Good News This Time

I called Pat last night. I told him I planned to come out to his place tonight to clean our guns. Pat’s my brother. I helped him begin construction on his gazebo up north two weeks ago. I’ve been caught up in other things lately and I …

What, Ms J? Guns? Yes, that’s what I said. Yes, we have guns. Small calibre rifles we have used in the past for hunting small game. Groundhogs, specifically. Some call them woodchucks. Farmers call them a dreadful nuisance.

Groundhogs live in burrows in hay fields. Sometimes, a cow or horse will step into the hole, breaking a leg. Often, the mound of dirt left from the groundhog’s excavation damages farm machinery. The farmer is unable to see the mound in a tall crop of hay or grain. So Pat and I have made annual trips to a friend’s farm to hunt and kill these pests. Dad used to take us when we were kids. He taught us how to shoot and he taught us gun safety.

“Don’t ever point a gun at anything you don’t want to shoot,” he’d tell us.

And “Guns are tools, like hammers and screwdrivers. They’re designed to do a job and they do it well. Guns are designed to injure and kill. A gun will kill a human just as easily as it kills a poor groundhog.”

And so we hunted, Ms Journal. We hunted with Dad until his legs grew old and tired. I remember the first time I asked Dad to come with us and he refused.

“Why not, Dad?” I asked and his answer made me sad.

“I can’t take all that walking anymore. It’s just too much for me.”

That was the first hint that my father was growing old. Old, Ms J. I still remember that day. Dad looked a little embarrassed. And we never spoke of it afterwards.

Anyway, what was I on about before I dashed off a tangent? My brother. That’s right. I left him a phone message that I’d like to pop over tonight to clean our rifles and put them away for the winter. Today, his wife called me to say I was welcome to come. Linda and I had a brief conversation.

“I saw your ex in town yesterday.”

“Did you?” I said. “Where’d you see her?”

“In Georgetown,” said Linda. “At Tim Horton’s.”

“Tim Horton’s”, Ms J, is the name of a chain of coffee shops. There’s at least one Tim Horton’s in every little town and village in Canada, it seems. Acton and Georgetown are neighbouring towns. Pat lives in Georgetown. Kelly lives in Acton, about fifteen minutes further down the road.

“Did you speak with her?” I asked.

“Yeah. Well, not really. She talked. And I listened. She stood there at our table and talked for nearly an hour. Did you know she’s planning to move from Acton?”

I said Meagan had told me they were going to move to Oshawa.

“Oshawa? No, Kelly said they planned to rent a spot in Georgetown. Norval, actually. Didn’t she tell you?”

“No,” I said, “she never bothers to tell me anything. What else did she tell you?”

Linda drew in her breath and prefaced her answer with a big sigh.

“Pretty much everything, I guess. I mean, I hadn’t seen Kelly for about five years or so. I guess she felt she had to bring me up to date.”

“Was she alone, Linda?”

“Nope. Emily was with her. And two men. That’s the first time I ever met Emily. She’s cute, eh?”

“Yes, she’s a cutie. An hour, Linda? She was there for an hour?”

“Mmm-hmm. She rambled on about all kinds of stuff. I wanted to visit with my friends who were there from out of town. We’d gone to Tim’s to sit and visit. Kelly stood by our table and talked … just talked and talked. I nodded my head and asked a couple of questions, but boy that girl can sure talk.”

Yup, Ms Journal. That woman can sure talk. It’s a shame really. She has virtually NOTHING to say.

So they’re not moving to Oshawa. They’re actually moving closer to Mimico and not further away. That’s a good thing. But still I wonder what Dan will do. If he goes with them, he’ll have a hard time getting to work, although I suppose he could hitchhike.

At some point, Kelly will have to let me know her new address and phone number. I hope to see Meagan this coming weekend. She’ll have more information, hopefully.

In other news, I went to visit another sister yesterday. Jill. I hadn’t seen Jill in a long time. Months, I suppose. Pity, really. Jill lives the closest of all my siblings. My sister Donna lives nearby too. I wonder why I don’t often see her either? Anyway, I’ll tell you about Jill.

Jill’s my sister. My little sister. June’s twin. They’re four years my junior. Jill lost a breast to cancer a few years ago. She’s married and has two young children. A girl, Erin, who’s just turned five and a little boy, Jason, who’s three. I love my sister. But I am not fond of those kids.

Jill’s kids are … well, the word obstreperous comes to mind. Let me look up the meaning to be sure it’s appropriate.

Dictionary.com offers this definition:

ob·strep·er·ous

adj.

1. Noisily and stubbornly defiant.
2. Aggressively boisterous.

Yup. That’s about right. The last few times I’ve visited Jill, her kids have completely spoiled my time there. They shriek and bellow and fight and argue. They demand – DEMAND! – attention. And Jill does nothing to make them behave. She’s the parent. She has to be there. I, on the other hand, do not. I don’t need to tolerate that noise. I’m not used to it. I live alone, Ms J. So I purposely stayed away for a while.

I visited Pat. And Helen. And June. And Donna. But I avoided Jill. I felt guilty for doing so, but I honestly could not deal with the noise level there. How could I visit with my sister when Erin was demanding her mother’s attention and Jason was lying on his back on the kitchen floor, screaming at the ceiling?

But yesterday, my guilt forced me to return for another attempt at a visit.

It wasn’t too bad at all, Ms J. I was surprised. Pleasantly! The kids were fairly well-mannered. And Jill, for her part, seemed genuinely interested in keeping a quiet atmosphere that was conducive to conversation. I was there for two hours. We had a nice visit. Perhaps now that the kids have gotten a bit older, and Jill has begun to take steps to maintain a level of order, I may visit my sister more often.

I’ve missed her.

Tomorrow morning, I’m off to Mt. Forest to see Mum and Dad for a couple of days.
See you soon, Ms J!

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I'll leave you with some pics from my trip to "The Land" with Pat:


We began our journey with a flat tire. Pat was really angry.


A young larch tree. Larch trees lose their needles in the fall. They were the last splash of colour in the bush around Pat's retreat.


Pat fixes a rafter to the top roof member. We worked in the cold until after dark.


He stood there and ignored the cold rain. My brother is a hardier soul than I, Ms J. I was nearly frozen. No, that's not the moon. It's a raindrop caught in the camera's flash.

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