The Sceviour House

The Sceviour House
The first house you see as you enter the upper harbour of Exploits Islands, is the Sceviour house. In my life time it was owned by Robert Sceviour and left to his son Herman (both deceased) and is now owned by Holly Rideout, a descendant of the Perry’s, the very first builders/owners of the house. In the sixties it was sold out of the Sceviour family to an American fellow, John Moore, who lived, fished and tried to generate an outport lifestyle, as this way of life was in decline. My mother, Lorraine Collins, nee Manuel was raised at the other end of the harbour and although her mother was a Sceviour she was not directly connected to the house in the picture. I was born and raised on the mainland, but from the age of two, spent almost every second summer in Exploits. Even though the passing of the outport lifestyle is a sad and tragic part of Newfoundland history, and this house is indicative of that, I feel privileged to have witnessed a little of the history of Exploits as it went from a viable outport community to a place of summer homes, cottages and memories, old and new. An evolution has taken place and Exploits is still a vibrant community. Over the years, I spent a few evenings in this house, both with the Sceviours and with John Moore. The story I would like to relate took place when John owned the house but includes the Sceviours.
In 1961 my family moved to the small railroad town of Hornepayne in Northern Ontario. We were welcomed and became friends with another Newfoundland family, Bill and Viola Jowitt. Newfoundlanders (or islanders) leave home to look for work. The nature of island life economics generates this diaspora. People who are away from home are naturally attracted to their own, and communities and clubs are built around this. Yet it always amazes me how the circles and loops reconnect even without that human intention.
Viola was the sister of Herman, the last Sceviour who owned the house. She was a little older than my mother, but they had known each other in Exploits. We became very close. My sister, brother and I spent Sundays at their house, watching Walt Disney, Ed Sullivan and Bonanza, when Mom put a ban on the TV in our house. During this time, Viola’s mom Alice Sceviour (wife of the original owner Robert) would sometimes be living with them. Alice suffered from old age dementia. Mentally she lived exclusively in Exploits. When she spoke it was as if she was meeting you on the path and would relate news of her contemporaries and the goings on …… as if it were happening that very moment.
A few years later, I took my own family to Exploits where we met and befriended John Moore. One evening, sitting around the kitchen in the house, entertaining ourselves in true Newfoundland style, John told the story of how another couple had lived with him in the house for a time, but had left because of a ghost. He said they would quite often hear a woman singing, children’s voices and a rocking chair rocking. As he was telling this story with a lot more emphasis then I impart here, it struck me, and I mean that literally, that these events occurred at the very same time Alice Sceviour lived in Hornepayne but mentally existed in Exploits. Could it be that she was so exclusive and focussed that the energy of her existence, or should we say spirit, spilled out in Exploits while these people resided in her house? John said at some point the noises became so annoying, he confronted the spirit and told it to go away, it was his house now and he would take care of it!
The house is still standing, but, there is a breach in the roof and the weather is getting in. Left as is, the end of it’s life span is at hand. I imagine Alice is back home again.

William Clifford Collins 1927-2006

My eulogy for Clifford. Delivered May 15, 2006 at his funeral.
William Clifford Collins born Spaniard’s Bay Newfoundland October 2, 1927, died May 13, 2006 Windsor Ontario

I would like to say a few words on behalf of my mother Lorraine, brother Don, sister Lori and our families. Please excuse my attire, I wasn’t really prepared for this. Who ever is?
Dad wouldn’t have approved, he was more often a suit and tie guy, whereas I am not. We didn’t see eye to eye on everything, in fact we disagreed on a lot of things. But that is to be expected. That’s life. We were from different generations, things change and time passes.
Nevertheless, no matter how I look at it, Dad’s life was good.

