An innocuous whirring noise sounds somewhere overhead as the dog and I traipse our preferred route around the Whistler Cay stomping grounds. It is almost unnoticeable, at first, until I notice it—then it’s all I hear.
My anxiety spikes when I locate the source—an unidentified, and unidentifiable, drone scanning my neighbourhood from above in all directions.
Its presence only sparks more questions. Who is operating it? For what purpose? Is that even legal?
And who would I even report it to if I decided to take action to protect my privacy?
According to federal rules passed in 2019, the drone’s operator doesn’t appear to be committing any obvious infractions, and it seems my options for recourse are few.
So I accept the invasion of privacy as yet another unfortunate fact of being alive on Earth in 2024; resignedly let the whirring follow me to my home, no idea who watches from the other side of the lens.
As is the case with so many of life’s minor irritations, I am left raging at nobody in particular.
But my patience has been tested regularly of late.
Maybe it’s troubling news from back home leaving you feeling paralyzed and ineffectual, separated from all your people by two provinces and all of Canada’s tallest peaks; a sick puppy making an absolute mess of your favourite rug, causing you to scream curse words into your ceiling at 5 a.m. on a Wednesday (sorry, housemates); but then you still have to produce a newspaper, but now you have to do it from home, and technology woes leave you staring at a spinning beach ball repeatedly at the worst possible times; it all somehow results in a misprinted date on the cover of your weekly newsmagazine that you swore you proofed three times properly.
Do you ever have the urge to assume a new identity, leave everything you know behind, and start a new life selling coconut jewelry on the side of a Caribbean highway?
Once or twice a year, here.
Oddly enough, it was five simple words from a kind Whistler stranger that pulled me from this recent bout of existential despair.
Packing up all my latest failures and frustrations into a neat little ball, the pup and I headed for Whistler’s Emerald Forest on a recent sunny afternoon, no set destination or even direction in mind.
Stepping through the threshold into the cover of forest canopy, the effect was almost instant. The river rushing by, somewhere near; the birds swooping and singing to each other; the wind whispering in and out of the branches and the old, creaking tree trunks. Natural bliss.
Not another soul in sight, at first, until a man on a bike approached slowly from deep within the forest.
He didn’t even have to say the five words that came next—one look at him and I knew we were both on the same page there under the trees.
“Peace and quiet is good,” he said matter-of-factly as he rolled past on his way out of the forest—a deliberately delivered mantra, almost more to himself than me.
The steady pronunciation of the words could only be that, I knew: a personal pronouncement of defiance in the face of absolute universal chaos; a declaration of soulful autonomy ringing out amidst the incessant clanging of a frustrating, confusing, constricting societal structure.
Or maybe just a friendly greeting to a stranger.
It didn’t matter.
The mantra followed me and the pup deeper into the forest, up and around the many offshoot trails, into the tangle of logs and trees and roots and rocks.
It climbed with us up the hills; sat with us on the fallen logs.
Over and again the words repeated in my head, step by forest-traversing step, as if written to be the backdrop to this exact moment, and nothing else.
Peace and quiet is good.
After a while we stopped in a small clearing to just soak it all in—pay special attention to the exact way the sun breaks the forest crown in just the right places to light up the undisturbed moss on the forest floor; listen to the ancient wisdom espoused creak by old-growth creak.
These are the natural rhythms people the world over flock to Whistler to experience—but that love and respect for nature expands well beyond our local borders.
According to the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society’s (CPAWS) B.C. chapter, residents across the entire province are sending a strong message about nature conservation as another election day approaches.
A recent CPAWS survey found 85 per cent of B.C. residents support the goal of protecting 30 per cent of lands by 2030, while 82 per cent support creating marine protected areas, and 84 to 88 per cent think it is important to expand protection for at-risk species in various areas.
The survey also found at least eight out of 10 B.C. residents are concerned about declining biodiversity, pollution and overfishing.
Life in the modern world can be overwhelming at the best of times. Short of the aforementioned Caribbean-coconut-jewelry scheme, or some other permanent, off-the-grid expedition, we’re stuck with the reality we’re all sharing, as dystopian as it may seem at times.
Here in Whistler, at least, we are still fortunate to have ample access to those things our souls seem to desire most (whether we realize it or not).
So the next time all your modern anxieties send you down the online rabbit hole of coconut craft ideas and flights to Barbados, take five deep, deliberate breaths and remember those five simple words.
Peace and quiet is good.
