A second Mom and Dad

We are a bit of everyone we meet, well everyone who touches us anyways. For ill or good we wax or wane as human beings by virtue of those we interact with. We are like sponges we absorb our environment and even when we wring ourselves out some of it remains. Like grape juice we try to squeeze out the last drops of some traumatic event yet we remain damp with the last few drops of impoverished childhood, or stained by thee time spent overseas during the war. Living changes us. We absorb life and life itself colors us.


Before you get too depressed, it colors us for good as well as ill. We absorb most readily the broth from those juicy people around us who live lives that radiate success. Not financial success, but life success. Those people who face life with a smile and who you just seem to gravitate towards. You know who they are, you always seek out their company in a crowd. You sit closer to them in a crowded room. You linger to hear a story you may have heard a hundred times before. One such man in my life was Clarence Rose. Clarence was married to Gertrude, my Mother's cousin. They owned a farm in Yarmouth county Nova Scotia. Rose's Lakeview farm a sign on the lawn extolled. Under the the name were the words "Overnight Guests" Bed and Breakfasts they call them nowadays. Never were two people better suited to take in strangers. They lived simple christian lives, were people of faith who walked the talk. They lead by example. As a teenager I was in need of such an example. I was a difficult child. I am sure I was ADD or ADHD, but they didn't have a name for it back then. I was bright and active, but hard to control and trying on the patience. My Mother and Gert had been raised together, both their Mothers had been widowed with children and in an age without any of the social services that exist today they had joined forces and each covered for the other so that they were able to hold down jobs and feed their kids. It wasn't easy but the kids grew into a family. Gert and my Mother put their heads together and it was decided that I would spend the summer on the farm. I would earn my keep as best as a kid with my shortcomings could. I was big for my age and that helped. I ended up spending three summers with the Roses and they treated me like one of the family. That was their way.

My birthday fell in the time that I was there and Gert would bake me a cake. Clarence would chide me about the pretty girl who kept house for his son whom I went to young people's club with one day. He caught me rubbing my bicep "Hugging arm sore?" he said with a twinkle in his eye. He had a quick wit and loved to laugh. He was never mean with his humor, not sarcastic just full of good spirited joy that bubbled over and you could not help but smile. Even if he was laughing too you knew he was laughing with you and not at you. I loved his wit and his impish sense of humor.
The Roses were people of faith, not that my family wasn't, we went to church and Sunday school each week, I was a Cub and Boy Scout. Before my Mother left me with the Roses she made it clear that they lived a more strict lifestyle and that I would live by their rules under their roof. Much of the difference in lifestyle revolved around the sabbath. On Sundays we would do chores and nothing more. You did not touch money on the sabbath except for the collection plate. Patrons of the B&B either paid on Saturday night or Monday morning. Same with the people who bought fresh eggs and milk from the farm, they were neighbors so they knew the rules. I knew them too, you made change for the collection plate on Saturday night. I made $20.00 a week. A princely sum for a young man in the early 1970s. One week I checked my wallet and I had several twenties, from previous weeks and I had a two dollar bill. My tithe, ten percent of my weeks salary, I was all set for Sunday morning.

Saturday night I scrubbed and cleaned, laid out my good clothes for the next day. My day didn't start as early as Clarence's and his son Billy. I got to sleep until nearly seven am. I went out to start cleaning the milkers and buckets, sweeping out and mucking out the barn while Clarence and Billy ate breakfast. Then I would change and wash up we would all pile into the family sedan and off to the little Bayview United Baptist Church in Port Maitland. The tiny Church was awash in summer sunlight and had the smell of old varnish. We entered the back door and made our way among friends and neighbors to a seat at the center back of the sloped theatre style floor. Talk revolved around the beautiful weather, the hay crops and family news dominated the conversation. Backs were slapped and hands were shook, the mood was upbeat and laughter the order of the day. Gradually conversation slowed, people settled into the high back pews. Heads were bowed in personal prayers. Others studied the Hymn list on the wall either side of the pulpit and marked the pages in their own personal hymnals. I sat to Clarence's right, Gertrude and the family to his left. The minister entered and we all rose. we sat down as he took the pulpit. I liked him, he was a good speaker and usually gave a good, upbeat sermon which was impossible to sleep through, he was a dynamic speaker and kept you rapt. There would be a special speaker this day, he said. A christian leader who lead a parish in the Eastern Arctic. He was a Inuit man who would speak of his own people. The sermon progressed and the audience was lively. The minister evoked laughter as well as "Amens". At the end of the ceremony the Inuit Pastor took the pulpit and spoke of the struggles of his people to live a Christian life in conditions that could only be described as "third world". Poverty and alcoholism did not stop his parishioners from spreading the message. I was genuinely touched. I wanted to help with all my heart. At the end of his sermon the Minister announced that there would be a special collection for the Inuit community of the visiting Pastor. I took my wallet from my pocket and opened it surreptitiously. I knew what I would see, only a couple of twenty dollar bills, my entire pay for the weeks of work. I had only had one two dollar bill in there this morning and there was no other denomination. The collection plate started at the front of the church and I struggled greatly with what to do. I was, after all only a boy, I could have quietly passed the plate, without putting anything in it. No one would likely give it a second thought. I would, though. I again opened my wallet, the one I had received from the Halifax newspaper I delivered papers for. There was still only the twenties. I gritted my teeth and slid one out and folded it in my palm so that no one could see it. The collection plate was approaching. I was still not sure what to do. Was this too much? If someone saw me would they feel bad if they had given less, twenty dollars was a lot of money in the 1970's. I decided I would slip it under the other donations and no one would be the wiser. I folded the bill four ways and when the tray approached I saw there were mostly singles and change. I palmed the bill and slipped it under the loose bills and handed the tray to Clarence. As I did I looked up for the first time since my epic struggle of conscience had begun. Our eyes locked and I knew instantly he had seen what I had done. His eyes were wide and he put his money on the tray. The plate went along the aisle. Instantly his gaze returned to me and I saw that he was smiling. He reached around my shoulders and squeezed me tightly there was a lump in my throat and I was shaking a bit, scared that I had been discovered. I feared what he would think, was he angry at me for making an ostentatious gift? Our eyes met again and saw nothing of this in his face. Instead he was beaming, he too seemed to have something in this throat as he cleared his throat but said nothing. He simply squeezed my shoulder and kept his arm there until we rose to leave. He then patted my back. He had said nothing but I had heard plenty. He was proud of me. We never spoke of that moment but in that second something between us changed. We never looked at each other the same way again. I knew that I had grown slightly in his eyes and he had cemented the bond between us that exists to this day, nearly a decade since that little church was packed for his funeral. Packed because he had touched a great many others too. Great people do. The Roses became my second Mom and Dad. They attended my college graduation. Their photo sits beside that of my own parents. They are both gone now, but scarcely a day goes by that I do not think of them, of the lessons I learned on their farm, in their home, as part of their family. I never gave the twenty dollars a second thought, but the look in Clarence's eyes has stayed with me over three decades. I hope that someday I can have a similar effect on someone else. That I could pass on the gifts that this wonderful couple gave me. I have been very lucky to have a second Mom and Dad.