When they finished painting their faces, they went up to the freezing attic to look for fancy clothes while I prepared dinner. A small turkey had already gone into the oven, minus the stuffing. I had no idea how to make stuffing, and I was afraid I might poison everyone. I peeled sweet potatoes and carrots and put them on to boil. I opened a jar of Eileen McKay’s high-bush cranberry sauce and spooned it into a crystal dish.
Bridget swanned into the kitchen, daintily holding up her long skirt in both hands. She was wearing a full-length, rose-pink gown and a chip hat with a pink feather on the side. It was strangely fetching. Wynona, too, was striking in a gold silk, high-necked blouse and a long black taffeta skirt. She’s going to be a beauty someday, I thought.
Bridget tugged at my arm and led me into the other room so she could talk to me. “You have to dress up, too, Mama, please! I picked out a dress for you!” I followed her into the attic where a trunk was standing open. There were some exquisite things inside, with styles ranging through the decades. Here was a silver brocade dress, a lace camisole, a fur stole.
Bridget handed me a dress made of royal-blue silk velvet that must have dated from the 1930s. It had a deep V-neckline with long tight sleeves and a full-length tulip-shaped skirt cut on the bias. I slipped it over my head. My great-aunt and I must have been the same size. I took a dance step and it twirled around my ankles.
“You look pretty, Mama!”
We ran back downstairs into the warmth of the kitchen, where the girls completed my ensemble with full makeup. I sat obediently while they liberally applied blue eyeshadow and mascara. They undid my ponytail and brushed my curly hair into a cloud.
I poked through my great-aunt’s jewellery box again and found a tarnished silver brooch. The Celtic love knot must have come from Ireland, and I pinned it onto the shoulder of my velvet dress.
When we sat down to our turkey dinner, I looked at the two girls, flushed and happy, and reflected that this was a very nice way to spend Christmas. We were snug in our house while the arctic wind howled outside. We could hear it moaning around the eaves, but we were secure in the knowledge that it couldn’t get to us.
“This gravy is real good!” Wynona said. I had painstakingly followed the instructions that Eileen McKay jotted down for me. Bridget didn’t utter a word, but she grinned and gave me two thumbs up. I laughed aloud.
When we finished eating, I stacked the dishes and stoked the fire in the fireplace. The early darkness had already fallen, so I lit four candles and set them around the room. The shiny ornaments glittered. We didn’t need electric lights.
Opening the piano bench, I pulled out a book of Christmas carols. While the girls tied a red ribbon around Fizzy’s neck, I played “Away in a Manger,” and “Silent Night.” I was the only one who sang the words.
While I was hammering out a rousing rendition of “Deck the Halls,” Riley started to bark. I ran to the back door, and there stood Colin McKay, wearing a green parka with a fur-trimmed hood. He was carrying a bottle of wine, and three gift-wrapped parcels. “Merry Christmas,” he said. “I was on my way home, and I decided to drop in to see how you’re enjoying your first Canadian Christmas.”
This was an obvious fib since my house was on the way to nowhere. A gust of wind howled past him and lifted my skirt. “Come inside before we both freeze!”
He stamped his feet, then pulled off his boots and followed me into the kitchen, unzipping his parka while he stared at me fixedly. “I was beginning to think you didn’t wear anything except black.”
I suddenly remembered what I had on: a blue velvet dress, with my new moccasins on my feet. My hair was tumbled to my shoulders, my blue jay feather stuck behind one ear. I tried to appear casual while I turned away and smoothed my unruly locks.
“Come into the living room.” I led the way through our sleeping quarters, thankful I had made the bed. Wynona was still sitting on the mohair couch, but Bridget had disappeared behind it.
“Merry Christmas, Wynona. You look very pretty tonight.” As I glanced at her, I realized that all three of us resembled painted dolls with bright red lipstick, red circles on our cheeks, and blue eyeshadow.
“Hi.” Wynona turned back to the flames.
