Chapter One: Catholic Church Devotion……Page Chapter Two: Jumping from one frying pan into another frying pan……

CHAPTER ONE Catholic Church Devotion

I would like to address something of the utmost importance to my friends. This is what the matter is. The amount of devotion one should give, in their life, to the belief system of religion. I can speak from experience about this, as religion has been a very important part of my life; that is, until I started to figure it all out. During the first part of my life the religious standards were set for me. There were no, ifs, ands or buts: just go to church and shut up. Listen to the priest’s sermon, say my prayers each night and try to be a good boy. Well, that worked for a few years, because I was brought up in a Catholic Church and attended a Catholic School for boys. Yes, we got it coming and going. Jesus, Mary and Joseph were like aunts and uncles in my family. The Catholic catechism was the big book for us, because it had all the answers, or at least most of them. The teacher or sometimes the priest answered the rest of the questions. We could always tell if the parish priest was going to pay a visit because the teacher would be hyper for a few days before the visit. We learned about sin and the Ten Commandments and the story of Noah’s Ark. Just going about my life and always being cautious not to play with non-Catholics. Most of the school days had a few prayers and usually a trip or two over to the church. This I think is where I first learned to giggle, sometimes uncontrollably, yes near pants

pissing giggles. They told us about God and the Son of God, Jesus and even tried to tell me about the Holy Ghost. Now this was a little iffy, but we believed it because we were told to. It was in grade one that Miss O’Brien sat beside me, and she tried to tell me that God and Jesus and the Holy Ghost were all one person. She said that they all lived inside of one another and they could change places any time they wanted except for the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost was invisible. That was a little hard for me to accept but I did for quite a while.

In grade two things got a little more complicated. On December 8th the church had a special feast day, it was called the Feast of the Immaculate Conception and it was a Holy Day. They tried to tell us about the virgin nonsense but I think the teacher gave up on it. This time in my life the word sex was a sin, and little boys like me didn’t know which end was up, let alone anything about getting pregnant -- and by a Ghost? Now Holy Days were a good thing I soon found out, because we didn’t have to go to school. The problem was that we had to go to Mass, but that was only about an hour out of the day and the rest was fun time. Grade five came along and we had a Brother for a teacher -- my first kind of man teacher. He wore all black clothes like a priest and even had that white collar and some kind of an apron that was like a cape in the back. Then, anybody that wore a cape was something a bit special. It turned out that this Brother/teacher was indeed a very special person. He loved children.

In the spring, when I was in grade five, something happened to me. It was an illness that the doctor picked up during a blood test I had during a physical examination. I didn’t know that I was sick or how very sick I was. The blood tests showed that my white blood cell count was getting higher. I had to go to the doctor now every Friday for a blood test. The only thing that I can remember about the illness is that I would get tired easily and run out of energy. In a few weeks I was taken out of school and kept at home. It was March now and the snow was melting. There were little streams of water running down the road at the curb. I floated a matchstick down the make believe river as a make believe canoe. It was my entertainment for sunny afternoons. My mom was crying a lot and I didn’t know why. They got some special food for me, it was called Neo Chemical food, and it tasted like corn syrup but not as sweet. I had to take this three times a day. They prayed for me at school and at church but I didn’t know this as I didn’t really know just why I was taken out of school.

It was a Thursday afternoon and I was running the imaginary canoe down the curb river again. The river trough was cutting out the ice. There were rapids and whirlpools and jam ups with other bits of dirt and debris. This is where my imagination would run wild and I would be in that little canoe desperately keeping it straight within the narrow ice walls of the river. I looked up, and down the street came the Brother.

He said, “Wayne, I want you to be back in school next week”. He picked

me up in his arms and gave me such a wonderful hug that he squeezed my ribs. He looked at me and said to not let him down. He said, “You’re not sick anymore”.

We went to the doctor on Friday for those blood tests, which hurt with the needles in my arm. I stayed home with my mom on Monday but the doctor called her to bring me back in. We went down later in the afternoon. He took my blood again. I overheard that something happened and the blood now had the right amount of red and white blood cells. The doctor wanted to confirm this with another test. He said he didn’t know what went wrong because everything was normal. The following Monday I returned to school and felt just great. I was full of the Devil again as usual. I did not know that a very loving person had healed me. This man loved all people, especially children. The disease that I had was called Leukemia. Now grade five was a pretty big jump for me as I was too big for grade three and they thought that I would get along quite well. I continued to learn all the ins and outs of that religion, and started to think that I might as well make the best of it and be a real good little boy. I knew that being good would get me a lot of praise from my mom and most other people.

The devil, Satan, soon made his presence known through all the Catholic teachings at least as far as I could see at the time. Just about everything that was told ended up talking about the devil and the snares that would befall us. He lived in Hell; that place of big hot fires made to

warm and burned the sinners forever. Wow!! That was sure one Hell of a place. At my age it scared the devil out of me; and I guess that was the idea behind all of that propaganda. Well, we learned just about as much about Satan as we did about Jesus.

We also found out that this guy was invisible, and always and forever just around the corner leading all of us into temptation. The threat of temptation was easily overcome by repeating the Lord’s Prayer several times. It was sure exciting all that new information that I learned at that very young age. Prayers were part of my life now, with the beads being the most boring but most powerful tool against the Devil. The beads or the rosary as it was called was just a string of beads of ten with a blank and another bead then a blank that was followed by another trail of ten beads. With this device you could keep them in your pocket and thumb all the beads through one at a time and say the proper prayer at each bead. This way no one would even know that you were praying. It always seemed to me that the beads were mostly for women because they always had them in their hands at church. Sometimes when I would have to attend a wake I would see the rosary wrapped through the fingers of a dead lady. The nuns were the ones that had real big beads, sometimes almost touching the sidewalk when they were walking to church. The rosary always had a cross at the end of it.

