CHAPTER #13

God's Country, new home, new job.

I rolled up to Canada Customs in my overloaded VW, opened the car door and fell out with two frantic cats glued to my back and shoulders. Disengaging them carefully I led them over to a patch of grass expecting them to do the decent thing. They had a different plan in mind and made straight for a nicely tended flower garden: Eden compared to the sardine can they had just left. I spent the next fifteen minutes untangling leashes and trying to get them back into the car, yowling pitifully, so that I could check my papers through Customs.

Easier said than done. Because Don was not travelling with me I was viewed with suspicion even though my documents were in perfect order. For two hours the cats and I tried to comfort each other while we waited for permission to enter Canada. It was dark when we were finally allowed to pass and there were still another two or three hours to go before reaching Port Hope, with cats pacing the car like caged ocelots on heroin.

Asleep, that night, my nightmare journey replayed endlessly while our two cats prowled up and down stairs in Pap's antique laden house. At 3 a.m. I was thumped and jostled awake by two excited felines batting a dead mouse around in the middle of my bed. Horrified, I woke Don, who gallantly leaped out of bed, picked up the mouse by its tail, threw it into the toilet, and flushed. Still shaken by the rude awakening, I decided to use the facilities myself. I lifted the lid and saw the poor moribund mouse still floating in the bowl - water pressure hadn't been strong enough to push it all the way down so Don had to use the toilet brush to send it on its final journey. What a night.

In the morning I was greeted by a stormy Pap. He had discovered some lumps of what looked like cat poop on the dining room carpet and was not at all pleased. On closer examination the lumps turned out to be dead baby mice unearthed from a nest that must have existed behind the fireplace screen. Pap's face lit up at this discovery and from that moment on he was pleased to have our cats in his house - even when they broke one of a pair of prized vases later on.

Because that old house was home to many mice I had to close my eyes to the carnage that ensued. For the privilege of staying in Port Hope, those poor rodents had to pay with their lives. The sooner we found a place of our own the safer they would be.

Pap took a great interest in the search for our new home and he came with us to see the final selections I had culled with the help of an estate agent. The vote was unanimous for the house we have lived in now for thirty-three years. The front is unprepossessing but the back takes us into a wilderness ravine filled with wildlife that includes foxes, raccoons, skunks, ground hogs, chipmunks, squirrels, birds, and even the occasional deer and coyote.

So, after the big move had been made, we settled in and I hoped that we would never have to move again. I told myself that the only travelling I wanted to do from now on was to make occasional visits to my family in South Africa.

Don was soon back into his workaholic daze at the office, and finding a new job for me turned out to be relatively easy. Within a month I had started work for the two senior partners of Marshall, Macklin and Monaghan, consulting engineers and surveyors, with offices on Don Mills Road. It was a job that turned out to be mutually satisfying and I made a great many new friends there.

It was at about this time, also, that I started getting commissions to paint portraits for some of the staff who had discovered my hidden hobby. I even did a partially nude painting of one of the girls in the office (for her husband, she said). He came along to supervise the pose, which I then photographed, and painted later on.

Now that we were settled in a community of our own I intended to join an arts group, so it was exciting to discover that there was an organization called The Art Guild of Scarborough just a few blocks from our house. What luck! I dialled the number, got through to the secretary, and was invited to attend one of the Thursday evening meetings at the local community centre. I clearly remember the names of the members I sat between that night, including the name of the artist who was demonstrating. It was such a stimulating experience that I joined up right away, started attending meetings regularly, and have continued to do so for the past thirty-two years. Who would have thunk it??

Back in 1970 there were under fifty members in the Guild and it was easy to join. Nowadays, with a membership of one hundred and seventy-five, it takes two to three years on a waiting list before it is possible to become a member. All of which just goes to prove what a good organization it is.

