Lydia and Jack get into the satellite-TV business, intially to great success, but life’s trials and tribulations continue with the young people, to whom they’ve devoted so much time and affection, causing some heartbreak. And as the years pass, Lydia says goodbye to her mother and welcomes some newborns.

@ @ @ @ @

In the fall of ’81, Jack decided that he could make money selling electronic equipment, fixing televisions and installing satellite dishes if we had a store right in Englehart. We arranged to rent the basement of a grocery store and raised capital to buy the needed stock.

Jack sold some farm equipment he no longer needed and his beloved plane so we could buy enough electronic equipment to get us started. As well as satellite dishes, video cassette recorders and taped movies were a huge hit that year, so since Jack was a Sony dealer, we stocked their VCRs, which at the time were only in Beta format.

We rented 20 movies from another store and were in business. Since we were the only outlet in town offering rentals, we did well with rentals and sales. We set up a display at the fall fair to promote our store.

Irvin enjoyed us having our store. He would come there after school and could play with his friends around town, but that just led to him getting into trouble.

Irvin wasn’t a streetwise kid, and we soon had the police at the store, telling us he was caught ripping off hood ornaments with another boy. Both were let off with a warning, and I made Irvin go home on the bus for a while. Saturdays he still came to the store with me, and one day he ran in, telling me if this boy came looking for him to say he couldn’t go out.
After questioning him, I learned that every store they entered, the other boy had stolen something, and Irvin was scared they would both be arrested, so he ran to our store and hid. I had hoped that now Irvin would see what happened when hanging around certain kids, but he didn’t.

Since the other boy never got caught, Irvin became braver himself about doing things he shouldn’t, and we started getting calls from his school about the trouble he was getting into and were advised to take him to see a psychologist in Kirkland Lake.

All three of us had to go, and we spent many weeks just talking individually and together trying to sort things out. The talks were doing me much more good than Irvin because I was finally able to express my feelings about my time spent in the concentration camp, but Irvin decided he didn’t like what the man was saying to him and refused to talk any more.
I got help so that I no longer felt guilty that we didn’t perish at the camp, but Irvin refused to be helped, and we were told not to bother bringing him again. Jack was well rounded and didn’t require any help.

Jack’s brother also owned a plane, and one day when he was returning home with his wife and nephew, they got into thick fog around Barrie and skimmed the top of some trees, crash landing in a thicket.

Their sister didn’t live far away, so they spent the night there and Jack and I took the camper bus down to help get the plane out. No one was injured in the crash landing, but the plane suffered considerable damage and we had to help get it out of the farmer’s field.

Stephen had just come home on a motorcycle, so we put the bike in the back and the four of us went down. We stayed at Jack’s sister’s and Stephen went on to Mother’s. After the plane was loaded onto a flatbed trailer, we all went on to Jack’s brother’s place, then to Carolyn’s and then to Mother’s. This was the longest vacation Jack and I ever had together, and I loved us being on the road for so many days.

Stephen was doing very well as a soldier, and I heard no complaints from him. He did call to say that the military dentist found a pellet in his chin and it had to be taken out. He also had to have his two front teeth redone after having them badly chipped a few years ago at school. A boy pushed him sideways on the swing and his mouth hit the pipe leg, chipping both front teeth. He had work done on them, with acrylic caps on the front and gold on the back. Now he was getting them permanently fixed in the army and told me he got to keep the gold. He was sent all over Canada, ending up in Calgary.

Tony, meanwhile, met Wendy in Hamilton while roller skating, and they were now engaged. With both boys doing all right on their own, my only concern was Irvin, and the older he got the more worry he caused me and the more he got into trouble. The good little boy we adopted was at last coming out of his shell, and everything that had happened to him influenced his behaviour at last.

Irvin could still be the nice kid he used to be, but more and more he was someone I didn’t know. He did well in his school work, but very poorly with his attitude. We didn’t know from one day to another if the police were going to see us about Irvin or about another matter. I was becoming to dread hearing from the school after he was suspended again and again, and Jack and I didn’t know what to do. Irvin refused to do any chores and openly defied any authority.