I remember once, at recess, one of the guys asked me. “Do you know what Jesus was saying?” Then he held the crucifix close to me.

“No!” I said.

Well, it was HELP! And he took the rosary and swung it around his head and said, “Hang on Jesus here we go again!” This was kind of funny but deep within I just knew that the devil was somehow involved in this.

Grade six brought me to a new school for boys and run by brothers. This was a major turning point in my life because of two things. One was that I was twelve years old, and I was allowed to wear long pants instead of those short ones with the brown ribbed stockings held up by garters on a belt. The other thing that I started to notice was that Gordon Miller had a real big dink, like twice the size of mine. I knew this because in the boy’s washroom there were troughs to pee in and after recess we would all go there and line up and leak away. What a shock that was! But Gordon was a couple of years older and well into puberty and I had no idea why. There was just NO sex education at home or school. Anything along that line of thought was talked about in whispers only and a lot of times another giggling session in the corner of the school yard at recess. One morning in the winter there had been a new snowfall and the play yard was a blanket of new snow. Stanley and I were over in the corner talking about girls. Yes, quite frankly, we were talking about what the girls had in their underwear. We weren’t too sure but the word cunt came to mind. This was the real word for what I later

found out to be a vagina. Now this word was never to be uttered out loud because it would turn a venial sin to a mortal sin. Anyway Stanley and I trampled a long two hundred foot long pathway in the snow the shape of a rather slender football. Then we walked straight through the centre of it and there it was, a two hundred foot long vagina complete with hairs trampled evenly about the center split every foot or so. It was a masterpiece of snow art that made us laugh so much we just about pissed in our pants.

Each school day was started by some class prayers which sometimes included saying a decket of the beads. Then we had at least an hour of religion and after that we learned about the power of the Pope and the Church. We were told that those lost souls were Protestants and they had the audacity to protest against God. All Protestants were doomed to Hell, so we were to keep away from them and that was what I was taught then. We learned about the sacraments of the Church and all the whole kit and caboodle of it all. It was starting to get complicated. The power of the Church was impressed into my mind always with the fear of Hell. It was: be good or perish in Hell fire forever and ever, to never see the face of God. Purgatory was something that I learned about at this time in my young life. It was my only possible escape from Hell. Limbo was another place that God had reserved for un-baptized babies so that they would not burn but would never see the face of God.

Grade two started the path to Heaven, guaranteed. But you had to have

a scapular medal around your neck. Now a scapular medal was about the size of a quarter and had a picture of Jesus on one side and a picture of a human heart on the other. Now these items were free but you had to bring a dime for the chain. The chain was what some bathroom sinks have to hold the little rubber stopper in place. Well, everybody wore this. It was a sure way to be saved and protected from the wiles of the devil. A guarantee for heaven should we die for some reason. The cross on top of St. Columban’s Church was a sign that it was a house of God. The word was that when you passed a church sporting this big cross on top of the steeple you would either bless yourself or genuflect. Personally, I was happy with the sign of the cross. I remember a couple of times when I passed the church on my way to school and forgot to bless myself. I got as far down the street as the fire station and remembered that I forgot to bless myself. So I turned back and ran the half block back to the front of the church and blessed myself. I was safe now and well on my way to school.

Whenever we entered a church we first remove our hats but the girls and women had to put one on. All catholic women and girls always had a hat or a kerchief so they could get into the church. It was simple: no hat, no church. How many times, I wonder, did I see women with a Kleenex on their head? Once there was one that had a piece of newspaper stuck on her head with a couple of bobby pins holding it on. This morning the church had some drafts or a little breeze was blowing, and the newspaper that was on the woman’s head had an ad on it. The

ad was a picture of a coke and every time the paper moved it looked like the coke bottle turned upside down. With all grade two sitting in church that morning in the pews and that flapping paper hat in front of us going up and down, the right conditions for a giggling contest was set. During the Mass there were bells that rang during the service and people would stand up and kneel down and then they would sit. Now Stanley started it, he giggled first, then it was me, then the whole row of grade two was into a pants pissing giggling contest. Then Mrs. Miller would look over and give us that look of “I’ll kill you later” with a loud “psssssssssst” every couple of seconds. We knew that we were terminated when she finally got about six of the worst offenders lined up on the church steps and made to sit there until mass was finished. Wow!! Terror had struck. We were all marched very quickly back to school and all promptly got a good strapping. One by one we got that strap on the hand, and when it was Stanley’s turn, I caught his eye and started to giggle again. This giggling now seemed to be an inherent part of my life or some kind of a devil’s trap, because giggling to me was something funny but just to me and another boy namely Stanley.

The Host was God, with Jesus inside of him. It was a round white piece of some kind of a wafer biscuit that had the taste of flour. There were big ones for all the church to see and smaller individual little Gods for personal communion. At that time we all called it the Host, but nowadays it is called the Eucharist. But it only has God in it if a priest or anyone blesses it in a special way higher up the ladder. This is what is

given to Catholics during the communion service. It represents and becomes the body of Christ during the sacrament of the Mass. The bell would ring and the people would start their way to the altar rail and kneel down before it. The Priest would then go down the row dispensing these little wafers on the tongues of people kneeling there ready to receive Jesus. An altar boy would then follow the priest along holding the “Patten” which was a highly polished piece of silver with a gold handle suitable to catch any crumbs of Jesus that may fall from someone’s tongue. Now at some of the special Masses there would be a seat for Altar Boys just up on the altar area behind the altar railing. Stanley and I a few times would be sitting there as we became altar boys for St. Columban’s church. I think it was an Easter Sunday Mass and we were watching the communion service, and there was a whole row of people with their tongue’s sticking out. No need to say that when I caught Stanley’s eye another soon we began another giggling match. I swear to God that the giggling is caused by some demon that lives around the church. Each time that I have ever giggled was at a church service. So, I decided that the school must also have some Giggle Demons.

