{"id":25878,"date":"2023-11-25T11:57:58","date_gmt":"2023-11-25T16:57:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=25878"},"modified":"2023-11-25T11:59:38","modified_gmt":"2023-11-25T16:59:38","slug":"episode-919-failure-in-my-life-19571958-embarassing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=25878","title":{"rendered":"EPISODE 919 FAILURE IN MY LIFE\u2026 1957=1958 EMBARASSING"},"content":{"rendered":"
EPISODE 919       FAILURE IN MY LIFE\u2026  1957=1958   EMBARASSING<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Nov.  25, 2023<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
LOOKING BACK \u2014 NOT ALWAYS A SMOOTh ROAD<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Note: Grade 9 \u2014 1953<\/div>\n
\u201cAlan, choose one option\u2026music, art or typing.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cTyping.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cWhy?<\/div>\n
\u201cI am left handed.\u201d<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Sketch done by Kate McCartney\u2026Alan  Skeoch\u2026.Did he deserve to fail?  <\/div>\n

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

<\/div>\n
SEPTEMBER  1957-1958 SCHOOL YEAR<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I knew I was in trouble , I could not write or make notes due to<\/div>\n
the cast covering my left hand.  And almost immediately my schoolwork began  a slow  l decline. I did not<\/div>\n
want anyone to know.  Denial . both coaches \u2026.Mr Griffiths and Mr Burford\u2026asked if the cast  impeded my Grade13 studies.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
\u201cAlan, is that injury to your hand affecting your school work\u201d\u201d]<\/div>\n
\u201cNo.  Not at all.  Everyting is fine.\u201d<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
But that was a big lie\u2026.a delusion.  Each school day in 1958  I slipped further down.<\/div>\n
Yet I did not want to face up to my problem.  It was a terrible school year which culminated in my Grade 13 Departmental exams.<\/div>\n
These final exams were meant to identify the best students in Ontario High  Schools and then funnel them into<\/div>\n
the universities.   I would not be among them.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
A lot of students failed to make the cut.   I deluded myself into the belief I could do OK\u2026not stellar but OK.<\/div>\n
But I was riding the escalator down.   I think my teachers knew that and were concerned.  I think some of them were not enamoured<\/div>\n
of Humberside\u2019s fanaticism regarding football.  My broken baby finger and subsequent <\/div>\n
academic decline was a good reason to cool football .I ceertainlhy did not want that to happen.   I did not want help.Too embarrassing.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
The school year made me more and more unhappy internally while my external demeanour MAY have seemed upbeat and joyful.   <\/div>\n
In retrospect a lot of  people knew I was troubled.   <\/div>\n

