| "TAKING BACK THE HILL" BY CALLUM HOUSTON |
No one likes to be told get lost.
There's a variety of ways to tell a person to go away. You gotta be careful. Do it the hard way you
dent egos and run risks. Guaranteed it'll go straight to their head, like you punched them in the nose
or something.
Then you have to start watching your back.
I'm not sure if you really ever properly saw the property we own in Powell River. Probably not.
There are two houses sitting on about ten acres. A barn was erected that Dad used when he ran his
hobby farm in the '70s and '80s. Over a few years he raised small head of swine and cattle and
there were even horses for a while when he was with Doreen, his second wife.
When I arrived at the family property in Powell River last October I noted great plumes of smoke
pouring out of a smokestack on the barn. This was unusual because the barn never had a fireplace
or furnace. It did now. As it turns out, the barn had been converted into a workshop - an
automotive repair shop - by a man who identified himself to me only as Earl. The police later told
me his name is Earl Graham. He was skinny with a gaunt face, sunken cheeks, in his forties
perhaps, black hair and a week's worth of stubble. He looked like a poor, dumb, greasy, garage
monkey. Leroy Brown the junkyard dog. Bad, bad. The barn and the area surrounding it had
turned into an auto wreck and repair operation. At the entrance to the barn was a tow truck and a
flat bed truck and there was usually another car parked between them that was being serviced. At
the back of the barn was an old rusted pickup truck filled with used tires and oil cans. Erected on a
fence post was a steer's skull. On the other side of the fence was a 1970s era camper trailer. I
identified myself as the owner to Earl and asked him what the arrangement was for his using the
barn as his garage. He told me he paid rent to the tenant who rents the other house on the property.
Although I considered this setup most unusual, bypassing owners and renting out property he didn't
own, I was prepared to let it go if it meant the tenant paid his rent vigilantly.
One day in March at six in the evening I left the beach house in my car. I was going into town to
pick up an order of Chinese. Off in the distance a chainsaw buzzed. When I turned the corner of
the driveway, drove around the elbow from the seashore up the hill, I found myself blocked by a
pickup truck. A very old woman, maybe in her nineties, sat on the passenger side inside the truck.
Behind the pickup was an old man. With a chainsaw. Cutting down trees. I got out of my car,
walked up the road past the truck and the old lady, and stood right next to the man with the saw.
He didn't see me, he was busy sawing a felled tree into firewood. I waited, standing right there. He
started when he finally noticed me watching him cut my tree.
"Hi," I said to him. He turned the chainsaw's engine off. "My name is Callum Houston. I'm an
owner of the property here. Why are you cutting my trees down?"
"Your father must be Scot Houston. He's the owner here isn't he?"
"He's one of them. I'm an owner too. Why are you cutting these trees down?"
"I'm clearing up the bank here. I got started on this a year ago and never got around to finishing it."
He nodded to the truck. "That's my mother. She likes to come along for the ride sometimes."
"Do you have permission to do this?"
"Yes."
"Who asked you to do this?"
"The guy who rents up top there. He wanted it done." The tenant has instructed this man to cut
down trees on my driveway?
"Is he paying you for the job?"
"Just in the firewood I cut."
"No, I want you to stop right now. You have no right to be doing this."
"It'll improve the stability of the slope there, having this done. It should be done."
Nice try. "No, stop right away. I'll let you take the firewood you've cut but don't cut anymore.
Clean this up and leave please."
"Okay," he said in agreement. The old man moved his truck out of the way and I left. He was
gone when I came back an hour later, the firewood cleaned off the road. Cutting down timber for
firewood on a private driveway to a residence? Pretty rude and disrespectful. Illegal too.
Nonetheless I let it the incident go and thought nothing more of it.
Five o'clock in the afternoon on Friday, May 5th I came home from town and drove down the hill
to my driveway. The road blocked again. This time by an old red Mazda pickup truck. An elderly
man stood beside the truck. Not the same old man I caught falling trees before, a different guy this
time. He peered northward up at the wooded embankment. I parked my car. Caught. Caught like
a gnat in a spider web. You're mine, I thought gleefully. Time for some fun. I walked down the
hill to confront the old guy. Push him around a little.
