The house is just to the west of the Meadowlark Shopping Centre, or about a half a mile this side of where the West Edmonton Mall now stands, if you want to look at it that way. This street is actually kind of hidden. 87th is an artery, but you slip over as you go westbound, onto a kind of auxiliary street. You take a quick right off of that auxiliary street and go down the alley that opens up there. It gives onto this quiet street. Turn to the left. We're just down on the right side, just before the end.
Here's another photo:
Doesn't give a very complete impression, does it? Should I bother saying that it's smaller than I remember it? There's the living room on the left. This is a split level home, by the way, or as you can see. It's very much of its time, though it's an architectural approach that's now fallen pretty far out of favour.
Kids don't know about that stuff. I remember thinking that the stairs and the various levels were pretty cool. Really cool, actually. So many things going on, so much to do, in so many ways! For instance, I'm remembering that living room for the way Scott, or our Uncle Robbie, on a couple of occasions, gave me bucking bronco rides there. You'd try to hang on, and you'd get flipped off. I was little, mind. These rides were just a little bit scary, in a safe sort of way. They were a challenge, physically and strategically. How do you stay on this thing?!
As these things go, it was as much of a pleasure to get unseated. There's probably something profound in that. It's the aspiring as much as the attaining.
This too. How many times did Rob do that for me? Three or four visits? Nine or ten times? And yet, to remember it so vividly, and so fondly! Of course Scott did me the same favour an infinite number of times. Well, sort of. At some point I'd make the request, and he'd get down on all fours, and I'd get on, and then he'd just turn turtle. The most supportive brother in history, but even perfection has its limits.
This isn't the aspiring/attaining thing anymore. Maybe it's Garden and Fall, or infant plenitude and then the advent of language and the law. Maybe it's that you need something from people. Want something, rather. People do their best. But at some point they can't! So we have precious moments and mighty lines. So resonant! So glancing and impermanent. After that it's echoes and ripples, and at least a measure of aridity ...
I need to break this up! Let's repeat that first photo.
Piggy-backs or bucking broncs in that living room. (So much verbiage, and from such a little thing!) Or the way that Uncle Robbie and Auntie Carol laughed, so readily and joyfully. Music! That amazing piece of furniture, that console stereo, with inlaid speakers and hidden turntable. Mum and Dad's selective but still eclectic, evocative, kind of electrifying record collection.
The living room. Learning to mix your ice cream until it attains malt consistency—Scott again. Why were we eating ice cream in the living room? Ah. Grandma Duncan was babysitting. That's where Scott and I would tumble out and pretend to fight. "Boys! Boys!" We'd giggle, break it up, withdraw until it was time for the next attack.
The top left window, on the house's right side. More music up there, on that great little record player with the built-in speakers. Danny Kaye X 3. Shari Lewis. Marvin Miller doing Dr. Seuss. Lots of, too much of Walt Disney. Help! Revolver. Bill Cosby and the Smothers Brothers.
The top left window. I think that's where I got my head stuck in the bars of the crib. I think that might be my first memory. I think I remember Sister Susan looking at me, as I sat there stuck. Sympathetic? Thinking that it served me right? What do you make of people? What do you know of people?
Do I remember feeling considerable pain in that same room? That was the mysterious ailment that landed me in the hospital for two weeks when I was about three years old, wasn't it? "Don't worry, Mum. I'll be alright," he said, parpingly. That's causing a physical reaction in a few of you, isn't it?
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