‘How I May Have Saved My Own Life’

A week ago I posted a blog that was about an older gentleman I knew from Stayner – Matt Rawn. He used to write columns for the paper from time to time mostly about war times as he was a Merchant Marine working alongside the Canadian Navy, but many of his stories were about his travels as a hobo in which he hopped trains to get from city to city across the country and into the States to find work. Some of his stories were about life on his farm in Monticello and earlier in Simcoe County where he lived with his family as a youngster in the Sunnidale and Nottawasaga Township areas. Matt was a character and he had lots of memories to share – some are yarns and some of true fact.

This next piece is about a love affair gone wrong but it’s a good reminder at Christmas time (or anytime of year) and will really make people think twice.

By Matt Rawn:

‘How I May Have Saved My Own Life’ is a story I like to tell just as often as I can but today I find it difficult to get anyone to listen to me. Of course, if my yarns or stories or whatever I’m talking about are laced with smut or any similar substance…well as I have said it’s just another story - so have a read of this one and see how it compares. Though I don’t stress and nor do I want to put a lot of emphasis on it because I think that water should be allowed to find its own level.

The first time I met her was in Georgetown Ontario way back when I was working on a dairy farm in that area. It was the general practice for hired farm hands to go into town on a Saturday night – we would each have a dollar or two - no more, and this would be during the nicer weather only. We would take in the Saturday night movie (silent pictures) usually a western or a thriller, shoot a game or two of pool after, get a haircut, buy a supply of fine-cut tobacco, maybe have a glass of what was known as 4-4 beer, buy one of any weekly papers with the brown section and coloured comics and then head for home about 10:30 or 11 p.m.

Well this Saturday night I wasn’t with the usual gang, I was with two older fellows and they introduced her to me. She was older than I was and exciting and she’d been around. The farmer that I worked with warned me to have nothing to do with her. He said no good would come of our relationship but I didn’t pay any attention and kept meeting her on the sly. She was so sophisticated and worldly it made me feel, well you know, more grown up just being with her.

It was lots of fun to take her to a party in those days. She was always the centre of attention. We began to see more of each other and I took her to my parents once or twice.  They were farm folks as well.  They didn’t think much of her and they told me so. When I got a place of my own later on she was a frequent guest and it was not long before she moved in with me. It may have been common-law and it was heart breaking for my parents and two of my younger sisters, but I kept reminding myself that I was not a kid anymore - besides it was legal.

We lived together through my early years and I seldom went anywhere without her but I wasn’t blind. I knew she was unfaithful to me and what’s worse I didn’t care so long as she was there for me when I wanted her and she usually was.

The longer we lived together the more attached I became to her but it wasn’t mutual. She began to delight in making me look foolish in front of my friends but still I couldn’t give her up. It became a love-hate relationship and I figured out that her glamour was nothing more than a cheap mask to hide her spite and cynicism. I could no longer see her beauty after I came to know her true character but old habits are not all that easy to break. We had invested many years in each other; even though my relationship with her made me lose a little respect for myself she became the centre of my life. We didn’t go anywhere and we didn’t do anything. We didn’t have friends over – it was just the two of us. I became depressed and I knew that she was largely responsible for my misery.

I finally told her that I was through and that I was leaving. It took a hell of a lot of guts but I left.

I still see her around and I miss her now and then. I’m not boasting when I say she’d take me back in a minute but by the grace of God or whatever you want to call it, I’ll never take up with her again. If you see her give her my regards for she is still as beautiful as ever and I don’t hate her. I just loved her too much and that was all.

Chances are you know the family. The name is ‘ALCOHOL’!  

 

 

 

  

Matt Rawn and the Christmas Tree Story

By Sharon Weatherall

When I began working at the paper in Stayner I got to know an old fellow who used to drop into the office from time to time to ask if we would be interested in publishing any of his stories. Matthew Rawn was a war veteran of the Canadian Merchant Marines and retired ‘tramp’ or ‘hobo’ – for anyone who isn’t familiar with that term it’s a person that “rode the rods” so to speak.

Matt saw a lot of the country hopping on and off trains during the Depression years, lingering in little towns wherever he could find work for a few days or weeks before he’d hop aboard another train and move on. He travelled around Canada and into the States doing odd jobs while caching a phenomenal store of memories which he would later share through his writings. When he was older, Matt moved back to Simcoe County area and his roots living his years out in Stayner at a small senior’s apartment behind the Main Street.

Many thought Matt to be an eccentric old fellow and didn’t bother too much by spending a few minutes talking to him. If they had they may have come to know a very interesting person with a lot of knowledge to share. It was commonplace to walk by on a summer’s day and see Matt outside his back door sitting in a swing and talking into a cassette recorder. Following this dictation, he would painstakingly transcribe the words onto coloured foolscap sheets neatly printed on both front and back, for me to take back to the office and type up.

Matthew had the gift of gab and I got to know him quite well during those years dropping by his place after receiving a phone call to let me know he had another story ready. He wrote about almost everything from children’s stories and fantasy, to real life war experiences and life on his farm in Monticello after the war. He was a caring old soul but I didn’t know just how generous he was until holiday time one year when I learned why he dressed as Santa and walked the streets ringing his Christmas bell. That year I discovered Matt did more than write – he also liked to play Father Christmas for those in need.

Every year during Christmas week Matt donned a worn old red velvet suit with a matted beard that had almost had the biscuit. Fastening a clumpy pillow under his wide vinyl belt, he headed out to the streets to greet people and wish them a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Each day Matt took with him one of five carefully packaged stockings which contained not only oranges and candy, but a certain amount of money. These did not go to just anyone – he followed people around stores looking for those he felt needed the help most and presented them with one of his generous gifts. People would accept the sock not knowing until they got home as to what it contained. Matt would feel happy that he was able to help someone that truly needed a hand at Christmas time and those sock recipients no doubt took a different view of the funny old man when they saw him again – no matter what time of year. 

Before he died Matt gave me many stories which I bring out at certain times of the year when I am thinking about him. He was a talented writer and I am happy to 'pay forward' some of those adventures and yarns he shared with me. Most of his writings have a lesson or twist in them that make you think twice about everyday life. I will never forget the stories he told me and keep his collection tucked away in my office for special times when people want to read a colourful rendition of what it was really like in those difficult Depression days when people were poor but helped each other to get by.

Following is ‘The Christmas Tree Story’ –by Matthew Rawn

Many, many years ago when I was in my mid-twenties back in the Depression years as they were known then (1929-1939), I and thousands like me were down on our luck and going all over the country looking for work. Our way of going from place to place was riding the rods, ‘hoboing’ on the freight trains.

I was doing so this day when I was riding a mixed train – part freight and part passenger. I was on my way from Wainwright Alberta to Calgary for Calgary was the place out West for tramps and hobos to go at such times and being Christmas time, I was planning to spend the holiday weekend in that great city. It was late in the afternoon – just about dusk, when the train stopped at a small town. There were no electric lights but in the light of the lamps that were there I could read the name on the station ‘Drumheller’. I thought “Drumheller – what a name”. But some places do have names that are different from Stayer, New Lowell, or Creemore like I was used to seeing.

It was a very frosty day and I was cold and hungry so I decided right then and there that I would go no further. So I left the train and started to make my way up town when I came to a little building where I could see that they sold wood and coal.  A lamp was burning inside so I went in begging for money to eat supper and for a place to sleep that night. I was in luck, a lady was in the office and she asked me if I would work so I told her that was “the biggest aim in my life”. Then she explained to me that she and her husband were operating a small business on the side – a Christmas Tree Lot, down at the four corners and her husband was down there at the moment.

In a short time he came in and it was decided that I would sleep on a small bunk-like bed in the back of the office. They would fetch me food to eat if I would sell Christmas trees up until Saturday which would be the Christmas weekend. So they gave me a key for there was a small chain woven in and around the trees to keep anyone from taking them when there was nobody around. 

The next morning after I had breakfast I set out for the Christmas Tree Lot. It was very frosty – well below zero and a very light snow had fallen during the night.  When I got to the tree lot and while I was taking down the chain I heard two of the trees talking. Oh yes, trees do talk, especially Christmas trees, for they have things to talk about like Christmas and other things as well.  They don’t talk words like you and me, but they make themselves be understood. And me having worked in and around the bush a lot, it was easy to know what they were saying when they said something.

I will tell you what they were talking about, but first let me tell you their names for trees do have names, the girl trees as well as the boy trees - you know like ah, Hazelnut and Rose Bush. Then there is old Tough Oak and Slippery Elm. But on this day these two talking trees were a different kind of tree and had different names.  Both were Christmas trees and both were evergreen trees, so don’t you see how they would have different names? One was named ‘Douglas’ – a funny name for a tree you might think, well not so, for if Douglas Fir had not been cut down at such an early age he might have become very large and tall. He might have been like one such tree I saw out in British Columbia where horses and wagons and later automobiles - yes cars, and even a bus would drive right through an opening made in the base of that tree.

The other talking tree was named ‘Jack’  - nothing fancy about him and his name and like Douglas Fir, had he not had a few mishaps and been cut down cut down for a Christmas tree, may have been like his brothers and sisters becoming one of the tallest pine trees in the forest.

So you see we had here two ‘might have been’ giants of the forest talking in a Christmas Tree Lot on this frosty morning. What are they talking about? Why the fellow who is taking the chain down, me of course.

“Listen! Look Jack! There is some new guy going to sell trees here today. I wonder where he comes from,” asked Douglas.

Smiling to myself, I fixed the chain back out of the way and lit a small fire in an empty oil drum so that I could keep warm while I was waiting to make a sale.  However, it wasn’t long until a man and a little girl drove up in an old Four-Ninety Touring car to the four corners.

The two tree friends continued in their conversation.

“How did you sleep last night Jack,” asked Douglas Fir.

“Not too good…my back is sore. It has been bothering me and this snow we had doesn’t help,” replied Jack.

“Yes,” said Doug. “I know this snow is bad. Here let me brush you off a bit. There now, how is that?”

“Thanks Doug. I feel a lot better right away.”

“I wonder if we will be picked today Jack,” asked Doug.

“Christmas is on the week-end and this fellow has quite a few of us yet to sell – maybe they will pick us today.”

“I don’t think anybody would want me,” said Jack Pine.

“I’m so scrubby and twisted and you are so straight and tall. I think they would pick you before they take me. I told those men who cut me down that nobody would want me for a Christmas tree but they said their boss told them to cut down anything that was green and with one swing of an axe, I lay there at their feet. And now I am standing here with you waiting for someone to take me home with them for Christmas. I hope you get picked and taken to a place with lots of kids Doug, but I don’t know who would want a tree like me.”

“Well that reminds me Jack, how did you get to be all twisted and scrubby like that,” asked Douglas Fir.

“Well Doug, it’s a long story. I might have been tall like my brothers and sisters but when I was very small a moose stepped on me and pressed me way down into the sand. I thought it was the end of me but I got over that and had started to grow up again when a big mother bear sat right down on top of me while she was eating blueberries and I think that is what stopped me from ever growing up to be a tall tree,” said Jack Pine sadly.

The conversation changed as the trees noticed some activity in the lot.

“Oh look Jack,” said Douglas Fir.

“That man and little girl that drove up a while back are coming into the lot now to look at us trees.”

“I believe they are Doug – let’s hope they buy both of us,” said Jack Pine.

The two watched as the little girl went along each of the trees feeling their branches while the man came along with her. When she came to Jack Pine she stopped and examined him for a bit and then said, “Daddy, this is the one I want…will you buy it for me?”

The father looked at Jack Pine with a sort of scowl then said, “alright, if that’s the one you want.”

The father came right over to me and asked me how much I wanted for the twisted little tree? It was my first sale and I had been told to sell each tree on its merits, or for whatever I thought I could get for they all had to be sold by Saturday. But, at the same time I was not to let them go for too cheap. Having been around the country a lot, I knew how to handle things and people too. Fifteen to 20 cents would have been a fair price to ask for the little Jack Pine but I thought that it was cheating no one when I said, “thirty-five cents, sir”. The man paid and started to take the tree to his car while the little girl lifted the top so it wouldn’t drag over the ground.

As they were leaving Douglas Fir called out, “so long Jack – have a nice Christmas.”

Jack replied, “Good bye Doug. I hope you will soon go as well and that you have a nice Christmas too.”

After the father and little girl had left with Jack Pine I heard Douglas Fir say to himself, “Of course well I’m glad Jack has gone and it looks like he is going to a nice Christmas place but for the life of me I don’t know what that kid saw in him – she must have been blind.”

Yes, it was true. The little girl had been born blind and couldn’t see anything but unlike you and me, she had something we didn’t - a wonderful sense of feel as some blind people do have. If you were to see these two trees and had your choice I’m sure you would pick the Douglas Fir but this little girl went by the feel of Jack Pine’s soft, silky needles in comparison with Douglas Fir’s long, course rough and prickly needles.

