Days in Our Lives.

This picture was take in Tsawaassen.

It reminded me of this story.

A few years back, when we went to Quebec to check our country house,we found the roof needed to be changed. During summer it is difficult to get construction workers or any worker for that matter and I wanted to be there when it was being done. I couldn't trust leaving it the way it was with the winters we have there. My Mom was still alive and she was a hand full, so I couldn't climb the roof and my husband was in BC working, so we could not depend on having his help either.

Well, I managed to get some neighbors to help me and finally hired my neighbor's son and his girl cousin who volunteered to do it. They ripped off the old shingles and threw them into my Dad's home made utility trailer.

My younger son and I took the trailer to the dump. In Quebec, you are allowed two free dumps a year. So when you bring in your trailer, you better make sure its a big trailer and full to make it worth your while. Then they tell you what to put where and your garbage can be mixed in the trailer.
I like this better than BC where they weigh your vehicle both in and out and charge according to weight.They are also particular because they charge for different things differently. Metal is free, normal garbage has one price, wood another, cardboard another. When you come, you can't mix so you need to come several times before you can get rid of everything and it becomes expensive.
In Quebec you also buy a trailer license only once and you can use it on any trailer till the end of time. In BC you need to pay every year like car insurance.

Well, the story went like this. I drove my huge fully loaded, 16 foot utility trailer and after being told where to unload, backed it in to the dumpster to unload my shingles. My son and I began unloading. It was scorching hot, the shingles were dirty and heavy and full of nails.

Then this Arab guy shows up with a tiny little trailer, similar to a wheel barrow. It was full of what looked like green smelly rabbit pooh. He asked me if I could move my trailer so he could unload.
I felt this was rather rude of him but the wheel barrow trailer was small and I figured he would lift it, get rid of the smelly stuff quickly and leave. So to be nice, I moved my trailer and he moved his in.

I watched him get out of his car with a small child in diapers. He took out the smallest shovel in the world and began to slowly shovel the stuff into the dumpster. Watching him, I stood there,wide eyed, open mouthed and fuming. He couldn't find a smaller shovel.

The baby was walking around by itself in a very dangerous area. The man would take all day to unload his wheel barrow at this rate, my son and I were hot, dirty, tired and then to boot I noticed that he wasn't even supposed to unload green stuff into this particular dumpster.
When he turned around to look at me, he saw I was fuming.

He said: " Look. I know you are angry cause I asked you to move."

Well that was the wrong thing to say, in the mood I was in.
He should have just unloaded and left because this was when I blew up.

I said : "You made me move my big heavy trailer for this wheel barrow and now you will spend half a day shoveling it and it's not even the right dumpster. You are supposed to put this in the other one." and I pointed out where.

There were no other cars anywhere. He had the whole dump to put his wheel barrow trailer but he chose to force me to move mine, like he was the King of Sheba.

I continued :
"Now, on top of that, you let out a naked baby to burn in the sun and to walk around glass and other dangers, like falling into one of these dumpsters.
I am going to follow you home and tell your wife what you are doing and then let her tell you a thing or two."

He began shaking and shoveling harder, getting me madder because all he had to do was to tip the trailer and everything would fall out in a second.

He grumbled : I don't know why I woke up this morning.

It dawned on me then, that he probably already had a blow up at home with his wife over this smelly wheel barrow affair and was there against his will. That's all he needed was to come home with another woman blasting his wife about him. I also realized he was not that good in multi tasking. This whole thing was a novelty to him.

We were both so fuming angry, sizzling like hot bacon in a frying pan, that when we stared at each other, like two cowboys in a duel, we both could not help but burst into laughter.
I think he could picture me explaining things to his wife and he never expected me to blurt out something like that, any more than I expected me to sputter it. lol

I must have looked a sight with all those dirty shingles and he was not so pretty either.
He looked like he fell out of bed. That's country life for you lol

Anyway, we parted friends. He took his wheel barrow trailer to the right dumpster and I got my spot back to unload my stuff. My 14 year old son did most of the unloading and I did the pushing up front stuff.

Before long my roof was finished and the neighbors 17 year old son did a great job. I don't know how he worked in the heat up there but he did and my son went up also but he stayed only half a day with the hammer before coming back down complaining about the heat.
The roof is holding to this day and I am happy. I call this a learning holiday. But I was around my sons age when my Dad built the house and it was a family project. My Dad believed that to be free you never take a mortgage. You do a dollar down, dollar a week, till you have what you want and today I still believe that this is the only way to get ahead in life.

We learned not to put all the shingles on the roof until you were ready to use them, Otherwise they stick together and they are hard to rip apart. So we needed to put them into the shade to cool, to separate, before using. lol Little tips.

A year later, the neighbors boy got himself a real job in a lumber yard.
He graduated from high school and got himself a car.

Grad year is a very dangerous year.
Kids go wild and party and then they die.

This boy didn't drink but he was heavy footed on the gas pedal.
Driving down a dark winding country road, something happened. He lost control of the car and it flew into the ditch hitting the cement which held up a commercial driveway. He wore no seat belt so he flew through the window, over an 8 foot frost fence which practically cut off his leg. Needless to say, his neck and head were broken. It was a mess.

My son graduated this year and I am always after him to be careful because this is not the first story of this sort I hear.
Two months later, this boy's friend also died this way but he was charging down the road with a wife and two kids. He died and his 5 year old, with a broken leg, tried to pull his Mother and baby sister out of the car.

The local country stories are incredible.

All we are left with are memories of playing soccer with them , having races, fixing a roof, sitting by campfires, exchanging stories and now this, an end to lives, which had everything to live for.

We love them. We raise them but eventually we are all in charge of

Days in Our Own Lives,

and we hope we have sense enough, to live them well.