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THE AIR RAID SHELTER CAPER…. HYDROGEN BOMB CHANGED EVERYTHING


THE AIR RAID  SHELTER CAPER…


MEMORIES OF FEAR

alan skeoch

august 2019

This Victorian desk/bookcase/vanity mirror brings back the fear I  felt in 1954 when atom bomb
laden B52 bombers overflew Toronto each day high up in the stratosphere.  Their vapour trails
were chilling.

More chilling was my sure and curtain belief that a nuclear war was very possible and that
Toronto could be a target of Soviet Union missiles.  Or Toronto could be hit by accident of an
American B52 crash.   I drew a circle with my compass.  One point on our city hall and the 
other pencils point tracing a circle.   We were just outside the circle of mass destruction.  Survival
was possible.  With care.   American atom bomb tests had  been  moved to Bikini Atoll, depopulated 

islands in the south central Pacific Ocean.  The population of 167 had been  moved.  They would never

 return as test after test of atomic weapons were conducted.  


BUT I figured  we might survive an atom bomb
explosion…just barely do  so if precautions were taken.

THE VICTORIAN DESK BOOKCASE


This cabinet was the heart of our basement air raid shelter.  It had to be stocked so I began slipping
cans of tomato soup, pork and beans and canned  peaches down the back stairs to the cabinet.
Never gave any thought to how the soup could be cooked.   Pork and  beans and peaches could be
eaten cold.  What else was needed?  A big bag of Quaker rolled oats tucked  away in a tin with a lid lest

  the mice erode our food supply.  Rolled oats  do not need to be cooked and are considered nutritious.

Alcohol? A year of so later  I stuffed a full bottle of Hennessey’s cognac in the ceiling gap
between heating pipes and floor joists.  Water?  That was easy.  “Mom, in the event of nuclear war, could
you rush down and fill the cement laundry tups with water?”  “What if I am working?” ?/ Right, anyone home
must fill the laundry tubs before the detonation.?



What else should I put in the old desk?  Books, perhaps a Steinbeck or

Dickens or Cowboy Western by Luke Short.  A bible?  Might get around
to reading it to allay fear or increase it?  Toothpaste.  The thought of
toothpaste raised another distasteful thought.   Toilet paper.  But where
would we relieve ourselves?  I had no answer except the tenant’s
downstairs toilet on the other side of the wood panelling between my
air raid shelter and their bathroom.  

Thoughts of Mr and Mrs Douglas, our tenants at 455 Annette Street, 
Toronto west end. raised the thorny question of who would  be let into
our raid shelter and who would be left to die of nuclear burns.  Shelters
had to be kept secret.  A terrible fact.  Our shelter would only have
room for brother Eric, mom and dad.   Four people.  And, oh yes,
our cat Tinker.  She would not be a  problem and she was family.
All others would be kept out which meant the hook latch on the back
door would have to be reinforced somehow.  Thoughts of friends like
Big Red Stevenson, Russ Vanstone, Good Sanford or Kaye  Donovon yelling for entrance
was unsettling.  Sadly my girlfriend was on the eastern side of the 
circle of death.  She would not survive.  The relationship was tenuous
at times anyway.




   We would need to keep a record.   Maybe have to live for two or three

weeks in the air raid shelter.  So the desk side was stocked with pens, pencils

and green spiral bond notebooks.  Who knows,  maybe a great novel will

result providing we all survive.

Survival?  The shelter was between the old cement block coal bin and
the huge furnace.  Some protection on the north particularly since the coal bin
was  double walled.  The western wall had no windows… solid  cement blocks.  


It was  on the east side I had a problem.  Two cellar
windows…flimsy.  If the shock wave hit them they would shatter and render 
the shelter useless.   I decided to ignore the window on the other side of the
furnace and  proceeded to consider bricking up the other window.  Mom and dad
did not approve so instead I covered the window with short pine planks and kept
a small supply of bricks ready if needed. 

The silliest part of this shelter was the sleeping arrangement.  One old moth
eaten studio couch was all I could find.    We would have to take turns to sleep.
Three chairs and the couch … and the Victorian desk that had been converted
into a larder of sorts.  Enough food for two or three days  at best.

Funny thing about the shelter was the floor.  For some stupid reason I began
construction by laying down a wooden pine floor. Made no sense really and  reduced
our headroom by  a few inches.   But it made the shelter look rather homey.

THEN, in 1956, a Hydrogen bomb was detonated on Bikini Atoll.   A hydrogen
bomb was 1,100 times more  powerful than the two atomic bombs dropped
on Hiroshima  and  Nagasaki. ELEVEN  HUNDRED  TIMES!   That information
changed  everything.  The new  circle of  total devastation went way beyond our house
in West Toronto…way beyond  Etobicoke…beyond Malton airport.  