One Sunday morning a newly transferred priest said the Sunday mass. He was good looking and about thirty-five years old. He got through all the basic prayers in Latin, as it was only Latin then, and proceeded to take a rather large Chalice full of hosts from the altar to the communion rail. We could hear the click-click of his little black polished shoes going

across the freshly waxed floor of the altar area. No need to say that he slipped and fell over the teakettle, chalice and all. Now this was a major catastrophe. Father Pellon was not hurt but I never, ever saw such a red face on anyone before. Now there were a few nuns in the church and they all started to cover up all the little hosts with Kleenex. There were blessed hosts and the real body of Jesus Christ was strewn about the altar and the nuns and priests were panic stricken. An emergency call had to be made to the Bishop. An announcement was then made that the mass would be continued at the altar of the BVM which means Blessed Virgin Mary. This church had three altars and a couple of spare altars for times for special moments.

Through the eyes of a young boy the meaning of the religion was very deep because it was handed to us to grasp without question. It was to be taken with blind faith, and not questioned. The Catholic Church became a haven for me with all the doctrine I could not go wrong. I was going to Heaven. To rest, fast and abstain from meat on Fridays and Holy Days of obligation, and days appointed by the Church, was the way for me. No meat was to be eaten on Friday; it was the law of the Church and of God. There were no ball games and even swimming was curtailed on the Sabbath, which was Sunday. We learned of the seven deadly sins and the meaning of a “High Mass” and a “Low Mass”. To this very day I fail to see the difference in it other than the low one was two dollars and the high one was five dollars. We learned the Creed and memorized it and I can recall it today.

"I believe in one God, Father Almighty, and Creator of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages: Light of light, true God of true God, begotten, not made, of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made; who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and was made man; who was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried; who rose again on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and is enthroned at the right hand of the Father; who will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead; and of whose kingdom there shall be no end. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father, who together with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified, who spoke through the prophets. In one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church I profess one baptism for the remission of sins, and I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come." Amen.

The length of the Nicene Creed and being memorized by a mere child was brainwashing in the first degree. Confession was a necessity before receiving Holy Communion except in special cases. Yes, we had to confess our sins before God. Now to do this meant the confessional was soon going to be my most dreaded confined area. To go into that darkened chamber and seeing some old man’s face through some kind

of rattan screening, was like going to the hangman’s platform. But we did it. We did it because it was do or die. It became like some strange ritual to confess your sins to a priest. Bless me father for I have sinned. It went, on as an act of contrition before God. Then I would try to reason a little and think that if Jesus gave his life for my sins then what is all the commotion about? Now lying was simple and stealing not too bad but penance had to be done. It usually came in the form of prayers. We say three Hail Mary’s, three Our Fathers and three “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit”, and go and sin no more. Also, we say the prayer “Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.” Amen

The Prayer: “Our Father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespassed against us Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.” Amen.

The Prayer: “For thine is the Kingdom the power and the glory for ever and ever.” Amen. If this prayer were ever recited, it would be a sin because this was the Protestant version of the Lord’s Prayer.

The Prayer: “Glory be to the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost as

it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be world without end.” Amen.

Now go and sin no more meant that next Friday evening would find me back in the confessional. Stealing, lying and basics were indeed simple and a part of my life at times. The words fart, shit and poop were in the Ninth Street vocabulary as everyday words. For a while I thought that the cops were a division of the priesthood because they were always referred to as the “God Dam Cops”. The confessional now was going to be my downfall, because I would rather burn in hell than to tell that old priest that I played with my dink and white juice came from it and it made me feel good. And “how many times” were asked slyly from the voice behind the rattan screen. Well, I started to get fast at arithmetic and would peep out squeakily from my quivering lips “two and a half” because my mother was coming, was my answer.

First communion time, I think, was about grade two. The idea that we could eat a piece of Jesus and in that way have God come into my stomach was an okay idea at my very young impressionable age. They had some practice sessions with some of the unblessed hosts. I guess just to see the reaction in the classroom. This was more of a play, like a movie production, so it had to be right on. We marched single file to a make pretend altar rail and kneeled down and stuck out our tongue. Mrs. Miller then had a teacup full of unblessed hosts and she put one on each of the kid’s tongues. The procedure was to say amen and make

the sign of the cross when the teacher put the host on our tongue, then stand up and walk orderly back to our seat. The host, as I recall, tasted like what I would call today, nothing. I secretly thought that if it was blessed it would taste like meat, such as a piece of chicken or ham or something like that. Practice for weeks before the big day, to get a performance suitable for a Hollywood pageant was what the teacher wanted. It was competition between two grade two boys’ teachers and between two grade two girls’ teachers who were nuns. We practiced for communion and for confession, and all done to perfection complete with make pretend sins for the practice.

A nine year old, at that time, was not what you would call a sinner in my books. So for the practice we just made up some with Stanley and I trying to out do each other when we would meet at recess and discuss the whole matter. One sin that Stanley had was that he tied his mother to the railroad tracks and the train runs over her. But I only stole Mr. Burnet’s horse and went into town and robbed a bank. So my relationship with the Catholic Church and the school was forming, rather soundly, within my little mind. It was not too bad a set-up if you didn’t think some of the ideas through, because just do it, have some sins, and be forgiven. Eat the host but not touch it with your teeth and do it on an empty stomach, because it would not be very nice to have Jesus’ body go into your stomach with a hamburger or a hot dog.

