Our Poor Mazda

Once Anne took me to a revolving restaurant in Vancouver where she sometimes lunched with a jewelry wholesaler. Hundreds of feet up in the air and a great view of a gorgeous city.

The height and motion made my stomach turn. I threw up going 'round and 'round in the washroom.

We went together for Anne's regular regular checkups at G F Strong (hospital) or in the Surrey hospital when she still drove her car, but after she had to quit, I drove her of course.

They seemed very particular about Anne's breathing and made her blow in a tube as long as she was able to, 'more anne, more more more, one moooore...,' which was hard on her.

Still Anne wanted to go camping. I loaded the boxes in the Mazda with food and camping goods, the mattress on top, two camping chairs on top of that, our tent, pillows and blankets, the ice-cream bucket, electric frying-pan, water hose, electric extension cord, and clothes.

Most campgrounds did not allow clothes lines, so Anne placed her underwear inside the tent, four red,four black and four white, on top of the quilt, where they dried quite quickly in the desert air. Once a week we washed the rest of our clothes, the towels and bed sheets in the town where we had found a laundromat.

Every other year when Anne's brother Henk came over from Holland for a holiday, he took the undies along from the city of Groningen, because he refused to buy 'these things' in the local lady store, and when he came over for holidays, he came prepared with a present for his sister that she really appreciated, because she wanted nothing else to wear than good solid dutch underwear, refusing the slinky thin Canadian panties.

We were all set to roll but wanted first to attend a funeral. John, the youngest son of our best friends John and Rita Heida, suddenly died in a car accident on the Patula bridge, a narrow - laned bridge over the Fraser river which created a lot of publicity at that time, all complaining about the narrow width of the bridge lanes, and John's sister was very actively involved in that as well.

I found a booklet in which Anne had recorded the tragedy.

Anne was very upset, as we both were, because John's death reminded us of the car accident and death of our own son.

Monday. Aug. 23 2004

Cleaning day!

While cleaning I found this little book.

Yesterday was a sad day, as Rita Heida's son John was killed in a car accident.

At night we visited Rita. I am sure we were not helping much, for one thing, when upset I just ramble on.

Phoned Jackie this morning to tell her the sad news.

Allen (Jackie's husband) gets his kidney operation in a month.

A long wait for them.

Will write more.

O, yah..

Anne did not like writing, more about that later.

We took Anne's car to Richmond, where the funeral service of 'little John,' was held, who was actually six foot 2 1/2 inches, (1.9M).

The church was packed. John had many relatives living in the lower mainland and was a well known car racer and many of his racing friends were attending as well.

Arriving home after the service we found our garage doors wide open. And the front door as well.

“O no” cried Anne, “we have been robbed.”

She was right, we left the car in the driveway and ran into the house. It was a total mess, the house was ransacked, even the antique travel trunk with our deceased son Len's belongings which had not been open for thirty years was violated.

A drawer of Anne's writing table, filled with empty (!) jewelry boxes was taken, our silver coin collections were gone, as well as Anne's personal jewelry, including a unique gold necklace, and an equally unique golden armband with hangings, our passports going back to 1953, while they left our up to date, valid passports on our bed.

Both Anne and I felt violated and not safe in our own house anymore, which was the worst.

They also had taken our faithful little vacation truck.

We were called by Delta police a few days later telling us that our truck was found but was somewhat damaged.

When we went to see it, we found her burned out beyond recognition, with all that was in it, she was a total write-off. Our tent, mattress, clothes, quilt, chairs, everything we had loaded in for a month's camping trip, including food, was burned to ashes.

Our holiday was canceled course, and I wrote a letter to the offender (s), which I hoped would be placed in the local newspaper The Optimist.

It was published and I got a reply from a woman who obviously had been involved or at least was familiar with the robbery, I pleaded with her to return at least Anne's wedding ring, for which I was willing to pay her generously, but she did not follow up on the offer.

We visited all second hand stores in our town if by chance some of the jewelry had shown up but without any luck.

The reason I wrote the 'event of the break in' had to do with a question Anne was asked by a specialist – if she ever had any trauma's in her life, at which she answered - 'no.'

I had to laugh about her answer and explained my disrespect by rattling off a dozen traumas Anne had experienced, including the one of violating our house and vacation property, which was indeed a trauma that could have set off her ALS illness, according to the specialist.

Others were the loss of our 18 year old son Len through a car accident, the burning of our house, the jewelry hold-up with a gun against her head, which do not need any further explanation, and about a dozen more.

Next time something about how we felt and reacted about these traumas and ALS.

… until we meet again.

What was left of our poor 1/2 ton Mazda pick up

Merriment in Misery

wine to ease the pain
a cup of water

How do you feel when your wife is dying, is a legitimate question.

How did I feel, when I was lying with my wife in bed, and what was she feeling.

What was Jesus feeling when he was dying, remembering that he was a man like us, like me.

When the man Jesus hung on the cross, he was thirsty. He made his need at that time known by asking for water, which was given to him and he drank.

Life goes on, even when you're dying.

I was feeling what every healthy man feels who lives and lay next to a woman, he feels passionate, which is (look it up in a good thesaurus) the same as being horny.

And how did Anne feel, I can say this without hesitation, she felt the same.

We gave up sex when Anne asked me to stop, because it interfered with her well-being, she told me, so we stopped, which was about a half year before before she passed away, and I have had no sex relationship with a woman since.

How I feel about that?

Right now I hear the Celtic Women singing in the background and I am crying, they are so beautiful, but I don't see their beauty, I only hear their voices, singing as only angels sing.

Let me rephrase that, like only Celtic women sing, hauntingly beautiful, touching my innermost. I have never heard angels sing, therefore its not fair to compare.

I was thinking about Anne, would she be singing like that in heaven.

One time one of our ministers came over for a visit, toward the end of her life, and knowing what an ordeal it was for Anne to sit the whole day in a chair he said

“Anne, it will be so much better for you to be in heaven than to sit in this chair,” and Anne asked “Why?”

“Because you will be singing twenty-four hours every day,” Anne answered

“I was afraid of that,” and seeing a surprised question mark on the man's face, she said

“I don't like singing.” That was the last visit by him. Too bad, for he was a good man and meant well, I am sure, but Anne was powerfully honest, specially at the end.

Both Anne and I felt as we did feel before we were aware of Anne having ALS, we had our good days and our bad days, only difference was that there were now more good days than bad ones, simply because I tried harder and had learned to listen to my wife.

How Anne felt about it?

She felt good about our decision since it was her request. I used this example because we never think that older people may have a need about sex, and we are too squeamish to talk about what is, after all, a great part of adult life. 

Anne was the only one to answer how she did really feel of course but since she never mentioned it I don't know, but she must have struggled with as much as as I did.

I got my strength of sacrificing my normal sexual activity by thinking that my wife would benefit by it and that she would appreciate my effort and I think she did.

To know that Anne gave up the same pleasure made me strong enough to carry it through.

We definitely did miss fun and merriment but humor made up for it as did a show of tenderness, and we did realize a lot of misery because of Anne's failing and had to adapt ourselves many times to new situations, but always found a solution, and never gave up our sense of contentment. Not ever? Not ever. The misery never won of the contentment.

A neighbor and his wife asked if they could come over for a short visit, if that was alright with Anne, who told me let them come.

I wanted Anne's approval because another situation had come up.

We received a special designed wheelchair with an opening on the seat corresponding to the opening of a toilet, from the ALS society, for which we were very thankful.

When Anne had to use the bathroom I would drive the toilet-wheelchair over the toilet which fit perfectly, she was sitting only a little higher than normal.

The problem was that I had a hard time to get her her underwear off, while she was sitting on the lounging-chair as well as on the wheelchair, so Anne decided from thereon to go without.

“Women don't wear underwear in hospitals,” she knew from her times of having a baby.

However that decision created another one, which had to do with the coffee call of the neighbors and Anne was still a little anxious.

“What if my skirt lifts.”

“There is no wind in the living room Anne.”

“But I feel that he looks at me, you know.”

“So do I.”

“O, you.”

We had fun about that the entire evening but it showed us clearly the unrelenting progression of the killer illness ALS and the misery keeping up with it.

One time visitors from The USA showed up, the wife of Anne's cousin Ben, who was living straight across the border from us in Sumas Wash., where they had a dairy farm.

We had so many great memories visiting them when the whole Maarhuis family came together to celebrate new year or any other event.

She came together with her daughter, who was then a professor and is now a doctor on a university. This daughter was the one who helped me on the way of writing stories.

Well, this time she taught me again though it had nothing to do with writing, she taught me a system to move Anne from the lounge-chair onto the new toilet-wheelchair.

“You are lucky that you're not any taller than you are.” She said looking me over like a farmer does a cow he wants to purchase.

“I guess you will do.”

“Now here is what we will do. I am sitting on the chesterfield and you are picking me up and put me on the wheelchair. How are you going to do that?”

“I pick you up and put you on the wheelchair “

“Well?”

Three women were intently following the proceeding, two of whom I wished far away – the mother of the professor and my wife, still the next step was up to me and everyone knows there are only certain ways to pick up a woman from a chesterfield but which one?

I started to sweat, how should I?… pull her by the arms?... I was sweating. Yes Durk, she is a beauty, and I am only a man. (Durk is one of my brothers, who knows more about women than I do)

My professor teacher, bless her, bless her, bless her, took the initiative.

“OK, you sit down and I pull you up. Put your arms around my neck.” I did what I was told.

“Now I put my arms around your middle, like this, see that I have my knees bend?” I sure did.

“Now I straighten my legs, see, hold tight you're going for a ride.” She lifted me straight up, held me up for a few seconds before she put me down again on the chesterfield. Amazing.

“If you would've been much taller you likely would damage your back,” she said.

I tried it on Anne and it worked splendidly and that was for the rest of Anne's life our exercise and - our pleasure.

“We should have done this maneuver a long time ago,” said Anne. We did this action, which we named 'the Maarhuis maneuver' approximately eighteen times a day which took us as close together as was physiccally possible, very pleasantly, right up to Anne's death.

Thank you doctor.

ALS or Lou Gehrig Disease

For several years Anne had made a trip to her doctor in Richmond who asked her asked her how she was doing, knowing the answer before she answered, after giving her only one look

“Doing fine,doc.”

If all his patients were as healthy as she was, he would be out of work. He'd give her an examination, wrote out a prescription for a year supply of pills and send her on the way – 'see you next year!'

When she was in in her early thirties the doctor caught Anne with a thyroid problem and advised her to have the gland partly removed, he had looked concerned and let it slip that because she was so young, there was a 'good' change it could be cancerous.

It would also take six weeks before he would be able to operate on her.

I was more upset than Anne, at least she wasn't showing her anxiety. During that time we frequently went out to the airport in Richmond, trying to forget what we perceived as a death sentence hanging over her, by watching airplanes starting and landing. At the end of those six weeks, which were probably the longest we ever experienced, Anne saw the specialist again, who asked her to take her favorite necklace along.

The specialist, whose name I am forgotten, drew a line under the necklace-rounding where he made a cut from side to side on her neck to take partly out the offensive gland and stitched her up, using a new system that hardly left a scar. What was left was hidden under the necklace-rounding. I am thankful for that considerate doctor for doing such a great job and after some time the scar had totally disappeared. Anne stayed with that doctor in Richmond after we moved to Tsawassen, then Ladner, and for several years after we had moved to Abbotsford.

I suggested to Anne to find a doctor in Abbotsford instead of traveling all the way to Richmond but she didn't mind the traveling and had several friends and business connections there and in Vancouver, which she regularly visited, but finally she relented and made an appointment with Dr Egolf, my doctor, who had promised to take her as a client. (it was quite difficult to get a doctor in Abbotsford at that time)

The visit proved not a success for Anne when she learned that she would get pills for only three months at a time, the time limit Dr Egolf used to prescribe medicines for all his patients.

She protested, wanting the same yearly prescription she was used to from her Richmond physician.

It was important to her for one or another reason, so tears were flowing, and Dr. Egolf finally met her demand halfway by changing the time of her prescription to half a year 'for one time only,' which did not make things any better for Anne, feeling she was treated like an infant.