Meanwhile, Pap was jigging along comfortably with Jimmy as his general factotum-cum-driver, helped out by a lady friend of Jimmy's in the housekeeping and cooking department. Then one day, quite out of the blue, Jimmy just up and died of a heart attack. This sudden turn of events threw Papboy into a real tizzy. The lady friend-cum-cook decided she didn't want to stay on without Jimmy and Pap was obliged to seek new help. He came to stay with us while a proper search was conducted.

Pap and I pored over the replies to an advertisement we had placed in the newspaper. Several interviews were arranged and I served tea to prospective applicants in the living room. Papboy, as usual, wanted to do all the talking so I learned to do some quiet probing on the side. After the applicants had left we discussed our impressions and it was left up to Pap to make up his mind. Most of them were not at all inspiring and we had got down to the last couple: Nellie and Norman, without having made a choice.

Norman was small and pale with a rather unctuous manner, but he was respectful and well-dressed. Nellie looked nice in an old-fashioned way and was patently eager to please. They had good references and were quite willing to relocate to Port Hope because they knew there was an excellent Kingdom Hall there. Uh, oh. Nellie and Norman were Jehovahs Witnesses. If they tried to convert a crusty old Baptist like Pap there would be trouble. But..."We'll, give it a try," said Pap.

Norman spent countless hours polishing, not only the silver, but all of the doorknobs in the house and Nellie kept everyone well fed. Pap was having some trouble with his own heart at this time and, mindful of Michael's and Jimmy's fate, was disposed to take a little more care of himself. This took the form of only having two pieces of bacon and one egg for breakfast instead of his usual double portions of both.

Genevieve grows up.

In 1971 the Orthogenic School reminded Kay that Genevieve would be required to leave Chicago after her birthday in March. Kay, living in Vineland again with Larry and Rod, was by now deeply involved in owl conservation with huge outdoor cages built to house the hundreds of owls that were being sent to her for rehabilitation. Introducing Genevieve into this environment would be disastrous for the birds and extremely stressful for both Kay and Larry. So Kay sought alternatives, one of which was the Whitby Psychiatric Hospital.

Some time later Don and I were asked to attend a meeting at the hospital, with Kay and Larry, to discuss Genevieve's possible admittance. We were advised that there would be no therapy or individual care for Genevieve, that she would be placed in a large ward with patients of all ages, given a small dresser for her clothes, and essentially left to her own devices. Don wept quietly throughout the entire meeting and it was left to Kay to ask a number of pertinent questions.

For Kay, placing Genevieve in Whitby seemed like the only alternative. On the way home, however, I urged Don to stop crying, and said that we could not allow Genevieve to be placed in what was essentially an insane asylum: if need be I would give up my job to look after her myself. Of course, I had no idea what taking care of Genevieve might involve, it was just an emotional response to a situation which seemed untenable for both of us.

The first thing I did was write to Dr. Bettleheim to ask his advice about Genevieve's continuing care. His reply did not recommend that she stay with us at home. He said Genevieve needed to lead a very structured life among peers, that she would never grow beyond the present stage of her development and that trying to keep her at home would have extremely negative effects on other family members. So there it was. What to do now?

I wrote to Kay to ask if she would reconsider her decision to place Genevieve in the Whitby Hospital and offered to try to find an alternative home for her from Toronto. Kay gratefully agreed to let me try so I contacted my old employers, the Canadian Association for Retarded Children. They referred me to Suffolk House, which was a testing facility, and I arranged to take Genevieve in for evaluation as soon as we had fetched her from Chicago. The carriage was in place and all we had to do now was set the wheels in motion. I wrote to Dr. Bettleheim again and told him of our plans. Fine, we could pick her up in May.

Regretfully I explained the situation to my employers and then handed in my resignation. They were kind, sympathetic and understanding. I still wear the gift I received at a farewell party they gave for me: a gold charm bracelet with two charms on it: one is a little desk with a typewriter on it (the typewriter flips over and disappears beneath the desk), and the other is my zodiac sign, Virgo. The bracelet has acquired a few more charms over the years and it doesn't jangle any more because now I wear it as a necklace instead.