Well, here I was now, a young boy with a powerful religion engrained in

me. All the rituals were memorized and all the many prayers were repeated over and over so many times that it was just base memory. One day at recess Stanley and I had a contest to see who could say the most Hail Mary’s in the shortest time. Sometimes some of the other kids would join in and for a while it was a game the same as playing marbles or allies. The schoolyard was a place to express your innate personality. It was of the utmost importance to get ahead of anyone else no matter what the challenge. It was the Olympics, and we outdid each other with speed praying and marbles and to see if anyone was brave enough to stick their tongue on the steel post on a cold morning. I did it once or twice. It was scary but it could be done. The secret was to just quickly touch just the tip of it and pull away. One cold morning the teacher saw a couple of us giggling at the window. She went over and saw that poor little Teddy was out at the gate with his tongue frozen to the steel post. She evoked a terrorizing scream for all of us to sit down and she ran out to the steel post to try to free up poor Teddy. This was another pants pissing and laughing match for the entire grade two.

We always had a spy; therefore, one carefully chosen by the group to be the one to trust. The spy would look out the door to see when Mrs. Miller would be coming so we could all jump back to our seats and appear, as if we never left them. But it didn’t always work because she said she could hear the noise from the street. An incident like this was a serious matter and the teacher would find out the cause of the commotion if it took all day. The trial began and each row was asked

one by one “Who did it?” The routine was that the first run was no one would admit to anything. The next procedure was to start by saying to the children that the whole class was going to get the strap if no one admits to starting the ruckus. The pattern was that when she started the line-up, Stanley or I and some of the others would then admit to starting it. But it never was anyone’s fault because someone else always made him do it. We knew that it would be terror in the schoolyard for us if the truth were not told because the forty-four kids would have our hides at the next recess.

My formative years were then in the times from my birth, to the times of grade six and seven. But I was a fully programmed Catholic. I was full of the religion and full of God and full of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Now as a companion for all the wonderful virtues I was also full of the Devil. At least my mother told me so quite a few times. I could recite many prayers from memory. I was baptized, circumcised, confessed, said communion, confirmed and thoroughly confused by the invisible God called the Holy Ghost that was some kind of an invisible shield that would somehow be within the other two invisible Gods that I also could not see.

ALTAR CALL

It is because of the powerful position that religion has over people that I

write this book. I know that I will make some enemies by writing this, and hopefully a few friends. And I know that I will be making these enemies because it is the truth that I am writing. I am angry, but not at people anymore but at the powers and principles used to control the minds of people. Mind control is the tool used to this very day. Fear is the next greatest tool of control and guilt all combined to take complete control over the lives of people. For two thousand years Religions of one kind or another have ruled us. After this length of time the track record of Religion shows its bloody colors. I for one refuse to let religion control me. I have found their doctrine has many holes in it. To get people thinking is what I want, and to have a thought or two of their very own is my ultimate goal. If this then is upsetting a few people then what I want to say is that the truth can indeed be very upsetting, but by being upsetting it may lead some to search out this great Christian myth. Now I was ripe for the altar call. I got my call to the altar from my mother. The call sounded like this “Wayne I want you to be an altar boy.” It was at that instant that I learned about mixed emotions, apprehension kneeknocking fear religion was born. At least that is what it seemed like to me. About fifty young boys were selected to go to the church hall one Saturday and get trained for altaring.

As in all the levels of the church there were levels in this group also. First, being the acolyte, then incense bearer then the master. The master altar boy was the one with the power and the most proficient with the new language, Latin. We were given a prayer book for a

minimal fee. It had all the mass sections written in red both in English and Latin. My mother was a proud woman; her prayers had been answered. I was well on my way to being a Priest then a Monsignor then a Bishop then arch Bishop followed by a Cardinal then eventually the Pope. On that Spring Saturday there were forty altar-boys selected, yes, Stanley was there, too. We together were the only happy part of fear religion. Then I happily went along enjoying the position of altar-boy for a couple of years. We learned how to light those tall candles and how to dispense the wine and the water. On a few rare occasions there would be some wine left in the serving decanter, which we were supposed to dump down the drain with the water and rinse out the vessels. Stanley and I thought it to be a terrible waste so we used to finish up what was left from the Mass. On more than one occasion we left the church a little tipsy and giggling all the way home. The wine used for the Mass was the best quality money could buy and had high alcohol content. At that time we didn’t know much about wine but it made my face feel warm and I laughed a lot.

There was an incident that happened with my older brother that I recall as something quite bad that happened in the church with one of the priests. What I remember is that when my brother got home from serving mass very early in the morning at maybe 6:00 a.m. There was one hell of a ruckus downstairs and my mother and father were screaming at one another. I was scared. I heard my father say that he was going to go to the church and shoot the priest. My mother finally got

him calmed down. Mom informed me that I was not going to be an altarboy anymore and she washed the altar clothes we wore and my father took them back to the church. My mother called me to the altar but my father called me back. My office with the church was now closed. To this day I do not know what happened at the church but it was bad enough for my father to get out the gun and think of shooting the priest. Mom, dad or my brother never mentioned those times ever. Now, I would like you to read the following poem:

RUMOR

A rumor was heard the other day That caused me much dismay About the Catholic Church. And a priest to come our way. I heard it from a friend. The ones that I can trust. This old priest likes little boys. Or a clean old man as much. Now this little rumor Struck terror in my heart Because I walk by the church a little after dark My mind now starts thinking About precautions I will take

