Mahaney’s Beach
My family has a photograph of what we call Grandma’s Beach. We have all seen it, there are copies that circulate amongst us. It’s one of those photos that is part of the archives and seems to have a life of it’s own. It’s a photo of Grandma’s Beach after a big sea hove in and we are told destroyed the wharf leaving wooden debris all over the beach.
I have spent a good many summers on the beach and have never seen anything like this. The picture is circa 1918, and we know this because one of the seven people in the picture is my oldest long deceased Aunt Alice who we believe is about five in the picture and was born in 1913. Now I say Grandma’s Beach but previous to that it was called Eleazer’s Beach. Eleazer, my great grandfather built the house which is in front of the beach for his father my great-great-grandfather Simon. We also believe that Simon bought the property from the Mahaneys. My great grandfather Eleazer is standing on the beach in that picture. Now I don’t think it would have been called Eleazer’s beach at that time because it was called Mahaney’s beach when the photo was taken. All the people in the photo have long since passed away. It’s a dramatic photo, all seven ancestors of ours, all that debris. I see at least seven stories, maybe even a novel where all the stories lead to this congregation on the beach. I look at it and the yearning to know is almost physical. Speak to me, give me a clue, tell me a little of the story that is locked away.
A couple of years ago I was down on the beach. I go back pretty much every summer these days and have been returning most of my life. The house and beach have miraculously come back into our family, but that is another story. I am on the beach and I see this huge piece of timber drift wood. It’s about six feet long and 24 inches by 18 inches with a cut out at one end with a large spike going through it. I am a wood person, I build wooden houses, cabinets and have a saw mill. Me and wood are inextricably entwined. I am relatively sure it is huge chunk of BC fir that has seen a life as a part of an industrial wharf or dry-dock and that’s the point . It’s a magnificent chunk of wood that has traveled half way around the world and has had a life of use with humans and here it is on the beach. There is always drift-wood on the beach but not usually of this magnitude. So I am looking at this phenomenal piece of wood and I feel so intensely that yearning to know some of it’s story and it’s frustrating because it’s that thing, that secret life of inanimate objects. That secret part is so intriguing.
This year I’m back down on the beach and the chunk of wood is still there. I was worried that someone might have taken it, or burnt it in the fire pit but thankfully it is still there. I have wrangled it a little further up the beach away from high tides, storms and the fire pit. I want to attach a sign that says property of Eleazer’s beach or Eleazer’s Beach Bench. It is truly an amazing piece of wood. I have recent pictures of my eighty four year old Mom Lorraine Collins nee Manuel who was born and raised in this house, sitting on this natural bench, on the beach.
A few days after our time out in Exploits, on the beach, in the house, has ended for this year I am at my cousin Gary’s place and we are talking about the house and our ancestors. Speculating on where they lived, when the house was built and about Simon our great great grandfather who originally bought the property. We have a few pictures of him in the archives too. One of him with six brothers, who we are told were all schooner captains. So my cousin brings out his book of old photos. As he is moving the book around that picture of the beach with all the debris comes out. He actually has two of that event on the beach so we are now ensconced in those photos again. There are three women to the right, one of whom we believe is our Aunt Alice and one who is our Great Grandma Maria. Further down the beach there are three men one of whom is our Uncle Herbert and another is our Great Grandfather Eleazer and I don’t think we know who the person in the boat is. I’m looking at these photos and I feel that yearning, that yearning to know something behind the picture. The why, the how, the who of it all.
Those two men are standing on a piece of debris and as I look closer it dawns on me the piece of debris they are standing on is THE piece of wood. My god it’s that chunk of timber. It has the same cut out at the end and spike protruding. Now I start to freak out, this is unbelievable.
My cousin Gary thinks I am losing it. So I tell him the story. I tell him what I think I am seeing. The thing is, it is his story too. He has spent more time on that beach then I have and he has something to add. Another piece of the puzzle. A few years ago Gary was scything the stinging nettles away from the trail going from the house to the beach. The nettles are a scourge that we are forever doing battle with. It is quite a patch and it’s been there forever. While he is doing the trail he decides to do the whole patch as he’s doing it he uncovers the timber. It has probably been buried in the nettles or may even have been part of the woodshed or one of the numerous out buildings that where once there. He got some help and drug it down to the beach for a bench by the fire pit. So that is why I can’t remember seeing it before. It had migrated up the beach and hid away, and recently come back down.
It isn’t really my story or my cousins, we are just bit players in a much longer older story. As it turns out we are just a conduit for those inanimate objects to tell their story through. I so wanted to know just a little of their stories and it happened. The picture, the timber and my deceased ancestors conspired to give up a little information. They spoke to me. Yet that piece of wood has a long history even before it arrived, how ever it arrived on that beach and became intimate with my family.
Next summer when we go down I will put a plaque on the timber, Eleazer’s Beach Bench.
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