Self-Reliant Like J.J.

     See the guy in the white shirt, that is J.J.  The photo was taken in 1980, during my first experience as a fire fighter.  J.J. had become one of the fire camp’s cooks.  

    When my wife and I bought our house in McBride and moved to the Robson Valley, we had no experience in maintaining a house, and had very little money to do it with, so we quickly learned that we had to figure out how to do things ourselves.  This was before the internet and youtube, so we couldn’t just watch a video to see how things were done.  Luckily, J.J. lived just down the road in a small log cabin, and he was a wealth of knowledge.

    J.J. had lived in the Robson Valley for a while, and I was amazed at his abilities.  He seemed to know how to do everything, including construction, electrical wiring, pumbing, gardening, chainsaw work (I was surprised to see him clammer up a birch tree to cut off its dead top).  Living in the rural isolation of McBride, he had gotten by, doing a myriad of odd jobs, and had learned a lot.  I always admired J.J. for all of his useful knowledge and abilities.

    As I look back at my life, I realized that, now, I also have become a lot like J.J.  Living in a place where I had to do most things myself, I have learned a lot.  When we bought our place I was a school teacher and a novice at just about everything else I needed to know about living a rural life.  Certainly rebuilding our entire house by myself had really expanded the range of my experiences.   

    I thought about that yesterday when I had to pull up the toilet to replace the wax ring underneath it.  I also had to deal with our satellite TV which had lost some stations.  When I called the corporation for help, at once point, the helpline suggested I have a satellite maintenance man come to our house.  I had to explain that there were no satellite maintenance personnel who would come to our remote area. (Twenty-plus years ago, I had to figure out, install, and aim the satellite dish myself.) 

    Fortunately, the satellite corporation was finally able to correct the problem on their end by doing some tweaking.

    Looking back, I am proud at how self-reliant I have become, however now with the restrictions of old age bearing down on me, I am having to accept that there are now a lot of things I can no longer do by myself, and I will have to start depending more on others to get things done.

    

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca