Memories are affected by trauma. Individual and collective. The trauma is like a spirochete infection. The white blood cells can’t kill it so they wall it off. Sometimes there are these spaces in our memories of various lengths of time which are empty. They’re like the scar tissues the body makes to wall off the infections. Around some memories there are these walls. Out from them the tissue is disrupted. It’s the same with the body fighting cancer how the immunological system keeps the host alive and wards off the sick.
The Cuban Missile or Kennedy Missile Crisis is like that. I don’t remember much after the conclusion. There’s a mix of the Bay of Pigs and later the Kennedy Assasination but I remember walking about in a fog after the Kennedy Missile Crisis. It was really very quiet. Like a city without bird song. It took us kids a while to get back to laughter. The Cold War wasn’t over and we’d all come to the brink of mutual annihilation and we kids knew fear. The adults, after Khrushchev, the Bang the Table guy, stood down, continued to feel the menace. I continued to have nightmares of Russian soldiers with Kalishnekovs and Tanks in the streets of Fort Garry. I took comfort from knowing my Dad’s lever action 30-30 was there and my brother’s shot gun and my 22 rifle. I thought we could protect Mom. We all had to protect Mom. The world revolved around Mom. Without Mom even the dog wouldn’t know what to do. He was Dad’s dog mostly but he loved Mom. A liver coloured springer spaniel central to the family.
So the Cold War continued. We were afraid. But there was a reprieve. The adults acted like things were okay so eventually we forgot a little. We played baseball and hockey like everything was okay. We all waited till the Berlin Wall came down. Only then could we breathe freely.
I got the strap after that. I continued to fight in the playground with the other guy. I’d take on three to one bullies and survive. The whole idea was to make the other guys suffer so they thought twice about coming back for more. The girls continued to play “Red Rover Red Rover I call Billy over.” In the gym the boys would play “Murder Ball”. We’d run around drill each other with this single heavy ball. Everyone tried not to get hit. It hurt like hell if you did. Boys running and screaming around in circles in our shite t shirts and shorts. It was crazy fun. I learned it’s been outlawed now for decades.
We had square dancing too. I think that was Mrs. Glover and Mrs. Murray. Country and western music and callers. “ Dosie doe. Swing your partner to and fro!” Touching girls. The angry ones and the happy ones.. Lots of laughter. Learning left from right. Dance was always a military tradition.
Then there was band. One of those sweet lady teachers had the band. Probably Mrs. Murray. We each would get an instrument. She tried us each out on every one. There was a band hiarchy. The more training or complexity the more difficult , the higher it stood on the band scale. Piano was the highest. Teacher played that but one of the girls played too, and one of the guys. Very simple three cord songs. Not classical by any means. There was some string instrument but mostly tambarines and triangles and sticks. One kazoo. I loved the kazoo. The class band was heavy on percussion. I started out at the top of the band and slowly moved through the ranks till I ended up at the lowest end on sticks. I liked to make noise and had a couple of friends who I’d get going. I was called an ‘instigator’. I never got the strap in band though. Just lost the tambourine , kazoo,drum and triangle positions. I was definitely downwardly mobile in the band. You can’t make a lot of noise or cause much disruption with sticks. I eventually broke them. There was no penalty. Band was supposed to be a fun time. Math, Science, English and History were the serious subjects. Breaking my musical instrument, albeit, sticks, I predated heavy metal performers by at least decades.
I believe it was Mrs. Glover who taught us geography in gr. 4. I remember her because she gave us this homework assignment to read about a country we were studying then write letters home about our trip.
“I’ve been giving this assignment to children all my career,” Mrs. Glover told my mother in front of me on parent teacher night. “Billy has taken more interest than any other student ever has. He’s read more and written more about each country.”
That fall studying geography of different countries had been a magical time for me. I couldn’t wait to get home and read about another country. Looking at the pictures, reading the stories, I was transported to that place and wrote ecstatically about my encounters, the people, the land, their customs. Funny how that is. Years later I’d be bicycling across Europe writing letters home after the real encounter with the art and people of those dry same countries. It was eerily prescient.There I was describing what I saw and being truly overjoyed by the experience. Loving meeting others, seeing new old architecture, experiencing man’s greatest achievements.