And like Jack Pine wished, Douglas Fir did go where there were lots of kids for he had been chosen as the Christmas tree at the Lutheran Church Sunday School on Christmas morning.

Now all of you have a very Merry Christmas for that is the way that I would like it to be.

 

  

 

 

Tis’ the season to help others

By Sharon Weatherall

Tis’ the season of giving but frankly we are living in a time when most people can hardly manage to look after themselves!

It seems to me that there are two halves to society – those who are wealthy and those who are struggling. And unless you get lucky and win a lottery the wealthy just seem to get wealthier while the numbers of people struggling get higher. What ever happened to ‘middle class’ –dedicated hardworking people that managed to create a comfortable life for themselves? I mean there ‘appears’ to be people living like that but in all honesty most of them are relying on credit and work from week to week to pay their bills. God help them if an emergency or job loss occurs because they would instantly fall into the ‘struggling’ category. That’s very scary and no doubt the cause of much stress in people’s lives today.

The proof of how bad it is out there lies in the number of people using food banks and soup kitchens - the stats speak for themselves. Those numbers have dramatically multiplied over the past 10 - 20 years. Christmas season used to be the busiest time but now charities and organizations helping the needy are busy year round. People rely on food banks to make it through to the end of the month when they get a cheque that barely pays their rent and living expenses, never mind putting enough food on the table.

We are not a third world country but there are stories of elderly people eating cat food in place of meat and educational facilities across the nation are now providing breakfast programs sponsored by community charities, to feed children that come to school hungry. The number of homeless people is on the rise and soup kitchens that used to operate once or twice a week are extending their service to meet daily needs. Hunger is like a contagious flu that’s spreading because people can no longer afford the basic means to live.

Maybe it was always this way – I mean there have always been people who relied on the charity of others to get by – maybe it’s just all the more evident now because it’s in our faces. People years ago had a stronger sense of pride and would do anything not to have to ask for charity, whereas today all you have to do is register at St. Vincent De Paul or Salvation Army to get on a list. The service is still confidential but when you are waiting in a line-up outside the local food bank everyone in town can see who is using it. Those driving by might be more understanding to know someone that has fallen on hard times or has maybe used the service themselves at one time or another. After all we live in a day and age when job security is basically non-existent. You could be working today and laid off tomorrow. More and more young people are staying home with their parents longer because they can’t afford to go out on their own.

I am not a stranger to the gift of receiving - or at least my family is not. The trouble is it took me years to figure out just why the church dropped a hamper of food on my grandma’s doorstep at Christmas each year and I imagine Christmas was not the only time she received food donations. I guess as a kid I didn’t ask why – I just thought it was a nice gift and maybe everyone that went to her church got one.  

I was excited to spend holidays at my grandma’s place – she lived on Highway 10 just outside of Brampton. It was considered the rural section way back then. My grandfather had died fairly young with a heart attack leaving my grandma with a houseful of kids to feed. Some of the older ones helped out by working and paying board or handing over cash to pay the bills, but the younger ones still had to be fed and clothed. The house was big but there was no running water. You had to hand pump it into a pail from a well out front and use an outhouse in the back to do your thing. The heat came from a wood stove, although there was hydro to run a fridge and stove for cooking. To me coming from a comfortable middle class home I thought it was different at grandmas but I did not question it at the time.

I can remember my grandma spending an hour or so every afternoon in the sunny living room reading her Bible and praying quietly in thanks for getting through another day. At the table there was never a meal that went by without giving “thanks to the Lord for the food we were about to eat.”

At Christmas I can remember the boys bringing in that hamper so filled with cans, boxes, dairy products and meats that it took two of them to carry it. Then my grandma would sit down and say a silent prayer of thanks before she even put the food away. I asked her once where the food came from and she told me that God looks after those in need. I told her my mom and dad don’t get a basket of food delivered to their place and she said “Thank God they don’t have to”.

So as I got older I came to realize that when my grandfather died he left my grandma pretty much in dire straits. She was a hard working widow with a brood of kids to take care of - no wonder she was so religious. Grandma relied heavily on her faith and the church to help her through those hard times and both always came through for her. In later years her life became much easier when the older kids went together and put her into a senior’s apartment with access to town, shopping, friends and church within walking distance. She was comfortable at last and no longer had to worry where the next meal would come from.

I remember visiting her there and she always cooked up a delicious dinner but we never took a mouthful until we thanked God for the food on our plates.  During those years my grandma never forgot those who helped her – she baked and volunteered helping out at her church. I am glad she was able to spend the last years of her life feeling like she could give back even in some small way. It is because of her that I look at people differently today to understand them. People in need do not always have a certain look about them, some hide it quite well.

So this year when you see the Salvation Army kettle filling up with money, know it goes toward a very good cause. You can help by even giving a dollar. It will go a long way if everyone does the same. Good people are looking after the needy and keeping track to make sure those who qualify get the help. Sadly it has come to the point where all charities have to monitor those on the receiving end so that there is enough to go around.

Many people in need are getting more than food and handouts – they gladly receive support and counselling to help them get back on their feet again. There are agencies out there to help them with specific problems like providing transportation, looking for housing, and even getting back into the work force in some cases. There are also services available to teach them how to eat healthy and budget their money to make it last. Everyone deserves a second chance and more if needed.

Grocery stores are making it easier for people to donate now with pre-packed donation bags at a minimal cost. If you can’t afford to donate that way you can drop a single can of soup into a donation bin or take it to a food bank. If you can’t afford to give what you have away, you can help out in other ways. This Christmas season many churches, restaurants and service groups will be providing free Christmas dinners for the needy - you can take part as a volunteer preparing and serving food. It doesn’t cost a penny but it will make you feel like a million dollars.

With winter season now upon us go through your closet and dig out those coats and boots that are too small or not worn and donate them to a coat drive. Remember most of those who can’t afford food cannot afford warm clothes either. If more of us were generous in donations of food, money or time, there would be less need in our communities. There are many hands reaching out for help in the world today but let’s help those in our own backyard first and start a chain reaction.   

Instructing ballet at a one room school house

By Sharon Weatherall

When you are out on a road trip travelling a familiar highway – say where you used to live as a child, you tend to get excited or most people do because it brings back memories.

