It's not a time for cake and fireworks

Today is Canada Day.

Normally, I would be celebrating our nation’s birthday. But I can’t. Not now, anyway.

It’s not because I hate Canada. I don’t. There are so many things I love about this country.

Canada is beautiful.

We have stunning landscapes; the mountains, the lakes, the rivers, the oceans - the trees, so many trees, and the amazing wildlife. Deer cohabitate the city I call home, like pets – they even use the crosswalks! When visitors see the deer, or bald eagles, they get excited and exclaim, “Oh, my God, look, look!” and we just turn and go, “Oh. Yeah.”

I love hockey.

Even though I was too poor (according to my dad, at least) to be put in minor hockey, I played floor hockey and/or ball hockey since I was nine. I watch it often and am currently elated to see my Habs in the Stanley Cup Final for the first time since they won it 28 years ago.

My partner is also a Habs fan because she is from Montreal – which I also love. It’s an incredible city! So Is Quebec City. Toronto. Halifax. Saskatoon. Ottawa. Calgary. Vancouver – Jasper, and all of the other amazing parks that I had the pleasure to see on the cross-country drive I took with my oldest son for his university Grad gift.

And there are so many wonderful people. Almost everyone we encountered on that road trip was so inviting and helpful – not unlike most Rupertites when we are approached by visitors off the cruise ships. Canada has a worldwide reputation of being nice.

Governments come and go but I support many of its programs, particularly those that are on the side of compassion and fairness (at least in intention. I know they don’t always turn out as promised). For the most part, Canada is a good world citizen and usually breaks up the Scandinavian monopoly on “best country to live in” annual lists.

But.

But.

With the recent discoveries of mass and unmarked graves at residential schools, it’s hard to celebrate the country they were built on. It is kind of like deciding to go ahead with a birthday party after a family member dies. That said, I do not begrudge anyone who chooses a quieter acknowledgement, sans fireworks and boisterous display, out of respect for those of us who are not in an exultant mood.

Remember that many of us are grieving. It is hard not to think about the children who were neglected and abused, who died far away from their families. We cannot help but wonder about the generations that were lost. For every child, there are untold numbers of grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews, grandkids … children that will never be.

And the trickle-down effect is immeasurable, making us wonder how things might have been different. Many of those that came home were damaged and they, in turn, brought damage to their families. Violence and abuse and alcoholism were not a part of indigenous culture but, to many, it seems like it.

It’s a lot to carry and, with new graves being found and more to come, this anxiety, that seems to hang on me like a lead blanket, isn’t going away any time soon.

I know most of you are good people and that the many of you who are struggling with the decision to celebrate or not are non-indigenous, people who love the country but are horrified at this dark piece of the foundation it was built on.

Just know that fireworks and parades, cake and music, big demonstrations of affection are not necessary to show your love. Sometimes it is like supporting a troubled friend or family member, and you just have to listen to what is being said and just being there, is enough … for now, anyway.

ON THE WRITE ROAD: Fire and Ice

The fog of sleep was thick that morning when my nine-year-old niece’s voice cut through it. She was yelling as she came up the stairs to where my room, one of three on the top floor of our house, was at the end of the hallway.

At first, I was annoyed, being hungover and planning to sleep for a few more hours but, then, one word cut through the haze: FIRE. She was screaming it and saying that everyone had to get out. I sat up quickly, along with my girlfriend, eyes wide and suddenly feeling very sober and alert. The door was right next to the bed and I pulled it open and saw smoke. Holy shit. This is real, I thought, and we hustled to get dressed.

I can’t remember if our shoes were downstairs or in the room but we didn’t have any as we hurried through the hallway and down the stairs to the second floor as the smoke got thicker. We could hear others yelling. Besides my niece, my parents and five other siblings were in the house.

We ran down the second floor hallway, to the front door and down the front steps, gasping as the cold air shocked us. We got clear of the house and I stopped briefly, at the top of the small stairway that led to the street. I did a quick visual check to see if anyone was missing and then, once all were accounted for, I looked at the house to confirm what I already knew: it was gone. No chance that it would be saved.

I joined the others across the street, where we went to make room for the fire truck and firefighters. It wasn’t everyone. Some had stayed up on the walkway.

At one point, one of my brothers had to dash back in to get my mom, who he found sitting on the couch, disoriented, and muttering about forgetting something. It was as if she had decided to go down with the ship.

Once everyone was accounted for, we all huddled together and watched in shock as the place that we called home for 20 years burned and crackled in protest. It was like a living thing, that had held us in its arms for so long, given us comfort and joy but was also the setting for many horrors. All we could do was watch it die. I wanted to tell it I was sorry.

Due to the cold, it took awhile for the fire department to get the water going from the hydrant but there was little that could be done. We stood on the freezing ground in our socks for about 15 minutes before the family in the house next door kindly invited us in. We knew them well; two of the girls were good friends of mine and they made us hot chocolate and fed us. While we warmed up, I heard from my brothers that the fire had been caused by our dad.

