Life North of the 54th

Transcript Chapters

• 00:00 - Introductions
• 16:27 - Finding Adult Life
• 39:02 - Perspective and Outlook

00:00 - Introductions

Opening Theme Music:
[bass guitar riff]

Garett:
Welcome back to Life North of the 54th. I'm Garett Brown. Preston's not here today, but we're really glad to have our cousin Jordan with us today. Jordan, do you want to introduce yourself?

Jordan:
Hi, my name is Jordan Streeper and I'm glad to be here today. Thank you for having me.

Garett:
Yeah, thanks for coming on the show, Jordan. We really wanted to talk to you because you grew up, well north of the Peace Country, which is pretty hard to say. You grew up in Fort Nelson. Do you want to tell us a little about what it was like to grow up in Fort Nelson?

Jordan:
Yeah, Fort Nelson is essentially part of the Peace Country. It's northern Rockies Regional Municipality. It's the chunk of land in BC that's north of the Peace Country to the Yukon border. As a small town we are, we are the biggest thing in that area. So there's not much to do there besides wildlife seeing and like in the wilderness and stuff like that. I did go through Peace Country a lot just to go anywhere else besides Fort Nelson, so.

Garett:
Yeah, but Peace Country is still pretty far away from Fort Nelson by most rights, right?

Jordan:
Yeah, Fort St. John is about a four hour highway ride.

Garett:
Yeah, it always astonishes me that going from Grande Prairie to Edmonton is like four and a half hours. And to consider going that far north of Fort St. John is just kind of mind blowing. I've been there. It's, it's beautiful, but it's, it's pretty far away.

Jordan:
It is. [chuckles]

Garett:
Do you have any favourite memories or any particular experiences that come to mind when you reflect on growing up in the north?

Jordan:
Um, it's a really small town. And it's really safe. Like I remember as like kid in the summertime would be out like late at night, just like a group of us kids. And it's like two in the morning and like the parents don't care because it's Fort Nelson, you know, nothing's-- the worst thing that's going to happen is we're going to see a bear or something. But I also like went fishing a lot with my dad, um, all the way up to like Muncho Lake is where we went to a lot. And then if you just go north a little bit of Muncho Lake is the Laird Hot Springs. Yeah. Which probably one of my favourite places in the world.

Garett:
Yeah. I have been to the Laird Hot Springs and they are fantastic. They're very wonderful. Or did you ever go to the yard in the winter?

Jordan:
I went to the winter a couple of times, like on a band trip, we did stop the Laird Hot Springs one time and yeah, the snow in the feet to the hot waters, the hot springs, that's quite something though. And then last June, actually that just happened. I went camping with a friend up at the Laird Hot Springs and it was like June. So it was still summertime but the nights were still super cold to sleep through.

Garett:
Yeah. Also, just trying to fathom what kind of experiences to take a band trip and then go even farther north.

Jordan:
We went to Toad River, the small community there, they probably have about 15 or so kids when I was in high school there. And then we just like performed for them. But then, cause it was like a day trip. We just took the bus up to the hot springs and back.

Garett:
Oh, okay. Okay. Yeah. That's, that's pretty cool. I guess what instrument did you play?

Jordan:
Well, I played the bass clarinet for a concert band and then for jazz band, I played the very saxophone.

Garett:
Oh, nice. I played the trumpet and Preston played the trombone. So we were brass players.

Jordan:
Nice.

Garett:
I'm not well experienced in the embouchure of a reed instrument.

Jordan:
Yeah. They're definitely two different types of instruments. That's for sure.

Garett:
Yeah. And when we spoke with your mom, Jesse, which is on fourth episode, she talked about how she really appreciated raising you and your brother in Fort Nelson because of the tight community that you were saying you, you could be with friends and other parents would know what was going on, even if she didn't. And then she would, or they would tell her and stuff like that. It sounds like it was a pretty tight knit community.

Jordan:
Yeah.

Garett:
Did it feel small?

Jordan:
To me it definitely feels small, probably a lot more than when my mom first moved to town. Cause I think when I moved out, it just, that was the year they did the last census and Fort Nelson itself was like 2300 people or something.

Garett:
Wow. That is pretty small.

Jordan:
And I know like if you Google like around 2010, it was like 7,000.

Garett:
Oh wow. Wow.

Jordan:
So yeah, it was definitely like a tight knit community. And there's a lot of people there, like, especially like the kids, like I grew up with all the kids that I graduated with and I graduated with a class of like 33 people, I think.

Garett:
Yeah. Wow. So you must've seen it change quite a bit then to go with like that population decline. I imagine it's mostly oil and gas people leaving and sort of the families that were there already were staying.

Jordan:
Yeah. Like, uh, what was it? I think in like grade seven or eight, like the Cat rental company closed down and that was just like a really big one. I remember hearing about in town, like I was too young to really like know the major consequences. But I think after that there was like a chain reaction followed through.

Garett:
Right. When Preston and I drove through there in 2012, when we were on our way to Alaska, I remember they had a Boston pizza. Did the Boston pizza survive too?

Jordan:
Yeah. They're still kicking around. Actually. One of my high school buddies works there right now.

Garett:
Nice. I was surprised to see a Boston pizza there, but--

Jordan:
Yeah, I think they're locally owned, I think so. That's probably, but you'll be surprised to hear actually, Donald's is just opening up like next month or something in Fort Nelson.