Colin handed me the bottle of wine and a rectangular parcel wrapped inexpertly in red tissue paper. I set the wine on the piano, and opened the parcel to find a book of Peace River local history. “Thank you so much!” I exclaimed with genuine pleasure. I had been wanting that very thing.
“This is for you, Wynona,” he said gallantly. I suspected Colin had meant it for me, since he hadn’t expected to find her here, but I was happy he had something for her. It was a box of chocolates, professionally wrapped in gold paper.
Wynona tore open the paper and lifted the lid. She took out a chocolate and it was halfway to her mouth before she remembered her manners and shyly offered the box to me, then to Colin.
“And this is for Bridget.” It was an odd shape rolled in the same red tissue paper and twisted at both ends, just the way you would expect a man to wrap a gift.
“Thank you so much.” I took the present from him and passed it behind the couch where Bridget was hiding. Immediately tearing sounds could be heard.
A brief silence, and then Bridget’s head rose over the back of the couch. She was holding a magnifying glass in front of her face and she had one enormous blue eye. Then she disappeared again.
“I was trying to think of what a little kid might like, and I remembered how much I loved my magnifying glass when I was that age,” Colin said.
“Girls, why don’t you go into the kitchen and make Colin something with the new playdough while we visit,” I suggested. They obediently scampered into the kitchen, closing the door behind them.
I went to the glass-fronted dining room cupboard and pulled out two Waterford crystal wine glasses. Colin produced a corkscrew from his pocket and opened the wine expertly, then poured us each a glass. We raised them to each other. “Merry Christmas!”
Back in Phoenix I occasionally drank a single glass of wine after Bridget was in bed, but here I saved every penny for the necessities. I hadn’t had a drink for months. The alcohol warmed the marrow of my bones. We sat down in the two comfortable Morris chairs that faced each other.
“What was your favourite Christmas present when you were a kid?” Colin asked.
“Oh, that’s easy. Santa once gave me a complete set of Little House on the Prairie. I loved those books. I read them over and over.” Smiling to myself, I found that I was able to recall this childhood memory without pain. “What about you? What was your favourite gift?”
“Probably my electric train set. I played with that thing for years.” He laughed. “Sometimes I still play with it, if you want to know the truth.”
He knelt before the fire with his back to me, blowing up the flames with the leather bellows. “Are you spending Christmas alone?” I asked.
“Yeah.” He sank back into the armchair and took a sip of wine. “My parents have gone to Mexico, and everybody else is with their families today. I don’t mind. I never had any brothers or sisters, so I’m used to being alone.”
“Have you ever thought about getting married?” The wine had loosened my inhibitions.
He gave a short laugh. “I had a girlfriend in high school, but she wasn’t interested in farming. She left for Vancouver right after graduation, ended up marrying a film producer. It isn’t easy to find a woman who wants to live on a farm, especially up here in the north. It can be a lonely life, as I’m sure you appreciate.”
“Well, Bridget is good company. But if you mean being away from the madding crowd, I quite like it.” I surprised myself with the truth of my own words. Sitting peacefully by the wood stove on a winter evening, I was in my element.
A little later the girls returned to the living room and Bridget hung back while Wynona presented Colin with his playdough present. It was an orchid like the one he had given Bridget, with hot pink petals and bright
green leaves.
Colin praised it extravagantly. “I’ll put it in my orchid room and I won’t be able to tell this one from the real thing!”
Wynona asked politely if I could play some more, so I returned to the piano. I played a few carols and then drifted into some simple classical pieces. I felt self-conscious with Colin sitting there, but if he was bored, he didn’t make any move to leave.
Finally he said he had to be going. While he was pulling on his parka in the kitchen, I caught a glimpse of myself in the foxed mirror over the washstand. My cheeks were flushed from the fire and the wine. I followed him into the back kitchen and smiled up at him. “Thank you for the presents,” I said, “and have a very happy new year.”
