Uncertainty, and My Father

I returned from Haileybury to a terrifying uncertainty. Kidd Creek phoned to rescind their offer of employment. No student starting after a certain date was to be retained. I, and all other college students, were now unemployed. I had no idea what I was going to do. How could I go back to school without summer employment? Where was I to make money? All summer positions had been filled in March. I was in a panic.

That’s when my father stepped in. What could he do in the wake of my summer employment disaster? Maybe nothing. Maybe a lot. You'd have to know my father and the shadow he cast across Timmins, much as my Poppa had, in his town, in his day. Now, my father's shadow was not nearly as long as my Poppa's, but he cast one. Yes he did, indeed.

You don't believe me? What do you know of my father, Ed Leonard? 

Nothing, obviously. Maybe I should fill you in a little.

Hockey is the first thing that comes to mind for most people when they think of him. He was good at it too. He lived it day and night, growing up. He’d rise, pack a lunch, and be down at the rink, regardless the temperature, until he could no longer see the puck. It was all he thought about. He might have made something of it too, had he not taken a stick to the face when he was 18 years old, detaching his retina.

There was no miracle eye surgery back then, in the ‘50s. He was sequestered to a bed in hospital for months, his head held immobile by sandbags. A mask covered his eyes. He had strict instructions to not move his head, to not, if possible, even shift his eyes. He remained that way for three months, blind and immobile, with only a radio to pass the time, until the retina settled to the bottom and knit itself in place. Were this procedure unsuccessful, he’d have had vision problems for the rest of his life. Either way, he had ample time to develop an uncanny ability to remember song lyrics. Luckily, his retina did as instructed, his only concern healing bed sores. But no scout would touch him after that, not after an eye injury.

Anger does not begin to describe how he felt about that, I imagine. His love had been stolen from him, his chosen goal, forever out of reach. He continued to play hockey, despite the risk, and did so until his late 30s without any further injuries, without the retina ever causing him further problems, as was suggested could happen. He had no choice but to get on with his life.

He’d worked as a parts boy as a kid, so he'd taken a job as such after leaving school after grade 10, a common thing in the North in those days. Without hockey, time passed as it was destined to, and in time my parents married and moved to Don Mills, and in time had Dean.

And it was because of Dean they could no longer afford to live in the South. Dean was what we would call Developmentally Challenged, these days. Severely so; in fact, he'd have been the postcard for developmentally challenged. Dean’s needs were costly. And those medical bills made it impossible for my parents to remain in Toronto. The stress was unbearable. My mother required the support of family, so they moved back to Cochrane.

My Poppa stepped in, pulled lofty strings and Dean was placed in a long-term care facility. Had he not, my mother would surely have suffered a breakdown, and my parents might have split, Catholic or not. Or so I believe.

My Poppa helped out a lot, allowing my father set up his own business in Cochrane, again, in parts. He was grateful, but he was not satisfied with mere parts, anymore. So, Dad sold the business after Karen and I entered the picture, and began working for Husky Ltd (my parents opting for guaranteed security), and then shifted employment again to Molson’s.

We moved to Timmins. More money. Not the best move, for more reasons than I wish to dwell on. Maybe it was for me and Karen, we would discover, but not my parents. Not really.

Dad was always on the road, gone from Monday morning to Friday evening. Time passed. Karen and I grew up. He brought me on his rounds on rare occasions during the summer when I was older (about 15, maybe), I recall wandering between tables and peeking behind bars, inhaling the aura of cigarettes and alcohol imbedded in the gaudy carpets, each a riot of pattern and colour to mask the stains and burns. I recall the Empire Hotel most vividly, my being fascinated by the coloured Plexiglas squares of Charlie’s dancefloor, the tangle of electronics crowding the disk jockey’s booth, taking in the dark oak pillars and bannisters, the finger-smudged brass. The room seemed an empty void without patrons. Both Charlie’s and Bogie’s were poorly lit in light of day, hazy with dust, the motes caught drifting on slow currents by the surprisingly alien sunlight that invaded them. I climbed up on the stage and surveyed the terrain before it while my father wrapped up his business with the owner.

My father had been a salesman for most of his adult life, first as a self-employed parts man, then fuel products for Husky Ltd., then as a booster rep for Molson’s Brewery, and then he sold heavy equipment for Crothers (after my mother had had her fill of Molson’s); that would be Caterpillar Equip., by the way. He was a member of social and business clubs; not the Shriners, or the Masons, or the Kinsman, or any of the sort, but ethnic clubs and social clubs and the sort. He knew a lot of people. I mean he knew a lot of people. So, when I lost my job at Kidd, he made some phone calls. He asked around, he pulled some strings. And a few days later I got a call from the manager of the Dome Mine. A personal phone call from the manager of the Dome.

He’d decided to hire all of the mining students, and only the mining students, laid off by Kidd. All of us. He was under no obligation; he’d already hired all the students he needed for the summer. But he made an exception that summer. I find it hard to believe that my father had little to do with that. I was saved. I’d lost a week’s wages, but I was saved. I wouldn’t have to apply for a loan. I wouldn’t have to scrape by that summer on a pauper’s allowance. But I did have to wait out a strike vote.

The Dome was in negotiation with its Union that summer, with little progress made as the weeks dragged on. I was informed that I ought to bring all my gear home the weekend leading up to the deadline. My stomach tied itself in knots. I still had a month to go before school, and not enough money to make it through the year. I packed my gear, tossed it in the boot, and waited out the news reports.

