Cadjo: Memories Last Forever

Biography

Acknowledgements

It may have been one or both of my maternal grandparents, Albert and Agnes Thomas, who gave me the unique nickname, Cadjo. Or some say it could have been my Aunty Mag. Another version is Cadge. Mainly family and old friends still call me by these names today. It warms my heart whenever I hear someone call me by one of those names. For the sake of consistency in this book, I use the name Cadjo exclusively, except in scenarios where Carol is the more natural choice. I also use this version in honour of my brother, Brian, whose nickname was Beano. We were close all of our lives, and someday I may write a sequel to Cadjo: Memories Last Forever with the title, Beano Was Here.

I thank my family, cousins, and friends who have encouraged me in writing my story and who are looking forward, along with me, to seeing my book in print. I would like to thank them for giving me permission to use their names in this book. Names for which I did not receive permission to use have been changed.

Veronica Dunne, thank you for meeting up with me for tea some thirty years later and for remembering me, one of many you counselled.

Dr. Bill Jacyk, MD, FRCPC, thank you for your kind words of encouragement (God bless your courage, your efforts, and your integrity), your permission to use your name, and your interest in reading my book.

Thank you, Ian Nairn, for your spiritual guidance, for opening my eyes to the truth, and for getting my life back on track.

I’m thankful that my brother, Beano, had a chance to read the first four chapters of my manuscript many years before he passed away in 2013. Like me, our childhood was engraved in his heart. I feel so blessed to have walked alongside of you in your journey through life.

I thank Helmut, my husband, who has stood beside me in the quest to solve the puzzle of my life. Thank you for loving me. In return, I have grown to love you even more over the passing years. Not a reader, he finally read my story this past winter for the first time. I told him he better read it before it was published so he could approve it. To my amazement, he finished the manuscript in one day and gave me his blessing.

To my son, Darren, I’m grateful that you grew up to be a strong, independent, and talented young businessman and artist. I’m amazed that you weren’t affected by a mother who was always searching for the answers to her unsettled life. I’m happy that you’ve been blessed with your lovely, supportive, and creative wife, Lisa, who’s a wonderful mother to your children and our adorable grandchildren, Taylor and Hudson.

A special thank you to my loyal, loving, and wise daughter, Leanne, who has always been my biggest supporter, confidante, and friend. Thank you for believing in me, sometimes even more than I believed in myself, and for proofreading and analyzing this book for comprehension and clarity. I’ve left some words in that you said you didn’t understand … just because I like words! Often, I doubted publishing my book, but you always encouraged me.

Thank you to my son-in-law, Jonathon, who helped find the cellar door in my childhood home, which inspired the design for the cover of this book. Thanks also for being a wonderful husband to Leanne.

Thank you, Mom (Anna Louise Thomas), for the ten wonderful years I had with you. They were the normal years that allowed me to experience love and security like every child should.

To Harold, my stepdad, who wanted me to think of him as my real dad: Thank you for instilling in me a love for God and His church. I’ve always held to these values of faith and always will.

To my sisters, Dale and Doreen, and your families: I love you always. Thank you both for your unconditional love and support throughout my life and for your approval of me sharing my story. Without it, this book would never exist.

Thank you to Word Alive Press and publishers Jeremy Braun and Jen Jandavs-Hedlin for making an overwhelming and unsurmountable task doable. From the start, the voice of Sylvia St. Cyr (publishing consultant) on the other end of the telephone was encouraging, as she informed me that my story was short-listed in the 2018 Women’s Journey of Faith contest. Tia Friesen (project manager) was responsible for all the detail in the layout and design. I am grateful that she raised my awareness of how I may be portrayed to the reader, causing me to second-guess what I wrote and make changes where necessary. Kerry Wilson (editor) was easy to work with. Although not seeing or speaking visibly to each other, we managed to successfully work together electronically, accepting and applying feedback accordingly. Thank you to Nikki Braun, cover designer, for replicating the cellar door.

We all have our own story and path to walk. Were it not for the saving grace of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, there would be no need for this book. I lift up His name to be praised.

Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name. And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased. (Hebrews 13:15–16)

Foreword

I consider it an honour to write a brief foreword for your book and am humbled to have been used in some small way to reveal your Heavenly Father’s heart to you and Helmut. I pray that God will use your courageous vulnerability to bless and encourage many others trapped by fear, isolation, and self-medicating as a result of the brokenness, selfishness, and failure of trusted fathers or step-fathers. Your story is another example of the truth experienced by Corrie ten Boom. Together with her, you’ve declared that there is no pit so deep that He is not deeper still. On behalf of all those who will be blessed and encouraged to entrust themselves to the healing process that can only come through the Spirit of God, the Word of God, and the people of God—thank you!

Ian Nairn, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Community Relations Manager, Promise Keepers Canada

Introduction

Cadjo: Memories Last Forever was mostly written by the time I was forty. For another twenty-five years, it sat idle but remained a monkey on my back. Like housework—you know it’s something you have to do.

Going back to my hometown of Beaconia always provokes a nostalgic residue in all of my being. I wonder if that happens to most people as they tread on the territory of their younger years. One particularly beautiful, warm, and sunny Saturday summer day, with not a cloud in the brilliantly blue sky, my husband, Helmut, and myself, along with our daughter, Leanne, and her husband, Jonathon, decided to go for a drive to visit my old stomping grounds. Leanne and Jonathon live in Winnipeg and were out for the weekend at our home in Seven Sisters Falls. It only takes one hour to get to Beaconia from where we live.

We first stopped at my house, where my mom had passed away over five decades earlier. A number of tenants had lived in it after we’d moved away, but it had been empty and uninhabitable for many years now. The land had been sold, and a chain had been placed across the road entrance where a sign read: Private Property. I resented the sign. Nothing had kept me out before, and nothing would keep me out now. The person responsible for putting up the sign could never take away the strong and unrelenting bond I held in my heart and soul for this place.

A new home was being constructed nearby; however, on this day it was quiet. There was not a person in sight; even the wind ceased to blow.

Helmut waited in the car. He had taken this journey before, and this time he chose to sit it out while we went in to explore. He wasn’t an adventurer, but he came along to support me and share the day with Leanne and Jonathon.

The windowless, weather-beaten, shambled old house beckoned me to come inside, as it always did. This house held tender, sacred, haunting memories—some good and some bad.

Leanne had been here before. She was always eager to learn about my roots. Jonathon hadn’t come with us before, but I could see that he welcomed the adventure as he opened the car door quickly and got out. The three of us traipsed over the chain link strung along the road entrance and across the once-gravelled driveway and front yard, now overtaken with a mixture of long grass, weeds, and wildflowers. We walked carefully and slowly, weary of a snake, spider, or frog.

Not one tree or garden was ever planted on our property, except for some tall, red hollyhocks that magically seemed to appear every spring and bloomed stubbornly all summer long, hugging the front exterior walls of the house. The only physical features that dominated the land were a shed off to the left and rear of the house, where boxes of old, used clothing were once stored, and a rusty, rickety pump from a well that once provided good drinking water to us and our neighbours. It had most certainly gone dry and now sat useless.

We stood at the entrance, the door lying on the living room floor. I could see by the look on Leanne’s face that she was skeptical about going inside. She was a neat freak, always keeping herself tidy. She would never sit on a bench in a park without checking if it was spotless, lest she mark her clothing with dirt. She followed us anyway as we lifted our feet up off the ground and onto the rickety and uneven floorboards of the living room. I remembered so well that to our right was where my mom had lain on a narrow bed brought in from the hospital. In the corner I could see where a clock once sat on a shelf my dad had made. The shelf was gone, but tell-tale etchings on the wall gave evidence of its existence. Tall, foreboding weeds grew into the only two window openings in the long living room.

In time this house would eventually be torn down, but before that happened, I needed some treasure or memento to keep as a souvenir. What would it be?

Adjacent to the left of the living room were two small bedrooms, each with a small vertical window. The first bedroom was Mom and Dad’s. Their window faced the front yard. The other belonged to my older brother, Beano, my two younger sisters, Dale and Doreen, and myself. Our window faced the driveway and the well. It also looked onto a flat wooden step and the back door to a small porch. I remembered our bedroom so well, where Beano had slept on a narrow cot set up against the exterior wall, and where my sisters and I had slept on the bunk beds that Dad had built—Dale and Doreen together on the bottom, and me on the top.

