(2)chapter 3 - Keith's Biography

Chapter Three: Junior High

I had a lot of great holidays with my family. My dad had his weeks off from work and we all piled into the station wagon. We slept together in a canvas 9x9 tent with a pole in the middle. We were just recently in Canada when we took a trip to Jasper. I remember petting a large black dog who had his head in a garbage can. He gave me a quick look over and went right back to his business. My mother was horrified and told me that I had been petting a bear.

 

 

On my uncle’s farm.

 

 

 

We spent many summers at Lakeview, on the Tofield highway. It was close enough to the city that my dad could drive back and forth to work. When I was eleven, I carried an air mattress to the beach, laid it in the shallow water, and fell fast asleep. My brother and sister were playing in the sand, and my older sister was tanning on a towel. There was a light breeze and when I woke, I saw that I was some distance from shore. When I jumped in to walk back, the water was well over my head. I could not swim and luckily was able to clamber back onto the air mattress. The fellow who ran the Lakeview Pavilion was asleep on his bed when his wife woke him and said there was some kid on an air mattress ‘way out on the water. He paddled out in his boat and brought me back. He was so angry that he took a knife to my air mattress. My parents had such a scare that they enrolled me in swimming classes at Borden Park.

 

 

  Another summer we were camping at Aspen Beach on Gull Lake. It rained hard for days and we were stuck in the tent with our parents. Because of the very tight quarters we soon got on each others’ nerves. Arguing and fighting broke out, and we all wanted to go home. My mother refused, because then she would have to get back to housework. This was her holiday too! Our black Labrador dog, Blackie, had puppies underneath the station wagon. In the early sixties we often went to Wabamun Lake Provincial Park. There we learned to ski behind dad’s fourteen-foot aluminum boat with a twenty-five-horse motor. One afternoon I walked five miles along Highway 16 to meet my dad coming back from work. My dad was an avid fisherman, and we ate pike at least once a week. Even in the winter he would put his boat into the water at the Wabamun coal-fired hydro plant’s outlet stream. There sure were a lot of bones to pick out of the fried pike! My parents were strong in the Christian Reformed Church. I was baptised in Holland when I was just a week old. We always went to church twice a day. In Canada we were members of the Maranatha Christian Reformed Church. The morning service was in English at ten, followed by the same service in Dutch at eleven. We went to Sunday School during the eleven o’clock service. There was another service at seven, so we never got to watch all of The Wonderful World of Disney. We had to wear our best clothes for both services and stayed dressed up all day. We could read books or play board games with the family. After supper on Mondays, we went to Catechism Class. We studied the Heidelberg Catechism. These classes continued until we were seventeen or eighteen. At that time, we were considered old enough to understand what a commitment to God involved. We were among a group of late teens who stood in front of the congregation and publicly professed their faith. Afterwards we were welcomed into membership, could vote, and partake of Holy Communion. Every Wednesday evening, I would attend the Calvinist Cadet Corps in our church basement. Each meeting started with singing our Corps signature song. To this day I remember the melody and all of the words. During the meetings we would earn badges, learn knots and braiding, and do other crafts. Every summer we would have a Cadet Corps campout. I was never much good at team sports. I had the distinction of being one of the last ones picked for playground teams. No team captain actually wanted me on their team, but they had to take me anyhow! In the spring, when it was slushy, we would play marbles. A classmate would throw his marble into the snow and another would try to hit that marble with his marble. A struck marble was captured and went into the victor’s bag. If you missed, the first classmate got a chance at your marble. We all had our favorite marble. It was good for capturing an opponent’s marble, but you surely didn’t want to lose it. One cold winter day I stuck my tongue to the metal fence post. Which kid hasn’t been amazed at how the frost builds up on steel when you blow on it? When you get a good layer of

 

frost built up, it is oh so tempting to lick it off. You never did that a second time! The teacher would have to bring warm water to soak your tongue from the post. We had a skating/ hockey rink at our school. Naturally the snow had to be shoveled off and thrown over the boards. The removed snow would be as high as the boards, five feet. When the snow was packed down, we would tunnel under it. We had long tunnels with larger “rooms” built under the snow. It was a good place to hide during recess. I will admit that I was not the best-behaved child in the classroom. Back in the day, teachers could slap the misbehaving child’s hand with a leather strap or a wooden ruler. I got the strap rather often. The teacher would prefer you to cry out in pain. I was not very smart and had a habit of grinning in the teacher’s face. This was generally rewarded with a few extra whacks. As the Dutch community was close knit, the teacher knew your parents, and I would get it again when I got home.

 

 

 

  During junior high I delivered the Edmonton Journal after school. I would collect my papers from the “rag shack” on 50th Street and 118th Avenue. I would stuff my sixty-odd papers into my route bag, sling the bag over my shoulders, and place each paper by my customer’s front door. Just about every household got a paper, so they took me about and hour to deliver. I would collect the thirty-five cents on Wednesdays and Thursdays. I could then keep a dime for each paper. It was very difficult collecting from some homes. If a customer got in arrears, I would turn the account over to my supervisor. I would babysit on the weekends whenever I got a chance. For that I got twenty-five cents per hour or fifty cents if I did some painting. At home we helped with the dishes and my mother taught me how to bake and cook. One summer our family worked on a honey farm near St. Albert for two weeks. I got a lot of bee stings at first but after a while they left me alone. Northeast Edmonton was a rough place to live. There was a group of three bullies that lived a few blocks from us. They would taunt me as I passed by on the way home. They would push me off my bike and beat me up. I learned to fight back and if I caught one of them alone, I would get even. Then the next day the three would come looking for me. If I came home all roughed up and dirty, I would be punished by my parents. I would be chased and beaten with a wooden spoon. I felt picked on and discriminated against. I became resentful and carried a lot of anger. This anger caused me a lot of grief in latter years. I handled conflict poorly and easily lost my temper. I have struggled with this all my life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I made friends with a few boys on our street. The “sticks” (treed area where the roads ended) were just down the block. We would build tree huts, make swords from branches, and have fake wars. The CNR tracks were two blocks north of our house. I would play by myself with stones and make roads and towns. I liked being by myself, in my own little world. I could stay out of trouble and not be punished. We lived right by the Newton School and would play baseball on the playground. I was never very good and occasionally we would be struck by a ball or bat and run home in tears. On Sunday afternoons we would play board games with our family. During my junior high years, I would go on long bike rides on Saturdays. I would leave after breakfast and return in time for supper. It was a good way to escape from home and avoid conflict.