BRINGING PRESENCE: CLOSURE AND LEGACY NEAR END OF LIFE
DONALD BENJAMIN RALPH DOHERTY
B.A., Acadia University, 1983
D.P.M., Acadia Divinity College, 1986
M.Div., Acadia Divinity College, 1986
Th.D., Fountain of Life School of Ministry, 2006
Thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Ministry
Acadia Divinity College Acadia University Spring Graduation 2018
© by DONALD BENJAMIN RALPH DOHERTY This thesis by Donald Benjamin Ralph Doherty was defended successfully in an oral examination on 30 August 2017.
The examining committee for the thesis was:
Dr. Stephen McMullin, Chair
Dr. John Sumarah, External Examiner
Dr. Glenn Wooden, Internal Examiner
Dr. Carol Anne Janzen, Supervisor
Dr. John McNally, DMin Program Director
This thesis is accepted in its present form by Acadia Divinity College, the Faculty of Theology of Acadia University, as satisfying the thesis requirements for the degree of Doctor of Ministry.
ii I, Donald Benjamin Ralph Doherty, hereby grant permission to the University Librarian at Acadia University to provide copies of my thesis, upon request, on a non-profit basis.
Donald Benjamin Ralph Doherty Author
Dr. Carol Anne Janzen Supervisor
30 August 2017 Date
iii TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE AND SIGNATURES i
TABLE OF CONTENTS iv
ABSTRACT xi
CHAPTER 1: Biblical Foundations 1
Introduction
Thesis purpose and Scriptural basis 2
Scriptural substantiation 3
First Scripture (with a promise): Exodus 20:12, the 5th Commandment 4
The Promise 6
Scripture examined: Ephesians 6:1–3
Further Scriptural foundation: 1st Timothy 5:1- 4 and v.8 10
Conclusion for previous Scripture passages 13
Wisdom: Wealth of Experience 15
The Love of God and τὴν ἀγάπην, the ‘first love’ as mentioned in Revelation 2:4 16
Exodus 33:14-15: ‘Presence’ of God 19
Bringing ‘Presence’ in the New Testament 23
Transcendence and Immanence of Presence 24
Ministry of Presence: a theology of ‘the image of God’ and of love in action 26
Contemporary ethnographers and theologians: a sampling review 29
William James: ethnography and religious experience 30
iv Table of Contents: Chapter 1 (continued)
Leland J. White: ethnography and the Bible, the social scientific approach 32
Mary McClintok Fulkerson: context driven ethnography 35
Summary: ethnography and theology within this thesis 37
Historically Negative vs Positive Resolve 38
Concluding Thoughts 40
CHAPTER 2: Theoretical Foundations 41
Prejudice 43
Ageism 45
Ethic of love: ‘other-person centeredness’ 46
Significance of the work of God 48
The work of God: simply believing Christ 50
Enlightenment regarding work 51
Theory behind the practical need: the work of God in a community of faith 52
Preserving Dignity
The substance of ‘faith’ in community 53
Overcoming the fear of Death 57
Final crisis: ego integrity versus despair 60
Needs of the dying from a psychosocial contextual approach … 63
Attending and redirection: prime factors and necessity 64
Legacy: The Ethical Will in enhancing dignity 67
Four pillars of Dying with Dignity 70
v
Table of Contents: Chapter 2 (continued)
The Interview 72
Logistics to be considered 73
Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.
Two-week Clinical Pastoral Education training course 74
Christian Body: helping to meet the need 75
Theory of the Question 76
The need for review 77
CHAPTER 3: Research Methodology and Process 81
Ethnography
Introduction to the life review process 82
Catharsis, the purging of pain 83
Regarding the second thesis purpose: the Question
Late stage/near end of life interview process 85
Interview delivery and specifics 86
Review and Debriefing 89
Potential harms 90
Potential benefits
Confidentiality 91
Compensation
Deception: avoiding bias
Deception: innocuous 92
Other agencies doing similar work 93
vi Table of Contents: Chapter 3 (continued)
Purchasing the equipment for the training aspect 94
Difficulty obtaining church support
The Salvation Army and the Dignity Manifesto 96
THE DIGNITY MANIFESTO
The alternate route: Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc. 97
INUNNGUAG - LIKE A PERSON 99
Traditions that shape and protect us 100
Interview process in practice: preparing for the interviews 101
Mont St. Joseph, the resident facility
RESIDENT/ELDER BILL OF RIGHTS
The Interviews 103
The first set of three
Drafts and family review 104
The recording software and the transcribing 105
Supplied ‘life history’ suggested questions list
For future data basing 107
Second group of interviews
The final participant and a welcome printing option 109
Last stage 111
Final production process specifics
Front cover and back with logo 112
Binding
vii Table of Contents: Chapter 3 (continued)
Final distribution 113
Conclusion of Chapter 3: Methodology and the end result
CHAPTER 4: Analysis of the Life Story Interviews 115
Post Interview Individual Responses
1) Participant Number 1: Ms. S
Participant follow-up response
Comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1 116
2) Participant Number 2: Ms. I 117
Participant follow-up response for Ms. I 118
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
As to the thesis question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1 121
3) Participant Number 3: Ms. G 123
Participant follow-up response
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1 126
4) Participant number 4: Mr. R 127
Participant follow-up response
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback 128
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1 131
viii Table of Contents: Chapter 4 (continued)
5) Participant number 5: Mr. T 132
Participant follow-up response
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback 133
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1 136
6) Participant Number 6: Ms. M
Participant follow-up response 137
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1 144
Final Response: Post Interview Facility Response Sheet
On the response by Pastoral Care Coordinator, Deacon Eldon Danielson 146
CHAPTER 5: Conclusion 147
Brief recap of the purpose of the thesis
Summary: Chapter 1 148
Summary: Chapter 2
Summary: Chapter 3 149
Summary: Chapter 4 150
Critical reflections: thesis Question; strengths and weaknesses of research; suggestions for further research and practice
FOLLOWERS OF THE WAY: 153
Synthesis of findings 156
Closing critical reflections 157
Project summary and conclusion 159
ix Table of Contents (continued)
BIBLIOGRAPHY 165
Texts Referenced
Online Topic or Name and Website Referenced 169
On-line News or Television Productions Referenced by Name or Topic 172
APPENDICES
Note: In general, appendix content retains original size font and formatting.
Appendix A: Life Interview Questions, Life Events 173
Appendix B: Life Interview Research Consent Form - Interviewee 177
Appendix C: Life Interview Research Consent Form - Facilitating interviewer/transcriber 179
Appendix D: Life Interview Research Consent Form – Care Facility 181
Appendix E: Training Module to be used for teaching the ‘My Life Story’ process 185
Appendix F: Life Story Interviews 197
1) Life Story #1: Ms. S, aged 96 199
2) Life Story #2: Ms. I, aged 95 233
3) Life Story #3: Ms. G, age 39, classified as Palliative 267
4) Life Story #4: Mr. R, aged 86 279
5) Life Story #5: Mr. T, age 82, classifed as Palliative 307
6) Life Story #6: Ms. M, age 83 359
Appendix G: Foundational Documents of Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc. 419
x Bringing Presence: closure and legacy near end of life
ABSTRACT
In answer to a perceived need to mine like gold the wisdom of the elderly and those in
palliative care for the good of society before it is too late to do so, this project was
undertaken to develop a simple methodology for life story interviewing. A not-for-profit
incorporated entity was created with intent to foster the ‘near end-of-life’ interview process as an option for everyone in society, regardless of background or culture.
Four principal goals undergird the theoretical consideration, i.e. for provision of comfort, help with closure, provision of a legacy document for the family and, last but not least, for the sake of posterity. It is a moot point that, without the wisdom of the ages (or the ‘aged’ per se), generations to follow would be doomed to what some refer to as
‘insanity,’ i.e. ‘to do the same thing over and over again expecting a different result.’
Within this project, biblical validation was primary. The first step was stringent
application of hermeneutic principle to exegete significant Scriptures that validate the
project effort, e.g. the notion of honouring ‘mother’ and ‘father’ and the ramifications of
this God driven requirement when interpreted within context.
Following the validation and theoretical consideration, a simple training process for the
individual life story interview was developed for application post thesis, principally as a
course in clinical pastoral education but readily adaptable for training volunteers.
Six interviews were completed, stories that tell of life. From immigrants who came to
early twentieth century Canada in pursuit of a better life, to the tragedy of having to surrender control of life and family due to illness and palliative care, their stories tell of a moral courage, of faith and a willingness to engage and overcome against the odds.
xi CHAPTER 1: Biblical Foundations
Introduction
This thesis project is on the practical and specific topic of elder and palliative care. It is an effort to create a working standard for what may be at times a neglected part of our social support network and fabric, i.e., service to the elderly and the dying for the sake of both recipient and those who remain, the living, who may need to be reminded that they soon may follow as recipients of this service.
In terms of foundational methodology for qualitative evaluation, this thesis employs ethnographic research. Ethnography focuses on the question “What is the culture of this people?”,1 for it is culture that shapes a people in “standards for deciding what is…, what can be…, how one feels about it…, how to go about doing it.”2 In this case, the research is accomplished through observation, i.e. unbiased collection and publication of life histories through a process of dispassionate interview.
As this thesis is for the Doctor of Ministry degree, in the search for biblical foundation for the idea of actively learning to minister to the elderly and the dying in a way that will offer or augment to them the four specific goals of comfort, closure, legacy and posterity,3 it became apparent that much of the Judeo-Christian Bible qualifies as biblical foundation for posterity.
1 Michael Quinn Patton, Qualitative Evaluation and Research Methods, 2nd edition (London, UK: Sage Publications, 1990), 67.
2 Ibid., 68.
3 “Posterity: 1: the offspring of one progenitor to the furthest generation 2: all future generations.” “Posterity,” accessed January 07, 2014, http://www.merriam-webster.com/ dictionary/posterity.
The Scriptures are a collection of life stories and histories, not only of Christ but of a unique, yet symbolic, group of people, i.e., symbolic of those with the quest to know God,
His expectations for living and the costs of both heeding and\or ignoring those expectations. The Bible would be much less personal and life changing than it has been through the ages as a catalyst of spiritual and social change if that were not a precedent given by the God we believe to be the Author of the Scriptures. Few would pay attention to its precepts if the Scriptures could not relate to life in the contemporary.
Thesis purpose and Scriptural basis
The title of this thesis is Bringing Presence: closure and legacy near end of life. The specific goals of the thesis are to help some experience, and others to provide, the sense of
‘Presence’4 and, from that, to provide empowerment toward the four goals, i.e., comfort, closure, legacy and posterity for society.
The biblical foundations for the thesis project are laid in Chapter 1 and the theoretical base is addressed in Chapter 2. For Chapter 1, attempt is made to present a selection of
Scripture to help substantiate the biblical foundation for the thesis project itself. Reference is made to other literature and, in the chapter summary, a brief discussion is given on the contribution ethnography and assorted theologians, ancient and contemporary, have made to the process.
Project purpose is twofold:
1) to standardize a process for archiving life experience of the aged and the dying
with intent to enhance life for both and for those who remain, i.e., for the sake
4 The biblical understanding of Presence is discussed later in this chapter. Presence and Ministry of Presence are capitalized throughout when in reference to Presence of God. 2
of leaving a legacy and to help with personal closure for those being
interviewed. It is intended to be a process to provide a nondirective physical
‘presence’ capable of delivering the ‘near end of life’ interview while enhancing
self-worth for, and the ability to gain and maintain a legacy from, the elderly
and those in facilities for long term and terminal care.
2) in consideration of spiritual and community of faith dimensions,5 to answer this
Question: ‘Will a set of impartial, nonreligious, life history interviews
demonstrate a perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical Presence
at any time in the past life experience of the interviewed?’
From the collected interviews, the determination is made if there is any level
of incidence wherein the interviewed, without prompting, expressed a
perceived awareness of any form of providential ‘Presence’ in life.
Scriptural substantiation
To help substantiate or offer support for comforting the elderly and dying by recording life history and archiving the result, a few cardinal precepts by way of Scriptural analysis are offered. In addition, the theoretical portion (Chapter 2) expounds other relevant
Scripture in discussion of the theoretical aspect.
5 By the term “spiritual and community of faith dimension,” I refer to the ethos* by or from which the person or group designs the particular ideology that guides the path and progress of life. This includes the inner dynamics evident in the struggle to discern and maintain the dynamic tension evident when the spiritual dimension is to be realized while maintaining the physical needs of administration and support of a community and vice-versa. * “Ethos: the distinguishing character, sentiment, moral nature, or guiding beliefs of a person, group, or institution.” “Ethos,” accessed January 21, 2014, https://www.merriam webster.com/dictionary/ethos.
3
In terms of a foreword, please note that, when a biblical reference is given and exegeted throughout this chapter, the Scripture is listed first in the original language and then in one contemporary translation.
Direct Scripture quotations are italicized. Single quotes are used if a portion of Scripture is paraphrased, e.g., used within a line of text other than a quote. Unless otherwise indicated, Scriptures in English are from the New American Standard Updated Edition.6
First Scripture (with a promise): Exodus 20:12, the 5th Commandment
12 כַּבֵּד אֶת־אָבִיָךוְאֶ ת־אִ מֶָך לְמַּעַּןיַּאֲרִ כּוןיָמֶ יָך עַּל הָאֲדָמָהאֲשֶ ר־יְהוָה אֱֹלהֶיָךנֹתֵּ ןלְָָֽך׃
12) Honour your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which the LORD your God gives you.
kā∙ḇēḏ, kawb-beed), the Hebrew verb for ‘honour’ in verse 12 is ‘piel’, meaning it) כַּ בֵּד is used to express intense action. It is in the 2nd person singular imperative, indicating (like the English imperative mood) a command to the individual to actively initiate and maintain a ‘weighty’ or ‘intense’ relationship with someone, of glorifying, promoting or giving honour to another,7 i.e.,
• to express a direct command or request; • to issue instruction, permission or exhortation; • to beg for an answer; • to seek for a direction.8
6 NASU: New American Standard Updated Edition
7 Francis Brown, Samuel Rolles Driver and Charles Augustus Briggs, Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 2004), 457. Cf. 1 Timothy 5:1,2 wherein we are instructed by Paul the Apostle to treat older men and women as fathers and mothers, younger as brothers and sisters.
8 “The Imperative Mood,” accessed October 24, 2017, https://www.scribd.com/doc/28989662/ Chapter-Eight-Hebrew-Imperative-Cohortative-and-Jussive.
4
It is important to note that the terms ‘mother’ and ‘father’ are used in Scripture for more than biological parents. The terms may represent various spiritual and community of faith caregivers and elders who have contributed positively to fostering either the personal or the collective community experience of care giving in the lives of others.
ǎḇ, is used in Scripture to define a father or father ,אָ ב ,’The Hebrew noun for ‘father figure, husband, elder, and protector. W.L Holladay defines it as:
(physical) father Gn 2:24, = grandfather 28:13, ancestor of tribe, nation 10:21; plural. = forefathers Gn 15:15; metaph. begetter (of rain) Jb 38:28; — 2. originator, founder of group, trade Gn 4:20f; — 3. fatherly protector Ps 68:6; 4.9 and J. Swanson similarly as:
caregiver, formally, father, i.e., one who cares for persons in need, as a figurative extension of a father caring for a child’s needs (Job 29:16; Isaiah 9:5).10
ēm, may denote either the ,אֵּ ם ,’The Hebrew noun in Scripture used for ‘mother biological or the adoptive female parent of any creature (Genesis 2:24; Exodus 22:29), 11 or a grandmother, i.e., the mother of a child’s parents (1st Kings 15:10, 13; 2nd Chronicles
15:16). It can be used for an elder caregiver as well, or any provider, near female relative, or one who helps, and/or one who protects an object as a figurative extension of a biological mother (Judges 5:7; 2nd Samuel 20:19).12
9 William Lee Holladay, Ludwig Köhler, A Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden: Brill, 1971), xvii-1.
10 James Swanson, Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Hebrew (Old Testament), electronic edition (Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997).
11 Ibid.
12 Holladay, Köhler, 19.
5 The Promise
that your days may be prolonged upon the ,לְמַּעַּן, יַּאֲרִ כּון יָמֶ יָך, עַּל הָאֲדָמָ ה ,The second part land, is considered ‘a promise’ (Ephesians 6:1-3 following).
is in the ‘hiphil’ or active causative , ארך yǎ·ʾǎri·ḵûn, from the root , יַּאֲרִ כּון The word stem (an ‘imperfect’ or yiqṭōl),13 3rd person plural verb meaning ‘[they] may be prolonged.’14 Contextually, this implies that actively doing this action referred to on a continuing basis is necessary and beneficial for the people doing so, i.e., causing to extend
.yā·mê, ‘days’: hence, for posterity, it may be of highest priority ,יָמֶ י their
Having looked at a foundational Commandment in the 1st Covenant, the Old Testament that validates the wisdom in honouring the ‘mother’ and ‘father, the next examination is on New Testament Scripture that provides confirmation of the continuity of that ‘highest priority’ to the instruction outlined in the 2nd Covenant, the New Testament.
Scripture examined: Ephesians 6:1-3
Complementary to Exodus 20:12, the text just examined from the Old Testament
Hebrew, is Ephesians 6:1-3 in the New Testament Greek:
13 Francis I. Andersen and A. Dean Forbes, A Systematic Glossary to the Andersen-Forbes Analysis of the Hebrew Bible (Oak Harbour, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2006).
ʾarak /aw·rak/] v. A primitive root; TWOT 162; GK 799 and 837; 34] אָרַ ְך “ 14 occurrences; AV translates as ‘prolong’ 18 times, ‘long’ five times, ‘lengthen’ three times, ‘draw out’ three times, ‘defer’ twice, ‘tarried’ once, and ‘lived’ twice. 1 to be long, prolong. 1A (Qal) to be long. 1B (Hiphil). 1B1 to prolong (days). 1B2 to make long (tent cords). 1B3 to grow long, continue long.” James Strong, Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon. (Ontario, Canada: Woodside Bible Fellowship, 1995), #748.
6
1) Τὰ τέκνα, ὑπακούετε τοῖς γονεῦσιν ὑμῶν [ἐν κυρίῳ], τοῦτο γάρ ἐστιν δίκαιον. 2) τίμα τὸν πατέρα σου καὶ τὴν μητέρα, ἥτις ἐστὶν ἐντολὴ πρώτη ἐν ἐπαγγελίᾳ, 3) ἵνα εὖ σοι γένηται καὶ ἔσῃ μακροχρόνιος ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς. 15
1) Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2) Honour your father and mother (which is the first commandment with a promise)…[literally: which is commandment, [the] first with a promise]…, 3) so that it may be well with you, and that you may live long on the Earth. 16
Ephesians 6:1-3 carries the message given from Exodus 20:12, the first commandment with a promise, into and past the time of Christ’s incarnation. However, as a messenger bringing the Presence of God and speaking in the name of Christ, Paul the Apostle exhorts the Ephesians regarding the 4th of the Ten Commandments, telling them it is a ‘faith’17 obligation of Christians to be remembered, practiced, i.e., as per Exodus 20, that ‘fathers’ and ‘mothers’ are to be honoured and obeyed, and those designations encompass elders who act in the positions of caregiving.
In the verse in question, Paul used the word τέκνα, tékna, ‘children’, the neuter plural form of τέκνον, téknon. It is common in some versions of the Bible to refer only to the masculine, i.e., ‘son(s)’, when using τέκνον. However, the term has been recognized as referring to both genders with respect to family, i.e., ‘children/child.18
15 “The Online Greek Bible,” accessed September 21, 2014, http://www.greekbible.com/ index.php. Cf. W. Hall Harris, The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear New Testament (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2008), 513.
16 New American Standard Bible: 1995 update (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).
17 More is said on ‘faith’ in Chapter 2.
18 Walter Bauer, William Arndt, Frederick W. Danker, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd edition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 994.
7 Further, the term may refer as well to those who are dear to another, without actual familial bloodline or distinction of age, and to those who follow a particular way of thinking
(e.g., Paul referring to Timothy in 1st Timothy 1:2; John and Peter referring to the children of God: John 1:12-13; 1 John 3:1; 1 Peter 1:14, et al), and can refer to descendants in the case of posterity, such as in Matthew 3:19 and Luke 1:17.19
Paul includes the phrase πρώτη ἐν ἐπαγγελίᾳ, prōtē en epangelía, first with a promise.
It is not a stretch to assume it is something Paul believed is to be done consistently through the generations. The terminology resembles the admonition found in Exodus 20 to Honour your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which the LORD your God gives you.
We examined the Hebrew side of the admonition ‘to honour,’ but now we see the word
ὑπακούετε, hupakoúete, an imperative of the verb ὑπακούω, hupakoúō, ‘to obey,’20 further delineating the ‘honour’ relationship. In Ephesians 6:4, Paul adds to the exhortation to define the relationship: Καὶ οἱ πατέρες, μὴ παροργίζετε τὰ τέκνα ὑμῶν ἀλλὰ ἐκτρέφετε αὐτὰ
ἐν παιδείᾳ καὶ νουθεσίᾳ κυρίου, i.e., and fathers, [do] not [make] angry your children but bring them [up] in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.
Καὶ οἱ πατέρες, and fathers, is in keeping with the concept of Jewish-Christian
Ephesians holding the ‘fathers’, e.g., and/or elders, responsible for educating children. This translation later expands to include ‘parents’ when it refers to the joint obligation of both parents to discipline the children.
19 Ibid.
20 Harris, 513.
8 I would point out that observing a correct ‘discipline’ assumes a previously recorded history to be considered a discipline, i.e., instruction preserved by a community of the Old
Testament predecessors in the ethos, the discipline and instruction, of that community.
Literally, Paul affirms that family has corporate responsibilities. The fathers (the elder male members within the Ephesian community of faith)21 are to ensure their children are discipled or instructed from Scripture in the way the Lord has instructed,22 i.e., from the recorded experiential knowledge about the Lord, the living history of a people, with the long-term good of the children in mind (hence, posterity) and that the children have a responsibility to honour and faithfully obey parents and elders. Both injunctions include discipline and instruction regarding responsibility to ongoing care (cf. 1st Timothy 5:1-3 in the section following).
To summarize, this corporate responsibility necessarily indicates education from a sacred observed and written text that makes instruction of the Lord relevant to generations that follow. This is possible when the discipline or instruction has been recorded for posterity and repetition, e.g., the well-being indicated by the promise in Ephesians 6:3,
21 “The change of wording from γονεῖς, ‘parents,’ in v. 1, the omission of the mention of mothers after this has been explicit in the commandment of v. 2, and the fact (as we have observed under Form/Structure/Setting) that in the ancient world in both Greco-Roman and Jewish writings it is fathers in particular who are held responsible for the education of the children… In later Judaism, this point was made expressly: ‘All the obligations of a father toward his son enjoined in the Law are incumbent on men but not on women, and all obligations of a son toward his father enjoined in the Law are incumbent both on men and on women.’” Andrew T. Lincoln, vol. 42, Ephesians, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word Incorporated, 1990), 406.
22 Harris, 513.
9 ἵνα εὖ σοι γένηται καὶ ἔσῃ μακροχρόνιος ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, i.e., in order that well with you it may be and you [your days] may be long-lived [may be prolonged] on the earth. 23
Further Scriptural foundation: 1 Timothy 5:1-4 and v. 8
1) Πρεσβυτέρῳ μὴ ἐπιπλήξῃς, ἀλλὰ παρακάλει ὡς πατέρα, νεωτέρους ὡς ἀδελφούς, 2) πρεσβυτέρας ὡς μητέρας, νεωτέρας ὡς ἀδελφὰς ἐν πάσῃ ἁγνείᾳ. 3) Χήρας τίμα τὰς ὄντως χήρας. 4) εἰ δέ τις χήρα τέκνα ἢ ἔκγονα ἔχει, μανθανέτωσαν πρῶτον τὸν ἴδιον οἶκον εὐσεβεῖν καὶ ἀμοιβὰς ἀποδιδόναι τοῖς προγόνοις, τοῦτο γάρ ἐστιν ἀπόδεκτον ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ. … 8) εἰ δέ τις τῶν ἰδίων καὶ μάλιστα οἰκείων οὐ προνοεῖ, τὴν πίστιν ἤρνηται καὶ ἔστιν ἀπίστου χείρων.24
1) Do not sharply rebuke an older man, but rather appeal to him as a father, to the younger men as brothers, 2) the older women as mothers, and the younger women as sisters, in all purity. 3) Honour widows who are widows 4) indeed; but if any widow has children or grandchildren, they must first learn to practice piety in regard to their own family and to make some return to their parents; for this is acceptable in the sight of God.’… 8) ‘But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
Verses 5, 6 and 7 of 1st Timothy 5 were excluded from this selection as they apply to specific instruction to widows concerning personal behavior.
Verses 1 to 4 and verse 8 of 1st Timothy 5 are directed by Paul the Apostle as specific to Timothy and to others who would deal in positive interaction with elders and with training, education and discipline in general. Within the background context of this passage, Paul was instructing young Timothy (whom, according to 1st Timothy 1:2, Paul viewed as γνησίῳ τέκνῳ ἐν πίστει, gnēsíō teknō en pístei, [my] true child [in] the faith),25
23 Cf. Proverbs 6:20 My son, observe the commandment of your father And do not forsake the teaching of your mother’; Proverbs 23:22 Listen to your father who begot you, And do not despise your mother when she is old; Colossians 3:20 Children, be obedient to your parents in all things, for this is well-pleasing to the Lord.
24 Harris, 547.
25 Ibid., 542. 10 cautioning him about assigned duties within Timothy’s sphere of influence (including, by extension, the ἐκκλησία, the global Church or the Body of Christ).26 Specifically, as noted, the focus in part is the specifics of the way to approach, converse with, appeal to and educate others, including with regard to correction. That appears to be the crux of the
Scripture, i.e., 5:1-4 and v.8, and refers to a required discipline based on previous experience, e.g., treating elders as fathers, et al.
In 1st Timothy 4:14, Paul’s counsel had been for Timothy not to let youthfulness deter him from ‘exercising the spiritual gifts’ that he, Timothy, apparently had received from the
Spirit of God27 through the prophetic utterance and laying on of hands by the presbytery, i.e., πρεσβυτερίου, presbuteríou, or council of elders within Timothy’s community of faith.
Timothy was ‘to persevere’ by paying close attention to himself in word [speech], in conduct, in love, in Spirit, in faith, in purity (v.12) and to the teachings he received to ensure salvation for himself and those who would hear him (v.16).
Paul’s caution was for good reason. He pointed out that there would be some who would fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons (4:1).
Theologian George W. Knight comments that this falling away would be due to “a false
26 “ἐκκλησία … the global community of Christians, (universal) church … The local assembly or congregation as well as the universal church is more specif. called ἐ. τοῦ θεοῦ or ἐ. τ. Χριστοῦ. This is essentially Pauline usage, and it serves to give the current Gk. term its Christian coloring and thereby its special meaning.” Bauer, Arndt, Danker, 303.
27 “A most important word is charisma. … its characteristic use is for the ‘SPIRITUAL GIFTS’, i.e., the gifts which the Holy Spirit imparts to certain people. Everyone has such a gift (1 Pet. 4:10), but specific gifts are reserved for individuals (1 Cor. 12:30), and individuals endowed with these gifts are themselves ‘gifts’ from the ascended Christ to the church (Eph. 4:7ff.)… important passages are Rom. 12:6ff.; 1 Cor. 12:4-11, 28-30; 14; Eph. 4:11ff. Salvation is God’s good gift to men, and all the rest arises from this basic truth.” D. R. W. Wood and I. Howard Marshall, New Bible Dictionary, 3rd edition (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1996), 411-412.
11 teaching of ascetism,” 28 i.e., that hypocrites would bring fallacies into the congregational fold such as ‘the forbidding of marriage’ and ‘abstaining from certain foods.’29 However, the church would not be caught in such fallacy if it was aware of or recollected what the
Holy Spirit had spoken previously, including the concern regarding ‘falling away.’30
Paul warned that such deception would be in error (4:1-5) as these supposedly forbidden things were created by God, therefore to be received with thanksgiving. Timothy was to point this out to the believers, to correct if he could and, at all times, to pray for the rulers and authorities with the desire to save and bring them to the knowledge of truth, for
τῦτο καλὸν καὶ ἀπόδεκτον ἐνώπιον τοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν θεοῦ, toúto kalón kaí apódekton enoópion toú Sooteéros heemoón Theoú, this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior. (1St Timothy 2:3-4). Wright explains that this is for posterity:
When Paul says “this is good,” he probably means that not only is it so ‘before God,’ but also because of all that is involved in such prayer, such as concern for all people, and (as he implies in vv. 3ff.) for their salvation, as well as concern for civil government, tranquility, quiet and a greater opportunity to live a life of Christian piety (cf. 2 Cor. 8:21).31
Paul instructs Timothy πρεσβυτέρῳ μὴ ἐπιπλήξῃς, presbutérō mē epiplēxēs, [an] older man [do] not rebuke (5:1). Instead, Timothy was to do specific actions in his inter-personal relationships, i.e. to παρακάλει, parakálei, come alongside/ treat/appeal to the following:
1) πρεσβυτέρῳ, presbutérō, the older man, ὡς πατέρα, hōs patéra, as a father;
28 George W. Knight, New International Greek Testament Commentary, The Pastoral Epistles: A Commentary on the Greek Text (Grand Rapids, MI; Carlisle, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Paternoster Press, 1992), 187.
29 Ibid.
30 Ibid.
31 Ibid., 119. 12 2) νεωτέρους, neōtérous, the younger men, ὡς ἀδελφούς, hōs adelphoús, as brothers;
3) πρεσβυτέρας, presbutéras, the older women, ὡς μητέρας, hōs mētéras, as mothers;
4) νεωτέρας, neōtéras, the younger women, ὡς ἀδελφὰς, adelphás, as sisters, πάσῃ
ἁγνείᾳ, pásē hagneía, in all purity;
5) χήρας, chēras, widows, τίμα, tíma, (give) honour/value/revere.
As well, Paul pointedly stated that children are ‘to be taught/to learn’ piety with respect to their own family and, therefore, to make some return to their parents, for this is acceptable in the sight of God. (v.4) Therefore, a person must take care of ἰδίων kai μάλιστα
οἰκείων, idiōn kai malista oikeiōn, his own relatives, especially members of his household.
Regarding elderly widows in particular, Paul makes the point that if a man does not take care of and provide for his relatives, especially of his own household, that person has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever (5:1-8).
The foregoing indicates that Paul was cautioning Timothy to practice an observed and taught discipline for correct living, a necessity that underlines the value in maintaining a recorded discipline.
Conclusion for previous Scripture passages
The Hebrew and Greek words used for ‘elders’ are found at least 200 times in the New
American Standard Updated Edition (NASU) of the Scriptures: 139 times in the Old
Testament and 61 in the New Testament. The Scriptures presented indicate that, throughout biblical history, elders were responsible for the care of the communities and were highly respected.
13 Throughout Old and New Testament times, the terms mother and father and elder were applicable to:
1) any significant progenitor, caregiver, parent, ancestor, originator, caregiver, et al,
from a familial context in either personal or community background;
2) the older males of the tribe or clan in the Old Testament;
3) the older person, both older male (πρεσβυτέρῳ, presbutéro) and older female
(πρεσβυτέρας, presbutéras) and plural πρεσβύτεροι, presbúteroi, older ones or
relatively advanced in age; an official, elder, presbyter.
4) the administrative officials within a cultural entity: e.g., among the Jews, from the
time of Joseph in the house of Pharaoh (Genesis 50:7) to first mention with Moses
לְֵּך ַּוְאָס פְתָ אֶ ת-זִקְ ֵּני יִשְרָ ֵּא ל in Exodus 3:16, i.e. relating that God had commanded Moses
,elders). Up to the present ,זקן the elders of, from :זִקְ ֵּני) .to gather the elders of Israel
the usage has been the same since before the destruction of the Jerusalem temple in
70AD, where and when the congregation of a synagogue in Jerusalem used
πρεσβύτεροι, presbúteroi, for ‘elders’ to denote its congregational officers.32
5) the leaders with the Apostles in the Christian communities in Apostolic times.33 In
the Book of Acts, 11:29-30 and 14:23, the recorder-physician Luke provides us
with the awareness that the Christians at Antioch were sending famine relief by
32 Bauer, Arndt, Danker, 862.
33 Walter A. Elwell and Barry J. Beitzel, Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1988), 679. 14 Saul/Paul and Barnabas to the elders of the Judean churches34 and that Saul/Paul
and Barnabas appointed elders in every church on their first missionary journey.35
Wisdom: Wealth of Experience
American philosopher George Santayana penned a poignant and relative to this thesis comment when he wrote “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”36 As Scripture we have examined implies, not remembering can be limiting.
Within the Scriptures that we have examined, the elders are indicated as important, respected and worthy of deference by the younger members of the community. Jesus and
Paul advocated that special attention be given in correction and instruction for elder care as well as in relating to others, i.e., all were to be taken aside for consultation and treated as fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers, i.e. as members of one’s own family.
In biblical times, the elders had significant influence in community matters and affairs, both civil and religious/spiritual. It was their function not only to help decide the course of events but, as well, to gather about and lay hands upon persons to send into the ministry of the Gospel, or Good News, of Christ (1st Timothy 4:14). Elders are called on to pray for and anoint the sick (James 5:14) and the significance of leadership by mature, experienced, elders in the church apparently is vital.
34 Ibid., 680.
35 Ibid.
36 George Santayana, The Life of Reason: Reason in Common Sense (New York: Scribner's, 1905), 284.
15 Upon examination of the context of the many biblical references, it is evident to me that those referred to as parents and elders were to be listened to for instruction and guidance with respect to what to do in both the present and the future. The greater wealth of experience resides primarily with those who have lived the longest and ‘wisdom’ is derived from having overcome rigors and challenges of life to survive. Perhaps the obstacles that time tends to bring before a community of individuals is the greatest wealth within God’s economy, a wealth best not to be squandered. This would agree with the sage advice of the
‘first commandment with a promise’ as described previously and, as per the following, remembering the love of God and, as will be seen, the ‘first love’ as God requires.
The Love of God and τὴν ἀγάπην, the ‘first love’ as mentioned in Revelation 2:4
“The most important [commandment],” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)
Love for God in Christ is emphasized throughout the New Testament (e.g., Mark 12:29-
31; Romans 8:28; 1 Corinthians 2:9; 8:3; Ephesians 6:24) as is love for fellow human beings, particularly among believers in Christ (e.g., John 13:34; 15:12; 1 Thessalonians
4:9; 1 Peter 1:22; 1 John 3:11, 14). The message of Revelation 2:4 is addressed to the angel of the Church at Ephesus, thereby to the people of the congregation, specifically warning that God was not pleased with their current attitude and disposition, i.e.,
ἀλλὰ ἔχω κατὰ σοῦ ὅτι τὴν ἀγάπην σου τὴν πρώτην ἀφῆκες, allá échō katá soú hóti teén agápeen sou teén proóteen afeékes, but I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
16 τὴν ἀγάπην, teén agápeen, the first love, is derived from the Greek noun ἀγάπη, 37 agape, a feminine noun from ἀγαπάω, agapáō, to love. Some scholars believe that τὴν ἀγάπην, the
‘first love’ spoken of in Revelation 2:4, was the fresh enthusiasm and relationship the
Ephesians first had with God at the beginning - the inward, spiritual and emotional, fresh love for God, as displayed in an outward honest and enthusiastic horizontal or brotherly love:
For instance, Beasley-Murray… says it “was primarily love for fellow men,” and Ladd … says, “The Ephesian converts had known such a love in their early years; but …struggle with false teachers and their hatred of heretical teaching had apparently engendered hard feelings and harsh attitudes toward one another to such an extent that it mounted to a forsaking of the supreme Christian virtue of love.” Others take it primarily as love for God.... However, a growing number (e.g., Mounce, Johnson, Krodel, Thomas, Giesen) recognize the difficulty of separating love for humans from love for God and Christ. The famous “summary of the Torah” in Mark 12:29-31 (cf. Matt. 22:37-39; Luke 10:27) combines the two… .38
The Ephesians had become zealous in exposing people who taught falsehoods among the Christian body. Christ is indicated as telling the Church that He, Christ, realized that they, the Ephesian community of faith, have perseverance and have endured for My name's sake (v. 3). Christ then warns but I have this against you… .39
37 “ἀγάπη… Love, affectionate regard, goodwill, benevolence. With reference to God’s love, it is God’s willful direction toward man. It involves God doing what He knows is best for man and not necessarily what man desires. For example, John 3:16 states, ‘For God so loved [ēgápēsen] the world, that he gave....’” Spiros Zodhiates, The Complete Word Study Dictionary: New Testament, electronic edition (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2000), 26.
38 G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: A Commentary on the Greek Text, New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans,1998), 230-231.
39 Grant R. Osborne, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2002), 115.
17 Revelation 2 records that the Ephesians were told by Christ τὰ πρῶτα ἔργα ποίησον, tá prōta érga poíson,40 to do the first works, to begin again and return to the love they had when they first learned of Christ 41 and, thereafter, to maintain doing the things they did in the beginning. Otherwise, Christ would ‘remove their lampstand’ (v. 5) from before His throne, or from their place as a member of the Body of Christ. It was nothing less than a threat to remove the congregation from consideration as a Christian community,42 a fair warning for posterity, or what must be remembered to survive as a community in Christ.
The exhortation is plain, i.e., that first love is important to pleasing God, requiring understanding and adherence to Godly discipline or direction.43 The community of faith is to remember what it has been taught and to maintain the discipline as an active way of life.
The Church of Christ has a mandate that undergirds this thesis: Ephesians 58:10 reads
40 Harris, 635.
41 Osborne, 115.
42 David E. Aune, vol. 52A, Revelation 1-5, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1998), 147.
43 “The point is not primarily that they had lost their love for one another, as argued by many commentators (e.g., Moffatt’s translation, ‘you have given up loving one another as you did at first’). Nor is the point merely that they had lost their love for Christ in general (as some commentators also think; cf. Jer. 2:2; Ezek. 16:8). The idea is that they no longer expressed their former zealous love for Jesus by witnessing to him in the world. This is why Christ chooses to introduce himself as he does in v 1. His statement that he ‘walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands’ is intended to remind the introverted readers that their primary role in relation to their Lord should be that of a light of witness to the outside world. That losing their ‘first love’ was tantamount to becoming unzealous witnesses is suggested further as we see a link with Matt. 24:12- 14, which shows such an end-time expectation: ‘Most people’s love will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world for a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.’ This explains the loss of love as unfaithfulness to the covenantal task of enduring in preaching the gospel ‘for a witness.’ Indeed, this is to occur together with an increase in ‘false prophets’ who will ‘mislead’ (Matt. 24:10-11, 23-26), just as was occurring in Ephesus.” Beale, 230-231.
18 8) for you were formerly darkness, but now you are Light in the Lord; walk as children of Light 9) (for the fruit of the Light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth), 10) trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord.
2 Corinthians 3:18 reads in part But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image… .44 With the foregoing in mind, ‘Ministry of Presence’ takes on a significant meaning for the spiritual community bearing the image of God in Christ within and to the world.
As confirmed by Bishop Ignatius, the Ephesians did heed the Lord’s warning, repented, and once again became a thriving community of faith:45
I have therefore received your whole multitude in the name of God, through Onesimus, a man of inexpressible love, and who is your bishop, whom I pray you by Jesus Christ to love, and that you would all seek to be like him. Blessed be God, who has granted unto you, who are yourselves so excellent, to obtain such an excellent bishop.46
Exodus 33:14-15: ‘Presence’ of God
14 וַּיֹאמַּ ר: פָנַּי יֵּלֵּכּו, יוַּהֲנִחֹתִ לְָך. 15 וַּיֹאמֶ ר, אֵּ לָיו: אִ ם-אֵּ ין פָנֶיָך הֹלְכִ ים, אַּ ל-תַּ עֲלֵּנּו מִ זֶה.
14) And He said, ‘My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest.’ 15) Then he said to Him, ‘If Your presence does not go with me, do not lead us up from here.’
44 “The glory of God’s presence, which at one time was Israel’s privilege, has now become the distinguishing mark of God’s people in the new covenant. They are being transformed by Christ and with unveiled face now see and reflect the glory of the Lord (3:18). Thus, believers fulfill their divinely created disposition to live to the glory of God and to mirror the glory that emanates from the face of Christ.” S. J. Kistemaker, & W. Hendriksen, Vol. 19: New Testament Commentary, Exposition of the Second Epistle to the Corinthians (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1953- 2001), 22.
45 Osborne, 119.
46 Ignatius of Antioch, The Epistle of Ignatius to the Ephesians: A. Roberts, J. Donaldson, & A. C. Coxe, eds., The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, vol. 1 (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 49; cf. The Epistles of St. Ignatius “Early Christian Writings: The Epistles of St. Ignatius,” accessed September 21, 2014, http://www.earlychristian writings.com/srawley/ephesians.html.
19
Exodus 33:14-15 records that God assured Moses the Presence of God would travel with him and the people who followed his God-directed leadership. The question becomes what this means to the people who would follow and in what manner it impacts those today who make the effort to follow obediently the direction of God.
In the passage, those who had left Egypt with Moses had covenanted with both Moses and God that they would obey instructions that God would give (Exodus 24:3-8). The assembly was now waiting at the base of Mount Sinai for Moses to come down from the mountain. Scripture records that Moses and seventy-three elders ascended the mountain and, partway up, God had permitted them to see Him (24:9-11). Then, God called Moses alone to the top of the mountain where he would receive stone tablets stone whereon God would record the conditions of the covenant to be made with Moses and the people (24:12).
While Moses went to the mountain top, he left the elders in the care of his brother,
Aaron, and a chief elder named Hur (24:14). Both men had supported Moses’ hands in the battle against Amalek (17:8-16) and were instrumental in that victory. Moses then took
Joshua further up to a waiting place on the mountain of Sinai, staying there for seven days until God called Moses to ascend alone the rest of the way to the top of the mountain.
Moses remained at the high place on the mountain for forty days and forty nights in communication with God, receiving specific instruction and the stone tablets concerning the way to live according to the will of God (Exodus 25-31).
The shift begins in Exodus 32 wherein, during the forty days that Moses was on the mountain and absent from the assembly, the people became restless and began to rebel against their new covenant. In Moses’ absence, the people asked Aaron to make a golden calf for them to worship and Aaron conceded (v. 1).
20 The Lord told Moses to go down from the mountain and He (God) would destroy this
‘obstinate people and make a new people’ (vv. 9,10) for Moses to lead. Moses intreated for
God to spare them, then went down immediately and destroyed the idolatrous golden calf.
He then called upon those who would be in obedience to God’s to separate themselves as opposed to those who would not.
The tribe of the Levites were the ones who separated themselves to Moses’ side (v. 26) and, in the name of God, Moses ordered every male of them to kill brother and friend and neighbour. The Levites obeyed, and about 3000 throughout the camp were slain that day
(v. 28). Exodus 32:29 records Moses words:
Dedicate yourselves today to the LORD - for every man has been against his son and against his brother - in order that [God] may bestow a blessing upon you today.
Representing the remaining population, Moses returned to the mountain to meet with
God. Moses pled corporate forgiveness for the people for having broken the covenant, then asked the Lord to blot his, Moses’, name out of the Lord’s Book if the Lord would not forgive. Scripture records (vv. 33,34) that God, in response, told Moses He would blot out whoever sins against God and the Israelites would be punished ‘on the day God punishes’.
God directed Moses to lead the Israelites where He sends and specifically told Moses an angel would go before them as Moses led them from that place (v.34).
Exodus 33 opens with God telling Moses at Mount Horeb that an angel would drive out the inhabitants of the lands wherein God would send the Israelites according to God’s earlier promises. However, God said He would not go with them for He ‘might destroy them along the way because they were an obstinate people’ (vv. 1-5). The Israelites mourned these words so God ordered them to strip themselves of their ornamentation and
God would decide what to do with them (the Israelites). They stripped off their ornaments
21 and, Scripture records, they obeyed from Mount Horeb onward. Thereafter, they would watch for when the Lord would descend in a pillar of cloud to the opening of the Tent of
Meeting to speak with Moses. When this would happen, the Israelites would arise immediately, go to the doors of their own tents, bow and worship.
In verses 12 through 15, Moses is before God and interceding for the people, this time to persuade the Lord to go with the Israelites:
12) Then Moses said to the LORD, “See, You say to me, ‘Bring up this people!’ But You Yourself have not let me know whom You will send with me. Moreover, You have said, ‘I have known you by name, and you have also found favor in My sight.’ 13) ‘Now therefore, I pray You, if I have found favor in Your sight, let me know Your ways that I may know You, so that I may find favor in Your sight. Consider too, that this nation is Your people.’
For this thesis, the next verses bear special significance. We read the following exchange between God and Moses: 14) And He said, ‘My presence shall go with you, and
I will give you rest.’ 15) Then he said to Him, ‘If Your presence does not go with me, do not lead us up from here.’
pā·nǎy, is a plural , ַּפָני ,The Hebrew word for ‘Presence’ used in verses 14 and 15
pā-nɩ̂ m, ‘faces,’ found 2128 times in the ,פָנִים construct noun comprised from the Hebrew
Hebrew. In the case of this thesis, it is to be noted that, although plural, the word for
pā·nǎy ) is used to represent the ‘face’ or ‘image’ of God and the relationship , ַּפָני ) Presence of God with His people.47
47 “PRESENCE: The Hebrews believed that they had a unique relationship with their God (Exod. 19:5; Jer. 30:22; 31:3). But even God’s revelations were shrouded with mystery to protect the glory of the deity (Heb. kāḇôḏ, šĕḵɩ̂ nâ; Exod. 3; 33:17-23, esp. 20; cf. John 1:18). Abram and Jacob commemorated their experiences of God’s presence by erecting sanctuaries (at Shechem, Beer- sheba, Bethel, and Peniel). Yahweh prescribed the tent of meeting (Exod. 40:34-38) and the ark of the covenant (25:10-30) as aids to celebrate his presence. Later, the temple served this purpose (1 Kgs. 8; cf. Ps. 24:7-10). The people eventually took for granted the temple as a symbol of God’s
22 Significant to this thesis, it is interesting to note that this Scripture could be translated as My face will go/dwell with you and settle/comfort you. Given that the current title of this ethnographic project is Bringing Presence: closure and legacy near end of life, it is my opinion that an alternative title could begin Bringing the Face (or Image) of God.
Bringing ‘Presence’ in the New Testament
With the alternative title and understanding of the meaning of ‘Bringing Presence’ as the quest for representing and discerning the ‘face’ or ‘image’ of God, to integrate this into contemporary application for the Church becomes discovery of a way wherein this aids in the understanding of God and His relationship with people today. For this consideration, I point to Scripture from the New Testament, i.e., Romans 8:29 For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren and Colossians 1:15 He is the image of the
presence and wrongly saw it as a guarantee of divine, protective favor (Jer. 7:1-4). The principal biblical word for ‘presence’ is ‘face’ (Heb. pānɩ̂ m [plural]; Gk. prósōpon). Adam and Eve hid from the face (presence) of God (Gen. 3:8); Yahweh promised that his face (presence) would accompany Moses (Exod. 33:14); and the face (presence) of God is the fullness of joy (Ps. 16:11). Whenever displeased with his people, God would withdraw his face or presence (Ezek. 10:18; Ps. 22:1-21 [MT 2-22]). In the NT the presence of God is shaped by the doctrine of the incarnation, that God was made flesh in Jesus Christ. Though he was human (Gal. 4:4-5; Phil. 2:5-11), he was the means of reconciling the world to God (2 Cor. 5:19; cf. John 1:1-18; 20:28; Col. 1:15-20; Heb. 1:1-4) whose glory shone in the face (presence) of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 4:6). God is present also as the Holy Spirit or Paraclete (e.g., John 14:25; Acts 2:1-47) and through angelic messengers (Matt. 1:18-25; Luke 1:26-38; 2:8-20). The ultimate hope for the unmediated presence of God is expressed as the coming (Gk. parousɩ́a, lit., ‘presence’) of Christ (1st Thess. 1:10; 2:19; 3:13; 4:13-5:11). Finally, John envisions the end time when God will be present with his people immediately and forever (Rev. 21:1-4).” R.A. Spencer, Presence, in D. N. Freedman, A. C. Myers, & A. B. Beck, eds., Eerdmans dictionary of the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 2000), 1081.
23 invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. These will be considered in the section following, i.e. “Ministry of Presence: a theology of the image of God and love in action”.
The New Testament Greek word for ‘presence’ used most frequently by Paul the
Apostle and Luke the Physician - and the apostle John as well within the Book of
Revelation - is the noun ἐνώπιον, ĕnōpiŏn. It is used as an adverb and is the composition of the Greek preposition ἐν, en, meaning ‘in’, and ὤψ, ṓps, meaning the eye, face or visage.
The word is used primarily in later Greek to mean ‘face’ or ‘countenance’ and, metaphorically, was used to mean ‘in the presence of.’48
Luke 1:19 records that the angel Gabriel announced that Zacharias’ wife would have a son who would prepare a people ready for the arrival of the Lord. The angel is reported to have said εἰμι Γαβριὴλ ὁ παρεστηκὼς ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ, which in full contextual translation could be I am Gabriel, the one having stood in the presence of or before the face of God.
Similarly, in Matthew 18:10, Christ talks about the face of His Father, God. The Greek word used is πρόσωπον, prósōpon, a neuter noun meaning ‘face,’ ‘countenance,’
.pā·nǎy , ַּפָני presence’ and/or ‘person,’49 similar to the Hebrew‘
Transcendence and Immanence of Presence
It is important to realize that both Old and New Testament Scripture relate the Presence of God as both transcendent (separate) and immanent (close) (e.g. Joshua 2:11; Psalm
48 J.P. Louw and E.A. Nida, Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament: based on semantic domains, Vol. 1, electronic edition of the 2nd edition (New York: United Bible Societies, 1996), 716.
49 Ibid.
24 139:7-10).50 This implies that God is possibly discerned at all times. New Testament
Scriptures such as Acts 10:33, Hebrews 2:12, 1st Thessalonians 3:9, 1st Timothy 6:12-13,
2nd Timothy 2:2, 4:1-2, the declaration by Peter in Acts 2:22-36, et al, reveal that both God and the Church of God, the Body of Christ, are the agencies whereby the awareness and joy of both the transcendent and immanent Presence of God is felt, experienced, known, brought and revealed to the world:
The primary NT manifestation of the presence of God is in Jesus Christ, Immanuel, “God with us” (Matt. 1:23; John 1:14; Heb. 1:1-3). This presence did not end with the death of Christ. The risen Christ appeared to the disciples (John 21:1- 14) and to Paul. Through the apostles, Paul, and the disciples, Christ’s work continued (Acts 1:8; 26:12-18). The Holy Spirit is an important manifestation of the presence of God and continues the redemptive work of God…. The church is called to be a manifestation of God’s presence. That community is fed by the presence of God found in communion between worshiper and God.51
In this case, ‘Bringing Presence’ is a metaphor concerning both self and others in a quest to find, discern and to help others find, discern and remember the Presence of God in the world, i.e., the active and resolving hand of God throughout history, in the continuity of remembered events that prospered both individuals and the larger population. This is a quest for evidence of continuity to be found within accounts of living history, i.e., the testimonials of everyday people, the aged and the dying, as they recount the incidents of life within their memories. That is the reason for the Question found on page 3. As well,
50 Joshua 2:11 When we heard it, our hearts melted and no courage remained in any man any longer because of you; for the LORD your God, He is God in heaven above and on earth beneath.; Psalm 139:7-10 Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? 8) If I ascend to heaven, You are there; If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there. 9) If I take the wings of the dawn, If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, 10) Even there Your hand will lead me, And Your right hand will lay hold of me.
51 W. H. Bellinger, Jr. Presence of God. In C. Brand, C. Draper, A. England, S. Bond, E. R. Clendenen, & T. C. Butler, eds., Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary (Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers, 2003), 1327. 25 that is the significance of the phrase ‘Bringing Presence’: provision of opportunity for those who would help to deliver the comfort intended to bring comfort and help with closure for the elderly and the dying;’ for posterity, the possibility to prosper future generations through reading, i.e. recounting through the ‘legacy’ of life the wisdom and the awareness of Presence found in individual and shared experience.
With that, we consider the ‘Ministry of Presence: a theology of ‘the image of God’ and of love in action.
Ministry of Presence: a theology of ‘the image of God’ and of love in action
Regarding ‘Ministry of Presence,’ I consider the following Scriptures:
God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. (Genesis 1:27)
For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren. (Romans 8:29)
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. (Colossians 1:15)
The pursuit of this thesis, through ethnography, is to accentuate a theology of love in action. These Scriptures point to this love.
In the Old Testament, e.g., Genesis 1:27, we discover that Mankind is made in the image of God. Further clarifying that relationship, the New Testament reveals God’s intent that
His people, those who compose the Church or the Body of Christ spoken of in Romans
8:29, are to be conformed to His image in and through Christ in the expression of the same.
26 Romans 8:29 ends with the word, ἀδελφός, adelphós, ‘brethren’. However, the plural can mean ‘brothers and sisters’52 or any Christian believers. As the incarnate Christ is the image of the invisible God and the elder brother of the children, the members of His Church household are destined to be conformed to that image, to reflect the face of Christ as the image of God to the world. That gives emphasis and context to the love in action spoken of in John 17:26, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.
Although some criticize this as anthropomorphizing God, philosophers and theologians alike point out this is legitimate in that it
is useful in speaking about God, and useful in God’s revelation in the world. … made understandable to us not only through such striking anthropomorphisms as God’s organs and feelings, but also in connection with God’s speaking, seeing, and hearing (He who hears prayers!). Of central importance is what Scripture says to us regarding the living and active God, in the forms and images of active men.53
G.C. Berkouwer finds this meaningful in understanding God, i.e. in this, we see God revealed as One Who “comes and goes, sees and hears and speaks, and in which He reveals
Himself to His people as the living God”54 wherein “His spirituality, freedom and sovereignty, His mercy and compassion, are shown.”55 Herein, we realize it is
impossible for man to seek in man-made things that which he cannot find in man, and which comes to him only through God’s activities, in a constant presence which is vouchsafed to him by God through various human analogies, in anthropomorphic manner, as an irrefutable and comforting reality.56
52 Bauer, Arndt, Danker, 18.
53 G. C. Berkouwer, Man: The Image of God (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing,1962), 79-82.
54 Ibid.
55 Ibid.
56 Ibid.
27 Understanding and experiencing the reality of an interactive relationship with a loving
God is a primary way humanity turns away from visualizing God in humanity’s own image:
The high-handed attempt to control the image of God is per se illegitimate and is in its very origin an act of unmistakable alienation from God. And it is, simultaneously, an act of extreme self-alienation, since man thereby seeks to construct an “image of God,” although he himself, in communion with God, should be that image in all of his being.57
Paul writes that the Body of Christ reflects, as ‘light shining out of darkness’, the light of God found in the face of Christ, who is the image of God. It is the contention of this thesis that this action of reflecting Christ is a fundamental requirement of the transforming relationship of God with humanity as expressed in the Exodus 33 ‘Presence of God’ and the New Testament ‘face’ or image of God, i.e. Christ:
5) For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bondservants for Jesus’ sake. 6) For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. (2 Cor 4:5-6)
It appears from Scripture that the Church is being instructed in a theology concerning a sovereign and loving work of God, i.e. the Presence of Christ, the image of God, with regard to who and what we are to be and become in Christ. As per Romans 8:29, the Church
Body is being conformed to that image for a specific purpose. Through discipleship in the rigors of interaction with others, the Body of Christ is reflecting to others the image of God in Christ through a Ministry of Presence found in inter-personal relationships
It is the contention of this thesis that, within that inter-personal awareness, an ethnographic recording and preservation of histories of the lives of others presents a
Presence of the image of God in Christ as a justified pursuit and a form of ‘love’ in action.
57 Ibid.
28 That Presence is found in the presence of the dispassionate and objective interviewer, i.e., that of reflecting the face or image of Christ within the world, and the love is evident through providing a dignity in dying while helping to influence change within the lives of others in the process. That includes being a light of comfort, closure, legacy and posterity to both the dying and those who will remain, e.g., the family and the readers of the recorded text of the life history.
As will be seen later in the text and appendices of this thesis, this has been achieved through a series of impartial and non-religious interviews with the elderly and those in palliative care.
Contemporary ethnographers and theologians: a sampling review
To demonstrate that others have felt the legitimacy in recording the history or lives of others, I have selected a small sampling of three of those who have contributed to this process of ethnography and, in part, to theology as well, becoming a functional part of research methodology. The primary consideration in this limited review is the contribution to ethnography.
As indicated at the beginning of the chapter, ‘Ethnography’ as a method of qualitative analysis is interested in culture. The process seeks to examine by interview “many individuals who share in the same process, action or interaction… examining shared patterns of behaviours, beliefs and language.”58 For this thesis in which impartial and unbiased interviews is the goal or objective, I employ the ‘life history’ and ‘realist’
58 John Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design: Choosing Among Five Approaches, 2nd edition (London, UK: Sage Publications, 2007), 68.
29 approach to ethnography, traditional approaches of cultural anthropologists.59 The focus is upon recording and reporting
objective data in a measured style uncontaminated by personal bias, political goals and judgement. The researcher may provide mundane details of everyday life among the people studied. The ethnographer also uses standard categories for cultural description (e.g., family life, communication networks, work life, social networks, status systems). The ethnographer produces the participants’ views through closely edited quotations and has the final word on how the culture is interpreted and presented.60
In particular, the interest that spurred this thesis into creation is the awareness that many people of every ethnic group and walk of life are afraid of the unknowns of approaching death: e.g. What is/was my life worth? What will happen to my family? What is/was life all about? Will I ever be able to be forgiven by others? Where am I going?. These are critical, existential, questions. However, from personal experience as a counselor, I have found that others learn best observation of what has worked in life. Therefore, the presentation that follows of three individuals who have contributed to ethnography and theology is intended to illustrate the concern for helping to overcome the fear of death as current and helping to instill comfort and faith in life itself through ethnography or written history as a valid pursuit.
William James: ethnography and religious experience
At the turn of the twentieth century, philosopher, psychologist and theologian William
James pointed to the existential crisis that many people go through as they approach near
59 Ibid., 69.
60 Ibid., 70. 30 end of life,61 a crisis of despair in the thought that life has been a failure and without purpose. He wrote that theologians hold, through personal experience of humiliation and sublime realization, that the deeper sense of life significance is engendered through crisis and hindsight itself:
Failure, then failure! … A process so ubiquitous and everlasting is evidently a part of life. “There is indeed one element in human destiny,” Robert Louis Stevenson writes, “that not blindness itself can convert. Whatever else we are intended to do, we are not intended to succeed; failure is the fate allotted.” And our nature being thus rooted in failure, is it any wonder that theologians should have held it to be essential, and thought that only through the personal experience of humiliation which it engenders the deeper sense of life’s significance is reached?62
James held that the reason or need for the struggles that people go through is not readily understood and that religious experience of faith was a post hoc rationalization. He held that people too often rationalize the presence and disciplining hand of God as an ‘after the fact’ explanation for the events of life:
I believe, in fact, that the logical reason of man operates in this field of divinity exactly as it has always operated in love, or in patriotism, or in politics, or in any other of the wider affairs of life, in which our passions or our mystical intuitions fix our beliefs beforehand. It finds arguments for our convictions, for indeed it has to find them. It amplifies and defines our faith and dignifies it and lends it words and plausibility. It hardly ever engenders it; it cannot now secure it.63
James believed in religious experience but not that it could precede life events nor inform in advance. He pointed to a need for theologians to explain life post hoc - i.e., that rationalization is a process of dealing with difficulty and failure - thus rationalizing
61 William James, Lectures VI and VII: The Sick Soul, Writings: 1902-1910, The Varieties of Religious Experience (London, UK: Longman, Green, and Co, 1903), 138.
62 Ibid.
63 Ibid., 436.
31 religious experience and comfort that is gained to a hindsight belief in the process of God shaping humanity into His image. Ethnography as Theology fits with James’ concept as recording of the events of life, i.e., critical hindsight as social history informs of the immanence of God for both individual and community of faith. As Leland White stated,
“As historical methodology dictates, the weight of the specifiable evidence determines the outcome.”64
Leland J. White: ethnography and the Bible, the social scientific approach
Dr. Leland J. White was one example of the disciplined academic who believed in ethnography as fundamental to understanding the Bible.
In pursuit of his career, White earned his Baccalaureate of Arts at St. Mary’s University in Baltimore, then the Baccalaureate and Licentiate in Theology at the Pontifical Gregorian
University in Rome. He obtained a Master of Arts in Educational Counselling at the
University of Michigan, a Doctor of Law at Seton Hall University and Doctor of
Philosophy at Duke University.
White studied theology in Rome from 1962 to 1966. During his time there, he was influenced by the Second Vatican Council wherein the fundamental human right to freedom of religion was recognized at long last by the Roman Catholic Church. Within that understanding was the recognition that culture is inevitably a major factor in religious understanding and teaching.65
64 L. J. White, Grid and Group in Matthew’s Community: The Righteousness/Honour Code in the Sermon on the Mount. Semeia 35: Social-Scientific Criticism of the New Testament and Its Social World (Atlanta, Georgia: Society of Biblical Literature, 1986), 64, 65.
65 “Sage Journals: Leland J. White: A Biographical Sketch,” accessed January 27, 2017, http:// journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/014610790203200202. 32 Prof. White joined the St. John’s University faculty in 1982. Prior, he was Chair of the
Religious Studies Department, Siena University, where he established and directed the
Reinhold Niebuhr Institute of Religion and Culture.66 In Grid and Group in Matthew’s
Community: The Righteousness/Honour Code in the Sermon on the Mount, White observed that “social and cultural history yields a descriptive account of social relationships that have been mentioned explicitly,”67 claiming that recorded data within Jewish documents might lead to reliability of corresponding data from Christian documents on relationships within each community.
White posited that anthropological interpretation of the Bible not only uses data from social and cultural history, but also adopts methods provided by the social sciences in attempt to reveal the theoretical framework by which the text may be “systematically interpreted and textual interpretations tested. This applies to the biblical world interpretations by comparing them with those interpretations developed in other cultural settings.”68
White identified two primary aspects of the social scientific approach:
(1) cultural meanings which are more often held tacitly than explicitly;
(2) the larger patterns of cultural meaning, also tacit, provide stronger basis for
interpretation than do the individual symbols, symbolic actions and texts.69
66 Ibid.
67 White, 64-65.
68 Ibid.
69 Ibid.
33 White stated that the branch of anthropology that describes specific cultures, i.e. , ethnography, “provides a wealth of data as necessary to the interpreter of texts as lexicography, or the linguistic discipline which defines how an individual word is used in available literature.”70 The ethnographer helps determine the “salient features of a culture by showing how symbols are used in a cultural system which sheds light on their meaning in any given text from that culture.”71
In White’s view, the ethnographer best organizes fieldwork and resultant data into cultural models, models that become working hypotheses creating a “theoretical framework for asking what a text or symbol means within a cultural system,” cultural models intended to validate or disprove interpretations of texts and symbols and to articulate dynamics and values. He stated that interpretation is not complete until all related and relevant cultural details behind the text in consideration have been discovered. He felt that “the relative simplicity of a few cultural models to be applied as working hypotheses is adequate.”72
White taught as courses ‘Introduction to the Bible,’ ‘The Synoptic Gospels’ ‘Jesus in
Christian Thought’ and ‘Interpretation of the Bible’ from 1982 to 1994 while at St. John’s
University in New York.73 Within the scope of his teaching, he focused on the illustration of how societal assumptions about persons and societies are embedded in source materials, e.g., “Mediterranean assumptions embedded in the materials for Christianity, European
70 Ibid.
71 Ibid.
72 Ibid.
73 Ibid.
34 assumptions govern commonly cited modern material sources.”74 White’s objective was to empower “U. S. students to identify U.S. assumptions and cultural patterns and thus rethink and reapply religious tradition to their own situations,”75 an ethic based in ethnography and, I believe, fundamental to understanding any particular community of faith and the psychosocial needs unique to that community.
Mary McClintok Fulkerson: context driven ethnography
Contemporary theologian, Mary McClintock Fulkerson, Professor of Theology at Duke
Divinity School, Durham, North Carolina, points out that ethnography as a part of
Christian theology and ethics is “essential, timely and provocative.”76 She holds that a sound ethic encompasses the “messy realities” of created life, realities that are accessed through participant observation, including ethnography. She writes:
By interpreting the practices of ethnography as “theology and ethics” these worldly realities, in all their complexity, difference and messiness, are thereby granted status as places where the divine presence can and must be discerned and as central to real theology.77
Fulkerson’s view is that the immanence of God,78 “divine presence” in which the divine encompasses or is manifested in the material world, is affirmed and exemplified in the
74 Ibid.
75 Ibid.
76 Christian Scharen and Aana Marie Vigen, Ethnography as Christian Theology and Ethics (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 1998), xi.
77 Ibid.
78 “The literal meaning of the immanence of God is ‘to be within’ or ‘near’ in relation to God's creation. Immanence is closely related to God's omnipresence, in that God is always present within the universe, though distinct from it. God is ‘within’ the universe in that God is its sustaining cause.” Norman Geisler, Systematic Theology: Volume 2: God, Creation (Bloomington, MN: Bethany House, 2003), 527. 35 incarnational nature of Christianity.79 To put the immanence of God within context and perspective, and vivified as a comforting influence in the lives of the people of God, a
Christian theology and ethic “requires the honouring of the finitely good creation in all its ambiguity, brokenness and potential redemption.”80
Fulkerson points out that liberationist theologies have long argued for the context- driven character of all theology81 and that specific forms of social brokenness should be privileged as the generative sides of theological reflection, for “this is the substance of context that shapes worldview and its embeddedness in power dynamics and social interests.”82
Regardless of when or in what order the experience of comfort comes, whether an a priori ‘before faith’ awareness, before a trial is endured and faith comes by hindsight and awareness of providence, or an after-the-trial matter-of-fact awareness of the immanence of God’s Presence, it is still comfort. Once a person feels comforted, that person begins to feel safe and, with safety, anxiety begins to diminish. A caring ‘presence’ providing comfort, and a vehicle of closure, is a positive event and, I believe, a necessary part of presenting the image of Christ to the world. It helps to remove the anxiety of separation and the despair of failure, of meaninglessness, that terrifies many on the approach of death.
This requires an examination of the nature of faith, a subject we will take up in Chapter 2.
79 Scharen, Vigen, xi.
80 Ibid.
81 Ibid.
82 Ibid. 36 Summary: ethnography and theology within this thesis
Given that ethnographic writings have influenced the understanding of life as well as
Scripture, I decided to pursue an ethnographic approach as methodology for this thesis project. As such, I have presented a sample of scholars who have applied ethnography as theology within their field of endeavor. The common factor is that context-driven understanding of culture. Such understanding requires hindsight perspective of the inhabitants of the culture. In the principal view of ethnography, that is obtained best through interviews with the actual participants and witnesses to events.
One of the key steps in ethnography is the discerning of the group to study. Creswell states:
Typically, the group is one that has been together for an extended period of time, so that their shared language patterns of behaviour and attitudes have merged into a discernable pattern. This may also be a group that has been marginalized by society. Because ethnographers spend time talking with and observing this group, access may require finding one or more individuals in the group who will allow the researcher in - a gatekeeper or key informants.83
It is intended that direction and wisdom gained from this process of unbiased interview and reproduction, available to any elder or person in palliative care, can help establish a core group of trained volunteer ethnographers willing to bring the Presence of God in a discipline designed to facilitate the four goals, i.e., comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and, from hindsight, helps answer the Question of whether or not people can see the hand of
God’s Presence in life. Hopefully, this will become a foregone conclusion in terms of positive awareness for future generations.
83 Creswell, 70.
37 A positive awareness may, through the understanding of precipitating historical factors such as cause and consequence, help avoid a recurrence of historically negative events.
This has the potential to pave the way for proactive change and growth toward the positive in general for society, including with regard to the societal impact of ensuring the proper treatment for the aged and those in palliative care.
Historically Negative vs Positive Resolve
Colossians 3:6 warns that the wrath of God will come upon the sons of disobedience.84
It is the author’s opinion that the current habit of abandoning elders to the loneliness and fear found in impending death is a historically negative development of culture AND is disobedient and unacceptable in the eyes of God.
Constituting a positive resolution through hindsight backed resolve, the contention is that to help comfort the elderly and the dying is a necessity essential to please God. This can include: assisting with closure by offering constructive hindsight and self-worth; helping the dying reconcile with others and with life in general; presenting a legacy both to the families of the interviewed and for posterity itself.
It is through the collected stories of what has passed in the lives of those who are interviewed, and the memory of victories gained over adversity, that we avoid the same errors over and over and, I contend, that is wisdom. I believe that not to do so is to offer neglect tantamount to the spiritual condition and lack of accurate teaching that Christ our
Lord warns against in Matthew 15: 4-9, i.e.,
84 Cf: Romans 1:18; 1 Thessalonians 2:16; Revelation 15:7; 19:15. 38 4) “For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘He who speaks evil of father and mother is to be put to death.’ 5) “But you say, ‘Whoever says to his father or mother, “Whatever I have that would help you has been given to God,” 6) he is not to honor his father or his mother.’ And by this you invalidated the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7) “You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you: 8) “This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. 9) ‘But in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.’”
This thesis project will attempt to counter that neglect, to honour God by doing what He asks with respect to elders, and to train others willing to do so as well. It is intended to offer comfort near end of life for both elderly and those in palliative care. It is one small and simple study, a step toward reconciling the situation by promoting the capture of living history, i.e., the wisdom of the aged and the dying, and to help recover the knowledge of
‘living correctly’ (posterity) with an active ‘first love.’ That is the reason one area of focus in Chapter 2 is upon the nature of ‘love’ itself, putting others first, as exemplified in this thesis as doing what is right, i.e., in creating a foundation of comfort, closure, legacy and posterity through promotion of the collecting of wisdom found in life by examining the hindsight of the elders, the mothers and fathers of our continued existence.
It is accurate to say that the people of Christ are the agency to bear and bring the
Presence or image of God to the world and that this is integral to the message and requirement of Christ. As proposed in this chapter, it appears compatible for past, present and future society and may include, even demand, offering a recording ‘Presence’ of Christ to the dying to extract a living history for comfort and posterity.
As with preserved Biblical knowledge, by looking back on a life history, people may be blessed with understanding and confirmation that life in the face of disappointment still holds meaning, that all lives have value and that we are interdependent upon each other for wisdom and growth, as knots in a fishing net are interdependent, to work effectively.
39 Concluding Thoughts
The members of Christ’s Body and those who are to present Him to the world, are important to God’s purpose of educating to survive by making mistakes and overcoming those mistakes. That knowledge permits ‘rest,’ a comfort that people need. Moses was told that ‘the Presence of God would go with him and give rest.’
I believe that mirroring the glory that emanates from the face of Christ is the primary way in which we find the rest found in what is pleasing to the Lord. One aspect of this is in doing our duty to others by fulfilling the prime Commandment from the Christ, i.e. Matt
7:12: In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
The contention of this thesis is that this prime Commandment, summing up the Law and the Prophets, obviously includes care for elders and the dying, e.g.: ministry of visitation; providing solace, comfort in allaying fear of impending physical death; facilitating reconciliation and closure; helping others understand in and through hindsight their personal worth and value to society; formatting and providing a legacy for individual families and posterity at large through the discovery, recording and maintaining of life stories as living history.
This brings the work to the end of Chapter 1. Chapter 2 is intended to form and clarify the theoretical foundation for this study, including a biblical exploration of relevant topics to assist in understanding the work and love of God.
40 CHAPTER 2: Theoretical Foundations
This chapter will form the theoretical foundation for this study, including a biblical exploration of relevant topics to assist in understanding the work and love of God.
A principle I follow in biblical exegesis is to allow the Bible to interpret the Bible.85
When translated as an ethical life lesson, that principle corresponds to care and concern for the elderly and the dying, i.e. to allow life to interpret life. To do so in accord with a
Christian ethic requires an act of belief in and obedience to Christ’s direction as found in
Scripture - i.e., an awareness of ‘a priori’ ethics such as in a written history of cause and consequence.
A primary question for this project was the theory or meaning for doing this thesis as a work of God. For the theoretical consideration, I also wanted to know if love is a work of
God and if the Bible teaches that this work is necessary for life.
First, in theory, what is the need for accurate knowledge of the work of God? One of the primary needs is historic: as befits the definition of posterity, we need to become aware of and keep alive the evidence and knowledge of what work has gone before for the good
85 “Article XVII: WE AFFIRM the unity, harmony and consistency of Scripture and declare that it is its own best interpreter. WE DENY that Scripture may be interpreted in such a way as to suggest that one passage corrects or militates against another. We deny that later writers of Scripture misinterpreted earlier passages of Scripture when quoting from or referring to them. Explaining Hermeneutics: A Commentary on the Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics. (Oakland, California: International Council on Biblical Inerrancy, 1983). Two points are made in the Affirmation, the unity of Scripture and its self-interpreting ability. Since the former is treated elsewhere (Article XXI), we will comment on the latter here. Not only is the Bible always correct in interpreting itself (see Article XVIII), but it is the ‘best interpreter’ of itself.” “Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics,” accessed July 8, 2015, http://www. bible- researcher.com/chicago2.html.
41 of those who will come after. To prevent harm, we need to recognize what the work of God is, what good and evil are and how they relate to the work of God. Perhaps that may be seen in the hindsight realization of hateful destruction that has occurred in history. One
Christian hermeneutic asserts that destruction is a well-established work of God Himself within the sphere of judgement.86 However, it is as well-established that humans have the free will capacity to hate and to become destructive as well.
The genocidal threat to society irreducibly is that others can become homicidal in an ethic of hate when they are convinced that ‘the other’ is blocking their path and therefore that other does not deserve to live. It is a too well recognized reality that humankind is noted for its relative morality, systemic brutality and repeated attempts at genocide when the group-think of racism87 or nationalistic ethnocentricity88 becomes involved. However, as I intend to show, this is not in tune with the primary work of God that He expects from
86 Isaiah 45:7 The One forming light and creating darkness, Causing well-being and creating calamity; I am the LORD who does all these; 2 Peter 2:12-13 But these, like unreasoning animals, born as creatures of instinct to be captured and killed, reviling where they have no knowledge, will in the destruction of those creatures also be destroyed, 13 suffering wrong as the wages of doing wrong. Cf. Leviticus 27:28; Numbers 24:20,24; Deuteronomy 32:24; 1 Kings 20:42; Ezra 9:14; Esther 8:6; Isaiah 10:25; 28:22; 34:5; 47:11; 51:19; Jeremiah 4:6, 27; 5:10, 18; Ezekiel 5:16; 21:31; 32:9; Daniel 9:27; 11:16; Hosea 7:13; 9:6; 13:9; Joel 1:15; Amos 5:9; Obadiah 12; Michael 1:1; 2:10; 6:16; Habakkuk 1:3; Zephaniah 1:15; Matthew 7:13 Romans 3:16; 1st Thessalonians 5:3; 2nd Thessalonians 1:9; 2nd Peter 2:6,12; 3:7,16; Revelation 17:8,11.
87 “Racism is the belief that a particular race is superior or inferior to another, that a person’s social and moral traits are predetermined by his or her inborn biological characteristics. Racial separatism is the belief, most of the time based on racism, that different races should remain segregated and apart from one another.” “Race and Racial Justice: Racism, definition of,” accessed July 8, 2015, http://archive.adl.org/hate-patrol/racism.html#.VeDzp-TltPY.
88 “Ethnocentricity: noun, 1. Sociology. the belief in the inherent superiority of one's own ethnic group or culture. 2.a tendency to view alien groups or cultures from the perspective of one's own.” “Ethnocentrism,” accessed July 8, 2015, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/ ethnocentricity.
42 us, and that the work He does expect is not found in an ethic of prejudice - that is, the unjust isolation, exclusion nor systemic removal of others.
Prejudice
It is too readily observed that prejudice injects regularly into life as hate and affects the well being of many. A.C. Myers commented on the biblical definition of hate as
aversion or hostility. Biblical usage represents a broad range of nuances from intense malice to simple disregard as expressed between individuals and groups and between God and mankind. According to the Old Testament, hatred may stem from wickedness (Ps. 26:5), ill will (25:19), apostasy (101:3), or political differences (Dan. 4:19 [MT 16]). The wicked hate those who are righteous (Prov. 29:10), just as the righteous hate those who sin (e.g., Ps. 119:113, 163). In its most intense expression, hatred connotes deliberation and intent (Num. 35:20; cf. Deut. 4:42; 19:4ff.; RSV “enmity”).89
The mindset of prejudice can manifest as murderous abuse intended to enslave or eliminate whole populations. It is neither unknown nor uncommon in history and this past century is no exception, e.g., in the slave trade of the past and present,90 in wars small and large, in the murderous arrogance of the Nazi regime and the concept of eugenics and racial purification that contributed to World War II,91 resulting in the unparalleled death of over an estimated 3% of the 1940 world population of 2.3 billion,92 including 6 million Jews,
89 A.C. Myers, The Eerdmans Bible Dictionary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1987), 466.
90 “According to the U.S. Department of State’s 2007 Trafficking in Persons report, there are 800,000 people trafficked across international borders every year.” “Slavery, Top 7 Facts about Modern Day,” accessed July 8, 2015, http://borgenproject.org/seven-facts-modern-day-slavery/.
91 Stephen B. Saetz, Marian Van Court, and Mark W. Henshaw Eugenics and the Third Reich, accessed July 8, 2015, http://www.eugenics.net/papers/3rdreich.html.
92 “The Guardian View,” accessed February 2, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/comment isfree/2016/nov/01/war-hell-for-natural-world-battle-atlantic-guillemot-population-95-per-cent.
43 over 15 million soldiers and at least 45 million civilians plus the wounding of 25 million more.93 Add to this contemporary examples such as recent ethnic cleansing of the Serbs versus the Croats94 and the genocidal in-fighting between the Tutsi and Hutu populations of Rwanda, et al.95 These are just a few examples of recent cultural genocide. It becomes obvious this ethic of hate is always evident within our world and touches every generation.
It seems a sad commentary on society that prejudice and abuse exist. Well is it said that the heart of our people is continuously wicked (Jeremiah 17:9; Mark 7:21).
Another abuse is the prejudicial attitude and treatment of the elderly that manifests socially as a lack of respect for life, to the extent that certain medical practitioners and social theorists have become comfortable with the notion that it is preferable, even profitable, to euthanize the elderly once care becomes difficult or prohibitively expensive for families and/or caregivers of the elderly. This abuse is referred to as ‘ageism.’96
93 “Research Starters: Worldwide deaths in WWII,” accessed February 2, 2017, http://www. nationalww2museum.org/learn/education/for-students/ww2-history/ww2-by-the-numbers/world- wide-deaths.html.
94 “In April 1992, the government of the Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina declared its independence from Yugoslavia. Over the next several years, Bosnian Serb forces, with the backing of the Serb-dominated Yugoslav army, targeted both Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) and Croatian civilians for atrocious crimes resulting in the deaths of some 100,000 people (80 percent Bosniak) by 1995. It was the worst act of genocide since the Nazi regime’s destruction of some 6 million European Jews during World War II.” “Bosnian Genocide,” accessed July 8, 2015, http:// www.history.com/topics/bosnian-genocide.
95 “The Conflict Between the Tutsi and the Hutu,” accessed June 18, 2017, https://www. mtholyoke.edu/~gallo22e/classweb/Website-World%20Politics/History.html.
96 “A new survey concludes that so many Canadians look down on seniors that ageism has become the most tolerated form of social discrimination in Canada. A poll of 1,500 Canadians found eight in ten believe seniors age 75 and older are seen as less important and are more ignored than younger generations.” “CTV News: Ageism widespread in Canada,” accessed May 8, 2015, http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/ageism-widespread-in-canada-survey-finds-1.1021641; “Ageism can be described as a social attitude, a way of looking at older people that stereotypes them, often as weak, frail, and disabled. Many people note that as they grow older and reach certain age milestones, (such as age 65), younger people begin to treat them differently - in many cases, treating 44 Ageism
Ageism has presented a major social anxiety to the aging. For an extreme example, a
2011 edition of a major media publication in the United Kingdom, The Telegraph, made specific reference to the 70,000-member Dutch Patients’ Association where at least 6,000 have living will declarations and carry cards stating that they do not want euthanasia before natural death if taken into hospital or a nursing home.97 It is incomprehensible to this researcher that such a prospect should even become a consideration. However, history has proven humankind can foster destruction when the ethic of hate supersedes an ethic of love.
That leads to the question of what is a biblical or accurate understanding of ‘love’?
older people as ‘less’— less valued, less capable, etc. Conversely, ageism may also involve positive stereotypes and myths of aging, when people assume all older people are wise. Robert Butler coined the word ‘ageism’ in 1968, writing, ‘Ageism allows the younger generations to see older people as different than themselves; they subtly cease to identify with their elders as human beings.’ Ageism includes the wide range of attitudes that prevent people from accurately assessing and responding to the social problems and conditions of older adults, and may be reflected in discriminatory practices in housing, employment, and services. The Ontario Human Rights Commission describes ageism as ‘a tendency to structure society based on an assumption that everyone is young, thereby failing to respond appropriately to the real needs of older persons.’ Negative attitudes towards older persons stem from myths about aging, the aging process, and being old. Ageism often intersects with and can be reinforced by other kinds of discriminations such as racism, sexism, and ‘able-bodied-ism’ (where preference or greater social value is given to people who do not have impairments or disabling conditions).” “Ageism,” accessed July 15, 2015, http://cnpea.ca/ageism.pdf.
97 “Elderly people in the Netherlands are so fearful of being killed by doctors that they carry cards saying they do not want euthanasia, according to a campaigner who says allowing assisted suicide in Britain would put the vulnerable at risk.” Martin Beckford, Health Correspondent, para. 11-12, The Telegraph, April 21, 2011, accessed July 10, 2015, http://www.telegraph.co.uk.
45 Ethic of Love: ‘other-person centeredness’
Matthew 22:34-40 records Christ telling the Jews of the Law that we are to love God and one another in a specific fashion.98
But when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered themselves together. 35) One of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, 36) “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37) And He said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38) “This is the great and foremost commandment. 39) “The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40) “On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”
Addressing legalist Jewish enquirers,99 Christ stated that the two central
Commandments of Hebrew Law were hinge points upon which depend (or ‘hang’100) the prime directive of the Law and the Prophets. To the disciples, however, Christ revealed the deeper mysteries of God, e.g., that which constitutes the full nature of the Law and the
Prophets101 in what has become known as The Royal Law102 found in Matthew 7:12:
98 Cf. Mark 12:30-31; Luke 10:27.
99 Matthew 22:37-39.
100 “NT:2910 kremannumi; a prolonged form of a primary verb; to hang.” Biblesoft's New Exhaustive Strong's Numbers and Concordance with Expanded Greek-Hebrew Dictionary (Seattle, WA: Biblesoft and International Bible Translators, Inc., 1994).
101 Jesus declared that the two greatest commandments are ‘to love God with all our hearts’, and ‘to love our neighbor as ourselves.’ In Matthew 7:12, it is recorded that Jesus said Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. In regard to our neighbor, our Lord said that we should ‘treat others as we would want others to treat us.’ Jesus’ teaching declares that the entire Bible could be encapsulated into the important principle of being loving, kind, merciful, generous, considerate, forgiving, etc., towards others. This Royal Law of Love summarizes the way God would have people to live as Christians, or followers of Christ. As we practice loving others as ourselves, we will be keeping the other commandments as well. “The Royal Law of Love,” accessed February 11, 2017, https://yehuda fm.wordpress.com/ 2012/03/09/the-royal-law-of-love/; cf. Luke 6:31; Jn. 13:34,35; 1 Corinthians 13:13.
102 In accord with James 2:8 If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. Cf. Luke 6:31.
46 In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
Christ pronounced this singular ‘other person centred’ concept to be the full measure of the Law and the Prophets: the encompassing summation of all that the Christ, as pre- incarnate Word of God (John 1:1-5; Revelation 19:3), had instructed in the Law and the
Prophets over the millennia prior to that pronouncement. Logically, as the summation of the Law and the Prophets, it would become the new prime Commandment, carrying more weight biblically than all others. It would constitute an a priori understanding that clarifies in a practical application all biblical instruction prior to its inception, including the two
Commandments of the Law most often quoted. This biblical injunction becomes a life ethic for this thesis project and theory, the ethic that Christ referred to as the summary of all taught prior to His pronouncement regarding The Royal Law, an ethic without which the elderly and dying might more quickly perish, as might we all.
The work spoken of by Christ as the ultimate ethical consideration for life turns out to be a selfless ‘other person centred’ action. This would mean that, by taking upon Himself
(His own plan and process: John 3:35; 10:17-18) the cruel death of crucifixion (along with the subsequent victorious resurrection offering to humankind the door to eternal life),
Christ demonstrated the epitome of what it means to sacrificially treat others the way we would want to be treated. If we believe what Christ has taught in both word and action, we come to believe that selflessness, self-sacrifice and the result as displayed in the life, death and resurrection of Christ is important to God.
Such a notion certainly appears to be the antithesis of much of what occurs as belief systems in contemporary society. All too often, these systems are manifested in the
47 objectification and dehumanization of people into ‘things’ of which disposal is permitted, i.e. continued isolation, marginalization, even victimization of at least two elements of the weakest of our society: the aged and the dying.
With that in mind, I think a closer look at the concept of the work of God in Christ is warranted if we are to understand the process of meeting the psychosocial needs of the aged and the dying. To keep alive a mosaic of civilization as a nurturing whole, perhaps we need to understand the psychosocial needs and record for posterity the living record of the pieces of that mosaic. Otherwise, we could continually commit the same errors.
At this point, I wish to consider what Scripture defines as the work of God and its dynamic significance. What is it that God commands regarding work?
Significance of the work of God
There are several Scriptures regarding the work of God, e.g., Psalm 64:9; Ecclesiastes
7:13, 8:17; John 6:29; Romans 14:20. In considering the practical application of God’s work, it can be posited that pleasing God is primary. What motivated me to pursue this thesis project and to relate the concept of ‘Bringing Presence’ was Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, chapter 5, verses 6-10, wherein Paul exhorts the followers of Christ necessarily to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Verse 6 instructs:
Now you are Light in the Lord; walk as children of Light (for the fruit of the Light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth), trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord.
In the foregoing Scripture, one emphasis in ‘pleasing the Lord’ rests with the idea of being Light in the Lord. The Book of John records Christ as saying, This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world… (3:19), and he who practices the truth comes to the
48 Light so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God. (3.21) Referring to His own life as that Light, Christ said I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in darkness but will have the Light of life. (8:12)
Two verbs in John 3:21 intrigued me - ‘practices’ and ‘having been wrought.’ The Greek for ‘practices’ is ποιωv, poiōn, a present, active, singular, nominative, masculine form of the verb ποιέω, poiéō, meaning ‘to produce something material, make, manufacture’ and
‘to do, perform, cause to be, work, make, behave toward, assign a task, make profit’103 and so on. I understand this to mean that we are to do something productive in accord with what Christ directs, e.g., practicing truth, in order to come to the light in God.
