Canada

(The Bachands from left to right: Andree, Monique (my mom in green), Esther, Roger and Bobby)

(My mom in her sister Esther's kitchen, my brother Mike in the background. Circa 1960's)

(My mom around the age of 10)

For all the Irish-ness and the St. Patrick's Day celebrations we throw...  my family is actually closer to its French Canadian roots than those from Ireland.  I've never been to Ireland.  I didn't know my father's parents.  And to be honest, for most of my childhood my Irish heritage has really meant two things:  mutton pies and St. Patrick's Day.  The learning about Irish history and theatre came pretty late to me and the adoration of all things Irish was really Patrick's doing.  If I'm being perfectly honest, we're really more Canadian than anything. 

My mother is Canadian-born.  She moved here at the age of 8.  Her mother never spoke a word of English, but always managed to express herself perfectly.  She was a tiny woman with vibrant, sparkling eyes.  I remember her pointed glasses and housedresses, her aprons and her little glasses of Coke, sugar cookies and slate chalkboard.  Her bedroom was always spotless, her bed enormous and seemingly impossible to climb into. My pepere had made the entire bedroom set and it was absolutely beautiful.  A gift to his bride and I never saw it with a speck of dust or an object out of place.  Patrick and I would see her standing in the doorway to her room, she would call us into her room.  We would go in and find her standing in front of her dresser, a quarter for Patrick and a dollar for me.  She wouldn't just hand them to us.  She place her gift in the palm of our hands and then close our fingers around the money.  It was her way of saying, "I'm giving this to you.  Please take it and don't tell your mom."  We would put the money in our pockets and say thank you, a kiss and a hug and we would scamper out, back into the living room of my Aunt and Uncle.



I was born too late to remember her living anywhere but with my Aunty Andree and Uncle Roger.  For me, she always lived in the big white house, with the cool furnace grate and fenced yard.  The home where my sister Lisa would "memere sit" while my Aunt and Uncle went bowling or square dancing.  The house with my Aunt's amazing jewelry and bright red, gold, and white mesh slips that I would dance around in for hours and hours. 

My Aunty Esther, didn't move with the family to South Hadley (that or she returned to Canada shortly after.)  My clarity is lacking here.  Either way, my entire life has included at least one annual trip north to visit my Aunty Esther and Uncle Gabby and various cousins.  Usually this trip happened at Easter time and included this amazing feast affectionately known as "The Sugar Eat."  Yes, The Sugar Eat.  Its a small mountain in Quebec and that mountain is covered in two things:  maple trees and sugar shacks.  The entire clan of Bachands would arrive around 11am and would sit at mile-long picnic tables.  There were sometimes 30 of us. 

And then... we would eat.

Family style platters of scrambled eggs, bacon, pork rinds, pancakes, beans, hash browns and on top of all that you would pour the best Grade A freshly-boiled maple syrup all over it.  Sipping on cold orange juice, milk and spreading head cheese on toast you would try to save room for dessert.  Grand Peres This is probably mis-spelled.  Pronounced: Grand Pies to a 10 year old American though.), sugar pie and more.  The Grand Peres are basically dumplings boiled in, you guessed it, maple syrup.  This is not the candied, super sugary, fake stuff folks.  This is MAPLE syrup.  And they make it right there on-site, from the trees that surround the shacks.  After eating yourself silly, people gather in the huge halls where there are gift stands, a dj and dancing.  Because hey, why wouldn't you want to dance after stuffing your face with sugar for two hours?  To finish off this exercise in gluttony, we would walk out back to a trough.  Yes, a trough of packed snow where some heathen would pour boiling hot syrup by the ladel-fulls over the snow.  There you are, with a sugar level approaching 300, twisting a popsicle stick around the now taffy-like syrup and sucking it down like a melted lollipop. Pieces of snow twisted in are a bonus.

Full for most of the day and buzzing on a sugar high that mere mortals should never experience, we would return home to my Aunt's cozy kitchen.  Uncle Gabby in his rocking chair with the squeak of the floor boards, coffee brewing, cream soda and warm cheese.  Dinner was pizza.  Pizza with a rolled up dough ball in the center to keep the cheese from sticking to the box.  Reclining in my Aunt's tv room and watching the news in French or playing on the floor with the new toy my mom bought me before leaving.  Curled up with a book on her couch, gazing at the biggest asparagus plant I'd ever seen in my life.  The sound of my mom speaking in her native tongue that always reminded me of Charlie Brown's mom on the phone.  The old Canadian French my mother describes as "slangy" tumbled in with an English word a name every now and then.  It was just enough for me to know the topic of conversation but never the details. 

My cousins Stephane (French for Steven) and his brother Eric were my age.  Stephane a year older, Eric a bit younger.  Sesame Street had taught Stephane perfect English and he was the designated translator in our games of hide-n-seek.  Eric and I communicating pretty well for not knowing each other's language.  Our play time would start out slow, each year meaning we had to get to know each other all over again.  After the ice was broken and my shyness would give way to the need for play we would hang out and have a grand time together.

Visits to Great Aunts, cousins and the traditional trip to the mall would make up the remainder of our time in Canada.  Packing the trunk of our car with cheese curds ("squeaky cheese" it was later dubbed) and Labatt's Bleue beer, we would get ready for the trip home.  We would stand in the kitchen and form a line, kiss each other on each cheek the procession of luggage moved to the driveway.  More hugs all around and waves from the backseat of our red Impala with the white roof. 

This is Canada to me.  It is where my mom is from and where her dearly-loved sister lives.  It is where she calls with family news, on holidays, when the Canadians beat the USA at hockey.  My mom has barely the trace of an accent, but every now and then it reveals itself and I smile at its sound.  Spring to me always means "road trip" and Canada more than it has ever meant green beer and Irish drinking songs.  It means a small cooler packed with green seedless grapes and plums, Mad Libs, Judy Blume books, the expansive backyard of my Canadian family.  It means finding Easter eggs in a motel room, my cousin's little convenience store, crossing the border and counting the miles.  It means cards games and late nights, road games and maple syrup on snow.



 It means family I guess.  My very French-Canadian family.