{"id":1941,"date":"2018-11-11T12:47:42","date_gmt":"2018-11-11T17:47:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=1941"},"modified":"2018-11-11T12:55:17","modified_gmt":"2018-11-11T17:55:17","slug":"my-dream-nov-11-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=1941","title":{"rendered":"MY DREAM NOV. 11, 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Freeman farm November 10, 2018<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Freeman Farm taken in summer of 1918 <\/div>\n
(with mom, Elsie, and  Grandma  Louisa and  the  dog Punch)<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Last night I had a bad dream.  Dreaming happens all the time, most are good dreams.  But last night I dreamed we  drove to the<\/div>\n
farm and found the whole house had  collapsed in on itself.  Hand hewn beams, lathing, plaster, furniture, dishes\u2026all spread helter<\/div>\n
skelter.   So we began the clean  up and  began  planning the reconstruction.  Optimism asserted itself.  To rebuild the farm house<\/div>\n
we would need  a builder so we drove to Rockwood in search.  The town was different with more Victorian and Edwardian buildings<\/div>\n
than  I  had  ever seen before.  Saunders bakery, a  place we visit often in real  life, was  no longer in the village.  But the other<\/div>\n
buildings were pulsing with life.  \u201cNeed a builder, try Coulson and the Mennonites,\u201d commented one  citizen.  Then the storm hit\u2026a  whopper<\/div>\n
of a storm with the sky as black as  midnight.  And wind began to scour the leaves and rubbish into airborne  missiles. Then the rain<\/div>\n
hit like a the worst torrent of  a mountain stream.  A  deluge.  We sheltered in a building with an overhang once used by horse drawn<\/div>\n
carriages\u2026brick with a curved arch.  No  sooner had the storm hit than it ended and the sun burst forth like the dawning of a new<\/div>\n
summer day.   We drove back to the farm where the boys were still imposing order on the heater skelter mess.  Strange mix of<\/div>\n
images dominant of which was a  feeling of optimism in the midst of the destruction.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Armisitce day\u2026100 years  after the end  of World War I\u2026any semblance of connection to the dream?  Mom\u2019s first boyfriend was killed<\/div>\n
in the Somme  offensive\u2026his  body marked by an  upturned  rifle.   Dad\u2019s  oldest brother Jack died  in the last day of the war, hit by<\/div>\n
a mortar shell as he walked  along a train track en route to a Red Cross station knowing, perhaps, that the war had  ended.  Both<\/div>\n
Harry Horsman and Jack  Skeoch were tragedies in our family life that happened long before I was born.  Harry\u2019;s death, sad though<\/div>\n
it was, meant Mom  would  look for a  new man and eventually, in 1937, married  Red Skeoch producing in 1938 myself and  in <\/div>\n
1940, my brother Eric.  A good thing for Eric and  me\u2026not so good for poor Harry.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
The death of Dad\u2019s brother devastated the Skeoch family.  He was  the oldest and a  leader for sure.  His  picture was  inserted  in<\/div>\n
a family picture taken shortly after World  War One.  A  ghostly  reminder of the war.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Then there was the death of my  cousin George Freeman who died when  his Halifax bomber was shot down  over Bourg Leopold<\/div>\n
in 1944.  The  deaths of George and  Jack  devastated  their respective families.  I was told by mom that Aunt Kitty and  Uncle  Chris<\/div>\n
kept George\u2019s  room at the Toronto Hunt Clubg  gardener\u2019s  cottage exactly as it was  when he left for the war.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
In all  three cases  I found  or have been given letters they sent home.  Jack\u2019s letter to his brothers is most explicit.<\/div>\n
\u2026\u2019do not come over here\u2019 (paraphrase from my memory).  Harry, who was a Home  Child with kn known parents, sent<\/div>\n
many letters to Mom, letters that got more depressing as the horror of the trenches deepened.   Harry\u2019s letters were<\/div>\n
given  to me  by some after my dad died.  \u201cAlan, you might like these.\u201d  I did and made  the letters into a  filmstrip\/movie<\/div>\n
for Ontario  students.   Technology unfortunately  has rendered that film obsolete.  Harry\u2019s lonely cry will not longer be  heard.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
George also seems <\/div>\n
to have known  his days were numbered as were  the days of all the flight crews  in  the allied bomber command where each<\/div>\n
returning flight had missing  bombers  such as  HX 313, the Blond Bomber.  I was able to reconstruct George Freeman\u2019s<\/div>\n
