Echoes from the Hilltop
By Ray Wiseman
& seven other St. Andrew's writers
Edited by Mary Lou Cornish
Smashwords Edition
Echoes from the Hilltop - Copyright 2011 by Ray Wiseman and Mary Lou Cornish
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
The copyright of all stories included in this book rests with the individual authors. All rights reserved. No one may reproduce any part of this book in any form without written permission from the copyright owners.
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Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers.
How to Deal with Your Problems
Saturday Nights in Fergus Way Back When
From Tea Shop to Pirate's Treasure
Tea Shop Memoirs: Annabelle and Stewart
Excerpt from Pirate’s Treasure
From Winter’s Cold to African Heat
Banishing the Ghost of the Forgotten Man
Maybe I can banish the spectre of the forgotten man.
I’m Dreaming of a Black Christmas!
Robots on the Streets of Toronto
The Wounded Eagle Learns to Fly Again
Introduction
Don’t expect to find this book full of preaching or Christian teaching. Rather, in it, you will discover that ‘church’ people, like everyone else, lead lives of adventure, filled with pleasure and humour, but sometimes touched by fear or pain. Yes, most of these stories relate true incidents--those classified as fiction nevertheless contain truth because they grow out of a Christian worldview.
Read on--in this book you will fly in a Liberator bomber, spend Christmas with 2,000 Africans, jump from an airplane with a company of elite commandos, and visit with street people of an earlier century.
Acknowledgments
No book comes together without the contribution of many people, all of them experts in their fields. Amazingly enough, each one makes St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Fergus his or her spiritual home. We could not have done it without the enthusiastic involvement of our eight writers. They range from award-winning authors to neophyte writers just finding their literary voice - you will find them listed on the Contents page. Thanks also to Ted Arnott for writing the Foreword.
A special thanks to our editor, Mary Lou Cornish, who worked with me throughout each step of publication and to proofreader, Anna Wiseman. Our thanks also go to Myron Lasko who designed the cover.
Foreword
At St. Andrew’s Church in Fergus, it seems everyone has a story to tell.
Contained in this volume are the stories of our lives. They will stir your heart, kindle your mind and nourish your faith. And even though we Scotch Presbyterians are sometimes (unjustly!) considered to be a pretty dour bunch, many of the stories are enlivened with laughter.
My family and I are very proud to be a part of the church family at St. Andrew’s. Our church is known for our good works at home and abroad, our spirited discipleship, and our musical talent which are all inspired by the love and message of Christ.
With the publication of Echoes from the Hilltop, the literary talent of our folk will become just as well-known. I know that you’ll enjoy and find memorable these touching stories.
Ted Arnott, MPP
Wellington-Halton Hills
Echoes from a Pastor’s Life
by David Ketchen
DAVID KETCHEN graduated from Fergus High School in 1957 and secured a position with Trull Funeral Homes in Toronto as an apprentice funeral director and embalmer. In 1961, sensing a strong calling to Christian ministry, he enrolled at Waterloo Lutheran University (now Wilfred Laurier) and graduated with a B.A. He further pursued his theological studies at Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. During his final year, he married Evelyn Root. They have three sons: Jonathan, Michael and Stephen.
David and Evelyn have ministered to five congregations: Cranberry Portage in northern Manitoba; Innerkip, Ontario; Sydney, Nova Scotia; Duanesburg, New York; and Valparaiso, Indiana. Now retired, he and his wife reside in Guelph, but attend St. Andrew’s in Fergus, the church of his boyhood.
Third Opinion
Some seventy-plus years ago, in the little village of Drayton, Ontario, long before there was a summer festival and the Festival Theatre was still the Town Hall, a young woman, recently married, got up early, fixed breakfast for her husband and saw him off to work. She hurried through her household chores, put on her winter coat, and trudged through the snow to visit the family doctor. She was pretty sure she knew what he would tell her, so she was not surprised when, after a lengthy examination, he sat her down and said, “You’re pregnant.”
However, she was surprised at the worried look on his face as he said, sadly, “Because of the peculiar anomalies of your pelvic structure, you can never bear children, and if you try to have this baby, both you and the baby will die. The only option for us is to operate and take the baby now. (This was long before the days of easy abortions).
“I’d like a second opinion,” she said.
“Who would you like to see?” he asked.
“Who would you recommend?”
“I think you should go to K-W Hospital (now Grand River Hospital in Kitchener).”
So, later that week, her husband borrowed a car, and they drove the thirty miles to Kitchener where she was examined by a team of specialists who unanimously concurred with the first doctor’s opinion.
It was a quiet drive home. What was there to say?
The next morning, she walked across the park by the cenotaph to visit her husband’s mother who was a cheery and chubby woman.
“Well Jeanie,” she asked, “What did they tell you in Kitchener?”
When the young woman told her the sad news, her mother-in-law said, “Nonsense! Go on up to Moorfield and see Dr. Jim McQuibban.”
Well-known and loved throughout the area, Dr. McQuibban had established his medical practice years before, in Alma, Ontario, with his brother George. After George left medicine to become the Liberal MPP (Member of Provincial Parliament), Dr. Jim soldiered on alone. Patients came from as far away as Elmira. Dr. George died suddenly of a massive heart attack in his Toronto hotel room at the age of 50. Both were active elders in the Presbyterian Church. George was widely-known as a lover of birds, and he had an extensive collection of rare birds. (Presumably, they were all Presbyterians, too).
Jeanie got a friend to drive her to Moorfield. Dr. McQuibban examined her at length. She told him what the other doctors had said and he smiled gently.