Highway #10 going into Orangeville is an especially touchy run for me since I lived in two houses along the way – a farm house and a bungalow.  On this stretch I also attended two different schools which I also point out while checking mailboxes to see if names still belong to my old neighbours. People travelling in the car with me know them by heart – yah, yah they say not understanding my nostalgic drive past memory lane

Among those most vivid childhood memories would be me standing perched on one leg in the basement of the old one room school house I attended, with the other leg extended far behind me and bent upwards at an agonizing angle. In my hand would be a pointer stick and in front of me trying graciously to strike the same pose, were a dozen kids of various ages – fellow school mates. On that day it had been raining outside so we opted to play in the basement as opposed to reading at our desks upstairs. Our desks were wooden with flip-up seats fastened to the front of the desk top and wrought iron frame work attaching both to the floor. There was a hole in the top for a bottle of ink and names and words from decades scratched into the wood. Depending on how big you were two people could fit on one seat bench.

Anyway – back to the dance story. Who died and made me ballet instructor for the day I’ll never know, but since there were plenty of difficult poses in our outdated Encyclopaedia Britannica I thought I would take on the lead role. I had plenty of male and female followers wanting to learn to dance. I was the sort of kid that came up with ideas of things to do and other kids just fell in with me. It was a comical sight I am sure with the group of us spinning, squatting, doing pointe and arching back so far some of us fell on the floor.

The basement of the old red brick school was a cool place to be and filled with dusty treasures. There were old broken desks, tools, baseball equipment, old maps, shelves of old books and boxes filled with papers, ink bottles and chalkboard supplies. Some of the stuff could have been there from when the school was built one hundred years before. There was an old furnace too, put in no doubt in more modern times since schools were once heated by wood fire and water was hand pumped from the well outside.

Upstairs there were two entrances at the front of the building marked ‘Boys’ on one side and ‘Girls’ on the other. There were one-toilet washrooms (that hardly ever flushed) on the same side as each, just inside the foyer before you stepped into the classroom area. In the foyer everyone had a hook and shelf to hang their coat and set their lunch pail. To me and my brother Doug, it was like another world. We had just moved to rural Orangeville from Brampton where we attended a large public school with hundreds of kids and every grade had its own classroom.

At the old rural school I was in awe of my teacher Ms. McCue, who taught eight grades in one classroom and walked with a hobble since she had one leg that was shorter than the other – or at least that’s what I was told by the other kids. She was a really nice lady and handled her responsibility with patience and kindness. Ms. McCue started each day with the Lord’s Prayer, God Save the Queen and the National Anthem. Then she gave lessons starting with grade ones and two’s in the first row and following along to grade eights in the last row.  In some grades there might only be one kid and in other grades four or five. I think there were only about two dozen of us total and many of those belonged to one farm family with siblings in nearly every grade.

 

I was in grade two with one other kid named Paul while Doug was in grade six with some other boys and a girl. Paul had two sisters in grade three because one had failed. He had brothers in Doug’s grade too. The farm kids were great and welcomed us with open arms. It was like we were some sort of gift or something.  They used to argue over who was going to play with us and then we’d all play together. Thinking back I guess we were something of a rarity after having the same kids at school for years with no different faces. They were hungry to know all about us.

The curriculum was the same as in other schools - geared to grade, and once a week a minister would drop by to teach us religious education. It was rare that Ms. McCue would sit at her desk because teaching eight grades kept her hopping - literally. When she wasn’t teaching or writing on the board she was helping kids who needed one-on-one. I remember this kid who sat at the back of the class – his name was Kenneth and he was as big as a man and needed a ‘special’ desk to fit him. I felt sorry for the big boy because he was a foster kid they said - with two foster sisters that attended the school with him - Pauline and Elizabeth.

Elizabeth was in grade one, a first nation girl and a real handful. She gave Ms. McCue a run for her money but you could tell the old lady loved her spunk. It was sad when we had to give a moment of silence one Monday after Ms. McCue announced that Elizabeth had drowned in a local lake on the weekend.

Pauline on the other hand was in grade seven and she was a handful too especially around the opposite sex. Ms. McCue had to keep reprimanding her because of a nasty little habit of lifting her top up in front of the boys. In the foyer, in the washroom, behind the school, in the trees - you name it and out would pop Pauline’s boobs. It was my first time seeing any so I was looking as much as the boys and so were the other girls.  

Poor Kenneth never had a smile on his face. I think they lived on a sheep farm and must have worked hard before and after school. Ms. McCue helped Kenneth a lot. I later wondered what kind of background those unfortunate kids had come from but at the time you don’t stop to think that something may be happening to them at home to impact their personalities and everyday life – you just thought ‘they are weird’.

Playing outside for recess was cool at the old one room school house. We had a ball diamond and mostly everyone took part during season. The great thing about attending a school where all grades were in the same room was that all grades played together in the playground. There were no clicks or segregated groups, because you needed everyone in the school to make a team – big and small everyone was important. We had wooden swings to play on and I remember the big kids pushing the little ones. In the winter we all made snow forts together, had snowball fights and made snow angels.

Winters were different back then – more severe and with lots more snow. Doug and I walked to school along an eight foot ledge created by the snowplows along the highway. When we looked down you could see the tops of the cars and trucks whizzing by. Good thing we didn’t fall onto the road.

I remember at the end of one school year we went on a bus trip to Toronto to visit some military ship – it was pouring rain and everyone got soaked to the skin. It was a long trip there and long trip back for a grade two student. I can only imagine what it was like for the teacher with a busload of country bumpkins that got their thrills going to town on a Saturday never mind spending a day in the city. She was brave to take us. We survived that trip but I don’t seem to recall us going too far for a school trip the next year.   

I think my brother and I attended that one room school for about two years and it ended badly with the school closing down – in fact I heard it was one of the last one room schools in the province to close. The nightmare began around Christmas time one year when a few of the kids started turning yellow. Within a few days over three quarters of the kids had been diagnosed with Hepatitis from the well water and I was one of them. Sick at home I was quarantined to my bedroom with skin more yellow than a Chinese girl – even my eyeballs were glowing. Health authorities stepped in and closed the doors then after the holiday we students were bussed to a brand new school near Camilla on Highway #10.

Sadly, something had changed forever, especially for the farm kids who attended that small school all of their lives. For Doug and I, the change wasn’t so drastic because we had come from the urban public school system. For the country kids we had come to know it was a whole different ballgame – new teachers, new environment, new rules and brand new institution.

Initially after getting off the bus we filed through big doors with hundreds of other kids. At first we tried to find each other during recesses but soon our little group split apart, made new friends and took different paths. It wasn’t cool for big kids to hang with little ones anymore. It was good in one way and gave everyone more opportunities for sure. But it was also sad to no longer to have that closeness at school.

