The Tale of Dale and Paul The Not So Small

This is not a Rant and this is not a Rave, what this is is an Amazement, as in it's absolutely amazing that I don't have a split personality.

You see, when I was nine I went to live with my dad in a place called Merville, a few miles north of Courtenay, on Vancouver Island. Now Merville is a place renowned for its hippies (and a few rednecks too) and after my parents' divorce my dad had moved there and fully embraced the whole hippy thing, right down to the long hair and gruffy beard. So for the next few years I found myself surrounded by all sorts of interesting hippy types... and activities. There were, of course, the nude sketch drawing classes (which I famously modeled for in my underwear, too embarrassed to go fully nude like everyone else), the tarot cards, the sweet smell of pot in the air at all the parties, and lots of great laid-back music playing at all times.

This Hippy Life was not a problem, as hippies are, generally speaking, quite warm, gentle and friendly people. You know what I mean, man. The problem came about when Dad brought some of his old life, his very old life, back into our happy hippy present. That old life came by the name of Dale, an old buddy from UBC who had been a member of Young Life, a Christian youth movement, which my mom and dad had also been active in during the 60s. (And let's not ponder too long here on the sadness of my parents' misspent youth, attending Christian youth group meetings while the rest of their generation smoked a few joints and partied to the music of the Stones, Beatles, Who, Kinks, James Brown, Sly and The Family Stone, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, etc., etc.).

Now Dale, who had not changed much in the ensuing years and had most certainly not embraced any sort of hippy lifestyle or any sort of post-50s mentality whatsoever, really had what could only be described as Pure Anti-Hippy Energy. Think Darth Vader or a U.S. Marine drill sergeant. He lived down in Victoria.

Then there were the other old UBC Young Life buddies who we'd visit up in Campbell River, who, as I can still remember quite vividly, made me go to bed at the unfathomably-early hour of 7PM while out camping with them one time mid-summer - when the sun didn't set until about 10 PM. I was 12 years old! And there were other encounters with these Unbelievably Uptight Ghosts of Young Life Past, but I'm not going to mention them all here.

Now, for some people being around these former Young Life buddies wouldn't seem all that weird at all, but that would be because they were used to being around that sort of intensely uptight, stern, Calvinist, Protestant energy. Me, well I was used to the hippies. I mean, this was traumatic stuff, suddenly being taken from my nice peaceful happy laid-back hippy existence and inexplicably thrust into the presence of the Dark Side, all so my hippy dad could catch up on old times with some buddies who were still literally living in the Old Times. It definitely didn't help that the Energy of Dale was so similar to the energy of The Despicables (an evil aunt and uncle I had to stay with for a time when I was 7 years old), but that's a whole other story.

Anyhow, into all of this walked Paul K., preceded by his giant hard-on. But, don't worry, this isn't a sinister tale of child sexual exploitation. No, Paul K. was the fully self-confident epitome of Hippidom. And he was really well - I don't want to say endowed - versed in the hippy-doesn't-care attitude. He lived on the Hippy Colony of Cortez Island, but even there he stood out for his full embrace of the whole hippy sensibility. This is a guy from New York City who chose to live on remote, isolated, one-store Cortez Island - you gotta believe he was embracing the lifestyle!

Ok, so there I was sitting in this sauna on Cortez Island together with my dad and my younger brother and sister, both of whom were out on a visit from Toronto where they lived with my mom, when in walks Paul K. fully nude, as any self-respecting hippy would be in such a place, with his fully erect manliness leading the way. It wasn't directed at anyone in particular, it was just, you know, along for the ride, or at least for the sauna. Now, as all men know, sometimes you get a hard-on for no logical reason, the worst case scenario being during class back in junior high school when the teacher would ask you to stand up and come to the front of the room. Of course most men simply hide somewhere until the embarrassing member has calmed itself back down again, but not Paul K. What do you think he was, an investment banker or something?

Ok, I know what you're thinking, this Paul K. guy had a hard-on because he was all excited to be taking a sauna with 3 kids, or perhaps it was my dad that you believe he was stimulated by, but, come on, admit it, that's simply your anti-hippy bias talking. I mean, we're talking about a totally innocent hard-on here. I only mention it for one reason: Contrast. There I was living my fully tranquil hippy childhood - well, besides when the redneck kids would call me "Hippy!!" and steal my hat on the school bus, or when my friend was banned from visiting our house because his intensely uptight father, not realizing the 70s had arrived about 9 years earlier, smelled pot when he picked him up one day (we had been playing ball hockey in the basement while my dad and friends were having a little party upstairs). Ok, so there I was living my ALMOST-idyllic hippy childhood, complete with Paul K. and his giant erect phallus, when my dad inexplicably and suddenly chose to expose me to the nasty and damaging energy of the Dark Side (a.k.a. Non-Reformed Young Life Deviants). And all I've got to say about that is that it's amazing that I survived intact.

I mean, it was one thing to go from granola and Shredded Wheat for breakfast in Merville every morning to marshmallow, chocolate and lemon spread, fruit loops and pop tarts for breakfast whenever we visited my dad's brother over in Vancouver, but to take a kid from a safe, happy, idyllic existence and then suddenly expose him to the Dark Side completely unexpectedly at random times throughout the year, well that's simply unforgivable if you ask me.

But, luckily, having grown up hippy and all - at least for a few years there - I've found it in my heart to forgive.

Mike Cowie
Monday, February 12th, 2007