Gifted With Strong Life

Gifted with Strong Life

by Bernice Daigle

as told to Anne Osborne

Copyright Anne Osborne 2000

All rights reserved

ISBN 978-1-55349-125-5

Published By Books for Pleasure at Smashwords

Part I: Mama

Chapter 1

So many children

Please, not me—I’ll be good, Mama, please, not the dungeon!

The big rats are going to get you! she would say and then she would slam the lid. It was as black as the inside of a cow and the moist clay stuck between our toes. We were afraid to speak to each other, but I was even more afraid when she put me down alone. Upstairs, you could hear a pin drop: the rest of the children were petrified they might be stuffed down there, too.

It was easy to deserve the dungeon when too many children were confined indoors all winter with nothing to play with. The cold cellar under the house where vegetables were kept became a dungeon for some of us when we were too noisy. Mama would lift the heavy wood cover and put us down there in the darkness.

I was put down more often than the others. I was really scared, especially when the devil was supposed to be lurking about in such dark holes looking for bad girls.

Mama had very little patience with her children. She would slap us down for little or no reason. If we just walked in front of her when she was not feeling well, or moved from a chair that she had ordered us to remain on, that was enough to bring on the punishment she believed was part of a good Christian upbringing.

My children are going to learn something of real value, she would say. Often she would caress and slap us down within the same hour. My flesh and my blood will do as she’s told.

Perhaps it’s not to be wondered at that she frequently lost patience with us. With Papa working away from home most of the time, the full burden of looking after the family including providing firewood was Mama’s duty. Even when she was with child, as she was most years, she still had to perform all the chores.

When the deep New Brunswick snows buried the woodpile, we children would stand at the windows, making a huge sign of the cross as she disappeared into the swirling snows. We would have to peer out to see her struggle to free firewood. Many times she had to split pieces that were too big to put into the stove. In winter months, many cords of wood were needed to keep the fire burning, sometimes all night.

All of this outdoor work was done with a minimum of protection against the cold because Papa could not afford to buy her clothing. The children came first although, even for them, there was little that could be bought. Old clothing was scarce because we had to use it up, wear it out, and make it do. So there Mama would be, fighting her way through winter storms with neither stockings nor underclothes to wear because we were so poor.

She also helped her father on his farm next door to us when his sons were not available. She would clean the barn, milk the cows, and feed the chickens and pigs. Often this would mean that she had to cook large pots of cull potatoes for the pigs. She made sure she found time to help her aging father as much as she could.

He shared some of the fruit of the labour with her and her family. But I also remember him coming over to our house and slapping her around when Papa was away.

Of course, there were times when Mama was loving and caring. Once, my brother John and I were sent out to cut cakes of snow to cool the wash water. Taking Papa’s double bit, razor sharp axe, John plunged it into the nearest snowbank. I bent down to pick up one of the cakes before John had time to pull the axe out. As he raised it, he cut me across the nose and over the left eyebrow.

Mama’s going to kill us! I cried, holding my hands over the cut. I was going to die, no doubt about it, bleeding like that. Blood poured down the neck of my dress and clotted in my belly button and along the heavy elastic of my one good pair of bloomers.

What are we going to do? quivered John. He would be guilty this time. Mama opened the door to see what was keeping us so long and screamed in horror at the sight of me. She grabbed me and pulled me inside the house leaving John standing on the snowbank, axe in hand, terrified.

Take John in, too! I cried, he’s so cold!

Aunt Bridgette swiftly opened the door and called him. It’s not his fault, Maggie, she insisted, I’m taking him in.

Meanwhile, Mother put a damp cloth on my cut to stop the bleeding. She made a bed for me in the baby’s carriage and started to wheel me back and forth in it. My wound didn’t hurt much, but it was bleeding a lot and this must have frightened her.

Despite my fear that John would be punished for injuring me, I dearly loved the warm attention Mama was giving me. She loves me, I whispered through my tears. Snuggling deeper into the baby carriage, I pretended to be falling asleep as Mama sang in her soft, beautiful voice The Big Rock Candy Mountain.

I later discovered that John was forgiven after Aunt Bridgette laid the blame squarely on Mama. You should know that they are too young for you to send them to do a job like that, she had snapped angrily at her sister.

It was a blessing that Aunt Bridgette was not yet married and could observe common sense things such as the fact that I was not more than five or six years old at the time and John was one year younger.