Garett:
Oh, that is surprising to hear. Like they didn't have a branch up there before.

Jordan:
No, I think the owner of the Fort St. John branch is the one doing it.

Garett:
Wow. When you would go around town, did you feel like Fort Nelson was small enough to walk or would you ride a bike or do you feel like you had to drive?

Jordan:
So for the town itself is like the rec centre and the museum on like going north. I think it's actually facing the west, but going north, which is the way the highway goes, like where the rec centre is. And then the other part of town is Tim Hortons and I could probably walk there in a half an hour. So like hanging out in the summertime with my friends and all that type of stuff. They lived at the top of the hill. We would just like bike everywhere in town and all that type of stuff.

Garett:
Nice. Was it decent to bike around? It wasn't I guess, I'm guessing there wasn't too much traffic.

Jordan:
No, the highway is like the worst part.

Garett:
Yeah. So you just avoid the highway and you're pretty much good.

Jordan:
Avoid the highway or activate the, they do have like, back then they had one like highway light or like pedestrians and then they opened the other light by the rec centre and that's got like a proper crosswalk intersection.

Garett:
What facilities did the rec centre have?

Jordan:
Our rec centre is actually really nice, especially for the size of our small town. We have two hockey rinks and then we had the swimming pool attached to it. And that's also where the visitor centre in town is located at. And they have a walking track too up there.

Garett:
Oh, nice. Nice. So in the dead of winter, when many feet of snow, you can go for a nice walk.

Jordan:
Yeah. I know it's like open at like 5:30 or six o'clock and people go to the little run in the middle of the winter.

Garett:
Yeah. Did you feel like it snowed a lot in Fort Nelson or do you feel like it was mostly just cold?

Jordan:
We did get a lot of snow, but I don't know like what a lot of snow is in comparative to other places. Like living in Prince George, talking with like my coworkers and people I know who live in town, we've had super like warm winters and like by January it's, it feels like all the snow has been melted for half the time.

Garett:
Wow. [chuckles]

Jordan:
I don't know like what's a lot of snow is like, I can walk in a snowbank back home or on my front yard and I'll be like a waist deeper, higher in the snow. But that just seemed like normal to me.

Garett:
Yeah. Yeah. [chuckles] Yeah. I had a friend who moved from Southern Ontario, like the London-Toronto area to, to Grande Prairie for a bit. And he was fascinated the first time that he saw the snow plows pushing snow into the middle of the road and then, you know, picking it up with the front loaders and dump trucks and hauling it off. And he's like, why are they hauling it off? Like, cause it doesn't melt. You got to move it. It's just going to take up the whole town. And he's like, Oh man, Southern Ontario, it just snows. I usually leave it and it melts and it goes away. You push it off to the side and it'll melt.

Jordan:
[chuckles] I remember I was baffled because once I got older, I learned that Fort Nelson has a amazing snow plow system set up. And when I came to Prince George, I went to the movies, like this is like my first year in town. And I went to the movies with my one buddy and he was driving in a small car. And when we were leaving the movies, we left the parking lot and they were plowing the road. And I remember looking at the window and Prince George got double lanes. And then one of the, like in the snow piled in between the two lanes, the pile of snow was taller than his car while they're in the middle of plowing the roads. They just converged to the centre lane and then they haul it out later. That definitely baffles me.

Garett:
Yeah. When the snow doesn't go away, you got to be fast to getting rid of it or it'll really pile up on you and be really hard to get back on top of it. Did you go in the wilderness much in the wintertime? Did you do any winter camping or was it mostly a warm weather activity?

Jordan:
I didn't really do any winter camping, but like, it's like a rule of thumb living up north that if you're highway driving at all, bring your snow gear.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
Gotta have that snow gear just in case, especially like you could just be stuck in a spot where there's no service. So that's all you're to save your life. You never know.

Garett:
Yeah. And did you ever venture farther north to the Northwest territories or to Yukon?

Jordan:
So only for the school trips is I know I've only been to Whitehorse once in my life and I was too young to remember that. And then we would go to Fort Simpson every year for a basketball tournament, which is in the Northwest territories. And one year for track and field, we went to Watson Lake. That's like the farthest north I've gone really.

Garett:
Yeah. I mean, it gets harder, you know, very well, like just as much as anyone who lives in the north, that when you drive farther north, you got to really plan it out. But when you drive south, it's sort of just take it as it goes. You'll find a place to fill up, you'll find a place to get something to eat. But when you go north, you have to like, you have to know where you're going and you have to know where you're stopping.

Jordan:
Yeah, that's for sure.

Garett:
Did you guys have ATVs or quads that you would take places in the bush?

Jordan:
So my buddies that I grew up with, they had like ATVs and all that type of stuff. My dad had like a side by side.

Garett:
Okay.

Jordan:
I didn't spend a super long time with my dad, especially older when I could have taken it by myself.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
My mom did have quads, but they were at the ranch that she grew up at. Over by Pink Mountain Beach and Wonowon. But yeah, I definitely had like, in lots of summers or even like springs and falls, where my friends, I just hop on their quad with them and we just go driving around. And I actually had a one friend that I grew up with his family owned a trap line over by Auntie Bailey. So we would take skidoos out in the winter and go on their trap line and they have a cabin out there and stuff like that.

