But what about me? Voyageurs had a notoriously short shelf life. A broken arm, a wrenched back and boom, I’d be off the job, still in the flower of my youth, if you’ll pardon my literary pretensions. What then with no home to go back to? I’d be the has-been voyageur, the tag-along with no people to call his own, my canoe dreams dashed and stuck in pre-flush-toilet times. Did I want to take that chance? Why did I have to be so practical, weighing it all out? Why couldn’t I just jump for it like Morrie. Boldly go where no man had gone before, or sort of. But that wasn’t the way I was made. A fantasy was one thing, a one-way ticket another. No, I couldn’t accept it. What exactly was anchoring me I couldn’t say. I just had this urge to see how my future would play out on this side of the International Date Line.
“You go on ahead, Morrie. By yourself.”
He looked at me as if I’d suddenly become a stranger to him. “What’s come over you? This is our dream here. If you don’t come now, the chance’ll never come knocking at your door again. You’ll regret it. For the rest of your life you’ll regret it.”
“Maybe so. But my mind is made up. I’m staying put.”
“Ben. Think. It’s all we’ve ever wanted. Handed to us on a silver platter. Who else in the whole wide world can say that? We’ve been chosen. Us alone.”
“I know, I know. And I’m grateful. Really I am. Honoured. But I can’t do it. I can’t go. You’ll have to be my representative. Hold up our good name back there. Show ’em what we’re made of.”
“It’s normal to have cold feet Ben. You think I don’t? But once we get ourselves into it, we’ll forget we ever had a life here.” That was the draw for him. But it wasn’t mine.
“I guess I’m just more firmly planted here than I realized.”
“C’mon Ben. It’s like everything. The first step is the hardest.”
“I’m staying behind, Morrie. I have to.”
“There’s nothing I can say to convince you?”
“No. I’ve thought it all out.”
“You’re sure now?”
“I am.” And I was. My mind, so prone to decision reflux, was at peace. Somehow I sensed that in years to come, I wasn’t going to be haunted by my habitual if only’s over my choice to stay behind.
“I guess this is goodbye then my friend,” Morrie said.
“Looks that way.”
“Be well.”
“You too. Don’t go pushing that heart of yours too hard.”
“I’ll be sensible.”
“You? Sensible?” I said. “Those two words don’t jibe.”
“Don’t worry wise guy. I’ll take care of myself.”
“See that you do, or I’ll have to come out there and do it for you.”
“You’ll be more than welcome.”
The memories were washing over me. It was hard to believe that Morrie, their starring character, wouldn’t have a role in any new ones I’d be accumulating. “It was a wild ride for the two of us while it lasted, wasn’t it?” I said.
“The wildest.”
“I’ll always be grateful it was me you chose to burgle. Don’t ever forget that.”
“I won’t,” he said. “And I’ll always be grateful that you called them to come.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Today. They swung by for us special when they heard your speech back at the canoe before. I’ll never be able to thank you enough for that. You were inspired.”
What? I was the one who’d summoned them? It wasn’t chance that brought them to us? This bombshell that Morrie dropped in my lap as by-the-way as if it were a weather report sent me reeling. Morrie’s new paddling mates appearing in the flesh before me was nothing compared to this. Here they’d been out there listening. To me. The satellite dish they’d whittled on slow nights around the campfire had pulled in my signal. If that could happen then where did prayers go? The question just jumped into my head. I wasn’t very religious, that’s for sure. I don’t think I ever prayed in my life. Praying was retro. It was what grizzled old men did in shul under their tallises. Or immigrants. I guess I never really believed anyone was out there on the receiving end. But now I’d have to give the whole subject a major rethink.
“Does this mean I can sort of give you a shout if I want to talk to you sometime,” I said, “check up on how you’re getting along?”
“It’s a nice idea, but I’m not sure if we normally operate on an on-call basis. This might have been a one-off.”
“Too bad. I would have liked us keeping in touch.”
“Me too.”
“Well, make my apologies then.” I felt a bit guilty that they’d troubled themselves to make a detour and only wound up with one new paddler instead of the two they’d been counting on.
“I will.”
Morrie and I reached out to each other. I thought my hands would just pass through his body, that he’d no longer have any substance considering he was half-here half-there, or whatever the proportions might be in such a situation. But he felt the same as always. One hundred percent present. His new companions looked anxious to be on their way so we could only clutch one another for a few seconds. When we broke apart, he turned to head back to their canoe, wherever in the wild blue yonder they’d moored it, and I headed back to Mum’s car to drive off to wherever I was intended to go in this life.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
You can’t paddle a voyageur canoe alone. I was lucky to have support in the venture, and to all my fellow paddlers I give thanks here.
An early draft of My True and Complete Adventures as a Wannabe Voyageur was workshopped in a Quebec Writers’ Federation seminar led by Claire Holden Rothman. Subsequent versions were scrutinized by my writing group, Frank Babics, Joanne Gormley, Kim Darlington, and Imola Zsitva. Kendall Wallis, as always, gave me invaluable suggestions, as did Ivan-Michael Juretic. I also owe a debt of gratitude to Lonnie Weatherby and Halyna Carpenter for services rendered, and to the crew at NeWest Press, notably Merrill Distad, Claire Kelly, and Matt Bowes.
Thanks to my son David who mercilessly blue-pencilled Benjie’s dialogue so I could convincingly sound like a smart-mouthed 23-year-old. If any clunkers remain in the text, it’s because I foolishly chose not to listen to him from time to time.
Finally, thank you to my husband Ron, who encouraged me in this as in all things. However many fur-trade museums and canoe exhibits I dragged him to, he was always up for more. It’s handy being married to a historian.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Phyllis Rudin’s writing has been published in numerous periodicals including The Massachusetts Review, Agni, Prism International and Prairie Fire. Her short story “Candlepower,” which appeared in This Magazine, won its Great Canadian Literary Hunt in 2010. Her first novel, Evie, the Baby and the Wife, a fictionalized account of the Vancouver to Ottawa Abortion Caravan, was published by Inanna Publications in 2014. Phyllis Rudin has lived in the US and France, and now makes her home in Montreal where she is engaged in a project to walk every street in the city.
My True and Complete Adventures as a Wannabe Voyageur Page 21