TRANSCRIPT

WW - Wes[ley] Washington, interviewee / LR - Lyn Royce, interviewer

LR: Did your family, were... Did you have social activities around the church at all with your family? Or was it just you went for service Sunday morning and that was, and school, and that was about it?

WW: Went for service 6 days a week; 6 days a week. Went to mass every morning. Every morning and Sunday. 'N then summer time, we went to Summer School.

LR: Summer school... right... okay... okay. When... What kind of social activities did your family, did you do together with your family? Did you do anything? I mean, people worked that hard, there's no, sometimes it feels like there's no day off, right?

W: Mhmm.

LR: But did you do stuff, do you remember family celebrations or family... Like how did you...

WW: Family celebrations, would, well, what we used to do was a, was our good friends, our neighbours, like uh, Wrekjes, uh, Petanzas, uhm, Hardies, would all come to the house, or we'd go to their house, and, and, and we'd have a little get together, sit back and relax and reminisce; that's all we did.

LR: Okay.

WW: we couldn't have no, no big monstrous parties for what? Lookin' at what? We didn't have nothin'.

LR: Right. Okay.

WW: And we used to play different games. We used to play Round, Round, Hole in the Icebox. That was...

LR: I'm... sorry?! [laughs]
WW: [laughing] A Round, Round, Hole in the Icebox. We'd turn around and take a person, stand 'em up to a telephone pole. To a telephone pole. And then we'd say, 'Round,' touch their back like, 'round, round, [chanting singsong] hole in the ice---box,' who stuck their finger in and there'd be about 15 of us. And the person would stick their, stick 'em in the back, and you had to turn around to say, 'It was Bill.'

LR: Okay...

WW: Or it was John. And, and if they did, then they had t'... if I turned around and they said one and who stick 'em, and somebody stabbed me in the back, and I'd say, 'Gordon, my brother.' Well that means I'd get free and he'd have to go and count to 10, standing at the pole, and we all go hide.

LR: Okay...

WW: We'd all go hide. But... And then we'd play another game, Kick the Can.

LR: Okay...

WW: Kick the Can. That would mean, uh, uh, pop can and we'd, we'd, we'd kick it. And then that person that was it had to turn around, run down there, grab the can, come back and put it in this circle and then come around lookin' fer us. And then they had to turn around, and say, uh, '1,2,3, on Gordon.' And then they'd run back to touch the spot. Little games like that. No trouble.

LR: Right.

WW: No trouble.

LR: No trouble. You didn't...

WW: When my, when, when my mother or Dad would say, 'When that light, streetlight, comes on, you better be on the property.' And if we were down the street at Bill Wrekjes, or, or, or Hardies, or, or Tony Petanza, uh, and the light went on, bang, PHOO!!! we'd fly home. And we'd look out and, okay; long's yer on the property.