I was stunned. A dozen trees had been cut down on the side of the road. Big mistake. The fallen
trees had been sawed up as firewood; woodchips and sawdust and logs were strewn across the
driveway everywhere. My presence didn't deter him from his activity. The old man barely took
notice of me, hardly looked at me, as though I wasn't even there, he kept tossing logs into the back
of his truck.
"Who are you?" I asked the man, walking up to him.
He gave me a sideways glance, lifted his arm and pointed a finger at another man lodged behind a
tree grasping a chainsaw in his hand. "I'm his father," the old guy said. "He rents the house up
top." The man with the chainsaw looked at me as though he was doing nothing wrong and had full
entitlement to clearcut our land. I got the impression they'd been waiting for me to arrive home.
"Do you have permission to cut down these trees?" I asked the man with the saw. He said nothing
and began stepping down from the bank. His build was portly and his clothes hung to his body
sloppily, his pants were falling off, the crack of his fat ass hanging out. "Do you have permission to
cut down these trees?" I repeated.
"Are you Callum? You must be Callum, right?" he asked me, wiping moisture off his sweaty brow.
I nodded. "I am, yes. I asked you a question. Do you have permission to be cutting down these
trees?"
"These trees needed to be cut down."
"I'm taking your refusal to answer my simple question as a 'no,' you don't have permission."
He'd descended the bank and stood on the other side of a small ditch on the side of the road across
from me. "These trees needed to be cut down. The view from the house above will be
dramatically improved. I'm increasing the value of the property by doing this."
Sure, just what I want to look at when I walk up the driveway, ragged tree stumps. The trees he
was cutting were nowhere near the front of the rental house. This was an undertaking to load up on
free firewood. "What is your name?" I asked him.
"Why do you want to know my name?" he replied, fearfully.
"So I can identify you when I call the cops about this," I said to him.
"Why would you want do to that? You don't want more police down here do you?"
"What do you mean 'more police'? What police are you talking about?"
"Didn't your father report you? That's what I heard. He was afraid of you. Thought you were
dangerous."
My sister or brother-in-law've been feeding this guy some nasty garbage. Bait not taken, asshole.
"Tell me what your name is," I asked him again.
Just then a newer grey pickup truck appeared at the mouth of the driveway behind my Mazda.
They'd brought in another truck to load up with our firewood. He dropped the chainsaw to the
ground and jogged up the road, frantically waving at the driver to leave. This scene should not be
happening on my driveway. This should not be happening. Something was said to the driver and
the truck backed out and didn't reappear. Chainsaw-dude walked back down the hill.
"What's your name?" I asked him.
"We've met," he reminded me, panting and winded. "A year ago when you came by to see who we
paid rent to. You were rude to us then as well."
I'm being rude? I thought, marvelling at his gall for suggesting I'd crossed a line of etiquette by
confronting him and his father on my driveway. It's true, we had met once before. I'd forgotten his
name since then. "My name is irrelevant," he added.
Okay, so that's how you want to play. "Let me tell you something you might not be aware of. No
legal rental agreement exists between the renters and the owners of this property, buddy. You had
an agreement with Allen Property Rentals. Bob Allen is long gone, he abandoned this place when I
told him I wanted my fair share of the rental revenue. I'm an owner and you have no agreement
with me to be on my property. You know what that means? It means you are not a legal renter
and you can be evicted at any time. Any time. There is no rental agreement. What is your name?"
"I don't have to tell you my name. You want us to leave we'll leave."
"Yes you will. And you will clean up this mess before you do. Load up and leave. You are a
couple of dumbfucks, you know that. Looks like dumbfuck runs in the family. Father and son.
Dumbfuck father, dumbfuck son."
"If you want us-" the guy with chainsaw began to say.
"Mike, we don't have to listen to that kind of sewer talk, " the old man said, cutting his son off.
