Allergies

I’ve been plagued by allergies for most of my life. Anyone who’s ever seen me suffer through an outbreak of hives, especially in those early ones, understands what I mean when I say plagued.

The first, and the worst, was in Grade 5, in the spring, just before our school celebrated some sort of Chinese festival. We’d spent weeks preparing for it (I have no idea how long we prepared for it, but we’d begun before I was stricken, and I was still stricken when the celebration was complete) when one weekend morning I woke to horrible itching. I scratched to no relief, and when I finally found myself in front of a mirror, was horrified by the angry red welts covering my face, rendering me somewhat unrecognizable. I called out to my mother in a panic, and her reaction to my new look was less than comforting. Further inspection confirmed the presence of hives everywhere, some small and round and only beginning to blossom; others mature, fully grown, and in all manner of shape, soon to be subsumed again within the confines of my skin. About three and a half weeks would pass before I was free of them, but not before my hands had swollen to the point where I could not even bend my fingers, my feet so bloated and sensitive to touch that I could not even walk, reduced to crawling about. Worse still was the blow to my vanity: the hives never left my face, painfully altering my features in some new caricature of self from first to last day. Begging sickness and hiding from view, I missed the entire festival, including the much anticipated Chinese food feast. Mr. Litchfield made a special trip to my house that day, carrying with him enough food for my whole family. I was thrilled, but I also refusing to come to the door until he’d left. My mother would have none of that, coaxing me from hiding to thank Mr. Litchfield for his kindness. Mr. Litchfield treated my fragile vanity with more tact than I thought anyone could muster, and never once showed any of the shock or loathing I’d expected.

Testing was prescribed. I was instructed to abstain from those things I was exposed to most often...to see what might happen, or not. Then the day arrived. The allergist had arrived and inked my arms with numbers, and over each was scratched an oil, an extract of some fruit or vegetable, some dust or dander, some sap or some some-such. I can’t say how many allergens were exposed, but there were certainly enough, including dog dander. I had to abstain from those things, which apparently was to include exposure to dog dander. There was some deliberation about what to do with Cookie, our dog. I would have nothing to do with being rid of her. She was an integral part of my existence.

Monthly shots were prescribed, not that I believe ever had any effect in halting, or even lessening the effects of further outbreaks, whatsoever.

So, further outbreaks followed, and were endured. Once, when renovations were again in full swing at the Hart Street house (still some years before the addition), I was sleeping in the basement, as my bedroom was reeking of paint, the red decorations poised to be put in place. Upon waking, I climbed the stairs to wash my face, which was feeling unusually tight, just then. I gazed down the upstairs hall and wondered, in my morning confusion, who the kid was down the hall. My heart skipped a beat upon recognition. It was me. It was my reflection in a mirror set out and leaning against the far wall. My face was in such a state as to render me unrecognizable, even to myself.

I learned, in time, to take the shock I would see in others’ faces in stride. I had no choice, I could not hide away from the world for a month at a time, two or three times a year.

But it did get better. Years found the outbreaks lesser, and in time infrequent.

I learned an important lesson throughout those ensuing years. Most people have difficulty with deformity, in whatever form it may exhibit itself. They retreat from it. And from the person. Dealing with that hardens one’s soul.

The Playground

Every kid watches the clock when the minute hand closes in on recess. Then the seconds as that final minute ticks down to twelve. I always felt cheated out of my most special times of the day if the bell didn’t strike at the exact moment the second hand struck the top of the circle. Ten, nine, eight…three, two, one, and….

The bell rang. The desk legs scraped the tiled floor as we’d rise in unison and somehow kept our exterior cool, lining up, and marching like the little army we were taught to be, bursting out into the yard.

I remember a number of Pinecrest school playground moments: chasing balls and things like that. I remember once dropping flat on my stomach when I presumed (unseen) that someone was going to bean me with a ball from behind. There wasn’t. But there was a boy rushing me to lay me flat with a push (we were always pulling pranks like that), but when I dropped before he could, he tried to check himself and ended up on his face. Karma.

