The Goderich Signal-Star, 1987-12-22, Page 18unit
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GODERICH SIGNAL -STAR, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1987
"Bethlehem Live"
�
comes to Goderich
Mary and Joseph, played by Melanie VanPatter and
Paul Speight arrived New Testament -style, complete
with donkey, for the local Bethel Pentecostal Assembly
Production of "Bethlehem Live," which was staged in
the church parking lot from Dec. 16 to 18. The produc-
tion utilized music, narration, actors and live animals
to tell the Christmas Story. Below: three wisemen,
played by Stephen Gower, James Spencer and Dale
Tipert, bear gifts for the Christ Child; shepherds Philip
Gower, Larry Hutchins, John King, Andrew McLarty
and Jeff Westlake pay a visit to the Bethlehem bir-
thplace of Christ; Lynette Hutchins (centre) leads a
host of angels in announcing the historic event. The
cast staged a total of seven 20 -minute performances
over the three -night run. Bethel Assistant pastor Mark
Scarr, said the church hopes to make the staging of the
production, which attracted around 60 people for the
first performance Monday night, an annual event.
(photos by Patrick Raft's)
SECTION
WILLIAM
THOMAS
How I grew up
with a rnigrane
I was born on October 18, 1946 at the
Welland County Hospital' a few hours
after Nadine Jowett. Two scrubbed -red,
screaming, twitching, naked babies in
adjoining beds - I fell madly in love with
Nadine Jowett even though at one point
that day she was twice my age.
A little later in life after Nadine and I
spent Grades 7 and 8 at S.S. No. 4 in Dain
City staring at each other across the
classroom, we were enrapt in love so
deep that the principal, Mr. Hodgkins
had to bring M the jaws of life to keep us
apart.
Love dies an agonizing death when
you're twelve and losing her plunged me
into a well of depression so black that on-
ly Brian Mulroney's political planner has
been there since.
I had nothing to live for and even less to
look forward to. There was, for me, but
one way out - death.
So I tried to kill Malcolm Hilton with a
railroad spike. Unsuccessful as I was and
he, rather perturbed by my unprovoked
attack, later broke my arm in three
places with a wheelbarrow and burried a
garden hoe in my hand. We decided, as
kids do but generals don't, that the score
had been evenly settled and called a
truce that has lasted to this day. I see
Malcolm socially and we're still the best
of friends provided nobody shows up at
the party with a railroad "spike, a
wheelbarrow or a garden rake. When
that happens, 1 swear, it's everyone for
himself.
I think of Nadine Jowett sometimes
when I drive through Binbrook where she
lives. I think she lives 'n the red house, or
maybe the other house in Binbrook.
Once born and breathing, I was releas-
ed from the Welland County General
Hospital on my own recognizance and
lived at 124 Dunkirk in the wartime
houses in Welland.
At 14 days of age, family tradition dic-
tated that my mother turn the frail and
frothing baby boy over to his older Sister
to hold in preparation of a decade of
babysitting to come. And, they say my
sister Gail was a very good holder of
newborn baby boys but that she had the'
attention span of a fruitfly.
"Oh Joan," Gail yelled to my sister,
rushing to the living room window,
"there goes Roger-Carbonneau, that cute
guy you like so much ! "
Gail forgot, one thing. Me. Eye
witnesses, my mother being one, would
later marvel: "He bounced ... he hit -the
hardwood floor head first and he actually
bounced right up in the air." It was a
shame that Gail was by this time trying
to pry the window open, otherwise she
might have made a gem of a recovery,
grabbing me on the first bounce.
A report of the incident in the Welland -
Port Colborne Evening Tribune by an
antsy reporter trying to get the sports
assignment, claimed I was the first child
in history ever to be spiked.
Despite the early effort of my older
sisters, I lived to the age of two
whereupon Gail was generous enough to
include me in her daily neighbourhood
bicycle tears. Had my mother known
that Gail had a two-year-old balanced on
the back fender with feet on the wheel
nuts and fingernails embedded in the
leather seat, she'd have beaten .her
severely about the neck and ears with
Plymouth Cordage Grade B cattle wire.
What Gail lacked in mental sharpness
she more than made up for in
friendliness. "Follow me" she said to a
man in a car who'd asked directions to a
neighbour's house. And we sped off with
me hanging on for dear, sweet but brief,
life. When a car backed out of a driveway
ahead on the right, Gail cut left causing
the man in the car following us to run us
over I was thrown into a ditch and a
coma, pretty much simultaneously.
Gail, as was the case in all our early
death -defying calamities, came away
without a scratch.
I would survive the crash and live to
see both Joan and Gail reach the apex of
their misspent youth - "The Shelter
Lady" game.
In this garne, the origin of which is
largely accredited to Dr. Joseph
Mengele, two grown up girls taunt, tor-
ment and terrorize a three-year-old boy
with the story that he was adopted. aban-
doned on the doorstep of the Children's
Aid Shelter by a hand of migrant tobacco
pickers and today - if he's not good - to-
day, while the parents are away - today is
the day that "The Shelter Lady" comes
to take him back.
They got a good year of cruel and
unusual punishment out of "The Shelter
Lady" game until I began to believe the
reassurance of my mother backed up by.
a certificate of birth and an unpaid in-
voice for the whole episode.
Then one day while my sister Gail was
out of the house, Joan called "The
Shelter Lady" and she came. I laughed
right up until I heard the rapping of the
cane on the back door. When I saw the old
black hat, the black veil and black gloves
I knew I was deader than Frankie
Sokoloski's dog.
A doctor would later explain my rup-
tured kidney to my mother as a rare case
of instant evacuation, so sudden and
complete that the organ actually
puckered and the walls stuck together. A
neighbour who watched from a distance
thought he saw a kitchen pipe burst.
I was a model child for nine years after
that incident. When I was a salesman
with the 3M Company, my manager used
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