Working Like a Man—My Adventures at Cluculz Lake

Reflections on Working the Jobs

Leaving Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada, in the Okanagan in 1993 to get away from the second boom and the higher cost of living, an entrepreneurial husband and wife decide to buy raw land. Traveling to the outskirts of the authors hometown of Prince George, British Columbia. A sublake shore five-acre lot is secured. Quietness and a simple way of living was the goal for the midlife years. Jessie would not be able to imagine the battles she would go through homesteading in the semiwilderness of Cluculz Lake. She was unaware of the instability the work life would involve and the challenging developments of building a house and homelife. Although many women were picking up mens trades, working at a wood mill was a new experience for Jessie. Her experiences of trying to change a statuary hobby into a home business by herself took every ounce of imagination she could muster. Jessie braved what was presented to her and overcame all that was ahead of her. Her creative nonfiction memoir leads to a life as a domestic again but, to her younger son and small granddaughter, leading to a day care occupation. The memoir is a span of sixteen years of Jessies life.