There was no point in my air raid  shelter.  Like thinking people around the world
I began to imagine a world without people.  One secret report from the scientists
testing nuclear weapons  on Bikini Atoll was  that the human race was about to
be depopulated.  Of humans only a ‘vestigial’ fragment would  survive and for them
life  on earth would  be unimaginably horrific.

So the Skeoch  air raid shelter just mouldered away.   Raids on the food supplies
occurred.  “Alan, go down and get two  cans  of tomato soup from your air raid 
shelter.” “Any rolled oats left down there?”  Finally all that remained was  the bookcase 
desk lathered with a dash  of coal dust.

About a decade later I remembered something really important.  That bottle
of Hennessy’s Cognac beside the stovepipe.  Eric  and I rushed  down and sure
enough, there it was.  Dusty like fine century old  wine.  But intact.  We had never
 tasted cognac and twisted  the top open.  Poured a bit of the nut brown liquid into
two glasses and then….YUCK!   This was not cognac.  It was water with colouring.

Dad had found the bottle long ago.  It must have given him a bit of pleasure as
he shovelled chunks  of anthracite  coal into he furnace.  And he must have
grinned to himself thinking that someday  his sons would remember the bottle.
And would they be surprised.

We  found it.   But we were not surprised. Nothing our dad ever did surprised  us.
Eric and  I were the luckiest of children.  Poor but we did not know it.  Treasured
but we did not know it.  Being taught but we did not know  it.  Loved  but we took
if for granted.   

“What kind  of Tom foolery are you up to now?”  
“Building an air raid shelter for all of us, Dad.”
“Now, if that is not the stupidest goddamn notion you have ever had, I’ll
be a monkey’s uncle.”
“You could  help get this  bookcase desk into the cellar..”
“Where in hell’s  half acre did you get the goddmaned thing?”
“Salvation Army store…delivered.”
“You payed good money for this thing?”
“Twenty dollars.”
“Another proof  of your stupidity.”

But he helped  lay the floor and get the old couch past the octopus
we called our furnace.   Neither Eric, Mom or I ever occupied the air raid
shelter.  But Dad did.  Shovelling coal beside the couch in winter. Then
reading the racing form from front to back and back  again. In summer the 
coolness of the cellar was as good a launch pad for Woodbine, Fort Erie, or

even Batavia Downs…as good  as he could  find.  Racing forms

were great literature to him.  Who did he  love more than mom and his  boys?
Northern Dancer comes to mind…a great Canadian horse.  Dad  did  not spend
time…waste time…thinking about the possibility of nuclear war.  He was  a man
of the moment.  A horseman.   If nuclear war was about to depopulate the planet
then Dad  just did  not want to be around such a stark landscape that had no horses. 

Then why did  he help the construction?  I think he saw me slip the bottle of
Hennesy’s into the the slot in the joists.  Just saying this creates  a false 
impression.  Dad  was  not a drinker in the sense of becoming an alcoholic.
He drank beer with friends and particularly his argumentative brothers…Art, 
Jack, Archie and Norman.  And Uncle Earnest who was really a cousin.
He also had  a  beer or two with his racetrack
cronies of which there were legions it seemed.  He was a social animal
rather than a solitary boozer.   I bet he shared that cognac with old Mr. Cook
on the corner house.  I bet they both laughed a lot.  

Fear of a depopulated world was not part of their lives.  I envy them now.
Nothing was to be taken too seriously.  As  mentioned  far too often in
these stories is Dad’s comment which  he repeated with glee.  “We have two
sons, one is a  gutsy bugger and the other is as stupid as Joes dog.”

As an adult I rather liked to be known as a gutsy bugger but Now, 
in retrospect I think Dad thought I was as stupid  as  Joe’s dog.
Building an air raid shelter when the world  was about to be destroyed.
Now that is stupidity.  

The Hydrogen bomb ended  the illusion of survivability anyhow.

alan skeoch
August 2019


BIKINI ATOLL

  Nearly 100 ships were anchored around Bikini Atoll in 1946 as American Nuclear test

explosion began in earnest.  The  population of the Atoll, around  147 people, were
displaced never to return.   Many of the anchored warships now like in deep waters
around Bikini.   One surprising result now over  70 years later is the return of fish life
and coral life to the waters and the verdant growth of palm trees.  Radioactive soils  remain
though and efforts at re populating the islands has been considered too dangerous.







