ARTS AND CULTURE
SIXTY SECONDS
A FILM BY LARA SHEA
skydiving instructor and airborne photographer in his adopted home of Victoria, B.C. The last thing the accomplished athlete and adventurer remembers from that moment, is deploying the pilot chute; four days later he woke from a coma in ICU with one leg amputated and a team of doctors scrambling to save the other. Raised in Calgary, Turner spent his twenties adventuring in the Rockies and living an envious #vanlife, pursuing his many interests as only an unencumbered, twenty-something can: surfing, rock climbing, snowboarding, raft guiding. However, Sixty Seconds, the short film by Revelstoke’s Lara Shea, isn’t about that Turner or
In sixty seconds, Tyler Turner’s life was cleaved into two segments: life before and life after he hit the ground from 3,000 metres up. On September 4th, 2017, at age 29, Turner was hurtling above terra firma, enjoying his day as a
FINDING THE MOTHER TREE; DISCOVERING THE WISDOM OF THE FOREST A BOOK BY SUZANNE SIMARD 2021, Allen Lane – A Division of Penguin Random House Canada reviewed by :: Joanna Croston
64
the adrenaline sports he pursued in the decade prior to his accident; it’s about the human body and mind and how we deal with the hole left when the things we love most are suddenly and violently ripped away. About a year after his accident, doctors were forced to amputate Turner’s remaining
Forest scientist and ecologist, Suzanne Simard, grew up eating dirt in the Monashee Mountains of British Columbia. Literally, she did, despite best efforts by her parents to get her to stop. There was something about the rich, earthy loam underneath the trees that subconsciously tasted like sustenance to her and, there and then, she committed herself to discovering the relationship between soil and plants. Indigenous wisdom holds that all life is interconnected. All living beings talk to one another, share energy and, more importantly, share love and wisdom to encourage growth. Convinced it was true, Simard was determined to find the scientific basis of this concept. Simard’s ancestral roots are heavily steeped in logging as her family pioneered many early techniques for remote harvesting and log transportation, however, she was certain modern tree harvesting and replanting was missing the mark. She believed current techniques were too focused on single-species regrowth often in clear cuts sprayed heavily with chemical herbicide to ensure the survival of the most lucrative tree crop. What she discovered in these clear cuts was stunted growth and death among young saplings. She went on to prove her theories of plant co-operation and communication, and has attempted to share her knowledge with the
lower leg, making him a bilateral amputee, and surprisingly, his world reopened; the chronic pain became more manageable and he moved forward in search of his previous life’s rhythm buttressed by friends, family and counsellors. Turner has since returned to surfing, snowboarding and skateboarding, he also works as a full-time skydive instructor in Campbell River where he lives on a sailboat with his partner, Kayleen Vanderree. He is also, amazingly, the only bilateral-amputee, wing-suit athlete in the world. This winter, Canadians will be able to watch him compete in boardercross and banked slalom in Beijing as he is a shoo-in for the 2022 Canadian Paralympic team. Sixty Seconds, Shea’s award-winning, 17-minute, short-form documentary will be released this November. You can check out the trailer at www.larashea.com/sixty-seconds
not-always-receptive forestry industry. Finding balance between the rough and tumble logging industry (which employed her and was rampant with sexism at the time) and scientific evidence that trees are more complex than they appear, is the sentiment of her new book, Finding the Mother Tree. Simard stresses trees are not simply a natural resource, but rather they are the foundation of a mind-boggling highway of communication and interconnectivity for an array of life forms. World renowned for her profound theories on plant communication and co-operation, Simard’s Finding the Mother Tree—although rife with science and technical information—is an accessible book for the average reader. By studying the principles of the sophisticated network of pathways that lurk beneath the loam Simard once eagerly thrust into her mouth as a child, the author not only reveals a new way of thinking, but also that humanity could take a lesson from the interconnectivity of plants and maybe even improve our own societies. Memory, nurturing, and education are not restricted to the world of fauna. Perhaps there is more to the forests than we have ever imagined. Finding the Mother Tree will not only open your eyes to possibility, it will forever change how you view the intricate web of forest life.