The verb structure of ‘having been wrought’ is a combination of two verbs in Greek: first, ἐστιν, estin, ‘having been’, a present, active, indicative, third person, singular form of the infinitive εἰμί, eimí, ‘to be’; and second, ειργασμένα, eirgasména, ‘wrought, done, worked,’ being the perfect, passive, plural, nominative, neuter form of the verb ἐργάζομαι,
“to engage in activity that involves effort, work, …be active.”104 Together, they point both to the integral need found in an individual’s work and to the origin of the person’s work - that work is to be from need found outside of the person and actually ‘wrought in’ or produced within the will of God. Since this specific work is integral to what God expects, it contributes to the theoretical foundation for this project. But, specifically, what work does God expect?
103 Bauer, Arndt, Danker, 691.
104 Ibid. 49 The work of God: simply believing Christ
In Matthew 15 and 23, Christ’s disdain for the legalistic practices of certain religious leaders is evident. Matthew 15:1 relates that some Pharisees and teachers of the law complained that the disciples were breaking the tradition of the elders by not washing their hands before eating. Verses 3 to 9 record a poignant response from Christ: He asked them to explain the reason they were transgressing the command of God for the sake of their tradition; i.e., God had commanded, Honor your father and mother… (one of the first
Scriptures to be considered for this thesis), and He who speaks evil of father or mother is to be put to death, yet certain religious practice at the time was in direct opposition to this command. Christ said that some of the traditions they followed were not from God and, in fact, were hypocritical.
Christ negated the notion that blind observance of religious tradition or practice represents what is pleasing to God. Matthew 23:16, 17, 19, 24, 26 records for posterity that
He called the hypocritical leaders τυφλοὶ, typhloí, blind: people “unable to understand, incapable of comprehending, people of mental and spiritual blindness”105 concerning the more important matters of the law - justice, mercy and faithfulness (Matthew 23:23).
In John 6:27-29, Christ taught that pleasing God is found in one particular work:
Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you, for on Him the Father, God, has set His seal 28 Therefore they said to Him, ‘What shall we do, so that we may work the works of God?’ 29 Jesus answered them, ‘This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent.
105 Ibid.
50 Scripture pointedly states the work of God is simply to believe Christ! If this saying was not recorded in writing, it is possible we would be enslaved still to tyrants and traditions.
Enlightenment regarding work
Discovering what the work of God is, per se, has enlightened me in terms of understanding what is necessary to please God. According to Scripture, it does not come from being overly involved in traditions and ways of the world nor of being consumed with religious practice. As a practical metaphor for the proper work, John 9:1-5 records:
1) As He passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. 2) And His disciples asked Him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?’ 3) Jesus answered, ‘It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.’ 4) We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can work. 5) While I am in the world, I am the Light of the world.
In the short life story found in the rest of John 9, a formerly blind man confesses belief in Christ: a visual description of what it is to do the work of God, i.e., to believe Christ.
To believe is to do: in other words, our belief is demonstrated by doing what Christ instructed. Further, in obedience to Christ, His followers communicate testimony of what they have heard and experienced in Him. For this project, that understanding undergirds the premise to honor elders by memorializing their experience for posterity.
Scripturally, it can be argued that memory of experience is the substance of faith (see page 53), i.e., hope realized, evidence of what was overcome against the odds.106 This is the same evidence intended to become the substance of testimony: the life histories to be gleaned from those who are elderly and those who are dying.
106 Hebrews 11:1-2.
51 Theory behind the practical need: the work of God in a community of faith
The concept of euthanasia is a hot potato in current society. I submit that such ideas arise when there is a poor understanding of the work of God and belief in Christ.
Alternatively, the theory behind the work described in this thesis centers upon the work of
God: in particular, Christ’s instruction with respect to life, a respect in this case demonstrated and perpetuated in recording the words of lives lived for the benefit of succeeding generations. Therefore, the psychosocial need for dignity in life for everyone, with focus on the aged and dying for posterity, is the central focus and, as per Chapter 1, is in accord with Scripture. I present it as an essential concept to understand concretely a specific work of God in the context of dignity.
Preserving Dignity
There is evidence that caregivers the world over make the effort to honor the dignity of life by providing comfort for the dying as they approach a natural death. I found this attitude in Mont St. Joseph, Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, the care home that collaborated with me in the development of this project. This is discussed in Chapter 3.
However, it appears to me that relatively few are making the effort to preserve the living history of everyone for posterity, for the good of generations to come, from the point of view that life is good and has meaning that continues after death. Those who do make the effort are involved in the ‘provocative’107 genre of ethnography (see chapter 3):
What is provocative, then, about this project is the push to recognize how Christian theology and ethics have crucial stakes in places where they rarely if ever go. Indeed, it is precisely the failure to attend to such places that allows some theological work to continue to reproduce power differences even as it invokes
107 See Chapter 1, 35.
52 high-minded doctrinal and ethical conclusions. Christian theology and ethics have never been - at least in the acknowledged sense - about simply repeating the past or had as their primary stated goal the reproduction of a religious institution, or the museum-like preservation of the past. The explicit and Christian theological reflection at its best has been discernment of God’s living presence in contemporary situations. “Ethnography as Christian Theology and Ethics” is a wonderful and provocative example of theologians’ and ethicists’ ability to discern this living presence. It invites us to discern this presence in new ways - theology cannot continue to be “texts about texts” - and it challenges us to receive from the many wisdoms and challenges that are in (non-academic) places.108
This thesis is about the establishment of both a simple, practical process and a registered charitable educational institute created to help meet the ethnographic need of engendering and propagating that process. Undergirding this project is the belief that the work of God includes a community of faith in enhancing such a view point without twisting arms and coercing others to do so - rather, making the process available and convincing.
The substance of ‘faith’ in community
At this stage, I want to gain a clarification of what faith entails biblically, in what way that faith applies to the theory of this project and what form of work it would require to proactively perpetuate that faith: considerations that are an integral part of the rationale for this project.
Humanists like to say faith is blind, a belief in nothing.109 The humanist atheist and sceptic, Bertrand Russel, wrote:
108 Scharen, Vigen, xiv-xv.
109 “Brainy Quote: Richard Dawkins,” accessed August 17, 2015, https://www.brainyquote .com/search_results?q=richard+dawkins+faith.
53 We may define faith as a firm belief in something for which there is no evidence... Where there is evidence, no one speaks of 'faith'… We only speak of faith when we wish to substitute emotion for evidence.110
I challenge that opinion as narrow thinking too common for the morally relative who, through a predisposition to reject reference to God, refuse to accept from evidence of day- to-day life that we can both see and understand the evidence, the existential proof of God, that faith entails. To negate the concept of faith for posterity is another reason to refuse to accept need for accurate history. However, acceptance of the premise of posterity begs that truth may best be served within the hindsight and foresight of written and objectively factual historical record.
Contrary to popular tradition, the Bible does not teach that faith is blind. Rather,
Scripture stipulates faith is a substance, an evidence, left behind from ‘hope’ having been fulfilled or realized. It is that faith, that personal record by hindsight, that arises and gives the Christian a positive life story as testimony to God. In the Greek for Hebrews 11:1,
Ἔστιν δὲ πίστις ἐλπιζομένων ὑπόστασις, πραγμάτων ἔλεγχος οὐ βλεπομένων, the two nouns
ὑπόστασις, substance, and ἔλεγχος, evidence, permit the English translation as Faith is the substance111 of things hoped for, the assurance/evidence of things not seen.112 When we
110 Bertrand Russell, Chapter 7, Pt 2, Human Society in Ethics and Politics (London: G. Allen and Unwin, 1954), 215.
111 “ὑπόστασις [hupostasis /hoop·os·tas·is/] n f. From a compound of 5259 and 2476; TDNT 8:572; TDNTA 1237; GK 5712; Five occurrences; AV translates as ‘confidence’ twice, ‘confident’ once, ‘person’ once, and ‘substance’ once. 1 a setting or placing under. 1A thing put under, substructure, foundation. 2 that which has foundation, is firm. 2A that which has actual existence. 2A1 a substance, real being. 2B the substantial quality, nature, of a person or thing. 2C the steadfastness of mind, firmness, courage, resolution. 2C1 confidence, firm trust, assurance.” Strong, Concordance, #5287
112 “ἐλεγμός, ἔλεγχος [elegchos /el·eng·khos/] n m. From 1651; TDNT 2:476; TDNTA 221; GK 1791 and 1793; Two occurrences; AV translates as ‘reproof’ once, and ‘evidence’ once. 1 a proof, that by which a thing is proved or tested. 2 conviction.” Ibid, #1650
54 become aware of something that works, that is valid and thereafter works consistently or reliably, it becomes factual and contextual evidence of truth, not of emotion.113
In the context of this project, I draw attention to the fact that faith spoken of in Scripture is witnessed as an experiential trust. It is drawn from objective experience and reason, a remembered record, evidence of how individuals and communities survived and of how hope was fulfilled, i.e. the assurance/substance of what becomes personal testimony of experience in overcoming and, therefore again, does not substitute emotion for evidence.
Referencing the work of Henry Blackaby,114 Rev. Dr. Charles Price of the People’s
Church in Toronto, Canada, stated in the sermon series titled Knowing God:
God reveals Himself in Scripture experientially. That is, we know God by our experience of God. He doesn't simply give us a catalog of facts but rather He reveals himself primarily in Scripture in his relationships with people and his actions amongst people. We will never be satisfied with knowing about God: we are satisfied only with our experience of God.115
That experience of God is our record or testimony and it is existential, i.e., that by which we will continue to live, believe and overcome, for we are convinced that …without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that
He is a rewarder of those who seek Him (Hebrews 11:6). That motivational understanding is gleaned from Scripture and Scripture is a written record of faith experience.
113 Brett Pelham and Hart Blanton, ‘Chapter 3: Moving from Fact to Truth: Validity, Reliability, and Measurement,’ Conducting Research in Psychology: Measuring the Weight of Smoke, Fourth Edition (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage, 2013), 69.
114 Henry and Richard Blackaby and Claude King Experiencing God: Knowing and Doing the Will of God (Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2008).
115 Charles Price, series Knowing God by Experience, accessed on February 27, 2011 (Toronto: Living Truth Productions), program 3.
55 To conclude regarding ‘faith,’ those who have found it know indisputably what and when it is. It has an extrinsic purpose and encompasses many areas of written history, e.g. according to the Good News116 of the Apostolic elders as they moved in a Ministry of
Presence117 that shaped the modern thinking of who and what we are in our world.118 It extends teleologically past the Apostle John on the Isle of Patmos and his testimony regarding future events119 and continues on through modern times as we bear testimony to observable truth. It is in that testimony that there is the reason for the ‘Question’ of this thesis regarding hindsight awareness of providential Presence in life. Tolstoy captured it eloquently in a faith statement when he declared that faith alone possesses answers to the existential question:
Since mankind has existed, wherever life has been, there also has been the faith that gave the possibility of living. Faith is the sense of life, that sense by virtue of which man does not destroy himself…. It is the force whereby we live. If man did not believe that he must live for something, he would not live at all. The idea of an infinite God, of the divinity of the soul, of the union of men’s actions with God - these are ideas elaborated in the infinite secret depths of human thought… ideas without which there would be no life, without which I myself … would not exist. I
116 “εὐαγγέλιον, ου n: (derivative of εὐαγγελίζω ‘to tell the good news,’ 33.215) the content of good news (in the NT a reference to the gospel about Jesus) -‘the good news, the gospel.’ οὐ γὰρ ἐπαισχύνομαι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον ‘for I am not ashamed of the gospel’ Ro 1:16. In a number of languages, the expression ‘the gospel’ or ‘the good news’ must be rendered by a phrase, for example, ‘news that makes one happy,’ ‘information that causes one joy,’ ‘words that bring smiles’ or ‘a message that causes the heart to be sweet.’” Louw-Nida, Greek-English Lexicon.
117 Presence and Ministry of Presence are capitalized throughout when referring specifically to the ‘face’ of God.
118 Acts 17:28 for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, 'For we also are His children.'
119 Revelation 12:10-11 Now the salvation, and the power, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, he who accuses them before our God day and night. 11) And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they did not love their life even when faced with death.
56 began to see that I had no right to rely on my individual reasoning and neglect these answers given by faith, for they are the only answers to the question.120
For purpose of this thesis, faith is that which is necessary to overcome the primary angst of life, the anxiety spoken of in Hebrews 2:14,15, i.e., the cardinal and primal fear of death.
Overcoming the fear of Death
Hebrews 2:14-15 14) Since then the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil; 15) and might deliver those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives.
Hebrews 2:14-15 points to the fear of death121 as a primal and root fear, an apprehension that keeps humanity enslaved throughout life, or in bondage as other translations read. For a topical example, Western culture appears all too prone to focus on and adulate the appearance of youth, of trying to stay young. Speaking on the issue of idolatry of youth culture in worship, the Rev. Isaac Wardell of Trinity Presbyterian Church, Charlottesville,
Virginia122 made this comment:
120 William James, ‘Chapter 1: The Varieties of Religious Experience: Lecture VIII, The Divided Self, and the Process of Its Unification,’ Writings:1902-1910, 6th edition (New York: Penguin Putnam, 1987), 171.
121 William Bates, D.D. The four last things: namely, death, judgment, heaven and hell, practically considered and applied in several discourses, improved edition (London: George Virtue, 1839), 8.
122 “Wardell founded Bifrost Arts in 2008 ‘to enrich the Church and engage the world with beauty and truth through music beautiful enough that non-Christians are attracted to it.’ Since 2008, he has become a prominent speaker on the subject of worship and music, teaching and leading worship alongside Louie Giglio, David Crowder, Francis Chan, and Rob Bell, among others. In 2011, Relevant Magazine named him one of North America's ‘foremost leaders in modern worship music.’ He is a graduate of Covenant College, Lookout Mountain, Georgia.” “Jango: Isaac Wardell…Bio,” accessed July 12, 2017, http://www.jango.com/music/Isaac+Wardell+Mason+ Neely /_ full_bio.
57 I see congregations where there is such an attachment to all of the entrapments of youth in America and this fundamental belief that we're not going to get old or that we can be both old and young at the same time.123
“All men are mortal” wrote Simone de Beauvoir, and “… become old: almost none ever foresees the state before it is upon him. Nothing should be more expected than old age: nothing is more unforeseen.”124
In What Dying People Want: Practical Wisdom for the End of Life, Dr. David Kuhl uses the Garden of Eden story as illustration of need and posterity:
The story also speaks about loss - of a dream, of innocence, of relationship. … By eating of the fruit, the two [Adam and Eve] became aware of their own nakedness as well as their relationship to one another, the world around them, and to their God. They were told they would die. Death became part of their new reality. …their lives didn't end; their lives changed. Imagine their response of feeling lost and bewildered, of looking back, of wondering what they might have done differently. Our lives are full of transitions and changes - leaving home, discovering and developing our own values, relocating, having children, seeing children leave home - our stories are familiar. Part of us dies through each one of these transitions. Then one day we learn about having a terminal illness and our naïveté about life as we know it ends. Dying becomes part of our reality. We can’t go back. We move through those transitions and change to a new way of being, a new understanding of ourselves, of our community, … perhaps even of the world.125
Kuhl’s representation uses biblical metaphor to present a story as a form of marker stone, a guiding structure like an Inuksuk126 perhaps, or an ancient writing as a form of
123 “Churches Called to Lay Down Youth Culture Idolatry in Worship,” accessed January 31, 2017, http://www.christianpost.com/news/churches-called-to-lay-down-youth-culture-idolatry-in- worship-70686/.
124 Simone de Beauvoir, The Coming of Age (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1972), 4.
125 David Kuhl, ‘Chap. 5, Life Review’, What Dying People Want: Practical Wisdom for the End of Life (Toronto: Anchor Canada, 2003), 139.
126 “An Inuksuk is a stone structure that can communicate knowledge essential for survival to an Arctic traveler. Inuksuit (plural) are found throughout the Arctic areas of Alaska, Arctic Canada and Greenland. Inuksuit have been used by the Inuit to act in place of human messengers. For those who understand their forms, inuksuit in the Arctic are very important helpers: they can show direction, tell about a good hunting or fishing area, show where food is stored, indicate a 58 allegorical point and moral compass relating an awareness of life for posterity, i.e. traditional wisdom about life and death in a larger sense than on which we normally focus.
Paradoxically, that point of awareness is realization of the fact that death has entered the world. This fact looms often menacingly larger than life and has presented a great challenge to many. The awareness of death is an anxiety met often with a high level of denial and avoidance and, too often, despair.
Kuhl points to the concept of re-examination of actions, i.e., what one might have done differently. The general population often becomes aware of death experientially as the need to face it arrives, a reality for everyone, for we all physically die. The need becomes a practical forewarning of the implications of death - an accessible and comprehensible hindsight, a record of traditional wisdom allowing foresight in the face of the inevitable.
I suggest that the fear of death may be a primary reason we fail as a society to embrace the inevitable onset of the end of this life. If we fear the concept of death, yet desire to be free of that anxiety, we need to learn to face and overcome the anxiety of death. It would be difficult to help others prepare in a meaningful manner for the inevitable if we have not reconciled the issue within ourselves. This need becomes foundational for training to reassure and engender respect for both self and others while dealing with a primal fear.
Perhaps if we, as a society, were not pre-occupied with the active avoidance of death, we could look back and see the manner in which the psychosocial need regarding fear of death was best handled in the past. After all, living in accord with biblical principle and the reality of coping with death in a traditional and family contextual way existed long before the modern practice of pretending that death is not around the corner. David Kessler, good resting place or act as a message center.” Mary Wallace, The Inuksuk Book (Toronto: Maple Leaf Press, 1999), 15. 59 associate and coauthor with Dr. Elizabeth Kubler Ross and comforter to many who have faced death, writes in his text The Needs of the Dying:
Sitting at countless deathbeds, I recognized that many family members, healthcare professionals, and even those who were facing death were unaware of the needs of the dying. If they sensed these needs, they had little idea how to express them. I began to feel that the final months and minutes leading to the end should be a powerful place in life, not a time of victimhood. Through the years, I have tried to restore power to those who are dying and their loved ones by explaining, incorporating, and expanding the needs of the dying. The difficult step was introducing the needs into practice. Society and the medical system have removed us from the process of death. At the turn-of-the- century, death was a familiar and natural part of our lives, occurring at home with, at best, a doctor's visit. But by the 1940s and 1950s, death had found a new home: the hospital. There, doctors treated the number of patients at once, while intensive care units made the latest technology available to the dying. During the 1970s, death was removed from the community, from the home, and from us as individuals.127
Final crisis: ego integrity versus despair
In The Logic of the Spirit: Human Development in Theological Perspective, aging is addressed by James Loder from a psychosocial perspective.128 He contends that the attitude of denial by many toward death and the elderly is a culturally constructed illusion born from Western society preoccupation with “youth and achievement, obsessively celebrating what is new… all on the way of maximizing productivity.”129 He writes that the “obsession with youth and productivity can more accurately be seen as in part a flight from aging and, as Ernst Becker put it, the denial of death.”130
127 David Kessler, ‘Introduction’, The Needs of the Dying (New York, NY: Harper Collins Publishing, 2000), xviii-xix.
128 James E. Loder, The Logic of the Spirit (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1998), 318.
129 Ibid., 319.
130 Ibid.
60 Loder claims it is no surprise that the Western society disdains and disregards the dignity required for the aging as a reality. He speaks of the psychosocial perspective of
Paul Pruyser of the Menninger Foundation, who points to the American phenomenon of seeing life as part of a form of Gaussian curve (i.e., Bell curve) wherein people move from being a helpless child to productivity and then back to the helplessness of old age.131 Loder disagrees with Pruyser, saying such a viewpoint pays primary attention to only the darker view of the lifespan when, in fact, this final stage of aging has outcomes that are both powerful and positive, so must be taken into account. To support this, he expounds
Erikson’s132 theory on psychosocial development of human beings regarding eight stages of crises within the development of the individual from infancy to childhood, with the final psychosocial developmental crisis being “ego integrity versus despair.”133
Erikson defined integrity as a positive “accrued sense of an appreciation for the ego’s proclivity for order, meaning over the years”, “the post-narcissistic love of the ego” and
“the agency we use for reality testing.”134 From this, aspects of integrity come into view:
1) an affinity or “comradeship with distant times” wherein one equates personal
struggle, though individually unique, as a reflection of “the universality of the
131 Ibid., 318.
132 “Erik Erikson (1950, 1963) proposed a psychoanalytic theory of psychosocial development comprising eight stages from infancy to adulthood. During each stage, the person experiences a psychosocial crisis which could have a positive or negative outcome for personality development. …. According to Erikson, the ego develops as it successfully resolves crises that are distinctly social in nature. These involve establishing a sense of trust in others, developing a sense of identity in society, and helping the next generation prepare for the future.” Saul McLeod, “Simply Psychology: Erik Erikson,” accessed December 9, 2016, http://www.simplypsychology. org/Erik- Erikson.html, published 2008, updated 2013.
133 Loder, 320.
134 Ibid.
61 human struggle” and, in appreciation, admits the individual would do it again in the
same fashion as in the original event;
2) “a new appreciation and more balanced perspective of one’s parents,” whose
“failures and successes can be more coolly evaluated into a balanced perspective”
as “the origin of ordering growth”;
3) the “affirmation of life itself in the face of death,” affirmation that inspires “trust in
the value and worth of life.”
Loder pointed to the latter aspect as being demonstrated in the way some grandparents no longer fear death and can inspire within their grandchildren a love and understanding of both life and death so that, at “the end of life, persons savoring the fullness of life give it to those who are just beginning.”135 It is in appreciation of that latter aspect that this project, specifically concerned with the life history review process for those near end of life, has been undertaken. Erikson believed that, without this positive potential of integrity at the end of life, the individual is rife for despair, i.e., the negative effect of regret in life.
Erikson called despair the “unacceptable,” the “accumulation of inferiority, role confusion, isolation, stagnation and the like,” the “iconic illusion” wherein fear, anxiety, apprehension and frustration as one approaches death makes one apprehensive about this being the one and only life cycle” and “death becomes the climax of all negatives.”136 This attitude in the face of death leads the disaffected individual to be unable to express other than base fear and “an attack on life,” an attack filled with “disgust, regret and demand, all that remains behind the image of the domineering, chronically depressed, self centred,
135 Ibid.
136 Ibid., 321.
62 paranoid older person.”137 The end result, says Loder, is “that which the ego was originally designed to conceal throughout the lifetime now surfaces with redoubled force,” particularly “despair, the older person’s version of the original loss of face.” In this state,
“no objects will remain” for “even one’s own face, as the mirror shows, is passing away.
Hence, despair is possible.”138
Loder points to a salient reality that supports the practical purpose of this thesis project, i.e., “what some psychologists claim” and “what folklore already knows”:
Young people of college age remember stories better if they are told by older adults than if the same stories are told by the same age or middle age persons. Discursive material is less well remembered if it is passed on by peers. This may be some indication of the archetypical power of the ancient storyteller… .139
Needs of the dying from a psychosocial contextual approach
The psychosocial need exists to reconnect the community with an understanding of life and death. This thesis project regarding life interviews is similar in psychosocial intent and process with Dr. Max Chochinov and Dignity Therapy. Both processes involve
‘attending’ through the process of ‘active listening’ and recording without interruption or coaxing the last testament the dying will give in an effort to connect their lives to those who remain. Chochinov records a one-hour interview for cancer patients to offer to the interviewed and families a written legacy before the patient expires. He refers to this as a
137 Ibid.
138 Ibid., 322.
139 Ibid., 321.
63 “generativity document,”140 to the interview as beneficial psychotherapeutic process and offers workshops to teach the procedure.141 As he states:
Throughout the course of Dignity Therapy, therapists must pay careful attention to everything…happening between themselves and their patients, including what is said, how…said, and even what the subtle nonverbal cues may be saying…. The process is akin to accompanying someone on a quest, who is uncertain what path to follow. The role of the therapist, through active listening, is to ensure that they do not get lost… are successful in reaching their destination. This means being ever vigilant, ever on the lookout for where responses might be leading them, tracking the flow of the interview, and anticipating when problems might arise. The tension of allowing patients to move independently and yet knowing when to guide them, even actively redirect them, is the essence of active listening and facilitation in Dignity Therapy. It is simply not possible to accomplish this task without full attention and complete engagement.142
Attending and redirection: prime factors and necessity
Regarding ‘attending’ and ‘redirection’ - being present through active listening - the process of redirection does not mean directing away from the story. Rather, it means helping the interviewed to get back on track when wandering off topic or to move through when ‘stuck’, e.g., perhaps when the interviewed are dealing with some unresolved personal issue. This is important in understanding the nature of the objective interview in which the interviewer, as recorder, remains out of, yet integral, to the flow of the story. It is also a process that requires a patience born of experience and training.
140 Harvey Max Chochinov, Dignity Therapy, Final Words for Final Days (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 40.
141 Ibid., 175.
142 Ibid., 77-78.
64 As mentioned previously, a prime factor in attending is in the ability to stay focused and attached with willingness to just listen without becoming distracted by story content and emotions that may arise in the listener. In Touching Tomorrow, Mary LoVerde wrote:
I cannot overemphasize the importance of just listening. For the elder, this interview may have special meaning. Reminiscing may allow older people, through storytelling, to reconcile or resolve important conflicts in their life. They may savor some recollections, particularly relating stories of when they were loved. Recalling treasured childhood scenes can be very nourishing. My mother’s eyes lit up when she described how she and her sisters “would put on a show, singing and dancing and doing tricks. We would charge the neighbourhood kids a nickel to attend and they would pay it!”143
The need is to leave a testament, a memory token of the missing smiles, hugs, laughter and bright eyes of the loved ones for the families that will mourn the loss of the storyteller.
It is well known that anniversary reactions are prominent markers of familial time, e.g., the rapid progression of ‘how many years have passed’ since the loss of a beloved family member.144 Many see the anniversary and, at each marker point, say something similar to
‘Wow, it has been X number of years since Mom died!’ Then, almost in what seems the blink of an eye, they arrive at other milestones and say ‘Wow, it has been double X number of years since Mom died!’ The loss of our loved ones can mark indelibly our path as milestones of life and a positive memory legacy can soften the grieving process.
143 Mary LoVerde, Touching Tomorrow: How to Interview Your Loved Ones to Capture a Lifetime of Memories on Video or Audio (New York: Simon & Shuster, 2000), 50.
144 “One occasion people find especially difficult to deal with is the death anniversary... It means that the person you lost was very important to you and that you still feel their loss keenly. These feelings have a name - anniversary reactions.” “Death Anniversaries,” accessed December 10, 2016, https://memoangel.com/blog/death-anniversaries-how-to-mark-them-and-how-to-survive- them/; “…can also evoke powerful memories of feelings and events surrounding your loved one's death. For example, you might remember in detail where you were and what you were doing when your loved one died.” “Grief: coping with reminders after a loss,” accessed December 10, 2016, http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/end-of-life/in-depth/grief/art-20045340. 65 Caring for others approaching death through attending is not a peculiar habit and unusual requirement; rather, it is a necessity of duty and dignity in respect of value in living history. To be blunt, it is the biblical injunction that to date in this work has been expressed several times, i.e., The Royal Law of ‘treating others in the way we desire to be treated.’
To honor the concept of theoretical need given previous gerontologic and palliative research for this chapter, I reiterate the point that someone faithfully needs to do the work.
I would assume that it is to be in a manner congruent with exhortations in Scripture such as examined previously, exhortation found as well in the verses from John 14:23-24:
Jesus replied, ‘If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24 He who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.’
The difference in process and theory between Chochinov with cancer patients and this thesis is that this project is an attempt to ensure ‘a larger-in-scope’ benefit, i.e., an interview process not exclusive to a certain population and not limited to one hour in time.
In theory, through establishing a standardized and generally accessible interview process, posterity would be enhanced. The thesis process includes a simple method of interview for recording life stories in as comprehensive a cross-section of society as possible. For others to receive a chance to memorialize a life as a written history to be passed on is to leave a written legacy for as broad a population as possible. Further, to empower this primary functional process is to offer comfort to help overcome isolation, loneliness and fear, elements of the crises into which too many are forced.
66 Legacy: The Ethical Will in enhancing dignity
A basic question of life and learning is both biblical and perhaps best answered by experience, i.e., ‘How can we believe what we don't know, or know unless we hear, or hear unless someone tells us?’145 The basic need for the elderly and the dying then becomes having some way, and someone, to relate the history of their experience to succeeding generations, i.e., for someone to make the commitment to a Ministry of Presence and to do the work. To do so is to help remove the elderly and the dying from the fate of obscurity.
As a result, the wisdom via the story of life learned comes from a trail of milestones left behind to guide those who remain, those with the same obligation to life, i.e., to raise families, to overcome and to pass on a living history to the generations to follow.
Training others by using a curriculum based on validated procedure is to objectivize that application being employed. In this case, the application is an interview process. The theory behind the interview procedure is to enhance psychosocial development of individuals from cradle to grave, from one generation to the next. In the following quotation, given in entirety due to contextual content, Chochinov refers to the biblical character of Jacob as a metaphor to recording the interview as an “ethical will”:
In Jacob's final words to his family, history records its first Ethical Will. Ethical wills, which were initially conveyed orally, were designed as a way of passing traditions and values from one generation to the next. What might Jacob have been feeling over 3000 years ago as he undertook this task? On the one hand, he no doubt saw this as a way to pass along moral values or generations to come. Perhaps he took some comfort in knowing that, in spite of death, the lessons and insights he most cherished would transcend his departure. In this way, perhaps he felt he was denying death its ability to destroy those parts of him - those beliefs, insights, and lessons - that defined his very essence. There must also have been a feeling, a sense
145 Paraphrase of Romans 10:14-15 How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? 15 How will they preach unless they are sent?
67 that in spite of his advanced age in fragile health, he was still valued and his life, or what ever little of it that remained, was cherished by those closest to him. Unlike Jacob, most people have not spoken directly with God, nor taken multiple partners, nor spawned a bevy of children destined to become an entire nation. On the other hand, is it not conceivable that, like Jacob, mere mortals might find comfort in knowing their final thoughts and words are deemed precious; that in spite of illness, they are still valued; and, perhaps, that it is possible to leave something which will outlive them and be a remembrance to those left behind? These, of course, are not new ideas. … each declares: “We were here! Don't forget us.” Ways of affirming this declaration are intricately woven into the human drama. … might the sharing of these stories provide a source of comfort, for those about to die, as well as those soon to be bereft?146
This project emphasizes that the right of dignity for the elderly and the dying demands that we pursue the alleviation of the sense of failure, hopelessness and despair that approaching death can generate. The first nationwide Dutch study on Medical Decisions to
End Life (MDEL)147 included three data sets on euthanasia extrapolated from
mailed questionnaires to the physicians of 7000 deceased persons, a prospective survey of physicians regarding 2250 deaths, and detailed interviews with 405 physicians who had participated in hastening their patient's death by euthanasia or physician assisted suicide.148
Chochinov points to some alarming statistics that arose in consideration of the three data sets. When studying the need for dignity in relation to those who felt it necessary to voluntarily end their lives early by physician-assisted suicide:
According to these positions, “loss of dignity” was the most common reason given for hastening the death of their patient, cited in 57% of cases. Other reasons included pain alone in 5% of cases, pain as part of a constellation of symptoms (46%), being dependent on others (33%), tiredness of life (23%), and unworthy dying (46%).149
146 Chochinov, preface, vi.; cf. Psalm 78.
147 Ibid., 4.
148 Ibid., 5.
149 Ibid.
68 With such alarming statistics, it is apparent that the concept of dignity is deeply rooted within the human psyche for maintenance of the ego, for integrity, and for the raison d'être or reason to be within life and society.
To provide hope and comfort in the face of despair - to fight against the loss of face
(presence) and shrinking of ego that aging can bring - an integral aspect of this thesis project is to develop and standardize the previously described interview process, similar to
Chochinov’s Dignity Therapy, wherein a physical presence or face is involved. The theory is that Ministry of Presence both encourages and strengthens integrity for both the elder and the others who relate to the positive story, appropriately a major characteristic of wisdom and posterity. By collecting and training others to collect the life histories of the dying, we help to carry out this process.
To understand the needs of the dying from a psychosocial contextual approach, the task is to discover and simplify the awareness of those needs. As in clinical therapy wherein the process of counselling and psychotherapeutic analysis is used to reveal the problems of a client to the therapist, awareness and simplification of needs permit a relative understanding, empathy and association to the needs expressed. Others may learn to relate to the approaching urgency of age by understanding that the predetermining factors are common to everyone, including the researcher. Through recognition of the universality of the need, the urgency for the research may become personal and focus may become universal in the search to prevent recurrence of problems.
This process needs to be objective and informed by verifiable facts of life. Hindsight wisdom comes from informed objective awareness for the elderly and, says Loder, from
69 that wisdom arises a “fundamental competence” of “simplification, a competence that gains ascendency in later years.”150
A significant aspect of simplification is that the “aging individual can begin to relax defenses and become more accepting of the negative ambiguities of life,”151 such as accepting with grace that aging brings material and physical loss, e.g., “achievement and production declines, … sexual rewards must be surrendered to loving and being loveable,”152 etc. Through simplification and optimism, integrity for the elder is improved and dignity preserved. The successful redefining of one’s status and enhanced sense of worth and well-being occurs. The result is realism in the meeting of needs, particularly through positive models of aging, e.g.,
The negative results of a life can be accepted more philosophically and without a reaction formation. One may simply say “That’s all past now. I have made my share of mistakes, but it seems to have worked out.” As defenses relax, the human spirit can be released into the assurance of forgiveness and God’s providential care.153
Four Pillars of Dying with Dignity
What I have witnessed from the series of texts examined for this work regarding the process of dying with dignity, i.e. meeting the needs for those nearing the end of life, has left me with the awareness of at least four cardinal elements of need, four pillars perhaps,
150 Ibid.
151 Ibid.
152 Ibid.
153 Ibid., 324.
70 of the process itself. This thesis revolves around helping to meet those four needs, i.e. comfort, closure, legacy, posterity:
1) offering comfort to the elder and to the dying during the time when the inevitability
of old age and or pending death is realized, including in the case of palliative care
and expectation of an early death, and the mind most needs reassurance;
2) assisting in closure, offering venue to the elder and the dying to express what
perhaps may have been unsaid but needs to be expressed, offering a listening ear
to encourage catharsis, to dissolve doubts and/or to help bring about resolution and
restoration of familial relationships;
3) presenting the elder and the dying and their families with a legacy document of
living history, a memory of the struggles and life lessons learned by a progenitor
for the future comfort and direction of the family;
4) recording a substantial work for posterity, i.e. each person’s life a piece of a living
history within a life history databank, the ‘Inuksuk Book’154 so to speak. The end
product is to enrich and guide the lives of those who will follow: an Inuksuk
databank of accumulated trial and error, of mistake and agony overcome and the
resultant wisdom of hindsight that remains ‘so they will know we were here.’
The objective is to empower others to learn from the mistakes of predecessors (i.e., ‘so they will know we were here’155) rather than have next generations ‘go around the same
154 A reference to the potential for the anthology, built and published from collected interviews, being referred to metaphorically as an ‘Inuksuk’ giving guidance for the reader.
155 The motto for the Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc., a registered not-for-profit institute newly created for the purpose of this thesis and for perpetuating the interview process and education with regard to the same. This is addressed in Chapter 3: Research Methodology and Process.
71 old bush’ of happenstance, personal error and consequence. As books and documents generally are the history of other people’s mistakes, it can be argued that it is the ‘perfect process’ to learn from our mistakes (per-FECT, verb, meaning to learn by trial and error).
It is even more so when we learn from the trials and tribulations of others, helping to anticipate and avoid repeating errors, to proactively prepare and triumph a priori. An aphorism often attributed to Benjamin Franklin, Voltaire, Albert Einstein, et al, asserts that
(paraphrased) ‘the definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over and expect a different result.’156
‘Those who do not learn from their mistakes, their past, are doomed to repeat that past’ is an adage that further attests to this understanding.
The Interview
The interview concerns the general process of obtaining client permission form signatures, arranging the dates and location(s), recording the interview, transposing the collected data, editing slightly to improve the flow but not to alter principle content or context, obtaining approval of the edited version with interviewee, or family, as appropriate, data-basing the accumulated content, then publication of the interview material in two formats:
1) the recorded interviews are printed in a living testament document for the family of
the interviewed;
156 Santayana, 17. 72 2) permission given, the interviews are published for public viewing for sake of
association and education as a society, a community of faith with a living and
proactively learnable history.
Concisely, a legacy is obtained for the family and some are published for posterity, i.e., the good of society as ‘wisdom’ needs to be paid forward to be remembered.
Logistics to be considered
Recognition of the logistics required to do the work is a primary consideration.
Chochinov pointed to basic essential considerations of time and cost within his approach:
Q: If the therapist’s time is covered within existing resources for psychosocial support, what are the additional or administrative costs for delivering Dignity Therapy? A: First there is the cost of the transcription itself. This will of course vary, depending on how long patients speak and various factors that might influence the pace and clarity of speech. We budget about $200 per transcript. The other activity, which we feel is best done by the therapist, is editing. Like Dignity Therapy, editing is an acquired skill; you will get better at it and more efficient with practice. Nonetheless, one should set aside about double the time it took to conduct the interview itself. So as not to underestimate the resource implications, let us assume two to three hours are needed to edit a… [1 hour] …Dignity Therapy transcript. For argument sake, let us further assume that a therapist’s time is billed at $100 per hour (this will vary, of course, depending on the disciplinary affiliation of therapists and the financial arrangements of their employment [e.g. fee for service, block funding, etc.]). This would bring the administrative cost of Dignity Therapy, including transcriptionist fees, to $400 or $500.157
Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.
With the logistics required to permit the process to take place on a continuing basis, consideration of obtaining public funding is a necessity. To continue post-thesis, the need presented would be to create some administrative base to carry out the post-thesis task of
157 Chochinov, 177.
73 carrying out the various elements of the process, including funding, interviewing, transcribing, publishing, teaching and, finally, promoting the knowledge and benefit of the process in effort to achieve and maintain a social standard. This would be set in motion by the creation and incorporation of a not-for-profit foundation referred to as ‘Inuksuk Book
Foundation, Inc.’ This will be explained in Chapter 3.
Two-week Clinical Pastoral Education training course
Theoretically, following both development of the ethnographic process for interview and creation of the corporate body to perpetuate the process, a two-week training course of orientation and experience in attending (with familiarization in active listening and responding through accurate empathy) would be employed to perpetuate the process.
Through training in the use of digital recording equipment and transcription of collected interview data, the course would train the student in an efficacious process of attending to the psychosocial needs of the dying in terms of facilitating by personal interview a cathartic and holistically healing life review.
It is my hope to develop the course to be offered eventually within and to augment the framework of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE).158
The training process developed would be designed to teach the student interviewer to deliver up to a total of four interview hours per person of those receiving the ethnographic service. Data would be recorded, transcribed, offered as a legacy document for the families
158 “Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) is designed to teach pastoral care to clergy and others. CPE is the primary method of training hospital and hospice chaplains and Spiritual Care Providers in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.” Mark R. Cobb, Christina M. Puchalski and Bruce Rumbold, eds., Oxford Textbook of Spirituality in Healthcare (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 417.
74 that remain, archived/databased then, with permission, published for posterity with names changed to preserve anonymity.
Written consent would be obtained in advance from those involved in the interview process, including both the individual and the (representative of) the facility wherein the interviewed reside.
Christian Body: helping to meet the need
As noted in Chapter 1, the Hebrew word for Presence is plural but also is used as the singular ‘face’ of God. By extension, the Body or Church of Christ may be considered a significant part of the face of God today, the agency of change in bringing comfort, closure, legacy and posterity in the inexorable and often terrifying face of impending death.
Part of the theory behind this project was that the followers of Christ are an ideal population to perform the task of Ministry of Presence to the elderly and dying - in the assumption that Christ, the founder of Christianity, taught the rule of other person centeredness to be the ethic of Christianity and of life in general.159 Theoretically, having a trained non-judgemental, dedicated, compassionate recorder attending to the process of collecting the life interview for posterity would be in accord with that direction.
Training for the student in the interview process is intended to foster a non-sectarian, non-biased and non-proselytizing ministry of service dedicated exclusively to recording objectively what is spoken, and to present that as lived experience without interpolation.
The theory for this project includes the premise that presenting one’s self as an impartial recording servant is valid ministry, i.e., reflecting God’s Presence and image. The ministry
159 Matthew 7:12 In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.; cf. Luke 6:31. 75 is sacrificial and there is no intent to proselytize. Being present and facilitating a therapeutic interview is the intent in meeting the need created by isolation and the fear of death. A significant element of the training course for the thesis would be intended to teach and empower people for the sheer sake of meeting this major psychosocial need - helping to allay the angst, the anxiety of separation and alienation, that impending death can create.
Theory of the Question
Relating to God’s providential care, a significant aspect of this process is found in the
Question of whether the interviewee will express a particular and individual perspective of religious experience that would claim to have created an awareness of providential
Presence at any time in life during the course of that journey. If so, then to what degree has it influenced the life of the respondent? Loder comments on the relevance of this quest in his text when he refers to the process of life, “even in its final stages, as it moves toward a decentering and transformation of ego,” a positive process wherein
a lifetime, with all its stages and upheavals, its losses and its satisfactions, its tragedies and its comedies, may sooner or later be recognized as a repeated quest of the human spirit for centeredness in the Divine Presence. Restored centeredness, Spirit-to-spirit, implies contemplation and the ever-deepening realization that every individual lifetime is a creative act of divine love, and what seems like ordinary life, even in the most common sense, is the ultimate love of God seeking ever fuller expression in the world.160
Of course, this question of providential awareness in life, or not, could not be asked within the scope of the interview. For this thesis, by permission of the University of Acadia
Research Ethics Board, the interviewer presented as an objective ethnographer without religious affiliation, a necessity to empower the interviewed to express answers to the
160 Loder, 326.
76 unasked question without skewed results. The interviewer made effort neither to editorialize the interview nor lead inappropriately the person being interviewed.
It is part of the hypothesis and theory for this project that people do naturally often become aware of a philanthropic Presence or ‘Higher Power’ within life. The analysis of data is to examine whether or not that awareness is expressed without prompting.
The need for review
The basis of this thesis is simple: it is found in my personal belief that everyone needs the chance to review life as objectively as possible. To do so means that someone needs to help them do that review. This may be so particularly when the elderly or those in palliative care are of diminished capacity in any of the senses involved with ethnographic recording.
We come to understand the elemental psychosocial need for ethnography, i.e., to gain the wisdom and comfort from a mirrored hindsight perspective and realization that people, despite the fact that personal failure and tragedy happens, are not failures in life.
Specifically, mistakes occur regularly and they are necessary in the process of life.
Mistakes are what we use to learn, can be used for our good and, from those mistakes, we have the capacity to develop a positive testimony. We may gain an understanding of faith as actual evidence and from that awareness, become proactive, i.e., hindsight memory of the manner in which things worked out in the long run. It is from a positive testimony that we have a socially productive life story, and it is from the telling of that story that others may engage, find comfort and reconciliatory encouragement.
77 It is a positive choice to believe that some form of good may come out of bad events in life. It is the way in which we choose to look retrospectively that encourages a proactive future effort and, I believe, this is empowerment to move toward reconciliation and closure.
With that said, I do not see that the work is getting done: not everyone is given opportunity to objectively review life. Some have been shunted away from the mainstream, almost as if to hide the reality that they are there. It may be that society, in its obsession with youth, has succumbed to fear of death and isolation of those approaching death merely reflects that overarching anxiety that Scripture relates has kept humankind enslaved.
We need to be able to look backward for consolation to look forward, for hope, for optimism, for courage to resolve fear and to pass on that courage and wisdom to others.
Both the dying and those who follow need to know they are of great worth and are still connected in the love they have shared and will remember even after the dying have passed.
This is our value. We need to know our life is not a loss, then pass that to the living.
In the closing of the collaborative text, Life Lessons: How our Mortality can Teach us about Life and Living, David Kessler and Elizabeth Kubler Ross agreed that:
In so many ways, loss shows us what is precious, while love teaches us who we are. Relationships remind us of ourselves and provide wondrous opportunities for growth. Fear, anger, guilt, patience, and even time become our greatest teachers. Even in our darkest hours we are growing. … In the beginning of this book, Michelangelo told us that the beautiful sculptures he created were already there, inside the stones. He simply removed the excess to reveal the precious essence that had always been there. You do the same thing as you learn lessons in life: you chip away the excess to reveal the wonderful you inside.161
161 Elisabeth Kubler Ross and David Kessler, Life Lessons: How our Mortality can Teach us about Life and Living (New York: Scribner, 2000), 195-196. 78 It is my hope that I have offered insight into the profound nature of work, faith and the need for dignity. Perhaps the reader will be more comfortable considering, and perhaps working within, the realm of ethnography as theology for these important concepts.
Whether or not the Gospel, the Good News of reconciliation to God through acceptance of Christ, is accurately and effectively transmitted depends on the factors that make up our notions of work, faith, dignity, testimony, and so on: how we reflect upon, review and study the events of life, both ours and others, and act thereafter. In The Royal Law, in everything you do, treat others the way you want to be treated, God asks us to do what is right, to do what is good, and faithfully to act out the principle of love in action that He has both spoken and so ably demonstrated in the life of Christ.
This understanding of The Royal Law and the necessity of becoming ‘other person centered’ in the fulfilling of the same is central to this project theory, yet unique in that it defines the essence of love as a transitive verb, an action more so than a thing. Love is seen as a proactive, life-altering force and resultant action for the good of others more than for self. In selfless sacrifice for the good of others, Christ is the living testament to this definition of love in action.
If the actual definition of love means ‘treating others the way we would like to be treated,’ then the larger reality for many is attested: that love in action demands change in current social attitude in the way emotional and physical needs of the most vulnerable are handled, i.e. the elderly and the dying, who too often are marginalized, ignored and unassisted in the need for comfort and closure. Too often, the treatment received by the elderly and the dying at the hands of those they nurtured, encouraged and raised into society may be considered an attitude more akin to hate than in the love found in ‘treating others
79 as we would like to be treated.’ That is the theory and reason behind this project, the belief it is a duty given by God to care first for others, even though they may be dying, for we all die and will all need that care.
In this case and project, we make the attempt at revitalizing dignity and re-enfranchising association of the dying into the world for the sake of the living through the agency of the life story, their living histories. The process of the collection and data basing of the life story interviews for the good of the elderly and the dying includes the good of those who will follow. This constitutes a valid Ministry of Presence within every community of faith: an active ministry that will help meet the psychosocial crisis of society in general, i.e. the need for comfort, closure, legacy and posterity.
Based on emphasis placed on Ministry of Presence and in Clinical Pastoral Education
(CPE) in general, the search for empowerment goes on in the training as clinical pastoral counselors, ministers and workers. In the case of this project, that involves a theology of ministry that includes ethnography as a tool, i.e. a process employed by bearers of the face of Christ as a ministry intended to impact positively the awareness of Christ being active within and to the world.
In conclusion of Chapter 2, I believe that the awareness of Christ being active within and to the world is seen within personal, yet selfless, other-person-centred concern, action and testimony. For this project, the starting point begins with the first love for the most vulnerable: our elders and those who are dying. As has been demonstrated with Scripture, to facilitate such a first love is to offer a Ministry of Presence, a ministry of the image of
God, in honor and obedience to Christ Who loved us first. In summation, that is the theoretic foundation of consideration for this practical project.
80 CHAPTER 3: Research Methodology and Process
Ethnography
As has been indicated in previous chapters, ethnography is the functional research methodology of this thesis. A phenomenological qualitative research approach that does not “yield raw data in quantifiable form,”162 ethnography focuses on “narrative: a verbal description of what the participant did or said.”163
Synonyms for the qualitative approach would be phenomenological, humanist, antireductionist, holistic, ethnographic, contextual, grounded, interactionist, reflective, hermeneutic, subjective, or verstehenist.164 165
The goal is a better understanding and disarming with regard to the crippling sense of isolation, guilt and worthlessness too often felt by the elderly and dying: a disarming assisted through application of the interview process:
Patients’ experiences of social isolation can also be understood as resulting from the ways in which their social and temporal perceptions had ceased to be enmeshed with those of the people around them. Patients, in a sense, had become drawn into ways of seeing and experiencing the world with which family and friends could not empathize. Both parties, as a consequence, felt increasingly alienated and estranged from one another; the common ground between them had begun to dissipate and ebb away.166
162 T.L. Brink, Qualitative Research Methods. In D. G. Benner & P. C. Hill (Eds.), Baker encyclopedia of psychology & counseling, 2nd edition (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books. 1999), 997.
163 Ibid.
164 Ibid.
165 “Ver·ste·hen: noun empathic understanding of human behavior,” accessed July 19, 2017, https://www.google.ca/#q=verstehen&spf=1500439655293.; “Verstehen: associated with the writing of Max Weber. Verstehen is now seen as a concept and a method central to a rejection of positivistic social science or Positive School, though Weber appeared to think that the two could be united. Verstehen (ferchaen) is the use of empathy in the sociological or historical understanding of human action and behavior.” “Sociology Index: Verstehen,” accessed July 19, 2017, http://sociologyindex.com/ verstehen.htm.
166 Julia Lawton, The Dying Process: Patients' experiences of palliative care (New York: Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group, 2000), 148. 81 The ethnographic research process created in this project is to establish and augment a ministry intended to offer a Presence of comfort, help with closure, a legacy for family intended to help restore family cohesiveness and to offer posterity for society.
The original intent was to train others first and have them carry out the six primary interviews for the thesis data through effective interview, recording, transcribing and data- basing of the resulting life stories. The trainees were to be from Christian denominations.
However, as this option was not available, the alternate plan was applied and is described: the incorporation of a not-for-profit foundation for collecting life story interviews, Inuksuk
Book Foundation - an institute which will take up the torch of training, encouraging, engaging and empowering selected trainees in a near end of life interview process for enhancing self-respect and meaningful, transitional closure near end of life. The training by the institute is intended to take place post-thesis.
Introduction to the life review process
This process of reflective communication and expression of memories and feelings is to provide a source of comfort and closure to those who need it. Given the way the elderly too often are relegated to obscurity in the closing stages of life, this project intent is a pastoral care Ministry of Presence to the elderly and the terminally ill to help deal with anxiety, pain and grief. It has been my experience in general that grief needs to be expressed and discussed in order to lose dominating control over the mind, to reduce cognitive dissonance167 and begin the cathartic process of reconciliation/resolution.
167 “Cognitive Dissonance refers to a situation involving conflicting attitudes, beliefs or behaviors. This produces a feeling of discomfort leading to an alteration in one of the attitudes,
82 Catharsis, the purging of pain
Once the catharsis or purging of pain felt from negative memories and emotion has begun, success depends largely on the respondent eventually being able to gain a renewed and positive perspective. This purging often is necessary to reconcile past events and move on to a healthier state of mind. It involves the previously mentioned listener process of attending by the interviewer and empowerment of the person being listened to while that person is allowed to reflect, laugh and/or grieve. It is particularly encouraging to know that someone cares enough to be present, in a Ministry of Presence, and to empathetically reflect and respond in kind.
Staff primary contact and experience with potential participants regarding lucidity and desire to share life stories was used to create the list of potential interviewees. The selected applicants were then approached, process explained, permission requested for participation and consent obtained from those who agreed to take part.
Regarding the second thesis purpose: the Question
An implicit Question of this thesis is whether or not a providential non-physical
Presence has been discerned by the interviewed participant through either experience or reflection upon of the events of life, a Presence felt or seen in the footprints of hindsight,
beliefs or behaviors to reduce the discomfort and restore balance…. Festinger's (1957) cognitive dissonance theory suggests that we have an inner drive to hold all our attitudes and beliefs in harmony and avoid disharmony (or dissonance). … a powerful motive to maintain cognitive consistency can give rise to irrational and sometimes maladaptive behavior. According to Festinger, we hold many cognitions about the world and ourselves; when they clash, a discrepancy is evoked, resulting in a state of tension known as cognitive dissonance. As the experience of dissonance is unpleasant, we are motivated to reduce or eliminate it, and achieve consonance (i.e. agreement).” “Simply Psychology: Cognitive Dissonance,” accessed December 1, 2016, http://www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-dissonance.html.
83 e.g. a tendency for things to work out despite the odds. This awareness of a providential
Presence may be hard to perceive. However, my own experience upon retrospect is that the transcendent Presence, almost contrary to logic, has been evident as immanent, leading and guiding through consistency of overcoming in life. That awareness may not be crystal clear, but the testimony of the life story is to see if a life history review points to the possibility, even if it may not have been noticed before or perhaps was discounted.
An awareness of a transcendent but immanent God was described by Canadian pioneer of CPE, Rev. Dr. Charles J. Taylor. He referred to the Greek concept of ‘Kairos time’168 or
‘Kairos Moment’ as indication of God’s involvement in life, i.e., that ‘ah ha!’ tangential point of illumination, understanding, empowerment when God intersects our lives, ‘when a person sees his life with different eyes…the moment when he discovers that he is loveable and doesn’t have to continue putting himself down.’169 To point to that time is part of this thesis in terms of Ministry of Presence and is part of the Question, i.e., to see if life stories collected point to such hindsight awareness. As Stephen Eyre indicates in Drawing Close to God, it is to be actively pursued or it may escape us:
There is something deep within us that longs for God. It is the inner work of God’s Spirit that all God’s children have. But that inner hunger can grow weak unless it is nourished. Preoccupation with day-to-day living can choke it out. If you are a student, it may be a concern about grades or finding the right partner. If you are earning a living or raising a family, and maybe balancing the budget or moving up the corporate ladder. Whatever it is that fills your mind and your activities, …learn to put it aside from time to time so that you can focus on God.170
168 Charles J. Taylor, Only Love Heals: Life Renewing Experiences of Prisoners (Hantsport, NS: Lancelot Press, 1978), 5.
169 Ibid.
170 Stephen D. Eyre, Drawing Close to God: The Essentials of a Dynamic Quiet Time (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1997), 54.
84 My experience as a counseling therapist has been that the perceived awareness of providential Presence is evident at times and instrumental in quieting the turbulent nature of fear and doubt. This awareness of Presence in Kairos time may help the individual in becoming less reactive and more reflective in thought. In my experience, some appear to bloom in increased and proactive self-respect and mental health, i.e., empowered to doubt their doubts, resolve outstanding issues and move on. For the elderly and the dying, this is significant given the loss of dignity that the effect of aging and social exclusion can bring.
Late stage/near end of life interview process
The near end of life interview employs open-ended questions not suggesting an answer.
Dialogue is strictly from the point of view of the interviewed, i.e. a client-controlled case information process to treat the participant as a living book with a history and a future.
For this life review thesis project, it was intended that the process would be carried out in two stages. For the first stage:
1) life interview sessions: for the initial set of interviews, six participants were selected
from the elderly and from those in palliative care;
2) potential interviewees were recruited from local care facilities within the geographic
area and elders within the community of Prince Albert;
3) permission was obtained, confidentiality and release of information forms signed
and interview schedules arranged;
4) interviews were held, audiotaped, then transcribed verbatim;
For the second stage:
85 1) the transcripts were edited, published for the family in a booklet form complete with
colour pictures selected by the interviewed participant;
2) copy of all collected data was supplied on DVD to the interviewed for the family
record, including the completed oral interviews, the edited transcript and the final
publication or legacy document given to the participant. in editable format for future
use by the family, e.g. as a core for further ethnographic gerentological
development.
Post-thesis, further interviews will take place under the guidance and training of the not- for-profit foundation created for the purpose. Potential interviewers selected from local volunteers will receive training in interviewing and attending skills by a clinical pastoral counselor and teacher in the near end of life interview process created within the project.
Interview delivery and specifics
In the introductory or pre-interview session, a sense of rapport was established and primary purpose of the process explained. Informed consent was obtained in writing from all participants (care facility, interviewer, interviewed, transcriptionist), as per the
‘Informed Consent’ forms included with this thesis submission as Appendices B, C & D.
To assist in easing concerns by potential interview participants, staff from the involved care facility participated in the introduction of the interviewer, the project concept and presentation of the consent form. The consent form was read with assistance from the staff of the facility where the interviewed resided, contracting of participation and disclosure agreements to meet all ethical and confidentiality requirements signed (to be placed on file in a locked cabinet) and the agreed upon interview schedule of four one-hour sessions.
86 As well, at the introductory session, the person being interviewed was supplied with a set of life history questions adapted from the public site of the Legacy Project.171 The stated intent of the questions was for prior consideration of areas the participant might consider for discussion. However, the questions were not asked directly in the interview process itself.
The interviews were conducted as per the stipulations of the particular facility administration, e.g. in a pre-determined, staff monitored but quiet and discrete location of the facility in which the interviewed resided. Over a series of four one-hour sessions, those interviewed were asked to relay personal life history as they remembered. Recollections were audiotaped, transcribed for file and maintained as confidential in a locked file cabinet until post-project when they will be destroyed.
The interview process itself was open ended with the agenda being to glean the life story by recall and exposition of the interviewee and attendant reflection and response by the interviewer. The interviewer opened the session by saying:
Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out. If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear from you for clarification. Then you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied that we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to four sessions to complete.
Following that, input by the interviewer was reflective only, using tools of attending and accurate empathy (tools to be replicated in the training course post-thesis), to understand or clarify without suggesting: one or two words of restatement of the premise
171 “Legacy: Life Interview Questions,” (see Appendix A: Life Interview Questions), accessed September 10, 2014, http://www.legacyproject.org/guides/lifeintquestions.html. 87 as understood by the interviewer to ensure accuracy of detail by the interviewer and full development of the thought for the interviewed. No other questions related to the life of the interviewed were asked.
At each succeeding session, the interviewer recapped information given by the interviewed during the previous session and waited for the confirmation and approval from the interviewee to continue. Following that, the generic question preceded the session,
‘Where would you like to pick it up to start today?’
The sessions continued for up to four successive weeks (which may be shorter if the person’s story is complete before the end of four sessions and it is so expressed by the participant). Assurance was given, if the interview process ended in less than four sessions and the interviewee decided that something significant could be added later, that the interviewer would return when contacted to continue up to the full number of sessions.
The interviewing relationship remained at arm’s length for the duration of the project, terminating in all intents and purposes at the end of the interview process. For training post- thesis, it will be stressed that any post-project relationship between interviewer and the interviewee will be of the interviewed participant’s choice and not that of the interviewer.
This ethical relationship consideration will be discussed during the primary two-week training instruction of the interviewer in training.
Following the session, each interview was transcribed by the interviewer and a brief recap given to the interviewer to be used in a confirming manner during the preliminary stage of opening the next interview with the interviewed participant. Post-thesis, with appropriate confidentiality agreement in place, a professional typist in the employ of the interviewer may do the transcribing if required.
88 Review and Debriefing
A closing response questionnaire was given to participants and the response recorded regarding opinions on ways to enhance development and delivery of the life review process. The results were used to determine the answer to the thesis Question. Further analysis of the responses from participants will be used to aid refinement of training, the efficiency of the person being trained and the process of the life interview stages.
Prior to the names and locations being changed to ensure anonymity for the thesis participants when included in the project submission appendices, two drafts of the interview transcript were reviewed with each participant to ensure accuracy. Each person interviewed edited and verified the content of their life story, some assisted by family.
The third draft of the interview became the databased copy of the life story, then was offered to the interviewee as a legacy. For purpose of this study, as stated, personal identifying names were made anonymous before being attached as an appendix in the thesis project submission. This was to maintain confidentiality as a first priority.
Post-thesis, permission to use future life history stories in whatever form appropriate and acceptable for publishing will be obtained prior to being published.
A debriefing session was held with the interview participants with the purpose of focus on improving the process for the future. A follow-up information session was and will be held with each participating care facility to ensure adequate closure.
Following publication of the study and acceptance of the thesis, as stated, extraneous interview notes and material will be destroyed.
89 Potential harms
Each care facility director or administrator was consulted and referral to follow-up counsel observed according to protocols of the specific care facility. This was necessary: recall of events can have a cathartic effect of reliving the emotional impact of that event.
Although the process of emotional recall and cathartic cleansing is normal and an essential part of healing closure and growth, the experience can be traumatic. Referral for counseling was available according to the protocol of the care facility administrator. Those being interviewed who experience a recall vivid enough to require counsel would have been referred to the professional help prearranged for just such occasion. However, in the case of the interviews for this project, this did not occur.
Potential benefits
Recording valued life experience could become an important tool for encouraging and empowering the catharsis and healing in resolution of bitterness and sorrow over unfinished business and for restoring self-worth and enhancing closure.
1) Individuals who reconcile central issues may be more capable of proactive use of
time to resolve secondary issues such as family relations, etc.
2) Intentional preservation of the hindsight life story of a respondent provides a
recorded legacy for the family and posterity for society, i.e. for nurture of family
and future generations through the wisdom found in overcoming and thus
understanding the process and challenges of life. It becomes a resource that may be
passed to succeeding generations in knowledge and skills.
90 Confidentiality
The participating interviewer agreed in writing to confidentiality of interview material.
If information is given that is required by law to be disclosed, confidentiality in that matter cannot be guaranteed. This was disclosed to the potential participants in the opening or introductory session.
Recorders and research material were securely maintained during the interview process.
As stated, the material will be destroyed following completion of the project.
Compensation
No financial compensation was given for either interviewer or interviewed participant.
The intent was to develop a process wherein the sole purpose is unselfish, philanthropic, pursuit of opportunity and skill in the recording of life history for: a) providing legacy for the participant; b) remembering individual presence as evidence of our humanity.
Deception: avoiding bias
It was the intent of the thesis Question (see p. 81) that analysis of the collected interview material might indicate if a particular response occurred and to report it accordingly as an incidental statement by those interviewed.
To avoid bias regarding the Question, no religious identification and no reference to spirituality on the part of the interviewer was mentioned during the interviews. Any mention of religion or spirituality by statement, inference or otherwise was left to the initiative of the interviewee. To do otherwise would not only be irrelevant to the goal of developing a process for recording life stories for the sake of closure, personal legacy and
91 posterity, but could prove detrimental in terms of skewing the response - such as staff inclined to recommend for participation those categorized as religious, or participants developing a response bias, feeling it necessary to speak religiously due to any preconceived notion concerning interviewer and/or interview process.
Care facility staff and those being interviewed were informed of the purpose of the life interview process - which was an attempt to develop a societal norm, a simplified interview process, intended solely to gather a legacy of life stories for posterity and facilitate closure for participant and family through reflective introspection on the part of the interviewed.
Deception: innocuous
The Research Ethics Board (REB) of Acadia University approved the deception as innocuous as there would be no intent to persuade, engender or convert the individual to any way of thinking other than found within the paradigm of the person being interviewed prior to the interview process. The goal was simple observation of statement and whether or not a providential Presence was reported in the life of the interviewed.
All participants signed consent that the interview was to be recorded in its entirety and that the project would involve determining the recurrence of incidental opinion on the part of those participants being interviewed (see Appendix B, C, D).
Participants were informed of the purpose of the Question when they received the final publication. There was no additional mention of the Question nor of the result within the individual life history documents given as legacy to the interviewed participants.
92 Other agencies doing similar work
Since I began my quest for Presence, I found that several others had, and since have, taken up somewhat similar quests to my 2011 thesis proposal:
1) the pioneering work of Dr. Max Chochinov who developed the conceptual
framework underpinning ‘Dignity Therapy,’172 an approach exclusively for cancer
patients first published in the Journal of American Medical Association in 2002;’173
2) the Legacy Project174 of “research and social innovation empowering youth, adults,
and elders for inspired lives, stronger communities, and a sustainable world.”175
3) the Memory Project of the Canadian military, “a nationwide bilingual project that
connects Veterans and Canadian forces personnel with the opportunity to share
their stories with Canadians in classrooms and community forums”; 176
4) the Concordia University ‘Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling,’
founded in 2006, which has been home to several large-scale research projects
including the Montreal Life Stories project, a community-university research
alliance funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. 177
172 Harvey Max Chochinov, Dignity Therapy: final words for final days (New York: Oxford Press, 2012), vii-Preface.
173 Ibid.
174 “Legacy,” accessed September 10, 2014, http://www.legacyproject.org/.
175 Ibid.
176 “The Memory Project,” accessed September 10, 2014, http://www.thememoryproject.com/.
177 “Center for Oral History and Digital Storytelling,” accessed September 10, 2014, http:// storytelling.concordia.ca/. 93 The uniqueness of this thesis project is that, to date, this is the one wherein exists the intent that the life story interview is to become available to all elder and palliative patients without exception or regard to predisposing factors such as occupation or ethnic or cultural background. The one requirement is to have lived and a desire to talk about it.
Purchasing the equipment for the training aspect
The initial equipment necessary to offer the training course was purchased (described later in the chapter). In part, the equipment purchased included six personal handheld Sony recorders, four Asus personal combination quad-core tablet laptops, three professional digital transcription kits with software, a two-terabyte Seagate USB backup drive for storage, the necessary equipment to bind the finished interview products and to laminate covers to produce individual booklets to be given to the interviewed recipients following transcription of the text and the necessary textbooks to teach the training course post-thesis.
The handheld recorders were found to be unreliable. Too often, they would fail while being used. The personal quad core tablet laptops were purchased and found to work adequately to complete the task.
Difficulty obtaining church support
The original intent for this project was to train others to do the interviews. The training course was created but unable to be delivered it to a core group from any particular church body. Therefore, the interviews were gathered by the thesis author and the alternate goal achieved, i.e., incorporation of a not-for-profit foundation to carry out post-thesis training of others to collect life stories. The course drafted within this project will be applied.
94 Post-thesis training will have the same goals, i.e., comfort, closure, legacy, posterity.
Rationale for the training course is the same as in this excerpt from the Legacy Project:
Doing a life interview is a chance to travel through time. In the present moment, the best gift you can give someone is to listen to them. You'll find out about the past as you hear about real-life experiences. And along the way, you may discover some timeless insights to help guide you through your own future. We live our lives forward, but we understand them backward. When you see a great movie or read a good book, you often want to see or read it again. Older people also want to “read over” or “see” parts of their lives again. In looking back, we can identify turning points or dynamic events. We can clarify and organize our thinking about life, make sense of events, and enrich the meaning of our life story. If we make meaning as young adults by fashioning dreams, as older adults we make it by shaping memories. We see how the story of our life has turned out - then change what we can for the future and accept the rest. This process of looking back is formally called “life review.” Informal (simply reminiscing) or formal (an interview) life review offers… benefits for both young and old: 1) It creates a sense of continuity, linking the past with the present and the future. 2) It enables younger people to find out interesting things about their family members or members of their community, as well as the broader historical past. 3) It's a way to pass on family stories and traditions and preserve family history and cultural heritage. 4) It builds self-esteem in those doing the telling and those doing the listening. 5) It helps young people develop research, interviewing, and listening skills. 6) It gives older people an opportunity to reflect on and assess their life achievements as well as disappointments. 7) It combats the isolation and sense of loss that may come with growing older. 8) It helps older people resolve conflicts and fears and gives younger people a model for facing their own life challenges. 178
Originally, I hoped that simple conversation with pastors of the various congregations in the city would encourage participation in the project. I had prayed that God would open the door and, if anyone was to participate once I explained the project, they would do so willingly. After approaching the various pastoral leaders in the city in which I reside, I
178 Ibid., “Legacy: Life Interview Tips,” accessed September 10, 2014, http://www.legacy project.org/guides/lifeinttips.html. 95 found I could elicit no cooperation with respect to recruiting potential trainees from individual congregations. I would not find the Presence I was seeking for this project there.
The Salvation Army and the Dignity Manifesto
The positive response received in the search for pastors and congregations that would participate was from The Salvation Army. I have gained from them the confirmation that there are ministries involved in helping people overcome barriers of economic and cultural disparity. Whether in war or peace, they are well-known for facilitating personal and corporate dignity179 of the human population through relief of physical and spiritual suffering. Specifically, I admire and agree with The Salvation Army in:
THE DIGNITY MANIFESTO I believe that: • everyone should have access to life’s basic necessities; • poverty is a scourge on society that puts dignity out of reach; • people’s lives change when they are treated with dignity; • everyone has a right to a sense of dignity; • the fight against poverty deserves my personal attention.180
I believe this Dignity Manifesto requires an objective purpose identical to this thesis project, i.e. requiring the presence of other person-centred individuals willing to pursue the empowerment of others to bring about a better standard of living. This fits the project intent, which is to provide an active presence promoting dignity of both the elder and the
179 “Dignity, plural ‘dignities’: 1: the quality or state of being worthy, honored, or esteemed; 2a: high rank, office, or position; 2b: a legal title of nobility or honor; 3: archaic : dignitary 4: formal reserve or seriousness of manner, appearance, or language.” “Definition of Dignity,” accessed October 5, 2014, http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dignity.
180 “The Dignity Project,” accessed October 5, 2014, http://www.salvationarmy.ca/dignity/ dignity-manifesto/.
96 dying. By encouraging and empowering through the telling and collecting of life stories for posterity, the betterment of both the one telling and those who follow may be achieved.
It seems apparent that empowering others to a better standard of life and personal ethic without requiring a significant repetition of the suffering by others may involve learning from those who have gone before. Perhaps the path to comfort, closure, legacy and posterity may be found in examples of those who have persevered: the fruit of such effort found in the stories of life survivors who have endured the odds and learned to overcome through conscious effort and determination.
The alternate route: Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.
In 2011, on the way home to Saskatchewan from the Maritimes, I stopped off in
Portland, Maine, to discuss a partnered relationship with Dr. Robert Atkinson from the
Center for the Study of Lives, University of Southern Maine. Dr. Atkinson is an ethnographer who developed a database of his own for life histories. The post-thesis intent is to follow up on that discussion by increasing to international status the life history database Dr. Atkinson developed. His book, The Life Story Interview,181 is one of the principle texts for the ethnography training developed in conjunction with this thesis.
In concert with a group of willing care givers who would become directors, a not-for- profit incorporated entity, Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc., was created to deal specifically with the purpose of embedding, enfranchising, obtaining funding and promoting this philanthropic service - this training and recording ministry to others - within the collective psyche of as large a population as possible post-thesis.
181 Robert Atkinson, The Life Story Interview, Qualitative Research Methods Series 44 (Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, Inc., 1998). 97 The four specific goals of Inuksuk Book Foundation are the assumption of this thesis that at least four elements or pillars of dignity in dying are a consistent reality. The process is to be in recording life histories of the elderly and the dying for the sake of comfort, assistance toward closure and for provision of legacy for the dying and their families as well as for posterity at large.
The six directors of the new Foundation selected the logo depicted below. In consideration of the specific Canadian identity for the current subject group, the symbol chosen as the logo for the new corporate foundation was an Inuksuk standing upon the
pages of an open book, with both transposed upon
a globe of the earth.
A one-minute video logo was created to express
graphically the foundational goals and intent of the Logo, Inuksuk Book Foundation new organization. The logo and Inuksuk Book
Foundation video were created in a collaborative effort between Sarah Doherty Heinrichs, artistic director (voice and illustration), ‘Eben Doherty, student at the University of
Saskatchewan in Saskatoon (technical production) and thesis author Rev. Dr. Don Doherty.
A viewing of the video logo can be obtained by typing ‘Inuksuk Book Foundation’ into an internet search engine, then clicking on the link ‘20150905 InuksukBookIntro Inuksuk
Book Foundation Inc. - YouTube’.182 The content and intent is self-explanatory.
182 “20150905 InuksukBookIntro ‘Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.,’” accessed on September 5, 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGme9ocoqu0.
98 In 2015, in accord with the collaborative conversation of the six potential directors for the new corporation, Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc. was registered as a not-for-profit entity within the province of Saskatchewan.
The first meeting of the Board of Directors of Inuksuk Book Foundation took place on
November 14, 2015, at the home of director and vice-president, Mr. Dwayne Cameron, a rehabilitative counsellor involved with Corrections in Saskatoon.
The foundational directors for the new not-for-profit include: Maj. Glenn Patey, Regina;
Rev. Rodney Cox, North Battleford; Ms. Sarah Doherty Heinrichs, Saskatoon; Ms. Barbara
E. Jean Doherty, secretary-treasurer; Mr. Dwayne Cameron, vice–president; with the thesis author as president. Copies of the foundational documents for the Inuksuk Book
Foundation Inc. are included as Appendix G.
To illustrate the relative analogy and the allegorical representation of both the ‘search for Presence’ and the ‘Inuksuk Book Foundation’, I offer an illuminating selection of text from The Inuksuk Book by Mary Wallace:
INUNNGUAQ - LIKE A PERSON An inuksuk is a stone structure that can communicate knowledge essential for survival to an Arctic traveler. Inuksuit (plural) are found throughout the Arctic areas of Alaska, Arctic Canada and Greenland. Inuksuit have been used by the Inuit to act in place of human messengers. For those who understand their forms, inuksuit in the Arctic are very important helpers: they can show direction, tell about a good hunting or fishing area, show where food is stored, indicate a good resting place or act as a message centre. Every inuksuk is unique because it is built from the stones at hand. Inuksuit can be small or large; a single rock put in place; several rocks balanced on top of each other; boulders placed in a pile; or flat stones stacked. One of these stone structures is known as an inuksuk, two are called inuksuuk and three or more are referred to as inuksuit. An inuksuk is a strong connection to the land: it is built on the land, it is made of the land and it tells about the land. Inuit are taught to be respectful of inuksuit. There is a traditional law, which persists today, that forbids damaging or destroying inuksuit in any way. New inuksuit can be built to mark the presence of modern-day
99 Inuit, but the old ones should never be touched. Traditionally, it is said that if one destroys an inuksuk, his or her life will be cut shorter. Over time, the style of building inuksuit has changed. In the past, most inuksuit were built by stacking rock in a particular way, but usually not in the shape of a human. However, any modern inuksuit are built to look like human figures made of stone (with a head, body, arms and legs). In Inuktitut, these are called inunnguaq… (like a person). Some Inuit believe that this type of stone figure was first built about one hundred years ago, after the arrival of the qallunaat (non-Inuit) whalers. Others say that this human look-alike originated long before this century. All things change with time; Inuit ways are not exempt. Today, as traditional ways are changing into contemporary ways Inuit, and even non- Inuit, sometimes build inuksuit simply to mark their presence—both in the Arctic and in their travels outside of their homeland. 183
Traditions that shape and protect us
The world over, people have traditions like that of the Inuksuk for the Inuit, traditions that intentionally inform and provide a form of contact and safety for travellers who will follow in footsteps of their progenitors. As Mary Wallace wrote, “An inuksuk is a stone structure that can communicate knowledge essential for survival to an Arctic traveler.”
Perhaps our survival depends on that kind of retrospective. Perhaps that respect of tradition is analogous to the care and concern we need to have for our elders and those critically ill. This is the basis of the theory behind this thesis and is well expressed in the statement from Mary Wallace’s work:
An inuksuk is a strong connection to the land: it is built on the land, it is made of the land and it tells about the land. Inuit are taught to be respectful of inuksuit. There is a traditional law, which persists today, that forbids damaging or destroying inuksuit in any way. New inuksuit can be built to mark the presence of modern-day Inuit, but the old ones should never be touched. Traditionally, it is said that if one destroys an inuksuk, his or her life will be cut shorter.184
183 Mary Wallace, The Inuksuk Book (Toronto: Maple Leaf Press, 1999), 15, 17.
184 Ibid. 100 Interview process in practice: preparing for the interviews
Although not successful in securing participants for the original teaching course, I decided to collect personally the originally planned six interviews for the data set: four interviews with the advanced elderly and two with subjects in palliative care.
Of the elder care institutions in my city, two agreed to participate. At the last minute, due to time constraints of the administrator, one of the two backed out. However, staff of one large and well-known eldercare institution were intrigued by our discussion and enthusiastically agreed to participate, i.e. Mont St. Joseph Home.185
Mont St. Joseph, the resident facility
When I met with candidates for the interviews, I was impressed with the peaceful composure presented by the candidates. I have come to believe this attitude reflects the quality of care received by elders in the facility. Perhaps to express the working ethic and ethos that was apparent within the facility, I will list the Seniors Bill of Rights186 found on the facility website and apparently to which staff adhere:
RESIDENT/ELDER BILL OF RIGHTS
It is the right of the Residents/Elders of Mont St. Joseph Home to: • Live with dignity, self-worth, and independence • Be recognized for their uniqueness as a person • Have their life respected, nurtured and cherished • Receive care that fosters their spiritual, physical, psychological, emotional and
185 “Mont St Joseph Home (MSJ Home) is a 120-bed long term care Home in Prince Albert, centrally located in Saskatchewan servicing the Prince Albert Parkland Health Region (PAPHR) along with referrals from the two northern Saskatchewan health regions. … MSJ Home prides itself on a holistic approach for all services provided including spiritual care, communal needs and family integration.” “Mont St. Joseph Home,” accessed November 20, 2016, http:// montstjoseph.org/.
186 “Mont St. Joseph Home: Resident Elder Bill of Rights,” accessed September 5, 2016, http://montstjoseph.org/residentelder-bill-of-rights/.
101 social well-being • Receive care provided by compassionate, competent and knowledgeable staff • Give as well as receive care • Have the opportunity for companionship, variety and spontaneity • Be informed, consulted and exercise choices • Maintain their relationships and integrate with their community • Be in a safe and accepting environment
The consensus was soon reached that the majority of participants for the interviews could come from within that facility, i.e., Mont St. Joseph Home in Prince Albert, For the sake of expediency, I was pleased with this permission.
When interviewing potential participants, I did so with Mr. Brian Martin, facility administrator, and Deacon Eldon Danielson, institutional pastoral and spiritual care coordinator. I was impressed with the sincerity expressed by the two men for concern in respecting the dignity of the facility inhabitants.
It is apparent that the residents of Mont St. Joseph do not need to be religiously affiliated
(Roman Catholic, nor even Christian) to live or work in this high-quality care facility.
Pastoral care coordinator Deacon Eldon Danielson is a Lutheran and offers a full range of pastoral/spiritual services to the residents.
The lay-out of Mont St. Joseph is a large open environment on two floors with
‘communities’ within the larger structure divided into quasi ‘neighbourhoods.’ There are outside and inside common areas and a separate large partitionable central common area where the elders gather ‘downtown’ for various types of social and spiritual events.
The environment appears exceptionally clean and staff care of excellent quality. The elders I interviewed were happy, well attended, semi-independent and quite mobile. They spoke well of the care facility, stating they felt safe, respected, able to live life with dignity.
102 The Interviews
By the time Deacon Eldon Danielson and the interviewer met to discuss potential interviewees, Deacon Danielson had met with several candidates. As care facility employees know the residents and are aware of who would be capable of presenting a life story in a cogent fashion for the four one-hour sessions, he had picked the initial three who had volunteered, with a second set to follow later. We set up the formal introductory
‘resonance’ interview wherein the interviewer would meet with the potential participants and attempt to establish a relationship of rapport.
Without exception, the first three candidates were friendly and accepting of the interviewer. As per Appendix B, Life Interview Research Consent Form, the release form for the institution was signed, then each interviewee and the interviewer signed the particular release form, with copy given to the individual participants. Then, four interview times were arranged for each person and the primary list of questions was given to help guide the participants through the four sessions.
The first set of three
Initially, the first three interviews were held in early May 2016 with two seniors in their mid-90s and with one young lady, a 39-year-old mother of four children, who was diagnosed in 2008 with multiple sclerosis and now classified as palliative. The first interviews took a month to record.
In June and July, 2016, the interview data were transcribed and made into books with eight copies given to each participant. This process took almost two months to accomplish for the initial three participants as a variety of factors prolonged the effort, e.g.:
103 1) transcription time required on average four hours to one hour of interview;
2) two drafts were made and approved by both the interviewed and the family of each;
3) third and final draft was converted into a book PDF appropriate for production;
4) the finished product took time to print, bind and publish, et al.
The various factors were confirmation of the learning and processing curve required for final production. Given the time-consuming process of traditional transcription methods, in the future, I would strive to find a more time-efficient transcription tool.
The identical procedure was repeated for the second set of interviews.
Drafts and family review
As noted, three drafts were made of each completed transcription. As indicated, a major factor that lengthened time for production was that each of the first two drafts was presented to each interviewee for their editing and approval. Inevitably, that meant at least a week between each draft, so family could examine the document to see if there was anything in the text of which they would not approve.
Only one of the participant families had problems with content. However, the one
family that did have problem with the
content appeared to grow closer to the
participant through the airing of
emotions surrounding undisclosed
information and misconceptions. This
was fortunate as the elderly participant Three stacks of eight ‘My Life Story’ booklets for the first three participants.
104 passed away soon after. The objective of providing timely Presence and helping with closure in similar fashion was validated.
The recording software and the transcribing
The free recording software, ‘Audacity’, successfully recorded every session with clarity. A quad core desktop computer with Windows 10 operating system, two large flat screen monitors and Microsoft Word 2016 processing software were used for transcribing in conjunction with an FSUSB Pro Ultra Professional Digital Transcription Kit. The latter includes transcription software, a USB transcription foot pedal and lightweight headset.
For word processing to complete the transcription, I used a second quad-core desktop computer in tandem with the first, plus two more large flat screens placed side-by-side to the first two, again with Windows 10, Microsoft Office Word 2016. Dragon Naturally
Speaking Premium, version 13, software assisted for ease of processing by both manual typing and word processing by speech, making it accessible to those with physical disability or limitations.
Supplied ‘life history' suggested questions list
For preliminary introduction, each candidate was instructed that the list of questions to help guide the participant through the four sessions was for suggestion only and would not be used verbatim. The questions are based on four stages of life and, if the interviewee so decided, could be used by the interviewed participant for pre-consideration to facilitate each one of the four interview hours in which they would be involved within the process.
Some of the participants did their interviews with questions in hand, some did not.
105 As previously indicated, each candidate was asked to reminisce through free association with the pre-considered questions in mind. However, it will be seen in the post-interview response sheets that one of the individual participants and the family of another participant stated that they would have preferred a more structured interview. However, general reaction was in favour of the free association process.
For the future, I intend to add more significance and explanation to the fact that the question sheet is broken into four fundamental quadrants and memories associated with those quadrants (and the related concepts) may be considered for expression in the one-
hour session if the participant so desires. It is my opinion that is a
sufficient compromise that would still permit free association.
Using a $20 table purchased at a local store, I set a Microsoft
Surface quad core computer tablet on top, ran an extension cord from
$20 wooden table the tablet to a wall socket in the room of each participant, set the required recording software to appropriate settings for good reproduction, then asked each participant to start at the beginning and walk me through their lives. Each day for four days per participant, they did so, and I enjoyed every minute of it.
My hope is that the elder participants received at least a part of as much joy out of the interview process as I received. From the responses garnered post-interview, as will be discussed in Chapter 4, it was apparent they did.
As per the original plan, the interview was concluded at either the one-hour mark or whenever the interviewee expressed a desire to stop. Then, prior to shutting down and packing up the recorder, the digital file was saved in both ‘wav’ and ‘mpg’ format,
106 requiring approximately an extra ten minutes per client interview. During this time, the interviewer would chat and conclude with the person being interviewed.
Prior to transcribing the oral interview text, the digital files were transferred immediately to individual computer folders named for each participant. The ‘wav’ file for each individual was then opened using the transcription software on one desktop computer while transcribing the oral text to a Microsoft Word 2016 file on the second desktop.
The Word files were renamed or updated daily using a year/month/day plus name format, e.g. 20160822 BillingslyJB transcription.docx. The files were backed up daily on an external drive.
For future data basing
After conclusion of this thesis and into the actual collecting, cataloguing, data basing and publishing of life stories in connection with Inuksuk Book Foundation, future interviews will be individually summarized and identified using the cover sheet listed as
“Appendix B: Cover Sheet” (not Appendix B of this Thesis) within Dr. Robert Atkinson’s work The Life Story Interview.187 However, for this thesis, the initial consent agreement with the interviewed states that the material will be destroyed post-thesis.
Second group of interviews
Following the original three, a second group of three participants was selected: two more seniors and one more in palliative care. However, one of the second group of seniors later changed her mind and decided not to participate. After having five participate from a
187 Atkinson, 78. 107 single location, I approached another individual, an elderly lady from the city who is well known for her service work, who agreed to participate when asked.
The final acquired data set is fully represented in Appendix F: Life Story Interviews, six interviews of four hours each, 245 single-spaced pages and over 103,000 words.
The data set contains the full text of the six acquired life story interviews with the elders and those in palliative care. Although not presented precisely in the format given to the recipients, included with the dataset appendix are all pictures that were used in the six sets
of books given to the interviewees. A picture of
the six completed books is presented below.
After four interviews per individual were
completed, transcribed and made into a pdf
document file, the document was given to a The six My Life Story booklets and one rear cover printing company for development of the
master copy. This master copy was used by myself for this project and supplied to the family of the interviewed to reproduce in the future a properly sequenced finished booklet style document if they so desire.
Four of the six documents were copied by myself from the professionally produced master book copy. An HP LaserJet Pro 200 MFP printer was used with high quality paper and card stock for covers. These supplies were readily available through Staples Office
Supply. This process produced clear two-sided reproductions of book pages from which I could bind the sets of books and laminated covers.
One of the second set of three participants, the second palliative patient, asked for a total of twenty copies. I told him that I could provide only eight for free as funds were
108 limited. He offered to pay for the other twelve. I thought on this, then informed him that I would comply under certain conditions: I would ask the professional printing company that was printing the master to produce all twenty copies and, if acceptable, I would pay for the eight previously agreed upon and charge him precisely what it would cost to produce the extra twelve booklets, i.e. specifically, that I would make no profit on the production and supply of the books to him. He concurred. It cost approximately $180 for the extra twelve and that is what the participant paid, while receiving the original eight copies for free. A total of twenty-two copies were reproduced, all in the high-quality image format.
The final participant and a welcome printing option
The story of the final participating elder, not from Mont St. Joseph, was almost 100 pages with many colour picture insertions. When I spoke with the printer concerning the size of the master copy, I was informed the printer had figured a way to produce the colour copies at significantly reduced expense while producing equal quality - resulting in a charge of just over $32 in total for ten copies (eight for participant), a massive savings.
With the radically decreased cost while maintaining a high-quality product and considering the time and expense involved in using a laser printer, future copies will be professionally printed.
It must be pointed out that the intention of the thesis author is to acquire equipment and capability to print professional reproductions within the teaching and working parameters of Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.
Finally, the laminating of covers and binding of the finished product was done by the interviewer. Each of two transcribed drafts was given to each participant for editing and
109 approval following the interviews and transcribing. A third and final draft reduced to 8.5” x 5.5” pdf for reproduction in booklet form, was printed and bound with a laminated cover into ten copies. Eight were delivered to the client as a finished product. One of each document was left by permission with the institution for their file and one kept for interviewer’s file.
Following delivery of the finished product to each client, a Post-Interview Individual
Response Sheet was given asking for feedback from each participant regarding the interview process and suggestions for improvement. Each participant responded with their appropriate hindsight review, the consideration of which will follow in Chapter 4.
Finally, a Post Thesis Feedback Response Sheet was given to the facility in which most of the interviews took place. As per Chapter 4, Deacon Eldon Danielson responded with suggestions that were considered as well.
The Post-Interview Individual Response Sheet reads in part as follows:
Person Interviewed: I have been interviewed in four one-hour sessions and have received final copy of the interviews in a booklet called “My story.” Following are my concluding comments:
All responses were done individually. One person’s post-interview response was done by her family, a response that appeared indicative of some of the control issues that need to be addressed within families to facilitate comfort and closure, e.g. in terms of the dynamics of families regarding age and remaining issues of independence of the elders.
