goderich beach, and they met my family. It was beautiful. It was also an incredibly rocky time. He is running his own camp this year with only one six-person crew. He offered me a place, but I decided to return to this camp because his camp is six middle-aged men and I would be extremely out-of-place. Not only would it make me uncomfortable, but I would inevitably mess with whatever vibe they have going on there.

So Max has his job as checker-guy this year. Don’t get me wrong, Max is an incredibly friendly person and was a fellow planter last year. He always asks how people’s days are going and remembers what people tell him about themselves; a truly genuine soul. It’s just incredibly strange to see him driving onto our block in the same truck the company rented for James last year. I’m so used to having a silent little personal burst of excitement upon seeing that truck roll into our block, but this year it’s just Max driving (no offence to Max - you’re a wonderful person and I like you a lot; you’re just not James). Then he walks around our block checking on our trees, with his pink flagging trailing along behind him. He means well and this is his job, but even so it pisses me off a bit to see him do this. Just mind your own damn business and let Molly check our trees; that her job. You’re not needed. But I know it’s his job too. I have nothing against Max and most certainly had nothing against James doing this job last year. But Max is not James and that’s what really bothers me.

Anyway, back to more pleasant topics. Tree planting is fucking exhausting work. The second day on our last shift was the hottest day so far (that is, the hottest of only 6 days) and nobody was used to it. Gulping down as much water as possible on our breaks, some of us wearing tight clothing that stuck to our skin, and nobody prepared for this weather, we trudge our way through eight long hours of scorching physical labour. By the end of the day, I am so ready to bag out and head back to camp. I look into my bags and county six trees left. I’m so close. I skip over a really brushy area because I don’t feel like dealing with it this late in the day; it’l take forever to find dirt and I’m so ready to bag out. So a find a place on the other side of the brushy area. It’s very damp ground, but it’s a larch I grab out of my bag. I plant it anyway; I don’t care and am just ready to bag the fuck out. My head is starting to sway and my throat is parched, but reaching into my back bag to grab the water bottle would take time and I just want to bag the fuck out. Four trees left… three trees… two trees. I look up at the sky and notice it’s just a million bright sparks flying before my eyes. That’s my body telling me it’s time to either get some water or bag. The. Fuck. Out. I plant the last tree. Done! There’s a very small hill I have to climb to get back to the truck and I debate grabbing my water before or after the hill. I decide to take the hill first. Bad move. I nearly faint before reaching the road, but when I do, I collapse, grab the water bottle out of my back bag, and gulp the whole thing down.

Upon reaching the truck, I drop my shovel onto the road, take off my gloves, and empty my bags only to find one more lost tree tumble out. Shit. In exasperation, I grab the tree and a shovel, and plant it on the side of the road.

“Now if you find you missed a tree at the end of the day, you do what Anneke just did,” I hear Molly’s voice loud and clear from above. I look up and see her standing inside the back of the crew cab staring straight at me. “You plant it in the road with no flagging so nobody sees it.” I smile guiltily. Busted. “Or like Kendall’s about to do with her last tree.” I look over to see Kendall, with all of her gear already taken off and guiltily staring at the single tree in her hand. She grabs her shovel in defeat and slumps over to the side of the road, where she too plants it.

Molly is still staring down at us from up on her perch in the truck, with a huge grin that says, “I totally caught you guys, but that’s okay because everybody does that.”

On the ride back to camp, Molly wants to listen to a specific band because she’s had their songs in her head the whole day. The somewhat-squawky bluegrass/redneck blares from our truck with Molly happily singing along “Them hurtin’ Albertans, they got nothin’ left to lose! They got too much oil money - never enough booze.” I’m not sure what I enjoy more; the endless Alberta-hate that goes on around here or the fact that my spunky crew boss is the best.

A few days ago, we were trying to find our way to the block (really shitty fill-plant block, but that comes later), but couldn’t seem to find the right road. We ended up driving up to this massive gravel pad where we asked some guy if we could drive through and get to the block on the other side.

