HELLO!

I like colour. My favorite colour is forest green. I suspect there is in me some deep-seated affection for that colour based on my paternal Irish heritage. But who knows? Moreover, I don’t rightly know what the ethnic origins of my gene pool have to do with whom I am today. My mother’s parents were English, second-generation Newfoundland, and Scottish, second-generation Halifax. My father’s parents were first generation Newfoundland (Flat Island, Placentia Bay) and Irish (the Littles came to Halifax in 1842, the result of the Potato famine). None of my four grandparents ever spoke of their heritage. My mother’s parents were “joiners”, it was the organizations they belonged to, that gave them a sense of identity (United Church, Odd Fellows, Rebekahs, Progressive Conservatives). My father’s parents spent all their time with my grandmother’s (the Kenways from Flat Island) kin. They all lived near the Halifax Forum, streets with names of European cities. We never got to know the Littles as the marriage of a Roman Catholic like Papa, to a Methodist (then United) like Nanny, did not impress the Littles.

I have never been interested in genealogy. I could not understand why it was important to know who your kin were a) if you never knew them and b) you did not absorb any of their traditions in your current lifestyle. I still don’t understand it, though I know I am in the minority. I do re-member (re-connecting their experience to my own) aspects of all four, their character, their outlook, their words. I re-member my father’s Dad, he was a hard-working employee of the CN, a carpenter who would repair the trains when they came into the station. He carried that work ethic into his household responsibilities. I re-member my father’s Mom, she loved flowers, her garden brought laughter, smiles, and joy to her soul. I re-member my mother’s Dad, he had a bad heart, retired early from Morse’s Tea, and drove around Halifax looking for people who needed a “boost”, he had the cables at the ready if someone’s battery went dead. He also participated in the Halifax parades walking on stilts. I re-member my mother’s Mom, she was the first female Clerk of Session at our church (J. Wesley Memorial on Charles Street) and she always dressed up as Santa Claus (we called her Nanny Claus) at Christmas to distribute our gifts from kin in New Brunswick and Ontario, not to mention giving gifts to all the lonely people my mother invited from our neighbourhood.

I do re-member. What and how do you re-member? Peace, Kevin

PS The upper photo, comes from my friend Brian, reminded me today of my grandmother, Alice (Kenway) Little. The bottom photo reveals Alice in her garden at the cottage (Petpeswick), my brother Scott is with her. Scott writes, “I have a Sumac tree on my property. Nanny and Papa loved Sumac trees, they always had one on every property they owned.”