He’s Not Heavy, He’s My Brother
In the rural backwoods of British Columbia where Rick grew up, a boy’s strength and ability determined his status among his peers. Rick was an athlete, a natural leader, a stalwart adventurer.
Even as a toddler he ignored boundaries. His mother was forever out looking for him, asking, “Have you seen little Ricky?” Search parties would find him on the river with a stick and a string, trying to capture a salmon. One time he found a dead whopper and dragged it home; it was bigger than he was.
It was that same intrepid spirit that led Rick to urge friends to join him on a camping and fishing trip to the remote coastal community of Bella Coola in 1973. He was just 15 years old, and his mother thought the plan was reckless, but Rick wasn’t a kid to take no for an answer. On a hot summer’s day, he and his buddies travelled 300 kilometres to the spectacular mountain valleys of the Atnarko and Bella Coola Rivers.
They camped out, caught fish, gazed in wonder at fresh grizzly bear tracks, and experienced the sort of grand, intense adventure that only teenagers on the verge of adulthood can appreciate.
On the way home, they hitched a ride in the bed of a pickup truck. Through the rear window, they could see the long-haired driver and his girlfriend. And then suddenly the truck hit some washboard gravel and began to drift. The truck slid out of control, hit the ditch, and rolled. Fishing rods, tool boxes, and teenage boys flew through the air. “Don, on the high side, was thrown free,” Rick remembers. “But I got crushed.”
He was knocked out for a minute, and when he awoke he was lying in the ditch, in incredible pain, unable to feel his legs. His young life was just beginning, and his back was