The Union voted to accept the hastily prepared counteroffer in the eleventh hour. And I was saved, yet again.

Lessons Learned: The Perils of Gambling

After Grampa died and his service was complete, his casket stacked in storage, the family convened at Gramma’s house for supper, and the wake. There was loads of food, of course; where it all came from is beyond me. Both my grandmothers were active in the Catholic Woman’s League, so I suppose the CWL pitched in to feed 50ish people. Beer and wine were served, liberally. It was 1980, and my relatives drank more than now, I believe. Not me, I was 15. Had I drank by then? What do you think? I’m from Northern Ontario. Most teens I knew had drank a beer, by then. But publicly, under the gaze of my relatives, not a chance. Not at first, anyway.

Someone suggested for us to play cards, poker, if I remember correctly. I ask you, who plays poker at a wake? A group collected around the kitchen table, and Uncle Frank asked Keith and I if we wanted to play. I begged off, telling Uncle Frank that I didn’t have a clue how to play poker, but Uncle Frank insisted, telling us that he'd “help.” That he'd explain the game to us. So, we agreed. We wanted to hang out with the adults, to finally graduate from the kids’ table. We sat at the foot of the table, at Gramma’s end by the kitchen, Uncle Frank between us. Keith held the cards. I leaned in to see them. I took care of the money.

Uncle Frank was the one actually playing. Obviously. He’d ask us what we thought, how many cards we should discard, and so on. But when it came time to actually discard, it was Uncle Frank who pointed out which cards to keep, and more importantly, what to bet, and when to fold.

The game was small stakes, nickels, dimes, the pot rarely rising above two bucks. Keith and I were up; I doubt we were the big winners, hand by hand, or even throughout. But we were definitely up, the small stack of coins before us steadily growing. We were thrilled.

Someone suggested that Keith and I were old enough to have a beer with the family. I looked up at my Dad, up at the head of the table. He nodded, so I had one. Not used to drinking, I sipped at it. It rose to my head fairly quickly, so I didn’t drink much, or that quickly. Not so others around the table. It was a funeral, after all. For some, their father had just been “buried.” Emotional states were fragile at best.

“Keith and I” won yet another hand. We whooped it up, I gathered in the next haul, and we laughed.

And then it happened. We were accused of cheating. Cheating?! How could we be cheating? We didn’t have a fucking clue what we were doing. Uncle Frank was running the show. But Keith held the cards, and dealt them when our turn came. And I collected the money.

Keith and I were dumbfounded. Uncle Frank told everyone to calm down. But they didn’t. Tension rose. Voices rose. And our accuser advanced on us. Uncle Frank rose up and stood before Keith and I, but come on, Uncle Frank was about 80, and not a big man by anyone’s imagination. A slight breeze might have floored him. My father shouldered his way between us and our accuser. They were nose to nose. Shoving began. Bodies entered the fray.

But before fists flew, the women were rushing into the room, and my grandmother was between the combatants, holding them apart at arm’s length. Giving them hell, telling them to grow up and behave themselves. And they regressed into little boys, staring at their feet. Eventually separated.

There were muted conversations, much milling about, more than a few tears welled up and the sobbing was renewed, here and there, then everywhere. The gathering began to break apart after that.

My mother rushed us into our coats. I didn’t want to go. I’d been given my first family beer and had been having a good time up till then, and I didn’t want to be separated from Keith, whom I’d begun to see less and less of. I was also drunk. And I think my mother knew that.

Herded into the car, she drove us back to Nanny’s. She set me aside, consoled me. I wanted to push her away. I was an adult, now, for Christ’s sake!

In the quiet of Nanny’s house, I began to cry, then to sob uncontrollably for the first time that day.

Grandpa’s Funeral

All things come to an end. That's a hard lesson to learn, but we must all learn in our own time.

We all remember our first funeral. The first I ever attended was my grandfather’s. I did not attend my Aunt Hazel’s (I was 9; I must have been, because Keith was nine when him mother died, and Keith and I are the same age), or my Uncle Ron’s (I was 12). My parents thought I was too young to attend those, too young to process the death, maybe. I believe we think differently now; children need to experience life’s passing, and the rituals we hold to help us mark the transition. I remember them passing, though, and why, and the sense of loss. I believe should have gone; children shouldn’t be shielded for death.

My grandfather’s funeral was special. Why? Because it was the first, and last time I was a pallbearer. The eldest male grandchild from each of the 6 branches of the family were chosen for the task, and although I was still fairly young (15), and many in my family thought too young, and maybe too short, or not physically strong enough, for the task, my father insisted that I was to be one.

Sadness prevailed. But the ritual was a comfort--it oght to be; it was a mass, much like every one I'd attended each and every weekend for as long as I could remember, even if the readings were different, and there were eulogies given as well as the expected sermon. The funeral Mass complete, we escorted the casket to the back of the church, sliding that beloved soul into the back of the hearse, and then to the cemetery grounds, we pallbearers following behind in a cousins station wagon. Cigarettes were passed around. I declined. Windows were cracked open, allowing the smoke to escape, and the chill air access. None followed. The graveside service has already been held at the back of the church. There would be no internment that day as the ground was still frozen.

We pulled into the cemetery grounds. I spilled out with my cousins, following, unsure what was expected, if anything. The casket was retrieved, and as one, we hoisted my grandfather on to a shelf atop the other caskets in storage, to be buried later. I’ve never forgotten that, lifting him up onto a rack where he would wait out what remained of the winter until the spring. It felt wrong, incomplete. I bit back tears. I resolved not to cry. I was a man now, after all. Maybe the others did as well. If they did, they did a better job at hiding it.

