TIME FOLLOWS ME

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE RIDING THE DOLPHINS BACKS

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

RIDING THE DOLPHINS BACKS

Lined up with the other passengers and went through customs. Showed them my Canadian Drivers License and paid my fare. I was aboard.

The Ferry Ride would take a few hours and I would be back in Canada. Leaving the U.S. of A. was with mixed feelings. It seemed that the mystery that I was pursing on this trip would be gone a bit. Now it was back to the Canadian West Coast and some long hard traveling ahead. I wished I could hop a freight train and just cruise all the way home, but I didn't think I figure that one out. Woody Guthrie would have done it.

It was great to be on the rolling sea between Port Angeles and Vancouver Island. The straits were very wide as we sailed into the sun beckoning the ship onwards towards the infinite. If we kept steering west and south we could make Hawaii in a week. Wouldn't that be nice? But, this ship was not going that way. Another time I would join the surfers there.

Went up on deck near the bow and through the white caps a school of dolphins were racing beside the ship, their backs glistening in the late afternoon sun.

They were fast and so beautiful. I felt like they were guiding me home, and they were. This was the first time I had seen dolphins, and to see them riding the waves just playing, sent a chill down my spine. It was like watching a herd of wild mustangs, all spirit, and unbridled power mixed with playfulness.

The trip across this watery expanse was symbolic to me but less understood. It was pleasant to not worry about safety for my personal well being for a few hours and let others do the navigating. I was in someone else's hands, like I was most of the time anyways. The dock in Victoria harbour had the instant flavour of Canadian(ness). People were polite and isolated in their own world without so much as looking at me.

Spent the night in a Youth Hostel for something like $5 bucks a night. Thought it would be good to sleep on a cot somewhere and make my plans for the next day. The place seemed to be full of foreign travelers, people from Britain, German and Holland and they all were traveling by train or plane and were traveling for a month or so, flying great distances to get to their next destination. I couldn't relate to them much ad I think I was one of the only hitchhikers staying overnight. The staff were nice to me and gave me a clean grey blanket and a pillow that I thought was awfully nice.

Even as a young kid when we would take a small trip in the brown Plymouth station wagon, I would look out the window with our dog Lady between my brother and me. I would daydream a little then quickly go to sleep resting on my dog's side. It was as if the motion would put me to sleep. Whenever I found a bed or a couch, I would be to sleep in a couple of minutes and sleep for ten hours straight or whenever we had to get up. In the Youth Hostel we had to be out by 9am. And they fed you a little granola or some porridge

It as Sunday morning I discovered and so I walked out into Victoria, a very British looking place. They even had some Union Jacks hanging from the flagpoles and very British looking pubs with Bangers and Beans all costing too much for my budget. Saw an Anglican Church and went in to the eleven am service. Sat at the back and went through the Eucharist. I went up to the front altar to partake of the bread and wine. This was a ritual I was so familiar with and it felt good to hear and recite the familiar prayers and responses. I remember saying a prayer for my Mother and Father, my Brother and a few friends. I thanked God for my safe passage so far and asked Him/Her (I wasn't convinced God was a Man, probably a combination of both) to watch over me the rest of this journey.

The Reverend at the end of the service asked the assembled to join them for tea and cookie after the service. I thought I would join them and see if there was any connection with anyone. I guess I looked a bit out of place here in my jeans, headband and knapsack."

I was politely ignored by almost everyone in their pressed white shirts and summer dresses with the children wearing bows in their hair and the young boys wearing smart black oxfords. The Minister said a few words to me. I mentioned that I was a Server at one time and asked if he had heard of or knew Bishop Reed?

"Yes, I have heard of him, but don't know him personally."

"I've been traveling through the States and just got back to Canada"."

"Oh, that's interesting," he said in the most uninteresting tone you can imagine.

I had the feeling that I was spoiling the image of his congregation where everyone should be scrubbed and polished clean, wearing the same tweed or flowery clothes and not say anything that might sound individual or radical. I felt that this was not a place I belonged and I wondered if I had any connection now to the Church I had grown up with?

Looked around the city that I found to be very sedate is the only word I can find, and stayed the night in the Youth Hostel again. Tomorrow I would take the Ferry over to Vancouver on the mainland. I had to reverse the saying I had kept in my head, "Go west young man, to Go East Young Man." I found it amusing and fortuitous that those two words East and Young were two out of the three words that made up my given name Pete Young Eastmure.