Instantly he was indignant. My use of a profanity suddenly gave him the high ground in this
trespassing matter. He was now morally superior to me. "Obviously this man doesn't know
manners. Just ignore him and let's get out of here. That kind of language is well beneath us. Don't
respond to him any more."
You've gotta be kidding me, I said to myself. He's lecturing me? On my land? About manners!
While he blocks vehicle access to my home and takes my firewood? The logic of idiots twists and
hurts my head. Makes me very angry. I turned around and marched quickly up the driveway and
got into my car. I started it up and drove down the hill and parked, positioning the car sideways
across the road so the pickup truck could not leave. Keys pocketed, I got out and walked past
them. "You two, get the fuck off my land immediately. The truck, however, stays. Get the fuck
out of here. I'm going home to call the police."
Dad was in the living room watching the news on TV. I walked into the room with him. He looked
at me as though he knew something was up. "You won't believe what's going on on the driveway
out there," I said to him excitedly. "The renters, the ones from the house up above? They're
chopping down trees for firewood. On the driveway! There still up there right now."
He absorbed what I said, shrugged and watched the news. I sat down and thought about my
prisoners on the driveway, stranded and unable to leave without their truck. Do I call the police? It
seemed to me I could report them for causing a disturbance, committing mischief, trespassing and
stealing our lumber. I reconsidered. If I report it I'd have to interact with cops. I really like to
avoid cops whenever possible. And ultimately they'd tell me to move my car so the trespassers can
leave with their truck. Nah, no cops. I'll handle this solo.
I walked back up the road. They were cleaning up the wood scatterings and loading logs into the
back of the pickup truck. They had a full, overflowing load of lumber. Pointing my finger at them
like a gun, I shouted, "Disrespectful! Absolutely disrespectful! This is so disrespectful what you're
doing. Totally disrespectful. I told you to get the fuck off my land and you're still here. Get the
fuck off my land!"
"You told us to clean up the wood. We're cleaning it up like you said," the old man replied. "And
I'm not leaving without my truck." He tried to toss a log onto the pile but he fumbled it, he was
shaken, and it fell to the ground at his boots. He creakily bent down, picked it up, and threw it on
again.
"No, no. I already told you, the truck stays here. I'm impounding it. The truck stays but you
leave. Get the fuck off my land."
"I am not leaving here without my truck. Michael, call the police."
"For what?" I asked him. "Why do you want to call the police? What crime is being committed
against you?"
"You're harassing us."
"I'm harassing you? How am I harassing you?"
"You won't let us leave with the truck. Michael," he said again to his son, "call the police."
An old lady in her seventies came sauntering down from the top of the driveway at the broken gate.
Probably the old man's wife. Had to put her nose in the situation. Now I was looking at three
trespassers. She didn't say anything, just watched intently.
I walked up the hill towards them, not wanting to get too close lest one of them should claim he or
she had been physically threatened by me in some way. The son produced a cell phone. "I'm
calling Tom," he said and punched in a number. Tom, my brother-in-law, is a co-owner of the
property along with me, my father and my sister. Tom and I don't see eye to eye. A few years
previous he ratted me out to the police and I got charged on a bogus rap of threatening to attack my
sister and their young son. The charge was tossed, it was totally unfounded.
Tom answered the call quickly. "Tom, it's Michael. I've got a bit of a problem here with Callum.
He's taken exception to the clearing we're doing to improve the views from the house." Something
was said in response. "Okay, hang on and let me put you on speaker-phone so he can hear you."
He pushed a button on the phone and turned it around, pointing its face at me. "Callum can hear
you now, Tom," he said.
"Callum," my brother-in-law said on the speaker, "I give them permission to cut down those trees."
"You can't do that, Tom," I said.
"They have my permission. If you don't leave them alone the police will be called."
"I agree, I think that's a good idea," I said to him. "The police should be called."
"When the police talk to me about this I'm going to say they had permission to cut trees and you
can be sure I will tell the police all about your criminal history and mental illness."
"Yeah, Tom, that sounds like something you'd do. The police should be called."
"Michael, go ahead and call the police," Tom said. "You have my number. Tell them to call me in
North Van if they need to know anything."