“Don’t worry, dear. I’ll get your baby for you.”
And he did. Mind you, it was touch and go, and Jeanie almost died. Afterwards, Dr. Jim said, “Don’t ever try to have any more!”
There are a lot of people I want to meet when I get to Heaven. One of the first has to be Dr. Jim McQuibban, because I owe him--big time, I owe him! You see, that woman was my mother, and I was that baby, and I almost didn’t get to be here.
Criminal Confession
I don’t remember very much about those early years in Drayton. My Dad worked at Potter’s Creamery and I remember visiting him there and surreptitiously dipping my finger into a vast pile of butter. Hmmm! It tasted so good! We lived just off the main street in a big double house just behind what was then the telephone office. We shared the house with Dave and Vera Upper, a pleasant couple with an adorable grey Persian kitten.
I remember one warm summer day Vera was out painting the veranda and when she went inside to make a sandwich for lunch I painted the kitten a dark forest green. It was never the same after that. The kitten I mean. I’m sure that wasn’t what precipitated our leaving Drayton although I expect Mrs. Upper wasn’t too sorry to see us go
The next few months are a complete blank to me. I know we moved to Selkirk, Ontario, where my Dad worked on a chicken farm. I suspect it was not a happy time for them because they never mentioned it. Next thing I knew we were settled in Teeswater, a quiet village in Bruce County. My Dad worked at Thompson’s Creamery candling eggs. Do they still do that? Sitting before a slim blue light in a totally dark room he would hold eggs up to the light and if they contained a blood spot or other imperfection they would go into a separate container for sale at a much-reduced price.
We lived in a large white house in what I think was the old Methodist parsonage. Two elderly ladies, sisters named Reid, lived next to us. There was Jen, the oldest and the boss, and Min who did whatever Jen told her. They loved me and it’s no wonder because I was a beautiful child--I was so!!! My mom and I would visit them every day and I could do no wrong.
Across the street and down a bit lived Vince Pettiplace. He was the Chief of Police. He had to be because he was the only one, and I don’t think he had very much to do because nothing ever happened in that idyllic community, until one fateful day when the peace was suddenly shattered. Some wicked person threw an empty beer bottle through Vince Pettiplace’s living room window which was closed at the time.
Well, that town came to life. Not many had telephones but those who did kept the wires humming. Who in the world would do such a thing? An editorial in the local newspaper expounded about the ‘crime wave’ that had besmirched the peace of our little town. Some people thought it might be someone whom Vince had put in jail, but Vince Pettiplace hadn’t put anyone in jail for twenty years or more.
Old Jen was particularly incensed. After all, it had happened right across the street from her house and in broad daylight, too. My Mom and I were over at Reid’s the next morning. Min was standing quietly by the stove and Jen was rocking in her rocking chair, faster and faster. The madder she got the faster she rocked and the faster she rocked the madder she got.
“Why,” she said, “I just said this morning to Mr. Robert Clifton Ireland (a music teacher with a car that he kept in Jen’s shed.) ’It’s high time the men in this town got together and did something to find out who did this despicable thing.’”
We still had capital punishment in those days and believe me old Jen would have held the rope. Then all of a sudden my Mom turned to me. I wasn’t paying any attention to all this adult talk. I was sitting on the floor playing with the cat. She said “David, do you know who threw the beer bottle through Mr. Pettiplace’s window?”
“Yes,” I said. “I did.”
Old Jen sprang out of her rocking chair (as much as an old lady can spring out of anything) and stamped her foot on the floor.
“Well now Min, didn’t I always say that Vince Pettiplace is an idiot? Why, what was he doing leaving an empty beer bottle on his front lawn? What did he expect the child to do with it?”
And she reached over and picked me up and gave me a big hug and patted me on the back like I’d done something really special. It’s so good to have a friend like Jen (or Jesus) who will never stop loving you, not because of what you have done, but in spite of what you have done.
How to Deal with Your Problems
Periodically, during the summer when the weather was fine, Old Jen would come knocking on our back door. “Can I borrow David and his wee red wagon?”
I was always ready for an adventure with Jen. So off we’d go down the street and turn right along the river on the path to the town dump. Jen would spend an hour or so sifting through whatever others had thrown out. She was into recycling long before it became the thing to do. Once she found a perfectly good cup and saucer with no chips or cracks. Of course they didn’t match, but Jen saw it as another treasure.
On the way back one day, the wagon piled high with memorabilia, Jen paused and went down to the river and peered over the bank.
“Oh David, come and see this.”
I climbed down beside her and looked at what floated among the reeds. I had no idea what it was. It looked like clear Jello full of little black dots.
“David, those are frogs’ eggs,”Jen said. “Get me that big pot off the wagon.”
She proceeded to scoop up the mass and said, “Now you take these home and put them in water and they’ll turn into frogs.”
Somehow I was a bit skeptical.
When we got home. my Mom was busy upstairs, so I rummaged around the kitchen looking for something big enough to hold the treasure. I couldn’t find anything that would suffice. Then an idea came to me. Out in the back of the house under the downspout from the eaves trough was a big barrel full of rain water. Perfect! I dumped the whole mess in and it floated nicely. I watched and watched for the miracle of the frogs appearing but nothing happened. I lost interest and took Jen’s pot back to her and totally forgot about the rain barrel.
About three weeks later, on a Saturday afternoon, my Mom did what she always did after the chores were done, the house was cleaned and preparations for Sunday were finished. She took a big kettle and went out to get some nice fresh rain water to wash her hair. All of a sudden there was a shrill shriek and that kettle went flying across the lawn. She stormed into the house.