BIKINI ATTOL…GHOST SHIPS OF WORLD WAR II…CONTAMINATION

In 1946 the United States had  a huge supply of surplus ships including the 
ships surrendered by the Japanese Navy.  So one of the most startling atomic test
was  planned  by anchoring 78 of these ships at varying distances  and angles to Bikini
Atoll where a test atom bomb was detonated.  Most were inside the Bikini Atoll lagoon.
Five sank and 14 were severely damaged but, surprisingly the rest survived. 

The USS Independence was one  of the test ships.  She Survived and sailed
back to port where she was stuffed with drums of radioactive  waste and  then
sunk 30 miles off the coast of California where she  rest spright to tis day.

What followed was a series of 66 more  test atomic  explosions  at Bikini.  Above
ground testing of atomic weapons continued through the 1950’s until such testing
was stopped as a result of scientists like Canadian Ursual  Franklin who roved
radioactive Strontium 90 was beng concentrated in children’s teeth.  How?  Very
simply.  Atomic  blast created clouds of radioactive dust that circled the globe.  Eventually
that dust settled on the ground.  Cattle ate radioactive  grass.  And  children  drank
radioactive milk.    That fact led eventually to world wide ban on above  ground
nuclear testing.

“Can we ever go home?”  So asked the displaced islanders of  Bikini Atoll.  They were awarded
a cash settlement of a two billio dollar land damage  claim but payment seems  to have stopped
when the initial fund  was  exhausted.  In 1970 the islanders were  allowed  to return but that
did  not last long since any food they tried to grow was  a radioactive danger to their health and they
were once again exiled, likely forever. “I do not believe its  safe,” said islander Evelyn Ralph-Jeadrik
even tough her island atoll called Rongelap, was a distance from Bikini.  “I don’t want to put my
children at risk.”

She was talking about the Bravo cnuliear test on March  1, 1954.  A  hydrogen bomb test that was  
“a thousand  times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.”

Ir took a while for the implications  of  the  1956 Hydrogen bomb to be clear I’m my mind.  I was building
the air raid shelter in the cellar based  on the hypothetical circles of devastation expected from an atomic
bomb.  That was  sometime in 1955.   By 1956 even a person  as  stupid  as  me realized that
there was  no hope of  survival.  Humanity had to rely on the Strategic Air Command bombers to 
provide some kind of  mutual  stalemate with the Soviet Unions  Bomber command.  No room for
error.

So the Skeoch Air raid shelter was  forgotten by all but Arnold ‘Red’ Skeoch as a  place to fantasize
about putting $20 on the nose of horses like Northern Dancer at the old Woodbine Racetrack while
he rested on the air raid shelter couch sipping Hennessy Cognac.

Events have a strange way of  interconnecting.  A few  years  later, in 1960,
I was a young geophysical prospector sent to test survey instruments at the bottom
of  CanMet uranium mine.   One of the Canadian mines that provided raw uranium
for the manufacture  of  atomic bombs.  

The account of that adventure has  been
attached in a separate email.  

alan skeoch

august 2019


PICTURE GALLERY SOMEWHAT RELATED TO THE AIR RAID  SHELTER CAPER
(What kind  of parents would allow their son to build and air raid shelter?)


Here we are emulating Red Skeoch whose White Owl Invisible cigars gave him
great satisfaction.   He taught his  grandsons, Kevin and  Andrew, to smoke them
when they were six and eight years old.   We all survived the  fears of the 20th century.

WHAT ABOUT YOUR MOTHER…ELSIE  (FREEMAN) SKEOCH?



MOM, Elsie was her real name but Dad  called  her Methusalum which is  a corruption of the biblical  Methusalah who was the oldest person in the bible.  Mom
was  a year older that Dad so it was natural for him to draw that to everyone’s attention.   Mom ran  the show.  She was the real breadwinner…the homemaker…
the common sense person.  And, as  such she was taken for granted.  Happens  to a  lot of people…being taken for granted.  Sort of a backhanded compliment.
Marjorie noted the picture  of Dad and Mon in their courting days…”his hand is perilously close to her breast.”   True.  Mom had the most important job in the
air raid  shelter caper.  “Mom, you rush right down and fill those laundry tubs while the city still has a  water system.”

ARNOLD “RED” SKEOCH

THESE pictures will give you some idea of  how dad just loved to make fun of his children.  A delight for us.  And you might understand how Dad  helped 
build the air raid shelter even though he thought it was a  damn fool idea.  He had the last laugh…for he got the bottle of Hennessy’s.  See if you can
find the two sons…the gutsy  bugger and the kid stupid as Joe’s dog’.  To Dad the air raid shelter caper was a source of great humour.

That’s Dad holding the plow handles AS we did another damn fool thing.   


