BY ANNA MAXYMIW
“DHC-2 Beavers stopped being produced in 1967, you know,” the pilot tells me with a shit-wild grin. I can’t see his eyes behind his huge sunglasses, but I know that he’s hungover from the way he speaks, and the way he slings himself into the front seat of the plane. By that logic, the de Havilland floatplane I’m currently sitting in is just about 50 years old, and it looks like it—worn brown leather seats, ancient controls, a smeared windshield.
I clench, immediately regretting all the decisions I had made that led me to this point. Deciding to spend a summer in remote Northern Canada was all well and good when I was still back home in Toronto in the big city, but now that I’m here, sitting on the very moment when we’ll start to move from what others call “civilization” into the true wilderness, I start to panic. Nothing about this— the pilot, the plane, my surroundings—is reassuring. This is what happens when city girls dream of a summer away in the big wilderness, a summer away from the internet and transit and trips to the grocery store. Why did I do this? Even now, sitting here, buckled in and about to take off, I’m not sure. I don’t quite know. I feel my thighs start to sweat, my skin sticking to the plane seat and the skin of the two girls who are wedged in on either side of me.
“If you need to puke,” he continues, “there are barf bags in the backs of the seats in front of you.” When I reach into the pockets he’s referring to, I pull out flimsy plastic shopping bags, which are full of holes. Behind me, the plane reverberates with a dull thunk as the airbase staff members throw my duffel bag into the boot, slamming the door. My palms are damp and my mouth is dry; I try not to move my hands around too much, because then the others might notice that I’m shaking. It’s not too late, I tell myself, to get the hell out of here. It’s not too late to unbuckle my seatbelt and wriggle out from between this sweaty female flesh, climb over thighs and torsos and fling myself out of the plane and back onto dry land. I could tear my duffel bag out of the back. I could leave and spend my summer in a safer place, where I won’t run into black bears, where I won’t have to spend eight weeks cleaning up after middle-aged men, where I can step outside and blackflies won’t gather on my eyebrows and temples. It would be the easy choice, because nothing about where I’m about to go is going to be easy, and I know that, and I’m scared.
And then the propeller starts with a thunderous moan, and I jump. The sound fills the tiny plane body, suddenly all-consuming; it vibrates into my bones, all the way up to my teeth, the purr of a huge, rusty cat; it crowds me so much that all of a sudden there isn’t space for doubt. There’s only space for momentum, for self-preservation, so I quickly pull the padded headset over my ears, make sure my seatbelt is still buckled, and curl my fingers under the lip of the seat. Think about what I’m about to fly into, what lies ahead. There’s nowhere to go but forward, I tell myself. There’s nothing to do but take off.
Three other planes had already headed up before us, carrying cargo and the rest of my coworkers. We are the last to be delivered of 13 young adults—from different towns all around the province, mostly strangers to one another, all of us running on empty stomachs and a bad night’s sleep at the airbase’s piece-of-shit bunkhouse—about to spend 67 days together working at a fishing lodge in the remote Northern Ontario bush.
—
Northern Canada: “The land of little sticks.” It’s a part of the country that evokes divisive emotions in those who have seen it or live on it—or have tried to live on it—and now it’s going to be my home for the summer. “The earth’s evergreen crown,” according to Canadian ecologist J. David Henry. “The land that god gave Cain,” Samuel de Champlain, explorer and founder of New France, wrote back to his king when describing the northern forests of Quebec. In fact, Northern Canada was deemed so worthless that in 1670 Britain’s King Charles II just gave the land away—7.7 million square kilometres of it—to the Hudson’s Bay Company, which, it might be said, turned a good profit off of it. And so Northern Canada, this mythological tangle of granite, black spruce, and ghost stories, is known as many things: the bush, the North, a wasteland, a place of infinite and strange beauty.
You can’t drive to where we are going. Apparently, roads end as if you’re about to go off the end of the Earth. Apparently, the snarl of trees and water stops you in your tracks. Kesagami Wilderness Lodge sits just 100 kilometres south of James Bay, near the Quebec border. It’s right in the middle of Kesagami Provincial Park, on the eastern side of Lake Kesagami—a big body of water, about 32 kilometres long and 12 kilometres at its widest, with about 290 kilometres of shoreline, which means many pockets of weeds and lots of gorgeous sand spits: Kesagami means “big water” in Cree, and the name is fitting. Big water, big land, big fish, big possibility.
Our plane suddenly lurches alive. I grab my elbows and brace my body as the Beaver’s prop revs up to full tilt, and the plane fills with a roar that makes it immediately impossible to yell at one another, let alone talk. We jerk forward, and then turn, heading toward the end of the lake, readying for take off. I’d ask the pilot a million questions—about safety, about speed, about how long he has to decide when to lift the plane up into flight before running out of lake—but no one could hear me even if I screamed. I can’t even close my eyes as we accelerate, faster and faster, the pontoons carving out a wake, and then we are hovering over the surface of the water, dragging out a spray, before the whole machine scuds inelegantly up, up, up, and we’re in the air, and there’s no turning back.