The CAS called us to see if we would take in our one and only foster boy, PJ, because he had to be moved, and at 14, we decided to give him another try. Now called Gordon, PJ was very tall and had settled down quite a bit, but after being here for a few months, we again had to let him go. I was visiting friends when Gordon took a twirling baton, placed it under Irvin’s chin and lifted him off the ground. Irvin struggled to escape and Gordon, in a sort of a trance, just pulled him tighter to himself, almost crushing the windpipe. I yelled and Gordon dropped Irvin, not realising what he was doing, scaring all of us.

Another time Irvin and a friend were digging tunnels in the deep snow when Gordon caved the snow in on top of them. Luckily the tunnels were near the surface and the boys dug themselves out. We found Gordon to be mean to animals and small children, but only when there were no adults present, so I had to keep my eye on him all the time. Eventually it got too much for me, and we had him moved to a home where there were only teenagers, but even there they found Gordon abusing their dog and had problems with him. I now knew why we got him when we did. The people he had lived with were expecting their first child and wanted him out before the baby came. They knew what he was capable of, and so did the CAS, but no one told us. We never had any more foster children after that.

Jack and I were busy with the store, but I still managed to go camping on weekends to the provincial park outside of Englehart, or to one of the many lakes around here. Irvin loved camping and usually brought a friend with him to swim or fish.

My friend Andree let me take her two children, and since they were younger than Irvin, I had them for company while Irvin and his friend fished. Andree had been coming to our Christmas Eve Ukrainian suppers from the time I met her in our theatre group, and I looked after the children a lot.

Louise always camped with us, so we had a lot of children and other company at these times. When there were too many on Louise’s bus, I took the overflow and we had kids sleeping on counters and the floor. That’s me at the lake in the photo with Louise’s granddaughter, Heidi.

In ’84, Tony and Wendy were getting married and they wanted us at the wedding. Stephen had decided to get out of the army shortly after receiving his mechanic’s licence, and went to work for a trucking company in Calgary, where he’d been stationed. He hadn’t seen any active duty yet, but had been to Norway on training exercises, and that was enough for him. This was before the first Gulf War and he wanted to make money working instead of what the army paid him. At first he rented an apartment, but decided it was a waste of money, so he cashed in his life insurance, sold some electronic equipment he had and put a down payment on a house trailer. He was now a homeowner.

Mother had had quadruple bypass surgery but was still having problems with her heart. Sister and her husband finally got divorced but still kept in contact with each other on occasion, so Mother again took Sister under her wing and helped her out financially. Brother needed money, so he called in the mortgage on Mother’s house, and she had to find a place quickly when it was sold. She couldn’t understand how Brother could do that to her and was very upset, but she had faith in St Jude, the patron saint of hopeless causes, and after praying to him found an apartment in a senior’s building right in Hamilton. Sister rented an apartment not far from there and spent a lot of time with Mother, who cooked for her and did her laundry in her building for free.

Tim, who was still in high school, would stop by to visit his grandmother, until his mother found out and put a stop to it. This hurt Mother, of course, but she couldn’t do anything about it. Debbie was also discouraged from visiting Mother but did come by once, bringing Laura, and that was the only great-grandchild Mother ever saw. Brother and his wife didn’t come to see Mother at all, and although Tony wanted a better relationship with them, it fell short of his expectations. He told us that as far as he was concerned, we were his parents and Englehart was home.

At Tony’s wedding: Brother, his wife, Wendy, Tony and me and Jack in the front and Stephen and Irvin behind.

When Tony got married, Stephen came for the wedding and that was the first time we’d seen him in a long time. His army haircut was now gone and he again had long hair and a beard. It sure didn’t look like my little boy, but he was still the same kid when he was around here for a few days.