As she was tear-stained on the way out, the doctor asked if he could help her with anything else, which made her stop.

“Yes,” she said “when I am bowling the ball falls out of my hand sometimes, without reason.”

After examining her her hand Dr Egolf said

“I want you immediately to see a specialist Anne, because I suspect you have ALS, Lou Gerich disease.”

He made arrangements for her to see a local specialist who was to call her after a few days for a definite appointment to diagnose her, but time went by and no call was forthcoming, so Anne contacted Dr Egolf about it who was furious about the delay, demanding to speak with the specialist.

Anne would have never received a call because her requisition 'had probably fallen behind the desk' said the receptionist, but the specialist the explanation that they were in the process of moving to G F Strong (hospital) in Vancouver, where Anne could see him the following week.

Already precious time had passed without any action taken.

I was quite anxious but Anne, who had the most to loose stayed calm and said,

“Look, I am the same as I was yesterday, lets just play it by ear and do whatever we can do.” She was so strong.

When we arrived at G F Strong the specialist beamed

“Anne, I have great news for you, I am sure you have no ALS after all, you have...” he named an illness I have forgotten, “which we can treat successfully.”

My spirits soared, thinking that maybe…maybe, God had heard the prayers of the church members, but my mood ranged from hope to despair. 

He went on to say that by chance they had a team of four doctors together in the hospital to test Anne, 'just to verify his diagnosis.'

Immediately Anne was put on a table and hooked up to a computer. The poor woman lay on that hard table for more than two hours without a complaint, before they concluded that after all it 'seemed they had been in error and had to treat her symptoms as being ALS after all.'

My hopes, raised so high were rudely dumped by hearing the outcome of the exam.

The specialists estimated that Anne's probable time to live, was from 2 to 5 years, and then we started thinking – when did she get 'it'?

Initially Anne counted back to our 50th wedding anniversary celebration in April of 2005, when she had difficulty climbing the long stairway to the reception area, but then she remembered also the even longer stairway from Timberlane street to Canterbury, where she had to rest halfway the sixty-odd steps, when before she just raced to the top of the stairs, waiting for me.

Our Fiftieth Wedding Anniversary with our youngest grandsons Jesse and Tyler as ring bearers.   

That was around 2004, which co-en-sided with the time she was having trouble dropping the bowling balls. If indeed that was when 'it' had started then two years of the maximum five years were already gone. Had Anne only three more years to live?

My heart cringed.

“So what are we going to do now,” I said more as a faith-a-complete than a question.

“Let's go camping,” Anne said, amazing me as so often with her upbeat attitude.

“I can still out-run and out-climb you,” she laughed “get packing,” and to frustrate me even more she used a phrase we sometimes used when making a sales contract for a house -

“Time is of an essence!”

I had made two drawers the length of the box of my Mazda ½ ton pick up, accessible from the rear, in which we put all we needed for camping, including a two person tent and food. We found that the drawers actually acted like a refrigerator keeping the food fresh for days.

The drawers were covered by plywood and over that a six inch thick mattress made to the size of the trucks box. (4' x 6') Two chairs on top of that and what we never forgot - a large electric frying pan in which we (I) made breakfast and Anne bannock, dinner, including steak and vegetables, even boerekool.

As soon as we arrived at a campground we set up our two person tent, then shoved in the mattress, clothing bags on each side, an ice cream bucket, pillows, sheets and a quilt we had received from our children as a wedding-anniversary gift, hung in a light bulb for reading at night and – were ready to camp and relax.

Only this time it was not to be.

Last Night at Lake Cahuilla

Our last night at Lake Cahuilla, ever.
It was our fifty-second wedding anniversary.
Arms around each other we watched the stars – millions of stars – Orion – heaven.
Anne shivered, are you cold dear – no.

Anne was going to live high-out two more years. Probably less.

Our granddaughter was studying the very stars stars at school that hung above us.

All was dark around us, even the majestic sky, were it not for the myriads of twinkling stars sharing their light from far away, even further than the sun is from the earth, leaving us in deep thoughts that made me shudder to, but not of fear.

I wondered what Anne was thinking, was she anxious about her impending death?

If she was she had never mentioned it and I had never asked.

Every day was precious now since the ALS was steadily devouring her.

“Let's go inside” she said.

The lit light-bulb dangling inside our small tent transformed it into a glowing yellow ball like a giant moon, yet it looked small between the palace-sized motor homes now fading into the dark. Their owners were asleep, gathering energy for a next day of retiring, while we still wandered around the campground using the tent as a beacon to return to.

'Nothing is more enjoyable than sleeping in a small tent in the desert.'

Our Tent

Anne loved sleeping in the tent as much as I did, we used to read before going to sleep, all the while listening to secret little noises of the night, only broken by the far away cry of a coyote calling his kin, who were closer to our tent and in chorus howled back as only they knew how. Ow ow ow-ow-ow woo...

Years ago their cries had frightened us, but since we realized that the eerie communication belonged to the desert night, we enjoyed it sometimes initiating it by howling ourselves.

I asked Anne once to name seven of the most enjoyable things she could think off in her life, not including having babies. All had to do with camping – lying on a folding chair sunning was one, talking together another, walking over autumn leaves in a campground near Kelowna.

“Do you remember that morning in Kelowna?”

I remembered it alright.

A hard wind had stripped most all the leaves off the trees overnight which after a wild ride plunged on the earth where they made a crisp carpet for us to walk over.

“What else.”

“Sleeping in our tent, reading, reading in bed.”

Anne was a voracious reader, she finished two large historical books before she was unable to hold the books any longer, the one was called Russia, the other Berlin I think.

One thing I would've added to her list - the regular breathing of my partner and my love beside me in the tent, my wife.

We had many great memories about camping in all of BC and the prairie provinces, but we never failed a winter holiday in the south of California and Arizona.

We couldn't get enough of the freshness of the air of southern California which just before sundown was drenched with the intoxicating scent of oranges and grapefruits.

We drove then with the car-windows wide open, swallowing the heady aroma by the mouthful.

Lake Cahuilla is made entirely of concrete and used as a water-reservoir for irrigation.

The lake is regularly stocked with catfish, bass, trout, even sturgeon, and anglers from different cultures fished only for the kind of fish they themselves preferred, often abhorring the choices of others.

We used to walk daily around the lake, taking about an hour, and made frequent stops to talk with the locals about the strangest of topics but mostly about fishing and fish which they didn't mind to proudly display.

After our walk we usually parked ourselves near our tent-home for a fresh-perked coffee.

O, It was such an easy going worry free life, which we enjoyed fully, but this would be the last time we would enjoy it.

I was dreaming about the great times we had when we were still together and camped at Lake Cahuilla. Time does not stand still, it keeps on moving sometimes slow, when bored or suffering but fast when dreaming.

The fourteenth of January was our our wedding anniversary. Our fifty-second, had Anne still been alive.

Two years ago we celebrated our fifty-ed.

My plan had been to celebrate our fifty-ed wedding anniversary on a grand scale, like taking family and friends on a fun cruise to some exotic place like the moon, a spectacular outing and I knew just the friend to make it happen, since she had traveled all over the world, but Anne vetoed my plan, choosing to go camping by ourselves, with our trusted two persons tent as we had done several times before.

Perhaps her plan would've been the better one, Anne usually did have the better plan.

We finally agreed to split the difference and had have a family friendly wedding party at a place of Anne's choosing, which came together with a long stairway to the reception room but not long enough to reach the moon. Anne had some trouble making it to the top of the stair though.

“We're getting older,” she panted. Old at 69?

We lived at the corner of Canterbury ave. and Boley street and since the front door faced Boley I had the property registered as 2763 Boley street.

Wrong. The address should've been Canterbury.

“How could you've been so …...!

Canterbury sounds much more elegant, more distinguished, more etc.

“It's the same as the dishes all over again, and the fridge, and the dining-room set.”

When we were just married I was very anxious to please Anne and made purchases that were perhaps better made by her, but since our tastes were similar I just went ahead and bought it when I saw something we needed (or not) I purchased it, loaded 'r up and surprised Anne with it.

I didn't quite understand why she was not more happy, when I took a twelve-place dinnerware set at home, placed all the pieces on the floor and nearly ran out of space. What a wealth, but Anne was not happy, even though she would have probably have chosen the same set.

The stove and fridge were bought from old man Paulusma before we were married Anne, and the chesterfield had been John and my bed, after we had taken the ends off and discarded so it would fit in the house trailer we build, and from there reversed to chesterfield again and used as such in the house we build. It actually looked pretty good when you draped a blanket over it. I agree Anne, the wooden dining set should have been purchased by you.

And the dishes.
And the dryer.
And the bed.

All of this and much more came to mind the fourteenth January 2018, which would have been our sixty-third wedding anniversary – had you been still alive.

Thanks For Waiting

Part of getting old is that I'm getting more and more deaf, while I'm stubborn enough not to want the 'aid' of a six-thousand dollar hearing-aid. Why? I just told you why, I am stubborn.

I promised to remember several more people who have been special to me. Some personal shortcomings made that it did not happen as fast as it should have, I blame on it on old age.

Old age makes you forget things, it was getting to the point that I forgot to take my medicines, worrying the doctor enough to order assistance from the Health Services.

Surprisingly, it improved my life considerable, not only do I get visits of nice young women  every morning and evening to check that I swallow my pills, but since that takes so little time they bathe me as well.

The only women who ever witnessed me naked thus-far were my mother and my wife, so I hesitated to undress in front of this strange lady who was very cute, however she was very nice and equally professional and when she was through with me I felt like a young man.

My thanks to all sisters, as I call them, may I have many scrubbings.

The new year is getting worn already so I better thank you all for your well wishing hoping that you do as fine this year as I am doing (except for the hearing).

Seventy-four years ago I met a twelve-year old Jewish girl, who was illegally adopted by one of our neighbors, since her parents feared to be deported to a work camp in Germany or worse by the Nazi's.

To save their children they contacted the dutch underground whom secretly took them from Amsterdam to the country site of Fryslân, where one of the girls found a safe home at one of our neighbors, her sister was adopted by a family in another village.

Ellie was my girlfriend and ours was not a relationship of the smooching kind, though we were familiar with that. She was now raised like we were, in the gereformeerd tradition attending school and church with us, but after some time she questioned certain things and was wondering wondering to which faith she really ought to belong - gereformeerd or Jewish?

Fundamental questions, even at her age about which we talked often at length, especially when rumors of extermination camps were heard. We feared the fate of her parents, and when at the end of the war the ugly truth became apparent that indeed her parents and all her relatives had perished in the gas chambers in Poland, and only her sister and herself had escaped that terrible death, she went through a time of deep grief. Ellie was an orphan now. 

She was thorn between two good religions she respected and was given opposing advice as to  which religion to choose, pressure mounting on her from both sides, troubling her more and more.

I remember suggesting for her to emigrate to Israel to find out more about her people and see if she would feel a sense of belonging among them, but she hesitated and in the end married instead and became mother to four lovely daughters. And after the fourth baby her husband died.

We had formed a club of four boys and four girls to hang out when we were about fifteen years old. If Ellie is still alive, she and I are the only two left of that club.

The last time I saw her was in the year 2000, when I got permission (ha ha) from my wife to spend two hours with Ellie, while Anne went shopping. It was the day before last we were in the Netherlands of our nine weeks holidays.

While we were sitting together on her chesterfield we sang the ballad of the sinking of the Titanic which we had sung as young children more than fifty years ago.

I asked what had become of her, was she Jewish or gereformeerd. She said “I'm nothing.” That did hurt me.

I got my first real honeste goodness kiss from a girl who liked looking at the moon while smooching. The kiss was a doozer, streaking like a shooting star from her lips via my sciatic nerve (it had to go via something) right into my toes, where it lingered, tingling like crazy, while I had my arms tight around her trying to prevent her from falling into the ditch behind her.

She must be 86 now but I bet, just as feisty as when she was fifteen.

In the year 2000 she inspired me to write, presented me with a large Frisian – English dictionary together with some unique autographed books. 