Larry McDowell and I had a fit one day, alpha male boy’s stuff, and during the recess soccer play, I purposely hooked his ankle with my foot, sending him spinning and landing on his face. I was thrilled when I saw his bloodied nose. Take that, I thought. But I knew I had to be on my guard. I knew he’d retaliate.

I remember playing basketball with Donald Rhodes, and Don always mimicking the Fonz from “Happy Days,” the apex of cool in the mid ‘70s. “Eh!” he’d say, hooking his thumbs out.

I remember recess always beginning and ending with a long peal of the bell. We’d run to the bats and balls set out at the ready. And we’d run back in to where we knew our places were, lined up by class, awaiting our instruction to enter the halls, always walking at a measured pace following the brass sheet tile lines to keep us orderly, until we came upon our class and had had to wait for a break in the girls walking the halls in the opposite direction, following the other gold seam.

It was like keeping to our lanes on a highway. I’m surprised that the leader did not have to signal his intent to turn.

The Snowball

Nick and I were roughhousing, throwing rough, icy snowballs that we mashed together at each other. It was a running battle. Much dodging, a lot of weaving. I remember it was great fun, running and dodging those poorly aimed throws; maybe not that poorly aimed, given the amount of dodging and weaving involved. We didn’t pay much attention to our surroundings. We ought to have.

I mashed a couple snowballs together, took one on the back, rose and threw. Nick dodged. Neither of us noticed the younger girl coming up behind us. Anyway, Nick dodged. It was a near miss for him. Just not for the girl. She caught the ball on the forehead. And that was the end of the fun.

She began crying. We dropped everything. We rushed towards her. Inspected her. There was no blood. There wasn’t likely to be; I didn’t have much of a throwing arm. Her right brow was red, though. We were consoling her. We were also worried. And rightly so; this was still the age of iron fist discipline and the strap. We knew kids who’d had the strap, no one in our class as yet, but we’d heard talk, none of it good.

Rumour had it that some kid had pulled his hand away at the last moment and Dick Litchfield had strapped his own hand. Dick was furious. Dick doled out two strokes for the kid having flinched. That was likely untrue. But urban myths prevail. And everyone loves a good horror story.

She would have none of our consoling. She went into the school, still crying, that damning red mark on her forehead witness to our impending doom. Before we know it, Mr. Reade was out the door, descending on us. The look on his face informed us that he was none too pleased with us. He took us by the collar and hauled us into the school, down the hall, and into the Principal's office. Mr. Litchfield was none too pleased with us, either. But Mr. Litchfield was also a wise gentleman.

He gave Nick and me a choice: the strap or two weeks detention during recess, doing long-hand division. Neither Nick nor I hesitated. Terrified of the strap, we spend the next two weeks at a table in the picture window across from Litchfield’s office brushing up on our math, and our marks went up with it.
That cagy Mr. Litchfield, forever a teacher. He knew how to dole out discipline.

The Concussion

When I was about 9 or so, we were racing down the hill on Patricia Street, north of Ross. My sister was there, my neighbor Dave was there, I’m not sure who else. I was riding my green CCM Mustang, the sort with a banana seat. I loved that bike; I still love its memory. Anyway, we were racing, crouched down, streamlining for greater speed.

Then a station wagon rounded the corner onto Patricia from Brousseau. We weaved left and right to avoid it. I went right, but there were a couple others crowding that edge, and it felt a little less roomy than I liked. It was tight, that much is sure in my mind. Too tight. Too tight to manoeuver. Worse still, once I’d committed to going right and discovered the lack of room there, there was no time to change my mind. That’s when I noticed that there was a rock on the road directly in my path. It wasn’t enormous, certainly not a boulder, but it wasn’t a pebble either. It was big, though, surprisingly big.

I felt trapped, unable to edge left or right owing to the bikes to the right and the car to the front that would be to my left in a moment.

I hit the rock and found myself flying over the handlebars. I reached out ahead and tried to ward off the onrushing ground at the same time.

