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Friday, September 10, 2010

Building Bridges


Bridges are amazing things. It is no surprise that they have inspired so much wonder. Take the Firth of Forth Bridge for example. Built in 1891 it is a Unesco World heritage sight. When it was built it inspired souvenirs. There were ashtrays and salt and pepper shakers; postcards and books. It is a truly impressive structure. Lina and I crossed the road bridge over the Firth of Forth in 2008. The bridge spans the Forth River and joins Edinburgh and Fife. You might say that we took the Firth of Forth to Fife where I bought a Fifth of Scotch (my Fourth). Sorry about that, I just couldn’t resist. Confederation Bridge which spans 12.9 kilometers from New Brunswick to Prince Edward Island. Do you think they cut a hundred meters off the bridge to keep it from being 13km long? I wouldn’t be surprised. It too has spawned many souvenirs. I understand the fascination. These are true marvels of engineering and rival even the pyramids as mega-structures.
I bring up the subject of bridges because I was watching the Antiques Roadshow the other night and they featured some souvenirs of the Forth Bridge. I remember how awed I was by the sight of it. I remember too how awed I was the first time I crossed the Confederation Bridge. I remember being surprised that it was not straight. I had expected the swell in height at its’ center where in goes from 40m high to 60m high to allow sea traffic to pass under it, but I had not expected that it would curve as well. Great bridges spanning great bodies of water. The span is what caught my attention. I had been thinking about my grandfather, Otis Larkin. My mother’s father. I did not know him. That is not surprising; neither did my mother. Otis died when she was only a year old. They say that no man is an island. But to me he was exactly like an island. A mysterious island to which there was no bridge. He was an enigma.
Frustratingly my Mom could be of little help. I knew some things about him. I had seen photos. I knew what he looked like. That he was tall and handsome. That he had huge hands and size fourteen feet. I knew that he was a Chef at Yarmouth’s Grand Hotel. He was, like most men raised in the south shore Nova Scotia town of Shag Harbor; a fisherman by trade. And sadly like most fishermen of his day he could not swim. It was this fact that caused his death. He had been fishing for lobsters for a dinner he was catering for the Oddfellows Club. Now I say that he couldn’t swim, but in the North Atlantic in March I doubt this contributed a lot to his death. These facts were known to me. I never thought to ask my grandmother about him until too late. Luckily for me I had a bridge. A human bridge. But believe me no less amazing than the twp bridges I have already sighted.
My bridge or actually bridges were sisters. Two entirely remarkable ladies; my Great Aunt (in every sense of the word) Marguerite Larkin and her sister Clarisse Hill. Aunt Marguerite lived to be 98 and Clarisse if memory serves 96. Two very remarkable women indeed. After my Uncle Mitchell passed the two ladies lived together, on their own until Marguerite was 96. Ill health and a broken hip forced them to move into a senior’s home. But don’t think for a minute that the years dimmed their senses. Not a bit of it, I would marvel at how the two ladies would argue over the minutest details. They would be discussing how some relative had visited just two weeks ago; “Why they stopped for lunch.” Clarisse would say. “We had a chowder (pronounces in the south shore accent “Chowda”) with some rolls.” Marguerite would add. “Now you see they-ah she’s losin’ it I tell you! Clarisse they weren’t rolls they were biscuits. She’s losin’ her mind I tell ya!”
I assure you neither of them had lost as much as one iota of their minds. They could talk in detail for hours of events that had happened years before. I loved to visit them and never missed a chance. Clarisse had been a school teacher and was very learned and well read. Both women were very articulate. I adored their accents as much as I adored them. I remember once arriving at their home to find out they were at a quilting bee at the local church. We tracked them down there. They were in the hall. “We have some foreigners here today.” They informed us. “All the way from Cawk’s Hawba” To the unmitigated that is Clark’s Harbor. Maybe five miles down the road. You could forgive them for thinking this was a long ways away, they could remember a day when no one had a car and the road was nothing more than wheel ruts in the rocky ground.
Aunt Marguerite once told me of the day my Grandfather died. It was not great day weather wise. Typical March weather in Nova Scotia, windy, choppy a cloudy sky with little sun. Nothing new to men who had taken a living for their families from the sea for generations. Staying home was out of the question. Otis had gone out alone as soon as it was light. Marguerite was making lunch when someone came up from the dock with the news. News that Shelburne County women had heard for two hundred years. An empty boat found adrift on a stormy sea. The community gathered round my grandmother and the family. Five long days would pass. No one would dare mention what they all knew. He wasn’t coming home alive. But at least they found him. Widows were common in those days. The sea gave but she also took.
Years would pass before I thought to ask for more detail. Marguerite too passed away. I wrote Clarisse and asked her a question that had haunted me. I know who he was, I know how he died. But what was he like? What made him tick? Was he serious, did he stutter? Tell me something, anything about him. Clarisse wrote back. In her typical school teacher perfect grammar she told me a little about my grandfather. No he was not serious. In fact he had a great sense of humor. He was hard working, and that is what drove him out in a dory on March seas. He was a big man but a very gentle man. He stood Six foot four which was tall in those days. He had hands the size of bread plates. He was a dreamer and he wanted better for his family. Better than the life of a small town fisherman. He had done well as the chef at the very Grand Hotel in Yarmouth. In fact he had won a coveted spot as the chef on a cruise ship in New England for that summer. He was filling in the days until he could take his family away to what he thought would be a better life. It was not to be.
I guess if he had taken my Mom away she and my Dad would not have met and I wouldn’t be writing this now. So many “what ifs”. I thanked her for the letter. She wished it was more. She had been quite young when it all happened. I looked at his picture as I read the letter and I thought I could read more in that face now. Perhaps a twinkle in the eye I had never noticed before. Maybe a laugh line I had overlooked. There was always a reserve in posed photos in those days. Long exposures meant that you had to hold the pose somewhat stiffly. You had to say more with your eyes. If he’d have known he was going to die maybe he would have written a letter to future generations. That is a bit presumptuous of course. Clarisse is gone now too. I miss them both. But before she left she gave me back a grandfather I never had. She bridged the gap between us. It is marvelous that we may meet people who lived long enough to bridge the gaps in our lives. I am old enough to have known veterans of the First World War and they were old enough to have known people who were alive for confederation. It was in just such a way that aboriginal cultures kept track of their history with remarkable accuracy. Stories passed from generation to generation. Who in your life spans the generations? It may be time to ask them some questions. Maybe to listen a little harder to those stories they tell. I am thankful that Clarisse and Aunt Margeurite were there to bridge the gap between m grandfather and me. I got a piece of him back. When I look at his picture I have a few less questions. No man should be an island.

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