Posted on

Fwd: Sunny side rocesvales July 24 2019



Begin forwarded message:


From: ALAN SKEOCH <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>
Subject: Sunny side rocesvales July 24 2019
Date: July 24, 2019 at 6:35:47 PM EDT


DATELINE:  SUNNYSIDE: JULY 24, 2019

Now here is an adventure that anyone can enjoy…a trip to Sunnyside Beach, a Rock garden of incredible beauty,

and a fine dinner at the Palais Royale.  We did it on July 24, 2019 thanks to Carl Kirk and the Roncesvales
group.  Really phenomenal outing that anyone can enjoy. Park your car in the lot just east of Sunnyside swimming pool…lots of room



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THREE DAYS AFTER THE AUCTON: A NEARLY BARREN FIELD

AMISH SCHOOL AUCTION…THREE DAYS LATER


alan skeoch
July 23, 2019

Three days  earlier this barren site contained  a couple  of thousand  people and as many cars, trucks, horses and buggies.  
But today it is a barren site


“Alan, where are we?”
“Marjorie, it has taken us nearly four hours to find this place even though I drove
here with Andy and Jack in less than 1.5 hours.”
“But where are we?”
“Somewhere in the centre of Amish Ontario…near Milverton.”



“Do you mean this empty field is where you spent last Saturday afternoon?:


SHORT days ago this  field was jammed with people bidding on the weirdest collection
of objets imaginable.  Today, three days later, the field  is barren except for the things
nobody seems  to want.



EARLIER
“I notice it is wash day…maybe these Amish folk can give directions.”


“And there it is Marjorie…sitting all  alone among the stubble and the footprints
of auctioneers  and  bidders.”
“Not another fanning mill, Alan, when will you grow up and know to stop…”
“Beautiful …right?




“Battered”
“140 years old,  bound to be bruised.”
“Does  it fit in the truck?”
“Not quite…needs to be rolled over.”
“How will we lift it?”
“Look what’s coming across the field…”


“Give you a hand if you want.”
“Wonder how we would get the mill into the truck without you”






“What make is it?”
“Looks like a Clinton made machine,…circa 1880 give or take…”
“Or it could  be a McTaggart…name long worn off by the grain and Calloused
hands…”



“Did you buy that thing…now that is interesting…a shoemakers anvil with
the shape of real boots made  of iron…interchangeable.”
“Where will we put it?”
“In the farm kitchen…looks good beside the stove.”
“How much did you pay for it?”
“Rather not say.  I paid $5 for the fanning mill though.”

“Let’s tale a few minutes to see what else has been left behind.”


A REAPER…WITH ALL PARTS…REPLACED  THE SICKLE AND CRADLE SCYTHE…TECHNOLOGICAL
WONDER IN ITS TIME.


HORSE DRAWN HEAVY HARROWS…WHEELED KIND


LOBSINGER THRESHING MACHINE…


REMEMBER WE BOUGHT ONE OF THESE 35 YEARS AGO…FARMER UP THE ROAD
BORROWED IT FOR HIS LAST THRESHING.  HE GOT INJURED AND HAD TO 
GIVE UP FARMING.  THE THRESHER WAS PROTECTED BY A TARP BUT THE
DAMN TARP ROTTED AND  SO DID THE THRESHER.  WENT TO SCRAP BECAUSE
WE HAD NO BARN TO KEEP IT IN. SAD.  MAYBE SAME FUTURE FOR THIS ONE.

FARM WAGON…ALSO LAND ROLLER

‘
HORSE  DRAWN CORN BINDER


NICELY RESTORED MOWING MACHINE





POTATO HARVESTER


MANURE SPREADER


HAY LOADERS…ABOUT TEN OF THEM.

SIDE DELIVERY RAKE




HORSE DRAWN SET OF DISC HARROWS





“ALAN, TIME TO LEAVE…DO YOU  KNOW HOW TO GET HOME?”

“NOT SURE…WE WILL JUST DRIVE EAST AND CUT SOUTH…TAKE US A COUPLE OF  HOURS.



MOOREFIELD  FOR LUNCH


“STRANGE LUNCH HERE MARJORIE”


“I notice  you serve raccoon steaks…”



“Look at the bottom entry…’Bright Raccoon 732..”
“So?”
“So, if I ordered  a “Dull Raccoon  steak” would it be cheaper?”
“Five dollars….”

(not the truth…Bright Raccoon is their Wi Fi number…a joke.  We had  two pieces
of Rhubarb and Strawberry pie with a mountain of vanilla ice cream…”





alan skeoch
July 23, 2019

Posted on

best of breed: SEQUJEL TO THE AMISH SCHOOL AUCTION: july 20,2019

AMISH SCHOOL  FUND AUCTION

JULY 20, 2019  MILVERTON, ONTARIO

BIG TIN BOOT WAS BEST OF’BREED’

Just for fun look at these pictures  with a sharp eye.  Look for what you think is
the best of breed…i.e. what you would want in your living room.