“Happy new year.” The porch was about twenty degrees colder than the kitchen, but I didn’t feel cold. Suddenly Colin pulled me against his broad chest and kissed me. It was completely unexpected, and the warmth of his mouth sent a shock wave from my scalp to the soles of my moccasins. It was a long, searching kiss. I responded involuntarily, as if I had no say in the matter. Which I didn’t.
At last he raised his head, and then kissed me again, one, two, three, short, hard kisses as if he couldn’t bear to stop. Then one more. They stunned me like the final rabbit punches before the knockout, except they were blows of pleasure rather than pain.
Without another word, he disappeared into the wintry night and the door slammed behind him. My skin was so hot that I didn’t even feel the blast of icy air. I stood in the back kitchen for a few minutes while the shock waves gradually receded. My knees were trembling. I went back into the living room and fell into the armchair, staring unseeingly at the fire until it was time to get the girls ready for bed.
I was wakened the next morning by a weight on my chest and opened my eyes to find a four-inch blue eye staring into my face. “Mama, you better pluck your eyebrows!” Bridget lowered her magnifying glass. “The hairs are just spurting out!”
December 26, 1924
My first Canadian Christmas, and sure it was a splendid one.
George and I cut down a tree, and I set my wits to fashioning some ornaments. I strung dried rosehips into chains and draped these liberally from the branches. These plus garlands of popcorn made the tree look quite festive. Dear thoughtful Ma sent me a wee angel for the top of the tree, wearing a gown of hand-crocheted lace.
We were invited to the McKays for dinner, a genuine northern affair with homegrown ingredients. For the first course, soup made with garden vegetables. Then their own roast goose with black currant jelly, mashed potatoes and parsnips from the root cellar, pickled beets and cucumbers, fresh rolls made with Peace River flour, ground from their own grain, and all served with fresh butter and cream from their dairy cow. We concluded this feast with tiny tarts made with preserved wild strawberries, whipped cream, and sweet wild clover honey.
As a crowning flourish, we drank to the prosperity of our new friends with a glass of homemade saskatoon wine. John McKay took the toast from Psalm 128: “For thou shalt eat the labour of thine hands: happy shalt thou be, and it shall be well with thee.”
There was a houseful including three families with a combined total of fourteen children, and after dinner Father Christmas arrived wearing traditional garb, except that he had mukluks on his feet instead of boots. He brought a small bag of hard candy for each child. They were as delighted as if he had given them sacks of gold.
Afterward both adults and children played musical chairs. The children screamed with laughter, poor little mites. Canadian children are usually so solemn. Their lot is a hard one and they toil along with the adults and have little time for play.
I wore my good black taffeta skirt and my gold silk blouse, and after two months of wearing nothing but trousers, it felt quite strange. I kept glancing down to see what was flapping around my ankles!
At the end of the evening, we stood and sang “God Save the King.” Even now I have trouble singing the English anthem although I certainly don’t wish the man any ill will. I’m much happier singing “The Maple Leaf Forever,” with its reference to the “thistle, shamrock, rose entwined.” I was a wee bit homesick then, but it soon passed off, thanks to the good company and the comfort of George’s presence.
As we drove home under a starry sky, I recalled the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson: “If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how men would believe and adore, and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the City of God which has been shown! But every night come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their admonishing smile.”
We had a quiet Boxing Day at home. Annie Bearspaw brought me a gift. Of course, she no more believes in Christ than the wee folk, but I appreciate her generosity. I have heard some people say that the Indians are good for nothing, but in our case they are nothing but good.
She gave me a woven rabbit-skin blanket, the most wondrous thing, made from fifty green rabbit skins. Each skin is cut into a strip about one inch wide, in a spiral so as to keep the strip as long as possible. The strips are joined end to end, and then the long piece is woven together using a frame. The result is the warmest, softest blanket imaginable!
Annie now visits me regularly. She doesn’t knock on the door, but silently appears at the kitchen window. Her English is getting better, and I know a few words of Cree, but we communicate primarily through sign language. She is fond of listening to me play the piano although it is nothing like their music. I find that there is something hauntingly beautiful about their wailing and drumming.
