Latest / Dad’s Bedtime Stories / The Maple Guardian and the Canada Day Caper - A Bedtime Story

Transcript

The Maple Guardian and the Canada Day Caper - A Bedtime Story · Dad’s Bedtime Stories

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: He Hello, friends from across the nation and around the world.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: My Martin and you are listening to Dad's Bedtime Stories,
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: a podcast where I normally take listener ideas and turn
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: them into bedtime stories. But today is a very special
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: day in Canada. It is Canada Day, at least the
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: day this is recorded. You might not be listening on
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Canada Day, of course, and for some strange reason, I
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: woke up wanting to do a very Canadian story and
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: this is what I came up with. It's kind of silly,
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: but I hope you I hope you enjoy it. If
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: you like the podcast, don't forget to follow us, rate us,
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: review us. On whatever platform you're listening on, Hit that
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: like button if you're on YouTube. I think if everyone
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: who was listening on YouTube regularly hit that like button
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: would make a really big difference to other people finding it.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: Maybe we can experiment. Why don't you just hit it now?
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: Did you do it? Thank you now. If you're not
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: in Canada, you might not know that Canada Day is
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: the celebration of the Confederation of Canada, the day we
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: became a country, and we like to celebrate, or at
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: least my family likes to celebrate by eating Cowortha dairy
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: ice cream and watching fireworks. And that's exactly what we're
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: going to do today after I finished this episode. Now
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: it's time to get as comfy as you can in
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: that bed, close your eyes, and just imagine yourself possibly
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: taking on the you know, the character of Martin in
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: this story. Martin grew up in a small town in Ontario, Canada,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: where people enjoyed hunting fish and four wheelers, wood stoves,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: frozen lakes, and boil in the life blood out of
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: trees into a sort of concentrated substance most people know
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: as Maple's syrup. To most people, Maple's syrup was a
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: breakfast topping, but to Martin, it was tree blood. Could
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: you please pass the tree blood? He would say at breakfast.
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: His mother would close her eyes for one full second
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: and say, Martin, please stop calling. At that, his father
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: would usually shrug and say, well, he's not wrong. Martin
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: was eleven years old, which meant he was old enough
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: to help with real jobs around the property, but still
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: young enough to believe, deep in his bones that someday,
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: somehow he might be come a superhero. He'd been wishing
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: for powers as long as he could remember. Every birthday,
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: when the cake came out and the candles were lit,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Martin made the same sort of wish. I wish I
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: could fly, he whispered. One year, I wish I could
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: throw big stuff, he whispered. The next, I wish I
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: could run so fast that people would only see a
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: plaid blur, he whispered another time. By the time he
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: was eleven, he had thought about it a lot. He
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: didn't want boring powers. He didn't want the ability to
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: like slightly warm up soup with his finger or something
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: like that. He wanted the classics flight, super strength, super speed,
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: maybe even laser eyes, though he was worried that that
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: might cut some sort of forest fire where he lived.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: The incident happened during maple syrup season, just after the winter.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: Martin was helping his family gather sap from the maple
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: trees behind their house. At eleven, he was actually sort
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: of useful. He could carry proper buckets, stack wood, help
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: check the taps, and most importantly, complain adamantly about how
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: much work he was doing. The maple syrup boiling station
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: sat near the sugar shack, and a clearing steam rolled
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: out of the evaporator and sweet white clouds. Firewood crackled,
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: sap bubbled. The whole place smelled like spring, smoke and sugar.
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: Martin loved it. He loved the sound of sap dripping
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: into buckets. He loved the mud, He loved the steam.
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: He loved that making maple syrup was basically a normal
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: Canadian activity where he was. Then the sky changed. At first,
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: it was only darker, but then it turned into strange.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: The clouds got a sort of green glow around the edges.
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: The buckets on the trees began to rattle. Martin looked
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: up at the sky. Is the sky supposed to be
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: that color? He asked? Uh, nope, his father responded. His
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: mother stepped out of the shack and looked at the treetops.
