For eons, there was only water. Until the volcanoes shot fire from the belly of the earth, stacking rocks on rocks until there was land, then more rocks until there were mountains.

 

In time, the mountains wore down, turned to dust and sand and dirt in which things would grow.

 

Then came the ice. And it came again. It scrubbed away the flotsam and jetsam of the ages and epochs and eras and eons and pushed it south to make fertile plains and prairies where things would grow and life would prosper.

 

All that remained was the ancient bedrock, gashed and scarred as if ravaged by the claws of an apocalyptic bear, and every slash and cut became a bottomless lake filled with water as cold as ice. When it was done, it was a place of terrible beauty protected from hungry life-forms by cruel seasons and an absence of plenty.

 

It would be called the Canadian Shield and it would be home to the desperate and the pure.