52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Week 50 Prompt - Naughty

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks

Week 50

Prompt – Naughty

I think it safe to say that we have all been naughty at one time or another in our life. Therefor I presume that even in my straight laced Mennonite or German ancestor's life there would have been naughtiness. Somehow those stories never seem to be handed down. Well maybe if they are criminal, they are passed along in secretive circles of folk lore.

Several times over the year, I have mentioned my maternal grandfather (Pat Sullivan) who is somewhat of a mystery to our family. He was certainly naughty and according to the law it was criminal enough to send him to jail. The family folk lore thinks it was for bigamy but that has not been proven yet. And just lately, in light of my DNA results, I doubt that he was really Irish.

There is a naughtiness that comes from ingenuity and a determination to do something other than that you are commanded to do. There is a story from both Bill and my side of the family. The sons of farmers were always counted on to work the field and Saturday was not an exception. The men would really want to go to the local Saturday night dance but the work was going to take them into the evening hours. I guess they would somehow tamper with the machinery to cause it to break down on a late Saturday afternoon. It would be too late to get parts to fix it. They would have to wait until Monday morning. A convenient plan to allow them to attend the social event without outwardly sneaking off when there was work to do. Bill's family farmed in Killaly, Sask. And my father's family farmed in the Hague, Osler area. Was this a plan that was used by all farmer's sons? Did the father's really know what was going on?

In 2006 we had a chance to visit our aunt & uncle in their winter home in Arizona. Wallace McLaughlin is my grandma McLaughlin's third child, a sibling to my mother. Uncle Wally as we called him was born in 1927 and died just 3 years after the visit. They lived in Ontario and growing up we rarely saw them. My older siblings know him better than myself. Uncle Wally was an Engineer who at one time was the Dean of Engineering at Waterloo University and in fact was president of The Deans of Canada Engineers. At the time of the visit, I was just starting to put family history together. We asked him of any stories he had of mom when they were young.

Vivian and Wallace in 1933

 He unfortunately could not remember many. We did learn that he was a bit mischievous growing up. He said his step father, Benjamin McLaughlin was strict and liked things just so, such as no talking at the dinner table. If you broke the rules you were punished by his “razor strap”. Uncle Wally knew if he got in trouble at school and in his words was “caned” at school he would get it twice as bad at home. So on his way home he would find a few layers of cardboard to put in his back so it lessened the severity.

Apparently his mother (grandma McLaughlin) use to own a 32 caliber Browning Automatic gun. What the heck was she doing with it - I will never understand. Grandma was quite deaf. Uncle Wally would go down into their cellar, find it and for the heck of it shoot it at the wood pile. He went on to explain that on one of grandma's visit to their home in Ontario, she decided it was “too dangerous” to have around her home. So she put it in her handbag and all of its ammunition. She flew with it in her purse as carry on without incidence. Uncle Wally and aunt Phyllis were flabbergasted that she took it on the plane but even worse was that the gun was loaded. OMG.

It was during this visit that I first heard of the term “rubber ice”. They grew up in Saskatoon where the Saskatchewan river runs through it. As boys they would love to go down to the river in spring thaw and play on the ice because it would bend and roll underfoot. They would see who could get further across. Boys will be boys but shooting guns and playing on dangerous river ice is the type of naughtiness that runs parents blood ice cold.

My naughty story comes from being a naive 17 year old girl driving dad's car around in Saskatoon on a boring Sunday afternoon. I can't remember which car it was but either the Caprice or Impala Chevy model, none the less one of those huge over powered beasts of a car that one had in the early 1970's. I remember it clearly as if it happened last week. I was sitting at the top of the Broadway bridge waiting for the red light to turn green when my friend, Bryce pulled up beside me and started to roar his engine. Like one would do to start a race when the light turned green. Well I did not know how to make the engine roar but I did what I thought was the procedure and that was put the car in park and step on the gas roaring the heck out of that behemoth of an engine. The light turned green and Bryce took off and I pulled the car from park to drive in one quick swoop all while revving the be-Jesus out of the engine. The car made an almighty frightening noise and stopped dead. There I was at the top of the bridge feeling very alone and pathetically scared.  I had a sense that I broke dad's car and remember we had no cell phones etc. Some how I phoned dad and told him the car broke down and somehow he showed up to assess the damage. The tow truck took the car to the service station where it cost my dad an arm and a leg to replace the engine or parts of it. To say I felt awful would be an understatement, but I never told dad what really happened. And as far as I am concerned he went to his grave not knowing. Or at least I think so. He never ever mentioned it again if he did. I know that they had no money to fix cars, but the car was necessary for him in order to get to work. It's a sad but a true naughty story.

Being naughty comes in different packages. Some need to push the limits to criminality, some of us come up with  ingenuous plans, some just need to be boys and live despite the dangers and some of us are naive 17 year olds trying to show off and too embarrassed to confess.

Wendy