EARLY MEMORIES

EARLY MEMORIES.

Every sense is sharpened when I visit Bermuda. It sparks an acute awareness I am back on my island homeland where I was born. A place where history haunts my every step. On a recent visit, I went for a quiet early evening walk along the old railway trail near our first family home in Baileys Bay in Hamilton Parish. The area where I spent the first four years of my life and the very spot on the island where my family first settled in the early 1600’s. Now with a legacy of some 18 generations of my ancestors having trod this very same ground, I started thinking about those who came before and the secrets this very location might hold in silent witness. There was nobody here when our first relatives arrived to settle this tiny uninhabited island in the middle of a vast Ocean, it was a blank but beauteous canvas. Surrounded by all this family history I was feeling a little nostalgic and began reminiscing my own life’s journey. I pondered thoughtfully, retracing my earliest childhood memories at this very location. The passage of time had not dampened their clarity. I knew the way here instinctively, even though I had not been back to this spot in some 65 plus years. My father and mother both gone now, but they remained alive and well enough in my memory, and that is the best one can hope for. Finally, I found myself standing in front of where my life had started, our ancestral home, “Callan Glen.” A large Georgian house painted white with dark green shutters, and a sweeping lawn in front overlooking the rocky coastline of the North Shore. The tennis Court now long gone. I could see my parents in their youth in my mind’s eye, and they were smiling at each other. It was a happy place, leaving me with so many indelibly etched early childhood memories, both fond and bittersweet.

The sun was beginning to set in the late afternoon, as I sauntered down to the waterside along the North Shore and sat by the water’s edge. A place that triggered a traumatic moment in my early life that remains lucidly vivid to this day. It was when I was about three years old. An event that terrorized me with absolute fear. It was when my mother would take all four brothers to this exact location. An early summer ritual after my brothers were out of school for summer break. And this was the place where my mother had every intention of resolving a constant worry on her mind. We were marched across the road from our house, ‘Callan Glen,’ for daily swimming lessons. These being directly aimed at me, the youngest who could not swim yet. The vexing worry of a mother living so close to the water’s edge. Previously we were taken to the safety of what was commonly referred to by local mothers as, ‘baby beach,’ in Tuckers Town where the water was puddle shallow and safe. Now it was time to get my big boy pants on and be put to the test.

So, ‘trial by ordeal,’ was my mother’s preferred method and it took place at this man-made camber had been cut out of the natural Bermuda limestone along the shoreline. It seemed so much smaller now than I remembered as a young child. Originally, it had been created for ship building and launchings hundreds of years earlier by my ancestors. My family being a large part of that legacy, as I imagined those times distracted momentarily. Marveling at the effort it must have taken to carve all this out from the natural limestone bedrock by hand. They had even carved a flat work area alongside that now served as the dock I was sitting on. Our forefathers were some very industrious people.

The water was exactly as I remembered, a vivid turquoise, and the bottom sandy white but ominously deep to me as a child. Now seemingly shallow, but it was multiples deeper than my diminutive stature at the time. All set against the backdrop of the grey weathered shoreline in stark contrast. There were even steps chiseled out of the stone to access the water, and I remember them with trepidation.

I was the fourth son, and my mother had little interest in babying me when we lived so close to the Ocean. The safety of her children was paramount and the responsibility of making sure we could swim was a matter of duty. Certainly, all my older brothers could as they skinned down to their tighty-whities and dove into the clear waters with total abandon, splashing and frolicking without a care in the world. I remember observing their pleasure, but it gave me no solace being the youngest, not yet able to swim.

Mother had tired of the slow schooling techniques of building confidence by being patient and took a more draconian approach to her duties. Sink or swim was clearly her motto, and I was fully cognizant of her mission as I screamed in protest to her intentions. I knew what was coming and on seeing that plastic ring fully comprehended her failed strategy. Her idea was one that included building false confidence by letting out most of the air in the ring, so I had little choice but to swim for my life. She had previously tried this strategy several times without success and her patience was waning because she now knew my protest was demonstrative of her failures. This time deciding I was not going in and had a full out tantrum as the ring was forcibly pushed over my head. Then without ceremony she picked me up and threw me overboard. I sank in a cloud of bubbles, as the ring was ripped away from me underwater by what little air was left in it. I clearly remember looking up to the surface and striking out for that ring. It was butter yellow on one side and had a clear side with some cartoon animal graphics on the other. I can still see them from that submerged perspective. As I grabbed it, there was so little air that it could not support me, leaving me with no choice other than to try to swim to the nearby steps. In a frantic panic mode, splashing and kicking with all my might aiming straight for those stairs with determined focus. I made it, now standing back on the safety of land and crying in protest to her actions. My mother leaned over, patted me on the head and said, ‘Now you can swim.’ And that is exactly how I learned to swim. By the end of that summer all four brothers would frolic in the warm clear sea near our home without supervision. The sea became my second home from a very young age.

