The Bouncy Ball Theorem and the Narnia Complex

the Further Adventures of Trashy Drifter

Chapter 42

The Bouncy Ball Theorem and the Narnia Complex

 

Every time I get on board a float plane at Campbell River and lift off, I get a gitchy, butterfly feeling in my belly. It’s not just fear of flying and turbulence and the surreal dizzying landscape rolling beneath me. It is a feeling of leaving the ‘real’ world behind and going to a magical land inhabited by wondrous creatures and steadfast companions. This is not a normal place. When I get off the plane, I put my wallet away and forget about it and immerse myself in a mosaic of whirling gulls, swooping eagles, honking herons and of course, waddling grizzlies bellying up to the feast of salmon.

 This feeling of leaving the real world behind and entering a magical one is a feeling I’ve had before. When I was a kid, I spent the majority of my time in Middle Earth, I actually went to the barber shop and got some hair and glued it to the tops of my feet and walked around the neighbourhood barefoot, looking for orcs. My brother Brent and our friend Darren and I founded a magical kingdom in our uncle’s pasture and cunningly named it Dakab, (which stands for Darren and Kevin and Brent). I recall being infinitely more interested in my own fantasies and other worlds than this one.

So it wasn’t with much surprise that I discovered that my own daughter has this same Narnia syndrome, perhaps it’s congenital? She has been devouring books where the heroines get zipped off to Faerie land to save the faeries from Jack Frost and his goblins in story after story. So when we spent last weekend at Long Beach, Bella transformed into Hannah the Harvester, a fairy who wandered the beaches eating bark and wild peas. Ava and I bought into this scenario and we were all transformed into other people in another place; which is of course, a welcome break from being this same old boring person in this same old place.  I think that people generally do live in a fantasy world in which they are playing characters, usually though, the fantasy is provided for you and so is the character that you are supposed to play, it’s called ‘life’.

There is a new superstar around this place. A young grizzly cub that is creamy white, that we have been calling Spirit, I wanted to call her Creamo or Honky but was voted down. She is one of three siblings, the other two are chocolate, but she stands out and gets everybody’s shutters chattering. The thing is though, Spirit’s mom is a total b#@*h! She’s been attacking every other mother bear at the weir and starting snarling fights with all comers.  Even though she’s smaller than most other bears she’s extremely aggressive, which isn’t necessary as there is enough fish for all the bears to have more than they need. But oddly enough, they are still territorial and owly with one another, and each mother keeps her own cubs tucked in behind her own rump and away from all other bears. She’d better ease up on the tough girl act though, sooner or later she’ll try that stuff with Bruno and then, look out, Spirit and her siblings will be orphans.

The other day I was taking some British bankers tracking and we wound down a bear trail into a clearing and I was stopped in my tracks by a strange sound. At first I thought it was an engine, then perhaps a cat purring, and then I realized that it was the loud and proud snoring of a bear that was resonating through the woods. It made me realize what it is that I love most about these big hairy goofballs.  They are honest. Bears have no guile or subterfuge, bears aren’t tricky or sneaky. They won’t drop on you out of a tree like a cougar, or deviously outsmart you like a coyote. They just see or smell what they want, they go towards it in a straightforward manner and then eat it. It’s that simple. And then, when they have eaten all they can, they just find a place to lay down and sleep until they wake up hungry. Ta daa! That’s it, that’s all they do. No wonder they have always gotten in trouble with us humans, they are too honest, we don’t know how to deal with that.

So, this job may seem to you like a breezy vacation, but really, you’ve got to be friendly and available and engaging 14 hours a day. Try getting peppered with questions by 6:30 am before you’ve even managed to pry your eyeballs open, and fielding questions and conversations until you fall asleep at night. It takes a lot ofbuoyancy and flexibility to be a constant host and guide. I reckon that if you need to be always flexible and bouncy and able to roll, you might as well be a bouncy ball.

You see, there are different kinds of balls that bounce; some of them such a as volleyballs and beach balls require air to fill them and make them bouncy. However, when an inflated ball loses some air, after constant use over a ten day period, it will become floppy, flaccid, grouchy and bitchy. Such a ball will require re-inflation. How they get re-inflated is a question that each ball must ask itself. Personally, I prefer hard rubber bouncy balls. They are dense, solid and resilient.  They are always ready for whatever comes their way and they never flag or fail until they finally roll under the couch to hide or are chewed to pieces by a terrier.

As an analogy, I’m not sure if that even makes sense to me anymore. But suffice to say, this summer has been an awesome adventure, but also an epic ordeal, and I am looking forward to spending some quality time on the couch by the fire with my lovely wife and kids and Pancake the wonderdog. Right now, from where I sit with the bleak and icy pacific wind banging at the door, home seems like a Narnia I’d like to escape to.