At first, I close my eyes and try not to think about the many small-plane crashes I’ve read about in the news. My ears pop and my palms sweat, and I sit as ramrod straight as I can, trying not to give in to the curiosity. But as we climb higher and higher, I couldn’t help myself. I open one eye, then the other, turn my head to peep out the window over someone else’s shoulder, and I am already blown away. Just a few minutes into the flight and we are already coming up to the boundary of where the Canadian wild really, truly begins. There aren’t words to describe the vastness of the land below us—the green depths of the forest that stretches farther than the horizon, the occasional ribbon of brown where a long-forgotten logging road braids through the wilderness. This is officially Northern Ontario, and the sight of it makes me feel as if all of the air has been struck out of my lungs.
The plane tilts to one side, putting the windows into a direct angle with the morning sun. An overpowering light slants through the smeary windshield and laces into our hair and across our faces. The sun creates a circuit: it prisms across the clean sky, scatters across the bodies of water below us, and then bounces up into our plane, filling it and filling us, and all of a sudden our palms and eyes are saturated with what feels and looks like glitter. Every surface of every lake is lit up, everything gold, almost painfully gold, and it seems as if we’re flying into the sun and beyond.
As we go farther north, the forest dimples and tatters, and the trees start to give way to swampy ground, a terrain I’ve never seen before: lime-green and brown and gnarled, braided with intricate, myriad bodies of water; hundreds and hundreds of lakes, lakes of varying sizes, lakes I never knew existed. These are the Hudson Bay Lowlands, a geological region defined by peat bog and wide, slow-moving rivers; an area formed by the ebb and flow of ancient seas and the rise and fall of ancient mountains; a place so uninhabitable that not all of the Lowlands have been totally explored. Who knows what lives below our pontoons? I feel that we’re tracing the footsteps of giants, travelling back in time. It feels silly to even think, let alone say out loud, and I’m glad that the prop rumble is so loud that I wouldn’t be able to voice my thoughts even if I wanted to. But I have a feeling, deep in the untapped part of me, that the forests below us hold secrets that not even the most experienced of us can manage to whisper. That monsters and gods exist below the wings. That agreeing to work at this lodge is the smartest or stupidest thing I’ve ever done.
As the plane nears our destination, my coworker-to-be Megan presses her face to the window, and I follow suit, slotting my damp torso against hers. If she minds, she doesn’t say anything. Something about a fist-clenched plane ride and being in close quarters has immediately set us at ease; our bodies are already comfortable around each other, even if our minds haven’t caught up yet. Below us, the colours of the land expand into mottled, rich browns and taupes, rust reds and middling greens. The earth has plaited itself into the water, and even in places where it looks like soil, I somehow instinctively know that there is water there, too, lurking below the surface. The lakes that looked like footsteps have now given way to footstep greenery, the land no longer the dominant force at work below us.
A saucer of thick water appears on the horizon. It expands in the windshield of the plane, broadening like a swath of brown velvet unfolded. My heart thumps. The lake grows and grows in front of us as we get closer and closer, and the sun hits its surface, the morning light dancing up in hues of black and silver and white and brown. And then the plane is tilting down, down, down, and I watch as we hover over the water for what seems like minutes, and then there is a great wake, a lurch and a hum, the propeller slowing its drumbeat as the plane sputters up to the dock, my pulse taking over. The smell of not-city forces its way past the windows and into the plane, curling its hands around our necks and stroking our lips with its fingers—it’s the smell of diesel, and algae, and lake water, and something else, something that I can’t put words to and something I don’t understand.
We pull up to the dock, fall out of the plane to lots of laughter. I can see figures on the shore that I don’t recognize, hear a chorus of male snickering. The light is too bright, the interlock dock beneath me too wavy, and I feel like an animal in a zoo. I squint and look up at the silhouettes: the sun’s so strong that I can’t see anyone’s faces, only the outlines of their ears and jaws and ballcaps. As I stare, one of the figures tilts a head. Charlie, the lodge manager, walks toward us, saluting us, chores already on his lips. We’re here.