She and Anne became good friends.

I am sure she is still looking at the moon and - 'if you're still around - thanks for the moments.'

Of one of the teachers I had at trade-school has still my deep respect and gratitude though  Mr. Hoekstra nearly fired me from school because I was disruptive.

He was not a churchman but definitely a just man, he would not embarrass me either about my faith. One of his lectures was about exotic woods, which he found as a wall-covering in the foyer of the local cinema.

He knew full well that a cinema was forbidden and unholy ground for a gereformeerd boy.

Not wanting to let on that he had noticed that wall while he was going there to see a movie we looked straight at each-other when he lied and said

“I had to be in the film-theater for business...” instead of 'while I went to see a movie ...'

Mr Hoekstra was firm and fair, he was a compass in my life, still is that to this day.

Her last name sounded familiar, like that of a young man with the same name who became entangled in the snares of love with a friend of my children. The ensnarement did last long enough for our family to like the young man but the entanglement did not, however his name lingered, and from somewhere in Fryslân this beautiful lady with the same name parachuted right into our life after I posted a photo of my grandparents on Facebook.       She identified my grandparents as her great-grandparents, 'and what am I to you then' which took some earnest figuring out.

Well, a great-looking woman is definitely something to me and my brothers alike, as well as to the female portion of the family, albeit in a more sisterly fashion. A pandemonium of sorts broke out, cousins from all over the world wanted to know 'what they were to each other.' 

My omke Bernardus Smid laid the groundwork of the documented history of the Smid clan as well as that of the Slofstra's, (my beppe Aukje's clan) by researching archives of many municipalities and churches for more than two years, sharing his findings on paper, expanded later by his sons.

Esther Eijzenga (for it was she) with help of her equal enthusiastic family-loving aunt Rennie Bloemsma, did more for the Smid clan by awakening that history, and bringing cousins together, than anyone.

Therefore in my book she is numero uno or, if you want in 't Frysk, nȗmer ien. (#1)

Of the many things I do not fathom since I am not that bright, none stands out as clearly as this one – I do not comprehend why it is that decent people, following bible principles, particularly the one of doing good to others, gets a hellish pain to endure where a destroyer like a drug-peddler to young children does not.

Esther has only shortly returned from the Groninger hospital after suffering unbearable pain of a hernia pushing against her sciatic nerve, for weeks on end, a pain worse than birthing.

She has recently been operated and is recovering at home.

I still feel confused and angry that she had to get through that ordeal, knowing that anyone was helpless to help in her suffering.

I sincerely hope that my wish is as good as a prayer that she not has to go through an ordeal like that ever again, and Esther thank you for dropping in into our lives. Love you.

When almost five years ago I rented unit 217 of the Pavilion I met several nice staff members of whom some were extra special. Pearl definitely belongs in the last category.

I forgot the occasion, but promised her a story I had written before, about under what circumstances I had come to Menno Place. I kept my promise handing her a copy of it and when a few days later I met Pearl she uttered one word only - “Wow”

That really surprised me as I had thought that she would correct my grammatical mistakes, but discovered that she was impressed by my writing.

That was the first wow I had ever heard about my work and from that moment she could do wrong no more by me and was my friend, realizing of course that the wow was for what I wrote, and not for my good looks.

Many people have been a help to me, I often found it where I didn't look for it, but Pearl was always there with advice and a listening ear, and whether I needed it or not, a kick at the pants. I feel safe to discuss everything that comes to mind with her like one would with an old friend, even though she is as young as my daughter is.

This chronicle is longer than it was meant to be, but as Shawn, an other good 'old' friend  once wrote '...we are blessed,' we are living with so many good-willing, and friendly acquaintances, friends and family-members, filling easily many more pages.

I thank God for sharing them all with us.

As my brother John many times wrote 'God is good.'

Saying Goodbye with a Bang

“... we found eggs all over the yard, this farmer's had no coop for his chickens, but what to do with with raw eggs, right, so Bill took a dozen to the farmer's wife with a cock and bull story – 'my wife wanted to be nice to the crew you see, and put this heap off eggs in my lunchbox, but she forgot to cook them, ha ha.' The farmer's wife was all willing to cook them for him.

So our Billy here, grinning from ear to ear, got us all a boiled egg for lunch, ha ha.” 

Everybody in the bus taking us back home from work had a great laugh about Bill fooling the farmer's wife in cooking her own eggs for the crew. Bill also humbly asked for some salt since that was forgotten by 'the wife' as well. She handed him a large salt and pepper shaker that went from hand to hand, to use. More ha ha in the bus. 

Worker's solidarity was strong even-though they were members of three different labor organizations, when working together, as we were, political differences disappeared, as labor-solidarity overturned vision-attachment. It wasn't work or lack of brotherhood making us want to go to greener pastures, it was restlessness and adventure, I think.

It was the last day of 1952.

Nothing much to do after the evening sermon of Dominee Bokhove.

Ah, Ds. Bokhove, the reverent of gereformeerde church of Ens in the northeastern polder.

One of the last jobs John and I did for the church was to clean the basement of a house in the middle-rich street of Ens, which the church-board had rented for the reverent to live in.

We found several liquor bottles, not quite empty, which we 'cleaned' first, making our job a lot more interesting. That was half a year ago, in the summer, and now it was winter. There was no snow but still it was December the thirty-first, and not warm. 

Across the street from where our family lived a church for the herformed congregation was being build, and John and I were taken from our cushy job to help finish the roof, which was scheduled to be completed before Christmas and they were running late.

A plain tower-like structure on top of the roof held already a bronze church bell, complete with a clapper.

We had looked at it a few times already and soon a plan developed. 

“Wouldn't it be nice to ring that bell as a farewell to the old (1952) year, ring the new year in, and as a farewell to to the old country?

At new years eve?

When else.

It will wake up the whole town.

Wouldn't that be fun?

But it would wake up Ooms as well.

What if he can't get to us?

All we have to do is to pull up the ladders so no one can get at us.

Right!”

A little before midnight we climbed two long ladders pulling the lower one up and landed in the cramped space of the small open tower where we waited until midnight.

When the appointed hour arrived we pushed the clapper hard against the bell. It made more racket than we thought it would make. We counted - that was one - eleven to go, and eleven more times we heaved the clapper against the bell to end the old year, and were about blown off the tower by the ear-shattering noise, while we saw the first lights of the village being turned on. After the twelve bells we had to really work in order to ring the bell, by hand.

Together we pushed the bell to one side as high as we could get it, then let it come down against the clapper and from thereon it was not hard to keep the rhythm going - boom! – boomm!!... boom! – boomm!!...

the thundering noise was about to burst our eardrums.

Lights in the town appeared now all over, while the thundering clamor roared over the village and many miles beyond, where it finally lost itself into the darkness of the night and died in the winter oats and Brussels sprouts.

Visible in the street-lights a man appeared, his right elbow out and upward holding his tobacco-pipe, a cloud of smoke failing to keep up with him. He used long strides, approaching fast. His unusual speed and strides told us that he was angry man. He was as mad as a bull.

I think we were a little scared by now, but he was unable to reach us, still anxious we waited as he stumbled around in the dark church. It seemed he wanted to out-wait us but gave up after a good while and went home, sucking hard on the pipe judging by the amount of smoke following him. 

The 'event' made headlines in the local papers, noting that a person or persons had with danger to their lives rung in the new year from within the tower of the herformed church of Ens, the first time the sound of the new church-bell was heard over the polder. No damage was reported, neither was/were the person or persons responsible detected or apprehended.

That excitement was not the greatest news of the new year as on February 26, 1953 a terrible storm ravished the Netherlands. More than 10% of our country was flooded by the North-sea which took the lives of over 2000 people, mostly in the province of Zeeland.

It was a disaster of immense proportions for the entire country but especially for the farmers whose lands were destroyed for several years by the salty seawater.

The dutch government provided help resettling many of them to the smaller farms around Ens and Marknesse in the north east polder, thereby bumping polder pioneers like my father-in-law, whose hope to obtain a farm went up in smoke since the land rented to the unfortunate Zeelanders was the last land the dutch government possessed to rent out – it was the last available arable land in the entire country.

Next - with Waterman to Canada
buying a car / driving license
building a motor home
buying real estate / building a house
tooth-aches and
john spots his future wife in church
sid joins the brothers

John My Brother

The first time I saw John was in the summer of 1935.

I was not impressed.

And my rear end was soar.

Dad pedaled, but he sat on a soft seat while I had to sit on the crossbar in front of him. I felt that bar right on my rump-bone and it hurt. It hurt for ten km's.

“Sit still,” dad said. “You will see your new brother in a minute.”

“Do you like your new brother?” a white lady with a wide smile asked, and I said “No.”

Her smile shrunk fast and changed into a grin. I hid behind dad's pant leg.

We had biked from Hijum to the deaconess hospital in the City where rich kids were born to see my second baby brother who was born there.

So John was born a city-slicker, and my but was still sore.

John was born on July the fourth, an important date for a country associated with untold richness and opportunities, but to our parents known only through vague stories about people striking it rich by finding goldmines but where also unfortunates lived, black people, who were lynched.

Still some people fantasied of immigrating to that dream country.

Little did we know that this dream would become real to John only eighteen years after his birth, though not in the US.

An immigration of sorts happened when our family moved from the north of Fryslân where John had attended four months of christian school in the neighboring town under the watchful eyes of miss Muis, a tall grade one teacher who his three older siblings had trained as well.

They moved from Hijum fifty km south to Oosterzee where John grew up and eventually found good friends in Sanne Wind, a farmer's son, and John Kingma, a slaughter's son, who hailed from a neighboring town.

John visited frequently our neighbor's son Rommert at his workshop where he made klompen for the neighborhood, since our father, the neighbor Tijtsma, and Rommert had cut down a large willow tree behind our house which was perfect for making the wooden footwear. Rommert told heit that he saw 'the makings of a good carpenter into that boy.'

After finishing a two year course in carpentry at the trade school in Heerenveen John easily found a job as second carpenter at the local dairy factory, where the first carpenter and he were in charge of maintenance.

Their job was as secure as the bank of London as the gereformeerd workers were under represented in the factory, which by hiring John was more equalized.

The dairy factory was owned and operated by local farmers of both pillars, gereformeerd and not gereformeerd, and that unique dutch system had to reflect into the number of staff and employees as well.

The director, the CEO of the factory was of the non church side, to counter that the chairman was gereformeerd.

Most of the workers, the cheese and butter makers, were of 'the other side' as well, so the milk-sample-taker was again gereformeerd, as was the man who with horse and wagon collected in 30 and 40 liter cans the milk from the local farmers, while the roman catholic bookkeeper represented the few catholic farmers.

But there was more – the first carpenter had two daughters, both good-looking, but the younger was clearly the winner and she was ordained by the gereformeerd pillar to be hooked up with John, as a future new family would strengthen not only the dairy factory operation but also the gereformeerde church as the gereformeerd pillar, it would satisfy the first carpenter family as well as they had taken a liking to John.

I don't think that John ever pursued that angle, or that the girl in question did, but I missed a few years when I was working in Limburg, so I am not sure about that. I do know that he had no problems attracting girls, one in particular tickled his fancy and that was one of the many daughters of the chairman of the dairy factory.

John's future was bright and secure.

However the carefully thought out pillar balance collapsed as our parents went on another mini immigration, this time from Oosterzee to Ens in the new North-Eastern polder, taking John along and also me who had returned to the family after an almost two-year stint in Limburg, and from that point on John and I started working as a team in the new polder.

Ooms, our first contractor, was a tall man. Holding a tobacco pipe in the right hand, with his arm high and outstretched, which made him an easy stand out in a crowd, led us to a huge pile of scrap lumber instructing us to pull out nails, clean, and store anything long enough to use as a picket, which meant anything over a foot long and store it like firewood.

That took us two full days and provided Ooms pickets for five years.

The next contractor had much more pleasant work.

He had a contract of building two-hundred farms in the polder including a large general barn, a pig-barn and a house. Several crews were putting in the foundations for these buildings and our job was to give them the height of the building.