Next I decorated a room for Genevieve, complete with stuffed toys and children's books. Everything was in readiness as we set off for Chicago by car early one Saturday morning. Both of us nervous, not knowing what to expect, we went straight to the School so as not to waste any time because our plan was to be back in Toronto by nightfall.

The transfer of Genevieve into our care was effected very quickly with no instructions given nor advice received. She left with a suitcase containing all of her clothes and one small circular green bath mat. Genevieve herself seemed nervously excited and I don't really think she knew she was leaving Chicago forever.

Uninterested in the pillows, blanket or small cuddly musical toy on the back seat, Genevieve kept yelling loudly and pointing at anything passing by. Wound up like a spring ready to go "sproing" at any moment, her speech was all but incomprehensible to us. We stopped once for supper - and to go to the washroom - and then, many hours later, arrived home totally drained and exhausted, ready to collapse.

Not Genevieve, though. She was as hyper as she had been when we first got her. However, I unpacked her suitcase, helped her to wash and get into pyjamas, wound up her musical toy and told her it was time to go to sleep. We both kissed her goodnight, put out the light and fell into bed ourselves. It felt like one of the longest and most stressful days of our lives.

At 2 a.m. I sat bolt upright in bed: there were lights on and music was playing loudly. I jumped up and found Genevieve fully dressed in the same clothes she had taken off no more than three hours before; every light in the house had been turned on, including all the elements on the stove, and the stereo was blaring out classical music. "No, no, Genevieve, honey," I said. "It's still night time. You will have to go back to sleep." So I helped her to undress, put on her pyjamas, and tucked her into bed again. I showed her a small alarm clock, pointed to 8 o'clock and told her not to get up before that time. Then we went back to sleep and I think she did too.

The five days that Genevieve spent at Suffolk House being tested were tough on her. For someone who needed to live in a structured environment the world must have seemed terribly disjointed and uncertain. She had been plucked from her home of nineteen years by a father she hardly knew and a stepmother she knew not at all; then taken into an unfamiliar house before ending up in another institution being examined by at least 15 psychologists.... I can't begin to imagine what it must have been like for her.

When I drove down to visit with her each day they told me that she had been crying in the night. Poor Genevieve. It was a relief for both of us when the fifth day came and I was called to a meeting with the staff and psychologists. Don was unable to be present and my heart was beating fast as I sat at a table with at least fifteen other people to hear the results of their assessment.

The bottom line was that Genevieve had the mental development of a four year old and was unlikely to improve beyond that point. They recommended a privately run home in Campbellford, On. and gave me the name and telephone number of the people to contact. Genevieve and I drove home, two strangers who were destined to get to know each other very well in the future.

The results of the assessment were expected by us since they had already been confirmed by Dr. Bettleheim. However, it was encouraging to think that there might be a permanent residence for Genevieve with all the fine qualities that had been described to me at Suffolk House. So I called Mrs. Ridley at Wingfield and she invited us to bring Genevieve up for a preliminary visit. We fixed on two weeks away as we planned to take her up to the cottage for a vacation first. "Stay for lunch and don't forget to bring Genevieve's bathing suit" were the last words Mrs. Ridley said before I put down the phone.

We had a reasonably good visit with Genevieve at the cottage; she was disposed to reach out to us at that time and would often almost choke me by clinging to my neck. It was also extremely exhausting because Genevieve has a very short fuse and is quick to throw a tantrum. Over the years she has broken her bed and several lamps and radios that I know of. She tends to pick up anything that is close to her and let it fly. Because she has no control of her emotions, I have learned to control my own in response to her tantrums so I just leave her alone to get over her bad humour. I would be pretty bad humoured myself if I had her limitations.

Wingfield turned out to be the perfect place for Genevieve. With a large farmhouse and three additional buildings beside, it is owned and operated by a Dutch family called the Klompmakers who treat their charges with great care and compassion.