The son hung up the phone. "Call the police," the old man said. He made the call to the police
station.
"Yes, hello, I'd like to report a problem. I'm not really sure if it's a criminal problem at this point. I
rent a house south of town-"
"The Houston property," I said. "What's your name?"
"Let him talk," the old man said.
"And we have a situation that may need-" The son was cut off. "Am I trespassing? Well, it's
unclear but that may very well be the case, officer," he conceded.
"Why the reluctance to tell me your name?" I asked. "Tell me who you are and we'll settle this,
you can go."
He looked at me, knowing he was in a bind. "Officer, it appears police intervention may not be
required. Allow me to see if this matter can be settled and should you be needed I'll call back. Yes.
Thank you." He hung up.
"Why do you want to know my name? You're not going to report this to the police, are you?"
"Nah." I shook my head. Why would I do that? I thought. "Tell me your name?"
"My name is Michael Brown. But you already knew that."
"I forgot. Michael Brown?"
"Yes."
"Get into your truck and leave. Don't ever do this again."
"I won't. It'll never happen again."
"Consider this a lesson. Now you know what happens. You come down here and act like a fool on
my property this is the shit you get tossed at you." I entered my car, started her up, and backed out
of there. The old man, seated and ready in his truck, sped up the hill, Brown running behind him
and waving him along, trying to make him go faster. The old man was gone in an instant. The old
lady, silent, not having said a word, walked away. Brown scrambled up the hill cradling an armful
of wood, kicking shards of scrap wood to the side of the road.
"This won't ever happen again, I promise you," he said, peering over his shoulder as he left.
"Next time you don't get your truck back."
Confronted by this incident, my attitude towards the tenants in the rental property, Michael Brown
and his wife, had shifted a hundred and eighty. It seems he has a deficiency when it comes to
respecting the boundaries of his neighbours. The incident was reported in writing to the police, a
copy of the letter sent to my brother-in-law. I informed Brown I would collect payment for the
rental of the barn from now on. I approached Earl a few days later to talk to him about a change
with the way things worked on my property.
There's a variety of ways to tell a person to go away. You gotta be careful. Do it the hard way you
dent egos and run risks. Guaranteed it'll go straight to their head, like you punched them in the nose
or something.
Then you have to start watching your back.
I'm not sure if you really ever properly saw the property we own in Powell River. Probably not.
There are two houses sitting on about ten acres. A barn was erected that Dad used when he ran his
hobby farm in the '70s and '80s. Over a few years he raised small head of swine and cattle and
there were even horses for a while when he was with Doreen, his second wife.
When I arrived at the family property in Powell River last October I noted great plumes of smoke
pouring out of a smokestack on the barn. This was unusual because the barn never had a fireplace
or furnace. It did now. As it turns out, the barn had been converted into a workshop - an
automotive repair shop - by a man who identified himself to me only as Earl. The police later told
me his name is Earl Graham. He was skinny with a gaunt face, sunken cheeks, in his forties
perhaps, black hair and a week's worth of stubble. He looked like a poor, dumb, greasy, garage
monkey. Leroy Brown the junkyard dog. Bad, bad. The barn and the area surrounding it had
turned into an auto wreck and repair operation. At the entrance to the barn was a tow truck and a
flat bed truck and there was usually another car parked between them that was being serviced. At
the back of the barn was an old rusted pickup truck filled with used tires and oil cans. Erected on a
fence post was a steer's skull. On the other side of the fence was a 1970s era camper trailer. I
identified myself as the owner to Earl and asked him what the arrangement was for his using the
barn as his garage. He told me he paid rent to the tenant who rents the other house on the property.
Although I considered this setup most unusual, bypassing owners and renting out property he didn't
own, I was prepared to let it go if it meant the tenant paid his rent vigilantly.
One day in March at six in the evening I left the beach house in my car. I was going into town to
pick up an order of Chinese. Off in the distance a chainsaw buzzed. When I turned the corner of
the driveway, drove around the elbow from the seashore up the hill, I found myself blocked by a
pickup truck. A very old woman, maybe in her nineties, sat on the passenger side inside the truck.