Lighten up!


Now this is just my opinion but if I  was  asked to choose the best of  breed in this 
auction I think the big tin cowboy boot would fill the bill.  it sold  for around $200
to a man of course.  I tried to catch up to him to get a picture but he was moving
as fast a Clint Eastwood in a shoot em up movie.  Maybe he was embarrassed.


Then I could be wrong.  This huge ‘man trap’ must have been used to trap bears long ago
when farmers were clearing the land.  These traps  are illegal I am told.  Bidding was
feverish.   I think a Democrat from the US House of Representative was the winning
bidder.  He hustled south.  No, I have no idea why he wanted the trap.   Fun to guess though.


THIRTY YEARS AGO we were  buying these dinosaurs of the harvest….thrashing  machines.  We even had a Lobsinger like this one.  Sadly the tarpaulin
we used to cover it from rain,  sleet and  snow was not up to the job.  Water slipped in and the wood rotted.   Eventually we hd to set it on  fire but there is
an upside to the story as a local farmer borrowed our Lobsinger for one last harvest.   That made us feel a little better.  Since then we have shrunk our tastes
to fanning mills, turnip pulpier, corn shellers, apple pulpers and  cutting boxes.


Hats tell a story.  The woman in black  is not Amish or Mennonite.  The boys clearly are.   The hats tell the one from the other.


This is my friend  Tom Schell whis is  an avid collector of hay carts…the kind that ran on track high up
in most Ontario barns.  They were used in the days when horses drew  wagons loaded with cured  hay
right into the barn threshing floors.  Then a massive hay force was dropped like a twin harpoon into
the hay load and by a  series of  ropes  and pulleys and hay cars  the loose hay was piled in hay mows.
Tom has done that….

Now Tom was also a collector  of fanning mills  which, when he downsized his tastes, he delivered the mills
to our farm.

Tom is a contented man.  Witness the smile.

 the Amish farms are neat and orderly….neat as a pin might be  the term although I don’t know the origin 
of the term.  How can a  pin be neat?


These pin up girl posters were a little out of place at the auction….too much leg showing.








We bought this elevated  water tough.   Single board  construction.  Tight as a drum.  
Of course it could also have been a feed bin.


alan skeoch
July 20, 2019


Posted on

JACK IS A LAID BACK KIND OF GRANDSON: YOU BOUGHT WHAT?

YOU BOUGHT WHAT?

(JACK is a laid back kind of person)

alan skeoch
July 20, 2019

My grandmother regularly,  in the 1950’s, sent me poems by Edna Jacques that she
carefully cut out of the Toronto Star in spite of her advanced Parkisons’s
disease.   Today, july 20, 2019, I thought of her and was reminded of a snippet
from one of those poems

“If you put your nose to the grindstone rough
And hold it down there long enough
In time you’ll say there’s no such thing
as tails that wage or birds that sing.”

(I imposed the ‘tails that wag’ as I forget what Edna wrote but
the meaning is the same”

The reminder came from Jackson Skeoch, our grandson, who is  best described
by the expression ‘laid back’ but also he is unpredictable at times.  Today was 
one of those occasions.

Andrew, Jack and I were attending the massive Amish School Auction sale near Milverton,
Ontario.   Piles and piles of things.  Long lines of items  laid out on a recently threshed  grain
field.   Thousands of people.


“Jack, look at all the horses and buggies….”






“Seems everyone is out for a good time, Jack.”




“Lots of people here grandpa…all after the same kind of ancient junk you like so much.”

“Take a really close look, Jack…there is more going on here than just the auction…more
than the bidding wars for hay ladders, crocks, wagon wheels, roosters, horses, picks and shovels.”

“What else?”

“Look around…you will see.”

So Jack disappeared while Andrew and I were bidding and buying wood water trough, 
fireman’s reeled  hose cart from the 19th century, ancient anchors rescued from the
bottom of the St Lawrence river, barrels, pumps, a boat, boxes of plumbing fittings…etc.”

“Where is jack?”

“No idea.”



“I hope he notices those Amish girls…there is a reason they are all dressed up
in their brightest dresses.  This is a meeting ground.”

“Jack will notice.  He’s seventeen with a keen eye.”




“Where have you been jack?”

“Over with the rabbits…bought four of them.”

“You bought four rabbits?”

“Yep,  waved  my hand at a fly and the guy yelled  ‘Sold’…no cage…cost
me $12.  Nearly had a box full of pigeons as well. What can we put them in?”