Garett:
Oh, man. That's intense. Like I guess he had like a wood log cabin of some kind.

Jordan:
Yeah, it's a wood log cabin heated by fire.

Garett:
Basically only accessible by off road vehicles or did they it was a road that went out there too.

Jordan:
Well, a lot of Fort Nelson is surrounded by muskeg. So it's hard to get out there without the wintertime.

Garett:
Yep. Yeah, I understand that. I as a teenager went to a scout camp and somebody was driving on muskeg. That was it was winter-ish, winter-ish like to think it was November. So some of the ground was frozen, but they broke through on this frozen part of muskeg and they sunk in and it took us like three hours to get them out. Because it was just such bad conditions to getting a vehicle out of muskeg because it's like as soon as they broke through, then suddenly they were bringing up water from underneath. And then that water was landing on the frozen muskeg on top and it was just making ice and it was just impossible to get traction and get them out. It was a horrible thing. And we were on a scout camp. So we weren't expecting to, you know, do any sort of like vehicle saving because we were expecting to just be, you know, intense and it was pretty rough. We did get it. But yeah, muskeg is mysterious.

Jordan:
Yeah, with the muskeg, there's like a lake in Fort Nelson called Parker Lake, like two minute drive out of the town centre. And they got like trees growing on top of water on that lake. Like you think you see the shore, but if you're on a boat and you go in, you'd notice that that's like you can like, if you wanted to swim, I wouldn't recommend it, but you can swim under like the trees and stuff like that.

Garett:
Whoa, whoa, that's crazy.

Jordan:
And then when we had that fire there, that's when I was in grade nine or 10 or something. And the fire was like put out and they ignored it. But for weeks on weeks afterwards, every time you drove by it, it was just still smoking because the muskeg just trapped that heat with the water and stuff like that, you know, drive by it and it's just smoking out between like the roots of the trees from the ground and stuff like that.

Garett:
Yeah. That would have been quite the sight.

Jordan:
Yeah.

Garett:
Yeah. When you went fishing and such, did you do pole fishing or fly fishing?

Jordan:
Just pole fishing. My dad took me fishing a lot when I was, when he lived in town before he had to move for work. Took me fishing a lot. Like I got my first fish at the McDonald bridge crossing. I don't know if it's called the McDonald Creek or river or not, but it's somewhere between Fort Nelson and Moncho. And then we went up to Moncho Lake and then that same weekend when we got back to town, we actually went to Auntie Bailey for the day and I got two jacks there.

Garett:
Wow.

Jordan:
But I wouldn't. Yeah. My dad had a lake boat or was it a river boat? I think it's a riverboat and we would go on Muncho Lake a lot in summer, especially at nighttime. Cause my dad always said that like fishing at nighttime was better luck and stuff like that. So there was a couple of times as a young kid for the weekend where I just spent be up till four in the morning fishing on Muncho Lake.

Garett:
Oh man. That sounds amazing. I imagine that the stars also were, were incredible to see out on the lake.

Jordan:
The stars, Northern lights too. You get a lot of Northern lights outdoors.

Garett:
Yeah. The only time I have fished on a lake in the dark was ice fishing. So it was really easy to just walk, walk out there and stand out there. [chuckles]

Jordan:
I've actually never been ice fishing.

Garett:
It's not as nice. [chuckles] Yeah. I've only been once and it was on, I think it was Sturgeon Lake. Yeah. Ice fishing is pretty cool. It's difficult because you got to, you know, auger through the ice to do anything and then you got to keep it from freezing over and you're sitting there. It's cold. Yeah. It's rough.

Jordan:
I was talking with one of my cousins this summer when I went for my great grandma's reunion or their anniversary. And he's saying that he loves ice fishing. Cause he's got the tent that you put like on to keep you warm and stuff like that. If you go in the daytime, you just like see the fish swimming below the ice. You can like taunt them with like your hook right there.

Garett:
Yeah. It's definitely interesting. When we went, we had only one shed of some kind. So the rest of us scouts had, were, you know, just sitting there exposed to the elements, I guess, build character or something, right? I don't remember when I caught my first fish, but I'm pretty sure I caught my last fish at 12. I fished a few more times, like since I was 12, but I've not caught anything since I was 12. [chuckles] I haven't been fishing in at least a decade, so I could try again.

Jordan:
I almost caught a fish last summer right off of, I think it's called Swan Lake.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
It's between Dawson Creek and the Alberta border or just over the Alberta border. And I went with my cousin and I was, it was just right off the dock. I didn't, he dropped off before I caught him all the way out of the water, but I had him out of the water, try to get him on dock and he just like let go.

Garett:
Yeah. I personally haven't done any hunting, but have you also gone hunting up there?

Jordan:
I haven't done hunting. I did go like grouse hunting once or twice, but I didn't get anything.

Garett:
Yeah.

16:27 - Finding Adult Life

Garett:
Did you want to share your experience of going to high school in Fort Nelson? I imagine it was a rather small high school.

Jordan:
It was a pretty small high school. I don't know the number of kids, but as I mentioned earlier, I graduated with 33 kids and most of them I've known since I was like five or so.

Garett:
Right.

