A road trip this summer took me to the Qu'Appelle Valley. I spent happy days in my childhood free ranging in that valley as we visited my grandmother. In the city there were rules - in a small town, we could wander free. That left me with great memories of the valley.
In fact, my first book From the Dust was set there. I always imagined that the farm perched on top of Cemetery Hill and bordering the cemetery, belonged to Binnie Clark, an activist for women's rights, who came from England and pulled her brother's farm from the brink of bankruptcy. Of course, while Binnie and her farm were real, I'm only hypothesizing on the exact location.
Cemetery Hill - is that its real name? I don't know. What I do know is that a cemetery sits on the peak of this hill that overlooks the town of Fort Qu'Appelle. As the hill drops into the valley - you find the oldest graves. There are plots of people who died as far back as the 1800's. As the cemetery pulls away from the valley, the graves ease into years rather than centuries ago.
In my latest story - a two decades old tragedy begins on this hill. And, as I wander around the cemetery, I read the tombstones which tell their own stories. Stories I realize that can't be told in a line or two so I fill in the blanks with my imagination.
It's a happy place and a sad place all at once. There's lives well lived and lives cut short. But there are also so many stories. Those stories are real but they inspired another - this time, it's completely fictional. |
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