Winter passed. Spring sprung. We returned for a further gravesite service later in the summer.

That felt better. For me, anyway. Not for my cousin Carol, who wept openly upon passing her mother's headstone. She wept. Was comforted. Composed herself, only to cry again.

Closure is important.

Grandpa, Part 2

The last missive concerning Jules, my grandfather, was anecdotal, myself repeating what stories I’d been told. Even as I wrote it, I knew I ought to write a follow-up, sharing some of my more personal experiences.

My grandfather was a tease. He could be gruff too, somewhat short of temper, I’m told; but he was always kind and gentle, all the times I ever saw him. And a tease. Anyone who knew him will probably say as much. My father was the same, and, I think, I suppose I don’t fall far from that tree.

I recall sitting on my grandfather’s lap. He asked me if I wanted a sip of ginger ale, his voice somewhat raspy, that of a long-term smoker, which he was. His face lit up with mischief as he asked, an expression I knew all too well. I was having none of that. I knew it wasn’t ginger ale, and told him so. “That’s beer,” I told him.

“No,” he said, trying and failing to sound serious, “it’s ginger ale. Here,” he said. “Taste it.” And he’d place the glass under my nose.

“Look at it,” I said, gentle pushing it away, leaning back. I did not like the small of beer. Too sharp. And it stung my nose. “Look at the suds.”

“That’s whipped cream,” he explained.

“No it’s not!” I said.

I did eventually plunge my nose into his glass, to confirm to myself that he was teasing me. When I came back up for air, my nose was wrinkled. “That’s beer,” I said, my nose still wrinkled. Of course, he laughed.

Somewhat later, when his flexibility was less than it had been, I used to kneel down in front of him to help him put on and take off his shoes. The elderly imp used to curl his toes while I did it, making the effort difficult, if not impossible. Once I figured out what he was doing, I’d look up into his eyes to see if I could see that mischievous glint in them. It was. “Stop that,” I’d command him. He’d just laugh, and do it again. Exasperated, I’d call out, “Mom! He’s doing it again.”

“Grandpa, stop curling your toes,” she’d tell him, expecting that he’d do as he pleased, would do what he would, regardless what anyone said. And that he would, eventually. Of course, that just made him laugh all the harder, that raspy chuckle shaking him.

I remember him in his place, in his chair in the dining room, the cards set out before him in solitaire. Listening. Calling out to my grandmother. Holding court at Christmas time. He’d call me to him, to that chair. I’d come close, and he’d gather me up, and then he’d pass me a two-dollar bill, slipping it covertly into my palm. He always seemed to have a two-dollar bill ready when we came to visit. This is for you, he’d say. Don’t tell anybody. Everyone saw. Everyone heard. But it was our little secret, just the same.

Grandpa

"Good old grandsire ... we shall be joyful of thy company."

William Shakespeare

Jules Leonard. My father’s father. Jules emigrated from Belgium at a young age. Born in Brussels, he came to Canada in 1906 at the age of 3, and his family settled in Saskatchewan. You’ll have to forgive any errors I make, my father was not the most curious of creatures, certainly not in the case of his family’s history, so I’m threading together the few facts I know, just about all from my Grandmother when I’d grown older, and asked her about her past (Gramma, was always brief about such things; I wonder if she thought that the past not something to dwell on, the present and her family always her primary concern), a couple from my mother, from what little she knows and related me over the years.

Jules worked for the railroad when he was a young man, and at some given time within those younger years, he attended a cotillion. That’s a French country dance for we young’uns. And as fate would have it, he met a young lady there, a young woman named Blanche, and though he managed to dance a couple times with her, she insisted that she be escorted home by the gentleman she’d arrived with, and not by Jules. But persistence wins the prize. Jules set his eye on Blanche and began to court her, and a while later, the two settled in Timmins, Ontario, where Jules worked at the MacIntyre Mine, along with his brother-in-law Frank, and Blanche set about bringing 6 kids into the world: Lorraine, Laverne, Ronald, Jerome, Edgar (my father), and then, after a brief span of 9 years, Derek.

Jules worked underground for about 10 years (total guess), Frank in the bit shop. Both decided mining was a death sentence, as it was in those days, it was—most miners bled out into their lungs and drowned in their own blood by their early 40s from silicosis, black lung, as they liked to call it.

Frank bought a motel in North Bay, never had any kids, but embraced his sister-in-law Blanche’s, and her grandkids, as his own, as much as anyone could.

Jules struggled to make ends meet. Five kids (as there were then) were financial burden enough, but he also had to contend with Blanche wiring money back home to Saskatchewan, back to a brother who’d been caught red-handed embezzling from his company and had only been spared prison under the promise to pay back the amount in full, money he apparently did not have.

Jules eventually moved to Cochrane, and re-entered into service with CN, and pulled more than his share of overtime while with them. Blanche had taken ill upon the onset of her change of life, and had been so ill that she’d received the last rites in her 40s. Times were tough. The future dire.

Enter Mec Gauthier (Poppa). Poppa sold medicine to Jules at a hefty discount, and told Jules that he had to get out of the house they were living in. There was an open sewer running alongside their property, not a particularly healthy place to live. So, when my parents married, and moved to Toronto for a brief period, Jules bought their house on 16^th Avenue, the much beloved house I remember as theirs. Blanche remained in poor health, always had need of medication, even after Jules had retired. But she did improve. I remember her suffering headaches, Jules never too far from her side.

