Read Online After River by Donna Milner - Free Book Online Page A

crisp, and clean. I have always loved the open sky of the Cariboo and Chilcotin plateaus, where it takes an honest day for the sun to pass from east to west. Such a contrast with Atwood.
    When I was growing up I paid little attention to the fact that the mountains dominated the landscape. I didn’t know anything else. I didn’t notice the absence of sky. Now I have to brace myself for the suffocating claustrophobia that grips me once I am in the shadows of those alpine slopes.
    The mountains, the sheer abundance of them, crowding and blocking the sun for a good portion of the day, can be overwhelming. Each time I return I feel hemmed in, smothered. When I lived there I hardly noticed when the sun disappeared prematurely behind the granite outcroppings and forest-covered hills, pulling its blanket of shadows behind. I gave no thought to the fact that to look at the horizon, I had to look up.
    The mountains that loomed over our farm were as familiar to me then as family. I knew their shapes, their locations, their size and elevations. I knew their names. Mostly thanks to Boyer.
    From as early as I can remember I rode his shoulders whenever he went hiking through the surrounding woods.
    â€˜I’m the queen of the mountain!’ I hollered from my perch one afternoon. A weak echo tried to reverberate across the slopes.
    â€˜Well, princess, maybe,’ Boyer laughed.
    He stopped to catch his breath on a mountaintop clearing. We sat side by side in the meadow grass and warmed ourselves in the sun as we gazed down at our farmhouse and the meandering patchwork of fields and pastures cut into the narrow valley below.
    Boyer pointed out landmarks and taught me how to orient myself by finding Robert’s Peak, which loomed over our farm. ‘On the other side of that mountain is the United States of America,’ he told me with a note of wonder in his voice. ‘Imagine, Natalie, a whole other country just miles away.’
    â€˜Is there a line?’ I asked.
    â€˜Line?’
    â€˜Like on the map?’
    â€˜No, it’s an imaginary line that divides us.’ He smiled.
    â€˜Are the people there different?’
    â€˜Well, there are certainly a lot more of them. But they’re pretty much the same. We’re fortunate to have them there,’ he added. ‘It’s kind of like living next door to a big brother.’
    â€˜Like you,’ I smiled.
    â€˜Something like that,’ he said and hugged me.
    Boyer showed me how to locate South Valley Road in the shadows of Gold Mountain and Robert’s Peak. Anyone turning off the main highway onto that winding dirt road was either lost, or coming to our farm. Or both.
    As Boyer pointed out the boundaries of our land he told about how our grandfather had arrived in the area after the first rush ofgold fever. ‘It didn’t take him long to realize that prospecting wasn’t for him,’ he said. ‘So he decided to make his living from the miners, instead of with them.’
    Our grandfather bought two Holstein cows and a bull. Then he began his return to what he knew best, dairy farming. He homesteaded the only usable acreage in the narrow valley south of town. He also laid claim to a good deal of the surrounding hillsides and forests. Four hundred acres of hill and dale, rock and dirt.
    â€˜More hill than dale, and more rock than dirt,’ I heard my father joke more than a few times.
    Even when I grew too heavy to ride on Boyer’s shoulders I tagged along with him whenever he went hiking. Morgan and Carl often joined us. He taught my brothers and me how to use the sun and the evening stars to guide ourselves home. ‘There’s no need to lose your way in these hills,’ Boyer assured us. ‘If you ever do, just climb higher until you can look down and see something familiar.’
    As Boyer shared his love of the forest he constantly reminded us of the hidden dangers in the mountains that toed into our