Jordan:
So yeah, it was a, it was a small place and most of us knew each other for a long time.

Garett:
Was it only one class then? Like you weren't separated into like separate homerooms?

Jordan:
We still had that a little bit. It wasn't too bad, but we were small enough place that for the more advanced classes, like physics and chemistry, they offered every other year, but they would do like chemistry 11, 12 and all the great 11th and 12th would be thrown into one class.

Garett:
Right.

Jordan:
And then the next year they did the same thing with physics.

Garett:
Okay. Okay. So you didn't have virtual teacher?

Jordan:
No. Most of our teachers, like I remember my chemistry teacher, she was like 22 or something like that. So a lot of our teachers are just like right out of like college university, just got their teaching degree and then come up there because it's that first place where they could get an actual teaching job, not a teaching assistant job.

Garett:
Yeah. Grande Prairie was a little bit like that. We would, I guess at the school I was at at Peace Wapiti Academy, there were, we would have a few brand new teachers now and then, you know, like the 22 year olds and my physics teacher in high school, he was very young, like 22 when he came and he expressed just how strange it was to, you know, teach physics. And then on the weekends go to the bars and see students because they were, you know, in grade 12 and 18 and you can drink at 18 in Alberta.

Jordan:
[laughs]

Garett:
And he's just like, it was so weird to just be at the bar. And then there were students there and it's just like, ah, make going to bars less fun now. [chuckles]

Jordan:
[chuckles] I don't blame him.

Garett:
Yeah. He also told me that he would teach virtually to students in Northern Alberta. There were some smaller schools in Northern Alberta that would sort of Zoom or Skype into to his classes and take physics sort of remotely, that there would be a teacher supervising the class in the Northern school, but he would be the one who was doing the teaching. Yeah. That's why I asked about the virtual teacher.

Jordan:
So that wasn't us, but I'm not sure about Toad River because like Toad River, as I said, was like a small community and stuff like that. And when like we did our graduation ceremony, like they were like part of the graduation ceremony and stuff like that. And they applied for scholarships through the Fort Nelson area. But I was under the understanding that most of them were homeschooled to a certain degree. I don't know about like for those harder courses later on in high school, what they would do there.

Garett:
Yeah. Thanks for sharing. Yeah. Also, I know that as you mentioned, the ranch that your mom grew up in was important part of her life. I mean, you say she kept her quads there.

Jordan:
Yeah. We spent a lot of time there growing up.

Garett:
Yeah. Do you want to share your experience about going to the ranch and like just sort of stuff that you get up to on the ranch?

Jordan:
So my aunts or my mom's sister, Aunt Joe, she owns that ranch now. And my mom absolutely loves the heck out of that place. It is her favourite place to be. And like she said that like if she wins the lottery, she's living at the ranch for the rest of her life and stuff like that. So I spent a lot of time growing up there and it's changed a lot since like I was a kid. Like they had a dugout, but they also had a creek there. So we spent a lot of time at either place, especially when I was younger. And then we've done like a lot of work, more so the adults, but there's been a couple of times where we've been put to work as the kids and stuff like that. And remember one year we actually went up there a lot for one summer because they redid the whole fence line. And my mom was like, "Yeah, I'll help with that." So me and my brother spent most of that summer just reading in the sun outside.

Garett:
They didn't make you go and pull the fences too?

Jordan:
No, not too much. I don't have too many vivid memories of like helping with the fences and stuff like that, but we helped in like the smaller other aspects of it. But yeah, it's my mom's favourite place. So we spent a lot of time there as kids and it's closer than Fort St. John's. So it's easy to get to.

Garett:
Yeah. Yeah. [laughs] Yup. Yeah. It makes a difference. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for sharing that. Would you be willing to talk about your transition out of Fort Nelson? I mean, you're living in Prince George now. Are you okay to talk about what it was like to move out of Fort Nelson into a bigger city and trying to find life as an adult?

Jordan:
So two of my closest friends when I graduated high school, their mom right before like they would have graduated high school had moved to Prince George and they'd gone with her. And the closest university in BC to my hometown was also in Prince George. And so that was my thought process for going to Prince George was I know a couple people there already. I got the university there. So that right after I graduated by September, I had moved to Prince George and stuff like that. But that was also that first year school for me. That's when COVID hit. And I basically just went back home before the end of the school year because they're like, hey, we'll give you money to get out of dorms. So we'll give you like a partial refund to get out of dorms. So I went back home for that time and I lived out COVID working up north. And then I tried my hand again after COVID ended at the school there. And that's when I decided it wasn't for me. So I just started working down in Prince George. I had a couple of friends from when I met that first year university that I met that I still know even and hangout now. And I still got those two brothers who I know that are in Prince George. Yeah, it was also more of I want to get out of my small hometown with nothing to do. Just somewhere bigger, you know?

Garett:
[chuckles] I know. Yeah, I mean, Grande Prairie is much bigger than Fort Nelson. But yeah, I understand the feeling too. [chuckles]

Jordan:
Grande Prairie is actually a popular choice for like a lot of people I have on like, because like, you know, Snapchat, how you got those maps things. There are a lot of people who live in Grande Prairie now for me.

