Valentine's Day 1964: An Unromantic Tragedy

I don't begrudge other people having fun today, but Valentine's Day isn't for me. It is a very special day but not in the happy sense, and it will never be a day of celebration.

62 years ago today, my big sister, the first born in our family of seven, died in a tragic car accident with two other young girls, both teenagers as well. The driver survived, only to die in a tragic boat accident, decades later. 

Thousands of people attended the funerals in our small Canadian prairie town of 10,000 souls. Schools were closed. Some businesses as well. The community mourned such an unthinkable, devastating loss.

It was February 14th 1964 and she was sweet 16. I was 3.

The driver had a new snazzy convertible and wanted to go for a joyride so he asked the girls, freshly released at the end of the school day, if they wanted to hop on board. My sister Linda was one of them, my other sister Dale, who was 2 years younger said she wanted to walk home. 

*(I just found this out today. She was 14 years old and had never told anybody until today. I'm still trying to wrap my brain around it. It's almost a blessing in one way I suppose, that mom didn't know this. Knowing that she was so close to losing two of her four (at the time) daughters would have been too cruel. But my sister never got a chance to deal with that trauma. I'm sure it has affected her, and my other siblings, in so many ways on so many levels. How could it not? I know it affected me and I only have one fuzzy memory of my late sister! I didn't share a bedroom with her in our house and grow up with her.)

They headed out of town to hit the highway, driving right past my dad's ESSO service station where he probably saw them pass as he pumped gas...and the driver somehow didn't see the school bus unloading children on the side of the road and drove right into its rear, jamming the car partially under it. 

I don't know any more details other than my sister's coffin was closed during the funeral, which is not customary in the Ukrainian Greek Orthodox Church. Open casket is always our way. That hurt my parents even more. Not being able to say goodbye properly in their deeply personal, traditional way.

So. I was the youngest, don't remember Linda and wasn't even at the funeral. And yet, the loss still affects me. Not sure why. Perhaps it's my strong pull towards family and my passion for history. Or, as my husband days, maybe it's because I'm an old softie and drenched in sentimentality. Regardless of which hits true, I faithfully put her school photo, one of only four pictures of her the family has, on my mantelpiece and light a candle on her birthday and on Valentine's Day. Seems like the right thing to do. Makes me happy. Sad-happy.

Her passing changed us all in some way, and it definitely changed the way my parents parented. My father who was usually pretty involved and vocal in raising his children, became a disciplinary mute. Any chastisements were handled through my mom. If he had something to say he would pass it through her. This is mainly because my sister and he had a blowout fight over her not being able to go to a Valentine's Day dance (she had to babysit me.) They argued and then never had the chance to make up. My father never wanted to suffer that mistake again.

And I never let my children leave our house in anger. Ever.

From texts, I just learned today that my sister and brother who were 7 and 10 respectively, had a few memories too that I'd never heard before too. They'd never shared their memories either. Nobody ever spoke about the accident as none of us wanted to upset mom and dad. We never asked questions about Linda or her short life. 

What a pity! I'll always regret being too late in breaking that shell of that sorrowful reflection. It would have been both cathartic I think, and wonderful to 'know' Linda through stories.

Although the internet is thoroughly slagged for its misuse and abuse, I have found that logging on to our small town Facebook page to be a complete Joy. And I found a lot of schoolmates of Linda who happily shared stories about her and the few memories they still possess. To me. That was an absolute pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. I enjoyed every word and cherish them still. So yes, Facebook has its beautiful uses!

Another plus of modern-day progresses is that I am grateful that we are now at a societal age where we can speak openly about our grief and seek professional help. Where counselling is readily available and quickly offered to everyone even remotely involved or affected by trauma. 

I only wish my family would have had that Saving Grace during their Time.

RIP Linda Elaine.❤️

MORE THAN JUST THE WHITMORE

School.

Love it or hate it, most of us have 'been there, done that'.

In my hometown, the Whitmore School on 6th Ave SW felt like an extension of our home. With a shared toilet for 400.