Brother and his wife, Debbie and her husband and Tim attended Tony’s wedding. Tom, the fourth child, couldn’t be found by anyone and no one bothered with him. Tony made sure we were included in pictures taken by the photographer, and he asked me to videotape the wedding. Because of Mother’s and Brother’s ill feelings, Mother and sister wouldn’t go to the wedding, so we had to tell them all about it. Courtney and her family were now living in Hamilton and we met them at the reception, where we all caught up on the news.

Jack’s mother could no longer look after herself and was now residing in the nursing home in Englehart. In January of ‘87 she died peacefully, at the age of 91.

Things were fairly normal for a few months until I got a call from Mother, asking me to find a house to rent for her and Sister because they wanted to move to Englehart. At the time I didn’t know how bad Mother’s health was, but she did, and she wanted Sister out of Hamilton where she had some bad friends, and up here we could keep our eye on her if needed. I found a small house with very cheap rent, and in the summer of ’86, some friends helped us move them to Englehart. I enjoyed having Mother closer to me, but I soon realised she wasn’t very well and required much doctor’s care, which she received here. Sister loved it here and soon settled in with her dog and cats.

In the spring of ’87 Mother was hospitalised, and I was told she needed to be flown to Hamilton because of her heart problems. A Medi-Jet flew us down and I stayed at Carolyn’s while Mother was assessed. They had her stabilised so I took the train home, only to be called a few days later that she was in serious condition and I should come down, which I did. Mother was moved to another hospital and was waiting for a second bypass operation, but in the meantime she was very seriously ill. She wanted Brother to come and see her but I had no idea how to contact him.

Tony finally called their home, but Brother was working and his mother was asked to relay the message that Mother wanted to see her son. Brother never got that message.

Tony and Wendy came to the hospital to visit Mother and we had pictures taken with her.
As it turned out, those were the last pictures we had of Mother. I again stayed with Carolyn, and spent the day of the operation in the hospital, until a doctor found me to say Mother hadn’t survived the operation. Her heart just gave up, and they couldn’t revive her. Tony was my major support at this time. He took over and called people and made arrangements for me. He took me to the places I had to go and Wendy looked after the wake for me.

When Tony called his parent’s home about Mother passing, Brother still wasn’t home, so he called his other grandmother, who got after her daughter and really gave her a talking to. Although Mother never got to say goodbye to her only son, Brother came to the funeral home with Debbie and Tim, but his wife never showed up.

Some of the nuns came for the prayers at the funeral home, as did many of Mother’s friends. Jack drove down with Sister, Irvin and Louise and Ross. Tony made us all welcome at his new home, and Wendy had a nice lunch for us after the funeral, where Mother was buried beside Father and Jeff. I was disappointed that Sister and her husband never did anything to mark Jeff’s grave to say he was even buried there. When Tony took me to the man about putting Mother’s name on Father’s stone, I had him include Jeff on there as well. The plot also held Sister’s three other babies, but since none of them survived one day, I didn’t include them. Besides, I didn’t know their names or the other dates.

Jack, Irvin, Sister and Louise and Ross went home, but I stayed with Carolyn and finished up all the other details. I had to see her lawyer about the bit of money she had to bury her and I wanted to wait until the stone was ready. That done, I came home to find Sister in financial trouble. She was spending more than her disability pension allowed her and she had no food in the house. I had to buy groceries for both homes now, and I had to tell her she was going to have to watch her money closely because I couldn’t keep bailing her out. It took a long, long time before she could live on what she received, but eventually, she could manage on her own.

Irvin was still giving us problems, and many times he would move out and live with Sister. Since she didn’t eat well herself, Irvin would get hungry, so I had to buy food for him at Sister’s and I was getting very frustrated with him and this moving in and out.

That summer his birth father called and told me he was married with a young son and wanted Irvin to stay with him for about a month. I arranged with friends to drop Irvin off and was preparing for a quiet summer, when a few days later, as we came to open the store, Irvin was waiting for us in the doorway. His father just didn’t get along with him, so he took him to the Toronto train station bought him a ticket and left. I never fully found out exactly what went on, but I did learn that Irvin didn’t like the way his father treated the young boy, and things weren’t as nice as Irvin thought they would be there. He never spoke of his father again and never wanted to go and live with him after that.

