Cassiar to Stewart, BC
Traditional territory of the Nisga’a
Cloudy all day, rain in the night
The first bear we saw we figured was worth stopping for. She had a cub and they were busy eating clovers and being hard to photograph. The third bear was three bears all together, climbing up the hill beside the highway. The sixth bear we slowed down for on the road towards the Salmon Glacier and the seventh we just laughed at, in the local park in Stewart. The forests and mountains are getting ready for the upcoming winter, and that means bears eating as much as they can in preparation for hibernation. I don’t talk about it much but I’m a homesick kind of person. I’m sure I’m not unique in this, but home was always more than just a place for me growing up. It was swinging sticks in the front field and listening to stories beside the bonfire. It was standing dizzy on a clear winter night and swimming in the river on hot summer days. And more than anything, it was family. It is.
So I get homesick. I miss the feelings of that place and I miss my family. I remember when I was catching a flight back to France after coming home for the holidays in 2014, perhaps the hardest part was having so temporarily returned it was that much harder to leave again. It felt like I had only just begun to see them again. So here, after a week or so with my parents providing trip support, we’re parting ways and it’s as bittersweet as France. I’m comforted to know that I’m now heading towards the conclusion of the journey, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t sob on my bicycle on the highway as that beige truck passed me one more time. My mom shouted something that I didn’t hear. My dad smiled out the window. I was alone, again.
I’m making myself cry while writing this, and listening to Howard Shore’s Lord of the Rings soundtrack (nostalgia for my twin sister) isn’t really helping. Stopping here in order to move on for now.