The earth around the farm-complex was to be slightly sloped away from the buildings to the ditches around the yard in order to drain the surface water away from the complex.

This work was formerly done by an engineer, we were told whose heights were more often calculated wrong costing the company a lot of money, as truck loads of earth had to be removed or added to the sites.

We developed a simple system by taking the heights at thirty-six different spots over the entire yard area, totaled the results up and divided the result by thirty-six, which gave us the the mean height from which the height of the buildings was to be calculated.

We had at no leveling instrument in the beginning, so we got our heights by establishing a center post with a cross board, over which board one of us eyed onto the horizon while the other marked a line on a slat at each point of the imaginary line between the cross-board and horizon.

It worked like a charm, and saved the company many thousands of dollars per farm complex. The trouble was that we didn't have enough work by doing only two farms a day, as we were expected to do, so we devised a game of reed sailing in the ditches around the farm-site to pass the time. From a single reed-leaf we devised a sailboat and since there was always a breeze on the water, our 'boats' were having races between each other, and we also raced between ourselves, always keeping an eye on the pick-up truck of the foreman, who knew that we had time on our hands and when he was in need of an extra hand for whatever job he just picked us up, but we didn't want to be seen empty handed by him.

It was an easy life but hardly fulfilling, and we were thinking of other things.

Like immigration.

But John was only seventeen and we were not at all sure if he would get permission from our parents to leave the polder. However our parents in the end approved and then we applied.

After a health test and interview we were accepted, to the chagrin of the company who wanted to keep us and even approached our father with an substantial offer of money to use his influence to have us stay employed with them. How much that substantial amount was I never found out.

There was a condition of the Canadian government of permitting only agricultural immigrants, therefore we quit the builder, (after doing four farms on the last day) to work six weeks for a farmer. That we still weren't able to milk a cow didn't seem to matter.

We worked well together and had pleasure doing so, but life in the polder was not exciting enough to keep us, I suppose.

Next – saying goodbye

Happy New Year

I wish all of you a joyful 2018, before I forget.

Little things can effect mood swings between joy and sadness. Receiving a smile often makes my day. This week our residents organized a hymn-sing with the help of a professional music director and members of the church of the Nazarene, having us sing Christmas songs not often heard on the media, but known to most, and appreciated by all.

A lady resident who is unable to hear and talk but able to smile and graces us royally with it, wished to partake by performing a Christmas solo! When she stood (smiling) facing us I didn't know what to expect as she had indicated (she writes beautifully) wanting to sing Silent Night.

After a nod of the director she placed a finger over her lips while making a motion of darkness with the other hand, indicating quiet and darkness, and we softly sang

silent night, - not missing a beat her finger pointed upward as we followed with

holy night, - she made the sign of peace followed by a blinding gesture and we gave her

all is calm, all is bright, - then she made as if holding a baby as we we sang

round yon virgin mother and child, - her smile was wide and tender as she faced us

holy infant so tender and mild, - and we answered when she wooed the baby to sleep

sleep in heavenly peace,

sleep in heavenly peace.

Those few moments of actively helping the lady singing her solo, was one of those rare moments of joy which not only made my day, but I know will be remembered by many as being so special, a joyful moment.

Through google I learned a little about what the the word joy means – great times of pleasure and happiness, delight, sweetness of life, a time of song, smiles, and laugh, and about twenty more, the bible speaks of good tidings of great joy as well.

At the end of this year I feel rich to remember so many people, events, and every-day living which can be characterized as joy, that I feel no longing for heaven.

If the joy I received could be measured in rich food I would be grossly overweight.

Over the past year, which like a shadow raced by, I received so many manifestations of appreciation, love, and goodwill to last me the rest of my life' and leave left-overs.

I received also eye-openers of how unworthy I was at times to receive all that good, as only a couple of days ago I walked behind a woman, who like me came from our 'gymnast class' on the way to the bistro for a coffee. She was unsteady on her feet, and walked very slow ahead of me, while I was impatient for the caffeine.

She did not show up for lunch today and chaplain John announced that she 'had moved to a better place with her lord and Savior,' in other words she had died, and I thought would she have noticed my impatience with her? Was that one of her last memories, and that was not a feeling of joy.

When a person experiences joy, he or she are automatically thankful, and I am thankful to to all people who have helped me in in several ways, like a certain university lady with advice and encouragement too much to describe, and only once criticized my feeble beginnings in writing, which she since has denied as being untrue. I am scared too say 'I love you,' as she has progressed so high in life, but I do love her anyways, and always will appreciate her.

I fondly remember the great times we had with my wife's American cousins. I (think) can taste the home-made ice-cream we liberally absorbed, and was witnessed by Anne's parents,  at a time when we were all young.

These were truly joyful times we were having in that great farm house with wall to wall kids and cousins.

In the mean time we have all grown older, and important members of the families, the pioneer arch-fathers passed on while new generations took over, and others were born.

What a joy to still have their memory.

The list of people I owe gratitude too of family and acquaintances is long, as it is of people I met as by accident, like 'ships passing in the night'.

We rush to where we came from, not to return, at least not in this time (I think).

I think of Len, my son, who would have been 56 year old, had he still been alive, but made it to 18 only. He could have been a grandfather, a father, a husband, and still a son, a brother and uncle. What tears have been shed in the almost forty years we have been without him.

I think of my brother Sid, who was the first one of our brothers to explore the mystery of death in this country, and our only sister Aukje, who was the proud mother of five children. Those two where so close one time but now are resting in worlds apart.

I think about my sister in law Tony, leaving a husband and five children, also in a car accident. I think about my parents, whom I owe so very much and have known so little, and wished I would be able to ask them so many questions yet. My in-law parents, who were so different from my own parents but whom I cherished as my own.

When I think of my departed wife Anne I think about the one time in my life that I went on a bus tour to Ouwehands zoo as a five year old, it was one long day of adventure and fun in 1936, when Anne was a cute little one year old baby.

I remember I got a pair of white bread sandwiches with cheese for lunch, not the pre-cut, prepackaged slices of make believe cheese of today, but a generous cut from a whole Gouda cheese, cut by a large lady with a big knife, or by a big lady with a large knife, holding the cheese against her bosom while she cut it.

She put a full slice as big as the plate in between two slices of white bread for lunch and a full glass of orange juice, things I never had tasted before, all because my mother's saved up of coupons obtained from the Spar chain, the rival store of mom and dad.

The sweet lemonade made me throw up, but boy did it taste good while I drank it. If you can still follow me, such was my marriage with Anne, adventurous, daring, unafraid, not one to follow without being sure, we loved, we warred, yet her last words were 'and I love you too', which made me make up my mind not to marry again.

My brother Frank would say - like Chinese food, sweet and sour, but the sweet won out all the time, and words are not strong enough and pages not large enough to describe my thankfulness to have been married to Anne.

Now, this picture shows Anne and the SON of the of the onderduiker Roelof Maarhuis.

I do not know his first name, but he is a Maarhuis alright, anyone can see that.

This picture is taken in the farmhouse of Ben and Norma Maarhuis in Sumas, US, and as you probably noticed Anne is sitting cozily close to this long lost relative of her. Anne is telling there the story about the father who never saw his son to the son who never saw his father.

She was the only one alive then to relate the stories to him. This meeting was a late high-lite in Anne's life as it certainly was in his as well.

The next picture is the father Roelof Maarhuis who never knew his son as he died before the son was born, he is in his early twenties here.

You can find the complete story of the onderduiker in three previous stories A true war story I, II, and III, on this blog.

Those pictures are a great Christmas present to me. Thank you Norma again for this very valuable gift.

I will quit for now but many more people will be remembered by me shortly – a tall lady in Fryslân / a teacher in Fryslân / a staff member at Menno place / a young lady of over eighty in Fryslân, two in fact / and many more, but for now - HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL !!

All I Want For Christmas is a Little Sleep, Please

A guest story by Brenda Beaton Smid*

Oh Joy! The stores had just put out the Christmas decorations, gift ideas, everything and anything that was even remotely associated with the season. That meant one thing for my husband and me.

The few few hours of sleep we craved each night, would now be cut in half.

Our two sons, born with severe disabilities are living testaments that a couple of hours of sleep is plenty enough for anyone, day after day, year after year. Their excitement for Christmas and life in general has never changed, thank goodness. Though we thought our boys the true meaning of Christmas, they still regarded the gifts and decorations the tangible evidence of the event.

I remember the first time Al and I told them Santa was coming that night. Wrong thing to say.

We all did a graveyard shift that night and finally, with four pairs of bloodshot eyes, two drooping heads, ours not theirs, (and a partridge in a pear tree), we let them open their presents at 4:00 am. It took another six or seven hours to calm them down enough to have a cat nap. We took what we could get.

For the first few years we'd put up a tree and decorations about two weeks before Christmas.

My husband and I were gluttons for punishment, we loved seeing their excitement.

We finally clued in that the day we decorated, was the start of even less sleep for all of us. Each year a day or two we would shave off, so it would be only a few days before Christmas when the tree went up.

Who were we kidding? Chris and Kevin had our number. They knew it was coming and didn't want to miss a minute of it.

An artificial tree took the place of the real one, less mess for me to clean up.

I was never gifted in the crafty, cutesy, perfect decorating methods.

That was just as well. Kevin had a habit of sitting close to the tree and he couldn't help himself from grabbing one of the mini- lights trying to pull it out. Many a time I would come into the living room and see one section or another of the tree spinning around like a top, with Kevin yanking on a string of lights.

As our sons grew taller and older, our Christmas tree got shorter and shorter. I figured it was less to decorate so the bottom section was left in the box.

Eventually, we ended up with with only the top section of the trees sitting on the coffee table.

In my defense, it was nicely decorated, albeit it little top heavy with the star being half the size of the tree, and it took only minutes to decorate or re-decorate when it was spinning.

Yahoo!, and it only took me twenty years to figure that out.

The presence of presents out in the open was cause for disaster. We learned very early on not to put the gifts under the tree until the boys grudgingly fell asleep on Christmas Eve.

They are both non-verbal but have hearing that is so tuned in, they could hear a gum wrapper rattling from another room.

We tried for years to sneak downstairs covertly and deposit the gifts, but Chris had a built-in alarm clock that would rouse him out of bed anytime after 1:am.

Needless to say, we had to change our tactics after he proceeded to open every gift once we had finally into a sleep-deprived stupor.

Eventually, because both boys developed epilepsy and pill taking in the morning was important,we adjusted by not telling them it was Christmas morning until they had their breakfast and pills in them, and their stomachs settled.

A couple of hours later, either Al or I would say “It's Christmas today!” We'd bring down the bags full of gifts and start the fun once again.

Both boys were grinning and gagging with over excitement, but it was totally worth it all.

I put as little tape on the gifts as was needed.

Their lack of fine-motor skills made it difficult opening things.

It took them no time at all to realize anything soft was probably clothing, so they were shoved aside. Oh, what excitement!

My sons are thirty-three and twenty-eight years old now.*

They live in group homes, happy, healthy, and enjoying life in every way. I see them two or three times a week. We lost their dad four years ago, and we have come through that time with a a peace and strength that comes only from God. I still celebrate Christmas day with my boys, not the same as it used to be, but with the same excitement that we always had.

I can still buy them noisy toys, and I don't have to use earplugs anymore.

Now it's the workers at their houses that have to put up with the noise.

Sorry about that. There is always a grave-yard shift worker on duty, and more than once my sons have kept them company, especially during the holiday season.

Christmas has been a very important and exciting event for us as a family, not because the gifts under the tree, but the greatest gift of all – God's love for us through Jesus Christ, and the love He has given us, for each other.

That's the gift I'll seek forever.

O, and maybe a little bit more sleep, please? Old habits die hard.

Durk's Birthday gift to Brenda

Meet Gavin

*Brenda's story was written in 2008, the same year my Anne passed away. Her boys are now 42 and 37.

Brenda is married to my brother Durk, they are living in Williams Lake, BC.

This beautiful and intelligent woman who won the 1st price with this story, which was published in the Tribune, is unable to talk and hear anymore.