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: Everyone inside quickly, but before they could move, lightning crackled
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: across the forest. It wasn't normal lightning though, for some reason,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: and it was green. A jagged bolt tore down from
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: the clouds and hit a maple tree. The whole tr
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: rung flashed like a giant glowstick. Another bolt slammed into
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: the ground near by, spraying mud and steam everywhere. Martin's
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: mother grabbed for him. When the biggest bolt struck, it
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: smashed directly into the maple surrup boiling station. The evaporator
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: exploded with green light. Sap hissed, steam blasted outward, metal screamed,
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: and the lightning began to chain. A bright green arc
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: snapped from the boiling station and hit Martin right in
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: the chest. For one second, the entire clearing disappeared in light.
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: His parents screamed his name. Then everything went quiet, except
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: for the rain, wind and of course, the soft dripping
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: of sap from the trees. Martin was laying on his
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: back the mud. His mother ran to him and dropped
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: to her knees. Martin, Martin, can you hear me? His
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: father slid in beside, checking his arms, his face, his chest,
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: his pulse. Hugh, Buddy, talk to us. Martin blinked, then
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: he coughed. Then he sat up and looked at the
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: absolutely destroyed boiling station. Did the tree blood machine explode?
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: He asked. His mother gave him a very very strong hug.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: His father stared at him in disbelief. You're okay, Martin
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: touched his face. Why does my forehead feel cold? His
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: mother leaned back and her eyes widened. His father just stared.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: What Martin asked? His mother swallowed your eyebrows. Martin reached
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: up and felt nothing. His eyebrows were gone. How man.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: That night, his parents checked him over again and again.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: Somehow Martin was fine. No burns, no pain, no injury,
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: just a smoky jacket, wild hair, and two missing eyebrows.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: By bedtime, the storm had passed. Everyone agreed it had
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: been terrifying. Everyone agreed that Martin was very lucky. No
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: one understood that the maple syrup had changed him forever.
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: The next morning, Martin came downstairs to find that his
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: mother had made pancakes. His father poured home made maple
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: syrup into a small glass pitcher and set it on
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: the table. Martin eyes lit up tree blood maple syrup.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: His mother corrected, tree blood. Martin whispered lovingly. He poured
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: a large man over his pancakes, possibly too much, if
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: that was a thing. He took a big bite. The
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: moment the syrup touched his tongue, a strange warmth spread
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: through his body. He froze, His fork dropped onto the plate,
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: his muscles tingled, his arms stretched, his shoulders widened, his
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: feet pushed against the floor and his hood he began
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: to creak. His mother stared Martin. His father slowly lowered
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: his coffee mug. In three seconds, an eleven year old
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: Martin had grown into a fully grown man, but not
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: just any man, a gigantic, unbelievably muscular future version of himself,
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: with a long beard, broad shoulders, and the general appearance
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: of someone who could shop firewood by just sort of
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: looking at it. His hoodie ripped apart at the seams.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: Martin looked down at himself. Then he opened his mouth
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: and said, in the strongest Canadian accent anyone had ever heard, Oh, buddy,
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: this ain't right, eh. His mother screamed, his father screamed.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: Martin screamed too, but it came out as sweet maple biscuits.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: What in the name Owayne Gretzky is going on here?
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: He ran to the hallway mirror. A huge bearded man
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: stared back at him. Martin touched his face. The bearded
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: man touched his face. Martin gasped, I got a beard.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: He then his clothes began to shift. The shredded hoodie
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: twisted and changed. Red and black plaids spread across his chest.
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: Denim formed over his legs, Heavy boots appeared on his feet,
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: and a belt snapped into place. Within seconds, Martin was
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: dressed like the most powerful lumberjack in Canadian history. His
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: mother pointed at him with a shaking hand. Why do
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: you look like a lumberjack? And why are you so tall? Oh?
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: I don't know, ma, Martin said, horrified. I'm all jacked
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: up like a moose in hockey season. Oh why are
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: you talking like that? Asked his father. Oh I can't
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: stop it, eh, Martin cried. The words are just skating
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: right out of my face. He backed away from the mirror,
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: stumbled through the kitchen door, and ran outside. I need
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: some air there. But the moment he stepped onto the grass,
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: his boots lifted off the ground one foot into the air,
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: and then three, and then ten. He looked down. His
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: mother ran outside and screamed, Oh, no, call the fire department.