The setting is rural and most residents also attend a sheltered workshop in Campbellford during the week. We know that Genevieve is happy there now. It didn't happen overnight, of course, but she has at last come to understand that she has two homes and that they are interchangeable.

Each year Genevieve participates in the Special Olympics in Kingston and she looks forward to it for many months: she runs and jumps in the competitions, everyone gets a medal (win or lose) "and hamburgers and coke and French fries" as I am told often enough. She is also a sports fan with a large collection of hockey and baseball cards. Don spends countless hours sorting them into teams and putting them in albums for her and then, as soon as he looks the other way she takes them out, shuffles them around and puts them in her pocket.

Genevieve also loves pomp and ceremony, and anything to do with the Royal family or the Pope or marching bands or Mary Poppins and the Sound of Music. She goes to church regularly in Campbellford and I've heard her trying to hum hymns when she hears them on TV - oh, and she loves Jesus too, especially at Christmas time when she's home for two weeks. Normally she comes home once a month for four days (to watch Sesame Street, go shopping and to the movies for popcorn).

Now that Genevieve is fifty she has put on some weight and has to take pills to lower her cholesterol. Just like her Dad. Apart from that I think she is as well and as happy as she can be under the circumstances.

I would like it if she didn't wet the bed every night, of course, but otherwise we are grateful that she has friends among her peers and is as functional as she is. And every day of our lives we bless her caregivers at Wingfield.

Oh, dear, Papboy was definitely getting frailer now....suffering from congestive heart failure but still getting around reasonably well. Unfortunately Norman and Nellie decided to retire and so once again the search was on for replacements. Pap moved back with us and we went through the usual routine. This time he ended up with a very strange couple indeed. A large rather blowsy woman who came into our living room with a tiny little Chihuahua tucked under her arm, accompanied by a husband whom I barely remember. The Chihuahua started yapping the moment he saw our cats and they promptly disappeared under a bed, terrified at the sight of such a strange creature.

Even though I did not have a good feeling about this couple, Pap invited them to start immediately. They turned out to be very disappointing, often absent doing something else when Pap wanted them, and meals were not well prepared either. However, they were all going to jig along together uncomfortably for at least a little while longer.

When I joined the Art Guild of Scarborough in 1970 I had no idea that it would set me on a long path of volunteerism that would last for many decades. It started in my first year with an art show, proceeded in the second year to being Vice-president, then later as Secretary, and President (several times over the years). In '74 the Guild nominated me to receive the award for Visual Arts presented each year (along with many others) by the Recreation & Parks Department to honour volunteers. The plaque I was given is still proudly displayed in our TV room. More about volunteering later, though.

The exciting news of the moment was that Mum was planning to visit us again and intended to stay for six months. This time we were going to make sure to spend a lot more time up at the cottage. Before she arrived, I rushed around spiffing up the house so that it would be neat and tidy enough to pass inspection when she arrived. (My sister-in-law, Joan, is a superb cook and housekeeper, you see, so there are definitely times when I suffer from the comparison.)

Mum loved our new house and spent a lot of time sitting out in the back garden reading or knitting. She's an outdoorsy person, my Mum, and a sportswoman too. Actually I'm not really sure that she IS my Mum because she often says she doesn't know where she got me.

I quickly caught up on all the South African news: my niece Cheryl, a dancer, teaching ballet classes at twenty two; Geoffrey, now twenty still into mischief, and Raylene getting ready to take a Home Economics course at College. It was going to be my turn to visit South Africa in '75 and I couldn't wait to see them all again.

One day early in '73 I received a phone call from the couple who were looking after Pap. They wanted to let us know that they would be leaving Port Hope because Papboy was becoming difficult and he was also walking around without his trousers on! Hmm. Pap was obviously getting fuzzy.... the trousers story didn't surprise me much (remember the washbasin down on the dock?) but I suspect that he was just walking around looking for his under shorts. Clearly, though, Pap's health was deteriorating and he could no longer live alone. I suggested that, instead of looking for new housekeepers, he should come to live with us and he agreed.