He travelled a long and winding road from Spaniard’s Bay Newfoundland to Windsor Ontario by way of Montreal, London, Hornepayne, Niagara Falls and Dundas. What an amazing journey it must have been for a young “bayman”, leaving home and family, to head out, look for work and make his way in life. After a stint as a seaman, Dad’s road led to Montreal and as a dapper young 21 year old he met Mom and as you can imagine….that changed everything. In September 1950 they got married and moved to London and this is where my perception of Dad’s life begins.

In hindsight and in the many ways we measure these things, Dad achieved a good life….on many levels.

He found work as a policeman first for the city of London and then for the CNR, and began to raise a family. As we all know this is no small feat. He took on his role as father and breadwinner and with Mom’s help he did the things that parents do. As a fellow parent I believe he did them well.

A lot of how life happens to us is defined by our own attitude. You don’t really have a lot of control in the grand scheme of things, so how you handle what happens is really the more important part.

As most of you know Clifford like to play cards. He made a good lot of friends around the poker games that got organized throughout his life wherever he lived. As a family we too played a lot of cards such as Euchre, 45’s 120’s. It is a wonderful healthy bonding thing for families to play together…..and we did.
Dad had what we thought was the annoying habit of slamming his ring fingered hand down on the table when he was going alone, or just emphatically grabbing hold of a winning moment that was dealt. And that is the point, Dad grabbed hold of the “moments” dealt him and lived them with gusto. And by moments I mean large parts of his and our lives.
When Dad joined the railroad in 1961, we moved to Hornepayne in Northern Ontario. We kids and Mom tried to find it on the map. When we finally found it Mom said “ where in God’s name is he taking us now”. As it turned out this was a excellent move for both him and us. It was one of those moments, an adventure that our young family lived to the fullest. That was how he took on life and consequently so did we. In Hornepayne he was his own boss, made his own hours, went trout fishing when he wanted to and took his family on a picnic to Nagagamasis Park almost every Sunday. I think he felt happy and successful.
Later on we left the North and moved to Southern Ontario, ostensibly to take advantage of better schooling for us kids. Actually when you think about it that is quite a powerful and large choice just to have the ability to make and he made it for us.
The trail then led us to Niagara Falls, Dundas and finally to Windsor. I never lived in Windsor and both my brother Don and sister Lori left home shortly after. Life was changing.

Around this time Mom and Dad made a daring move and invested in a parking lot which gave them a little extra pocket change. Life became a little more comfortable. They took advantage of the moment and did some travelling; Europe, Florida and the North West Territories, and a lot of trips to NFLD. Who would have thought I would see a picture of my Dad in the Swiss Alps wearing a Tyrolean hat.
At this point Dad indulged himself with a few big cars, culminating in a Cadillac, Dad’s idea of a status symbol. They meant a lot to him and I can understand why. On his road and from whence he came, this was his measure of the road travelled. And I can tell you, I loved travelling to NFLD in those cars with him. It was luxurious and believe me, he was never happier then when he was behind the wheel of one of those cars on his way to NFLD, in control of his own destiny.
Which brings us to another thing. Mom took us to NFLD almost every second summer all our lives. Now, she did the footwork but Dad made it possible. What a privilege for us.
Dad achieved an amazing level of success in his lifetime. He was an active Mason and Shriner, and a founding member of the Windsor Newfoundland Club. Dad was rewarded by the loyalty of his brothers and sisters Dave, Fran, Marion and Don, who remained close and supportive all his life, also by his neighbours everywhere he lived but especially here in Windsor where they lived happily between there neighbours Steve and Pat, and Garn and Babbs for 35 years. Now that is a supportive community.
My brother Don, sister Lori and myself, 7 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren, right down to the 14 day old Dexter Blue, started our roads from Dad’s. We thank him for giving us all such a wonderful start and all the many opportunities it gives rise to.

They say time spent fishing is not deducted from your lifespan. The last few years Dad fought off all his ailments and we all thought it was amazing how he bounced back. I think it was the time spent fishing that gave him those years.