A year or so later Doug and I moved further north and the next school I went to was an older one too. It was typical of the three story brick schools with stairwells, hardwood floors/trim and rows upon rows of windows but was a far cry from the little one room building and so much bigger.

I will always be thankful I had the chance to attend a one room school during my childhood because many from my era did not have the same opportunity.  I got to experience a different way of learning and feel a close camaraderie amongst classmates while going there. The school setting was much like a family really, where kids of all ages were friends and looked out for each other. The learning experience in a one room school was something to be recognized since we learned so much from each other. If you were done a lesson quickly you could listen to lessons being taught to other students and pick up on it quite easily.

I got to witness the old style of teaching where one person taught eight grades all by themself in one room - unheard of today! One teacher held control over an entire school with basically just the tone of her voice. She was involved in each and every student’s welfare – sometimes both school and family issues.

Ms. McCue was a teacher, a coach, an art instructor, a shoulder to cry on and many other things – even the person who dealt out punishment when it was deserved. She shook the bell on her desk to start the school day and when it was over and then stood at the door to see you out. Ms. McCue deserved a medal – all teachers of one room school houses did and our parents will attest to that.

Teaching has changed over the years and so has everything about school. And while teachers and institutions of today serve their purpose in a difficult time, there’s something positive to be said about the phrase “old school” and everyone who ever attended one can certainly appreciate that.    

‘Y’ me

By Sharon Weatherall

Once in a while everyone looks in the mirror and decides they need to get more physically fit. Some do nothing while others walk, run, or even decide to join a club and that’s what I did. Let me tell you about my first day.

Walking at a speed of 4.0 knots and working up a sweat I am feeling good and asking myself "why didn’t I do this sooner". I had joined a YMCA, paid my membership, dug out my summer t- shirts and yoga pants and packed up my bag. I had a mission and it was falling into place …Mmmm Hmmm.

A ‘plink’ and flash of silver woke me from my daydream and of course, changed everything - typically ‘Y’ would this night be any different?

The plink sound was my locker key falling off my shoelace and into the bottom of the tred mill I was on – I think. I still didn’t know for sure when I left a half hour later after all the on my knees digging, arm wrenching, car horn blaring and lights flashing. Oh, I was sweating all right…the Y will do that to you.

So right then I decided how much I hated that stupid key and myself for fastening it to my shoelace.

When I had come the day before to register they told me to get a lock and key and showed me what kind. I had stopped at the Superstore to pick one up on my way to the Y - it was a double pack - with four keys. I opened it before I came in and took out one lock and one key and put the rest back in the bag – or at least I thought I did – but maybe they were in my purse which was in the locker at the Y that was locked and the key was under the tred mill – the second one from the end. 

No one actually saw it happen but me and I could have walked away quietly – walked six miles home and come back later with another set of car keys  - because my set was in my purse locked in my locker …at the Y. But it was cold outside and I didn’t have a coat – it was in the locker too.   

So at the time the key dropped I just looked down and saw I still had time left to tred and time to contemplate how a person would handle the situation. As I thought about it, the place was filling up fast. When a staff walked by I called out meekly “excuse me” but he didn’t respond and kept walking. When my time was done on the tred mill I cleaned my machine and non-chalantly got on my hands and knees to look under it but didn’t see anything. So I carried on to the bikes and started pedalling – wondering what to do next?

Another staff passed and heard me this time when I yelled “excuse me” a little louder. After listening to my plight he asked me not to go anywhere until he checked it out. Like I could! I keep pedaling trying not to watch as the man crawled around the machine trying to see underneath. He went away and I heard a name paged on the intercom - then two guys come back and start crawling around. When I am done pedaling I join them. One guy goes for a broom but that doesn’t work. The lady now using the tred mill starts to get nervous and asks if we want her to leave?

Now the men want to know if the key was important? Dah! I begin rhyming off all the things that are locked in my locker with the new lock that only the key under the tred mill will open. They tell me the key may have went inside instead the track and in that case they can’t get it. But they have pliers and say they could try to cut the lock off my locker.

I opt for that and we go downstairs to spare myself anymore embarrassment (or so I think). Outside the change room, a guy walks up with a huge pair of pliers and gives them to a girl since he can’t go in with a room full of women. The girl who has never used pliers before does not know how to work them. The lock I bought is extra strong and would take Superman to snip it off or three women who all try to manoeuvre the long armed wrench but cannot even make a dent in the steel.

“What can we do” asked one lady with the pliers in her hand and sore muscles from trying to snip the lock? As a last resort I say I could try to break into my Jeep to see if the package with the other lock and three keys were in it – but I didn’t have a coat. Even though I was sweating and frazzled, a kind lady lent me hers. I ran outside throwing my arms in the air as I passed the male staff member who was wondering if we got the lock cut off? No woman (even three of us) would admit they weren’t strong enough to do it and needed a man to do the job.

“Gonna try getting into my car,” I said, hurrying passed.

By some miracle I was able to get in and sure enough the lock package and keys were still in the store bag on the seat. I grabbed them and ran back in the Y – while behind me the lights of my Jeep are flashing on and off and the alarm is blaring. I curse under my breathe thinking that while everything else was breaking down on that old Jeep the freaking alarm would likely last to its wrecking lot days.

Panting I ran in and gave the lady her coat back, went to the dressing room, opened the locker and grabbed my stuff. Outside my Jeep still blaring and flashing has gathered a small crowd. Red-faced and frazzled I dug the keys out of my purse, unlocked the door and started the engine. I sat totally still wondering if it had all really happened and if I would ever come back.

That was my first day at the Y – how was yours?

The Séance

By Sharon Weatherall

It was mid-August – summer holidays and were sitting around Jan’s kitchen table with our hands linked and a candle flickering in the centre. Outside it had started raining as a storm moved in - the sky was black as pitch and it was only early afternoon.

We had come to Jan's house to hang out because her grandmother was working and we wanted to play with the Ouija board after spending the past week talking about ghosts and spirits. We found out quite by accident that Jan's house actually had a one. Her grandmother had bought the house as an estate sale - the former owner having died, had been found near the steps several days later. We thought we might like to hold a séance to contact the old man and see if we could "raise the dead" so to speak. Shockingly that rainy afternoon, we came very close to doing so.

For some reason and at some point, most kids become totally obsessed with the paranormal. They want to read or hear ghost stories, hang out in graveyards, try out Ouija boards and call up the dead to get scared skinny. Usually one kid in the group being a little more knowledgeable about the subject instigates interest in it. In this story, that kid would be me.

