A TRIBUTE TO GEORGE MAREK

TRIBUTE TO GEORGE MAREK

© by E.J. Lavoie

27  PIKE’S PEAK  ...page 102 - 104 from "THE ANNALS OF GOSHEN: the Chronicles of Goshen I

This Chapter First published...November 2004

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"And I learned another thing about summits.  It can be fun getting there.  It can be fun leaving there.  But some peaks are just plateaus (Okay, for you bilinguals, plateaux).

This year, after the spring breakup, I climbed the continental divide, the one that runs east and west in the land of Goshen.  Three of us hiked there unaided, save for the graded road, the 6-cylinder Ford truck, and detailed maps from the Geological Survey of Canada.

For the last few miles we paddled, assisted by a 15-horse Johnson outboard.   The top of the world here is called Summit Lake, a shallow pond with waist-high water plants.  I had come to scatter my friend George³.

George loved this place.  So I dumped him there.  The wind caught some of the dust; the water, the rest.  The water leaves Summit at one end by a crick, some of which eventually trickles into the Atlantic.   And the water leaves Summit at the other end by a stream, some of which trickles into the Arctic Ocean.  So, you see, Summit Lake is a peak.  George has crossed the divide.   Both ways.  And he’s still traveling.  I just know he’s having fun.

By my calculations, some of George has already reached the Kapikotongwa⁴ River to the north and Ombabika⁵ Bay to the south.  Some might be wintering in a wild rice bed, some lodging in a beaver house, and some powdering a peak in Colorado, carried there by the muddy feet of wild geese. 

Now, as for the wind-borne motes of George . . . they could be on the other side of the world by now.  They could be fertilizing Alice Springs in the Australian outback.   George and I are both having an enriching experience."

Marek, George Thomas , Excerpts from Obituary (on-line)

"February 05, 2003"

"George Thomas Marek passed away peacefully at Noric House in Vernon, BC on January 8th, 2003 at 82 years old. "

"A long-time resident of Beardmore,Marek was well known in northwestern Ontario for his contributions to boreal forest management. He was a field forester for the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources ."

" Marek's entire career was devoted to better management of northern forests, and he advocated the now commonly used term, ecosystem management as early as the 1960s. "

" Marek felt a special bond with Aboriginal people in the area, having worked with them as treeplanters to establish the Tyrol and Limestone plantations ."

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