I remember hitting, hearing my head bounce off the asphalt ... and then nothing until I was on a gurney at St. Mary’s Hospital. I’m told that I was awake after wiping out, that I never lost consciousness, that I was sitting up and responsive the whole time. I just have no memory of it. I remember waking up for about thirty seconds in the hospital, unable to see but aware of my mother next to me. Frightened, I tearfully told my mother I couldn’t see, and then I heard a nurse complain, “He watches too much TV.”

I was pissed at that. I still am, whenever I recall it. Then I was out again. I woke up again in the middle of the night in a panic, not knowing where I was. Not to worry, I wasn’t awake for long then, either, no more than a couple minutes before crying myself to sleep.

When I woke in the morning, I was asked by a nurse (maybe she was kitchen staff; I wouldn’t have known the difference then) to fill out my preferences for a meal plan, for some reason. Was I to be there long enough to require a meal plan? I didn’t like the thought of that. I wanted my mother. I wanted to go home. I didn’t like any of the choices given me; what I wanted was spaghetti and meatballs. Doesn’t matter; I only ate breakfast. I was released from hospital that morning, if I remember properly.

The Cop Car

The police seemed quite different when I was younger. They were enormous, most officers towering over those around them. I know, I’ve never actually been tall, and I was a kid then, so, everyone towered over me. But the stories told me suggested they were of sterner stuff. That may not be true, that may just be tinted memory.

Be that as it may, one day, when I was a kid, David Miller and I were at the base of Pinecrest, taking a break from whatever. It was hot. It was the dog days of summer. I recall us standing, straddling our bikes, leaning on the handlebars, not actually going anywhere, not actually doing anything, when we heard a distant siren. Our interest was perked. What kid doesn’t love a siren and the excitement that always seems to accompany one? We noticed the siren was getting louder, and louder still, overlaid by the high-pitched whine of a motorbike. Dave and I looked at each other, aware that their source was definitely coming our way. And then we saw it, the motorbike flying up Brousseau, actually leaving the ground as it topped the rise at Toke Street. Its scream was terrific, loud enough that we’d have cupped our hands to our ears had we not been astounded at what was playing out in front of us, had it not crossed right in front of us, so quickly that it was a blur that was already receding. The bike threw a spray of fine sand behind it as it fishtailed into the bush trail at the base of the school hill, back towards the cruiser that raced after it. Remember the cruisers then? White and blue, and as big as a ship. It too passed in a blur, a white streak that to our surprise was not slowing down. The cop car was way too wide for the trail ahead, regardless how wide its entry. We ought to know, we all but lived back there on those trails. As the cop soon found out as he sailed into the trail in hot pursuit of the bike. And then he was lost to sight. We heard the snap of branches and branches and even more branches. And then just the siren. And then silence, just a tiny motorbike in the far distance, and the thrum of the cruise however far it had carried into the trail. Dave and I hadn’t moved, never having taken our eyes off the trailhead. A short while later, not long, no more than a minute or two, the cruiser backed out, breaking still more branches. Twigs and leaves stuck out from the hood, the front lights, the wheel wells.

I suppose the cop gave us a hard look as he backed out and drove away; maybe not, maybe he was too embarrassed to want to see if those kids were still watching him. I wasn’t, I was still too bewildered at what I’d just witnessed to actually see him, still staring at the bits of bush bristling from all over the cruiser.

TV, Vietnam & Watergate

I have only the haziest recollections of Vietnam as it was happening. I have no indication that those memories are real; they may only be the ghost of all those Vietnam War documentaries that were aired over the years, slipping into their periodic place. I stand by the memory, though. Vietnam was on the news, every day, and I could not help but notice those little war movies on the TV every night after supper. They were confused with and jumbled up with WW2 movies and M*A*S*H until they were all one conflict, all part of WW2 in my mind.