“Did you say no cage?”

“Yep, what can we put them in…you must have something grandpa…how about
that $2 chicken crate?”

“Jack you make me laugh…all the time…maybe you can wheel one of my purchases…wicker
baby carriage and two old  saddles to the truck.  I will give you the cage.”

“Sure.”

“Did you notice the girls?”

“What girls?”

(He made that comment with the usual twinkle in his eye.  He saw them…and they
must have seen him.  Both sexes were dressed to be seen.)





“Grandma, there are four rabbits in this crate…see the shining eye of one?”



“Jack, you bought four rabbits?”  said Marjorie with hooping  laughter.

“Dad had to wait hours to get those cages.  Cost more than the rabbits.”

“Males or females?”

“How would I know, Grandma.”  And Marjorie proceeded  to determine the
sex of the rabbits…a very tricky thing to do…three males and one female…enough for a brood to come
along.

“What will Julie think when you get home with these rabbits.”

“Remains to be seen, Grandma….they will be company for the dogs.”




“Got them with the swat of fly, Grandma.”

alan skeoch
July 20, 2019


Posted on

COYOTES ARE HERE TO STAY


COYOTES ARE HERE TO STAY

alan skeoch
july 2019

“Marjorie, the coyote is  here…right behind  you.”

“How do you know?”
“Saw him dance down the street as if he was Prince Harry”
“When?”
“Right now, 8.15 a.m. on July 16…Glenburnie Road, Mississauga…got a picture
quick…here he is…”



“Woody was barking his head off just behind my ear as we looked out the truck window.”
“What was  the coyote doing?”
“Eating what was  left of a dead squirrel that a car squashed.”
“Did  he hear Woody?”
“Sure…but did not give a damn.”
“Where did he go?”
“Ducked into the Lack place…(next door to us)…he was about 10 feet from
you as you came out our lane.”
“I think he knows me…loves me or hates  me.”
“Where did  you get that crazy, off the wall, idea?”



“Alan, do you  know what happened earlier this morning…while you were asleep?”
“Nope.”
“Well there was  quite a fuss on the street.  A man came jogging down Glenburnie with two full
grown Labradors…and right behind them came the coyote…almost at their heels.”
“A  coyote could  not pull  down a  Labrador.”
Alan, you were not there.  The man was scared…running.  He stopped to throw
two rocks at the coyote but the stones  did not phase the coyote one bit. He loped
along right behind them.”
“What did  you do?”
“I got in the truck and tried to put it between the coyote and the man.  The coyote
just circled the truck which drove Woody wild.  Barking like there is no tomorrow.”
Woody  probably remembers the coyote that tore a strip off his ass.”

“Don’t make light of it Alan.  The lady next door said  three coyotes  surrounded her
when she took the baby for a walk.”
“The only coyote I have seen lately was the cute animal sleeping in the tangle of
weeds at the back of our lot.”
“He sleeps  there all day long…drives Woody mad…Lucky that half our lot is fenced.”
“No matter what you say Marjorie, I like the coyotes…beautiful animals…great dancers…
intelligent …survivors.”
“”Alan, they are predators.”


“Predators…Shmeditors…they are fascinating.  And they were here before we were here.   They have
a right of residency.”
“Dr. Hawrluk (local  dentist) opened his  front door yesterday and a coyote was standing there.”
“Maybe the coyote had a toothache.”
“Don’t be silly…”
“Coyotes do not have dental plans…rely on charity…but they have good teeth
normally…gnawing on squirrels, rabbits, raccoons and, if they are lucky, wayward cats…the 
gnawing keeps their teeth in good  shape.”
“Alan, stop that drivel…this is serious business.”
“Sorry.  Just trying to make the point that coyotes have become part of our 
urban landscape.”


“They move so fast…so delicatlely.   Look at the pictures I took…almost seem like mirages…like there
was no coyote present…just blurred images.”

(Marjorie, talking to Woody our dog, as she often does)_
“Alan would not say that Woody if that coyote tore a strip off his bum, would he?”

“Woody cannot speak our language Marjorie.”

“His tail is wagging…he agrees with me.”

“Woody can spot a coyote before we can…maybe the smell.”

“He does  not love those creatures  as you seem to do…proving
he has  a higher level of intelligence than you, Alan.”

“Probably true…”

alan skeoch
July 2019
Posted on

FIRST SUNDAY IN JULY: OUR LIFE IS FULL OF LEAVES…ETC. JULY 6, 2019

AHH! THE FIRST SUNDAY IN JULY.