According to what I was told by the 96-year-old elder interviewed and confirmed in follow-up by the pastoral care coordinator (see Care Facility Response Sheet, Chapter 4), response by the family appeared to differ from that expressed by the person interviewed.
However, it was what the recipient allowed though she indicated it did not express her
110 opinion. I was informed by the participant there was a differing opinion between the balance of the family and the two individuals who wrote the response for the elder. This will be discussed in Chapter 4 under consideration of the response.
Finally, a response was given by the Director of Pastoral Care at Mont St. Joseph, the sponsoring facility for five of the six participants interviewed. As with the individual responses, it will be discussed in Chapter 4.
Last stage
The last stage of the procedure was recording a DVD complete with all digital files, including master text and all oral interviews, to be given with the My Life Story booklet to the interviewed as a part of the legacy for each interviewed individual’s family. With the file saved in both .wav and .mp3 audio formats and included with the material presented to the individual family, it is intended that others may use a variety of equipment to listen to the actual recordings.
Final production process specifics
Following transcription of the interview text using Microsoft Word 2016, the text was
transposed onto the 5.5” x 8.5” dimension split
page (8.5” x 11” turned sideways) in a .docx
format using an 11 point Calibri font, then saved
as a pdf document and sent to the printer where
it would be converted into a master copy for One of the master copies showing the opening page (right) and closing pages (left) on one side of the page.
111 proper book printing format, i.e. mirrored margins, page one on the right, pages on both sides and all pages in proper sequence.
Once the production master was created, the resulting copies were manually assembled into booklets to become the finished product ready for binding. Using a quality 67-pound card stock, booklet covers were printed and covered with a heat laminated pouch.
Front cover and back with logo
The front of each booklet cover was inscribed pertaining
~My Story~ to the individual as the cover sheet template shown at the left. Full name of the individual A Life History Interview The back cover was printed with a small copy of the two-
part Foundation logo and address as shown in the diagram Recorded by Rev. Dr. Donald B.R. Doherty below.
for Inuksuk Book Foundation Inuksuk Book Foundation 1317-4th Street East Date Prince Albert, SK S6V 0L6 - A non-profit foundation
Binding
To accomplish the binding, a new metal comb binder was purchased. Seventy-one copies of the published booklets were completed: eight per client plus twelve extra for one individual; one copy each of five participants for the file of the participating care facility,
Mont St. Joseph, and one copy of each of the six participants for the interviewer record.
112 Final distribution
Once binding was done, the eight life story booklets and the DVD with all four oral
interviews and document transcripts were
packed into a gift box and delivered.
Finally, at the time of delivery of the
package, the Post-Interview Individual The comb binding machine used to produce the seventy-one copies of the Response Sheets were delivered. Participants. My Life Story booklets were informed they could take a few days to fill out the form. If they desired to speak with family, all commentary would be accepted.
Conclusion of Chapter 3: Methodology and the end result
The end result of this ethnographic effort is twofold. First, as intended, a simple model of interviewing the elderly and those in palliative care has been developed, a model for the purposes of:
1) obtaining the equipment necessary to do the interviews;
2) seeking and obtaining permission for interviews;
3) completing the interviews and objectives;
4) printing and publishing the final product.
Second, the model has been tested through interview, data collected and reproduced as per the model structure. This has allowed opportunity to enhance the process of offering comfort to the interviewed and family, assisting with closure, providing the interviewed participants with a legacy document to leave for loved ones and, finally, for posterity in bequeathing to society a living book from which to learn and grow.
113 To conclude, the specific attempt of the methodology was to develop ad hoc a project process that could be reproduced readily for the good of everyone. By both carrying out the rudimentary steps to develop the process and by gaining hindsight into delivery and modification required to improve and streamline efficacy of the interview process in general, that was accomplished.
114 CHAPTER 4: Analysis of the Life Story Interviews
The following is a discussion on participant response to the interview process. Now that the project has completed and near end of life stories collected, the objective is to analyze the data collected from the interviews. As this has been a simple project with a simple goal, final analysis is simple and based upon actual feedback from both interviewed participants and from the personnel of the facility that sponsored a significant portion of the project through allowing me to work with their long-term residents.
Post Interview Individual Responses
1) Participant Number 1: Ms. S - Ninety-six years of age, Ms. S is a Canadian citizen who emigrated with her family from Poland to Canada when she was young. She is lucid, communicates well and able to get around unassisted by using a wheelchair.
Participant follow-up response
In my response to Dr. Don Doherty’s work, I think he did a wonderful job. It isn’t easy to come and ask a ninety-six-year-old person to write what he did. He is to be congratulated for his work. I enjoyed what we did. Thank you, Don. (Ms. S)
Comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
This elder is a bright, eloquent lady who speaks with a bit of a Polish accent. Her life history booklet was fifty-three pages long with few pictures. It told the story of immigrants in the early part of the twentieth century who arrived with little other than the clothes they wore and meagre belongings. Through fortitude and determination, they overcame
115 intimidating odds, language and cultural barriers and the harsh environment of the
Canadian Prairie winters to establish homesteads, large families and to thrive. Ms. S’ story was the first of several that illustrated common themes of overcoming the unexpected, e.g., injury, loss, grief, and in doing much with little. A quotation from the transcribed interview succinctly summarizes Ms. S’ pioneering view garnered from a harsh but successful life:
You know what? To achieve anything, you’ve got to have in your mind: work hard, persevere, be a good person! It’s no shame to be poor; but live a good life! That’s the only way you will get on in this world. Nothing is given to you: you got to work for it!188
One recurring theme throughout the various interviews was the tendency for people to go to outside activities for entertainment or to have fun. In this case, Ms. S mentioned that she and her husband often mixed with neighbours and went to the dances that were held frequently in their communities. It helped them to relieve the stress of life, such as grief from loss of a child (as so many did in those days) to a medical condition that is remedied easily today.189
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1
Will a set of impartial, nonreligious life history interviews demonstrate a perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical presence at any time in the past life experience of the interviewed?
In the case of Ms. S, the first interview respondent, the answer for most of the text was
‘no.’ However, at times she expressly stated that she was Roman Catholic and how that
188 Appendix F, 34, para 6.
189 Ibid., 14, para 4. 116 had impacted her life in a particular situation, i.e., trying to get her son into a particular school within the Prince Albert area.190
However, in keeping with the thesis Question of “a set of impartial, nonreligious, life history interviews demonstrating a perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical presence…,” Ms. S described a strong memory from her youth when her brother almost lost his legs from a mowing accident. She considered the event to be a miracle:
Dad didn’t know any doctors in Prince Albert. That was 1931 and we had never been to a doctor here. But that was the neighbour’s doctor. He gave my brother five major operations beside the first small one and they reconnected and saved his legs. Until he died at ninety-three, my brother ‘A’ could walk, he could dance. It was a miracle. The doctor told my dad what he did but, he said… that he could thank God for A’s legs.191
Given that Ms. S went on to speak about the trials of life found in such events as the early loss of her husband and the raising of her children on a farm alone and with so little; that she stated ‘It was a miracle!’ concerning the saving of her brother’s legs; and demonstrated by the fact that she had me take special note of the cross that a former prisoner made for her and she has on her wall;192 I am inclined to the affirmative ‘Yes!’, i.e., that Ms. S did ‘demonstrate perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical presence at any time in the past life experience of the interviewed!’
2) Participant Number 2: Ms. I - Ninety-six years of age at the completion of the interview process, Ms. I is a Canadian citizen born in Saskatchewan. She is ambulatory without need of a wheelchair.
190 Ibid., 28, para 2-6.
191 Ibid., 11, para. 8.
192 Ibid., 35, Ms. S' Cross. 117 Participant follow-up response for Ms. I
Based on the age of the interviewee, perhaps a consultation with the family should have taken place prior to the process. The interview times were too lengthy, deadlines for responses were too restrictive, expectation to respond was extremely difficult for a ninety-six-year-old. Overall, the process caused anxiety. After discussions with our mother, the above is the opinions of two daughters. (Ms. I) (submitted by one of the daughters, J)
[On the side of the page was scribbled “shorter sessions, more often.”]
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
Ms. I spoke of the common theme of overcoming hardship on the Canadian Prairies, of having been born and raised through the harsh times of the 1930s and throughout her life.
As did several of the other participants, she spoke of the general lack of education. She spoke of closeness to siblings and to her family. The exception was for her harsh ex- military father who had been wounded three times in combat. She said he would at times punish her harshly.193
Ms. I talked about the harsh environment, about collecting ‘cow chips’ to dry and burn as fuel,194 the need to find work wherever she could, and the harsh conditions under which her mother and father died. In general, her early life was rugged scarcity, as she describes:
As far as having allowances, we never did have allowances. There was no such thing… We had dust storms, many. Many times, from our barn to the house, I had to go onto the ground because the cyclone was just going to lift me! If I was in the house, I would go in the basement. That was during the dirty 30s: that’s why they called it the dirty 30s! If I was coming to the barn from the house, and the wind was coming, I would have to get out of the way.
193 Ibid., 38, para 7, 8.
194 Ibid., 39, para 2.
118 But anyway, my life in the Prairie was a tough go. When I think of the fact we were very short of water. We did have dugouts so when we did get a severe rain and they overflowed, we were thankful!195
One particularly interesting area of which Ms. I spoke (as did one of the other interviewees) was the relationship on the Prairies between the European-based and the First
Nations culture. In one of her descriptive discussions, she related the fear and then positive growing realization that occurred when her hometown Mayor received a request from residents of the nearest Reserve to be allowed to come into the town and entertain the population. Apparently, the request was made to break down barriers and, just as apparent from her discussion, it worked:
Well, [hometown] itself was just a hamlet, a small town with an elevator, a railroad track, a church, maybe a little gathering hall and a post office. Anyway, not too far from [hometown] is a reserve. The natives asked the Council if they could come in to the town and perform some time. So, they asked my dad if he would pipe them in. So he took me, my sister and brother with him. Mother stayed back home; she didn’t come. I remember so much about going to that. I was about ten years old. We were so fearful of the Indians… we were scared of them. The hall we went into had a loft so, instead of us staying in the lower part of the hall, Dad had us go upstairs so we could look down on the balcony to watch him piping the natives in. That was an excitement. When I think of it now, it was beautiful! It was beautiful… the colors of the native’s outfits and the drumming that they had behind my dad was just beautiful! They banged their drums and they performed, they danced, they went in circles and held each other’s hands. Later on, the chief got a few of the people of the municipality of [hometown] to join in with them in the circle: the minister, the grocery man, the elevator man, some of the important people of the town. At the time, we were scared but when I think about it more and more now, it was beautiful! Being that they were so close, they wanted to be good neighbors to the people. Later on in years, they [the natives] did have pastureland: a lot of pastureland. If we had too many cattle, more than our quarter could handle, farmers could pay to use this pastureland. Of course, all the cattle were branded so they would know the difference and they would come and pick up their cattle in the Fall. So, the natives became friends
195 Ibid., 42, para 5. 119 and became closer with the white man. I saw that, even though I was very fearful at the time. It was unbelievable! In those days, we just thought the natives were some kind of a tomcat or some wild character to be scared of and shouldn’t be in amongst the rest of the people. We were very scared. I wasn’t the kind of person to be scared by much but I was scared. Now when we see them, they’re just the real thing: just human beings…!196
Once again, what appeared was the rugged individualism of the Prairies and the spirit of overcoming - a spirit that, in the end, trumped both fear and prejudice.
The rest of Ms. I’s story is a mix of the mischief of youth, of going to dances, to ball games, of finding love,197 of personal loss then finding love again and of the large families that can result. Basically, it was about the stress and problems that faced so many through the dynamics of life at the time.
Another issue raised regarded how the elderly may get mixed up in, or be prescribed, the wrong medication in such a manner that it becomes dangerous to their health, often with long-term repercussion. Ms. I made the observation:
Not only that, I had gone to a doctor at the [clinic]. He gave me the wrong pill, and an elderly person with diabetes should not have received that pill. So, I had the last rites and I was gone for three days! I don’t remember anything during that time. My kids told me this. My whole family came to the hospital. My oldest daughter took pictures of me. They showed me the pictures and I don’t want to ever see them again!198
With regard to the participant response given by two of her daughters on the follow-up sheet given to Ms. I, the opinion of the daughters (who were not consulted prior to the interview as to Ms. I’s capacity to participate), Ms. I told me that she did not agree with
196 Ibid., 48-49.
197 Ibid., 51.
198 Ibid., 63, para 8,9. 120 the way that the response was written. Rather, it was her daughters’ opinion and she let them put it down. Although I would have preferred a response from Ms. I, her daughters’ response was accepted with gratitude.
My observation regarding the response is that it illustrates a cardinal point: that the elderly, though often still capable of handling many of their own affairs, often are marginalized and disenfranchised through over control by the well-meaning family.
I will take into account the two daughters’ opinion for future work. Developing a sense of harmony and rapport, of concord and reconciliation, is of the utmost significance to me and I recognize that, even if misplaced, the comments are made from concern and in good faith. However, I hold that the opinion and welfare of the elder is first their own concern.
Finally, Deacon Eldon Danielson stated that the rest of the family, after reading their mother’s interview, informed him that they were pleased.
Ms. I verbally expressed that she was comforted and happy with the interview process, that it helped with closure and that ‘she knew God is waiting for her.’ She was glad that her children would have the booklet of her life story as a legacy. However, when such interviews take place, she stated they could open a clarifying dialogue between the parent and the children, as it did in this case. This was a primary purpose for the project.
As to the thesis Question under consideration as stated on page 3, chapter 1
Ms. I spoke of an often harsh and punishing life199 but, from the first interview onward, she expressed a belief in ‘faith.’200 She said she believed it to be a miracle when she was
199 Ibid., 42.
200 Ibid., 41, para 2.
121 able to save her father from drowning in the well. She said “I think that God was there working for us…! That was a miracle.”201 She expressed similar observations at other times in the interviews.202
At the conclusion of her interviews, Ms. I made this statement:
The children respect me… so far. At the odd time, they would kind of give me a dig but, maybe I had it coming to me!? But, anyway, it’s all in the past and there might be more coming up, who knows? I’m still here! What I would say to one I would like to say to the other. All I have to tell them now is to accept their life the best they can, cope with things, always try to respect people! The one thing that I would like to tell them the most is to love God and to know that somebody’s there! I just want my kids to know that there’s somebody up there, because He’s telling me there is and He’s waiting for me! Sometimes we have some bad days and it just seems to me, just like that cat in the picture on the wall with the two eyes looking at me, that guy up there is watching me! The last question on this sheet is “What’s the most important thing in living a good life? What would you say?” I was starting to think, “I don’t know! But to have a good life you have to accept the best you can!” It says here [on the question sheet], “What would you like your children or grandchildren to remember you by?” That’s the most important thing to me! I have always tried to care for and respect all of my kids, grandchildren, great-grandchildren or whatever, and people, including all people. All you have to do is say that you love them and to keep trying to think the same way I do! Care for people, don’t hate them! And always care for each other. Don’t try to find fault with each other because we all have faults. Rather than trying to stir the pot, keep it from overflowing! Finally, the thing I want my kids to remember the most is to try and love God, love God always, because He’s there! He’s waiting for me, for all of us, and they will follow me too one day!203
In the case of the thesis Question for the participant, given her own words of closing to her children, I think it is safe to say that the answer is ‘Yes!’
201 Ibid., 42, para 8 - 43, para 1.
202 Ibid., 47, para 3; 48; 61, para 1.
203 Ibid., 66, para 10 - 67, para 5. 122 3) Participant number 3: Ms. G - Thirty-nine years of age, Ms. G is the mother of four children. Diagnosed in 2008 with Multiple Sclerosis, Ms. G has been in palliative care since 2013. Multiple Sclerosis is a debilitative disease and Ms. G requires assistance for all normal functions, including the interview. It was difficult for the participant to express herself. Nevertheless, she was excited about the opportunity to do so and gave it her best.
The interview was facilitated by a caretaker of Ms. G, an assistant who through long term association was able to interpret for the transcription process the oral responses that the interviewer could not understand. Thus, the process was effectually completed.
Participant follow-up response
I think it went well, even though I had a hard time speaking. It was good to get it off my chest and release my knowledge. (Ms. G)
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
Ms. G is classified as palliative. She has limited control of her physical abilities.
However, despite obvious difficulty, she has a wonderful attitude with a dry wit and humor.
When we began discussions of Mont St. Joseph as to who would anticipate in the interviews, due to her palliative status, both the administrator and the pastoral care coordinator wanted Ms. G to be on the list of those chosen for participation.
Having met with the participant and realizing that I had difficulty understanding her speech, I was concerned as to how this would be accomplished. I was informed that I would not be allowed to interview anyone if I did not interview her, so I conceded. I didn’t mind this ‘all or none’ condition as it appeared the facility staff had a genuine love and concern for this young woman. So, it would just have to work out.
123 As stated, the interviews were facilitated by one of the primary care workers, one with whom Ms. G felt comfortable. She told me that she thinks of the worker, M, as a second mother. In fact, in the attitude and treatment of Ms. G, the worker expressed a genuine love and patience. One needs only to look at the picture204 of Ms. G and M to see the bond.
As the sessions progressed and I attended closely to Ms. G’s words, I realized that I was becoming familiar enough to understand much of her speech. The point is, as she had to work so hard to communicate, I felt it was necessary that I work just as hard to understand.
Nonetheless, M was asked to assist in deciphering the recordings so as to be transcribed accurately. She did so with enthusiasm. Her involvement was essential and appreciated as a model for staff participation in the future.
Ms. G’s booklet is the shortest, barely eighteen pages, not because she didn’t have much to say but because it was so difficult for her to say it. It took great effort and energy on her part. In fact, at times, the session had to end before the time limit. By the end of a one-hour session, she was exhausted. Nonetheless, with her all too apparent joy in her participation, we accomplished all four sessions.
In those sessions, Ms. G spoke about what she had accomplished in her short life. More than anything else, her reflection was on the family with whom she was raised and upon the four children that she has borne yet had so little opportunity to mother and raise.
Now that it’s written down, it is obvious that Ms. G has a wonderful, ironic sense of humor. For instance, she tells of the time when one of her children was being born and, rather than delivering, the attending doctor kept pushing the baby back. Apparently, he wanted to wait for arrival of Ms. G’s own physician:
204 Ibid., 73. 124 There was a new doctor who was uncomfortable delivering. The doctor kept telling me ‘You’re not in labour! Go home!’ I said ’Okay!’ and went home, because he said I wasn’t in labour. Then on Christmas, I think it was about two in the morning, I went to the hospital and said ‘I’m in labour: don’t you dare send me home!’ They checked and, sure enough, I had waited long enough! Every time I went to push her out, the doctor kept pushing her [the baby] back in! I’m like ‘WHAT!?’ He wanted to wait for my own doctor. I just looked at J [G’s mate] and said ‘Catch, because he’s pushing her back in!’ I was going to kick the doctor. I was not impressed. I thank God that my doctor showed up and he said ‘G, how are you doing?’ I said ‘Catch!’ and, sure enough, one good push and she was out!205
Ms. G’s story speaks to all of us. She shares humor, wit, compassion and regret. Despite her condition, the regret is more for others. For example, she tells one story wherein her older sister, while pregnant, was abused by a man who, when faced with the prospect of losing her, committed suicide by shooting himself in front of her sister. She notes:
Her boyfriend kept saying it was her fault and he shot himself right in front of her! That was tough for all of us. I kept telling her “at least he didn’t take her, but just himself!” She had a boy, J, and she’s such a good mom. What she has been through, she is a strong person! I think all my siblings are amazing people. My oldest sister, D, has shown me so much love and gives that love unconditionally.206
Although Ms. G speaks of the pain she experienced at the hands of an abusive mother, she is forgiving and optimistic. She tries to present the best face for her children (though she sees them only upon occasion).207 The closing words she chose for her story were:
I have forgiven my mom for hitting me, but I try not to associate with her. Once you have been hurt, so many different circumstances, you give up on trying. I wish you [her Mom] the best but, it’s not going to be with me. The biggest thing I would tell everyone would be:
205 Ibid., 81, para 5-8.
206 Ibid., 78, para 9-11.
207 Ibid., 82-84.
125 Don’t be afraid! It only bothers a person for a short period of time. Take life easy. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger! And that’s it. I think I’m done. Thank you so much!208
So frail yet so much courage! I believe it is apparent from the text and feedback statement that Ms. G, being able to express herself openly, experienced comfort and was assisted with closure. Considering that it was such a physical effort for her, Ms. G underscores especially the value being advocated of the life history interview process. Her closing follow up response speaks for itself: “I think it went well, even though I had a hard time speaking. It was good to get it off my chest and release my knowledge.” - Ms. G.
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1
Without prompting, Ms. G expressed knowledge of God in her life and wished to pass it on to her children. She made these two poignant statements: first, near the end of the first interview; the latter, near the end of the fourth:
1) I think of the illness and in the beginning, I had it hard but, now, I think of my illness as the biggest blessing of my life! My kids are big blessings, of course, but if I had to be anywhere, this is a good home! I hope that people can open themselves up to God and deal with whatever you have to deal with and let go of things! Don’t be scared to let go and trust God! I am extremely grateful that I learned to let go and trust in God.209
2) I’m glad I moved in here in 2013. When I moved in, I cried a lot for the first year and a half, but I still kept natural as possible. I cried a lot because I lost my kids and my life would never be the same. All the staff and residents have been so good to me. Being here, I have drawn closer to God. You learn to belong and accept your past. I gave up all my kids and that was so sad. Such a hard thing: learning to let go and trusting they are okay!.... I want my children to know that they can trust in God. Be humble and kind to everyone and love life! Watch for the little things in life and appreciate them.210
208 Ibid., 84, para 3-7.
209 Ibid., 77, para 3,4.
210 Ibid., 82, para 9,10,12. 126 To conclude Ms. G, given her words of closing to her children, I think it is safe to say that there was demonstrated “a perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical presence at any time in the past life experience of the interviewed.” In the case of the thesis
Question for the participant, the answer is ‘Yes!’
4) Participant number 4: Mr. R - Eighty-seven years of age, Mr. R was injured by a fall two years ago. The damage to his legs was substantial and left him permanently disabled.
However, he is able to get around using a wheelchair. He requires assistance in most functions, including dressing, as he has no use of his legs.
Mr. R has family who visits him regularly, but he appears estranged from his son. At first, when we began the sessions, he was unable in conversation to move past the time that he and his wife split in their relationship. He appeared to hold hostility and blame for her in this and he would continually come back to this event.
Our time together was hampered as well by the fact that his memory appeared to be going and related events were not sequential and consistent. However, two of his daughters were aware of the interview process and were looking forward to helping edit the material.
Despite the difficulty, we were able to proceed through the four sessions.
Participant follow-up response
I think this is wonderful. I forgot a lot of stuff and would put it in if we had it to do over again. My daughter phoned to find out if the pictures were in and she had a lot we didn’t use. If I had them, I would put them in, too. (Mr. R)
127 Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
Mr. R died shortly after this interview series. I was glad to get an opportunity to know him and to help his family communicate, confront and (hopefully) resolve an area of significant difficulty.
Mr. R reflected on his life, focusing on the recurring themes of how little there was to go around in the Prairies in the early part of the twentieth century:
In those days, you made your own fun. That was about it! You went skiing or played games. You didn’t run to town because you couldn’t get to town. There were no roads.211
Other recurring themes came up in the interviews, e.g., of how little education many people had. Mr. R related he had a Grade 7 education and he has “done fairly well with that.”212 As well, the theme of dealing with sickness arose, particularly of living with lupus
(from which he suffered) and with the regret that he passed it to his daughter.213
He also related other themes that arose in other interviews, e.g., how often people socialized by going to dances214 and by playing organized sports such as baseball.215
As the sessions with Mr. R unfolded, he commonly expressed anger focused at his former wife - unresolved anger regarding blame for their divorce. The degree of anger tended to spill and transfer so that he belittled other members of his family as well, his son in particular.
211 Ibid., 87, para 5.
212 Ibid., para 3.
213 Ibid., 108, para 6.
214 Ibid., 89, 96, 103.
215 Ibid., 86, 89, 94, 96, 105-106. 128 By the time the first draft was complete, there was a substantial amount of negative content. I was deeply concerned as to where it would go once the family had a chance to read it and, once they had, my concern was substantiated.
In the interim between completion of the interviews and completion of the transcription,
Mr. R’s former wife passed away. When the two daughters who had agreed to edit the material received the draft from their father, they confronted him and expressed how much the negative content regarding their mother hurt them. They told him how angry they were over his unresolved addiction issues, of their opinion with the degree of his responsibility for the divorce and that they would never talk to him again if he didn’t deal with it and change the material.
At first, Mr. R found it difficult to understand this reaction, yet he was ready to comply.
This appeared to open a door, perhaps to reconciliation, within the family. The daughters expressed to me their anger and their belief that alcohol and their father’s behaviour contributed to the original breakup, but they had tolerated and overlooked it. However, apparently, it coloured their relationship with their father. This occasion appeared to present a vehicle for honest discussion and reconciliation. They had serious discussion and counseling with the pastoral staff and, subsequently, the family worked it out. Mr. R reconsidered and changed the text for the next draft.
The spiritual care coordinator for Mont St. Joseph, Deacon Eldon Danielson, and I met with Mr. R and helped him to understand the perspective from the family’s point of view.
Following this, it appeared Mr. R and his daughters were able to reconcile.
I received the draft back from the family after the discussion with their father and made amendments as requested, removing or rewording material to which they objected.
129 From a different perspective, the final commentary from Deacon Danielson regarding his involvement in the counseling speaks of how the family resisted Mr. R midstream and of the Deacon’s resultant opinion that individual elders should be able to make up their own minds about information they wanted to relay. Deacon Danielson wrote:
I had mixed feelings about dealing with this. I felt, unless I was invited in, it was up to them to solve their issues. I did feel it was the right of the story teller to tell what they wanted. Having the person take the uncomfortable out was kind of censoring the individual. As people age, their filter changes and I guess it isn’t up to me to decide what is acceptable in the filter. Family members cannot always tolerate this in their journeying. So, in midstream, there was some opposition to the person writing their story. I recognize the importance of the individual to make total decisions - however as a facilitator of the home it becomes a wider issue. We have the job to work with the whole family.
As is the intent of this project, comfort also includes closure, and closure also includes the goal of reconciliation. In this case, in presenting a legacy document for the family, crisis did arise, confrontation did take place and, through honest conversation with his children, a father became more aware of the role he played in the difficulty. It is my opinion, in terms of the goal for the project, that this form of interpersonal communication and reconciliation is of prime value in offering comfort and closure. In this case, it happened just in time as
Mr. R died shortly after.
Finally, in relation to comfort, closure and legacy for posterity, Mr. R appeared to speak of a feeling of loneliness for his family, perhaps marginalization or disenfranchisement as well, but also of gratitude for the opportunity to leave a legacy:
Where is G [son of Mr. R] now? Oh, he’s way up at the lake. He’s on holidays now, two or three month’s holidays… he’s way up at one of the farthest lakes in northern Saskatchewan. He phoned me and told me that’s where he’s going and the phone does not reach here. So, that’s where he is today. G does fishing. He and his wife have their own pontoon boat up there. They live there during their holidays until he goes back to work. He’ll probably stop in before he goes back to work. So that’s it! Just little me here!
130 Yep, when we think back it’s… well, you often say to yourself “Maybe we should write a book!” And here you are doing it!216 …. I hope everybody will enjoy reading this. It’s a hard thing to do, I’ve never done it before, but I’ve enjoyed it! It made me think about things I haven’t thought about before.217
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1
With regard to the thesis Question, Mr. R spoke of both his mother and father being religious,218 that the family attended the Lutheran church regularly and that, at Christmas, they “had Christmas at church more often than at home.”219 He spoke of how the generosity of a Rev. H had impacted his life. However, as the interview progressed, Mr. R illustrated his view of the slow but sure decline of the congregation as society changed:
as time went on, they started to drop off and, pretty soon your church is too small, not enough people to look after it. It cost quite a bit of money. You had to have a minister and you had to pay him wages!.... That was Rev. H! Eventually, he fell for a woman and everybody got against him! They weren’t supposed to have a woman apparently so, then, after that, everybody was against him. Pretty soon he was gone! There were other ministers after that but the church didn’t pan out. And then some of the older ones, like Dad, got married and some others got to be Jehovah Witnesses. Pretty soon, there was hardly anybody at church.220
After that part of the conversation, Mr. R never again overtly spoke of any form of faith or awareness of God. However, looking back upon the death of his father, he did reflect:
216 Ibid., 101, para 5-8.
217 Ibid., 113, para 12.
218 Ibid., 86, para 1.
219 Ibid., 88, para 3.
220 Ibid., para 5, 6, 9-10.
131 I was about 25 (when Dad was killed). If only he wouldn’t have went that day, eh? It’s just like things are meant to be! You often hear people say “If he wouldn’t of went!” or “If they wouldn’t of went, they would never have got into trouble!”221
It was elucidated in Chapter 3 that the implicit Question of this thesis asks whether or not a providential non-physical ‘Presence’222 may be seen in the ‘footprints’ of hindsight.
In light of the foregoing paragraph, it may be fair to say that Mr. R may have expressed a reflective awareness of such. Though the answer is not an apparent ‘yes,’ perhaps there is a ‘maybe’ in the statement “It’s just like things are meant to be!”
5) Participant number 5: Mr. T - Eighty-one years of age, Mr. T was diagnosed with
Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and has been at Mont St. Joseph in palliative care for the last few months prior to the interview.
Participant follow-up response
I totally agree with Dr. Doherty’s objectives of encouraging all people, especially seniors, to detail for posterity the story of their lives, not only for future generations to build upon but for their own inner examination of the effect those experiences had made in becoming the person they are. Dr. Doherty is setting out upon a mission to have all peoples aware of their own past and be happy with the person they have become. This exercise teaches the participant to realize, as Tennyson attributes to Ulysses, “I am a part of all that I have met” and this is our promise of immortality, as all that we have met are also a part of me. Personally, I did not follow the suggested questions very well and this was totally acceptable to Dr. Doherty as he allowed the conversation to find its own sense of direction. This allowed for some vibrant conversation and the revelation of many forgotten incidents that had an impact upon my life. I look forward to examining Dr. Doherty’s final submission [his My Life Story booklet] and observe that I hope I can pay special tribute to my grandsons O and Q, hoping they will understand their own idiosyncrasies later in life when they have examined their past. (Mr. T)
221 Ibid., 91, para 8.
222 Eyre, Drawing Close to God, Exodus 33:14 The LORD replied, ‘My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.’
132 Mr. T was the second to be interviewed in the second set of three participants. He is classified as palliative. However, despite the diagnosis, he took little notice of his condition and spoke little of it throughout the four interviews. What he did was give me an enthusiastic summary of his colourful life.
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
Mr. T is a well-educated octogenarian who led a diverse and well-rounded life. He is proud particularly of the fact that his generation, ‘so undereducated and with such little resource, was able to foster and raise with such success the generation of postwar Baby
Boomers that followed.’223
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy and posterity, the entire treatise presented by Mr. T appears to be a study in early twentieth-century Prairie life. The anecdotal story evidence of the Canadian Prairie spirit of perseverance and overcoming is too generous to relate here in detail.
Similar to the first four elders interviewed, Mr. T tells of the tendency for many of his generation to go not much beyond Grade 7 or 8 as that was the minimum required before a person could by choice quit school in the years of his youth. Mr. T said it was difficult at that time for people to continue to higher education due to the constraints of the farm and to the necessity to provide for life in general. However, Mr. T departed from the norm of his generation and chose the path of education. A significant portion of the anecdotes of his life are involved with this pursuit and illustrated in his My Life Story booklet.
223 Appendix F, 156, para 2, 3.
133 Mr. T was never at a loss for words as his experience had been broad ranging. He went from being a small child on the Prairie who had to learn the hard way - from inventing games with his friends and siblings when no equipment was available224 - to a man with a strong sense of pride and accomplishment against the odds. He learned to play a variety of instruments to entertain himself, then to supplement his income as a teacher.225 He taught school when he was eighteen,226 worked as a roughneck on oil rigs in the 1950s,227 played in bands, returned to university, worked in social work until becoming a teacher again,228 learned to overcome personal and group addictions,229 dealt with death and loss in relationships,230 became a pillar within his community as a town councillor and a strong proponent of education by serving on the district school board right up to the date of the current interview.
Mr. T accomplished some unique objectives, such as acquiring all signatures of the last ten Canadian Prime Ministers on a copy of the Canadian Bill of Rights, all of which were obtained by approaching in person the sitting Prime Minister at the time.231
Mr. T led a multifaceted life. His anecdotes are hilarious when one thinks of the situations involved. For example, this story from Mr. T as a child where, as his father was
224 Ibid, 124, para 6.
225 Ibid, 120, 122.
226 Ibid, 129, para 10; 130, para 4.
227 Ibid, 131, para 10.
228 Ibid, 132.
229 Ibid, 119, 143, 147, 148, 153, 154.
230 Ibid, 128, 134, 135, 136 (Poem for Muffie), 146.
231 Ibid, 161, 163. 134 going out the door, the father left the young fellow with one of those classic statements of
‘And while I’m gone, don’t do this…!’:
I remember at my age of five or six, Dad going down to the post office, which was about 100 yards away, and leaving me in charge of the drugstore: even at five or six years of age. In fact, one event that happened… and it’s a question that you could raise in the material that you gave me, i.e. “Do I remember ever being disciplined?”232 … was my dad was going down to the post office and he told me to look after the store while he was gone to get the mail. Well, I tell you, it’s only 100 yards. He said “And don’t set fire to that pile of rubble in the backyard!” I would never have thought about setting fire to that pile of rubble in the backyard had he not mentioned it. So, I went out and set fire to the rubble in the backyard! I remember, of course, there was no fire equipment in the village, and I could understand the danger of setting fire to this big pile of rubble. My dad took me to the front of the store, sat me down on the steps, pulled my pants down, gave me a good spanking on my bare bottom and sent me home!233
Suffice it to say that, as with all other participants but Mr. T in particular, I found it a joy to listen to his life story and to grow in the process as a result. As with all the stories I had taken to date, I felt both enriched and enlarged.
As far as comfort, closure and legacy for posterity go, I let the concluding words speak for themselves:
In some cases, it’s not all positive. I’m sure I’ve done some bad things: I know I did some bad things! But, they don’t seem to be following me around as much as the good things are! [Editor’s note: compare Chapter 2, p. 69, para 4 to p. 70, end of quote with para 2]… I would close my comments today with thanking you. You’re making it possible to leave a message that has some credibility because it’s being put together by an outside body. It would be a message that, somewhere along the line, I hope my two grandsons will have the opportunity to look and see some of their mother through me! I know that she carries a lot of the characteristics that I have. She’s a lot like me in many, many, ways. And I think she has done primarily the positive things.
232 One of the questions on the handout, Appendix A, given for the participants to consider prior to the interviews.
233 Appendix F, 116, para 6-8.
135 I’m hoping that, somewhere along the line, my grandsons will understand that they are a reflection of their mother and, to some extent, the reflection of their grandfather! And, they can do that through the reading of this biographical sketch. Thank you very much! You’re a good man, McDuff! (Mr. T)234
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1
Relative to the Question, Mr. T never mentioned a reliance upon or belief in “a providential but nonphysical presence at any time in the past life experience… .” Rather, it is noted that he appears to respect life in general. That may be evidence of his own
‘community of faith’ which was centred more on education and, particularly in the life of the elderly, the overcoming of difficulty.
It is to be noted that Mr. T spoke at the beginning of the interview in the present tense when telling me the name of his mother and father.235 Given what he had to say in his feedback response and the commentary regarding what he would like for both his grandchildren and other seniors to consider, perhaps that is his viewpoint, i.e., to deal with the here and now and live life to its fullest. With respect to the thesis Question, the answer is ‘No!’ Yet, it is apparent that Mr. T believes in an overcoming spirit of life.
6) Participant number 6: Ms. M - Eighty-two years of age, Ms. M is a Canadian citizen born in Montana. She is fully mobile, lives in her own home, retired but works independently as a Chartered Management Accountant (CMA) for those who request it and also does home care for one young lady with special needs.
234 Ibid., 161.
235 Ibid., 115. 136 Participant follow-up response
I found it hard to sit and talk about myself for an hour at a time. I would have found it easier to have a few questions interspersed through the interview. The process did, however, make me feel that my life was important - that I had something important enough to talk about. (Ms. M)
Regarding comfort, closure, legacy, posterity and interview feedback
Ms. M is a well-known CMA in the area of Prince Albert who, though retired, has been known to do the books and keep records for a number of local philanthropic organizations and church congregations. When I approached her to participate, she was hesitant at first, thinking it would be difficult to talk about herself for a prolonged period of time. This concern was demonstrated again in the feedback comment following the interview.
However, as she had been thinking about doing a life history and had started writing her autobiography, she agreed. She gave me what she had written to include as the first pages of her My Life Story booklet. She specifically asked me to leave the sub-headings so I concurred.
I would note, with respect to her feedback claim that she found it difficult to talk, that it was never apparent. She relayed her life fluently, at times with an eloquence that prevented me from stopping her at the hour limit and, more than once, we went well over.
Apparently, as the flow of conversation proceeded without interruption, it wasn’t until the end of the interviews, and her feedback acquired, that she remembered she had been given the list of questions for pre-consideration. We got a good chuckle out of that as she realized that the format or structure she desired was actually there in the question sheet but that she had forgotten. Nonetheless, she had no problem relating information, to the point that she had the longest of the six life stories gathered.
137 Ms. M appears to be a shy, gracious, friendly and funny lady. From the interview, it was clear early in our conversation that she has a strong faith in the presence of God. This faith was instilled in her from youth by both the deep abiding faith of her father,236 who in addition to being a labourer237 was also a Sunday School teacher,238 and by the conservative upbringing that comes with a lifetime of congregational attendance within a strong
Christian community of faith.
Ms. M’s story is a heartbreaking litany of the early Prairie life of scarcity and hard work,239 albeit in Montana. Ms. M. was the youngest of three. She knew the tragedy of separation early in life when she lost her mother at the age of six months.
Ms. M’s father soon remarried and she then spent her youth in the emotional obscurity of being one of nine children to her father and his second wife. Though Ms. M excelled in school, she received little recognition by her stepmother. Further, several of her summers were spent working away from home on a sheep farm with her aunt.240
The balance of Ms. M’s life was spent overcoming some of the common theme areas evident within these elder interviews such as separation, loneliness, declining health and sickness.241 However, an overarching theme from her personal life appears to be found in
236 Ibid., 183, para 2-3.
237 Ibid., 170, para 5.
238 Ibid., 181, 183.
239 Ibid., 175-177,
240 Ibid., 177, para 10.
241 Ibid., 184, 209-210, 215, et al.
138 comparing herself to her younger siblings and their place within the stepmother’s heart. As she pointed out in her text, “the insecurities began early!”242
It took her several years to find out what had happened to her birth mother. Her father, apparently dealing with suppressed pain from the loss of his own mother at an early age, wouldn’t discuss the issue with Ms. M.243 However, when pressed, he finally told Ms. M that her mother had gone out in the cold to find a cow that had broken loose. By the time she got back, she had caught a chill that took her life within days.244 Apparently, such was life on the Prairies nearly nine decades ago.
Before she died, the mother adamantly expressed to her husband that she didn’t want any of the three children adopted out or sent away after her death.245 Her father honored that agreement.
Ms. M’s father remarried when she was two years of age. The new stepmother, who
Ms. M thought only of as ‘Mom’ as she was but two at the time of the marriage, was just nineteen years of age when she took on the huge responsibility of working a farm in
Montana and helping her husband to raise three infant children.
Within short order, Ms. M had six more brothers and sisters until there were eleven in the family, i.e., nine children and two parents. The story thereafter contains many of the dramatic elements that go along with challenges that follow such a large family.
242 Ibid., 173, para 10.
243 Ibid., 181, para 5-7.
244 Ibid., para 9-10.
245 Ibid.
139 Ms. M’s life story relates the fears of the child as she tries to make sense of the world, particularly at the height of World War II. She relates her fear of airplanes - afraid that the light from her house would be seen by an airplane, an entity she felt was an enemy: 246
I really had no concept of a real airplane - to me an airplane was that little thing you could see in the sky. I had no idea that, when it got on the ground, a man would step out of it…. A couple nights before we were to go on the train, I had a dream that when we got to the train it was filled with airplanes (all of them were the size you see in the sky). I was terrified! Why do these strange childhood fears stay with us so long? I have never liked airplanes. I have flown quite a bit in my life, but I never have enjoyed it.
In my opinion as a clinical therapist, her story reveals an ‘angst,’ an ‘anxiety of separation,’ wherein Ms. M was never sure of her place within the family. She was not allowed to talk about her birth mother in the presence of her stepmother and she constantly struggled for the stepmother’s approval. For example, she states:
When I was in the first year of Bible School, I wrote a letter home. I thought that I needed to give a bit of background on the life I was living there so that they could understand what I was talking about. I don't know how much background I gave but it couldn't have been too much because they were hand-written letters. When I went home for a visit, Mom and I were talking and I mentioned something I had written in the letter. She said, “Oh, I never read that letter! It was too long and boring!” I find it very, very, hard to write letters even today. Am I boring?247
Having a new person coming into the fold as the mother figure when Ms. M was only two, it might be that Ms. M had trouble separating the mother figure from that of her birth mother. However, on the other hand, as the stepmother had not actually nursed the three
246 Ibid., 172, 173.
247 Ibid., 179, para 3-5.
140 stepchildren and had to work and adapt to raising the large family that followed, the bonding with stepchildren could have been different than with her own children.
So, the fact that I felt that Mom criticized me so much and Dad ignored me left me lost in a crowd of nine kids! I was just one of the kids - there was nothing special about me to anybody. It made me very shy and insecure.248
From my experience as a clinical counsellor, it is not unusual to hear similar accounts as the story of Ms. M, in which the stepparent found it difficult to treat children from a spouse’s prior marriage in the same manner as biological children. To make it worse, she did not part on good terms with her stepmother before the stepmother passed away.
Problems arose from the antagonism that might arise in such a relationship, in which the stepparent expresses a definite favouritism for one sibling over another. This occurred when Ms. M was visiting at a full family gathering. She sat in her long-departed father’s empty chair. A step-sibling came into the room from working outside and, in front of all family present, ‘Mom’ gruffly ordered Ms. M to vacate the chair and sit elsewhere. When the younger brother, also an adult, protested and asked the reason that he should take the chair, the stepmother said, “Because I said so!” It probably appeared minor to the stepmother but it was heartbreaking to Ms. M. She never went back...
It was that “I said so!” that really hurt. If she had said, “M, how about letting D sit in that chair? He has been working hard and is tired!” I would have been up out of the chair in a minute and the incident would have been forgotten. But the tone of voice and way she said it told me that she thought I was very inconsiderate and selfish by not immediately getting up and offering my seat to D! I looked around the room and knew that there was no one else in the room that she would have ever spoken to in that tone of voice in front of the whole family. I was up out of my seat in a second and, rather than going over and sitting on the couch, I went to an empty chair that was by the archway leading into the dining room. I waited until the conversation got going again, then got up and went into the other room as if I were going to the bathroom. Instead, I went in and laid down on my bed and cried….
248 Ibid., 186, para 2. 141 Mom was the only one who was up the next morning when we left. She came to hug us goodbye like she always did. When I hugged her, I couldn't say a thing. I just stood there and cried, then I got in my car and cried for most of the thirteen hours it took me to drive home. I never saw Mom again… .249
It would appear the event left an unreconciled affective or emotional trauma within
Ms. M, a trauma that appeared only to be exacerbated by the memory. Regarding angst or separation anxiety in children, Gary Collins writes:
When there are parent-child problems, the children sometimes act in ways similar to parents. Anger, hostility directed toward parents and other family members, guilt, frustration, and fear can all occur. Unlike parents who can express themselves verbally, children often resort to nonverbal means of expression. Temper tantrums, rebellion, underachievement (especially in school), delinquency, fighting, silliness, excessive crying, dawdling, and other attention getting behaviour are ways of saying nonverbally, “Notice me. I’m hurting too!” … Sometimes children are afraid to express themselves, or they may not know how. Adults use words to communicate, but children, especially young children, lack the verbal abilities and the abstract thinking abilities to express themselves in words. As a result, they express themselves through their actions or through their play. If there has been a trauma or if there is fear, children may try to deny reality, or they may quietly conclude that they are incompetent failures. The seeds of inferiority and low esteem are being planted, even though they may not bloom in the prominence until much later in life.250
Given that Ms. M stated that “insecurity began early” in her early life,251 perhaps this applies. However, being able to relay her story in all its complexities, allowing her fears and disappointments to emerge and to be spoken out loud for the adult self to hear is to allow the healing catharsis either to begin or to continue, and for the ‘inner child’ to express its pain in effort to reconcile and heal. In Ms. M’s case, that appears to have been the reality
249 Ibid., 180, para 3-5, 8.
250 Collins, Christian Counselling, 222, 223.
251 Appendix F, 173, para 10; cf. 178, para 5; 186, para 3; 189, para 1; 194, para 10.
142 as she relayed her life and hindsight reflections, allowing her to tap into the deeper emotional residual trauma that needed to be expressed.
The author is of the opinion that healing catharsis is an important function of the life story interview, i.e. to provide the comfort of a conveniently neutral situation wherein the suppressed can be spoken, and to allow the closure to begin with the resolution that can occur by bringing to light old fears and crisis points of trauma in life. Unexpressed negative ideation is often referred to as ‘stinking thinking’252 and is known to be able to haunt the psyche for years, even to the point of creating an affective or emotional disorder. As has been disclosed, Ms. M related that such fears have been a part of her life since childhood.
One of the most common types of skills learned in psychotherapy today focuses on our thinking. Unbeknownst to many of us, we often engage in internal conversations with ourselves throughout the day. Unless we’re trained to examine these conversations, however, many of us don’t even realize we’re having them! For instance, imagine looking in the mirror at yourself. What’s the first thing you think when you look at yourself? That thought is a part of our internal conversation. Having these kinds of conversations with ourselves are perfectly normal and in fact, everybody does it. Where we mess up in our lives is when we let these conversations take on a life of their own. If we answer ourselves in the above example with something like, “I’m fat and ugly and nobody loves me,” that’s an example of “stinking thinking.” Our thoughts have taken on an unhealthy attitude, one that is working against instead of for us. Psychologists would call these thoughts “irrational” because they have little or no basis in reality. For instance, the reality is that most everyone is loved by someone (even if they’re no longer with us), and that a lot of our beauty springs from inside us - our personality.253
Further, Ms. M related that she’s had a love for people that extends to everyone with whom she becomes involved or who may cross her path. She admits that her objective judgment has been compromised at times in that she has enabled others to abuse her good
252 David Burns, The Top Ten Types of ‘Stinkin’ Thinkin’, accessed December 5, 2016, http://psychcentral.com/lib/the-top-10-types-of-stinkin-thinkin/.
253 Ibid.
143 nature.254 However, her story remains a testament to faith and hope as she learned to surrender to the will of God and accept the pattern of life He established for her.
In terms of comfort, closure and legacy for posterity, I am pleased with the comment by
Ms. M, i.e., “The process did, however, make me feel that my life was important - that I had something important enough to talk about.” As Ms. M maintains contact with her brothers and sisters, perhaps this will help in the future in terms of further resolution.
As to the thesis Question under consideration and as stated on page 3, chapter 1
Ms. M spoke often of her community of faith and awareness of God’s influence in her life. Although she wrestled with her understanding of God and His will, she made it clear that life for her would not be worth living without her understanding of the presence of
God.255 With respect to …a set of impartial, nonreligious, life history interviews demonstrating a perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical presence…, the answer for Ms. M is an unequivocal ‘Yes!’ She had no difficulty relating that her relationship with God pre-existed her life story interview with me:
Then came the time for me to make a decision for Christ! I'll never forget the night when we were having special meetings! As we stood to sing the final hymn, the atmosphere in the room was electric! I had never felt anything like that before. I realize now that the Holy Spirit had come in all His fullness and that's what I was feeling!256
Final Response: Post Interview Facility Response Sheet
By Deacon Eldon Danielson, Director of Spiritual Care, Mont St. Joseph Home, 777 - 28th St. E., Prince Albert S6V8C2 306-953-4508 [email protected] - 2016/11/09
254 Appendix F, 218-222.
255 Ibid., 197, 201, 204, 206, 227-228.
256 Ibid., 189, para 4. 144 Five of the six legacy project participants came from this one facility. The ages of the participants were in the upper 80s and middle 90 age group. One of the respondents was a young lady with severe disability. All of the 5 participants had the capacity to think for themselves. The agreement was made between Don and the individual to do the work. One resident who had severe disability to speak needed an assistant to help her express herself. This took a lot of time for the volunteer to help her. It required her to use her free time to help. It was expecting a lot for her to help as she did. The interviews were of 4 one-hour sessions. My Residents mentioned how hard it was to compact 95 years of life into a 4-hour talk. As chaplain of the facility, I was to find people to participate in the project. It might be noted that, in a facility like MSJ, there are few people who could do this self-directed project to organize the stories of their life. I had some concern for the effectiveness of the study after all 5 came from this same facility. They may have been talking with each other which might have affected their story. As it turned out, I don’t think that was as much a concern as I thought. The people selected were happy to tell their story. It was clear as to the various degrees of ability of our people participating. Age was a factor too. A person 96 years old may be very healthy one day but take a turn for the worse the next. That can influence the story they tell. The fear of speaking to a microphone and recorder was also a concern for the residents but this was soon overcome. Two of the people interviewed had concerns that they repeated themselves too much. They needed self-assurance. The outline questions were valuable, so participants were able to keep the story flowing. Conflicts in family and cracks in relationships showed in a couple of the stories. I had mixed feelings about dealing with this. I felt unless I was invited in, it was up to them to solve their issues. I did feel it was the right of the story teller to tell what they wanted. Having the person take the uncomfortable out was kind of censoring the individual. As people age their filter changes and I guess it isn’t up to me to decide what is acceptable in the filter. Family members cannot always tolerate this in their journeying. So, in midstream, there was some opposition to the person writing their story. I recognize the importance of the individual to make total decisions- however, as a facilitator of the home, it becomes a wider issue. We have the job to work with the whole family. Now, on another note, I noticed that some family members appreciated the stories because they heard a side of their parent they had not heard from previous. One of the participant’s family learned a lot about their parent’s life prior to coming to Canada. My overall view was that the people who participated grew spiritually in the sense they have something to pass on to others. Overall the exercise was handled well. There needs to be time for trust to develop. The end product of their legacy books and the ability for the books to be made available for family members was great.
Deacon Eldon Danielson - Facilitator
145 On the response by Pastoral Care Coordinator, Deacon Eldon Danielson
From my perspective, I am in agreement with Deacon Eldon Danielson’s analysis. I am glad that, based on his conversations with the participants, he felt the project was handled well and that interviewees grew spiritually. I know that I grew. It is as if a new dimension was added to my thought processes and memories by the life stories of the participants.
When I was a child, I would read stories of people from other places and it would feel as if I was in the story. The interviews in this project were reminiscent of those times. The closest analogy that I have for it is that the experience leaves an impression similar to when my wife and I used ‘Google Street View’ software that graphically depicts the external view of an address to view in advance where my wife’s mother had moved in Nova Scotia.
When we arrived physically at the location, there was the distinct impression that we had been there before. In other words, the ‘Google Street View’ visual depiction had left an indelible mark on our memory. Such is the experience after having listened to the life stories of the individual participants interviewed within the scope of this project.
With that, we conclude Chapter 4.
146 CHAPTER 5: Conclusion
Chapter 5 summarizes the purpose of this Doctor of Ministry project. It includes a chapter by chapter summary, synthesis of findings, closing critical reflections, a hindsight introspective on the thesis Question and a perspective on the strengths and weaknesses of the research and suggestions for further research and practice.
Brief recap of the purpose of the thesis
As explicated in Chapter 1, the purpose statement proposed that the effort of this project was to create a working standard for what may be at times a neglected part of our social support network and fabric: i.e. service to the dying for the sake of both recipient and those who remain, the living, who may need to be reminded they soon may follow as recipients of the service.257
Further, the purpose statement described the project’s intent as twofold:
1) to standardize a process for archiving life experience of the dying… i.e. for the sake of leaving a legacy and helping with personal closure for those being interviewed. It is a process intended to provide a nondirective physical presence capable of delivering the near end of life interview while enhancing self-worth for, and the ability to gain and maintain a legacy from, those isolated in facilities for terminal care.
2) in consideration of spiritual and community of faith dimensions, to answer the thesis Question: Will a set of impartial, nonreligious, life history interviews demonstrate a perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical presence at any time in the past life experience of the interviewed?258
257 Chapter 1, 1, para 1.
258 Ibid., 3, para 2. 147 Summary: Chapter 1
In Chapter 1: Biblical Foundations, Scripture-based support for the project was presented to validate the purpose statement. Through the application of appropriate biblical passages, reference to other literature as appropriate and a limited review of ancient and contemporary theologians, the case was made that it is a Christ-ordained obligation of the
Judeo-Christian community of faith to pursue actively the honoring of our elders.
Specifically, for purpose of this project, that includes the effort to glean as much experience as possible from elders in the effort to infuse and perpetuate that wisdom into the present and future society - wisdom derived from the hindsight of lessons learned through obstacles that have been overcome. It is the contention of this project that an effective way to do this is to help create, as far as possible, a social standard to collect histories of the elderly and those in palliative care at near end of life.
Summary: Chapter 2
In Chapter 2: Theoretical Foundations, the foundational premises for the topic were presented, including a perspective on the needs of the dying (relevant to this thesis) from a psychosocial context. This was evidenced also by a short look at some previous gerontologic and palliative research in contemporary culture.
Dealing with the fear of death was highlighted as a primary need for humankind in general. Further, consideration was given to several of the primary aspects of life within the community of faith, e.g. that which constitutes a biblical understanding of the nature of the Presence of God and of the love, faith and work of God. In conclusion, a case was made that:
148 the process of the collection and data basing of the life story interviews for the good of the elderly and the dying, including for those who will follow later. This constitutes a valid Ministry of Presence within every community of faith: an active ministry that will help meet the need for comfort, closure, legacy and posterity.259
Summary: Chapter 3
Chapter 3: Research Methodology and Process presented a brief description of the theoretical research foundation, i.e., ethnography as the qualitative methodology, plus specifics of the process employed for completion of the practical project to establish a
Ministry of Presence to offer comfort, help with closure and to record a legacy for family and posterity.
One original intent of the project was to develop a training module for individuals, training designed to facilitate delivery and archiving of the conciliatory procedure and product of the late stage or near end of life review. The effort to engage Church personnel in such training proved in this case to be unsuccessful. The alternate route of creating a not-for-profit foundation designed to do the training and accomplish the project goal post- thesis was applied and accomplished.
The balance of the chapter contains the description of the process developed and equipment employed in carrying out the project process of doing six sets of four one-hour interviews per elder or palliative-care participant. Completing the process followed, i.e. transcription, printing and publishing of the individual participant’s My Life Story booklet that was given to each in conclusion of the individual interview process.
The project was intended to develop a process as a vehicle to replicate the interview results within society. The newly incorporated not-for-profit Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.
259 Chapter 2, 80. 149 is intended to help achieve that standard wherein the My Life Story interview process will be available without exclusion of anyone from any community of faith or way of life.
Summary: Chapter 4
In Chapter 4: Analysis of the Life Story Interviews, a case-by-case presentation of data and identification of emerging themes was made of the six sets of interviews and the participant feedback. From the content analysis, the nature of comfort and closure received by the interviewed was identified.
There was little evidence of difference between the elder and palliative participants other than the awareness of a tragic nature of suffering and impending loss in the life of the young who are near end of life. However, it is noted in particular that the love shown by caregivers within the community of faith to those in palliative care was evident.
Critical reflections: thesis Question, strengths and weaknesses of the research, suggestions for further research and practice
2) in consideration of spiritual and community of faith dimensions, to answer this question: Will a set of impartial, nonreligious, life history interviews demonstrate a perceived awareness of a providential but nonphysical presence at any time in the past life experience of the interviewed? (the Question, p. 3, para 2)
In terms of the Question, i.e., awareness of a providential Presence, the palliative male
interviewed made no claim of a community of faith nor to a form of or belief in divine
providence within his life. However, he did express a respect for life, even speaking in the
present tense for those who passed many years before.
According to the male palliative participant, having worked within Saskatchewan
education for over sixty years, octogenarians such as himself draw satisfaction from the
150 fact they did a good job raising the post war baby boomers. “There were very few of us and I think we did a very, very, good job of it with very, very, limited education.”260
It was also pointed out in his interview that people were required to go to Grade 7 in the early part of the century but could choose thereafter to leave school. As it was ‘hard times’ in Canada during the early part of the 20th century, many took advantage of the situation to stay home to work and did not make it through high school.
Of the remaining five participants, the other interviewed male expressed that he had a strong community of faith when he was young within an active Prairie community congregation. As a child, he remembers spending more time at the congregational meeting than at home, particularly at Christmas. However, he notes that ended after the congregation in the small community in which he lived dwindled in number until it ceased to exist as a viable entity. After that, he made no specific reference to awareness of a providential presence except when, in discussing the accidental death of his father, he did state that he felt that “It is just like things are meant to be!”261
When he married, the couple were happy at first and had four children. However, as time went on, the couple drifted apart and divorced. When I began interviewing this individual, even though it had been years since parting, he tended to obsess on her guilt as he saw it, and couldn’t move past blaming her at what seemed to be every other sentence.
To make it worse, the woman discussed in the interview died in the week prior to receipt of the first interview draft. When the draft was complete and presented, family members who read it became angry with both their father and with the interviewer.
260 Appendix F, 156, para 3.
261 Ibid., 91, para 8. 151 On a good note to a bad situation, the interview with the father and the grief of the family appeared to open the door for long overdue honest communication regarding alcohol abuse and other familial issues on the part of the father, things that needed to be discussed. Contingently, the individual and family received family counselling from the
Director of Pastoral Care at the facility where the interviews were held.
The end result for the individual and family was a major revision of the text with a more emotionally balanced representation by the person interviewed. This resulted in peace and some form of reconciliation between the three daughters and the surviving parent, a peace that was just in time as the interviewed participant passed away shortly after reparations with family. In my opinion, this is poignant validation for the need for people to tell their story as soon as possible while allowing the Kairos moment of understanding to take place.
All four remaining participants, one from a strong Protestant community and three
Roman Catholic, related incidental memories that lend a positive answer to the Question, claiming awareness at some point throughout life of a providential presence, accrediting awareness to their community of faith and understanding of God.
Given the foregoing, though a small data set, the conclusion is approximately 67% of the small number (83% if the one ‘maybe’ is included) claimed without prompting to have had an awareness of a nonphysical but providential presence in life.
It is interesting to note that the four of six who claimed awareness of a providential nonphysical presence were women. Although this data set is insufficient to draw significant conclusions, it correlates with statistics regarding the percentage of women versus men who worship in churches, i.e., fewer men attend worship than women. For Canada -
In 2008, 31% of women attended a religious service at least once a month, down from 37% in 1998 and 46% in 1988 (Chart 4). A higher percentage of women than
152 men attended religious services at least monthly than men. For men, their attendance fell from 37% in 1988 to 26% in 2008.262
For the United States -
While the U.S. population is split fairly evenly between men and women, there are more women (61%) than men (39%) in the pews. This difference is found in every age category, so the fact that women live longer than men does not explain the gender difference in religious participation.263
More significant is evidence that communities of faith influenced the lives of four, and partially one other, of six participants. Perhaps understanding the influence objectively requires pre-examination of established biblical community of faith principles. Perhaps a community of faith rooted in articles of Christian faith may be necessary to acquire the awareness that leads to ‘the Way’ of God within boundaries of Judeo-Christian Scripture.
This is the reason we examine Scripture for this project, i.e. to see if there is validation for the endeavour as legitimate Ministry of Presence that will represent efficaciously the life principles illustrated within what has been referred to as ‘the Way,’ e.g.
FOLLOWERS OF THE WAY: Early Christianity was far from being an abstract belief; it was a whole way of life. The new way of living was obvious to those around… and to the Christians themselves, for they were following Jesus’ lifestyle, the way he had lived and taught. Soon the term… “the Way” meant Christian. Thus Saul (the pre-Christian name of Paul) was sent to Damascus to arrest anyone belonging to ‘the Way’ (Acts 9:2). Christians may also have used the term to describe themselves; Luke referred to the Christian movement as ‘the Way’ (Acts 19:9, 23; 24:22). It may be the only name Christians and non-Christians both used for the new movement.264
262 “Statistics Canada: Female Population,” accessed July 20, 2017, http://statcan.gc.ca/pub/ 89- 503-x/2010001/article/11475-eng.htm.
263 “USCLS: Key Findings: Who Worships in the US,” accessed December 6, 2016, http:// www.uscongregations.org/blog/2014/02/17/key-findings-who-worships-in-the-u-s/.
264 Elwell, W. A., & Comfort, P. W. ‘Tyndale Reference Library’ Tyndale Bible dictionary (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2001), 1297. 153 The one participant who lacked any community of faith to guide in knowledge of God saw life as being of personal control. A humorous yet poignant observation of perspective by Carl Yung points out that ‘search for Presence’ along biblical guidelines is important:
The idea of an all-powerful divine Being is present everywhere, unconsciously if not consciously, because it is an archetype. There is in the psyche some superior power, and if it is not consciously a god, it is the “belly” at least, in St. Paul's words. I therefore consider it wiser to acknowledge the idea of God consciously, for, if we do not, something else is made God, usually something quite inappropriate and stupid such as only an ‘enlightened’ intellect could hatch... .265
In part, the objective for asking the Question regarding perception of providence, or providential Presence, is to bring attention to the Kairos moment in time. As identified,
Kairos time266 is the moment spoken of in Greek thought as a second form of time, a moment of understanding, different from Chronos or length of time measured by a watch.
The Kairos moment is acknowledged as a tangential point in time, almost fourth dimensional, when the Holy Spirit intersects or interacts with clarity with our thought process and, Eureka!, the direction of life is changed. That may include conscious
265 C. G. Jung. Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Volume 7: Two Essays in Analytical Psychology. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. 2014), 71.
266 “A ‘kairos moment’ is God’s appointed time to act… A ‘kairos moment’ is a moment in time when the Holy Spirit draws near to do a special work in and through a person or group. The Holy Spirit creates and orchestrates ‘kairos moments.’ In his book, The Fourth Dimension, South Korean pastor Dr. David (Paul) Yonggi Cho illustrates what a kairos moment is and how we can cooperate with Jesus when they occur.” Philip Nordmans, “Holy Spirit, Kairos Moments,” http://holyspiritempowers.com/2012/10/kairos-moments/ (accessed December 07, 2016). “Καιρός and χρόνος are used partially as synonyms, esp. where the ‘statement of a specific duration of time of human life in the calendrical sense’… is involved. But χρόνος designates a “period of time” in the linear sense, while καιρός frequently refers to ‘eschatologically filled time, time for decision.’.… Paul avoids the demonstrative pron. when speaking of the present time (except in the citation of Gen 18:10, 14 in Rom 9:9) and says instead ὁ νῦν καιρός, ‘the now existing time’: Rom 3:26; 8:18; 11:5; 2 Cor 8:14.” H.R. Balz & G. Schneider, Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament, Vol. 2, (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans. 1990), 232-233.
154 interaction with hindsight known as belief and/or faith. However, reaction to that Ah-Ha! moment in time needs tempering by patient wisdom to determine the will of God.
It is my contention as a Christian aware of the sovereign nature of God that all things lead to Christ through the agency of God, but only as God decides, not as religion shapes.
History proves the need for caution tempered by wisdom in accord with the loving but disciplined ways of Christ, i.e. ‘the Way’ illustrated in Scripture. For example, out of war comes the renewal of recognition of the horror of war in general and ennoblement of the perennially chanted hindsight warning of ‘Lest we forget!’
Such hindsight is validation that good can come out of bad and, of such, is the warning of the continued need for discernment based on ancient principles, an existential reality highlighted in the call by the prophet Jeremiah to the ancient paths. The response, as stated by the voice of God in Scripture, all too often is lack of wisdom-based judgment:
Jeremiah 6:16-17 16) Thus says the LORD, ‘Stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths, Where the good way is, and walk in it; And you will find rest for your souls.’ But they said, 'We will not walk in it.' 17) And I set watchmen over you, saying, 'Listen to the sound of the trumpet!' But they said, 'We will not listen.'
Standing by the ways and asking for the ancient paths, where the good way is, then walking in it, that we will find rest for our souls: that is the direction of this thesis project, i.e., in effort to prosper humankind in retrospect, all deserve to have their story told.
Of particular import is the knowledge of what to do that will please God and highlight right ways to foster and live life. To do otherwise is to fall too easily into self-righteousness and self-determinism, i.e. But they said, 'We will not listen.'
155 Synthesis of findings
As we have seen, the fifth commandment in the Decalogue instructs us to honor our mothers and fathers. Elsewhere, Scripture proclaims it is pleasing to God to give due honor and care to the elder, particularly of one’s household but also to elders in general. Scripture also teaches that not to do so is to deny the very faith itself.
The terms mother and father in Hebrew and Greek can be used to include other than biological parents, i.e. in spiritual and community of faith context. The terms may be applied to elders who act/have acted in a variety of caretaking capacities, e.g. guardian, advisor, protector, founder, and leader.
Exegesis of relevant biblical language has provided nuances of understanding. For example, it has been noted that the Hebrew term for God’s Presence literally means the face of God and that meaning may be applied as relevant both to the multitude that accompanied Moses on his journey and to current followers of Christ.
In Greek, a common term for ‘presence’ refers to the eye or face of God, and the angels/messengers of God represent, and are in, the eye or face of God, i.e. the eye or face of an immanent and perceiving omnipresence.
The precise nature and form in which the omnipresence of God is made manifest is not the purview of this work. However, it appears from examination of both Scripture and life that God often reveals the nature of His Presence in the providential manner as discussed earlier, i.e., Exodus 33, and that the things that are pleasing to that Presence include giving honor and respect due to elders while, again, not doing so is to be contrary to the mandates of the Judaeo-Christian faith. Scripture also indicates that God may send angels out to assist others, i.e. Exodus 33:5.
156 The New Testament moves us into a deeper awareness of the Presence of God, a disciplined awareness for which the groundwork was established in the Old Testament. In particular, it was determined that the Presence of God refers not only to the face of God, but to the fact that Christ, as the biblically identified image of God, is that same Presence.
From this awareness, we discern that the Church, the Body of Christ, is called to reflect the image of that Presence, face of God, as the reflection of Christ to the world. An outcome of such an understanding is that ethnographic pursuit of recording the lives of others, offering the dignity of comfort, closure, legacy and posterity in dying, is a justified ministry pursuit toward accomplishing that purpose.
Closing critical reflections
This is an ethnographic study with a small data set. Analysis of the material obtained is pragmatic and to the point. A more in-depth study could be obtained with a larger data set, e.g. with a slightly altered objective that would involve focused critical analysis from a qualitative perspective wherein an in depth look at the reasoning behind certain human behaviour could be observed and determined. However, that was not the objective for this project.
The objective of this project, similar to other projects around the globe that offer an ethnographic recording option to select groups, was to attest and attempt to validate the concept that everyone without exception or exclusion has the right to tell their story. The actualization of Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc. is to promote that option, for posterity, to better society in general.
157 In summary, I believe the primary accomplishment in this project was the gleaning of a core perspective for each of the lives that were intersected and that the result was indicative of a Kairos time of understanding. In reflection, all interviewed participants expressed appreciation for the opportunity to memorialize their memories for the good of family, i.e. legacy, and society at large, i.e. posterity. In itself, I believe this validates the project objective.
As life history stories are gathered from a general cross-section of society, improved procedures could become evident that would facilitate a smoother and more comprehensive response from each participant. This advance would enhance future training and delivery.
However, we have to start somewhere: hence, this thesis project.
In light of the responses by participants and families, certain aspects of process delivery may be adapted to suit the need-based dynamics, i.e., the interview may be modified to suit individual’s needs or preferences. I am convinced, however, that the overarching principle is that it needs to be as simple as possible to be practical.
The interview format within this project was free-flowing without interviewer direction other than through a preliminary orientation, gathering of consent paperwork and offering the guiding questions given for pre-consideration. Most responded that they liked the format and that it generated spontaneity and overall recall. One participant with two family members commented that preference would have been for a process with more structure.
However, other members of the same family disagreed.
Perhaps the result may be more productive by increasing the collaborative pre- conditioning approach to include the families prior to the interview. However, given control issues of some families with their elderly parents, it may not work for some.
158 Finally, perhaps collaborative effort with others involved in similar projects will heighten the capacity to plumb with increased depth the facets of individual events that shape personality. I believe in collaboration and will actively pursue the capability, hence, the reasoning behind this thesis as to collaboration with Dr. Robert Atkinson, Centre for the Study of Lives, University of Southern Maine.
Project summary and conclusion
As noted earlier, Scripture tells us wisdom begins with the fear of God. If we fear God, the quest becomes to find out what pleases Him. As well, that quest to know Him better is to try to understand what He requires and that, as we saw earlier, is simply to do his ‘work’: i.e. to believe Christ, the one ‘Salvation sent by God.’
Revelation 19:13 reveals Christ to be the incarnate Word of God. Logically, believing
Christ involves obedience to His direction as to what is necessary for life. This would include directions found in the New Testament, and those particular to the Old Testament that have not changed in covenantal nature, e.g. pertaining to treatment of the elders. A life of obedience involves trusting Christ, despite the fact it may bring pain at times in the carrying out of His direction - as we come to understand the dynamic nature of ‘grace.’
The knowledge of truth and the wisdom that is learned by experience has made it glaringly evident that God is always immanent, e.g. the ‘10,000 coincidences’ show by
Kairos moments of understanding that everything works within God’s timing. A quote from Greek tragedian, Aeschylus, about the “awful grace of God”267 speaks to that realization of God’s tempering discipline
267 Edith Hamilton, The Greek Way (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1930), 61, 194. 159 whose law it is that he who learns must suffer. And, even in our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.
Given the direction to honor our elders and the knowledge that wisdom comes from the discernment of what has passed in the lives of self and others, I have come to believe it is an existential necessity of life to attend and listen to others in effort to discern what is right.
Contingent to that is as much a necessity to provide comfort to survive.
After following the direction of the Research Ethics Board and the educators that have guided to this point, the two existential necessities have been validated for me in the process of having interviewed the six participants recorded. Throughout the long preparation to this process and, finally, through empathy with the laughter and the tears of each related life story, I can say again that I have profited and grown. A part of each of their lives has become part of my life, a wonderful experience I would make effort to share with others.
Though four of six interviewed stated directly they were aware of a providential
Presence within life, I posit that the ‘search for Presence’ within all six interviews was successful. In my opinion, the Presence of God was displayed by each individual within the interview in stories and in the faces and, as I was ‘present,’ I am their witness.
In discussing the overcoming of life’s challenges evidenced in each interview, all six demonstrated the belief that life has meaning. As well, the follow-up discussion that occurred with the families indicated desire for reconciliation which, for the elderly and those in palliative care, constitutes effort toward closure to complement that meaning.
My hope for those who read life stories left by others as a legacy is that the sense of optimism and wonder found in reading about their overcoming will help to stimulate the
160 hindsight faith which provides comfort, assists with closure and, as well, extends the olive branch of inner peace as a gift for posterity to others.
In summary, the work of this thesis-project has:
• validated Scripturally that ‘other person centred’ care of the elders/elderly is an
expectation of the love relationship placed on us by God while we reflect the image
of God in Christ, the one true image of the face of God;
• drawn attention to the fact that wisdom is something God expects us to seek, and
that wisdom is obtained by both seeking and asking for it;
• developed a process for obtaining practical, experiential wisdom through an
interview process centred on four primary objectives: comfort, closure, legacy and
posterity;
• created the Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc. as an incorporated non-profit with a
Board of Directors that will carry on the work;
• secured the collaborative partnership with Dr. Robert Atkinson, director for the
Center for the Study of Lives, University of Southern Maine, with the objective of
helping to create an international database;
• created the clinical pastoral course for training future personnel who express a
sincere interest in the process of life story and ‘Ministry of Presence’ interviewing,
• carried out six complete interviews with a total per interviewee of four hours of life
history as an example of the process;
• transcribed and produced the ‘My Life Story’ life history booklets for the six
interviewees and families as a further development of the process;
161 • given each interviewee eight copies of the individual ‘My Life Story’ booklets
(complete with color picture ‘memories’ chosen by the participants) and a DVD
that contains full interview voice recordings and written material, including masters
for duplicating or building on the stories in succeeding generations;
• obtained the follow-up feedback sheets from all participants including both the
interviewed and the facility sponsoring the interviews;
• reflected theologically and sociologically on the resultant data in consideration of
psychosocial, spiritual and community of faith considerations, thus completing the
ethnographic interview process as a whole;
• reflected upon the process, particularly in light of critical suggestions made by the
interviewed participants and families, concluding that further effort to enhance the
process would be for the good of all - for comfort, closure, legacy, posterity.
The primary goal of this research was to develop a doable process to ‘Bring Presence’ through interview, recording and preservation of life histories. Concurrently, an attempt was made to discern if the interview subjects validated by unsolicited testimony that they experienced the providential Presence of God in their lives. Within the parameters and definitions of this study, these goals appear to have been accomplished.
To conclude, in the bringing of Presence within the scope of this project, I found
Presence as well. Each person who shared with me offered me a piece of their life and I believe I am the larger for it. In itself, that is a validation of the project as well.
At the same time, it was a privilege for me to be there to receive their gift of memories, to be ‘present’ as one reflecting the image of God in Christ, and I believe that to be in
162 accord with God in regard to what pleases Him, i.e. within the resonance, continuity and progression of His people toward His Eternal Kingdom.
It seems appropriate to close with Scriptures which underscore the value of attending- being ‘present’– to the lives which have so much to teach succeeding generations:
Psalm 78: 1) Listen, O my people, to my instruction; Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. 2) I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old, 3) Which we have heard and known, And our fathers have told us. 4) We will not conceal them from their children, But tell to the generation to come the praises of the LORD, And His strength and His wondrous works that He has done. 5) For He established a testimony in Jacob And appointed a law in Israel, Which He commanded our fathers That they should teach them to their children, 6) That the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, That they may arise and tell them to their children, 7) That they should put their confidence in God And not forget the works of God, But keep His commandments, 8) And not be like their fathers, A stubborn and rebellious generation, A generation that did not prepare its heart And whose spirit was not faithful to God.
Proverbs 23:22-23 Listen to your father who begot you, and do not despise your mother when she is old. 23) Buy truth, and do not sell it. Get wisdom and instruction and understanding.
Matthew 25:34, 40 Then the King will say to those on His right, 'Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world…. 40) The King will answer and say to them, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.'
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172 Appendix A: Life Interview Questions, Life Events
Questions adapted from the public site of the Legacy Project.268 When reproduced, the pages are in Times New Roman size 14 for easier reading by the target group.
The questions below will not be asked. They are intended only to stimulate your memories. The interview will be your own thoughts and words, without interruption. Please think about the questions the day before each interview.
– Childhood
1 On what date and year were you born? Did your parents tell you anything about the day you were born? What day of the week was it?
2 Where were you born?
3 What was the reason you were given the first (and middle) name(s) that you have?
4 What’s your first, most vivid memory?
5 What was the apartment or house like that you grew up in? How many bedrooms did it have? How many bathrooms? What was your bedroom like?
6 Can you describe the neighborhood you grew up in?
7 Tell me about your parents. Where were they born? When were they born? What memories do you have of them?
8 Who was most strict: your mother or your father? Do you have a vivid memory of something you did that you were disciplined for?
9 Did your parents have a good marriage?
10 How did your family earn money? How did your family compare to others in the neighborhood – richer, poorer, the same?
11 What kinds of things did your family spend money on?
12 How many brothers and sisters do/did you have? When were they born? What memories do you have of each from when you were growing up? 13 Did you have grandparents? Where were they born? When were they born? What do you remember about them? When did they die?
14 Did you have any pets?
268 “Legacy: Life Interview Questions,” accessed September 10, 2014, http://www.legacyproject.org/ guides/lifeintquestions.html. 173 15 What were you like as a child? What did you like to eat? What did you do for fun? What were your favorite toys or games? Did you ever have a secret place or a favorite hiding spot? What did you wear?
16 Did you get an allowance? How much? Did you spend it right away, or save it? What did you buy? What responsibilities did you have at home when you were young?
17 What kind of school did you go to? Were you a good student? What was your favorite subject? What was your least favorite? Who were your friends? Who was your favorite teacher and why?
18 Did you have any heroes or role models when you were a child?
19 How did you spend your summer holidays? What were your favorite summer activities? Where did your family go on vacations?
20 How did your family celebrate holidays (e.g. Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year, Easter, and Remembrance Day? Did lots of relatives get together? What traditions did you have year after year? What food was served?
21 What was the best gift you remember receiving as a child?
22 What did you want to be when you grew up?
23 What big world events do you remember from the time you were growing up?
24 What inventions do you most remember?
25 What’s different about growing up today from when you were growing up?
26 When you were a teenager, what did you do for fun? Did you have a favorite spot to “hang out”? What time did you have to be home at night? Did you ever get into any trouble?
27 Were there any phrases that were popular when you were a teenager?
28 What did you like to wear? How did your parents feel about the way you talked and about what you wore?
29 When did you learn how to drive? Who taught you? What was your first car like?
30 What was your graduation from high school like?
31 What dreams and goals did you have for your life when you graduated?
174 The Present
32 Do you have any hobbies or special interests? Do you enjoy any particular sports?
33 What’s your typical day like now? How is it different from your daily routines in the past? Is the present better or worse than when you were younger?
34 What do you do for fun?
35 Who do you trust and depend on?
36 What things are most important to you now? What was the reason?
37 How have your dreams and goals changed through your life?
38 What do you see? (Hold a mirror and look in)
Aging
39 What do you remember about your 20s? 30s? 40s? 50s? 60s? What events stand out in your mind? How was each age different from the one before it?
40 There are some ages we don’t look forward to. What birthday were you least enthusiastic about? What was the reason? If you could go back to any age, which age would it be and what would be the reason?
41 How do you feel now about growing old? What’s the hardest thing about growing older? What was the best thing? What were your parents like when they got older?
42 Did you have any expectations at points in your life about what growing older would be like for you?
43 How should a person prepare for old age? Is there anything you wish you’d done differently? Do you think about the future and make plans? What are your concerns for the future?
44 What do you look forward to now?
Life Lessons and Legacies
45 What’s your most cherished family tradition? What is the reason it is important?
46 What have you liked best about your life so far? What’s your happiest or proudest moment?
47 What do you feel have been the important successes in your life? What were the
175 frustrations? What’s the most difficult thing that ever happened to you? How did you deal with it?
48 What do you think the turning points have been in your life? What were you like then?
49 Are there times of your life that you remember more vividly than others? What is the reason? What have been the most influential experiences in your life?
50 Describe a person or situation from your childhood that had a profound effect on the way you look at life. If you were writing the story of your life, how would you divide it into chapters?
51 What, if anything, would you have done differently in your life?
52 What do you know now that you wish you’d known when you were young?
53 What have you thrown away in your life that you wish you hadn’t? What ‘junk’ have you held on to and what is the reason?
54 What have you held on to that’s important and what is the reason it is important? Over time, how have you changed the way you look at life/people?
55 What advice did your grandparents or parents give you that you remember best?
56 Do you have a philosophy of life? What’s your best piece of advice for living? If a young person came to you asking ‘What’s the most important thing for living a good life?’, what would you say?
57 How do you define a ‘good life’ or a ‘successful life’?
58 Do you think a person needs to first overcome serious setbacks or challenges to be truly successful? In what way is it important to know your limitations in your life or career?
59 If you had the power to solve one and only one problem in the world, what would it be and for what reason? What do you see as your place or purpose in life? How did you come to that conclusion?
60 What would you like your children and grandchildren to remember about you?
61 If you could write a message to each of your children and grandchildren and put it in a time capsule for them to read 20 years from now, what would you write to each?
176 Appendix B: LIFE INTERVIEW RESEARCH CONSENT FORM - Interviewee
Research Title: Bringing Presence: closure and legacy near end of life
Researcher: Dr. Donald Doherty, a student writing the thesis at Acadia University - Contact: [email protected]
Supervisor: Dr. Carol Anne Janzen, Acadia University – Contact: [email protected]
Chair, Research Ethics Board: Dr. Stephen Maitzen, Acadia University – Contact: [email protected]; (902) 585-1407
Interviewer: ______One of the volunteers facilitating the legacy interview
This consent form is for a research study on the practical topics of gerontology and palliative care. The intent is to develop an interview process
• to train students and potential interviewers in delivery of a life interview process for enhancing self-respect and meaningful closure for those being interviewed.
• to develop a standard process to be used regularly to record life histories, histories that are the legacy of the presence of a person and a people, and the retelling of that history is to be accomplished so that the reader and generations to come will remember that presence and gain wisdom from those who have gone before.
Confidentiality
If information is given that is required by law to be disclosed, confidentiality cannot be guaranteed. As well as being in this consent form, this will be disclosed to the interviewees in the opening or introductory session. No information that discloses identity or location of the interviewee will be published. Names and locations will be replaced in the final product with pseudonyms to hide identity.
Participating interviewers agree to confidentiality of interview material. Nothing said by the person being interviewed will be disclosed by the interviewer to any third party beyond what is the purpose of this project.
Recorders and research material will be kept in locked cabinets during the interview process, then gathered and maintained by the author in a locked cabinet while being processed. Following completion of the project, the material will be destroyed.
The Interview Process
All material will be audiotaped and then transcribed by the interviewer.
Strict confidentiality will be maintained. Collected interview information will be modified (names and locations changed) and kept safely in a locked filing cabinet until after the project is published. Following that, it will be destroyed. All names of people and places will be changed after the interview process for purposes of publishing this project.
Interviewee Consent Form Page 1 of 2
177 (Appendix B: cont’d)
A secondary purpose will be to determine how often certain opinions reoccur within the overall material gathered, e.g. how often similar expressions recur across the various interviews.
Before the names are changed, the completed life history will be reviewed by the participant to ensure accuracy. A copy will be supplied to the participant as a legacy.
Participation in the interview process is voluntary for the period of up to 4 sessions over a period of 4 separate days, in a preferred time frame of 4 (a maximum of 6 weeks if necessary) at 1 hour per session.
All prospective interview participants have the right to refuse to participate in the proposed research.
A decision to participate in the research is not binding. Those being interviewed may withdraw at any time with no negative consequences. Pre-existing entitlements for care, education and other services will not be prejudiced by the decision to continue or not to continue once the interview process has begun.
Also note that consenting to participate in the research does not waive rights to legal recourse.
Statement of Consent As research participation must be voluntary, I voluntarily consent to participation in the interview process as described on page 1 for a period of up to 4 sessions over 4 separate days at 1 hour per session. Further, I understand that I may withdraw at any time.
If I withdraw before the interviews are completed, I understand that no information gathered from me can be used in the project. However, given completion of the 4 interviews in the process, I the interviewee agree that the information gathered will be used to facilitate completion of the project, with the information treated as per this agreement. I understand that no financial payment will be given for the interviews. However, I will be asked by the interviewer at a later date to confirm the accuracy of the transcript and a copy of the completed „life history‟ summary transcript (names and places unchanged) will be given to me as a legacy upon completion of the project.
For the sake of publishing, all identifying names (people, locations) will be changed in the final product to ensure no personal identification is available. Following that, for confidentiality, interview material collected will be kept in a locked container until published then deleted.
By signing this document, I confirm that I have: 1) read and understood the information; 2) understood I have the right to ask questions about the interview process at any time in the future; 3) 3) consented to taking part in the research by signing the „Life Interview‟ Research Consent Form
Date: ______
Signatures:
______Participant to be Interviewed Interviewer
Proposed Interview Dates: 1) ______2) ______
3) ______4) ______Interviewee Consent Form Page 2 of 2
178 Appendix C: „LIFE INTERVIEW RESEARCH CONSENT FORM - Facilitating Interviewer/Transcriber Research Title: Bringing Presence: closure and legacy near end of life Researchers: Dr. Donald Doherty, a student writing the thesis at Acadia University - Contact: [email protected]
Supervisor: The Rev. Dr. Carol Anne Janzen, Assist. Prof. of Practical Theology, Director of Mentored Ministry Program, Dean of Students, Director of The Taylor Centre for Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care, Acadia Divinity College, Acadia University - Contact: [email protected] Chair, Research Ethics Board: Dr. Stephen Maitzen, Acadia University – Contact: [email protected]; (902) 585-1407
Name of Facilitator: ______Purpose:
This consent form is for a research study on the practical topics of gerontology and palliative care. The intent is to develop an interview process
• to train students and potential interviewers in delivery of a life interview process for enhancing self-respect and meaningful closure for those being interviewed.
• to develop a standard process to be used regularly to record life histories, histories that are the legacy of the presence of a person and a people, and the retelling of that history is to be accomplished so that the reader and generations to come will remember that presence and gain wisdom from those who have gone before.
Confidentiality If information is given that is required by law to be disclosed, confidentiality cannot be guaranteed. As well as being in this consent form, this will be disclosed to the interviewees in the opening or introductory session.
No information that discloses identity or location of the interviewee will be published. Names and locations will be replaced in the final product with pseudonyms to hide identity. Participating interviewers agree to confidentiality of interview material. Nothing said by the person being interviewed will be disclosed by the interviewer to any third party beyond what is the purpose of this project.
Recorders and research material will be kept in locked cabinets during the interview process, then gathered and maintained by the author in a locked cabinet while being processed. Following completion of the project, the material will be destroyed. Also note that consenting to participate in the research does not waive rights to legal recourse.
The Interview Process
All material will be audiotaped and then transcribed by the interviewer. Strict confidentiality will be maintained. Collected interview information will be modified (names and locations changed) and kept safely in a locked filing cabinet until after the project is published. Following that, it will be destroyed. All names of people and places will be changed after the interview process for purposes of publishing this project. Interviewer/Transcriber Consent Form Page 1 of 2
179 Appendix C (cont’d)
A secondary purpose will be to determine how often certain opinions reoccur within the overall material gathered, e.g. how often similar expressions recur across the various interviews.
If I withdraw before the interview process is completed, I understand that the information gathered by me can be used in the project and I will keep the information confidential as per this agreement.
Names of people and places will be changed post interview process for purposes of publishing this project. Before the names are changed, completed life histories will be reviewed with the interviewed to ensure accuracy.
Following the review with the person interviewed to ensure accuracy of the transcript, all collected interview information will be modified, i.e. names and locations changed, to ensure anonymity. The material will then be kept safely in a locked filing cabinet until the project is published. Following that, it will be destroyed.
Participation in the interview process is voluntary for term of the project: i.e. the two-week training; delivery period of 4 sessions over a period of up 4 separate days at 1hour per session.
Statement of Consent
As research participation must be voluntary, I consent to participate in the thesis project as applicable: i.e. the interview process for both the training period of 2 weeks and for the interview period of 4 sessions over 4 separate days to each of 2 individuals, at 1 hour per session (interviewer); to transcribe the content of the interviews in full immediately or as soon as possible following the interview (transcriber).