Garett:
[chuckles] Yeah. So how has Prince George been for you? Have you, I mean, yeah, I can share a little bit too. So when I first graduated from high school, I actually moved to Fort St. John, which is a smaller town. But I lived with my aunt and uncle and I bought my own car. [chuckles] It was a piece of junk. I spent like 1500 bucks on it, and then had to spend like another 1500 bucks just to fix it up so that it would run. Anyway, it was not great. But I had my own car. And I wasn't living at home with my parents. So there was, I was living with family, my aunt and uncle. So there were expectations that I would, you know, be there and help with chores and, you know, do things like that as a kid and a family would do. But there was a lot more leeway for me because I wasn't their child. And I was an adult. And like a particular example that I remember, I was working full time at a tire shop. So I had spending money that I'd never really had before. And I bought, I mean, I love marshmallows. And I bought a bag of No Name brand, large marshmallows. It was like a whole kilo bag of marshmallows.

Jordan:
[chuckles]

Garett:
And I kept them in my car. And I would eat them on my commute to and from work. And I finished the bag in like three days. [chuckles] And it was like, man, maybe I shouldn't have eaten that many marshmallows. [chuckles]

Jordan:
[chuckles]

Garett:
It was sort of like, I can do whatever I want. But there's a, there's a limit on like how much I can do that my body will take. And it's just like, I can't, I can't just, you know, eat pure sugar for 30 minutes straight. It's gonna do me in. Yeah. You don't have to share any specific examples like that. But like, you know, in your experience of going from living at home to having, you know, more independence, how was it? Like, what did you do?

Jordan:
So I moved to Prince George, though, I'll base it a lot mostly on the second time, because I was outside of dorms. And then that was really like, taking care of myself more than that. Because like dorms, I had to show up to the cafeteria, and they had pre made food and stuff like that.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And so when I was living by myself is after I stopped doing school before I had a job, I kind of just like locked myself in my room and played a ton of games. Because like all the people that like I knew in Prince George, were just always busy for a lot of the time and stuff like that. And when they had time available, it was more like, hey, we're online now. So like my social life a lot, especially when I first moved to Prince George was situated at my computer.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
So I spent a lot of time in my room before I got my job. But then once I got my job, man, a lot of my coworkers were, a lot of them are great people I love to hang out with and stuff like that. And that's when and then like, things started slowing down for a lot of the other people. So I just slowly got out of that phase.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And stuff like that. But yeah, I as my one manager put it correctly, when she found out that I had no family in Prince George, she asked me, why did you move to Prince George then?

Garett:
Yep.

Jordan:
Yeah, so I had probably a lot more freedom than you had when I first moved to Prince George and stuff like that.

Garett:
Yeah, I was under the watchful eye of not only like the aunt and uncle I was living with. But I had, you know, other family in Fort St. John too. Even Aunt Joe was living in Fort St. John at the time. And yeah, there were people there keeping an eye on me, probably reporting back to my parents.

Jordan:
I think I only got like one person like that in Prince George. And that's my buddy's mom who still lives in town and stuff like that. But I don't see her very often.

Garett:
Yeah. Yeah. Has it been good?

Jordan:
I enjoy the people in Prince George. The town itself is it's not so great, especially I've heard in the past few years, for example, like the homeless situation has gotten pretty bad in Prince George because of the fires, right? Like the Williams Lake fire, they shipped all of them up here, and then they just stayed up here and stuff like that. It's even noticeable. There's a couple people that you see walking around like nicer part of town. But once you go down the hill past the hospital into like downtown, it's definitely noticeable like how many people there are out there and stuff like that.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And I always like think twice when I when I have to like walk somewhere at night instead of driving about doing it downtown. Or do I just, especially if I'm going by myself?

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
Because it's definitely I do not have that safe feeling that I had in Fort Nelson of like, I was 16. And I can walk across town at three in the morning by myself.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
Versus it's 11pm. And I'm still with someone I'm still thinking twice about like going for this walk across town.

Garett:
Yeah. I think I've only been to Prince George once or twice. For me, Prince George is the city where my parents bought Donkey Kong Country. We were on like a road trip and we're coming back and they bought Donkey Kong Country for the Super Nintendo. And that's to me that's what Prince George is Prince George is the place where Donkey Kong Country came into my life. Because that was my favourite game for many years. [chuckles]

Jordan:
I've only been to Prince George a handful of times before I moved here myself. And most of them were just to go to the airport in town.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
I went once to get adjudicated for band in town. And then I went once for track and field.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And those were like the only two like actual times I spent any real time in Prince George before I moved here.

Garett:
How has the city changed in your mind from a place that you had gone to visit to now place where you live? Has the I don't know the shape of the city or the layout of the city changed from like, oh, yeah, I remember this was where I went before for this or that to Oh, yeah, that's not a place that I know of in town, but I never go anymore.

Jordan:
I don't know, to me is because like, Fort Nelson is such a small place and Prince George is 80,000 people. Before I started working, it was just like, when I had my interview for my job, that was over by the Walmart, and I was not by the Walmart. I asked them what was the address because I applied for Domino's. And all the Domino's in town are owned by the same person. So they just interchange all the employees can work in one of the stores and stuff like that. And if one starts an interview, the other store can get it.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
So I applied for the Domino's that I knew the location of and then one of the other Domino's called me and I had to ask them for their address so I could show up for the interview. And I googled my maps my way there and back for that.

