My mind have been drawn to the vulnerability of our age group just recently.  When I was first introduced to the Wingham Reunion site I was quite shocked to see how many old friends and colleagues were deceased.  I have already mentioned Bob Angus as he was part of our later close group and we spent many days together towards the end of my time in Canada.  I already published a eulogy to Bob mentioning some of the antics we got up to.

 I also remember Pete Carmichael very well.  We used to go around together for some time at around grade 6 and 7.  Indeed he was the one who introduced ,me to hockey We had some great times together for a year or so.

 I also remember Walt quite well , although he wasn’t part of our immediate group we were well acquainted in the Scouts and you will see him in our Scout picture in the marching group.  I found the story of his last days very sad.

 I already wrote about the early demise of Elvis and Ricky Nelson and how influential the Everly Brothers were on the music scene.  And now, only in the last few days, we have the announcement of Phil Everly’s death.  You would have always expected Don to go first as he was the oldest.  During the split amongst the brothers it was always written that Don was the main reason for the split.  To this day I don’t really know what the split was all about.  I watched for many years as Cliff Richard - the Peter Pan of English music - tried to bring them back together - quite successfully as it happened.  They had a number of reunions at the Albert Hall which Cliff sponsored.  When you look at Cliff Richard himself at around 74 he looks like a 50 year old.  I don’t know what his secret is, but the money didn’t do any harm. Apparently Phil had smoked virtually all his life and eventually died of a lung disorder.   I remember as a 12 year old kid in Wingham trying my first fags just behind the bowling alley.  Stupid really and it is always disturbing to see young kids experimenting in exactly the same way.  I stopped smoking about 30 years ago and was very glad that I did.  I had no problem stopping as I realised that I was doing myself a lot of harm.  At one point I was up to 80 a day.  I used to spend a lot of time at Exhibitions.  When you are on the stand you don’t have much to do except have a fag.

 During recent years as my Mum was dying I developed heart disease.  Probably preventable to a certain extent and I have to say that the medication I received was suspect in the extreme.  Had I been given effective and considered medication I might be in better shape today.  Unfortunately my Mum was greatly responsible for my recent condition due to her dementia and her unceasing demands of me as a carer.   She had a particular habit of making a lot of fuss in the middle of the night by deliberately making out she had fallen out of bed or fallen over.  It certainly strained the old ticker and one of my heart attack’s was during one of her tantrums.  Paul kept advising to stick her in a home.  Probably would have been a wise decision but in the UK you have to pay for that privilege and it is hugely expensive.  Exorbitantly so.  We tried to resist it as long as possible and we gave her about 8 months extra life by providing the care.  Unfortunately it probably took  a few years off mine.

 Just these last couple of days we had the announcement that Trigger - of Fools and Horses fame - died at age 69.  When they die younger than you are, it hits you even harder,  It always reminds me of the biblical 3 score and 10. Enjoy the days as much as you can.  ~You never know when the grim reaper will call.

 Crying in the Rain’

Emigrant Experiences
A few more memories have surfaced since the last article I submitted.
During the first few weeks of school in Grade 5, I was caught swinging on the
bars across the stalls in the boys' washroom. Mr. Beattie happened to walk in. There was no staff washroom then. I got a detention and recall almost being in tears. I certainly felt hard done by.  Bob mentions poetry. I recall the poem in the Grade 5 reader which started ....
"There was old, old, old, old, lady
and a boy who was half past three.
And the way they played together
Was beautiful to see"
This was in the early part of that year and my English was still limited.
I think it was about a grandmother and her grandson playing hide and seek
by guessing rather than hiding. I still enjoy poetry.
Walking through piles of Autumn leaves and the smell of the burning leaves
is another memory of that first fall. The grade eights helped Mr. Manuel in
raking of the leaves in the playground.During that winter out in the playground
I put my tongue on the fire escape rail to lap up the frost that was on it and got stuck!  I pulled it off leaving part of top skin of my tongue on the rail--Ouch. Never did I play that trick again!
Miss McLauglin asked my brother Doug and myself to mow her lawn. She paid us .10 cents each and offered us each a glass of milk. She must have felt we were not getting proper food at home going by our lunches! Probably she wasn't far off the mark. With 9 mouths to feed it was more quantity than quality back then.
I introduced Bob McIntyre to brown sugar sandwiches. He used more sugar than we ever did. Does anyone besides me know what potatoes taste like after they have been frozen? My parents didn't believe in throwing them out. It wasn't that we were really poor but their upbringing was such that nothing was thrown out.

That reminds me of the invention of copper wire. It happened when 2 dutchmen fought over a penny!

Sanitation was another story. We must have been the only family in school with privy. For some reason our outhouse had no pit dug under it but it did have 2 holes a luxury unheard of in Holland. My dad rigged it up with two large pails. He was emulating what was done in our region in Friesland (a northern province of Holland) with wooden barrels which were collected  and disposed of eventually to become fertilizer. That was fine in the milder parts of the year but in the cold part of the winter stalacmites formed eventually reaching heights dangerously close to the holes. It made the going quite challenging! There is a lesson here. Be careful when you try to impose foreign culture on Canadian soil. “On the same subject, when I went to ‘relieve myself’ outside church against the nearest tree, as was  normally the way it was done by men and boys when I was growing up, my aunt told me in no uncertain terms that this was not done in Canada!”  It wouldn't be until 1956 when my mother was expecting her 10th child in our own house in Clinton that we finally had indoor plumbing.

Money was scarce back then. In the summer of 1953 my brother Doug and I spent a few weeks thinning turnips for an immigrant farmer at the west end of the B line. The total pay was a sack of white beans. One source of a little spending money  was pop bottles. I think it was 2 cents for a small and 5 cents for a larger bottle. We cashed them in at the Fruit Market across the main street from the former ball park. You could get an ice cream cone for 5 cents. New Immigrants had to wait a year before becoming eligible for family allowance.
continued.............

Dick Roorda

Clinton