November in a small village

We are settled into the wee village of Ashcroft which straddles the Thompson River.  It is about 10 minutes driving time, up the mountain, to our house in the next village.  We have rented the house out to a fellow who wants to rent-to-buy.  Alleluia.  So we will just stay here in the Bed and Breakfast, where we do have to make our own breakfast, for the winter.  We will have very itchy feet that will want to get travelling again by Spring.  The lovely thing is that my church is on the next corner so I can walk to all the activities and I joined a study group on Tuesdays and help with the Soup kitchen on Fridays.  We are also making prayer shawls for the Healing and Reconciliation Meeting next year with the First Nations folk who were abused at Residential Schools earlier in the century.

On November 11, I went to an early service as we were all going to troop 3 blocks to the cenotaph for the service there at 10:30.  Our church has all stained glass windows, so imagine our shock to open the doors to a white world.  Hello Canada.  The streets were blocked off for the parade and to make it safe for the crowd to gather on the roads at the cenotaph's corner.  The red coat on the fellow by the cable/Internet company building belongs to an RCMP officer going to stand on duty at the cenotaph.

My friend John Pierro, who is from the Bonaparte Reserve, drummed and sang in memory of all his First Nations folk that served in the Wars and never came back.  He named his song 'Soldier Boy'. 
The landlord Jim, turned 65 in late October, so they held a huge family party.  We were sent off fishing for the weekend so they could use the suite for visiting, but welcomed back to join the dinner on Sunday night.  He is a fine fellow, who does a lot of volunteer work for this community and even for our church, although he doesn't attend services and isn't a believer.

This is what it looked like in our kitchen with more tables to do a sit-down ribs and chicken dinner for all the family that could get to Ashcroft for the big day.  I helped with the cleaning of vegetables in the morning.  But it didn't take them long to clean up and remove the tables and chairs afterwards and we had our suite back.              

It feels good to be back in our old community.  Old Man Watching says that he was born here (almost on the steps of the original hospital) and he plans to die here.  I hope that doesn't happen for a few years yet.  But we are happy to be in one spot for the winter.  Now I will catch up on what you folk have been up to.