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: His father stood in the doorways, still holding the syrup pitcher.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: What are they gonna do? I don't know, she shouted.
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Brang a ladder. Martin waved his arms wildly. He spun sideways,
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: dipped toward the roof, bounced back up, and nearly crashed
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: into a maple tree, but soon something clicked. He leaned forward.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: He moved forward, he leaned backward, he moved backward. He stopped.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: Soon he was flying left, right, up, down, and in
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: slow circles over the yard. Oh, I'm getting the hang
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: of it now, he called. After a few minutes, Martin
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: landed clumsily in the yard. His heart was pounding with excitement.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: This was it, This was the thing he'd wished for
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: every birthday. He had powers, actual powers. If I'm a superhero,
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: he said, I gotta try lift in something. Ah. He
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: bent down and grabbed a rock sticking out of the ground.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: His father had always said it was probably part of
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: the Canadian Shield, which is why he hadn't been able
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: to move it. Martin pulled, and the rock tore out
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: of the earth with a deep cracking sound, and was enormous.
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: He held it over his head like it weighed nothing.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: As parents just stared. Martin grinned, well, slap a duke
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: on a beaver. That's a big old rock. He threw
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: it as hard as he could. The boulders sailed into
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: the forest and landed somewhere far away with a crash.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: That well, you could feel in the ground. Then came
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: the geese. At first there were only a few. They
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: landed in the yard and stared at Martin. But soon
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: Moore came and more. Soon the yard was full of
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: Canadian geese, waddling, honking, flapping. Now, no one in Canada
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: truly liked Canadian geese. People respected them and maybe even
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: feared them, but they didn't like them, and no one
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: liked having them on their lawn because they left behind.
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: Uh well, presence will call them. Martin stared at the
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: nearest goose. The goose stared back. Then Martin heard a
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: voice in his mind, not words exactly, more like meaning hungry, angry. Ready.
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: Martin blinked, you can you can hear me? The goose honked.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: Martin pointed at the geese. All right, then, geese, line up,
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: he said, and every goose immediately waddled into a neat line.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: His father dropped the syrup pitcher. Martin tried some more
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: orders too. First he had them form into a little
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: sort of goose pyramid. Then he had them fly around
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: in circles overhead. I come manned the cobra chickens, he
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: eventually announced. Martin continued to play around with his powers.
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: They lasted for about an hour, then he began to
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: sink from the sky. His beard shortened, his muscles deflated,
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: his plaid shirt for some reason, just sort of disappeared,
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: and in moments he was an eleven year old boy again,
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: standing barefoot in the grass. The next morning it happened again. Pancakes,
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: homemade syrup, warmth than his body, fully grown, bearded superhero
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: with a plaid shirt, flying around, throwing things, and commanding geese.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: That was when Martin understood it was the syrup. The
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: green lightning hadn't just hit him, it had given him
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: some sort of connection to the syrup itself. From that
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: day on, Martin kept a small bottle of syrup tucked
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: into his sock, just in case. Over the next few months,
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: Martin trained in secret, well mostly in secret. It was
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: hard to secretly fly over a field while being followed
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: by thirty honking geese, but he did his best. He
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: learned to fly faster and turn without crashing into things.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: He practiced lifting heavy stuff too, fallen trees, old tractors,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: and one time, even the back end of his father's truck.
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: He learned to move at super speed becoming a red
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: plaid blur across the fields of dirt. Most importantly, he
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: learned to command the geese. One goose was sort of annoying.
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: Ten geese were very convenient, but a hundred geese working
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: together or a natural disaster with wings. Martin trained all
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: through the spring until summer came July One Canada Day,
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: a day when Canadians celebrated Confederation, argued about the problematic
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: past of Canada ate ice cream, and watched fireworks. Martin
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: was sitting at home when he heard the CBC News
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: report authorities in Minden Hills are investigating after bandits reportedly
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: broke into the municipal storage facility and stole tonight's Canada
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: Day fireworks. Martin froze stole the fireworks on Canada Day, Well,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: the dogs would probably be happy, but this was going
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: too far, and he stood up slowly. He reached down
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: into his sock and pulled out his emergency syrup flask.
