This Is A Picture Frame

This is a picture frame. An empty picture frame to be exact. But it can't have always been a rotten old empty picture frame. Once upon a time it would have been a beautifully ornate carved wooden frame that wonderfully complimented the picture (or painting) held within. (And enjoy that, that's about as poetic as I get)

But that picture is long gone. Taken by the owners of the old house I found it in, torn out by previous explorers, burned, who knows. But what was it? It was right next to the front door of a house, so probably a beautiful image, or something that was very close to the people who lived there.  Maybe a family portrait, maybe a valuable painting.

There's no way of knowing, we can only imagine. We have a sign that it was there, but it's up to us to project our imaginings into it. I love to do that, it gives an idea of who you are, the people who hung up this picture frame become you.


I suppose that's why I love to explore abandoned places.

This is the view down main street in a small town called Rowley. Back in the day, Rowley was a mining town, home to some 500 people. Not much, but still, it's something.

Now there's 12 people. Most of the town has been torn down, either by farmers who want to expand their field or by nature. The 12 folks of Rowley love their town and go to great lengths to keep it looking nice. It's a bit of a tourist attraction now.

This is inside the house with the picture frame. It's small, there's a mud room, a kitchen, one bedroom, one bathroom, and a living room.

It looked like it was once a pretty house, well kept.

Now it's run down, it's tilted over to the point where you feel like you're on a ship on the ocean, and it smells like rot.

This house wasn't in Rowley. It's in a coulee a few kilometers south of Three Hills. It stands alone, tilted and rotting. By far one of the biggest ghost homes I've ever visited, there were two floors and four bedrooms. A large living room, kitchen, mud room, and cellar.

This house evidently belonged to a rich family; the house was built of BC cedar, and the newspapers that were lying about were dated to before there was a reliable way to get across the mountains beyond the rails. It would have cost an arm and a leg to get all that wood across the mountains, but this family did it.

Now it stands abandoned; the family left their remarkable home. Why? Did they, like many country dwellers, find a better job in the city? Did they own a large ranch, and at some point the new generation decided they wanted something else? Or did they come to try their luck at the riches of Alberta, only to fail, returning to wherever they came from?

We know why Rowley was abandoned; it was a Coal town. When the world shifted over to oil, Rowley's economy failed and everyone left. Simple as that. There was nothing else in the town, and so it failed.

They say to learn from history or find yourself repeating it, and sometimes I worry that we are repeating it. We are building our Rowleys (Fort McMurray, I'm looking at you), our large estates, our pillars of strength as a society. When the world changes, and it will, what will happen to these places and things? Once they have been abandoned, will our pillars of strength remain? Or will they become pillars of foolishness to our descendants?

What will they project into our empty picture frame?

Insights Into the Life of a Pilot

So I'm sitting at the Calgary Flying Club; I had to fly one of our planes down to Springbank airport for an inspection, and I'll be flying it back to Three Hills once the inspection is done.

That gives me three hours (ish) to relax and wait for the plane. The problem, is that the weather is deteriorating. The wind has picked up, and there is a storm building to the west, headed right for us.

We make plans, but God doesn't always agree with them.

Days like this are stressful, I have to figure out a lot of things on the fly (no pun intended). Hopefully the weather will improve and I will be able to fly out, I might have to dodge around some storms, but that's not too difficult. On the other hand, if the wind is too strong, I won't be able to safely take-off. Or worse, land.

There is no easy answer to what I'm going to do. For now, I can just sit tight and wait to see what the weather looks like when the inspection is done, but if the weather is still questionable, then what? Where do I draw the line for acceptable risk with the weather? I have to take into account my skill, the performance of the aircraft, and the likelyhood that it will get worse after I take off.

What's more, how long do I wait to see if it'll clear? The aircraft isn't certified for night flight, and I'm not current, so I have to make it home before dark. But it still takes a bit of time to fly out there, and I need to give myself extra time for contingencies since the weather is interesting.

And what do I do if I decide that the weather isn't good enough? I have to call someone to drive down here (one hour each way) and pick me up, which doesn't sound pleasant. Hey man, can you drive for two full hours to pick me up despite your busy schedule? Thanks! And even then, now I have to get back to Springbank to get the plane. So I could spend the night at a cheap motel, but in Calgary, cheap is a relative term, and still pretty expensive. Also, there doesn't seem to be any motels around the airport, so how am I going to get to one without spending more money on a taxi or a rental car?

So yeah, that's a small insight into my life as a pilot, and I want to remind you that these questions don't go away when you get into the big leagues, so next time your pilot delays the flight for weather, don't get mad at him, he wants to fly just as bad as you do, and he spent a lot of time thinking about his decision.


Update: I made it home on time, though I had to divert around this storm system (the weather guy called it a Super Cell!), making my flight considerably longer.