Wondrous Ways

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By Dana Ramstedt

 

As I travelled on my way from Vancouver to somewhere fun, somewhere else, Kamloops was just a place beside a stretch of highway. In my late teens, all I saw was a dry desert landscape: too hot and too windy.

 

I ventured into the town below the highway, but only once. The myriad of interchanges led me in directions unplanned and I was soon completely lost. No Google Maps in those days. Even so, I dreamed a little of living along the river where the mountains looked as if someone had used a butter knife to carve long benches into the hillside. Time had eroded the land and created gently sloping pastures that flowed downward and toward the river’s shore.

 

Thirty years later. Who could believe so much time had passed?

 

I was older and my life and health had changed. Twenty years in the child care field and living with fibromyalgia; I was worn out. My disability exaggerated my limitations: my body ached, my memory was nearly nil. Still, I struggled to adapt. I needed some time to recharge. And then, out of the blue, my hubby decided we would sell our land in Langley and move away from the coastal craziness.

 

I was shocked. No, more like horrified.

 

“Move from my stomping grounds?” I objected. “To a desert in the middle of nowhere? Away from my friends. And my doctor. There is a doctor shortage you know. I’ll never find a doctor again.” He just shrugged his shoulders.

 

“Closer to your Mom in 100 Mile House and your sister in Cranbrook,” he countered.

 

“My critique group…,” I complained. My arguments failed. It was no good. My protests were ignored. We were moving. The search was on…

 

Eventually, I accepted my fate. After all, I could email, text and even Skype if need-be.

 

He put ads in all the B.C. newspapers announcing our criteria. We wanted highway frontage and at least ten acres with a view. We were on a mission—sell our five acres—and move.

 

As we searched the listings, the results were the same for Kelowna, Salmon Arm and points north and east. To find acreage in our budget, we would have to go into the hills. That was not acceptable but after a year of scrambling around the Russian Olive trees and the sage brush, we were exhausted and reeling in shock at some of the rules the house builders had ignored. Ultimately, we decided, to achieve our goal we had to find bare land and build our house. It was then he got the call from a man who was selling a recently sub-divided property.

 

It sounded too good to be true, but we took the chance and drove the four hours on the Coquihalla Highway and then thirty minutes east of Kamloops. When the map verified we were nearly at our destination, I was nineteen again. To either side of the highway, were those plateaus that turned to fields and then to river shore.

 

When we parked along the driveway, noisy with cricket song, I stared in awe. Before me was the vista I’d seen so long ago but I had given up hope that I might one day live there. From the plateau where I stood, the land flowed downward to a field of lush green grass, the highway and the train tracks. Dividing us from the other shore, the South Thompson river sparkled as it flowed by. The men talked but I heard none of their conversation.

 

Five months after signing the purchase agreement. As I packed, I did so knowing that I would have to find a job once we got settled. I dreaded the thought. With the fibromyalgia firing off at painful intervals, I didn’t know how long I’d be able to drive the half hour plus to Kamloops for work. After endless hours of packing up our house and farm, and driving nearly every weekend through increasingly worsening winter weather, on December first, we handed over our keys to the Langley house.

 

Then, I found the lump.

 

As a last gasp to keep me whole—I guess—my body formed a layer of inflammation around a growth in my breast. Purely by accident—in a way most rare—as cancer doesn’t hurt, the mass hurt when I bumped it. That was in February. In March, I saw my doctor. In April, the biopsy was done and by June, I was on chemotherapy.

 

“Why this crazy rush?” I asked my oncologist.

 

“Cancer goes to the head of the list,” he said. I sent up a silent prayer.

 

If we still lived on the coast, I am certain I would have waited a very long time for a diagnosis. I might not even be here today. Every professional I met in Kamloops, from the doctors to the Cancer Society staff, were incredibly kind and helpful. I felt truly blessed.

 

The next eighteen months were very rough, but Kamloops was my saving grace. The twenty acres we had purchased became the balm for my wounded soul. With my hubby’s unwavering support, I endured. We built our house, started that new business, furnished my office, and I gathered strength.

 

As I trudged through the chemo fog, I felt my spirits lift, and I breathed. One year in and I was still unable to drive, unable to process instructions and in various states of stress, pain, and distress, I felt lost. I know the Lord works in mysterious ways; He certainly did for me.

 

One afternoon, feeling defeated, I sat in a lawn chair under a wide umbrella. As I studied the view before me, a peace came over me and remembered me; the woman I was before exhaustion and fog had shrouded my optimism. The road ahead was still untravelled and I counted my blessings: I am a writer, I can write from anywhere and with a click on the keyboard, I can send my work around the world.

 

The side-effects of fibromyalgia, and the chemo and radiation changed aspects of my life. To some, my experience might not seem a blessing but the whole ordeal, wrapped up in our adventure, helped me recognize new strengths.

 

Now ten years in remission, I feel renewed.

 

Kamloops and the incredibly kind and friendly people I met, made me welcome. The desert sun, the wind-swept fields, and landscapes like nowhere else in the world are my new home. And those slowly sloughing mountains that erode to become fields that extend to the shoreline of the South Thompson River? Well, that dream is fulfilled. I happily live and work there, now.

 

On those clear nights when the train rumbles by and sounds its passing, I smile. I hug the eerie silence that follows. The land, the heat, the snow and the train are such a part of my life, I miss them when I’m away.

 

Thank you, Kamloops.

 

Thank you, Lord.

 

Thank you.