The house in Port Hope was sold and all the magnificent antiques and other contents auctioned off by either Sotheby's or Waddingtons over a period of two days. It would have been painful for Pap to see his belongings being bandied around so he didn't attend the sale, but Joan and I were there to keep track on his behalf.

So Pap moved into our downstairs TV room with some of his own favourite pieces of furniture around him. His double bed, a comfortable chair and lamp, a small Persian carpet. We bought a new colour TV which he couldn't really hear but enjoyed watching nevertheless. Even his eyesight was marginal by then because one day he told me that women were silly because they put "Oil of Clay" on their faces. Papboy loved the mohair rug that was given to me when I left AOC in South Africa and relinquished it only when he died in 1975.

Having Pap at home was a bit distracting. He kept trying to orchestrate my paintings (he had done a few, himself, in his salad days) so I decided to take up decoupage in self defence. After completing the first course I was asked by the instructor to teach a class of beginners myself. Flattered, I agreed, and spent the next two years teaching a succession of ladies how to convert plain bottles into elegantly decorated ones, with unusual tops, and how to shape wood into interesting wall plaques using electric drills and sandpaper. Once the shapes had been created, magazine photographs or fancy wrapping papers were used to create designs on them and these would then be overlain with up to fifteen or more layers of varnish.

One of my pieces was even featured on TV: Channel 9's news program previewing the first show by the Decoupeurs Guild of Ontario. It also won a cup for best design under varnish so I was quite chuffed about that. Unfortunately all the sanding that decoupage required eventually gave me bursitis in my right elbow and I had to quit but I still have many pieces around to remind me of that phase of my life.

Pap used to spend his days reading, eating caramel candies, dozing and watching TV. He had become very frail, wouldn't eat properly (no doubt because of the candies) and his heart problem was getting worse. His ankles were swollen all of the time and he had become totally incontinent.

It was a sad day in 1975 when Papboy died in hospital at the age of 88. His ashes were scattered up at Pig and to commemorate his memory his name is inscribed on a totem at the Pine Hills Cemetery in Scarborough. William Thomas Aikins MacFadyen was a kind and generous man whose presence is still very much a part of our lives. I think of him every time I see a chipmunk.

Rod turned twenty-one in 1975 and at this point was studying biology at Queen's University. We drove to Kingston on his birthday to celebrate the occasion; he seemed pleased to see us but I thought he looked really lonely.

Rod has always been an introverted and solitary soul who does not assimilate comfortably into social gatherings or make friends easily. Unlike his garrulous father and grandfather (or maybe because of them), Rod is the calm, silent type who rarely speaks. I've always thought a happy medium would be nice but, ever since I got hooked up with the MacFadyen family, that has turned out to be an unattainable dream.

Rod eventually left Queen's U and completed his degree at Brock University in Vineland. It was difficult to find employment from that rural community so in 1976 he came to live with us. Rod moped around without any direction for several months before Don sent him to a company that assessed candidates' intellectual capacity and suggested optimum career paths. Seems our dear Rod came out in the top 3% of intelligence.

When I asked him a little while ago what career paths had been suggested for him he said: "Used car salesman". Yeah, right. Salesman was the last choice on the list, with computers very near the bottom. At any rate whatever the prime suggestions were, Rod was soured on academia and would have none of it. Eventually I bullied him into taking a computer course at Control Data and after that he went to work as a programmer for IBM.

Rod grew a beard during his first vacation so that nobody would ever know whether he was smiling or not. Despite the fact that he has a successful career at IBM and has received numerous awards to prove it, he would retire in a heartbeat to cultivate and plant native wildflowers in the garden and spend time playing with our cats. Soon, Rod, soon.... only eighteen more years to go.