ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, April 28, 1996 TAG: 9604270010
SECTION: BOOKS PAGE: 4 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: BOOK REVIEW
SOURCE: REVIEWED BY JUSTIN ASKINS
LEANING ON THE WIND: Under the Spell of the Great Chinook. By Marty Sid. Harper Collins West. No price given.
No one can deny that "Leaning on the Wind" is a rich volume, loaded with an abundance of information about the east slope montane of southern Alberta, a "land of giant forms, of mountain, foothill, prairie and sky." The human and natural history of the area is meticulously recorded, but unfortunately it is only after Marty Sid's personal story takes over - well after the first 100 pages - that the plethora of details is woven into a fascinating individual account.
Initially, in a chapter titled "How the Ocean Got Up in the Sky," Sid addresses the geological history of this "narrow band of high, bald-headed hills and timbered whalebacks," once part of a vast inland sea. Then he introduces the key non-human character, the famed chinook: "a warm Pacific wind that brings temporary spring in the midst of winter." With winds often over 100 mph and bringing incredible shifts of temperature - in Great Falls, Mont., a Chinook changed the temperature from -32 to +15 in seven minutes - the Chinook is a powerful presence, one that can bring hurricane-like destruction and suck away every trace of moisture in the soil, changing the land into a veritable desert.
With such admirable tension established, the book seemed destined to speed along with Sid's own encounters with the great wind holding center stage. However, the narrative quickly bogs down in some plodding chapters about the Early Native American inhabitants and then several chapters about the area's white settlement, including a long stretch of Sid's family history.
After that lull, the sails fill again, and Sid's own telling experiences with the Chinook begin as he purchases a dilapidated old house right in the middle of the montane: "Don't think about the renovations, I told myself. Don't allow logic to get in your way ... Any fool can fix a house. Only God can create heaven on a hillside."
It is in that heavenly abode that "Leaning on the Wind" finally reaches its full stride: "Over the years we have learned that if a Chinook blows in around March 1, it seems at first to break the winter's back. Snow turns into a flood of meltwater; the roads are running freshets. But March is just a battleground between Pacific and northern fronts. The ground may quake underfoot as the warm wind blows. But during the night, the wind backs up as the cold arctic air pours south like water. Warm and cold air mix up a low fog that oozes west toward us off the prairie, a grey blanket being drawn upslope. In the morning there is a fairy tale landscape of lacy hoar frost on every twig and stem. Underfoot, the frost has tightened yesterday's quaking pudding into a drumhead again." This is vibrant writing, a sensitive observer allowing his knowledge to be guided by his own personal involvement with the land.
Unfortunately, the last part of the book loses track again, with several chapters (particularly those on bull riding, cowboy poetry and sweat lodges) that mar the volume's integrity. Nevertheless, there is much to praise in "Leaning on the Wind," and I recommend it, especially for those interested in Western Canada.
Justin Askins teaches English at Radford University.
LENGTH: Medium: 62 linesby CNB