Behind the pickup was an old man. With a chainsaw. Cutting down trees. I got out of my car,
walked up the road past the truck and the old lady, and stood right next to the man with the saw.
He didn't see me, he was busy sawing a felled tree into firewood. I waited, standing right there. He
started when he finally noticed me watching him cut my tree.
"Hi," I said to him. He turned the chainsaw's engine off. "My name is Callum Houston. I'm an
owner of the property here. Why are you cutting my trees down?"
"Your father must be Scot Houston. He's the owner here isn't he?"
"He's one of them. I'm an owner too. Why are you cutting these trees down?"
"I'm clearing up the bank here. I got started on this a year ago and never got around to finishing it."
He nodded to the truck. "That's my mother. She likes to come along for the ride sometimes."
"Do you have permission to do this?"
"Yes."
"Who asked you to do this?"
"The guy who rents up top there. He wanted it done." The tenant has instructed this man to cut
down trees on my driveway?
"Is he paying you for the job?"
"Just in the firewood I cut."
"No, I want you to stop right now. You have no right to be doing this."
"It'll improve the stability of the slope there, having this done. It should be done."
Nice try. "No, stop right away. I'll let you take the firewood you've cut but don't cut anymore.
Clean this up and leave please."
"Okay," he said in agreement. The old man moved his truck out of the way and I left. He was
gone when I came back an hour later, the firewood cleaned off the road. Cutting down timber for
firewood on a private driveway to a residence? Pretty rude and disrespectful. Illegal too.
Nonetheless I let it the incident go and thought nothing more of it.
Five o'clock in the afternoon on Friday, May 5th I came home from town and drove down the hill
to my driveway. The road blocked again. This time by an old red Mazda pickup truck. An elderly
man stood beside the truck. Not the same old man I caught falling trees before, a different guy this
time. He peered northward up at the wooded embankment. I parked my car. Caught. Caught like
a gnat in a spider web. You're mine, I thought gleefully. Time for some fun. I walked down the
hill to confront the old guy. Push him around a little.
I was stunned. A dozen trees had been cut down on the side of the road. Big mistake. The fallen
trees had been sawed up as firewood; woodchips and sawdust and logs were strewn across the
driveway everywhere. My presence didn't deter him from his activity. The old man barely took
notice of me, hardly looked at me, as though I wasn't even there, he kept tossing logs into the back
of his truck.
"Who are you?" I asked the man, walking up to him.
He gave me a sideways glance, lifted his arm and pointed a finger at another man lodged behind a
tree grasping a chainsaw in his hand. "I'm his father," the old guy said. "He rents the house up
top." The man with the chainsaw looked at me as though he was doing nothing wrong and had full
entitlement to clearcut our land. I got the impression they'd been waiting for me to arrive home.
"Do you have permission to cut down these trees?" I asked the man with the saw. He said nothing
and began stepping down from the bank. His build was portly and his clothes hung to his body
sloppily, his pants were falling off, the crack of his fat ass hanging out. "Do you have permission to
cut down these trees?" I repeated.
"Are you Callum? You must be Callum, right?" he asked me, wiping moisture off his sweaty brow.
I nodded. "I am, yes. I asked you a question. Do you have permission to be cutting down these
trees?"
"These trees needed to be cut down."
"I'm taking your refusal to answer my simple question as a 'no,' you don't have permission."
He'd descended the bank and stood on the other side of a small ditch on the side of the road across
from me. "These trees needed to be cut down. The view from the house above will be
dramatically improved. I'm increasing the value of the property by doing this."
Sure, just what I want to look at when I walk up the driveway, ragged tree stumps. The trees he
was cutting were nowhere near the front of the rental house. This was an undertaking to load up on
free firewood. "What is your name?" I asked him.
"Why do you want to know my name?" he replied, fearfully.
"So I can identify you when I call the cops about this," I said to him.
"Why would you want do to that? You don't want more police down here do you?"
"What do you mean 'more police'? What police are you talking about?"
