Twentieth Century Limited Book One - Age of Heroes. Jan David Blais
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We were all Catholics, of course. Some Protestants lived in the area but I didn’t know any. The children of Protestants went to public schools and we felt sorry for them because they were in error and didn’t have the sacraments or God’s grace. Jews I knew nothing at all about except they killed Christ and were still paying the price. Chinese and Japs? Cartoons in the back pages of the Bulletin. It never occurred to me they might have churches, too. For me the world was either Catholic or non-Catholic. I had the same pride being a Catholic as I did being American. It was something precious, something everyone would have wanted if they really understood things. America, America! God shed His grace on thee! Just as God was a Catholic, deep down I knew He was an American, too.
My mother never missed a chance to rail against politicians. She had gone to school with some of them and said their hat size was bigger than it had any right to be. My father liked to remind her that living on the same block as the ward chairman brought certain benefits – garbage collection, snow plowing – and anyway, when you’re in business like he was you need to get along with people, not knock them all the time.
Most of their fights were over religion. My mother had nothing good to say about the big-shot bishop downtown and our parish priests except Father McAdam, yet she never missed Mass and we always had fish on Fridays, deep-fried hard and brown or finan haddie creamed and cratered in mounds of mashed potatoes. My father said bad things about her saying bad things, but he often slept late Sundays then ambled down to the shop to get caught up for the week. Some nights he disappeared there too, and my mother would read, enjoying some peace and quiet, she claimed, though I noticed she didn’t turn the pages as fast as usual and sometimes seemed out of sorts.
IT WAS ABOUT EIGHT. My mother was in her room, recovering from her labors. The house was filled with the friendly aroma of ham. Suddenly I heard noises, a car outside. There were footsteps and voices. Before the doorbell rang I was at the door.
“Ti-Paul! Ti-Paul!”
I couldn’t believe my eyes! Tante Jeanette! And Uncle Albert! “Ça va, mon petit?” he said, hoisting me in the air. “My, how big you got!” Uncle Albert was a giant, with a rough, leathery face that scratched mine as I flew up over his head. From my perch I looked over his shoulder... not one car but two! And more people coming up the walk! Laughing, Uncle Albert put me down. “Ah, ti-Paul, you’re so heavy you give me a rupture!” That pleased me. I was still trying to break fifty pounds but had been stuck a long time at forty-six. His laugh boomed up at you from way down near his shoes. I really liked Uncle Albert. My father was at the door, beaming, as everybody threw their arms around everybody else. Uncle Albert was my father’s oldest brother and Tante Jeanette his sister. She was always smiling, I swear, even in pictures. She was also tall, though of course not as tall as Uncle Albert.
“Entrée! Entrée!” My father waved everybody in. Tante Geneviève, Uncle Albert’s wife, as tiny as he was tall, squeezed my hand and kissed me silently on the cheek. She didn’t talk much, I remembered that from the last visit. In all, nine people including cousins I’d never even heard of. Just then, my mother appeared, finger marking the place in her book. She had this funny look on her face.
“Albert! And Geneviève! My, this is a surprise!”
One by one she greeted our visitors so I got to hear the names again. Cousin François was a younger copy of Uncle Albert, and two men who didn’t look much older than Buddy Malloy next door, plus their wives. As usual, no kids my age. The women all were wearing nice clothes, dresses and sweaters, and the men had on plaid work shirts and baggy pants. My mother was staring at the tracks on the carpet.
“We heard something about tomorrow being ti-Paul’s big day,” Tante Jeanette was saying, her face red and shiny as she tousled my hair, “so we come by to say hello. And Catherine! Jolie! Si jolie!” Catherine had slipped in behind my mother. She was always slipping in somewhere.
My father was counting heads. “How long on the road?” he asked. Not waiting for an answer, he yelled at me through the hubbub, “Ti-Paul!” He hardly ever called me that, “two chairs from the dining room.”
Well, I had to move four chairs because he forgot my mother and Catherine. Jim was out, as usual. Conversations criss-crossed the room which suddenly seemed small and inadequate. By the time I dragged the last chair in my mother was in the kitchen, opening bottles of Narragansett – that’s beer – and boiling water for coffee. I couldn’t figure out why, but she kept shaking her head and looked like she was going to cry.
In the living room, my father was sitting with Uncle Albert. My father was the oldest of les Bernards américains, as they called themselves, so he was in charge of parceling out the visitors among the local clan. My uncle kept nodding and waving his hands and saying “way, way.” Once in a while he’d throw in a “you bet!” and an “oh boy!” and nod even faster. His English sounded a lot like my father’s French. My mother placed a bottle on the table beside him with a coaster. She was big on coasters.
The plan, they’d stay two nights, then hit the road Sunday, arriving back in Québec for work the next day. Farmers and mechanics they were, who my father said never took a day off in their lives, even weekends, so it was a big deal they came all this way just for me. I noticed my father heading for the phone with my mother on his heels. She was waving her hands like Uncle Albert then she disappeared into the kitchen.
“Ti-Paul!” Tante Jeanette was beckoning me over. She was holding a small package wrapped in white paper tied with a red ribbon. “Here! For you!”
I took the package and turned it over in my hand. “Ouvrez! Vite! Vite!”
I knew enough French to undo the ribbon and tear off the wrapping. Of course my nosy sister was there taking it all in. When the paper fell away I saw a small, thin box. I lifted the lid... it was a watch! A real watch! With a leather band! “We was afraid maybe you had one already,” Uncle Albert was saying, but I shook my head. My heart was beating fast. “Waltham,” the dial said in gold letters. It also said twelve-fifteen. For as long as I could remember I could tell time and it wasn’t twelve-fifteen. I stuck my thumbnail under the stem and started to pull it out like I’d seen my father do. Tell the truth, I had tried that a couple of times with his watch when he left it out, though I never dared touch his pocket watch, the one he wore on a chain with his best suit and vest, the brown one. “Here.” The watch disappeared in my uncle’s palm. He fitted it to my wrist, inserting the little gold point in the band.
“Always put it on before you wind it,” Tante Jeanette said, “over the bed is best.”
I pulled out the stem, a real trick with one hand, and set the time by the mantle clock, seven fifty-two. “I’ve been wanting one a long time,” I said.
Tante Jeanette beamed. “Don’t wind too far. When it feels tight, stop.”
As my mother replaced Uncle Albert’s empty Narragansett she nodded at the watch. “I hope you’ve thanked them properly.”
Tante Jeanette winked. She knew I was getting to that. “Fiona, something for the house.” She handed over a larger package with the same wrapper as mine. My mother opened it – a tin of maple syrup with a picture of trees and a red maple leaf.
“How nice. We’ll have it for breakfast tomorrow.”
“Non! Non!” Tante Jeanette shook her head. “Save it! It is for you to enjoy!”
“We’ll see,” my mother replied, placing the container on the table next to Tante Jeannette, kind of like a trophy.
A few minutes later Catherine came parading in with a platter of sandwiches but they were gone before it got to me. Luckily she was right back with another plate. I grabbed one, the meat still warm from the oven, butter melting into the bread, that good kind with the fingerprints. I was feeling great when I realized – we’re eating my ham! There won’t be any left for tomorrow! After a couple more bites, though, I decided it was okay. My mother would take care of everything, she always did. Besides, fasting from midnight meant a long wait for my next meal. So I did what