It was a very cold day and our pipes were frozen. My dad and the oldest brother were trying to fix it. At some point, my brother was sent to the store for something and my dad was supposed to wait for his return, but he didn’t. He decided to start without him and took a blow-torch to the pipes on the ground floor. Well, our house was old and filled with cobwebs, and flames were shooting up through the house in no time.

A common theory among the siblings was that if my dad had just waited for my brother to return and they had taken whatever alternative action they had discussed, the house would have still been there, that my dad wouldn’t have used a blow torch near the downstairs ceiling. I’m not sure it would have mattered.

My dad was not the kind of man who took blame easily. He saw faults in others far easier than he did in himself. And so, he took a defensive stance, even suggesting that my brother had taken too long, although his tone was half-hearted. Some of my siblings cast my dad as an old fool and they held a grudge for many years. I saw no point in that as I was certain that no one felt worse about it than him.

I don’t believe in signs, messages of fate, but I felt that this one was hitting me over the head. Yes, I was planning to go to school but it still wasn’t one-hundred-percent firm due to the good money I was making at the fish plant. I knew that most reporters were making considerably less and was considering putting school off for a year or two, which could have easily become three or four or …

No. I was heartbroken and I needed to get away. It wasn’t just the house going; it was the negativity and anger that followed, coursed through the family for years, and that could have pulled me down. I was going and I called my sister in Calgary, who said she could put me up until I found a place of my own.

Before I went, though, I would enter my house, my room, one last time. It was alcohol-infused idiocy and one of numerous such moments that I was lucky to survive.

A few days after the fire, I went back to the property to look at the skeleton of 124 – 4th Avenue East. It was gutted but remained standing. With the temperature still below zero, ice created by the fire hoses covered much of the building, making it look like a giant, melted doll house. To go inside it, let alone up three stories to my room, would be very dangerous.

But I had to go in. One last time.

Next on THE WRITE ROAD: Farewell to my home and onto Cowtown.

ON THE WRITE ROAD: When dad nudges, you go!

The following is the second in a series on my journey as a writer, from when I made the decision to go to college and became a reporter, and all the in-between, including becoming a community playwright and actor and, finally, writing my first novel.

It was a rare night of me staying home.

There was no party call, it was mid-week and pouring rain, so I was just puttering about and eventually found myself in the living room with my dad, watching Front Page Challenge, a current affairs show in which journalists/contestants had to guess the identity of the famous guest backstage.

My dad was in his armchair by the door and I was on the couch next to it, with an end table and lamp separating us. Half the time, I was staring out the big picture window that overlooked the front yard and the bottom of Fourth East, watching the rain. He and I didn’t have these moments much anymore. It was surprising when he went somewhere that wasn’t idle chatter.

“So, what are you going to do?”

The question came out of nowhere and my immediate thought was the present. “Just staying home,” I shrugged.

Easily annoyed, he shook his head. “No, I mean what are you going to do with your life?”

Taken completely off-guard, I hesitated. My life?

He continued. “You’re a writer, aren’t you?”

I hesitated again, then said, “Yeah.”

“Well, then when are you going to school? I thought you were going to be a reporter.”

There it was. Again. I was being told to shit or get off the pot.

I had to consider my answer carefully because this was meaningful, and the reasons were both inspiring and heartbreaking. Even though I wanted to ignore it, to push it down in my heart and mind, I knew that I was his last hope.

Now, when I say I was his shining light, it’s not because I bought into his thinking. I love my siblings and they each have their talents and do many things better than me. But my dad had seen something in me that he believed made me different, that meant my path would not be that of a lifetime fish plant worker. As wrong as it was for him to cast me as The One and, by comparison, the others as ordinary, it had sway.

I don’t know many people, especially in my cohort, that did not wish for a father’s approval. As big of a bastard as he was, as mean and violent and completely full of shit … he was the person whose approval meant the most to me, as much as I tried to convince myself that it didn’t.

When I represented my elementary school as a winner in a Remembrance Day poem contest, he was bursting with pride at the presentation, which was held at the Legion. We had a dinner and read our poems to the members and veterans. I remember that, as a I read my poem one of the members wept. It was one of the most powerful moments in my short life and made me think … maybe I do have something.

I knew that if I went to college, I would probably get funded by the band but it would be just the necessities. My dad was aware of this and so, that night in our living room, he sweetened the pot.

“I would support you, send you extra money, so you wouldn’t just be getting by,” he said, meeting my eyes with conviction.

I hadn’t said no to him a lot in the first place and, well, I was planning to go anyway, albeit with moderate enthusiasm, and no date set. The application to Mount Royal was sitting somewhere in my room, just waiting to be filled out and mailed off.

I smiled and nodded. “Yeah. Okay. I’ll send my application off this week.”

He smiled back, that lopsided grin he was famous for and that I can still see in so many photos, and turned his attention back to the TV. As we watched the show, I snuck occasional glances at him, trying to see through the rough surface. He was my dad but there was so much I didn’t know about him; his childhood, how he was raised. How could a man of such humour and joviality also be so cruel?

That chat would be the second-to-last meaningful conversation that I had with him. The coming winter would see him cause a tragedy that changed our family forever and made my going to college a certainty.

NEXT: It’s gone. It’s all gone.