My Early Years.

“Family makes you who you are and who you aren't.”

That quote would probably best describe my early years. I was a firstborn baby who arrived here on planet Earth back on the second day of August in the year 1960. I was born to parents who for the most part probably should never have been married. My mother was a stay at home mother and my father worked in the telephone business.

St Mary’s Hospital in the city of Montreal was where I took my first breath. While at St. Mary’s I was given the name Michael mostly because both of my parents liked the name. I was also given the middle name Alexander who was my grandfather on my father’s side. He was given the name Alexander after Alexander Graham Bell, the Canadian who invented the telephone.

How true that is I really don’t know, but it was something I was always told.

Obviously, because I was a baby I don’t remember much about the early 60's and my first few years. The three of us all lived in a small, low-rise apartment building on Grenet Street in the suburb of St Laurent. There was a small airport nearby and I apparently was fascinated by the sound of prop planes.

My mother told me that we were avid campers when I was little and we would often spend weekends going away camping. I don’t recall any of those camping trips, but I have seen the proof. There are numerous black and white photos of me camping back in 1962 and 1963. I find this rather amusing because I abhor camping and have for all of my adult life.

When I was four years old my father was transferred with his job at Northern Electric to St. John’s Newfoundland. From this time on my recollections start to become much more clearer. I also now had a baby brother Patrick who was three years younger than me. We were Anglicans and I can vaguely remember going to church on some Sundays.

I also started prep school at St Thomas Church Anglican School which was located right beside and was part of our church. I wore a uniform to school with a dark forest green blazer that had my school crest embroidered on the chest pocket. At St Thomas I remember having difficulty properly writing the number eight. I would always have to practice writing the number eight properly instead of the little snowman I lazily wrote.

One thing I do remember while living in St John’s was Signal Hill. I have so many vivid memories that are forever etched in my brain from that historic landmark.

I could see Signal Hill from the house we rented on New Cove Road. My father would drive us to the top many times while we lived there. There were big canons, ancient stone walls, the Cabot Tower and I remember seeing massive icebergs just floating out in the distance on the Atlantic Ocean. I remember humpback whales splashing their tales and leaping from the ocean after arriving each spring from their Caribbean breeding grounds. I also recall picking blueberries up on Signal Hill with my parents.

My parents argued a lot and my father was always smoking cigarettes. He was also a beer drinker and Labatt’s 50 was the beer he always drank. We always had cold beer 'stubbies' in our fridge. He also played broomball on a rec team with guys from his work and I remember once he had to wear a shoulder sling after he slipped and fell on the ice. I watched him play with my mother while chewing Juicy Fruit gum sitting in the arena stands.

There were many car trips to the local A&W where the three of us ate foil wrapped burgers with fries washed down with thick frosty glass mugs of root beer. We always ate in the car; our food would be brought out on a tray and placed on my father’s semi rolled down window.

While living in Newfoundland I developed a bad habit of using the word 'fuck' as part of my very limited everyday vocabulary. Fuck this, fuck that, everything was fuck, fuck and more fuck. My mother was furious with me and she threatened many times to wash my mouth out with soap if I didn’t stop.

I didn’t stop and my mother did indeed wash my mouth out with a big bar of Ivory soap. My father was mad at her for doing it and I had a soapy taste in my mouth for a couple days afterward. I am pretty sure I still used the word, but not as often and definitely not within earshot of my mother.

I have memories of an old rundown house on our street. I was told it was haunted and an evil witch was living inside. A neighborhood chum and I would hide out in the tall grass and weeds hoping to see the witch. We did this quite often always with our cap guns in our hands and at the ready, but we never saw anyone ever in the house.

After a year the four of us moved back to Montreal and I have never been back to Newfoundland.

Once we were back in Montreal my parent’s marriage was on the rocks and my mother was looking for some direction. Her sister Marg was living in Bradford Ontario where she had married the village drunk my Uncle Nick a few years earlier. Their marriage could be best described as a train wreck that is until the day Jehovah’s Witnesses knocked on their front door.

Everything changed and my Uncle Nick stopped drinking once they began studying the bible with the Witnesses and their marriage was saved. Marg and Nick’s life had done a complete 360 reversal and now my mother wanted the same for her life and her marriage. It would be soon after our return back to Montreal when Marg arranged a visit by the local Witnesses to my now desperate mother.

A woman named Gail showed up at our house shortly thereafter.

My mother immediately grasped onto the religion like a drowning man grasping a life preserver. My father was actually okay with my mother attending the Kingdom Hall, but he forbid her to have me or my brother involved with any part of her newfound faith.

Eventually when I was five years old my parents split up for good and my mother sought refuge at her own mother’s house back in Toronto. My father’s inability to keep his dick inside his pants was the final straw for my mother and she pulled the plug. I was so young at the time and it would be many years before I would ever see my father again.