Seriously, they were. I couldn’t unravel the tangle at the time. Indeed, I wasn’t even aware of the Vietnam Conflict as a separate entity, then. I recall watching a John Wayne war film on TV with my father: It was "The Green Berets,” his only film set in Vietnam. Watching it now, it's rather obvious that it's set in Vietnam. Glaringly obvious. Vietnam had even been named throughout, but to my young mind, John Wayne always fought in WW2, when he wasn't fighting Indians in covboy movies. Indeed, he was the face of WW2. He always fought against the Japanese in the Pacific theatre, too; never Nazis (the Longest Day exluded). And the Vietnamese looked deceptively like the Japanese, so it was an easy to supplant one in the other.
I know that the Vietnam war left its mark on me, because it has since become mythic in my mind, a confused array of firebases and jungle patrols, and firey plumes of napalm consuming all that adheres to. I remember a phrase that was strangely popular for a time, a cruel, insensitive, and horrific phrase: "Naplam sticks to children,"

I do have a solid memory of being absolutely pissed off about Watergate. Everything I wanted to watch pre-empted by all that bla bla bla Watergate Nixon talk. It was all too boring for the 9 or 10-year-old I was. Everything was preempted. Not “Hockey Night in Canada,” though. Never that. Nothing could preempt Hockey Night in Canada, not in Canada. I rebelled. I had a fit. I bitched about it to my parents, as if they could do something about it, but we were limited to two or three channels then, and Watergate was on them all.

Early TV

A television show from my childhood popped into my head the other day, the Hilarious House of Frightenstein, a Canadian children’s show that aired in 1971, hosted by Vincent Price and starring Billy Van, Billy Van, Billy Van, and Billy Van. I looked it up on Wikipedia and was surprised to see that it only lasted one season, but aired 130 episodes! Vincent Price introduced the skits from a dark and stormy balcony, lightning flashing on the stone wall behind him. He’d recite bad poetry in that voice we all remember so fondly to set them up. Or should I say, that I remember so fondly. Billy played most characters, including Count Frightenstein, the Wolfman, Grizelda the Witch, the Ghastly Gourmet, and most others, but it was the Librarian that I remember most vividly. And wrongly. My memory is more in tune with “Tales from the Crypt” than what was.

We’d creep into his library for story time, where the wizened, ancient librarian was sleeping and had to be awakened. He sputtered. He was gruff. But then he would welcome us, ask us to sit and he’d begin to read children’s stories like Humpty Dumpty to us. He thought were horror stories, he thought they would terrify us. When he saw that we weren’t frightened, he would admit that he wasn’t actually frightened either, and that maybe the story wasn’t that scary, after all. But he promised that next time he would truly terrify us with another gruesome tale. Truth was, HE and his library terrified me! There were cobwebs everywhere, skulls on tables, moldering furniture; but mostly it was him, ancient, wizened, curmudgeonly, and covered in cobwebs, that creeped me out. I wanted to race from the room and hide every time I heard the Librarian theme music.

There were others that come to mind from that period in my life, shows far less terrifying: The Banana Splits Adventure Hour, The Magic Roundabout, H.R. Pufnstuf, Do Not Adjust Your Set!, Davey and Goliath, and of course, The Friendly Giant and Mr. Dressup.
Did I make you remember those special TV shows from your childhood? I hope so. They were magical!

The Field

When we first moved to Timmins, and for years afterwards, the lots across the street, the space between Hart Street and Murray and bounded by Brousseau, were owned by the district school board and remained undeveloped. In various stages of growth, every so often sheared to the nub, it was a spark of imagination and a little space of bush, a couple of blocks from the real thing. It was a wonderful playground for all around.

There were trails of passage, worn down by thousands of footsteps, trails that remained even when it had grown feral. That only happened once, when the shrubs had reached a proper height to create a proper maze. But more often than not, the bushes were no more than ankle height. There were thistles and fungi, blueberry bushes and alders scrub. But when it was a proper maze, it was a brilliant place for hide and seek!