Nanny

Hilda Gauthier, my mother’s mother. My Nanny was a career woman. She had always worked. She didn’t do housework, not really, she puttered on occasion, and straightened papers, but she didn’t have time for such things, so she hired live-in maids when my mother was young, and then housekeepers and cooks later on, the last of which was Mrs. D., who worked for her for years, the only one I’d ever known.

As you might expect, Hilda had not been a hands-on mother. Not that she was distant. She wasn’t. She just didn’t know how to express her love. I think that may be why she was never a tactile grandmother with Karen and I. We knew she loved us, adored us, but she was more comfortable in the company of adults. And yet she was always happy to see us, was always generous and lavished us with gifts, and visited us with regularity in Timmins, usually for a week at a time.

Back in the ‘20s, Hilda had begun working at Bell, the telephone company, when her mother, Susan, took in Mec, my grandfather-to-be, as a boarder, and saw an opportunity for her daughter in him. Mec would be a pharmacist, not a working man living from paycheck to paycheck, but a proper professional. I’m not sure what Hilda thought of Mec in those first years, he was 11 years her senior, but she eventually did marry Mec, despite their age difference. And moved north with him to Matheson. Which must have been a shock. Matheson was not Toronto. Matheson must have seemed the savage frontier, the very edge of habitation and barely civilization. And Matheson was French. There were very few people for her to talk to, I imagine. So, moving to Cochrane was probably a wish come true to her. English. A railroad town. And their own business. Their money. Her own money. While in Toronto, Susan used to meet her at Bell, palm out for her paycheck.

In time, they flourished, prospered, bought and drove a car back up north when the road from the south to the north was completed, and later still, they adopted my mother, raised her, or reared her, in any event. The housekeepers and later Mrs. D. may have had more than a hand in raising my mother.

Hilda may not have been an overtly tactile and lavishly emotionally loving mother, but she was always there for my mother. She and Mec helped my parents when they married; financed a house for them; used their social and political connections to make arrangements for my parents when their first, developmentally challenged child was born. She was a live-in babysitter for my sister and I when needed, no matter how harrowing the experience of dealing with me may have been for her, at times. She was there to listen whenever my mother needed to talk, never judged. She bought my parents a Caribbean vacation for their 30th anniversary.

She may not have lavished us with hugs, she may not have said “I love you” often, but she found her own ways to express it.

Poppa

Joseph Meclea Gauthier, Mec to his friends. My mother’s father. Poppa had retired to his bed, and all my memories of him were in that bed.

When we came to Cochrane to visit, we always stayed at my mother’s parents. Karen and I would get out of the car and run up to the house, a large green painted, cinderblock building, mount the stairs two at a time, and greet Nanny at the door. We’d leave our bags to our parents to carry. They were probably heavy for little kids, you can’t convince me otherwise. Having kissed Nanny, we’d race up the flight of creaky stairs to our Poppa’s room. I’d jump onto the bed with him, hug him and kiss him. He was a small man, rail thin, sporting a somewhat longish beard, making him a new age hipster, way before his time. He was the only man I knew with a beard. I’d seen others, it was the early ‘70s then, so they were scattered about, but it was also Northern Ontario, and barely out of the ‘50s despite the date.

Poppa should not be judged by his largely unkept state, or his having retired to his bed. He cut quite the figure in his time, despite that small frame. Born in Quebec, he mostly grew up there before his family moved to Ontario. It was rustic here, then. Matheson, Cochrane, and Timmins hadn’t been around that long. There were few roads, none of them connecting the North to the South. Indoor plumbing may have been a luxury when he was young. His father bought the Stanley Hotel in Matheson, his mother was a school teacher, a family of note in the North, middle-class. They valued education in a time when most people in the North quit school after grade 7. They insisted on it, sending their boys south to school in Toronto, a rare occurrence in those days.

Mec and his brother became pharmacists, graduates of the U of T. He met my grandmother while in Toronto, married in 1926, and settled back in Matheson first and then in Cochrane once he’d bought a pharmacy there. He was one of the first people to drive a car north from Toronto to Cochrane once the road north was finally completed in 1927, a trek that took 9 days, I’m told, 3 to North Bay, then 5 to Cochrane. He was an important figure in his community, never turning people away without their prescriptions, medicines he had to mix and dispense, himself. He kept a book of what was owed him, but he was paid in eggs and chickens and cut meat on occasion, often probably. He was in charge of rationing in Cochrane during the Second World War. He counted Judges and the leaders of the town among his friends, and a certain railroad worker named Jules Leonard, as well.

His memory and his welcoming hugs warm me still.

Coming of Age, Of a Sort

That would be between ‘76 and ‘78, I’d say. That's a hard thing to nail down for most people, if not all of us, as it happens in leaps and bounds over a period of time. So let’s observe some of this process. Further details of each to follow, I imagine.

In ‘76, I began helping out at the pool, not the Schumacher pool (that’s where my sister began her junior guard experience), the Archie Dillon Sportsplex, then only a year old. Judy Miller was still at the cash (God love her for her longevity of service), but other than that, the two pools could not be more different. The Sportsplex was brick, tiled, windowless, '70s modern in every way. It echoed, as all pools do. It was humid, as all pools are; but hot, as the Schumacher Pool never was.

