Tales From a Lost Water Bottle

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One of the things that intrigues me the most about travelling is the brief encounters you have with people all over the world. Every single person you come across has their own life, memories, and experiences different from your own. I often think about those brief moments in time in which you cross paths with others, and about all of the things you will never know about them, or their story.

One such materialization of these thoughts came last year in the form of my university roommate’s water bottle. Right from the time I moved in, it caught my eye. It was covered from head to toe by stickers from several national and provincial parks, the flags from a multitude of provinces, and a bunch of outdoor brands’ logos. One day I finally asked him about it, and it turned out that the water bottle wasn’t even originally his. The curiosity, and the mystery of who it belonged to ate at me for months. Who was this person? What was their story?

One day, as it was getting closer to Christmas, we were waiting for our lecture to start. My roomate pulled out the mystery bottle to take a drink and I re-sparked the conversation of who its’ owner might be. This time, we took special notice of sticker on it’s side that said “CKCU”. When I googled it, a student run radio station in Ottawa, Ontario came up.

Finally a lead.

We both got excited and decided that the bottle must belong to a DJ or an avid listener of the station. Seeing how niche a student run radio station is, we figured that contacting them might just get this mystery solved. My roommate Alex got to work, drafted up an email, and hit send.

What follows is that exact email:

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“ Greetings,
I found this green Nalgene water bottle in Hearst, ON while tree planting this past spring. When I saw it in town on a day off, and I thought it might have belonged to one of my crew members so I grabbed it. No one from my crew claimed it and for the last 6 months, I have been in the possession of someone else’s water bottle. There are at least three tree planting companies that operate out of Hearst and the bottle likely belonged to one of their planters.
Based on the wear, and the vast amount of stickers, I imagine that it’s pretty special to them and they miss it very much. This beautiful bottle may even have a name, but if it does, it’s a name I do not know. Seeing as this isn’t my bottle I’d like to get it back to its rightful owner and I think that there is a possibility that you guys may be able to help. The most identifiable and significant sticker on the bottle is a CKCU sticker.
Do you know who the owner of this bottle is? Do you have any way of finding out? If you do, I’d love to send it home for Christmas.
– Alex “

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We waited and waited until one day we finally got a response.

Unfortunately, the radio station told us, nobody recognized the water bottle. We were devastated.

However, they agreed that they would help us in our quest to find the bottle’s owner, and possibly send it home. They posted Alex’s email and photo on their website with the hopes that one of their listeners might see it.

As of writing this in November of 2020, the bottle’s rightful owner has still not been found. Although my roommate continues to take care of it like it were his own, I can’t help but wonder what stories it would tell if it could. Where its’ been, what its owner has done, and the people they’ve come across together in their travels. It may just be a water bottle, but behind it is a person who I will likely never know. The stickers give me a small glimpse into their life, memories, experiences and story.

In my lifetime, it’s certain that there will be a number of people, stories and experiences that I will never have the fortune of knowing. The water bottle, and its’ owner, is just another example of this.

So when I do get to meet someone new, have a fresh experience, or get a glimpse of a previously unknown story, even if just for the briefest of moments, I’m just glad that I was given the opportunity to do so.

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