Over this Saturday morning’s coffee, we await the edge of a massive tsunami that is apparently headed our way after the 8.8 magnitude earthquake that struck Chile. Apparently it is expected to arrive sometime after 3 pm PST. Looking out of my office window, the water is flat calm; a tug is slowly making its way northwest toward the paper mill. The Mergansers, Bufflehead and Harlequin ducks are fishing close to shore, even the heron seems content to stand in silent pose waiting for an unsuspecting fish to swim into the tidal pond.
We are protected here by the headlands of Vancouver Island, the Gulf Islands and to an extent Texada Island, partially cloaked in low morning cloud. Still, the earthquake in Chile serves as a warning that our turn will come.
I experienced a few earthquakes while studying in Japan, and as we sipped on our second cup of coffee, Judi and I talked about a response I received from a potential publishing agent to whom I had sent book one, Betrayal of the Will Gunn trilogy. The agent, who liked the story of Will Gunn, seemed more interested in my biography, and urged me to write the story of my own life. Judi, who is not only my business partner, and the smarter of the two of us, she is also my wife, lover and best friend. Judi thought it a great idea.
I have always been reluctant to write the story of my life so far, mostly because it has been so full of events that writing them or speaking about them has, in the past, had people claim that I am making it up to somehow embellish who I am. That certainly happened during my tenure in politics, and I found myself having to defend the true story of my life from nasty comment from journalists and gossip columnists masquerading as thoughtful political writers. I assure you, it is not fun to have to try to convince someone of the life you have lived, especially when you are not even keen to talk about it in the first place.
As lives go, mine has certainly not been dull. More by circumstance than design, I have lived through interesting times. It started when, at nine months of age, my parents moved our family from Canada to Africa so that my father could complete his doctoral thesis in Anthropology. I broke out with measles on board a Trans Canada Airlines flight from Vancouver to London, en route to Africa. They flew the four prop, tri-tailed Constellations then, and it took many more hours to reach our destination than it does today. My mother knew the problem that my red-spotted face would pose for British immigration and health authorities, so she quietly arranged to have me entered the country buried in the flight attendant’s hand luggage.
What convinced me to put up a new category in this blog space called Life So Far… is the fact that my late father never did write up his fascinating life as anthropologist, private businessman and father raising three white Canadian children in East Africa in the 1950s, 1960s and part of the 1970s. Similarly, my mother, still going strong today at eighty-nine, did remarkable work in Africa in the field of community development, and women’s rights, and has never written it up.
I suppose the fact that my parents departed the life in Africa moments before the fascist police of Idi Amin arrested them, and the fact that they returned to Canada without any material benefit of their years of work, nor recognition of their generosity toward the African people with whom they lived, worked, published, helped to educate and advance, might have something to do with their desire to just forget about it. I think it is because when they told their stories, friends and family chose not to believe them, or even when the stories were believed the listeners could not understand the significance of what took place.
So, I will from time to time put up a snippet from my life so far. I hope you find it all worth reading.

1. Lee Says:
   February 27th, 2010 at 11:46 am

   Looking forward to it.

2. Myst DeVana Says:
   February 27th, 2010 at 12:03 pm

   I am looking forward to this. My mother is a keen family historian. Her research enabled my fascination with my quarter-Cherokee great-grandmother, who did the Oregon Trail as a pregnant runaway at 15 and was out dancing the week before she died at 94. Her ‘unbelievable’ life was kept carefully hidden, for native blood and bastard children were taboo among respectable pioneer families in the Canadian Prairies but discovering even bits of it was a gift that led me toward being able to see some of the quiet braveries going on around me during my own life. We each live an adventure and our sharing of it with others can be an immense source of courage, motivation, and appreciation for the adaptability of the human spirit. What you share will do others much good.