The dugout basement was the most unappealing part of our house. It was situated right beneath our bedroom. After the spring rains, water accumulated on the dugout floor. A musty smell wafted upstairs whenever Mom or Dad would go down to collect something. They’d descend carefully in the dark on each rickety, wooden step until they finally found the string attached to the light bulb to light their way. Dad had built a large wooden bin for potatoes and onions, and rows of shelving for Mom’s canning.

I could picture her jars of lightly-tinted, pink crab apples soaking in sugared water, stirring memories of sucking their soft, sweet flesh, leaving only the pit and stem to cast away.

The three of us stood at the entrance to what was once my bedroom, a sloppy array of old boards and debris on the floor. A full-sized mattress was sloppily angled upright, probably lying on more debris.

Hey, Jonathon, I said with mounting excitement, there should be a trap door under there to the dugout basement. Can you lift that mattress and see if it’s still there?

I was fearful that there would only be a dark hole under the mattress and that mice, a rat, a skunk, or who-knows-what would come running out from underneath. I voiced my concern, but to my surprise, Jonathon eagerly lifted the mattress. Sure enough, the trap door was still in place!

I want it, Jonathon. Do you think you can lift it out? I’ll hold the mattress.

While I held the mattress, Jonathon bent over and tugged the door loose. There was my treasure, my keepsake. It was something I could take home with me.

Jonathon laid the trap door aside for a few minutes while we tramped into the kitchen at the back of the small house. It was a mess also. The open oven door on an old stove exposed a dead bird sitting inside, and a battered wooden table sat alongside the wall. It was at one time a neat and spanking-clean kitchen with everything in its rightful place—both a happy place and, in the end, a very sad place.

Leanne and Jonathon were ready to go, but I was lingering. I wanted another treasure and soon found one as I poked amongst the pile of broken glass and window frames in the living room. Hard to find a name for it. I’ll call it an air hole lever, used to bring fresh air in from the outside—part of the window structure and featured at the bottom for easy access.

We walked back to the car in the warm sunshine, where Helmut was waiting patiently. He eyed my treasures, and I knew by the look on his face he was skeptical. He knew better than to ask questions. When his wife really wanted something, she usually got her way. He popped the trunk, and Jonathon and I laid them down carefully.

We continued on our journey through my hometown, the neighboring town of Balsam Bay, and the cemetery where my parents and many others that I once knew oh so well are buried. We then went to Lakeshore Heights, stopping by the dock and taking photos of each other against the stony-bouldered shores of Lake Winnipeg.

Memories were formed in that little house in Beaconia. It took half of my adult life to put the pieces of the puzzle together, and the other half to realize how precious, despite any circumstances, family bonds are. They leave an indelible impression on the very core of your being for the rest of your life.

By the following year, 2016, the old house was a heap of ashes.

The cellar door and air hole lever that hangs in my home.

Part One

Early Years

1951–1959

There ain’t nothin’ better than the days of yore.

—Carol Sakwi

"From heaven the Lord looks down and sees all mankind; from his dwelling place he watches all who live on earth—he who forms the hearts of all, who considers everything they do."

(Psalm 33:13–15)

One

Beaconia

Beaconia, Manitoba. Except for being born on the Peguis Indian Reserve, this is basically where I come from. Whenever I drive through my hometown, or even just drive past it on the highway, it tugs at my heartstrings. If I could build a house there right now, I would, and I’d feel so comfortable calling it home. But that’s not the case. In 2001, Helmut and I settled close to his childhood home in Seven Sisters Falls, and we can’t afford two homes. One is definitely enough!

Beaconia is fifty kilometres north of Winnipeg and about half a kilometre west off Highway 59. About a kilometre west of town, following a gravel road with swamp and bulrushes on both sides, is a three-kilometre-wide spread of sandy beach known as Beaconia Beach. How lucky were my siblings and I to have a lake so close by! We spent many summer days exploring the beach and walking in the fine white sand with the neighbourhood children.

A plaque on a monument standing in the centre of the small village provides the history of the name Beaconia:

Around 1896,