Refocusing on the moment unfolding, the sky was now on fire as I watched the sun dip over the horizon. I slipped off my Docksiders and dangled my toes in the warm soothing sea. This was the last place we had lived when my parents were still together. They divorced when I was four. A flood of memories gushed through my mind. I could see Dad giving my older brother Douglas a two-shilling coin for raking up the leaves around the old Norfolk pines. I had been the helper albeit of little use, dragging the rake around without any real purpose or effect in hindsight. But in my young mind I had done a fine job, probably better than my brother, so I pleaded my case in a flow of tears. Dad seeing my distress walked over, picked me up fondly, gave me a gentle kiss on the forehead and pulled out a shiny two-shilling coin for me. He smiled at me lovingly as I took it beaming in delight, not because of the money, but the feeling of self-worth. I remember it like yesterday today.

Then of course there was the time the four brothers ranging in age from three to nine got into a heap of mischief. We excelled at that! My father had decided to renovate my Great Grandfathers home, ‘Virginia Cottage,’ which sat in a hollow on the other side of the tennis court. There was also a small tidal lagoon next to the cottage that my father stocked with a plethora of marine life. There were turtles lazily swimming around, rockfish, along with any number of local species to be found from parrot fish to Sergeant Majors. There was even a nurse shark in the pond that added great excitement, particularly to this spectator.

It was while Dad was at work and after the workmen had left for the day that we all decided a site inspection was in order. We entered the cottage to the smell of freshly plastered ceilings. They were creamy white and perfect. My oldest brother decided a nearby length of reinforcing bar might very well be the perfect tool to test this new work. He gave it one small jab, and it perforated the ceiling with a perfectly round hole. Then he did it again, marveling at the replicated result. Before long all four of us were marching around the cottage puncturing the ceiling in absolute delight. After several hundred testimonies to our naughty nature were artfully decorating the ceiling, we tired of this fun activity and sauntered back home for dinner. When Dad arrived home from work on his scooter, he was so anxious to see the workmen’s progress, he went directly to the cottage. He came back fuming, and it was not long before the culprits were found guilty and sentenced. For some kindly reason, my three older brothers maintained that I was not one of the perpetrators. Their punishment was a strapping from Dad’s leather belt and then off to bed without T.V. I remember them all crying from the meted punishment they got, flinching in sympathy at the sound of every stroke on their rear ends. However, I was allowed to watch TV late for being a ‘good boy.’ What particularly stands out after their punishment was delivered, was my three brothers peeking around the bedroom door angrily telling me to come to bed too or they would tell on me. I simply shrugged my shoulders and said, ‘You’ll get more spanks for lying,’ then continued cross legged watching my favorite show, “The Lone Ranger.”

Of course, there were those times I did not get away with my misdeeds. On one such occasion my brother Douglas, and I thought it would be a superb idea to do a little covert fire testing as young boys often do. We were fascinated with fire and executed our mission with precise planning, or so we both thought. Stealing the box of matches was the easy part. The more challenging aspect being where to set up our controlled event. We decided that the old cast iron tub used to collect rainwater behind the old tennis house would be a sensible place to exercise our plan. The drain had rusted away long ago so it was empty making the perfect vessel to carry out our mission. It was both a covert hiding place to conceal ourselves, and well away from prying eyes, like those of our hawk-eyed mother. She certainly would not have sanctioned this ill-advised venue, and we knew it. First, we collected twigs and flammable items from around the immediate area, and soon the tub was full, with an added reserve supply of firewood on the side at the ready. After several attempts we achieved ignition, and it was not long before we had a crackling fire. That was until the side of the tennis house made of wood caught on fire. Now we had a roaring out of control fire. All efforts to snuff the fire out by any means readily available, including sand and dirt.... failed! Soon the entire structure was ablaze, and our mother came running out of the house having smelled the smoke. She knew something was amiss and immediately called the fire brigade. The perpetrators caught red handed. By the time the fire truck arrived the structure was all but gone, just the embers glowing, and a blackened tub standing in lonely homage to our misdeed. The fire brigade adding a great deal of excitement to the event as they sprayed the remnants with their hoses. After, the Chief came in the house to have a little chat with us about the dangers of fire. Surely our practical lesson and subsequent failure had been teaching moment! We thought so, but Mom was not convinced and thought she should punctuate the lesson with a little one of her own. I remember her lighting a match and burning one of our fingers as we fiercely resisted, to ensure we understood the pain fire could inflict. Grimacing in anticipation as she forcibly drew our finger to the flame. We learnt!

