My Impressions of the north, and a good friend’s wedding.
I was very excited when James my good friend now living in edmonton was able to be on the same flight as me up to Yellowknife for Tim’s wedding. Both of us had never been that far north before, so, as we broke through the cloud cover on our descent to yellowknife, NWT, we were in awe of the prominence of the city of yellowknife against the vast unbroken tundra that surrounded and choked in the lone city. The trees and, daylight hours were short, and it was cold. Snow had fallen and it was there to stay, and the lakes were almost all but iced over. The town, for those interested, felt like a frontier town, landing in the airport reminded me of the Rebel Alliance base on the snowy planet of Hoth from Star Wars. The city had a feel of adventure to it, you could almost see it on people’s faces. The anticipation for some big break, something to turn their luck around, a way to finally make it rich enough to end their stay in the north of Canada.
The city is surrounded by water, rock outcroppings are set amidst lakes, rivers and swamps giving builders and settlers some firm foundations on which to build their houses.
We were met with a very warm welcome from tim and his family when we landed, when we saw how excited everyone was I knew that I was in for a great celebratory weekend. We dropped one of the bridesmaids off at the bridal shower and then grabbed a quick bite to eat made by Tim’s mom. Tim, James, and I then headed to Tim’s house to share in Tim’s last few days of freedom… I mean bachelorhood. We relaxed and just hung out for a while, then Tim drove us around the city, we climbed a mine-shaft headframe and then got ready for the bachelor party.
We didn’t go to hard on Tim, although I think we did go near the line when we gave tim a time limit to eat some of the hottest wings that I had ever tasted. He didn’t quite make it on time, and he didn’t want to finish the rest “just because”. We gave him the first of many dress-up garments for the night. By the time we dropped tim off in the middle of the wilderness (in the middle of the night) Tim was wearing a ladies robe, a lei, necklaces, and a wizard hat. We all had a good laugh.
The day before the wedding we “repaired” tim’s jeep, the jack slipped out while we were changing a tire and the jeep fell about a foot to the pavement. Luckily jeeps are designed so the vehicle doesn't land on the disk breaks. We jacked the jeep back up, put the tire back on and funny enough the rubbing sound was gone! I guess gravity should really take credit for that fix.
On the day of the wedding, we ate breakfast at tim’s place, and we had all of the guys over. For all of you (Kristin) that think I should chew my food more, I now understand and will listen to you. James tried to not chew part of his breakfast, he ended up having the Hiemelek (not sure how to spell that one) maneuver preformed on him, and all was well. Needless to say now I have something that I will not let James live down...ever.
The wedding itself was fantastic. I have never laughed so hard a a wedding ceremony and doubt I ever will again. Tim used dr. Seuss vows that can be found online and that was quite the hoot! Then Jamie’s (Tim’s lovely bride) brother gave a speech at the reception that kept us all in stitches.
We then went to a Friend of Tim’s house for the night and enjoyed some great fellowship together. The church up there is fantastic, and I really appreciated the genuine nature of the believers up there that we met. Definitely a city I could go back to and feel at home with the people I now call friends that I met up there.
Well, the adventure is not quite over yet. I’m writing this in the airplane on my way to toronto from edmonton. My flight was delayed by 2 hours and we are barely going to make it to toronto before 2 am.
Although I had a ton of fun this weekend seeing one of my good friends get married to an amazing young lady. I really missed my 2 ladies at home and I can’t wait till I can give them both a huge hug and kiss each… and then a few extra for Kristin.
Until the next adventure...
Andrew Lang