I understand that no financial compensation will be given for the interviews. However, my name will be listed in the published work as a founding interviewer/transcriptionist and, upon successful completion of my part in the project. If appropriate and desired, I will be considered as a potential collaborator and trainer in the interview process.
I also understand that credit for clinical hours will be given by the project author if and when requested.
By signing below, I acknowledge that I have read the approved Research Ethics Board proposal as background to my training and participation in this project.
By signing this document, the prospective research interview/transcriber participant testifies to: (1) having read and understood the information; (2) having understood the right to ask questions in the future; (3) consenting to research participation by signing the „Life Interview‟ Research Consent Form.
Date: ______
______Interviewed
______Interviewer
______Dr. Donald Doherty, author of thesis Intervewer/Transcriber Consent Form Page 2 of 2
180 Appendix D: LIFE INTERVIEW RESEARCH CONSENT FORM – Agreement with Care Facility
Research Title: Bringing Presence: closure and legacy near end of life
Researchers: Dr. Donald Doherty, a student writing the thesis at Acadia University - Contact: [email protected]
Supervisor: Dr. Carol Anne Janzen, Acadia University - Contact: [email protected]
Chair, Research Ethics Board: Dr. Stephen Maitzen, Acadia University – Contact: [email protected]; (902) 585-1407
Name and Address of Facilitating Care Unit: ______
______Purpose: This consent form is for a research project on the practical topics of gerontology and palliative care. The intent is to develop an interview process
• to train students and potential interviewers in delivery of a life interview process for enhancing self- respect and meaningful closure for those being interviewed. • to develop a standard process to be used regularly to record life histories, histories that are the legacy of the presence of a person and a people, and the retelling of that history is to be accomplished so that the reader and generations to come will remember that presence and gain wisdom from those who have gone before.
Confidentiality
If information is given that is required by law to be disclosed, confidentiality cannot be guaranteed. As well as being in this consent form, this will be disclosed to the interviewees in the opening or introductory session.
No information that discloses identity or location of the interviewee will be published. Names and locations will be replaced in the final product with pseudonyms to hide identity.
Participating interviewers agree to confidentiality of interview material. Nothing said by the person being interviewed will be disclosed by the interviewer to any third party beyond what is the purpose of this project.
Recorders and research material will be kept in locked cabinets during the interview process, then gathered and maintained by the author in a locked cabinet while being processed. Following completion of the project, the material will be destroyed.
The Interview Process
Life history material given orally by the interviewed participants will be audiotaped, transcribed verbatim from the recording and supplied directly to the thesis project author. The interviewer/transcriber agrees to delete/destroy any evidence of the transcript at the end of personal involvement in the project.
If an interviewee decides to terminate participation before the completion date, all material related must be turned over to the thesis author and a new interview undertaken with a new subject. Material from the prematurely ended interview series cannot be used or kept in any fashion. It will be destroyed.
Care Facility Consent Form 181 Page 1 of 4 Appendix D (cont’d) Strict confidentiality will be maintained with NO discussion regarding the data collected outside of the people involved in the thesis project. Sharing of material will be on a need to know basis only. This is an agreement between all parties in the project, including interviewer, interviewee and care facility.
Also note that consenting to participate in the research does not waive rights to legal recourse.
A secondary purpose of the project will be to determine how often certain opinions recur within the overall material gathered, i.e. from how often similar expressions occur across the various interviews.
Names of people and places will be changed post interview process for purposes of publishing this project. Before the names are changed, completed life histories will be reviewed with the interviewed to ensure accuracy. As a legacy for the interviewed, a copy of the total interview transcript, with names unchanged, will be given to the interviewee after the project interviews are complete.
Following the review with the person interviewed to ensure accuracy of the transcript, all collected interview information will be modified, i.e. names and locations changed, to ensure anonymity. The material will then be kept safely in a locked filing cabinet until the project is published. Following that, it will be destroyed.
Participation in the interview process is voluntary for term of the project: i.e. delivery period of 4 sessions over a period of 4 separate days at 1 hour per session.
Two interviewees per interviewer will be sought from care facilities: one from assisted living homes and the other from palliative care. A short list will be developed through conversation with care facility administrators and staff.
Staff primary contact and experience with potential participants regarding lucidity and desire to share life stories will be used to create the list. Potential interviewees will then be approached, the process explained, permission requested for participation and consent obtained with those who agree to participate.
Interview delivery...
One interviewer will be assigned to each interviewee and two interviewees to each interviewer. Interviewers will record the interview without involvement from other interviewers (except assistance from the author if urgent).
In the introductory or pre-interview session, a sense of rapport will be established, primary purpose of the process explained, the consent form read (if necessary, with assistance from staff of the facility wherein the interviewee resides), contracting of participation and disclosure agreements to meet all ethical and confidentiality requirements signed (to be placed on file in a locked cabinet) and the interview schedule agreed upon.
As well, at the introductory session, the person being interviewed will be supplied with a set of life history questions to consider. They are adapted from the public site of the Legacy Project with the stated intent that the questions will be a guide only, for prior consideration, of things the participant may wish to discuss. However, the questions will not be asked in the interview process itself. (http://www.legacyproject.org/guides/lifeintquestions.html)
Over a series of 4 interview sessions of 1 hour each in length, those interviewed will be asked to relay personal life history as they remember it. As stated, recollections will be audiotaped, transcribed for thesis file record and maintained as confidential by being kept in a locked file cabinet until destroyed post-project. The interview process itself will be open ended with the agenda being to glean the life story by recall and exposition f the interviewee and reflection and response by the interviewer. The interviewer will start the interview by saying Care Facility Consent Form 182 Page 2 of 4 Appendix D (cont’d)
Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out.
If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.’
Following that, response and input by the interviewer will be reflective ONLY, i.e. to understand or clarify without suggesting: one or two words of restatement of the premise as understood by the interviewer so as to ensure accuracy of detail by the interviewer and full development of the thought for the interviewed. No other questions related to the life of the interviewed will be asked.
At each succeeding session, the interviewer will recap what information was given by the interviewed during last session and wait for the confirmation and approval to continue from the interviewee. Then, the generic question Where would you like to pick it up to start today?’ will begin the next session.
The sessions will continue for four succeeding weekly sessions or until the person’s story is complete if less.
For all intents and purposes of this thesis project, the interviewer will have had no prior relationship with the person being interviewed. As well, the interviewing relationship will remain at arm’s length for the duration of the project, terminating in all intents and purposes for the sake of the project at the end of the interview process.
Any and all relationship between interviewer and the interviewed post project will be of their concern alone and is not relevant to this project. However, ethical relationship considerations will be discussed during the primary two-week training course of instruction for the interviewers who will record and transcribe the sessions.
Location...
The interviews will be conducted in a pre-determined, ‘staff monitored’ but quiet and discrete location of the facility wherein the interviewed reside, as per the stipulations of the particular facility administration.
How informed consent will be obtained
Informed consent will be obtained in writing from all participants, including care facility, interviewer, interviewed, transcriber. To assist in easing concerns by potential interview participants, staff from the individual care facilities will be asked to participate in the introduction of the project and presentation of the consent forms to the short-listed participants chosen in consultation with the interviewees, location staff and the interviewer.
Debriefing A closing question will be given to participants and the response recorded regarding their personal opinion on ways to enhance development and delivery of the life review process: i.e.
Now that the interview process has taken place, please tell me what you think may enhance or improve the process for the sake of future interview sessions with others.
Analysis of the responses from all participants will aid further development and refinement of both ‘training the trainer’ and life interview stages, with results being reported in this thesis.
Care Facility Consent Form Page 3 of 4 183 Appendix D (cont’d)
Risks & Safety
Potential Harms
Each care facility director or administrator will be consulted and, according to protocols of the specific care facility, referral to follow-up counsel will be observed. This precaution will be necessary as recall of events can have a cathartic effect of reliving emotional impact of that event.
Although the process of emotional recall and cathartic cleansing is normal and an essential part of healing, closure and growth, the experience can be traumatic. As such, referral for counseling will be available exclusively according to procedure of the care facility administrator. Those being interviewed who experience a recall vivid enough to require counsel will be referred to independent professional help prearranged for just such occasion.
Potential Benefits
• Recording valued experience could become an important tool for encouraging and empowering the catharsis and healing that takes place in resolution of bitterness, regret and sorrow over unfinished business, and for restoring self-worth and enhancing closure. • Individuals who reconcile central issues may be more capable of proactive use of time to resolve secondary issues such as family relations, et al. • Intentional preservation of the hindsight life story of a respondent provides a recorded legacy for nurture of family and future generations, wisdom for understanding the process of life, a resource that may be passed to succeeding generations in knowledge and skills.
Statement of Consent
As research participation must be voluntary, the administration of the care facility listed above consents to participate in the thesis project as applicable: for the introduction period, interview period of 4 sessions over 4 separate days for approximately 1 hour per session.
I understand that no financial compensation will be given for the interviews. However, the staff and facility will be listed in the published work as a founding part of this pilot project. If appropriate, the facility will be considered as a potential collaborator and trainer in the interview process for the future if the administration wishes to continue.
By signing below, I acknowledge that I have read the approved proposal as background to the facility participation in this project.
By signing this document, the administration of the prospective facility testifies to: (1) having read and understood the information; (2) having understood the right to ask questions in the future; (3) consenting to research participation by signing the Life Interview Research Consent Form.
Date:______Dr. Donald Doherty, author of thesis
______Care Facility Facility Administrator
Care Facility Consent Form Page 4 of 4 184 Appendix E: Training Module to be used for teaching the ‘My Life Story’ process
‘My Life Story’ Interview Training Course
Rev. Dr. Don Doherty
Texts:
• David Kuhl What Dying People Want: Practical Wisdom for the End of Life
(Toronto: Anchor Canada, 2003)
• David Kessler The Needs of the Dying: a guide for bringing hope, comfort, and
love to life’s final chapter (New York: Quill Publishing, 2000)
• Robert Atkinson 'The Life Story Interview: Qualitative Research Methods Series
44 (Thousand Oaks: Sage University Press 1998)
Supplementary excerpts will be taken from:
• Howard Clinebell Basic Types of Pastoral Care and Counseling: Resources for the
Ministry of Healing and Growth, 3rd Edition (Nashville: Abingdon Publications,
2011)
• Gary R. Collins Christian Counselling: A Comprehensive Guide 3rd Edition
(Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2007)
• Ethics Training Workbook - Laban's Trainings, Harrisburg PA.
Procedures: Counselling Basics, e.g. 1st and 2nd stage accurate empathy, attending; reflecting. Interviewing basics, e.g. recording, transcribing, printing, databasing, follow- up, et al. Pre-read three required texts and answer all questions for discussion.
185 Daily Schedule
Section/ Time: XXXX-XXXX (students must be motivated and on time, no excuses: late/absent twice will mean dismissal from class; absent once without prior approval or mitigating necessity will mean dismissal)
8:30-9:30 Chapel, sharing, individual reflection and discussion, instructor first day then one student each day thereafter leads with personal reflection, then open discussion of biblical themes.
9:30-9:55 Informal Coffee break
10:00 - 10:50 Intro to project and themes, e.g. nature of ‘Presence’ and ‘ministry of presence’; required homework regarding course content; specific Counselling Skills training: e.g. introduction to attending and facilitation with issues arising from session; daily dynamics including review of previous day of training and moving into methodology and equipment training.
10:50-11:00 Break
11:00 - 12:00 continuation of section 2; clarification of issues and practical attending and counselling skills, e.g. objective reflection and training in open ended questioning.
12:00-12:50 Lunch 12:50-1:00 Preparation to resume class time
186 1:00-1:50 discussion of Atkinson text: 5 chapters and 3 appendices: 1 per day
1:50-2:00 Break
2:00-2:50 continuation of section 4 with specific Counselling Skills training: Introduction to attending and facilitation with issues arising from session; use of the interview, recording and transcription tools; printing, binding and presentation of product to the interviewed.
2:50-3:00 10-minute break
3:00-3:50 IPR session examining results of the chapters 1-9 of Kuhl text, one chapter per day, discussion centred on personal answers to questions in text; consolidation of day’s training and review of counselling skills
3:50-4:00 cover required homework regarding course content
4:00 Dismissal
End of Week 2:
- review of all material and clarification of questions; final exam with respect to
ethical and practical application of methodology.
187 Education Credit:
- following the two weeks of methodology orientation, a practicum of one to two
months may be assigned with a care facility wherein the student will arrange and
carry out the ‘My Life Story’ interview process with an appropriate number (to be
determined by the course instructor, care facility and the student) of elders and/or
those in palliative care.
- academic education credit, re. Clinical Pastoral Education, will be determined in
relation to the individual and institutions involved in partnership with the Inuksuk
Book Foundation Inc., the not for profit entity created in conjunction with the thesis
project as a vehicle to continue the life history collection process post-thesis.
Passing this course and being chosen as one of the interviewers depends on the personal acumen and diligence of the participant in: overcoming personal issues and bias; becoming orientated to an other-person-centred perspective of objective interviewing capability; punctuality (necessary for other person centeredness); displaying of interview and recording skills.
The decision of who will pass and who will be the interviewers is solely that of the instructor(s).
Core of Training Objective
The primary requirement of the interviewer is to be someone of solid character and sufficient empathy as to be willing to listen and record without interruption and interpolation.
188 For the initial stage of training, up to 6 potential interviewers may take part. Those found capable of facilitating the interviewing process, i.e. interpersonal skills, will be selected to continue in the project.
To ensure continuity, a list of potential interviewers will be maintained in case of withdrawal by one of the two selected.
Life Review Process in short
It has been my experience that cognitive dissonance (and grief in general) has to be released, to ‘get out’, brought to light, expressed and discussed in order to lose its dominating control over the mind and for the cathartic process of reconciliation/resolution to begin. This process of ‘reflective’ communication and expression of memories and feelings provides a source of comfort and closure to those who need it. In this case, particularly given the way they are often relegated to obscurity in the closing stages of life, the intent is pastoral care to the elderly and terminally ill.
Once the catharsis or purging of pain felt from negative memories and emotion has begun, success largely depends on the respondent eventually being able to gain a renewed and positive perspective from hindsight, the providential and proactive viewpoint evident from this side of a past event: an event often formerly seen as ‘negative’, and often guilt or shame based, i.e. ‘wisdom’.
Often, this catharsis or purging is necessary to reconcile the event and move on. It involves a listener process of ‘attending’ and empowerment of the person being listened to while allowed to reflect, laugh and/or grieve. It is 4 particularly encouraging to know that
189 someone cares enough to be ‘present’ (‘ministry of presence’) and to empathetically reflect and respond in kind with them while they do so.
Selection of those to be interviewed
Two interviewees per interviewer will be sought from care facilities: one from assisted living homes and the other from palliative care. A short list will be developed through conversation with care facility administrators and staff.
Staff primary contact and experience with potential participants regarding lucidity and desire to share life stories will be used to create the list. Potential interviewees will then be approached, the process explained, permission requested for participation and consent obtained with those who agree to participate.
Interview delivery
One interviewer will be assigned to each interviewee and two interviewees to each interviewer. Interviewers will record the interview using supplied digital recorders without involvement from other interviewers (except assistance from the author if urgent). In the introductory or pre-interview session, a sense of rapport will be established, primary purpose of the process explained, the consent form read with assistance from the staff of the facility wherein the interviewee resides, contracting of participation and disclosure agreements to meet all ethical and confidentiality requirements signed (to be placed on file in a locked cabinet) and the interview schedule agreed upon.
As well, at the introductory session, the person being interviewed will be supplied with a set of life history questions to consider. They are adapted from the public site of the
190 Legacy Project269 with the stated intent the questions will be for prior consideration of things the participant may wish to discuss. However, the questions will not be asked in the interview process itself.
Over a series of four interview sessions of one hour each in length, those interviewed will be asked to relay personal life history as they remember it. As stated, recollections will be audiotaped, transcribed for thesis file record and maintained as confidential by being kept in a locked file cabinet until destroyed post-project.
The interview process itself will be open ended with the agenda being to glean the life story by recall and exposition of the interviewee and ‘attendant’ reflection and response by the interviewer. The interviewer will start the interview by saying
Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out. If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.
Following that, response and input by the interviewer will be ‘reflective’ ONLY using tools of attending and accurate empathy taught in the training course, i.e. to understand or clarify without suggesting: one or two words of restatement of the premise as understood by the interviewer so as to ensure accuracy of detail by the interviewer and full development of the thought for the interviewed. No other questions related to the life of the interviewed will be asked.
269 http://www.legacyproject.org/guides/lifeintquestions.html 191 At each succeeding session, the interviewer will recap what information was given by the interviewed during last session and wait for the confirmation from the interviewee and approval to continue. Then, the generic question will begin the next session, i.e. ‘Where would you like to pick it up to start today?’
The sessions will continue for four (4) succeeding weekly sessions or, if sooner, until the person’s story is complete. Assurance will be given, if the interview process has ended in less than four (4) sessions and the person being interviewed decides that something significant can be added, that the interviewer will return when contacted to continue up to the full number of sessions.
For all intent and purposes of this thesis project, the interviewer will have had no prior relationship with the person being interviewed. As well, the interviewing relationship will remain ‘at arm’s length’ for the duration of the project, terminating in all intents and purposes for the sake of the project at the end of the interview process.
Any and all relationship between interviewer and the interviewed post project will be of their concern alone and is not relevant to this project. However, ethical relationship considerations will be discussed during the primary two-week instruction of the interviewers.
Transcription
Following the interview, each interview will be transcribed by the interviewer (and a professional typist in the employ of the author if required, with appropriate confidentiality agreement in place) and a brief recap given to the interviewer to be used in a confirming manner during the preliminary stage of opening the next interview with the interviewee.
192 Location
The interviews will be conducted in a pre-determined, staff monitored but quiet and discrete location of the facility wherein the interviewed reside, as per the stipulations of the particular facility administration.
Consent: how informed consent will be obtained
Informed consent will be obtained in writing from all participants (care facility, interviewer, interviewed, transcriptionist), as per the ‘Informed Consent’ forms included with this submission, i.e. Appendices B, C & D.
To assist in easing concerns by potential interview participants, staff from the individual care facilities will participate in the introduction of the project concept, the interviewer and presentation of the consent forms.
Debriefing
A closing response questionnaire will be given to participants and the response recorded regarding their personal opinion on ways to enhance development and delivery of the life review process: i.e.
‘Now that the interview process has taken place, please tell me what you think may enhance or improve the process for the sake of future interview sessions with others.’
Analysis of the responses from all participants will aid further development and refinement of both ‘training the trainer’ and ‘life interview’ stages, with results being reported in this thesis. As well, the results will determine the answer to the thesis question.
193 Prior to the names and locations being changed to ensure anonymity for the thesis project, the interview transcript will be reviewed with each participant to ensure accuracy.
Each person interviewed will verify the content of their life story.
An unaltered copy of the life story will be databased, then copies offered to the interviewed as a legacy.
For purposes of this study, life histories gathered will be made pseudonymous before being integrated into the publishing of the project. Permission to use the story in whatever form is appropriate and acceptable for publishing will be obtained prior to being published.
Confidentiality will be maintained.
A debriefing seminar will be held with the interviewers and the others who took part in the initial training to focus on how to improve the process for the future. A follow-up information session will be held with each participating care facility to ensure adequate debriefing.
Following publication of the study, all extraneous interview notes and material will be destroyed.
Risks & Safety: Potential Harms
Each care facility director or administrator will be consulted and referral to follow-up counsel will be observed according to protocols of the specific care facility. This will be necessary as recall of events can have a cathartic effect of reliving the emotional impact of that event.
Although the process of emotional recall and cathartic cleansing is normal and an essential part of healing, closure and growth, the experience can be traumatic. As such,
194 referral for counseling will be available exclusively according to procedure of the care facility administrator. Those being interviewed who experience a recall vivid enough to require counsel will be referred to independent professional help prearranged for just such occasion.
Risks and Safety: Potential Benefits
Recording valued experience could become an important tool for encouraging and empowering the catharsis and healing that takes place in resolution of bitterness, regret and sorrow over unfinished business, and for restoring self-worth and enhancing closure.
Individuals who reconcile central issues may be more capable of proactive use of time to resolve secondary issues such as family relations, et al.
Intentional preservation of the hindsight life story of a respondent provides a recorded legacy for the family and posterity for society as a whole, i.e. for nurture of family and future generations through the wisdom found in overcoming and thus understanding the process of life. As such, it becomes a resource that may be passed to succeeding generations in knowledge and skills.
Confidentiality
If information is given that is required by law to be disclosed, confidentiality in that matter cannot be guaranteed. This will be disclosed to the interviewees in the opening or introductory session.
No information that discloses identity or location will be published. Names and locations will be replaced in the final product with pseudonyms to hide identity.
195 Participating interviewers will agree in writing to confidentiality of interview material.
Recorders and research material will be kept in locked cabinets during the interview process, then gathered and maintained by the author in a locked cabinet while being processed. Following completion of the project, the material will be destroyed.
Compensation
No financial compensation will be given for either interviewer or interviewed participant. The intent is to develop a process wherein the sole purpose is unselfish, philanthropic, pursuit of skill in the recording of life history for the sake of: a) providing a legacy for the participant; b) remembering individual ‘presence,’ evidence of our humanity.
Conclusion
This training module is intended to be used at any time in the training process in relation to the thesis project in question: i.e. either before or after conclusion. If after conclusion, it will be the property of Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc., the not for profit entity created in conjunction with the thesis project as a vehicle to continue the life history collection process post-thesis. The material may be amended as necessary to facilitate the in training personnel to competence in the ‘life history’ interview and databasing of the information collected as a result.
Rev. Dr. Donald Doherty
Thesis Author and President
Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.
196 Appendix F: LIFE STORY INTERVIEWS - Four Elderly and Two Palliative
1) Life Story #1: Ms. S, aged 96 … Page 199
2) Life Story #2: Ms. I, aged 95 … Page 233
3) Life Story #3: Ms. G, age 39, classified as Palliative … Page 267
4) Life Story #4: Mr. R, aged 86 … Page 279
5) Life Story #5: Mr. T, age 82, classifed as Palliative … Page 307
6) Life Story #6: Ms. M, age 83 … Page 359
Appendix F and all interviews are presented as the sample reproduction of the actual process used to produce the ‘My Life Story’ booklets. General formatting is as presented to the interviewed participants.
197 198 Life Story #1: Ms. S, aged 96
Life Story Interview with Ms. S Interviewed by Rev. Dr. Don Doherty Interview number 1, May 13, 2016, 1330 to 1430 hrs. at Mont St. Joseph, Prince Albert, Saskatchewan.
Interviewer: ‘Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your
199 first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out.
If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.’
Ms. S: The memory is what I was told, you know, like where I was born and how I was born. I was born in 1920 in a village in Poland. The city where the church was in was named Tarnobrzeg, but we were in a village and the name was Stale. That was according to what my parents told me. They didn’t have anything. The first building that my dad put up, that’s what I was born in. Afterwards, it was a barn. The house that I lived in had a thatched roof, and a clay floor, no lumber. I must have started school at the same age that children do now but I don’t recollect the first day of school or even the last days of my school in 1930. As I was born in 1920, I must have gone at least three years. It was a mile: we had to walk, just like any other child growing up. There were not too many activities, the parents were strict and so were the teachers strict. It’s altogether different than what children have nowadays. I liked school. We played with the local children, did what the things that all children do at that age. I had one brother, A, two years older than me, born in 1918. My parents were good people, loving people: too strict. In those days, a child was seen but not heard. However, it was a good childhood. The people like my parents didn’t have much. They were poor, but they were happy. In their society, they were quite happy until they heard of better things. My dad did a little bit a carpenter work, put in windows and things like that. They had a few acres of land and farmed. They made a living and that was about all. My maiden name was K. My father’s name was W K and Mom’s name was A K. We lived a very simple life. I didn’t play with other children, just my brother. We were quite excited when the parents told us we were going to come to Canada. I think after my uncle, my dad’s brother, emigrated in 1927, he told us that he got 160 acres. That seemed huge. I think that’s when my dad got the idea that he should come to Canada. That’s when the agents started coming to Poland for people, and they asked Dad if he had any other trade. They wanted him on the farm. That was the agent’s goal: to get the people to come and open up the land and they praised Canada. So, that’s when it started. My dad had only one eye. When he was a young man, he worked in Germany before he was married. He worked on the railroad and a piece of steel chipped off and went into the pupil of his right eye. The German government told him that if he didn’t have the eye taken
200 out, the nerve from that eye would go and he would go blind. They took his right eye out and he had an artificial eye. However, they were very good about it. When he came back to Poland, he was compensated. He was getting compensation so he had to get a special paper made out by the Canadian agent, I don’t really know for what, so he could come to Canada because that was a defect. So, when we came to Canada, he didn’t get compensation anymore. Then from 1927 to 1930, that’s when the paper started to get drawn up for us to come to Canada. Any more about the papers, I don’t know. I was just a kid. But we did go about a year, or maybe more, that we had to go by rail from the city, Tarnobrzeg. In the village there was no railroad. But, from Tarnobrzeg, we had to go to Kraków for medicals, all of us. We had to be 100% healthy before we could go, even before they would draw up the papers. So we went, maybe a year ahead of 1930, I’m not sure as I don’t recollect clearly. I only know that we went, then we came back, and the procedure started about coming to Canada. We were excited. Another thing, my dad’s parents came with us to Canada. They were in their 60s. They couldn’t travel on their own so they came with us. They went to the medical the same with us except Dad acted as kind of the interpreter. Nobody spoke English, not a word. For me, even when we went for the medical, going to Kraków from the village, oh my gosh, it was huge! They had these open stalls that you could shop: it was fascinating. So we spent a day in Kraków. In Kraków is where all the kings were buried and Dad told us that. It was common for us to have to go upstairs to places overlooking the Vistula, the Polish main river. I was scared of heights so I stayed down when my brother and my parents went up. So, all of that went on and on, back-and-forth. I don’t know how many times the agent came before everything was finalized. By that time, Dad sold the little property that he had and they told him, the agent, that we would make it in Canada if he had $1000 clear after the voyage was paid for. That’s what they told my dad. However, it didn’t work out that way. In 1927, when my uncle came to Canada, you could get a homestead for $10. But, when we came in 1930, that had gone up and we couldn’t get a homestead anymore for $10. For the first quarter of land, Dad had to pay $500 down. Somehow, when I think of it now, a lot of it they didn’t explain to the people. When you came to Canada, it turned out to be very difficult. However, as we got ready, we just waited and got things ready to travel. Then we started out. My uncle, my mother’s brother, took us to the railway in Tarnobrzeg and we travelled overnight to Kraków and I don’t how many days we had to wait in the city, in Kraków, for another medical. It sure was very stringent. They checked the internal medicine and all the ladies went into one shower and all the men into another. Then we eventually started on our way. I can’t recollect how many days we spent in Kraków but we went from Kraków
201 to Warsaw then to Gdansk. That’s when we boarded the small ship. I think we then went on the Baltic Sea. I don’t know how many days. We had a storm on the third day. It wasn’t the biggest ship and the waves were coming. We weren’t allowed to go out and everybody was sick. I don’t know how many days we were on the ship. From there we landed in Belgium where we were to board another ship, a big one. But you know, in those days in 1930, they were not luxury liners. In Belgium, I recollect, we must have been there about a week before we boarded the big ship. I was about 9. I didn’t become 10 until we landed in Canada. We eventually landed in Halifax Nova Scotia. We ended up in Prince Albert on June 2, 1930. Between the rail ways, the examinations, and everything else we must have been on the go for the most of May. In Halifax, we went for health examinations again. My grandmother, my dad’s mother, had a red eye from the wind or something and they put drops in it. If it had not cleared up, she would have been turned back. That is why I have mixed feelings about people coming to Canada as refugees and the way we were treated when we came to Canada as immigrants. I don’t remember how many days we spent in Halifax. Mostly, we stayed around where the ship docked. Nobody could speak English, but my dad could speak fluent German from his time in Germany and there was the odd person who my dad could go up to and ask questions. Maybe they had other interpreters as well, but I don’t know. I was just a kid. The parents didn’t explain to us children what was going on. We just went, and that was the normal thing. My dad’s mother and father were named J and A K. My mother’s mother and father remained in Poland. However, her 18-year-old sister S B (B was my mother’s maiden name) also came with us to Canada. There were 7 of us altogether. My aunt was part of the family. My grandmother and grandfather were healthy. My dad’s younger brother W… and two younger sisters were already in Canada so the whole family was now in Canada. The brother came in 1927 and made out the papers for the other two sisters. One was single, about 18, and the other was married and had a baby girl. However, the husband couldn’t read or write. You know in Poland there were a lot of children whose parents were killed for some reason. It was a poor country, always fighting going on, so what happened to him was that when he got to Warsaw and couldn’t sign his name, they turned him back. For two weeks, he had to stay at my dad’s place and learn to write his name and read simple things. I remember as a child I was going to school and my dad would be sitting in one room and I would listen. My dad would get so upset with him when he couldn’t remember. However, he went to Warsaw again and made it the second time.
202 My uncle found it much easier in Canada than we did. We came at the wrong time, in 1930. Everything was higher: prices were higher; it was harder to get a job! I think maybe so many immigrants had come. I don’t remember what the government was at the time. It was very difficult because, once we were settled on the land, you either survived or not. We didn’t get anything. In fact, I think that if my father had been given all the money he spent in the first year, he would have gone back to Poland. It was very hard. They worked much, much, harder. At first, that is the way they thought at the time: they would have gone back. But when Hitler invaded Poland, my dad said “How lucky we were that we left there!” It was very difficult at first coming and not knowing anything. However, my dad did very well. Within a year he got on well with English. However, my mother never did. She stayed at home. Women stayed at home on the farm and associated with the Polish people, the way my parents did. But, what do you do? They had nothing to go back to and had no money to go back. When I think of it now, coming from a poor country, they should’ve been informed a lot more about what the circumstances would be. My brother and I went to school in August. In order to survive the winters, my mom and my dad would go and cut poplar trees, split and stack them. It took a big toll on them as they had never done that kind of work before. The winter was awful. In Poland, we have snow but we wear shoes all winter, not winter boots. A lot of children went barefoot in Poland. Poland, Ukraine, Czechoslovakia and the other countries, those immigrants that came in the 30s, they were all poor and placed on land that took hard work. But they were hard workers. At first, the agent kept coming every day to my uncle’s place saying “Let’s go look at the land!” In Poland, there is a hectare, or 2 hectares, but what does one think when the agent comes and talks about 160 acres of bush?! Who knows what goes through their mind?! Anyway, at first they came and took my dad and uncle here and there. We stayed at my uncle’s in Henribourg outside of Prince Albert. We didn’t go to school at the time. The agent would come every day to show my dad places, but they weren’t homesteads where you pay $10. It required a $500 down payment and they bought a place outside of Prince Albert called Lily Plain. It was all bush. I think he was overwhelmed. He put $500 down on that piece of land and when we were going to move from my uncles onto that piece of land, there wasn’t a building of any form. My mother panicked and said ‘we were going to die out there!’ We went out there and stayed with my dad’s sister overnight and my mother decided that they’ve got to go see the agent; that they were not going to live out there. They went into Prince Albert to talk to the agent. He calmed my mother down and said ‘That’s alright! The money is still here. It hasn’t gone through yet. We can give it back to you but it will be like a down payment on another place.’ So they came and picked my brother and me up, and our belongings, and back to Henribourg we went! The next day, when we got there, my dad said to my mother ‘We’re going to go look on our own!’
203 My dad went to the farmer’s supply store in Henribourg, to the storekeeper by the name of A S who could speak Polish, and bought a spade. The storekeeper told my father that in Henribourg there was an Englishman with the last name L who had lost his wife to tuberculosis and was selling a farm (he had two boys and another farm). My dad and my mom walked over there. I don’t know how my dad would know what the land was like, 160 acres, but in Poland you could spade the land you had. Anyway, there were three buildings all in all on that land: there was a house, a log barn and another building. That agent came and Dad bought that farm with $500 down. At least we had a roof over our head. I don’t know how my mother felt. They never told us. But they were miserable. But we were glad to get out of the other house. It was difficult having two families together in my uncle’s house. The house they had was very small and my uncle’s wife was kind of hard to get along with. Even though we had no house or place to go, she insisted that my dad buy a cow for us to have milk. So we got a cow. We brought it to our house on our land. At first, the Englishman and his two boys lived in the kitchen part of the house and we had the rest. It was good as we had a roof over our head. Mom dug and put in a garden and the Englishman had about six or eight chickens for eggs. There was maybe two or three acres plowed but nothing was seeded previously. There were wild oats that look just like real oats and my dad was so excited. He thought the wild oats were real oats. The English farmer told him ‘No, no, no, no, you’ve got to cut that down for hay!’ Dad was so astonished. Dad couldn’t talk English… that’s going back but I’ll go back…! In Halifax, I guess the government or whoever was in charge gave us a booklet with three columns: one was in Polish, another in proper English and another translation. In English, there’s a lot of letters we don’t use. But, in Polish, we pronounce every letter. However, the spelling is the same as in English. The booklet was fairly thick so if Dad had to ask anything, he would look it up in Polish then he would show the Englishman the translation so they could communicate. This is how they found out that the oats were wild oats. It was harder to communicate with the Englishman then it was with Canadians. I don’t know why. But we lived with them for nearly a month with the door in between them and us. I remember one time when my mother and father got scared: NORTHERN LIGHTS!! You know, there was more of them around then than there is now: I don’t know why! I remember, as kids, my brother and I woke up and my dad said to my mother ‘There’s something going on!’ Such a simple thing, but they had never seen it in Poland. They woke up that Englishman and showed him what was going on!!! He told them ‘That’s alright, it’s okay!!’ That’s how we got introduced to the Northern Lights! Such a small thing but, you know, a different country…! The atmosphere in Poland, probably where it’s located, doesn’t show that. Then it comes to the first winter: oh, that, that… it was really… it was pretty awful!
204 I had to walk to school 2 ½ miles and, you know, I didn’t have the kind of clothes that they have today. They did the best they could but it was pretty, pretty, awful. My uncle told them the winters were cold but he didn’t tell them how long and how cold! We came on the land, it must have been, close to the end of June. We landed on June 2nd at the immigration office, so it must have been pretty near the end of June when we arrived and were in the same house with the Englishman. Then came the Fall and, of course, there was no crop because there was nothing on the land. What my dad did was he bought a grub hoe and started clearing where he thought that it would be broke. So, he was working, grubbing I guess, cutting around the roots around the trees, clearing, cutting up the trees and piling the logs, what you could use, pile and burn the next year for firewood. He did what he could. Mom and Dad brought from Poland a huge wicker trunk with tools such as a saw blade and a wide axe that they used to make the logs square. You could bring things from Poland. I don’t know if they paid extra for luggage. There is a lot of things I don’t know, that they never told us kids. We just, you know, like I said… kids were to be seen and not heard. We did our own thing. My uncle told us it was cold but, he had hit the better times, so he didn’t tell us the bad things. You learn… I think they wanted to better themselves so they took it for better or worse, and they did bring things. I remember my dad brought what was like a sheepskin coat. It was kind of brown leather… I don’t know whether it was skin or leather, and on the inside was like sheepskin. And the same with my mother! But the coats, they were only so long. But that’s only part of that… Dad had never seen anything like felt boots, they didn’t have them in Poland. You can wear shoes to walk in Poland. In the winters, there was snow but it never got very cold. I can’t ever remember, in the years that I went to school and I had to walk, that I missed school because it was cold. However, here in Canada, there were times that it was -45° in those years. I actually think that the winters were more severe then than now! I think between the two of them, my dad and mom, they missed Poland… and I could almost say they were depressed at times. You know, sometimes you can be poor but happy. But here, being isolated on 160 acres, with neighbors a mile away or something... the neighbors were English so you really couldn’t communicate. Getting started on a farm, you need to buy everything. So, that $500 that my dad had left over after he paid the $500 down payment didn’t leave a lot. He had to buy a cow, you have to buy this… you’ve got to buy everything! In our house, we didn’t have a stove. The first stove that they bought was a cast-iron with four burners and an oven. It was the cheapest and most economical they could get. They had to saw the wood to burn. And for the winter, they had one of those airtight heaters, the round ones. It was just like tin. It heated up fast but it cooled down fast. You had to keep stoking it.
205 In Poland, we never had a heater for the winter. They had, like, a chimney for baking bread, all made out of bricks and clay. There was another thing. This house did have a chimney up above but, up to that, it was a stove pipe. However, other than that, we felt we were fortunate to get that place! Once the Englishman moved out, we had the kitchen to use as well, so we had ample room. Yeah… ample room, but no furniture! Do you know what kind of beds we had? It was ship lap, like when they make lumber and they have the sides left over!? I guess he could get them cheap, or maybe they were discarded, so Dad would make like the head board and the back and the side on either side, then put boards across. My mother, in Poland, grew a lot of flax and they weaved a lot of linen material in the winter. My father made my mother a shuttle and they would make big strips of linen out of the flax. We grew flax and the little round flowers and pods and, when it was ripe, they bound the flax and made oil from the flax seed. They had a way of making the bundles of fibers soft by putting them in water and, when they dried, they broke up the sticks and the fiber was left. It was just like wool and my mother spun it into thread. In winter, that was a woman’s job: they made rolls and rolls of this linen. In the Spring they would bleach it. They were used to doing that! When they brought that linen to Canada and had to have a mattress, Mom sowed two sides together like a sack and fill that with hay, fine hay, and sewed up the end. Those were our mattresses and that’s what we slept on. That’s when your body had no curvage because there was no spring to the bed! That’s the kind of bed that we slept on for years. And then you just put a sheet on top of it. The bedding, we brought all that in that huge container: the bedding, the pillows and so on, because people raised a lot of geese, tame geese, in Poland. When winter came, they saved the feathers and down and then they made pillows and, like, not comforters but, just to cover up… it was really, really warm. END OF PART 1 Interview number 2, May 20th, 2016, 1330 to 1430 hrs. If you can call that furniture, it was just bare necessity. My dad was actually pretty good. When he was in Poland, he put in windows and small stuff in carpentry. So, he made like benches, so we had benches and stools. It was a bench so two could sit on it. And a table that he must have built on its own! Maybe, outside of the cook stove, that was all the furniture we had. Bare necessities, cooking utensils… you know, when you start, you don’t have a lot of money so that is how we started. Mother did plant a garden though. It was practically the end of June, so we did have a garden. Later on, I can’t remember the dates, Dad bought two horses because we couldn’t
206 do anything without them. We had one cow and, towards Fall, we bought two piglets. So we had that. We also had the hens that Mr. L left, so we had eggs. There was no recreation for the two of us kids, so our recreation was picking roots. When we got there, our road was just a trail 1½ mile from the main road. They plowed that, I think it must’ve been the municipality, and they told my dad that if we picked the roots it would go against the taxes, or no money would be taken off for taxes. So for Mom, my brother and me, that was the recreation and chores for the whole summer. There were neighbors about a half a mile but we couldn’t visit because we couldn’t talk English. So, it was… the days went by that way all summer until August or September, whenever school started. Then, when school started, my brother and I started school in Henribourg in grade 1. From then on, from when we went to school, it progressed. We walked 2 ½ miles every day except Saturday and Sunday. That was it. We walked snow, rain or shine! We hardly ever missed school. My brother, I can’t remember when, but he talked more with an accent. But when I started, by Christmas, I could get around already. I picked up the language. I didn’t know everything, but enough so that, when somebody asked me, I knew what they wanted. So I had a little recitation in the Christmas concert. And after that for me it was just school, walk home 2½ miles after school. I was still 10 years old the first Christmas. It went smoothly from then on until 1931. In 1931, Dad had the two horses and he bought a mower to cut hay because on the farm he had bought quite a lot of hay meadow. In summer, it would dry out and he would cut hay. We had two horses and one cow and they didn’t eat up all that hay, so he would sell it. In the 1930s, we had the drought in the South so they came and bailed the hay for the South. So that was what we did until tragedy struck. In 1931, when school was out, my dad was cutting hay. My brother had just turned 13. He wanted to ride on the mower. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the mower? You sit on the seat and it has a blade on the side and you drive it. You go round and round cutting hay. It was several days that my brother kept asking dad ‘Can I do it?’ My dad kept saying ‘no’ until, finally, he had another job to do and he let my brother drive and cut. I was at home. Mother was out raking hay. Dad had let my brother go while dad used a scythe. Do you know what scythe looks like? My dad had brought the scythe with him in that big trunk from Poland. Something happened! I don’t know what my brother did. Nobody else was with him. My brother was not good with animals so the horses ran, still connected to the mower, and he cut his legs. Nobody knew what happened but he didn’t shut it off. I heard the mower going from a long way off on this 160 acres. Then the horses ran home. They had broken away. But they had cut both his legs very badly below the knees.
207 We went running out to the hay meadow. There wasn’t a drop of blood. Apparently, the shock had stopped the blood. But, by the time I got there, my dad had already come to the scene and had gone to the English neighbor. I don’t know how but he had gotten him to come and pick him up. The mower had cut through the bone on both legs and it was just the flesh left holding together on the back of the legs. They took him to the Holy Family Hospital in Prince Albert. The English neighbors took him. And here was Mother and Dad, not able to talk English. He was in the hospital a year and eight days. You know, after that, the whole year… you had to pay for the hospital, the doctor, so everything that we grew… any extra that we grew… eggs, butter, anything… went to the hospital. They had no money to pay. So it was tragic. For me, as a kid, I didn’t know any difference but, for my parents, it was tragic. But you know, the doctor, Dr. H in Prince Albert, saved his legs. They put pins and grafted and connected. I don’t know how many miles it was from Henribourg to Prince Albert but his legs didn’t start bleeding until they hit the old bridge, the railroad bridge, which was used for everything at that time. They rushed him straight to Holy Family Hospital. Dad didn’t know any doctors in Prince Albert. That was 1931 and we had never been to a doctor here. But that was the neighbor’s doctor. He gave my brother five major operations beside the first small one and they reconnected and saved his legs. Until he died at 93, my brother A… could walk, he could dance. It was a miracle. That doctor told my dad what he did but, he said (to my dad what he could understand from the book) that ‘he could thank God for A’s legs.’ After a couple of years, A was able to use his legs again and he worked with my father in farming. Eventually, my father had two quarters of land and cattle and A worked with him. One of his feet, the right foot, he had a hard time lifting it but the other was perfect. He had to protect the areas where it had new skin for a long time to protect them from being damaged. Yes, that accident set us back. My dad even cut up railway cars full of cordwood for the Holy Family Hospital as partial payment. So you know, for me being left as a child, it was very difficult. I was alone. Every Saturday for over a year, Mom and Dad would drive with the wagon to visit A and I would be alone. Once in a while we would rotate and I would go but, at 11 or 12 years old, it was difficult. Here are these immigrants with nothing and something like that to happen!? So A never went to school anymore. But, I went to school up to grade 8. I skipped from grade 5 to 6 at Christmas and went from grade 6 to grade 7 that June. Once I got the language, I was a lot better than the average so was able to go ahead. However, children my age had already gone as I had started grade 1 at about 11. When we got a new principal, all the children my age were gone so, when I hit grade 8, I didn’t want to go to school anymore.
208 In those days you had to be 15 or finish grade 8 if you wanted to be a Canadian. I don’t think in other nationalities that they did that!? The natives didn’t go to school. So, about Easter of 1937, I told my dad I didn’t want to go back to school. I was turning 17 and I had this big idea that I would quit school, go out, get a job but, when it came to it, Mom said ‘We need you at home!’ So, when I quit school, I worked that much more at home. Mom would not let me go out to work because they always needed me. When I had gone at Easter time to get my books to leave school, my teacher had said to me ‘Oh S, you are so foolish because you are clever enough to go further!’ But, I wanted to date. I regretted that. I should have finished my grade 8. Even when my brother came home, he could not work. He went around on crutches but his legs were very weak, so we had to build them up. So he kind of slid around on his butt. It fell for me to do a lot of the farm work that he would be doing and I did that for another four or five years. As such, I never got to work outside of the home until 1942, 11 years after the accident. Well, I should put first, when war broke out in 1939, Dad was glad they did come to Canada. He thought that it didn’t matter how rough we had it: it was better to be in Canada because Hitler invaded Poland first. Things continued to pick up, even in farming. Dad bought another quarter, 160 acres joining our 160 acres, and he broke more land. Things were hard, having a son that had been in the hospital for over a year, and it fell hard on Mom and me and Dad to produce, and a lot of the produce and stuff went to the hospital. Yet, there are so many things they needed on the farm, so I stayed home to help. In April 1942, a lady in a general store in Henribourg asked me if I would come and help her clean. I so wanted to get out and go with other people. By that time, age 18 or 19, I was dating. I had stayed at home, but parents demand a lot from the children. So I went to work at the store in Henribourg. That’s where, in May of that year, I met my husband. My family went out close to Shellbrook, 25 miles north, with a couple that knew these people who had a car. We didn’t have a car but they did. It was the Y… family who had come over with them on the boat. They asked us to come over and visit. That was when I met my husband, B, in May. We got engaged in August and we were married in November! My husband had his own land in Cookson but didn’t have a house built. When we got married, we lived with his family for the first winter, which wasn’t too smart. For a young couple, we shouldn’t have lived with them! He was 25 and I was 22. I think the years of being home made me want to get married and get out sooner than if I had been able to go and work outside. I think it’s good for children to go and have the independence for a while that, when you’re at home, you don’t. Mother was not pleased, but I didn’t listen to her anymore. I was 22. I probably regretted it after but, when you get out and work, you learn so much. My mother didn’t see eye to eye with my husband, but they got along.
209 We got along very well, so the first winter he worked with his father. He was the oldest out of four. His younger brother had enlisted in the Army. My husband had a heart defect, but I didn’t find that out until after we were married. When he was one year old, people didn’t talk much about children getting sick. He wasn’t vaccinated and he got smallpox. Without a doctor’s aid, he survived and, from what his mother told me, the fever was so high that she wondered how he would survive! I think that is what damaged his heart. When we went to the doctor when we got married, we found out that he had an enlarged heart. You know, it’s kind of difficult to find out the hard way! His parents would not acknowledge, when we got married, that he had any problems. When we got married, they masked us if we had any problems when we went to get our marriage license, but his parents said ‘no, they weren’t aware that he had any problems.’ However, when he got older, you could tell. He shouldn’t have been on the farm. We got married in November 8, 1942, and he died on June 16, 1962. He died from the enlarged heart. But we had 19 good years together. I was very insistent. He would say he wasn’t feeling good and I could tell that his heart was beating fast. I even insisted in 1955 to our doctor, Dr. P, that my husband go to see a doctor at the Mayo Clinic in the states, which he did. But, even though he went, they couldn’t do anything for him. But it was good that we had almost 20 years together! Over the years we were together, his condition kept getting worse and worse. He was in and out of the hospital. Towards the end, Dr. P said that his heart was so large there was no room left in the cavity. My husband was sick in the hospital. He also had gallbladder problems. There were times you could look at him and you wouldn’t know that anything was wrong. He could work. We had a good life. Some people have a short life and it’s good. In 1943, we had a house built. I was pregnant with our first daughter, the daughter that we lost as an infant. We had a carpenter build it. It was the first frame house in Cookson. That is where we farmed and did everything like a normal family. After that, we had two more daughters and a son. My first daughter, A, was born perfectly normal but then died of pyloric stenosis.270 It’s a disease of the muscle below the stomach that tightens up and won’t let any food go through.
270 Pyloric stenosis – infant Pyloric stenosis is a narrowing of the pylorus, the opening from the stomach into the small intestine. This article describes the condition in infants. Causes: Normally, food passes easily from the stomach into the first part of the small intestine through a valve called the pylorus. With pyloric stenosis, the muscles of the pylorus are thickened. This prevents the stomach from emptying into the small intestine. The exact cause of the thickening is unknown. Genes may play a role, since children of parents who had pyloric stenosis are more likely to have this condition. Other risk factors include certain antibiotics, too much acid in the first part of the small intestine (duodenum), and certain diseases a baby is born with, such as diabetes. Pyloric stenosis occurs most often in infants younger than 6 months. It is more
210 In 1943, they did not know how to fix it. She died in the hospital of starvation. She wasn’t even a month old. Everything just shot out: her food got so far but wouldn’t go down. You can’t keep feeding a tiny baby through a tube. My second daughter, L, had it as well in 1951 but, by then, they knew how to fix it. They just open up and loosen up that muscle. I had my first daughter home only four days when everything started. At first, they had kept her in the hospital for seven days and everything was normal but, somehow, it just started. Everything tightened up. I think it’s more common than we know. We were just married a year and we had just moved into our new house. We had been staying in a little shack on the land. The new house was started in May, 1943 and, although the gyprock wasn’t inside, we moved into it in August. There were times that my husband’s heart didn’t act up if he wasn’t doing extremely hard work. My children asked, if I had known Dad was sick before we got married, what would I have done? Well, I don’t know! We were young, 25 and 22. You know, for me, he was a nice guy, a good family man! Even if he had said he had a defective heart, I don’t know what I would’ve done! People have to cross that bridge when it happens: when you don’t have to cross that bridge, you don’t know about it. I didn’t have to get married: I wasn’t pregnant. So, I don’t know what I would have done even if I had known. Some people said “Why did you have a family when you already knew he had a heart condition?” Well, you can’t live a life and deny somebody just because they have a problem! We were happy. Sure things got tough but, that’s the route you took, and you lived it! It wasn’t the worst thing that could happen. After our first child, we didn’t have another for four years. Then, in 1947, we had another daughter. When they found out about my husband’s heart condition, my parents knew that life would be difficult for us. However, we were living on our own. His family never talked about it. As a matter of fact, my husband’s father never talked about it. He was convinced that my husband got his heart condition after he was married! I got along with him, I tolerated him, but he wasn’t my favorite father-in-law. However, his mother knew that he had smallpox and she knew what had caused his problem. When his mother told me this about B, my husband, I had mixed feelings: perhaps that they had neglected him after he was sick? When we lost the first child… then the second one had been operated on and the baby was normal after that… I didn’t talk to them about what it was like for them after B was sick. It must’ve been terrible for him.
common in boys than in girls. – “U.S. National Library of Medicine: Medline Plus,” https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000970.htm.
211 The loss of my first child didn’t impact my mother and father too much. They were always there in support of me. We were 44 miles apart and I didn’t see them that often. Things weren’t like they are now. However, they were more supportive than my husband’s parents were. Some people, I guess it doesn’t bother them. It wasn’t my husband who pushed to go to the doctors in the heart department at the Mayo Clinic. You can’t just go, you need to be referred. We didn’t have the finances. You have to be referred by a doctor from here and my doctor here felt like they may not do anything for him. However, our doctor told me that he would do it for my piece of mind. So, in 1955 when I was still on the farm (with the two girls but before our son was born), B drove to PA and took the train. Even then, his heart was beating too fast and he knew it. After he came back, I never heard anything about his condition and he never told me. I didn’t know anything they had said at the Mayo Clinic. It cost $500 for him to travel by train to Rochester New York and back. My father-in-law argued with me about having spent the money but I never regretted B going. I wanted the peace of mind to do everything to keep him living. After our first child died, we just kept working. My husband was feeling pretty good and we decided it was time to have another baby. On February 23, 1947, our daughter E was born. She is now 69 and lives in Vernon, British Columbia. She had problems, too, but it wasn’t serious. It could be fixed. When we were driving her to the hospital, B said to me ‘S, if we lose this one, then we can’t have any more children!’ But she grew up and we didn’t have any more problems! We were farming and we did everything we would normally do. Outside of the times he was sick, we were happy. We mixed with the neighbors, we went out: he liked dancing, I like dancing, so we went. We had cattle. His parents and my parents, because neither of us had gone out working prior to getting married, each gave us two cows and two calves. My parents had cattle and two quarters of land. They gave us our first cows. I had told them I wanted to go out, I could have worked elsewhere in a store or anyplace else, but I had stayed on at home and worked. During the war, if you are a good farmer you could make a good living. Prices had gone up in our favor and we got started at that time. Our quarter of land was paid for, so we had no debts. By 1950 it had been four years since we had our last child and we thought we might try again, perhaps for a boy this time. In 1951, our daughter, L, was born. She’s 65 now. She had the same problem as the first baby, that pyloric stenosis. At three weeks of age, she started throwing up and we took her to the hospital. The doctor told us it wasn’t serious and knew what to do. As soon as she started throwing up, they opened, loosened the muscle and fixed it. She only has a small scar. Neither B nor I, neither of us, had that problem. But the doctors said it was hereditary. As far as we know in our family, my mother and father only had the two children and, on B’s side, his mother and father lost one boy.
212 It’s the same as everything else. The doctors knew things that they found out. Look at polio and how they found out about that. Anyway, I accidentally got pregnant two years later and we had another daughter, S. END OF PART 2 Interview number 3, May 26th, 2016 1330 to 1430 hrs. S was born August 23, 1953. She wasn’t expected, but she was a good baby. Financially, we were set up better than when the first ones were born. Life was pretty good! S was born in ‘53, and in ‘55, B went to Rochester, New York. I kept telling him that maybe they can do something for your heart. I wanted him to go but he didn’t want to. But I did keep going to his doctor and I persisted that he refer him to a heart specialist at the Mayo Clinic. He went in the summer of ‘55 by train. The trip was $500. During that time and before he went, he was having trouble with his heart. It was beating really fast. That didn’t mean he was sick in bed. It was different than having a heart attack. I don’t remember how long he was gone but my mother came and stayed with me to help with the children. When he came back, I don’t know if the doctors at the Mayo Clinic sent out reference regarding his heart, but he never told me. Maybe he didn’t want me to know so he never told me. But he did tell me that if he took life easy, he could live to a ripe age. But it didn’t work that way. They couldn’t do anything for his heart. I don’t know how many tests he had there or anything and I never questioned whether they sent a referral to the doctor here in Prince Albert. I should have but you don’t think of everything. So I just let it go and we lived. It was good, he would have a spell and we would go on. We went into cattle. We had about 50 head of cattle. We had a community pasture as we didn’t have enough land. I think that’s what helped us. He wanted to buy more land. We had an argument about it. I told him, ‘I know what you have and it’s hard for me to manage! We are making a living, with what we have so why go into more? I just won’t allow it!’ So he never bought any more land. So, we stayed with it that way from 1951 on. Then our son was born in 1959. In 1959, T… was born. That was unexpected. It was a tough year to find out we were having another child knowing that his dad might not live! It was bad all around so we never said anything. About a month and a half into the pregnancy, my dad and mom came out when I was really upset. I was close to my father, closer to my father than my mother. I don’t know why! Maybe girls are closer to Daddy. So, he did say ‘Well, if you going to raise three girls, raise the fourth one, too!’ That was good advice. It kind of snapped both of us out of it. B was worried, but not as much as me. So, when we got our boy, it was a happy day. I was happy because, well, because it was a boy. We had our daughters and now we had our boy!
213 I don’t know what went on in my husband’s mind. He was kind of a man that didn’t say too much. He didn’t express himself. It’s harder, a lot of times, to know. But if I was in his position, knowing that the doctor said there was nothing to be done, I know what would go through my mind. But, even though we were husband and wife, you can’t compare yourself. So it must’ve been a difficult time for him! However, I was so happy to have a boy that it didn’t matter until a crisis happened again. Then, it really hit me again. However, even then, I couldn’t panic too much. The time it really hit me was when T was 20 months. B was sick in the University Hospital in Saskatoon and T got a high fever. The doctor put T in the hospital in Prince Albert. So I had one in the hospital in Saskatoon and one in the hospital here! That was hard, yeah! But, you know, you can’t explain how you feel. You just carry on. B came home, got over it, then T came home. T used to get tonsillitis. It always used to flare up. Both my oldest daughter E and T had their tonsils out by the age of four years. E actually had them out twice. She had had them out when she was about three, then got an infection again with a really high fever. We took her to the doctor who said it was tonsillitis. We said it couldn’t be as she had them out. But the doctor said that when they are young, if even a small particle is left, they can grow back. So, they grew back in again after she had them out the first time. The doctor said they couldn’t keep feeding them antibiotics so, when they flared up, she had them out again. She was seven years old the second time. All of that was hard. Sometimes it seems that between good things and bad things, for some families, it doesn’t matter how good things are. It always seems that bad things will flare up! We had hard times, there is no doubt about it, tough times, but we felt that you have to put it in the back of your minds and just go, live a day at a time, and try to forget the bad times. B was a good father. Yes, a good father. I worried a lot about what was to come, about bringing the children up if I was by myself. I wasn’t worried about myself: it’s all about family. You know, when I hear about families now, how quickly they break up and they’re fighting about the children… that never entered my mind. The children always came first! Too often today the people don’t think, of the consequences, of what harm it does to the children. That was in 1959. In 1960, B’s health was just balancing. It was good and then bad, then he would have to go and get injections in the hospital for a week, then he would come back. It was then that we decided maybe, between B and me, that we should buy a house and move into town. So, when T was about a year old or a little more, we came into town. We looked at property to buy a house. Both of us thought that I could get a full-time job and he would stay home and take care of the children. Financially, we were able to buy a house and keep our land and rent it out. So, we did find a house and we were going to buy it.
214 The girls went to school. T, my husband and I came and we were going to buy a bigger house and maybe rent a part of it out for some income. We were on the way to Prince Albert and, about half the way from Cookson, B said to me ‘You know, I can’t do it! I can’t do it!’ He broke down and said ‘I can’t move to town and have you working!’ Maybe he wasn’t sure of himself, that he could look after the kids, so I gave in and I said ‘Well, if you don’t want to. We’ve got everything that we own…’ like our place, we had a home, we had everything, ‘…we’ll just keep on living!’ We came to town, bought the groceries we wanted, then turned around and went home. We didn’t buy anything. From then on, his health, his heart, went really, really, down. He passed away on June 16, 1962, at home. So then, after that, there was no thinking, no making decisions. I was still on the farm with four children. The children were too young. There were no phones. At least the power had come on in 1952. How could I come into town? B would never talk about how I would carry on! A lot of times, I tried to bring it up: I wanted to talk about it, I wanted him to talk and tell me about how I should carry on but he was reluctant to talk and tell me. You know what? Even though you’re husband and wife, you can be so different in your thinking! I was open-minded all the time: I wanted to discuss everything but he didn’t. How can you force somebody to talk about what to do when you know that he probably was hurting because he knew that he wasn’t going to be there? So you just kind of dropped it and just carried on, like normal. It was very hard. When I think about it now, I don’t know how I did it. But you know, when B passed on, I was on the farm. It was 2 o’clock in the morning and he wasn’t in bed. I looked around and he was in the kitchen. He went to open the fridge, took a glass of juice, and it must’ve caught him. He closed the fridge, the glass was on the table, he was kind of in the sitting position in the corner. I thought perhaps he had blacked out, like he had a couple of times during our lifetime. I called for my oldest daughter to come and help me. She was almost 15. So I was going to give him a teaspoon of brandy, as the doctor had told me that it might revive the heart. But, he was gone. I didn’t panic. They were all four standing there. I said ‘Daddy’s gone… !’ So what do you do? Nothing! Here, no driver’s license, a car in the garage but nobody to drive it! I shouldn’t say that I couldn’t drive. I could drive in second gear: I knew enough. When I said I’m going to get the car out and go get my brother-in-law, their uncle E, they started screaming and saying ‘No, no, no, Mom!’ I said ‘We’ve got to go get help!’ They were scared that I would maybe crash the car, and then there would be nobody left. It was… it was traumatic, I’m sure, especially for my oldest daughter! At the time, I didn’t think about it, but now that I think of it, I’m sure it was traumatic for her. But I backed the
215 car out of the garage, drove second gear, and I went and got my brother-in-law to go and get the people to come all the way from PA. B was two years older than E. E was married and had two girls and one boy. But when I got there in 1942, he was in the Army. That was when they conscripted. B and E farmed together. They each had their own farm, but they helped each other, and that helped. The brother-in-law helped as well. When B got sick, I had to rely on E to drive B to the doctor or to the hospital when my husband couldn’t drive anymore. My husband died on June 16 and I had my driver’s license by the end of August. I went at it! I went to Shellbrook, as that’s where the girls went to school. I went there and got the papers and studied as you had to write a written test first. I went in and those people, the ones who are not police officers, the driver examiners, went around and took us for the driver’s test and whatever. At first I studied for the written test. They were tricky questions: there are three questions that you had to have correct! On one, I wasn’t sure, and it could have gone either way. My sister-in-law went as well. Because I didn’t have my license and was going, she went as well and got hers. So it was nicer for me. However, I failed the first time! If we passed our written test, we could drive with somebody who had a license on the road. But, if we didn’t, we couldn’t. When I couldn’t pass it, I was disappointed. After I failed the written test, I studied it again then, as we could take it anywhere, I went into Prince Albert. The next time I wrote it, the examiner said that I did well and could practice my driving. Once I got it into reverse, I could drive it into the garage. I had problems backing up. I couldn’t look at the front and then at the back. I couldn’t get that! I always jackknifed the car. My brother-in-law picked out a place on the meadow that was smooth and he laid logs… how to parallel park and all that… and I did everything right except the backing up. I used to go in the evening, like after supper in the summer, July and August, and he was busy. At that time, our land was rented out: not to my brother-in-law but to other people., and I had nothing to do with the land anymore. I would go in the evening, and we would go, just him and me, to this area that he had and he would put logs down so that I would know how, you know, park this way and back in. He would stand outside and I would be in the car… oh, I had an awful time! When I stopped, he said ‘S, don’t get so nervous! You’re going to do it. You’re all…’, and I got a little angry. I said ‘it’s easy enough for you to say that… you’re not in my boots!’ So then we came home. That’s when the children would come in, especially my oldest daughter. We had kind of a long driveway from the road to the house and then we had a turn and then the garage. So the young ones, they would run out of there. So my oldest daughter, she would say ‘Mom, we will just drive back, up and down, up and down, until
216 you get the feel!’ It really, really, helped because you’re not with somebody to make you all tightened up. You do your best and you don’t feel bad. But with somebody who is good at driving and watches, they don’t have to tell you that you are doing terrible! All I had to do was look at him and I knew that it was awful. I went up and down and up and down I bet you an hour, back and forth. So the next time I went to his place to try out, (he didn’t tell me, but his wife told me, when we had coffee together) he had told her ‘I don’t know what S is doing, but she’s doing much better!’ It was good! My sister-in-law passed her test. When she came back and she was smiling. My heart was pounding, bang bang bang, and I thought ‘Will I be able to do it?’ It means so much: to have that independence! So when I went in… it was a good thing that it was a nice officer… and he could tell that I was tense. Of course, I went to Canwood. I didn’t come to P.A. because there was more traffic. Canwood, Shellbrook, just a small place. When we got in there, I said ‘I am really nervous. I want so bad to pass but I don’t know…’ He said, ‘You know, whether you make a mistake, or not, I’m not going to say anything. I will just tell you what I want you to do.’ Those words were like magic to me! It made me relax… I never even thought of being in front of somebody. I went on the road and when we were coming back he said ‘I don’t expect you to take off at 60 miles an hour and to go to the city, like Prince Albert, but for what you need, you’re good!’ He passed me! Then we came home … We always used my car as it was in better condition than my sister-in-law’s and it was better for me because I would be the one driving whereas, if it was my sister-in-law, she had her husband drive so she wouldn’t have to worry about it. When we came home, that was not only a big day for me but for my children as well. They were all standing at the end of the driveway asking ‘Did you make it, Mom?’ So, at the end of August in 1962, I got my driver’s license. Oh, then I could go to the store. We could go to visit and have coffee, on a farm. It’s hard to explain to somebody what it was like to have that independence, when you could do something for yourself! It was a big thing and the kids were so happy!! I had decided to get my driver’s license the last two times B was in the hospital in April. He died in June. I actually was driving a little bit, you know, like from my brother-in- law’s!? But I was only going into first and second gear. You know, when your children don’t know anything, so they don’t care, as long as the car is moving… so, I took my time and I was relaxed. Then, B came home from injections and fluid buildup and everything… he came home and he would drive. But, he said ‘You’ve been driving for coffee to E’s!’ The girls were in school, so he would say ‘Let’s go to E’s for coffee. You drive!’ But coming home, he said to me ‘Put it in third gear: you’re doing fine!’ But, you know, it went with a little bit more speed than I was really used to and, when we were coming to our turn off, I panicked a little. If he hadn’t been sitting next to me and grabbed the wheel, I would have rammed the fence post. I got nervous!
217 It’s hard to explain how you feel. But, as soon as he saw that I was losing control, he grabbed the wheel and cranked it. He wouldn’t let me drive after that! Even if he wasn’t feeling good, if we had to go, he would drive! I think he was scared that I would crash. I don’t know what he was thinking, down the line what would happen!? Maybe you don’t think? How can one explain? A lot of times, I think to myself that it must’ve been torture for him because his mind was good, right to the day. “Well, I am leaving four children behind!?” You know, now, when I think of it, I would’ve been a basket case! So, he had to keep up. And I should put in that there were times when he would get sick and the children were in school and I did the chores… well, even after he died I kept three cows and chickens and pigs: I had everything, I was used to the farm… so when I would do the chores, he’d be laying on the bed in the bedroom and I would come around and I could tell how he was going down. You know, emotion takes you, and I broke down! When he saw me, he said ‘S, please, don’t do that…!’ because, he couldn’t take it. It was about a month before he died, so I never…. when you get emotional your heart speeds up … so I never broke down in front of him. But, when I was alone, it was awful! Well sometimes it relieves you to let your emotions go or to just talk to someone. Not to the children though: I very seldom broke down in front of the children. I didn’t want them to see. It’s surprising what you can do. Many times, I had to cry. You just can’t keep it bottled up. For B, for him, he used to go on his own. He would be lying down, I would be doing my thing, the kids would be in school, he would say ‘I am going to go to E’s for coffee.’ I think that, for him, being just the two of us, and seeing the little guy T… who was not quite three, the emotion probably was too much so he would go! And I often wondered why, but I think it was so not to face me, for he probably knew how hard it would be. Yeah, you know what? If it had been different, if it had been me that had been sick, he would never have survived! A man having four children by himself, he could never have done what I did! In the first place, I was 42 and he was 45. We had a lot of living to do yet, and to be left alone… there’s a lot more than just bringing up children! It’s so tough that I don’t know whether there’s really words unless you’re the type that could erase it… I couldn’t! It’s very, very, very hard! Especially, maybe if I would have had two, one would have thought differently? Say for instance I would have had the two, they would have been 15 and 11. Well, you might have thought ‘I could move to town and get a job. They can come home and they can help!’ But, no, not the way that I had my family! It was from 15 to 3: too much space in between! So, there were sad times, there were bad times, but there were kind of good times! But I always… I didn’t quit living… I went with my brother-in-law and his wife, when they were still on the farm, to the local dance. But I always felt like a fifth wheel, when you go with somebody!?
218 My brother and family were still in Henribourg, 44 miles away. Whenever there was a crisis, Mom would come out and stay with me. However, because they lived so far away for 20 years when I was married, we lived a different life than my folks lived. When my brother got married, they lived together, they farmed together: we didn’t like that. It wasn’t a good thing! You know what? When my children started growing up, I told them ‘When you get married, even if you have to live in a tent for a while, be on your own!’ I lived one winter, the first winter when we got married, with his family. I agreed because, you know, you’re young and you’re stupid!? And what should’ve been the best year of life was the worst! It was the worst year! Never mind getting used to your husband but, you’ve got to get used to living with somebody that you’ve never lived with! It was okay for him but not for me! They were strangers! He had a sister that was a year younger than me. She was at home and out of school and, oh oh, that didn’t work! We tolerated each other, but it was always hush-hush-hush, this and this. You know what it’s like, living with two families? Once you get married, it’s two families. It’s not good living together! Believe you me, when Spring came, there was a little shack on the land and we moved into that. I had to put pots and pans here and there as it was only dirt and boards, but it was a lot better than living together! You don’t really know! You think, like, when I first balked at getting married in November, I said to B ‘We will wait to Spring!’ He said ‘…the roads, they don’t keep them open.’ That was in 1942, so he said ‘We probably won’t see each other for a month, or maybe for longer!’ It seemed like a lifetime when you’re young, so he talked me into it. I thought, ‘I got along at home: why can’t I with them?’ We never talked, we never quarreled, but there was always this tension. You think differently. So that’s why I said to my kids ‘No! Nobody is living with me. You get a shack, or rent something, or anything, you be on your own! Whether you make noises or fight, nobody’s going to hear it!’ My daughters, now that was something. I worried when they started dating. I missed my husband B so much, to be able to talk to him about what happened. I used to think just to myself ‘How am I going to deal with it if my daughter comes home and tells me, Mom, I’m pregnant?’ What am I going to say, that’s my child. Believe me, I didn’t worry about my son but about the girls! I was so glad when they were grown up. You can’t believe it! They all finished school in Shellbrook. I would have wanted them to go on for higher schooling, but it wasn’t possible. My oldest daughter, though, took a business course here in Prince Albert within a year after graduating. My next daughter did the same thing after graduating: she took a business course. My third daughter got her grade 12 and took a job at The Bay at the South Hill Mall. When my oldest daughter graduated from high school and took her business course, my husband’s parents lived in town. I used to come on Monday to Friday to town and stayed
219 at my father and mother in-law’s. My daughter would come on a school bus that I asked permission for her to ride on, so she could ride to take that business course. When she finished her course, she met her man and they were going together and got engaged. So my oldest daughter got a job in Prince Albert. She was working at Victoria Hospital in the unit for people who had TB. She got married in 1966 when she was 19 and they moved to town. That left me with three. In the meantime, O F, the storekeeper that we had in C…, his wife died in 1967 and we became friends in 1968. We were friends for 2½ years. Of course, my oldest daughter opposed that, but I didn’t listen to her. I worked for 2½ years at the store in C… for O. We were just friends. We never talked about marriage. He was a good Norwegian man. In 1970, he sold out the store and then spent the winter in Vancouver, Victoria, British Columbia. He had a brother there. We corresponded regularly. When he came back from Vancouver at the end of March, he said ‘S, I’m not well!’ So he went to Saskatoon and had a complete examination. They thought he had ulcers, but he didn’t have ulcers. That was in April. I think he died April 25, 1971. My second daughter was getting married in May and had asked him to do the toast at her wedding and he said ‘No, get somebody else.’ Friday night, he came to my place and I said that we were going to Saskatoon shopping, the girls and I, and ‘I won’t see you in the morning so I won’t bother blowing the horn’, because he lived right by the store. ‘We will see you when we come back.’ When we went at 7 o’clock, we started from home and I picked up my other two daughters in Prince Albert. We went to Saskatoon and came back by 6 o’clock. My son-in-law, married to my oldest daughter, came to me and said ‘We’ve got bad news for you, Mom. O… died today.’ An artery to his heart had ruptured. END OF PART THREE Interview number 4, May 27th, 2016 1330 to 1430 hrs. I moved to Prince Albert in 1971. As I pointed out before, my second daughter was to get married on May 2, 1971. On this particular weekend, I had planned to go to Saskatoon to do some shopping. I had talked with O, left in the morning and then he passed away that afternoon. So, we went to the wedding in May. It really, really, hit me hard. It was like living through the first time all over again. It.. It… Honestly, I was devastated! But what do you do? You just go on. I stayed in PA: I didn’t go to the farm. My youngest daughter was at home at the farm but we didn’t have a phone. But, they phoned. Next day, I came home. Well, it… it’s gone.
220 My youngest daughter, she graduated that Spring in 1971. After L…’s wedding, S moved into town… No, she worked at Waskesiu that summer. There was only … L was in town, E was in town… It left only T and me out on the farm. And losing my friend was just like a double whammy! It just seemed that everything was empty. What do you do on a farm? So throughout the summer, we talked about it and I decided it’s not fair for me to stay out on the farm. T was going into grade 7 by bus to Shellbrook School. It’s not the kind of life for a mother and a boy, so I decided it was time for me to move. So I told the other children and decided that I should move to town. I had stock, maybe six head of livestock, some chickens, and I got rid of that. In September of ’71, I moved to Prince Albert. I rented the farm. After moving to town, I couldn’t live just off my money. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have lasted very long. I wasn’t ready to sell the farm. That was kind of a bond. It was still something that was ours, so even my son, the age he was, said ‘Mom, that’s all we’ve got!’ So, we did keep it. I got a good renter and, in September, I moved to town. I enrolled T into school and I didn’t know the people would ask you which school to go to. I was Catholic. I should never have said the religion because that’s the first thing they threw at me, that he should go to separate school! My children went to school where everybody went. They put T in separate school: that was difficult. It was difficult for him and for me. He went to the Catholic academy, you know where the Sacred Heart Church is? They’ve got the swimming pool there now, the aquatic swimming pool. That was the school. He went to. He didn’t like it and that made me unhappy. I lived on 26th Street East and the 500 block. He should’ve gone to John Diefenbaker School but it was too late for enrolment and, another thing, I had told them I was Catholic and so they said ‘Well, separate school!’ My daughter S, the youngest one, she worked the summer at Waskesiu. When fall came, she worked at the house of souvenirs in Waskesiu. Then, she moved to town and lived with us. We had a two-bedroom fourplex. She started working at Eaton’s until The Bay opened up. So, the three of us lived in town and the other two were both married by then. She lived with me until 1973 when she was 19 or 20, and then she got married. So that just left T and me again. Of course, for my first job in PA, I went all over. My first job was house cleaning at the Coronet Hotel. It was right across from McDonald’s in Prince Albert. It’s called the Travelodge now. We were set up for the first winter. I rented the fourplex on 26th Street East, the bottom part, which was not good… I didn’t like it. Coming from a home on a farm, having
221 everything to yourself, it wasn’t what I liked… but we made it. So that winter, we spent there… T and I and S … she stayed with me, but the time goes fast. I was working. I didn’t mind the work but I didn’t like working and knocking on doors. You get many surprises when you knock on doors, you know!? I used to think, when I used to drive home, ‘If my husband would know what I’m doing, he’d turn over in his grave!!’ He was a proud man. That’s why he backed out of the buying a house and having me working, and him at home… at least that’s what goes through my mind. So I made it. I worked there from September 1971 to March 1972 but, oh, I did not like it! And, even though I’d worked in the store for O for 2 ½ years, it was different working in the store in the country when you know everybody and that. I wasn’t ready to go and apply for a job in a big store. You know what the minimum wage was then? $1.70. So I worked there and I met somebody that had come from the farm and moved to P.A. I told them I would really like a different job. That’s when I got the job at the Golf and Curling Club. I started in March of 1972. It was hard, but it was in a kitchen. It was working with food which was much nicer than cleaning after some people. I worked there for many years. After working so many years, I got up there. I was good at it. It was hard work ... after eight hours on the feet, I was beat! I had many, many, thoughts: did I do right, did I do wrong? You know, I got so adjusted on the farm that I had mixed feelings. I could’ve sold my house because it was a frame house and had a furnace. After my husband died, I kept having trouble with heating and I was afraid of the oil heater I had. It was upstairs and I thought, ‘Oh, my God, if it ever explodes with the two bedrooms on either side we would be trapped!’ I got talking to my dad and he said I should have a furnace put in. So I put in a furnace. I think it was the winter of ’63. Two guys came from Prince Albert and put in a furnace for me, which was much better. It didn’t take long to put it in. They had put in an oil tank in the basement and there was a pipe from the outside. We had electricity by then. When the electrician came to connect the electricity, you know, the upstairs was like an attic. The electrician stepped on the gyprock and his legs came through the ceiling. Here I am standing in the kitchen, my little boy was standing on the side, and the man’s legs came through! Of course, the business owners had to go and put a new sheet in it and, you know, plaster it and paint over it. We were all so happy for the furnace: not only me, but my children. The heat was running and it got warm. We had the thermostat. The worry was off… the worry is a terrible thing to live with! So, back to selling: when people heard that I was moving to town, I had offers to buy my house and to put it on skids to move it to their place. I could’ve gotten $5000 but, you know what, I had such mixed feelings that, if I didn’t like P.A., maybe I would move back. So, I
222 didn’t even cut out the electricity. I paid it for that winter. So I heated it. It cost me more to heat that house empty than if I lived there. There was a couple who wanted to live in the house for next to nothing and I made the mistake of letting them. They just made a big mess. Anyway, I told the people ‘No, I’m not ready to sell my house.’ It had a double car garage on the side. The barn was made of logs so that didn’t matter, there was nothing in there. I had the stove, an electric, and a woodstove. The fridge was there but was disconnected. It was a good house. So I kept the house, I think, three or four more years. Then, I cut out the heat. When I went to the house after cutting the heat, the condensation had built up from winter and I could hardly open the door. The tile flooring had lifted. There was a lot of snow that winter, all against the house, nobody shoveled, so when it started melting in the Spring and there was water in the basement. I decided I better sell it. So, I sold it. I put it up for sale and people from Emma Lake by the name of C bought my house. They gave me $3000 and I was glad, I was really glad. So I took the $3000 and shared it four ways with my children. That was when I was in town. It was good times and bad times. When you could move into town and work for $1.70 an hour!? I wasn’t suffering but, you have to make friends all over again. You don’t know anything. It was hard for my son, coming from a farm, not having a father and making friends. It was really difficult the first few years, but once he got into Carleton, which had a different name at that time, he was happy because he could play football and so on. T had started grade 8 at the Catholic separate school. In the middle of… oh, I can’t recollect how long into the year it was. I had gone to the principal at Carleton and I called the principal at the separate school and said ‘…It’s far… I have to drop him off because it’s a long ways… I live on a hill…!’ T had a bike, but then he had to lock it up at the school and they were stealing there, you know how it is!? I lived on 27th Street in the 500 block. Well, when I got the call from the principal that there was an opening (at ‘Carleton’), I was at work at the Golf and Curling Club. They pulled me aside and said ‘There’s an opening: your son can start!’ That was around October, sometime before Christmas, so I called the Catholic school and said ‘Please may I speak to T?’ They put him on and I said ‘Get your things together!’ Well, oh my God, it was… he probably just flew in there! He was so glad! It made me feel good that he was feeling better. It was more convenient, he walked to school. The school was not called Carleton then. It was from grades 8 to 12. And they’ve expanded since then. He could play football. So that was a big thing settled.
223 From then on, I worked at the Golf and Curling Club. I can’t recall what year but we got a new manager. I had been working from Monday to Friday and, because I had worked so long, I had my weekends off. I would open the cafeteria at eight and when my hours were up, I would have my weekends off. The new manager wanted me to work weekends because there was more business, you know, golfing in summer and curling in winter. But I said ‘No! I got my schedule. I worked my way up!’ Well, he wouldn’t give me a choice so I quit. But I quit on account that he wouldn’t give me leeway. So I went to where you get unemployment. I went to them and I told them how long I had worked and how my schedule was so, of course, I got my unemployment. After that, I was referred to many jobs but I was smart enough. I knew my way around by then. I knew that if I was interviewed and went and looked it over I could say no. And I was getting my unemployment. I was getting close to my pension as well, so I could dicker a little. I worked into my 80s at the Golf and Curling Club (where I returned). One place, the manager had come and asked me to be in charge of banquets, but I said ‘No, I don’t want to be in charge of banquets! I would work part-time and banquets any time but I don’t want to have that headache!’ I had had enough. So, until… you know, I can’t even remember what year I quit there, but my daughters… my second daughter, L … said ‘Mom, you don’t need to take that! There’s younger people that need jobs.’ But, I like people. It was getting away. So I worked part-time. Once you’re at a job, you like people, and you know your way around. I worked and got enough hours that I was actually making more than when I was working full time. They increased my wages of course. So I worked there until retirement. I could have worked elsewhere. I had applied to work in the kitchen in training at the Holy Family Hospital when I first came to town. But, they were filled up and they didn’t need anybody. It was run by the Sisters. So then they contacted me later and I could have worked in the dietary or on the floor. But, my family talked me out of it. I was over 65. They said ‘Mom, all you ever did in your life is work, work, work! Don’t take it on full time. Go and stay someplace where you can work part-time!’ I worked on a part-time basis into my 80s. It was setting up, being with people, serving people. You got to know a lot of people. It’s just… but stayed away from men! That was one thing! After meeting the second man, I wanted to be friends but just friends: to go out, but not on the serious side. Another thing, after you live alone, I think you do get used to your own habits and it is that much harder to adjust to an adult, you know, their ways!? Every Saturday, I played cards. That was my time. I joined the clubs: at the Heritage Centre and at Parkland. Every Tuesday, we played Whist, Cribbage, whatever. So that was my life!
224 It was just getting out and having coffee after. Life has its ups and downs. Definitely, like in my story, I never put in my sorrows and the sickness. I had … just like everybody else… I was in the hospital in Saskatoon when I had the operation on my knee. On the farm, I went to feed the cattle in the morning to save my husband from having to do it. You know what? You learn to do it so he wouldn’t have to. A cow got her front leg through a chain around her neck. So there was a little pen that was boarded up… I think it was in April but I don’t know what year… and, of course, when I was halfway to unhooking the chain from around her neck, she started to throw herself around to get her leg up. She hit me on the side and I went flying into that pen with the calves. There wasn’t space in the stall so I hit my left knee. Because it hurt so bad, the first thing I thought when I got up was ‘Can I walk?’ But there was nothing broken. But it bruised my knee. Mom came out to help while my husband looked after the kids because I couldn’t get around for about a week. But then I went to the doctor and he said ‘Nothing is broken: you will just have to stay off your feet until it’s better!’ But later on, when I moved to town, out of nowhere, my knee swelled up, like a big balloon! And it took a long time, but, you go through all those things. So I went to the doctor and he thought I had water on my knee. He stuck this big needle in my knee but nothing came out. So he referred me to a bone specialist in Saskatoon. My son was driving at the time. He took me to Saskatoon. I could walk but it hurt and the knee was huge. So the doctor said that he thought, on the x-ray, that I had a floating spur, a piece of bone left over, so he would operate. So they operated. But it wasn’t. You know what happened? From the injury, it was a build-up of calcium on the bone of the joint. So they scraped all that off and, after the operation, the doctor came to me and said ‘It will be alright, but don’t ever, ever, have surgery on that knee! If you recover… you will recover... but how long you will be able to use the knee without using a wheelchair… I hope, until you’re at least 75!’ I jokingly said ‘Oh, I don’t have to worry about that because I’m sure I won’t live that long!’ I must’ve been well into my 60s at that time… maybe after 65. But I never thought that I would live to be 95. So, I went home and recovered. And the knee would always swell up, like a little, if I walk a lot. It does give me more problem than the right one. But I was able to get around until I was 90. So, it proves that you can last longer than even the doctors predict! I celebrated my 90th birthday in 2000 at the Golf and Curling Club with all my family. I was using a cane when I walked but I still drove. I drove until October, 2000, then it came that I had to renew my license. It was getting more difficult in winter, having no garage?! Even though I had the automatic starter, having to go out there and clean the car when you’re 90 years old!? So, I said to T, ‘I will not drive through the winter and won’t renew
225 my license until Spring. In Spring, if I feel good enough, I will get it.’ But, by Spring, I was in and out with the medication. I went through the whole works with the painkiller. I was in pain constantly from my waist down, especially in the hips, because osteoarthritis set into my spine and my hips. So I went to a different doctor. I was referred by my doctor to a doctor in Saskatoon and he said ‘Have you considered surgery?’ And I said ‘No, not really. I am, you know…’ I was 80 then... ‘If I can get something to ease my pain, I’ll be alright!’ So he put me on Vioxx for pain management. Four 5½ years I had no pain. Then they took Vioxx off the market because there were some people who were having heart attacks. That was an American product, you probably know about it? So my daughter phones me one morning that ‘anybody that is on Vioxx, discontinue it immediately.’ But I kept taking it, and she said ‘Mom, if you have any of that left, throw it away!’ I said ‘Why?’ I said ‘I heard it. I’ve been taking it for 5½ years and I’m still here!’ So for 5½ years I was pain-free. My doctor called me and told me to come in and said ‘S, we’ve got to change your medication…!’ and, from then on, it was like a musical ride: trying medicine after medicine. After that, the only thing that helped ease my pain was arthritic medication. For a while it worked, but after I used it for a while, it started working on my kidneys. I went to see the doctor, and she said ‘the kidneys aren’t looking good, so take the medication every second day.’ But it wasn’t enough, so I discontinued it. I didn’t want my kidneys to go because then I would be on dialysis. So that’s when it started: then I was in pain. That was from 2000 to 2011. Nothing killed the pain so they put me on morphine, a high dosage. I was dealing with Dr. L at the community clinic, the doctor that weans people off narcotics. He put me on methadone. He never really told me what it would do, but it wasn’t working for me. It didn’t make me hallucinate. It just did nothing for me… except I had to keep taking it or I would go into withdrawal. I made the mistake and missed one and, then, I was praying for death! That withdrawal… that’s a terrible thing! My son came that afternoon and I thought my insides were going to explode. The doctor put me on methadone. I was taking it but I would throw up. Not only did I throw up all the food and the medication, but had that nausea feeling where you would heave!? My daughter came from Kindersley and she said ‘Oh my God, Mom!’ I was going down but I said ‘Well maybe…!’ So I stayed on it. They stayed one day and the next day they were going to go home. That morning in the end of April, 2011, I got up… T was on a meeting for the jail in Regina so there was nobody
226 there… and the lady from next door came over and said ‘Oh my God, S, you look terrible!’ I said ‘I feel worse than terrible!’ I knew that … was going to leave that morning from Rosthern to go to Kindersley to pick up their daughter so I phoned her. They were halfway to Saskatoon and I said ‘S, please: come back or I won’t make it!’ So she came back. In the meantime, I phoned the clinic and the doctor tried to make an appointment with me to come to the clinic in the afternoon. But when S came, she said ‘Mom, you’re not going to the clinic. I’m calling an ambulance!’ So we got the ambulance. That was May 10, 2011. The hospital said ‘We haven’t got a bed!’ but S said ‘Mom, we are not taking you! If you go by ambulance, they have to see you!’ It is awful to be in that kind of position. So the doctor in the emergency room, when he looked at my chart, said ‘There’s going to be a bed for you!’ That was in the afternoon. By 11 o’clock, I was on the fourth floor. So then they weaned me off of methadone. They put me on fentanyl, the patch, and I have been on it since, right up ‘till now. Every three days, they change it, and it’s a high dosage: 70 parts or something… I don’t know. I have to take Gravol at every meal because my stomach is very touchy since the methadone but, I’m not pain-free but I can manage. That was the time in the hospital when I said to my son, ‘You know, I am 90 years old T and I know how to think for myself… but if it comes a time that I start talking… you know, don’t listen to me. You take charge and, even if I don’t agree to it, you do what needs to be done!’ There is no way that you can say, ‘Well, the family will look after you, move in with them!’ No, I wanted to be looked after but that’s what senior homes are for. So that didn’t fall on my children. I was in favor of everything. It was an awful job to get into here! I could’ve gotten into a private place but I wouldn’t have lasted. I never had that kind of money. You have to do what you have to do. The money that I had when I sold the land in 1980: I divided that among my children. I didn’t want them to go through the rigmarole after I died, so I said ‘That’s part of your dad’s and my heritage so you do that!’ I just left enough so that I would be secure. So, I couldn’t go into a private place. Oh, it was awful. You know why? Because my mind was good! There was a time when I was in the hospital and they would come to ask me about a placement and, as soon as they started talking to me, and I talk like I’m talking to you today, they would say ‘You’re not ready to go into a long term senior home!’ Because of my mind! My youngest daughter S was with me the one time and they came… and they were coming, a different one, just about every day… and before she left, she said ‘You know, Mom? You’re not going to get anywhere. Maybe the next one that comes, act a little stupid!’ Can you imagine that? That’s how desperate a person gets! I didn’t. I didn’t do that! The next one who came, she was a middle age lady. I told her, you know, about my life… what I went through… raising four kids and a husband, looking after him until he died! And I broke down. I really broke down! And I said to her ‘You know, it’s awful in this day
227 and age for an honest person that doesn’t know where there is an allowance and you reach the age of 90 and there’s no place for you!’ I told my daughter and she said ‘Well, you know what Mom? She’s the only one and if she puts in a good report for you, you’ll have it. But if not, they’ll throw something else at you and you’ll have to keep fighting!’ It took maybe a week, or close to two weeks, but my two daughters that are here, and T, kept in touch with the board. They had this meeting place and they went through everything. I finally found out that I was ‘assessed’ for a long-term care home. But before that, at the hospital, they moved me from the floor I was on up to the sixth floor, where the terminally ill are. My birthday was at the end of June and they put me on the sixth floor. I was there until August and then they came up and told me that, in order to get into anywhere, that I would have to move to another place: Shellbrook! It upset me because it was longer. Nobody was there that I knew anymore! The kids would have to travel! But, after a good cry, and talking with T, he said ‘You know, Mom, it could be worse! They could send you to Big River or they could send you to anywhere else!’ So I went. I was supposed to go on August 6th but my granddaughter got married at that time. They gave me two extra days to stay so I could go to the wedding. So on the 8th of August, I went in to Shellbrook until there was an opening here in P.A. at Mont St. Joseph. I was there in Shellbrook until December 10, 2011. I could have come in sooner to the Herb Basset home, but my first choice was here and that came later. They had a place at Herb Basset but, I kind of liked Shellbrook! They were very good to me and I knew… because that’s where we… my children went to school… so I stayed. I gave another lady that was from Prince Albert the opening… for which she thanked me. Two times I could have gone to Herb Basset but I balked, still thinking my turn was going to come. Then, about the beginning of December, Terry phoned me and he said ‘Mom, just keep your fingers crossed! I’ve heard that there might be an opening at Mont St. Joseph, but don’t say anything and don’t build it up!’ You know what? They were so good to me in Shellbrook that, when I left there, I cried! But I was prepared. That was in the old hospital that they had. The staff and everything was good, but the place needed to be torn down. They were building a new one and the old one is torn down now. But they were so good to me, and I made so many friends but, of course, I came here. So, I’ve been here since 2000… well, since 20 days of December. So it will be five years this December. Having a mind like mine and being in a place like this is not the way I wanted to live the end of my life. I wanted to live like my husband and when the time comes (slaps her hand), you go! You know, it’s good but I am not looking forward to a long… like some say… ‘Are you looking forward to being 100?’ No, I’m ready!
