The Butler Did It

In the mid 90s ... I commissioned Ray Butler .. a Saint John historian and artist .. to paint a portrait of the apartment building my parents lived in on Rockland Road before and after my birth ... it stood perched high on a rock promontory overlooking Saint John Harbour .. I think the promontory was called Rockaberry Hill. Ray .. during Saint John's urban renewal phase in the mid to late 60s ... Ray took pictures of all the old wooden clapboard buildings .. and indeed streets and areas .. before they were all torn down .. the old area referred to as Portland completely disappeared ..there are actually a couple of web sites dedicated to preserving that area's legacy if you Google it.

I wasn't nostalgic about the building and memories there .. so much as trying to jog some memories ... if I remember right .. to access the apartment building you had to enter through a very narrow driveway width lane between two houses which opened up once inside to a larger area in front of the building itself .. I think we lived on the third floor .. the highest elevation .. but I can't be sure ...I have a vague memory of an old vehicle maybe a 40s model sedan .... slowly moving backwards and rising high enough on the embankment on one side that it rolled over ... it might have been a dream ...

There are times when a diesel truck will go by me .. and if the exhaust smells just right .. I am suddenly transported to a time in my mind when I am on Rockland Road with a wagon ... it's a strong image only brought on by that olfactory cue ... the two strongest memories I have of Rockland are ..

1 ... crawling around on my hands and knees ... detaching old gum that has been deposited underneath chairs in what have been the Living Room .. and stuffing it in my mouth .. I distinctly remember the wad of gum finally being so large as to be unchewable ... I assume I deposited the big wad under an appropriate chair ... 

2 .. I had some kind of fall ... I remember an ambulance coming into the yard .. the next thing I know I am at the hospital ... alone ... I then have a strong memory of running from door to door looking for a washroom ... the next thing I know I am restrained .. tied to the bed ... arms and legs by cotton straps .. improvised bandages I assume ... to this day the thought of any restraint like that will initiate the beginnings of an anxiety attack ... my mother has never volunteered to talk about this incident .. nor have I ever asked ... I have made oblique reference to it .. but no response ...

I used to joke that my mother tossed me off the third floor landing but somehow I landed on the second ... I spent 4 months with my mother two years ago working on her house getting it ready for sale ... we had conversations that no mother and son should ever have ... and in the midst of one of them .. I became almost convinced it was no joke ... right then and there .. if she the had the capability to physically hurt me ... she would have ... she told me I was acting like my father ... I looked at her nose to nose and said ... you're turning me into my father ...

Phil - (28 December 2020 - San Patricio de Melaque - 7:03 PM)

Krome Koan - 'Don't make me go Mom on you'