“Oh no,” says the gravel-guy, “that gravel pad just drops right off into the water.” He then proceeds to tell us where to find the actual block we need. When we carry on, we start making jokes about driving the truck off the gravel pad and into the water to get to the other side.

“Hey Rainer, look, we made a bridge!” jokes one of the girls.

“Yeah,” Molly chimes in, “You’ve heard about people planting whole bundles of trees at a time, well we planted the whole truck!”

The jokes continue until we hit another roadblock. The culvert we’re supposed to drive over has completely dislodged and there is now a massive creek separating the road in half. Molly drives up close to the creek but decides that it is too deep and even our tough-ass truck might not be able to make it across. The block isn’t too far away though, so we work out how to cross on foot as Molly turns the truck around. We could crawl through the dislodged culvert with our bags? We could build a bridge? Finding logs from the side of the road, we throw them across the creek until we can walk across them. After our weight is doubled with our full bags, however, the bridge begins to come apart. Finally, we opt to crouch down and make our way through the culvert. 

When we finally arrive at the block, we’re exhausted under the weight of our bags and haven’t even put a single tree in the ground yet. The bags get lighter faster because fill plant trees are bigger and heavier, but Molly tells us that the piece is long and we’ll have to walk in our next bag up. Fuck. After making it all the way to the block with full bags again, Molly leads us to the back of the piece, which is another 20 minute walk and the back corner has no clear boundaries. This block is infuriatingly difficult and confusing. As the day goes on, it is clear that none of us are in good spirits. Something is rotten in the state of our crew. I just hope we don’t all end up killing each other in one final scene.

Toward the end of the day, I overhear Molly talking to Velma, one of the first year planters on our crew, about alcohol.

“Yeah I don’t really drink alcohol,” says Velma, “but mango is juice is absolutely delicious!”

“What about you, Anneke?” asks Molly as she walks toward where I’m planting, “Do you like beer or cider?”

“Beer not really, but sometimes cider,” I say, “I’m more a fan of the fruity, girly drinks.”

“Sometimes I like those too,” Molly laughs as she continues back toward the truck, “though I don’t like to admit it.”

Why is she asking us about what we like to drink? I wonder while throwing my shovel into the ground with my right hand to make a hole for the spruce in my left hand, Shit. She’s gonna ask us to stay overtime. Sure enough, we’ll have to stay past 4:30 in order to finish this crappy fill plant. Technically, we are not obligated to plant a single tree after 4:30, but it’s generally preferred to finish the block rather than leave a small section for someone else to come back and fill later. We have a mini-celebration when we all manage to bag out and finish the block at around 5:30. We are done with this crappy fill plant. It may have been 30 cents per tree (nearly double what most blocks are), but there’s still an underlying sinking feeling of only planting around 800 trees in the day. Nevertheless, we are done.

Molly stops by the liquor store on the drive back to camp and calls out, “everybody wait here!” as she runs in. Kendall peeks into the bag when Molly returns, but Molly slaps her hand over the bag. “No peeking!” She shouts. We spend the whole ride in anticipation for whatever’s in the bag.

When we make it pack into camp, Molly parks the truck and reaches for the bag. “Thanks for being such wonderful sports today,” she says, handing out One Tree ciders, Pilsner beers, and a mango juice for Velma.

“Thank, Molly!” Everyone says as they take a drink and make their way to the mess tent.