I remember when, in the early/mid ‘70s, my father bought a Skidoo. We didn’t have it for long, a few years at most, I suppose, but when we did we had a caboose trailer too. I recall hours of bone chilling cold back there, despite our being wrapped up in a heavy woolen blanket, when Karen and I were being dragged along behind my parents on the sled. My feet were blocks of numb ice at the end of those family outings. Not fun. But when we weren’t being frozen in the caboose, Karen and I would take the skidoo out onto the barren lot across the street for a ride. That was fun, that was thrilling. There were laps and loops and figure 8s etched all over that field. Karen drove more often than not, but I did too, never at great speed—my mother told us to keep it down, and since we were in plain sight, we did; to do otherwise risked our never being allowed to play on the sled, ever again.

One winter, Keith came to visit for a weekend. We were playing war out in that field, with hockey sticks for rifles. We stormed the banks, and defended them. Then we split apart, adding hide and seek battles to the scope of play. I was left to seek. He was out in the deep, windswept field, and I was sneaking up on him, keeping low, using the high banks for cover. I risked a peak over the bank, expecting to see his toque clearly, an obvious dark spot out in the stretch of snow. But he was nowhere to be seen. I panned left and right. No Keith. So, once I reached where I knew I’d seen him last, I bounded up and over the bank, expecting him to scream BANG, BANG BANG! But all I heard was silence, and the wind. I crawled, my belly sliding over the snow. When I reached where I’d last seen him, there was just an empty foxhole, and a berm neatly piled up around it. I looked over the berm and discovered he'd hollowed a tunnel.

“Keith?” I called.

“Down here,” he answered. Climbing down feet first into the hole, I found he’d been busy. He’s burrowed out a warm cozy tunnel down there. We spent the next hour expanding the space...until it collapsed on our heads.

That began a furious burrowing out of banks by David Miller and me after Keith had gone home. At least until we saw the snowplows and massive city snow blowers pushing back and cutting into those banks, crushing them, chewing them up and spitting them out into trucks. Visions of being caught inside one of them when these monsters passed ended our snow tunneling phase.

Shortly after that, the school board sold off the lots, houses rose up on them, and that short-lived free-for-all playground disappeared for good.

There was disappointment. There was mourning. They’d stolen our domain.

A Birthday Party

I haven’t had many birthday parties. What I had were birthday celebrations, dinners, the like. Mostly just with family. But actual parties? None that I haven't thrown myself.

My first that I remember was in Timmins. I was in my early grades at Pinecrest, but after I’d been held back, because I remember that it was those boys who came: Larry and Tony and Leslie and Mark. David Miller, too. David was my neighbour, my first friend in Timmins.

I was excited. I’d never had a party where school friends were in attendance. In fact, I can’t remember my ever having a birthday party before, at all. So, excited is an understatement. I was bouncing off the walls. I would check the street about every minute or so, regardless how much time remained until the guests were set to arrive.

In time, they did. I recall not being sure what my role was. Host? My mother certainly instructed me to greet all my guests at the door. Man of the hour? Prince? I think my mother may have told me I was the host of the party, but I would not have understood what that meant, at that age. What did a host do? They entertained their guests, my mother said. Me, entertain them? I thought it was my day. Wasn’t it?

I can’t say what was for dinner. Hot dogs? Most likely. I was a kid, not terribly fond of most meats at the time, so hot dogs must have been on the menu (in later years, the standard was meatloaf, mashed potatoes and peas; how that came about I'm not sure; I suppose it was deemed my favourite meal, and it came to be a tradition; but my favourite meal was spaghetti and meatballs, but I suppose that might have been deemed either too messy, or too pedestrian for a birthday celebration). There was cake. Of course there was cake. That’s what a wound-up kid needs, more sugar.

I was a bit of a tyrant, I think. Actually, I know I was a bit of a tyrant. I wanted to be the center of attention. I wanted to play with every toy. I took toys away from the other kids. I had a tantrum. My mother was having none of it.
She demanded that I behave. She demanded that I let my guests play with the toys, too. I had a fit. They were my toys!

I ended up getting a spanking and being sent to my room for a time.
Did I deserve it? You bet I did.