(Of all the Sundays of the year…52 of them…the first Sunday in July is the most dazzling to Marjorie and me.)

alan  skeoch
July 7, 2019

So let’s make a  game of it.  SEE IF YOU CAN FIND

1) Our farm attic  gothic window with stained glass and top hat boxes.  (easy…first p;icture0
2) Our front lawn in Toronto
3) Our big swam with water lilies
4) Our new crop of flax
5) Our other family farm with stone silo
6) Our wilderness trails
7) Our trip through Limehouse…cross RR bridge, up escarpment road
8) Our peculiar collection of shapes stuffed in the old green house
9) Our living room in the old  Freeman farm house
10) Our effort to grow milk weed for the Monarch butterflies
11) Our days of glory on the football field … yes, both Marjorie and i …she was
an SPS cheerleader but no picture
12) Our stuffed porcupine (on a beam, high above the guy in plaid shirt)
13) Our walnut trees
14) Our water trough vegetable gardens
15) Our favourite game on a board made by hand
16)Our  version of “The Tangled Garden”
17) Our almost forgotten International W6 tractor
18) Our abandoned  threshing machine hidden on a tree clad hill
(once belonged to Angus McEchern on farm next to ours)
19)  Our fanning mill, our pump organ, our wood wheeled wagon
20) Our recently refurbished cream separator
21) Our poppies that appeared without our knowledge but are welcome
22) Our gravel clad bridge between the two big ponds
23) Our old  three furrow drag plough 
24) Ourselves
25) Our old farmhouse beside our ancient walnut tree

IF YOU CANNOT BE BOTHERED…THEN JUST FLIP THROUGH THE PICS…THEY ARE RELAXING.

alan and marjorie









Posted on

RAVENS…ARE VERY SMART THEN WHY ARE THEY NOT HOUSEBROKEN? JULY 5, 2019


IF  RAVENS  ARE SO SMART…THEN WHY ARE THEY NOT HOUSEBROKEN?

alan  skeoch
July 5, 2019

A pair of ravens have assumed they have the right to raise their young in our barn.   This year they chose
a portion high above our prop storage shed.  The nest is  huge, maybe 3 feet in diameter made of sticks  
so large it is a wonder the ravens could lift and weave them into a nest.

They are smart birds.  They know who we are … recognize our faces …and make raucous greeting sounds
when we have the nerve to peek into the drive shed  which they have claimed as theirs.

I wish they did not feed their young  baby birds plundered and  murdered from other birds but we, as humans,
do the same.  Seems that chicken has become a main course for all of us.

But the ravens are a problem.   How do I put this delicately?


Notice how perfectly they keep their feathered bodies.  Very neat.  Like tuxedo class of humans.  Right

But they are not perfect.


“Listen, bud,” quoth the raven, “Mind your own business.  We live here now.”

“Well, Mr. and  Mrs. Raven, your chosen home could do  with a toilet.  Instead you have used
all my prize rental goods as if it was a place to slather with your excrement.”


The farm is  quite pretty…complete with a hand made field stone silo dating back to 1870



Yet look what the ravens have done….


Could be worse, I guess, as the Ravens could have chosen the farm house for their summer home.


This has become their rearing shed…sadly.


Seems they also use their own nest as a toilet.


Now I must face the clean up…Yuck!


Posted on

I do not know why WOODY love me? No big reason to do so.


I DO NOT KNOW WHY WOODY LOVES ME

alan skeoch
July 2019



I do not know why WOODY love me, but he does.

He has no special reason to love me unless being taken for 
granted is a reason.
I do not spend a lot of time petting him as others do.
Even strangers  give him more attention than I do.
But he love me.
How Do I know that he loves me?
He waits at the bottom of the stairs each morning for me to descend, his  tail thumping
the floor or the wall.
And then as my foot touches the bottom step he leans into me…body tight and tipped,
tail whistling in its own created wind.
Ah, I know you think I feed him and that food is the love  trigger.
But I only feed him occasionally, maybe four times a  month.
Every other day Marjorie feeds him.
She also brushes him, walks him, doctors him when he has a sore paw
or an oozing coyote tear.
But he loves me.
Loves Marjorie as  well but she has earned his love.
I have not.
Yet he waits beside my truck lying prone on the green grass
anticipating a ride to nowhere in particular as long as it is with me.
And when I drive in the lane alone, Woody rushes out to
the drivers  side with his nose tight to the crack where the door will open.
He does this  every time I come home alone.
I might rub his  forehead  a bit but otherwise do not go crazy with affection.
But I know he loves  me.
Sometimes  he goes crazy when I pull in and he starts to run around
in big circles, all four feet in the air such is his  speed…he runs in great loops
around trees and buildings always  arriving back close to me.
He wears his joy in ways such as this
And when he disappears  and I call him with frustration in my voice
I always find he is just behind me…silently padding along as I search
for him with impatience in my voice.
Woody does  not like to be bad but he can be bad at times,
especially when we fail to keep the garbage high off the ground
or when a pound  of  butter is  left tantalizingly balanced on the edge
of the kitchen island.
He  will steal…temptation becomes just too great.
And when he steals and I get angry Woody drops to the floor
Rolls over on his back 
Offers his life
And rolls his eyes
Which makes discipline seem an invitation
For me to raise my voice in anger.
But he loves me still.
Why?
On two occasions I have forgotten he is with me at the farm
And driven part way home before reaching my hand behind me 
in search of his paw on the bench seat.
Most times that paw is present.
But twice, maybe more, it has not been there
And I have stopped, cursed, turned around and retraced my way.
Only to find Woody waiting for my return curled up on the farm porch.
He loves me…trusts me…with little reason to do so.
Love is one of the great mysteries of life on this earth.
The decision to Love is  a force more powerful than any other…stronger than greed,
anger, pride, self-obsession…
Love is irrational I think
For Woody has no earthly reason to love me so much.
I have given him no reason to do so.
And yet he loves me.
He does not expect me to change.
He does not want me to change.
He loves me as I am.
Why?



