I'm Proud I Went Up There

Police vandalism, tow trucks & chaos. The final installment of a Nova Scotia fisherman's story.

Photo taken by me, July 2023

Mark stayed in Ottawa until the end. "I was there right until the tow trucks were there," he says. It was Saturday, February 19 - between 10 and 11 am, he thinks - when he witnessed the arrest of an armed forces veteran:

That guy brought his camper in there. I don't know his name, but he was a veteran. He said, 'No, I fought for this country and I'm staying here until the end.'

And they towed him out. They broke all the windows out of his camper. What for? He was standing outside, and they had him handcuffed. And then they broke every window out of his camper. What for?

So that's when I rolled down my windows. I was sitting in my truck and it was running. I had it turned around, pointed out. But I couldn't get out, anyway. There's tow trucks in the way, and total chaos.

That's when two men in full riot gear accosted him - one at each window:

There was two of those clowns. They was all masked up. Gas masks, they had everything. Pepper spray pointed at me. I took it to be pepper spray, they had some kind of canister thing. 'You gotta sign this paper.'

I said, 'I ain't signing no paper for you or anyone else.'

'Well, you gotta sign this paper and you gotta leave this city.'

I said, 'I'm leaving this city and if you don't get off my running boards, you're gonna go out of this city, too.'

So I just dropped the clutch out and started, and they jumped off.  And I drove, wiggled my way out, and left.

Mark stopped briefly at another hub friendly to the truckers, located 30 minutes east of Parliament Hill. When he said he was heading back to the Maritimes, they told him: "Well, we're gonna fuel you up so you can get at least most of the way home. And they filled it right to the top." No charge.

Driving through the night, Mark was back in Nova Scotia 16 hours later.

Today, both sides of the cab of that C500 Kenworth announce that it spent over 20 days in Ottawa. "I'm leaving that on there," says Mark. "I'm proud I went up there."

Sometimes he gets razzed at the highway weigh scales. "I was going through Quebec with a load of stuff on the back, on the trailer," he recalls. The chap in the booth hollered out, "Geez, you ain't got much respect."

When Mark replied, "What was your first clue?" he says the chap gave him a thumbs up and told him he agreed with him. "Off I went."

Part 1: A Fisherman, a Truck and a Train Horn