In ‘77, I bought my first albums with what little wealth I had: Fleetwood Mac’s “Rumours,” and the Eagles’ “Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975.” I loved them both, but I can’t say I chose them on my own. They were picked out on the advice of my cousin Alan, in from Cochrane. We stumbled upon each other in the new Timmins Square on a Saturday afternoon, at Circle of Sound. I was in a record store for the first time, out with friends, trying and failing to be mallrats, leafing through the maze of future personal purchases, browsing the best sellers, when Alan appeared. We talked, he asked me what I liked, and I admitted I didn’t really know, limited to the playlist on the local radio and the memory of the too many ‘60s and ‘70s rock in my older cousins’ collections to remember; I’d yet to find my groove. When he asked me what albums I had already, I begrudgingly admitted that I didn’t own any LPs, then, yet. He took those two off the best-sellers wall, and said that these were two worthy of building a record collection from. He was right.

In ‘76, the class trip to Midland, the first time I was ever away from my parents. We were placed four to a room, one of whom likely stole the $10 of mad money my mother gave me for the trip. That kid held a $10 bill up to me and all in the room and said, “Look what I have.” Me too, I said, in response, unsure why he was so boastful about showing it off, my own mother telling me to keep it secret; but upon a search of my own luggage later could not find my own money my mother had given me. Read between the lines, and I’m sure you will come to the same conclusion I did. But how to prove the theft? I let it go.

In the summer of ‘77, Star Wars was released. I very much had an Eric Foreman moment.

In ‘78, I saw my first video game, Pong, on the school trip to Toronto. We spotted it in the restaurant of the hotel/motel we were staying at, and were soon 3 to 5 deep around it, fascinated, transfixed by what we knew was the future. That same trip, someone was caught shoplifting on a stop on the way home. One of our teachers went down the aisle with a basket, telling us that if anyone else had stolen something, to place it in the basket and nothing more would be said. He left with an empty basket. The shoplifter was eventually returned to us, his head low with shame upon entering the bus.

In ‘78 and beyond new interests began to penetrate my shell: girls, New Wave, Post-punk; video games, first at the Square, then Andy's Amusement, and later still at Top Hat’s.

The list of crushes to that point: Heather, Alison, Patricia, Shelly, Kim, and Sandra. Obviously, more to come.

Bits and Pieces, and Such

Oddly, I have a lot of gaps in my memory of attending St. Theresa. I have a fair number of gaps in my memory of attending Pinecrest, too. Grades 1 to 2 are not quite as vivid as 4 through 6, when my class had solidified, somewhat.

I remember surprisingly few teachers. I remember a woman in ruffled shirts and salt and pepper hair teaching Grade 2 (don’t quote me on that, she may have been Grade 3), then Mrs. Gage (I do not remember her maiden name—she had that the first semester, then returned married after Christmas...unless I’m confusing two separate school years) for Grade 4, Mr. Litchfield for Grade 5 (our Principal took over the class after the nameless teacher we began with left for maternity leave quite early in the school year), and finally, the beloved Mr. Reade for Grade 6. I remember Mr. Battachio subbing in for gym class, his change jingling in his pockets. I remember mistakenly calling Mrs. Gage mom, once; being seated beside Alison Tilly for art class in Grade 6; Mr. Reade reading a chapter of a novel about a winter plane crash to us each day. My memory is replete with playground recollections: lots of soccer and touch football, then baseball and basketball. I remember being bused to the Schumacher Pool for swim classes, the water so cold that Tony Syball (sp) used to shiver uncontrollably. There were occasional testosterone clashes with Larry MacDowell in the playground, and sometimes with Donald Rhodes. I remember Alison Tilly and Tony Syball joining our class sometime around Grade 4 (I’m sure there are many who can tell me exactly when). There was Kathy Kreiner mania after her gold medal win at the ‘76 Olympics, and track and field try-outs.

But surprisingly few memories of Grades 7 and 8. I remember a snow day which turned out to be one of the best winter days ever, a solar eclipse when we had to sit in class with all the curtains drawn to protect us, a school Olympics where teams made up of people from different homerooms and grades were combined. I recall a socially awkward boy who was ridiculed by almost everyone. He was clueless, it seemed, unable to follow others’ lead to fit in. I first saw him up against the urinals, with his pants and underwear down around his ankles, all the boys in the washroom laughing at him. I felt so sorry for him, but what was to be done? He went from one social gaff to the next, never talking to others. I do recall how many people left to go to Ross Beattie in Grade 8, the socially awkward boy among them, the year parents had to pay extra for the privilege of having their children attend Catholic School.

I am cognizant of how many times I had to “start anew.” I began school in Cochrane, then began again after moving from Cochrane to Timmins (another beginning, when you think on it), then again when I was held back in Grade 2. I began again in Grade 7, when my parents transferred me from the public-school system to the separate. Losing many people mid-middle school was another surprise.

This trend of my starting over would continue in post-secondary, even in work, but those are stories for another day. Throughout my entire life I was always finding myself starting over. I shouldn’t complain. I may have lost many friends with each renewal, but I also met new people with each beginning, as well. It’s no wonder that my memory is a riot of mixed memories, somewhat loosely anchored.

Christmas

Every Christmas morning after we left Cochrane for Timmins, we’d wake up to my father rushing about the house, hammering on doors, declaring that Santa had been here! We’d leap or drag ourselves out of bed, depending on the year, leap at young ages, drag later. We’d eat a hasty breakfast, despite our ogling the feast of presents about the tree, open our gifts and be left to play with the toys for a time; not too long though. There was preparations to be made: every year for 10ish years after leaving Cochrane, we were to return to the homeland for celebrations with the family, eat an early lunch, pack up the car with the gifts to be given, and pile in, Cookie at my mothers’ feet in the front. I can’t recall if Piper, our next dog, ever made the pilgrimage with us, if she had, she'd have been in the space at the back window (that’s where she loved to lounge for the hour-long trip).