It loomed large and foreboding across our narrow asphalt street my entire childhood, and I oft times felt it a portcullis to my Camelot-esque kingdom...but mostly it felt like a convenient extra room where we got to see our friends. It was approximately 6 car lengths from my front doorstep...or 2047 dill pickles laid end to end. This is a guess as we only had one car... and I hate pickles. 😉

I saw it in from the dining room table as I ate breakfast, lunch and supper. It was in my peripheral vision as I watched the black and white visages of The Beverley Hillbillies, Hockey Night In Canada and Linus Westberg in our living room. It greeted me every time I stepped outside, and when not inside it I was often running around it, using it as a jungle gym.

It wasn't just the grandiose backdrop on the stage of my world, it was my Adventureland.

                                  *The Whitmore from the front...way before our street was built.

*From the back; you can see its little sister a wee bit on the bottom behind it. If you jumped right over the small school, you'd land on my roof!

*Me: age 2. My 1st photograph. Running from the kiddie pool, crying, having suffered some terrible injustice!😆

 Over our white picket fence of domestic bliss are both schools.

The Whitmore was actually a double act. The beautiful old multi-story stone building was given a younger, modern sibling at one point, plunked down mere feet ahead of it, and it was a one level, plain-roofed building that looked like an elongated shoe box lined with windows, stretched to almost the full length of the block. The two structures could not have been more dissimilar. Stoic/Old Majestic Stone vs Geometric/New Modern Wood. My siblings and I lost so many tennis balls, baseballs, golf balls and frisbees on that damn flat roof that we could have easily opened a sports shop atop it and made a killing. Black's Cycle and Sporting Goods would have been nudged right out of business!

We had a ladder at the ready to clamber up to retrieve the latest football, birdie, boomerang or whatever...but after the older kids left home or started dating etc, it was up to me to play retriever. It was scary as hell going up, and dizzyingly impossible to get down. I did it exactly one time. That roof ate up a lot of my meager pocket money, replacing whatever got stranded.

Grades 1 to 3 were in the new school, and grades 4-6 were in the grand one that looked like a castle. I distinctly remember the butterfly-stomach thrill of knowing I was going to the Big School, as we'd dubbed her. How lucky was I to step up in the world like that! I must be a bit of alright! Even Princess-like should one's imagination drift...

But pride cometh before the fall.

One of my most distinct memories of going to school is the acquisition of my forehead scar. A hole-punch divot the size of an apple seed a inch or so above my left eye. (If only it had been lightning shaped, right? 🗲 Dammit!)

At recess, students had to play outside. In cowboy movies, herds of cattle frantically push their way through corral gates in a mad throng, smelling freedom in the air, and that was basically what happened after the recess bell sounded. I survived that just fine, but coming back in was another matter. At the sound of the bell, we all had to line up in orderly fashion at the front door steps. For whatever pre-teen reason, it was a BIG deal to be first in line. The quest for this coveted position saw students taking off from the playgrounds at breakneck speed, vying to be #1 in lineup. I was never fast enough. And I didn't have bribery money or a henchman to trip up any frontrunners.

But one day I devised an ingenious plan: I'd forgo any of the pleasures of recess and hover close to the front door steps, so at the first note of the bell, I'd be there to step smoothly into first place. And it worked! Dozens of kids had to stand behind ME! I peeked over my shoulder and basked in the blazing green heat of their jealousy as they strained to see who'd won. I was in my glory...until someone at the back of the line shoved someone in front of them and a domino effect rippled until it hit me and I went head first into the edge of the concrete steps.

Shocked and embarrassed, I quickly got up and told the teacher at the door I was just fine, but her face went pale and the look of horror on her face told me otherwise. I was sent upstairs to the principals office, thinking my short reign as Recess Queen, unscrupulously attained, had put my head in a guillotine. But a wet cloth was placed on my forehead instead, and as I held it in place, I found the cloth couldn't get near my face as it rested on a ridiculously long bump! It likely only protruded a couple of inches out, but it felt a banana was sticking out of my head. There wasn't much blood so I was sent home and sent to bed. In retrospect I should have been checked for a concussion and received stitches but I just slept... no doubt dreaming of how I'd one day regain my title and stand proud once more at the helm of the recess line. Wearing a football helmet.