Durk has communicated with Brenda in a variety of ways and now mostly by showing and gestures, as Brenda does not connect written words with the meanings of these words any longer.

Brenda is not demented which makes their suffering more severe, but they are still dancing together, often in the new work shop where Durk makes his chairs and other wood articles out of trees which he and Brenda pick up from the local first Nation band.

They are so very much in love with each other and with life, and often dance in the work shop where Durk produces his wonderful wood crafts. I urge every one reading her wonderful story in which she shows not any self pity but certainly a trust in God and a love for her sons, to support Durk and Brenda and to remember both in your prayers.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New-year

lex (leffert) smid

Let the Feasting Begin

This feast was going to be different from all the previous feasts in Hijum. No, the two churches would still have their own members going in Sunday clothes to their separate churches, and the members of both churches were called to worship by the inviting drone 'bingg g -- bangg g – ing' of the herformed church bell only, because the gereformeerd bell, though much smaller, was not being tolled anymore for fear that the support holding it would collapse and money for repair had to wait until next years budget was presented and voted on by the male members of of the church as the female members were not allowed to vote, and why should they?

It could only spell trouble, said Bouke, and a 110% more of the men said 'amen' to that.

“Say, a man voted against an issue and his wife voted for it, they might as well have stayed at home since one vote would cancel out the other, but even worse would be the thought that your own wife could cancel out your god given manly vote just by voting against something you were in your heart absolutely sure about and had voted conscientiously100% for.”

Would you be able to live with that?”

The chairman reported on the corps meeting that the drummer would be present three days before the parade and would like to have at least one rehearsal with the all members present.

It had been decided not to play the psalm because some members felt it didn't fit to play on a parade like they were accompanying, while another quoted scripture by mentioning not to throw pearls before the swine and besides nobody would be able to walk that slow.

The corps could play Alte kameraden as good as they were able to and instead of the psalm they had been studying hard on a second but less difficult march.

The leather straps were made and tried to full satisfaction on Bouke, who was able to carry 'the thing from here to the city' as he said and that was at least 10km.

Some of the members were getting a bit of stage fright, but all were excited to get the ball rolling and the chairman leaped into a joyous thanksgiving prayer. The bugs were out of it.

Did he jubilate too early?

There stood two well maintained bikes against the brick wall when came home.

Both elders of the church were waiting with stern faces as the chairman, my father, walked into the room. They stood up to shake hands, after which they went straight to the business for which they came. The store keeper elder took the lead

“Brother Smid it has come to our ears that you as chairman of the christian music club, has given your permission to play for the public school. Can you deny that?”

“Of course not, we had a meeting about that, the young members consulted with their parents, and not one ...” The storekeeper, who was father's major grocery-store competitor in the village, stopped father in mid sentence and asked again

“Did you or didn't you give your permission for the club or whatever you call it to work for...”

This time father interrupted and as calm as he was able to put the storekeeper in his place.

“I want to draw your attention brother that you are in my house right now, and in my house I demand respect, even if you are strong enough to ruin my business.”

Lacking a suitable answer the storekeeper elder looked for help to the other elder, a well to do farmer, who said

“What mister Smid suggests is not unreasonable I think, brother, a man should have respect in his own house. The question of my brother elder is unnecessary though, we know that Smid gave his permission to not only to cooperate with the public school, but actively lead a public parade, thereby and therefore not only endangering himself himself onto the pathway of perdition, but with his misplaced decisions takes several of our longtime members along with him.”

Father's face, taut under the whippings of words by the second elder got now red, as they had crucified him already by not naming him brother Smid, and alluded that he was a newcomer and did not really belong.

“We all know that this is gekkewerk a folly, and against Scripture what you make others and yourself to do, stating 'thou shalt not serve two masters, as …” Now father cut the elder off.

“No,” he said.

“I haven't finished.”

“Not needed. Your intent brothers, was to tell me to retract my word given to mister Wiersma.” ”The president of the public school, right?”

“Right.”

“And what keeps you from doing that Smid?”

“The bible...

… where it says – 'your yea shall be yea and your nay nay.'”

“So that is your last word?”

“Should I go against the bible?”

With that the elders could go home. And they did.

They were lucky at best. As a five year old I saw my father boot a much bigger man than himself out of the house. That was some years later and has nothing to do with today's story, as this happened in 1936 when father as one of 30% unemployed ground workers was walking the street of Hijum from the bridge where we lived to the Loane street, and back again, smoking an empty tobacco pipe to save cash, which was much the trajectory the coming parade was going to cover.

Well, this man, the only son of the local fuel-merchant was likely out trying to make a sale of peat or cokes for our stove, and had received a cup of coffee from my mother, made a remark in jest to her about father being too small for such a good looking woman, which made my father jump up from his chair aiming for the much larger man who in a wink was on his feet as well, but a wink too late, as my father with his head down charged right into the pit of his gut, making him stumble backward, through the backdoor, outside, and on the ground.

I still see the bewildering look on the man's face before my hero father closed the door on him and locked it.

That was then, what was waiting him now? He sure had the church board against him now. When the elders were gone and he had calmed down father realized he had never before been in a pickle as big as right now. And only days before the parade...

Alright, next week more about the church board, about uncle Johannes, and about girls in very short shorts.

The Little Drummer with the Big Drum

When the two corps members biked to the city with a pocket full of money to purchase musical instruments, the salesman noticing their intent to buy several instruments, offered them an over-sized drum for a fraction of the original cost. It had not been the corps members intend to buy a drum at this time but they realized that a drum did belong to a fanfare corps as theirs, so they were talked in buying it.

After they had delivered their prizes they were at a loss what to do with the large boom boom drum, since they could not find anybody to play it mainly because it needed two persons to operate it into a parade as the one they were rehearsing for, one to apply the mallets making the boom booming, and one to pull the wheeled drum-carriage.

Ordinarily a drum is carried by the drummer by lashing the instrument to his front, so that he has his hands free to administer the mallets on both sides to the drum, and because it was over-sized it was feared to heavy to carry and because of its size might drag to the ground.

The corps members eyed the big drum from all sides trying to visualize how to operate it, forgetting that they had come together to rehears the new march, because they realized that they had a cheap music instrument alright but that a lot of important parts were missing. There was no carriage, no mallets, no straps, and most importantly, no drummer and no one willing to pull the drum-carriage, if they had one.

Since there was no carriage, how were they going to transport the thing, ride it piggyback onto the rear of the hay wagon filled with kids from the public school, as one suggested.

Uh, uh, cautioned the rest, there were limits that were not to be crossed and that was definitely one of them. No self respecting gereformeerd man would steep that low to be riding on a public school bandwagon.

That was not even worth discussing but what than?

They were out of money to buy a carriage and - they still had no drummer.

Hulbe, remember Hulbe, the big strong Hulbe, who prophesied that the two churches in Hijum would never cooperate with one another, he lifted the large drum up and was surprised of it's light weight. He put the thing gently down again and surprised everyone when he said

“I would be able to carry that thing in the parade, if Gosse (the tailor) makes a strap to fasten

the thing on my back. I'd see that rather than lower one of us to ride the public school wagon.”

That Hulbe, he could say things nobody would think of mentioning, but he was loyal to the cause alright. His papers went sky high in the Gereformeerde community as people would praise him long long after the coming public school event and say

“Rather than become an accomplished clarinet player he sacrificed himself to carry the large drum on his back, a man like that one can depend on.”

But they still had no drummer.

The chairman had an in-giving, which like the final piece in a jig-puzzle, could finalize the deal, as he carefully added

“I know a drummer who lives all the way in Gasterlan, but if we could get him over here while the public school has its parade, then our problem would be solved. I am very sure that if we reimburse him the bus costs we can get him.”

“So than you don't need me,” Hulbe said.

“You will see when and if he arrives that you are needed alright,” the chairman said.

Hijum owned only two telephones, one belonged to the policeman, the other to the mail man.

The chairman wrote a postcard to his brother in-law Johannes who was indeed a drummer in Gasterlan, inviting him to visit with his sister Jakopje, (whose name he again misspelled) and to honor the christian fanfare band of Hijum as its first drummer.

He left out particulars as who's parade it was for, fearing the wrath of his father-in law who by chance might read the invitation and my grandfather Leffert was super conservative.

Who was this drummer Johannes anyways.

I knew the household of my grandparents Leffert and Durkje Roelevink quite well as I spent several holidays with them in Hemelum, a village like Hijum were the members of the two churches though living side by side, had as little as possible contact with each other, other than at their death.

The gereformeerd churches did not have a cemetery around their church like the herformed church had and at their death the gereformeerd people returned home from where they had left a century ago, but in a coffin.

Siebe, the herformed bicycle repairman and grave-digger used to say about the gereformeerd

“In the end they all come back at the old church again, no matter how gereformeerd they are, and I make sure that they don't stray again.”

Uncle Johannes was quite short and also born with an abnormal curvature of the spine toward the neck which was called a high back, he had a roguish face that easily grinned or laughed and joked a lot. As kids we adored him because he was a great story teller about young characters getting into mischief or adventure, like climbing a continuous growing vine which would take them to the moon.

It was a joy to be with the family on my holidays and now father wrote him to come to our place which would bring lots of laughs in our house. I could hardly wait for him to arrive.

If only he'd come.

He did. He send a return postcard with a message that could not be miss-understood

“Dokkumer train arrives Hijum Tuesday 6 pm J R drummer hungry”

The Second Miracle

The members of the Hijumer christian music corps really put their minds to it by first rehearsing a thanksgiving psalm after all the blessings received.

'Thank thank now all our god' must be played slow and exalted. The slow rhythm afforded the musicians more time to find the next valve on their instruments by moving their fingers from valve to the other, which for the beginners was a godsend.

But, let's go back to the rehearsing night after they received that bombshell letter from the chairman of the public school society, asking the christian music society of all things to play for the public school. Who in the world did dream up a crazy thing like that.

It even confused my father, the chairman, this was not like buying a bread from the wrong baker, or standing next to one of 'the other side' digging a ditch, they were asking, this was with eyes open working with the adversary. What they asked cried against his principle.

“We have to stand on our principle,” he began carefully, which was at least a safe start.

Let me call the chairman of the christian fanfare society, Hendrik Smid, from here on, 'my father,' who in fact he was.

My father had received a large tuba but ran into trouble with my mother who could not stand the noise of that 'big thing' as she called it, and told him to go to the potato field in the next town if he really must make that irritating hoompa hoompa noise.

Rather than be banned from home father handed with the tuba to a young farmer's son with strong lungs who practiced the solemn praise-song out in the barn, scaring the bewildered cows, whom drastically lowered the milk production.

My father, now without tuba, was voted chairman on the strength of his ability to offer a decent prayer, which he performed admirably before and after the weekly practices.

Baker Wiersma had given him work delivering Santa-clause goods in and around the village and had promised him more work in the future, so father felt beholden to the baker and since work was scarce and father's grocery business did not create enough profit to feed his family, he felt himself in a bind, worrying what he might do if a decision had to be made between work, meaning food on one hand, and principle on the other.

Hulbe was a strong but not the most smart member of the society, but as sometimes happens made up by vocalizing his opinions the loudest.

“I side with the Chair, and I for one am principally against the publicans,” he triumphantly looked around that he was able to use those intelligent words, and some, not counting the misusing of his words even agreed. which encouraged Hulbe to get louder and wilder, nearly screaming

“We might as well burn our christian school, and, and, and boot our kids to the publican's school,” he stuttered.

That was far enough for Bouke, who had been the one driving the 'bakfiets' to the city to carry the music instruments triumphantly back to Hijum.

“You have big talk now Hulbe, but don't forget that without the help of the Herformed you'd be blowing only in your snot-kerchief instead of the beautiful saxophone we bought you.” People as a rule listened to Bouke and he was not quite through.

“We asked Wiersma's people for support and they came through more generous than we dared to dream. Now they ask something from us, no money, no joining them, not asking for our dear children, who walk every day to school in another town instead of our own, and we all know that their school may have to close down for lack of children.”

