Orphans of the Storm

Everyone has his own private myth, of course, but I am coming to believe that perhaps towns, too, can have a personal myth: the story of how it came to be and why it its life is as it is. This is not about history or facts, of course, but about myth…the symbolic truth. It is the inner spiritual truth that explains all outward facts and signs.

I have never before lived in a small town that seemed to have a personal myth, but I can easily imagine that it is true of towns in the South; indeed, the whole South (as in the Confederacy) has a personal mythology that people often use to explain everything that happens there. But of that, I know nothing, personally. Of Point Roberts, perhaps more.

Here is what I think the Point Roberts myth is, at least what it is for some people. We—the residents of Point Roberts--are the children of royalty who abandoned us long ago, but who left us with many family resources. However, because we were thus made orphans, we were put rudely into a rude guardianship, and our guardian took charge of not only us but of many of our resources. Like orphans everywhere, we are badly treated: our roads are not plowed, our streets are not maintained, our ditches are not cleaned quickly enough, our water is mishandled, and our cruel guardian takes our money from us and instead of using it all to provide for our needs, uses it for its own nefarious needs.

We hope that someday, our royal parents will come back and set things right. But if, as is possible, our royal parents are now dead or—worse—imprisoned by our fearsome guardian, then we may have to rescue ourselves by developing an economic plan so stunning that we will be able to demonstrate once and for all that we are able to stand on our own, that we are the equal to (or even better than) our guardian, much more powerful, able, mano a mano, to win our freedom. And our economic development will be so stunning that we will be able to buy and sell our former guardian, and we will incorporate and no longer send our money or the Canadians' money away.

Suffice to say that I have recently been to another community meeting in which we sit around the campfire on a dark and stormy night and re-tell the oft heard tales of the cruel County. These tales focus primarily on the County’s never-ending desire to take from us our money in the form of taxes and to refuse to give us back, in kind, exactly the same amount of money. Thus does the cruel County demonstrate not only its cruelty but its failure to understand American democratic values (those who have a lot should pay a lot, but then they should get it all back so they won’t feel they’ve been treated unfairly).

And in addition, I am told, the County is refusing to repair the boat ramp in Lighthouse Park, which would mean that no longer would there be anywhere here to launch boats. End times? First Whalen’s Park disappears and now the boat ramp.