Other memories are are vivid and almost tangible:

* pulling off your socks and shoes, climbing up the long steel tube that was the fire escape at the front of the school. The summer warm, metallic smell invading your nostrils as you climbed barefoot to the top; toes spread-eagled, fighting for purchase, fingertips grasping for the shallow riveted inner-seams that held it together. At the very top, sitting on the small wooden lip that protruded from the tiny locked door that fed from the building, I'd sit with a fist full of dirty, sweaty gravel and toss it down the tube, watching the rocks bounce madly about, rattling like a machine gun, deafening and brilliant! Then a quick slide down, only to turn around, shove more gravel in your pocket, and begin the slow crawl up again. Best to be alone, not having to suffer the pain of taking turns.

* being so excited for the elective music class where, having chosen a smaller version of the violin my dad had, I sat in the front row of the Grade 3 assembly and waited breathlessly for instruction. I never told my father I was going to learn to play. It was to be a surprise, with me dazzling him with my virtuoso performance someday! The teacher called out our names, and upon reading mine, looked at me and said loudly "Your sister couldn't play...you won't be any better. " I felt my face grow tight and hot, and I froze on the spot. Then, ashamed, I got up and left. 50 years later, it still hurts.

* Grade 6 gave us a new young teacher, Miss Prokopchuk. Her not being a 'Mrs', it was hard to remember to call her Miss. And OH! was she not indeed Barbie pretty! Teachers thus far had been the standard older, married, thickening women with short, over-permed hair and black rimmed glasses, with hemlines below the (apparently) lust-inducing knee and necklines modestly covering anything that even remotely makes women female. But now we had a young, slim, casually dressed lady with a bright smile and knees we could see. She had a loose, stylish head of soft blonde, sunny hair and one just knew she must drive a baby blue convertible that matched her fashionable V-neck dresses! I adored her and debated failing that grade to do a repeat... but then thought better of it. I had a crush to stalk!

                                                  The lovely Miss Prokopchuk

* Halloween was the best time of year at school because we got to wear our costumes to class and have a party. My go-to costume was being a hobo, complete with 5 o'clock shadow, and lunch packed in a hanky hanging from a stick that I carried over my shoulder. Once, instead of walking home, I decided to show off my great outfit and stand in front of the kids waiting in lines for the bus. I pretended to be looking for someone ...enjoying the attention, kids pointing at me and smiling in what I thought of as 'wonder and awe'. However, the smiling turned to outright laughing, and perplexed, I looked around to see what was SO funny. And looking down, I discovered the source of all the merriment: my hobo pants, miles too big for my skinny frame, had shed it's poorly knotted rope-belt and had fallen shamelessly down to my ankles. I was standing in front to busloads of kids with my faded, hand-me-down undies in full view. I hadn't felt the breeze on my legs, likely due to my being warmed by misguided hubris. I picked up the treacherous pants and Usain Bolt-ed it home, all the wiser to the hazards of ego.

All in all, the Old Whitmore was, more than anything, my Garden. My Greenhouse Nursery, if you will. The seeds for my love for writing were first planted there; the first sting of that thing called love were nettles grown there, and I began to learn that like a garden, a school was populated by strange, surprisingly different living things that were in themselves fascinating, but together made up a special place to grow. Being a common flower that is also a weed, I think it's safe to say I was the daisy of the Whitmore School! *shrug* It's also safe to say that if Miss Prokopchuk was the beautiful rose in my garden, my malevolent elementary school music "teacher" was definitely Western Skunk Cabbage...😒

I have very few, dull recollections of the demolition of the Big School, but no doubt life-altering things like watching Get Smart, parading up and down main street with Marianne Kereliuk or riding my bike down to Bum's Jungle took precedence over the felling of my mountain. 

*sigh*

Sadly, we tend to value many things in our lives much more once we leapfrog 50. Or if we've just been released from prison. Either way, George Bernard Shaw said it best: youth is wasted on the young.

Waves of nostalgia wash over me at the site of old photos of The Whitmore and I'm left to wonder... why didn't I have shorts underneath those hobo pants? *smile*