Peter Johnston

Lasqueti Island Trustee with the Islands  Trust 

My parents believed that if you stayed in one place you were going nowhere. I came with them to Canada when I was six years old, lived in a small northern Saskatchewan city, then moved to Saskatoon and Vancouver for post-secondary schooling, taught elementary school in northern BC, and traveled in Europe, north Africa and western Asia for a couple of years.  In 1974 I came to Lasqueti to teach at the two-room school, which I did full-time for two years.

I've been living on Xwe'etay/ Lasqueti Island since then, now nearly two-thirds of my life. Currently, I'm making our small farm even smaller. My children and grandchildren have grown up here, and have their roots here.  I have learned that having deep connections with, and knowledge of, a place is good and rare.