If it happens on some dark night That I pass that priests gate Now I know this isn’t like me But the only way I’ve found To never take a bath again Until a new priest comes to town Wayne Anthony Sturgeon

I was active in the church with Sunday Mass being one of the highlights of the weekend. We went on picnics now and ball games were allowed on Sunday. I was growing up and soon ready for high school. Church activities changed somewhat for me because there were a few other interests for me now. One of the last times I remember that was a frightening experience with the church was one spring Saturday when a Jesuit Priest was to give a sermon. The command was given from the pulpit the Sunday before for all the male parishioners to attend the lecture next Saturday. All I knew about this kind of a Jesuit Priest was that they wore a brown uniform with a hood something like a monk would wear. Saturday came and I attended with my father. This sermon was about sin and the many ways that sin would foul up our lives. It was a sermon of doom for me and about the sin of adultery which meant the sex sin. Sex was a forbidden word classed as a sacrilege along with the words hell, damn, bitch, fuck, fart and all the regular schoolyard slang common today. Sex education came from Stanley, Bob’s Pool Hall that was on the forbidden list and general street talk under the street lamp at

night. The Jesuit told us of how we were guilty of the sin of adultery when we would have any kind of sexual excitement that happened when we looked at a girl or a woman. Now this meant I was guilty of adultery before I even knew about girls because I was having erections and what we called in those day’s “boners”. This was a kind of a happening that was hard to suppress, especially when I was entering puberty.

There were several kinds of boners for me, and I think most boys, during puberty.

The list follows, (1) Sleeping Boner, which happens a lot of times during the sleep period. (2) Deliberate downright evil thought boner that we bring on by ourselves with the helping hand of Satan (3) The girl in the green sleeves walking down Sydney street boner. That happens because she looks just so beautiful from behind with nice shaped legs and her little bum wiggling down the street to school.. Well, here I was now sporting the three deadly boners of the underworld. Yes they were like the blessed trinity of evil and I was harboring these three evils. This I think is where I first heard the word masturbation. At first, I thought that it was some level of the Priesthood, a degree or something of that nature. When I went home, I looked it up in the dictionary and there it was. It was the same as jerking off. It was clear now that the discussions under the streetlight were a place where evil of the lowest nature dwells. But I grew older and sported the three boners from time

to time. It was just something that had a way of not being suppressed. It was within my being; it was part of me. Even when looking at the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary for a long time my mind would wander to the thought of “I wonder what kind of underwear she wore, “Maybe none.” I thought which brought on a giggle boner caused by excitement. Girl’s underwear is what I believed to be usually dark blue bloomers that had elastic at the leg slightly above the knee. And sometimes you would see them when they rolled around the grass. The girl’s skirts or dresses were always at the knee or modestly below the knee. Now this, for me, was the mystery of the hidden world. The area contained within the underpants and that area within the brassiere. They were off limits but for discussion purposes only under the street lamp. I got through grade school and now ready for the high school.

Opening day in September brought me to this high school. It was about three times the size of the old separate school that I just left. The signs pointed the way for all the newcomers and we met in the auditorium. We were given an introductory speech by the Principal and then directed to our Home Form. Here I was in grade nine general, sitting in a room with several girls attending. It gave me the creeps; cautiously looking to my left was a girl who I will call Anne. She was enormous. She had her knockers hanging down over the inkwell. She wore a bra because I could see it through her white silk blouse. It was scary for me. I had no boner. It brought to mind the sermon given to the entire grade eights about entering a Protestant and public school. It was given by a priest,

and informed us that there would be all kinds of temptations in the new school and that the devil lurked everywhere to snare us. Well, he sure was right because the chest that that Anne had was obviously a work of the devil. It was my first experience seeing a woman’s body and up close. I was about fifteen then and entirely uneducated about the female person. Anything we knew was from the gang under the street lamp or that forbidden pool hall or from the back yards of Ninth Street.

A few years before, I was asked by one of the locals if I had ever seen a bare naked girl? I said, “No.” Then he said, “If you look into this thing, you will see one.” Wow! I thought this is a must for me so I took the device, which was like a long mailing tube and put it to my eye, and I looked as hard as I could, but there was nothing. Garry said try looking at the sun with it and it might show then so I pointed the tube to the sun; until there was nothing but darkness. I tried the same thing with the other eye and suntil nothing but blackness. I was disappointed but shook it off quite well even with all their laughing, yes hard laughing. I left and wandered around the block so I would get home from the opposite direction. This was the plan so mom would not know that I was on Ninth Street. It was dinnertime and I went to the table and my mom was shocked. She asked, “What happened to you?” I said, “Nothing.” You go up to the bathroom and wash your face and hands and look in the mirror. Knowing she was upset I ran upstairs and to my surprise both eyes had these big black circles around them. It was black shoe polish and the answer to all the laughing on Ninth Street was now clear.

Growing pains and the Catholic Church seemed to be there for quite a while. Sunday Mass was a necessity for Heaven. I sure was under the spell of the Catholic Church. There was no alternative. The Church knew what “was right for all”. We were like little slaves to this belief system. We couldn’t dive into the pool without first making the sign of the cross. We didn’t dare get into a real fist fighting ruckus without first blessing ourselves. I had a wonderful mom and dad. They were very sincere people. They did as good as they were capable of because we were what you would call poor people, at least by today’s standards. There was little money to spend and no holidays for many years. It was hard work. There were five children, two brothers and two sisters, in my family. My dad and I joined the Holy Name Society and dad also became a member of the Knights of Columbus. The Catholic Church was a very important part of our lives during my early years. Church parades several times a year. Marching and proudly displaying that Christian Banner and viewing the extra large host that always accompanied these events. Religion was very well ingrained in us. There was NO escaping. We couldn’t leave the church. The only exit was through the gates of Hell. We did not have to think, because it was all done for us. Some days I felt so trapped and restricted I had to tow the line, or else. But there were a few good things and a few good people within the walls of the church and one was a Brother teacher that for some reason loved children and I will include a poem that I wrote about him on the next page.

