Every year, at the end of the treeplanting season, I tell everyone I might be coming back again next year. And every year I know in my heart that no, that really was my last contract.

Maybe I’ll feel the same way at the end of this season, because off I go again.

The last couple of years were short seasons for me, but this year it’s going to be really short. 2 to 3 shifts, as part of a six-planter contract working out the back of somebody’s house in Rosswood, north of Terrace. Nothing like the 90 day, multi-company seasons of yore.

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This will be the the closest I’ve come to coastal planting, which I foreswore many years ago as a pass-time for crazies. But I’m told the land isn’t too bad, the blocks aren’t too steep, the views are good and it’s 28 cents for straight plant. I’ll find out soon enough, for better or worse. Two summers ago my knees started to go, and last year I got tendinitis for the first time. What fresh wonders of terrain and physical decay are in store for me this year? Surely nothing can go too badly in two shifts. I could stand on my head for two shifts if I had too.

And then I’ll be back! And looking for summer-time fun and grownup work in the grand old city of Vancouver.

British Columbia, where the blocks are as steep as the prices

Previously:

• 2009 Kooteny Coastal, Season II
• 2008 I Want to See What Treeplanting Is
• 2006 The Crewboss Email Arrives, the Foreboding Begins
• 2005 keep it light enough to travel
• 2004 a summer in numbers
• 2003 “What have I done?”