A Fickle Wind. Elizabeth Bourne

to wear it at night indefinitely. I was thrilled with the results, and I think it changed my personality. This was really brought into perspective at Craig’s company Christmas party that year.

      Max always had a lovely party for his employees, in a private room at one of Toronto’s better hotels. It was a wonderful opportunity to dress elegantly—one of my great pleasures in life—and socialize with people we knew but didn’t see very often. During the evening, a man I didn’t recall asked me to dance. He remarked that I was a different woman that year. I asked what he meant. He said that the prior year he had noticed how sad I was, and this year I was happy and smiling all the time! I knew I hadn’t been sad, but that was obviously the impression I had given. I had simply been hiding my teeth!

       Chapter Seven

      One weekend we were in Toronto with Jean and Don, and someone came up with the idea that we should drive to America. Could we really do that on the spur of the moment? Didn’t we have to make plans? Of course we could—and no, we didn’t. According to Don, we could do anything we liked at any time. And no one should try to stop him if they knew what was good for them! We had now spent enough time with him to have confidence that if he said so, it was so.

      Going to America meant driving about a hundred miles south and entering Buffalo, New York, across the Peace Bridge. We started out, and I couldn’t have been more excited. Back then, Canadians and Americans crossed that bridge with no identification necessary. Those really were the good old days! “Where are you from?” was the question asked at the border, and if a slurred “Toronna” came back, you could be on your way.

      But halfway there, it occurred to one of us that Craig and I weren’t Canadian. What now? No problem, according to our fearless leader. And for the next fifty miles we practiced how to emulate a Toronto native! We were a little nervous but passed with flying colors, thereby fulfilling what had previously been an unattainable dream. We were in America. Really! Pinch me!

      Buffalo isn’t the most exciting part of America, but I didn’t care. It qualified! We drove around the streets, wandered through a park, looked at shops, and ate in a restaurant. It was magical. It became too late to drive back, so we decided to spend the night in a hotel—four to a room, of course. I felt bewitched. It was all too much for me to believe. Wait until I sent my weekly letter home!

      On the subject of home, we decided it was time to take a trip back. My father had suffered a mild heart attack a few months prior but had had a good recovery. However, I needed to see him. I had dutifully sent weekly letters to our parents so they were able to track our exploits. Sometimes we made a tape they could play. No phone calls were possible, because they still did not have phones. You can imagine how excited we all were about the trip. I think I failed to mention that Craig was also an only child, so also very much missed. Craig’s father, Sid, had acquired a small car during our absence, and he and Craig’s mom, Kit, were to pick us up at Heathrow.

      We had a great beginning to our trip. We were in line to go through customs behind the Beatles! We couldn’t believe it. They were newly famous and, according to some pundits, the most popular and sought-after entertainers of all time. And there they were, chatting away to each other and smiling at us!

      First stop was my parents’ house. My father did everything except dance on the table, he was so excited to have me home. My mother, less demonstrative, of course, served tea for the six of us, and Craig and I started to regale them with stories of life in Canada.

      It was soon noticeable, and seemed to us a little strange, that the women tended to try to compete, interjecting their own stories about inconsequential incidents at home. For example, after I told her something amazing, I recall my mother saying, “Hmm! Well, last week this woman on telly won ten thousand pounds on a game show.” What did that have to do with anything? Didn’t they care about Canada? Didn’t they want to know how well everything was turning out for us? Well, in a nutshell, no! I quickly concluded that was the case and had enough sense to stop discussing it.

      I couldn’t wait to see my close friends. Marion had married while we were away, so lots to hear about there. She hadn’t even known her husband, Reg, when I had left. She and I made a date to meet in London, just the two of us. That way we could have a no-holds-barred conversation. We have honored this tradition through all the years I have lived away. We’d meet there late morning, go to a lovely restaurant for lunch, and either walk around shops (I loved shopping in London and taking the latest styles back) or sit in the park. Wherever it was, we talked incessantly. There wasn’t then, nor is there now, ever enough time to share everything we wished to share, and we would be forced to say goodbye well before we were ready to do so.

      I also enjoyed seeing Stella and Monica, who were interested in my new life and in sharing stories about their jobs, boyfriends, and activities. I loved my girl time with good friends. Apart from spending time with a love, which I really didn’t have, my women friends have always been so important to me.

      We visited relatives, including my Auntie Lily. She asked me if we would now be making plans to move back. It hadn’t occurred to me that we would ever move back. Why the question?

      “Because of your father’s heart condition.”

      “But I thought he was okay.”

      “Well… never the same, of course. It’s not out of the question that he could have another one.”

      Horrors! I never wanted to move back. I hadn’t liked it before, but now, living a life with so much freedom and opportunity, there was absolutely no way I could settle there again. I call it the, “How ya gonna keep ’em down on the farm” syndrome. And I sure filled that bill!

      Then my mother started to emote in her not-so-subtle way. She had met an old classmate of mine who had said, “It’s hard to understand how an only daughter could leave her mother and go so far away.” At least, that’s what my mother said she said! I refused to be drawn in. “I have to do nearly everything myself around the house now, and it’s not easy,” was another comment. And, “We aren’t getting any younger, you know, and your father’s health isn’t good. Try walking with him to the shops. He stops every two minutes.”

      My father seemed fine, made no complaints at all, and gave every indication that he was very happy that I was carving out a decent life for myself. He was still my “You go, girl” dad. What was going on? My mother had been so supportive of our going. For all her complaining, her situation wasn’t really all that different. I realized, of course, that they had had a fright, but my father was not at death’s door. To me, he seemed able enough and in his usual good spirits.

      As often happens when I really ponder something, it all started to fall into place. It was never mentioned, but I intuited that my mother had planned that Craig and I would be the front runners, and she and my father would follow us to Canada. My father’s health issue was interfering with her plans, and she was no longer sure he could make the move. In fact, I think she was becoming sure he could not.

      I also believe that she was starting to become aware of an embryonic independent streak emerging in me, which she had previously managed to overpower. And with her typical dog-in-the-manger attitude, if she couldn’t have it, neither should I. Seen from her perspective, I was the insurance policy that wasn’t paying off! When it came time for us to leave, her parting words to me were, “You are such a disappointment to me.” It felt as though she had actually struck me in the face.

      We were happy to be back in Canada. Our trip had validated my certainty that we would never live in England again. Craig and I had made several moves during the years we had lived in Canada, and we were now in a Toronto suburb called Don Mills.

      A new friendship had recently developed for me. A woman named Doreen had replaced me at the car dealership, and one of the other girls in that office had set up an introduction. We were both young and from England, and we had each married just before moving to Canada. Doreen’s ethnicity was Czech, and her parents had escaped just prior to the Nazi