WHEELS

What a day it was back then When grade five I arrived My teacher was a loving man That rode his bicycle to school When he came into class that day And brought his special case We knew that it wouldn’t be long For smiles and laughter upon our face Time for music now my boys The accordion flowing in and out We will sing this song together

Our voices billowed out Now summer time was on its way And June was round about Tomorrow is Friday And we all are going out A day of natural science To study our outdoors And don’t forget your swim trunks boys Or a pair of old drawers Away we marched on Friday morning

To the forest we all went But soon we heard him call us now To the old swimming hole we were sent One by one he took us On his back across the bay We all then had our lunch together It was such a beautiful day Now Friday soon was over He took us to the road And sent us running safely home His bicycle he then rode Wayne Anthony Sturgeon

There was no stopping me from growing up, but my mother worried that I wasn’t interested in girls. By fifteenth birthday I became very interested in girls, but I was a lot more interested in cars, so that is what occupied most of my time. Also deep within I knew that having a car was a sure way of getting girls. I remember my mother buying me a skin-tight bathing suit that sure enough showed that I indeed had all the necessary equipment that was meant to attract girls. There was hair growing in all the designated places and the beginning of a man was walking around. Another positive shaving was now something that came about every once in a while. The pimples were on the decline at this time. Yes, I was growing up. Stanley was not in the same neighborhood and I never saw much of him in school at this time. Most of the giggling had subsided and there was closeness to Jesus in my life, at least on

Sundays. Confessions were not quite as critical now as they were when I was younger. The communion rail was before me fewer times in the year.

Other than the sacramental wine that Stanley and I got into at church there was very little alcohol in my life. After I turned seventeen, everything that I had known in my life was about to change. There were places that would serve you alcohol as long as you had the money. I was gradually slipping into the snares of the devil. But, nevertheless, I continued to live with this terrible boner infliction and not knowing that it was a very normal event in any man’s life. The high school that I attended had a session, for the recreation period, that taught us how to dance. They had a record player there and they were playing a tune on it that I remember today. It was called Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom Time, a waltz song with the trumpet being in the foreground. Now there I was with the boys on one side of the gymnasium and the girls on the other. The teacher soon got us all paired up and we learned to waltz. Now it was a new experience for me. They showed us how to hold each other and where to put our hands and the different paces required for waltzing. I was so stiff with fear that I know I had to look stupid.

We held each other. She was so soft, and I was constantly making sure that my hand was between her waist and her bra. Yes, my arm was frozen in that position, but not frozen enough to see just how soft a girl’s body was. It felt wonderful, and we waltzed the night away. We ended

up changing partners a few times, and I felt like Pinocchio made of wood. Due to my stiffness I had a sore back for a week. But I did it, and it was not such a terrible adventure.

Now some of the girls seemed to be a little more pleasing to look at than some others. Yes, they were interesting all right. Sometimes my mind would wander to the seam in their stockings. I guess at that time to have those nylon seams perfectly straight was an art. But now the trouble being that my mind would wander all the way up the stockings to where the legs are fastened to their bum. Now that Jesuit’s sermon would start to ring in my head and the three boners would also rear its little head. So here I was trapped by the devil so bad that Jesus could not help me. What went wrong I would think? Why am I constantly fighting something that I had absolutely no control over? Was I sick I thought? I had a lot of questions but very few answers. Soon though there was, in our health class, some good information given to us about puberty and the art of being a man. It made me feel kind of normal for a change. The three boners now became friendlier and were more like the Three Musketeers than the evil wiles of Satan. So, I was a normal young boy after all. That Jesuit Priest had triggered a chain reaction within me, because whenever there were any normal sexual desires that came forward, I was an evil person.

To this day the scars remain. I was a victim of the Catholic Church and it did an enormous amount of damage to me and many other growing

boys. God cheated us. We were sold a bill of goods that was as wrong at that time, as it is wrong today. That church took control of my mind with words from someone else’s mind which said that this is best for all young men and that sexual desires are the snare of the Devil. I was damn well cheated and I want my money back. Dominminus Vobiscum rolled out from the priest, followed by Eccum Spiritutuo from a man that replied to the Priest. At this time I am not even sure if it is spelled correctly. Then, when the echo’s stopped, there was a small but clear and concise voice from behind me that said “Dominus Nabisco Shredded Wheat”. The row of guys, all of us teenagers by this time, burst out into a laughing and giggling match that got us into a lot of trouble. The church had a balcony with a stairway at each side. There was room for about a hundred people. The large church organ was also up in the balcony. Saint Joseph’s statue also found its way up there. When I turned around, there was Burt beside the statue with his fedora on Joseph’s head and a cigarette in the mouth. Now this was Sacrilege and deserving death or at least excommunication for sure. Eight of us were now in trouble. We had desecrated the church. The Monsignor was coming up the west stairs as fast as his little fat legs would carry him. All eight of us were now heading down the east stairwell making a beeline to the car and immediately driving away from the church. Not only were we driving away from the church, but also out of the country and over to Massena. We made the decision to stop at Massena so that we could proceed to get drunk. We were doomed. Now Massena was a village in New York State just over the international

bridge and it was our Heaven away for home. We could drink there if we were seventeen, but in Ontario we had to be twenty-one years old to be served. I don’t blame anything on my drinking. Drinking too much alcohol caused it, and I crossed over the line into an addiction. It controlled me for about six years and that was a long time when you are only twenty-five. It was a necessary part of my spiritual growth and I had to experience this. My freedom was curtailed by a creed. My right to think was removed from me without ever having any say in the matter. I was judged from my baptism as an infant to this very day.