“你知道，DHC-2比弗斯飛機從1967年後就不生產了，”飛行員咧嘴大笑著說。我看不清他巨大太陽鏡後的眼睛，但能從他說話的語氣、滑向駕駛座的樣子感覺出他昨晚喝多了。照這麼說，我們乘坐的這架 de Havilland 滑翔機已經快50歲了。破舊的棕色皮座，上古的操作器，以及被塗抹的擋風玻璃——看起來也是有這個年頭了。
我攥緊了拳頭，當即後悔起來，後悔所有致我走到如今這步的決定。還在大城市多倫多的家中時，這個 “來偏遠的加拿大北部度過夏天” 的決定看起來沒什麼問題，但現在，將要啟程從 “文明世界” 前往荒野的這個當下，我開始慌了。飛行員、飛機、周圍的物事——沒有一件令人安心。這就是當一個城市女孩做戶外夢時發生的事，夢想在野外度過一個沒有互聯網、沒有交通、不用去食雜店的夏天。我為什麼要這麼做？哪怕現在，坐在這兒，系好了安全帶，馬上就要起飛了，我還是不確定，不明白。大腿開始出汗，我感覺皮膚黏在座椅和後來塞進來的兩個坐在我兩側的女孩皮膚上。
“如果你要吐，”他接著說，“前排座椅後背有嘔吐袋。”我伸手去拿他說的袋子，只翻出薄薄的透明塑料購物袋，全是洞。身後，地勤人員把我的登山包扔進機艙，甩上門，飛機發出沈悶巨大的回響。我的掌心微濕，嘴唇幹燥；為了不被其他人看出自己在發抖，我試著不讓自己的手亂動。還不晚，我對自己說，還來得及逃離這個鬼地方；還來得及解開安全帶，從身邊汗濕的女性身體旁擠出去，爬過大腿和軀幹，把自己扔出這架飛機，回到地面。我可以把背包拽出來，我可以離開，我可以在一個安全的地方度過這個夏天，在一個沒有黑熊、不用跟在中年人後面打掃衛生、出門眉毛和太陽穴不會爬滿黑蠅的地方度過這八周。這才是舒適的選擇，因為我知道自己將要去的那個地方，沒有舒適，而我很害怕。
隨著螺旋槳發出雷鳴般的吼聲，我跳了起來。聲浪充滿小小的機艙，突然之間變得強烈，像一只巨大的、生銹的貓的呼嚕聲，我的骨骼、我的全身都和它一起震動；這聲音將疑慮擠出我的身體，只剩下沖勁和自我保護，於是我迅速地戴上頭戴耳機，確保自己的安全帶系好了，手指扣住座椅的邊緣。想著我即將飛去的地方，那裏會有什麼。我告訴自己，除了前進別無他處，除了出發別無他法。
其他三架飛機，載著貨物和其他同事早已出發。十三名來自全省各地的年輕人中，我們是最後被送過去的，彼此還是陌生人。前夜，所有人在機場糟糕的工人宿舍將就睡了一晚，現在又餓著肚子上飛機，並將在北安大略省的偏僻野外，一間垂釣民宿一起工作67天。
加拿大北部：“小樹林之地。”它是這個國家中特別的一部分，能激發出曾見過這片土地的、想在或已經在此居住的人心中不同的情感。而現在，這裏將成為我今夏的家。加拿大生態學家 J. David Henry 稱之為“地球的常青之冠。” “上帝賜給該隱的土地。”新法蘭西的發現者與創立者 Samuel de Champlain 在給國王的回信中這樣描述這片魁北克北部的森林。事實上，加拿大北部地區曾被判作毫無價值，1670年大不列顛國王理查二世就把770萬平方公裏的土地送給了 Hudson’ Bay 公司，而後者，可以說靠這塊地大掙了一筆。從此，北加拿大，這片混雜了花崗巖、黑雲杉、鬼故事的神秘土地，也有了很多代名詞：草叢、北疆、廢土、無限與奇美之域。
我們無法驅車到達目的地，道路終止了，看起來好似要走到世界盡頭一般。樹林和激流咆哮著阻斷前行的道路。Kesagami 野生園區坐落在詹姆斯灣以南100公裏的地方，靠近魁北克邊界。它在Kesagami省公園的正中央，Kesagami 湖的東邊。Kesagam i湖是一片大約32公裏長，最寬處達12公裏的水域，水岸線有290公裏長——這意味著大量的野草和美麗的沙灘。Kesagami 在克裏語中是“大水”的意思，這個名字恰如其分：大水，大地，大魚，大可能性。
機身突然開始傾斜，螺旋槳轉到全速，我抓緊肘彎，抱住自己的身體。飛機發出巨響，此刻甚至聽不見彼此之間的嘶喊，更別提說話。飛機猛地向前，繼而轉彎朝湖邊飛去，準備降落。我想問飛行員一萬個問題——關於安全，關於速度，關於在飛機沖進湖底前他有多少時間可以考慮拉升——但即使我尖叫也沒人聽得見。飛機加速時，我甚至不敢閉上眼睛，速度越來越快，飛機底部的浮筒在湖面留下一道浪花，接著在水面上盤旋，帶起水花，整個機器不優雅地爬升，我們在雲端，沒有回頭路。