I recall many such long commutes back to Cochrane, getting car sick, puking into the ditch despite tripping on Gravol. I was not a good traveller then.

We’d arrive at Nanny’s (my mother’s mother’s) house, where we’d open gifts, then be herded back into the car for the short drive to Gramma’s (my father’s mother’s) with Nanny in tow (my mother’s parents were always invited if I recall properly, certainly my Nanny after Poppa passed away), where we opened gifts again. Those gifts were packed away in the trunk of the car before my uncles, aunts, and cousins arrived.

Gramma’s house already smelled like dinner when we arrived. There was a great deal of cooking to be done in such a small galley kitchen. Food was piled high on the dinner table, arranged in depth, buffet style. Only Grandpa sat at the table, holding court on how much anyone might take, even though there was enough food for three times our number (about 30ish people in what I would describe as a wartime house). Turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, pickles and beets and Lord knows what else, my memory fails me. There were six types of pie: apple, cherry, raisin, mince, pecan (?) and sugar (?), one for each son’s preference. They each had to have their favourite. And they’d have been disappointed had their personal favourite not been there. Family politics. Enough said.

Grandpa would always call me over, draw me in and hug me, and slip a two-dollar bill into my pocket.

There wasn’t enough room at the table for everyone. Obviously. And with thirty people in attendance, seating was an issue. Families sort things out, and by the time I came along, a system had long since been adopted. The adults ate in the living room, with paper plates in wicker baskets on their laps. We cousins were arranged on the stairs, each to his own riser, Keith and I sharing a small bi-fold table at the base.

Gramma never ate until everyone else had. And by then the Great Clean-up was in full swing, the food and dishes tackled by the women, teens and adults alike; but not by Gramma, though, she was eating.

The men congregated in the living room, the chairs and stools arranged, years of Daily Press Carol booklets laid out, one to a seat. Once the Great Clean-up was complete, we sang, we soloed. I most certainly soloed. I was expected to sing “Rudolph, The Red-nosed Reindeer” every year. Tradition, you know how it goes. There was no accompaniment though: I don’t know if anyone could play anything portable. Karen could play piano, but there was none present. Gramma played fiddle, but I don’t remember it ever being brought out. I recall French songs being sung after the carols were complete. Beer flowed. There were chips and snacks and such, because that’s what we all needed, more food.

We kids took that as our queue to retreat downstairs where there was tabletop hockey and an absence of adults and alcohol and demands by our elders to bring them more. I think the elder cousins may have played street hockey out front or may have just slipped away to party with friends.
If they did, Keith and I were oblivious to it all, having lost interest in all things adult, even all things teen. Later still, Karen and I were packed up by our parents to go back to Nanny's for the night. Over the next few days, we visited...everyone. It was exhausting, fun, but exhausting. Christmas would never be as exciting as it was then.

The Cottage

My parents built a cottage on Rancourt Lake, just outside of Cochrane. Some of my earliest memories are there. I imagine it quite large in memory, but I’ve seen it since growing up and it’s quite small in reality. My first memories of it were from before we moved to Timmins, so, I was very young, then. I remember being bathed by my mother in the lake, rainy days spent indoors, my parents playing card with my Uncle Jerry and Aunt Hazel at what seemed at the time an enormous oak table, the TV displaying more snow than picture, yet issuing what might as well have been a radio play for all we could see.

We returned often those first years after moving. We invariably visited my uncle and aunt there. I recall playing with Keith along the shore. The Owens two cottages down. Their kids Darryl and Ronnie. My parents spent a lot of time with the Owens, so Karen and I spent a lot of time with Darryl and Robbie.

I remember one day at the Owens’ cottage quite well, or should I say I remember a particular incident quite well: I was lounging in an inner tube out on the water, not too far from shore. My mother was on shore with Mrs. Owen, talking, having a drink, maybe. I slipped through the hole, becoming all but stuck. Yes, I almost drowned. The water was not deep, no more than a couple feet deep, but my circumstances weren’t ideal. I could not, for the life of me, get out of the inner tube hole and back on top of it. I’d try to drag myself up and out, but I kept falling back in and below the waterline until I could slip no more, fully stuck, the water lapping at my mouth and nose. But while I was still struggling to release myself, I saw a progression with each crest of my struggle: my mother in the lawn chair, my mother leaping out of the chair, my mother running, my mother sailing into the water, and finally hauling me out of the inner tube and carrying me back to shore where I was no longer allowed near the water, definitely nowhere near an inner tube, in or out of the water. I can’t say I wanted to, not then anyway, not for about ten minutes, anyway. I felt like I was being punished after that.

Timmins, First Impressions

We moved to Timmins in the summer of 1970, just after I had completed kindergarten. My father actually preceded us by a year, beginning work there in 1969 and commuting. I suspect we waited a year so that my sister and I could finish our school year.

Timmins was huge by my reckoning, boasting about 26,000 residents (about 40,000 after amalgamation), compared with Cochrane’s 5,000. Most of it had been built in the ‘20s and ‘30s, the newest bits in the ‘50s. And it towered above Cochrane, its downtown core reaching up three stories. (I always referred to the downtown core as uptown, as we had to travel uphill to get there.)

