Acknowledgements

In about 2008 I joined a little group that meets at the Georgetown Inn in Canmore, Alberta. The Inn sports a sign at the front claiming it is one of the “Charming Inns of Alberta.” The group calls itself the Georgetown Institute.

I want to acknowledge members of the group: Joost Aalsberg, Paul Carrick, Michelle Dagenais, Sally Guerin, Rick Hester, Peter Nichol, Lawrence Nyman, Brent Pickard, Peter Rollason and especially Dave Palmer, whom I omitted to mention in the acknowledgements to Bad Judgment.

The room where we meet, called the Miner’s Lamp Pub, is decorated in traditional English pub style, with wooden floors and wooden furniture and an imposing oak bar. The ceilings are white plaster with large wooden beams, the walls are covered in ornate wallpaper, and there is memorabilia everywhere celebrating the history of Canmore as a mining town and as a skiing and mountaineering centre.

There is a framed notice on the wall that reads:

The Georgetown Institute meets here
Wednesdays at 5:00pm.
Visitors always welcome.
Imbibo cum a credo forsit

We think the Latin motto says: “Drinkers with a thinking problem,” but there have been Latin scholars visit us who say this is not a very good translation.

There is a little brass plaque on the table in front of the fireplace that says “Reserved: Georgetown Institute, Wednesdays at 5:00 pm.” Each of the members of the Institute has a pewter beer stein with his name inscribed on it. These hang over the bar when not in use, and constitute part of the decor. On the ceiling beam over the Institute table we have hung the mug with Ian Lockwood’s name. When Ian died a few years ago, we gathered in that room to drink to his memory and hung his stein above our table so that he will be remembered as long as we continue to gather there.

At one of the first meetings I attended, I met Bob Sandford. Bob is now the EPCOR Chair for Water Security at the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health. He has written many books on the subject of water, climate and the national parks. He welcomed me as a new member and facetiously commented: “It’s good to have you join the club, Judge Reilly, but you understand this is a literary group and if you want to be a member you will have to publish.”

Me: “I’ve wanted to write a book, but I just have never gotten down to doing it.”

Bob: “What would you write about?”

The facetious nature of the conversation had become serious.

Me: “I would write about my experience as a judge with jurisdiction over the Stoney Nakoda First Nations at Morley, Alberta; the years of conflict that I experienced as a result of my efforts to improve the delivery of justice to the Stoney Nakoda people; and the changes in my thinking about justice as a result of my experience.”

Bob: “Why have you not done it?”

Me: “It just seems like such a huge project that I am too overwhelmed by it to even get started.”

Bob: “It sounds to me like more than one book. We should talk more about this.”

Some days later Bob called me to say his publisher, Don Gorman, was in town and he wanted to introduce us. I met with Bob and Don at Murietta’s restaurant in Calgary over a pint of ale. The pints seem to be a necessary stimulant for literary endeavours. I had pretty much the same conversation with Don as I had had with Bob, but Don was a little more insistent.

“We at Rocky Mountain Books would really like to publish anything you write, and I think Bob is right that you are describing several books.”

Don then went out to his vehicle and returned with Bob’s book The Weekender Effect, a small monograph he had written for RMB’s “Manifesto” series. These are little hardcover volumes, about 100 pages of about 200 words a page – basically 20,000 word essays.

Don continued: “Just think this size.”

Me: “Okay, I can do that.”

Don: “Good. Now what part of your ideas will you put into this? Rocky Mountain Books is mostly focused on matters of local interest, so your stories about the Stoneys are what we would be most interested in.”

Me: “That seems like a good place to start.”

Don: “What would the title be?”

Me: “That’s a good question. John Snow took credit for writing These Mountains Are Our Sacred Places. Perhaps I could call it These Mountains Are My Place to Hide from John Snow.”

We chatted for a while about various possible titles, and then:

Don: “How about Bad Medicine.

Me: “Oh, that’s perfect. Medicine is the term for Native spirituality, and there is so much bad stuff happening out there that Bad Medicine is a perfect fit.

Bob: “I am so glad you are going to do this. Now let me give you some advice. Just put everything down that comes into your head; don’t try to edit as you go. Don has an editor who will take your rough work and fine tune it. You may not even recognize it, but it will be your writing and he will make it perfect.”

Don: “Yes, Joe Wilderson will do the editing. He used to work for Carswell Legal Publications, so he will be totally appropriate for editing your work.”

With a title to get me started and the promise of publication when I was finished, I had the motivation to write my first book. I was still working as a supernumerary judge and sitting almost every day, so it wasn’t my only endeavour, but within about six months I had a manuscript ready for Joe Wilderson to work on.

Joe was a delight to work with. He would get excited over every story and seemed to just really enjoy his work. He suggested changes and corrected errors in spelling and grammar and rearranged text to make the final product much better than what I had handed him in the beginning.

I thank Don and Bob for getting me started on my fledgling career as a writer, and Bob for his continued pressure to write this book.

There are a number of others I would like to thank as well:

Martin Parnell for his advice to “just do 10 minutes.” When it seemed like I couldn’t force myself to get writing, that advice was very helpful, and the 10 minutes would sometimes expand to several hours.

My old friend Robert Fulton. Bob is a social worker who has spent most of his career doing research and presenting papers to numerous social service agencies in Ontario. He has shared many insights with me that I have included in this work. After spinning my wheels on this manuscript for several years, I asked him to help me pull my ideas out of the ether and get them on paper. We engaged in lengthy conversations that made it possible for me to do that, and he rewrote some of the chapters, greatly improving them. Without him this might not have been completed for several more years.

Margot Van Sluytman, for her book Sawbonna: I See You, and for suggested changes and additions to the chapter on Sawbonna.

Rupert Ross for his books Dancing With a Ghost and Returning to the Teachings and the many insights they contain.

Thomas King for his book The Inconvenient Indian.

Annette Stanwick for Forgiveness: The Mystery and Miracle.

Roland Rollinmud for the painting that was reproduced on the cover of each of my books. I have used this as my logo. The symbolism of the feather over the gavel is the Indigenous way taking precedence over the Eurocentric system. The circle of the sweetgrass symbolizes the spirituality of the Indigenous way.

This book is the last instalment of a work I started more than ten years ago. There have been many times when I have had great difficulty in putting words on paper, and I have appreciated gentle encouragement I have received from many friends such as Anne and Garney Baker, Henri and Donna Vultier, Keith Paynter, Helen Diotte, Ron England and Alex Chen, Lorraine England and others too many to mention.

Finally, I wish to give special acknowledgement to my son, Sean Raymond Charles Reilly (born in Calgary, November 11, 1970; died in Taiwan, August 5, 2016). I have a very pleasant memory of us sitting on the patio at Jameson’s pub in Calgary while Sean suggested changes to Bad Medicine. For his encouragement when I was working on the manuscript for Bad Judgment at his home in Taiwan, and his help on the book report I wrote for the Alberta Law Review, on Grace Woo’s Ghost Dancing with Colonialism (Sean explained the term “paradigm” in a way that I could understand). We planned to work on this book during his recovery from chemotherapy, but the cancer metastasized and he died. It has taken me more than two years to get back to it, but I needed to finish it so that I could dedicate it to him.