We Soon Forgot We Were Good Friends

11/24/02 Copyright RUMBLE ON CLYDESDALE STREET

Chapter 9 “We soon forgot we were good friends.”

During the height of our warring years, the kids were not so much a modern (for the day) warrior, as more one of our own design. Something in between would better describe the invention. Some time Cowboy. Some time Pirate. Some time Soldier. Some time Fantasy.

Many fancied our efforts as a wild band of swashbuckling buccaneers. Captain Kid and the Pirates of the Caribbean would have been put to the plank. Denny and Buddy were of this cloth. Other kids wanted to be like their dads with a little war surplus clothing thrown in. Whatever the choice there was no mistaken we were warriors. Our feet were the oars on our ships and the wheels on our tanks. Larry was just plain ole Larry. Larry and his sling singing as it twirled.

Sword fighting was big no matter what. Carrying a sword was good anyway when Old Red was around. All the kids could also identify with swashbuckling pirates. Being a pirate and wearing an eye patch was special.

We fashioned great weapons. When we did not fight our enemy we fought amongst ourselves. This was not a good time to wear a patch. There were duels most evenings around the time the Dad’s were out at the Horseshoe pitch. Their clanking covered ours. Sticks banging on shields was loud.

One particular duel carried all the way from my yard, across the street, up the walkway, and on into Denny and Buddy’s. Denny and I were in a feverish battle. Swords flaying. Our hands were feeling the blows on the metal shields right up to the shoulder. Little muscles were cramping. The life ebbing out of every pore but we warriors do not give up. My stamina fleeting, Denny’s sword kept pounding and pounding. He was not to be denied. The pounding continued. We soon forgot we were good friends.

Tiring, I began to retreat but there was nowhere to go. I won the first round but Denny now had me on the ropes and there was nothing I could do except give up. NO. Not yet!

We were touching on Denny’s carport or was it an unfinished garage? What really was not clear is how I started to bleed profusely. There was no warning just warm sticky blood streaming down my face.

A protruding nail perhaps on the side of the garage caught my left cheek just under the eye tearing down to my jaw. Denny had worn me out and as I turned away from him I stumbled and fell against the side of the structure. My cheek simply opened up. The scar of that day still remains as a reminder how pugilistic we were in our imaginative roles. Reality stuck.

Denny was one good fighter. A very strong kid he was. He helped his dad carry bricks and rocks around as part of his chores and obviously gained an early entry to hardening up his body. In my case, being the scrawny bean sprout I was, my best offense was to hit and retreat. Running became less a passion at times and more a matter of necessity. I could run. Denny went on to be a Golden Gloves Champion. I kept running.

Although Larry was the greatest asset to the Clydesdale crew, Denny was no slouch either. There were those normal occasions of course were we ended up just all being plain kids. Comic books were a satisfying alternative.

Exploration for some kids was a yearning to reach beyond Clydesdale Street and discover new vistas. We knew, to the east, our chance of exploring in peace was limited by the Boners. Knowing the challenges we clearly had to expand westward. Well, at least to Boundary Road.

To the west on Clydesdale was the safer route to discover a kid’s bigger world. Everything was much simpler then. Blue skies prevailed.

Just a little walk west was Boundary Road. It was where Boundary, north south, first intersected 12th Ave. which became the Grandview Highway south for a few blocks on Boundary, turning abruptly east, leaving Boundary to continue due south. Confusing? Not yet!

12th Ave directly east became my Clydesdale Street at Boundary Road. Now it is about confusion. What now of Clydesdale Street? Clydesdale Street is now Grandview Highway, the entrance to Highway #1 east and in reverse it is 12th Ave. going west. The short of it all Clydesdale Street subsequently vanished. Clydesdale Street, in name yes, but kids memories are planted deep in the soil below the tire worn asphalt.

Boundary Road, when Clydesdale Street flourished with post war kids, had on the south east corner a few shops like a butcher, grocery store and pharmacy. The building is still there some 50 odd years later. A tattoo parlor and lawnmower repair now graces the premises.

Monuments to yet an earlier time and beside the stores, where the new 401 Motor Inn now stands, was the Sunset Motel, a rickety old style roadside establishment right out of pre Route 66 era. There were many such motels along the route joining Burnaby to New Westminster.

It was owned in part by close friends of my Mom and Dad. Mr. and Mrs. Martin who would become significant in my family’s life however I would foolishly resent them for helping. Eventually we would move away from Clydedale with their help. They did too.

Directly across the street on Boundary and to the west was virgin bush lands and we kids were all told never to venture there. Big animals lived in the bushes. Besides it was Vancouver or Africa or something. All we knew it was a divide, a barrier, the end of our Universe.

Much activity was going on behind all those trees and bushes. Houses were being constructed for the returned war veterans. Land was being carved out of the heavy forested area a fast as it could be. War veteran families were jammed into the old Sunset Motel waiting for the houses to be finished. Families and lots of little kids all crammed into a small area. Nobody played with anyone from the motel. Our parents saw the transients as a very bad influence even though, all they were doing is waiting for their own homes. Kids just saw kids.

We avoided going there to play, but Roy Finchum’s house, being on Manor Street was pretty close to the motel. The decaying Sunset Motel was right on the corner of Boundary Road and Manor. Hard to avoid, being close.

The kids at the motel seemed to know they were unwelcome. They did not care. It was not a big deal for them. They played amongst themselves on the motel grounds most of the time and we continued as usual. We were thankful they liked us anyway. Whew! Boners on one side and these kids on the other would have proven devastating for we Clydesdale scamps. The idea of being a sandwich did not feel comfortable at all.

The name of the motel was appropriate as sunsets from the Sunset Motel were spectacular. You could see forever the sun falling from the sky. The old motel is long since been replaced but the magnificent sunsets remain.

There were a few houses on Clydesdale due west before reaching Boundary Road. They began on the other side of the dense blackberry bushes that bordered the west side of where my house was and still it remains to date.

Almost to Boundary were two brand new houses built on my side (north) of the street. All the parents saw change coming with the addition of these modern homes joining our very eclectic group of residences. These were talked about as being state of the art for the times. They sure were fancy.

One of the houses had a very tall steel tower topped with another narrower silver rod reaching high for the sky. It was called an antenna. The kids were in awe. We were told the man living there was a Ham Radio enthusiast. Dumfounded we could only imagine why would anybody be so excited about a radio made out of ham and what did the antenna do anyway? Sometimes it was hard being a kid. He had a collie dog so that was okay.

Boundary, due north, headed down a quickly descending grade that led the way to the most coveted journey of our lives. The railway tracks! Running parallel to the tracks was Still Creek where we enjoyed pole fishing, guerilla swimming, and just plain exploring where it came from and were it went.

The “ whys” occupied us continually? How far away did it go? Could it be another side of the world? We thought so. We knew for sure digging a deep hole would get us to China so traveling far to the north had to go somewhere.

Across the tracks a distance we knew there were milk farms just before where the Bridges Movie complex now stands. Cows were everywhere. It was here many of our parents, including mine, walked or rode to get fresh dairy products before Glenburn Dairies started going house to house with a horse drawn cart. This was too far a field for little kids out on their own.

To the east Still Creek found it’s way to Burnaby Lake, mudflats and swamplands, filled with mud, oozing bogs, skunk cabbage and ferns. To the west, running under Boundary Road we tended not to explore the creek at all except to build swimming holes. That part of the creek was meandering far into the Horse Farm territory, far beyond our site. To the very far west was surely to find Africa.

Copyright
RGT