James Michener would become a favourite writer. I’d read dozens of his incredibly written and researched books. I’d study anthropology in the 80’s. I love Fran’s Boas. My individual and academic interest in cross cultural encounters way before it was even much of a subject at university. In psychiatry I was definitely way ahead of my time in that regard. Yet there in Gr. 4 with Mrs. Glover I’d got the seed. Teachers did that. They planted seeds. With water, sunshine and the right environment the seeds grew into adult experiences rich in breadth and depth. I was truly blessed to have those teachers and to attend Viscount Alexander.
Somewhere in these years psychologists came to the school. They gave some of us all kinds of tests. I think it was done in gr. 5 and again in gr 7 or 8. I just remember these tests because years later I’d give similar or the same ones to kids. What came of it though was definitely life changing. My parents were brought in to the school. That was the first time I heard the word ‘genius’ . I wasn’t alone. I remember Kirk and I talking because he’d apparently scored so high there was talk of him going to a special school. I know they wanted to give me a scholarship to this place but my Dad and Mom didn’t want me ‘treated like a freak.” There were two sisters too who we all knew were off all the scales. They even made Kirk and me think we were slow. There was this one girl also who was really quiet and had the cutest smile but she really rocked intellectually. I guess I knew I was smart. I was often correcting teachers. Whenever I wanted to I got A’s and understood things really a whole lot quicker than everyone I knew. Except my brother Ron. He was way smarter, in an applied science and academic way. My friend Kirk was even more a genius than I was. His family were all smart but I think he was smarter. The sisters we knew were down right freaky. They’d be into goth and stuff like that way before there was a trend. We talked physics with them as kids. We were all interest in space back then.
Looking back I was really blessed to have these really bright and talented classmates. It probably shouldn’t have been much of a surprise. Lots of us kids had professional parents. Lots had parents who taught at the university. This was the closest district where lots of university folk chose to live. Lots of alumni too. My Dad and Mom had specifically picked Fort Garry because it had ’ good schools’. I don’t know what criteria they used but it really was true. Looking back I had some of the smartest and kindest teachers. It would certainly help make some friends who were the most exceptional human beings. Their careers in later life showed it.
Some were slow kids for sure but a whole lot of super smart kids. We didn’t feel so different. I was worried for a while Kirk was going to go off to a special school but none of us did. Instead we got a whole bunch of ‘enhanced’ studies. For a while there was special class. For the first time I wasn’t bored in class. I stopped getting the strap. That was gr 5. I was 11 and school became really interesting.
We had a private rich kids school built along British lines in the neighbourhood for boys. It was considered really strict and really expensive but the school never achieved anything in sports and the students we knew who went there in later years were usually kids who had behavioural problems. The parents had to have money. We’d still see these guys on weekends sometimes but it was like they left the neighbourhood when they put on that school uniform
The months after being told we were geniuses were interesting. The teachers treated me a whole lot better. Kirk was always a nice guy and didn’t get into trouble so I don’t think it affected him so much. But I and the scarey sisters were treated a lot differently. Suddenly the teachers were stoped getting knee jerk angry with me and instead thought about what we were asking or saying
I’d learn years later of a psychological study where some psychologists came into a school and gave the kids a whole lot of tests then told the teachers the stupid ones were super bright. I wondered if that had happened even though no one ever called me stupid. From as long as I can remember I was told ‘you’re too bright for your britches.’ I always felt different. Still when I read about that study I couldn’t help remembering how we were overnight ‘different’. I sure did like the enhanced study, the biology, and history, and the extra books. By then I’d read most everything in the library that interested me. Whenever I had any free time I was reading. I loved the encyclopedia. I read it once.
Kirk and I were good in sports too. Just natural athletes. Again, even though Kirk and I excelled we never thought we were that good because we knew other kids who were great. Parents and teachers were always concerned about us ‘thinking we were so good’ but kids just naturally compare. They don’t necessarily compete. We had Keith Carter in our class. aKeith was unbelievably athletic, a truly talented gymnast. He went onto compete in the Olympics representing Canada. We didn’t think we were ‘better than’ the other kids. We just knew that each kid was different. We saw kids had some gifts.
One kid who was into mathematics wasn’t good at murder ball but he was more coordinated in square dancing. Another kid who wasn’t very bright at all academically could throw balls like no tomorrow. He went on to be a foot baller.
Kirk, Boris, and I and a few that were ‘all rounders’. Everyone excelled in some things, some in two or three things. We three were really good in most things. Success in one thing brings confidence and confidence then spreads. I didn’t know what I excelled in athletically at first. We just tried everything which itself made us different fro a lot of kids afraid to fail or content to be one trick ponies.