Garett:
[chuckles]

Jordan:
And then now it's just like, I think you give me like a street address or a name and there's like a good chance I could just like show up without my maps.

Garett:
O wow. Wow! Well done. That takes a lot.

Jordan:
But like, the delivery driving will really help me with that.

Garett:
Yeah, for sure.

Jordan:
Because I know the town pretty well now.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
It's just crazy to think like, I don't know like where I'm going or where I need to go to. And now it's just like, I tell my friend who's lived in town longer than me, turn here, it's faster.

Garett:
That's so cool. Yeah, that's not my experience in Toronto. Toronto's taken me a long time to figure out the roads.

Jordan:
That's a much bigger city, though.

Garett:
It is! It is. Granted, it's millions of people and, you know, so many streets in Prince George are the roads numbered like a grid or they named or combination of both.

Jordan:
It's a combination of both. So you got one way you get the numbers in the other way. They're named. They're alphabetically named.

Garett:
Oh, weird. Okay. You want to try and describe that?

Jordan:
So like, you're coming into town from where we call from the Hart Highway part or the Hart is what locals call it. And you get to like where the Save On is if you're coming from the north side, and that Save On and like the strip mall type of style is like on fifth. And then like the that there's a set of lights there and the next set of lights is on 10th. And the next set of lights is on 15th. And that's like the main one of the main roads in town besides the highway. And if you go down that they'll take you by the hospital, take you downtown and stuff like that. If you go up, it'll take you towards the university.

Garett:
Okay.

Jordan:
And then I work on the hospital located on Alward street. And so like the street above it is like Burden street and the street below it. I don't know what it's called off the top of my head. And I'm assuming it's like a lower letter thing. Like I remember delivering in that area. And it's just like, I need to go to this street. So I just like, okay, this is B, how many more till like, I think it was like the G Street. I just like counted in the alphabet. I couldn't see the sign names, but I knew my alphabet. So I just counted and then I turned on there. And as I rounded the corner, I saw the sign. I was like, yeah, this is the right street.

Garett:
Okay. Okay.

Jordan:
And then same thing we have a I know a lot of towns have a lot of tree names for their streets.

Garett:
Right.

Jordan:
And all the tree names are also alphabetical.

Garett:
Okay. Okay. That is a fascinating mix of names. So it sounds like kind of a kind of a bit like Calgary. Calgary is, you know, has numbers everywhere. But it also is has, you know, names for streets around it. Whereas Edmonton, yeah, Edmonton is almost entirely just numbered.

Jordan:
Yeah, College Heights is a little bit different. I can't really, it's not like what we call the bowl is because like the Hart you go up the hill and you're in the Hart and then like where the Walmart is, you go up another hill. That's where like the Walmart is and stuff like that. But for like what we call the bowl because we're like in a valley almost, that's how it works for the most part. Especially in like the once you get to like more business areas and off of the university foothill area.

Garett:
Yeah, that's fascinating. Having grown up in Grande Prairie, all of the streets are north and south and all of the avenues are east and west. But one of the things that I find most difficult about Toronto in Toronto, you just have like, no idea. Like, you know, they have they have streets, avenues and roads. But they aren't like specifically a type of street or type of avenue or type of road. They just are named whatever they want.

Jordan:
Interesting.

Garett:
For example, Yonge Street, which is one of the most famous streets in Toronto goes north and south-ish. But people say just goes north and south. And then Spadina Avenue is parallel to Yonge Street. It also goes north and south. That's just how it is. And Bloor Street goes east and west. And of course, Spadina Avenue just turns into Spadina Road halfway through a street. So it's a bit of a mess. [chuckles] So most people, most people, especially newcomers like me, will just say, the beginning of it, you know, we'll just say like Spadina or Yonge or Bloor, and not even say whether it's a street or an avenue or road, or something like that, because it's so difficult to remember which one of those it is. And so you just, you just remember the names of them. And people know what you're talking about. It's weird. It's messed up. It takes a while to learn to.

Jordan:
Contrary to like living in Prince George, it's like I can navigate Fort Nelson, like the back of my hand. But don't ask me what street I'm on. I cannot tell you really.

Garett:
Yeah, you were saying before that Prince George also had has recently had warmer winters than Fort Nelson. Do the locals say that it's abnormally warm? Or do you feel like it is actually warmer than Fort Nelson?

Jordan:
I don't know. It's kind of like we just get like a false spring with by the time January hits like my first year in Prince George by January, the days for like a three week period were reaching seven degrees. And so all the snow was melting. And then at nighttime, all that snow would melt into ice. So they just had big chunks of ice just everywhere across town.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And then it's definitely not how Fort Nelson is because Fort Nelson you get like your first sign of spring by March if you're lucky, maybe April.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And then yeah, even this last winter, it wasn't it wasn't that bad. Like my first year in Prince George, we were still like by February, we were like, is this springtime now? Or are we going to get a ton more snow? And I remember like, we went on the phase of like, you can see the grass. And then next week, there was three inches of snow covered on it. But all the next week, the grass is back.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
We went for like a while to do that pattern.