“The rain barrel’s full of polliwogs. How would polliwogs get in our rain barrel? You don’t think--No! Do they come down in the rain?”
I never said a word. My Dad said quietly, “Why don’t you go over to Jen’s and get some water from her barrel?”
So she did. After about three weeks the problem disappeared. The polliwogs all turned into frogs and hopped away.
Good lesson. When life stacks up against you, just wait patiently. Soon the polliwogs will go away on their own. It’s the way life works.
School Daze
A terrible thing happened to me when I turned seven. I had to go to school. All that summer, my Mom prepared me for it. She taught me to read and do simple mathematics and assured me that she would walk with me to school so I didn’t have to worry about it.
I worried anyway.
Sure enough, that first day my Mom was sick and could hardly get out of bed. She dragged herself across the road to the neighbour’s to ask Margaret, the oldest of the Blake girls, if she would please accompany me on my first day of school. Margaret wasn’t enthused to have this little boy tagging along, but eventually we got to the school.
In those days all schools had two entrances, one on each side; the one on the right for boys and the other for girls, and woe betide you if you got caught going in the wrong door. It meant the strap for sure. I have no idea why.
Margaret pointed me to the boys door and told me to stand there until the bell rang. I peered around the corner at the playground. I could not believe my eyes. Six million kids, all shapes and sizes, hooted and hollered all over that playground. I had no idea there were that many kids in the whole world. Well, I’m probably exaggerating a little bit. There might only have been about two million. Anyway, all of a sudden right over my head this big bell started ringing very loudly and all those six million kids started running straight toward me. I was petrified. I was swept into the building on the tide and miraculously wound up in the first grade classroom.
It was all so boring. I knew my letters and how to put them together and could count to a hundred or more. Before long I began to feel a familiar feeling in my belly. I had no idea where the bathroom was or how to get there so I crossed my legs and prayed but, sure enough, I had to go. You know how it is when you have to go, I mean you really have to go, how it sort of backs up and starts running out of your eyes. The little girl across the aisle looked concerned and whispered ” What’s the matter?”
“I have to pee,” I whispered back.
She, bold as brass, put up her hand and said, “Teacher, David Ketchen has to go to the bathroom.”
I couldn’t have been more embarrassed if I had gone right there.
A half-hour later I was feeling much more comfortable when, without warning, that bell started clanging again and all the kids ran out of the room. The teacher, Miss Goodfellow, said, “David, it’s recess. Don’t you want to go out and play on the swings and the slide?”
Well, I got outside and you couldn’t even see the swings for kids. So I hid behind some bushes. Then the bell rang again and they all disappeared. One minute they were all there and the next minute they were all gone.
Wonderful! I had the swings and slide all to myself.
The Value of a Good Friend
I have learned a lot in my seventy-plus years, but the one thing I never learned, even as a boy, was how to fight. Not that there haven’t been lots of times when I would have liked to punch somebody’s lights out. I just never could get the hang of it, which presented many problems. It meant that anyone who was looking forward to a fight and needed to get some practice or anyone who had just lost a fight and needed to rebuild his reputation and ego could always find me. I got used to coming home with bruises and occasionally a black eye. What’s a little kid to do?
I found a good solution. I went out of my way to make friends with another kid in my class who went by the name of ’Toughie Matthews’. His real name was Murray, but only the teacher called him that. Nobody scared him and he could lick his weight in wildcats. So every Friday when I got my allowance (ten cents) I would buy two chocolate bars, (Neilson’s Four Flavours--why don’t they make those anymore?), one for me and one for Toughie. I’d let him come home with me after school and play with my toys which he often broke. I didn’t mind, because after Toughie Matthews became my good friend nobody dared lay a finger on me.
But then, as years went on, I faced some problems that even Toughie Matthews couldn’t help me solve. So I found another friend to see me through the scary times of life. His name is Jesus.
My Career With the Boy Scouts
I guess I have always been a bit of a loner. As an only child, I grew up in a world of adults and had little opportunity or desire to relate to others nearer my own age. My Mother used to worry about that (she worried about most things) and so she signed me up with the local Cub pack of the Boy Scouts which met every Monday night in the gymnasium at Melville United Church.
I hated it! Two hours of noisy confusion with about sixty boys hooting and hollering, tearing around willy-nilly. Whenever the leaders managed to restore some semblance of order, we would play a mind-boggling game where you held a clothespin on the tip of your nose and tried to drop it into a milk bottle on the floor. You should try it sometime. Oh, I forgot. We don’t have milk bottles anymore. Rejoice! You’ve been spared. I stood it for a month. Then on Monday nights, I would take my fishing rod from under the back steps and in my new scout uniform, head off to the river to fish--alone!
That worked for a couple of months and then my Mom met Scotty Henderson, the Scout Master, downtown. He said, “How’s David? We haven’t seen him for quite a while.” My Mom said, “I don’t understand. He goes regularly every Monday night.”
The fat was in the fire. When she got home we had a little ’Talk’. Enough said.
Later that week the minister called on a pastoral visit. His name was Cap Young, so-called because he had been a captain as Chaplain in the Army. She told him her worries about my reluctance to engage in socializing with my peers, with the Boy Scout debacle still firmly-planted in her mind. He said, “Well, you go and stand on the corner outside Mellville Church on a Monday night and listen to all the ruckus. No wonder the boy doesn’t want to go.”
A wonderful minister, Cap Young.