I had excelled in writing letters home to my mother from imaginary travels. But in sports I was just generally good at stuff. It helped that I coordinated. I was called a ‘Billy goat’ because I was so sure footed. I ran up hills leaping from boulder to boulder. School was good for kids. It gave us so many opportunities. In later years I’d look back with amazement and realize the ancient Greeks understood this when they set up the first games. Only last year I met a national champion shot putter. You’d never think this doctor friend was an athlete but sure enough he was. Just like the national champion dart thrower I met. They’d found a niche and capitalized on it, becoming the best. I even met a champion horse shoe pitcher.
The key was participation. The kids broke up into those who tried and joined and those who had attitude. We saw that the smokers stopped doing sports. Yet in track and field it was clear there were so many opportunities to excel. It would become even more pronounced a couple of years later after we had our growth spurts and kids found their natural grooves. I was never a sprinter but being ornery I could run long distance. Not that I won anything but I was one of the hundreds of kids that ran miles. I never did do a marathon. I was so proud of my brother when he was older, trained and ran a marathon. Here in Vancouver hundreds of thousands come out for the walk and run 5 km events. They’re so different from that whole bunch of people who say “I could do anything if I was interested.”
The fact was the successful simply were more willing to fail and take the humiliation and get back up, like a baby learning to walk. Everything I did I started out bad at. I was ‘lucky’ (we say that’s God acting anonymously and I really got a lot of prayers from my mom and a lot of encouragement from my Dad). I was a fairly quick study.
I’ll never forget when a couple of years later Kirk got interested in volleyball. He had a thing for it. So as his friend I’d be out in the back lane with his volleying until it was dark. My supergenius friend was this obsessed volleyball nutbar who needed someone to play with. We’d both end up on the provincial championship team years later because of his insanity and weird drive. That’s just how it worked.
There were so many things that were offered in school. Chess clubs. Debating societies. Science clubs. Long Jump. High jump. Cheer leading. Drama. Choir. I’d play chess and later get involved in photography too. There was literally something for everyone. The kids that participated really did do well and succeed in life. I’d learn later that the kids who had problems usually just isolated or didn’t want to stick to things.
When a study of childhood was done years ago, every intelligence test known was given these kids but years later looking back the researchers found that the ‘marshmallow test’ was the one that was most likely to difffentiate the ones who went on to be most successful, rich, powerful, in life. In the marshmallow test the teacher put a marshmallow on the desk of the gr 1 students later in the morning. She said the kids could eat the marshmallow while she was out but if they waited till she came back they could eat that marshmallow and get another marshmallow as well.
The kids who waited, having the capacity for ‘self control’ and ‘delayed gratification’ , were the ones who were most likely to complete phd’s, become professionals, get journeyman tickets , run businesses, and/or become millionaires.
Kirk and I and the crazy sisters would have passed the marshmallow test hands down. Years later working in the field of addiction I’d see that drugs affected the reward circuit in the people’s brains. The last part of the brain to develop in the human species was the fore brain, sometimes called the human brain , because it was so associated with planing and organization. McLean described the basal brain as the lizard brain. It did all those basic housekeeping tasks like feeding, defecating, breathing, sleeping, digesting, fighting and flighting, aggression and territory and basic reproduction. This was all located basically in lower brain and brain stem. Reptiles , like psychopaths,developmentally missed the more advanced functions. McLean’s described the animal brain or emotional brain that was found in the ‘mid brain’ . It was what gave the kinship and relationship world of the animal. The whole Jurassic Park backstory was that the dinosaurs and birds had developed this capacity for group behaviours. Reptiles in our world didn’t work together or hunt together but some dinsosaurs grouped together and had coordiated attacks. This ‘cooperative behaviour’ had previously been considered purely an ‘animal’ or ‘warm blooded’ development. Animals have the capacity for familial love.
The human brain carries this greatest capacity for ‘delayed gratification’. I did try to teach my dog to let some meat sit on his nose until I gave the command to eat. He did it but it’s not one of his better skills. Advanced civilization required planning specialization and a whole lot of delayed gratification. I remember medical school as a whole lot of delayed gratification. It was worse than early days of courtship and some might argue the instant gratification of the ‘sex, drugs, and rock and roll generation was a set back.
Drugs disrupt this capacity. Discipline certainly can enhance it. The marshmallow test showed this in 5 year olds.
Kirk had me playing volley ball with him hours past when I thought it was fun.