In winter, we children craved the outdoors, wishing the snow away. Winter was always long for us who had no shoes or warm clothing. Much of our time was spent looking out through tiny holes we melted with our tongues in the frosted windowpane.

When the March sun started to expose patches of bare earth near the house, John and I would jump with joy. We knew that soon we would be going outside to play where we would squat down, trying to use our body heat to keep our bare legs and feet warm as we played on the still frozen ground.

Mother would heave a sigh of relief to have two fewer children in the house to make noise. Then she and Symblia, who was eighteen months older than I, but much more mature, would be better able to get on with the household chores.

It seemed proper for us to be sent out in the cold to get accustomed to hardship early in our lives. We needed to be gifted in surviving the mean winters along the shores of Chaleur Bay where the cold was so intense it would split the new shingles on our roof, pop out the loose knots, and plow them clean across into the neighbour’s yard where they would be lost in the snow until spring.

For some years, we lived with relatives before Papa built us a house next to Mama’s parents. I remember watching from a distance every day as the men worked. Finally, I could hardly believe my eyes when I found they had put on the roof and were putting in windows and a door in front and back.

The new house was wonderful and when we moved in, we felt we had happiness and what we considered comfort. The main floor was just one large room with no partitions. The fact that everything was open and large, made it difficult, indeed almost impossible to heat.

Upstairs there was also just one big room with two double beds at one end, and a big window in the middle. At the other end of the room was the opening for the stairs. The stovepipe came through the floor and extended out the roof. At the far corner was another double bed for the boys.

We had no pictures on the walls upstairs, but a large crucifix hung in the place of honour. In our Catholic home, the cross with Christ nailed on it was a constant reminder not to be afraid to suffer because our suffering could never come near what Jesus went through. Kneeling in front of the cross morning and night reminded us of our duties to Christ. We said our prayers in the shadow of the cross every day and felt good about it.

The house was never finished inside, only the outside was completed. This arrangement provided us with entertainment that helped keep us quiet because the sticky gum from the unfinished lumber would bubble through from time to time. We would prowl around for hours searching for fresh bubbles.

In order to keep warm at night, we’d all sleep together. Oh how I hated those gray blankets my mother put on our beds. When Papa was away she took the baby to sleep with her, and I often wished that it was me instead. She had nice white bedsheets and quilts. Many nights the little ones messed our bed. I could never sleep in it, and would stealthily get out of bed and lie on the floor, knowing if Mama caught me I would be sent back to bed regardless of the mess. It was very cold on the floor, especially in winter, but I preferred that to a messed bed.

Margaret (Maggie) Bacon, our mother, married Papa, Arthur Doucette, in 1914 when he was thirty-two and she was only sixteen years old. She had beautiful, soft brown eyes and light brown hair. Tiny as she was, nevertheless, she knew how to survive in those pioneer days.

All Grandfather Bacon’s children were well trained in farming and Mama was no exception. She could do a man’s work even when she was heavy with child. Life was work, and work meant survival. Although her parents seemed to have everything rich people had, they lived mostly to work and pray.

Joseph Bacon was a large figure in the lives of his thirteen children (Mama was his last). The boys were allowed some schooling, but not most of the girls. They were born to obey and have a man take care of them. They were to marry, have children, and take care of the household. Nobody in Grandfather’s family ever dared to question him: they worked and obeyed as long as they lived at home.

Aunt Bridgette told me, Father used to keep us working the back fields from daylight to dark. We had to carry a lantern to light our way going and coming. Sometimes us girls would come home so exhausted that we wanted to make the last few yards on our hands and knees.

Once his family was grown and all married except Aunt Bridgette, Grandfather needed a smaller farm to work. He fell in love with the sea and sold the big old farm at Mitchell Settlement for a smaller one near the shore with a few cattle, two horses, a dozen pigs, and a hundred or so chickens.

On his six acres along Chaleur Bay he built a large barn and a modern house with a water pump inside. Outside, he had a covered well for water for the cattle.

My grandparents were perfectionists.Their new home had to have new furnishings, and the chests of drawers had to match the washstands. There were dressers with large oval mirrors that swung on fancy frames, the gold and brass handles perfectly installed. Every piece of furniture was polished to a high finish. Grandfather had learned cabinetmaking as a boy in Paris, France. He was proud of his work; nobody he knew could match him.

