Category: Nonfiction

A large black bear had been hanging around our backyard area. It was a bit of a shared green space, although if you asked my crotchety old neighbours on the one side, they certainly wouldn’t have considered it shared. Shade was provided by about ten large cedars and bear food was available via an old cherry tree, some berry bushes, and garbage cans.

I always start my pedicures with a thorough examination of the feet, before I instruct the client to place them in the soapy water to soak. It’s rare that I will run across a contraindication worrisome enough to stop me from proceeding, but it does happen. Athlete’s foot, planter’s warts, varicose veins and toenail fungus are all a possibility, among worse things. Nothing was out of the ordinary today─ just tanned, clean shaven legs and neatly trimmed toenails painted a shade of vibrant pink. These feet didn’t look like they needed a pedicure; the heels were soft and smooth as peaches, and the base of the polish was exactly 1/8th of an inch from the evenly pushed-back cuticles. The polish hadn’t even chipped or lost its shine yet.

Another oil spill in Vancouver’s harbour. The media features bedraggled bitumen-laden gulls, terns and other birds dead or dying on sandy beaches to the consternation of the animal rescue crews who are desperately cleaning those still living. A sense of deja vu, then a fully formed image pops into my mental vision of an event more than fifty years ago. The black gobs of coalesced tar-like mounds littering Kitsilano beach from one end to the other, the suffering, suffocating dying sea birds of all descriptions expiring in large numbers as far as the eye could see, all the same. But therein lies a more twisted tale…

Gaya and his family had recently relocated nearby and visits were becoming frequent. The Rules bubbled up after the first few visits from the narrator’s grandchild. These became the ground rules for harmonious living.