July 28, 1990

Washed two loads of clothes. That’s all I did. The trailer is really nice. It has three bedrooms. I want to go to Alberta in August but I don’t think we’ll get to.

Trite. My life was trite, lol. I did a lot if not all of the laundry as a kid/teenager. Mom worked fulltime as a nurse and that involved shiftwork, twelve hour shifts. Dad was a farmer and so my sisters and I shouldered many of the chores growing up. Laundry was easy, no biggie. The trailer I’m alluding to is the one I talked about on the last post of my calendiaries. We had lived in a tiny house and then moved into a house trailer that was also small but bigger than what we’d had.

I was wishing to travel out to Alberta in 1990 and nothing’s changed lol. I could have easily posted today “wish we were going to Alberta in August but most likely won’t be.”

July 28, 1991

Jim phoned. He is coming Tuesday or Wednesday with his wife. Make a pie and started a casserole but we went to Gramma’s for supper. Watched “Elvis and Me” Part one, on TV.

Jim was our Uncle Jim, although not our actual uncle. He was from Michigan and he was one in a group of guys who travelled up to our place every fall to hunt geese and ducks and eventually also started coming each spring to fish.

We collectively called them “the Americans” growing up. Uncle Jim started coming before I was even born, 1971 I believe. But he came every single September and spent a week, camped in our yard, for over 30 years. It was just an annual event that happened in our lives and really was pretty exciting. He had a core group of guys that came up with him and his son Richie came every year too from about the age of 15. Uncle Jim would always bring us treats and toys when we were young. American things I guess. And sometimes big things. A microwave one year, a dirt bike another year.

I think how it all started was he just stumbled across my dad’s land and thought it would be good for goose hunting, came and asked permission and then came back year after year after year. He was close with my Gramma too and called her “Ma”. She would let him and his hunting partners use her downstairs bathroom and shower when they needed to. And she would feed them oodles of homemade baking and goodies.

They brought tents and campers I believe in the first few years but once we moved into the trailer and no longer needed the house, it was outfitted as a sort of hunting lodge for Uncle Jim and his crew. They built bunkbeds, three beds high in two of the rooms. In shops class in grade 9, I made a sign from wood that read “Goose Fever Lodge” and proudly presented it to Uncle Jim. I was such a nerd.

During the year we kept in touch with Uncle Jim by letters and sometimes phone calls, a card at Christmas. I only vaguely remember this particular year that he talked his wife into coming way way up north to Canada during the summer for a holiday. If I remember right, she was very citified and didn’t appreciate the rugged beautiful land around our farm, the way he did.

When we got older, Uncle Jim made a point of taking us to town for pizza and actually spending time with us, at least for an evening. Which was really something because goose and duck hunting was like an obsession with him.

I have great memories of the Americans and the time we spent with them. Glen was hilarious, such a hoot to be around and a super nice guy. He, like Uncle Jim, had kids almost the same age as my sisters and I, and he would tell us stories about them.

I had a super duper major crush on a guy named Chad. I still have a picture of him somewhere. And then there was Jamie. He was exactly the same age as me. He and I were good friends and my sister Gena and I took him to the bar one night just so he could experience a small town Canadian Saturday night. I remember he drove us to town, in her Beretta and he was going so fast, getting the miles and kilometers on the odometer mixed up.

Needless to say, Uncle Jim was a big part of our lives, if only for one or two weeks a year and we missed him immensely once he stopped coming. I can’t remember what year he passed away but September always seemed so boring after that.

July 28, 1992

Rode my bike. Went for another ride on Holly and Gena came on Starr. Went to Gramma’s. Our new truck is an ’85 GMC S15 and it’s white.

Rode my bike while listening to my walkman a lot in those days. It was something to kill the time. I’d ride up and down the highway or down to my Gramma’s.