EPISODE 262 THE YEAR 1956 WHEN WE WERE YOUNG AND OWNED THE WORLD AROUND US
alan skeoch
Feb. 2021
Ah! Wonderful! When we were young and anxiously awaited the March Break to go camping
on the banks of Etobicoke Creek…a wasteland of mysteriously abandoned farms with empty barns
and brick farm houses . Nobody around. As if some mysterious disease had wiped out all living
things … a plague … a pandemic. And we arrived free of any contagion to document this empty
land.
Russ Vanstone, Eric Skeoch and me. Just three of us on this venture. We got to the “Land Where
Nobody Lives Anymore” by hitchhiking and public bus from West Toronto. Packed for three or four
days. Sleeping bags, food, camera and bits and pieces of winter clothing that we hoped would
be unnecessary.
The dead horse had floated down near out campsite as if to confirm the mysterious plague…pandemic…imaginary
interpretation as to why the land was empty. Corpse still frozen. No smell. The only smells were those
of the land getting ready for spring…a damp, coming alive, kind of smell. Lots of wood on the creek
banks for our campfire. Great slabs of fossilized shale…Ordovician, 500 million years old with tiny whitish
things that once were alive. Those slabs were beds for us. Not sure if we had air mattresses.
I wonder if the future explorers on Mars will have the same feeling we did.
Endless adventure ahead.
YEAR 1956: THREE ADVENTURERS ON THE EMPTY LAND CALLED ETOBICOKE…RIGHT TO LEFT…RUSS VANSTONE,
ERIC SKEOCH, ALAN SKEOCH
YEAR 2021: I NEVER GO BACK TO ETOBICOKE, ESPECIALLY NOT TO ETOBICOKE CREEK. THERE IS NO WILDERNESS
LEFT. THAT ENDED WHEN THE SOMMERVILLE BLACKSMITH SHOP WAS DEMOLISHED AND THE BULL DOZERS MOVED
NORTH FROM DUNDAS TO BURNHAMTHORPE ROAD. I NEVER GO BACK THERE. I LIKE TO KEEP MY IMAGINARY WORLD INTACT.
alan skeoch
Feb. 2021