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

<\/div>\n
Try and decipher  this note written with my left hand which has the crooked little finger.  Easier still \u2014find the word decipher\u2019<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
TRANSLATION  \u2019NOV. 24 \/ 2023<\/div>\n
\u201cMY WRITING WAS VERY BAD.I WOULD HATE TO BE A MARKER TRYING TO DECIPHER MY SCRIPT.   JUST FOR<\/div>\n
FUN TRY WRITING WITH YOUR LEFT HAND  (signed  Alan Skeoch)<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
The crisis climaxed with the departmental exams.  Students today in the year 2023 have no idea how demanding <\/div>\n
were these exams.  There was no wriggle room.  Failurerate was high. <\/div>\n
As I remember a university acceptance  would need a grade average of  75%.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I knew deep down that I had slipped below the cut off.  But maybe I would be lucky.  No Such luck!    It was the Physics exam <\/div>\n
that got me  I Could not remember what the letter \u201cs\u201d meant i n solving physics mathematical problems   I was blank.<\/div>\n
And \u201cs\u201d was such a simple part of the exam.   It was a given.  A simple given but for the life of me i could not remember<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Then the school year ended.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I accepted a summer job as a surveyor working on the new stretch of the Canadian transcontinental Highway .<\/div>\n
There were 8 of us living in a shack near the village of Hunta just a few miles west of Cochrane.  To get there I rode<\/div>\n
the last steam train on the ONR.  It was an escape.  The survey crew were all much like me .Young and <\/div>\n
full of energy and misplaced enthusiasm. All except for one boy who was really troubled.  Made my troubles seem minor.  the boys<\/div>\n
badgered him So I chose hin for my three man team.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I can still remember the moment he snapped.   His pent up hatred burst forth in a frenzy of anger directed<\/div>\n
at me for some reason.   I was running the transit and john C was setting up pickets with a blazing axe.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
\u201cGet in line, John, More to the left\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cFuck you!\u201d  And he turned and threw his blazing axe right st me.  It missed but it was close.<\/div>\n
\u201cWhat the hell did you do that for?\u201d<\/div>\n
And John went into a kind of catatonic state. I  told our crew chief what had happened.<\/div>\n
\u201cWe will have to do sometihng\u201d <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
That night John went a little more berserk\/  All 8 of us slept on metal cots in the highway bunkhouse.<\/div>\n
About midnight when we were all asleep,  John got up quietly.   Picked up a large rick the size of a football that he had<\/div>\n
secreted under his bed.  <\/div>\n
He tip toed over to Hazuda\u2019s bed and dropped the rock on what he thought was Hazuda’s head.   Smashed the water jug<\/div>\n
to smithereens.   <\/div>\n
Then got back in bed before we put the lights on.   He said nothing.  He was crazy.  We stayed up all that night while<\/div>\n
John jus lay in hia cot.  In the morning he was  put in a straitjacket and  taken away.  We never heard what happened but <\/div>\n
imagined he was committed to a place like Penetang for the insane.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
This event and the regular arrival of a black bear took my mind off my own troubles but not for long.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
The letter came.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I new it would be bad news but I had persuaded myself to think that miracles happen.  I did not open the letter in our<\/div>\n
sleeping shack nor in our cook trailer.   Instead I took s long walk to an abandoned one room school<\/div>\n
on the transcontinental highway near the village of Hunta, a village made famous as the boyhod home of<\/div>\n
a member of the notorious Boyd Gang.  I think his name was Steve Suchan (something like that).<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
There was an outdoor back house behind the school and that is where I  opened the letter.  Time to <\/div>\n
be blunt.  I failed.  Failed get above the cut off mark.  My marks were OK in most subjects.  Not stellar<\/div>\n
but OK.  Middle of the pack marks.   Good enough to pass but not good enough to enter university.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
It ws convenient to blame my busted baby finger for my failure.  But that was not true.  Even before the <\/div>\n
injury I had stepped on the road to failure by avoiding homework.   By bluffing.  I thought I was good<\/div>\n
at that.   Thought I had fooled my teachers.  Not so.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Miss Schroeder made hatt clesr to me gently in a French exam.  While writing the exam she slipped<\/div>\n
a newspaper clipping on my desk.  A clipping from the Dagwood and Blondie comic strip where <\/div>\n
Blondoe accuses her husband of using words that do not exist.  Dagwood\u2019s response was<\/div>\n
\u201cIt takes brains to invent words that do not exist.\u201d<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I looked up.  Looked at Miss Schroder whose face was impassive.  That was a moment of truth for<\/div>\n
me.  I had  fooled no one by using English words with French pronouncement.   If anything I had <\/div>\n
been a source of amusement. My desk was in front of her desk\u2026.by accident rather than design.<\/div>\n
Or had she put me there for her amusement.   \u201cMonseur Skeoch, would you read P 23 of the <\/div>\n
story converting English to French from your homework?\u201d<\/div>\n
  <\/div>\n
At which point I would read from a blank page.   <\/div>\n
But she liked me anyhow.   Smart ass stuff fooled no one except for me. I had bad habits.  Rarely<\/div>\n
did homework.  Spent more time dating girls, sharing stories with my 38th Boy Scout Rover Crew,<\/div>\n
playing football, joining the Drama Club, the Science club, the student council.  No time in the <\/div>\n
school day for something as trivial as homework.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
So my failure in hat letter read in the back house of an abandoned school in the wilderness of <\/div>\n
Northern Ontario was not just due to the cast on my hand and wire drilled down the centre of <\/div>\n
mybsby finger.   All the same it was comforting to have n excuse.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