Our new home was my grandmother’s house at 178 Byng Avenue in the suburb of Willowdale. It was a small white wooden three bedroom bungalow with a detached single garage. Her house sat on a large half acre lot with a huge treed backyard. Up until that first day when the three of us showed up at her door, I could never recall meeting my grandmother before. I know I had never met my grandfather because he died of a heart attack nine years before I was born.

My grandmother was a sweet old lady who at the time was around the same age that I am today while writing this story. She worked full-time as a cafeteria worker for Beaver Foods at an office tower in downtown Toronto. Every single day rain or shine she would leave at 6 am and walk the mile plus out to Yonge Street where she would then catch a bus down to the Eglinton subway station. From there she would take the subway right to the office building where she worked. After working all day and standing on her feet she repeated her morning commute in reverse.

I will never forget my grandmother’s amazing work ethic.

My mother’s younger brother Richard also lived at the house on Byng Avenue. My Uncle Richard would probably best describe himself as a jack of all trades, but he was a master of none. We hardly ever saw Richard. He worked as a parts guy at various GM auto dealerships in Toronto and I can recall at least four that he worked at. He always had a job and he was home every night for his supper.

There would always be a hot meal waiting for Richard that my grandmother and/or mother had prepared. Every evening Richard would eat his usual meat, potatoes, vegetable and he would wash it all down drinking a quart of skim milk. That was what Richard wanted every night for his supper and I learned pretty early while living there that whatever Richard wanted Richard got. After dinner he always went out with his friends and on weekends he was hardly ever around. I never remember seeing Richard do any chores or help out around the house and on most days he never even made his bed.

I stand corrected, I did see Richard cut the grass and trim the front yard hedge a few times while I was living there.

Even in his adult years, Richard was still being babied by my grandmother. He was the youngest of four kids and he was the only boy. He lost his dad, my grandfather in 1951 while he was still in grade school. He was crushed and my grandmother always felt sorry for him. She would end up spoiling him for his whole life.

Richard would forever be my grandmother’s baby.

Richard made no effort to even get to know me or my brother while we lived at my grandmother’s house. Even at my young age I could sense Richard did not like having the three of us living in the same house with him. He was never mean or abusive, but he also was never kind or caring.

If there was one thing I loved about my new home, it would be Art. Art was a golden retriever that Richard had gotten when he was just a puppy. By the time I arrived at the house Art was a full grown dog.

He was such a wonderful dog.

Even though Art was Richard’s dog, it was my grandmother who looked after and cared for him. Richard could no longer be bothered having a dog, but I absolutely loved having Art in my life. Art became part of our family and I considered him my dog.

Art was and always will be my first dog.

Richard had never bothered to train Art; he was not an obedient dog. Art could never go on neighborhood walks because he was too big and strong and none of us would be able to control him. The only person who would have been able to walk him was Richard and not once did I ever see Richard walk his dog.

Art spent his life mostly in the house. When he went outside he was secured with a long, thick twenty foot rope clasped to his chain collar. During the four years that l lived with my grandmother Art had bitten two mailmen and a newspaper boy. They had all gotten too close to the house. He was such a gentle, docile dog with all of us, but would not tolerate any strangers coming near my grandmother or her house.

I remember it was my job to feed Art each night. Just before we all sat down to eat our supper; I would crumple two Gaines-Burgers patties with a bit of warm water into his metal dish. Art woofed down his food in mere seconds and then he would mooch food from our table while we ate.

Every single night before she would say grace my grandmother would tell Art to go lay down, but he never did. I was not allowed to feed Art any food from our table, but I always accidentally on purpose dropped something on the floor for him. It didn’t matter what it was Art ate it.

I attended half day kindergarten my first year at Finch Avenue East Public School and my teacher was Mrs. Mosey. The school was exactly a 1 km walk from our house and I walked to and from school every day by myself.

One thing I do remember that first year of school was nap time. Every day we each got a mat from the pile and Mrs. Mosey would pass around an Arrowroot cookie with a dixie cup of apple juice to each student. She would turn out the lights and draw the Venetian blinds while we ate our snacks sitting on our mats. There was no talking allowed and some of the kids would have a little nap for a half hour or so. I am pretty sure I too would have had many naps also during my first year at Finch Avenue East School.

I also attended grades one, two and three at Finch Avenue East. I went home every day for lunch and walked a total of 4 km’s every school day during those three years. For the most part I was a good student, but I could be a bit disruptive in both the classroom and schoolyard. I learned this years later after looking at my old report cards.

The Batman television series was very popular and I always made Batrings out of construction paper. I made many Batrings and I wore them in both the classroom and schoolyard. Maybe that is what made me so disruptive because I was always trying to protect my school from evil villains the likes of The Riddler, The Penguin, Mr. Freeze, Joker and Catwoman.

Although, I must not have been too disruptive since I was always promoted each year up to the next grade.

This memory continues on with the 'Byng Avenue Willowdale' memory,