Causeway: A Passage From Innocence
Page 36
Just look at the bugger as he strides toward me, not a doubt showing. The onus is on me. It would only take a word, a hesitation of the hand. But already shamed, I blurt recognition and catch his hand with a studied firmness.
It is soft. He couldn’t miss the scratchy hardness of mine. I have one of those Scandinavian woodstoves in the living room for extra heat. I split my own wood. I’m bony and fit because I’ve been running and sober for seven years.
“You look great,” he says. “Life’s obviously good to you.”
“No complaints,” I say. “You’re looking,” I begin, searching for a truthful word, “prosperous.” And in a gesture of self-confidence that makes my knees watery, I pat the bulge of flesh swelling over his belt like dough.
He laughs and sucks it in.
Sextus is my cousin. First cousin. Around here that’s about as close as a brother. Closer, in a lot of cases. He’s the only son of my father’s only brother. The late Jack Gillis. Uncle Jack. Finest man that ever lived.
Because there were only the two, each named the first-born after the other. I’m named after Uncle Jack. This fellow is named after my old man. Not the Sextus part. That’s actually the second part of his name. His first name is Alexander. That was the old man’s name. Sandy for short. He’s been dead now for years, since November 22, 1963. The day they shot Kennedy. Almost twenty years ago.
“For a long time I had to block everything out when I heard his name.”
Our name is common around here. But none of the other Gillises are related to us. So seeing him brings back memories. Most of them bad because of everything.
He’s really been gone longer than thirteen years. Last time I saw him was just after Uncle Jack’s funeral. But he’d been gone a long time before that. He’d already made a name for himself away, writing on newspapers. Then he wrote a scandalous book. And then he stole my life and ran with it. For a long time I had to block everything out when I heard his name. But I rebuilt and eventually he just blended into the miserable part of the memory. It means nothing to me now.
But here he is. He shifts his hand to my arm, clutching my coat just above the elbow.
“Long weekend,” he says, by way of explanation.
I remember. He’s a teacher now. Or something.
“Just got in. Jesus. It’s good to see you.”
I am suddenly speechless.
“I was planning to drop in on you, out at the old place. You’re still there, of course? We’d have a drink. Jesus Christ. Wow,” he says, face animated. “Just look at you.”
I half laugh. Allow a look of surprise.
His smile holds firm, though I know he’s reading my mind.
“No, no, no,” he says. “We’ll have lots of time to talk about all the old stuff.”
Web Detective
http://www.cansocauseway.ca/history.html
A tribute to the Canso Causeway, this extensive site covers the celebrations that took place in 2005 in commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the causeway’s opening. The site includes a historical timeline, interesting facts, and a photo gallery, all dedicated to the landmark.
http://archives.cbc.ca/IDC-1-69-250-1269-10/ on_this_day/life_society/canso_causeway
Go back in time to watch a video of the opening of the causeway.
http://gaeliccollege.edu/index.php
Visit the home page of The Gaelic College, founded in 1938 in Cape Breton. Learn about the study of the Gaelic language and this institution’s dedication to preserving Gaelic culture.
http://www.capebretonisland.org/
For all would-be travellers to Cape Breton, this website highlights the area’s attractions, with an emphasis on exploring the island’s diverse history and colourful heritage.
http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/
The home page of the fifth estate, the award-winning Canadian investigative journalism program for which Linden MacIntyre is a host.
To receive updates on author events and new books by Linden MacIntyre, sign up today at www.authortracker.ca.
Acknowledgements
The inspiration to write a memoir was not mine. My friends and literary representatives, Don Sedgwick and Shaun Bradley, first raised the idea with me. My initial reaction was a profound lack of enthusiasm. I told them early on that I was suspicious of the genre, because while I have felt comfortable writing journalism and fiction, I felt uneasy about the extent to which a memoir—especially a boyhood memoir—must rely on the subjectivity of memory. I decided to proceed when I discovered that there were abundant sources, some of them objective records, against which I could test the accuracy of my recollection of events that occurred half a century ago. Without the assistance of these sources, I would not have dared to begin.
My cousin and friend, Archie MacIntyre, was unfailingly generous with time and reminiscence during a particularly crucial period of his own life—the final stages of a desperate battle with cancer. He never hesitated to make time available to me, spoke frankly on the basis of his own extraordinary capacity for remembered detail, offered valuable advice and even read a first draft of my manuscript. His memories of growing up on MacIntyre’s Mountain and our shared reminiscences about our grandparents, Peigeag and Dougald, gave the project an element of pleasure that I hadn’t anticipated.