I found the core to be a riot of activity whenever my mother brought me there. There were streetlights, traffic was dense and continuous. People bustled here and there, the sidewalks thick with them. Buildings crowded one another, with barely a hand span between them, unlike in Cochrane where you could usually drive a truck between them. It was all spectacular to me, but the most spectacular place downtown was Bucovetsky’s. It was the only building in town with an elevator. Enormous by even today’s reckoning, it was most definitely a service elevator fitted for public use, its walls draped with canvas. I would insist we use it whenever we went there. Although the stairwell was fascinating, too. There were photographs lining the walls, most black and white (most photographs were black and white, then), all chronicling the history of the store: there were pictures of car give-a-ways, fur coats, bridal dresses, pictures of Christmas displays, Christmas windows, Christmas floats, ribbon cuttings. There were newspaper clippings, and a few sales advertisements thrown in for good measure. But what always caught the eye in the stairwell was the huge painting of 3^rd Ave between the 1^st and 2^nd floor, painted when Timmins was still just a bush camp mining town, its few permanent buildings just log cabins.

The 101 Mall was still to come, with its elevator and its central gallery, its artificial Christmas tree hung from the ceiling and spanning three stories.

Woolworths’ hadn’t opened yet, either, but when it did, it had an escalator. That revolving staircase frightened me when I first saw it. I was terrified that my foot or my clothing would be caught in its teeth whenever I stepped on or off of it.

Like I said, I was quite young when we first came to Timmins.

Moving Day

We moved from Cochrane to Timmins in the summer of 1970. It was the most important day of my life, up to then.

I was four and a half, so moving from the only place I’d ever known to some place I'd never heard of seemed like moving to another planet. I was concerned, unsure what to expect. I’d no idea what was going to happen. I was also profoundly sad when the day came. I recall wanting to linger, to play with my friends for just five minutes more when my parents called for me to come, telling me it was time to leave. I kicked stones. I ran. I can’t say for certain what I did because I remember doing both, and both can’t be true. I had nightmares of similar leavings for years afterwards. I’d be told it was time to leave in my dream, and I’d pull at dandelion heads and kick at stones to delay the even. I’d wake in a cold sweat upon the completion of a countdown in my head (probably a side-effect of years of NASA countdowns), just as the moment arrived.

I climbed into the car. I cried a little, chocking back what I could. We were leaving my home, my grandparents, my uncles, aunts, my cousins, my whole life behind forever, as far as I could tell.

The hour it took to travel to Timmins felt like an eternity. The furthest I’d ever travelled was to the cottage, and that was only ten minutes from our house on 16^th Ave. The eternity passed. Probably not well, either. I was prone to car sickness and was usually doped up on Gravol so that I wouldn’t get car sick. They tried rubber strips, too, the theory being that it grounded the static electricity from the car. None of that worked. I’d almost always get sick. Sometimes we’d stop in time and I’d throw up into the ditch. Sometimes I threw up in the car. I have no memory of getting car sick on that ride, even though I probably did.

We arrived.

We pulled onto Hart Street and rolled down the hill towards Brouseau Avenue. There it was, 560 Hart, the new house, a yellow brick split level, two lots up from the Avenue. An empty lot separated us from the tall two-story on the corner. An undeveloped field lay across the street, the brush higher than my head.

Our new home was bigger than our house in Cochrane. Stairs up to the bath and beds. I ran up and down them, then downstairs, discovering that the basement was a work in progress, then back outside.

The movers followed shortly, and that inevitably brought every kid in the neighborhood out to watch. I discovered our new neighborhood was flush with kids my age. We were shy at first, me especially. But we were kids, and I was NEW, so we were playing in no time, before the furniture was even fully unloaded. It was like I’d lived there my whole life. I doubt that Cochrane crossed my mind at all.

That’s what kids do, they meet someone their own age and they’re best friends within ten minutes.

Kids adapt.

It’s so cool how they do that with so little effort.

It can leave a mark, though.

Driving Lessons

Not mine, obviously. My grandmother’s. She learned to drive late in life, sometime in her 50s. Probably not the best time to learn, but her husband’s health had begun to fail, so she decided that she had best learn. She asked my mother to teach her.

She did. And Gramma became a driver. She was probably not a very good one. But she was good enough to negotiate the streets of Cochrane.

I remember Gramma driving Keith and me. I believe she was driving us to school. It was in the winter, anyway. Regardless where and why, she was driving us somewhere. Keith was in the front with her. I was in the back, hanging off the back of the front seat. None of us were wearing seatbelts. Car seats and rules about how tall you had to be to sit in the front weren’t a consideration then. Not really. Kids sat in people’s laps then. I don’t think seatbelts were installed in cars then.

If she was driving us to school, it would have been in the winter of 69-70. I’d have been about four years old then, and in kindergarten.

We were driving up 7th Ave hill, approaching Transfiguration Church, and halfway up when the tires began to spin.

Gramma stopped and backed down the hill. That must have been frightening for her. Terrifying, in fact. Had the car begun to slide, she probably wouldn’t have had the skill to correct. So, she must have had a white-knuckle grip on the steering wheel as we inched back down the hill. She tried again to the same affect. On her third attempt, as we were nearing the top, the tires burning on the ice, Keith and I began to yell, “Don’t stop, Gramma!” She persisted, she hammered the fuel pedal to the floor, tires spinning like mad the whole way. We made it that time. Much to Gramma’s relief.

