THE NORTH Shore, of course, should have

been called the North Slope, although I guess,
technically, it is really the South Slope, meaning
the south slope of the.Coast Mountain range.
Maybe we’!l leave the name as it stands.

This much is certain: it
stands at an angle. Like,
everything is tilted! Per-
sonally, 1 enjoy living on a
slope. Between the top and
the bottom of my property,
there is a downward curve
of land — a drop of 40 or
50 feet.

I’m not sure the whole
province of Manitoba drops
that much from one end to
the other. So there is, for
me a Prairie refugee, a cer-
tain thrill to living on tilted
land. If I stand sideways,
one foot is always slightly
lower than the other. Unless
I adjust my posture, I look
like a tin farmer teetering at
an angle.

My house doesn’t sit at
90 degrees in relation to the
front and back yards,
naturally. There’s a drop
right there of four or five

feet. This is amazing stuff.

to me. When you think
about it, living on the slope
of a mountain, even the
lower slopes, is a quite
peculiar undertaking.

For one thing, there’s the
Stream. It changes

dramatically from time to
time. In summer, there is
just a trickle along the coil-
ing pebble and rock gouge
running across the property
like a Sylvester Stallone
pectoral scar: jagged, but
basically shallow.

If you sleep out on the
bedroom sundeck at night,
you can hear this faint,
tickling giggle of water over
the rocks. Even if the forest
is silent, rare as that is, we
always have this whisper
from nature in our ear.

Come winter, the whisper
is a roar, as though your pet
rock had turned into an
avalanche. Quite out of
control. There is actual
white water. Rocks the size
of. a briefcase break loose
and grate along, like wak-
ing things. The roots of the
alders along the embank-
ment are dug out by blasts
of raw hydraulic power. We
have to shout to hear each
other above the tumult.

Every once,in a while,
somewhere nearby in the
forest, a great tree snaps.
Often it’s a big alder giving

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way to a hemlock that has
grown up under her wing.
But sometimes it’s a fir.
They make more of a crun-
ching sound as they come
down. Heavier. In any
event the instinct is to duck
for the house.

The forest, of course, is
haunted by all sorts of
creatures: rabbits,
neighborhood dogs, bob-
cats, raccoons, deer,
coyotes, bears, a rare Mule
deer. When you hear twigs
popping in the bush, you

* look up. Right?

In the summer —
especially last summer —
there is always a. certain
amount of sniffing that
goes on among us lower
mountain folk, sniffing for
the dreaded whiff of burn-
ing trees. You learn that it is
good to have alder around,
for instance, because it
burns fast, like a backfire,
preventing the heat from
setting into the guts of the
pines, where it really starts
to burn.

Every once in a while, I
imagine what it would be
like if a real landslide ever
came through here, or the
stream ever got REALLY
big, big enough to tear
away my house,
volcano decided to do its

AME BRED

or a’

re
al

lo,

thing somewhere above. I
mean, if even enough snow
piled up ...

It might also be my im-
agination, but up here it
seems the wind beats more
frustratedly than it does
below, but that’s probably
pure anthropomorphism.

One thing is for sure,
there’s more rain!

All right. It is a
dangerous and daring thing
us low mountain people
seek to do. It's not that
nature abhors an angle,
particularly, it is just that
gravity never relents. You
were wondering when I’d
get to the profound part,
weren’t you? I think, ahem,
there is a certain kind of
naked courage that’s need-
ed to live on the siopes, any
slopes.

As a matter of fact, J
Often think of my house as
a little ark run aground ona
conifecous Ararat. Just
kind of waiting for a tidal
wave to come in and wash
me back out to sea.

Living on a hil! may be
hell, but come, the Flood
we’ll all have
waterfrontage.

Sounds like real estate
heaven to me!

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