What more can we ask for in this life but to be surrounded by our family and friends as we pass from this life to the next.

My Former Life

My Railroad Retirement Speech.
A week or two ago I overheard fellow retired railroader Yves Leroux ask my wife Mary if we were going to the retirement do. Mar said ” yes” and Yves said “good I’m looking forward to George’s speech”. Mar said “well I don’t know if he’s giving one, he’s pretty nervous about giving a speeches”, Yves said ” no way , not George” and Mar said “oh yeah, he’s actually a pretty shy guy”. Yves couldn’t believe this. George shy. No way.
One on one I can talk your ear off on almost any subject…..loudly, as many of you know, but in a group setting I’m a mess so please bear with me.
It’s interesting what we know and don’t know about people even after spending a lifetime working together.

I come from a family of railroaders. At one time 4 out of 5 in my immediate family worked for CN. My grandfather lived in Montreal for a decade and was a carpenter for the Grand Trunk Railroad and you can bet he worked on the Victoria Street bridge. I thought of him every time I went across that bridge….how a guy from a little outport on a couple of little islands off the extreme east coast of NFLD, with no electricity or indoor plumbing, moved to Montreal, the largest city in Canada, worked for the railroad and then quit and moved back to those little islands…. to the house I now own and go to every summer. I guess he knew something. Pretty crazy continuity. But I digress.

Back to that talking, one on one business, in a small 8×8 room, on an engine or in a caboose, for hours and hours, was like primal therapy or hell, or bits of both. And sometimes it was amazing.
I look at life as a constant education, always learning, that’s how I get through things. It’s a bottom line. You’re always going to learn something and that’s a good thing, most of the time. Being thrown together like that makes for interesting situations. We don’t get to choose, who, when or where, so you deal with it and in the best scenario you develop a sense of camaraderie with all sorts of different people and whether you like it or not, you invariably get educated by them.
So, “I learned all my bad habits from you people”, and lots of good ones too and that camaraderie that developed because of the way we worked, was one of the good things.

I have a bit of a philosophy about my railroad career and I guess it applies to life in general.
You may choose a path but soon as you take a step on that path anarchy prevails.
So I chose a path, “I hired on the railroad” and immediately realized I really had no idea.
There is no knowing the future even with signs, and that choosing, although seemingly huge, may still be minor in the grand scheme of things. When I took that first call, little did I know I was never going to really sleep again for 35 years. Man railroading kills the idea of circadian rhythms …..dead.
But you deal with it.
I started hearing that phrase, “some weekends and nights were involved”. I realized this was not a 9 to 5, 5 day a week, 40 hr work week job.. Scheduling, what scheduling. That first step produced all these new parameters that you could either whine about or find the good stuff and make something happen. It had a way of defining people. I chose to find the good stuff. I had to. The next 15 years were the crazy spare board years. If you can handle that, while trying to raise a family and live a life, you can handle anything. It taught me a big lesson: you have to have a flexible interface or it’s just gonna be trouble.

Those early years were rough. I thought I was going to get an ulcer. You want to do a good job, but you’re clueless because it’s soooo different. Nothing can prepare you. You have to learn it on the job. I remember thinking I had to settle down or quit. I did finally settle down and got a bit of a handle on it. I started the very uphill battle of making it work for me……at least a little.
I spent 15 years on a slow spareboard, but even that was not consistent. You’d make money in short frantic bursts, then spend it all waiting for the phone to ring. Waiting for your call. 20 times out all week waiting for that call, and then it would come, the midnight west end yard and invariably the guy behind you would go to Montreal.
But you dealt with it.
Those years on a slow spareboard gave me the time and incentive to be creative, gave me the insane idea I could do other things. I spent quality time with Mary and we raised 2 fine kids. My young family and I traveled across Canada to either coast at least 10 times. We were broke but we took the train and had a lot of fun. We found a way to make it work for us.