MY history teacher, Evan \u201cCrusher\u201d Cruickshank, had a few good tricks up his sleeve.   His best one was just three words.<\/div>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d  He would leave a question dangling as if he really did not know.  On a couple<\/div>\n
occasions I even tried to help \u201cCrooky\u201d by going to the Runnymede Public Library to <\/div>\n
find the meaning of something like Karl Marx\u2019s \u2018dictatership of the proletariat \u2018.  I was deluded <\/div>\n
into believing Crooky needed help.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Much later in my life after Crooky hired me as a high school history teacher I discovered that<\/div>\n
a blood relative, Alex Skeoch, had been the barn builder n the late 19th century on the Cruiksahnd farm near Sarnia.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Down deep I loved my techers but did not suck around.  What I liked best about them was <\/div>\n
their objectivity.  They treated all students the same\u2026or tried to do that.  There was no crime greater<\/div>\n
than being a teachers pet.  Better to keep buried in the classroom\u2026.as far back as possible.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Roberta Charlesworth new how to straighten out students that did not do their work.<\/div>\n
She handed out detentions in an even handed way.  \u201cSkeoch, you come in after school<\/div>\n
\u2026.detention\u2026.Next time do your work.\u201d<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
She was coaching the girls basketball team in the girls gym.   Why serve s detention in<\/div>\n
home room If i could sit in the gym and watch the girls jump around in their blue <\/div>\n
gym bloomers.  So I did.   Next day.  \u201cSkeoch, come up to he front.\u201d  I thought i must<\/div>\n
have done something right.  Thought that until she lifted me off the grabbed by my<\/div>\n
left ear lobe and lifted.  Made my eyes water in front of he whole class.    \u201cWhen I say detention<\/div>\n
I mean detention in this room not the girls gym.  Now sit down.\u201d<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Later she got me several jobs tutoring students in English.  She did this as well as lift me by my ear<\/div>\n
lobe.  I never told  one Greek student I helped started our <\/div>\n
tutoring with a glass of liquorice brandy.    And another was a friend of a nice Ukrainian<\/div>\n
girl I waned to date.   Her parents did not like me until I used  a few Ukranian words<\/div>\n
that Jim Romaniuk gave me.  \u201cSho Tish Niyue\u201d (??) meant ‘How are you?.  Won them<\/div>\n
over and got the date.  But that went nowhere as she was Catholic and I was<\/div>\n
Presbyterian which seemed to be a wall.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
IN school\u2026public school\u2026religion had no place.   Tha was a good thing.   Football <\/div>\n
replaced religion I suppose.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
LOWER THAN A SNAKE IN A RUT<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
My parents were not upset in a way some might expect.  They were only upset <\/div>\n
because I was hurt.  They loved Eric and I in spite of some of he stupid things we did.<\/div>\n
What a joy that was.   To be loved in spite of failure. No condemnation.  Mom<\/div>\n
knew the cast covering my baby finger was a partial reason.  But she also <\/div>\n
knew I had rarely done my homework and was  partially o blame .   But she never said so<\/div>\n
And dad did not really give a dmn.  He had been thrown out of school in Grade 9<\/div>\n
at Fergus for firing snowballs at girls in the female back house that hung over the<\/div>\n
steep hill above he Fergus Fairgrounds.   Instead of going back to school he caught<\/div>\n
a train to Saskachewan after hiding from his father for some time.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Should I do the same as dad.  Head for Saskachewan where Uncle John had a huge farm. <\/div>\n
 In other words Quit school and \u2018climb telephone poles\u2019 as my typing <\/div>\n
teacher \u2019Tiny Tim Talbot called quitters.  No.   Mr. Burford\u2019s words<\/div>\n
popped into my conscious mind. \u201cWhen the going gets tough, the tough get going.\u201d<\/div>\n
Football philosophy had a powerful influence on daily life.   Replaced religion.<\/div>\n
Some readers will  be offended by that comment I know.  My mind was like a blank<\/div>\n
slate on which new ideas were written all the time.   I only wished that  my<\/div>\n
mind had not gone blank in that 1958 Departmental physics Exam.  Maybe my mind just up and failed me<\/div>\n
as a lesson.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Did I have the guts to go back to high school\u2026to repeat my Grade 13 year.<\/div>\n
\u201cTo suffer the slings snd arrows of outrageous  fortune.?\u201d  Did I have the guts?<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Luckily I was not alone.  My best friend got the same devastating news<\/div>\n
that I got.  We would both return to Humberside.  And surprisingly we were <\/div>\n
welcomed.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Note:  This may sound like a lot of crap.   What am I trying to explain?  Simple. My <\/div>\n
crushed baby finger was not the whole cause of my failure to get 75% on the<\/div>\n
1958 Deparmentsl Exams.  Mea Culpa!   It was my fault,,,not just my baby finger.<\/div>\n
Simple causation.   For every effect there are multiple causes.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
I had many surprises ahead of me\u2026good surprises\u2026wonderful surprises.<\/div>\n
And I chose a new path.  Study can be a joy\u2026.even an obsession.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Nov. 24, 2023<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
\n
\"1958-Grade-13-History-Final-Exam-by-toramble-ontario\"\"page<\/div>\n

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

EPISODE 919       FAILURE IN MY LIFE\u2026  1957=1958   EMBARASSING alan skeoch Nov.  25, 2023 LOOKING BACK \u2014 NOT ALWAYS A SMOOTh ROAD Note: Grade 9 \u2014 1953 \u201cAlan, choose one option\u2026music, art or typing.\u201d \u201cTyping.\u201d \u201cWhy? \u201cI am left handed.\u201d Sketch done by Kate McCartney\u2026Alan  Skeoch\u2026.Did he deserve to fail?   SEPTEMBER […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25878","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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25878\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}