Our interpreter scrambles into a depression in the earth, his young face covered by a handkerchief under an old green helmet. He’s a native of Kandahar, and interpreters always know the ebb and flow of their homeland. If he’s taking cover then so should we. I crouch a little lower behind my mound of dirt.
“Two Section! Prepare to move to the wadi,” yells the Sergeant behind me. Pause.… two… three… “Move!”
“Moving!” The last half of our serpentine column disappears into a ditch. “Here it comes!” Yells someone from up front.
My eyes can’t scan everything fast enough. “Where are they? Where are they?” I say.
Snap-snap! Snap-snap-snap! Tat-tat! Tat-tat-tat!
The opening fusillade of incoming bullets is fierce. Hot lead is splitting the air like gusts of wind above our heads. The noise echoes against the surrounding mud walls.
“Over there! Over there!” I hear someone yell, but without a point of reference, “there” could be anywhere. Where are they? Where are they? I can’t tell if I’m speaking out loud or if this nagging question is trapped in my mind.
“Left flank! Left flank! Twenty metres!” Someone finally gives an actual indication, and it’s close!
Doof! Grenades are being thrown. The unmistakable thrust of pressure hits my chest. Doof!
I see dust clouds to our left. I don’t want to remain underemployed. It’s time to help the patrol with my rifle. My rifle spears out at nothing in particular. The view in my scope shows gaps in a wall with those dust clouds dancing in them. Anything that’s not us and not a bush or a wall might be a lurking insurgent.
Pak-pak! Pak-pak-pak! I’m pulling the trigger as fast as I can without losing control of the rifle. Pak-pak! Pak-pak-pak!
I don’t feel safe where I am. The enemy likes to pop out at us from all directions. My back feels eerily exposed. I decide to drop down in order to pop up somewhere else. I begin my descent from the mound….
The mound above my head becomes three little explosions of dirt. I don’t hear it, I just see it a few inches above, and I’m aghast.
Some unseen enemy on the right flank has the back of my head in his sights and my only saving grace is less than a second of time and a fraction of a degree of deviation. I’ve never met this someone. I’ve done nothing to him so far as I know, but it’s painfully clear he’s trying to end me.
I sink out of sight to the earth. My soul is crushed. My being is emotionally defeated. This isn’t a harsh breakup with a girl. This isn’t the disappointment of a lost game. I am being hunted by another human. I’m no longer looking for work. I’m no longer firing my rifle. I’m no longer functioning like I’m supposed to. Someone wants to end me. My mind is adrift again.
A sergeant tries to monkey-walk by my quivering self, but stops to look at me. He sees what’s happening. He knows I’m going through a close call. He puts a meaty hand on my shoulder. “Hey,” he says, “as long as you’re breathing, keep moving.”
As long as I’m breathing, keep moving, I tell myself. That line becomes my new mantra. I lift my body up and heft my rifle and continue to fire back, pulling the trigger as fast as I can while staying under control.
Our patrol withdraws under sporadic, half-hearted fire. We all look exhausted. Our heads are hanging. Our rifles are swinging from our spent arms. Our boots shuffle through the dirt. We are intact, but spent.
This isn’t our first battle, nor will it be our last. But it stands out to me, because it’s the one where a human being saw me and tried to end me. I don’t know his name. I don’t know if he’s Afghan or Pakistani. He may be Pashtun or Arab. He may be dead now. I don’t know.
What I do know is that a fellow soldier has given me words I will use forever — “as long as you’re breathing, keep moving.” And I stupidly forgot to ask his name.
The desert remains and I’m left to walk across it. I’m not meant to be here, but here I am, and I don’t want to be anywhere else. I’m the first born of a first-born child, and the first Canadian-born of my family line. I am an heir to Canada, a son of the Philippines, and I am a proud Canadian soldier.
~James Barrera
Etobicoke, Ontario
The Album
For the dead and the living, we must bear witness. For not only are we responsible for the memories of the dead, we are also responsible for what we are doing with those memories.
~Elie Wiesel
Had I not burst into the front parlour one day like the young whirlwind I was, I would never have known of the photo album. My father was sitting at his old oak desk flipping through pages covered in black and white pictures.
“What’s that?” I asked without hesitation.
He didn’t get the chance to stuff it back into its niche as I stared curiously over his shoulder. I somehow knew he didn’t want to talk about it, but I was young, and discernment comes slowly to youth. After a pause, his quiet voice pushed out the words. “You’re old enough. You should know.”
Shifting aside enough for me to see the album clearly, he turned back to the first page. Glossy scenes lined up in neat rows and I could almost hear the soldiers singing and laughing as they enjoyed their downtime in barracks.
“This is me.” He pointed to a slim, dark-haired soldier holding a guitar, the smile wide as he sang but the eyes somehow sad. His hand stroked the page for a brief moment as though there were things he wanted to say and couldn’t.
The page turned.
“We were in Germany. This is Bergen-Belsen.”
I stared at the tidy camp stamped on the paper in shades of white, grey and black. Pristine buildings squatted behind strands of barbed wire and I could almost hear the shouts of soldiers saluting their leader. Dad’s voice softened more as the pages quietly turned. I didn’t know much about this concentration camp where Jews had been imprisoned. Pointing to a broad paved road he told a story I would never forget.