Then came those middle years. I acquired the illusion of a little seniority, the dream of a regular job. A regular job on the railroad. Yeah right!!! Ha Ha Fat chance.
There is nothing regular about the railroad.
But it did change the parameters again.
I started to work more, to be away from home more and make more money. So it was good…..and bad. Being away drastically cut into my creativity, but I really enjoyed my time in Toronto and Montreal. I had friends and relatives in both cities and took advantage of it. I had roller blades stashed in both cities and did a lot of exploring. I capitalized on the dichotomy of living in the bush in extreme privacy and then immersing myself in the hustle bustle urban landscape of those two large cities. It was wild and invigorating.
Making more money …..well that was good because we had so many things we wanted to do….like build a big log house in the bush. But we all know “the more you make the more you spend”. The middle years were good and busy.
But again….things change.

The railroad itself was going through massive change. The path and parameters were in a constant state of flux, constantly shifting. Too much change. It could very well be, that as we get older we get more susceptible to the stress caused by change. We don’t handle the disruptions as well. We don’t have such a flexible interface. My good years were probably the middle ones, the ones I had the most stamina for. These last few years seemed to be more of a struggle. The seniority got me a better job, I liked my mates and capitalized on the friendships that developed but the act of railroading was becoming oppressive. I needed more rest to work less. It started cutting into MY time and my sense of well being. It was getting harder to deal with. I was getting tired of the struggle to maintain the good things. I guess I was ready to retire.

You know, I never thought of myself as a stressful person. For years I got woken up at ungodly hours, removed from my family and home for days at a time and sent to crazy places with strange people. It’s like that Robert Johnson blues song about the guy who “sold his soul to the devil at the crossroads” or in the 60’s you would have said “sold your soul to the man for money” and I did, we did. I had things I wanted to do and that was the path I chose to travel.
My records and files will tell you I did it safely and successfully, and as you all know, that is no mean feat. I thought I went up and down the road pretty easy, taking it all in stride, but in the last few months of being retired and not working, I can’t believe the weight that has been lifted off my shoulders. The railroad, that world of heavy metal at 60 per, the lack of sleep, the rules and regs, the mismanagement, the bullshit and abuse…..that stress is HUGE.
All of you people, all of us are worth every penny we’ve been paid and more. We have earned it. The responsibility is enormous. It’s a life and death job. I know that even more now that I am not doing it. All I have to do is hang around with a working railroader and I know. That immense all encompassing stressful weight of responsibility is gone.

It’s amazing how light and happy I can feel. I hope I can carry the light feeling around as long as I carried the weight, of chasing that elusive dollar. “Money makes the world go round”, but you know, it’s not hard to realize what a tired overused cliché that is. Sure, money is our working system, but make no mistake……TIME is the real currency. Time trumps money. Money is nothing if we don’t have time to spend it.
So now I feel like I just may have a little time to do a few more of the things I want. It’s my retirement. It’s what I have earned…. a little time. Time to travel to NFLD, kayak with the grandkids, play more music, write more, play way more hockey, hike with Giffy, time for so many things, I may even finish my house. I know that would make Mary happy and that is important because this isn’t just my retirement it’s ours. I couldn’t have done this without Mars constant support and her very flexible interface.

A couple of months ago, Jim Dwyer our railroad brother and my fellow retiree saw a poem I had posted on the internet about railroading. He told me how much he liked it and how it described our shared lives. I wrote a lot of stories and poems at work. It was something I did. It was something I found on the path. I would have written this speech at work but I found a little time else where.

I’d like to read that poem.

This Time in a Room of Thunder

These coloured lights flashing,
these steel wheels turning,
these endless silver ribbons,
so substantial, yet so unreal,

All these things I see,
all this continuous movement,
all this time in a room of thunder,
so much passing through,
at least that’s how I feel.

That lonesome whistle wail,
that passing place,
that time I’ve spent,
so much come and go,

All this weight,
all this push and pull,
all this heavy rolling,
so much momentum waste,
as least that’s how I feel.