Cookie

Cookie was my first dog, or more accurately, she was my parents’ dog, even more accurately, she was my father’s dog. My mother could call for her until she was blue in the face without result. She’d give up, my father would open the door, call out for her once, and Cookie would be at the door in minutes. She was a corgi, a very popular breed then, as the Queen had a kennel full of them.

Cookie may have been the runt of her litter, but she was a giant in my eyes. She was my first companion. Loving, protective, always present. She followed me everywhere. And like I said, she helped me out from time to time while I learned to keep my balance.

When I began attending school, she was waiting in the window for my return. My mother tells me Cookie would just rise and go to the window about five minutes before I returned. (I've witnessed Hunter do the same, Piper, Sassy, Jasper too; dogs must be very aware of their internal clock.)

Cookie was smart. She could be cunning, too. There was this kid on the street that used to taunt her. She’d end up choking herself at the end of her rope as the kid wound her up, time and again, laughing at her; until the day she pretended not to reach, only advancing halfway up the extent of her rope. The taunting kid neglected to notice Cookie’s slack rope and entered her range. And then she rushed him. The kid was so surprised, he staggered back, falling on his ass.

Cookie was with us for some years after we moved to Timmins. Then she got cancer. And she died. Her passing was likely the first taste of intense grief I had ever experienced.

But that was still years away.

A Beginning, Cochrane

Some time ago, I found myself thinking about those first, largely, emotional snapshots in my head. When I mentioned them to others, I always heard the same surprised response: “You remember that? I can’t remember that far back.” But I could. Although I’m not unique in this, I’ve found it rather rare. Most people can’t remember their earliest years, apparently. Most people seem to have difficulty even remembering high school, let alone their preschool years. Don’t get me wrong, those early memories aren’t that detailed; they’re largely emotional moments, like a memory of me and my cousin Keith being pushed in strollers.

A lot of my earliest memories involve Keith. He and I are only two months apart, and we lived only two doors apart, so he would factor large in them, wouldn’t he? Not all, but most.

I don’t know how many people remember learning to walk, but I do. I’d shuffle along a piece of furniture and when I reached its end, our dog Cookie somehow knew that I needed help and would be by my side. I would take hold of her and catch a ride to the next couch or chair, where I’d take hold of it and shuffle along until I needed her help again.

I remember playing in puddles, all dolled up in a mud suit and rubber boots. I’d jump in, stamping them, watching them spray, spattering my legs, and I’d laugh.

I remember riding a “hobby” horse so hard that the springs should have broken. I’m astonished that I kept my seat.

I remember my mother not wanting to be bothered with putting my boots on when we were on our way to Uncle Jerry’s (Keith’s father), so she zipped my into my one-piece snowsuit, and swaddled me up in a blanket instead, carrying me the short distance down the street and up the single path to the house. My uncle was the most judicious of shovellers, clearing just enough for his car and a footpath up to his house, and he did this every year, because later on, when I was a year older, I remember mounting that slight, but seemingly endlessly steep hill, the banks as high as houses.

Later still, Keith and I decided we were going to Gramma’s house for cookies (she was always Gramma, never Grandma). We jumped on our trikes and ventured out. Cookie followed. Cookie always followed me. I suspect she had it in her mined to keep us safe. It was no simple venture for two three-year olds to go to Gramma’s house; we had to cross one of the busiest streets in Cochrane to do so, and another besides. When we arrived, Gramma met us at the door. “What are you doing here?” she asked, as surprised as can be by our arrival. “We came for cookies,” we said. So, she invited us in, served us our much sought-after milk and cookies...and called our mothers. When our obviously fearful and furious mothers arrived, I found myself hauled to the car by an arm, then hurried on my way by a quick rap to the behind.

Summers were spent on Rancourt Lake, just ten minutes from our driveway. For a child of two or three it was a long haul. I’d grow inpatient, eager to be where we were going, a place of fun and friends, of boats and wading in shallows, of scary fish, and of cousins. I’ve memories of being bathed at water’s edge, of thunderstorms, of my parents playing cards at the dining room table, of board games. There was a woodstove, almost never fired, and a TV, one that played little but snow.

Later still, Keith and I were packed up for school, where there was finger painting and pictures on the wall, A for Apple and B for Bees. Carefully drawn letters, in both capital and lower case topped the blackboard. I remember the first day after Christmas vacation most vividly, though. I arrived wearing new mittens. I was in a panic at day’s end. I couldn’t find them. I searched and shifted the many other mittens, the coats and boots looking for them. I enlisted the aid of the teacher, but my mittens were nowhere to be found. “You lost them,” she said. But I hadn’t lost them. I’d specifically placed them in my coat pocket after showing them off to my classmates. They’d been stolen. But who to blame? To this day I can’t believe that the teacher sent me out into the cold without mittens. The distance could not have been long, five or six blocks, I imagine, from school to home, but it was bitterly cold. My hands were frozen. My cousins came to my aide. “Where are your mitts?” they asked. I don’t know, I said. I couldn’t find them. They waved down more cousins, and one arrived on a snowmobile. He set me in front, facing him. He undid his snowsuit and told me to reach around and hug him. “Hold on,” he said, and raced me home. I’d never travelled so fast. My mother was livid. She tied strings to my mitts for years, and thread them through my sleeves.

Those are my memories of Cochrane. Not all. I remember uncles and aunts and carnivals and the hill behind my house. I remember Christmases, dressed up so smartly in jacket and clip-on tie. I remember my room.

I remember the day we left Cochrane.