CHAPTER TWO: Jumping from one frying pan into another frying pan

When I got to my late teens and out of high school, Mass was part of my life. Attending Mass started most Sundays. I was programmed for it, and it was not easy to break. My thoughts now started to change into a more adventurous lifestyle and Mass was a hindrance by times, so a plan had to be made. When we went over the border to the US, we would have someone that went to Mass that day tell us, on Monday, some of the details of the sermon. Then if we were asked by our parents about going to church on Sunday, we would have a general idea of what the sermon was about.

Soon there were many other things and activities that held more importance than Mass. One of them was a fishing trip, but more accurately described as a drinking trip with a couple of fish. Alcohol soon became my manager. It managed me because I had to plan my day around where there would be some alcohol. Girlfriends were few except for one that ended because I rationalized that a non-Catholic would just not do. But Lonny was a little more advanced than me and a marriage for her was her only goal. I put her off for five years then she dumped me. My relationship now with Lonny and Jesus was about the same and that question was who could I trust? God and the Holy Ghost somehow didn’t cut it with me anymore. I felt like a loser and started to romance alcohol quite regularly. I was becoming an alcoholic. Just like

the Jesuit said, another snare of Satan. So I dated randomly for a while and got interested again in machinery because I could reason with an engine better than a female, or so I thought.

My drinking increased a little each year. But then Cupid’s Arrow struck me, and my life took a turn into an adventure that is second to none. Yes, I was in love. She was from another town quite far away. I had met her one time before, when I attended the wedding of one of my best friends. She seemed, as I recall, just a little teenage sister of my friend’s new wife. That day there was a lot of unseen chemistry happening, because there was the chemistry of losing one girlfriend and finding another. Yes, the love potions were boiling. Chemistry in this case was mostly within the female domain, as the girl that I had been with, for four years, had gotten tired of waiting, but that brought me to my knees. The adventure had started and a plan was in motion that would bring us together for many wonderful years. She lived a hundred miles away from me. And I wondered why any friend of mine would find a girl so far away from our hometown, Cornwall. The many miles we drove to court our girls got us so that we became pretty good mechanics. The wear and tear on our cars was tremendous. I made that trip to Quebec on a regular schedule, sometimes to Montreal and sometimes to St. Paul or Rawdon, Quebec.

My first solo trip to visit with this girl was a real eye opener. I had to go to Montreal. That proved to be quite an accomplishment, as I had never

driven there before. In 1960 this was a four-hour trip for me. Along the old number two highway was the only road. It was a long trip especially during the winter. I found her apartment and went inside. I was so nervous because she was not really known to me. She looked so small and tiny, with her green sweater on and one of the felt type skirts that were common in those times.

“Shall we go for a drive?” I sputtered to her. It was my first conversation, in person, other than that phone call, about two weeks before. She was nervous, too, I could tell by her voice.

We went to a restaurant on Decarie Boulevard in Montreal. We ate, we made eye contact, and the chemistry was working but not her stomach. She couldn’t eat. She was so beautiful that I fell in true love immediately. She was it. This is what had been missing, and it was love. I was hoping that she felt the same about me. After finishing our first meal, I asked her if she would like to go for a drive, and she said, “Yes.” She was so pretty. I wanted to tell the whole world about my beautiful treasure from Montreal. We drove to the mountain in the city that had a beautiful park. The park was called Beaver Lake Park. Anxiously, I took my camera with me and held her hand for the first time. We found a nice place under the trees on the lawn and we sat together. At the time I worked for a photographer in Cornwall. And all my skills now were going to be tested with color film for the first time, and the color slide type. I took the whole roll of film on her and treasured these prizewinning photos for

many years. She posed for me and I snapped the shutter and reposed and I ended up with a few real nice photos. One of them seemed to show up her chest in such a beautifully enlarged way, the green soft sweater embracing those hidden treasures, at least hidden at this time. The photos were developed and I had a couple of them plasticized so they would keep forever. They were in my wallet and special they were, as I boasted about her to my friends and had the proof in my wallet. On the mountain that day, we kissed each other and hugged and embraced each other. I gave her my school ring to keep. All this was to be because we were meant for each other. Distance would not separate us, because I loved her and she loved me, and it was the beginning. The phone call came two weeks before. There was a dance at her workplace and she asked me if I would go with her to the dance. At that time I was not dating any other girl on a regular basis.

I panicked, and I said, “Well I will have to let you know”. I think that Cupid’s arrow hit me through the phone and stunned me. But I got her number and the address, then I thought; how stupid I was. So I called her back the next night and said, “Yes, I would be delighted to take you.” She sounded so nervous when she called me, as, in those days, girls did not do the asking out. I think her older brother and sister talked her into it saying, “It’s okay, because he doesn’t know about the dance. He’s in another province”. I was like a man that had been hit in the face by a frozen trout. That Cupid’s arrow hit me hard. After our visit to Beaver Lake Park, we started to date on a regular basis.