Bouke stopped momentarily to fill his tobacco pipe.

They gave him time for that, knowing that he had more to say. He took his time to say what he still had to say after he had lit his pipe.

“Hulbe was right when he touched on our children having to walk all the way to Hallum to the christian school, but didn't we promise by their baptism to teach them the way of the Lord. We not only have our commitment to God to teach them but also to have them taught to, that is point one, but next to that we also have an obligation to show out gratitude to them who did good to us.

I want you all to think that over as well.” Bouke sucked deeply on the pipe and waved to the chairman that he was finished.

The chairman suggested to think it over for a week and for the young men to discus it with their parents and after that they would decide what to do.

“I know a thing like this has never come before a christian like ours,” he said, “so for once we are number one in the country, but now let's see if we can muster this psalm.”

A week later happened a second wonder in our little town – but this time it came from the gereformeerd side – not one of the members objected to participate with the Herformed and un-churched in their public school festivity by given it their best of their musical talents during the parade.

This was indeed something which had not happened in a hundred years that members of the two churches had worked together in this way.

“We have to study another piece beside our psalm, something peppy.” said the chairman and they settled on the beautiful march Alte Kameraden. The chairman liked that choice because he said 'at one time we were friends,' even though that was more than a hundred years ago before the Gereformeerden separated from the Hervormde church in 1834. What he didn't know was that this song a decade later was one of the most popular songs of the Nazi's, and frequently sung by Hitler's soldiers.

The chairman was real happy with the out come as there was now no problem with his job prospect with baker Wiersma, and besides, there blew a fresh wind of goodwill through the town. There was ample time to study new march in, and if they started with the psalm and do the march twice that would be more than enough playing time for the parade to move from the Loane road starting point to the finish at the bridge over the Hijumer canal, where the merry-go-round would take over.

Was this the end of the two pillar way of life in Hijum? Would after hundred years of strife and bitterness between brothers and sisters, be peace in the fresh flat land of sugar-beets, flax, and potatoes? Hulbe did not think so.

“Bouke is a mooi-prater, he talks like a chicken with its head chopped off,” he said, “we will not be working together in a hundred years. You watch my words.”

A Miracle Among the Pillars

It was a short letter the chairman of the christian music society of Hijum received -

Mr Hendrik Smid,
chairman christian music society of Hijum,

Our intention is to hold our public school and folk feast shortly, and ask for your assistance to play some fitting music for our children's parade.

Please reply at your earliest convenience,

greetings
Mr Wiersma, chairman of the local public school.

The members of the corps, as they referred to the band, were stunned after the chairman, (who happened to my father), had read the letter at the beginning of the rehearsing, but then everyone talked at the same time.

“Now I have heard everything, are they nuts or something, how do they dare asking a christian band to play for a public school, not over my dead body.”

Sometime before the previous story a wonder happened in our village, an event that nobody had thought possible, certainly not the members of the re-reformed band or corps as they lovingly called it – our corps.

My father joined the 'our corps' in 1930 as a young married man and had just established himself as the owner of the tiniest grocery store in Hijum, a village of a small church full of mostly poor people.

The christian music band members all belonged to the re – reformed or Gereformeerd church started with lots of faith and enthusiasm, and time on hand, because work was already hard to come by, but also with – no instruments.

The few members with a rag tag variation of wind instruments lamented that with the present amount of players and instruments the corps would never reach its potential.

My father did not own a musical instrument except a mouth organ with which he used to drive the cows crazy, but he could formulate a good prayer before and after the rehearsals, and because a chairman was to open the meetings with prayer he was made chairman.

He also suggested to hold a drive through the village members of the other pillar of the area the Herformed for a drive, which was received with jeering and derisive laughter.

“You think that you get one red cent from the other side? You have not lived in this area long enough. Not a hope, no sir. Would we hold an offering for their Sunday soccer club? Not in a million years.” But since no one could come up with a better plan, they figured to give it a try. The chairman mentioned the enterprise in his closing prayer and all the members were given a district to canvas door to door, but only the Herformed and the non-church people, 'our own people have financial problems enough paying for an expensive preacher an all.'

And than something happens sometimes that makes you stand with your mouth wide open in amazement, making you quiet, feeling strange, you don't know what to say or do. Everybody had come together in the consistory room of the church to where they come every week to practice, but this time the whole corps stood around the table counting the result of the drive.

When the counting was completed, the coins in rows of ten and the paper money in heaps of one gulden, two, five, and – ten! and old dominee Douma, who had baptized me, and was invited to do the official counting, was finished doing just that, he and the entire corps were stunned with the amount.

That was the first miracle.

I Have Been Thinking

I have been thinking, leaving me open to a sarcastic suggestion that it might be painful for me to do, and sometimes it is hard for me to think things out, when a subject just does not want to come into focus, which happens, while at other times thoughts just take over and lead me. Often my thoughts bounce off of something, a reaction to something else, and when I read the eulogy of my cousin Frank Smid of Winnipeg for instance, I think what would my eulogy read. Would it say something about having been lovingly remembered by some?

Once in that certain mood it might linger on for a long time.

Frank was special to me, making me think back to when I met him when we landed as immigrants in 1953, but before that I had met him while he lived in Limburg, and I worked there. It was in that beautiful part of the Netherlands where I was so fortunate to grow up.

I do my thinking often in bed, where I receive my best inspiration.

I easily solve things in bed, having the time and all the room in my queen-sized bed where I am not distracted by anyone.

Solving problems gives me satisfaction, even joy, to have solutions worked out makes my heart overflow with gratitude - only to forget the whole effort with equal intensity in the morning.

There are things that need nothing else but to think about.

Thinking about my grandchildren always brings a smile.

Thinking about a certain person far away, whose name I have mishandled by omitting an important letter of her queenly name and despite my neglect by spelling her biblical name properly, again, never fails to bring a smile onto my face.

My father misspelled the name of my mother who was not named after a queen but after an individual who in spite of being a crafty person, still became quite important in bible history – Jacob, the last of the trio of patriarchs.

This bouncing off of something has taken me via the nice woman with the royal name to the bible, and via my bed, to my parents, which is how it often goes in the end after all that thought jumping I forget to write what I was going to share.

I still want you to know what the original thought was, if you are still with me.

My father, after many years being married to my mother, still managed to spell her name Jakopje instead of Jacobje, the last one being her name. But just like my name was shortened from Fertile to Lex, so her name was Japke, or Jap, which she hated, but she lived long enough to see her grand child named Jackie or Jacqueline, which I managed to misspell to Jaqueline. She had however a grandchild named after her by the name of Cobie.

Is my thinking boring you?

I could tell you something about one of my my uncles making you wonder from which gene pool some of you originated and laugh about this - he was lend out by his father, against his will, to sleep with the young wife of his neighbor for four weeks, but afterwards bragged about it. I think about the most good-looking grandfather of one of my granddaughters-in-law, who survived the last world war as a member of the British air-force, of him I think with awe and jealousy. No, he is not my brother Durk.

I am still thinking.

It storms.

The storm sweep-ed all the needles from my veranda which my house keeper Margaret, trying hard to restore order in my dwelling, furiously sweeps away every week. She can not see dirt and disorder, while I specifically hired her to talk to me and – like needles on the deck around my still flowering artificially flowers attracting fluttering unfilled butterflies.

I miss Anne badly.

The lot of a widower is that having female company, specially married women, in my place is rare so I made it a point asking Margaret to fill that need by providing female conversation as I prefer that over male bragging.

Old people, even old men. have little to brag about even though they have the time for it.

I still miss Anne.

There are needs that can only properly be satisfied by a woman, o, what the heck, I am referring to sex, there, I said it. It was not a difficult decision for me to decide not to search for another wife. Anne filled my desires, and her abilities and characteristics far exceeded my expectations. I was proud to have Anne to be my wife. And my friend.

I was not old at 76 when she departed from me, and and still very satisfied with our love-life.

Maybe I was too satisfied with her to want another wife. I was cautious not to go into any kind of relationship with another woman for fear of neglecting my daughters, whom I love as much as much as did my wife and to whom I wanted to leave whatever earthly worth I possessed, (a very limited amount) and had seen several times how easy a bank account falls into the beautiful hands of a woman out to bamboozle an old man.

Enough of my thinking, at the end of the week I will share some things that no one remembers anymore – the secret and not so secret lives of the old who once were young in the solemn and not so solemn days of the 1930's and '40's.

Until the end of the week than.

Now, after all this thinking, something nearing a catastrophe happened. This chapter should have been published before the Frisian village life during the 1930's. It failed to do so because of a fight between me and the computer, which I (again) lost.

If this has caused any confusion on your part, I apologize.

Frisian Villiage Life During the 1930s

An invisible yet sharp tear ripped our village in two half.

The rupture sneaked like a snake between the homes and split some double residences clear in half. The breach was so deep and so wide, there was not a pole-jumping stick long enough, or a man powerful enough, to to jump over it.

It was the difference in thought and religion.

When I started writing short stories in earnest, I was encouraged by a young good looking, intelligent, adventurous, witty, warm, and many things more, woman, first a university student, then professor, and finally doctor. I had written a story which I was quite proud to show her, expecting to get praised. Glancing it over quickly, she killed the little self worth I had, in the process smashing my hopes of praise when she said

'This is crap,' twisting the knife even farther by saying 'you do not understand our language' and as a farewell blessing 'why don't you write in your own language.'

For months my head was filled with 'your own, your own' wondering what my own language actually was. I was born Fryslân, dwelling about seventeen years in that wonderful part of the world, with their own, revered Frisian language but lived then more than sixty years in English Canada.

So, I started writing.

in the Frisian language, I liked stories about my youth and once I started, the stories just rolled on and on, as if on their own.

However, nobody in Abbotsford BC was able to read Frisian except a retired preacher from Oldeboorn.

Then like an angel out of a clear sky, a cousin, born in Earnewald, dropped in out of the sky, which I handed a some of what I thought was my best writing to show his father Bernardus to read, but he went straight to it Friesch Dagblad, a Frisian daily newspaper and had the stories published, altogether about twenty of them.

The one above is one of those stories translated into English.

Thank you Dr. P. Atricia and nephew J'an Smid.

There were differences in status in many things in my birthplace ninety years ago – a farmer was in status higher than the laborer working for him, there was, and still is a difference between a man and his wife, between old and young, teach-er and teach-ed, ones with responsibilities and authority, the other with commitments and benefits, but all are, or should be, working together, for without it they do not function well.

The partition without a bridge in our village was between people belonging to the Herformed church and the people of the Gereformeerd church. Both churches confessed the same faith in god, the same doctrines, baptism practices, they even held Sunday church services at the same time, invited by the urgent bing-bang-ing of the five-hundred year old church-bell which pealed from the tower of the centuries old Herformed church, which was countered by the Gereformeerd church claiming to have the purest interpretations of their doctrines but - had no church bells.

The opposing groups on either side of the invisible divide did not want anything to do with with the believers of the other side, and therefore patronized not only 'their own churches', they also purchased their bread from a brother-in-the-lord baker, so that two bakers had a meager existence feeding the 420 village souls, where one would've been quite sufficient.

The same applied to the butcher, shoemaker, milkman, grocery store, farm-hands and maids, their like-oriented newspapers, their own political parties and unions, and send their children to their 'own schools,' the Gereformeerd children slouched to the school with the bible in the next town, while the Herformed children attended the public school in the village.

The Herformed were an offspring from the Roman catholic church, the name Herformed meaning reformed, but the Gereformeerd, being an offshoot off the Herformed or reformed, were via the reformed also reformed from the Roman catholic church and thus double reformed and logically called themselves Gereformeerd, or re-reformed.

The two groups were later called zuilen or pillars. There were thus two pillars in Hijum, Herformed and Gereformeerd. Had there lived Catholics in our village, there would have been three, as the Catholics formed the third pillar, and so it was in all of the Netherlands.

All three pillars were not out to destroy each other but avoided each other as the plague and worked and patronized only the members of their own stripe.