228 I brought up four children, have seven grandchildren and I’ve got 12 great-grandchildren! What more can you really expect out of life? You’re born once and you know that it’s so… there’s things in here that, it’s not like being on your own, by far it’s different. But it’s clean, it’s bright. This is why I chose to come to Mont St. Joseph over Herb Basset. Herb Basset is dark, it’s dreary so, when you are down in the dumps and it’s a dreary place, it’s drearier. It’s nice here. As far as the staff, you get a variety. But that is everywhere. But when I have a bad day: my son, God must’ve known what he was doing for me to have my son at 39. So, when he comes, my son says ‘Mom, it could be so much worse!’ and that snaps me out of it. I did everything possible that I knew to bring my children up to be good people. Maybe I made mistakes along the way. A lot of times you don’t know when you haven’t got a partner to confide in. No one knows what it’s like until you have travelled that road. That’s what I want… I want to be remembered because I did everything possible for my family. I had many good friends… I had a good life, maybe a hard one but, who’s to say? You know what? Really, having four children, and having normal children, when you come into a place like this and you see how people suffer… what it’s like to have no memory… not able to know your own spouse?! If not for them, but for the family, it must be terrible. So that’s all. I’m happy! Editor: I asked Ms. S if, in closing, there was anything she wanted to say to her children. Her closing response was: You know what? To achieve anything, you’ve got to have in your mind: Work hard, persevere, be a good person! It’s no shame to be poor; but live a good life. That’s the only way you’ll get on in this world. Nothing is given to you: you’ve got to work for it! Up until now, I am happy. T said to me the other night that none of the other family know about this recording. It will be a surprise! I just want my children to all know that I love them and I hope they feel the same way. What more can you really say? Otherwise, you get all choked up. I will just say that there were happy times, good times! I loved my husband. He was a good man! When I see the young couples nowadays… in my family, too… two or three years and breaking up, and there’s children! The poor children in between, what they have to suffer! My children knew that their father was gone, that he had gone from something that nobody could change, so there was no friction about that. This fighting… ‘Where are you going to stay?’ I have a grandson who split up, and with two children… it’s awful! Whereas, my children didn’t have that! I honestly don’t think… I know T doesn’t, but I don’t know about my oldest daughter… she’ll probably have a chip on her shoulder. She’ll probably think I could have done better but, you know what? You do what the time dictates for you! It did bother me but it doesn’t
229 anymore. But I love them all! If it wasn’t for me, they wouldn’t be here. Children don’t just pop out from nowhere! But, love is everything, it’s all that matters! From the union of B and myself, we had four children, seven grandchildren, twelve great grandchildren and many, many, wonderful loving friends, all who I love dearly! Thank you all! S Editor: with that, we close this reflective autobiographic chapter in review of the life (up to May 27th, 2016) of a remarkable lady, Ms. S.
230 Ms. S’ Cross
231 232 Life Story #2: Ms. I, aged 95
Ms. I reviewing her interview draft
Life Story Interview with Ms. I Interviewed by Rev. Dr. Don Doherty
Interview number 1, May 12, 2016, 1445 to 1545 hrs at Mont St. Joseph, Prince Albert, SK.
233 Interviewer: ‘Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out.
If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.’
Ms. I: I understand that you want to know my age and when I was born. I was born August 18, 1920. Also, I was born in M in the southern part of Saskatchewan. I was born I A F. For my middle name, I was named after one of my aunties. We lived in a very large house, a two-story house, growing up. It had one large bedroom and one small bathroom that was turned into a bedroom. In the large bedroom, my two sisters and I slept in the one room. My brother slept in the converted bathroom. Our toilets were outside bathrooms. My neighbors were very friendly people. I got along with everyone. My memories of M were of many people helping one another, which I don’t see nowadays. My father was a very strict man, too strict. There’s not many movements I could make without him hauling off to hit me for some little thing. Many times after he would whip… punish… me for something, my nightmares would be of me running away from him, him chasing me with a sword and with me falling in a well. He would punish me for no reason at all and put me in a dark basement. Our basements at that time had no windows and I’d be down there with the lizards and the snakes until he was ready to tell me to come back up again. My parents had a good marriage, I would say, except for one particular case. About two weeks before a Christmas, my dad and mother had the outs and mother was not on speaking terms with him. Christmas was arriving in a few days, so my father sent me to a town 5 miles away in a blizzard with a gunnysack over my head with two holes so I could see to get to M and back again with a few goodies for our stockings to be hung on the chimney. As far as them getting along, they seemed to have gotten along fairly good otherwise. How my family made money was by farming, the little they could farm, by having cattle and selling eggs and meats to a grocery store. As far as us having much, we were poor but not real poor. We did receive some relief, how would you call that, they had relief funds or assistance that we used to receive for clothing and for fuel, coal. The other fuel we used was cow manure. When the manure came out of the animals, it would form a patty, and we would go out in the fields later when it was partly dry and with
234 a stick stack it up like we were stacking sheaths in the field. Then that was gathered in the fall. What else can I say now? Being that my dad was a soldier, I do believe he got some assistance, not much, but a small pension. I’m not too sure of that. He had been shot three times: he had a hole in his arm from one and two other times that left marks in other places. The thing that my family used to spend their money on was mainly their food, like sugar and meat, salt. It was mainly for stuff in the home. I had sisters and brothers: there were five of us children on the Prairie. In 1934, we moved from M and two more children were born in northern Saskatchewan. Two more sisters were born, but I never really got them to really know that they were my sisters. I wasn’t living at home. As far as my grandparents, they were in Scotland so I didn’t know anything about them. I don’t remember when they died or that. I do have my grandmother’s death card but I can’t tell you offhand right now what church or where. There were two brothers and us three sisters: me, J, J, N, and J. After we moved from M to northern Saskatchewan, the two girls who were born were E and M. I am the oldest. I was the first child, and I had to show an example to the others. My brother and I got along just great. We were well matched. Whatever I would do, J would like to do. As far as us having someone really close to me, my oldest brother was the closest because we played with everything. We would pretend we were driving a car we had a tin lid off the honey pail. We would be going around the yard with a honey pail in our hands as a car. That was our car. Or we would go for sleigh rides down the hill from our house and pretend we were horses. We would take fence posts and tie them with binder twine and those were horses. When it came to what I liked to eat, well, I pretty well enjoyed everything. I never complained. I’m complaining now, but I certainly could eat anything. What did I do for fun? When I wasn’t kicking around in the barn or helping my dad… and actually I didn’t help my dad, I was more or less helping the hired man because my dad had a hired man… I started milking cows when I was six years old. I remember the first pail of milk I was so proud of. I ended up putting the milk in the slop pail instead of the right pail. So the family didn’t get to have the milk: it went to the pigs and chickens. I didn’t start school until I was 7 years old. In fact, I was almost 8 years old when I started because I waited for my sister so that we would both go school together. When we started school, we rode horseback. My sister would hold on to me with one arm and she would hold the lunch pail in the other hand. Plus, we had to have two sheathes so the horse might have feed as well.
235 A few years later, after my brother was ready to come to school, my dad built a two- wheeled buggy. Then we went with the two-wheeled buggy. We had to go about four miles. That was the thrill of our life because we were able to sit in the middle on the benches. The buggy was made with just a box that our feet went into so we had to be careful when we got into the buggy because the wheels were attached to this box and then there was seats so we could sit on. It wasn’t very nice but it was fun. And I loved my horse so the horse would have to do a little trick once in a while. Give it a slap of the tail and away it would go. Dandy Doodle was his name, let me think, yes, the horse’s name was Dandy Doodle. When my other sister was ready, then the four of us were going to school. By the time she was ready, there was a need for a bigger buggy to ride in, more sensible buggy to ride in I would say. Anyway, going to school, one particular time I remember there was a boy at school… well, three or four boys at school used to get into mischief really… and I liked that they would get into mischief. I didn’t get into mischief but I liked knowing that they were going to do things. Sometimes I did know what they’re going to do and I found out later on this one particular guy was stealing. He would steal things and wouldn’t bring them home because his parents would have gotten after him for sure. One time, he stole a large 5-pound box of chocolates and he gave the box of chocolates to me! What am I going to do with that? But I did accept it because I liked candy. I’d give my hind leg for a candy! So, I had these chocolates in the buggy and thought “How am I going to get that upstairs without Mom and Dad knowing, because that’s been stolen?!” So, all of a sudden, I realized “Oh, there’s binder twine up there! Sure, I’ll tie the binder twine to it, come home and have the buggy up real close!” It was a little closer than usual. Anyway, I got my binder twine down through the window when it was late and Mom and Dad couldn’t see what I was up to. I got my box of chocolates: there were a lot of chocolates eaten… My two sisters helped me to eat them and there was a few that we couldn’t get rid of and we didn’t know what to do with them. They were the softer ones, so I had the idea “Why don’t I just take the softer ones and make a ball of them and throw them outside?!” But I couldn’t throw away the box. You know why? The picture of the Virgin Mary was on it! Now, what am I going to do with the box? My dad had an old basement that he always put the dirty garbage and stuff to throw into the garbage. So I went down in the basement, took a chisel and chiseled out a place and that’s where my Virgin Mary stayed. Once in a while I went down to say “Hello, how are you?” So, from that day on I knew, even if the chocolates were stolen, I knew I had faith which I never thought I had before. As far as I know, the box is still there, I think. Anyway, that was an experience! Oh, and the boy that did the stealing, he ended up in jail later on in years. His parents were very nice people but he was a very bad boy, but I did like his chocolates!
236 Anyway, going to school, it was tough going. It was fun. I wasn’t a smart student but I was good at my music, not too bad at math, slow at everything else. I would sooner have stayed at home and clean the barn than go to school. But I did learn a certain amount. Many times I got caught chewing gum in the school. Where I got the gum from I don’t know, but I did get it somehow or another. Maybe my dad did buy it, for sure, but we weren’t allowed to chew gum in school and I would get called up to go and stand in the corner! The people were all looking at me because the gum was on the end of my nose: the teacher put it on the end of my nose instead of giving me the strap. I couldn’t see what was wrong with chewing gum! When Christmas time would come, there was nothing better when the people at the school would say “I, would you like to perform?” And I love performing! I loved singing! I can see myself and my dad: he played the pipes and he taught people to play with the chanter… so I grew up with music. That’s one thing I will say! I did dance the Highland Fling and the sword dance. I had lessons from a man from Scotland for the Highland Fling. I did perform the odd time in a town by the name of McCord. They had special occasions. My dad played the pipes and I danced the Highland Fling. He was proud of me when I danced the Highland Fling. The only person I danced to music with was my dad. I danced for years after I got married, too. Anyway, regarding toys, I really wasn’t a person for toys. I would sooner have a piece of wood and kind a chisel and make something out of it. That was my fun and if I could make it look like something…! I liked to draw. I did like playing games, hide and go seek was one of them of course. We loved to play hide and go seek! That was always a real favorite. I would hide anywhere that would hit my mind: one particular time I did go up in the hayloft with two others. So many were chosen to go and hide. Then, somebody would yell “It’s time to find the people who are hiding!” I went up in the hayloft and, while the others were still looking for me, I fell through the hole where you feed the horses from above the horse manger. Nobody knew: the horses were in the barn, two in the stall. I stayed right down in the manger. They didn’t find me but I finally gave up. The horses didn’t like me in there in the first place! As far as having allowances, we never did have allowances. There was no such thing. Oh, we might get a chocolate bar or something, and that would be our treat at the time. But the one thing that I really liked with my family at M was that every Saturday, my mom had hardwood floors and we had a very big home. She made her own wax for waxing the floors from bee’s wax’s wax and old coal oil and that was for polishing the surface on the floors. She washed the floors, then put that polish on, then we would have to follow behind her to polish it. When you put that on, you had to rub it and that would make it just beautiful! We would do that every Saturday, because we had the stoves and the house had to be cleaned once a week. It had to be washed: there were no vacuum cleaners in those days. And every Saturday it had to be done because Mom did not want to work on Sunday. Not because she was religious or anything!
237 We had dust storms, many. Many times, from our barn to the house, I had to go onto the ground because the cyclone was just going to lift me! If I was in the house, I would go in the basement. That was during the dirty 30s: that’s why they called it the dirty 30s! If I was coming to the barn from the house, and the wind was coming, I'd have to get out of the way. But anyway, my life on the Prairie was a tough go. When I think of the fact we were very short of water. We did have dugouts so when we did get a severe rain and they overflowed, we were thankful! But the wells themselves were always quite deep. So, this one particular time, my brother and I were outside playing. I could hear a yelling. I went to the house and asked Mom “Where’s Dad? I hear him yelling.” Well, she said “He went down the well to connect the pipes!” I said “You’re not there?” So, I said “Mom, you go to the well and I’m going to go get Beauty and the lariat rope!” My horse was named Beauty. She was smart: she would lay down to let you off her back. Dad had a lariat rope because he roped many animals at times. I got to the well and stood close enough with Beauty, put the rope down the well and got the rope tied around my dad. My dad was stuck in the well and was slipping. It was winter time and a steam surface had formed on the pipes. So, with the help of Beauty, I got my dad out! I had the rope around my dad and around my horse’s chest. I had a good hold of it. I was taking a chance, it might’ve pulled me off but it didn’t! I think that God was there working for us…! That was a miracle. If my brother J and I hadn’t heard him…! J ran with Mom to the well but they couldn’t have done much without that rope because he was just hanging on! But, you know regardless of what I did, my dad was still ready to give me a beating when he got mad for something. I was known then for going into the cooking bin, especially if cookies were there, especially shortbread! Today, I won’t eat the damn thing! I won’t touch a shortbread ‘cause I stole too much of it out of the cooking bin. One time I got a licking and that same day, when my mom made the hired man’s bed, they found shortbread under his bed. I got accused for stealing quite a bit of shortbread that time when it was the hired man. I got blamed for it, but he’s the one that stole all the shortbread. Anyway, in the 30s, my dad decided to come to the northern part of Saskatchewan to look at some land. He left me responsible at home… now, I was about 12 years old then, and he left me in charge to work outside along with the hired man. We were trying to pick up the cow chips. I was to see that the cow chips for fuel would be picked up all the while he was gone. Of course, I did need my team of horses. We kids had gone out to pile them up, and now it was time to bring them in. So he left me in charge to see that those would be brought in. So, instead of taking the old horses, I decided I would take one good horse and one wild in order to train the wild one.
238 That was exciting. I was so proud of me taking this other horse that hadn’t been hooked up with the other that was tame. I had my sister J and my brother J in the wagon. We picked the chips up then, coming home, I covered the kids with the blanket. They were chilly. I wasn’t chilly because I worked my butt off. But, there were three of us out there going along with the plans we had made to pick up the chips. It just took the blanket to scare them! When we got back home to unload, I happened to pick up the blanket we had on because it was chilly. I threw the blanket out and as I threw it out, away went the horses. They took off. The wilder horse got scared by the blanket! J and J were both out of the box, of course, but the rest of the stuff went flying and half a mile of fence was torn down. The load of chips went everywhere: they were not picked up! We didn’t have a wagon: it was gone, shot! The horses went down the field and, by the time they come home, they only had the pole and two wheels left. So, I was in trouble. But when it came to throwing the blanket, I just did the wrong thing! Maybe the tamer horse would have gone too, but I can still see the cow chips going flying, all over the ground! Thank God that the kids were already out on the ground. The hired man was there so he fixed the fence. We had to get a new box for the wagon and the back wheels were shot. We found them somewhere. Well, I wasn’t left to look after the chips in the wagon anymore and I don’t know if we did gather chips after that! After Dad’s visit to the north, he came back with the idea of moving to the north. My mom had a brother-in-law, a guy by the name of S W, a fellow that Dad knew who would tell them all about the north. S was a Scotsman himself, eh? He was very enthused about getting into the bush. Anyway, it was in 1934 when we moved to the northern part of Saskatchewan, to Cloverdale just north of Prince Albert, 3 miles from the airport. It was just rented land by then. In the following year, he bought land in Spruce Home. He wasn’t there two years when Dad had interviewed to become a guard at the jail. Dad continued to farm for a while. When he moved to the Northern part of Saskatchewan, he still had a hired man. Then, when he got together with S W and B W, S’s brother, they decided Dad would get this job at the jail. We moved here using a one-ton truck. Our belongings, whatever we could take, our horses, our animals, were shipped by train. They were delivered here in Prince Albert by train. At the first old bridge, the one that’s the railway bridge now, there was a station almost at the end of the bridge. That’s where the horses and the cattle were unloaded. We had three horses and five cows.
239 We stayed with the Ws until it was time for these animals to be delivered. So this S W had a crew together but, once they were unloaded, people would be on each side to guide them. But I rode on horseback with the other two horses having their heads tied together. The horse’s heads were tied together so they would follow each other across the bridge. Then, when we got across the bridge, we took all the other two horses and had just two lines with me on the saddle. We went Hwy 55 and turned just this side of the airport to the left into all that bush. That was all bush and it’s still all bush! I wasn’t quite 14 when we got here! Within 3 miles, it was a country trail they called the Henribourg Trail. Henribourg Trail people were all farmers that had taken this trail to Prince Albert. My husband ended up buying land out there and that’s how we built our home. That’s where he cut the logs and our lumber was off that land that he brought from that area. I went back to school after we got here, but not for very long. I went back because I was trying to write exams. I had to write grade 7 exams but I never did. I broke out with impetigo and ringworm. They wouldn’t allow me go to school. So, being that I couldn’t go to school, one of the neighbors who got to know my mom and dad said “Oh, we’re not scared of ringworm or impetigo! My wife and I have two hired men: my wife needs somebody to help her!” So, when he asked me to go work for them, I was in my glory! It was after that that I didn’t want to go back to school and I didn’t. I just felt that I didn’t need it. I liked working out! It was after I started working out that somebody who belonged to St. John’s Nursing Division said “I, why don’t you take a course in St. John’s? At least, if you get a little bit of knowledge of first-aid, it will come in handy!” I must’ve been about 15 or 16 when I decided I would do it. Yes, I was about 16 when I decided I would take first-aid. I enjoyed the first-aid and stuff like that. I went back and forth to it, then I kind of quit and left it for a while. In later years, of course, I went back to it and started all over again. I started to take a course, upgrading myself. Then, all of a sudden, I met a nice young man and, of course, I was going out to dances and the like. I didn’t want to miss the dances. They were in the country. There were lots of dance halls: up near Cloverdale, Honeymoon, Spruce Home, Henribourg and Paddockwood, but mainly around Cloverdale. When I started to go to dances, I started to enjoy my life. I lived close to where my mom and dad’s house was, with people by the name of M. I was helping them out. All of a sudden, I found a man I really loved and he made me believe that he really loved me to! I met him at the dances, then he started coming to my mom and dad’s house. Anyway, I started going out with this D and before Fall, I got a diamond on my finger. I was just 17. He was going to go into the bush at Carrot River to work. We were going to be married in the Spring. So, I was accepting these love letters, writing back to him: back-
240 and-forth. However, he came home In the Spring and, uh, never had uttered a thing in his letters that he had found a cook in the bush! Well, that was a tear! I was just beside myself! The parents of the two daughters were cooks… I guess he might’ve thought I was a woman for the barn and not the house… I think he liked eating better than they liked working! Anyway, I was very fortunate. I worked on that and I kept on working in my other job. I worked here for W S’s aunt in Prince Albert and I worked for his grandmother in the summertime. Then I started going to ball games and taking in things and starting another life. Every once in a while, I would go to this ballgame and this C L would come along and sit beside me and talk in kind of broken English, but I loved that broken English! All of a sudden, he made a little pass at me and told me that he liked my friendship. He was French and I like that accent... I just loved it! This particular time I went to a house party, not too far from where I was working, and C was there. There were a few other friends. My gosh, he asked me to go steady with him! There was another guy and, by the time Fall came, there was another diamond on my finger! I wondered if that was the set that the other guy bought me?! After he put the ring on I gave him a big hug, saying “Yes, C!” He said “Why are you looking at your ring?” I said “Well I sure don’t want it to look like the other one I had on my finger!” Anyway, we made a little joke out of it. So, again, C goes into the bush for the winter. In the meantime, while he was in the bush, my brother said “I, I want you to come out to the farm. Dad has gotten a job! Would you come and stay with me for a while?” Well, I said that I still had a little while to finish my job. I was getting five dollars per month for the three months and, if we completed, we would get $250 from the government. So, anyway, I still had a month to go. I told J I would go with him for a while. In the meantime, I had no religion. I promised C that I would faithfully go and become a Catholic. C said “Don’t force yourself just because you’re going to marry me!” I said “C, I don’t have a religion. The odd time, I went to Sunday School. But, not only that, my dad does not believe in Catholics. My dad was an Orangeman and they didn’t believe in Catholics!” Anyway, coming back to meeting my husband: I did take my studies every week, coming into Prince Albert to the Sister’s presentation. I walked to Spruce Home, caught a bus in the morning and went back home at night. I finished my training to become a Catholic. Three weeks before C came back from the bush, I had made my first confession. I was a Catholic. END OF PART 1 Interview number 2, May 13th, 2016, 1445 to 1545 hrs. Anyway, to start off, I did want to mention my mom and dad, when they became ill.
241 My mom was the first one to become ill. They didn’t see their 40th wedding anniversary as they thought they would. But, anyway, I was on duty at the hospital on nights and my mother was trying to locate me. She wanted me to be with her as she was very sick! I was working mainly on second floor and I couldn’t go as soon as she wanted me to as I was very much involved with my patient who was very ill. It was my job to look after them, the bedpan and such. My mother didn’t know where I was. She had been sick off and on but I… there were just two or three times that I didn’t go. It didn’t bother me as I didn’t realize she was as ill as she was. Anyway, when I did see that she was very sick, it was no hoax. She had cancer. So, I told the girls I won’t be on this case at nights here. I needed to go home and take care of my mother! So, I looked after my mother. I can’t really say how long it was but it wasn’t much more than a week. She just exploded and died! That was it! I cared for her and did up the body for the morgue like I would’ve done with the others. Before doing that, I called my dad and some of the rest of my family. I had her all nice like she was sleeping. I managed to find myself another gown because the one I was wearing got very badly splashed and… whatever… It was a terrible memory but I had stood over her three times when they were trying to pump her out. It was harder on me seeing her being pumped out, and me sponging her face off while they were doing it, then it was for me to look after my mother the way she was. When my dad got ill, he had prostate cancer. It had spread and he was required to go to hospital. He ended up in the same hospital but not in room 203, where my mom died. Anyway, when he got very sick, he was in the hospital for about three days and he said to the kids, I forget which one he asked, “Do you think I… would come and look after me like she did mother?” So, they got in touch with me and I said “Well, yes, he’s just another patient. Sure, I’ll go. But I’d like my brother Jim to come with me to.” So, my brother J and I, we kind of took over care for my dad, but the others would come and go. The last week, Dad wasn’t talking. He was mainly sleeping. Three days before he died, he opened his eyes and he said “If I have hurt any of you, forgive me!” His eyes wet… I went out of the room, J stayed in the room. That hit me, of course, when he said that! If he hadn’t said that, I would’ve still carried on but I couldn’t go back. I couldn’t go back again! So, the next time I did see him, it was at the Legion here in the coffin for the funeral, peaceful, like everybody else is when you’re gone. It didn’t fizz on me: it was just another person who passed away. My dad was in the Forces. He was a pipe major. He was big man, a sturdy man. They called him the wandering piper. He left home at 17. He was kind of ‘rangy-tangy’ the kind of man who always got his own way. I don’t know if he… he had feelings, but the
242 feelings he had weren’t for me! No, they weren’t for me. But, they always say your father will always be your father, but… hard to believe. Just hard to believe…! But anyway, all said and done about mother and dad and their passing, seeking for me to care for them when they didn’t help with my marriage in any way and, uh, there ‘was just no way that he was going to come to the wedding! He wasn’t going to step foot into the Catholic Church!’ But he did come to the wedding. Didn’t even take his hat off when he sat in the second pew with the rest of the family. Somebody had to take her hand and knock his hat off. So, that’s as much respect he had for the Catholic Church. But, he was an Orangeman and they were nonbelievers. While he was in the war, he turned against the church. His parents were United Church. He turned against religion: he didn’t even want to hear about God! One particular morning during the war, there was the lineup, and the minister got up and put his hand up and said “All you boys out there, do your best! We will see the light one day and God will be with you!” He repeated this dozens of times. All of a sudden, three or four boys down the line was his brother and, bang, he got shot. That was my uncle that got shot. My father was angry all his life about that. He repeated that many times because it was his favorite brother, apparently. He was angry with the minister, which made him angry with the church and with God. I know that because he repeated that many times because it bothered him for all his life. That’s the reason the funeral was in the Legion and not the church. Talking about church, a few times while growing up we went to Sunday School but it was through mother. She was United Church, mother, and she still believed. My mom had the Bible! Sunday school was held in the school that we went to. We enjoyed it, we enjoyed it thoroughly, because it was getting out amongst people, hearing something about God, you know… that which dad wouldn’t speak about. The question on the questionnaire asked “What kind of event in life did I experience that I remember?” Well, M itself was just a hamlet, a small town with an elevator, a railroad track, a church, maybe a little gathering hall and a post office. Anyway, not too far from M is a reserve. The natives asked the Council if they could come in to the town and perform some time. So, they asked my dad if he would pipe them in. So, he took me, my sister and brother with him. Mother stayed back home: she didn’t come. I remember so much about going to that. I was about 10 years old. We were so fearful of the Indians… we were scared of them. The hall we went into had a loft so, instead of us staying in the lower part of the hall, Dad had us go upstairs so we could look down on the balcony to watch him piping the natives in. That was an excitement.
243 When I think of it now, it was beautiful. It was beautiful… the colors of the native’s outfits and the drumming that they had behind my dad was just beautiful. They banged their drums and they performed, they danced, they went in circles and held each other’s hands. Later on, the chief got a few of the people of the municipality of M to join in with them in the circle, the minister, the grocery man, the elevator man, some of the important people of the town. At the time we were scared but when I think about it more and more now, it was beautiful. Being that they were so close, they wanted to be good neighbors to the people. Later on in years, they (the natives) did have pastureland: a lot of pastureland. If we had too many cattle, more than our quarter could handle, farmers could pay to use this pastureland. Of course, all the cattle were branded so they would know the difference and they would come and pick up their cattle in the Fall. So the natives became friends and became closer with the white man. I saw that, even though I was very fearful at the time. It was unbelievable! In those days, we just thought the natives were some kind of a tomcat or some wild character to be scared of and shouldn’t be in amongst the rest of the people. We were very scared. I wasn’t the kind of person to be scared by much but I was scared. Now when we see them, they’re just the real thing: just human beings! When I think of it now, some of my own children are part native… my grandchildren and great-grandchildren are part native. It’s just… so scared back then, but now I love them. I shouldn’t put that word ‘love’: I care for them, the natives, like everybody else, you know?! My grandchildren… I love them! It’s wonderful to have these kids, not realizing that, years ago, that this could be happening. I’ve never had problems talking with other people. Just recently, they had a man coming here who works here but hadn’t been here too long. He came from the dark country, where people are black, and he sat here and asked me several things. He wanted to know a few things, asked a few questions, then he got called and he had to go to work again. But it was nice. He said “Would… you have a little time for me?” I told him I had more time than money! I try to be nice to everyone. There’s always somebody that will turn your crank! Not in a bad way… accidentally. We can get a little hurt, kind of like starting a car with a crank and it backfires! Anyways, as far as being at home, I may as well start with my leaving home. The one thing about going to school: I wasn’t very smart! I’ve never been very smart, but I can remember names of people that went to school with me: Beagle, Baylor, Cameron, Crouse, Deringer, Sheaffer, Cowie, Czar … I remember all those names. They called the roll and I remember them. Then, every morning, we had to say the Lord’s Prayer. Every morning!
244 Anyway, this thing here about finally leaving home: after we moved in 1934 to Spruce Home, I wasn’t quite 14 yet. I decided to leave because I had never gotten along with my dad. He mistreated me. I couldn’t do anything right so I thought, if I left home, I could be of some use to somebody. So I went to a neighbor and they said “Oh, we would love to have you!” Dad had a hired man, J K. I’m not sure of the spelling. They weren’t Ukrainian or Polish. I forget what their nationality was. The day I left, I left with very little clothes on my back. I left on a Sunday morning with the hired man because he was going to the same place that I was going to go to with the neighbor. His parents lived in that area, too. I started to realize that I had to get some clothes so, when the hired man came back on Sunday night, I went with him. It was quite late at night. I yelled to my sister, J, to open the window and she did. I said “Get some warm clothes! I need more of my clothes!” Then we went back to the neighbors and stayed there for three months. I just stayed there and they gave me a little money once in a while. Nothing was through the government. The last place where I had worked for the government, with a family called C, I left when I was 16. I was going out to dances around the countryside and getting acquainted with people. After we finished the interview the last time, I was mentioning I had gone to the hospital to visit C’s sister-in-law, who was a very close friend of mine when I was going with D. I was married to C and six months pregnant. D had also been married and his wife was six months pregnant. She said “You know, I, D is just two doors down from here. Would you go and see him?” I hesitated, of course, but she kept trying to encourage me to go. I did go, but I couldn’t open the door. I went back and then she got out of bed and said “We’re going to see D!” We went in and that’s when he looked up at me. I said “Hello, D!” He looked at me and said “I, that’s all I’ve been waiting for…!” Two days later, he was gone! Anyway, I met my husband and decided I was going to start over with my life. I was going to forget all about the rest of the bad because that was over. I started to enjoy myself, going out to dances, ball games and that sort of thing. It was in the Fall of 1938. I was 18 and it was during that time that I was going to the dances and I went to a house party next door. That’s when my husband had said he would like me to go steady with him. We started going together in the Spring and, in the Fall of 1938, I got engaged. He gave me a ring. C went to work in the bush at Carrot River for the winter. My dad had been called for a job as guard at the jail. My brother J was asked to carry on with the farm and asked if I would come and stay with him for a while, so I went and I stayed with my brother.
245 While I was with my brother was when I decided I would become a Catholic because C and I were going to be married in the spring. In the meantime, … used to get his gas at the service station. These people named L said “We hear I is out of work!” When J said ‘yes’, they said “Well, do you think she’ll come and work for us?” So, I went to work for them. However, though I went to work for them, they had to realize I had to go every Friday to take catechism to prepare for my marriage. Being that I was only 2½ miles from there, I took the bus every Friday until I finished to become a Catholic. So, by the time I had my lessons done and Spring came, I was ready for the man I was to marry. I did my thing and became a Catholic, had all my instructions, was all finished with it and was confirmed. That was just before Easter. We were married on 16 April, 1940! We had two days together when, no more lovemaking, it was time to work the land!! We got busy and became a couple hoping to have a garden, hoping to have a crop, hoping to have a few animals and so on. We did that for the Spring. When Fall came, we were just living in a lean-to hooked on to an old, old, huge log building on the quarter of land that we had. It was going to be mighty cold to stay there all winter so we moved to town. I stayed in town at my sister J’s because her husband had joined the Army. My husband thought he’d try to going to Niagara Falls because there was a job opening there. The war was on and he was working in a chain factory. It all had to do with equipment that was going to have these chains and whatever for the war. However, he didn’t like Niagara Falls and wasn’t too enthused about the job either. He worked for part of the winter and didn’t care for it, so he came back and took on various jobs like carpenter for the barracks they had here in Prince Albert. He tried the bakery and didn’t like that. Then he got a job with the dairy. It was called Glass Dairy. There were two dairies here in Prince Albert, Glass Dairy and the Dairy Pool, the Co-op dairy. He wasn’t excited about the job at Glass Dairy so a friend got him a job at the Dairy Pool. He worked for a while when all of a sudden, two years later, he decided that we weren’t going to stay in the Cloverdale area. He had a chance to buy a farm in White Star close to, across the road from, where his dad and mother used to live. He bought it in 1945 and we sold the quarter section in Cloverdale. The quarter section in White Star was closer to the highway and closer to the elevator, a half a mile from the elevator. We had animals, chickens, pigs, cows, and that was the beginning of our real farming. There was a house on our new quarter. An old, old-fashioned house but we loved it! It was a log house, a two-story. Not a very nice kitchen but it had a bedroom off of the downstairs. The whole upstairs was not divided. It was one big room with beds all around.
246 The first time we walked in it was hard to believe in one way, what it looked like, but it was a better-looking place than the lean-to we had left where we first lived after our marriage. The old building that our lean-to was hooked onto was all sagging and ready to fall. I was very happy with the house on the new quarter. The dining room was huge and had hardwood floors, just beautiful shiny hardwood floors right up to the stairway: right up to the stairs, everything was just shining! We had the old fashion blinds, I don’t know what you call them, black blinds that rolled up and down. So, we had that for the beginning. I managed to save flour sacks. Later on, we had flour sacks by the hundreds. So, my sheets were made from flour sacks, my tea towels were made from flour sacks and my curtains were made from flour sacks. The blinds were fine at first as we could pull them up and down. But I did put a little bit a fancy work on my curtains, a little bit a ribbon here and there that might show up red or blue or something (chuckles)! Anyway, we stayed in the old house until around 1963. Then we moved into the home that’s there now. We started building it in 1953 when I was still pregnant with my fifth child, Ron. My youngest son, R, is still living there. We originally sold him 10 acres off the quarter section and he’s in his own new home there. My grandson, S, lives in our old house, the homestead. S works for C R in Prince Albert. He’s a salesman. He’s 37 years old and quite a character. So, he lives in that house. So, we bought that place and C dropped the Dairy Pool and everything because he started farming. We had been married about four years. At first, we didn’t make much on the farm. We had a tractor and a binder but we didn’t have a combine or all the equipment that they have now. I did help with cutting the grain: he was on the binder and I was on the tractor. We had two crops. Then, some friend told C there was an opening at the Dairy Pool so, in 1956, he went back. After that, he worked at the dairy and farmed as well. So, we did that for the next 29 years. At the beginning of our lives, that left me for 29 years raising a family while he was gone. At 4 o’clock in the morning he was gone until 4 o’clock in the afternoon. I held the fort and did the best I could, outside and inside. We started having children almost as soon as we were married. I was married three months and became pregnant. We had five children: there is L, born March 21, 1941. She’s 75. There is R, born December 24, 1942. He’s 74. There’s A, born March 22, 1944. She’s 72. There’s J, born September 11, 1946. She’s 69. And our youngest, R, is seven years younger than the fourth, born September 12, 1953. He’s 62.
247 I’m very fortunate all my children are alive! They are starting to all have their health problems but nothing too serious that I know of. There’s been a bit of cancer in my family but not too bad. Two of the children were born during harvest time: R and J. We were threshing a crop and I had a hard time! I had given the threshers a cup of coffee but, before I could get the second out to them, I was ready to go to hospital! My husband got me there with the old ‘Model T’. Both times during the harvest he got me to the door but it was always that he had to rush back because there was another load of grain to go to the elevator! At least, with the last two children, C had a sister still at home that we could call and have her come and look after the children while I had those two babies. Our first car was a Ford, a Model T. It was bought about five years after we got married. My husband never did drive a vehicle then. I would be the one to drive it to the bridge and across. I had 15 grandchildren up until two years ago when J lost her son, R. L has three girls; R has been married twice, so he has two girls and a boy from the first marriage and two girls from the second marriage, so he has five children and they have children. I have great grandchildren. Some have gone to college; one will soon graduate from the college that her grandpa, my son R, taught at. She’ll be graduating, the first one, from Mount Royal University. That’s where R is. I do have six great-great-grandchildren, the fifth generation, another one coming any day soon, and another one in October coming for the fifth generation. I have a picture of the first ones of the fifth generation. Anyway, with C working 29 years, he had become ill quite often, many times in between his working. I have a list, over the period of time, of the many doctors that he had to go to. One of the largest illnesses was an aneurysm that they had to open him full length. His surgery had to be done in Calgary because they couldn’t do it in Saskatoon. That was touch and go. I don’t know what caused it but I do have the diagram of what the surgery looked like. Being sick off and on, he was allowed time off but he would go back to work as soon as he could. I do have an account of how many little surgeries he had, and some big ones as well. In 1981, when he was getting so sick, he was working with the Co-op dairy. We had been going to Arizona for 14 years. I think we started in the 70s. I had quit working at the hospital in 1971 when we decided to begin going to Arizona. In 1982, C got very sick. We’ll talk about that next week. END OF PART 2
248 Interview number 3, May 26th, 2016, 1330 to 1430 hrs. When I was in nursing, I had accepted this man from North Battleford. The family was desperate about taking him back home again because the mother had suffered a stroke. Being that I knew them very well, my in-laws knew them very well, I said I would accept it. The hospital couldn’t find any place for this man. He attacked everybody. The daughter walked in and she couldn’t handle him either so that was when they had to send him back to North Battleford. Anyway, before that, I tried to get my dad to look after him because he had worked at the jail. He managed very well. He used to just take a deck of cards and throw them on the floor and the man would pick every one of the cards up and say “Mon Dieu!” He’d be played out and would sit on the bed for quite some time. My son likewise managed to handle him because he was home. He was taking his psych nurse training in Moose Jaw and was in his second year. So, he took on the case. I wanted some time off and we couldn’t get anyone else. They didn’t know what to do so, one day, they tried to let him handle himself. However, that didn’t work. His daughter was pregnant and he attacked her in the bathroom. So, they called me to see if I would come and see him off back to North Battleford, which I did. After that, after he went back to North Battleford, the mother (his wife) got sick so I took on the case of sitting with her for a while because she was upset that he had returned. But I couldn’t continue with that either because I had to go back to work at the hospital. I did that during the odd days that I would have off, or I would take the odd one off to just handle that case. After we got into the new house, I started taking in welfare children. At first, I just took in two. Then, the orphanage burned down and I took in another one. We kept that one. The other two that stayed with me had to go back to LaRonge. I kept children for about two years. They would come and go. All told, I kept about 10. I only had two at a time. Finally, they begged me to take a child that was seven days old. I kept that child until he was three months old and then they took that child from me. One day the social services just came in, picked up that little kid, and I said: “You didn’t even notify me!” It was very rude. I just gave them notice that I would never do another one. So I quit taking in children. As they were taking my baby out of there, I told them “We got to love this child, my husband also. We cared for that child. It was covered with blisters. We cured him and he’s turned out to be a beautiful baby! What’s the reason? Why are you taking him?” They said “The mother wants it back!” That was the reason, so I just pointed my finger at them and said “Under these conditions… and the way you handled this… don’t enter my door and don’t ask me to take care of another child again!” So that was the end of that!
249 The one child from the orphanage came to us when he was around 12. His name was B. We kept him until he was ready to go away to university. My husband was ‘Pop’ to him and I was ‘Mom’. He always accepted us as his parents. B got married. He was part native. He married a white girl who was a librarian. They had three children, two boys and a girl, and they used to visit. He did pretty good, but they did finally part after the children grew up. After my husband passed away, I didn’t hear from B as much. He passed away three years ago. B did have a lady friend at the end. He was in a home. I think he was 70 some years old. We never did get a write-up on him, what really happened, but found out from some half relatives that he had been here in Prince Albert and that he had passed away. I don’t know the relatives; I had heard the name but didn’t know them. Also, I kept an old man for a year or two because he had lost his wife. He stayed until he fell, then we had to admit him. When the children got big enough to look after things, I stopped taking in welfare kids and started taking a course in nursing. After the children started growing up and were big enough to manage things, we taught them as much as we could. They would help in the barn and milk cows. And the boys, their dad taught them quite a few things. Especially my oldest son, R: he was always wanting to go to the bush, to cut a tree down or to help Dad work the land. And R, well, he was younger and didn’t know all that much about working the land but he did go out and help his dad, you know, cut logs and the sort. We did have another quarter section of land that, later on in years, we got all of our lumber off. That’s how our home was built: from trees that were cut off that quarter. There were two sawmills, one not too far from Prince Albert, and that’s where he would take the wood. I think the people’s name was S. Our new house didn’t have running water but it had a cistern in the basement. That was our water supply, when it would rain. We had a well outside with a pump. We didn’t have running water for a while because the pipelines didn’t come through that way for quite a while. The children loved the new house. They had a little bit bigger place to live. It was a three- bedroom home, two upstairs and one downstairs. The two boys slept downstairs and the two older girls slept upstairs. Jeanette, because she was younger, she slept out on a little couch in the living room that we could open up. We called it the Davenport, I think. So that’s where our kids slept.
250 Anyway, as I said before, my husband worked for 29 years with the dairy plus farmed as well. As soon as the kids were able to look after themselves, I decided to take up a nurse’s course. I first started with the St. Johns Nursing Division and then went from there to taking courses at both Holy Family Hospital and the Victoria Hospital. That was in about 1960. I started bedside nursing. At that time, they wanted people who had taken a clinical course through St. Johns Nursing Division to sit with sick people. If you enjoyed it, they would help you to continue toward becoming a nurse’s aide, an LPN they call it now. I now have my little label that I had my LPN. I still have it in my pack, my little brown package. Life was tough, but I enjoyed the nursing. Between the two of us, money was starting to come in and things were looking up! I still did the gardening and took care of the livestock. We had about seven Holstein cows that C had gotten from the jail in trade for beef cattle. C would go to work at 4 o’clock in the morning until 4 o’clock in the afternoon. I went on in nursing at seven in the evening, often until seven in the morning. I would come home and have to make the children’s breakfast, get them off to school then go out to the barn and do the milking. My husband couldn’t do that at 4 o’clock in the morning so, I was left to do that once the kids were up and off to school. There were times I didn’t get to rest until perhaps 11 or 12 o’clock noon. It was a tough road. Milking cows by hand was getting tougher and tougher so we bought a milking machine. The milking part of that was fine but it involved all the cleaning of the parts of the extra equipment that had to be used, the cream separator and so on. It was expensive: the machine was expensive to begin with. That only lasted for two years. Then we decided to cut back on milking of the cows. It was just too much work so we cut back. We had pigs, too, and chickens. C was allergic to the pigs so we cut back on that. Chickens we had for the longest time but we cut back on those, too. Anyway, I continued my nursing from 1960 until 1972. I mentioned at the end of the last interview that C got very sick in 1982. We weren’t married three years when he had a ruptured appendix. He was 27 days in the hospital. It was winter time and he stayed three days at the house before going to town. When we got him to town, they said he would have had only a couple of hours to live. Somehow or another, I got a team of horses together with a sleigh and picked him up at the door. I told him “You be ready now! Come out the door when I come up!” I got the horses, got to the front door and said “Are you ready C?” He said “I’m shaving!” So, I said “What the heck are you shaving for?” He said “Well, if I die, I’m at least shaved!” That was his answer, “…if I die, I’m at least shaved!” (Ms. I chuckles)
251 Well, I got him into the sleigh and to the corner. I got him half a mile from our place because the mailman lived there and he had a car. The mailman, D M, took us into Prince Albert. We got to the Holy Family Hospital but they wouldn’t accept him because he wasn’t in touch with the doctor. So D knew where Dr. S was because he delivered milk to him. C said “Take me to Dr. S’s door!” In no time, my husband and Dr. S were in the operating room. Being the kids were small, and with the chores I had to do, I never once went in to see him. I couldn’t. I was left with too many things to do. I didn’t have a car or a phone so I had to depend on the postmaster a half a mile away to deliver a message to me if it was necessary. C had always had his chop, the feed, ready for the cattle. He always had the wood split. But, during those 27 days, it was time to do the crushing because we’re running out, and it was time to have somebody split the wood because I couldn’t split it, so I had to get a hired man to come to do it for us. We had the neighbor boys to come and do the crushing. Out of those two C boys, T is gone but B is still living. A L boy, my sister in law’s brother, came and chopped the wood. So, I had it lined up, but it was through the help of the neighbors until C came back home. But he was sick off and on after that, including the aneurysm and surgery in Calgary. He was quite a few days in Calgary but we were farming then, just on the farm. In between his problems, he would come back and just start working again. I had my own sessions, my problems and things, but I overcame them and don’t like talking about them. I guess my gallbladder was the worst one. They didn’t seem to know much about cutting a person open at one time. That was the worst surgery I had. It was years and years ago while I was raising the children. I would get severe pains and it turned out it was gallstones. They finally took the gallbladder out. I was still pretty young when that happened. I never asked my husband how he made out when I was sick. He had a sister there who could help. Anyway, in all the sickness that this man had, he did very well in between. He would get back on his feet and set to work again. I don’t remember when we moved to town but he was still delivering milk and found it too hard to keep going over the roads in the wintertime. So, we decided we would come to town while he was still working. Then we rented out our land, but not our house. We would go back and forth to the home off and on. The children were starting to leave home and getting jobs. They weren’t interested in being home anymore or in farming. Farming wasn’t their lifestyle. My oldest girl, L, started as a car hop girl at the Suburban Inn, bringing food from the building she was in to people outside that made the orders. I think it was the Suburban Inn,
252 but can’t remember the name for sure. It was out in the country but not too far from Prince Albert. Most of my kids left by the time they were 17 or 18 years old. They all graduated from high school. My son R is a professor. My daughter L owned a hair salon and worked in Real Estate. There are three divorces. L is remarried but A and … are not. But J has been with her man for 30 years and A’s been with her man friend for almost 20 years. And the others: R lost his wife from cancer of the liver; J lost her husband from a massive heart attack. The kids all graduated and have all done well. R, the baby, is the only one who’s still working. He owns a heavy equipment supply shop in Prince Albert. He’s had his shop for 33 years. He has two children, S and R. The kids all moved out and then started having babies. So, when the babies started coming, I had a big dining room table and we had many a weekend with the table being loaded with family. They just loved coming out, all of them. Then they started getting divorces and another life again. I could see where things weren’t right, what had happened, but it happened! Maybe if I was in their boat it would’ve happened to me, too. First, the girls that got married had to get married. They got pregnant. And R, I don’t know if he had to get married. He was taking psych nursing at the same time when his wife was taking psych nursing in Moose Jaw. Anyway, out of it, I got grandchildren, great-grandchildren and now seven great-great- grandchildren. A new one was born just last week. Again, I had 15 grandchildren until I lost a grandson, J’s son, two years ago from a heart attack. His dad died from a heart attack and his dad’s parents died from heart conditions. J doesn’t complain very much. She’s like me. I don’t complain very much unless I have to. When I have to, I have to! If J has any health problems she doesn’t tell us. You don’t hear her complaining very much. She had a boy and a girl. Her daughter is a registered nurse and lives here in Prince Albert. Once the divorces started, it seemed that the families were not coming as much. They were trying to make a new life for themselves and they all found it tough going at the beginning, I’m sure. I don’t know all of it and I will never know all of it. They’ve had their times but they wouldn’t tell me. However, a second marriage can bring on more problems, trying to get used to another person. I might say I have 30 grandchildren. Taking the stepchildren, I have more than the 15 I mentioned. R has two girls and a boy from the first marriage. The two girls are with the criminal justice system in the courts. His son T works with the delinquents and makes TV shows so I don’t hear much from him. It’s his life and it is so involved!
253 L has three daughters. B lives and works in Sylvan Lake and has a boy and girl. Then there’s T… who has two children. And M lives at Spruce Home. She’s got two children, a girl and a boy. Moving on, the kids had all moved out. I quit my nursing in 1972 and C had quit farming. We had been going to Mesa, Arizona, each year for about 14 years. We were snowbirds. In the summertime, we would go to the farm house. We would go to Candle Lake and just travel around, meet friends. We enjoyed going to the States. There were many things we did there. We did walks, we played cards, we had happy hours. There was dancing every second or third night. That became our second home, until C got sick. That’s when we stop going for two years. Then we try to for two more years but we stop going. It wasn’t the same, everything was changing. In the 14th year, we sold our mobile home and tried to rent a home. It wasn’t the same. We are in a different area to what we were before and it just seemed that something was just telling us to stop going. The travelling was getting too hard… the coming and going, the driving, was getting too dangerous. People were changing, dying, getting older, crippled, not interested in cards anymore, not interested in dancing anymore, not able to dance anymore. It wasn’t as much fun so we started staying closer to home and just made the best of our life living in town. C was getting sicker, taking more drugs. We could see there was a change in him and that was the tough part… that was the tough part! He was starting to lose it. J was living on 7th Street and we went to have a Thanksgiving meal with her. She put out some goodies for us to munch on until supper was ready. C and I were sitting on the chesterfield waiting for J to say that supper was ready and he was eating many of the goodies that Jeanette had put out, but he was dropping them on the floor as well. I finally said “C, you’re dropping your chips on the floor!” Then he’d just keep taking another mouthful and dropping some more. After a while, he said “Take the dish!” That was it. He wasn’t munching on anything else until J called us for supper. Things were fine. He ate his supper and, later on, supper was over so we decided to play cards. All of a sudden, in the middle of the card game, he wasn’t playing his game. He didn’t know what he was playing! One of the kids said “Dad, play your cards!” It never dawned on us that something was wrong. When it was time to go home, he couldn’t find his keys. They were with his hat on a shelf but he couldn’t find his keys! That troubled him. So finally, we got out. It was time to go home and we were heading for home. He grabbed the door, get into the car and, when he was driving, he wasn’t heading up 28th Street as he should. He was heading for the river! I said “C, you’re going the wrong way! You’ve got to turn!” “Oh, leave me alone!” he said. Finally, I grabbed the wheel and I just… thank goodness there wasn’t much traffic!
254 We got turned around and started back up to hit 6th Avenue and turn onto 28th Street East. However, he went through every red light! Well, thank God… God was with us because, C, he never stopped at a light and just kept going until we got to 15th Street. When we got up on the hill to turn, he wanted to go to the golf course in the opposite direction. We did go the right way though because I grabbed the wheel! It never dawned on me until the next day that something was wrong until I finally told the kids that he had been doing strange things. Then we found out that it was a stroke! He had a stroke. Two days later, we got him to the doctor and the doctor said “You’ve had a stroke, C!” From then on, I was “stealing his purse”, “hiding his things on him” and so on! It got worse and worse. We finally had to go to the Health Board and get him to go to daycare. So, we started going to daycare. So, with him having this, he was told not to drive anymore. Well, that was another disaster because ‘I wasn’t driving properly!’ At 82, I gave up the wheel and wouldn’t drive anymore. From then on, I took care of him for seven years. Then I took sick and I couldn’t take care of him anymore. That’s when he had to go to a care home, the Good Shepherd Home in Prince Albert. At first, I went with him. I thought maybe we could do it as a couple. I had a week and a half and that was enough. That was about six or seven years ago now. I’ve been here (at Mont St. Joseph) for four years. END OF PART 3 Interview number 4, May 27th, 2016, 1445 to 1545 hrs. So, to review, we were married in 1940. We bought our second quarter section in 1945. Anyway, the place we bought was originally the first post office in W S. We had always been going to put a plaque on that area because my son is still on the land, the 10 acres, with a house is there and a post office at one time, the first post office out in the country. I wanted my son to put a sign there but you have to go through different processes for the city to have this special sign and it involves a lot of people before it takes place. My son R might do it this year, we’re not too sure, because his house is still on the land. I’d love to see that little plaque on the corner from where the old house was a post office. One year, we went to Nanaimo, British Columbia, and we sat a home for a couple, millionaires, and they got us to come and look after their big cedar home for the winter. We had quite an experience when we lived there because I took sick, just maybe two weeks before we were ready to close the doors to go home. What happened was, while we were there, we found a little attic. The owner happened to have money, a lot of money, in a bag in the attic. We didn’t want to leave with that just there, unsafe. My nephew B lived in Nanaimo too so we called him and said “What are we going to do about this? We have to go home!”
255 My nephew knew the people and was the one who got us the job. He sold carpets for a carpet company. He was the type that travelled from here, across the border, across the country. He was all over the world selling carpets! So, they knew him very well. I had taken sick. I should’ve gone sooner but I wasn’t to leave that place until the bag was out of the house. So, my nephew got a hold of the couple and they asked him if he would take care of it. So, the bag full of money had to enter the bank and we couldn’t leave until it was deposited. So that was our little experience! Anyway, I was told they were millionaires. They didn’t have a family: just themselves. Then, the next year, we tried Las Vegas. That was different. My son-in-law and his brothers, they are all of one family, and the families would take turns going into this cabin that they had in Las Vegas. I was offered to be with my son-in- law and my daughter for the next two periods of time. I liked it, but it was too high-class for me. Not only that, we found out that we had two big floods, and one big flood where people were told that no one was to cross a certain area because the flooding was very severe. Yet, a couple decided to take their chances and they were washed away with their car. Water doesn’t disappear fast. Anyway, that wasn’t to our liking. I don’t remember the year. After that, we decided maybe we would start going to Arizona. So, we started going to Arizona. My daughter’s husband’s parents had a place there in Black Canyon, Arizona, that had an extra mobile home. My daughter said, the first year we went, that the mobile home would be right next door to theirs. So, we tried a winter in Arizona. From there on, we went for 14 years. We bought our own mobile home in Mesa, Arizona. An elderly couple got very sick and we had a chance to buy their place. So, that’s where we started owning our own home there. We were always involved in something, bingo, bus tours to different parts of Arizona. It was really nice. Every second week we had dancing so there was always entertainment and a good time. And the cards, it wasn’t in the big hall, it was always in somebody’s home. When it rained, it was water all over. You didn’t dare go out the door. We met many friends. But, near the end, several had gone, sold their mobiles to other people and were not coming back. There would still be the odd one, but most of the people we chummed with were gone. Being that I’m going to be 96 years old, I don’t think there’s many left that I could relate to. Anyway, after my husband got sick, things didn’t work out very well so we started to stay home. We started taking an interest in what our grandchildren were starting to do in their
256 married lives. We made quite a few trips to different places where the kids lived, those that got married. Anyway, when we moved out of our house and moved in town, we bought a two-bedroom condo on 27th Street East, this side of the park, in Prince Albert where we lived for 10 years. It was up by the South Hill Mall so that made it easy for us to go shopping. We were both driving the car at that time but, in the 10 years there, my husband started to have different problems again. He had prostate surgery, which really turned him into a different person. Then he had two strokes, and that put him in The Good Shepherd home on 15th and 15th. That was six years ago. When he was in The Good Shepherd, I finally decided to sell the condo and move into Marquis Towers, right downtown, so I would be close to the Co-op, drugstore, doctors, and the Legion. I had given up the car by this time, so I wanted to be able to walk to these places. While I was in Marquis Towers, I got sick. I’m not sure just when. I can’t remember just what happened but I have diabetes, number one, and that landed me in the hospital. Then I started coping with daycare off and on for my bath and hair appointments. Anyway, I got sick and, this one particular day, I forget what I was going to do. Through the night, I took ill. In the morning, I called my daughter Anne and she came and took me to a walk-in clinic. We waited in line for a little while but I couldn’t take it any longer. So, she went and got the ambulance and took me right to the hospital. From then on, I was attended to and was very ill! I wasn’t expected to live. Not only that, I had gone to a doctor at the …. He gave me the wrong pill, and an elderly person with diabetes should not have received that pill. So, I had the last rites and I was gone for three days! I don’t remember anything during that time. My kids told me this. My whole family came to the hospital. My oldest daughter took pictures of me. They showed me the pictures and I don’t want to ever see them again! What I can remember is that I started to recover. I can remember somebody trying to feed me but they would talk to me and I couldn’t answer. They put things in my mouth and it would come back out. Finally, my little sister M D came and sat with me for two weeks. She sat by my bedside and looked after me. She is a caregiver. Finally, with her encouragement and her sitting by my bedside and taking care of me, I started eating not too bad. She finally started getting me up and I started walking. It was difficult to say ‘I am going to take the handle of that walker and walk again!’ M’s a little girl but she was determined that I make my steps. I was laid out lots of times. And my eyesight had gone a little strange. It still goes a little strange, but that’s diabetes!
257 Diabetes is a strange and very funny thing. If your count is up, then your sight is off. I already had been to hospital with it not realizing what it does. I realized once I got it that I had to change: don’t be going into sweets! I was born with a candy in my mouth! I ended up being three months at the Victoria Hospital. After that, the Healthcare Board decided ‘this woman, her place is in a home now!’ So, this is where I came. I managed to get in here and I’m very thankful that I came to Mont St. Joseph. This is where my wishes would have been for both my husband and myself. It was here that my husband wanted to be. It was through a lady that works here, a friend of my kids, that I came. They said ‘seeing that your dad had been on the list for a long time, they were going to accept your mother.’ I thought that was very nice of them. But then, in the meantime with me being sick, it’s been a tough time. However, I accept every day of my life at the fullest. If I get sick, I’m sick! I don’t bother anyone here unless I have to and so far, so far, I’ve done pretty good! I’ve been here for four years. When C first went in, I used to do his hair and cut his toenails. He was very thankful to have that done because no one else could do it like I did. I think after he went in there and I would visit, I would say “I have to go!” and he always would say “Oh sure! You’re probably going to go and find another man!” But, I just accepted it because I knew I wasn’t. He would say that, but I don’t know if he really meant it or if he was just joking!? He was a joker at times. I don’t know, but I kind of didn’t like it! He was a good man, a very good husband. He was a very hard worker. Work was his number one thing. He wasn’t a loving man who would hug you and kiss you, but the way he showed it was if he could do something for you. He never spanked the kids, he never hit them. Whatever he did, I think my kids learned from him for many things. I was the disciplinarian in the family, with my screaming and yelling. However, with C, talking loud was enough to get the kids to listen. C believed in his children going to church. He never made a fuss about it when they were home, but no one goes to church now. They were all bought up Catholic, but they are not going to church anymore. The oldest girl, she does read the Bible and says she knows as much as anybody else and doesn’t need to go to church. She’s very smart at a lot of things, and an artist as well. She did these pictures on the wall (of I’s room at Mont St. Joseph)! I just can’t remember how long C was in the home, it may have been five years!? He passed on September 5, 2011. (Ms. I showed the interviewer the card for her husband’s funeral. It read:
258 C L, born December 29, 1916, in W S. Passed away September 5, 2011, in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, age 94 years. Lovingly remembered by his wife, I, of 71 years, his children L (B L), R (J), A (M T M), J (G T) and R (P) L. 15 grandchildren, 23 great-grandchildren, 4 great-great-grandchildren as well as step-grandchildren and step-great-grandchildren, his brothers A (T), O (N), his sisters-in-law A L, H L, J C and M D, his brothers-in-law S D and L G as well as numerous nieces and nephews. Funeral mass Saturday, September 10, 2011, at St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic. Celebrant: Rev. Father N. (Ms. I showed the writer the list of many doctors, as well as the pictures of the operation C had for the aneurysm. It was evident that he had narrowing of the arteries as well as the aneurysm and a stent was put in to relieve the pressure as well. The pictures indicate that it was done at the Calgary Health Region by Dr. M, Regional Clinical Peter Lougheed Centre, Suite 3601, Calgary, Alberta). In 2009, while I was living in the condo, they found out that I had cancer on my nose. I was shocked! I found out when my nose swelled up. Before that happened, I had a blackhead on my nose that I made a habit of squeezing. However, by squeezing it, it no longer wanted to come out but instead would backfire. I never should’ve touched it. No one should touch a blackhead because it’s dangerous. My mother, when she became sick, it was caused by a blackhead in the middle of her shoulders that my sister would squeeze. Finally, it backfired and it turned out that my mother had malignant cancer. It went all through her. It started between her shoulder blades off of where the blackhead was. It hit her whole internals. That happened while I was nursing. That was when I took over to look after her until she passed away. I had 15 treatments on my nose for the cancer. I would go there on Monday by bus for treatment and come home on a Friday by bus. I had three sessions. When they did the biopsy and took the chunk out of my nose, it didn’t look like much. But when they started the radiation treatments, the treatments made my whole face become one big massive scab! Sometimes now, when I wash myself, my face is still red. My nose still discolors at times. It comes out and then disappears. I was really upset about the cancer! My nose didn’t look very good, it would swell up quite badly and, when I tried to blow it, it was closed off on the area inside the right side. I didn’t go out very often. Even now, I don’t go out much so I can protect my nose from the sun. My face wasn’t very nice for a while! When I came here on April 5, 2011, I was glad to get in here. I always had said that, if I was to get sick, I would not have my children look after me! I knew we had enough money to put me some place for help if the time came that I got really, really, bad. It’s been very good to stay here compared to some other places. The place is clean. They keep it as clean as possible. They make sure we get our meals. They are there to help us if
259 we happen to need them. We have a bell to ring and, if I can reach my bell, I’ve been able to contact them. I keep the bell close to my bed. Conclusion I know my children all have their problems. As far as I’m concerned, problems are never completely solved as long as we live. I think we have to take everything with a grain of salt. My kids have gone through different things. It’s been tough, and I think where there’s a death… out of all my five kids, my one daughter has lost her loved one and a son. So, that part is hard! So far, the rest haven’t experienced that, but now they’re all experiencing little bits of health problems. I think they’re all trying to more or less catch up to me in age but I doubt they will see that! He he! So far, I think they have all done fairly good. With their problems, I know they have them but I don’t want to hear about them. The children respect me, so far. At the odd time, they would kind of give me a dig but, maybe I had it coming to me!? But, anyway, it’s all in the past and there might be more coming up, who knows? I’m still here! What I would say to one I would like to say to the other. All I have to tell them now is to accept their life the best they can, cope with things, always try to respect people! The one thing that I would like to tell them the most is to love God and to know that somebody’s there! I just want my kids to know that there’s somebody up there, because he’s telling me that there is and he’s waiting for me! Sometimes we have some bad days and it just seems to me, just like that cat in the picture on the wall with the two eyes looking at me, that guy up there is watching me! The last question on this sheet is ‘What’s the most important thing in living a good life? What would you say?’ I was starting to think, “I don’t know! But to have a good life you have to accept the best you can!” It says here “What would you like your children or grandchildren to remember you by?” That’s the most important thing to me! I have always tried to care for and respect all of my kids, grandchildren, great-grandchildren or whatever, and people, including all people. All you have to do is say that you love them and to keep trying to think the same way I do! Care for people, don’t hate them! And always care for each other. Don’t try to find fault with each other because we all have faults. Rather than trying to stir the pot, keep it from overflowing! Finally, the thing I want my kids to remember the most is to try and love God, love God always, because He’s there! He’s waiting for me, for all of us, and they will follow me too one day!
260 (To conclude, the writer will point out that I… told me a story after we finished one of the sessions. She told me that, at her last birthday party, she asked that all her children would sit together at one table, without anyone else sitting with them, and just get along. She told me that was the greatest gift they could have given her. With her closing words, this part of the story is complete: “to try and love God, love God always, because He’s there! He’s waiting for me, for all of us, and they will follow me too one day!”) ______
Family of I. and C
Addendum Given by youngest son, R: EULOGY TO C L I, being the youngest in the family and still living at home when Dad was in his prime, find it hard to give a eulogy on the person that I considered to be *** Bill Cosby*** and ***Archie Bunker***all rolled into one. Dad’s humor was something else. If you could sit in a room with him for a ½ hour and not laugh at something he had said, then somebody should be checking your pulse. Dad always had a comeback. Dad really did live by the “Golden Rule”. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. This was so true whether it was to help a friend, neighbor or the community. Dad was always one of the first people to volunteer his time in any way. Dad had a Mazda truck he nicknamed the “Jap”. When you saw the “Jap” pull into your driveway you had better find him something to do. About 5 years ago, Mom and Dad would still come out to the old farm house and stay basically until their food supply ran out. “This is where Dad loved to be.” I would come home and there he would be either trimming trees, hilling potatoes, raking grass, or just sitting on an old tree stump in the shade with our dogs lying at his feet.
261 While working for the Dairy Pool, Dad would have me help him deliver the milk at Easter and Christmas so that he would be able to get home earlier to spend more time with family. Family that would be arriving for holidays. On one of these days before Christmas I awoke to help my dad and found him still sitting at the kitchen table without his jacket on, which was strange because he was usually ready to walk out the door by the time I got dressed. I asked him “What’s the matter Dad? Won’t the car start?” He turned to me and said, “No that’s not it. I’m just waiting for R… to bring it back.” I think that every family shows love in a different way. Our dad was no exception. Showing affection was not an easy thing for Dad. He was not the type to give you a hug, a kiss or say I love you. His way was to provide for you and be there for you in any capacity that you may need him in. For myself, this is what he used to do with me: open the door of the house, throw a chocolate bar across the floor, then disappear out the door and not talk about it anymore. This was Dad to a tee! We all laugh about it now. He was not only a father to us, but also a teacher. Not like a teacher in school, but a teacher of life. He taught us that faith, honesty, hard work and a belief in yourself is all that you needed to succeed in life. Dad’s home for the past couple of years has been The Good Shepherd Villa. True to his nature, Dad developed a close relationship with several of the caregivers. We know that these special people are sharing their own grief and the family would like to thank them at this time. Another special person needs thanks at this time and it is our Mom. She worked side by side with Dad as they built a life together. She cared for us kids, and the farm, by herself at various times when Dad would be in hospital with one of his numerous illnesses. She was Dad’s caregiver until about 3 years ago when it just got too much for her to handle. So Mom, from all of us kids “Thank you and we love you.” In Dad’s lifetime he attended many funerals. And when asked “was it because you knew so many people?” Dad would reply “No. It’s because I like the lunch.” It will be difficult to imagine life without Dad, but he left such a great legacy in the families he left behind. He created so many wonderful memories that he will live in us forever. ______Given by eldest son, R: EULOGY TO C L Good morning and thank you for coming to celebrate our father’s life. As you will see, he was a unique individual. The memories of my dad were filled with feelings of childish disappointment, evolving respect and finally PRIDE. As children, we are often unable to appreciate the “big picture” or to understand what a person may be struggling to accomplish and, in this sense, my dad was the perfect example of this outcome.
262 Dad was a very traditional man, one who willingly accepted the responsibility of providing for his family. He was a hard and dependable worker, one who in a time of need took on an additional job as a milkman in Prince Albert to help make ends meet. All of us remember him getting up at 4 a.m., struggling to get the old car started, hoping that the road to the highway was open and then working until 4 p.m. delivering milk to the “East Flat” and apartments along Central Avenue. That must have been hard work and to the best of my knowledge, Dad never missed a day and never once complained. He drove the last horse drawn milk cart in P.A., loved the comradery of his co-workers and the social events that the staff of the Dairy Pool partook in. But Dad’s day wasn’t done when he got home at 4 p.m. There were the cows to milk, barns to clean, land to till and the crops to harvest. Rarely did he ever quit until the sun went down and then it was straight to bed to garner a few hours of sleep before it all started again. In all of this, I’m sure there were times when he was ill, but he never said. Dad was also a very structured and talented individual. To him, there was a time for everything and everything had to get done. Thus, in the early spring, it was time to pull out all the machinery that he would need to look after the farm. He, along with Uncle Frank, worked to repair their own machinery and there was nothing that they could not fix. Once home at 4 p.m. the cows had to be milked and counting on us kids to get it done must have been disappointing at times. Then there were the barn and pig pens to clean and the garden to till so that Mom could do her thing and bring all of that “fresh produce” to our meals. They were not elaborate but they were delicious. Dad was also a TRUSTFUL and COMMUNITY minded individual, one who believed that everyone should help out in a time of need. He was a “trustee” of the W S Church for years and took personal responsibility for ensuring that the graveyard was kept in a respectful manner – the very graveyard in which he will rest. I recall one striking example (and there were several) of Dad’s readiness to help out and to rally the community to come to the aid of someone in need. On a cold wintery day, Dad received a call that a woman, who was seriously ill and being transported by car, was experiencing difficulty getting through the snow and that the car probably would not be able to get through the road from the W S School to the highway. He immediately got on the phone, relayed the story and asked everyone to bring their shovels. I went with Dad and could not believe the site of 40 men literally shoveling a pathway for this car to the highway. That was a site for a young boy like me to see, remember and emulate. Dad also went beyond the call of duty in helping my sister J following the death of her husband. He made several trips to Saskatoon to help her get resettled and when I look back at this, I am not sure how he squeezed that into his very busy week. He was always there for her and I know that meant the world to her. Dad had his moments of fun and while they may have been limited, they were remarkable for their “out of character” nature. We all recall occasions when Dad would attend a social event like a wedding or staff party and consume a bottle of beer or two. He was not much of a drinker and, in a very short time, there he was dancing on the floor in a very uncoordinated fashion. All of us were amazed and stood back to watch this “crazy old fool”, as Mom described him, gyrating to the latest tune. He loved the time that he and
263 Mom spent in Mesa during the winter (a span of some 14 years). Going to the odd ball game, attending parties and just sitting around and talking with others. And then there were the times at L and B’s cabin at Lac LaRonge – he loved every minute of solitude and playing crib – especially when he beat B. He also loved our family “get togethers”, where the whole tribe would show up and assuredly end up playing Kaiser, 99 or whatever card game came along. Dad was not the adventurous type but, in retirement, decided to “go back to school” – the Herb Basset School here in P.A. There, he spent his time doing crafts, building bird houses, touring gambling sites, going on road trips around the community and escorting the “real old guys” (Dad was 86) to and from the bathroom. In essence, he became another staff member and they enjoyed the cavalier and somewhat sarcastic and fun loving tone that he brought to the job. He really loved this place and on one occasion talked the staff into taking him gift shopping for Mom’s birthday. He bought her a pendent and was so proud of this accomplishment – something that was once again out of character for my dad. The last few years of Dad’s life have really been a struggle – for all of us. He lost his independence and, while he realized that he needed special care, he always wanted to be at home. On all of my visits from Calgary, I tried to spend as much time with him as possible, taking him on car rides into the country. He especially enjoyed going to St. Louis, Albertville and Arnie’s golf course near Waskesiu. But nothing brought out the best in Dad more than a ride on the back roads past Sandy Lake. The memories of his logging days in the logging camps along that beautiful road just perked him up beyond belief and it was pure enjoyment to watch this happen. During June of this year, I spent a wonderful day with my dad. I packed him up in his wheel chair and off we went for the day, down the hill and all the way to the river – he loved that river. Along the way, we stopped several times to reminisce about the good times and while there were many, several are worth mentioning. The first involved a struggle of sorts – on my part, to tell my father that I loved him. This didn’t happen until Dad was 89 and I have never understood why it took me so long? I never missed the opportunity after that and while Dad was a little uncomfortable with this practice, we never parted otherwise. The second memory that we shared was the day, during his mid-80’s, when we walked and struggled through the trees and thick brush to find Dad’s “special place”. This place is located on a hillside; on land that Dad once owned and where we went to cut logs for the lumber to build our new home and to eat lunch. It’s a place where cold fresh water oozes out of the ground and down the hill to a deep gorge below. More importantly, it’s a place where a father and son went to bond, enjoy the solitude, listen to the birds sing and to watch the trees sway back and forth like the waves of an ocean. This aspect is a testament to Dad’s love of nature and as we headed back to the car, he paused, looked back over his shoulder and said “wish I’d have never sold this land”. If there is a place where the human spirit can live, I know where Dad is sitting right now. The third memory happened on our last meeting and I let my dad know that he was a good father to me. He looked straight at me and returned the compliment by stating that I was a good son. Both of us knew that we were far from perfect, but it didn’t seem to matter. Dad
264 knew his days were numbered and I knew that getting back to P.A. was going to be difficult. I wheeled him back up the hill in the rain and we said our good-byes. On his last weekend with us one of his grandchildren went to visit and during their conversation leaned over and said “Grandpa, I’m going to break you out of this place”. Dad just laid back, took his time, smiled and said “Yeh, it’s time to go”. WELL DAD, I HOPE YOU ARE ENJOYING YOUR ESCAPE AND THE PEACE THAT IT BRINGS. YOU DESERVE THAT. OH, BY THE WAY DAD, WE LOVE YOU!” ------
265 266 Life Story #3: Ms. G, Classified as Palliative, age 39
Ms. G and Helper M
Life Story Interview with Ms. G Interviewed by Rev. Dr. Don Doherty
Interview number 1, age 39, May 12, 2016, 1130 to 1230 hrs. at Mont St. Joseph, Prince Albert, SK
267 The C Children Top: D; Center: D and R; Bottom: M and G
Interviewer: ‘Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out.
If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.’
Ms. G: My name is G L C. I was married to M P. I was born in M, Alberta, April 6, 1977, to J and L C. They are my mom and dad. The earliest I can remember is when I was five or six. My cousin put his hands down my pants and told me not to tell. So, from that day on, I made sure I was never left alone with him again! It scared me and I never spoke of it.
268 I can remember being raised on the farm and I had an okay childhood. I remember when my sister and I were playing baseball and she got the ball right in the nose. She bled and cried, a lot. I remember that my mom made a potato salad and she put apples in it. It was so good! And she didn’t smile much. I believe I was raised by my older sister and my dad. He did farming in the summer. He was in Rainbow Lake in the winter. I remember going with Dad to get the Christmas tree every winter and going in the bush to cut a tree down the old fashion way. It looked so beautiful in the bush! Coming home, it was the saddest tree you have ever seen! But, we made popcorn garland and it worked for us. We weren’t rich, but we enjoyed life! I know that my dad worked so hard and kept us going. I can remember learning how to operate the equipment, the tractor, and it was fun. I remember the good things that he tried to give us. Lots of love and pointers! He taught me how to change the oil and change the blades on equipment. That was so good! We got an old trailer and it was in the back bush. Dad went and got some paint from the Co-op and brought it home and said “Go to it!” So, two friends and I, we got paintbrushes and we got to paint the trailer. That was so awesome! Dad was so patient. I remember following him home from one of the fields. I was a young teenager smoking and trying to hide it from Dad. I knew he knew, but he said nothing. I was 16 and it was okay to smoke! He came up and said “Give me a cigarette!” I said “What do you mean?” He said “I’m not stupid!” and he didn’t give me shit or anything! He knew that I was old enough then and I could smoke! One time, D… said he was helping Dad to clean out the shop and he found an old pipe. We thought it was a marijuana pipe, but Dad wouldn’t admit it. He said “Ahh, I found that on the road!” “Yeah, right!” He is such a good man! I know that Dad and Mom did the best that they could. But I think my mom had a lot of stuff in her past that she needed to deal with. I think that all my sisters and brothers looked out for me: I was the baby! Holy, don’t mess with the C boys’ baby sister! No one, for the longest time, would even talk to me because they knew what would happen! And then my other cousin… I was so extremely protected. You don’t mess with the C twins! I think back at all the things I learned and saw when we were growing up and I’m a better person for it! I’ve always known about God: I am Catholic! But, I met him here and got closer to God. And, now, He is important! I think we all need to have hope and respect for one another! That’s my biggest thing.
269 When I was a teenager… I’ve done stupid things in my life, but I think that it helps make you who you are! And now, I love God! I love my dad, I love my mom, my brothers and sisters! I have forgiven all of the people in my past! I say you have to be willing to suck it up and let go, forgive! You can’t forget, but you can forgive! But, if you can let go of the past and see that God’s got so much more for you, I think that’s all you will need. I don’t like bringing up my bad past anymore. I think I’ve grown up from the blame and you need to let go! I love my kids, A (B. Dec 8, 1998), B… (B. July 14, 2001), N (B. Dec 26, 2006) and T (B. Feb 7, 2008). I think of my four gifts that God entrusted me with. I tried to be a good Mom to them. I hope that they’re not angry because of my illness. They are such a big part of my life. A and B live in Alberta with their dad, so I don’t see them often. T and N live here in Prince Albert, with J’s parents, so I see them often. I know my kids are happy… . I remember going to Mom and Dad’s friends to have a barbecue. We were outside playing soccer and their son decided my name should be ‘Germ!’ So it started: I got called ‘Germ’ by everyone!! I even got called ‘Bacteria’ and ‘Germinator!’ One day, I asked my mom “WHY?” “WHY Germ?” and she started crying! She said “I named you after my baby sister. She died of pneumonia at nine months old!” After that, it didn’t bug me anymore! I had one of my friends make up a song that went like this: ‘G, G, snorts cocaine!’ He sang that all the time. I got picked on all the time. I got used to it. Then my brother D even gave me another nickname – ‘Juantia Lupar!’ He was a good brother! When he got hit in the head by a log and ended up in the Alberta hospital in Edmonton, my husband and I rushed to go see him. I remember when we saw him! They said “G, he doesn’t remember anyone. Don’t get upset!” I said “Okay!” But when I walked into the room, he looked at me and said “Ah, Squirt!” “My God he’s fine!” I said, “There’s nothing wrong! D is fine!” But I was the only person he remembered… I was so proud that he remembered me! He even remembered that the thermostat on his truck needed to be fixed. And to this day we are close. I said “Ha ha! He can’t forget me.” He is a good brother! I’m a very lucky person. I’ve got so many great family members and they’ve all been so good to me! And E (the pastoral counselor at Mont St. Joseph), I have the dumbest questions for him! I ask him and he answers! I think of the illness and in the beginning I had it hard but, now, I think of my illness as the biggest blessing of my life! My kids are big blessings, of course but, if I had to be anywhere, this is a good home! I hope that people can open up themselves to God and deal with whatever you have to deal with and let go of things! Don’t be scared to let go and trust God! I am extremely grateful that I learned to let go and trust in God.
270 I think that’s it. I don’t know what else to say for now…. END OF PART 1 Interview number 2, Friday, May 13th, 2016 1030 to 1130 hrs. I’ll start with that I grew up on a farm about a mile from town. We had a quarter of land and about half of it was farmland and a section was the bush. We had bees in the bush and we got honey from the bee farmer every Fall. We had lots of honey! The home we had was a two-story house. I believe it was built in the 70s. And Dad built an addition to the master bedroom years ago. The porch was old and had an old cupboard in it. One day, D told Dad that she found baby pigs in the cupboard. Dad went to look and he found mice. Since that day, D hates mice! The kid’s bedrooms were upstairs. M and I shared a room. We fought all the time. The boys shared a room and D had her own room. I had four older siblings. My sister, D, is the oldest and she treated me so good. I was basically raised by her when my dad was working in Rainbow Lake in the winter. My sister D taught me how to love and not judge people! She took good care of me. She and her boyfriend one year bought me a teddy bear for my birthday. It was so huge. I loved it and I loved her! R owns and is farming the home quarter. I was his little tag-a-long! Everything he did, I followed. He taught me mechanics. I listened and knew more than some of the guys. He was so good to me. I loved learning about carburetors and alternators! He was a good teacher. And D taught me so much too: to be happy, to love life, to know that he is with me, no matter what! I remember when A was four and D came to visit. He let her shave his head with a Bic razor and he said “No big deal!” She loved him! I still think he was nuts but, to this day, she talks about when ‘Uncle D let me shave his head!’ Every time he came to our place, I made a lemon meringue pie. He loved lemon meringue! My sister M… was kid number four. I’m the baby. She was so brave. She got attacked by bees in the bush and D brought her to the pond because of the bees. She started taking her shoes off and told D ‘I can’t get them wet! Mom just bought them!’ D said ‘Screw that!’ and threw her in the pond! I guess she got in the car to go to the hospital and threw up everywhere! They got in the hospital and they took care of her. But she didn’t get her supper and she was SO hungry. All they had was a raisin cookie and M hates raisins! She was not happy.
271 She is a tough girl. She was living with her boyfriend and she ended up pregnant. She left him because he was having a meltdown! When she went to get the last of her things at his place, he had jimmied the locks in the doors and windows. So, as soon as she shut the door going in, it locked. She couldn’t get out! And the window was locked, so she couldn’t get out! Her boyfriend kept saying it was her fault and he shot himself right in front of her! That was tough for all of us. I kept telling her ‘at least he didn’t take her, but just himself!’
She had a boy, J, and she’s such a good mom. For what she has been through, she is a strong person! I think all my siblings are amazing people. My oldest sister, D, has shown me so much love and given love unconditionally. My brothers are so different! It’s hard to believe that they are identical twins. D was more of the one that knew what to say to keep the adults happy. R is a heavy-duty mechanic. He is so smart! D is so smart, too! He loves computers technology. I call him ‘the computer geek.’ He is! I remember being a teenager and having my girlfriends seeing D and they would go “Hi, D!!” And he would go “Hi, girls!” I used to tease him. I used to say “Really, they’re not that special!” When D saw R and said “Hi!”, R would turn beet red, like a tomato! I would say, “You’re not that good looking!” He was a smooth talker! I remember Dad, one year, when we were picking rocks in one of the fields we owned. Dad asked some friends of mine, “Wanna come to a rock picking party?” They all said “Yes!” When we got there, Dad got on the tractor and they said, “What are we doing here?” Dad said, “You’re going to pick rocks. That’s what a rock picking party is.” “Mr. C, you tricked us! We would have never agreed to this.” You should never agree to something Dad says!! We had a tractor. We called it ‘Mini!’ You could hook up to the auger and go by the grain bin but you didn’t touch the driveshaft. D’s friend was wearing a loose shirt and got pulled into the auger. Dad called him ‘Stupid!’ and told him not to wear loose clothes that close to the auger! You learned a lot farming! END OF PART 2 Interview number 3, Thursday, May 26th, 2016 So, in 1995, Dad, Mom and I moved to G P, and we lived in a duplex across from the two high schools there. At that time, it was more important to work then go to school so, I worked. I was 17.
272 I met my ex-husband then. A friend and I went to a bar when we were underage (they thought I was 18!). Her mom worked at the donut shop about two blocks from the bar. My friend ate my husband M’s chili, and that’s how we met. She just started eating his food! M loved snowmobiling! He had a Polaris snowmobile. Don’t call it skidoo: it’s not a skidoo, it’s a snowmobile! I was taught that a long time ago. I thought it would be funny to pull an April fool’s joke. So, I called him on the phone and told him “I’m pregnant!” He said “W H A T?” and I actually made him mess up, while driving his big rig, backing up! He had to ask someone else to back it up. I said “April fool!” He was not impressed! Six days later, on my birthday, I found out I was pregnant. That backfired on me big time! I called up and said “I’m pregnant!” He said “Yeah, right!” I said “No, this time it’s true!” That was the last time I said that to him, ever! I gained an extra 50 pounds. I had A. I thought babies were limp when they were born. When she was born, she actually held her head up and looked at the doctor. All I said was “Doctor, is that normal?” I had never seen that. The doctor kept reassuring “She’s just strong! It’s okay! She’s strong!” I said “Ah!” I almost had a heart attack. The next morning, the nurses weren’t that nice because I smoked during my pregnancy. A was fussy, and they said she was having withdrawal because there was no nicotine. I felt horrible. My doctor came in and I asked him if my smoking hurt her?! He said “I don’t think it hurt her! It’s not recommended, but she held her head up!” I said “Okay, send us home!” It was good to be home with her. She was a tough girl! I had her December 8, 1998. I got married to M on June 12, 1999, and A, she cried the whole wedding! I should have listened. She didn’t want us to get married, I guess! Actually, on that day, it turned out that she cut her first tooth and she was not happy! Then, we were at friends watching a movie (I want to say the movie was ‘Armageddon’) and A was about seven months old. She loved to walk along the couch. That night, she let go of the couch and started walking! At seven months! I almost had a heart attack. She was so tiny! When we would go in the mall, she would just go walking and no one believed that she was only seven months. We were so proud! No one believed it, she was so short! It amazed us. We stayed married. We had B, and that was number two. I said “I want another baby!” Bang, I got pregnant! I learned that I have got to shut up! I went into labor and I knew it was time. M came home and said “Do I have time for a shower?” I got so mad and said that he ‘better make it quick’, and he did. We went to the hospital and he said “I’m going to be there this time!” I said “Okay!” I had Mom as backup just in case.
273 At the hospital, they checked me and said “You’re not in labor!” I said “Look! I’m having this baby tonight!” So, whatever!! They said “Let us call your doctor.” My doctor said “If she says she’s having the baby, admit her!” And they did, thank God because, six hours later, my son was born! I said “I told you! I knew, I knew! When I say it’s coming, it’s coming!” B was born with his two front teeth, his bottom ones. They said “You have to breast-feed him!” I said “Not a chance!” They said that he would lose his teeth but I don’t think he did. They said it was just calcium. I thought “Okay, I’m not breast-feeding him! Bottles are good enough. Two weeks after, my dad and my stepmom E got married. My aunt was there and was so shocked that the baby still had his teeth. She took a picture of them. I have the weirdest kids! Strong and growing things they shouldn’t. I was so proud! I knew I did good but, never again with M. M and I got a divorce in 2005. Inconsolable … inconsolable differences! Then I dated a co-worker and he was so good to me. I fell hard for him. His name is J. We had N and T. J named N. He said “N is Hea… backwards!” I said “That’s neat! I never heard that name before!” I was going to ask Mom to be there just in case because M couldn’t handle it when A and B were born. J said “No! I’m going to be there!” And I said “Okay!” I went in, I think it was, Christmas Eve 2006. I was wearing a towel like a diaper because my water was leaking so much while we were going to the hospital. There was a new doctor who was uncomfortable delivering. The doctor kept telling me “You’re not in labor! Go home!” I said ‘okay’ and went home, because he said I wasn’t in labor. Then on Christmas, I think it was about two in the morning, I went to the hospital and said “I’m in labor: don’t you dare send me home!” They checked and, sure enough, I had waited long enough! Every time I went to push her out, the doctor kept pushing her back in! I’m like ‘WHAT?’ He wanted to wait for my own doctor! I just looked at J and said “Catch, because he’s pushing her back in!” I was going to kick the doctor. I was not impressed. I thank God that my doctor showed up and said “G, how are you doing?” I said “Catch!” and, sure enough, one good push and she was out!