Saturday Nights in Fergus Way Back When
Back in the 1940s and 50s when I was growing up, Fergus was a sleepy little village of about 4,000 people. Peace and calm settled upon us like an eider down quilt on a warm bed. Six nights of the week by 8 o’clock you could fire a shotgun down St. Andrew’s Street without fear of harming people or property. Saturday nights were totally different. Saturday nights were shopping nights and everybody and their cousins headed out to pick up their provisions for the coming week. All the stores were open until 10 o’clock. We lived in a third floor walk-up and our living room and my bedroom faced the main street. My cousin, Jeannie, and I would sit by my bedroom window and blow streams of bubbles down upon the crowds below. We loved the puzzled look on their faces, but none of them ever looked up.
One lovely spring Saturday night a middle-aged farmer from the outlying countryside arrived in town in a spanking new yellow Ford convertible. He dropped his wife off at Steele Brothers Grocery and Dry Goods Store and proceeded for the next hour to drive slowly up and down the street honking his horn and waving at all the young ladies. Everybody noticed, but nobody said anything. Finally, after three weeks of this strange behaviour, somebody got up the nerve to ask his wife what in the world was going on. She was a laid-back lady, used to dealing with the vicissitudes of life.
“Oh,” she said. “It’s nothing to be concerned about. I figure it’s like our old dog Skippy. He likes to chase cars but he wouldn’t know what to do if he ever caught one.”
The Kid With Red Pants
Praying is something most of us do from time to time and something we all should do more often, especially when you remember all the encouragements the Bible gives us. “Pray without ceasing.” “Cast all your cares upon Him for He cares for you.” etc. Jesus said to his disciples one day, “Whatever you ask of the Father in My name He will give to you.” The Bible doesn’t say, but I wouldn’t be surprised if He added, “But be careful.” Why would He say that? Here’s a story for you.
I’m about ten years old that lovely spring day, tootling down main street in Fergus on my way to school. It’s about twenty to nine so I’m in no hurry. It’s bad enough having to go to school without getting there early, so I stopped and peered in the window of Max Elkin’s Men and Boys Wear. Oh my heart! Mirabile dictu--that’s Latin and it means ” too wonderful to put into words!”
But first I have to tell you--things were a lot different back then in the late forties and early fifties, especially when it came to men’s clothing. You basically had four options--black, brown, navy blue or grey gabardine, nothing flashy or colourful. Nobody wore jeans except maybe to the barn or out in the field because the only people who wore jeans were very poor. We all were, of course, but nobody wanted to admit it. Pretty different now, eh? Yes, for sure. I saw a young guy in Zehrs a while back. He had baggy orange shorts, a lime green muscle shirt, and his hair was not only spiked, but he’d dyed it a bright, neon, glow-in-the-dark blue. Wonderful! I wish I were young again. However, I think one earring is enough to make a statement. I think five is a bit much. But that’s just me.
That morning in Max Elkin’s store window the dawn of a new age was about to begin. Red pants! Not fire engine red of course, but a dark maroon. Unbelievable! I thought about those pants all day and on my way home that afternoon I paused to check them out again. I could see the tag. They were just my size.
After supper I helped my Mom with the dishes and then took her down the street to show her this wonderful new trend. You know how they say that children with no siblings are spoiled rotten? Well, that’s not true, except for that one time. My Mom bought me those red pants. Oh, my! I want to cry just thinking about it. The fad never caught on. That was the only pair of red pants Max Elkin ever sold. So there I was, the only kid in town with red pants. You know my name--Ketchen--so you know what they called me--Ketchup. Someone would say, “Here comes the Ketchup bottle.” And someone else would add, “Yeah, and it’s only half full.”
So you see why I said, be careful what you pray for, because you just might get it.
Bonnie Dundee
On the day after Labour Day, I and about thirty others made our way to Fergus High School with some trepidation. As some wag put it, “I didn’t mind school. It was the principal of the thing.” Right. His name was W.J.A. Stewart, otherwise known as ‘King Bill’. But to his face it was ‘Sir’. He had been a sergeant-major in the war, but somebody neglected to tell him the war was over.
He herded us all into the auditorium and announced that we must learn to march. He lined us up in two columns and declared in stentorian tones what he expected of us.
“We need some music. Does anyone here play the piano?”
Of course nobody volunteered, but a couple of people looked at me. So did King Bill. “You play the piano?”
It just so happened that I had learned Brown’s Jubilee March from Grandma’s old Giant King book. So reluctantly I began to play.
“No! No! No!” he shouted. “Play a real march. Do you know Bonnie Dundee?”
Well, of course I didn’t. So I tried a few lines of Repasz Band. It wasn’t a real march but it had a good strong beat and I hoped it would do. It didn’t! Maybe he knew the words. It was kind of silly:
If you know any ladies who want any babies
Just send them around to me.
We’re giving them away, a dozen a day,
One with every pound of tea.
Mercifully, I’ve forgotten the rest. So began my first day of High School. Not an auspicious beginning.
The following Monday our first class after lunch was called Guidance. We certainly could have used some. We didn’t know who the Guidance teacher was, but guess who walked in the door? The king himself.
“Your first assignment is to write a paragraph explaining what you want to become after you graduate,” he said.
I would have liked to know that, too. Here I was, thirteen going on fourteen, and I was supposed to have my future all mapped out. I had no idea. It happened that the week before, our church, St. Andrews, had held a recital by a former ’Fergusite’, John Linn, now a soloist at one of the big churches in Toronto. I still remembered being carried away by his playing of Malaguena and Country Gardens. I thought, “Why not?” So I wrote that I would like to be a concert pianist.
The next Monday our teacher returned and he said, ” I was quite impressed by some of your plans but some of you need to be realistic. One person said he wanted to be a concert pianist. That’s ridiculous! He can’t even play Bonnie Dundee.”
