Teaching at Minus Fifty - Part Six

I won't provide many details but it has been a very difficult week here in Salluit.  Lots of issues, lots of sadness, lots to think about, perhaps too much.

Then a colleague said let's do something different and we did. As a friend and colleague said later, “We needed this."

We went to what is referred to locally as the Airport Lake and I have to tell you no photograph could do it justice. It is simply not just a place, it is a place where glaciers "just" receded 5000 years ago. Where evidence of that movement and change are everywhere to be found. Where if you make even a modicum of effort you can find the oldest rocks on Earth - billions of years of history. Where you can watch your wife and child engage with local people, who are nothing but the warmest caring and sharing people you could possibly imagine. Where you can pick blueberries and cranberries and another berry whose name escapes me at the moment. Where you can find the remnants of a caribou and with appropriate guidance bring it home to draw for maybe the next year.

Do I sound out of breath? If I do it is because I am. Not from the effort of the walking about that I did. No, not that - it is from how loud my heart is beating. The experience was exhausting but in the most marvelous, awe inspiring way. I'd be lying if I said I can wait until the next time - how about tomorrow? <3