274 I thought “My God, she is tiny!” Well, to me, she was tiny. She was 6 pounds and 10 ounces. The nurse said “We thought you were going to kick the doctor in the head!” I said “It was close, but mine showed up! It scared me. I felt numb after the doctor had pushed my baby back in so many times. It could make them retarded! But, she doesn’t have that problem. She is too smart for her own good! She was so tiny. We put her in the middle of the hospital bed and she looked like a doll, she was so small. I love all of my kids. T is my youngest. Before she was born, I wanted to know the sex because my son B wanted a baby brother! When I went home, I said “Sorry, Honey, but it’s a girl!” He was so mad. I had T on February 7, 2008, in the morning. A week before she was born I went to the hospital and was sent home. The next morning, I was getting ready to go out and I got the call that my grandmother had died. That whole week, I was depressed. I waited until I could wait no more. When we went to the hospital, T was born. J and I were shocked. She had no cheek and her mouth was wide open to her ear. We know now that some kids are born with cleft palates but, it was the cheek. It was the whole cheek that didn’t close! She was tube fed and we were waiting for her to be flown to Edmonton. We were living about five hours north of Edmonton in Falher, Alberta. We had to wait until the next day to go to Edmonton. I cried. B held her at the hospital. B loved his baby sister. He had the brother expression: ‘Don’t hurt my sister!’ J and I went to the neonatal unit to see T and we were looking at all these poor babies. One baby got abandoned by his mom because he needed a heart. We got to T and I started kissing her. We knew we were going to have a long journey because, by one year, T already had three surgeries. And she had more, but she’s tough! But there’s more to do. They’re going to take a rib and put it in her cheek because she is missing bone. END OF PART 3 Interview number 4, Friday, May 27th, 2016 1030 to 1130 hrs. In July 2008, I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. After a month giving myself needles, I decided to ‘go natural.’ I moved in here (to Mont St. Joseph) in October, 2013. The day I started here, I was still able to walk a bit. I ended up in a wheelchair full-time in 2014.
275 I’m glad I moved in here 2013. When I moved in, I cried a lot for the first year and a half of being here, but I still kept natural as possible. I cried a lot because I lost my kids and my life would never be the same. All the staff and residents have been so good to me. Being here, I have drawn closer to God. You learn to belong and accept your past. I gave up all my kids and that was so sad. Such a hard thing: learning to let go and trusting that they are okay! I think they are okay. I get to see the girls, N and T, pretty much every Saturday, and that’s so nice. They need to know that I liked controlling my life but, being here and being sick, I can’t! But, I learned to accept it. I wouldn’t wish this illness on my worst enemy, trust me!
I want my children to know that they can trust in God. Be humble and kind to everyone and love life! Watch for the little things in life and appreciate them. I think I’m blessed because I have four beautiful kids. I think I had a good life. I hope and pray that my children can see the good in everything and everyone! I think I’ve been extremely blessed! A, L, B and others here at Mont St. Joe’s have all been so good. M I call my adopted mother because we’ve got a lot in common. She is the type of mother I would want! That’s it! I think I’ve been so lucky, so fortunate, I have… even S (nurse practitioner) has been so good. When I need someone, she and M, they understand me the best. I just appreciate my life! I’ve learned to see the good about everything! I’m not going to sugarcoat it! It’s a difficult mess, but I have learned so much and appreciate so much now. I think a person needs to have that, and to not be afraid to deal with the past, and any of the hurt. You need to be willing to talk about it no matter how old you are! That would be my biggest thing to tell others, to not be scared to talk about it, and to deal with it. You’ve got to be willing to take the bad with the good! It might hurt but, just know that it doesn’t last, the hurt goes away! My dad, tell my dad “Thank you!” He taught me so much and loved me unconditionally and that meant the world! He is someone I hope I share my kindness with. Then, to my sister D, I would want to say “Thank you for loving me and trying to be the best mother she could!” She did good, and she is such a loving person! To R, my brother, I would say “Thank you! I know I was a pain in the ass, but you protected me the best way you could!”
276 My brother D is such an important person in my life! He has tried everything natural that he came up with. I tried it. He has been through a lot with me and I appreciate the support that I got from him! My sister M needs to be willing to get out of town and live, and to know that all the hurt brings in the good parts of your life. You need to be open, to be willing to step out of the box and take a chance! And I hope she knows that I love her! To my kids A, B, N and T: remember to love, take a chance in life and be happy! That’s what counts: in that, you can be happy. Remember that, no matter what, I love you to infinity and beyond! Be strong like I know you are! A: holding your head up when you were born! B: being born with teeth! N, I have a picture of you in the hospital when you were so tiny, but you grew up to be strong, and stubborn like your mom! And T, you’ve gone through so much and you smile and, for the most part, are happy! That’s what I see, and I hope that all my children and all my family know that I love them so much! About my mom, she lives in R, Alberta, and I don’t talk to her much. The visit I just had, the end of May 2016, was the first time in three years. T had her confirmation, so Dad and my stepmom E, my sister D and my kids and my brother D came with my mom. It was a good time seeing everyone. I have forgiven my mom for hitting me, but I try not to associate with her. Once you have been hurt, so many different circumstances, you give up on trying. I wish her the best but, it’s not going to be with me. The biggest thing I would tell everyone would be: Don’t be afraid! It only bothers a person for a short period of time. Take life easy. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger! And that’s it. I think I’m done. Thank you so much! With that, this reflective interview with a remarkable young lady, Ms. G, concludes… for now… with the sincere words of wisdom: “Don’t be afraid! It only bothers a person for a short period of time. Take life easy! What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”
277
Ms. G and her children: Top: A and B; Bottom: T, G and N
278
Life Story #4: Mr. R, aged 86 Life Story Interview with Mr. R Interviewed by Rev. Dr. Don Doherty
Collected and assembled from four interviews, August, 2016 Mont St. Joseph, Prince Albert, SK.
Interviewer: ‘Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out.
If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.’
Mr. R: Well, my name is R F. I was born on the farm on May 23, 1929. My mother’s name was J and my dad’s name was F.
I had an older brother, E F, and two younger sisters, D (who married E T) and E (who married E W).
We didn’t get an allowance back then. I don’t think anybody even thought about it then (R chuckled).
We were short (financially), never well to do, but we always got along! Dad always gave us money. For example, when I told him we are going to get engaged, he took out his purse, gave me $100 and said “You go buy a ring!” So, I did. 271 All my uncles lived all around. When they homesteaded here from Sweden, they had 5 quarters of land, all pretty near, in one chunk. There were five brothers. They’re all gone now.
I had one brother and two sisters. Today, I only have one sister. There was E first, then me, then E, then D. D is the one who has died.
My mother died when she was very young so I didn’t get to be with her. But Dad and she were married for about 20 years.
271 (Lower left) Three brothers: right to left - C, R’s father F, A. 279 My mother was religious. Dad was religious, too, but he liked his drink. He wasn’t a drunk, but he liked to have a drink once in a while. I know at the farm he had a bottle of wine in the car shed, that old car shed we had there. One sip and that was it: the top went on.
My family originated in Sweden. Dad did, but not my mother. My mother was born here. They met here in Canada. When the F’s came, there was hardly anyone around. I don’t think Beatty had even started. It was about 1905. 272 My mother’s maiden name was E. I think Dad met her at a dance. And then she died in the hospital when I was young, about 14. I remember that Dad and I were there. 273 My auntie was a F, Auntie F, and she had a store. Pretty near everybody had a store out there, a country store, and she was the unlucky one. It was tough times and everybody wanted credit back then. But, she made it through. It was tough but she was tough: you had to be!
During my childhood, I became the cook. I could cook anything. The girls were 12 or 13 years younger so I did all the cooking and the baking.
We spoke Swedish at home so we had to go to school to learn English.
My childhood was doing chores, going to school: we always went to school, every day, we never missed a day! In the summertime, we ran barefooted, didn’t have shoes. It felt good! Everybody ran in bare feet and, in those days, nobody had money.
As far as playing together goes: we played ball together… and we went skiing down the C Hill. There was a creek not too far away, quite a steep hill, so we could ski there. And we used to go to our neighbors where we would have one horse and a toboggan.
We put ropes on the toboggan and we use the toboggan for skiing. There’d be one guy driving the horse and three or four skiing, hanging on to the rope behind the toboggan.
We were good at skiing, when you think about it, especially by the C Hill. We used to make a jump and go flying over it (R laughs)! It’s a wonder we didn’t kill ourselves!!
272 (Upper right) E’s homestead: left to right – R’s: cousin G; mother J; cousin H, Grandmother Louisa E; Grandfather Ludwig E, cousin A.
273 (Middle left) Wedding at the E… homestead: A E; C F; Groom: F F, Bride: J E F, G E, E F. 280 On a farm, you went to school, and I went to the C Hill School. It was about a mile and a half away and we had to walk it all the time. In fact, I bought the school when it was all closed up.
I have a grade 7 education and I’ve done fairly well with that. I became a certified nurse attendant and that takes an education. As well, I was a pilot and owned my own airplane on the farm.
They did pretty good to build a nice school! A S was my teacher. She’s passed away, too. But, she stayed at my uncle’s place for a long time. They had a good team of horses and they drove her to school. From their place, it was about 2 miles to school.
In those days, you made your own fun. That was about it! You went skiing or played games. You didn’t run to town because you couldn’t get to town. There were no roads.
You know what a prairie trail is? It’s just two trails made by one single unit by going over the same place all the time. Just ruts: that’s a prairie trail! And that’s what we had for many, many years: back and forth to Kinistino, or to B.
B was 6 1/2 miles away, and that’s where dad hauled his grain, got his groceries, and stuff like that, at the good old Red and White store.
The owner of the Red and White store was an Englishman. He was a little boxer, he was champion of England at one time, I think it was. He used to jump around, he had the gloves, and would show us what to do.
Then, he had a revolver! That was the big thing! He always used to show us his revolver.
He also cashed all the checks in B. He was the banker. So, he did good because of that. But she (his wife) died and then he finally died, and there was no more Red and White! So, then we started going to M.
Way before that, there was a bank in B. And there used to be two grocery stores, a garage, a post office. So, it was a busy town. I think all the towns were from the very start. Then they just got smaller and smaller and smaller!
I was baptized a Lutheran at the church there. There was a Grandma F who lived for a long time after and we would go visit her. I used to stop there on the way home after church to visit Grandma. Grandma F was 99 when she died.
We went to church pretty well every Sunday. That was 5 miles anyway. In the winter time, we had to drive by team and wagon box.
We would put hay in the wagon box and we’d crawl in there. Then, when dad got to church… they had built a big long stable, maybe 20 teams… they (the horses and wagons) were tied up in there and we went to church.
281 At Christmas time, we had Christmas at church more often than at home. We would bring our gifts to church. We always had a big tree and it was all lit up with candles that clipped on. I remember that! They often say now that those candles were dangerous, risky for a fire, but we never had a fire.
The church was full pretty near all the time. Well, there was nothing else to go to: church was the thing!
They used to have a Ladies Aid. They would have their meetings once a month. However, as time went on, they started to drop off and, pretty soon your church is too small, not enough people to look after it.
It cost quite a bit of money. You had to have a minister and you had to pay him wages!
I remember there was one minister, a Reverend H, who was minister when I got confirmed. He had a Model ‘A’! Do you remember the Model ‘A’? It had a rumble seat in the back.
There were three girls and myself and the minister: we got in the Model ‘A’ and drove all the way to M, about 15 miles, and back when we got confirmed. He treated us on beefsteak, first time I ever ate it.
That was Rev. H! Eventually, he fell for a woman and everybody got against him! They weren’t supposed to have a woman apparently so then, after that, everybody was against him. Pretty soon he was gone!
There were other ministers after that but the church didn’t pan out. And then some of the older ones, like Dad, got married and some others got to be Jehovah Witnesses. Pretty soon, there was hardly anybody at church.
However, when we got confirmed, that was the thing. We all got in that Model ‘A’ and went to M. It was at least 15 miles and we had dinner there. That was his treat as we were confirmed!
That must have been a lot of money for him! He didn’t have anything to start with. But he had that Model ‘A’ and away we went! I think I was 14 or 15 at the time. It was after my mother died.
But as far as home life goes, I would play with the girls. Ed was older so he started going out, like I said before, with girls and I would stay at home. I was the cook, too, I did the cooking… but, you know, I don’t remember much about washing clothes.
We didn’t have an electric washing machine. We just had one of those things that went back and forth. I think, once I got married, that my wife Virginia did all the washing.
282 When we were younger, we used to go to a few dances. There was a dance every Saturday night. Of course, I was the youngest between Ed and me and very seldom had a girlfriend. Ed was about 16 or so.
One time we went to the dance and there came a blizzard. We couldn’t get home! We slept at the hotel in Kinistino... we got as far as there. It was terrible cold! You know, when you’re young you’ve got to be fancy. You’ve got to wear leather shoes, you know! Can’t wear nothing warm! I damn near froze my feet!
One thing we did was we formed a ball team, the East E Tigers. We named it after our school. There was nobody that could beat us! We had a good team.
E was the pitcher and I was the catcher. Every day, or five times a day, we would practice, you know. Yeah, we had a good team. Pretty near all the neighbors… Yeah, well, now they’re all gone…!
R H, he just died, and he was the last one. I’m still alive. So, it’s odd to be the one left living of the ball team!
The team lasted for maybe 10 years. We have been playing quite a while when we bought baseball uniforms, white and red uniforms. We had a sports day and made enough money to buy them.
There was maybe 20 teams there at the event. We couldn’t play: we were the best in the country, so we couldn’t. We didn’t dare to play. We just looked after the event for the day!
We had teams from M, B, Kinistino and all over the country. We used to play PA (Prince Albert) quite a bit.
We had dances as well. We raised enough money so each one bought a uniform. But, we had to buy our own shoes!
Yes, we had a good ball team for many years and people still talk about it: old-timers, like I am myself! They remember how good we were.
Someone had an old ton truck and we would all pile on the back. No one had any money so we would go that way.
Sometimes … at Yellow Creek, they made a lot of homebrew. When we played there, sometimes we’d buy a wine bottle full, or a beer bottle full… well, four or five guys could get drunk on it! But they had good homebrew there! So, we’d sit on the truck with our homebrew…! (R chuckles!)
I was about 14 when Mom died. She died in the Kinistino hospital. I’m not sure of exactly what because one forgets. It’s funny how things slip your mind.
283 But, anyway, she died. And, at that time, it was barely a hospital. So they didn’t know too much about different diseases!
When my mother died and Dad got the hired girls, we got along pretty good with them. Then came S … but it wasn’t the same.
Like I said, I only had a grade 7 schooling. My sister became a hairdresser but, when she got married, that ended. When Dad died, from what money he left her, she took a course in hairdressing. E and I farmed the land.
Again, I went to C Hill School, and that’s where I got my education. My dad got Hereford cattle and I was looking after them a lot. Whenever we went showing cattle, I was the one that went with him! E would stay home to do the chores as he had a driver’s license and could get around.
We won the grand champion in Prince Albert here one year for the Hereford bulls. That was something, it really was! I’ve got pictures, too. I looked for them but, when you move, you lose the best of them.
The Hereford cattle, they have curved horns. Do you know how they get the curve in the horns? There are three different weights – heavy, medium and light. So, you put these weights on that pulls the horns down ever so much. It’ll take about a year to do it. But that’s the best way to put the curve in the horns.
Then we had to put the rings in the nose. So, Dad and I held the bull and E had to put the ring through the nose. It hurt, but that’s the only way you could do it at that time. Maybe there’s a better way to do it now but I don’t know.
Then they had to be tattooed. That means they were tattooed in the ear. Each of our Hereford’s had ‘C Hill Farm’ tattooed in their ear.
Finally, we got married and went away and, when we came back, we found out Dad decided to sell all the cattle. So, when I got home, I had a nice little roll of money. And that was the end of C Hill Herefords.
We had a bunch of cows, too, for milk but I don’t remember much about them. We just cleared them out, too. So we didn’t have any cattle for a while, but not very long. Grain farming became the thing. Wheat was a good price and, why have cattle when we could make money selling wheat?!
So, we farmed together for quite a while, E and I, but then we decided to split up. Usually, that’s what happens. People don’t stay together too long. Then he moved away to M and I stayed on the farm for a while.
Yeah, we had purebred Herefords for quite a few years when you come to think of it! We bought the cattle from a farmer named P.
284 There was a guy named S B who helped us haul the cattle home.
Dad was pretty proud of his cattle. Like I said before, we got ‘Grand Champion’ here in Prince Albert with our bulls. I got the picture here somewhere. But, you move and pictures get put here and there.
When we took over the farm, Dad bought a café in P. So, he operated a café for many years and then he sold it. Then he went back to visit and, somehow on the way home, he drove in the ditch. Dad was killed in an auto accident and that was the end of him. He rolled his car, or truck: he had a truck. I was about 25.
If only he wouldn’t have went that day, eh? It is just like things are meant to be! You often hear people say “If he wouldn’t of went!” or “If they wouldn’t of went, they would never have got into trouble!” I think everybody is in that position once in a while. (R paused and reflected for a while)
I think E got married first and then, pretty soon, I got married.
I got married when I was about 19 or 20 years old and I lived on the farm. I moved to a different place, to the west quarter. We lived there for a while, then we moved to M.
I married V L. I met her at my cousin’s place, E F. She was visiting her sister E, E’s girlfriend. Anyway, V was there and I happened to go there.
V probably had her eye on me then before I did but then I started visiting there and, pretty soon, we started going together. 274 I got married early. I asked Dad for $100, went in and got the ring and we got married after that!
I went to Prince George, BC, and worked in the work camp for a while to make some more money. That was just shortly after we got married. V, G and M came along with me. M was small when we went to Prince George.
We worked in Prince George for the winter, then came back in the spring. After we came back from BC, having been gone for the winter, we just lit the wood stove and went on farming.
We had a few hundred dollars saved up so we put the crop in. We went fishing, the usual things, and lived on the farm.
274 Wedding party: S L - brother-in-law and ‘Best Man’, R and V, D F - R’s sister and Maid of Honour to V L F, 1949. 285 E, he moved to B. We farm together for a while but just didn’t… it doesn’t seem like it works out. So, I went one way and he went his own way.
We lived in Dad’s house on the farm. It was an old house but it was fixed up pretty good. We had a barn there and a chicken house.
Dad had worked in the woods before and they took all the fallen logs, sawed the lumber, planed it all and built the barn, chicken house, toilet and all kinds of stuff.
It’s just like I said, when Dad died, we almost went on our own. We started farming ourselves. E started farming himself… then he got married. I started farming myself. What a change!
Our wives hauled grain for the combine. As far as seeding goes, you could seed the lot by yourself. But you need help to haul grain.
Everybody had chores! We have to stop and go milk the cows and stuff like that.
We didn’t have too many cows: we couldn’t have too many. We had about 10!
My father had eight or ten red bulls, and then we had the Herefords, which was quite a few. He had at least twenty Herefords and one or two bulls. We took them over when he died. The girls didn’t want to have nothing to do with that, of course!
E,275 she’s still alive. D276 has passed away…! So, it’s just me and E that are living. My brother E and sister D are gone…
It was quite a simple life on the farm. You got up every morning and the first thing you done was milk the cows, then pull out the cream separator and separate the cream. Pretty soon we got electric, and that was pretty nice. That was in the ‘80s sometime. Up ‘till then, we had to do everything by hand!
I would get up about 7 am. E had to sleep in. But, I was the early birdy, so I got everything going.
275 (Middle Left) E.
276 (Middle Right) D. 286 When we had all the Herefords, we had a pump jack for the water for the cattle. We had a little Briggs & Stratton gas motor operating that pump jack. We didn’t have any electric there!
My uncle bought a windmill so, when the windmill would turn, it would pump water. The windmill is still standing there, kind of a landmark!
It was a very simple life. It was just on the farm. We would play outside, make snowmen, went skiing with little wee tiny skis. We weren’t in the city where there were more things to do. In the city, you can go to library, but we didn’t have a book to read. But, I think it was our cattle that got us through. I would go along with dad to show the cattle.
We had hay, lots of it! That was a big job, all by hand. I don’t know how many hay racks full. We never baled it. There were very few bales then. We’d stacked the hay.
We would pile it up in rows: we had about five rows behind the barn, all in long rows of hay, and we had a couple of bins of oats and barley.
We had a hay knife and we would slice it up. And they cut like unreal, they really do! We had our own crusher to crush up the oats and barley into ‘chop’, where you chop it up until it’s fine, ‘chop’ for the cattle. And we would go out there and give them half a gallon pail of ‘chop’.
We went into some milk cows that were really good to milk. We bought some of that milk replacer as a supplement to their feed and, oh, they would milk! We put that in with the chop and fed it to them. Boy, they just milked all the more! It was really wonderful stuff!
Then E, my brother, heard that the radio was supposed to make the cow’s milk more. So, we put a radio in the barn… I don’t know if they milked any more, but we did it!
E N was a baseball pitcher and I used to catch for him. So, he used to come down and visit. I remember he came into the barn and the place was jumping. He thought that was a son of a gun, having music in the barn! They (E N’s family) never had much for cattle but we always did have cattle and milk.
We would hay in June, a little bit in July, until about the middle of July. The whole family! We would stay home from the Fair! We couldn’t go to the fair because we had to go to the hay! When it’s ready, grown and dry, you’ve got to do your hay and that’s what we done! You stayed home!
The Fairs back then when we were young were like they are now when we’re old: noise, noise, noise!
But everybody went to the grandstand. They used to have lions and tigers and bears and elephants! Oh yeah, it was all there, around the middle of July. Really, Fair time was the main time of the year!
287 Besides playing ball and other sports, we went to town and it was always good to have a double cone ice cream. You can’t buy them now, I don’t think!?
Dad used to treat us to that in M at the bakery there! They had a good bakery: a very good bakery! (R laughs) They had pink ice cream, so you had one pink and one vanilla! It was a treat and everybody got an ice cream cone! 277 Dad had an old ‘Whippet car’. It was something like a Model A. You had to crank it half a clip to get it going. That was it: it was just…! (R makes three quick whipping sounds, like something whirling through the air, representing the car when it would start) I can still hear it!
In the winter time, they used to jack it up. They would drive it in the shed… we had an old shed there… and we jacked it up and that’s where was until the spring. We used the horses in the wintertime.
We used the horses for hauling out manure, for hauling hay… Dad did use them to haul some grain to town with the wagon… and a sleigh in the wintertime. I think we had 4 horses… no, I think we must have had more. ‘Cause, there was a stable, that’s what you call a horse barn, that is, a ‘lean to’ where you had the cattle.
So, there had to be… 2-4-6-8… he could have had 10 horses at one time. Well, he had to, because he had to have 4 on the harrows and 4 on the drill or cultivator.
I remember walking beside the drill and all the dust coming up, seeding grain in the spring. Everything was done by horses as there were no tractors, so they had horses on the harrows, horses on the cultivator and horses on the drill. So they had to have about 10 horses. E drove a little bit but I was too small. I just walked along.
Finally, we got tractors: International 1530, all steel. Oh, they were rough, the seat... terrible, and dusty!!
They had dugouts on the farm so, soon as you started seeding, you sat on the drill. After, you could jump in the dugout and have a good wash. The dugouts in the fields were full of water. In the spring, they were nice and clear. So, you could have a swim in there and wash all the dust off! That was our bath room!
Again, when I was small and Mom died, I took over the baking. Probably I did most of the housework, too! But, you never think about it anymore. Now, they say even today, ‘that’s why you’re such a good cook because you started when you were young!’
E did a lot of the chores and a lot of the fieldwork. But the girls were too small.
277 Circa 1920s Whippet. 288 E would come in from milking and separating the milk. Then, they all came in and got their breakfast. D and E would go off to school. I got busy to wash dishes and clean up. It seems like I was the cook all the time, right from day one!
For things I like to cook, we have a Swedish dish called ’Palt’, where you take and grind up a whole bunch of potatoes. But it’s got to be old potatoes. You got to peel them so the peelings not on them, then cut them up.
Do you remember those old hand grinders? You got to put them through that. Then you add flour and salt and, pretty soon, you can make a ball like a baseball. Then you boil that for an hour and 15!
The kids would say to me “Will you make Palt?” All of my kids, they can make Palt, every one of them! It’s a good dish. You can cut cubes of pork in there, too!
For play as a boy, I didn’t do too much. When Mom and Dad were gone, or Mom was gone first, I think it was like a hole in the wall. You were empty!
Then, later on, Dad got killed in the truck accident. But I was married then because I remember them coming down and saying “Your dad is dead, he rolled over in a truck!”
Then, I moved back home and built another house. I bought a Co-op ready built house. We were going to build one, but a brand-new Co-op two-bedroom house was $600. So we bought a brand new house! That was Northeast of K, Southeast of 27 46 20, off of 4…, 6 miles north of B and half a mile west.
I moved back home then, seeing he (Dad) was never going to come back again. I had the house until pretty well late in life.
Then I took over the farm and we started seeding, the usual stuff. E too, he had moved to B and that’s where he resided. He married a woman from B.
And we bought the school, C Hill School! We got the mover to move everything for, I think it was, either $400 or $500. Yeah, all the way from K to 2 miles out to our farm just north of B.
I was going to make a garage out of the school building but, then, E wanted to buy it. So, E bought it and moved it to his place.
I think he was going to do the same thing with it I was: make a car shed with it, because it was big, and a real good, well-made, school building. But then he passed away and I don’t know what became of it then.
So I stayed on the farm. Then we started playing ball. That’s when we raised the money to buy the uniforms, had the dances and all that kind of stuff.
289 Again, I was the catcher and E, he was the pitcher. That’s when we played fastball.
After that, we turned to hardball. E N was the pitcher but I was still the catcher. And we played ball like that for many, many years until... I think I’m the only one left.
That was pretty well what we did… ball was the main thing while we were growing up. Now, of course, we had the Hereford cattle. Do you want to start getting into that now?
Dad had bought Hereford cattle. So, he took a half share in that. He had Red Bull cattle also. We came to P.A. to the show and Dad got Grand Champion and I got Reserve Champion! I was quite a feat, to get Grand Champion and Reserve from a place that had never had purebred cattle.
And I think it was the guy where we bought the first quarter that we bought the Hereford cattle from, in K. We bought the whole herd as he was disposing of his herd.
We had a neighbor who had a one-ton truck so he helped haul all the cattle home. Of course, we had to start fencing… a lot of fencing! I was about 16 or 18 years old at the time.
Of course, like I said, we started showing the cattle and we started selling it. That’s when Dad got killed, just after that!
I don’t know what made Dad’s decision to buy the cattle. But, you see, Dad’s brother had ‘short horns’ so I kind of think that he was just getting his due, the purebreds. So he bought these Herefords because he liked the Herefords better than the short horns. They are nice cattle you know, white…!
Yeah, then we sold cattle and we had to fix fence… fix fence forever… we had all his cattle now! It had to be about 2 miles. It was mostly just me! E went out working in the field, because they were older, you know…!?
I remember that’s when that new kind of a plier came out, that pulled staples out, with a hook on it! It had a hook on one side and hammer on the other. That was nice so we bought one of those. It was pretty nice!
Like I said, we were always putting staples in because the cattle would lean against the fence and the staples would just pop out. They were never a real good thing!
We bought the fence posts. We bought the treated ones first but they didn’t last as long. Not only that but, in the treated, the staples popped out twice as easy.
We had the hand auger and then we had a bar that you made a hole with. I don’t know what you call it in English, but we always called it a Jaren’s Sip in Swedish. It was just a bar that you put down in and made the whole bigger, down and again. It was better for willow pickets!
290 It made the hole bigger and bigger until it was about 2 or may be 2 ½ feet deep. Then you would put the willow pickets in and use a sledgehammer to pound them in. They would last for a long time.
Talking about the mall that we used to pound the posts in: our neighbor O B, he and his brother were working at fencing, pounding them in, using the mall. You know, they are at least 3 pound malls.
His brother was like this (R showed the brother in full position to swing the mall down upon the post) when O said “Wait a minute!” in Swedish. He put his hand on top of that post and his brother hit it! It split every finger! It was a mess… oh, it was terrible! I couldn’t look at it. Boy oh boy, it was awful!
But, he worked for us pretty near all his life! He learned to milk because we always had milking cows. But he never regained the use of his hand altogether. But that would’ve been a son of a gun (slaps his hand together). That must’ve stung! It must’ve been around the same period, when I was about 16 years old, but I still remember it just like it was yesterday!
When we started farming after coming back from B.C., the crops in our area were usually good all the time. We got ‘tailed out’ a bit once: E and I farmed together and he had insurance and I didn’t. The South quarter got hailed out. E paid 15% or 20% in Crop Insurance, and I didn’t have to pay anything, but we got the same thing in the end for the crop that did work out. So I didn’t pay insurance and E had to pay out of the insurance he got for the South quarter.
We had four children, all born in M: G, born June 27, 1949, now 67; M, born May 28, 1955, now 61; J, Oct 21, 1958, almost 58; L, August 24, 1959, now 57.
When we came back from B.C. and started farming, G was about 6. He wasn’t doing well in school. He drove the tractor some. But, he was just like any other buck – boy, I mean!
We had to buy him a motorcycle, you know, so he would sneak off. Our friends in K would say “Well, so G was in town today!” (R laughed) We didn’t know! But, that’s the way things were! He took off more than he was at home so, as far as him helping on the farm, it was about nil! 278 There’s quite a bit of difference between G and M’s age, about 6 years, but the three girls are closer. L is younger than J, then M: they’re fairly close together. But it was quite a while between G and them because he had already started going to school.
278 Back: J, G, L; Front: M, R, V. 291 It wasn’t planned that way. At that time, there wasn’t any birth control. It just happened that way! It’s not like today where you plan it with your birth control, pills and the like. We didn’t have that!
When the girls were growing up, we had hired girls and sometimes the hired girls didn’t get along well. But we had S there and she was the best one! I think S and them (R’s sisters) got along fairly well but I think there was a little bit of friction. She was more like the girl’s mother almost. She patched clothes and did all the cooking.
Dad and S were together and they bought the café in P. They moved there for a while to run it. One of the girls, J, went to high school there.
They had that café for quite a while when they decided they would come back to live on the farm. After that is when Dad decided he would go back to visit in P and that’s when he was killed, on the way home. 279 I was living at the other place. E came over and told me. D was away in one of those religious groups, not the Jehovah Witnesses but those other ones, and was going to school. E was dating and got married to E.
So, we had the funeral there. That’s when E said to me that you better move home. We were at our own home place at the corner, in the new house, but we moved home and I was there ever since.
But S, when she left our place after Dad died, a big storm came. She went in this house, a trailer at B, Saskatchewan. She was sitting and knitting in her rocking chair and the storm, a tornado, blew the house down and killed her! It was a freak accident! I was at home when I heard from B, her son, who told me she had been killed.
I can’t remember how old they (the children) were at the time. But, we all went to the funeral.
We never thought about summer holidays. Farmers don’t do that. My kids went on holidays after they got married. They went on their little trips.
E, she went to high school. She was the last one to graduate from P. She’s quite happy. She’s got R now, her son, and they’ve got a big herd of elk. They’re quite an animal.
E, R and his wife were here the other day and we had a real good visit. E went back to M. She’s got a big house there.
279 F and S (H). 292 My kids, they are good to me. We always celebrated holidays a little bit. Maybe Christmas time was the biggest one. I would get a turkey and we’d invite everybody down for a meal, turkey and all the trimmings…our whole family. They’d all show up: they wouldn’t miss that. That carried on after the kids got married. I always help with the cooking, setting the table, put in the turkey on, checking that it was done.
A lot of times on birthdays, too… Christmas and birthdays! We always had a birthday cake when somebody had the birthday. We always had a meal but it was with a cake. They all had a birthday cake!
M, she’s in C. She lost her first husband, K W H, in 2000. M and K were married in 1972 in K. They had four children: T K H, born August 20th, 1973; C A H, November 12, 1974; A P H, May 13th 1978; C A H, November 3, 1979.
C married a fellow by the name of M B in 2008. That’s her child, my granddaughter A, in that little red airplane in the Christmas picture. 280 M remarried on August 2, 2002, to a fellow by the name of B R. She’s happy. He’s a good guy. They come here a lot. That’s them in the Christmas picture. 281 Then there’s L in S C. She’s married to a man by the name of K R J. They were married August 27, 1983 in M and have got two kids, A K J, born April 3, 1983, and R K J, born April 24, 1984.
She’s got a job and he’s a land assessor. They’ve got a very good lifestyle, you know, such as pontoon boats and all that kind of stuff?! And it’s good, that’s good, they all have pontoon boats!
And J: J and her husband R live in C Lake. They were married February 5, 1983 in Arborfield. They have three children: K R R, born January 3, 1977; J J R, July 14, 1983; L R R, November 20, 1984.
280 (Upper left) M, C, R, C’s daughter A in the little red airplane.
281 (Middle right) B and M R.
293 They’re both retired. He overhauls golf carts at the Candle Lake golf course and she works in the office at the golf course. They have a nice house.
282 G knew how to operate machinery. I know what he does, too, but my mind is a blank right now. I have to think.
He had three children from his first marriage: C F, March 9, 1972; D F, June 28,1973; J F, April 9, 1976. He and his wife E had two children: V F, April 15, 1993 (deceased) and C F, September 27, 1994.
Where is G now? Oh, he’s way up at the lake. He’s on holidays now, two or three months holidays… he’s way up at one of the farthest lakes in northern Saskatchewan. He phoned me and told me that’s where he’s going and the phone does not reach here. So, that’s where he is today.
G does fishing. He and his wife have their own pontoon boat up there. They live there during their holidays until he goes back to work. He’ll probably stop in before he goes back to work.
So, that’s it! Just little me here …!
Yep, when we think back it’s… well, you often say to yourself “Maybe we should write a book!” And here you’re doing it!! (R was addressing the interviewer)
When Dad sold the herd, he had all the money down in the cellar. He kept it in the cellar because he didn’t believe in banks.
When we came back from BC, he gave me $4000 or $5000, whatever it was. So, he went down on the cellar and got this roll of money and, what did I do, I was rich for a long time! We lived quite well for a long time… we were into spending it!
After Dad died and the herd was sold, I went out working in M… as a certified nursing attendant. I worked there for quite a few years and it was enjoyable.
The wife, she went out working, first as a housekeeper. At that time, there was training available as a certified nursing attendant. I kept the certificate because I am proud of it. I only had a grade 7 education. (The interviewer read the certificate.) It says:
January 15, 1973: Operations Parkland Hospital. Phone Mr. B J T 523-0641 (Administrator) Mr. R H F M, Saskatchewan Nurse Attendant 6102
282 (Upper left) Left to right: E, a former girlfriend of C, C, G. 294
I kept that because I only had grade 7 education and I lied to get in. I said I had grade 10.
What motivated me to be a nurse attendant? I think because V was working and so I thought I would work to, and you train on the job. So, that’s why I got the certificate. I think I had it in seven months and it was supposed to take a year. I trained at the M Parkland Hospital. I did well: I could catheterize, I could do anything!
The M Parkland Hospital was something like this here, for seniors that had heart trouble, no legs, whatever! You had to wash them, put them to bed, get them up.
I worked there for quite a while. It seemed like a long time, 10 years, and I farmed at the same time. That was pretty hard! But, uh, we had two quarters… the home quarter and the one across the road, so it wasn’t that much!
We got the second quarter at the same time as the first. I had them for a long time.
The home quarter was the one we got from Dad. I think we bought the second quarter, and it wasn’t that much money either. When I sold it to T S, he bought both quarters. And he’s still got it, as far as I know.
I also got a pilot license as well. (The interviewer read the certificate) It reads:
F, R H License Renewal Certificate, Private Pilot License Number WGP10914 is hereby renewed for all attaching privileges from this date until January 20, 1973. And this said license is commercial, senior commercial or airline transport is renewed for private pilot privileges only until (non-applicable) subject to the following limitations: valid only when required glasses are available. February 17, 1972. Signed: KD Castle, Minister of Transport
My son G used to work at the Parkland Hospital, too. He used to talk about getting pilot’s training. So, when he was taking his pilot’s license, I decided to take mine, too.
I went to take the course, but I didn’t have a landing strip and I didn’t have an airplane. But, soon as I passed, I decided to make a landing strip and buy an airplane!
I think I brought my airplane from P.A. This guy from P.A. flew up to M and I gave him the money and that was it. I think it was over $3000, $3000 or $4000. It was a Luscombe! EJV: those were the three letters on the tail and the wing. Sometimes in the morning before I went to work, I’d go fly for a couple of hours or an hour.
I made the landing strip at home. Everything was going good. I was making money, farming and working out. I flew all over: sometimes I would fly to M before I went to work. Then I would come home and drive to M to go to work.
295 I tried to teach my wife but she didn’t have any idea about flying. So, I just used it for my own use.
It was around that time that my wife started to sell something and she would be gone all day. She and I worked different shifts. I would go to work, then be going home and she would just be going to work! We’d meet halfway between M and B, or just north of B.
When I get home it would be around 3 o’clock. There would be time to farm: quite a bit. We didn’t have any cows because we sold all our cattle. ______
So, I went to work at the Parkland Hospital, then I got my pilot’s license, then I bought the airplane and put the landing strip in. I put the broom grass there. The main one was North to South, pretty near the full quarter. The landing out there was quite level for landing strip. But I know when I got the airplane, all the neighbors would be driving around down the road, two roads south and west, and they would stop and watch me take off. I enjoyed it! ______
The Sawmill
L and A W were two brothers that E and I knew. We had always done things together with them, went to dances and to visit. They were older than me but A and I were the closest in age.
The Ws always had a seed cleaning plant, but it was never big enough. They wanted to expand. So, they asked Ed and me if we wanted to go out logging and they would buy the lumber from us when we were done. We thought that was a good idea, you know, a few dollars in our pocket. So, away we went.
We worked and we took turns up in the bush of two or three weeks at a time. We built a little plywood cabin there. We actually used bolts to bolt it together, and we stayed in that.
We took turns cooking meals. We had a little stove, an airtight heater, that worked well to keep warm and cook on. So we were in there for mostly two weeks, then L and E would come in for two weeks, and that kept on until we were done.
First of all, A K was the Forest Ranger. He said where there was a big bluff of good wood, big stuff and little stuff, and we could have that as long as we cleaned it all out. We said that it was just what we wanted! (R laughed) So, we went and cleaned that out that winter and spring.
In the spring, we started building up a sawmill over at W’s. It was mostly E down there at that time helping with that. Somebody had to stay home and do the chores and that was me.
296 Building a sawmill was talked about right from the very start. It wasn’t that hard. Some of the stuff they had and some of the stuff they had to get made here in P.A.
When it got it all set up, we started sawing lumber. All of the logs were pretty well at my place so we had to haul the logs to W’s so we could saw it.
We got that done and there wasn’t much else to do. They figured out how much lumber we got and they gave us a cheque for it. They were quite well to do and they gave us the money and the deal was all finished. We got around $200 or $300 for the lumber.
After that, we ended up buying and dismantling the little shack that we lived in, bolts and all. We bought it back to our land because I had an airplane and could use the shack as a hangar for the plane.
We used to take fence posts in the bush, my brother E and myself. So, we built the plywood shack up again in the bush on our land. We just reassembled it so the ends would be cover for the wings. It was real good! ______
It’s around the time that V started working when the trouble started between her and me. That’s when I think the split up was starting. Everything went well until something went wrong. She left and that was the end of it, and of my marriage! We divorced and I have been single ever since.
After V left, we sold the farm. We divided all the assets. I had enough money to get along so I didn’t work. Oh, I was a guard at the jail for a while, just part-time you know!
After that, I went with a bunch of different women. I drank some, but not very much. I’ve got two bottles in there (the closet). I got them at Christmas time but never touched any of them. They still got the seal on them. I don’t need it.
It was just a normal bachelor’s life until I fell! But anyway, I’ve got enough money yet in the bank that I don’t have to worry too much. Especially in the condition I’m in now! You know, I can’t drive!
I had a brand-new car when I got hurt. I had to sell that after I got hurt. The company bought it back. They didn’t take it back because it had been paid for. It was one of those foreign makes. I tried to remember which model but can’t remember that either.
I just barely had it. I was going to put it up for sale and they came here to Mont St. Joseph and said they would buy it back. So, they did! ______
297 Synopsis
We talked about the cattle and we talked about where I met my wife.
I was around 19 years old, sometime around 1948, going over to visit my cousin and he was going with my wife’s, as of now, sister E. So then V started going down there and I started going out with her. It wasn’t long before I asked my dad for $100 for an engagement ring and we got married shortly after that.
We moved out to B.C. just for the winter and we moved back again. We had the cattle and milk cattle. My brother worked out, Fall and Spring work. We got the crop all in.
Like I said, we had the four children. We continued to live on the farm. Then, we built a house of our own. It was the ready built house we bought. Then my dad died so, then, we all moved back again to the farm. We took over Dad’s chores, what he was doing, and that’s where we were.
It was really better: I enjoyed it better being back at the home place. It was on our own land, the house, and it seemed nicer to be at home. We had our cows to milk.
Then we started playing ball in the spring. We played a lot of ball. I was the catcher and E was the pitcher. We’d practice every day. We took in about 20 to 22 sports dates, ball tournaments, every year. That sure helped out with the groceries. We were good. We were known all over the country to have a good team.
Then we decided to have a tournament of our own! Dad said “Yeah, you can use the pasture!” So, we fixed it up, set a date. But, we didn’t play ball ourselves! We sent invitations around to all over the country, B, Kinistino, M, Prince Albert, and they came down and played out.
Then we had a dance after and we made money, so we had enough money to buy our new uniforms. They look pretty sporty so, when we played ball, we looked pretty good. We lined up 2 on 2 and played catch. And that something pretty good to do! If you’re familiar with ball, and if you’ve seen that done at a tournament, it looks good. And that’s about it.
As far as the children go, G and M, they got married pretty quick. The other two didn’t for quite some time. But they did get married.
We had wedding dances and all that kind of stuff for them. The wife and I went along with it, but we were broke up then. But we said we’d march with them, you know, the way they came in?
Yeah, and life went on, and it’s going today! I’m not sickly, I fell and hurt my leg, but I’m not sickly, so I’m healthy otherwise.
298 Before I fell, I was doing everything and life was good. I was living in a house not too far from here. I used to go up town every day. I didn’t have to do anything because I had enough means to get along fine. I would just get up, get dressed, make my breakfast… toast and whatever… then maybe go up town and come back before dinner.
I met a lot of new people up town. I would have coffee with people and just hang around… kind of a loafer! No, not really... (R laughed)… but, I got along good with everybody! And, every other one was a friend.. “Hi, R”, “Hi, R!” And, even the daycare… “Hi, R!”, “Hi, R!”, you know, and then they would have to give me the high five!
How I fell and hurt my leg was they wanted me to come into the house and I just stepped in a hole and down I went. That was about two years ago and just before I came in here. The girls said they were lucky to get me in.
My neighbor had just given me an ‘Alert’ button the day before I fell. I had put it in my pocket so I thought about that, pressed alert and E came down right away. Wonderful, eh!?
They phoned the ambulance, took me to Saskatoon then, eventually, back to P.A. I was in pretty bad shape. It was broken in lots of places and is still bad today. It will never recover but I get along good.
I wasn’t in Saskatoon all that long but the family all came to visit. It wasn’t too long before they shipped me back here. I was in a wheelchair.
I had that wheelchair first (points to a standard wheelchair folded up over against one wall), then I went to the powered one, must’ve been about a year after I got the first one.
But, when you fall and can’t use your legs, you’ve got to have something like this (the powered wheelchair)!
As far as the kids go when they were young, they were very good. Yes, I had more trouble with G playing hooky at school. He had one of those motorcycles, you know, and he’d take off and wouldn’t be at school. But the rest of them were pretty good, normal!
What else I want to put into this book is the hard question. I told you about the Hereford cattle, the kids going to school, and I told you about when my wife and I broke up, too! That’s when we got the divorce and that was it. 283 I had a nice place and could look after myself but, after I broke that leg in pieces, I can’t do it. It was bad. I was in Saskatoon for months. However, I had good luck when they sent me home and here I am.
283 (Lower left) R and another resident as King and Queen for a year at Mont St. Joseph. 299 The girls found out this place was open and I’ve been here ever since. And I like it! In fact, I got to be the King!
There was a contest here. The two or three fellows, the ones who take care of the place, Mont St Joseph’s, they voted me in as King for the year.
Everybody was there. I didn’t know anything about it! It was because of, uh, well, there were so many things, such as honesty, getting along good with people, not swearing...!
That was quite a feeling. They were watching me, I guess… I didn’t know it. They overheard I had purebred cattle on the farm… (this is a point of pride for R and he showed significant emotion and gratitude for the event).
I couldn’t take it! I never believed myself as such, you know? They read that all out and I cried! It’s terrible… to hear people saying such good things about you, you know? It’s unbelievable!
There’s a lot of people here didn’t like me after that. Jealousy? There’s a lot of jealousy here. But the majority are good! I was pretty proud of myself! They (the two head men) were the big boys of this place and that was something!
This last time I moved because I fell and got hurt. Before that, I had a nice place of my own. Now, I can’t use this leg. I stepped in a hole and down I went.
It’s a funny thing… My daughter-in-law and G had just given me one of those Alert buttons. I pressed a button and others were there to help me. Otherwise, I would’ve died there. I’m glad it worked. My daughter-in-law E came immediately.
I was in Saskatoon in the hospital for a month or two months. Then they moved me here, and I’m still here. And I will be here. I am 87 now. I feel good and I’m happy! ______
Lupus
There’s a guy who comes from Saskatoon… what the heck does he do now? He stops in once in a while. Oh yeah, he looks after the people with Lupus disease. I’ve got it… (R shows me the areas of his skin affected by Lupus). You lose your hair and you can get it down your skin.
I found out I had it when this guy came from Saskatoon and told me what it was. It was a long time ago. I don’t know if I was even married then. I was just like I am now, just as good as can be, but I had signs of Lupus: the loss of hair and the scabbing on the skin.
My daughter L has Lupus, too. She lost all her hair. She wears a wig. Papa had to give it to my daughter…! It’s inherited! (R appeared to say this with pain) ______
300 What’s important now?
What things are the most important to me now? Well, besides my family, to keep my friends and, when there’s a meal time, I’m ready to go and eat.
The women come and dress me every morning: there are two with them. They put clean shorts on me, my pants, my socks, my shoes, then I sit here all day long! I don’t think anything of it because I know I have to do it!
They take good care of me. I’ll never leave this place! It is a good place to be! I’ll tell that to anybody. And a lot of people listen to that to… they listen to the ‘King’! (R laughed)
Yeah, that was quite a night when they crowned us the King and Queen. I don’t know her name, there’s lots that I don’t know, but I met her yesterday and she kind of laughed and said “Remember that?”
We had a little chuckle on it. I met her up town (in another part of the facility). What we didn’t talk too long about it. But we had our usual thing: we had our breakfast together. 284 Last night at the supper table we were discussing some stuff. Did you know that you can eat a porcupine? You not allowed to kill them but, if you’re starving in the bush, you can eat them raw!
I asked this other guy if he ever heard that and “Oh, yes!” he said, he had heard that before.
I saw one when I was coming home from B. It was up in a tree and it was so heavy: they are about 30 pounds, the branch was just bent. That was the first porcupine I ever did see. I’m not a young guy anymore and I haven’t seen one since. ______
Hunting
I used to hunt deer and moose, but now that’s gone. My leg is gone! But I don’t regret it. We had a lot of good hunting trips: got the odd moose and the odd deer! Moose is most what we were after. And when we got a moose, we were pretty happy!
G, L and I, we hunted together for years. And this one morning, we went out and we were going to get water from Candle Lake. What do you think was standing in the middle of the road? A great big buck!
So G, he stopped the truck and I got out and BANG! It jumped 2 times and landed in the ditch.
284 (Middle left) Christmas party at Mont St. Joseph. 301 My Uncle A came along and he said “I’ll show you boys how to skin a deer!” He took a knife and put a slit and two chops, like that (R made chopping motions), and it was done! But he was an old hunter. Yes, it was quite a thing!
Then, at another time there was about three or four of us, including W T. He was my uncle, too, who had a quarter of land up in C Lake and we were supposed to hunt there.
G and I hunted the first day. We slept up in the attic of the house and the mice all night were rubbing back and forth against us. So, we said “Enough of that!” and we said we were taking off! We had a place about 10 miles away that was our favorite spot, on what we called the Tower Road, and we went there.
It had snowed about a foot of fresh snow. We got pretty near there and there’s three tracks, moose tracks, and what do you think was standing there? A cow moose and two calves! And shortly after that is when they quit shooting cow moose: you’re not allowed to shoot cows anymore. But at that time, you were allowed to shoot them and so, cow and two calves, ‘BANG’ ‘BANG’ ‘BANG’!
The calves were almost as big as the cow! We shot them in the morning and it took us all day to skin’em and dress’em!
We loaded them up in my car, a Ford Fairlane, and this is the way it went (R showed me his hand indicating the rear end was dragging and the front end was up in the air)! It was loaded!
We went home and we got pretty near to P.A. when we got a flat tire. And we had a car full of moose meat! So we had to unload all the meat.
It was right by a farmer’s yard so he came out and gave us a hand. He gave us blankets so the meat wouldn’t get dirty. So, we put it on that and he helped us change the tire.
After that, he said “Have you got a liver?” “Oh yeah!” we said. We didn’t eat moose liver so we gave him all the liver for helping us change the tire. So, on our way we went!
We got home fairly late that night, but it was good hunting trip!
We filled up the tub full of water and a couple boxes of salt. We put all the meat in there.
When we shot something in the bush, we dressed it. It was just not a quarter here and a half there! It was cut up into quite small pieces.
So we put all the salt in the tub and we let it soak for about 24 hours. Talk about good! The blood got sucked right out of it! Wonderful! Then we took it into Dod’s in K to get it cut up!
302 Dod’s had been there for many, many years: he was well-liked; an honest butcher! So, we took it in there and got it all cut up. Then they packed it. Then they’d freeze it for a couple of days and we could take it home.
There must’ve been 150 pounds or more of meat. I think that was the time when we could rent a box there and so we left all the meat right there, frozen. They’d cut it up and freeze it for you. So we left the meat right there and, whenever we wanted some, we drove into town and got our meat. We’d just turn the key and there you go!
That was our favorite spot, the Tower Road! We would just get up in the morning, have our breakfast and go out. That’s where we went most of the time to find our game. And that’s the happy part of a hunting trip is when you get your moose and you can get it all cut up and take it home! ______
Dad used to have a café one time. When he couldn’t sell the café, he moved stuff home! And he had four ice cream wells, or was it two, and he had two lids where he could put moose meat and all that kind of stuff there. Yeah, we had that in the porch. It was a café cooler for bulk stuff like bricks of ice cream and whatever!
That was the café that Dad bought when he wanted to get off the farm. But that’s the sad part! He sold it and he was going back to visit when he got killed on the way home. ______Life’s lessons and legacies
Holiday celebrations: we always celebrated holidays a little bit. Maybe Christmas time was the biggest one.
I would get a turkey and we’d invite everybody down for a meal, turkey and all the trimmings…our whole family. They’d all show up: they wouldn’t miss that.
That carried on after the kids got married. I always helped with the cooking, setting the table, putting the turkey on, checking that it was done.
A lot of times on birthdays, too… Christmas and birthdays! We always had a birthday cake when somebody had the birthday. We always had a meal but it was with a cake. They all had a birthday cake!
I think my most cherished memories are when we would get together at Christmas and birthdays.
Also, when we would meet at the lake! Not too often anymore, but we used to meet at the lake. We would sit around and have a beer or two. We would sit and talk. Some of them would go fishing!
303 I remember this one time we were at C Lake. The boys were only about, remember, maybe 10! They snuck away and took our boat!
They came back with a whole slug of fish and the rest of us couldn’t catch a bite! It was the boys, G, L and B. They swiped the boat and when out fishing... just a little ways out… and the fish were biting just one after the other. We couldn’t catch anything.
We had a fish fry. We’ve often talked about that. Oh, they teased us about that, I guess: how we couldn’t catch a fish and the boys did! ______Most important success…
For the most important success in my life, it was when I was crowned King! That was quite a moment. It was the two owners who appointed me and that was quite a thrill. M was here as well then.
The turning point in my life is when I got hurt, when I fell. I was at a standstill! I couldn’t do what I’d done before.
It’s not that I’m not happy because, the girls, they come and visit me and we all have a good time. But I don’t go down there anymore, haven’t been for a long time, to S C.
No, I’m happy to be here. It’s a good place. And that’s what I tell everybody, it’s a wonderful place. ______
(I asked R “Are there any times in your life that you remember more vividly than others, that stand out to you?”)
Right now I can hardly think. It is a kind of hard thing to say. But, I think it was a kind of a relief when we sold the farm and came back here.
When we sold the farm in 1977, there was nothing for me to stay there. So, then I moved to K, then to M (L said she remembers that because that’s the year she graduated.)
I don’t think there was anything I would’ve done differently in my life. I’ve been happy, no matter what we got into! We done our hunting, we done our fishing, we used to visit a lot!
The kids are married. But we used to visit them!
I think when S and Dad went, it was kind of a relief, too!? You know, S wasn’t the same as your mother, but she was good though: she was pretty good to me anyway! Maybe not to the girls so much but… (R was talking about his sisters). ______
304 (I asked R if he had thrown away anything in his life that he wished he hadn’t thrown away, that he wished he still had today.)
Well, I think that when we kept on moving, we always left something. I can’t say what. But I used to hang on to things that were old. Anything old! I used to love antiques and, anything old, I hung onto. But I’ve got nothing here!
I used to have old guns and so on. However, after I fell and hurt myself, I divided it up. I took pictures of four lots and that’s what they got: G, M, J and L. ______(For the last 10 minutes of the interview, I asked R concerning his life legacies: that we wanted to take a little bit of wisdom from him that he would give to his children, some advice or life lessons that he would want them to know.)
I don’t know! I think I’ve been pretty honest with my children. I’ve never really done too much without them knowing. We’ve always got along good together!
Like I said, we had Christmas together. Every birthday we’d always have together! You know, things like that!? So, what I would say to each one of them is: “Be honest, be honest and fair, to your children.” Yes, I think so!
I would want everything to keep going good for the rest of their life. Be kind and generous to your children and then them to their children.
(R’s daughter L… was present and pointed out that one thing the grandkids would remember the most about Dad and Mom is that they would always take them on trips every year.)
L: “They would always take two kids and then they would go for a week… That’s one thing the kids would always remember! They had a little motorhome so they would just pack them up in there and away they went!” ______
(I asked R how he would define a good life, a successful life.)
You can still have a drink and not hurt anybody. You can have a drink and really hurt somebody. So, I would say, go and have a good time without hurting people!
I think they will all say I was good to them!? I don’t think there was one of them who say I cheated one or the other. So, I hope everyone will do the same for their children and for their children after that.
I hope everybody will enjoy reading this. It’s a hard thing to do, I’ve never done it before, but I’ve enjoyed it! It made me think about things I haven’t thought about before.
(With that, the summary interview with Mr. R F, a big and gentle man, was complete.)
305 Although this short summary may just scratch the surface, it is to serve as a ‘seed’, a foundation, for R’s descendants to build upon, i.e to continue the journey of discovery into the process of open communication that strengthens family and relationships. This process recognizes that mistakes made then overcome through communication is the process of life: it is the ‘perFECT process’, meaning ‘making mistakes and learning from them’, i.e. the way we survive, thrive and grow.
Thank you, R, for taking part in this project, and thank you to your daughters for their part in helping to complete the final product. - Rev. Dr. Donald Doherty)
306 Life Story Interview with Mr. T Interviewed by Rev. Dr. Don Doherty
Interview number 1, August 16, 2016 Mont St. Joseph, Prince Albert, SK.
Interviewer: ‘Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out.
If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.’
T: Well, my name is R T, a product of rural Saskatchewan. My birthday is September 9, 1934. I think it’s a Sunday!
My dad’s name is G C T.
My mother’s name is V M, maiden name W. She was raised in southern Manitoba and my dad was raised primarily in the area around Togo, Saskatchewan, on the Manitoba border. He was born in Asessippi… it’s a regional park now in Manitoba. Other than that, I don’t think it exists!
I was born and raised in a place called R which is in the Melfort, Tisdale, Nipawin area. When I was born in 1934, the village probably had a population of 230. Today, it’s about fifty or sixty. It’s a typical rural Saskatchewan community that fell apart badly, probably in the ‘50s, ‘60s and ‘70s, to the point where it’s almost nonexistent anymore.
It was a good place to be raised. It had a school, four rooms in the school, from grade one to twelve. I completed my grade twelve there.
My father was a druggist. He had the drugstore in R from 1927 to 1953. How he made a living in that village all those years and raised three children was a great surprise to me, how he could’ve done it or achieved it, because there was no hospital. The nearest one was twenty miles away in Tisdale: the nearest hospital and the nearest doctor for that matter.My sister and brother are both older than me. They are both alive and enjoying retirement.
My brother, C A T, is a retired professor from the University of Lethbridge and my sister S is retired from psychiatric nursing and lives in M as a widow.
307 My dad’s drugstore was almost unique, looking back upon it, because he recognized immediately in the ‘40s or ‘50s that he had to do more than just dispense prescriptions in order to make a living. So, he was a lot like a small-town Shopper’s Drug Mart where he got into other products. He sold some jewelry and other things. 285 I remember at my age of five or six, Dad going down to the post office, which was about 100 yards away, and leaving me in charge of the drugstore. Even at five or six years of age. 286 In fact, one event that happened… and it’s a question that you could raise in the material that you gave me: “Do I remember ever being disciplined?”… was my dad was going down to the post office and he told me to look after the store while he was gone to get the mail. Well, I tell you, it’s only 100 yards. He said “And don’t set fire to that pile of rubble in the backyard!”
I would never have thought about setting fire to that pile of rubble in the backyard had he not mentioned it. So, I went out and set fire to the rubble in the backyard!
I remember, of course, there was no fire equipment in the village, and I could understand the danger of setting fire to this big pile of rubble. My dad took me to the front of the store, sat me down on the steps, pulled my pants down, gave me a good spanking on my bare bottom and sent me home!
I remember when I was about thirty or forty years old joking with Dad “You know, Dad: I haven’t forgotten that lesson!” I said “It’s your fault, Dad! I would never have thought of it had you not mentioned it!”
I also remember, in remembrance of Dad, I was quite a good athlete in my day. I was about fourteen or fifteen… I was in grade nine… and one day we were curling in our high school district and we had to go to a place called Moose Range, which no longer exists, which had a one sheet curling rink. And Dad said: “Well, I’ll drive the team there!”
I don’t know where he got the car, he had to borrow it, I’m sure! And I remember going to them and saying to Dad “I know it’s going to cost about ten dollars to take us there. We don’t really have to go, because that’s a lot of money!” And it was a lot of money. He said
285 (Top right) T, S, C - 1939; (Lower left) 1947.
286 (Middle right) T, age 4 - 1938. 308 “Son, I won’t miss ten dollars ten years from now!” And that line has stuck with me all my life.
It’s governed a lot of things I’ve done in my own life, in terms of whether or not I should invest in something or whatever, and I keep coming back to that “Well, I won’t miss that ten dollars ten years from now!” So, it’s a bit of philosophy that came through with my father. 287 My mother: my mother was pretty ill all her life, I think! She was also a good curler… not as good as I was: I actually played provincial finals in Regina from out of Prince Albert at one time... but, she spent a lot of time in bed and I realized, later in life, that she was either depressed quite a bit or just not well. Whatever it was!
I remember, as a kid, Mom saying to me “Go down to the drugstore and get me a handful of 292s!” - a handful - and in those days, there was no accounting for drugs of that nature. So, I would just go to the drugstore where Dad had 292s in a quart sealer. They were shipped that way. And I would just get up a handful and put it in a paper bag and take it home!
Mother took a lot of that in her lifetime. But she lived to be 90 in spite of it all!
She and Dad… I never heard them argue, I never heard them fight, I never heard anything negative between the two of them in all my life! So, I think they had a good marriage.
My sister S and I were, and are, very close! She’s the oldest in the family, and she’s 86. We communicate by phone, probably three to four times a week, just staying in touch. 288 My brother is eighty-four. He’s in L, but he spends a lot of time in Mesa, Arizona, in the wintertime. He has a family of boys and girls and grandsons and great grandsons and granddaughters and I can’t keep track of them all! And I don’t try too hard.
287 (Upper right) G and V T.
288 (Lower left) T and sister S, January 26, 2011.
309 That’s basically it, as far as the family is concerned. In my own case, I was married in 1964 at the age of almost thirty. My wife was thirty-two.
We went to Malaysia… as my passport says, I’m an ‘expert advisor to the government of Malaysia’… where in fact I was assisting a Chinese community to switch to English as the medium of instruction. I was there to complete the equivalent of grade eleven and twelve in their program, which I did do! We used the Cambridge syllabus.
I did complete that and, looking back on it, I didn’t do as good a job as I should have! I’m not bragging about the work I did. I got far more out of it than I ever gave, and I didn’t give enough. So I’m not really proud of the work I did there! But, I did do it and it was a great experience. It was good for both of us!
We came back to Canada in 1968 into the high school community. I taught senior English until my retirement in 1986 at the age of fifty-two. I had started teaching at the age of seventeen and, by this time, had accumulated over thirty years of eligible pension time. 289 I had also put in a couple of years as a social worker for the Department of Social Services in S C, which counted toward my retirement benefits. So, when I retired in 1986, I did some sub teaching and some fill teaching until 1988 when I took on the job of being the treatment supervisor at the Alcoholism Treatment Centre at S L, about … miles … of Prince Albert.
When I arrived there, the program was faltering, and that’s putting it kindly! Anyway, I rewrote the program completely. I had an opportunity because there was a strike, for six months. I had six months to put together the program, because I was not on strike. I was part of the administration.
I wrote the entire program for that center, which was then adopted and adapted, and I did some hiring and firing of staff.
At the time of my leaving, which was six years later, we were operating at over 90% capacity… 95% in most cases… and I had treated and been responsible for the treatment of about 3500 alcoholics, basically, and I became quite an expert in alcoholism.
Being an alcoholic myself didn’t hurt my experience. It was a part of my life! My alcoholism, I mean. I am still an alcoholic. I haven’t had a drink for thirty-one years, but that doesn’t relieve me from being an alcoholic. I am one for my entire life. I know that. I’ve had a relapse and I know what that’s like and what causes it, in my case.
This alcoholism runs in the family. My dad’s two brothers died drunk, his father died drunk and, I think, if there is a genetic connection for alcoholism, maybe I came by it honestly!
289 (Middle left) T and V, Wedding, December 29, 1964. 310 But I don’t put the blame on them at all because I never met my grandfather. He died before I was born, so he didn’t influence me. I only met the one uncle and that was for a short period of time and I didn’t even know he drank.
So, people who like to blame their alcoholism or whatever their problem might be … socially, or whatever it may be… on genetics, my grandfather is not going to cure it nor is my uncle going to cure it. The only person who can deal with it is me! So, I learned something from every experience, and this is one!
I don’t dwell on it at all. It’s not worth my time! It’s just not. I’ve got a lot of life to… I still have a lot of life to do, I think!
As I said, my brother C is a Professor Emeritus from L. He’s written probably twelve books so far… published twelve books. Some are research books; a couple are novels that he attempted. Some are of interest to some academics, I guess. But, he’s a professional writer and he writes a lot. His field is history.
My sister was married to a businessman. He actually owned a taxi company in North B and also ran the Greyhound bus depot there.
She was a graduate of the provincial hospital there as a psychiatric nurse. She did much of her work at the Indian Hospital there.
After they reached full retirement age, they decided that the area of North B had deteriorated to the point where they should move. They sold their house and they moved to M, into a condo… a nice condo.
They have a daughter who lives just out of M on a farm. They have a daughter here in Prince Albert and they have a daughter in S. So, she has three daughters. As I said, she and I are very close!
My brother and I are distantly close, put it that way. We don’t see that much of each other, although he came up here when he heard I was ill! He came up to the hospital here and we had a short visit. He made the effort to come up to see me. I really saw in his eyes the fear that he was seeing me for the last time!
We fought a lot when we were young. He was bigger than me, he’s two years older. He was stronger than I was and I remember times when he would wrestle me to the ground and make me eat grass. So, I played that game where, you know, “Shut your eyes and open your mouth! I’ve got a surprise for you!” and I popped in a baby sparrow that was about an hour old that I had taken out from a nest in the garage and I popped that in his mouth!
He and I still refer to that incident, almost eighty years later… seventy-five years later. He came in and says “Now, behave yourself or I will go out and feed you some more grass!” And I said “That’s good! I’ll pop in another sparrow!”
311 But, I hit him so hard one time, when I could no longer stand it… I hit him so hard I knocked him right through the wall of my parent’s bedroom! And, I told him if he ever touched me again, I’d kill him! And I think I would’ve, you know!? But, that was the last fight we had. That would be at about the age of thirteen… when I was thirteen.
He also protected me from time to time. That much I know. Because, in our village, we were divided into the East and the West side of the village by Central Avenue, a street that was two blocks long. And, every Saturday in the wintertime, we’d have a fight on the main street between the East and the West and our main weapons were frozen horse turds, cow pies… if you could get a fresh cow pie, that would really be a good one to throw at somebody if you could hit’em… and, once in a while, there would be a bit of a fistfight.
But we also played together. It’s just that Saturday seemed to be the fight day for some reason. I don’t know what it was all about, thinking back, but we didn’t have much else to do! We had no money; we had no tools!
My allowance when I was a kid was five cents a week. So I got a job at the local hotel chopping and hauling wood every day for a nickel. It was during the war, so I had a lot of money! I had about 25 or 30 cents on a Saturday, which was used then to buy war saving stamps… and they were a quarter each!
By the end of the war, I had saved something like $35 in certificates, and that was from cutting wood and whatever! But money was… there was no money! That’s as I recall.
A nickel a week sounds pretty ridiculous but a nickel bought a bottle of pop! It bought a chocolate bar! And fifteen cents got you to a movie, that sort of thing!
I can’t think too much of my early youth that is of particular significance, although I’m sure it had a quite an impact on the rest of my life and the way I think. I must’ve developed a lot of rural values, being raised in a rural area, which have always held me in good stead, I think.
My sister S left home after grade twelve to go to North B… to train as a psychiatric nurse. It was in 1947 and I was thirteen at that time.
When Mom and Dad dropped her off in North B, I went with them. When they dropped her off, I think she said she had ten or twenty dollars, and that was to last her! And she made it! She made it, you know!? I recall those days.
I recall that, in 1954, I threw a dart at a map to find a place to go, basically! And it was H P, Alberta, that I hit. So, I went to H P!
I was in North B. I had a car. I had bought a car with my first cheque teaching down in southern Saskatchewan. But, anyway, I had a car! Not much of a car, but it was a 1947 Chev: a torpedo back. I didn’t have a spare tire! I had $20 in North B…, that’s all I had,
312 and I’m trying to get almost 500 miles - it’s 400 miles for sure - to H P, Alberta, up the old Number 2 Highway, which was gravel!
So, I went to a used car lot and stole a tire from a trunk! Well, it was the only way I could get a spare tire. I went through the used car lot until I found a trunk that was open and, yeah, I stole the tire for a spare and, fortunately so, because I had a flat within fifty miles of leaving Battleford. So, I really needed that spare, and it got me all the way to H P, Alberta.
I got into a hotel and it was two dollars a night. I had thirty cents left in the morning after having to pay this hotel! I had to decide whether I was going to buy a package of cigarettes or have breakfast. So, you can imagine what I decided!
So I smoked my way into a store, a big department store. A fellow named S K owned it. I went up to him and said “Mr. K! Hi, my name is R T and I have a job teaching school here. I’m going to be starting next week, or two or three days from now! Can I open a charge account?”
“What do you want it for?” “Well,” I said “I haven’t got any money!” So, I opened a charge account and I bought a carton of cigarettes.
This time, I went to the beer parlor with this carton of cigarettes and I sold as many as I could in the beer parlor; and I wasn’t of legal age to go in the beer parlor.
Well, I sold them anyway, then I went down to the pool room. I happened to be an expert pool player and I lived for a month off the revenue from the pool room!
So, those are the things you had to do to get by! And I’m sure these kinds of stories are not unfamiliar to you, with your own life! (with which the interviewer agreed, being raised in the Maritimes)
We played a lot of ‘Odd-ball,’ which is 1 ,3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 13, 15 and game. And you paid per ball. I remember going into the pool room in Dawson Creek on a July weekend and they were playing, I think it was, Odd-ball at the time. They also played Golf, they played Boston. They also played N….. which became a bad word… but N….. was Blackball, which was above 8 and below 8 with 8 as the game ball.
So, I got in the game. I had never played for more than a nickel, or a dime, an odd. Anyway, I got a pretty good run! You only paid the guy behind you, or ahead of you, so I could leave people really tough and they wouldn’t make anything. If they got a little careless, I could do very well.
Anyway, I made $35 the first game, because there were seven people playing and I made seven or eight of the ten odds and they all had to pay me! But, what would I have done if I had lost, because I didn’t have any money?!
313 I had maybe $2, but that wouldn’t have done it. They were playing for a quarter a ball! I’d still be hanging on that Mile Zero post in Dawson Creek if I hadn’t won. So, I played one game and got the heck out of there.
But, pool was a pretty important part of my upbringing. I love the game! I still like it! Can’t find a twelve-foot table anywhere: there isn’t one in Prince Albert anymore!
There’s twelve-foot tables in Saskatoon, up in the industrial area. I’ve gone there and played.
So, I was teaching in H P. I never had enough money because I developed a lifestyle that was a little on the expensive side for the income that I had. I took a job working in a hardware store from four to six, then I pumped gas from seven ‘til ten at night at a garage and then I played for at least two if not three dances a week.
I played saxophone at that time mostly, the saxophone and the fiddle, and I took up the piano later, on top of teaching.
I developed some really good, close, friends in H P and I still stay in touch with them. One of them is the grandfather (and he and I curled together) of the lead for the O Briar team. G H’s lead was a fellow by the name of C S. It is his grandfather that I played with in H P, and that’s where the family originally came from.
Anyway, this young C, I had never met him. He’d be the grandson. I was in Victoria and I went to watch the Briar playoffs that were going on at the time. They were playing in representing O.
They were sitting at a table, probably having a beer or whatever, and I went and sat down beside C. He didn’t know who I was or anything. So, I introduced myself and said “You know, without me you wouldn’t be here!” He said “How’s that?”
I said, “I went to … where your grandfather lives and I introduced the slide to northern Alberta because nobody had ever used it before up there” … and it was quite a remarkable thing to see this young guy going halfway down and further in delivery… “so I brought the slide that your grandpa taught, then your dad… and your dad, who I babysat, taught you! So, without me, you wouldn’t be here!”
He got quite a kick out of it! Yeah, he got quite a kick out of it… I’m sure he won’t forget it.
Love of Music
I’ve always had a love of music, right from day one! My dad played the piano a bit. He was a chord player… he chorded. And he played the fiddle a bit. He played in an orchestra periodically in the village.
314 We had a piano at the house, but I didn’t take the piano. My dad bought a saxophone for $40 somewhere, so I ended up with the saxophone, then eventually took up the fiddle a bit. I was never very good at it (the fiddle).
I don’t recall if my father bought the saxophone for himself. He didn’t buy it for himself, I’m sure! But, it was a C Melody Selmer saxophone. Selmer made quality instruments. It was used, of course, and it was $40, which was a lot of money, I guess.
I had expressed an interest in this neighbor, a fellow by the name of Phineas Taylor Barnum – P.T. Barnum - who played sax and he played it very well.
He played a song called ‘Saxaphobia.’ I’ve often tried to get a copy of that music. I can’t get it! I can’t find it, even on the Internet. I can play part of it… it was lovely. I can remember that I was really impressed with his work, with his ability!
I still have the violin. In fact, I have two violins. I’ve kept them and made sure that my daughter put them away so they didn’t go in the auction sale, because one is 300 years old.
Anyway, a neighbor down the way played the saxophone quite well and I admired his work. So, when I went to ‘normal school,’ we had an orchestra there. Two of us played sax, we had a trumpet, we had an orchestra, and we just played!
I don’t read music. When I got my first teaching job, I had thirteen children in grade one, six grades and thirty-three kids. It was a pretty busy time for a seventeen-year-old who did not how to teach! But there was a piano in my room. At night, totally inefficient, I went to work every night preparing for the next day. So, I finally ended up just tinkering away on the piano.
First thing I knew, there was an orchestra in town and a guy who was very good on piano. But he played by ear as well! And he taught me quite a few tricks, piano tricks I use today, to the point where I thoroughly enjoyed playing the piano!
I play it here quite a bit. That’s why the piano is out there (in the common room)! They moved it there so I could be closer to it, and I’m the only one in the place that bangs away at it. Yes, I’m the only one that bangs away on the piano here but, apparently, they like it. But, yeah, you know music was a part of a lot of small towns because there wasn’t much else to do! Dances… but you’ve got to have music to dance!
As kids, we didn’t have any equipment. If we had a softball, it would be a used one that had fallen apart. We’d go to the local shoemaker or we’d sew it back together by hand ourselves.
We had a game that was called Can-Can, as in tomato cans. We would get three tin cans and set them up side-by-side and then, about thirty feet down, three at the other end. So it’s a lot like Cricket. Then we’d go to the lumberyard and steal some lumber, 2 x 4s usually, and we’d make bats out of these 2 x 4s or whatever was available. We’d whittle them.
315 I think the guy who owned the lumberyard knew that we were doing it but he just let us go ahead.
What we did was we would bowl the ball and we had to knock all three cans down. Then you would switch sides and the other person would then run back and forth. And we would play that game for hours and hours and hours!
You could play with two people, or four, or six or whatever number you want: you just rotate according to whoever is next in line. And we played that for a long time. I think it made good ball players out of us over the years. But, that’s what we had and that’s what we did! It was good, really good, exercise!
We never saw a football, not an oval football: you never saw one! We didn’t know what it was!
I remember having a TV interview when I was in S C. The local sportscaster phoned me up and wanted to interview me about the Regina football team. And, of course, I went!
I had never been to a football game in my life. I didn’t know a forward pass from a punt. I bluffed my way through the stupid interview! But, that’s the way I was and… probably still am!
I’ve often wondered how we came by the game of Can-Can, whether we invented it or not. But, we weren’t the only community that played it.
I remember when we went… even when we developed a ball team… and actually used a baseball. We didn’t have any bats, so we would go to the lumberyard and steal a 4 x 4. Then we would take it to the garage where a guy who was good on a lathe would make us a bat. You did what you had to do in order to play!
We did some things we shouldn’t of done, I suppose: we did steal it, you know!? But, again, I think the guy knew we were doing it. (R paused to reflect)
I M was his name, the guy who ran the place. I saw him in his late, late, years in Saskatoon. He showed me some card tricks when I was just a little kid and I’ve never forgotten them! I’ve used them on my grandsons and others, even today, but they are little tricks that he taught me, just as a kid. I’ve got pretty good memories of growing up.
He ended up in his retirement managing, as a night clerk, an old hotel in Saskatoon: the one on 23rd and 3rd Avenue. They’ve remodeled the place recently in the last few years: a lovely old hotel. That’s what he did because he had to make a living. And that’s what people had to do!
The world may owe us a living, but you have to work like the devil to collect it! But, today, the second part has kind of been removed. The world owes us a living but, hurry up and pay me! My grandparents earned my pension!
316 Growing up, I remember my sister, brother and I had to do the dishes at night. And the three of us sang! S was a good singer. She sang alto or whatever it is … harmony, anyway… and we sang a lot of songs while we were doing the dishes. We argued as well, of course, but…
Because she was five years older than me, I don’t remember all that much of my association with her. She had her own room upstairs and my brother and I shared another room upstairs.
We had a bathroom, but we had to melt snow to have a bath and, I know because I was the youngest, I was always the last one to bathe. My brother would tell me, after I had my bath, that he peed in the bathtub. And I never forgave him for that!
We didn’t have any water. Dad eventually built a cistern in the basement. We had a force pump in the kitchen when we first had the cistern. You had to prime the pump to get water.
We ended up before leaving R, in fact probably by 1950, installing a water system: a pressure tank in the basement and water. The water was piped up by pump through the stove. It was a wood stove: it heated the water and put it into a holding tank. So, it was a water system and it worked.
Earlier, we had a well, but it dried up. So, we put the toilet on it and used it as a toilet dump. The thing was, it was on the same stream that we got the water from in the well in the neighbor’s yard. I’m sure that we gained all kinds of protection from diseases because we were drinking it all the time! The only well close by was the neighbor’s, and it was on the same stream that our toilet was on.
I recall, after leaving R, going curling in the high school play-downs in Saskatoon. We stayed at the King George Hotel. We had never been to a hotel before with running water: a toilet that flushed, and water, and taps. I had never seen that before! That would be 1949 or 1950.
We had never seen that before. We just sat there: flush, flush, flush! Couldn’t believe all this water here! It was amazing!
Three students were with me. I skipped a team from the village and we played the provincial champion.
But it was easier to go from natural ice to artificial ice in Saskatoon than it would be for people on artificial ice to go to natural ice because we had to learn… we didn’t have matched rocks… we had to learn how to read ice, because it was deadly… we had to learn how to read the rocks, because they were all different… and for anybody from more sophisticated rinks to go to what we had to learn from, they couldn’t do it!
But we adjusted pretty well. We didn’t win, but we were pretty proud of ourselves! But, in the hotel, everybody was as surprised as me because nobody in R had running water.
317 When somebody told me they finally got water in R, I laughed like heck! I’m not sure what year it would be but I think it would be the latter ‘50s. I got a letter from somebody that “they’ve got running water now in R!” And I said “Oh, good!”
Actually, what happened was, they had one tap in kind of a slough area: one tap where people could go and open the tap and get water and take it home. And that was their running water: one tap, for the whole community!
It’s like that cartoon where the guy was building an outdoor toilet for ‘His’ and ‘Hers’. He built ‘His’ hole about a foot wide and ‘Hers’ about a foot and a half wide: then wondered how come he got hit over the head! ______
There is an article that I wrote, and I’ll see if I can find it for the next time you’re around, probably… I don’t how long ago. But, it was one where I had prepared a speech for if I was ever called upon to deliver a speech, and it was an emergency, that I would have something available. It was on my philosophy of life: about a twenty-minute speech.
When my daughter came over, she brought a bunch of stuff that she rescued from the house and this speech just happens to be in it. It’s a three-page thing.
There’s a piece in it at the end where this guy says… I don’t know where I borrowed it from… where the guy says “You know, we’re in this life all backwards! It’s too bad we couldn’t die first!” Then he went through the entire program that we would have until, at the very end of our life, we would come back as an orgasm!
It’s so funny! I had forgotten that I put that together. I had to take it into one of the other residents to read it to her and I couldn’t go through it without laughing.
I don’t know when I wrote it. I don’t think there’s a date on it but I know I’ve got it here so I’ll show it to you.
END OF PART 1
Interview number 2, August 19, 2016
Well, I think I mentioned a very traumatic thing that haunts me today about running over my own dog. I was thirteen years old I think. My cousin and I were hauling a granary out to the farm, about three miles away, on skids. 290 I had this beautiful little cocker spaniel and I had put her up close to the door at the front and she would come running to the back of the granary because I was riding in the granary.
290 T and Jo (Josephene) the pet that was killed, about 1947/48. 318 Anyway, she fell out at the front, went under the skids of the granary. I jumped out beside her and watched her as she rolled through to the end.
I went to pick her up and she was about that thin (R indicated a thin, rolled out object with his hands). It was terrible, and I felt it was my fault. And it was!
She bit me and I had to get my cousin to kill her with an axe, which is all I had. Even today, I still have nightmares about that incident. I still see her rolling around underneath the skids. It was such a traumatic thing for me that I still live that, and I believe that I’m stuck with that for the rest of my life. Well, I know I am: it’s seventy years later! And I still sometimes have nightmares about it, oddly, and for some reason, whatever it is! Anyway, that’s a tragic incident of my youth that I haven’t gotten over.
It’s one of those incidents that won’t go away. Of course, I’ve been overprotective of every animal I’ve had, and all animals ever since. That’s good: yeah. So, animals have played quite a role in my life.
Anyway, that brings me to being about seventeen years of age and I think I mentioned I was in North B, totally broke, and wrote a letter to ‘normal school’ and to the bank for a job. I decided to go to the one that answered first and that’s how I get into teaching. Normal school happened to be the first one to answer.
It’s a good thing because I would never have kept my fingers out of the dead accounts in the bank. I know, I would have seen all the dead accounts and cleaned them out and probably still be in jail for it! So, it was a good choice, in order to avoid the jail! (R chuckled)
I tried to quit normal school because I wasn’t learning anything. I went to Dr. Bates, who was a psychologist of sorts, and I told him it would be about in March. I said “You know, I’m not learning anything here and I think I should quit!” He said “R, hang in there until the end of the year and at least get a teacher’s ticket!” So, I did hang in until the end of the year.
I failed one exam, and it was in music. I had a run-in with the music instructor. I was in the band, I was an orchestra leader, I was in the choir, I could play half a dozen different instruments, and I finally went to him after class one day and said “Why don’t you try teaching music!?”
I was a very critical, snotty nosed, seventeen-year-old. So, I got 35/100 in music as my final mark and that’s on record at the normal school, no doubt! So, it suits me fine.
Normal school, at that time, I described as a repository for incompetent senior teachers! I think at that time it was. There were a lot of them there that were totally incompetent, but they had a job.
319 I remember one of our instructors coming into the classroom one day and he said to the class “I just don’t have anything to teach you today!” It was in mathematics. “I don’t have anything to teach you today so, don’t make too much noise!” And away he went! I admired him for his honesty!
Anyway, my first school was in a place called C which is down just north of S. It was a two-room school. I had grade one to six, thirty-three students, with thirteen in grade one and twenty others. I went there because they paid a bonus for every student you had over twenty of $25.
So, I had a bonus of $325, which was big: it bought me a car, my first car, which was called an ‘Americar.’ It was a car made by Jeep. It had a Jeep motor and it had no second gear because it was broken. But I had the money to buy it!
Anyway, I soon found a family who were very musical and I joined them quite often. They were very poor people but they had a piano. He played the piano well by ear and I learned a lot of piano from him. The mother played the violin and the three kids all played instruments. So, we had an orchestra and I enjoyed it!
I remember the chairman of the local Board came to my classroom and said to me “I notice you’re fraternizing with the Wyatt family and we don’t think you should!”
They were a very poor family, so they didn’t have a very good reputation in this Anglo- Saxon community. So, I said “Well, you’ve got a choice then! You either fire me or you stay out of my private life!” And, I said that to this chairman of the board, and I was eighteen years of age! That was the end of that effort on his part.
I had a very good Christmas concert! That was how teachers were judged in those days. So, I was well-liked in the community because I had a good Christmas concert! And I curled there. There was a one sheet rink: I impressed them as I was already an accomplished curler.
The principal of the school was a woman from Ontario who had a daughter with a thirty- eight-inch chest… breast… in a thirty-two-inch sweater! She was trying to pawn this daughter off on me and I wasn’t interested. Well, she tried to get… well, she did… she ordered me to teach grade twelve physics to her daughter after hours. But I didn’t fall for it! And, I’m glad I didn’t!
She eventually ended up marrying a wealthy farmer, so she was all right! But, the old girl… the mother… she must’ve been at least forty or forty-five… or fifty… she came to my classroom every day at four o’clock or three-thirty and cried!
She always cried because she just hated the students that she had to work with. And here I am eighteen years of age and my first school! So, I remember that.
320 I then, almost by accident, ended up in H P, Alberta. I taught school there, grade six I think it was. I say almost by accident as I threw a dart at the wall and decided where to go! So, I ended up in the Peace River country and that’s how I ended up in H P.
I had these three jobs to keep me going and in money. By that time, I had learned how to drink! So, the next year… the second year I was there… they had made me principal of a school in a place called C Creek, which was almost on L S Lake.
I had two really good-looking girls, young teachers from Edmonton, on staff. They gave them the teacherage and I ended up in a shack, an awful shack.
The one arrived pregnant and the other… she got married to somebody. But, anyway, I got into difficulties there. I got into trouble with the law.
Well, I was curling in a place called McL, which is past H P toward Grand Prairie, with my friend S, the grandfather with the curler for the H in Ontario… and we had a really good team! I played third with L S.
We lost, bang bang! So, we went back to the hotel and the hotel owner wanted an extra day rate for our room. This was about four o’clock in the afternoon. Well, the dentist stole all the towels from the room, L upset the bed… these are grown people… and I didn’t want to be outdone! So, I threw the mattress out on the fire escape.
Well, the following week, somebody was in the hotel and they ripped the carpet up from one end to the other in the hallway! They didn’t know who did it, but they knew who put this mattress on the fireplace. So, I got charged with endangering people’s lives under the Criminal Code.
I didn’t know anything about law or courts. I had a summons to appear in court in High Prairie and I’m living sixty miles down the road in C Creek. So, I thought I’d go the next day, which I did. I stayed and did my work in C Creek and I went on Saturday to go to court.
Well, of course, court was the day before and they’d already issued a warrant. So, they got the local magistrate… who was in opposition to L S in the hardware business, but also the local magistrate… and the policeman was somebody that I had taken out his girlfriend a few times. That didn’t sit very well. Anyway, I had quite a few strikes against me!
When he asked me how I wanted to be heard, I said “Well, by Judge!” Well, he wasn’t a judge, so he said “That’s fine! We’ll keep you for three weeks until we can get a judge in!”
“No, no!” I said “I want you!”
“Oh!” he said “All right. Well, how do you plead to section 272?” … and I’ll never forget it from the Criminal Code… and I said “I plead guilty!” because I did throw a mattress out.
321 But I had no idea that this was an indictable offense under the Criminal Code. I didn’t know what that was!
So, he said “Three weeks in Fort Saskatchewan!” So, that’s the trouble I got into.
So, up to Peace River I go, to jail! I resigned my job because I wanted to protect my teaching certificate.
It took five days to get out of jail to appeal it. A dentist somewhere in the Yukon paid my bond, whatever was required, and I think it was about $1000… way beyond what I could raise! But, it was some dentist that I’d never met. He was Oriental, I believe Japanese. I was told by my friends in H P that was who had the money and got me out of jail!
I went back to Saskatchewan and no sooner got here when I got a call to go up to S River, to teach, because somebody had become pregnant and they needed a teacher up there. I went up there and finished the year.
That ended my early start in teaching. I decided I should go back to university. I went down to O, Saskatchewan, and that whole area in the late ‘50s was doing oil drilling. So I became a roughneck on an oil rig. In those days, if you were willing to do anything, you had a job.
I went for my first job and I lied to them. I told him I was experienced on the floor! I had one shift before they fired me, but I learned what they’re doing on that one shift because they were doing a fast hole.
Then I got a second job with another rig: all kinds of terrible things on that rig!
