Saturday, June 04, 2011

Just fish-trucked to downtown Vancouver, BC, and back. It's a prettier drive than the eastward trek to Toronto: rhododendrons and other flowers of the NW are in bloom; Snoqualmie Pass waterfalls are gushing; Montana's big rivers are full to the banks. Saw eagles and elk and, in Post Falls, Idaho, ate real Mexican food. Which is a big deal when you reside anywhere in North Dakota.

Auspiciously, the night we got to Vancouver the Vancouver Canucks beat the Boston Bruins in Game One of the Stanley Cup. Canada, of all countries, has had an eighteen-year hockey championship dry spell, so I'm rooting for the other home team: I was born in Vancouver. Ma & Pa Sand were living in British Columbia in 1970, ranching in the Chilcotin Country and striving to avoid Nixon's toxins. After I was born, they realized they needed familial support and they also realized they wanted to part of changes happening in the U.S. So I lived in Canada for just five weeks before they moved back to Montana. I now possess a Canadian birth certificate, and I can never run for POTUS.

Upon return to Killdeer two days ago, my pal Indio Saravanja was there to greet me. He'd rolled in hours before and slept in my parents' guest bedroom. Indio drives truck off and on professionally, but most notably he's a world-class troubadour. It was a treat to show him around Killdeer Mountain with Hana.

Hana, by the way, flew to Espanola, Florida, today to visit her ailing Grandmother Joyce. Per request, Hana took Joyce some fresh rhubarb from our garden.

Tomorrow I drive to Toronto, and on Wednesday, to Calgary. I'll return in time to play some songs at Army's in Dickinson Friday night, opening for Outlaw Sippin', my friend Beni Paulson's rockin' new band. They'll then back me up on my joint "This Time," as a segue into their set.

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