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: Martin held up the flask, took a drink, and power
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: surged through him. His body grew, his beard appeared, his
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: clothes shifted into plaid and denim for some reason, and
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: his boots hit the floor. With a heavy thump. He
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: stepped outside, looked at the sky and shouted, all right,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: ye majestic hissing sky goblins, come to me, and the
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: geese came. They formed a giant v over the town,
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: dark against the summer sky. Martin launched into the air
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: and flew at the front, spread out. He commanded, searched
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: the county, find me those fireworks before some absolute hozer
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: ruins Canada day. The geese broke formation and scattered in
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: every direction. It didn't take long. A single goose came
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: honking back. After a while, Martin understood every hawk prock
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: shed bad men. Fireworks. Lead the way, friend, he ordered.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: The goose turned and Martin followed. A few minutes later,
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: he landed in front of an old shed where several
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: bandits were unloading boxes of fireworks from a cube truck.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: The bandits froze. One of them pointed, who are you
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: supposed to be? Martin folded his arms. I'm giving you
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: one chance, voice returned the fireworks, apologized to the town,
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: and maybe we could all go and get some co
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: worth at dairy ice cream. The bandit stared, then they laughed.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: One ran forward and punched Martin in the chest. His
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: fist hit Martin like it had struck a steel wall.
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: The band had yelped and grabbed his hand. How what
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: are you made of maple? Mostly, Martin said. Another bandit charged,
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: and Martin shifted into high speed. The world slowed. He
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: grabbed a rope from the truck, zipped around the first
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: robber twelve times and stopped. The robber blinked, and then
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: he fell over, wrapped up in the rope. A third
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: band had swung a crowbar. Martin leaned aside, still moving
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: too fast to see, and flicked the man gently on
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: the forehead, not too hard, just enough. The band and
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: its eyes crossed, and he dropped into a pile of weeds.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: Oh sorry, there, But the remaining thieves grabbed fireworks and
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: tried to run. Martin raised one hand and silently commanded
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: the geese. The sky darkened as the flock descended. At
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: first the robbers didn't understand. Then hundreds of geese landed
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: around them, on the roofs, on the trucks, on the boxes,
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: on the driveway, at the edge of the trees. Every
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: goose lowered its head, every goose opened its beak, and
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: every goose hissed at the same time. The sound was awful. Now,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: many of you may not know that geese can hiss,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: and boy can they. One of them is sometimes a
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: little bit scary. Hundreds of them were an a slute nightmare,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: so much so that the thieves dropped everything. They ran
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: straight towards the police cruiser that had arrived on the
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: road to check out the commotion, and surrendered, just begging
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: for them to keep them safe from the geese. Martin
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: loaded the fireworks back into the cube truck with the
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: help of the police. Then he grabbed the sides and
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: lifted the entire thing into the air. He flew it
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: back to the municipal building. The mayor stood outside, looking
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: kind of worried. Martin landed gently and set the truck down.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: Oh I hope you don't mind, air, Mayor, but I
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: think I found your fireworks. The mayor stared up at him.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: Who are you? Martin looked at the crowd, He looked
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: at the geese circling above. He looked at the may
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: belief flag waving nearby, and he smiled, you can call
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: me the Maple Guardian. That night, fireworks exploded over Minden
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: hills in red, gold, green, and blue. High above town,
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: Martin floated in the warm summer air with a bowl
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: of maple ice cream in one hand. Below him, people cheered.
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: Beside him, geese flew in a perfect v. Martin took
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: a bite of ice cream and smiled. Happy Canada Day.
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: And from that night on, whenever danger came to small town, Ontario,
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: people knew to look at the skies, not for like
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: a bat signal or a spotlight or anything like that,
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: but for a giant flying lumberjack wearing plaid and drinking
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: maple syrup, as well as a terrifying number of geese.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: Of course, good night, everyone.
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: On Never name n N N never union name in
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: New yor Union No no no no mo M M
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: one one man
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: M