Besides the many relatives and friends with whom I shared a seemingly unusual childhood—being caught on the threshold of the future while the voices of history still rang loud and clear in our daily experience—I had access to important media and archival resources. The Gut of Canso Museum offered a profusion of relics, reminders and records; the Public Archives of Nova Scotia provided access to newspapers from the period. Of incalculable value were the microfilmed back issues of the Victoria-Inverness Bulletin.
The Bulletin, as we knew it, was part of a tradition of community journalism that is sadly rare in these complex times, since the lives of ordinary people and their communities are seldom deemed worthy of media attention. The Bulletin and its many anonymous correspondents faithfully recorded the comings and goings, sorrows and celebrations, of its readers. Today, viewed from a vast distance in time and space, these records constitute a priceless people’s history and a benchmark against which we can measure our progress and our losses.
To friends, relatives, archivists, and the selfless volunteers at the museum in Port Hastings, my deepest gratitude and apologies for unavoidable errors and omissions.
Once launched on the project of remembering, I was fortunate to have the guidance and help of a remarkable team of professionals at HarperCollins Canada. I’m especially grateful to Jim Gifford, Noelle Zitzer, Katie Hearn, Debbie Gaudet, and Phyllis Bruce for editorial advice and reassurance that the stories of people who were largely invisible in the sweep of history are really timeless and, in their potential for inspiration, universal. Thanks also to Rosemary Shipton.
I am also grateful to my wife, Carol Off, for her forbearance as I wrestled with many ghosts in what was sometimes an emotionally challenging project.
Alistair MacLeod was kind enough to read a draft of the manuscript and to respond with timely encouragement, important suggestions, and warm reminiscences about the history and the heritage we hold in common.
Acclaim for Causeway
“It is emotionally moving, full of sadness and humour…This book should give pleasure to everyone.”—The Globe and Mail
“A sweet and edgy coming-of-age story that reads like a good conversation over many drinks.”—Ann-Marie MacDonald
“MacIntyre has an excellent sense of the connection—and often the disconnection—between boys and their fathers…[His] novelistic style and the stories of men, dogs, work, mining, liquor, church, politics and fate are reminiscent of No Great Mischief.”
—Quill & Quire
“Causeway explores a world which depicts a certain region of Cape Breton as it was ‘before Canada joined it.’ The book aches with details that are both rational and emotional…MacIntyre is a
fine writer.”—Alistair MacLeod
“The well-told tale not only of a hard-won Cape Breton dream…a story of pride and privation, of eccentric relatives living on mountaintops, of Gaelic tale-telling and drink-laced funeral wakes…MacIntyre is a perceptive writer.”—London Free Press
“[A] haunting memoir…MacIntyre captures the spirit and uncertainty of that time almost perfectly.”—The Gazette (Montreal)
“MacIntyre walks us across the causeway and straight into his family’s past, telling us the story of a young boy anticipating the outside world’s arrival and his father’s return home, capturing both Cape Breton’s startling, difficult beauty and a boy’s yearning. A touching portrayal of a father and son relationship, and the pain of leaving home.”—Laura M. Mac Donald, author of Curse of the Narrows
“[MacIntyre’s] writing talent shows itself in the ease of phrasing and simplicity of language…Magic shines through when he recounts…memories of his Gaelic grandmother and informs his understanding of the stresses caused by an absent father.”—Edmonton Journal
Copyright
Causeway
© 2006 by Linden MacIntyre.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © JULY 2010 ISBN: 978-1-554-68952-1
P.S. section © 2007 by Linden MacIntyre.
Published by Harper Perennial, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
Originally published by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd: 2006
This Harper Perennial trade paperback edition: 2007
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
www.harpercollins.ca
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
MacIntyre, Linden
Causeway : a passage from innocence / Linden MacIntyre.
1. MacIntyre, Linden—Childhood and youth. 2. MacIntyre family. 3. Canso Causeway (N.S.)—History. 4. Fathers and sons. 5. Port Hastings (N.S.)—History. 6. Cape Breton Island (N.S.)—Social life and customs. 7. Port Hastings (N.S.)—Biography. 8. Cape Breton Island (N.S.)—Biography.
1. Title.
FC2349.P6Z49 2007 971.6’9104092
C2007-902806-3
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