The dance was the first formal outing. I met her sister and brother at that time. My life was changed now and for the better. It was Margie, Wayne, God, Jesus, Mass, confession and communion and in this order. The Jesuit, I thought, had to have a few marbles missing. If love came complete with boners, then someone was wrong and it was the Jesuit. All week long I waited for the bus to come to the stop as she was coming to meet my parents and stay the weekend. The nights in between were now filled with a lot of drinking. The pictures became known throughout the local beverage rooms that I frequented. It was a week filled with drinking, loneliness, excitement, boners and love. Religion now was not as important anymore because I could not believe some of it. It just didn’t make sense. I believed in Jesus and kept a line open to Him. Missing Mass was now quite common as I was working and somewhat grown up. The drinking continued with some control used during our dates. I was living at home with my mom and dad and two sisters and only one brother as my oldest brother was killed in a car accident a couple of years before. My mother never recovered from that loss and would cry each time a tune that was popular at that time was played on the radio. I remember her wanting to drive to Lancaster and ask the local people if he had been at church recently. Mom lived with the burden of Hell on her all her life. It was a violation of human rights to impose the fires of Hell on my mother. She was a very devout Catholic and had her life screwed up by the Catholic Church.

The Church was losing Latin, it just was not acceptable anymore and

not even reasonable. It had to change, but did it in slow motion, and that was wrong. As I look at all these matters and when I start to reason a few things through, the whole Christian story is flawed throughout the whole system.

Fighting the alcohol problem that I was reluctant to believe was also hard. Fighting the Church and the teachings was easy because none of it made any kind of sense at all. I was starting to see the bill of goods that I was sold as a load of garbage. When the weekend arrived, I would go to the station an hour early because I didn’t want to miss a minute of the time that Margie and I shared together. Our time was always spent together. We would drive around during the day, and in the evening we would drive to a favorite parking place. I was a frustrated young man being forced to suppress natural sexual desires that were normal made for mankind. We could hug and kiss and caress but God forbid having sex in the full beauty of it. Every time I had an erection that God forsaken little Jesuit bastard Priest would come back to my mind and spoil everything. It was like living constantly on a bungee cord that you always were snapped back just short of the end.

Yes, you could go just so far, but snapped back by rules and regulations set forth by some ancient oracle a thousand years ago.

One Saturday afternoon we found this little road that went along the lake. There was a nice place to park by the water’s edge. A nice lawn

beckoned us and we lay down together. It was just so nice the two of us together alone, in the sun, on the fresh green grass. We hugged and petted and were oblivious to the world. We kissed and wished we were married. We then got back in the car and drove back on the highway that went along the water. After a while the road seemed so close to the lake. We could see the spot that we were just in a few minutes before and it was so close to the highway that we were red faced for quite sometime. We thought that we were in such a secluded spot by the lake. We chuckle about this place whenever we drive by fifty years later. Another time when we were at the cottage we went out in the big rowboat and after rowing for a while, came to the leeward side out of the wind and just relaxed in the back of the rowboat. Soon we were engaging into pretty heavy necking, petting and all the accessories short of having intercourse. The sound of engines and that big fog horn from big Jims cruiser startled us so much that I just about fell out of the boat. They must have had a good laugh at us as we tried to resume a sitting in the back seat position in a hurry. Our faces were so red that we could feel the heat. Our romantic interludes brought us to the edge all the time, to the edge of sex, the edge of the road, the edge of the boat and the edge of our nerves. It was bungee cord sex and romance all those times for a year.

Cupid also hit Margie, but the chemistry is different with girls and women. When I looked into her eyes I could see a ring and she was waiting for THE RING. It was the engagement ring that led to a wedding

ring. But I was not making a lot of money and I had to change my job to get a little larger pay check. Also alcohol was starting to take its toll with me. My financial condition was always lacking. I was courting Margie, alcohol, the three boners and living in the shadow of a religious system that warped my thinking.

I had no money to buy an engagement ring. She knew that and she was able to put aside some money to purchase one and it was a dandy for those days. I contributed very little to the ring purchase. I also was acquiring an amount of debt from my last steady girlfriend. Items that I had purchased for her had to be paid. These debts followed me right into my marriage with Margie and she, a little at a time, was able to get the bills paid for me.

Sometimes I feel that it is some kind of a destiny that brings two people together, perhaps some guidance from some source that we just don’t see. Maybe a plan of the Angels that saw the qualities we both had and were able to join us together. Margie was a very sincere and spiritual person and so was I, and it took a woman like Margie to be strong enough to put up with all the misery that I would put her through. I believe that if it had been any other person, my marriage would have been very short lived. Our courtship went very well and not many disagreements between us. We went together for a year before we got married. It was a wonderful time. I loved her so much and I knew that she loved me. We had our family planned and where we would live and

Margie had some very excellent business skills, and I was into mechanics. Margie was twenty, and I was twenty-five. We married at that time. It was my nature to do anything to the fullest including drinking, photography, and my own business in later years.

The plans were set in motion and there was a wedding in our future, but I don’t believe that I was ready for that kind of responsibility. What man is? One time while visiting at Margie’s home her mother and father called me aside and showed me this beautiful engagement ring, it was a beautiful solitaire mounted on white gold. It was given to me with a gentle hint that wedding plans were in the making. We were engaged in March and a wedding was set for September 2, 1961. The six months went by quickly. Yes, too quickly it seemed. It happened that the date was the same day as my birthday, and a church wedding and a big one to boot. Now the weekends always had some extras to be done. Making a list of guests and finding a best man for me. And Margie also had many items that to be attended to. One of them was to book the church for the wedding. Margie and I went to the parish church in her hometown and we saw the Priest. We looked at the appointment book and 11 AM was free. Upon putting down a deposit for the service, Margie noticed that there was a booking at 10 AM the same morning. On our way out she said to me in her anxious little way “Gee, I hope that was not a funeral booked at 10:00 the same morning, it would spoil the

wedding.” I also hoped not but going home in the car, it hit us that funerals are not usually booked ahead four months. To this day it is often remembered with all the excitement that goes with a wedding. We laughed about this many, many times.