Editor: My name is Sage and I am 13. My family has a house on Lawrence Grassi Ridge.
Recently, the Town has decided to develop the green spaces in our community. Some people think that only the adults were trying to save it … but it wasn’t.
My friend and I always used to play and plant trees in those spaces. As much as I am excited to have new neighbours, and possibly new friends, it breaks my heart every time I think about those spaces not being there anymore.
A few years ago when I was around five, my brother, mom and I built a big fort on one of the trees inside the green space across from us. It lasted for many years, through blizzards and thunderstorms. I would go and check on it every now and then, and every time, there was a new spider web, or moss, or species of bug on the tree. A couple of months ago, my mom told me that it wasn’t there anymore. When I asked why she told me that the developers had cut it down. That is not the only fort in those woods that we have made, but it was my favourite.
Just a few weeks ago, as my family was preparing to go to the Nordic Centre, a small herd of elk were grazing in the woods were the fort was. Two years ago, when my cousins were visiting from Vancouver, an elk was strolling down the street, eating off everyone’s trees. Despite the loss of flowers that day, it was very cool to see. I will miss the elk.
Every summer, we would play street hockey on my friend’s driveway. One spring, just after the snow melted, we were so eager to play that our dads went out and cleared all the gravel so we could play. They even beat the street cleaners. That will be a lot harder with more cars everywhere.
I love those woods. I always will. I don’t want to see the trees and animals that I, and many others, grew up with gone. I don’t want to hear the sound of the dynamite blowing up the soil that my feet have touched so many times.
What I want is for my kids and their kids, to be able to have many stories in those woods too. I want to be able to cross into those forests without it being considered as trespassing. I want the animals to have their homes there. What I want, is for those woods to remain undeveloped.
Sage Gilliland,
Canmore