I suppose I should have been embarrassed, but I wasn’t. I just went on and became an undertaker.
P.T.
There were many things about High School that I detested but the absolute worst was that, for 40 minutes five days a week, we had a class called P.T. That stood for Physical Training, but for me it was Positive Torture. I was never interested in sports and knew nothing about the rules of any of the games. Spring and fall weren't as bad because we played soccer. I would get out on the field and kick the ball into the bushes, run after it, throw it back onto the field and I would stay in the bushes. That worked fine. But during the winter there was no escape. Down in the gym we would pick teams. Do you know what that’s like when you’re the last one picked and your whole team groans?
There then followed an exercise (game?) that I’m sure was hatched by all the demons in hell. There were four basketball nets, two at each end, two on the sides. The object was to dribble the ball (why not call it what it really was--bouncing) and there apparently were rules about how many steps you could take between ’dribbles’ or you’d be called for ’travelling’. How ridiculous can you get? Hoses dribble and faucets dribble and old men dribble, but basketballs? I mean. Really! When you got to each basket you had to sink the ball adeptly through it. Anybody could do it, right? Wrong! I couldn’t. Maybe if I had a stepladder. The game would be finished and I was still trying to get through the first basket. So I suffered, waiting for the bushes in the spring.
Early in my second year, they decided that all students should have a physical examination. So Dr. Sutherland, the local Medical Officer of Health, arrived. Students entered the teachers’ lounge in alphabetical order. I anxiously watched the clock. P.T. was coming up at two. Could I please be called just before two? I didn’t make it. They called me at 1:30. I knew I’d never escape P.T. now.
Dr. Sutherland sat me down and proceeded with his examination. When he came to my heart he paused, listened again through his stethoscope, and said those magic words, “You have a heart murmur.” Knowing what I was about to endure in 10 minutes, he’s lucky he didn’t hear a scream! But the murmur was enough.
“I’m sorry young man,” he said, “but I must notify the office that you are no longer allowed to play any sports or participate in P.T.”
Dear man! I owed him my life. The rest of my High School days I sat in a ’spare’ doing homework. Dr. Sutherland has long since gone to his reward. I hope it’s a good one.
Grandpa Jim
My Grandpa was one of those people who might be called ’one of a kind’. When he started school it was soon discovered that he was a whiz with numbers, but when it came to letters and reading he was impossible. Today he would be diagnosed as severely dyslexic. It was his lifelong ambition to be able to write his own name, but no matter how hard he tried it was not to be. But for someone who could neither read nor write he had an amazing vocabulary He could swear for ten minutes and never repeat himself once.
You could easily tell where you stood in his estimation. If he was meeting you down on Main Street and you ranked high on his list of importance, he would stop, surreptitiously reach into his pocket and put his false teeth in so he could smile and greet you. If you didn’t matter to him, all you got was gums. If he didn’t like you, which was more than likely, he would just cross to the other side.
He was not a church-going man. Grandma went every Sunday, but he never did. If the minister or an elder came to visit he would go and sit in the back shed and smoke his pipe.
They lost the farm during the great depression and moved in with their recently widowed eldest daughter, Vera, and her two girls. After several years Grandpa and Grandma moved to Fergus to care for an elderly gentleman who had no family. In appreciation of their good care, he left them his house and a large piece of land. There was room for a second house so Grandpa went to work and built one himself, a lovely home that still stands today.
One evening after everything had quieted down and they were sitting in the living room, he said to Grandma, “Lizzie, get your Bible and read some to me.” So she did--a Psalm and some from the Gospels. Then he said, “Now Lizzie, say a little prayer for us.”
That became a nightly occurrence. After a few months he took ill and had to be hospitalized in St. Mary’s in Kitchener. He grew progressively weaker and after some weeks we hired one of the nursing sisters to sit with him during the night.
I remember the night we got the call. We bundled Grandma into the old 1939 Plymouth and sped to the hospital, but he was gone.
“It was amazing,” the nursing sister told us. “He was resting so peacefully when all of a sudden his eyes flew open and he tried to raise himself up on one elbow. He looked right past me at the door and a look of amazement spread across his face. He said, ’Jesus?’, and he was gone.”
Jesus said, “If I go I will come back and take you to be with me, for it is my desire that where I am, there you will be also” (John 14:3).
Christmas Calling 1960
Dateline: Toronto, Friday, December 23, 1960. The snow had started about 3:00 in the afternoon, not the wind-whipped blizzard kind, but big fluffy flakes drifting noiselessly to earth. I finished my shift at the funeral home at 4:30 and ate a hasty supper in the Greek restaurant across the street. The magic of Christmas was in the air as I made my way to downtown Yonge Street.
The streets were crowded with shoppers and gawkers, individuals bent on finding that last-minute gift and parents trailing wide-eyed children. The two large department stores, Eaton’s and Simpsons, vied in creating the most colourful and magical window displays--Santa’s workshop, the elves busy with their tasks, nativity scenes, everything imaginable in a
Canadian Christmas. Carols filled the air, either from loudspeakers or groups of carollers on the street corners. The magic of Christmas permeated everything.
Later, as I walked up Woodycrest Avenue, the still falling snow cast its mantle of purity over the quiet scene. The houses on either side were festooned like giant wedding cakes dripping with white frosting. The strings of coloured lights twinkled in the quiet Christmas night.
Suddenly, I don’t know how, the magic of Christmas faded to be replaced by mystery. Why had he come? What brought him from the glories of heaven and the company of angels and archangels? Immediately, I knew the answer. He came for me! And horror of horrors, I knew what I had to do.