This place full of people,
this country that’s empty,
this give and take away,
so bereft of meaning,

These sounds that mean,
these signs that say,
these people that talk,
so much a momentary state,
at least that’s how I feel.

The stars that fill the dark,
the sky that swallows the ribbons,
the dark that turns to day,
so fleeting this dreaming thought,

The repetition of transience,
the rhyme of day to day,
the song of leaving,
so much a rhythmic chant,
at least that’s how I feel,

about my former life of playing trains.

My family and I would like to thankyou all very much for all the camaraderie, and all the help, getting through the wild and crazy railroad years.

Trout Fishing Joe’s Brook

Joe’s Brook
My brother Don and I have been exploring and fishing Joe’s Brook for the last couple of years. I remember Don saying “I have a brook on the forestry access road just off the Trans Canada Highway between Gambo and Gander that I’d like to try”. So we did. Little did we know that it would turn out to be a place we would go numerous times in the next few years. We had great success that first time and it continued to be productive late in the season and even after being fished more frequently by others. This last time there we saw two trailers parked nearby which may mean it’s too easy to get to and spell it’s demise.
Joe’s Brook where we access it from a bridge on the forestry road, is made up of a series of “rattles and steadies”. These are Newfoundland terms for what I would describe as rapids and pools. When the water level is down to a normal (summer) level you can pretty much walk down the brook on the rocks in the rattles. You could not white water canoe these spots because there is more rock then water and the steadies aren’t really large enough. We have been catching pan size trout in the steadies at the end of the rattles. I believe the trout sit and wait in the deeper pools for the rushing water of the rattles to deposit bugs and water larvae. Sometimes the surface of the water seems to boil with there feeding activity even to the point that they get air-born completely out of the water.
One of the reasons that Joes Brook continues to attract us is not only because we have always caught trout there but because about a mile down it empties into a large pond that until this year we have not been able to get around. There is even more brook below the pond and we know it goes quite a way down before it empties into the very large, thirty mile long Gander Lake. So after having such good luck on the upper part of the brook we have been yearning to get to the rest of the brook like some sort of fisherman’s golden fleece. Last year we continued on the logging road past the bridge looking for access to the lower end. We hiked over a cut-over to a feeder stream that led to the pond. The feeder stream produced quite a few trout. We had our limit before we even got to the pond which was great but still we failed to get past the pond. Another time we tried to walk around the pond but about half way I called a halt. It was a way to hard slog already and the prospects of getting all the way around and then having to do it all over again to get back was too much work and as a fifty something year old I wasn’t that interested in pushing the heart attack limits. I wanna’ trout fish not die. So you can see how this has become a mission for Don and I. Well this year we got a satellite print-out that showed where the old logging roads went and how close they got to the brook, giving us possible access points. Don and I took my old truck, found the logging roads and went as far as we could on wheels and continued hiking on foot across a cut-over and then through a thin strip of bush that the loggers are supposed to leave around waterways. Success!! We hit the brook right below the pond. As we approached the woods we could hear the rushing water which made us feel good and meant we weren’t gonna’ get lost or have to trek through more cutover or dense bush. Sometimes the alder thickets around the streams are virtually impassable and the cutovers are just a mash of skidder ruts and small tree parts, very tedious hiking. It had taken three years to get to this point …we were feeling good.
This was the last stretch of the brook before it empties into Gander Lake, our goal had been realized. It was beautiful, lotsa’ water and fast flowing, a continuous rattle, definitely not navigable by canoe or kayak We got the worms out and went at it working our way down the brook. Now at this point I use that term brook loosely because this is the last section of the stream and it has collected all the water from its feeder streams and it’s been raining a lot. This is really a small rocky river rushing to its grand finale, Gander Lake. Trouble is, there are no steadies. It does not slow down and form those pools that the trout so love to sit in wait of food that flows into the pools from the steadies. Trout sitting in a still pool are called a hover of trout. Well there was no place for these trout to form a hover. We walked quite a ways down the brook before we gave up. Stunningly beautiful, but disappointing as far as catching fish. So again we called a halt to the trek on Joe’s Brook and began the arduous hike back to the pond. At the pond we fished for awhile and managed to salvage the day by getting a few decent trout for dinner. It is the nature of exploring streams and brooks looking for trout. You are bound to be disappointed. Somebody will have been there before, there is not enough water, you are not there at the right time, the fish are not hungry. In this case the topography of the land the brook was going through did not create the environment we needed for optimum trout conditions. But life is a verb and it is all about the action. Don and I spent quality time dreaming about and activating our attempts to find a way to the lower end of Joe’s Brook and we did it. The saga of Joe’s Brook has come to an end.