Mom was divorced and remarried by the time I was five. But during the transition period my three brothers and I were moved from our homeland Bermuda with our mother to a wholly different world, Miami, Florida. Mom was an American and thought the clean break from our Bermudian father would be easiest on us kids. At least that is what she told us. I was just four, but I remember it all with surprising clarity. Our entire lives were upheaved from our privileged and genteel life in Bermuda. It was all I had known. But being a band of four brothers kept us feeling like there was some continuity, albeit in this strange new world. I remember the year we spent there, my school, our apartment, the small house we lived in and the neighbors whose kids became our friends. They taught us the ropes in our new and unfamiliar circumstance. What we did not know, was Mom had a plan in play which included marrying the love of her life, and this was only an interim solution while the divorce decree went through. She wanted to shield us from any potential unpleasantness, as is often the case in these matters. A wife with four kids leaving her husband for a younger man. This situation had potential risks. However we were oblivious, and she remained fearful our father might use his local privilege and try to take us from her. In hindsight she realized this would never have been a likely scenario.

We were very young, resilient and easily bent to these changes. And it was not long before we were in the rhythm of our new lives. My new fascination became the kids next door who kept pet grass snakes they housed in a wire cage in their backyard. It was not the kids that interested me… it was the snakes. I had never seen a snake much less touched one. Their smoothen skin, darting forked tongues and movement captivated my imagination with unwarranted interest. We would spend hours of our idle time hunting butterflies to feed them. Feeding them being an early lesson in prey, eat or be eaten. Their vibrant green skin and size was memorable, especially from the perspective of a four-year-old. They soon became our adopted pets, and we would carry them around in the protection of our shirts. I remember the feeling as they wrapped around my waistline, head peeping out from between the buttons from time to time. They seemed to like it there; they never tried to get away and were very friendly as I saw it. That was until we tried sneaking them into our house. We had gotten away with it often enough, but when my mother saw this green head pop out from the cover of my shirt, she shrieked in absolute horror. That was the end of that, and I remember being very upset that my new pets were treated to such an unpleasant welcome. I loved these snakes; they were my new friends.

School in the U.S. was very different from the more regimented British system I had briefly experienced at home in Bermuda. And I was surprised that every afternoon we would be instructed to roll out mats on the classroom floor for naptime. Seemed very babyish to me at the time. It reminded me of the time I had spent in hospital. I was probably about two and a half, maybe three at the time. I had a particular craving for sesame seeds on the side of bread. I would judiciously strip the crust of every seed on a piece of bread with unequalled zeal. I loved them! So, when I went into my mother’s bedroom and there on her bedside table at eye level was a box of them, temptation took over. They were even presented with a see-through plastic window to further entice me. Mom was asleep on her afternoon nap, so the opportunity was ripe. I grabbed the small box, ran downstairs and pulled a kitchen chair over to the counter. Then I nimbly scrambled onto the counter, retrieved the bread from its lofty lodging in the upper cupboard, grabbed the peanut butter and set about making the most magnificent sandwich ever. It was just after I had tucked into my dream creation that Mom entered the kitchen. Time froze as our eyes met, stopping mid bite and looking at her with guilty pleasure written all over my face. She saw the box, the seeds scattered all over the counter, the evidence was all there, “Andrew what are you eating?” She shrieked.

Well, seemed obvious enough to me, “A peanut butter sandwich.” I replied with peanut butter voice.

“Did you put those seeds on that sandwich Andrew?” She blurted in confusion.

“Yes…I like them,” I answered bluntly, but fearing I could be in trouble for pilfering them from her bedside.

“Oh my God…that’s rat poison,” she shouted at me, fear visibly screaming across her face. Rat poison, I thought to myself, why would rat poison be the seeds I love so much. I was entirely confused, and in my defense, too young to read. They were laced with Strychnine! It goes without saying I was rushed to the hospital, rubber tubes shoved up my nose and down into my stomach as I watched the big glass bottles fill with my contents, surrounded by whitecoats. Now comes the part that I was reminded of, they put me in a baby bed with sides that pulled up to keep me in like a baby’s crib. I was not happy then, nor being forced to have a nap now! However, there was a silver lining. After naptime we were given two Graham crackers and a chocolate milk every day, and I loved that aspect of school in the U.S. Our time in the US was brief, but even as young as I was, I remember it well. We were all happy at the prospect we were going back home before the coming summer.

I have so many early memories that obviously impacted the way I viewed the world, but one thing is certain, it was always experiential. The outdoors was ours to explore and life once back in Bermuda an idyllic playground to build character through action. Not always the wisest decisions were made, but there was always a lesson to be learned.