I fled to the silence of my room, crying, “No! I’ll give you anything. I’ll go to church. I’ll put more money in the offfering plate--anything God, but I’m not going to become a fanatic, and there’s no way I’m going to become a preacher. I’ll show you! I searched out the Bible my mom had given me when I left home. I opened it at random, and my eyes fell on the matchless words of my Saviour in John 15:16 (NIV): “You did not choose me . . . (For sure, Lord!) but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit--fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.”
Then I knew that you can’t say, “No,” to a God like that.
Katie MacLeod
One night in the closing days of my ministry in Innerkip the phone rang. It was Ben Short, a good friend from Westminster Seminary, who a year before had left his church in Sunny Corner, New Brunswick, to become pastor of Westminster Bible Presbyterian Church in Sydney, Cape Breton. I was surprised to hear that after only a little more than a year he had accepted a call from a congregation in California. Having been in Sydney for such a short time, he wanted a smooth transition and he was determined that I should be his replacement. So two weeks after our third son, Stephen, was born I headed for Cape Breton.
When I got off the plane in Sydney it was raining, not the good old-fashioned Ontario downpour, but a steady, dreary drizzle that lasted the whole week I was there. It was not inspiring and I soon began to count the hours before I could leave. I stayed that first night at the home of Betty Tweedie, a lovely lady whose son Eric was home from medical school in Halifax. The next day Eric drove me around to show me the lay of the land. I remember standing with him on top of Kelly’s Mountain, fog-bound and still drizzling.
“Now down below is St. Anne’s harbour, and over there is another big mountain, etc.” Of course we couldn’t see a thing through the fog, but I admired Eric’s salesmanship.
I spoke at the Wednesday evening prayer service and again on Sunday. (Still drizzling. Did it ever stop?) By this time I had pretty well decided that this was the last place on earth I wanted to live. After the morning service, I stood at the door greeting the people as they left. The last person to leave was an elderly lady named Katie MacLeod. As many Cape Breton girls did, she had left Cape Breton to seek work in Boston. She was fortunate in finding a position as an aide to Pearl Mesta, a sort of early version of Martha Stewart. Pearl was known as ’The Hostess with the Most-est’.
“Young man , I have to tell you,” Katie said, looking at me seriously. “It’s only right that you should know. I am not a well woman and I have been in my bed all week so that I could be here this morning. Now I am going back to my bed and I will commence to pray that the Lord will give you no rest and give you no peace until you come to be our pastor.”
That afternoon I phoned Evelyn and said, “There is no way that we’re coming here, but there’s a little old lady who might just ruin our plans.”
Three months later we moved to Sydney.
Just another example of the power of prayer.
Memories of Sydney
We spent nine years in Sydney on beautiful Cape Breton Island. It was during our second or third year there that the Mormons decided to focus their efforts on our Cape Bretoners. You could see them on every street, nice-looking young men in white shirts and dark ties and trousers.
They came to the manse on Park Street. I wasn’t home and when Evelyn answered the door, the two young men said, “We’ve come three thousand miles to tell you about the gospel.”To which Evelyn responded, “Oh, you should have phoned first. I could have saved you the trip.”
Around that time, late one morning, working in my study, I suddenly remembered that I needed to get my sermon titles to the newspaper for the Saturday edition. I had the morning service well in-hand, but had made no headway on a subject for the evening. I could think of nothing. So I fell back on a preacher’s reliable standby--a series on the cults. I headed for the Cape Breton Post just before the deadline. There on the Saturday Church Page was my evening sermon title: “Mormonism, Church or Cult?”
When we arrived at the church on Sunday evening, the elders were all out in front pacing furiously back and forth. I hadn’t even turned off the ignition when they ran up to me in obvious distress.
“Pastor,” they exclaimed, “They’re here. They’re all here!”
When I entered the church I could see why they were concerned. The two front pews were filled with Mormons. I did a quick review of my sermon and emphasized some things that were fairly innocuous and bore down on the main point of justification by faith alone. It went well, I thought as I went to the back of the church to greet the people.
One member of the congregation Malcolm Smith, was widely known as an argumentative, opinionated and forceful fellow. Annie Morrison came tearing up to me, grabbing me by the arm.
“Do something!” she cried. “Look at him. He’s making a fool of himself as usual and of us too!”
I looked and sure enough, there was Malcolm surrounded by Mormons, gesticulating frantically, waving his arms, pointing at his Bible, deep in conflict.
“Annie,” I said. “Don’t be alarmed. He’s pretending to be Samson slaying the Philistines. See. He’s using the same weapon, the jawbone of an ass.”
She gave me a look that would curdle milk and headed out the door.
Good old Malcolm. He had an answer for everything. When Mormons came to his door, they said, “Sir, we are missionaries of the gospel.” Malcolm scowled and said, “You look more like wolves in sheep’s clothing to me.”
One Sunday, when two of the ladies got up to sing a duet, Malcolm headed for the door, muttering about old hens squawking in the barnyard.
And I always knew when he disapproved of my sermon for he would put his head down and clap both hands over his ears.
Cape Breton was a popular tourist destination and many strangers visited during the summer. One day, Malcolm was striding down Charlotte Street (the main street in Sydney) when some tourist hollered, “Hey, Bud, where’s the liquor store?”
Malcolm never broke stride, just turned, and said, “It’s on the road to hell.”
Malcolm had a sister named Tina. She was married to Bert Winsor who didn’t share her faith, much to her chagrin. She was a devoted follower of Perry Rockwood, an ex-Presbyterian Bible-thumping radio evangelist out of Halifax. When his program came on, she would plug in the radio just outside Bert’s door and crank up the volume to the max.