Whales Tale

The Beluga That Met My Family
The immature beluga pictured on the cover of Vol.16 No 03 of the DownHomer magazine was touring Notre Dame Bay or more specifically the Bay of Exploits, swimming and playing with anyone who would get in the water with it…aggressively seeking out humans to be social with. This whale seemed to be on a collision course with my family and Charlie Falk and his son Chuck figure in my story also.
My parents are both Newfoundlanders though I was born away, I’ve had the privilege of celebrating at least ten of my fifty some birthdays in Newfoundland, most often on grandma’’s beach behind my mom’’s ancestral home on Exploits Islands. For the summer of ‘‘02 my wife and I planned a gathering in Exploits. My eighty year old mom, Lorraine Collins nee Manuel the matriarch of a family reunion that would include two of her great grandkids, one (Nate) only two months old and on his first trip to Exploits. I did my first pilgrimage when I was one and our daughter Skye was three months old when she did her first, so there is a long history of us trekking to Exploits of which my mom is extremely and deservedly proud.
This whale story actually begins in St.Johns a few days after we’d arrived in Argentia. We had visited family, toured the sights and were heading north to Central to make ready our excursion to Exploits. I called Lindy Rideout a teacher/kayak builder from Cottlesville to see about getting a kayak. He told me he was about to go paddle around with a beluga that had shown up in the harbour, which he did and the Downhomer ran his letter and photo last fall (Vol.15 No.,04). This was my first contact with the whale.
We made our way to Gander where I arranged a lift to Exploits so I could open up and clean the house before the throng descended. Nobody had been in the house for a couple of years. Through the magic of cell phones I called my wife in Gander where she was having adventures of her own. She and my cousin Sheila Woolfrey had done a tour to Twillingate and met up with an excited Charlie Falk and his dripping wet son Chuck, fresh from their close encounter with the whale. It was an irresistible tale, so off they went to see for themselves. When they arrived in Summerford the wharf was crowded with gawkers and at least a dozen kids were in the water with the whale. Not one to miss an opportunity, Sheila climbed right down into the sea, clothes and all and got some major thrills when the gregarious whale came right on over to greet her. So this was my second contact with the whale, albeit both were so far– just by phone.
Two days later, after much scrubbing and sweeping, the house was in some semblance of order and I left Exploits with Sheila’s husband Gary and friends Elwood and Eilleen Anstey headed to back to Summerford. And there on the wharf was a group of people, all watching the kids in the water with the beluga. The whale immediately came over to greet us. I think it is attracted by the motor sounds, tones and pitches. It swam slowly by the boat allowing all of us aboard to put our hands on it. She felt like clean wet leather. It did this three times and then stopped adjacent to me with it’s one eye about eighteen inches away and stared at me with an intelligence that I had not experienced from a non-human creature. A novel, interesting and somewhat unnerving experience. It then went off towards a sea-doo that had arrived. At this point cousin Gary said ” if your going to swim with it “now’s your chance”. So I handed him my camera, doffed my shirt and dove off the bow of the boat. When I opened my eyes I was nose to nose with the whale. It startled me but at no time did I feel fear. The whale rolled over underneath me and I put my hand on it’s belly, then, when it turned over again it floated up underneath me, I was virtually on it’s back. I did not want to squeeze it and I didn’t want to grab its fins but there I was, through no effort of my own, riding on it’s back. We broke the surface and swam directly towards the boat while Gary was frantically taking pictures. All the while, the beluga was making chittering and clicking sounds that we interpreted as an expression of the pleasure and excitement it was having frolicking with us. When I got out of the water and left, the last thing I saw was the whale pushing some kids in a toy rubber raft around the harbour. This was my third and very thrilling contact with this whale.