alan skeoch
July 2019
Posted on

“COYOTE IS AFTER WODDY, DO SOMETHING.”. June 31 2919



Begin forwarded message:


From: ALAN SKEOCH <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>
Subject: Coyote wall. June 31 2919
Date: June 29, 2019 at 3:53:22 PM EDT


“COYOTE IS AFTER WOODY, DO SOMETHING!!”

alan skeoch
June 2019

“Alan, the coyote was back last night at dusk…I think he wants to get Woody”
“Forget about it…Woody is too big and does  not wander.”
“Sure, sure…don’t you remember the slash on his bum from a coyote Woody thought was friendly.”
“Scared hell out of him…came running up to me and leaned  against my leg.”
“Well, surely that would teach you that coyotes are dangerous.”
“Damn beautiful animals as long as  the mange doesn’t get them.”
“Alan, we have a pack of coyotes  living in the bush back of our house…that is scary.”
“Live and let live, Marjorie.”
“Do you want Woody killed?”
“Never happen, our dog run is fenced.”
“Not any more…coyote has been digging under the chain link.”
“Imagination.”
“Sometimes  Alan I find you irritating…maddening…far too laid back.”
“Show me the hole.”



So that little incident started our Canada Day week end.  Fence repairs to keep the coyotes out.
I am not proud.  I admit that the repairs were done by the female crew living with us.  They had
seen the coyotes and  Woody nose to nose with wire mesh in between.  I had not seen this contact
so I was  a little less enthused about fence repairs.




Women are better at this kind of thing anyway.  Moving cement blocks from place

to place to frustrate the coyote.  They were good at the job.



“While you are doing repairs, I am going coyote hunting.”

“Alan, come back here.”

“Just hunting with my camera.”



Our house lot is long and wild…50 get by 400 feet.  Part of the ancient Mississauga

First Nations territory.  Last part they held.   So it is nice and verdant…wild.




Works was progressing well


About half way down our lot, we had built a fence to keep our  dogs from irritating

neighbours.  We have had lots of dogs…Shadow, Sunny, Molly, etc, etc…and now
Woody who is about as laid back as his owner except when the coyote comes calling
at dusk every night.  Then Woody barks.  Very brave barking since he is protected
by the chain link fence.
“Alan … the fence has been compromised,,,where are you going?”
“See if I can  get a picture of the coyotes family…back in the bush.”



And so I used the camouflage of greenery to escape the fence building…just like

the coyote…I was hidden.




At the back of the lot we keep this old dump rake as a reminder of the days long

ago when this was a hay field.













I know the coyotes were watching me but I could not see them…lots of places 

to hide and slink about.







“Alan, you did  nothing to hep the girls…nothing.  As  usual.”

“I was on point…the point man in the defence of our fort…doing recon”






“The least you could is fix the gate…handle not working…enough of a gap for

coyote to get through if we are not careful.”

“Get Gabriela on that…she is  right handed.”
“I wish you would stop using that left handed  excuse.”
“That excuse has worked for 80 years so I have not intention of
giving up a good thing.”






“OK wise guy…we are going to lock you out there with the coyotes…right now.”




“So here I am … inspecting fence repairs from the outside.”

“Quite amazing work…lifting cement blocks…placing them…now let me back in!”




  “

Somewhere behind you Alan, a coyotes is salivating…slobbering…anticipating a good meal.”


alan skeoch
June 2019


Sent from my iPhone