One night Bert had a major heart attack and when I visited him the next day in hospital he said, ” Well, I almost went to the black place last night.”
“That must have been frightening,” I said.
“Oh no,” he replied. “That’s where I’m going. I don’t want to go to heaven. My wife is going there. I’ll take the black place any time!”
Some months later, Tina placed Bert in a nursing home. One day, after I read the Scriptures to him, he put his trust in Jesus. It helped when I explained to him that, in heaven, Tina would be perfect.
Interesting people!
The Condo
Somebody once said, “Never put your mouth in motion unless your brain is in gear.” It’s great advice, especially for preachers. Especially for me! Over the years I’ve certainly made my share of gaffes in the pulpit. I’ll only relate the worst one!
We were preparing to move to Valparaiso, Indiana, where I’d been called to be pastor at Good Shepherd Church. After nine happy years in Duanesburg, N.Y., I was looking forward to the new experience of working in an upper middle-class university town. We had been there in December and after the call came I went out again to look for a place for us to live. We had decided that we wanted a condominium. The real estate lady showed me five that were on the market. Only one suited me, a two bedroom condo in Heritage Valley on the edge of town. Evelyn had not seen the condo so I asked Lucy Hrivnak to make a video tape of it and I sent it to Evelyn in Duanesburg. We agreed that it was just what we wanted, so we spent a few weeks planning how we would decorate and enjoy our new condo.
That last Sunday night in Duanesburg, in the evening service, I asked for prayer requests from the congregation. Many of the townsfolk had come to say good-bye since I was leaving for Indiana the next morning so the church was full. It was Shirley Martin who piped up, “We need to pray for you and Evelyn. You’ll be alone out there since your boys are staying behind and you’ll be on your own.”
Of course I should have said, “Thank you very much. We appreciate your concern.”But being a Presbyterian minister, I had to open my big mouth so wide I could have gotten both feet in it. I said, “We’ve made a lot of plans and I really think we’re going to have a lot of fun. We’ve bought a condom--”
The place exploded with laughter.! I should have just pronounced the benediction and gone home but I laboured gamely through the rest of the service. As I got to the back door, I was nearly bowled over by Margot Ruther and Diane Fidler rushing out.
“We’ve got to get home right away and send this to the Reader’s Digest. They’ll pay three hundred dollars for this one.”
Husband’s Tale
He sat at his desk sipping his coffee at break time, thinking about the events of the day.
“I left the house this morning too quickly,”he thought. “The kids were giving their mother a hard time and all I wanted was to get out of there. I really should have stayed and helped her deal with them. Next time for sure. I wonder how she’s doing. I really ought to do something special. Let’s see. It’s not her birthday. That was two months ago, and I don’t think it’s our anniversary. No, that’s in August. Well, even if it’s not a special day, I’ll make it special just for her.”
So on the way home he stopped by the florist and bought a dozen red roses, long-stem of course. He was almost home when he thought,She loves chocolates.So he wheeled around and headed for the Mall where he purchased a two-pound box of Laura Secord’s soft centres.
He walked in the back door with the gifts behind his back. His wife was just taking supper out of the oven. With a sheepish look on his face, he held out his gifts to her.“Here, Honey. These are for you, just because I love you.”
She gazed at him with a stricken look on her face.
“Oh,”she said, bursting into tears. “I’ve had such a terrible day! I was coming downstairs this morning with a basket of laundry when I slipped and fell. And the baby threw my hair brush in the toilet and it overflowed all over. And the kids have been horrible all day.And now--now you come home drunk!”
From Tea Shop to Pirate's Treasure
by Mary Bentley-Lloyd
MARY BENTLEY-LLOYD Mary Bentley-Lloyd is married to Kevin and mother to Ryan and Katie. She grew up in a traditional Mennonite home, and faith and community are a way of life she tries to instill in her children despite the pressures of a modern culture. An avid reader and possessing a strong imagination, she wrote stories in grade school, earning top marks in English. Not bad for a student who started not knowing the language. Many years later, her first novel came to her in a dream and, feeling compelled to write it down, she fell in love with the process all over again.
As a tea shop owner, Mary encounters a lot of characters always ready to chat over a cup of Assam or Nilgiri. Sensing great value in their stories, she decided to write about some. Enjoy an excerpt from Tea Shop Memoirs. Mary wrote Pirate’s Treasure to see what would happen if a pirate, infamous and murderous, turned to Christ. She shares an excerpt from that upcoming novel.
Tea Shop Memoirs: Annabelle and Stewart
“Lord, help me be a blessing to someone today” was all I could get out in my morning prayer session before the bell over the tea shop door trilled incessantly, making the older couple wince as they stepped through the door. I don’t even try to stop a grin from curling my lips nearly to my ears. It is Stewart and Annabelle, regulars to my shop.
“You can’t sneak up on me with that as my lookout,” I apologized loudly over the clanging brass clapper.
“It’s alright. It certainly is cheery,” Annabelle replies over the clamour, putting a gloved hand over her smile as she glances up at Stewart who towers her by over a foot.
“100 grams again today?” I ask, knowing already what the answer will be.
“Yes, 100 grams of each,” Stewart replies, leading Annabelle by the elbow to the cash counter.
I weigh out Lapsang Souchong for him and Sencha for her. Many wonderful and interesting people come into the tea shop and Annabelle and Stewart can definitely be counted as two of them. Though considered to be in the twilight of their life, the sparkle in their eyes belies two people still young at heart.