There’s a group of people who are often found on the couch reading toward the end of the night, all of them returning planters from last year. There’s Chad, of whom I really think the best description is a sort of cross between a highschool football player and a fisherman. He’s got the body and face of the high school jock named “Chad”, but also the rough-and-tumble appearance of some laid back fisherman. He’s also very kind and down-to-earth. I’m aware the name “Chad” may sound a little dim-witted and insulting (my sincerest apologies to all the Chads out there), especially considering the fact that this particular Chad can often be found reading things like Ernest Hemingway, Jack Kerouac, and Hunter S. Thompson. However, my favourite English professor’s name was Chad and he really changed my perspective on the name “Chad”, which is why it seemed like a fair pseudonym for this planter (also, my professor’s last name was Wriglesworth. Professor Chad Wriglesworth. An incredible prof with an even better name). Another person in this late-night reading group is Sparky, who would probably hate the name Sparky. Sparky is a fairly small guy who is always cheery and friendly, with the most adorable face and an incredibly genuine and uplifting laugh. I swear, his laugh is so amazing it could bring stillborn swans back to life. Then there’s Sophia, a kind and spiritual woman who is always reading something that sounds extremely appealing. She’s also often read whatever I’m reading and highly approved of me reading “Eat, Pray, Love”. I feel like we have a very similar taste in reading, she’s just actually read it already. Francois, the hockey-loving French highballer often joins us there as well. 

One night, Cathy and Rainer have joined us in the mess tent; Molly and Max are there as well. They are discussing Molly’s brother Caedon, another planter at this camp. It seems he’s acquired a fairly bad cut on his shin and it’s become infected and swollen.

“It’s pretty bad; he’s on his way to the doctor in Sparwood right now,” says Cathy, “What do you think of all this, Molly?”

“Like, he didn’t even put Polysporin on it,” Molly shrugs, “If you ask me, he’s not very bright.” This definitely isn’t the first time sibling rivalry between Molly and Caedon has surfaced.

“But he’ll still get covered for it, won’t he?” asks Max.

“Yes,” Cathy answers, “if he takes what the doctor prescribes him.”

“That’s the thing,” Molly interjects, “if he takes what the doctor prescribes him. But like, if he doesn’t follow the orders, he’s not going to get covered. And he might not. Like, he didn’t even put Polysporin on it before it got this bad. He’s not practical.”

“What do you mean?” asks Cathy. Sparky perks up at this. He’s sweet and all, but if it were possible for Sparky to dislike anyone, I kind of think it might possibly be Caedon. They are friendly with each other, but they just don’t see eye-to-eye on many things.

“I sense a little bias here…” Max begins, smiling, but Molly continues anyway.

“He just spends too much time thinking about how the government is run by aliens and not enough time thinking about actual practical things,” Molly explains, “but that’s just my opinion.” Sparky bursts into his swan-reviving laugh at this statement; he’s loving this. I smile too, remembering conversations I’d had with Caedon about how he does indeed believe the government is run by aliens (YouTube it - it's a thing). Molly isn’t exactly exaggerating, but this is getting a little mean so I keep reading.

The next morning, I run into Caedon while we’re packing our lunches for the day.

“Good morning, Anneke,” he smiles kindly at me.

“Good morning,” I say, “how is your shin?”

“It’s not so bad,” he says, “it’s infected, but it’s not getting worse. The doctor gave me some antibiotics, but I think I’ll wait to see if it gets worse before using them. I don’t really believe in antibiotics. The whole name ‘antibiotics’. Anti-life? It just doesn’t seem right. I mean, I understand this is the kind of life that we don’t really want growing on us, but still.”

“Yeah,” I smile at him, “I really hope it gets better!”

“Thanks,” he says, and we continue packing our lunches. A part of me wants to shout just take your damn antibiotics so you still get covered if it does get worse! and another part of me is really impressed with him for sticking to his convictions. I can see where he’s coming from, and he’s sticking to what he believes in without hurting anyone in the process. There’s really nothing wrong with that; it’s his life and he’s free to live it however he chooses.

That's one of the most beautiful things about planters, in my opinion. Everyone's just being who they are living their life however they choose, so long as they're not hurting anyone in the process.


PS - don't forget about the Palestine delegation in which I am participating in August 2017! Around $200 has been raised so far - lots more to go! To donate, go to http://cpt.org/donate and follow the steps to donate. Toward the end of the process, there will be a box that says "donation inspired by". Be sure to enter my name in this section to ensure that the donation goes to this delegation.



Peace and love, friends!