一開始，我閉上眼睛，試著不去想在報紙上讀到的許多小飛機墜毀事故。耳壓再次平衡，掌心汗濕，盡可能地坐得筆直，試著不輸給好奇心。但隨著飛機越來越高，我無法控制自己，睜開一只眼睛，再睜開另一只，轉過頭，視線越過某人的肩膀瞥向窗外，然後就被嚇飛了。才上飛機幾分鐘，我們已經到了加拿大的荒野邊界，真真正正的荒野。語言無法形容下方那片曠野的遼闊——森林的綠色延伸到地平線之外，偶然冒出的棕色絲帶，是久被遺忘、穿梭於原野中的伐木車道。這裏真的是北安大略，眼前的景象令我窒息。
飛機轉向一側，窗戶直面朝陽。強烈的光線穿過臟汙的擋風玻璃照在發絲和臉上，熠熠發光，太陽制造了一條環線：通過澄清的天空散射，落在身下的湖面上，然後反射到飛機上，充滿了機身，也充滿了我們，突然之間，掌心和眼睛都充滿光華，每一點湖面都被照亮，泛著金色的光芒，這金色令人刺痛，我們好似要飛向太陽。
隨著我們一路向北，樹林慢慢被濕地攻陷，森林的邊界開始陷落。這是我未見過的土地，檸綠色混雜著棕色、粗糙的，錯綜交織，無數的水體——成百上千的湖泊，不同尺寸，我從未知其存在的湖泊。這裏是哈德遜灣低地，一個由泥炭沼和寬闊緩慢流動的河流定義的地理分區；一片由古海洋潮起潮落，古山脈起起伏伏，滄海桑田般的演化形成的領域；一片不宜居的土地，未被完全探索。誰知道在浮橋下生活著什麼？我們仿佛循著巨人的腳步在時間裏回溯。連想想都覺得很蠢，更別提說出口了，還好螺旋槳的轟鳴足夠蓋過我的聲音，即使我想說出來。但我內心深處，尚未被開發的那個部分有一種直覺，即使我們之中經歷最豐富的人，也未必能聽懂森林的秘密低語，在機翼之下，有神的存在，也有怪物的存在，來這裏工作，是我做過最明智也是最蠢的決定。
飛機即將抵達目的地，未來的同事梅根把自己的臉貼向機窗，我也跟著轉過身去，緊挨著她。即使她介意的話，也不會說什麼。這次驚心動魄的飛行體驗拉近了我們的距離，即使我們的靈魂尚未來得及交流，但在彼此身旁已感到舒適。下方的土地色彩延展出復雜、豐富的棕色和灰褐色，鐵銹紅和中綠色。土壤把自己和水系編織在一起，即使看起來是土地的部分，直覺還是告訴我水系就藏在地表之下。看起來像足印的湖泊現在給綠植讓路，在我們下方，土地不再是掌權者。
遠遠地地平線上出現一片水域，在飛機的擋風玻璃上展開，像是打開一塊疊起來的棕色天鵝絨。我的心臟如受重擊，隨著我們靠近，眼前的湖面也越來越大，太陽觸到它的表面，晨曦化作黑色、銀色、白色和棕色的光芒舞蹈。飛機繼而降落，越來越低，我看著飛機在水面短短盤旋了幾分鐘，接著是一個大顛簸，機身搖晃，發出嗡嗡的聲音，螺旋槳的轉速慢下來，飛機準備降落，我的心跳終於恢復。非都市的氣息一路蔓延，穿過機窗，進入機艙，纏繞脖頸，滲入口腔——是機油的氣味，是水藻、湖水，還有一些其他什麼的氣味，一些我無法言說難以理解的東西。
我們在碼頭降落，大笑著離開飛機。我看到湖岸邊有我不認識的身影，聽到男性的笑聲。光線明亮，腳下的碼頭鎖鏈晃動著，我仿佛變成了動物園裏的一只動物。我瞇起眼，擡頭看著剪影：陽光如此強烈，看不清任何一張臉，只有他們的耳朵、下巴和棒球帽的輪廓依稀可辨。就在這瞬間，一個身影轉過頭，Charlie，民宿經理向我們走來，敬禮，唇邊已經有笑容。我們到了。
Anna Maxymiw lives in Toronto, Canada.
Her first book, a memoir about working at a fishing lodge, will be published with McClelland & Stewart in 2019.
Anna Maxymiw 住在加拿大多倫多。
她的第一本書，關於在一家垂釣民宿的工作回憶，將在2019年由 McClelland & Stewart 發行。
annamaxymiw.ca
