Gophers were the commonest thing on the prairie. When you stepped off the end of the Railroad Bridge you stepped right onto the prairie and there you were – free as the gophers. The great thing about Saskatoon was the way it ended sharp all around its edge. We were in a hurry to get out of the city and into the real prairie, where you can climb a fence post and see for about a million miles – that’s how flat the prairie is. It was the spring wind, and the smell of it made us walk faster. But we felt another breath, a gentle one, blowing across the distant wheat fields and smelling like warm sun shining on soft mud. The river was icy with thaw water and, as we crossed over the Railroad Bridge, we could feel a cold breath rising from it. Snowdrifts still clung along the steep banks of the river in the shelter of the cottonwood trees. Spring was late that year in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. One May morning my friend Bruce and I went for a hike on the prairie.
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