For as long as I can remember I had an interest in the paranormal and still do. I have dreams and experience ghostly presences in some old houses. There will be like a smell to me when I walk in and then usually I get a chill up my spine. I swore there was a ghost in the old house we lived in on Sunnidale Street and hated going up the steps to my room at night for fear of passing its ghostly presence on the stairs.

On that stormy afternoon three of us had been calling up the old man's spirit through the Ouija board and asking if he was present in the house? We asked the typical questions - “what is you’re your name” and “how did you die”, as if we didn’t know. In response of course, the little three legged table with our fingers pressing softly, slid slowly across the board spelling out answers to the questions we asked. It was a good prelude to our séance - our nerves were tingling and we were spooked at any noise. We decided we needed to call up the old man because we felt sure he was still in the house. So we had lit a candle, closed our eyes, joined hands and began inviting the spirit to come forth. Poor old guy wouldn’t know what hit him!

Outside the storm got worse with thunder booming and lightening cracking through the sky. The wind was blowing so hard that tree limbs knocked against the house. Inside a storm was brewing too and the old man who’d died in the house was letting us know he was not happy to be called away from his peaceful sleep.

Suddenly cupboard doors in the laundry room began slamming open and shut and the budgies in the living room started going crazy in their cage - fluttering and squawking with no escape. The three of us joined in séance gave up our connection and let go of hands jumping up from the table and cowering against the kitchen wall. It was surreal - the noises from outside and within.

We whimpered and cried and clung together in a corner of the room, one of us braving to grab a broom and another trying to open the window to yell for help. That was me and to this day I can tell you that window would not budge an inch to open. It was stuck hard and fast. We dropped together to the floor and clung to each other until the storm passed, listening to the squawking birds and strange noises coming from inside the house. We closed our eyes and ironically prayed "please God....help us, please protect us from evil spirits!"

Finally the storm outside subsided and the rain stopped. I stood up and tried the window which opened easily, then started yelling "help" to anyone that might hear. Inside things had quieted down as well as we calmed down slowly and worked up the courage to go into the living room to survey the damages. The birds were alive but there were feathers everywhere under the cage. Cushions from the couch were strewn about on the floor and the bedroom doors were shut. We opened them but all was in place – apparently the havoc had not reached that far.

We decided to make a dash for the back door and ran outside, jumping down the back steps under-which the old man was said to have been found. Free from our invisible chain of fear, we ran down to the park laughing hysterically and verbally summarizing what had just happened. Had it happened for real? Yes – we all agreed.

Along the way we ran into some boys and tried to tell them the story of our near escape and possession, but of course they didn't believe us. They called us liars and pooh-hoohed at the silly report. It was pretty unbelievable I guess if you weren’t there and part of it. Sandy, the third girl in our group was spooked and decided she was going to go home - it had all been a bit too much for her. In truth she did not hang out with Jan and I that much and did so even less in future. In fact in years to come when I approached her about that day, she said she didn't remember it the same way at all. We all had our own version of that séance I suppose.

As for Jan and I, we didn't let it stop us from ghost hunting that summer - we just didn't do it at her place again. In fact the next stop was the cemetery where along with some other kids we laid down in front of gravestones pretending we were dead when airplanes flew over.

The story about that rainy afternoon is one I have told over and over again when the subject of paranormal comes up. Every kid likely has a scary story to tell, but I wonder if it happened in broad daylight during the worst storm of the summer?

 

    

Living beside 'Lucretia McEvil'

By Sharon Weatherall

Growing up everyone has someone in their neighbourhood they never forget - for good or bad reasons.

Mine was the girl next door and for the sake of confidentiality (and because it fits so well) we'll just call her Lucretia 'McEvil'. That girl tormented me something terrible. Today it would be called bullying and it was no doubt because I was a skinny, fuzzy haired kid usually with some kind of sore on my face that I had picked into a big, red crater. I think I was in grade one when we finally relocated, but Lucretia left her mark on me during the first six years of my life.

Anyway it's a good thing we moved or else I may have turned out to be a child murderer or something– by that time I had already hit her over the head with a garden spade once and wouldn't have thought twice about doing it again if the situation arose.
 
Lucretia was one year older than me and an aggressive sort of kid that liked to push rules and people’s buttons to the max. She was one of three children, the middle one between two boys. She was doted on by her dad - a roly-poly guy that had a hard time getting in and out of his car, and her skinny little mom who thought everything Lucretia did was 'cute'.

I should mention that it was a fairly new neighbourhood with quite a few quaint older couples and not a huge number of kids  - all of which were different ages so you didn't get anyone close to hang out with.

Across the road to the left was 'Wanda' who was two years older than Lucretia and to the right was 'Little Lisa', who was a year younger than me and still too young to play with us for the most part. I can't remember exactly when Wanda moved into the neighbourhood but she pretty much took over Lucretia's spare time on weekends. During the school year their time together was hit and miss as Wanda had classmates she hung with and during those times Lucretia was often excluded  - I am sure once her friends met the feisty neighbourhood chum they wanted nothing to do with her.

So, while she actually preferred to hang with Wanda, sometimes Lucretia still got stuck with me. When that happened she would be in a vindictive mood and our play sessions ended in ghastly fights with me bawling and her snickering behind her hand. Even when she was in a decent mood Lucretia was the type of the kid that would pick boogers out of her nose and wipe them on you just to make you gag – a habit she got from her brothers no doubt, say nasty things to older neighbours and ring people’s doorbells then run away leaving me standing there. Lucretia did all kinds of little tricks that ended in my butt getting tanned while she was rarely sent to her room. For the most part my mom forbade me to play with her.

One day when I sitting in my sandbox in the backyard minding my own business, Lucretia called over the fence to see what I was doing? She invited me to come and play at her place - something that hardly ever happened after the best friend thing with Wanda commenced. But I agreed to go and off we went in through the back door and up the steps to her bedroom.

Her mom was in the kitchen smoking and having coffee with Lisa’s mom, because back then that's what moms did all day while dads were out working. My mom would join them sometimes when they were sitting outside but because she didn't smoke she usually steered clear of the indoor coffee sessions. Anyway they hardly noticed us walking by because Lecretia's mom was busy winding her long auburn hair into pin curls all over her head. She went around like that all the time - pin curls with a scarf wrapped around them and tied like Aunt Jemima at the front. Any other day I would have stopped to watch her, mesmerized by the way her nimble fingers wrapped up a foot long tress and nipped a bobby pin over it.  