There were a few deaths on that rig from the way they operated… if you don’t know what this is about, it won’t make any sense to you. Anyway, people would ‘break out’, as it was called, disconnecting the pipes. They would do it from the floor just by force. If the cable breaks, which it did periodically if they were careless, it would wrap around… and you around… the pole!
A fellow on a previous shift got wrapped around the pole… like tight, and it would kill of course… by steel cable from bottom to top. That was the kind of work I did for a while.
I couldn’t stand that very long. It was a $1.95 an hour, which was big money in 1957, if you worked overtime. I put in a thirty-two-hour shift, then slept for a while, and put in a sixteen-hour shift. I thought “Boy, I’ve got a pot full of money!”
I had to go to Manitoba to see my grandfather, who was dying from Parkinson’s, and I came back to find out they didn’t give me one cent of overtime because, in those days, you did your overtime according to your pay schedule - if you got paid once a month or once every two weeks. I lost all of my overtime! So, I said “Well, that’s enough of this business!”
322 I saw an ad in the paper where they needed a teacher in C, which is halfway between Regina and Saskatoon just south of D, and I went there on the first of October. Another teacher had disappeared for whatever reason… I can’t remember why the job was open.
I had a really good year there! I taught grade seven and eight in that school. I enjoyed it. I loved the community. I still stop in when I go through to Regina with friends. I made the reunions in that village: I just thoroughly enjoyed it!
I had a principal by the name of C who hated the place. I was introduced to the village by going into his office the night before I started school. He told me what a terrible town it was and how he hated it! And I found out soon enough as to why he hated it. It was because he was not a very competent person and he would hate and be hated in most places he would go to. 291 Sure enough, he ended up in PACI292 up here. When I moved up to Prince Albert, who was sitting there snoring in the staff room but C!
I had a girlfriend (in C) and some good friends there. My girlfriend got killed in a car accident. She rolled her car, and that was a tough experience for me, and a tough experience for the family.
Her mother: I would stop in to visit her mother right up until last spring! She was 103. She just died four months ago.
So, anyway, C was a good year.
From there, I went back to university. Then, I realized I didn’t have a car. I saw an ad in the paper where they needed a social worker in S C and that job came with a car. I thought “Well, I’ll become a social worker with a new car!” And I got the job. I did that for two years. It was quite an experience.
I loved S C. I had good friends there. One of my good friends, I talked to him yesterday. He lives out in T, B.C. But I still have friends in S C and it’s a lot of years later!
Social work was a good experience! I did everything from protection to unwed mothers to punitive fathers to probation services. I covered the whole gamut: mother’s allowances, childcare, foster homes, foster children. It was a huge, huge, job: the entire southwest corner of the province. It followed the North Saskatchewan River to the Alberta border, south of East End then over and up past Shaunavon, Gull Lake and back into S C.
291 (Middle left) T at C…, SK - 1956.
292 Prince Albert Collegiate Institute. 323 It was a huge area. I had 130 on my caseload, or something like that, but I was young and full of spit and vinegar, so I made the best of it. I managed to make my expense account subsidize my income a bit. You learn those things quickly, if you’re so inclined. And, I must admit, I was! I was pretty good at it.
Anyway, I never had any complaints. But, they only paid $3.25 a day for meals, you know, and if you wanted to use the car for personal business, you had to give them five cents a mile. Well, all I had to do was disconnect the speedometer… so I never used the car for private use that way.
From there, where did I go? Let’s just stop for a minute. (R pauses to gather his thoughts) Oh, yeah! I went into summer school trying to pick up my French 102. I had taken French 101, which was grade twelve French, somewhere along the line and for some reason or another I got passed on it. But, it took me … I think it was five times I had to write French 102.
I got 49/100 the first time. Then I got 32. That’s about as high as I could get. I got all my credits in history: I got a pile of A’s in history! In my education classes, very poor!
I eventually went to the French teacher who was leaving the next day for Paris … and I knew that… and by this time, in 1965, I had become married. I knew I didn’t know enough French to pass it! I didn’t know at the time a part of it was hearing problems: what he said and what I heard were entirely different things!
Anyway, I went to him in the Arts building where his office was at night and I said “You know, this is the fifth time I’ve written this exam! Today I wrote it!” Then, I said “I don’t know enough French to pass it, and I know that, but” I said “you have sixty papers to mark and you’re going to Paris in the morning! I know you can do an adequate job of it overnight, tonight, and that’s fair!”
By this time, I’m twenty-eight and I’m a little smarter. I said “I want you to know that it’s going to cost me $2000 in wages alone if I don’t get a pass in this! It’s the difference between a degree and a non-degree.” I said “I’ll be on that airplane right behind you to Paris and will have a discussion over there if you fail me!”
“Well” he says, “do you promise not to teach it?” I’ll never forget that: “Do you promise not to teach it?” That’s how I got my French.
So, I saw an ad in the paper where they needed a teacher at Prince Albert …. In those days, you could quit a job at ten in the morning and get a new one at one o’clock. I know that because I was in that milieu for a long time.
I came up for an interview. At that time, the principal did the hiring. So, he said on the phone “Can you come up tomorrow?”
324 I came up to PA on a Saturday or Sunday to his house. His wife was there and she made a nice meal for us: lovely people! He said “Do you think you can handle the students?” - ‘cause I was only twenty-five years old by that time - and I said “I wouldn’t have applied if I couldn’t handle it!” That’s what I answered and I guess that’s what he wanted to hear. So, I became a teacher at that place in 1960.
In 1964, I got married to V, who was a beauty queen locally. She was very bright, secretary to government in Winnipeg and Regina in charge of organizing on behalf of Cabinet… whatever social functions are required of people like that.
We were married forty years. We adopted J in 1976: J D is her name…
J is a Doctor of A and a pediatric specialist. She has her own clinic …. She teaches A at … University in … three or four times a year in terms of contract work.
She is the light of my life. She has two sons, seven and eleven now but they will be eight and twelve in December.
My wife died twelve years ago from a combination of cancer and lupus and adrenaline dysfunction. Just what she died of, probably I’ll never know for sure. But it wasn’t cancer, although she was in remission fifteen years and fighting it.
I know she developed lupus at the end, and that was bad. But, her death was probably a shutdown of the adrenaline with no blood pressure whatsoever left. I don’t know a lot more, but she was a very, very, accomplished person herself: a lovely person!
Once that ended twelve or thirteen years ago, I became a bachelor again and I’m a good bachelor. I’ve enjoyed bachelorhood and I still enjoy it. I have no desire whatsoever to get hung up with another relationship. I never did have. Not because I have any moral or religious or spiritual connections. I just enjoy life as it is right now.
I think I’d like to stop for few minutes. (We paused)
I have, over the years, had many occasions to go to Regina, particularly on school board business and/or municipal government business. When I go through C, I nearly always stop at the cemetery and pay tribute to my old friend, my old girlfriend. I usually take some flowers and leave them. My wife knew that I was doing that, I wasn’t hiding it.
My girlfriend’s name was M. I was in C and she was the matron at the hospital. There was a hospital there at the time and, in a town that size, you met everybody. I went with her all the time that I was there.
Later on, until last year, I’d put the flowers on the grave and then go see the mother who was still alive: a very old lady. She was in a nursing home and I would stop in to visit with her and tell her that I put some flowers on her and her husband’s grave site, which were side by side. I said “I always stop at the cemetery because I don’t know whether you’re
325 still alive or not, and I don’t want to come here if you’re not alive! So, I always stop at the cemetery and, when I see you’re not buried there, I know you’re alive and I come in for a visit!”
But, she died this year: I think in June. I was disappointed that I wasn’t informed because I would’ve gone down to her funeral, just out of respect. So, that’s about all that I would say about that.
Tragedies happen to everybody in life. I’ve had other tragedies, you know, but life has to go on. I had to put this dog down when I ended up with shingles: this one up here (pointed to the picture on his wall). I ended up with shingles and I had to put that little guy down. You know, it’s just how attached you can get to animals!
My wife’s mother taught school at PA... She taught Home Economics, so I knew her. When I arrived, she was involved in a wedding. Her youngest daughter was getting married. She is in S now but was living in W R. She just became a widow last year.
Her son is the president of that soccer team in… what do they call them, the Breakers, no! That soccer team in … B.C.? … Her other son is a lawyer in Toronto and he just went off to Jamaica to do some legal work for a company that he owns down there. They are both doing very well!
Anyway, she was getting married and that’s where I happened to stumble across this one, the sister, and I said: “Well, where’s the good-looking one?”
At that time, she was working in Regina so I drove her down to Regina and she thanked me for the ride. And I got mad about that before I left Regina! I thought, “I drove all the way down here and I’m driving back to PA and this is all I get as a thank you?!”
Not only is it a five-hour drive down here but it’s five hours back. I was pissed off, to say the least! So I phoned her and said “I’m coming back! The least you could do is kiss me good night!” So, I went back to her apartment. 293 She ended up back here in PA so we got together. I had to drop another girl that I was with who lives in Texas now. She and I correspond back and forth. But I had to go and tell her that I wouldn’t be seeing her anymore.
I had quite a few women in my life that made life interesting.
293 Poem for Muffie (Spookie) - by V
God saw you getting weary Although we were heartbroken Your little eyes were dim. To lose our dearest friend He knew it was time to stop the pain I know the time will come someday And take you up with Him. When we will meet again. 326 We got married in December but we started going together probably in June or July of that year. We got married on 29 December because I wanted to take advantage of the income tax benefits at the time. We got a full year because it wasn’t prorated. It was a practical solution.
In 1967, I took a position over in Borneo with the federal government. A lot of people asked us, “Why on earth would you go over to Borneo?” Why, why? And I was almost resentful because it was none of their business why! Because I didn’t know myself why!
So I would say “Oh, I’m going to go over and find myself” You know, that was the standard line at the time? I often wondered if I didn’t find myself over there! But, that was another experience that I wouldn’t trade for anything.
We were there over a year. I was into my second year: it came at the end of the school year. We saw a lot of Southeast Asia, and I became a changed person in terms of my attitude toward life.
It would have been very much a turning point in my life, I think, in terms of my thinking and my acceptance of people, acceptance of situations, acceptance of different cultures. ‘Acceptance’ became very much a part of my vocabulary and it still is. It’s a permanent fix that I like, and I like a lot. And I spread that gospel as much as I can! 294 I think I had to wait until I came back to Canada to get the full impact of what I had done previously. We landed in Vancouver and went straight to a hotel, or motel. When we got to the motel and went to open the door. The door here was into the beer parlor, or drinking section, and just as I was opening this door, the door flew open and I guess they threw a guy out, drunk, on the sidewalk.
I thought “You know, come to think of it, I haven’t seen a drunk for year or so! I haven’t seen one! I’m obviously back in Canada!” This is something I hadn’t seen and I’d forgotten that I hadn’t seen it. That was a bit of a shock!
As time went on, as remote a culture as they were where I was, I began to realize I had a lot to learn from these people.
We were in Sarawak, in the northern part of Borneo, about 150 miles upriver. The mail from Toronto, which was the Globe and Mail Air Edition that I ordered, arrived in Singapore, then from Singapore by boat or by plane over to Kuching, which was the capital of Sarawak, through the South China Sea up 150 miles. It took five days to get the Globe and Mail. That’s better service than we get from here to Saskatoon! Figure that one out!
294 T and V in Sarawak, 1968. 327 I came back, met up with a friend that I knew from S C, and we bought a fishing camp in LaRonge. It was a big camp. We had twenty-nine cabins.
My friend is dead now but his name was O. He and I did a lot of things together in S C. He was from Regina actually. He was the salesman for Western T. His dad was one of the owners of Western T.
Anyway, we bought this fishing camp. It had twenty-nine cabins, twenty-nine boats and motors. We had a Lodge, two grocery outlets and a filleting plant. It was huge and in three locations.
The best location across the lake at H Bay was at the first narrows. There were seven cabins there of the twenty-nine. We had five cabins further up in H Bay, across from a fellow by the name of V who had some other cabins out there. And, we had property in Wapaweeka Lake which was all silica sand.
It was a big operation: way, way too big for two people. It took us seven years to go broke, but we did. It was just too much!
We got out of it alive! So that was another experience. And all of that I was doing while I was teaching school.
So, once it was over, I came back to PA and that’s when I got into municipal politics. In about 1972 or 1973, I ran for city council. I lost: I didn’t win!
I had six or seven teachers having a party. I went there three times before the day was over and I said “You guys, you’ve got to get out to vote because I need your vote!”
I lost by four votes. They didn’t get out to vote! So I said, when it was over, “If you guys had gone out…!” And the one guy says “Well, it’s better to lose by four than it is by eleven!” What a rude guy! (R laughed)
Anyway, they all eventually ended up nominating me next year, because there was a by- election, and I got in. Then, I served for eleven years on the City Council. I was a very, very, active person, to say the least.
328 My daughter was showing me a scrapbook that I didn’t realize my wife had put together. I did a pretty good job. I don’t have any negatives there at all in my life. I’m pretty proud of it!
With the hunting camp, I learned a lot about business. I found that, if you don’t fail at something, you’re probably not learning anything. The people who keep making the same mistakes are bound to get the same results.
We eventually had to give the town property back to the property owner who was holding the mortgage, which was a hotel owner and a big property owner in Prince Albert. But we kept the H… Bay project, which was the main generator of cash. It was mostly Americans who we brought out.
You made your money off the Americans! You don’t make it off the Canadians because Canadians bring their own boats, they bring their own motors, and they expect to be treated the same way as you treat somebody who was paying for it!!
It was a good learning experience. We even tried ‘guaranteed moose hunting’. Which is another experience, but we tried it!
There was a lake halfway between Doré Lake and LaRonge called E. There had been a forest fire through there and that’s where you go to find a lot of moose. So, we found an empty cabin up there, and the guy who owned it, and we rented it. Then we advertised ‘guaranteed moose hunting!’
I remember one of the first groups that came through. There were four of them. We flew them then through Athabasca Airways at that time to Emmeline Lake. We put a couple of canoes on the plane and the side and flew them in there.
I went out to see them, I think the next day, and there was a coffee table about the size of a card table in the yard. There were four rifles pointed in four directions, all of them loaded!
I said “What in hell are you guys doing?” They said “Well, we’re waiting for a moose, and if it comes from whatever direction it comes from, look out!!”
One guy was drunk and he had at least a $1000 hunting outfit on. I took him out duck hunting and he had a 10gauge Magnum. Well, the first bird he hit, there was nothing left of it! It was an antiaircraft gun! I said “Oh, you guys…!”
Anyway, lots of experiences.
Some Americans came up through Montana. They were hunting antelope, and antelope travel in large numbers together. They went back to the border by two o’clock in the afternoon: they had shot their limit. They couldn’t believe how quick it was!
329 When the Custom’s guy came out, they had these animals all stacked on top of their wagon, or whatever it was. What they had done was shoot four calves! They couldn’t believe how easy it was! Well, the Custom’s guys took their vehicle, fined them, took their guns: took everything!
But… they had shot four calves…!
END OF PART 2
Interview number 3, August 23, 2016
Upon getting ready to fly home from Sarawak, we boarded a plane in Sibu and flew on to Brunei.
When we got to Brunei, there was quite a thing going on. The Sultan was crowning himself that day as the Sultan of Brunei. His father had died. There was quite a parade out there at the aircraft and they mistook me for an official because I had a suit and tie on. So, I went out of the plane and inspected the troops and did what I thought important people are supposed to do!
Being a brash prairie boy from Saskatchewan, it seemed only logical that I should inspect the troops. And I did quite a good job of it, until the right aircraft arrived. It was the blue- and-white one with the proper official on it, and it was an Englishman.
So, my wife and I were taken into custody, which was interesting! But, I had a passport that had a special inscription on it hoping that we would get favorable consideration, because my title was ‘an advisor to the government of Malaysia.’
Well, being taken into custody gave me an opportunity to see the Sultan’s golden carriage… an incredible piece of equipment… and I got a chance to see the gold roof on the temple in Brunei.
We were escorted back to the airplane and escorted out of the country. Barely any harm that day, but it was an interesting incident!
We arrived in Jesselton, which is now Kota Kinabalu in Sabah, which is the northern province of Malaysia. From there, we went on to Manila. We no sooner got into Manila, and this was in the latter part of August, when we were in the middle of an earthquake: a very, very, serious earthquake. It was 7.2 on the Richter scale.
The hotel we were in was severely damaged. We were on the third floor and that’s where the hotel breaks apart...!
There was a lot of damage. The apartment building next door to us: there were 250 killed in that immediately!
330 President Marcos was in deep trouble at that time and was about to lose his position. So, because of this disaster that took place in Manila at the time, there was a demolition group from Hong Kong that offered their services to assist in the rescuing of these people that were in this apartment block. He decided that he would supervise it personally.
He got a cherry picker with bulletproof glass and got it set up beside where this rubble was and, ostensibly, personally supervised the demolition for his people. He got his picture, of course, in the paper: that ‘Here is our beloved President doing this kind of work!’
The end result of that was another 250 died from heat prostration because of his failure to use expert people from Hong Kong! But, he also got another dozen years of power. So it worked out for him very well. But, that was another incident…
So, we were in an earthquake, a serious one. I remember we crawled out of the hotel, but relatively uninjured. I broke a toe, but that’s all, and I had a bottle of whiskey in my hand which I had because we had crawled out through a bar.
That bottle of whiskey was very handy because we went and sat under a tree and there were a lot of people who needed a lot of help. Whiskey was a good assistant. I gave everybody a drink out of this whiskey!
We went on from there, eventually got out of the Philippines, and we ran into a typhoon on the way to Hong Kong. These clouds are seven miles high, vertical, and we had to fly all the way around them.
It was a remarkable experience to have an earthquake, a typhoon, then also a volcano. I got photographs of looking down into the volcano as it’s erupting. To have a volcano, typhoon and an earthquake within a week… when you’re not going to have one of those in a lifetime… but we had three in a week!
It was an amazing escape from Brunei. So I wanted to include that as part of my story!
I couldn’t go past the second floor in any building for almost three months because I got dizzy. I got disorientated, and that was from the earthquake.
Actually, there were two buildings I think about twenty feet apart, and they crashed into each other. I’ve got photographs of the two buildings where they punched holes in each other! And these are only six-story buildings!
It was a wild experience, coming back. But that’s what I wanted to add with respect to leaving Borneo. Now where were we?
(The interviewer brought T up to speed where we left off at the end of session two, e.g. the hunting camps, the American hunters who shot calves instead of antelope, and the Custom’s officers that seized the hunter’s equipment)
331 Well, there were a lot of experiences like that when we had the fishing camp up north. But, most of the fishermen who came up were pretty knowledgeable people. I know that, in the one case where I had to fly a guy out of Emmeline Lake cabin, he refused to pay for all of the expenses we had flying them in and flying them back out.
He refused to pay, so I found his vehicle in L. It was a station wagon sort of thing, a van, and he owned a sports store of some kind. There was all kinds of equipment inside that van, like fishing tackle and fishing rods and so on, that mysteriously disappeared after I left. I found them sometime later in my possession! So, I was able to get my money back. But, those are things you have to do if you’re going to survive.
So, that’s where we were, so I don’t know where we are going to go from there.
Well, after that experience, that would bring us up into the mid ‘70s probably.
From 1970 to 1977, I got involved in the fishing camp along with my teaching, but as soon as that ended I got involved in municipal politics, again along with my teaching. In about 1980 or ‘82, I became an extremely active elected person. I had some aspirations that I wanted to achieve and, looking back on it, I think I was pretty successful.
I wanted to redevelop the downtown area and I was very instrumental in that as I was Chairman of Parks and Recreation for many years in the city. We developed Prime Minister’s Park, which maybe you have seen, adjacent to Carlton Comprehensive High School.
We developed that park… and that included three ball diamonds, lit ball diamonds, the Harry Jerome track, the development of the Communiplex, or… if you like… the Art Hauser Centre, the arena… on that property and it became a central recreational area in the middle of the city. I was involved in that right from day one as Chairman of Parks and Recreation, and I had my finger in all of those things.
I was Chairman of the Museum Board when we developed the museum on the riverbank from the old fire hall and, also, the Museum of Corrections which is up at the Chamber of Commerce building on Marquis Road and Second Avenue, and the old schoolhouse which is up there with its interior.
That schoolhouse is well visited by a lot of people and so is the Museum of Corrections, as it’s called.
I was vice chairman of the hospital board, the Victoria Hospital Board, and I served on that board for seven years.
The Communiplex was put out for a competition for what it should be named, and Communiplex seemed to be the most appropriate name. But, when somebody comes around as Art Hauser did with $1,000,000, you can’t afford not to put his name on it. It’s as simple as that!
332 The same thing with the new center out by the hospital, the Fieldhouse. When people are prepared to put a lot of money into something, we couldn’t afford to turn it down. It’s as simple as that, in dollars and cents.
Following my retirement from teaching in 1986, I looked around for things to do with my life. I spent a couple of years doing a lot of supplementary teaching and that sort of thing. I ran into A C, who was very big and early in the addictions business in Saskatchewan, and A and I hit it off very well. By that time, I had sobered up completely. Well, not completely, but in the sixth month.
They needed a treatment supervisor at S L Rehab Centre. I applied and got the job. I made an agreement, with A as Chairman, that I would stay for five years. I stayed for six and we achieved a lot of good things at that treatment center.
It was a two-week program, as opposed to the regular treatment of twenty-eight days at other centers. We took in fifteen to sixteen clients every Friday, each Friday, so we ran two programs going simultaneously
We had four counsellors and myself. People used to ask me “Well, how successful are you?” “You can’t be successful in two weeks?” was really what they were saying. “How successful are you?” they’d say, and I would say “Well, we’re 100% successful!”
They’d say “How can you be 100% successful?” “Well,” I said “we set out to deliver a good program, and we do, and we’re very successful at it! But, if the question you’re asking is how many of them sobered up and stayed sober: those who get into a follow-up program had a good chance of retaining their sobriety!” And many did! “But, those who didn’t have a very good follow-up program were doomed to repeat the same mistakes. And that’s the way it is!” And that was our philosophy.
So we pushed hard to get people into an AA program. That’s the type of program that is no longer pushed hard enough, in my opinion.
Today, they’re even teaching people how to drink. From my experiences, I don’t know of an alcoholic yet who needs to be taught how to drink!
Anyway, I kept the job. During that time, my wife developed cancer: lymphoma. There was a lot of travelling back and forth to Saskatoon to the University Hospital where she was taking treatments.
She remained in remission for fifteen years. But it was fifteen years of very difficult living. She eventually contracted lupus, which is a very difficult disease as well, and she died... as I understand it… of adrenaline gland problems where she lost all her blood pressure.
She died in one day! I took her in the hospital at ten o’clock in the morning and she died at 8 PM that day. Looking back on it, that’s a marvelous way to go! I wouldn’t have wanted her to have suffered any more than she had already suffered.
333 I don’t remember how we found out that she had cancer. She found out when she was in the hospital in Saskatoon. She was being examined, probably on the basis of some blood work, and J… and I went in that day... of course, we went in almost every day… when she announced to us that she had been diagnosed that day and she had to start her chemotherapy.
I don’t recall the circumstances that led to her finding out. The impact on J… was pretty difficult. She was going to university in M while this was going on. There were a couple of times when she had to leave the university and come back to stay with us for a week, mainly because we had health problems.
We had a car accident, my wife and I, in Saskatoon where we got broadsided. I had two fractures of my pelvis… you never get one fracture of the pelvis, by the way: it’s always two!
She had some damage to her back. I ended up on the street outside the car. Eventually I woke up when the ambulance was there to load me up.
I got into the hospital. The only test that they did on me, apart from taking a photograph of my crotch, was they asked me “Do you know where you are?”
I looked up at the ceiling… I had been in that hospital fifty times if I’d been in it once… and I said “Yeah, I’m at the University Hospital!” So, therefore, I don’t have a concussion, you know: I don’t have any problems because I answered the question clearly. The reason I knew I was there was because I looked at the ceiling!
They sent us home that day, just like that! They sent us home the same day, within hours. The treatment was awful, to say the least! Yeah!
I had to go in a half ton truck and I stayed at my niece’s house in Saskatoon, and V did as well. The next day, my niece and nephew had to drive us to Prince Albert and that’s when J had to come to give us some help.
I was completely bedridden, well, chesterfield ridden, for about two weeks because I simply couldn’t get up. I couldn’t move! You have to wait for your crotch to heal.
That was around 1994, in there somewhere. J was in university at the time and she had to take an extended leave to come home. She felt she had to take leave. I didn’t want her to but, she felt she had to: she wanted to and she did!
By the way, when she finished her master’s degree in M, she was awarded top student in her class.
She got some awards in Phoenix, too, when she did her doctorate in a…. I’m really proud of her. She and I were very, very, close and continue to be close. We are important to each other.
334 So, that brings us back to where we’re at, I guess. I don’t know where to go from here!
It took three or four months, something like that, to recover from the accident. It took probably a couple months before I dared walk and even that was difficult. But I did recover. In fact, I recovered well enough to go back curling! I can show you a picture of myself curling where I’m pretty much flat on the ice.
My wife recovered, her back, but she had so many other health problems with the cancer, the chemotherapy, that this was just another aggravation. I guess that would be the right term.
She wasn’t a strong woman physically but mentally she was pretty strong. She surprised me in all kinds of things through our married life.
She was a model to start with: a professional model. She taught a lot of young people, girls, modelling in PA and around.
She was very, very, good on her feet in impromptu speeches. It just blew me away! I hadn’t realized she had that talent until a few times, when I was on City Council, she had an occasion to respond to either questions from the audience, or whatever.
When she was on her feet, she was very, very, fluent. She was very good at it! It surprised me. But, the world is full of surprises!
When my wife V died, I didn’t have any kind of a reaction. I think I’ve mentioned that, but I may not have. And I feel good about that. It doesn’t take away from any other respect, admiration and, I suppose, ‘love’ you could call it: that I cared. It didn’t take away from that, and I can’t do anything about how I feel!
I have a very close friend in British Columbia by the name of R M. He and I were old pals when I worked in S C as a social worker. He had two drugstores in S C, along with a
335 partner, and we’ve been close friends since 1958 when I first went to S C. In fact, I had a chat with him a couple days ago.
We communicate by email and just phoning each other. He is about four years older than I am. He had serious health problems and we kind of leaned on each other for a bit. But, we’ve done enough bad things together… and neither one of us regret it… so we’ve got a real good friendship.
I’ve always found that a person is privileged to have one or two good friends in a lifetime, three maybe if you’re really lucky, but I’ve got one left that still alive and that’s R. So I cherish that very much. His wife and my wife were good friends, his kids and my daughter J were good friends.
It’s funny! I had a woman come in here since you were here last who has a son who was a very promising hockey player. His grandfather drove him all over Saskatchewan and Manitoba, taking him to these various hockey things because he was going to make a National Hockey League player out of this boy. He’s thirty years old now.
His grandfather was my sponsor in AA. He’s dead now, but the boy’s mother … who is my sponsor’s daughter… was worried about him. He separated, or divorced, from his wife and four-year-old daughter and is in a treatment center in B, British Columbia.
“Can I be of any assistance to you?” I asked her, and she said “Yes.” She wanted to know if I could come up with somebody in B.C. who could communicate with this grandson, her son, so two days later I contacted her and told her to come here to my room. I said “I’ve got it lined up where, if your son wants to contact the fellow I’ve got in mind… who is my friend’s son, who I helped many years ago to get into the program… we can line it up. He’s prepared to talk to your son.”
All of a sudden, that whole thing fell apart because she hadn’t expected me to respond that quickly. That’s what she told me. “I didn’t realize that you were going to be able to work that fast!”
I said “Well, my experience with alcoholics is that if they’ve got a problem and they have to wait at C Centre for three weeks before they can get admitted, it’s too late. They need help today, not three weeks from now! So, I assumed that your son needs help. And, by the way, who’s looking after you?”
And that’s what I went with because, I said, “You know, the caregivers are the most neglected people in the world! So, who’s looking after you?” So, we got into that and I offered my services to her.
I don’t seem to be able to escape this kind of life, and I don’t want to escape it… I’m not trying to escape it… but it seems to fall into my lap a lot. For that, I think I’m probably grateful because it certainly kept me sober! If I didn’t have somebody else, at least in attempting to do it, it’s kept me sober for thirty-one years!
336 When I took the job in S L, I had been sober six months. A fellow phoned me, and I think it was through my wife who had called him, who is very active with … radio. To quote and unquote him, he said to me on the phone “R, you are a god damn drunk and I want to take you to a meeting on Monday!” This was probably on a Thursday. I said “Well, all right!”
I’ve known this guy a long time. I was with him when he sobered up, the night he sobered up, and his reaction was “Any time you’re with that bugger for an evening, you’d sober up too!”
I used to tell the story about how I saved his life. But, it’s a bit creative.
He came into the curling club. There used to be a little restaurant there, just a bar, and he was drunk as a skunk. That was in October, 1960. He was drunk - he was drunk most of the time, as a lot of those radio people were.
He was giving me hell for the treatment of his family. He had seven kids. So, I just told him where to go, what I thought of his radio program… which wasn’t much!
I was new in town, I’ve been here for about a month or two months, and I was teaching his kids. He just decided that teachers were good for nothing, just generally speaking… he was drunk and pretty belligerent.
He ordered a bowl of soup. The story I tell, and I’ve told it at several meetings… “He’s got a big nose… he actually fell into his soup and he was drowning! So, I pulled his head out of the soup” and I said “I saved his life!” That was the last drink he had, too, by the way!
Of course, we were good friends right up until about a year ago when he died. He died in a veteran’s center in Saskatoon.
That’s how I got sobered up. I went to my first meeting and thought “How am I ever going to explain to my wife that I went to an AA meeting?” I hadn’t told anybody that I was going. Well, I went there. There were fifty-two people there and I think I knew twenty-five or thirty of them! So, I ended up in AA and I got a sponsor.
So that’s the way it happened. This fellow took me to the first meeting, and I had to go wake him up at the radio station to get there, he made me promise… he said “I don’t want you to have any drinks between now and Monday!” Well, I had my last drink at 7:12 PM, on December 2nd, 1986!
I had to have two or three good hits before I went to the meeting because I knew I would be there with a bunch of drunks. And I was there with a bunch of drunks! So, I took two of them home: two good friends of my wife and me who would explain to her why I had gone to an AA meeting! I was pretty ashamed of myself, but I kept going.
So, that was my introduction to recovery. If there is such a thing as recovery… !
337 My dad’s favorite philosophy, one of the other ones besides “I’m not going to miss that ten dollars ten years from now!” was “Moderation in all things!” That’s pretty good advice. I use it a lot. Even though I’m not living it very well, I can still say it.
I wish I could be moderate in all things, but I’m not. I’m overindulgent in all things! It’s a goal that escapes me, and it’s one that I failed at. Everything I did, I overdid, and that didn’t matter whether it’s the treatment of women, or the amount that I drank, or the amount I smoked, or the work habits that I had. Everything was overkill!
I used to smoke: you bet, a lot! I started smoking when I was thirteen years old. We started smoking with brown paper and leaves from the bush when Fall came. We learned that way how to smoke.
I smoked until about fifteen years ago, and I smoked hard, heavy: pack and a half a day at least!
I liked smoking. I smoked everything that was there. I never smoked any drugs. I had a pipe which I smoked once in a while. I smoked cigars: I loved cigars!
Tobacco got pretty expensive. I was spending about $15 a day on tobacco. That’s a big chunk of cash out of your pocket. Although, I’m no better off having quit! I guess maybe I just put it somewhere else. I don’t know where it goes.
I didn’t want to quit and I didn’t have any plans to but, when I had my carotid artery surgery, I hadn’t smoked for four days… which you couldn’t do in the hospital. I had tried quitting once… I didn’t try very hard… and I thought “I can’t quit because I don’t want to! So, I won’t start. I wonder what it would be like if I don’t start smoking because, that way, I don’t have to quit!”
Anyway, that’s what worked for me. I just decided I won’t start smoking again, so I didn’t have to quit. I hadn’t quit smoking: I just didn’t start!
My carotid artery surgery was about thirteen or fourteen years ago, before my wife died. One day, I had some real tingling in my fingers. I knew I was in trouble because it was most unusual: real tingling along with being dizzy.
I would go to an A&W restaurant, put my head up, try to read what’s high up on the wall and I couldn’t keep my head up. I was getting dizzy.
So there were a number of factors where I knew there was some kind of a problem. When my fingers started tingling, I said “I’m in trouble!” so I went to the doctor. He looked at me and said “Well, we better get a CT scan to start with.”
He couldn’t get one here so he phoned Saskatoon and they told him that they had an opening if I could come in that afternoon. So, I went in and got my scan that day in Saskatoon. I just fluked out!
338 It showed that I had a severe blockage on one side and that it should be operated on to strip all the plaque that was there. And they did! They did the surgery within two months or so.
That was a bit of a rather trying wait, knowing that you’ve got the serious problem. But, I remember going in… and it was Dr. E from E Motors in N B, … and just before he gave me the intravenous to put me to sleep, I told him that “If I haven’t got my mind when I wake up, end it!”
I said “Pull the plug! I don’t want to come back if I haven’t got my mind!” He says “We’re pretty good at this, you know!” And that’s the last thing I remember.
I haven’t had any difficulty with it since. I’ve had occasion to have it included in some of these other x-rays being done and it doesn’t seem to be any necessity, or any particular problem, as far as I know. What the heck, I’m eighty-two years old in a few weeks!
Well, I finished with the operation and went back to work. I’m a workaholic, I guess. As you know, I’ve written quite a few documentaries, and written a lot of obituaries for people. That keeps me busy.
And I bang away at the piano here for the local people.
I ended my council work in 1986. I went on the school board. I’ve been on it for 15 years and, as you know, I’m still on it. I’ve been involved with education continuously really.
You don’t get invited to those things: you go after it. People who say “I’ve got a massive bunch of people telling me I should do this and do that”, they’re liars! The fact is that you’re just sitting down thinking “I think I might as well try and fill this job. There are some things that I can do.”
I felt in my own mind that I had a lot to offer them. I had a lot of teaching experience: every grade in the system. I had international experience. I had municipal experience. I had work experience that went well beyond social work and physical labor, and I thought I had a lot of things to offer the school division. I thought I was a hell of a good candidate.
I think the first time I heard about the vacancy, it was a by-election. There were two of us for two seats and I think we were acclaimed: there was no opposition. And, from then on, it’s been that you simply run for it. It used to be every two years, then it went to three and now it’s four: every four years.
I’ve seen some things happen that I was directly involved with, some of my own initiatives. The most important thing that I’ve achieved in sixty-five years in education was achieved this year.
On February 1st, 2016, we had our first school board meeting with two high school students sitting on the board, attending a school board meeting, and that was my initiative that I
339 worked on for almost four years, i.e. getting our board to accept the fact that we should be including students.
We deal with parents, we deal with provincial politicians, we deal with municipal politicians, we deal with pressure groups, we deal with teachers, yet we’ve never, ever, ever, dealt with the most important people in our lives, and that’s our kids! So, we invited thirty-two students from the entire school division, representatives from each high school, to sit down and organize themselves: to elect an executive and set up a student’s organization.
The tragedy we ran into was that our president (of the student’s organization) had to resign this year because he had done some things that were contrary to what we could allow. Then he was replaced by the VP, and she got killed in a car accident a couple of months ago. She was from C.
So, I’m going to go back to the school division sometime in September. I want to make sure that this organization has a new executive and they can move on and in the same direction that we had been going.
But I have been really, really, pleased with that program. It was my initiative and it was probably the most important one that I’ve done in my life in government! At least I feel that way.
Their contribution, the two of them… both the one who had to resign and the girl who died… they participated in the meetings. Our Chairman now, B, … I taught practically the whole board, and the superintendent I taught… he makes sure that the students get a chance to express themselves. He asked “Is there anything you want to bring forward to the board?” and, if there’s something that involves the students, they’re asked if they have any comment! And they are very, very, vocal. It’s excellent!
On September 19, 2016, the students met and elected a new executive. They already plan to bring ‘Pinball’ Clemons’295 in for a motivational speaker and, as well, are arranging programs to complement their community. Success! WOW!
Anyway, maybe that’s a good place to stop it. I think that’s good for today!
END OF PART 3
295 Michael Lutrell “Pinball” Clemons… (born January 15, 1965) is an American-Canadian Vice- Chair for theToronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League (CFL). Clemons played with the Argos for twelve seasons, and twice served as their head coach. His no. 31 jersey is one of only four that have been retired by the Argos. He is one of the most famous former Argos players, and is also one of the most popular professional athletes in the history of Toronto. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinball_Clemons 340 Interview number 4, August 26, 2016
I have a little bit that I want to put in and I wrote it out. I suppose in this final session, we should review our life and try to evaluate and ask ourselves how we would change things were we to have the choice. In my case, I don’t want to change anything! Our past makes us what we are and that cannot be changed.
It is very important to ‘accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, and latch on to the affirmative and don’t mess with mister in-between!’ That was a very popular song after the war. Society reacted to that particular song because things were pretty bad! I have apologized to those I may have hurt, or slandered, or treated negatively and, in every case, the person did not recall the situation. It was important to me, but it was not even remembered by them!
Of particular concern was my treatment of the opposite sex, from my first love in H P, M, to others in pretty well every place that I lived.
As soon as a relationship started getting serious, it was time for me to escape! That was not very fair, and I felt badly in later years that I had treated people that way. But, it’s the way it was!
Even when I addressed the Caledonian Club in Prince Albert about Robert Burns and the many women in his life… and he was known as a ‘rake’296 and he had many, many, children from various women in his life… I ‘accentuated the positive’ in his story and about how he was 200 years ahead of his time in terms of advocating equality for women.
That has to be the focus of my life now, that is, ‘accentuating the positive.’ The key word, of course, is ‘acceptance’ - of people - as they are, who they are, society as it is, history as it was - and it changes depending on who’s writing it and who has political motivations for putting the history together.
The histories that we read… Hitler in ‘The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich’ by W.L. Shirer (1960)... differ from some of the stuff that’s coming out today. If you read the two histories, it may be entirely different: the same thing with Mussolini, and certainly Joseph Stalin.
So, I think that I have to emphasize for future generations, that they have to learn to accept… not necessarily embrace… but accept life as it is, people as they are, situations as it may be at the time, and move forward from that point. After all, this is of course ‘the first day of our life’, today!
296 ‘Rake’: one definition: noun 1. a dissolute or profligate person, especially a man who is licentious; roué. OriginExpand 1645-55; see rakehell. Synonyms: libertine, profligate, lecher, womanizer. - http://www.dictionary.com/browse/rake.
341 So that’s an opening comment in dealing with what I believe to be the intent of your (the interviewer’s) thesis.
I think it is an accurate assessment, and what I have really appreciated about this experience with you (the interviewer) is that it has provided me with what I think is an endorsement of the efforts that I too have made, in terms of encouraging people to present themselves, to write about themselves, to record about themselves.
What I liked about what you’re doing is that you’re going to have a vehicle to spread that information far more broadly than I could ever do. I believe it’s going to be a very successful enterprise on your part. It deserves the support you’re getting from your sponsors!
I don’t know what else I can say.
(I asked T if he could offer a retrospective comment on aspects of his biography wherein he helped change a person’s life, i.e. when he took on those work positions)
Well, in the S L work, when I took the job on, I recognized it was going to be a five-year commitment on my part. It turned out to be a six-year commitment.
I felt when I took the job on that I could complete what I wanted to complete, what I could complete, within that time period. And within the time period left of my life, for that matter. I didn’t want to give it more than that amount of time.
I dealt with approximately 3500 clients directly. I was directly involved with all 3500. I learned a lot about recognizing addictions. I learned a lot about how to treat people who were carrying this heavy load, whatever it may have been in their life that drove them partly toward their addictions.
It was a really worthy experience. I know that I had to hire and fire staff as well. I learned in a hurry about hiring because I had a totally inexperienced staff when I got there.
When I started interviewing people for work, I’d have somebody come into my office and they would make a pretty good verbal presentation. I would be impressed with them, perhaps, as a potential employee.
In every case, I asked them to take a pencil and paper and to go into the next room and, over the next ten minutes, to evaluate our interview. It was surprising the number of people who couldn’t write, period! Of course, the work they would do demanded writing reports.
So, I learned quite a few things in that work.
With W, the Employee Assistance Program, I wasn’t as successful as I was in S L. Maybe partly because of the distance from here to Big River, which was an hour and a half almost,
342 maybe partly because I was hired basically by the Union and I was paid through union funds.
The importance of confidentiality in a place like that meant that I had nobody to talk to other than the few clients that did come forward with their problems.
So, I don’t look at that five-year period as an incredibly successful part of my life. It presented me with a little bit of income but, beyond that, I don’t look at it as a very successful part of my life.
The one thing that we practiced, and that was very, very, clear from the beginning at S L Rehab Centre, was the follow up and follow-through. If there wasn’t good follow-through, these people would not have a change in their life.
We happened to be among the group that felt the best vehicle available, in the most places, was Alcoholics Anonymous. We encouraged that participation and, in fact, I phoned dozens and dozens of clients a week or two after they had left St. Louis just to see how they were making out and to let them know that we were sincere in our approach to their recovery, if they were going to have a recovery.
I don’t how successful it was, but it could not be unsuccessful. Those who got into a good follow-up program of some kind were successful and they probably had quit drinking… mostly alcoholics that we were dealing with… and probably were successful. Those who didn’t probably relapsed.
Unfortunately, things have changed in treatments these days. I know that there are programs that advocate teaching people how to drink and giving them real alcohol at the treatment center for the purpose of ‘moderation in all things’, as my dad used to say. But, to teach moderation to an alcoholic, to me, is foolhardy.
And, things will change again in the future. What goes around comes around!
What I would tell people doing this work? I would listen to them! I don’t know whether I would tell them anything. I would listen to them as to what are you doing now, how successful is it, how do you enjoy it, is it working as to whatever your aspirations are and what your goals are?!
My goals were to help people to cease drinking. If they didn’t, I wanted to know how their life had changed at all.
No, I would be inclined to listen to them because there’s no sense in lecturing to people who don’t want to be lectured to!
(I asked T about where he lived before Mont St. Joseph)
343 I lived in P.A.: I’ve lived here for fifty-six years. I had a house over by the golf course, which was sold after having to come in here. The actual sale won’t be completed until next Wednesday, the takeover is the first of September.
I’ve lived in three or four different houses, a half a dozen different places in P.A. over that period time. I had owned three different homes.
(I asked T if he played golf)
No, I didn’t play golf. The reason I didn’t play golf is, first of all, I don’t like the game. Secondly, I’m no good at it. And not necessarily in that order is the reason I didn’t play much golf. But I wasn’t much good at it and I didn’t see much sense in golf.
It really took a full day to play a round a golf because you’d have to get up in the morning, get there on your booking time, and then… after the game is over… which is close to four hours, certainly three hours… you have to go and have a few drinks with the boys, or coffee or whatever it is as a social function. By that time, half the afternoon is gone. So, you’ve ruined the whole day for a lousy game of golf, of chasing a ball around eighteen holes, and that didn’t make much sense to me.
And on top of that, it was very expensive!
I had golf clubs. I did play, periodically. And I was so lousy at it that I really didn’t enjoy it. So, golf was not part of my vocabulary. Curling, of course, was!
At one time when I was competitive, we played maybe 185 games a year, a winter. That’s a lot of curling because there’s also practice sessions. And there were also sessions where I taught curling to high school kids. So, I don’t know where I had time to do that. No idea where I found the time to do it. But I did do it! And I was very good at it!
Well, it was good exercise: yeah! You know, you start going to cash bonspiels on the weekend. That’s usually two to three days and that usually goes for several games during the weekend. I don’t know where I found the time!
I was just such a competitive person, but I fairly enjoyed the competition. It was an important part of my life. I’m still competitive, and I always will be competitive!
(I asked T about the awards that he has received)
Well, you already know about the award that I got through Dr. J’s organization…. That organization phoned me that they were having an organizational meeting. They wanted to know if I would be the guest speaker. I wanted to know what they wanted me to talk about. “Well, talk about whatever you want to talk about!”
344 I said “I happened to be a depression baby, and I am particularly proud of the depression babies who have achieved so much with so few of them attempting to deal with the massive number of people who were born after the war, the postwar baby boomers. 297
There were very few of us and I think we did a very, very, good job of it with very, very, limited education. Particularly, in the school systems where people like myself, eighteen years old, out into a classroom teaching in very, very, difficult circumstances: you know, big, big classes; big, big, numbers! We did it and we did it successfully. We produced a good generation! 298 We weren’t really educated much beyond grade twelve, in some cases less than that. And we did a very good job!
297
© Herald photo by Perry Bergson perry…[email protected] @Perry…n - March 13, 2015 - http://www.paherald.sk.ca/News/Local/2015-03-13/article-4074983/T...-honoured-for-continued-service/1 T was named the first winner of the 70+ And Still Going Strong award on Thursday afternoon. Dr. J of the … made the presentation following T’s speech to a couple hundred people at the first annual gala luncheon at Plaza 88 on Thursday afternoon. T was clearly taken aback by the presentation. ‘It was a total surprise to me,’ he said. ‘It’s flattering but I accept it on behalf of seniors but not just for me. There are 7,000 years of experience out there,’ he said, gesturing to the room of seniors. ‘That’s what it’s all about.’ T is busy. He recently wrote a book called ‘Move Aside, The Octogenarians Have Arrived: Life Begins at 80’. After a lifetime in education, he also serves as a Saskatchewan Rivers trustee, recently spearheading a movement to include students on school board. In addition, he is hoping to set up a volunteer police program with the Prince Albert Police Service that would lean on seniors. A, the co-ordinator for the …, said T was a terrific choice. ‘It makes sense,’ she said. ‘This is somebody who doesn’t just talk the talk, he walks the walk. It seemed fitting for him to be our first recipient.’ Dr. … said the committee looked at a number of people who would have been good choices as they live ‘unretirements’ in which they stay active and engaged. ‘His name came up several times from different people,’ F said of T. ‘Education is something that has an influence. That’s why we chose him. I think he’s a good choice.’
298 (Upper left) T with his Grade 12 Graduating Class, 1952: 4 girls and T - M W, W A, T, P S, R K.
345 I know when I was going to school, there was a big dropout at grade eight. Provincial legislation in Saskatchewan said you had to be fifteen or have grade eight before you could quit going to school.
Then there was another dropout after grade ten. If you were in grade ten and completed, you could join things like the RCMP. But you had to have a minimum of grade ten. 299 About 7% of us graduated from grade twelve, those who started in grade one. About 3% of us went on to university. There weren’t very many of us at all.
Today, of course, kids can stay in school until they’re twenty-three, paid for by the taxpayer. If they are twenty-three before they complete their grade twelve, they’re still funded. So, things have changed. But, we really, really, did a heck of a good job as the depression babies, and I wrote a book on the depression babies and what they had achieved. It’s the book on “60 Years of Education in Saskatchewan.”
That was an interesting evening (with the Prince Albert …). Since then, I returned and I gave a short address for the second recipient of that award, and that was last year, or this year actually (2016). 300
When I was speaking to the crowd of senior citizens there, I was telling them about the benefits that are offered by the federal government in terms of disability allowances, and how they should be exploring the disability allowances, because few people know about it. Very few people know about it, the disability allowance provisions through Revenue Canada.
What it is, if you are disabled according to their criteria for measuring disability… for example, I know people who are blind, or nearly blind, and have been for some time: they could never get a job and keep it… they may be eligible! Or, people who are immobile may be disabled by their (Canada Revenue Agency) definition, and the benefits are about $2300 a year in terms of what you don’t pay in income tax.
So, if you’re paying income tax, you would get relief of about $2300 per year for the rest your life. If you been disabled for four or five years, they’ll give you ‘back pay’ for four or five years, which is tax free cash!
299 (Upper right) T and the remaining members of his grad class.
300 (Middle left) T in Scotland by Seniors’ Crossing, 2014. 346 Well, since then, I’ve had some seniors come to me to get further information as to where they can get the documents and so on. They’ve seen advertisements where lawyers are offering their service, and also other companies offering the service “Let us help you seniors get these benefits!” But they also charge big bucks! I said “You can do it yourself and it won’t cost you anything!”
So, anyway, I had several of them get back to me for information. I know of one person who got a cheque for $10,000 from the federal government because his wife was disabled. Another one got quite a bit, but I don’t remember how much. But, anyway, I’m very pleased with that and so was J… F… pleased with that.
I don’t know how many people I’ve shared that with in Prince Albert, to tell them to go over to Revenue Canada in Prince Albert, to get an application for disability allowance. I said “It’s a nine-page document. The doctor fills out seven pages of it. Most of them charge, I think, $50 for their service. You have to pay that. Then you checkmark two other pages, send it in to Revenue Canada, and they’ll get back to you in due course.” It’s something that came out of that particular award that I got from the organization.
(I asked R… an aside, i.e. if he thought there were organizations preying on seniors)
Oh, absolutely! There is an organization called ‘Grants International.’ They advertise all the time to assist people, seniors, and they say “There will be no charge unless we are successful!” Well, you’d be mentally deficient to fill out their application.
So what the lawyers and Grants International do, “Oh, you’re getting this award and now we charge!” And I think the going rate is 40% that you don’t get but they do! For what? For the price of an eighty-eight-cent stamp?!
To me, it’s approaching criminality. That’s what I would call it: preying upon people who don’t have a defense. They don’t have one!
And, if that’s the aside you’re asking about, I include lawyers, and that’s a lawyer’s organization.
Also, we’ve got people coming in with these collective class action suits, and some of those are just… I don’t want to express my opinion on that! They’re that bad!
There’s a law firm in Regina that is just blatantly suing on behalf of the aboriginal population. And, for every million dollars, they pick up and pocket a fair amount of it. Well, if they never had the first lawyer they wouldn’t need the second so, there you go! (I asked R… if there was anything in particular that he wanted to put in to conclude)
No, I don’t think so. But, I think probably a month from now I’ll wish I had responded to that.
347 I said something in there how important my daughter is to me. She knows that, and we share everything, pretty well everything in our lives, and we’re very, very, close. She means absolutely everything to me and she knows that. And I mean everything to her, and I know that. So we’re a very close pair. I’ve nothing new. And she knows exactly what’s going on here, and what’s gone on in the past, even some of the things that I wouldn’t ordinarily tell her but she’s found out through other people!
But she’s also the one who used her air miles to take me down to Phoenix to her graduation, you know, so I went to her graduation.
I enjoyed being in Phoenix. I had never been to Arizona, and I had never had a desire to go there. I learned a bit about Phoenix and I learned I wouldn’t want to live there!
I walked the streets, and it was 110°! I was the only one there. Here’s the stupid Canadian walking down the streets at 110° while all these other people are all hidden away somewhere for the afternoon.
I went into a couple big stores and I was about the only shopper. All these massive sprays of water at the entrance to the buildings: the mist, by the time it hits the sidewalk’ it’s dried! And I thought they had a shortage of water, yet here they are cooling the entrances to their buildings with it.
I went in to the ball diamond of the Phoenix baseball team (the Diamondbacks?). I went in there because they had a good meal. They had a steak dinner for, I don’t know, eight bucks or something. And it was very good! But, I’m one of the few people in the restaurant!
The door was open so I went down, all the way down onto the ball diamond, and took a few pictures inside that place. But, once again, it was not my place…!
I have no desire to go to California either, and I’ve never been there. I travelled a lot of the world but, those are two places that I don’t care to go. I don’t even want to go to Las Vegas, and I won’t now, so… but those are places I don’t miss.
(I asked T about when he heard that he had to come to Mont St. Joseph)
Well, I was having trouble. I knew that I was in trouble. I was having weight loss and my appetite was going down. I wasn’t capable really of doing much about it living as a bachelor with my dog in my home. I was going down. I had contracted a virus and I lost a lot of weight.
I had a couple of occasions where I fainted, or I thought I had fainted: I ended up on the floor in the bathroom. I don’t how long I was there, because you don’t know! But I thought that I got up immediately and there was no problem.
I had some tingling in my hands one day, so I knew I was in trouble. That’s when I got the carotid artery surgery done.
348 After that was over, I was running into other problems, particularly about four years ago, those problems being losing my energy and losing my ambition. I was just going downhill!
I actually went down to about 100 pounds. One of my friends came into the house and said “You look awful!” And, apparently, I did!
He got a hold of my daughter, and she took me to the hospital instantly! They admitted me with, as it turns out, COPD!301
I was there about a month. I tried going back to her home where I could live with some care in her home, but that just didn’t work out. It was too much for everybody! That’s when I got accepted at the hospital for more permanent observations.
I was there about a month and had applied for a place like this. Eventually, fortunately, a place came forward and I’ve been here ever since.
The one good thing that’s happened, apart from getting rid of all the unnecessary things in my life, is that I put on thirty-five pounds in two months! I now weigh 135 lbs. and I’m still putting some weight on.302 The doctor will have some observations on that today, no doubt, and I think he’s going to be somewhat surprised.
But that’s fine! I’m content at the moment with my situation. I don’t know where it’s going but it does look as if I’m here for good.
I’m here under the palliative care program, which provides quite a few benefits. And, I try to stay on top of those benefits as they are important, such as for drugs. I’m on certain drugs for the rest of my life.
There may be some other allowances that don’t come to my mind at the moment, but I’m on top of all of them. Anything that’s available, I’m pursuing and did pursue.
This place is an obvious benefit. I wish there were more people here that I could associate closely with, but there aren’t. But, I can’t do anything about that.
Fortunately, I get a lot of visitors. That helps, and I’m still able to do some assisting of people who are in trouble, and I’m doing that. And I’m continuing to do that. I’ve done that all my life. I guess I’m not going to change.
301 Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, or COPD, is a lung disease that is often a combination of chronic bronchitis and emphysema, states WebMD. People suffering from COPD have difficulty breathing and a chronic cough accompanied by mucus. – “Reference: health, Conditions and Diseases,” “ https:// www.reference.com/health/chronic-obstructive-pulmonary-disease-copd-e90e0609acb64847#.
302 140 lbs. as of October, 2016.
349 I’m still on the school board. I’ll be leaving that. I can’t see any way that I can keep it up. There is an election in October and that should mark the end of my political career, which will be well over sixty-five years in education, continuous from when I served in the classroom. So, I think that’s a rather remarkable achievement and I feel good about it because I know I left a mark of some kind.
In some cases, it’s not all positive. I’m sure I’ve done some bad things: I know I did some bad things! But, they don’t seem to be following me around as much as the good things are!
I would close my comments today with thanking you. You’re making it possible to leave a message that has some credibility because it’s being put together by an outside body.
It would be a message that, somewhere along the line, I hope my two grandsons will have the opportunity to look and see some of their mother through me!
I know that she carries a lot of the characteristics that I have. She’s a lot like me in many, many, ways. And I think she has done primarily the positive things.
I’m hoping that, somewhere along the line, my grandsons will understand that they are a reflection of their mother and, to some extent, the reflection of their grandfather! And, they can do that through the reading of this biographical sketch.
Thank you very much! You’re a good man, McDuff! - R
I want to thank Mr. T for participating in this project and, also, for the unexpected gift he so generously gave me:
It seems Mr. T spent several years meeting with and accumulating the signatures of the last ten (10) Prime Ministers of Canada on no less than a full-size copy of ‘The Canadian Bill of Rights.’ I am proud to be a recipient of such a unique historical document, a monumental piece of Canadiana.
With that, this interview concludes a short window on a remarkable life of (in his own words) a ‘depression baby’: a life lived in the difficult times of a country recovering from depression and war; a life lived in and through time of a population boom; a life dedicated to helping form and shape a recovering fabric of the Canadian community. Thank you again, Mr. T, for everything! -Rev. Dr. Donald Doherty
350 303
304
303 (Top left) Siblings C, S and T - October 7, 2016; (Top right) K L M L, 61, S and J’s middle daughter, died of cancer complications, Oct. 4th, 2016.
304 (Middle and bottom) The Family, October 7, 2016. 351 352 The Last Word
Biographical Sketch: Mr. T - Education and Educational Activities
1940-52 Began Grade 1 in R, Saskatchewan, graduating in 1952. 1952-53 Attended Normal School in Saskatoon, practice taught at Happy School near Allan and later at C Hill in Saskatoon. Attended Summer School in a Physical Education class. Awarded Interim First-Class teaching certificate. Provincial finalist in track competitions. 1953-54 Taught Grades 1-6 in B School Unit at C. 33 students, 13 in Grade 1. Formed an orchestra to supplement income. Briar and baseball. 1954-55 Taught Grade 6 at H, Alberta. Organized most physical education activities and worked at a gas station and at a hardware and formed an orchestra to supplement income. Played baseball in South Peace league. Northern Brier representative. Member of B.P.O.E. 1955-56 Accepted Principalship of a 3-roomed school at C, Alberta. Accepted a relief teaching position in S, Alberta. 1956 Summer employment as a roughneck on oil rigs in B field in southeast Saskatchewan-various locations. 1956-57 Taught Grade 7-8 at C, Saskatchewan. Formed orchestra to supplement income. Formed and played local baseball team. 1957-58 Attended University of Saskatchewan. Awarded Standard Teaching Certificate. (equivalent of Class 3).
353 1958-60 Social Worker with Saskatchewan Government in S C with a 125 client caseload including protection cases, unmarried mothers, punitive fathers, social aid, adoptions, foster children, foster homes and all court cases. The area covered was all of South-West Saskatchewan. Local Brier representative. Member of A.F. & A.M. and B.P.O.E. 1960-62 Taught junior High School at Prince Albert … . Joined the executive of the PA Curling Club and was a Briar Finalist for the province in 1961 Developed (with Phys Ed teacher) the first track at the Collegiate with all-volunteer labour and equipment. 1963-64 Attended University of Saskatchewan. Awarded Professional “A” teaching certification and BEd. 1964-67 Taught senior English and Social Studies at Prince Albert … . 1967-68 Appointed Advisor to the Government of Malaysia in Education serving under the Columbo Plan in Sarawak. This involved completing the development of the British Curriculum to the staff and students in a Chinese community at the Form 4 and 5 level. 1968-75 Taught senior English at Prince Albert … . Also served as City Alderman from 1972-73. Active in Cosmopolitan Club, Masonic Order and community fund raising (Cancer Society, Diabetic Association, HeartFund). 1975-86 Taught senior English at C C High School, Served as Alderman with the City from 1976-85. Chaired the Museum Board establishing Heritage Museum and Museum of Corrections, Vice-chair of V Hospital Board, Member of Police Commission, Chair of Parks and Recreation developing Prime Ministerʼs Park, downtown streetscape, all seven community clubs, Frank Dunn pool, Communiplex, riverbank parks and Red River Park improvements. Chaired flag committee that developed the city flag, chaired beauty queen pageant with the Winter Festival, chaired the Prince Albert Regional Training Advisory Committee (PARTAC305) that was the community advocate for the development of SIAST on 15th Street East, plus other minor committees. 1986 Retired from teaching. Awarded Life Membership in Saskatchewan Teacherʼs Federation. 1986-88 Substitute teaching primarily in Prince Albert. 1988-94 Treatment Supervisor at the S L Alcoholism Rehabilitation Centre. Wrote the programme used and supervised the delivery of the programme to over 700 clients a year.
305 This committee, which I chaired, had a membership of heavyweight community leaders (both politically and financially) with the dedicated leadership of L S, principal of N C College, met bi-monthly presenting pressure upon The Department of Continuing Education to expand SIAST into the province's third largest city, Prince Albert. After several years of intense lobbying, the facility was built and is one of the top employers in the City, accommodating thousands of students on a wide variety of technical and university programs and is now known as part of Saskatchewan Polytechnique. In my 11 years on city council, this would have to be my proudest work and achievement. - T.
354 Also lectured in school systems on impaired driving related subjects. Supervised staff of 14, 4 counsellors. 1994-9 Employee and Family Assistance Program (EFAP) programme supervisor on contract with W C at B location south of Big River. Worked with schools in C and B R as required as well as S and Prince Albert. 1999-02 Wrote and published three books of educational significance and did perform some limited school relief work. 2002-12 Elected School Trustee for Saskatchewan Rivers School Division. Near perfect attendance and extensive participation in provincial and federal associations. Given Award of Merit for community service by the City Council of Prince Albert. 2013 Wrote and published fourth book in praise of the Octogenarian Society and the admonishment of the Post-War baby boomers who have failed to plan for the last decades of productivity following retirement. 2014 Awarded Certificate of Participation, Canadian School Boards Association in Niagara Falls, Ontario. Awarded for Professional Development in Aboriginal Education, 21st Century Learning Skills, and Student Health and Wellness. Awarded “Long-standing Community Commitment Award” by MLAs V J and N W, Province of Saskatchewan.
In all, this represents 63 continuous years of active participation in Education. Tenure on the School Board will be until the fall of 2016, the date of the next election. At that time, barring personal expiry, the accumulation of continuous service in education will be 65 years.
355 356 357 358 Life Story #6: G…, age 83
Life Story Interview with Ms. M Interviewed by Rev. Dr. Don Doherty
Interviews in August, 2016, at MS. M’s residence, 60 B…, Prince Albert, SK
359 Interviewer: ‘Tell me about yourself. I want to assure you that you are important, what you have to say is important and you have the right to say it. Start at the beginning with your first memory and be assured I am interested in hearing the story of your life. Please don’t feel you have to leave anything out.
If you would like to use the questions given to you, please feel free but you are not required to do so. I will just reflect back what I hear for clarification and you can revise or confirm as necessary and carry on until we are complete and you are satisfied we have covered as much as you would like to cover. There is no hurry and we will have up to 4 sessions to complete it.’
Ms. M: I was born on December 4, 1933 at 7:40 p.m. in my Grandmother's house in Conrad, Montana. My father, R A M who was born in Eureka, Montana, was 27 years old and white. My mother, J V, who was born in Williams, Montana was 22 years old and white.
My father had worked as a general labourer for six years and my mother had worked as a housewife in our home for four years. Their ‘place of abode’ was Conrad, Montana. I was a female whom they named M and, when I entered the home, there were three children in the family. I was ‘full term’ and ‘legitimate.’ My doctor's name was W L D.
All this information I got from my birth certificate except for the fact that I was born in my grandmother's house. I was told that later in life. Montana kept good records of all its babies at that time! 306 I was named M after my grandmother and I believe that, since my dad's younger brother was married to a woman named M, my mother thought I could carry on the name for both of them. I'm not sure where ‘L’ came from unless it was from L B who lived just outside Fortine. I think she and my mother were friends.
The one thing I questioned about the information on the birth certificate was the “place of abode” for my family. I have never been sure if the family had been living in Fortine, Montana at the time and my mother went home to her mother's to have the ‘new baby’ or whether they were actually living in Conrad.
I do know that in June, 1934, they were living in Fortine - and it was there in Fortine that my mother died when I was six months old. And so started a hurt in my life that has never healed - I believe because I have never been able to talk about it.
306 J V M and R M. 360 Dad married again on October 3, 1935. My new mother was just 19 years old when she entered the marriage. She was a hard worker, having been raised in a home where everyone had to work. I remember her telling the story about when her dad asked her and her sister to clean all the debris out of a meadow and promised them each a new dress when it was done. The work was done - but they never got the dresses.
In this new marriage when she was 19 years old, she took on a family of three: R, 4, V, 3, and me, 2. Fifteen months later - February 2, 1937 - D came along, seventeen months later (June 19, 1938) S was there, then came D (January 26, 1940) and then G (April 22, 1941). And so, by the time she was 25 years old, she had a family of seven – or nine if we included Dad and her.
THE FISHPOND
The first house I can remember was located close to the road at ‘the Fishpond’ (about three miles out of Fortine up Meadow Creek Road). Grandpa (Dad's father) and L (his second wife) lived right by the Fishpond. I can just barely remember us kids calling L ‘Grandma’ because we knew she didn't like it. She would never let Dad or his brothers and sisters call her Mom - they had to call her L…. We thought we had done something really funny!
THE COOL PLACE
As I remember it, we moved from the house on the Fishpond to the ‘Cool Place’, a house where a man named D… Cool had lived about seven miles up M C Road. It was located across the road from the barn on the property we would later call home for over 70 years. Uncle B, Aunt G, and their kids L and H lived in the house: the one we would later call ‘home’.
Those years contain memories that have never left me. The stories would probably be boring to anyone else, but since this is for me, I'm going to tell them.
1. The first memory I have was of us kids playing on the sawdust pile. Our home was located on an old sawmill site and there were two large sawdust piles left on the site. The smaller one was a favorite place for us to play. The only problem was the sawdust that got into our pants. So we took our pants off - problem solved!
For us girls it was okay because we had on dresses and no one could see that we weren't wearing panties. But, for R and L, no pants meant that everyone could see what they shouldn't be seeing!
Dad came home from work, and saw what no one should be seeing! He was down at the sawdust pile in a few short strides and soon R’s bare bum was smarting!
All the time this was happening, R was saying, “But Dad, the girls have no pants on either!” This was the signal for V and me to head for the toilet - surely Dad wouldn't come in there for us! But he caught us just before we got the toilet door open!
361 2. Another little cabin on the site, a building we later used as a chicken house, was occupied by a lady named Mrs. B. I think it was at this time that S was born and Mom was in the hospital. Mrs. B was helping out in our home.
Mrs. B smoked. She kept her cigarettes on the warming oven of their kitchen stove. When she was over at our house taking care of things, we kids snuck into her house and stole her cigarettes and some matches. Then we went out under the barn (straw and all) and had our first smoke!
We tried and tried to light those cigarettes - but they just wouldn't light. We didn't know enough to draw in. Finally, we gave it up and went on playing. Then Dad came home. He stopped in at Mrs. B's to thank her for looking after us.
In the conversation, Mrs. B looked for her cigarettes and when she couldn't find them she said, “They were right here on the stove this morning!” And then she looked at the matchbox and said, “That was almost full this morning!” Dad didn't say a thing - he just looked down at us and we're out the door and headed for the woodpile!
3. Another memory that is so vivid has to do with airplanes.
Every once in a while, we would have an airplane fly over our place. It was the height of the Second World War and Uncle ‘Squeak’, Aunt M's husband was in the war. So, the talk among the grown-ups was all about the bombing in the war. They told about people having to put coverings over the windows at night so that the light from their house couldn't be seen from the airplane.
All of this talk was very frightening to me and I was so afraid that the light from our house would be seen by an airplane. I really had no concept of a real airplane - to me an airplane was that little thing you could see in the sky. I had no idea that, when it got on the ground, a man would step out of it. 307 About that time Mom planned to take all of us kids on the train to go to Aunt M's place, about a 250-mile train ride. Dad was going to drive over there with the truck so he could bring Aunt Myrtle's piano back. She was giving it to us.
A couple nights before we were to go on the train, I had a dream that when we got to the train it was filled with airplanes (all of them were the size you see in the sky). I was terrified!
Why do these strange childhood fears stay with us so long? I have never liked airplanes - I have flown quite a bit in my life - but I never have enjoyed it.
307 (Middle right) Aunt M and Uncle J ‘Squeak’, c. 1955. 362 4. Then there was the time when V was being good to R and gave him a piece of chocolate. He thanked her for it, ate it - and figured out a short time later that it was Ex-lax! V really enjoyed that!
5. One night, we girls decided that we would sleep in the hay in the horse barn. R and L thought this would be a good time to scare us. They dressed R up in a blanket and he started crawling toward the barn pretending to be a bear.
We knew it was R out there. L, seeing that their prank was failing, decided to pretend that R was with him - so he started talking to a “pretend R” close to him.
As soon as he heard L talking, R, (the bear) stood up on his two hind feet and called out, “What did you say, L?” We girls really got a laugh out of that one!
AUNT P'S PLACE
We moved from the ‘Cool Place’ to the cabin on Aunt P's place about half a mile down the road. Aunt P and Uncle G lived in another little cabin just across the road.
1. One of my main memories at Aunt P's place was of Mom and Aunt P laughing because D had told Mom, “My doctor told me that all I can eat is salmon!” Mom and Aunt P had been discussing what their doctors had said to them and D, who must have liked salmon, seemed to think this was a good way of getting what he liked. He must have been about three years old.
2. It is at Aunt P’s place that I remember the time V came prancing into a room where the grown-ups were seated around the table - and one of them made the remark, "Isn't she cute!" My immediate thought was, “I wish someone would say that about me!” My insecurity began early!
3. Another memory that stands out from this time was of me sitting on the steps outside the door and Mom leaning over, tying my shoes with tears running down her cheeks. We had just got news that Grandpa M had died.
4. Fighting bedbugs seemed to be an unending battle for Mom. Bedbugs lived in the walls of the house at Aunt P's Place. They were always there - and Mom hated them!
The kids in the family slept on camp cots and I can remember Mom having one of those cots out in the yard going over every inch of the frame with a blowtorch! Any bedbug hiding on that cot was not going to live to get another drop of her kids’ blood!
The final straw came when G, her newborn baby, came home from the hospital. She put him to bed and then, in the middle of the night, she lit a lamp and saw bedbugs crawling all over him. We soon moved from that house!
363 The man who bought it had it fumigated and we heard that the bedbugs were gone. It wasn't long before the house burned to the ground - and then we knew they were gone!
What always surprised me was that the bedbugs didn't follow us to the new house since we brought all our bedding and clothing with us - but I can never remember fighting bedbugs again!
HOME
We moved from Aunt P's Place to ‘Home’ - the house our family would call home for the next 70 years. It was a building with three rooms shaped like a cracker box. I heard that it had been used for a cook-shack for the sawmill crew.
The front door was in the centre of the wall. When you went in, there was a door in the center of the wall between the first and second rooms, then a door in the centre of the wall between the second and third rooms. When you got to the last room, you had to make a right-hand turn to get to the outside door. This set-up made a wonderful race track!
I remember us kids chasing M H (a mentally challenged lady who lived about three miles further up M C Road) in the front door, down the length of the house and out the back door - then back again to the front door! Poor Mom! How did she ever put up with it?
There wasn't room for the eleven of us (on February 19, 1947 H… A… was born and on July 19, 1951, K W came along - the final baby) in the family to sleep in the house, so Mom and Dad, us girls and the babies got to sleep in the house and the boys had to sleep in ‘the shack’ - a little very rustic cabin about fifty feet from the house.
Then, in about 1950, Dad tore the last room off the house and built an add-on along the side of the house. This gave us three bedrooms on the main floor plus room for a bed in the attic and in the basement, a kitchen, a dining room, a living room and a bathroom. By that time, some of us were ready to ‘leave the nest’ so the whole family could be under one roof.
The things I remember with joy from this time have mainly to do with nature - the wild flowers called ‘Shooting Stars’, the ‘Lady-Slippers’, the wild strawberries (so tiny and yet so sweet - especially when they topped a dish of home-made ice cream), the smell of cedar at Christmas time from our own cedar trees, the white-tail deer looking at me as I sat quietly under a tree reading a book, the moose running up the road in front of the school bus - the snow on either side of the road too high for him to get off the road - and the kids in the bus saying “That moose runs just like M… (me)!”
364 MOM 308 I am repeating these lines because this is the background I need to keep in mind as I talk about the deepest hurt of my life.
Dad married again, October 3, 1935. My new mother was just 19 years old when she entered the marriage. She took on a family of three, R 4, V, 3 and me, 2. Fifteen months later, February 2, 1937, D came along. 17 months later, June 19, 1938, S was there, then came D, January 26, 1940, then G, April 22, 1941. So, by the time she was 25 years old, she had a family of seven kids. 309 In those early days of Mom's marriage, there were no washing machines - all laundry was done on the scrub board and hung up on the clothes lines in the back yard to dry. There was no hot running water. Water for laundry and baths had to be heated in a copper tub sitting on the back of the wood stove in the kitchen or in the ‘reservoir’ which was built into the side of the kitchen stove. Often there was no running cold water - it had to be hauled from the creek.
Diapers were a vital necessity during those days, and too expensive to be purchased. So Mom solved the problem by buying a bolt of flannel, cutting it into diaper sizes and hemming the sides on the old treadle sewing machine - a machine which worked by keeping the treadle in motion with your feet.
Mom raised a large garden every summer and the produce had to be canned for food in the winter - there were no refrigerators and no deep freezers. We had an ‘ice house’ (a little shed filled with sawdust). The men would cut blocks of Ice every winter and bury them in the sawdust - a refrigerator during the summer, a freezer during the winter!
The canned produce was kept in the root cellar, a cave dug out of a hill close to the house. The root cellar had a door which was always closed to keep out the cold when the winter weather plunged to 40 below. The potatoes and carrots were also kept in there.
308 (Top right) Dad and 3 children: R, 4; M, 2; V, 3.
309 (Middle left: Back row) Dad, M, V, R; (Middle row) Mom and H (the baby), S, D (Front) G, D. 365 Mom worked - and worked hard - milking cows, cleaning the barn by shoveling out the manure, feeding the pigs, chopping wood and carrying it in the house, making meals, sweeping floors, hemming diapers, patching clothes, darning socks, putting the little ones down for their naps! All these things meant that she had no time to sit around and feel sorry for herself! When Dad married her, he married a true ‘helpmate’ who carried her end of the marriage. Yes, she worked and she worked hard! But she didn't do it alone!
She had been raised in a home where the kids were trained to help carry the load at a very early age and she just assumed that was the way the world worked and, so, she started training her family to do ‘their chores’. The boys milked the cows, cleaned the barn, fed the pigs, chopped and carried the wood. The girls did the dishes, swept and mopped the floors, set the table, helped cook the meals, helped with the gardening and canning, helped wash clothes and bring them in from the clothes line. I can remember when I washed clothes on the scrub board! I can only remember doing it once.
I can remember all of us taking the sled loaded with two cream cans - special containers holding about five gallons that farmers used to ship the cream they wanted to sell - to the creek on a sled in the winter time and bringing them back full of water.
And so it was, in this family where everyone had chores to be done and everyone was expected to do those chores, that I had trouble! I was known as ‘the lazy one’!
I have often wished I could go back and observe the family dynamics as an unbiased adult and decide if that name was justified or if it was a name that had been given to me: a name that had to be justified by pointing out every infraction on my work!? I remember two incidents that could point out that maybe the name was justified:
1. I was told to sweep the floor. While doing that, I found a magazine. I loved to read but was never allowed to read at home. The temptation was too great that day and when Mom came to see what I was doing I was sitting on the unswept floor reading the magazine! I got a good bawling out for that!
2. I was sent down to weed the garden. The sun was very hot and I noticed that the potato plants were high enough to offer shade. When Mom came to see how I was doing, I was lying in the shade of the potato plants. I got another bawling out.
Those two I remember. S tells me of the time that she and V were getting things ready to do dishes and looked out the window and saw me headed for the toilet! “There she goes again - just when it's time to do dishes!”
Was I really trying to escape dishes or was I responding to the call of nature? I don't know!
If the name ‘lazy one’ was justified, I came to the place where I knew that it no longer applied to me when I was in High School.
366 In the summer of 1949 Aunt M, who was married to “Uncle Squeak” - a sheep rancher just out of Whitlash, Montana - decided she needed a hired girl to help her with the chores on the ranch. She asked Mom if V could come over and help her.
Mom felt good about sending V - she was the ambitious one. V went and all went well for the summer. However, the next summer, when V had graduated from High School, she didn't want to go back to Aunt M's.
That was the summer when Aunt M was in desperate need of help. She was hosting a “50th Wedding Anniversary” for Uncle Squeak's parents and needed to get the whole ranch spruced up. 310 With a great deal of unease, Aunt M decided to take me – ‘the lazy one’ - to help her out. When I got there, Aunt M and I worked together, ‘hand in glove’!
We kept the house clean, cooked the meals, raised the garden, fed the pet lambs, herded sheep, rode the hay-bailer to tie the bales, shocked the grain to have it ready for threshing, fed the threshing crew, and had the ranch ready - which included a freshly painted white fence - to host the 50th Wedding Anniversary in style! It was a great summer. And so, for the next five summers as soon as school was out in the spring until it started again in the Fall, I worked as ‘hired girl’ on the ranch.
When I graduated from High School in 1952, I wanted to spend the summer working at church camps. I had always loved camping. Aunt M asked me to come to the ranch for the spring months when the lambs were being born and there was always a lot of work to do and then to come help with the Fall work after camp was over.
When I got back to the ranch in the Fall, she asked me to come and live permanently with them, year-round. While I was at Pioneer Ranch Camp I had talked to G C, the Director's wife, about going to live in her home and working in a bank in Calgary. So, the decision was “Should I go to Calgary or should I stay on the ranch?” It was a hard decision to make, but I finally decided to go to Calgary.
My niece, V, has often asked me if I felt Mom treated me the same as she did the rest of the family. My answer has always been, “No, she didn't!” V asked her dad, G, the same question and his answer has always been, “Yes, she treated us all the same!” Because V has asked that question a couple times, I have found myself trying to figure out why our answers are different!
I think maybe our birth order has a lot to do with it. G was the ‘baby’ of the family for six years, and everybody in the family loved the ‘baby! I was never really ‘the baby’! I was almost two when Dad and Mom got married. I had been cared for by my mother until I
310 (Upper right) M when she was young. 367 was six months old - and then by others, I'm not too sure how many had that responsibility! I know Mrs. P cared for me for a while and I think Aunt F (Mom's sister) worked in our home.
I think that was how Dad met Mom. But I'm sure that, when Mom started caring for me, ‘insecurity’ was my name! And my place as ‘baby’ was taken over by D in just fifteen months. So, when the family was complete, I held the position of third in a family of nine children. There was nothing special about being third - nothing special about me!
So, the family dynamics were set up. For some reason or other, I always felt that I couldn't do anything to please Mom. I can never remember her complimenting me about anything - if she spoke to me it always seemed to be pointing out something I was doing wrong! She never physically abused me. But the criticisms were always there. The following three examples show my point.
1. V and R each started school just before their sixth birthday. They both had trouble with school which was reflected on their report cards. Since my birthday was in December, Mom and Dad decided to hold me back a year and so I was almost seven when I started school.
I loved school - I was in my element and my report card reflected it! Mom's remark about my report card was, “Well, grades aren't everything!”
2. When in my senior year of High School, the ‘Business Ed’ teacher took a group of us to Missoula to take state exams. Everyone in the class expected Phyllis D to take several awards. Instead, I was the only one who got an award: second in the state of Montana for bookkeeping for that year!
I was so surprised. But I can't remember any one at home even talking about it!
3. When I was in the first year of Bible School, I wrote a letter home. I thought that I needed to give a bit of background on the life I was living there so that they could understand what I was talking about. I don't know how much background I gave but it couldn't have been too much because they were hand-written letters.
When I went home for a visit, Mom and I were talking and I mentioned something I had written in the letter. She said, “Oh, I never read that letter! It was too long and boring!”
I find it very, very, hard to write letters even today. Am I boring?
4. The worst hurt came when I was around 60 years old and had gone home for a visit. By that time, I had been home several times when it was just Mom, K and me at home. When I got home, Mom always greeted me with respect like she did any other member of the family.
368 K and I always got along well and walked the woods looking for lynch pins, etc. Mom and I were friends. We walked the woods and chatted, played endless games of Yahtzee and just had a good time. At last I had the relationship I had always wanted. But then, another member of the family would come home so that they could see me while I was there, and immediately the criticism would start. If it were S who had come home, she would gently turn the criticism into something positive. 311
Then came the day when most of the family decided to get together. I have forgotten what the occasion was, but there must have been twenty or twenty-five of us sitting in the living room just talking.
When I entered the room, Dad's chair was empty so I sat down in it. I loved sitting in it because it was Dad's! When Mom came into the room I just got the sense that she didn't like the fact that I was sitting there, but I didn't know what to do about it without making a scene.
We had been talking quite a while when D came into the room. He had been out cutting wood. He was looking around for a place to sit and Mom spoke up and said, “M, get up out of that chair and let D sit there! He has been working and he is tired. You can go over and sit on the couch!”
D said, “But why?” and Mom said, “Because I said so!”
It was that “I said so!” that really hurt. If she had said, “M, how about letting D sit in that chair? He has been working hard and is tired!” I would have been up out of the chair in a minute and the incident would have been forgotten. But the tone of voice and way she said it told me that she thought I was very inconsiderate and selfish by not immediately getting up and offering my seat to D!
I looked around the room and knew that there was no one else in the room that she would have ever spoken to in that tone of voice in front of the whole family. I was up out of my seat in a second and, rather than going over and sitting on the couch, I went to an empty chair that was by the archway leading into the dining room.
I waited until the conversation got going again, then got up and went into the other room as if I were going to the bathroom. Instead, I went in and laid down on my bed and cried.
After about thirty minutes I heard G ask, “Where is M?” Mom said, “She went to the bathroom a long time ago and has not come back!”
311 (Top Left) Mom and M in the kitchen. 369 Finally, the group broke up and S, who was sleeping with me, came to bed. She found me in tears and I told her why. She had been fighting some ‘feelings’ of her own. She told me that she was going to get up and leave early in the morning. So, I decided to do the same thing. Mom was the only one who was up the next morning when we left. She came to hug us goodbye like she always did. When I hugged her, I couldn't say a thing. I just stood there and cried, then I got in my car and cried for most of the thirteen hours it took me to drive home. 312 I never saw Mom again. Why? I had two girls with special needs living with me, and a houseful of pets. It was hard to arrange for someone to look after the home while I was gone.
Then, 911 happened in 2001 and it was really hard to arrange to get across the border. Or were these just excuses? Did I just not want to face her? I had phoned her several times - but that's not the same as seeing her! And so this wound has never completely healed.
Was I being overly sensitive by letting it hurt so much? Sometimes I almost wish that Mom and I had never had those good times together - but then I enjoyed them so much, I can't wish them away!
I guess I just wish I could have gained her respect on a permanent basis. I have worked on not letting bitterness stay in my heart because of this!
The thing I found hardest about my growing-up years was never being able to talk about my mother! The topic of my mother was never free and open. Most of the family seemed to think the reason for that was that Mom always believed that Dad loved my mother more than he loved her so, to spare Mom's feelings, we didn't talk about my mother.
I really believe that the main reason had more to do with Dad than it did with Mom. Dad had lost his mother when he was four years old. His dad married again - a woman named Lottie. She had one daughter from the marriage - Aunt M. Aunt M was the only one in the family who could call her ‘Mom’. To the rest of the family, she was ‘Old L’! So, for a boy raised in a time when people in general didn't talk about their feelings and by a woman who didn't care about his feelings, Dad was never comfortable in discussing matters of the heart.
The only time I can remember Dad talking about things that he felt deeply about was when he could use them as illustrations in his Sunday School class.
312 (Middle left) K, Mom, P and B in Montana. 370 So, for me, the one thing I wanted to hear about most - my mother - was a taboo topic in our house.
Finally, the day came when my niece, M, was to be born. Mom wanted to go down and help J at that time so she asked me if I could come and cook for Dad and K while she was gone.
At one of the meals, I finally asked Dad what had caused my mother's death. He told me that she had a friend whose legs were constantly paralyzing on her, and my mother was always afraid that it would happen to her.
One cold June day, our cow got out and my mother had to go and find it and get it in. In the process, she got very chilled. She went home, went to bed and her legs paralyzed. When Dad came home she told him that she was not going to make it, asked him not to adopt us out and, within a few days, she was gone!
They sent tests in to see if she had polio but they came back negative. The cause of her death was never determined.
I sent the things that I wrote at the beginning (several of the first pages of this interview) to my brother G in Manitoba. He heard that I was writing my life story so he asked me to send it to him.
I told him that there were things that I had mentioned about Mom in my writings that told of my relationship with her. I was hurt quite deeply from my relationship with Mom. He has always loved Mom and I wasn't too sure if he would be hurt by what I had said. He wrote me back an email saying that he affirmed me and, yet, he could see things from Mom’s point of view, too! So, that whole issue has been quite a bit on my thoughts this last little while, ever since I got that email.
Anyway, it’s made me think a lot about my parental home lately. I loved my dad. The rest of my siblings seemed to be hurt by Dad, probably way more than by Mom.
Dad had a quick temper. He would get angry when things were out of his control. The boys say they can remember him chasing R once with a 2 x 4! However, I don’t remember any violence in the home.
The boys were in their teenage years after I left home so, a lot of their memories were in those years when there were four boys, teenage boys, at once in the home and I think Dad had a very hard time trying to keep them in control. What all he did, I don’t know! But, I do remember him getting very angry!
What I remember is that some problem would suddenly present itself (i.e. there was a flat tire and we were already late for church)! Dad would say “Confound it!” and mom would start shushing us kids up: none of us dared speak at that time!
371 I think the fact that we all reacted that way made Dad more tense. I never remember him physically abusing anybody. It was just that we all knew he was angry and we had better be quiet!
Part of Mom’s reaction had to do with her father, who was an alcoholic. She was raised in a home where there was a lot of tension.
That was one side of Dad. The other side was that he was the spiritual leader of our home. He had a faith in God that was deep and intimate. He trusted God to a degree that I have seen very few people trust Him.
Dad’s mother died when he was four years old. His stepmother would never allow the kids to call her ‘Mom.’ They always had to call her ‘L.’ So, Dad never learned to express his feelings at all. The only way he had of expressing them was by using illustrations from his relationship with God in his Sunday school class.
He taught the adult Sunday Class for as long as I can remember. He was a very good Bible teacher! We had a number of the ministers from the denomination come to the church and sit in his class. They would go back and say “If you want to hear a good Bible teacher, there’s one in Fortine!”
Anyway, Dad lived his faith. He trusted God! One of the stories I remember was, when I was about seven or eight. Dad was working in the hay field. The hay wagon fell on him and broke his back. He spent several days in the hospital.
I can remember us going down to see him and, coming back in the dark, the lights on the car failed. We had to drive home in the dark with no lights! Being on country roads wasn’t as dangerous it would have been on the highway. We got home!
Dad got out of the hospital and then, years later, I was in one of his Sunday School classes and he was teaching about trusting God for things. He said that he had trusted God to take care of his health all his life and that God had not failed.
Then somebody told him that he should have insurance, just in case something happened. It was the only wise thing to do. So, he said, “Finally I got insurance. As soon as I got it, I needed it! I decided it was much less painful to trust God so I let the insurance go!” That was just the way he thought!
He thought it wiser to trust God than to trust insurance! The thing is, he never did go to the hospital again until he was older and his social insurance had kicked in. Some of his hospital bills were taken care of through that.
I sat in several of his Sunday School classes when I went to visit, and I learned a lot more about him that way than I ever had learned at home.
372 He loved babies. Up until the time a child was about three or four years old, he just doted on him. They were always on his lap. But then, at about the age of four, a new baby would be there and the rest of us just became part of the family. There was no more individual attention! 313
With me, I couldn’t remember three and four years of age, so I can never remember sitting on Dad’s knee. I can never remember him giving me a kiss! I was never able to remember him telling me that I looked nice or ever asking me what I thought!
In about 1990, I went to a seminar that the A… Church here in town was putting on. It was about ‘inner healing.’ The first day, the priest told us that, when he had people who came in with emotional hurts, one of the exercises he would walk them through was an ‘imagination’ exercise.
He would have them close their eyes and picture themselves standing at the edge of a meadow with a river running through it. He would ask them “Do you see it now?” and they would say “Yes!”
He would say “Jesus is standing beside you: take his hand and walk down to the river!” Then, he would say “Jesus, being who He is, will walk across the river and you just to go in and play around in the water. When you’re done, just get out on the other side and Jesus will be there waiting for you with a gift!” So, they would just play around in the river and then it would be time to get out.
He would then say, “Okay, Jesus is giving you a gift. What is it?” He said that he never heard the same answer from any two people!
