How Different Things Were Then
I write this on Christmas day, 2023.
I moved to the island ( in a converted school bus) in October of ’95.
I know I sound like an old man, which I am becoming, but things really were different back then.
When I first moved here to the island, there was no internet. There were no cell phones. There were either land lines or pay phones on outside walls everywhere.
Since we were on the Canadian border, there was mostly Canadian TV, Canadian radio, and lots of Canadians.
There were no sidewalks, and many roads were still gravel. We had many, many more parking spaces available in town, and far less tourists. This place was really fun. I have told folks it was like- burned out hippie meets fisherman-logger- type people.
It took a lot of work to get in trouble with the Cops back then.
Cops were known to give drunks a ride home.
I remember, at “The Great Equalizer” ( Laundromat) I did my laundry right next to a County Sheriff.
There was a fair amount of nakedness. It was pretty discrete and a lot of fun.
There were only a few places you could get a shower on the island. Such resources were coveted, because people lived in shacks, tipis, old trailers, yurts, and big vans. Lots of rough living.
Everybody had an outhouse.
Everybody had a dog and a boat.
There was no Amazon.
There were no delivery services.
If you needed boots, it was a trip to the mainland. We fixed our own cars and trucks.
The island had more artists in one place than I had ever seen. Clay sculptors, painters, wood carvers, musicians, actors, and martial artists.
Everywhere there was home-made music. I had brought one crappy old guitar with me, but within a few years I had far better skills and a bunch of guitars, ukulele’s and harmonicas.
There were campfire music jams everywhere. Most of it was pretty crappy, but a bunch of fun.
It was magical.
-To be continued.
-John Titus
Those were the days, my friends