52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Week 28 Prompt - Reunion

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks

Week 28

Prompt – Reunion

I can't say that I have participated in a formal family reunion. Sometime after both parents had died my siblings decided to get together for a camping weekend at Pike Lake just outside of Saskatoon. It was quite informal. It was a gathering of all of us, our spouses and children. We had fun and food and a grand summer Saskatchewan thunderstorm that scared the wits out of me as we were in a tent which barely withstood the wind storm. However we made it through the weekend alive.

I have attended many weddings which in a way is a form of family reunion and mostly under happy circumstances. A family reunion would be the ultimate genealogy party – well for me!

Betty and John on Their 56th Anniversary - April 2018

Last evening, my sister and her husband were over for our usual Friday evening get together and coffee. We were chatting about this and that when Betty recalled a memory from her childhood. I love when this happens. 

November 1941 - Betty Peters.  Dad Enlisted 2 Months Later

Betty remembers the day that dad returned from the war. She would have been 5 years old. She was excited and couldn't wait to see him. She, mom and Diane went to the train station. I imagine there were many many more waiting just as she , mom and Diane were. Betty recalls the train coming into Saskatoon train station and they were waiting on the platform for the men to disembark. She recalls that the soldiers came off the train and marched 4 abreast into the station. When they had all gone by they had not seen dad among them. Betty was very sad. They turned around to go back into the station when she saw dad sitting on his haunches next to his duffel bag in the corner of the station. Betty was so happy to see dad again and went running to him. 

Diane & Betty Peters Circa 1946.  Around The Time Dad Came Home.

What could be a happier reunion than this? What a beautiful memory. I can visualize it. I can see dad sitting quietly at the side and possibly smoking a cigarette. I could see dad looking across the scene of the military disembarkation and maybe even thinking that he had been forgotten by his family. Although I can't say for sure I bet he sadly took in the scene thinking about the last time he was at the Saskatoon train station leaving for war and how naive he was and how now his world would never be the same after all that he had seen, done and experienced in the name of war and peace. 

Jake Peters 1942

Wendy