That is why all thirty eight Gereformeerd kids walked, ran, or slouched the three km to the next town's christian school, since Hijum was a one only school town, which happened to be the public school, teaching only Herformed and un-churched children.

The gereformeerd children were not disallowed from the public school, they were in fact wanted, even sorely needed because the public school teetered on the brink of being closed of lack of students, but in spite of that their parents favored the christian in the next town out of principle.

The other side feasted their 'school and folk fest' apart from our side, but our side responded by naming our feast after the queen, 'queen Wilhelmina school and folk fest.'

Hijum had thus two school and folk feasts where each half of our cracked up village, both featured a parade of two hay wagons, filled with yelling and waving children.

But only 'the others' operated also a marry-go-round.

The marry-go-round was very big issue with the Gereformeerd church board, making it a main stumbling block between the two sides, and when one of our young people strayed and found guilty of taking a ride on the offensive machine he could well be put on the first step of censure.

Both sides were allowed to fly the national tricolor from the tower of the Herformed church though since that building belonged to the state, the Gereformeerd was also able to flag from the competition church also flew a flag from their own church tower, of which the Herformed were of course not allowed access to.

It was really sad that it was this way but we didn't know any better, this was the way it had always been and likely would stay forever. However...

more to come, much more – good night Esther, and Megan and Jan, and Dr. M.

I'm Stuck in the Muck

by Brenda Smid

It was the summer of 1973. Mt father, looking for adventure, decided we would leave Alberta. He borrowed his older sons' truck and canopy. With an eight by nineteen ft. trailer in tow, we set out for BC. Divorced for many years, Dad had sic children to deal with. Both Morgan and Doug were working in Alberta. In the cab of the truck we packed in like sardines, all four of us girls. I was sixteen and miserable leaving my friends in Sundre. Colleen was thirteen going on thirty, Tracy and Lisa (twins) were seven and yappy. Out Dad, nicknamed "doc", was a very patient man. 

Camping along the way, we stopped for a couple days at Canim Lake. Back on highway 97, rain poured down as we came along to Williams Lake. Rain drops dancing on the water, lush green hills, a mist over the lake, it just took a hold of me. I will never forget the feeling of peace at the moment. 

Motoring on to Quesnel, we visited with Dad's brother Norman. He was the editor of the town's newspaper. We set up out little trailer at Ten mile Lake. Dad had initially wanted to live in Prince Rupert. Norman told him about the open pit mine at McLeese Lake. My father was a road building from the time he left the Navy after the War.  He could do anything with heavy equiptment. We took a drive to Gibraltar Mines. He went into the office and thirty minutes later, came out with a job. After the last few years in Alberta, making three hundred and twenty five dollars a month, this new job was three to four times more money, and it felt like we hit the mother load. 

We moved to Freemans Trailer Park and set up out piddly little home three miles from the hamlet. Jean and Frank Grimard owned the Oasis Restaurant, a motel, and cabins on the short. They took an interest in our family, as did the Goyettes' at their store, along with the rest of the community. Not too many people would see such a good, devoted father. One of the first treasures we found was Jean's butter tarts, oh so goo! We had a ritual at the cafe a couple times a week to savour the flavour and to get the local news. My brothers arrived from Alberta, securing work at the mine and staying at the camp. Colleen and I had a lucrative business. We were the resident babysitter for all the families with children at the park. Autumn was showing her colours, so dad traded the trailer for a brand new 25 ft. travel trailer and we built a porch next to it. We were warm and happy, most of the time, when we girls weren't at each others throats. The twins went to school in McLeese and we took the bus to Williams Lake. 

In late spring, when Dad had weekends off, we took drives around the Caiboo. We fished at Polley, Dugan, and Tyee lakes in Morgan's new 16 ft. canoe fitted with pontoons and a small motor for trolling. We got stuck trying to get in and out at Jackson's Hols. It was the best of times. 

Summer, yahoo! I graduated and got a job at the mine. It was a family affair. I was a warehouse parts person, first of three girls hired for labour. At the time, Williams Lake had only steel toes boots for men and I had to buy the smallest size, a Snoot Boot. My nickname was Boots, or Five Foot Two. The best part of my job was the money, $4.50 an hour, overtime, and the eye candy all around me! I blushed easily when the man came to the counted wanting a part. Giving me a bogus order, I'd write out the request - one hundred feet of shoreline - when I looked up at him he burst out laughing, and then I got it. 

All the rented cabins at the Oasis were brimming with good lookin' men. My brothers rented one, and we practically lived there. We hitched a ride on their off days, and we stayed till dark. It was so much fun, lots of fun, swimming and fishing at the creek. Love was in the air for my brothers with their girlfriends, and for my first boyfriend. Doug bought a speed boat. Water skiing for whoever wanted to do it. They mounted a toilet on the float and, sitting on the can holding the roped hollering "HIT IT!", off they went with a porcelain smile. At the end of the summer, we talked Dad into buying yet another, bigger trailer. A twelve by forty eight, replaced the other one foot at a time. 

I married my boyfriend, Al, a minter from Ontario. Dad had to sign for me because I was still seventeen years old. We put our brand new twelve by sixty furnished trailer in the park, a hundred feet from my family. The decor, deluxe harvest gold, brown and orange (yikes!) I had a dress in the same colours and it I stood in front of the curtains I was almost invisible, with only my face and legs showing. Two years later, all of my family went back to Alberta. Al I am moved to Williams Lake and bought out house. We reared our two sons, born with severe disabilities, with love. After thirty years of marriage, Al learned he had cancer. He fought the battle, but it took his life. Seven years later, I remain here with my sons in their group home, four door from mine. 

I love it here, The Cariboo is a way of life. The scenery is amazing, but it's the good, hard working people, great friendships, people on the street who are quick to smile, and those who take the time to help each other. That is what makes us strong. 

Part 3 of a True War Story

The year is 1995, fifty years after the end of the war and I am sixty years old. Where has the time gone. My hair is gray, but only I know.

I asked my husband once if he wanted to see what I really look like and he said 'I like what I see,' so I had it colored once more. The waves are my own.

We are taking our Dodge '74 motor-home out for the last time to our favorite camp ground in California. When we come back here next time at Lake Cahuilla, east of Palm Springs, we will be camping in a small two-person tent. Because I love sleeping in a tent.

We are assigned a site next to a local couple, I notice, as their vehicle license-plate says California. The woman is my age I guess and speaks with an German accent, which reminds me of the end of the war fifty years ago.

My husband and I reminisced about my adventure in the potato cellar in 1945, and the strange affair with 'our' German soldier at that time.

The woman's accent annoyed me for some reason, reminding me of that time in a negative way, and she made it worse by asking me to take care of her 'darlings,' a pair of Chihuahua dogs while they can visit their friends.

I said I would, as long as they would be back before supper time.

They were not, so we asked another neighbor to dog-sit the little things who were no trouble.

When we came back from our diner the doggy owners apologized profusely, inviting us to their campfire.

The woman informed us that she was born in northern Germany not far from the border with Groningen and a little later she started telling a story that gave me goose bumps.

I listened intently as she started

“Our house was located just on the outskirts of a small village in northern Germany not far from the Dutch border. One day a platoon of soldiers whom had retreated probably from from your country arrived in our village. One of the soldiers knocked on our door and ordered us out of the house.

'There will be fighting, we need your house,' he said. My mother was scared and asked the soldier to leave us alone but he insisted that we leave and find a place to hide hide into the marsh immediately.

When mother saw that he would not budge, she begged him to come with us.

'I can not do that Fraulein,' he said, 'I am in uniform.' Mother pleaded for him to come in.

'Take off that uniform, my husband's clothes will fit you fine, he is also in the Wehrmacht and who knows he may never come back to me.'

I had never before heard mother mention her fear that my father might not come back, it frightened and saddened me. I started to cry.

'The war is over anyways,' mother tried yet, but to no avail. And then we left the house for the marsh. I was a little girl then but still I remember, I remember it like yesterday.

That night the sky lit up and the air was filled with the rat tat tat of machine guns. At dawn it was all over. An eerie stillness hung over the village. All the soldiers were gone.

All, except for one.

He laid in the middle of the street. Face up - dead. My mother stood over him. She recognized him as the soldier who had talked to her only hours before.

'Foolish man, is this better than?' she cried. 'Don't you think it is silly to die on the last day of the war. Will you men never learn? When will you men ever learn.'

That was the last day of the war for us. I was little then but I still hear mother cry

'When will you men ever learn?'

It was very quiet in the campground and so were we, for what seemed a long time.

The dark comes fast in California. The campfire was almost gone and the host threw a few logs on the hot ashes, fanning the fire

and then I began to tell my part of the story of the last days of the war which was like a previous chapter out of the same storybook... “

Ten years after our camping trip to south California were we met the woman with the German accent, in 2005, we celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary, and then I started to feel signs of weakness. I had trouble making the long stairway up to the reception area.

Instead of camping in the small two person tent, because I was unable to get up from the low bedding, we purchased a van, so I could flip my feet trough the side-doors outside making it easier for me to move in and out.

It still took a year before I was finally diagnosed with Lou Gehrig disease, ALS.

I have never been one to give up easy, so we kept on camping in California and Arizona until it eventual became too hard for me.”

Here ends Anne's portion of this story.

Anne was using a wheelchair already, in fact we were only half a year away from her dead when we received a call from Norma Maarhuis who lived only a few miles from us across the US border, telling us that a dutch couple were visiting them who wanted to see Anne.

When I asked Anne if she was up to it, she gave me that Smit look of who-do-you-think-I-am, and said 'lets go.'

What a surprise awaited us!

The Dutch man introduced himself as the son of Roelof Maarhuis, the fugitive out of Anne's story and his vivacious young wife from Brabant! The reason he had asked for Anne was that she was the only one alive who could fill him in about his father's life during the war.

There was no question about him being the son of Roelof Maarhuis.

'It is as if I see his father' said Anne, 'he definitely looks like a Maarhuis. He proved to be a strong man as well, as he carried Anne up on the stairs into the Maarhuis house, which Anne thoroughly enjoyed.

Anne and the Dutch guest were sitting close together, Anne had placed her hand on his knee as she related to him the story about his father Roelof, the fugitive who never saw his son - to the son who never saw his father.

.... and so the tapestry transcending time and place began far far before Groningen via California and Sumas Washington goes on and on and on ....

where in the world did I hear that?

Part 2 of a True War Story

My father luckily kept his cool and sat down in mother's chair, while the soldier after thanking mother for her kindness, took off to the farm to the east of our house, where a platoon of the German Grun Polizei had placed an anti-aircraft gun on an centuries old small dike behind that farm with which to shoot Allied bombers.

The gun was not used at the end of the war as English and American bombers droned over our homes by the hundreds making the earth tremble, but one day they did use it.

The thunderous noise was painful on the ears, and my little brother Bart, who then already was a wanderer, was lost and nowhere to be found. Mother went half crazy with fear but did find him unharmed at the gun site where a soldier had put cotton wads in his little ears.

(Note: The Grun Polizei had the task of policing the civilian population of conquered countries and were operated at the end of the war by the infamous Waffen SS.)

The following morning the soldier came back to return the borrowed tools. His stomach ache was gone, he said, and presented mother with a nice chunk of hard cheese.

He told mother that he lived not far away in northern Germany, he said this was the reason they understood each other so well, as they both spoke a similar dialect.

He wanted to visit mother 'as soon as this mad war is over' to introduce her to his wife. They would come on a motorbike he had hidden under straw.

After that he came regularly for a few days, but was smart enough to stay out of the way of father, though he somehow made friends with our fugitive Roelof!

Coming from school one day my brother Henk did not belief hie eyes when he saw Roelof and the soldier sitting together at the kitchen table peeling potatoes for mother who happily smiled.

The last time 'our soldier' as we called him (but not father) came over, was to say goodbye and to warn mother to hide as there was going to be fighting in our village.

Father took that message to heart and spoke with the neighbors who agreed to hide in the potato cellar of our neighbor friend for the night, 'just in case.'

Were we in for a surprise, instead of fighting somewhere in the village, we were going to be right in the front line.