Garett:
Yeah, my first experiences living in Utah was kind of like that, where by February, the grass was back. And you could see, you could see the grass and then it would snow again here or snow again there. But I remember people saying that Utah is known for like false springs, right? Like you would get a nice warm day, you would feel like a wonderful spring. And then boom, you get another six inches of snow or something. But it's also pretty high elevation in the mountains. So getting a dump of snow in April is not horribly uncommon because of how the weather patterns work.

Jordan:
Do they get a lot of snow in Utah in the wintertime?

Garett:
They do in the mountains. Yeah, there's, they say, I guess one of their slogans is like best snow on earth or something for skiing, snowboarding.

Jordan:
Interesting. Because yeah, I've only been to Utah once and we were just driving through. And I just remember it just being so hot outside, like not quite as bad as like Vegas was just so hot outside.

Garett:
Yeah, it does get surprisingly warm in the summer. But in the wintertime, it does get a decent amount of snow. Not necessarily cold, but definitely snow.

Jordan:
I mean, Fort Nelson gets polar opposites of like super warm in the summertime and super cold in the wintertime. That year that they were having like, I think that was the year my brother graduated. That would have been 2021, I think.

Garett:
Yeah, I think it was 2021, had the huge, huge heat dome.

Jordan:
You heard about Lytton burned down? It was that year. We were reaching like 40, 42 degrees in Fort Nelson. But I believe in 2017, one time, Fort Nelson was the seventh coldest place on the earth, minus 67 degrees without wind chill.

Garett:
Yeah, that's very cold. That's too cool.

Jordan:
Yeah. So like we get the polar opposites of, oh man, it's really hot too. Oh man, it's really cold.

Garett:
Yeah, Death Valley can't say that it gets that cold, even if it gets the hottest. [chuckles]

Jordan:
[chuckles] Yeah. And we're not so bad as like Vancouver and Toronto, they can get cold. But their cold is like a wet cold. So it's like you're soaked to the bone almost, and freezing where Fort Nelson is called dry cold.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
Where we got like a small river on like, on the thing. And so we're like, you go outside and like you're relatively warm if you got all your snow gear on and like, if you got like, rated for the cold weather snow gear, then it's not too bad. Like your face might be get cold or something like that. But yeah, from like, what I hear, because I've never like really been in like those wet cold areas before.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
Sounds like we're quite lucky with even though we could get cold. It's not like a wet cold.

Garett:
Yeah, my, my worst experiences with wet cold has been living in England. And in England, I mostly got around on a bicycle, and it would be like zero right on freezing or plus one and raining. That is the worst experience I've ever had. Because the water, you know falling from the sky, is hitting you at practically freezing temperatures. And so you're getting like, it hits you on your skin, and it's just ice cold, because it's literally ice cold, but it's wet. And so you just get wet and cold. And it's very horrible. Because when it gets colder, and it starts snowing again, snow is easier to deal with because you can brush it off. If you're really lucky you can sweep it, but you can at least like, push it out of the way. But rain, rain right around that freezing temperature is the most horrible winter experience I've ever had.

Jordan:
I'm glad I've never had to experience that.

Garett:
Yeah, it's not as bad if you get to drive a car or take a bus, but you get around on pushbike. It's not so great.

39:02 - Perspective and Outlook

Garett:
So Jordan, would you be willing to share what kind of life experiences you've learned from growing up in the north?

Jordan:
I think like the biggest one. And it's not so much just purely from living in the north, but it's going from living in a small isolated place to a bigger centre. It would be that like, a lot of the mindset, especially like politically wise, living in Fort Nelson, most of it are just all the same mindset. And then you come to like Prince George, and it's a little bit of a bigger centre and stuff like that. And there's just different mindsets around you. Just like one thing that I just gotta just pay attention to sometimes is like not everyone has the same way of thinking that I do all the time, like I did up north. That was definitely a bigger thing that I got. Because like Prince George is part of the like, for politically wise, Prince George is like kind of the Fort Nelson area. But like once you cross those Rocky Mountains, it's definitely a big difference. Like Prince George and Fort St. John got their similarities, but like, they also got the differences too, and stuff like that. So that's like one thing to pay attention to. And also it's just, I gotta be careful, especially like living in the safe Fort Nelson to just be mindful about like, especially like, about like the possible hidden crime that I could be exposed to or dangers that I could be exposed to just living in the city that never really had to worry about in Fort Nelson, stuff like that.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
But yeah, it's just, I didn't really like life lessons really. It wasn't really much that like, it was like specifically living there, gave me an advantage over versus living somewhere else.

Garett:
Yeah, no, that's okay. Thanks for sharing. I think it's a great point. It brings to mind it at one of the museums in Toronto, they have sort of like a bunch of stuffed animals, you know, like taxidermy animals on exhibit. And they have this display, which shows the number of variations of bats in the number of variation, like different species of bats, and different species of seashell animals, like ones that make spiral seashells, starting from starting from the equator in the tropics, and then going north. And you just see like the number of different species of bats down in the tropics is just incredible. And then as you go farther and farther north, you have no bats, right? Like you go to the Arctic, there aren't there aren't bats in the Arctic.

Jordan:
Yeah.