Our store in the basement was getting too small, and Jack started looking for a larger place. Just down the street, the Home Hardware store was relocating to a new spot and we made a deal for the old premises. “Old” was the right word! We had to tear out the buckled floor, put in a washroom and fix all the walls. The ceiling had pipes running all over it, so we had to install a suspended ceiling and put in more lights and wall plugs. It took forever, but finally, in the fall of ’88, we moved into a brand new facility. There were three apartments upstairs that were rented, but they all needed lots of work, which Jack did over the next few years.

Tony called to tell us they were expecting a baby in March ’89, so I got busy knitting. If Mother had still been with us she would have done that, but I now took on the role Mother had played in her grandchildren’s lives, and since I considered Tony mine, it was like me being a grandmother. Stephen still hadn’t found anyone to share his life and preferred to be by himself, with his cats. Irvin liked helping out in the new store and everything was pleasant for a while.

Carolyn called to tell me her sister had cancer and she asked if I could come down to stay with her for a while. Of course I did, and the three of us spent some time together.

Friends gathered some money and sent the two of them on a trip to Hollywood, since they were both very interested in movies and movie stars. Neither Carolyn nor her sister married, so my coming for visits really helped them out.

In March, Tony called to say he’d had a son, Michael, and I sent flowers to the hospital. He told me that Debbie had a second child, a boy named Brian who was now about three, but I didn’t see them often so I didn’t know. As soon as I could get away, I went to see the new baby and loved being a great-aunt/grandmother.

Here’s a photo of Laura, Neil, Brian and Debbie.

Tony called his parents, but they never bothered to come to see the baby, and he said he wouldn’t bother with them any more.

Every time I went down south I would check phonebooks at every rest stop, looking for any sign of Tom, and one day while I was at McDonalds by Barrie, I found his name in the book. I called to see if it was my nephew, and when his wife told me it was, I asked if I could stop in. I had just been to see Tony and celebrate Michael’s first birthday when I finally found Tom, and I wanted to visit very badly.

Roni welcomed me and showed off their baby, Amanda, who was so tiny at five months because she was a preemie. I couldn’t stay then, but promised to come back as soon as I could, and I was so happy to have finally found Tom.

Irvin finally decided to move out, and since his aunt Carrie had a restaurant in New Liskeard, she let him stay in the apartment over it. Irvin’s oldest cousin tried having him live with her and her family, but that didn’t work out because of Irvin’s bad attitude, so this was the next best thing.

Coming from shopping one day, I saw him walking to the restaurant and offered him a ride. He was cold, poorly dressed for the weather, and he was sick. We went to the mall, where I bought him warm clothes and food, and then I told him I would be back the next day with warm bedding from home because he didn’t have any. Irvin seemed a changed person by then. He was grateful for what was done for him and his attitude was back to the one I knew when he was little. But he still wasn’t over all his hurt and bitterness.

Jack and I had a hard time in the store keeping up with the bills. By now there were several video outlets in town, and the cost of buying new movies was very high. Also, a Wal-Mart had just opened, and people went there to buy their electronic equipment. The satellite business was still good, but with cable coming to town, that started to fall off as well.
We didn’t have too much success with our apartments and we were owed a lot of back rent until we let Sister move in upstairs. We didn’t rent the two small apartments and she had the whole place to herself. For a reduction on her rent, sister was to help out during the noon hour when our helper went home, and that worked fine for a while, until Sister told Jack she didn’t want to work for him for nothing. An hour a day for free cable and hydro, plus all the odd jobs Jack did for her for nothing, didn’t seem to count, so Jack got a bit upset and soon Sister had some friends move her out.

Continue to Part 15.

@ @ @ @ @

Previous chapters: Part 1 @ Part 2 @ Part 3 @ Part 4 @ Part 5 @ Part 6 @ Part 7 @ Part 8 @ Part 9 @ Part 10 @ Part 11 @ Part 12 @ Part 13