On this occasion as I followed Lucretia I realized she was just being way to nice. When she shut the bedroom door behind us I started getting a bad feeling in my stomach and wondered if I should have stayed at home? We sat on the bed and right away she started telling me about a fight she had with Wanda. While I felt kind of important that she was confiding in me, I nervous at the same time. Her main focus was to try and get me to agree with the bad things she was saying about Wanda, but all the while she was glancing toward the closet door. I soon knew why - someone was in there laughing.

I jumped off the bed and ran over to open the closet, but Lucretia quickly pushed me away. We struggled and the door flew open spilling out a red faced laughing Wanda. The two of them grabbed hold of me and put me in the closet throwing themselves against the door to keep me in there. I was as humiliated as a five and half year old could be. She had tricked me again! They weren't fighting at all - the little witches had planned the whole thing. 

I was so upset. I just wanted to get out of there so I started crying, yelling and kicking the door. I finally escaped and squirmed free but Lucretia McEvil had already spread eagled herself in front of the bedroom door so I couldn’t possibly get it open. I started hollering at the top of my lungs. Wanda had her hand over my mouth and was trying to shush me when Lucretia's mom burst in to see what all the commotion was about. Of course Lucretia went flying and that took the focus off what was really going on. Her mom turned on me, saying I couldn't play without fighting. She would not listen to my side and called me a baby, sending me home and telling me to stay there. I left crying and got little sympathy from my own mom when I tried to tell her the same story. She said it was my own fault for going there in the first place. It seemed no one even cared about what those two conniving girls had just done to me.

On the day I hit her in the head with the garden trowel, Lucretia had relentlessly antagonized me for an hour or more. It was a hot summer day and I was sitting beside our driveway which was located between our two houses extending from the street up to the back yard fence. There were narrow strips of grass bordering the driveway and it was shady. Minding my own business on my own side, I was picking 'pretty' stones out of our newly delivered gravel and setting them in little piles – crystalized quartz was commonly used when you could not afford asphalt.

In my eyes, these were precious gems worthy of collection. With a pail and small garden spade I was sorting vigorously when along comes Lucretia to sit herself down in the grass on her side. She begins to pick stones off the very edge of the driveway telling me they are hers, then running her fingers through the stones further in and sifting out the pretties to set in her lap. I am mortified and tell her that she should not be touching the stones that belonged to our family and not hers. She smiles smugly and we start arguing about property boundaries.

Lucretia says the stones are on her property now so they are no longer mine. I am seeing red, but get even more very upset when Lucretia throws one at me. I pick up the little trowel, cross the driveway and hit her smartly on the head before she even realizes what happened. She grabs her head and begins to scream bloody murder when she sees some blood on her hand from the place where the trowel had bonked her. You’d have thought someone cut her whole head off but still, when I see the blood my stomach does a flip-flop and I know I am in big trouble. Softening my voice, I try to coax her into stop crying by telling her she can now play with my stones.

But it’s too late. Lucretia's mom comes barrelling around the corner to see what has happened. At the sight of blood on her daughter’s hand, she starts screaming and yelling. She grabs my arm and begins shaking me so hard the spade falls from my hand to the ground. Then we hear my mom’s voice above me coming from the bathroom window and Lucretia’s mom yells  - "do you see what your daughter has done?"

My mother yells out the window for her to unhand me and start looking after her own little troublemaker. The two women holler back and forth at each other for several minutes while Lucretia continues to scream loudly alerting the entire neighbourhood that a catastrophe has happened. My mom says she has been standing at the window for the last half hour listening to what was going on and Lucretia "deserved what she got". I stopped crying and turned around in surprise. My mom was really defending me. Lucretia’s mom yanks up her howling daughter and goes off in a huff  - she didn't speak to my mom for some time after that.

In the house I got told it was wrong to hit Lucretia but my mom also sympathized with me for what had happened because in her opinion “that bratty kid deserved what she got this time”. But I was harshly advised to walk away next time which I knew was easier said than done.

Lucretia lived through the ordeal and didn't even need stitches. It actually turned out to be a very superficial cut – maybe she just had a soft head. Even though the moms weren’t speaking, it wasn’t long before she was back knocking at my door again with a new plan of action. This time my mom blamed me just as much for what we did even though I tried to tell her it wasn't my idea to run back in forth past the Portuguese neighbour’s house yelling gibberish, and bent over twisting our hands over our butts pretending there was poop coming out. No, I would have to say that didn’t go over well at all...... Neither did the time we went exploring in a new development behind our houses and one of us went to the bathroom in the bathtub and pushed it down the drain with an envelope of screw nails. The construction crew went door to door telling parents what some kids had done and they were not too happy. Unfortunately my mom had seen us climbing the fence earlier that week and yelled at us to stay away from the construction area. Too late the damage had already been done – when you gotta go, you gotta go.

Life next door to Lucretia was always like that – one bad idea after another and never a dull moment.

I ran into Lucretia many years later at an arena where our sons were playing in a hockey tournament against each other but she had no time to visit she was so busy screaming at her kid to get a goal or beat down the other players. Everyone in the arena was looking at her and I am sure the coaches weren't impressed. I was not surprised to see she hadn't changed a bit – she even looked the same!

Somehow her screeching voice brought back a flood of memories that made me hunch my shoulders, twist my head and back away saying “ya, well….see you later” but she didn’t even notice. It was like taking a step back in time. I scanned the crowd of course, to see if Wanda was anywhere around and realized Lucretia was on her own this time. I would have loved to be a fly on the wall during the years those two girls were playing together and wondered what kind of memories Wanda had? Maybe she was smart and moved out of town too.

The Grass fire on Sunnidale Street

By Sharon Weatherall

The marshmallows were cooking nicely as we stood by our small fire pit constructed of red bricks and old refrigerator racks. It was the last day of our weekend camping experience and we were just making up from an argument - one of several we had during the weekend. This was par for my cousin Kathy and me as we couldn’t usually get along for more than a couple hours at a time.

On this windy day in late August we had debated about not having a fire then decided to have one anyway to use up our marshmallows. We were on our own as the family had gone away for a short while. We looked at each other and laughed as we pulled the burnt brown puffs off of sticks and popped them into our mouths.

At some point we realized there was more smoke floating around than seemed possible from the tiny pit we were standing in front of. Turning around we screamed in panic seeing the entire yard behind us ablaze with a fire that was spreading quickly towards the house and a mobile home that was parked at the edge of the property. You had to drive up a dusty, dirt laneway to get to the house and the whole yard was surrounded by the long, dry grass of a farmer's field.

