Landmarks confirm the direction home

An old trailer burned down in Bissett the other day. My sister posted a photo of the blaze on Facebook. Bissett is a small community, so the fire was the talk of the town, no doubt.

The trailer was easy to miss if you didn't know it was there. It was tucked behind a drift of trees, not far from Margot Bach's place, across from Vanson Road.

It was sad to hear an old Bissett landmark is gone, even if it was abandoned and falling apart.

The trailer was vacant for years; my sister remembered when Minnow Mike and his girlfriend, Gloria, lived there.

Gloria was my mom's friend and she would come over for coffee once in a while. Both Mike and Gloria moved away after their relationship soured and ended.

I remember the old trailer when it was Rene Laderoute's place.

Rene's place was on the edge of town, so I didn't get a good look at it until I started high school in Hollow Water First Nation.

School only went up to Grade 9 in Bissett, so continuing your education meant moving to Winnipeg or going to school on the rez.

This also meant a 30-minute drive on a gravel road, twice a day.

Back then, we were the only aboriginal family in town, so it was me and a few white kids who headed to school on the reserve. I found this kind of funny, like I was an imported Indian -- even though it was my grandma's reserve.

Every morning we would get a ride with Jack Thiessen, who worked at the school as a handyman.

Rene's Laderoute's young stepson moved in with him, along with his even-younger girlfriend, Angel.

Angel wanted to finish school, so we began stopping by Old Rene's trailer to pick her up.

She was very pretty, with long brown hair and big brown eyes. I'm pretty sure she was Métis. She seemed so grown-up and worldly.

Oh, to be as pretty as Angel.

I remember being impressed by the inside of Rene's trailer. It was the first time I'd seen a sunken living room and thick carpeting.

Both my parents worked, but we lived a very modest life at my great-grandpa's place, where we finally got cold running water in our kitchen, but still didn't have bathroom plumbing. Our floors were linoleum tiles and we had a wood stove to heat the house.

Angel got pregnant a few months later and quit school, so we stopped dropping by to pick her up. Not long after, she and her boyfriend moved back to Winnipeg.

People pass through your life all the time -- some at the pace of a snail and others like a flicker of lightning. Some friends whisk into your life and dance out again, weaving around you like a carousel.

But for a few years I would pass that place and think of that girl, as well as how beautiful I thought the trailer was.

I often thought to myself, wouldn't it be nice to live in a place like that? Over the years I'd seen the trailer slump with age, but I still remembered its former glory.

Like I said, it's hard for me to say goodbye to landmarks -- even when they're old and weathered.

Landmarks are important, no matter what their age or price tag. What could be a pile of rubble or rocks could hold meaning for someone else.

Landmarks have a special power; they help you get your bearings when you think you feel like you are getting a little lost among a sea of people.

They help you remember old memories, when you were young and had no idea what the world had in store for you.

Landmarks are proof you're headed in the right direction, and you've only got a bit of a ways to go until you are home again.

Colleen Simard is a Winnipeg writer.

colleen.simard@gmail.com

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition February 18, 2012 J11