life overseas  in a story titled The Last Flight of HX 313 by interviewing all the survivors of his crew.  George tried to squeeze as<\/div>\n
much life as  possible  into those months before his death as an  upper turret gunner when  a German  night fighter stitched<\/div>\n
the bomber with slugs.  Those  who were still alive bailed out.  George  did not.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Was anything learned from the loss of so many young men?  Was there anything positive from so much destruction?<\/div>\n
I think there was.   Most survivors knew the full meaning of  war and  the subsequent Cold War was carefully managed<\/div>\n
lest a  hot war burst forth.   And we all  knew that any future world conflagration might spell the end  human  life as<\/div>\n
we know it today.   Nuclear war would take no prisoners.  The Freeman\/Skeoch farm house would  be pile  of rubble.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Any connection to my dream?  Maybe.  No matter, today I  think of Harry and Jack and  George\u2026boys I never knew yet<\/div>\n
came to know so well.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Nov. 11, 2018<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Want some proof?  Pictures  below.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Alan  and  Eric Skeoch  at the Freeman farm around 1947.  We were<\/div>\n
the luckiest generation the earth has  ever seen.  Children who<\/div>\n
became adults  in the booming post war years the 1950\u2019s. Yet<\/div>\n
we worried about the nuclear bomb.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Some of  the Skeoch Brothers around 1956 on the Fergus family farm\u2026<\/div>\n
Norman, Archie, Greta  (aunt), Arthur and  Red whose real name  was Arnold,<\/div>\n
my father (all dressed up for gambling at the horse races)<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Elsie Freeman and  Red Skeoch around 1937 when they got<\/div>\n
married though mom was cautioned about dad who had<\/div>\n
deep love  of horses as much as that of  mom.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Uncle Art rolling his  own  cigarettes.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Uncle Norman,  the youngest brother who inherited the family Fergus<\/div>\n
farm.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Mom,  Elsie  Freeman about the time she  was  corresponding  with harry Horsman<\/div>\n
in 1916\u2026not really  a torrid love affair.  Mom  was too young and  Harry was too<\/div>\n
lonely.  Mom gave me his letters after  Dad died.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I reconstructed  Harry\u2019s  life in a  filmstrip titled  Canada and  World War One\u2026now<\/div>\n
a technology long  outmoded and never to be  seen again.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Arnold, Red,  Skeoch in 1930\u2019s<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
This is  Victor Poppa around 1980.  He was the rear gunner on HX 313 and best <\/div>\n
friend  of George Freeman.   Victor was  trapped in the bubble at the back of<\/div>\n
HX 313 as  it pirouetted  out of the sky  in May 1944.   Hydraulic  lines  had been<\/div>\n
severed  by bullets.  Sure of his  death.  Then the plane corck screwed  and  the <\/div>\n
force twisted the bubble  in such  a way  that Victor fell out with one line attached<\/div>\n
to his  parachute\u2026he pulled the  line down  and yanked the rip chord.  Became  <\/div>\n
a POW.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
We visited Victor in California\u2026got his story which  became the basis  of<\/div>\n
\u2018The  Last Flight of HX 313\u2019.   <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
The great mass  of the Freeman families  around  1958 when we gathered to celebrate<\/div>\n
the golden wedding of  Aunt Kitty (seated centre) and  Uncle Chris Freeman.  There<\/div>\n
would have been more people in this  picture  had George Freeman survived.  How<\/div>\n
do  I  know that?  Because I found a  picture of a British girl he was planning to marry<\/div>\n
after the war.  Sadly her name is lost.  Red  Skeoch is seated  far left\u2026Elsie (Freeman) <\/div>\n
Skeoch is  standing with arm on hip on far right.  Eric  is sitting beside dad.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Freeman farm November 10, 2018 Freeman Farm taken in summer of 1918  (with mom, Elsie, and  Grandma  Louisa and  the  dog Punch) Last night I had a bad dream.  Dreaming happens all the time, most are good dreams.  But last night I dreamed we  drove to the farm and found the whole house had  collapsed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1941\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}