Ipperwash

July 8, 2019

Greetings from the gift returned,

We would drive along a windy road that mimicked the coast, crammed into a Buick Vista Cruiser, a half dozen humans of various ages, our tent, the camping things we would need except for the things we forgot.  We had crossed the Blue Water bridge into Ontario, bending the truth about my Dad’s place of birth, and then amid arguing and poking in the Way Back, we made our way to Ipperwash.

The dusty drive into the campground took us past the camp store, where we knew if we asked often enough, we would be allowed to buy candy.  We would creep between the other campers wedged into each lot until we found our place, marked by a wooden post with a number carved in its face.  And then we would disgorge from the Vista Cruiser and change the place into something that looked like a refugee camp, which in a real sense it was.  Our home for the week.

The shore was shaped by a perfect beach that stretched for miles.  We roamed up and down that coast, picking up shells and pieces of wood, and dug in the sand and watched the water pool.  There was a place where a channel was cut, and a small peninsula of stone jutted into the lake, pointing back at the country where we came from.  We would explore among these huge flat rocks, playing in the tidepools, finding small living things.  There were people who would come to lift the rocks and scrape the perfect clay from underneath and create art on the stone.

My Dad’s family would join us sometimes.  They came from the north of Scotland, a place of cold and damp, of bleak and harsh.  To them, this simple place was like the French Riviera. They would lie on the beach and play in the water until they were scoured by the sun into various shades of pink and red and brown.  Their laughter was the most robust in camp, and everywhere you could hear their thick brogue calling to each other.

My sisters and I would roam the tents and small trailers looking for new friends, run in the sand, play along the beach.  Creating castles, or holes, or burying each other up to our necks in the warm soft sand, as fine as powder.  We could swim out into the water and find a sand bar where it was so shallow we could play on our knees sometimes.  There was a pontoon boat that plied the coast called the Good Ship Lollypop, a floating party shop, and if the stars aligned, we could take the colorful foreign currency with us to the shallow and buy popsicles.  We could stand in the water and turn our faces orange or blue as the boat chugged off, the tinny sound of its theme song playing over cheap loudspeakers.

Just beyond the border of the campground there was hundreds of acres of sand dunes.  There was a fence, a pitiful affair that any ten-year-old could foil, strung with warning signs that this was a Royal Canadian Army camp, and there was a risk of live ammunition there.  To a small boy these were more invitation than caution

We explored the dunes, finding all manner of things, including spent shell casings.  The dunes came to the shore in a dramatic bluff where the bravest of us would run and leap from, landing in the soft sand below.  The beach here was wide enough and firm enough that cars could drive along near the water.  People would carve art into the face of the dunes.  Sometimes there was bonfires built there, and teenagers would gather and sing and do whatever teenagers do.  Once in a while the local police, or the soldiers from the camp, would come along and gently remind us of the warnings on the fence.

When the campground didn’t hold our attention, we drove a few miles down the coast to the little tourist town of Grand Bend.  We had to put on sandals and shirts, so there was chafing of all sorts, but we knew the rewards if we behaved.   We would walk along the sidewalk, crowded with other sunburned visitors, and wander into gift shops and admire moccasins and t-shirts and tourist trinkets. There was a block of arcade games, and a section of small carnival rides.  We would get fish and chips wrapped in greasy newspapers and put vinegar on our French fries.  We ate cotton candy and taffy and ice cream.  On the way back to camp we would stop at the ‘package store’, the only place where you could get beer and spirits.

We played and explored and ate and slept and did it again until we were brown everywhere and everything had sand in it.  The tent swelled and emptied, and the family buzzed and whirled and soaked in the place.  For the children it was timeless, limitless place of fun.  For the parents it was simple refuge from the daily grind, and the sharp shapes of the city.  A beautiful, natural wonder, a pairing of water and earth that refreshed the soul.  These were our memories of our Ipperwash.  What we didn’t know was whose memories were already there, surrounding us.

Three decades before the Canadian government had taken this section of land from a First Nations tribe of Chippewas, a people who had lived there since before the British Crown.  Families were moved out, and with some promise that the land would be returned one day.  Ipperwash campground, and the Canadian Army base we played in, had always existed, as far as we knew.  But there were generations of people who had been there before us, who stood in the shadows waiting.

Almost three decades after our time there, they decided they were finished waiting.  A group of protestors occupied Ipperwash, and eventually, after a violent confrontation, the Canadian Royal Army left.  In time, nearly another three decades, the land is finally in the hands of those who first claimed it as home.

When I was grown, I drove by the place, not long after the occupation.  I was shocked and saddened that our little resort had been taken away.  All I could see was our little snapshot of time had been spoiled.  The training camp was littered with burned out cars and old snowmobiles, the buildings covered in protestor’s graffiti.  I shared the story with my family and we all tisk-tisked and life went on.

I see now how lucky we had been to have been guests, unwanted or not, in that beautiful place.  I know now that the dunes we played in were important burial grounds, that the places we lounged and ate and ran and played were once someone else’s back yard.  We were only there by the grace of good timing between injustice and justice.  I don’t feel guilt in that, I think we were innocent spectators, but at least with this perspective I have a new respect for our page in this chapter.

I don’t feel a shadow on those childhood memories, those were wonderful times for our family.  I am grateful for our chance to have been there, and to now know the story of Ipperwash.  Reminds me of how fleeting our own history is among humanity’s history, no matter whose tribe you point to.   It makes me aware of the same kind of stories that exist all over our globe.  Makes me a better visitor, no matter where I explore and play.

Hope this finds you knowing where you are,

David

Copyright © 2019 David Smith