Erickson called the years between 5 and 12 the ‘industrial years’. That’s when kids do things with their environment, art, sports, all the exploration. Today when I meet people thoroughly defeated in life I ask them about this time. Often what gave them joy then and was forgotten goes on to be the cornerstone of a new life, new career or new hobbies. These were the years when another friend was shooting at the goal all day long at the ice rink. He put up targets. He’d go on to play in the national hockey leagues or near to it. Kirk did the volleyball thing. That started in Gr. 5.. I don’t know what I was doing. Mostly I remember muddling along. Not that I wasn’t keenly interested and learning vociferously.
My aunt Sally had this expensive guitar. She gave it to the family. Ron wasn’t interested in guitar so it was decided I’d learn guitar. I began lessons in ‘slide guitar’. No one we knew in the city played ‘slide guitar’. Dad was from the north, everyone in the country and especially in the north admired the country and western ‘slide guitar’ players. Rock and roll, Elvis, Holly, and the lot were coming in at that time. The contemporary music in my child world was anything but country western That was old fogie stuff like square dancing. I did my lessons. I wasn’t interested. I’d practice in front of the tv. A year later Dad got angry and said he wasn’t going to waste any more money on a kid learning to play guitar if he wasn’t going to practice. So I stopped playing ‘slide guitar’ not realizing that a few years later a ‘slide guitar’ player could have joined any band. Even the Beatles and Rolling Stones would have benefitted from a slide guitar in some of their songs. I was a kid and missed a great opportunity. The tv was far more interesting than learning to read music. I had my year though. It would stand me in good stead for later endeavours. I’ve always enjoyed messing around with guitar. I was Like all those guys and girls who learned classical piano but really wanted to play honkey tonk. As kids we were so often playing out our parents fantasies. We could do a lot worse.
Years later Dad who hated the Beatles and wouldn’t allow me to play Bob Dylan in the house, told me he thought Gordon Lightfoot was good music. At least he liked one of the artist I did. Dad never stopped loving country and western, Hank Williams and Gene Autrey being favourites. I did however grow up in a home where music was appreciated. My mother loved gospel. My own life was enriched with music even though I never liked my parents interest in music till I was much older.
At school I played sticks in the band. As for the scarey sisters whatever they did they did really well. They were ahead of their times in everything. They would go on to be so weird and cool. Kirk and I liked that they liked us but once they became beauties they were intelligent enough to go out with guys twice our age. I liked my friends who were nerds before nerds were a things, kids who would tell me about their chemistry sets or tying flies .The guys down the street made a car that was totally illegal. Intermittently it would suddenly speed around the neighbourhood then go back into the garage, just a frame, an engine and wheels. Those were the older guys. In Gr. 5 we were just beginning to soup up our bicycles. We were riding a lot together as groups of three or five.
Gr. 5 and being 11 was a good year I guess. My grandmother , my mother’ s mother died around then. She’d come to live with us for a number of years in the front room. Her death sucked big time. I cried and missed her. Don’t know why I took it so hard. I took death hard as a kid. I’d been able to sit with her and she loved to listen and she loved the dog. She was all crippled with arthritis, slow and old. Mom was happier when she was alive.
My father’s father and the cowboy and logging uncles would visit from time to time most years. That was a big event. They’d stay for a week. The house would be rowdy, lots of men and noise. Granddad had the big boat of a car. They’d always arrive with four or more. All of them wore suits like Elliot Ness. We’d go out to restaurants, talk of cows and logging. Stories of moving outhouses and community dances, northern neighbours and all that sort of stuff would go on. Dad would become more connected. We’d listen with rapt attention as kids. My grandfather and uncles loved that I was learning guitar. They’d want me to play. I’d play the slide guitar for them. They’d love it. I knew maybe one country song. But it was what they wanted every year for several years.. You’d think I was Waylon Jennings the applause I got.
I wonder whatever happened to the crazy sisters. I must ask Kirk. Last I heard they gone academic in some field as an after thought. I read about them in the news, one of them overseas doing something unusual. A lot of kids from those years really did interesting things. I loved going to a high school reunion years later and learning about the kid who was a playwright on Broadway, another girl with three children and a guy who built computers. It was a real blessing to be surrounded by such bright and sometimes brilliant friends. I didn’t feel different or out of place then . We were all accepted . We had these great teachers, this great neighbourhood and a whole lot of great parents.
Years later I’d read Alice Miller’s, Drama of the Gifted Child. I realize Kirk and I and the other few kids had got everything she said was good for a year or two at least.
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