When it became dark we filed into the potato cellar, while English soldiers had taken possession of the farm to our west and now we were right in the middle of the war zone, with on the east the German soldiers and to the west the English, they were only two-hundred feet away from each-other, both ready kill the other, and we like sitting ducks right between them.

I could easily stand up in the potato cellar but we all sat down on potato crates, - waiting.

Waiting for what, I wondered.

It was pretty dark inside as there was only one small window just above the ground outside, and they had put straw bales over the top of the cellar.

Everyone was quiet, not knowing what to expect. It was all very exiting.

It did not take long for all hell to break loose.

I think it was the German soldiers who started by shooting the big anti-aircraft gun, which made three distinct sounds, first a boom when they shot the projectile, then the loud overhead whizzing of it, and finally the blast when it landed, but since the farms were so close together the time between first and final was very short and since they shot in series of ten or twelve at the time, it made a racket like summer thundering, when the lightning and thunder happen at the same time.

When the English, which we found out later were Canadians, returned the fire with machine guns and mortars, it changed to continuous lightning and thundering.

The noise was painful.

The neighbor woman in turn cried and yelled, her husband told her to shut up, because the soldiers might hear us, and I wondered about that – how could they hear us with all that noise, and the woman did not stop screaming.

I saw feet of German soldiers rushing by through the little window and later what must've been Canadian feet, because they were of a different color. O, it was exciting, and everybody was scared, but I was not, because my father was with us.

Finally toward dawn things were getting quiet and father wanted to investigate, mother tried to stop him but he went anyways. I sneaked up the ladder as well and saw father standing in the morning sunshine rolling a cigarette, so everything was alright.

But it was not.

It was eerily quit and a strange smell hung over the village.

Then the woman who had been crying so much started screaming now

'Where is the farm of Jansonius, where is the farm of Jansonius,' and turning around

'where is the Church farm. Bastards! they shot everything to a rubble. That beautiful farm.'

Both farms were burned to the ground.

'Good the cows were out,' my father said, who really cared about animals.

Our house was spared except for a little bullet hole in the living room window, where father used to sit on Sundays and when there were visitors. He never repaired the glass.

'To remember,' he said.

He decided to walk to the next village where he knew a relative, to get out of the line of fire.

It was one of these beautiful spring mornings when you cannot help but be happy when we started walking.

The first lilacs were just out blossoming. Father had planted purple and white lilacs, not appreciating either color since he was color blind, close to the kitchen window so mother only had to open the window to savor the scent.

I liked the white lilacs the best because they smelled the best. Mother used to put large bouquets of them on the table filling the house with this sweet aroma.

But no-one thought of picking flowers today.

We started to walk, and my feet were hurting because my shoes were too small.

I remember it well, it was my birthday, I was ten years old and not one remembered that.

But hey, the war was over and we were free, though I had never really felt imprisoned.

Our soldier never visited us on on his motorcycle as he said he would, but after a few months we received a letter from his wife in which she thanked mother for her kindness.

She went on to write that her husband had been killed at the end of the war, close to the border.

Mother was sad about it, but most people were surprised about the little change the end of the war and foreign occupation had brought about and everyone continued doing what they had been during the war and even before, and wild expectations of great changes about when we were free again just fizzled out and died.

Our fugitive Roelof Maarhuis joined the Dutch army soon after the war ended. He received his training in Brabant, in the south of the Netherlands, where he found a nice girl whom he took to Groningen one time to show her off to us, and no wonder, I was so impressed with her, she was so different from the local girls, so vivacious in her yellow dress. I just adored her.

Shortly after he married the lively Brabant girl, Roelof died

I vaguely remember a rumor that his wife might've been pregnant, but those things were not talked about with young girls around, so I am not sure about that and since we not heard a thing about her anymore, we never found out.

And what about me?

I was surprised how little changed after the war was over and we were free, other than that all excitement had gone, a feeling, I understand, many people would share. The good thing I remember is that mother sometimes bought oranges.

Remembrance Day: Part 1 of a True War Story

The 11th of November is Remembrance day. Veterans will gather at the cenotaph inscribed with the names of their fallen brothers in arms.

A lone bugle will lament the 'Last Post' followed by two minutes of silence.

Heads will bow and tears will flow; with closed eyes and lost in thoughts, the old veteran's will be fare away in time and location, there, where their comrades fell, never to rise up again.

They will re-remember their personal stories of loss and grief.

But than the noise of life and living quickly will bury the silence, as if embarrassed by the quiet. The crowd will slowly disappear, another ceremony has come to an end.

Yet, some stories stay alive, tucked away in the minds of who care and – remember, and remember that not all war stories are exclusively about hate and killing, some stories will be remembered because of care and sacrifice on both warring sides, some of deeds of love.

This is such a story, which is told by Anne Smit, the eldest daughter of Luke Smid and his wife Jantina. Anne was also my dear wife for over fifty years. Anne had me record her story which will be published in three parts.

PART ONE of a true war story

After the capitulation of the Dutch army in, my father Lute Smit, a man of few words, and an intense dislike of the occupying Germans, bordering on hate, held on to his military rifle after the dutch army lost an humiliating war against the far superior German Wehrmacht in the spring of 1940, when the dutch army surrendered after just five days of fighting. The defeated soldiers were required to surrender their weapons to the enemy but my father, known for doing certain things his own way, hid his service rifle in the bedroom closet, which was a serious offense punishable by death.

Father had been a sharpshooter in a dutch paramilitary organization which operated until the end of the five day war with Germany when the Nazi's, of course, abolished it.

To make things worse for father he hid my cousin Roelof Maarhuis, a former soldier in the dutch army, who was conscripted to work for the German army or become a German soldier. Roelof refused and fled from them to our place, where he slept above my bedroom in the attic, where father had build a hiding place for him.

Hiding a fugitive was also punishable by death.

My father was a soft-spoken man and definitely no talker, if a sentence required ten words, he would use eight, and bite off the ends of some of the words as well. He was also a man of his word, a good example being that, before they got married, he promised mother to attend church with her every Sunday and kept that promise until she died, but after mother passed he never set a foot in church anymore.

When his own time came up and a funeral service was held in the church but he was carried in and not aware of what happened.

Had he anything against the church? He never talked about it if he had.

My mother was a stately woman, tall and slender, flashing a great smile, often shyly, behind her hand, at whoever she would meet.

Her sisters all had worked as farmer's maid but mother had landed a job as a nurse maid for a rich farmer, looking after his little children and babies, which made her quite proficient of bringing up children, but not of cooking, and when she served father every day a week long the same dish, after their wedding, together with an angelic smile, and father mentioned that a little variety was alright with him, she cried and confessed that this was the only dish she was able to cook.

From thereon father supplied her every day with a variety of fresh vegetables out of his own garden which they learned to cook together.

My mother nearly panicked and her heart raced when she saw three enemy soldiers coming toward our house. Quickly she rushed our fugitive into his hiding place where he got in record time. They were knocking again, more impatiently now, while mother unlocked the front door, still praying that they would not find Roelof.

And there they stood, three large German soldiers with three big rifles, mother shook with fear when she looked from one to the other, however, they did not really look malicious and one of them asked for tools to cut down a tree with.

Father's tools were in the barn where mother took them, all three one after the other following behind her. When she got into the barn she noticed that the ladder leading to Roelof's hiding place was still standing up and in full view of the soldiers.

The soldiers took what they needed and left, while mother, still shaking went back into the living room and cried. Hat they gone up the ladder to investigate they surely would have found Roelof and could've killed both her and the fugitive.

After she had calmed down a bit she went back to the barn to get potatoes for supper and was shocked to see one of the soldiers still there, sitting up against the wall, his head between his knees, doubled up with pain. He was about her age she thought and when he lifted his head she saw that he had no cruel face. He could've been a neighbor, save for that hated uniform. If only Roelof would stay out of sight.

It took all her courage to ask the soldier what ailed him and he answered that he had severe stomach cramps, which she understood well since she herself had often stomach pains.

”I take warm milk sometimes,” she said, wondering why she was was she was even talking to him, but mother was a compassionate woman whose kindness won out over all other considerations.

'Come in the house with me,' she said, 'I will warm some up for you.'

Can you imagine, my mother was a beautiful young woman, only thirty-two, inviting an enemy soldier with her in the kitchen with her?

So, now I hear my father coming home, he walks directly into the kitchen and stairs right into the eyes of a hated German soldier, sitting in my father's chair at the head of the table, a half filled glass of milk in his hand, and his other hand well within reach of his gun which stands against the wall, while mother shyly smiles from one to the other.

Father's illegally held rifle was directly on the other side of the wall in the bedroom closet, and what if Roelof feeling hungry would come down, because it was close to supper time...

One Eyed Charlie

“One-eyed Charlie was a staunch supporter of the Republican party and wholeheartedly participated when a political argument ended in a fistfight, because he loved a brawl as much as politics, and though he was not one of the biggest men, he was wiry and his punch was dynamite,” the bus driver started, and all of us hung on his lips, expecting another great story.

There are only some who can tell a good story and a few out of them who are extraordinary at it, our bus-driver belonged in the last category.

He did not use his hands to emphasis his story, good god, he better keep his hands on the steering wheel, or use his voice mimicking. He did not have to do any of this because his stories were interesting and entertaining enough and his subdued delivery added to it.

We were on our way from the south of western Canada to lake Tahoe by tour-bus, having arranged to have the story teller as our driver who carried on with his story

“About Charlie's early life is little more known than that he was orphaned at an early age and as a youngster, together with hundreds of others, ventured west in search of excitement and fortune.

He loved being with horses and sought them out for company whenever he could. He slept with them in the barn as well as under the stars.”

“His affection for horses never diminished, and when later in life he owned a team of spirited horses with which he drove a stagecoach, he kept the practice of sleeping with them even though he by then had the resources to sleep in a hotel at night. He did not shy away from from his compatriots and was liked at at most bars in several states for his companionship and known for his debating skills. And for his hard fistfights.”

“He was a staunch supporter of the Republican party and wholeheartedly participated when an argument about a political issue ended in a fistfight, because he loved a brawl as much as politics, and though he was not one of the biggest men, he was wiry and his punch was like dynamite.”

“He just loved his horses and when one of them stumbled and got lame he was heartbroken, tearfully he shot it between the eyes. The horse fell but his foreleg spasmodically kicked the light out of Charlie's eye. He covered it with a black patch and was since known as On-eyed Charlie.”

“In spite of thus being handicapped he was still a good shot and always drove with two loaded guns. When one day he was delivering a payroll to a mining camp, a four men bandit-gang confronted him. One-eyed Charlie whipped his horses into a gallop and drove right into them with both his guns blazing. Three of the bandits went down and the fourth took off as if his life depended on it, which in fact it did.”

“Age, sleeping under the skies and in drafty barns took its toll, more and more he felt the nagging pains of rheumatism. He then decided with regret to end the life that gave him so much excitement and enjoyment and sadly said farewell to his horses, freeing them from of their harnesses and shooed them off into the wilderness to roam as they wished.”

“He settled down near Sacramento, where he spend the rest of his life with friends. He was found peacefully dead by one of them. When they prepared him for burial, they found to their horror that Charlie was a woman.

Charles Parkhurst, known as One-eye Charlie proved to be Charlotta Parkhurst and under that name she was buried.”

“Charlotte, orphaned at an early age, was likely born in the early eighteen hundreds and as a young woman had little choice of having a bright future – she did not have the education to become a teacher, she didn't want to get married, to hire herself out as a maid abhorred her, as did a life of prostitution.

Her chances of success were much better as a man, and therefore she took the identity of a man, dressed like one, behaved like one and changed her name to Charlie. Not one ever questioned her gender, neither did anyone find out until she was dead.”

“Hundred years after her death someone erected a monument to memorialise the story of this incredible woman, Charlotta Parkhurst in the San Francisco Valley in the 1970's. It states on there among other things that Charlotte was the first woman in the state to vote, in fact she voted fifty-two years before women were given the right to vote!” 

Our storyteller driver drove us through the San Francisco Valley were we paused momentarily at the memento to that remarkable woman with her incredible story.