After she left, I took the opportunity to cut George’s hair and shave the back of his neck as he was looking quite wild. Then we continued our winter-long game of cribbage, for one cent a point. So far I am up $3.22 but George says there is a great deal of winter left. He came downstairs on the morning of December twenty-second and sang out: ‘Well, my darling colleen, the days are getting longer!” It is impossible to feel gloomy when one lives with such a good-natured soul.
This evening we gave ourselves a treat, by reading the mail we saved for this occasion. We subscribe to the Juniper Gazette, the Edmonton Journal, and several times a year we are fortunate enough to receive the Eaton’s catalogue, referred to as the “Farmer’s Bible.” I can understand why, since we study it more closely than we ever read the Scriptures!
I even had a Christmas card with three lines from Macaulay. He has sent only two postcards from Arizona, one of a giant sequoia cactus and another of the Grand Canyon. As Macaulay’s skin is as fair as mine, I wonder how he manages the intense sunshine.
When we finished with the mail, I darned a pair of socks, and now I’m writing in my diary. It is very peaceful, with the wind howling outside and the candle flames reflected in the windowpanes. My granny always called them “rabbit’s candles.”
George is reading the new book of poetry I gave to him, called Beauty and Life, by Duncan Campbell Scott, and smoking his pipe in front of the fire. I enjoy the fragrant odour and have sometimes been tempted to take a puff myself. But then I recall my father’s words: “When I see a woman smoking, I think ‘There’s a fire at one end and a fool at the other!’”
Days remaining: 223.
17
January
“Mama, look at me!” Bridget was feeding Riley in the back kitchen. Her head was stuck through the circle of his tail, her face framed in a hairy hoop. I laughed, wishing I had a camera. This was another thing I had forgotten. Next spring I would scrape together the money to buy a small camera and take photographs of the house and yard so that we could remember our year in exile.
I was glad that Bridget found her pets so entertaining. I wasn’t bored because I had such a wide selection of books. I was now reading Roughing It in the Bush, by Susanna Moodie. I had thought that I was roughing it in the bush myself, but the trials of this early Canadian pioneer made me feel as if I were wallowing in luxury.
Perhaps I could teach Bridget how to play a card game, something si
mple like Snap or Go Fish. I knew there were games in the dining room sideboard, but they were too complex for her. While she attempted to make Fizzy a little cowboy hat out of playdough, I knelt in front of the sideboard and examined them again.
Chess. That was too difficult. I didn’t even know how to play chess. Backgammon. Still too complicated. Here was the cribbage board that George and Mary Margaret used. I held it in my hands, thinking affectionately about their long winter evenings.
There were several thousand-piece jigsaw puzzles that were too advanced for Bridget, although maybe Wynona and I could take a crack at them. There must be a deck of cards around here. I opened the centre drawer. It was stuffed with papers, receipts, letters, flyers, and coupons. And here was a pack of cards, each one bearing an image of a red-coated Mountie on horseback.
I tried to push the drawer closed, but it stuck. Reaching inside to readjust the contents, my hand fell upon an old book. I drew it out and found an accounts ledger, bound in black cloth with a green spine, reaching back for years. Here Mary Margaret had kept track of Wildwood’s annual income and expenses. For each calendar year there was a meticulous accounting of tools, seed, fuel, and other expenses on the left-hand page, and an income statement on the right.
To an accountant, this was fascinating stuff. I lowered myself into the chair adorned with the needlepoint lady’s slipper and opened the first page. The ledger began in 1924, the year she arrived. I flipped through the years, checking the bottom line on each page.
Their expenses were small, but so was their income. My great-aunt had made notes in her distinctive black handwriting. In 1933 she noted that spring was slow to arrive, the seeding was late, and by the time the grain was threshed it was good only for livestock feed.
In 1935 the crop was destroyed by drought. “The dust rose from the field like a black blizzard.” In 1936 the wheat “headed early” and was too short for the threshing machine. The following year saw a bumper crop mowed down in July by a vicious hailstorm.
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