"Didn't your father report you? That's what I heard. He was afraid of you. Thought you were
dangerous."
My sister or brother-in-law've been feeding this guy some nasty garbage. Bait not taken, asshole.
"Tell me what your name is," I asked him again.
Just then a newer grey pickup truck appeared at the mouth of the driveway behind my Mazda.
They'd brought in another truck to load up with our firewood. He dropped the chainsaw to the
ground and jogged up the road, frantically waving at the driver to leave. This scene should not be
happening on my driveway. This should not be happening. Something was said to the driver and
the truck backed out and didn't reappear. Chainsaw-dude walked back down the hill.
"What's your name?" I asked him.
"We've met," he reminded me, panting and winded. "A year ago when you came by to see who we
paid rent to. You were rude to us then as well."
I'm being rude? I thought, marvelling at his gall for suggesting I'd crossed a line of etiquette by
confronting him and his father on my driveway. It's true, we had met once before. I'd forgotten his
name since then. "My name is irrelevant," he added.
Okay, so that's how you want to play. "Let me tell you something you might not be aware of. No
legal rental agreement exists between the renters and the owners of this property, buddy. You had
an agreement with Allen Property Rentals. Bob Allen is long gone, he abandoned this place when I
told him I wanted my fair share of the rental revenue. I'm an owner and you have no agreement
with me to be on my property. You know what that means? It means you are not a legal renter
and you can be evicted at any time. Any time. There is no rental agreement. What is your name?"
"I don't have to tell you my name. You want us to leave we'll leave."
"Yes you will. And you will clean up this mess before you do. Load up and leave. You are a
couple of dumbfucks, you know that. Looks like dumbfuck runs in the family. Father and son.
Dumbfuck father, dumbfuck son."
"If you want us-" the guy with chainsaw began to say.
"Mike, we don't have to listen to that kind of sewer talk, " the old man said, cutting his son off.
Instantly he was indignant. My use of a profanity suddenly gave him the high ground in this
trespassing matter. He was now morally superior to me. "Obviously this man doesn't know
manners. Just ignore him and let's get out of here. That kind of language is well beneath us. Don't
respond to him any more."
You've gotta be kidding me, I said to myself. He's lecturing me? On my land? About manners!
While he blocks vehicle access to my home and takes my firewood? The logic of idiots twists and
hurts my head. Makes me very angry. I turned around and marched quickly up the driveway and
got into my car. I started it up and drove down the hill and parked, positioning the car sideways
across the road so the pickup truck could not leave. Keys pocketed, I got out and walked past
them. "You two, get the fuck off my land immediately. The truck, however, stays. Get the fuck
out of here. I'm going home to call the police."
Dad was in the living room watching the news on TV. I walked into the room with him. He looked
at me as though he knew something was up. "You won't believe what's going on on the driveway
out there," I said to him excitedly. "The renters, the ones from the house up above? They're
chopping down trees for firewood. On the driveway! There still up there right now."
He absorbed what I said, shrugged and watched the news. I sat down and thought about my
prisoners on the driveway, stranded and unable to leave without their truck. Do I call the police? It
seemed to me I could report them for causing a disturbance, committing mischief, trespassing and
stealing our lumber. I reconsidered. If I report it I'd have to interact with cops. I really like to
avoid cops whenever possible. And ultimately they'd tell me to move my car so the trespassers can
leave with their truck. Nah, no cops. I'll handle this solo.
I walked back up the road. They were cleaning up the wood scatterings and loading logs into the
back of the pickup truck. They had a full, overflowing load of lumber. Pointing my finger at them
like a gun, I shouted, "Disrespectful! Absolutely disrespectful! This is so disrespectful what you're
doing. Totally disrespectful. I told you to get the fuck off my land and you're still here. Get the
fuck off my land!"
"You told us to clean up the wood. We're cleaning it up like you said," the old man replied. "And
I'm not leaving without my truck." He tried to toss a log onto the pile but he fumbled it, he was
shaken, and it fell to the ground at his boots. He creakily bent down, picked it up, and threw it on
again.