Garett:
That reminds like what you said, that reminds me of my experience growing up, you know, not terribly far north, but you know, farther north than most places is, as a scout, I felt like I had a pretty good grasp on the environment of like my surroundings. Like if I were good to go out into the bush, I would know what the trees are, I would know what the plants are, the animals are, I would know what to expect, I would know what to find. But as I've lived in places that are much farther south, it kind of scares me. Like when I when I go to a place that I see, like, for example, just so many different bugs, and beetles and things like that, that it's like, I don't like I don't know what these are. Because in the north, there's just so few bugs, they're just like so few different species that can survive in the north. Then when I go farther south, I have to remember that, oh, things are different, like they're not all the same. Like there's a huge uniformity that exists in the Arctic, because you got to live a certain way to make it. And when you go farther south, it's just, there's so much more variety. And I forget that too. And it really astonishes me even in nature that I see that. And yeah, the desert, especially scares me the most. Because it's so foreign to my experience that I just don't know, like I know that it's like a, it's a deadly place. The desert is a deadly place. But I don't know what is the deadly things. And like, even the plants are deadly. And I just don't know how to handle it. It's kind of terrifying. Yeah.

Jordan:
Yeah. Speaking on that, it's just like, where I live is like, we had zero like, poisonous or like, venomous animals and stuff like that. And there was no like, I didn't have to worry about a spider bite that was going to kill me or something or didn't have any snakes up there either and stuff like that. And then even like, I went to with my one friend because he runs his place off of firewood. And so I went out with him on an old logging road. And we got some like trees and stuff like that. And I just like, had that realized that was like my first realization that like, the topography is different from my hometown of Prince George. Like, you look on the map, like, they look pretty similar. And like driving through, I didn't really notice it. And then but like, I was in that bush on foot and stuff like that. That's when I noticed, especially that underbrush that just like, I don't have these parts up home.

Garett:
Yep.

Jordan:
As well as like, you get the bigger bugs here. I discovered some point in the last year that I don't like if it's big, and it flies, I don't want it in my face.

Garett:
[chuckles]

Jordan:
And I had a moth like the size of my hand, like, dive bomb my face a couple of times. Did not like that.

Garett:
Yeah. Yeah, when I would meet people, you know, who grew up farther south, and I would talk with them about what my experience growing up, or the north was like, I would tell them that when you when you go into the bush, in the north, you know, if something is going to kill you, like, because it's big, it's coming, like you can see it's coming, you can hear it coming. If you can't hear it coming, because it's like a cat, a big cat, which there aren't very many big cats, or I've never seen one, but like a wolverine, you know, like, if it's something that is stealthy and going to kill you, then it's probably just going to leave you alone. But it's mostly like, you can see what's coming. And so it's just terrifying to change, to learn a new mindset that there are small things that they could bite you, or poke you or hurt you and just like you didn't even see it before before it's too late.

Jordan:
Yeah.

Garett:
It's terrifying. It's scary.

Jordan:
And even on that is like the big ones that you can see, you still gotta be careful with them, like a moose or a buffalo. Like, just because you can see them, they don't look dangerous, or something doesn't mean they aren't dangerous.

Garett:
Yep. But yeah, exactly. You can you can avoid it easily. It's not like, yeah, it's not like you go to put your shoes on and then a scorpion was hiding in your shoe and stuff like that.

Jordan:
Stop, honestly. I remember going for vacation in Costa Rica.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And yeah, that was one of the things was check your bed and check your shoes every time before you went in.

Garett:
Yeah. Yeah, you're not gonna find something hiding in your bed in the north that's sneaking, trying to kill you.

Jordan:
No.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
I don't think I ever like woke up and like, Oh, man, that's a bug in my bed. Only I've ever had that issue.

Garett:
Yeah. Like what you said before about like, coming from a small town and like, feeling like politically was all similar mindset. And then going going to a bigger city. That's sort of what it reminded me of, right, that it's in a lot of ways, you feel like you can get to know all that there is just like, you know, in the northern boreal forest, you kind of get to know all of the plants and animals and you can, you can become an expert in it. And you feel like you're comfortable there, and it's fine. And then you go to a bigger city. And, you know, there are people who don't, who don't think like you who don't act like you. Just like, you know, there are more species that you're unsure about. They're not all bad. But it takes it takes some time to figure it out. Yeah, it takes takes some practice and getting to know what's out there.

Jordan, is there anything else you want to share? Before we wrap up?

Jordan:
As eager as I was to get out of Fort Nelson. Fort Nelson will always be my home. Like I may have lived in Prince George for two, three years by now, but like, Fort Nelson, I'll always just view Fort Nelson as my home.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
Even more so than where I'm currently living. Like I call Prince George I live in Prince George. I'm from, I'm from Prince George, or I come from from Prince George, but like Fort Nelson is my home.

Garett:
Yeah.

Jordan:
And I don't think there'll be anything that can take that away from me.

Garett:
And that sense of place is, I think, is really important to us as humans and people. It becomes a part of us. Thank you for sharing. Thanks for taking some time to talk. It's a great to catch up with you.

Jordan:
Yeah, thank you once again for having me.

Garett:
Yeah, we're also very grateful for all of our listeners who do listen. And if you have any questions for us or any feedback, or if you want to write in a story for us to share, you can email us at lifenorthofthe54th@gmail.com. Or you could go to our website at peacecountrylife.ca/feedback. And let us know there. I hope to see you around Jordan.

Jordan:
Yes, thank you.

Garett:
Bye.

Ending Theme Music:
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