Their household was managed as if they had servants. The beds had lace skirts, pillow cases had large handmade borders of matching lace. The water pitchers on the washstands in each bedroom were always kept full for morning use. There were beautiful Victorian style chairs in the parlour and living room. The rugs were of the finest quality. How well I remember the set of china, and crystal with large borders of gold that I was sure only the rich could afford.

The kitchen had lots of windows—a rarity then. There was a walk-in pantry where everyday dishes and foods were kept, along with barrels of soda biscuits and hundred-pound bags of flour, beans, and barley and other dry foods. There were also crates of dates and raisins and shortening by the fifty-pound pail. All this came by train and Grandfather would hitch the horse to the farm wagon to meet the freight train at Altocan Siding, the small railroad crossing nearby.

There was always plenty of good rich food faultlessly prepared when Grandmother, Eliza Jane, was alive. Her dinner table is one of my fondest memories. Wide borders of snow-white lace in designs of every description were gathered around the linen tablecloths. Whenever wild flowers were available, arrangements in crystal vases were placed everywhere in the house—even in the upstairs hall.

There were occasional celebrations at Grandfather’s house. Many people would be invited from far around the community and the backwoods settlements. Tables were set up to play cards. Large pots of chicken stew simmered on the stove for an after-midnight lunch. Grandfather’s thirteen children all came to share in the festive occasion.

I recall clearly the garden party Grandmother held in the summer, at the end of the lobster fishing season. The last lobsters caught were kept for the feast. As well, she would cook in a massive black, iron pot (the one used for cooking outdoors, including boiling the water when they killed the pigs) her special dish of navy beans and salt pork. Everyone thought that they were the best in the world. My mother’s genius with food was probably a legacy from Grandmother.

Sometimes Grandmother would invite someone to entertain her guests. One such entertainer was M. Lamoth, a fiddler. No doubt he was a lumberjack with his knee-high moccasins laced high and tied just under the knee. His old worn buckskin jacket and raccoon skin cap revealed a face and hands wrinkled and tanned deep brown. When he smiled or wiggled his mouth as the long rosin bow crossed in front of his nose, we could see he had some teeth missing.

M. Lamoth made such beautiful sounds come out of that old fiddle. We children were gathered round sitting on the floor in the kitchen to hear him as he sat on one of the parlor chairs. We marvelled at the way he could make music come from what looked to us like a funny piece of furniture. I wanted to get up and shake my body when he played the fast pieces.

How can he do that? whispered my cousin Cathleen Bacon. Where’s the sound coming from?

I wonder, too, I whispered back.

Maybe he’s the only man in the world that can play so fast? added John looking pleased at the thought.

We children were taken by surprise since most of us had never heard violin music before. This was my first music other than Mama’s singing and it filled my heart and soul. Mama often talked about angels’ music in heaven. M. Lamoth must surely be playing like an angel.

Nevertheless, when it came time for him to take a break, he was pleased to eat some of Grandmother’s wonderful food before he sat down to play some more of his old-time reels.

Chapter 2

Christmas at Grandma’s

Christmas at Grandmother’s house was an event to remember. Weeks before Christmas, dozens of brass bells were to be polished to perfection, then wrapped in white cloth. I remember helping when I was small. From then on everything was done in such strict secrecy we children saw nothing of the preparations until the actual day.

In the early afternoon of Christmas Day everyone arrived almost at the same time, twelve families in all. Inside the house, all the doors which were usually kept closed were opened wide. In the centre of the living room stood a perfect evergreen decorated with the most shimmering, sparkling ornaments that I had ever seen. Candles the size of my little finger and in all bright colours were all around the tree which was so big it touched the ceiling. All around it on the floor were many beautifully wrapped packages.

Oh my God—I can’t believe that people can make such pretty things, I cried, Mama, Mama, come see!

Mama never heard a bit of it she was so busy arranging on the goody table food she had brought.

How on earth did Santa Claus manage to make a tree like that? Aunt Amanda was wide-eyed and staring, seeming to be just as bemused as the children.

With my baby brother Patrick in my arms, I started for the door of the livingroom to show him the shimmering little fairies merrily dancing on Grandfather’s Christmas tree. The tree seemed to quiver quietly, just a little movement. By this time, however, Mama was paying attention to me. Oh no, young lady. You go sit on the stairs and take good care of your brother. Feeling much smaller and unhappy we retreated to the steps where we couldn’t see anything nearly so interesting as that wonderful tree.

Grandmother’s special day had been carefully planned. She had worked long and hard to convince all her children to make a great effort to attend—no small request for so many to