Earlier in the week Kathy and I had come up with a plan to make a playhouse in the abandoned brick henhouse behind the house. I lived in the mobile home with four siblings and my parents on the property, which belonged to my grandparents. The big farmhouse was split in two with my grandparents living in the larger back half and my aunt, uncle and their two kids renting the front of the house.

We had come to live there in the trailer earlier that spring after selling our house in Orangeville – dad wanted to start a paving business in the area. Once it was up and running he planned to buy a house for us but still wasn’t sure where he wanted to live.

Later that fall my dad and gramps must have had a falling out because we moved the mobile to Cedar Grove - a trailer park in Wasaga Beach. Then eventually we moved back into the back half of the old farm house after my grandparents purchased a smaller house in town.

Anyway, after coming up with the playhouse brainwave ten year old Kathy and I spent a whole week lugging old furniture to my place from her place on Warrington Road - a good 30 minute walk, including a small dresser, cupboard shelving for food, coffee table and other necessities we thought we might need. We even had electricity with my dad's new extension cord to turn on our lamps and an old toaster we were using for our bread.

The henhouse was a fair size of maybe 10’ x10’ with two beds made of old wire springs and red brick legs. We had no mattresses for the beds and so sleeping was pretty uncomfortable and we ended up both nights in on the kitchen floor of the trailer. In truth the hard beds were not the only thing we were trying to escape. There were scary noises we kept hearing outside and one of the nights there was a thunder storm, so of course we didn’t want the building to get struck by lightning.

During the day time Kathy and I passed the time playing house, eating our stash of candy and food or playing cards etc. when we weren't arguing. If the fights got bad enough she or I would threaten to go home and end up over visiting Gramma’s or my aunt next door.  Our uncle made a point to tell us not to light any fires out there because the grass was too dry – I think he was a volunteer fire fighter at the time but we decided after leaving that he should mind his own bees wax.

We were very protective of the playhouse too and would not let the other kids in which caused a lot of crying and trouble from my mom. She threatened to make us rip it down if we didn't share. She was also making me come home on Saturday morning to do my chores which took away from playhouse time. Kathy offered to help me with the dusting and cleaning so we could get back out quicker. Mom, who considered Kathy to be “too verbal for her own good” did not allow her to help me so she went to Gramma’s to wait. Kathy, who didn't really like being told what to do usually, voiced her opinion loudly which caused more trouble because my mom had ears in the back of her head.

While it was cool having the playhouse by Sunday Kathy and I were getting tired of the game and of each other. We had already promised to clean up our mess when we were done and keep the area looking good. The two of us had decided to lock everything inside and made plans to camp again the next weekend. We just had to get rid of the food so it didn't attract coons and mice.

With my family away and our grandparents gone somewhere too there was only my uncle left on the property. He was sitting at the front side of the house drinking beers with a friend. Since they were out of sight and earshot before breaking it up for the weekend, we decided to roast some marshmallows and set about getting a small fire going in our little brick fire pit. This took some effort due to the breeze which kept blowing it out but using newspapers and cardboard we finally got a nice little blaze going.

Suddenly, there was a lot of smoke coming from behind us. Turning around to see the ‘out-of-control’ blaze Kathy and I freaked out and grabbed each other. ‘What the heck?????” Then we went into action mode trying to get the fire out before anyone saw it. I grabbed a piece of cardboard box and Kathy grabbed a broom and we began beating the fire. It didn’t take us long to figure out where to start  - we ran to trailer and house then began beating it towards to the open lawn. But it was a losing battle - every time we got some out another section would flare up.

Our efforts seemed fruitless with the fire racing towards the long grass along the side of the driveway. If we didn't get it under control it would reach the highway and alert passing cars…then the fire department would be called and everyone would know! Tears and sweat streaming down our faces we beat at the fire winning some areas and loosing others. Finally we decided we had to get our uncle to come and help. Kathy stayed stomping at the fire while I ran around the side of the house and blurted out the crisis to him and his friend. They jumped out of their chairs and followed me to the back of the house. "Holy shit!" my uncle yelled. "What did I tell you girls about lighting fires today?"

Both men went to work- one grabbing a water hose and the other grabbing a sheet of plywood to begin beating the fire. Eventually the whole lawn was covered with black soot - a dead giveaway that there had been a fire, but at least the house and trailer were safe. We then concentrated on the lane way where the blaze was working its way to toward the highway. Finally the combined efforts of the four of us got the fire under control. Kathy and I were exhausted and crying when it was finally out. Our uncle and his friend were surveying the damages shaking their heads at the mess - everything was covered with soot. They chastised us about what could have happened and said Grampa would be “very upset”.

After begging the two men not to tell on us we promised to clean it up and grabbed straw brooms and began sweeping the soot off the grass which actually made a big difference. We worked until we had blisters on our hands sweeping the black away until it looked pretty clean again. Under the charred remains we found bright green new grass. It took us most of the afternoon to get all the soot off the burned areas and we were exhausted but still running on adrenaline.

My uncle and his friend did not offer to help with the clean-up but after pointing out the damage we had done to my dad's new electrical cord found their way back to the front of the house again and continued their visit – no doubt laughing to think we could clean up the mess. Oh what a story it would be to tell their friends.

Kathy and I used black electrical tape to cover the burnt extension cord and then we started taking apart the playhouse and loading up the wagons to pull the furniture back to her place. I knew it would be the first thing my mom would demand when she found out and wasn’t going to wait to be told. I was in big trouble and knew it. I figured I would be grounded for weeks and not allowed to play with Kathy for even longer.

When Gramma and Grampa pulled in we were still busy dismantling the playhouse. Grampa asked why we were taking it down and we told him we were done playing there for now. He said it seemed like a lot of work for just one weekend – boy did he have that right! Then, walking along the perimeter of the property hands behind his back, Grampa then headed down the laneway past where the fire had stopped near the long grass and we followed. "You know," he said to Gramma, “I think we need to get the boys out here to burn this grass.....it's getting pretty long!"

Kathy and I nearly dropped on the spot. Had he been talking to our uncle? He and his buddy were still at the front of his house and hadn't come round yet. Maybe Grampa knew but he never, ever mentioned the August grass fire to us. As for my dad, that was a different story – our uncle wasn’t long telling him. The first thing dad did was check out his electrical cord and when he couldn’t find the burn damage, he came and asked me where it was. I told him I had taped it up and all he said was he guessed it was time to clean up the playhouse for this year. Kathy and I said we were already in the process of doing that.

That was one of the more exciting but dangerous antics Kathy and I were involved in over the years but it sure wasn't the only one - we got into quite a few messes back then but we laugh about them now.