sense of who they were?
Oh, Canada, tidy Canada, what bugs are up thy shorts, I wondered? I’d have to sit back in this alien nation I finally decided, that much was clear. Let the robot do the talking.
Everyone was so pleasant. It made for suspicion. The bus drivers looked like nicer versions of Chicago policemen, with their checkered Blue Line Voyager hats. Daley would have rolled over on his graves. I wouldn’t have wished America on anyone, even then, but at first this place gave me the heebie-jeebies. It was way too neat.
The bus station in Toronto was a two-level job, more like a travel agency than a bus terminal. Sculpted concrete, nice, if few, seats. No loiterers here I guessed. Everyone had direction in Canada, or were encouraged to have some. It made me laugh, the imaginative stretch it would have taken to get the uninformed, an Eskimo say, to believe that this place was of the same genre as the Port Authority in New York—or the Greyhound Station in Cleveland for that matter—where every scab-infected unfortunate on the earth pitches a tent in front of the t.v.’s, hits you up for a buck, giving you t.b. in the process.
It didn’t look like diseases were allowed in Canada. But how had they managed it? Socialized medicine? Cold northern virtue? Maybe the whole country wears a wig. It’s respectability, denial. Keep your sins at home. We just don’t do that here. And all the while, beneath that veil, giving license to every “progressive” notion of victimhood. As much as they say they detest American chest-pounding, they fall in line.
By the time the bus had gotten to Peterborough, I was about ready to jump ship. Just what was I doing up here? I didn’t even remember the basic tenants of the Catholic faith. Wasn’t one supposed to do something when going into a church? Sprinkle himself with holy water or kiss, worship at the feet of Mary goddess? Why hadn’t I paid more attention? What if I gave myself away, made some accurate comment?
My anxiety waned, though, as I did a quick hike around part of the town to stretch my legs during the rest stop. Quaint. What were these nice, clean Canadian Catholics going to do to me anyway, throw me to Canadian lions? To Bert Lahrs . . . fur brekfesst?
Peterborough was clean as a spitless whistle. All the funny money, the slightly taciturn, if smiling, folk. I wondered what the insane asylums looked like up here. No need for straight jackets. Just tell the inmates to sit here, go there. Or if they did have jackets on, you could watch them skinny along the ground, humping like cartoon worms, cocoons, obeying your every command. I wondered if they had a test to tell who the insane ones were? Or did they just march up, confess it meekly. “I’m insane, you know. It’s true. I have a paper right here.” In crayon, big tears.
After a quick look through a liquor store, more like a supermarket with rollers than the institutional look you get back in the states, I bought a bigger bag of M & Ms, headed back to the bus. I felt so good that I even talked to some old lady awhile as we rolled up the perfect highway, ever northward.
It got old, the ride. Moose Jaw was a long way. I wondered if they had running water, any summer to speak of up there. I’d find out soon enough, and as late afternoon waned, chilled, I tried to make a bed of the seat. In snatches I watched what looked like virgin forest pass by: more and more birch, pine, fir. Too neat, way too neat.
We stopped for dinner at a restaurant. Kind of a cleaned-up Nebraska, with corn-fed proprietors, friendly, gabby in a local sort of way. The woman behind the register and the driver were old buds I guessed, everyone with that often higher pitched Canadian way of speaking. There was an awful rightness to this place as well, nicely creased napkins and spotless water glasses because it was a place to eat. A fresh bulletin board with notices about Moose Lodge meetings, boy-scout camperees. Not one whiff of dope, unkempt facial hair. I would not take up bowling I decided. They couldn’t make me.
When I finished my cheeseburger, the cheese squarely on top of meat, placed perfectly below the bun, I stepped outside, finally noticed the snow that had put the squeeze in their voices. It was piled high along the edges of the parking lot. It wasn’t terribly cold, but I had miscalculated. Spring up here was not running on the same schedule as in Ohio. I would need a winter coat. No stores between here and Moose Jaw either I bet.
2.
I was the only one to get out at my stop, hours later. The driver followed me down, flipped up the underneath compartment door and got me my duffel bag without a word. That was it. Just me and the exhaust, in the middle of a new world. The mooses. (I called a few times, no answer.)
Looking at the size of the town, rubbing up my creased jacket sleeves, I was surprised it was on the map at all. On my side of the street there was a red barn-shaped general store behind me. Clean, neat. It’s competition, a Western front, two doors down on the same side, the post office/restaurant in between. The only other building on this side was a rent-all place some 400 yards—a-hem—meters down the road. On the other side of the street, a laundromat and a very small motel, closed for the season. There was a docking ramp out back for what I was to learn was the Madawaska River. Apparently tourists liked this place in the summer.
The river behind the motel was beautiful: wide, surrounded by miles and miles of dense forest, the salt of birch, a mild confusion in the branches. That was it, though, as far as the city was concerned. No sidewalks. Just sand by the road. I stood out there for awhile in the dark, getting cold, wondering just what my next move should be. It was never made clear to me over the phone where exactly the farm was in relation to the highway, or where I was to be picked up for that matter. I hadn’t asked: so I had no choice right then but to stand there, befuddled in my mint new latest things, banks of snow shoveled, eye level on either side of the restaurant.
Finally, I just sat down on my duffel bag, in front of my repeating breath. After a while I decided. I’d just have to go across the street, find the house behind that motel and knock.
I didn’t even have time to reach down and pick up my bag, though, because a van pulled around in front of me, up to the post office next door. Some guy got out and deposited a slew of mail into the all-night slot before spotting me. I figured he must be the guy, given the volume, and walked over. “Are you looking for The Madonna’s Farm,” he asked? “Nobody told me anybody was corning.”
Given the obvious organization, I figured I was in for a treat. Who ran the place, a bunch of old, burnt-out hippies?
“I have,” I said grandly (going for early humor), but it was like he didn’t even hear me.
“And jeepers, no winter coat. Come prepared, eh? You could’ve frozen out here. Hop in.” He had a fine Irish brogue, youngish. About thirty or so, with a long reddish beard. (He looked like one of the Smith Brothers.)
“Got any cough drops,” I asked him?
“You like it, eh,” he asked, laughing like a leprechaun, pulling down on his whiskers? “It’s a gift from me old grandmother. I wonder why no one told me someone was coming?”
“God will take care of me,” I ventured.
“Indeed. But a fine winter coat wouldn’t hurt any, either, now would it? Well, best be getting back,” he said with a laugh. The van was bare bones, a second seat behind ours, hinged benches along the back panels which served as flip-top containers. After a pause he added, “Welcome to The Madonna’s Farm.” He turned and bowed. “My name is Patrick, and I will be your flight attendant. How did you hear about us, anyway?” I told him about the Newman Center, said I needed to find my way, within the context of the Catholic faith, of course.
“We can lend you a coat tonight. Tomorrow’s a half-day. You can go up to St. Joe’s in the afternoon. You’ll be able to pick up something cheaply.”
“Great, cheap and free, two magic words as far as I’m concerned.” He didn’t answer, so I wondered if I had been too flippant, decided to heel the hounds. We drove that way, him only breaking the silence to point out St. Joseph’s Rural Outreach Center, which we passed on our way in.
As we pulled into the gravel parking lot, I got my first glimpse of the main house. It was an old well-kept, steep-roofed white house off to the right side of the lot. And judging by how well