Besides the obvious difference in stature, other peculiarities endear them to me.Shorter and stouter, Annabelle dresses in sombre tones as her brown wool coat, matching scarf and knitted hat attest. In fact, in a quick sweep of the downtown street, one could easily overlook her on a dull grey January day. Stewart, however, is known all over town because of the puce parka he pairs with a cherry red scarf and tartan tam. In the close quarters of my small tea shop, his colour combinations are actually painful to look at. I asked him once to which clan he belonged, pointing to his tam, but he told me he was not Scottish. He just couldn’t figure out which colour would best work with his favourite puce coat and decided to wear all of them. “One of these has to be the right one,” he’d added with a chuckle.
Once they pay and leave, I watch them until they go beyond the sightlines of my window. The bell is barely quiet a few seconds before it dances again.
***
Sitting at the table by the window with my laptop going over inventory and ordering sheets, I let out a yip of delight when the bell clangs suddenly in the stillness of the tea shop. Ready to warmly welcome any distraction that takes me from the mundane chore of tracking numbers and weights, my grin curls up further when I see Annabelle.
“Is your husband not with you?” I ask, getting up to stretch.
“No. I walked by myself today,” she replies, removing her gloves and stowing them in her shopping bag. “Stewart wasn’t feeling his best, but he is out of tea and I wanted to surprise him when he gets up from his nap.”
“That’s a nice thing to do. Can I weigh out his usual 100 grams?”
“Yes. And 100 grams of the Sencha as well.”
I get the jars and head for the weigh station. Annabelle follows.
“I don’t know how he can drink that stuff,” she says quietly, shaking her head.
I chuckle. “I know what you mean. Lapsang is very pungent and only a very small percentage of the population love it. But those that do are borderline obsessive about it. Your husband is one of only a handful of people that keep my stock constantly rotating.”
“You know when we have our tea in the afternoon, I sit as far away from him as I can,” Annabelle laughs. “Or I take mine in the kitchen while making supper. I can’t stand the smell of it. But he loves it and, like you say, has to have some every after noon.”
“Between the two of us, we’ll keep him stocked,” I say with a wink as we head to the cash counter.
“Have a good day and I hope Stewart is feeling better soon.”
Annabelle puts the tea in her shopping bag and with a wave, makes the bell dance as she steps outside. With a deep sigh, I turn back to my laptop and the file beside it.
***
I am going to take the bell off the door!
All day it has rung and rung, which is great, don’t get me wrong, because it means that business is brisk, but after a while the clanging starts to grate on my nerves.
Saturday is always busier for some reason. It is as if everyone is out of tea all at the same time. Maybe the warm spring weather is finally coaxing people out of their winter hideaways and what better way to celebrate a change in season then by trying a new tea.
At least that’s my opinion.
There goes that bell again. I look up from the customers before me to greet the patron just stepping inside. It is Annabelle. I call out her and wave but my attention is quickly drawn back to the lady plying me with questions. Eventually the customers are all handled in their proper order and cashed out. Meanwhile, Annabelle has taken a seat by the window, waiting.
“I’m sorry that took longer than I expected,” I say. “Can I get your usual 100 grams of Sencha and Lapsang?”
“Just 100 grams of Sencha,” she replies.
“Don’t tell me Stewart has given up Lapsang,” my hand goes to my throat theatrically as I feign horror, my eyes wide and mouth dropping. Upon seeing Annabelle’s bottom lip begin to tremble, I snap my mouth shut. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong, dear,” she replies, reaching into her brown coat pocket for a tissue. It is tight and rumpled and bits fall off into her lap.
“Let me get you a new one.” I hurry behind the counter and bring back a couple of fresh tissues.
“Stewart passed away last month.”
I sit down heavily on the chair opposite her, my mouth falling open and my mind reeling. What do I say?
“He finally went to his reward ahead of me just like he always joked he would,” Annabelle said, the corner of her lip lifting gently. “He needed to so he could make sure the Lord puts us in the same mansion was his excuse.”
“I’m glad to hear he was a faithful man,” I whispered, reaching across the table to touch her arm.
Annabelle nodded. “We’ve been very blessed over the years and even now when I miss him so much I can’t complain. I know we’ll meet again soon.”
We sat there by the window for a long while. Thankfully, the bell managed to keep its clapper silent.
“Well, I better get myself home.” Annabelle reached around for her scarf hanging on the back of the chair and tied it in a knot at her throat. “Just 100 grams of Sencha today.”
I weigh out her order then watch her step out into the sidewalk, closing the door softly behind her. I marvel that the bell only gently tinkles.
***
“Have a happy thanksgiving.”
“Thank you. I will,” I return the greeting with a wave as the customers hurry out the door to their family party.
The shop should have closed a half hour ago, but everyone wants fresh tea for their celebrations and so I find myself late for my own gathering. But such is the life of a shopkeeper.
I hurry to empty the sample carafes and tidy the tea shelves. I am about to turn over the sign in the door to ‘closed’ when Annabelle appears. The overcast afternoon light is dim and I nearly miss seeing her just coming up to the door in that brown coat she wears.
She looks expectantly up at me on the other side of the glass.
“Am I too late?” she mouths.
I shake my head and open the door wide for her.
“Thank you. I promise I won’t be long. I just need my usual,” she quips. “My family is coming for dinner tomorrow and my granddaughter loves her tea.”
“How have you been? You’ve not come in for a while,” I say over my shoulder as I head to the green tea section. Annabelle follows me.
“My son and daughter-in-law took me out east to see some of Stewart’s family that couldn’t make the funeral and I ended up staying with them for the summer.”