The next morning, he started off the seminar by saying that, for most of us, our picture of God as Father is seen through the relationship that we have with our father here on earth. So, I thought “Oh, really!? I wonder what my picture is then?”
All of a sudden, I saw myself in my imagination as a little, tiny, tiny, girl sitting up against the stem of a huge toadstool. The walls of the toadstool came down all around me and
313 (Upper left to right) Mom and Dad, 45th wedding anniversary, 1980; Mom and Dad at home in Montana, 1980.
373 touched the ground on every side. But the walls and the ceiling of the toadstool were very far away, way past my reach. Suddenly, I realized that’s the way I saw my father’s love.
I knew that my dad loved me, that his love surrounded me and would protect me, but it was so far away. There was no intimacy in it! I started to cry, and I cried…! I think there were two days left in the seminar and I cried through it all!
I just wanted somebody to walk with me through that imagination exercise. I didn’t want to go to the priest, I don’t know why, and I didn’t know who else help me with it. So, I came home after the seminar and I thought “If nobody else will help me, I’ll do it myself!” I got some pillows set up on my bed, leaned myself up against them and closed my eyes.
I often have pictures of my life. For several weeks (before that inner healing session had happened) the picture that I had in my mind of my life was of me standing on a high mountain goat trail, (those little tiny trails that mountain goats wear around the mountain). I was standing on the trail, face-to-face with a huge cliff that was completely blocking my way!
I don’t know what I was going through at the time to see that picture. But then, about two weeks before (that ‘inner healing’ vision), I found out that I had come down from the cliff and I was standing in a mountain pass where two mountains f meet. I was standing at the edge of a huge meadow with a river running through it.
When I closed my eyes this time, I was at the edge of that meadow with the river running through it. Then, I realized that Jesus was there so I reached out to take his hand. And, when I did, I was four years old!
We walked down to the river together and, because I was so small, he didn’t let me go into the river by myself. He came in with me and played around in the water with me. He taught me to float on my back and, then, we just sort of played around in the water for a while. Then he said “I’m going to pick strawberries. You can come when you want to!” So, He got out of the river.
There was a large wild strawberry bed right by the river and He knelt down and started picking wild strawberries. It didn’t take me long to get out and start picking strawberries with Him. I was very concerned that He would get strawberry stains on his white cloak.
Then He said, “You keep picking as long as you want to. I’m going over there and sit by that tree and read for a while!” So, He went over and sat down by the tree. Soon, I was over and curled up next to Him and He read me a book!
When it started to get dark He picked me up in his arms and started taking me back home. As we were walking along, I kept wanting to say to him “Can we do this again tomorrow? Can we do this again tomorrow?” Then I thought “I can’t do that! The other kids need him, too!” That was running in my mind the whole time.
374 Right at the end, I finally said “Can we do it again tomorrow?” and He said “Yes, we can do it again tomorrow!” Then, he put me down and I went into the house. The vision was over!
The three things that were part of the vision… floating on my back, the wild strawberries and the reading of books… were all things I loved in my childhood.
That is the only time I have ever had any kind of a vision. But, to me, it told me that He understood the isolation of my childhood and, for once, I had the full attention all by myself of an adult! That was such a healing thing in my life! I don’t know what other people think of it but, for me, it was something that was very healing for me!
So, the fact that I felt that Mom criticized me so much and Dad ignored me left me lost in a crowd of nine kids! I was just one of the kids - there was nothing special about me to anybody. It made me very shy and insecure.
I remember one of the boys from school, when I was probably in my early teens, saying “You’ll never get married, M!” Well, of course, it was the one thing that I wanted more than anything else: to be married and to have a family of my own! But, he saw my insecurity.
I didn’t believe I could ever be attractive to any fellow. I would watch girls flirting with fellows in school and wonder how they could do things like that. I just knew that it wasn’t part of me.
I've always felt lost in a crowd. I’ve always just hated crowds! If I love being in a one-on- one, situation but when I get in a crowd, I feel lost.
We were raised in the mountains of Montana during the ‘dirty 30's.’ Money was scarce. Dad got most of his money for the year from Christmas trees. Eureka (where we went to high school - about 20 miles from home) was called ‘the Christmas tree capital of the world!’
Logging the timber on his own land also provided revenue and the rest came from building houses for people in the community. He was an excellent carpenter and had his electrical license so he was able to do all the electrical work himself.
Over the years, Dad would hear of a plot of land that had gone up for sale - often at ten dollars an acre and sometimes one dollar an acre. He would find the money and buy the plot. He ended up with 800 acres of timber property.
Dad had always believed that ‘You can't out give God.’ If there was a need to be met, he would often give beyond his means. One story that has inspired me was that about the time when he and Mom had saved up about $1800 to build onto our house. Our house at the time had four rooms - a bedroom for the girls, one bedroom for, Mom and Dad, a kitchen and a dining/living room. The boys slept in what we called ‘the shack’: a little cabin about
375 fifty feet from the house. Dad wanted to build onto the house so he could get all of the family under one roof.
With the $1800 they had saved, he was just ready to start building. Then, our church burned to the ground. Dad was reading in one of Haggai (one of the Minor Prophets). The verse ‘…they build their own house, but my house remains unbuilt!’ 314 planted itself in Dad's mind. Dad felt that God putting his hand on the money. So, he ended up giving the whole $1800 to the church.
Soon, he heard that slabs were selling for $5.00/thousand. We lived on a sawmill site and were rich in slabs. They had always been garbage but were now worth $5.00/thousand. Dad was able to haul out enough slabs and make enough money to finish off the church and to finish off his own house.
About ten years before Dad passed away, a developing company (I think they were stationed in Hawaii) wanted to buy land to sell to people in Hawaii who wanted a retreat in the backwoods of Montana as a getaway cabin. Dad sold 710 acres for $285 an acre. Because he didn’t need the money to live on, he financed it himself. I am not quite sure how it all happened but, by the time he passed away in 1984, he was able to leave Mom with about $500,000.
That money went on to K after Mom died in 2011. My youngest brother K never married. He lived at home with Dad and Mom and then he and Mom lived there until she died. During the last few years of her life, my brother H and his wife J moved in with them. K inherited everything from Mom. I hear that there is still one balloon payment to come in on the land. I'm not sure what a balloon payment is but there is still one to come.
I worked on the ranch for Aunt M and Uncle Squeak for seven summers. They had about 2,000 sheep. In about April, they would start lambing. It was an interesting procedure!
Quite a few of the ewes would have two or three lambs. So, in order to make sure that the lambs were getting fed, they would ‘brand’ the ewe: say, the third ewe that lambed out, they would stamp a ‘3’ on her with paint, and then stamp the '3' on the lamb.
If the ewe had twins they would stamp the '3' on each lamb and a bar across the top. If they saw a lamb with a ‘3’ number on it that was getting skinny, they would check to make sure that the ewe was accepting it. A ewe would often reject one lamb when she had twins.
If they found a lamb that was getting skinny, they would try to transplant it on a ewe which lost her lamb. They would do this by skinning the dead lamb and putting the skin on the live lamb. The ewe would smell the skin of her dead lamb and allow the transplanted lamb to eat.
Some lambs couldn't be transplanted and they would be brought home for us to feed on the bottle. We had this rack built with holes that would allow us to put a nipple on a beer bottle
314 Haggai 1:9. 376 and put the nipple through a hole. We would put the milk in the beer bottles, put the nipples through the holes and the lambs would come suck the nipples on the bottles.
Usually, about the 4th of July, we would hire a shearing crew. The shearing crew had a huge, huge, tent… an oblong shape… that had four, five or even six shearing stations in the tent.
There was a shearer with electric shears at each station.
There were pens all along the outside of the tent on either side. Aunt M and I would keep the pens on the one side of the tent filled up with un-sheared sheep and Uncle John would be on the other side branding the sheep with paint as they came out sheared.
The shearers would reach out and get a sheep, shear it and then put it out the other side. The sheep blatted constantly when they were in the pens on either side of the tent, but in that tent, there was no sound of sheep blatting!
At the end of the tent, there was a high platform, probably about eight feet high. They had large wool bags made of gunny sack material. After the sheep was sheared, somebody would take the wool and throw it up on the platform where the wool was hanging from a large hole in the platform. A man would be IN the bag trapping down the wool as each fleece was thrown up.
I often thought what a horrid, horrid, job that would be. They must’ve been so hot and sticky by the time the day was done!
MY CHRISTIAN LIFE
There were two main elements in my life - my ‘home’ life and my ‘church’ life. The two of them intertwined - but were also separate.
I can never remember not going to church. There was no question about it! The whole M family would be in church twice on Sunday. Then, many of us would attend prayer meeting on Wednesday and when we got old enough to join the youth group we would be at those meetings on Friday.
Those meetings were often “parties” including sledding down the “big hill,” being pulled on the sled behind a car, chili, hot chocolate, etc. Sometimes the parties were held in the house and included all kinds of games. My favorite was ‘musical chairs’. Oh, to be a youth again!
The fact that I went to church meant that I could never be popular. It seemed to me there were two types of kids in our community: the popular kids, who never went to church, and the church kids, who were too religious to have any real fun.
377 I was one of the ‘church’ kids and my inability to socialize except when around other ‘church’ kids - and not very well even there - showed how much I believed that statement! I'll never forget the day when R A, a ‘non-church’ kid, told me that I would never be able to find someone to marry me! He was right. My deep insecurity made me very shy! But God started building things within me that did not show up in my social life.
When I was about nine or ten, A and E E came to pastor our little church in Fortine. Evelyn taught the girls class and opened up the book of Genesis to me in a way that has never left me. The people in Genesis became my friends and I read their stories over and over.
Then, A taught the youth class and made the Bible ‘real’, just like E had. So, the basics in understanding the Word of God were laid in my life.
Then came the time for me to make a decision for Christ! I'll never forget the night when we were having special meetings! As we stood to sing the final hymn, the atmosphere in the room was electric! I had never felt anything like that before. I realize now that the Holy Spirit had come in all His fullness and that's what I was feeling!
Suddenly a man came from the back of the church - it seemed to me that he was almost running - and got down on his knees at the front pew. I tried my best to see what he was doing - I thought maybe his little son had gone up there and was playing under the pew and he was trying to get him out - and then all of a sudden it hit me – “He's becoming a Christian!” My immediate response was, “I want to become a Christian!”
It seems to me that maybe a little ‘revival’ was going on in the church at that time. E handed out several books for us kids to read about people who had been ‘saved’. In all of the books, the skies were bluer and the grass was greener when they got saved. In the church there was a series of altar calls where people would go forward, kneel at the front pew, cry and pray and come out ‘saved’. Why I didn't go forward at those times, I don't know but I just stayed back and wished that I could be ‘saved’!
Then came the day when Mom and Dad were at prayer meeting. All of us kids were at home and V… came in and announced that she had been “saved”! She had gone out in the woods by herself and had been ‘saved’. My response was, ‘You can't be! You have to cry to be 'saved'!’ She said, ‘I did cry!’ That settled it for me - she was ‘saved’! So I asked her to help me be ‘saved’. She said, ‘Let's wait until Mom and Dad get home from prayer meeting!’
When Mom and Dad came home from prayer meeting, V told them what had happened to her and that I wanted help. The four of us went into our bedroom and knelt by our bed. The only light in the room came through the door from the gas-lantern hanging in the living room.
After we had prayed I got up from my knees and my first thought was of surprise! The bedroom was still as dark as it had been before we had prayed. Surely if the ‘grass is greener and the skies are bluer’ the room should have been lighter! I later found out that the grass
378 and skies were still the same colour. And so I got in bed - not sure if my ‘salvation’ was real!
I lay in bed and thought to myself, ‘Well I did what I was supposed to, so I must be a Christian!’ And so started a series of trips to the altar! Every time there was an altar call in our church, I would be up front. This was okay because I was just ‘re-dedicating’ my life to the Lord. This lasted through my High School years.
When I graduated from High School in 1952, there was never any question in my mind but that I would go to Bible School. The Alliance Church (our church in Fortine was affiliated with the Alliance) had four Bible Schools at the time: one in New York; one in the State of Washington: one in St. Paul, MN; one in Regina, SK. I wanted to go to the one in Regina.
A and E had moved from Fortine to help out with the School in Regina and another girl from our church was attending there that year. This offered security for me.
Somewhere in my Christian training, I had come up with the belief that if ever we really wanted to do anything we could be quite sure that God would want us to just the opposite. So, since I wanted to go to Regina, I was sure that God wanted me to go to St. Paul! I decided I just wouldn't ask God about it - I would just go to Regina! But there was no peace in that! Finally I said ‘OK, I'll go to St. Paul!’
I wrote and got an application, filled it out and put it on my dresser to mail the next day. Then I got down on my knees for my prayer time and suddenly I heard God say, ‘Did I ask you to go to St. Paul?’ and, along with the question, was the sure knowledge that He had not!
I had just assumed that He would ask me to go to St. Paul. So I asked, ‘If I'm not to go to St. Paul and I'm not to go to Regina, where am I to go?’ The heavens were silent. There was no answer. I was left in a vacuum!
That was the first time I had ever heard God speak to me. Later I would wonder at the fact that this didn't surprise me, i.e. that God would actually speak to me. But it didn't - the issue He talked to me about so filled my mind and emotional life that I was able to take the fact that I had heard directly from the God of the universe as a very natural thing! The fact that He wasn't speaking again really puzzled me because I needed to know what He wanted me to do in time to get ready to go to school! But there was just no answer from God at all!
Since we had been taught that God would lead us, I just made up my mind that ‘I am not going to a school that teaches me that God can direct my life if he doesn’t lead me to that school!’ So I just dug in my heels and waited.
It felt so like a vacuum! I didn’t know what I was going to do that Fall and it was getting closer and closer and closer to the time when school should open.
379 I was working on the ranch with my aunt at the time and she and my uncle decided to go home to see Mom and Dad. When we were ready to go back to the ranch, Mom said to me ‘What are you going to do this fall, M? and I said ‘I don’t know! God hasn’t told me!’
Mom said ‘Well, why don’t you send in an application to Regina? If God doesn’t want you to go there, He’ll close the door!’ I thought ‘No! I’m not going to do that. If God doesn’t guide me, then I’m not going to go to a school that teaches me that He will!’ I went back to the ranch, with that thought foremost in my mind. It was in my thoughts, day and night!
One day I was walking across the ranch yard thinking about it and, in my mind, came the verse, ‘Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right!’ 315 I said ‘No, I’m not going to!’ It was like it was telling me to ‘Obey Mom!’
Again, I said ‘I’m not going to do it! I want to know what the right thing to do is!’ Then, the verse came back to me ‘Children, obey your parents in the Lord for this is right!’ Suddenly, I said ‘OH! That’s the way God is guiding me! He does want me to go to Regina!’ So I sent and got the application for Regina, filled it out and, from that, learned my first lesson in having God direct my life!
As I said, I had been going back and forth to the altar so many times every time we had a special meeting because it just seemed like what I had experienced in ‘being saved’ was not right… something was missing!
The first fall at Bible School in Regina, the School was having special meetings for the students. I knew there would be an altar call after the meeting. During the day that day, I said to myself “I am going to go forward one more time and, if nothing happens this time, I’m out of here! I’m done with it all!”
I went forward and Mrs. B, the president’s wife at the school, came and talked to me. She said ‘Well, M, I don’t think you believe God can do anything for you! You have to have faith!’ So I worked at it! I screwed up every bit of faith I could and said ‘Okay, now I believe!’, and ran back to my room to see if I did! And, I didn’t!
I struggled in prayer there for probably an hour or an hour and a half, then I just threw myself back on my bed and said ‘I can’t fight any longer! That’s it!’ It was at that point that God quietly entered my life.
It wasn’t any big emotional experience. It was just that God was there! My life took on new meaning. God quietly lifted my life! He just gradually changed me! There was that security of knowing that He was there. It has continued to grow and to change me inside.
I remember once when a male student came up to me and said ‘You have changed so much, M! You’re more…’ I don’t remember how he put it, but it was the idea that I was more comfortable with myself, - more at ease with being me! That change has continued to grow over the years. I graduated from Bible School in 1956.
315 Ephesians 6:1; Colossians 3 :20. 380 After Bible school, my question was ‘What do I do now?’ I had always loved going to church camp! The Alliance churches in our area had gone together and built a church camp on the banks of Dickey Lake, one of the most beautiful spots in the Rocky Mountains of Montana. The M kids went there every summer. I just loved it! One of my favorite memories of going to Dickey Lake was the Teel toothpaste Mom bought for us to take to camp. At camp, we didn't have to brush with salt! So, I decided I would volunteer to go as a counsellor to Dickey Lake that summer. Since that would last just a couple weeks, I decided to also volunteer to help at P Ranch Camp in Alberta, a camp I had just learned about. I volunteered to help in the kitchen there. 316 I had promised my Aunt M that I would go to the ranch to help with the Spring work when the lambs were being born, and then go back to the ranch to help with the Fall work when the camps were finished. 317
Pioneer Ranch Camp was very different from our church camp. At Dickey Lake there were more ‘special meetings’ with an emphasis on the kids being ‘saved’. The activities consisted mainly of swimming and water sports. At ‘P’, the activities were emphasised more, e.g. horseback riding, riflery, archery, swimming, out-trips (including cooking over a campfire) etc. The Gospel was shared in living experiences and in a Bible study which each counsellor had to lead with his/her cabin group every day. It was a new experience for me and gave me much to think about.
While I was there, G C, the wife of the camp director mentioned that she would like to have a girl come and live with her. She had three small children and her husband was on the road quite a bit of the time. She wanted somebody to help her with the children. They lived in Calgary, Alberta. I decided to talk to her about it. She told me she thought that she could get me a job in a bank in Calgary!’
When I got back at the ranch to help Aunt M with the Fall work, she asked me to stay on the ranch permanently, to live with them all year! But, I had already talked to G about
316 (Upper right) Dickey Lake Bible Camp Banner.
317 (Lower left) Activity at Dickey Lake Bible Camp (Bottom right) Current Fortine Alliance Church ‘Camp’ bulletin for the Dickey Lake Bible Camp. 381 going to Calgary. I had a decision to be made ‘Do I stay at the ranch or do I go back to Calgary?’
Again, I decided that this was the kind of decision I couldn't make on my own. I just didn’t have the wisdom to know what to do! I thought ‘I need God to direct me in this one!’
I prayed about it - but again the heavens were silent! I just wasn’t hearing anything from Heaven. 318 Finally, one night, I was lying in my bed and said ‘Oh Father, just give me a verse! You directed me with a verse from the Bible before. Please do it again!’
Immediately in my mind, came the verse ‘Get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred and from thy father’s house into the land that I will show you and I will bless you and make you a blessing!’ I knew that God was saying ‘Go to Calgary.’ So, I went up to Calgary and got a job in the bank.
When I got to Calgary, J & G C were attending the Covenant Church located about three blocks from their home. I decided to go with them to the Covenant until I learned my way around Calgary and then start going to the Alliance.
I never got back to the Alliance - I became a ‘Covenanter’ and a ‘Covenanter’ I have remained. I am thankful for that - it was God's way of showing me He has His children in His churches everywhere - not just in the Alliance.
The Alliance is a good church and I am thankful for the things that were built into me by that church - but I needed to know that it was not the only church!
I worked in the bank for about a year then decided I wanted to get into some kind of church ministry. I quit the bank and spent the summer going to different Covenant churches in Alberta holding daily Vacation Bible School. I was hoping that God would lead me into some kind of church ministry for there. He didn’t! So I went back to banking.
My first job was in the Bank of Montreal but, after that summer, I got a job in the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce.
I worked in the bank for about six years and got a good financial training. Then the door opened for me to work for P Ranch Camp in their office. I was put me in charge of their books.
It was the first time I had ever kept a set of books. All of my banking experience had been with the bank's viewpoint. Now, I had to do books from the company's viewpoint.
318 (Upper left) M in Calgary, c. 1970. 382 The person who had set up the books for the camp had a very good bookkeeping knowledge and had set up a very good set of books. Just by following what he had done, I learned so much about bookkeeping. I came to realize that God doesn’t only use people to do ‘church work’ but He needs people in every area to represent Him. I got a really good grounding in accounting and found out that I loved it!
I worked for P Ranch Camp from 1966 to 1972. The office was open year-around. We arranged for weekend camps at their camp at S, Alberta and processed the applications for the summer camps at both camps, R M House and S. Then at Christmas time we had an event for International Students at Banff, Alberta.
It was during this time that I met E. He was a ‘regular’ at all the functions. I was attracted to him - I was wary! There was something about him that just said “Be careful, M! Just be careful here!”
The next part of my life is the deepest hurt that I ever had and I don’t know how much I want to disclose of it. It was, I don’t know…!
I had always assumed that I would be married: that God would lead me into a marriage and that I would have children of my own. Our whole family loved children. I just had always assumed that they would be a part of my life. But, my deep insecurity from my home life just made it so hard for me to open myself up emotionally. With any man that I really liked, I would just sort of freeze whenever we were together.
There was one or two times when it looked like I might be going to get a boyfriend but then it didn't happen. It was a pretty deep hurt in my life. Then, one day, I was reading the Phillips’ translation319 of the Bible, I came across a verse where the translation was, ’But you cannot say that our physical body was made for sexual promiscuity; it was made for God, and God is the answer to our deepest longings.’320 I said, ‘Okay, God: if that’s true, make it true for me!’
I realized I had been placing my happiness on hold until I got married. Marriage was going to make me happy! I said to myself ‘If you wait for marriage to make you happy, M, then you’re not going to have anything to bring into a home! You’ll bring an unhappy person into it, so you better just allow yourself to be happy before you marry!’ I set myself to it and learned to enjoy life, in spite of the fact that I was unmarried.
That year when I was at Banff International Christmas, E was there. On the last day he asked me to go out for coffee. I said ‘Oh, I’ve got to go wash my hair!’ Not quite knowing what to do, I just avoided him.
319 “The Phillips’ translation replaced the King James Version in my life, and I found it so much easier to understand.” - G… McKenzie.
320 1 Corinthians 6:13b. 383 I went home after International Christmas and prayed about it asking God if E was His will for my life or not. Finally, I decided to give God a sign to show me - I said, ‘Okay God, I’ll make this deal with you: if E ever asks me to marry him, I will!’
There had never been any dating, so I assumed that if he were to ask me, a relationship would be set up and there would be time to get used to the idea. I heard God say ‘He who puts his hand to the plow and then looks back is not fit for the kingdom of God.’ I said again ‘Okay, God: that seals it! If he asks me to marry him, I’ll do it!’ - a simple vow!
Then the question came into my mind ‘Are you going to hold him at arm’s length like you always have?’ So, I sat down and wrote him a friendly letter. When his letter came back, I can remember I was afraid to open it… I put it by the television for quite a while. When I finally opened the letter, my life was changed! In it, he said ‘I have been wondering if it’s God’s will for you and me to marry!’
I said to God, ‘Okay God, I didn’t expect anything like this! I had thought we would spend time together and get to know one another better. But, here, he’s come out with the question just like that.’ So, I believed it was God’s will for us to marry.
I still think that it was: I believe that if I had had the courage to follow through on it, I would have seen the wonder of what God could do!
He bought me a ring and we let the people at camp know that we planned to get married. But, when we did that, M L, one of the leaders of the camp, said to me M, has E told you everything about himself? If he doesn’t tell you everything, I’ll tell you!’ I said, ‘No, E will tell me what needs to be told!’
I wrote to E and said ‘M thinks that there is something that you need to tell me about yourself!’ After I’d sent the letter, I just prayed ‘Please God, don’t let it be that he’s homosexual! If its adultery, I can handle that. But, whatever it is, please don’t let it be that he’s homosexual!’
When his letter came back I found out - he's homosexual! Then, I felt caught! My dilemma was with me day and night! I had made a vow to God that, ‘If E asks me to marry him, I will!’ I knew that’s what I had told God! And yet… how do you live with a man who prefers men?
I could maybe compete with other women if it were adultery - but how do you compete with men? And yet I had made that vow! All summer long, every sermon I heard was about taking a risk for God! I just felt they were saying to me ‘You need to risk this, M! You need to see what God will do!’ I went through with the wedding plans!
But, when E and I were out together and he met some of his young men acquaintances, my constant thought was ‘Has he been with them?’ I would sort of burn with shame and wonder! ‘Did I love him?’ I don’t know: I was just so mixed up!
384 Two weeks before the wedding was to take place. E and I were out. I asked him, ‘Have you been with a man since we have become engaged?’ He said ‘Yes, I have!’ I started to cry! E didn't know how to handle the tears!
I gave the ring back to him, then I would ask for it back again. Then, I would give it to him and ask for it back again. Finally, he just took the ring and ran. I never saw him again.
I was left with the question ‘Where is God in all of this? Why could God not have healed E and made it work? Is there really a God? Does God really exist or have I been based my life on a lie all these years?’ The questions were very deep and wouldn't go away!
I had quit my job at the camp in order to get married. I needed to find another job. I just didn’t even want to find another job. I decided to leave Calgary and go live with a friend in Saskatoon.
I stayed with her about a month. She was a Covenanter and, about that time, the C College from Prince Albert brought their ‘Choir Tour’ to Saskatoon.
When the Dean of Women from the college talked to me and found out that I was looking for a job she asked the president of the School if he would hire me as Assistant Dean of Women. We knew one another well and she felt she needed help. So I went to C College as Assistant Dean of Women.
It was a place where there was not a lot required of me. It was a time when I had time to myself to work through the deep emotional hurt. I came to the point where I didn’t know if God really existed or not. But, I knew that if ever I allowed myself to believe that he didn’t exist, I would commit suicide!
There was just no reason for living at all if God didn’t exist. I had suicide plans all worked out. I was going to take all the money I had, go down to the bus depot, buy a ticket to somewhere (I would decide where when I got to the bus depot). When I got there I would find a hotel, go in and take an overdose, and that would be it! I wouldn't take any I.D. so no one would know who I was.
I had a reputation in my church world as being a woman of real faith - and if God did exist I didn't want the fact that I had bombed out to spoil somebody else’s faith.
I lived with that for about three years. It took me about that long to work through this whole issue. Then I decided ‘I need God!’ ‘It doesn’t matter: I just need God! I accept the fact that He does exist, because I need him!’ Life started to turn around again. God does not always answer our questions. Sometimes we have to just trust - not knowing!
I have lived with the question ever since: ‘What would have happened if I had decided to go through with the marriage? What lessons would I have learned?’
385 I don’t know where E is today! I heard that he had turned to drinking quite a bit. I don’t know what has happened in his life - I would love to know. Did his life just go down the drain, or not? If we had married, would God have done something to change him and bless both of our lives? I don’t know, and it’s one of the questions that I will ask and find the answer to when I get to Glory!
It was a long hard journey and it is something that has made my roots go down so deeply into who God is. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God has forgiven me for anything I did that I shouldn’t have. I know that His forgiveness is there and that He has blessed my life in a way that I just do not deserve. Yet, I would like some answers to the questions!
I came to Prince Albert to work with C College as the Assistant Dean of Women in 1972. I worked there for three years as Assistant Dean.
The first year I worked with M E. She was there with her husband B, the Dean of Men, and her little daughter, A. I became a close friend to M and her family.
The two following years I worked with M L, Dean of Women, and K K, the new Dean of Men. The three of us had a lot of fun together and became close friends.
K was quite a bit younger than I. There was never a question of any kind of a relationship, so this left us open to become good friends. On my birthday, he decided to treat me and take me to a wrestling match! I spent the time hiding behind his back! But, we had a lot of fun.
I haven’t seen any of these three Deans for years but, whenever I do see them, we just pick up at the same spot we were when we parted company.
There was a group at the school who were involved in the charismatic movement. One of the teachers, whom I really respected, was involved in it. The president of the College didn’t believe in it and fought it tooth and nail.
I found it hard to get along with the president. Many of the students would remark about how ‘deep’ he was using the fact that ‘you couldn’t really understand him when he preached because he was so deep.’ But I believed that the things of God shouldn’t be so 'deep' that we can’t understand them! I think God wants to relate to us in a way that we can understand.
Every year the College put on two musicals: one at Christmas time and one at Easter. The president of the school, W, was very musical and directed those. The people in Prince Albert always looked forward to those musicals.
In the fall of 1975, I decided I wanted to live in Prince Albert permanently, so I needed to get a job that would pay more than the Bible School could afford. I saw a job advertised in the paper for The Government of Saskatchewan. They needed a secretary, so I applied for the job and got an interview.
386 In the interview, I was asked to give a summary of my working experience. When I told them about my banking experience, my job as bookkeeper at P Ranch Camp and that I had helped do the books at C College, the interviewer said, ‘It seems to me that you have a lot more experience in bookkeeping then in typing!’ I said ‘Oh yeah, the bookkeeping part of it I love! The typing I do because it’s part of the job!’
After a couple of days, I got a call from him and he said ‘We’ve given that job to somebody else, but we would like you to go and see our chief accountant!’ So, I went to see the chief accountant and was hired pretty well on the spot for an accounting position.
I spent the next nineteen years with the Saskatchewan Government doing accounting. Over the years, they paid for me to take accounting courses so that I ended up with a certificate as a Certified Management Accountant.
I worked for the Department of Northern Saskatchewan. The two main projects for that Department were building roads in northern Saskatchewan and building houses for the natives who lived in Northern Saskatchewan.
The Department would build the houses with Native labour, then sell the house to the natives, setting up a mortgage for them. Then the Department would pay a subsidy on the mortgage so that the natives were only responsible for a small portion of the total mortgage cost.
There were so many stories coming out of the North! They were stories of how the natives didn’t respect the homes, watering the horses through the windows, etc.
Basically, the stories were that the homes were run down within two to five years after they had moved into them brand-new. The Department was building the houses at a about $110,000. That was quite a bit of money at that time. Yet the homes were in ruins very quickly!
From that experience, I began to think through the issue of the Native culture, what they believed about themselves and how that belief shaped their lives.
It seemed that the white people viewed the natives as a people who would always fight addictions of one kind or another and they could never break that addiction. They just couldn't win and would always need someone to help them. And it seemed that the natives agreed with the whites on this issue - and that belief shaped their lives.
I got started on computers when I was with the Saskatchewan Government. It’s interesting: the first computer we ever had occupied a room about six foot by six foot, and the paper was about two and a half feet wide by about a foot and a half long. It produced these great big reports that were twenty-five to thirty pages long. Somebody was in there feeding that machine constantly, getting reports out.
387 Then, we all got desk computers. I’ll never forget the first time somebody showed me a ‘spreadsheet.’ The computer added up all my columns- lengthwise and up and down carried balances from one place to another, etc., etc., etc. Goodbye paper spreadsheets forever! I thought it was the best thing I had seen since ‘Mom's apple pie!’
Then, they had what they call dBase. The professionals hadn't developed the intricate accounting programs we have today. With dBase we could develop our own programs. I developed one for reconciling the cheques that we sent out for firefighters. It wasn't a bad program for an amateur.
In 1977, D and D F came to be the pastors at the Covenant Church in Prince Albert. It wasn't long before they and I became very close friends. One of the things that drew us together was the interest we all had in the healing ministry of the church. D and D became good friends of T and W W who were the pastors at H Church (an Anglican Church in Prince Albert). T and W were very involved with the charismatic movement.
D and W set up a little business down town. They did typing for small organizations which did not have enough typing to do to make it feasible to hire a secretary. They wanted to offer ‘accounting’ to any clients who needed it, and they needed to get their own accounting done. So they asked me to help.
They found a little software package called ‘Bedford’. By that time, I had enough computer experience to tackle Bedford! It was very, very, basic. You still had to write in whether you were debiting or crediting the entry.
It had no windows in it at that time. Gradually it was developed with windows then with more and more integration in the various functions of the package until it became the Simply Accounting we have today! So, I grew with Simply Accounting, right from scratch, and have used it a lot and have enjoyed it very much!
During this time, D, D, and I began to explore the ‘charismatic movement.’ D had read through the Book of Mark and the whole book took on new meaning for him. And I had always been convinced that there should be more to our Christian lives than the ‘church activity’ that described the lives of so many of us.
I knew that, for a lot of people, their Christian life was basically just going to church. Once you had been at church, and done your duty at church, then you went back to your ordinary life.
I believe that the church - our church included - has somehow over the years become a place where we ‘…have a form of godliness but deny the power thereof.’321 We no longer expect anything from God. Our Christianity consists of what we can do for Him - not what He wants to do for us. And I believe that He wants to heal us physically!
321 2nd Timothy 3:5.
388 One of the women in our Bible study recently asked me, ‘Do you think that God has allowed us to have doctors in this day and age rather than having miracles?’ My answer was ‘No! I believe He has allowed doctors but I think that we have failed to believe him for the health of our bodies, and we have allowed ourselves to see things as the world around us sees them!’
There’s that verse in Romans that says, ‘Don’t be conformed to the world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.’ 322 I believe we have accepted the views of the world around us so that when sickness comes our first and often only thought is that we have to see the doctor. Often, we don't even think of asking God about the problem.
I believe that we are missing out on what God wants to do for us. D and D and I were exploring this together when we got in trouble with the rest of the church: ‘we were too charismatic!’
They accepted a call from a church in Florida in 1987. In 1989 I went down to visit them for a week and really enjoyed it. I had orange juice from the oranges on the tree in their yard. It was really good.
After they left our church we had a series of interim pastors for about ten years. Then, we called a pastor and his wife from Winnipeg, R and L.
R had strong leanings toward the charismatic but he didn't make them public. I never did discuss it with him. I heard some stories about things that happened with the youth group. I think he was open to let God work in ways that weren't just religious.
R decided - and I think rightly so - that the power in our church was in the hands of the elderly and that it needed to be shifted into the hands of the younger people. So, he just gradually eased the elderly out of their positions and put it into the hands of the younger people.
In that process, I lost much of my involvement in the church. I have always believed that my basic gift from the Holy Spirit has been the gift of teaching. I love teaching. I probably had not been without a Sunday School class in the church for as far back as I could remember.
Our Sunday School started getting smaller and smaller. Pretty soon, we didn’t have a Sunday school. We had an adult class, which I had always taught, but it was shifted out of my hands into the hands of a younger person.
Then, I had the senior high class for a while. Then, it was decided that the youth pastor should take that class. I had no class.
322 Romans 12:2. 389 I said to myself, ‘Nobody can take anything from me unless God allows it.’ I believed that God was allowing this and I wouldn’t fight to keep it. I believed that He had things to teach me that I wouldn't learn if I clung to the positions that I had always held.
I had done the bookkeeping for the church for many years. That job, too, had to go! I needed to train somebody younger to do it. So, I trained another fellow to do it. So, I was out of the books!
I had been on the Board of the church for a long time because I did the books. As soon as I didn’t do the books anymore, I was no longer interested in the Board. I do not like administrative work at all. All these changes put me right out of the inner circle of the church. Then my hearing started going bad. There was a ringing in my ears that made it very hard for me to hear anything coming over a loud speaker. There were many times when I went to church and didn't hear a word of the sermon. This isolated me more than anything.
In 2014, my eyesight started going. I first noticed it when I was driving at night. One night I was driving on 28th Street and I couldn’t pick out the lanes.
It was in the winter - the lanes were well worn - but, I couldn’t see them clearly. So, I turned off 28th Street to a street with less traffic. I still couldn’t pick out the lanes. Apparently, I was driving down the middle of the road.
There was a car right behind me and they were very upset with me. They yelled at me, ‘You’re driving right in the middle of the road!’ They turned me in. to the police. That week I got a letter from the police saying ‘I had been turned in for impaired driving!’ (We both laughed).
I didn't realize it, but the ‘dry’ type of macular degeneration which I had for years suddenly went to ‘wet’ macular degeneration. A few nights later, I was driving on 15th Street and almost ran into one of the islands - I just didn’t see it.
P was with me and yelled, ‘M, watch out! You're going to hit that.’ I turned my head just a little and saw what I was doing.
I think P… thought that I was trying to commit suicide. She asked me later, ‘What was on your mind when you did that, M?’ I said ‘Nothing - I just didn’t see it!’
So, I asked God, ‘Okay, God, do I hang up my keys, or do I just hang them up for night driving?’ It was at night that I was having so much trouble!
Before this happened, I had gone to my optometrist and she had said ‘I want a specialist to look at your macular degeneration, M!’ She had set up an appointment with the specialist to look at it and that appointment came up just at that time.
390 When I went for the appointment, they took me in to have the eye test - those letters they make you read where they start out large and get smaller and smaller. I did fine with my right eye but when they asked me to read then with my left eye. I said ‘There’s nothing there! I can’t see a thing!’ They said ‘Nothing? When did that happen?’ and I said ‘I don’t know!’
When I saw the specialist, he told me that my macular degeneration had gone ‘wet’ in my left eye. They had the drug on hand to counteract the problem so he gave it to me. He put it in my eye with a needle! I have gone back several times for needles! I'm getting used to having needles poked into my eye!
Since then, the optometrist has told me that my problem has really improved. I can see quite clearly even at night! I don’t know what it will be like in the wintertime but now I drive at night all the time and P relaxes even when I am driving at night!
However, all of these things left me isolated. It was hard to see, it was hard to hear and, because I had fasciitis in one foot and had burned the other, I had trouble walking! And, here is me believing that God wants to heal us!
So, I’ve just been praying and saying ‘Okay God. You healed the deaf man so that he could hear perfectly! You healed the blind man so that he could see clearly! And You tell me that I will walk freely and lightly!’ And, gradually, gradually, God has been working.
The blindness: although they used the drug for that, it seems to me that the doctor is almost surprised that it is turning around as quickly as it is! Maybe prayer and a drug are a good combination!
And my hearing? I have been able to listen to quite a few sermons and get much more out of them lately. I had gone to church for a long time and heard people say, ‘That was a good sermon!’ and I would say, ‘Was it?’ Now I’m beginning to hear the sermons and am able to say, "Yes it was!"
So, gradually, gradually, these things are happening. I wonder how much God will teach me before I go to Glory! I would love to learn it while I am still in the land of the living!
My dad wrestled with these issues. Dad’s life with God was intertwined with his personal life. He had a very personal relationship with God. You couldn’t call it ‘charismatic' but it was very personal!
He was a member of an Alliance Church and, being Alliance, he read a lot about A.B. Simpson who had founded the Alliance Church. A.B. Simpson believed very, very, strongly that God still heals today. And Dad agreed with him!
Yet, it didn’t seem to happen the way we would like to see miracles take place. So, it was the deep questioning, believing that miracles should be there yet not experiencing them!
391 I had grown up with this issue and have wrestled with it all my life. When Jesus was here on earth, He said that He was doing ‘The Father's will’323- and His ministry was teaching and healing. So, it must be God's will to heal. He healed anybody and everybody of every kind of disease. So, I wrestled with it!
D, our pastor, started wrestling with it! It was at the time when the charismatic movement was at its height. It challenged us to believe that there was more to the Christian life than going to church on Sunday morning! And yet the strong emotional content in the movement caused many people to try to ‘make things happen’ if God didn't do it on time!
One thing I have learned for sure about God is that He has His own time table and He doesn't hurry when we tell Him to! And so a lot of ‘human works’ took place In the ‘Movement' which created a picture of a movement that was run by emotion and some of the genuine things that God was doing got over-shadowed by the false - the things that men were trying to make happen.
But there were many who were seeking the truth! And so, in our church, the battle lines were drawn!
Two of the leaders in our denomination at that time were definitely opposed to anything charismatic. I was on the Conference Board of the Covenant at that time.
At one of our Board Meetings we had spent two days doing the conference business. We were all looking forward to adjournment and, just as the Chairman was going to dismiss us, those two men brought in a document they wanted passed which said that ‘the Evangelical Covenant Church is not anti-charismatic but it is non-charismatic.’
They expected us to pass it that night. The Chairman of the Board said ‘No way! I will not let this come to the Board at this time. It’s too late at night and I have charismatic people on this Board!’ He named one other man and me as the charismatics! It was the first I knew I was charismatic!
The whole charismatic issue created a division in our church at that time. And so, in 1987, D and D accepted a call to a church in Florida.
I missed them very much! I have never had that close a relationship with a pastor since then. I was left with nobody to wrestle these things through with me.
I don’t want to live my Christian life with just religion! There’s got to be something much deeper in my Christian life than going to church and doing my duty and coming home to eat dinner! The relationship with God has to be much deeper than that! I’m still convinced that God wants physical healing as part of our every-day life!
323 John 6:35-40. 392 The Bible tells us that He heals in answer to faith. ‘Thy faith has made thee whole!’324 He said that to so many people when He healed them. He gave the credit to their faith! But what is faith?
When I was struggling with wanting ‘something more’ in my Christian life while I was at Bible School, and was at the altar with Mrs. B, she said to me ‘I don’t think you believe, M, … you don't have faith!’ So I tried working up ‘faith.’ However, that is not ‘faith!’
Jesus is the author and the finisher of our faith. If I can work it up on my own then He didn't need to die! My question is still ‘What is faith?’ And how do we get the kind of faith where Jesus can say to us, ‘Thy faith has made thee whole!’?
Just this morning I have been thinking about Hannah.325 In my imagination I placed myself in the family circle with Hannah, Peninnah and Elkanah.326 Peninnah is rubbing it in to Hannah because she can have children and Hannah can't. She is making Hannah’s life miserable!
Then, they go to the yearly sacrifices and Elkanah, trying to cheer Hannah up, is saying to her ‘Hannah, am I not more important to you than ten sons?’ Peninnah is over there smirking at Hannah.
They sit down to have the sacrificial meal and Elkanah gives her a plate of food fit for a lumber-jack: twice as much as anybody else, and Hannah can’t even take a bite. She gets up from the table and runs. She runs to the temple and there she prays, and says: ‘God, if you give me a son, I’ll give him back to you!’
Eli, the priest sees her and thinks she's drunk. ‘Lady, why are you at God's temple drunk?’ She says ‘I’m not drunk! I’ve been praying to God and I’m very sad!’ Eli says to her ‘May God grant you your request!’
Hannah thanks Eli, gets up and goes back to the feast. She sits there and eats her meal, peace enveloping her like a blanket! Eli had said, ‘May God grant you your request!’ She believed him - he was God's priest! She knew she was going to have a son! God was going to answer her request.
That is ‘faith’: ‘…the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things of things not seen!’327 That is the kind of faith that Christ is talking about. We just know that 'God has said' and we believe it! I’ve been asking God to give me that kind of faith. If God has said it, I can depend on it! That’s what real faith is!
324 Matthew 9:22; Mark 5:34; Luke 8:48.
325 1st Samuel 1 and 2: Hannah and Peninnah are the two wives of Elkanah. Hannah is childless.
326 Ibid.
327 Hebrews 11:1 KJV. 393 Why do I want that faith? That’s the question!
Basically, I think that I want that faith because I want to see the activity of God in my life and in the lives of people around me! There are people whom I desperately want to see give their lives to God. Right now, it seems as if they are almost at the end of themselves. I believe from the bottom my heart that they will choose God's way. I’m not sure when and how. But I believe I will see it!
When I had retired from the Saskatchewan Government in 1994 and was home all day, a native lady named D lived next door to me. We got to be friends. She had a little girl named N who was just starting kindergarten.
D was going to school that Fall. N was only in kindergarten half days and D had full days at school. She asked me if I would take care of N when she got home from kindergarten until she (D) got home from school.
Soon, N brought another little girl, T, home with her. They had become good friends.
Then they got in the habit of staying overnight at my house on Saturday night and going to church with me on Sunday.
Then, they bought a couple of other girls from school to church with them. For a while, I had about four or five girls sitting with me in the pew every Sunday. I was really quite disappointed in the fact that these girls never did get integrated into the church. They were always on the outside.
Then, one day, T asked me if she could ‘camp over’ at my place (spend the night at my place). I think it was a Sunday night when she asked to camp over. I said it would be fine! I was working at a little credit union every Wednesday. It was a credit union for the Saskatchewan Government workers and only had office hours on Wednesday.
T stayed Sunday night, then Monday night. I told her on Tuesday that she would need to go home on Wednesday because I had to go to work. I finally got in touch with her mother and told her that T would have to come home for Wednesday because I had to go to work. Her mother said ‘Fine, she would be home!’
Wednesday morning, I got up, got T ready to go and sent her off on her bike. Her mother’s home was not too far from my home. I was getting ready for work when, all of a sudden, T was back and told me that her mother wasn’t home.
I had to go to work and I didn’t want to leave her alone, so I phoned Social Services and told them that she was riding her bike around the neighbourhood, couldn’t go home and couldn’t get into my house. She was probably about eight at that time. It was after I had known her for about a year. Social Services came and picked her up and took her to Children’s Haven.
394 From this incident, Social Services knew that I had an interest in her. A little while later, her home fell completely apart. Social Services phoned and asked me if she could stay with me for ten days and I said ‘Sure!’
After the ten days were up, they called me again and asked if she could stay another month until they got things straightened out at home. Again, I said okay.
Then they asked me to go to court and, there, they asked me to keep her for three months. Then we had a series of court appearances. 328 At each court appearance they would extend her stay with me for another three months. They gave me a stipend of $270 a month to take care of her.
While we were going through these court appearances, her little sister T L was living at her grandmother’s house. Things got tense there so they asked me if she could live with me also.
I had the two girls for probably about three years. I would take them over to visit their mother, R, usually on weekends. Then I would go pick them up and bring them back here again.
One day, Social Services phoned me and said ‘We’re placing the girls back with their mother!’ I said ‘Oh, did their mother find a home?’ They said ‘No, we’re going to put them with their mother and her boyfriend.’ I said ‘You can’t do that - they live in an apartment where no children are allowed. They can visit there, but they can’t live there!’ The social worker said ‘Oh, I’ll have to go talk to my supervisor!’
When she phoned me back she said ‘They’re going to be on an extended visit!’ I phoned the mother and asked her if Social Services had been in touch with her. She said ‘Yes!’, so I asked ‘Shall I bring the girls over?’ She said ‘No, I don’t know if I’m going to be here tonight. I think F (the boyfriend) is kicking me out!’
I wasn’t going to leave the girls on the street so I just kept them. The stipend that I had been getting for the girls stopped. I phoned Social Services and told them that the girls were still with me. They said ‘Well, we assumed that!’ and that was the end of the story for them!
The girls continued to live with me for five or six months. Then, one day, the mother was in at Social Services applying for money to live on. While she was there she heard that she could get the child tax credit for the girls from the time Social Services had closed her file
328 (Left) T, (Right) T L: two young ladies M started caring for when they were small. 395 until the present. I was giving her a ride home when she told me that she was going to take the girls back and apply for that child tax credit.
I had been getting the child tax credit and I knew that, if she was able to collect it for that time, I would have to pay it all back. I said ‘Well, you’re not going to get it. I’ll get letters from the school principal and the dentist stating that the girls have been under my care! You can’t take them back, R - your life is such a mess. If you take the girls back, they will never be in school anymore!’ It made her mad. She got out of the van crying!
That night, the girls didn’t come home from school. I went to see about it and she had picked them up at school. I didn’t know where she had taken them at first.
She had taken them to the YWCA, where she lived, for about a week and then moved in with her mother. Then, she rented an apartment in a drug infested townhouse complex. The girl’s lives just went right down the drain after that!
All of this involvement with the native people has made me focus in on the Native problems. I have watched how the government tries to fix them.
You hear about kids committing suicide, of many women who had been working as prostitutes going missing, of kids in one Northern Community sniffing gasoline. In that case, the government completely rebuilt another town and relocated them! They changed the location, but not the kids! They sniffed gas at the new location, etc, etc.
The government is well aware of the problems and wants to help, so they set up a budget to fight the problem! Money should fix anything! But it doesn't! It doesn’t matter how much money they spend - the kids still sniff gas, commit suicide and the women go missing!
The Government has set up ‘treatment’ for the ones who are addicted to drugs or alcohol or who have anxiety. They go for treatment for a few weeks, come back with the problem solved - for a few days - and then are back where they started. I have been so discouraged as I watched this happen over and over again in the family I was talking about, T, T L, R!
I’ve become convinced that no amount of money will fix the problems. Jesus has to break those chains or they will not be broken!
I hear the heart cry of these people as they are trying to break an addiction and failing at every attempt! As I study Scripture, I realize that this is what Man has always done: tried to find some way of cleaning himself up, some way of getting rid of sin by himself. But, there is no way that he can do it! It is only if Christ Himself comes in and breaks the chains of that sin that it’s going to be done!
That has become the main prayer of my life. Ever since 2001, I have been praying for a series of people that have entered my life, and I just keep asking God ‘Please bring them
396 to Yourself! Don’t let them get ‘religion’! Give them a real relationship with Yourself! That is the only thing that will turn their lives around for good!’
Mini Strokes
In about 1996 or 1997, I had a series of mini strokes. the first one was when I was at work at the credit union. As I said earlier, I had been working at the credit union one day a week after I had retired from the Government.
When I got to work there and tried to open the lock on the safe door, I couldn’t remember the numbers. I finally got it open.
Then someone came in and wanted to arrange for a loan. It was just as if everything was so vague in my mind that I couldn’t figure out what I was doing. Soon it passed and everything was back to normal.
Then, one day, I had to pick up T and T L to take them somewhere, I think maybe to school. I was driving and, all of a sudden, I couldn’t talk. I couldn’t say anything! That too passed, and I could talk again, but then it would happen again! I didn’t know what was happening. It would just come and go on different days.
I remember once going in to get some gas. R happened to be with me at that time. I wanted $50 worth of gas but, when the attendant asked me how much gas I wanted, I just said ‘fi… fi… fi…!’ They didn’t know whether I was saying ‘fill it up’ or ‘fifty’: I could just get to the ‘f’ part of it!
Then, R told him I wanted $50 worth, then she suggested that she drive. I said ‘Oh no, I’m fine! It’s gone already!’
Then, one day when P was home, I had one. Again, I couldn't talk! I motioned for her to phone our pastor to see if he would come and pick me up and take me to the hospital. He came, picked me up and, when we get up to the corner of 15th and 15th, I said ‘Oh, was that F who went by?’ My speech was back. It was over just that quickly. But, he still took me to the hospital.
They checked me out and did a lot of work to try to find out my problem. I remember T came up and stayed with me all day long. I thought that was so good of her to take the full day and just be there with me!
I had a couple of different doctors and we started working through this. They started taking my blood pressure, which was really high. The doctors determined that I had an irregular heartbeat and, since my blood was too thick, it had a chance to form a clot between the heartbeats. They put me on Warfarin.
During that time I met my current doctor. He told me ‘There will be a 98% chance that you will never have another mini stroke!’ T heard him say it - ‘A 98% chance! That’s really
397 pretty good!’ I was so out of it that I probably would have missed that statement if she hadn't heard it!
Anyway, it is working. The doctor set it up so that I would take the dosage he told me to, then I would go to the blood clinic once a week and have them take my blood. If it was too high, he would phone and tell me ‘lower it one’ or, if it was too low, he would phone and say ‘raise it one’.
We worked it through and, soon, I started going every two weeks, then every three weeks, then once a month.
We finally decided that I needed between 3 mg or 4 mg a day. If I took 3 mg a day, after a month or so he would phone and say to raise it another milligram, then a month later he would call and say lower it a milligram. After a while, I said ‘Phooey, this is nonsense! Three is too low and four is too high!’ So, when I put my pills in my pillbox, I put in 3 mg for three days a week and 4mg for four days a week.
After I started doing that he never called me for quite a while. I told him what I was doing. After a while it got too high and he said to try 3mg four days a week and 4 mg three days a week. I have been doing that for a few years now and I only have to have my blood checked every three months when I go to see him.
T lived with R for a few years. They would move into an apartment, trash it, get evicted and then move into another and repeat the process. Their last apartment they lived in, I kept asking them, ‘Where are you going to go when you’re evicted from this place?’ They would say ‘Oh, we have lots of friends!’ Well, when they got evicted the only ‘friend’ they could find to live with was me.
They came to live with me for a while. But, since I had two girls with special needs in my home, Social Services told me that any adult who lived in my home had to have a criminal record check.
Rather than have the criminal record check, R left. But, T stayed. T had the criminal record check done. It came back ‘Nothing to report unless she’s fingerprinted, and then maybe there would be something to report.’ So, we sent in for a fingerprinted report.
It takes about six months to get a fingerprinted report. I forgot about it and am not sure if it did come back. I didn’t even think about it anymore. I think that maybe, when it did, T took it out of the mailbox and destroyed it.
Then, she wanted to get a job at a daycare centre and so, again, she had to get a criminal record check. It came back the same: ‘Nothing to report unless she’s fingerprinted, and then maybe there would be something to report.’ So, again, she was fingerprinted and, again, it took six months to come in.
398 The day it came in, I got a call from Social Services asking ‘When are you going to get that report in for T?’ I said ‘Well, it just came today. I’ll send it in.’ So, I sent it to them.
In 2010, when T was turning 17, she had a celebration party with quite a bit of liquor. She had broken a beer bottle and stabbed another girl with it. The other girl pressed charges and T never followed through with it: she just kept avoiding the court cases. Because of that, she had several other charges against her for avoiding going to court. So, this was reported on the criminal record check.
I thought, since it was now 2014 and the incident happened in 2010, maybe it was old enough so that it wouldn’t matter, but it did! They gave her a week to move out. Her mother didn’t want her and her grandmother didn’t want her and she didn’t have any place to go. She ended up going to live with a boyfriend.
I kept saying ‘Why don’t you go live at the 'Y'?’ She said ‘I don’t want to live at the 'Y'!’ I said ‘Why don’t you try it?’
She lived with her boyfriend for little while and that didn’t work out. Then, she did go to live at the 'Y'. She settled in and was there for a couple months. Then, all of a sudden, I didn’t hear anything from her for a while and then found out that she had gone to Saskatoon and was living with some fellow down there.
It was just before Easter in 2015 when she gave me a call. She was back in town and wanted to come visit. Social Services had allowed her to visit, but not to live here. We had the rule after Social Services said she had to move out that she could come, have supper with me and then I would take her to wherever she was staying that night. I said ‘Okay, where are you staying?’ She said that she was staying with her mother, so I said okay.
When she got here, she said her mother would pick her up. I was having trouble with my eyes about that time and didn’t want to drive after dark so, when it got a little bit late, I said ‘When is your mother coming?’ She said ‘Oh, they are delivering pizza but they will be here!’ By about 10:30, I knew they weren’t coming and I knew she would be staying the night.
She had always slept downstairs, but that night she went to sleep in my bed. Then, about 2:00 in the morning, B and P were in my room waking me up saying ‘M, the police are here!’
I said ‘The police? What are they here for?’ I went to the door and the police told me that T had been running naked in the streets and the neighbours had phoned them about it. I asked, ‘Where is she now?’ They said she was in their car. I asked if she was still naked. They replied ‘No, she has a sheet around her!’
They took her downtown and I assumed that they were keeping her there. About forty-five minutes later, B and P were in my room again: ‘M, the police are here!’
399 I went to see what they wanted. They said that they didn’t think that T needed to stay with them so they had brought her back to spend the night with me. I went back to sleep and, pretty soon, ‘M, the police are here!’
I went to see what they wanted this time and they said that somebody had been phoning in saying that ‘…men were trying to break into the house!’ T is the only one who would have made those phone calls.
Anyway, she was with me the next morning. The girls went to work so I let her stay during the day. The next night, I phoned Mobile Crisis and told them to take her to ‘Our House’329 downtown.
About 8:00 next morning, she was back at my door. I don’t know how she got back. I let her stay that day. But, when night came, I told her she was going to have to leave before it got dark so I could take her wherever she had to go.
I ended up taking her to the 'Y'. I waited to make sure everything was okay. She came out and said she couldn’t get a room at the 'Y' (she had abandoned her room in January when she moved to Saskatoon and she couldn't get back into the 'Y' for six months).
I said she would have to stay at ‘Our House.’ She asked me if I would take her to her mother’s to see if she could get some cigarettes.
I took her to her mother’s, hoping that maybe she could stay there. Her mom wasn’t home. So, she asked me to take her to her grandmother’s to see if she could get some cigarettes. Her grandmother wasn’t home. So, I said ‘We’ll just have to go to Our House then.’
She said ‘M, I don’t like living in Our House! It’s all old men there and I just don’t like it!’ Finally, I said ‘Okay, I’ll let you stay at my place one more night and then that’s it!’
I went to bed that night and, about 2:00 in the morning, I woke up to P yelling at the top of her voice saying ‘No, T, no! I won’t let you do that! No, T!’ Then she said ‘Watch out, M, she’s got a knife! Watch out, she’s got a knife!’
I got out of bed, went to the kitchen where T was standing in the middle of kitchen floor. I asked, ‘What did you do? What are you doing?’ She looked confused and said ‘I don’t know!’
I sent her to the basement, then I went to see how P was. P was dripping blood all over the floor! T had stabbed her with a kitchen knife. P had turned just in time so that she got the stab in her arm rather than in her back. She was on the phone to 911!
The police came and took T away. The ambulance came and took P up to the hospital. P called me from the hospital and I went to pick her up.
329 ‘Our House:’ a YWCA adult shelter in Prince Albert for men and women 400 That was on the Thursday night before Good Friday. Since the Social Service workers were on Easter holidays I waited until Monday to report this incident to them.
When the meeting was over, both girls had been pulled from my home! The girls had been with me for nineteen years and I was devastated! I had never dreamed the relationship I had with the girls would end like that! They put B in with her sister and they put P into another care home. Of course, T went to jail.
I had been getting paid very well for taking care of B and P. All of a sudden, about two thirds of my income was gone. Then, the question was ‘What am I going to do?’ Should I sell my home and move into an 'assisted living' home? A short time before this I had taken the verse in Psalm 32:16 where God says, ‘I will guide you along the best path for your life. I will counsel and watch over you.’ So I asked God to guide me through the next step. It seemed that He was saying ‘Just be still for now.’ So, I waited!
P didn’t like the home she was in. She said ‘M, they treat me like a kid!’ She lived about three kilometers from me. She would get up each morning, walk those three kilometers to my place and then walk the dog. I would pick her up after work and we would go to the airport to walk the dog. Then she would have supper with me and I would take her home by about 8:30 PM.
Then, one night after I taken her home, she called and said ‘M, I’ll talk to you in the morning. I can’t talk to you now: they're listening!’ I didn't know what she was talking about but the next morning when she got to my house she came into my room and said ‘I am not spending one more night there! I’m just going to stay here and we won’t tell the Social Worker!’ I said ‘Oh no, we will tell the Social Worker!’
I phoned the social worker, R, and told her she had better talk with P. She met with P and P told her that she wouldn't stay there anymore because they treated her like a kid.
I can understand the people in the other care home – P was supposed to be living with them but was never there. They were trying to understand why!
The problem was that I had never treated P and B as 'special needs' - they were just P and B with different problems than I have, and we all have problems. They had access to the whole house at my place.
Other care givers often do not integrate the 'special needs' into the family. They allow then to eat with them but then have them go to the basement and watch TV until bed time. Since B and P had always had access to my whole house, this kind of setup made P feel like they were treating her 'like a kid'. B had moved in with her sister and was naturally treated as 'part of the family'.
Social Services decided that P could move back into my home but with clear warning that my home was going to be decertified on December 31st. Then the question was ‘Where was P going to go on 31 December?’
401 Social Services found another home within easy walking distance from P’s work and from my house. She went to see it and liked it very much. She was really enthusiastic about moving into it so I phoned the lady of the house and told her how much P was looking forward to moving in. I told her that, in all of this mix up, I hadn’t been able to get P to the doctor and did she know any female doctors because P… only wanted a female doctor. She told me ‘Oh yes, she knew several!’
I asked if it would be possible for me to come over and look at P’s room. In the process, I must have mentioned that P and I had talked about her walking the dog with me at the airport at 3:00 each afternoon after work. We have done this for fourteen years!
The lady of the house had a job and didn’t get off work until 4:30. We just assumed that P would be able to walk the dog with me and then I could have her home for supper by 5:00. At the end of the call we arranged to meet the next day so I could see P’s room.
I thought she was going to call me. When I didn't hear from her I phoned and asked if we were getting together. She said ‘Oh, yes. You're supposed to be here at 2:00. I've asked the Social Worker to meet with us!’
When I got to the meeting, she and R asked me to try to persuade P that it would be a good thing if she had just very little contact with me! Walking the dog was out, coming to see the cats was out, etc.
I knew that one of the reasons P liked the home was because it was so close to mine and she just assumed that my home would always be open for her to visit and especially to see her pets. I believed that there needed to be a transition period for P to break the tie that had been set up between us.
They would be cut as she got used to her new home. But they felt very strongly that it would be better for her to make a clean break and then get used to her new home. I just couldn’t understand their reasoning. The meeting got very heated and finally, I just got up and said ‘Well, you guys handle it. I can’t!’ Then I left.
As I went to my van I thought ‘They want me to persuade P that this would be a good idea. I can’t do that because I don't believe it! But, I won’t put a negative spin on it. I just won't tell her what we talked about. I’ll just wait and let R tell her about it!’
So I only told P that l had met with the lady of the house and R. I didn't tell her what we had talked about. But I was very upset, so I talked to my best friend T about it.
About that time, I burned my foot - a very deep burn that took five months to heal. Since I was having trouble walking, I asked T to take P shopping for Christmas. I hadn’t told T that I hadn't told P about our conversation.
When P got back from shopping, she knew the whole conversation. She said, ‘I’m not going to that woman’s house! I’m going ask to go into a suite!’ They had given her the
402 option of going to another care home or going into a suite with assisted-living. She had decided she wanted a suite on her own! I didn’t like the idea. I believed she would be able to handle the work but I didn’t think she could handle the loneliness.
In talking it over with her, I remembered a suite that a couple in our church had in their basement. In the past they had rented it out to some girls that P got to know really quite well. I knew that they didn’t have anybody in the suite at this point. So, I told P that maybe she could get into that suite. I thought that at least she would be in a place where there was someone to keep an eye on her.
When R came to talk to P, she was just assuming that P would go into that care home, and when P told her she wanted to go into a suite R said ‘I’m going to tear my hair out!’
I was downstairs while R was talking to P - I wasn’t allowed to be in on their discussion. When they were done, P called me upstairs and said that R was ready to leave. R said to me ‘Well, where is this S suite?’ I said ‘Pardon?’ And she said ‘The suite that P is going to go into!?’
I told her that I hadn’t even talked to the S’s about it! So, I sat down right then and phoned Mrs. S and asked her if there would be any possibility of P moving into their suite. She said that P could move in for the month of January, but they had made plans to go on holidays for the months of February and March. She didn’t think it would be wise for P to be there by herself while they were gone.
I told R what she had said and R said, ‘Well that will give us time to work on it.’ When she left, P was under the assumption that R was taking her to move into the suit on December 30th. P went home to Debden for Christmas. She was back here on December 30th for R to take her to the suite.
The 30th came and went, but no word from R. The 31st came and went - still no word. Then, it was the weekend and so, on Monday, January 4th, I phoned.
I asked R, ‘What is happening with P?’ She said ‘What do you mean, what’s happening with P? Didn’t you move her into the S suite?’ I said ‘No, nobody has even talked to the Ss about it. They don’t know anything about financial arrangement or anything!’
I had just assumed that Social Services would be doing the moving. They had made it quite clear, that my home was now closed. I was no longer to be involved.
R came and took P over to look at the suite. P really liked it and, at that point, Mrs. S said that P could move in permanently. I was really surprised at that! But, Social Services never came to help her move.
In about two days, I received a phone call from the SS asking for R's phone number. They said they had changed their mind and didn’t want to rent the suite. They were going to save it for when their grandchildren came to visit them. Another door closed!
403 Then I got a letter from the people in Regina who do the funding for P. They said, ‘We understand that P is living in your home and your home has been decertified. Under what arrangement is she living there? Would you please contact us?!’ They left a number for me to call.
I called and told them the whole story, about P being stabbed and having my home decertified because of that. I said ‘I don’t want her funding cut off. The day is coming when I’ll not be around and she’s going to need funding!’ They said ‘No, she won’t be cut off from funding. She’s just cut off from the program with Community Living.’ They asked if I had received a cheque for February. I said ‘Yes, I was still getting paid.’
Then, P got a letter from Social Services that said, ‘We gave you the opportunity of going to another care home or going to assisted living in a suite and you chose rather to live with M. So, therefore, you are cut off from Community Living.’
P had chosen to go to a suite but they never arranged it for her. P didn’t choose to live with me. She likes living here, but she also would like to prove that she can handle living in a suite on her own. She is concerned about when I will no longer be able to take care of my home - what will she do at that time?
I had been praying this whole time that when it’s time for me to give up my home, P will not be left an orphan: that she will have a safe place where she is well accepted to move into. And, I don’t believe either one of the care homes that they had provided for her would have been a place where they would have accepted her on her own terms.
When that letter came, I panicked. I phoned the lady in Regina who was responsible for P's funding and again she assured me that the funding was still in place. I'm still getting the funding and she is still living with me.
I believe that God has put a roadblock in everything Social Services tried to do and He placed her back here with me. He will do the timing on this issue and have things ready to provide a safe place for her when it is time for us to part. He is a God of details and He can be trusted!
My constant prayer is, ‘Make sure that you don’t leave her orphaned! Lord Jesus, I have a right to ask for that - you ask it for your disciples!’ He said to his disciples ‘I will not leave you orphaned!’
During this period. I didn’t know what was going to happen to me. I thought a lot of maybe moving into Caleb House, which is an assisted living complex for elderly people. They provide your meals for you and do some housekeeping.
There are rooms for anyone who lives there to gather so there are always people to talk to. It sounded like quite an ideal set up for me, so I thought that, if things fall apart here, I’ll just sell the house and go live there.
404 Then, one day, my friend J phoned and asked if I would be open to having somebody else live here. J said ‘There is a girl who just moved in from LaRonge. She is taking schooling at … . She has just moved to Prince Albert and is staying with a fellow here in town. I don’t think it’s any kind of a physical relationship. She’s just living there, but it doesn’t seem to be a very good place to stay!’
I said, ‘Well, she can come and look at my place and see what she thinks!’
That conversation took place in May, 2015. I never heard anything more about it. A couple months later, I phoned J and asked her about it. She said ‘I gave her your number and I’m leaving it up to her. If she wants to phone you, she can!’
On December 30th, when we were waiting for R to find a suite for P, the girl phoned me. She asked ‘Is your place still available?’ I told her she could come and look at it. She came down with her parents and her boyfriend and looked at the room downstairs. The next day, she phoned and said ‘Can I move in today?’ So, on the 31st of December, she moved in downstairs and has been living there since. ______
After T had stabbed P, she went to jail. She was there for about a month and I had no communication with her. P was very afraid that T would come back and stab her again. I think P had a good enough reason for that fear!
These events took place in the first part of April. Then, in May, her mother came to see me.
R and J had come to see me one night in August, 2014. They asked me if they could move into my place ‘for a couple nights’: that ‘somebody had been stealing their furniture and they were moving out of their apartment…!’
Supposedly, their landlord had several apartments in town and he was going to put them into a new one. They needed a place for just a few nights. I said ‘Okay, for just a few nights!’ They moved in and moved all of their stuff in.
After they were here for three or four nights, I asked how the suite hunting was coming. They said ‘Well, we're working on it!’ Then a couple of nights later I would ask again.
It was getting close to the end of August and I asked again. Finally, J said to me ‘We’ve signed a lease for the first of October!’ That meant that they would be here for another month.
Although they lived and ate here, they didn’t pay anything for room or board. They just moved in, ate, and did their thing. It was very, very stressful having them here! Finally, the first of October, they moved out!
405 R had lived here before and, when she left the first time, she left about half of her stuff here. It was stacked up down in the basement. I told them when they moved out that they had to move it all with them or I would give it away to The Salvation Army.
When they moved out, they left about two thirds of the stuff here. So, I kept after them ‘If you don't move your stuff I’m going to give it to The Salvation Army!’ ‘Oh, we’ll take it!’ And they would come and take a few boxes here and there. Finally, I said to them ‘If it’s not all gone by the first of the year, I’ll give it to The Salvation Army!’
It wasn’t all gone by the first of the year so I asked The Salvation Army to come in and take what they wanted. They took some of it, and left the rest. Then I started sorting through it, taking some more of it in boxes, the better things, and dropping it off at that at The Salvation Army.
There was a set of shower curtains that R really liked. She had folded them up and put them in a box. I took them with me to The Salvation Army.
I had taken a lot of it to The Salvation Army. Then, on May 6th, R showed up and said that, because she had a new baby, she needed the breast pump that she had left in her stuff downstairs. I told her that I had given a lot of the stuff away to The Salvation Army but that she might find it.
She went down and looked and it wasn’t there. She found out that a lot of her things like those curtains were gone and she was really, really, upset with me! I said ‘Well, I told you and told you that if you didn’t take your stuff, it was going to go to The Salvation Army!’ When she came up from the basement and headed out the door, she saw my cheque book on the ledge. I had just written a cheque to somebody and had left it on the ledge by the door. She saw it and took it without me noticing.
A couple of days later, I checked my account on the Internet and noticed a certified check for $200 had come out of my account! I thought ‘Oh no!’
Once before, T had stolen one of my cheques, had it certified for $75 and cashed it. I thought ‘How did they get the cheque?’ Then I realized that my cheque book was gone. I went down to the bank and asked them about it. I showed them that it wasn’t my signature. I had the worst time getting that money back from the bank. I finally had to write the bank manager about it!
I was really upset with R. I still had a couple of boxes of her stuff here. P and I loaded them up and took them up to R's apartment. She had just come home when we got there and we met her at the door.
We set the boxes down on the deck and I said ‘Just don’t bother coming around to my place again!’ She said ‘You owed me that money, M, for stealing my stuff!’ ______
406 When T got out of jail, she phoned. I talked for about five minutes but let her know that she couldn't come to my house. There have been a few phone calls since then that have lasted about five minutes each but that is all the contact I have had with her.
She phoned about a month ago and said that she was getting $400 a month now and that she really was wanting to change her life around. She asked me if I would come and pray with her!
I had not been alone with her since the stabbing. I was a little afraid to go alone, so I phoned my friend J and asked her if she would come with me to see T.
I met J near Walmart. She got into my van and we started looking for T. She was supposed to be at Walmart. We drove around the parking lot several times looking for her. We were just about ready to give up when Jenny said ‘Oh, there she is!’
She had lost a lot of weight and I had trouble recognizing her at first. Then, she got in the van. I had told her on the phone that, if she was really wanting to change her ways, she should give half that money to her grandmother because she was living at her grandmother’s house. That’s what an adult would do! But, she wanted to spend the money on herself.
She got into the van, opened her shirt so we could see her chest, and there across her chest was a great big tattoo that said ‘Princess!’
J said ‘Oh, you’re a Princess! That means you’re a daughter of the king! Do you know who the king is?’ T said ‘My dad?’ J said ‘No, it’s Jesus!’ T ignored that remark and, since I hate her tattoos so much, I didn't say a thing.
Then she showed us a beautiful white sweater jacket that she had just bought. The tattoo cost $200, and the jacket was $90, and all of her money was gone. She hadn’t given anything to her grandmother.
I tried to turn the attention to the fact that we were there to pray for her. She said ‘Oh, just take me home. That’s too boring!’ Then, she asked me to buy her some McDonald’s. I said ‘No, T, I’m not doing that again!’
She had just received $400: wasted $200 of it on a tattoo and bought an expensive jacket and had nothing left… and she wanted me to pay for McDonalds! I said ‘You’re just using me, T, you’re just using me!’ She said ‘No, I’m not, I’m not!’ But I said ‘Yes you are, and I won’t have it!’
She said she wanted to go to the 'Y', so I started driving her there. Then she said ‘No, M: we won’t go to the 'Y' now. Let’s go…’ Then J said ‘No, let’s go to the 'Y'!’ So, we took her to the 'Y'. J got out of the van to open the back door and make sure she got out.
That's the only time I've seen her since the stabbing.
407 Then, the other day she phoned and said ‘M, I’m in the hospital, in the psych ward, and I’m going to have an operation on my leg.’
She had previously hurt her leg somewhere and had a steel plate put in it. They were supposed to take that steel plate out. She said ‘Would you come and visit me? And, when you do, would you bring me McDonald’s?’ I said ‘They have food in the hospital, T. You should be able to eat that!’ ‘But I like McDonald’s!’ I said, ‘No, I’m not taking you McDonald’s!’
I went up and tried to get into the psych ward. I couldn’t find anybody to show me her room. Finally, someone told me, ‘Go down that hall and somebody there will show you in!’
When I got down the hall, nobody was there to help me in. I think she must’ve been in a high-risk section of the psych ward. I couldn’t get in to see her, so I just had to go home. I didn’t have a number to call her to let her know that I had tried to see her.
She phoned me again in a few days and said she was back in the hospital. She wanted me to come see her and bring her McDonald’s, but I said ‘No!’
I have just cut the whole family out of my life. And, yet, I still believe from the very bottom my heart that God wants that family and He put them in my life for a purpose. I had been supporting them when they ran out of money and I got in trouble with some of the people in church for doing that. They thought I was just enabling them.
I have prayed and prayed about it. I told God, ‘Father, I don’t want to do anything that you don’t want me to do. I can’t keep track of the money once it’s gone out of my hands. I'm sure they don't always spend it on what they have told me they need it for! They tell me lies… they always tell me lies… am I doing right?’ And, I believe that God said to me ‘M, we’re using it as bait on a fishhook. We’re just baiting the hook!’
However, now, I believe He has said to me ‘That’s it! No more bait. From now on, they’re in my hands and mine alone and you are to stay out of it!’
I’m tempted to feel ‘M, you have cut them out? You don’t show them that you love them!’ But, God’s love is the kind of love that won't stop. They will never get outside His love. ‘Though sin is wide and deep, His grace is wider and deeper still!’
E, R’s mother and T’s grandmother, has always been a part of the picture. She has always had a job and supported herself and some of the family. But, she’s had a lot of trouble with alcohol.
This last little while, she phoned me and asked me if I would pray for her. Something was wrong with her stomach. She thought it was a stomach ulcer… and the pain was severe. We prayed about it and I asked J, who knows the family well, to pray about it.
408 E wanted to go to the ‘Upper Room’330 downtown, so I made arrangements for a lady from our church to meet with her and pray with her at the Upper Room. Then, J invited her to tent meetings that were going on at this time.
E and her son B started going to the tent meetings. She just phoned me, and I asked ‘How are you feeling?’ She said ‘Oh, M, God has healed me! I feel just fine! I’m back at work and my whole body is just fine!’
She was so chipper when she phoned this time. Always before, her voice was really discouraged. This time, her voice had a lilt in it! God is working in her life. I don’t know how this will all turn out, but I really believe it is all going to turn out for His glory!
P and I always pick B up on Saturdays, go to McDonald’s, buy lunch and then go and park by the river to eat it. A couple weeks ago, we went down to park by the river and there was another vehicle where we usually park. P immediately said, ‘That's J's jeep!’
Before I knew what was happening, R was at the back door of our van and got in! She told me that she had become a Christian. I could tell she was on some kind of drugs and her story was jumbled - but I do believe she may have had an experience with the Lord. She told me that she had taken her prescription drugs. She wanted to come over to the house so that she and J could use the shower and wash their clothes. I prayed about it and I just believed that God was saying, ‘No!’ at this time. But I do believe He is working in her life.
T L has gone to live with her dad in L, Alberta. She has had some problems. I think that she did drugs for a little bit, but her problems do not seem to have gone as deep as T's did. She has almost finished her high school and wants to go on to university to take Social Work. ______
When I retired from the Saskatchewan Government, I wondered if my accounting days were over. Accounting had always been a major part of my life. I have always loved accounting.
I received my degree as a Chartered Management Accountant while I worked for the Government. After I retired, Northern Canada Evangelical Mission asked me if I would audit their books for $5,000 a year. I thought, ‘$5,000 - that sounds good to me!’ So, I went out and looked at their books and took the job. I audited their books for several years.
They have a very large ministry. They take in a lot of money that goes to funding many different programs. They have a large budget. I thoroughly enjoyed doing their audit and was very impressed with the work they do!
330 ‘Prince Albert Upper Room Prayer Center’: a registered charity, with weekly prayer groups, worship and testimonial services and phone line for incoming prayers. 409 I got to know the people out there. Mr. R, one of the men who works there, painted that picture of the wolves that is on my wall and gave it to me.
I got to know more about Tribal Trails (a local NCEM Christian television show), and their bookstore, their Bible school and their mission work. It was a very good experience. As I had always done my accounting on Simply Accounting and they did theirs on QuickBooks, I was able to learn a little bit about QuickBooks from them.
When I reached 70, I decided that I probably shouldn’t be doing that kind of audit anymore. I thought I was too old to do it. So, I told them so and they got somebody else to do it. I went out to see them later and they told me that they felt I had done one of the best jobs of auditing that they ever had done out there and that I should have continued on for a little while.
I now do the books for three or four small companies. I also do a couple small audits each. I audited the books for SGEU (Saskatchewan Government Employees Union) for a while. One of the fellows in our church was on the Union board, so, he had asked me if I would look over the books.
The first audit I did for them, I was concerned about the travel vouchers that the office secretary had submitted. The union didn't have the practice of someone else authorizing the travel vouchers. She had built up quite a large travel budget.
I told them, ‘I can't verify this travel because she’s signing her own vouchers and I don’t know where she’s going!’ Anyway, the upshot of it was that she was signing the vouchers, taking the money and putting it in her own pocket. She had taken about $10,000 or maybe more than that. I think that eventually they asked her for about $10,000 back.
So, it’s little audits like that that I’ve been doing - just something to keep me going, to keep me in the accounting field. ______
I would like to finish this paper with some of the lessons God has been teaching me from the Bible.
Probably about 15 years ago, when our pastor was preaching his Easter sermon, he made the statement that Jesus could have said ‘No!’ to the cross. He had ‘free will’ so, He could have said ‘No!’
410 That statement just burned its way into my being! I kept saying ‘If He could have said ‘no’, why did He say ‘yes’? Why did He choose the Cross?’ It has made me visualize the events of the Cross and, especially, the Garden of Gethsemane.
I would read the stories about the Garden of Gethsemane, and Jesus there in the garden saying ‘Please Father, You can do everything! Can you not remove this cup from me?’ And, the answer had to be ‘No, I can’t remove the cup from you! If I do, all these people whom I love will be doomed! It’s either You die or they will be doomed!’
The picture is really amazing! The picture that came to my mind as I thought about it was the picture of a Jewish mother who was facing a Nazi soldier. She had her little boy holding one hand and her little girl holding the other hand. The soldier said ‘You tell me which one of these to shoot! Then, you and the other one can go free!’ She looked at the little boy with his big eyes, then the little girl with her big eyes, and she said ‘I can’t! I can’t choose!’
To me, that was the position that God was in! He had us holding one hand and Jesus holding the other. He had to choose and He chose! He chose us! ‘I can’t let them go! We love them too much! We have to go through this, Son! There’s no way out! If there were another way, we would do it, but there is no other way! If you don’t go through this, then all of these people right back to Adam will be lost!’
As I thought through this, Isaiah 53 was very much a part of my thinking, where it says:
We thought that he was being punished for his own sins, but he was wounded for our iniquities, he was bruised for our transgressions, the chastisement of our peace is upon him and with his stripes we are healed!
Then, the part ‘As a sheep before the shearers is dumb so he opened not his mouth!’
I had spent seven years on a sheep ranch. Every summer we had about a week of ‘sheep shearing’. I knew that, before the sheep went in to the shearing pen, they were constantly blatting. But, when they went into the tent where they were being sheared, they were completely quiet! Not a sound! Then, when they got out on the other side, they were blatting again! When Jesus was before Pilate he stood there in silence. His accusers could say what they wanted and he wouldn’t open His mouth to defend himself.
When the Cross was over and He was alive again, Isaiah 53 again says When he sees all that is accomplished by his anguish, he will be satisfied.
Some translations say that He said …it was worth it all!
When I read that, I had the picture of Him walking with the Father and looking over the train of people following Him because He had set them free when He went to the cross, and because of the huge train (trillions), He said It was worth it all! He was satisfied! And I was lost in that crowd!
411 Then, I thought ‘No! It’s not quite like that!’ He looks back over that trillion or so people, sees my head bobbing among them, and He comes and places His hands on my shoulders, looks deep into my eyes and says ‘It was worth it all, M: you’re here!’
But, at the same time He’s doing that, He’s looking… He’s finding you, and putting His hands on your shoulders and saying ‘It was worth it all: you’re here!’
He is like that! He can focus on me and, at the same time, He can focus on you and on a trillion other people. It’s something that is beyond human experience, but it is so true!
For quite a while, we had been singing a song in our church with the lyrics ‘Like a rose trampled on the ground, He took the fall, and thought of me above all!’ As I sang that, I could picture the rose being trampled on the ground. But, when I came to the words ‘He thought of me above all,’ I would say ‘Well, that can’t be true! He couldn’t have been thinking of me!’ And yet, He was!
To me, that’s the amazing thing about God: we are never lost in a crowd! He can focus on each of us! ______
Many times when God has a lesson to teach me, a verse will start repeating itself in my mind and I will start meditating on it. One of the first verses that I remember God teaching me was the verse that says
You cannot serve both God and money! Either you will love the one and hate the other, or else you will cling to the one and despise the other. You can’t serve God and money! 331
The Scripture version that I use says ’You can’t serve God and money!’ So, I prayed about it and I said ‘Well, God, you know that I live in Prince Albert and need money to live in Prince Albert!’ I said ‘I could live in a cheaper house if you want me to or, or if you want me to live in a cardboard box on the street, please call me to a lot warmer climate!’
It was as if God said ‘The operative word here is ‘serve’: you can’t serve God and money at the same time. If you serve money, then I’m out of here. But, if you serve Me, we will make money our servant!’
I said ‘Okay Father, but how do I know if I am serving You or money? You know that my heart is very deceitful. I can believe that I am serving You and not serving money and just fool myself. How do I know?’
He said ‘There are two tests! One is ‘Who do you think about most?’ Do you spend your time thinking about money or do you spend more time thinking about me?’
331 Matthew 6:24; Luke 16:13. 412 At that point, I remembered I had been sending in Reader’s Digest lottery tickets and dreaming about all the wonderful things I was going to do for the church when I won that lottery! I decided, ‘Okay, that’s enough of that! No more lottery tickets!’
Then, He said ‘The other test is, ‘Who makes the decisions in your life? Do I make them or does your bank account make them? Do you decide what you’re going to buy in relationship with me, or do you just go to your bank account and see if you have the money to buy what you want?’’ Then, I knew that he was asking me to pray about the how I spent my money!
It wasn’t a legalism so that I couldn’t buy even a pair of socks without asking him about it - but that it was about just taking Him in on my shopping. ‘Okay, Father, I’m going grocery shopping today! Will you help me to make wise decisions?’
Then, another verse that started rotating my mind was
Come unto me all you who labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest! Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart and you will find rest to your souls.332
When I started hearing this verse, we were moving the Bible School and the Conference office from Prince Albert to S. It was a very, very, busy time. I was tired! The thought of ‘rest’ was good news to me! In my mind, my picture of ‘rest’ was a little cabin in back- woods Montana: snow-covered, a pot-bellied stove, and lots of reading material - no responsibilities at all! Then, the verse went on ‘Take my yoke upon you…’
I thought ‘Oh-oh! A yoke means work!’ I knew that, when they trained oxen to the yoke, they would yoke a well-trained ox and an untrained ox together. As they worked together, the untrained animal would learn the rhythm of the yoke from the well-trained animal.
In the first of the training session, the trainee would be trying to do his ‘own thing’ pushing back and forth, as he works with the well-trained animal, a rhythm would set in and they could pull it with ease.
Jesus was saying, ‘Put on my yoke with me. I'll teach you how to work without stress.’ So, I realized that, when He said I will give you rest, it was not so much rest from work: rather, it was rest in, or during, work!
If I go to my job in accounting all stressed out in my mind, I will find no rest. If I am relaxed in my relationship with Him and can go to work with a relaxed mind, work is ‘easy and light’.
The physical picture I have was of Dad swinging the scythe in our yard at home. We had quite a few thistles and Dad would often cut them down with the scythe. I would go out to try and do and it would just hack, hack, hack, hack. Dad would go out and do it with a
332 Matthew 11:28,29. 413 smooth swing to the scythe that would just mow the thistles down. He would come in rested - I would come in tired.
I believe that the picture that God wanted to give us was a way of doing our work that was relaxed and at ease.
Then, it says Take my yoke upon you and learn of me.
I spent a long thinking about those words ‘learn of me’. I said ‘What does that ‘of’ mean? Does it mean learn from me or does it mean learn about me?’ As I thought it through, I realized that when we learn from Him, we also learn about Him. Any time we have a teacher who teaches meaningful lessons we learn to know the teacher!
Then I found that verse in ‘The Message’ (Eugene H. Peterson interpretation of Scripture, ‘The Message’): Are you tired, worn out, burned out on religion?… and, I often put in there, ‘on doing the Lord’s work’…
Come to me, get away with me and you will recover your life! Walk with me, work with me, watch how I do it! Learn the unforced rhythms of grace! I will not lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you will learn to live freely and lightly.333
This paraphrase shed a lot of light on the verse for me. When we walk with Him and work with Him - walk in tandem with Him since He is relaxed - we will relax. He will not lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on us.
We will 'learn the unforced rhythms of grace!’ All of His rhythms will become ours. Like the oxen, as they get into the rhythm going around the track, it becomes easy and light!
I’ve done a lot of thinking about ‘rest’ because it comes up in so many places in the Bible, such as where it says we will ‘rest in the shadow of the Almighty’. 334 There is so much about ‘rest’ in the Bible. Yet, sometimes, I am inclined to think that my only value is when I am working! But, I need to learn to ‘rest,’ too. God places a very high value on rest.
When we have learned of Him, when we have learned about Him, there is that quiet confidence that all will be well! Even when things are just topsy-turvy in our lives: if there is that quiet confidence that “The Lord is here! I’m safe!’ Then, that’s what brings the ‘rest’.
It’s a rest of mind and soul, and just such a quiet confidence that things are okay. Then, you can go through some pretty tough problems and say “Nothing can happen to me in this situation that He does not allow! And, if he allows it, it’s going to be there for my good!
333 Matthew 11:28-30.
334 Psalm 91:1. 414 He has said that ‘all things work together for my good!’335 So, if he allows it in my life, then it’s going to be good for me!
(I told M that we had come to the end of the hour and she could conclude with what she would like to say to tie it all together for her loved ones to whom her story would go.)
I guess what I really want is them to know the wonder of Who God is!
336
335 Romans 8:28.
336 (Top) Sunset at Dickie Lake Bible Camp.
415 337
337 (Upper left) P, (Lower right) B: the young ladies who lived with M for over 19 years. 416 338
338 (Upper left) One of the few pictures I have with Mom and Dad: (Middle) M, A, Mom and Dad on the deck of the house in S L.; (Lower) M, A and G.
417 339
(We have covered a lot of territory, M…. It has been a pleasure! Thank you for being an integral part of this project for Inuksuk Book Foundation. May God bless both you and all found within your ‘House’! - Rev. Dr. Don Doherty)
339 (Upper left) Clockwise from back left: D, R, M, V, S, G, D; (Upper right) M at home, mid-October, 2016; (Bottom) Patches, Tigger and Kayla (now deceased), silent sentinels waiting for M to come home. 418 Appendix G: Foundational Documents of Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc.
The following are the minutes of the first meeting of Inuksuk Book Foundation Inc. complete with Constitution and Bylaws.
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