"No, no. I already told you, the truck stays here. I'm impounding it. The truck stays but you
leave. Get the fuck off my land."
"I am not leaving here without my truck. Michael, call the police."
"For what?" I asked him. "Why do you want to call the police? What crime is being committed
against you?"
"You're harassing us."
"I'm harassing you? How am I harassing you?"
"You won't let us leave with the truck. Michael," he said again to his son, "call the police."
An old lady in her seventies came sauntering down from the top of the driveway at the broken gate.
Probably the old man's wife. Had to put her nose in the situation. Now I was looking at three
trespassers. She didn't say anything, just watched intently.
I walked up the hill towards them, not wanting to get too close lest one of them should claim he or
she had been physically threatened by me in some way. The son produced a cell phone. "I'm
calling Tom," he said and punched in a number. Tom, my brother-in-law, is a co-owner of the
property along with me, my father and my sister. Tom and I don't see eye to eye. A few years
previous he ratted me out to the police and I got charged on a bogus rap of threatening to attack my
sister and their young son. The charge was tossed, it was totally unfounded.
Tom answered the call quickly. "Tom, it's Michael. I've got a bit of a problem here with Callum.
He's taken exception to the clearing we're doing to improve the views from the house." Something
was said in response. "Okay, hang on and let me put you on speaker-phone so he can hear you."
He pushed a button on the phone and turned it around, pointing its face at me. "Callum can hear
you now, Tom," he said.
"Callum," my brother-in-law said on the speaker, "I give them permission to cut down those trees."
"You can't do that, Tom," I said.
"They have my permission. If you don't leave them alone the police will be called."
"I agree, I think that's a good idea," I said to him. "The police should be called."
"When the police talk to me about this I'm going to say they had permission to cut trees and you
can be sure I will tell the police all about your criminal history and mental illness."
"Yeah, Tom, that sounds like something you'd do. The police should be called."
"Michael, go ahead and call the police," Tom said. "You have my number. Tell them to call me in
North Van if they need to know anything."
The son hung up the phone. "Call the police," the old man said. He made the call to the police
station.
"Yes, hello, I'd like to report a problem. I'm not really sure if it's a criminal problem at this point. I
rent a house south of town-"
"The Houston property," I said. "What's your name?"
"Let him talk," the old man said.
"And we have a situation that may need-" The son was cut off. "Am I trespassing? Well, it's
unclear but that may very well be the case, officer," he conceded.
"Why the reluctance to tell me your name?" I asked. "Tell me who you are and we'll settle this,
you can go."
He looked at me, knowing he was in a bind. "Officer, it appears police intervention may not be
required. Allow me to see if this matter can be settled and should you be needed I'll call back. Yes.
Thank you." He hung up.
"Why do you want to know my name? You're not going to report this to the police, are you?"
"Nah." I shook my head. Why would I do that? I thought. "Tell me your name?"
"My name is Michael Brown. But you already knew that."
"I forgot. Michael Brown?"
"Yes."
"Get into your truck and leave. Don't ever do this again."
"I won't. It'll never happen again."
"Consider this a lesson. Now you know what happens. You come down here and act like a fool on
my property this is the shit you get tossed at you." I entered my car, started her up, and backed out
of there. The old man, seated and ready in his truck, sped up the hill, Brown running behind him
and waving him along, trying to make him go faster. The old man was gone in an instant. The old
lady, silent, not having said a word, walked away. Brown scrambled up the hill cradling an armful
of wood, kicking shards of scrap wood to the side of the road.
"This won't ever happen again, I promise you," he said, peering over his shoulder as he left.
"Next time you don't get your truck back."
Confronted by this incident, my attitude towards the tenants in the rental property, Michael Brown
and his wife, had shifted a hundred and eighty. It seems he has a deficiency when it comes to
respecting the boundaries of his neighbours. The incident was reported in writing to the police, a
copy of the letter sent to my brother-in-law. I informed Brown I would collect payment for the
rental of the barn from now on. I approached Earl a few days later to talk to him about a change
with the way things worked on my property.