The story didn’t end there though…a week or two later more family and friends (Manuels and Lillys) made the trek out to join us in Exploits and when they arrived Aunt Mabel said, ” we met your friend this morning”. I was puzzled as I couldn’t imagine who she was talking about. Apparently, when they were leaving Little Burnt Bay the very same beluga showed up and they too experienced it’s exuberant camaraderie. Contact number four and pretty much our entire entourage had been touched by this phenomenal creature.
After three amazing weeks in Exploits, another birthday bonfire on the beach and everyone else had departed home to all parts of the country, my wife and I continued our travels to the west coast and up the Northern Peninsula. Naturally I told my whale tale and because of this, heard of other people’s close encounters. There’d been a young beluga visiting around St.Anthony and yet another around Codroy (Echo), both of whom were exhibiting the same gregarious behaviour and aggressively socializing with humans. As far as I know this is not their natural behaviour. They usually travel in pods. So all this and the fact that it wasn’t just a lone whale exhibiting this behaviour made it all the more intriguing.
When I arrived home I did some internet investigations, telling my story and asking for information. I received a letter telling me that what I had done was illegal. There is a ten thousand dollar fine for harassing whales and swimming with them is considered harassment. The person responding said my story was interesting and that she would forward my questions on to someone else. Not too long after that I received another reply from an organization that is studying this beluga phenomena. They have profiled and documented on a website a number of belugas found around Newfoundland and the Gulf of St. Lawrence demonstrating this wonderful yet strange conduct. None of the belugas on the site are the one we met, but the one from the west coast (Echo) who had been wounded by a propeller is there.
I do understand why maybe humans shouldn’t interact so closely with these whales. If they are fed by humans, which I personally did not see happen, but undoubtedly does, they could become dependent and therefore at risk. But I concur with Charlie Falk about getting in the water with a wild whale. That whale was seeking people out and contact would have been difficult to avoid. It was the thrill of a lifetime and I did not feel fear or the cold of the water, I was so completely in the moment. My wife and I have a running joke: someone must have hired these whales to do PR (Public Relations) because once you have met one in this fashion you feel bonded, would never harm one and would do anything for them.
This is not my first whale experience. When I was a young teenager an older cousin and I sat in a punt surrounded by a group of minkies wondering if they ever came up under boats. I’ve watched from a headland as fishermen herded them away from their nets. I’ve played guitar sitting on a stool sized whale vertebrae and have whale bone carvings in my home. I have listened to an old outport fisherman friend tell me about a whale that had visited him on a daily basis at a certain fishing ground. In 2002 my grandkids got to see a whale and heard over and over how grandpa rode one. Every time I am in Newfoundland, I see whales. Even this past year, though I spent more time in the interior trout fishing, every time we went to a coast, we saw whales. I feel deeply privileged.
I have gotten quite a bit of mileage out of this whale story. When I start to tell it I say ” last summer I rode a whale”. Eyes widen and jaws drop. I understand, they picture some Moby Dick style leviathan with a tiny human standing on it’s back. I love and savour the moment and even let it drag a second or two before I proceed to bring them back to reality and tell them about swimming with a smooth, sleek, highly intelligent, twelve to sixteen foot beluga. And what an amazing experience it was!

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.