“This was called ‘The Avenue.’ The camp was empty when we arrived. All the prisoners that were left had already been moved. See the line down the centre of the Avenue?” I nodded. “If the regular German soldiers crossed this line, they were shot by the Black Shirts,” he explained, using the slang term for the SS soldiers.
Shock rippled through me. “They shot their own soldiers?” Surely he couldn’t have meant that. My dad nodded, yes.
“And this is the acid pit.” He pointed to another photograph. Tears filled my eyes as he explained the use of the pit that now sat empty. “And here’s the monument to remember the 20,000 Russian Jews who were marched into the woods. They never came back.”
My father looked at me then, as though weighing the burden he was sharing with me. Could a young teen carry such a weight? “You will remember them, won’t you?” He whispered it, more as though talking to himself than to me. I nodded and turned my gaze back to the catalogue of empty buildings — all that was left of a group of people who had once celebrated life, laughed and cried together — and died together.
The final page of the album was blank — black archive paper with small brackets to hold pictures that had been removed.
“I took these out,” Dad explained. “They were pictures of the building where some of the scientific experiments took place. I just couldn’t leave those pictures there.” He said no more. He couldn’t. How could one put words to the things done to people in the name of science? My father then returned the album to its place, and closed the desk.
The days passed and the pictures faded from my teenage mind until November 11th of the following year. My father came home from work and gestured for me to follow him to his desk. Again the album came out, and again we went through the pictures. He told the story again, a little easier with it now as though the first telling had offered some small healing. I was a year older and I remembered more this time.
Each year after that, Remembrance Day became a living thing for me. I grew to know the faces of those laughing soldiers. I pondered the nameless dead buried beneath that mo
nument. I shuddered at humanity’s potential for horror.
I grew up and got married and the tradition continued. My children were born and when they were old enough to understand, I invited my father to come and teach them how to remember. I still see him in my mind’s eye, standing in our doorway in full dress uniform, photo album tucked under his arm. My children sat in sober silence as he shared the story with them. I watched another generation take hold of the responsibility that comes with remembering. And I saw that it changed how we viewed ourselves as Canadians — as people.
We now all stand just a bit straighter when we hear the national anthem. We all feel the tears in our eyes at the Canada Day celebrations because we know what being Canadian means. We have been taught that our freedom to celebrate our nation came at a very steep price — the price of our soldiers’ hearts and minds as well as their bodies. When I see the flag lifted on the currents of a summer breeze I am reminded that there are good men and women who will face the horrors of war on my behalf. My mind skips back to the black and white photos tucked away in a khaki-covered album — photos that speak of tyranny, and the loss of freedom.
My children are grown and raising children of their own. My father has passed on but the album remains. It sits hidden in a cupboard waiting for that time of year when I will open it and remember the victims of hate. Then I will hear my father’s voice again asking me, “You will remember them, won’t you?”
The day will come when my grandchildren are old enough to carry the torch for their generation. I will bring the photo album and a picture of my father to their door on a frosty November day and I will tell them the story that should never be forgotten. I will teach them what it means to be Canadian.
~Donna Fawcett
St. Mary’s, Ontario
Backyard Memories
The game is bigger now, but it will never be bigger than a small boy’s dreams.
~Bobby Hull
It was bitterly cold and 2013 wasn’t even a week old in our quaint little town of Queensville, Ontario. Outside it was bright despite the lack of sunshine, the deep white snow covering the ground.
School would be resuming soon and our three boys, along with a couple of their friends, had decided to take advantage of what was left of their Christmas break. They went out back to do what they did every chance they could. They laced up their skates and got ready to battle big with their taped up sticks and little black puck, making sure their sharp hot blades were ready to cut up the ice.
They had been out there for some time when I glanced out the window and saw someone I didn’t recognize standing there behind the weathered fence watching them play.
Judging by the way he was dressed from head to toe, the vast field behind him must have been the playground that he and his snowmobile had used, his machine now parked a few feet away. But what he’d seen taking place, happening in our back yard, was definitely enough to make him stop.
Maybe it was the deke or dangle. Or better yet, the take-away before the goal. Or maybe quite simply, it was the heart-warming sight of a bunch of young kids having so much fun playing a great game.
I realized then this guy was Colorado Avalanche’s Steve Downie, and figured he must’ve been visiting his mom who lived nearby. I also knew that because of the NHL strike at the time, he hadn’t played a game yet that season.
There he stood, his arms crossed. Behind the back fence, watching a bunch of boys play what he got paid millions to do and no doubt missed doing that winter. Before long he and the young athletes had engaged in small talk. And then, without warning, he asked if they had a stick he could use. Of course they did.
And so, for a short while, on a homemade backyard rink, one NHL player and five young NHL wannabes played what we Canadians are known for.
There were no owners present. There were no contracts drawn up and definitely no money was exchanged. It was just six boys aged seven to twenty-five. Happy as they could be, playing the game they love to play. Simply because they wanted to.
And for me, standing there in the comfort of my kitchen, a feeling of warmth flowed into every crevice of my heart. It didn’t matter that there weren’t any cameras rolling back there that day. Instead, we had a real life memory in the making that was worth far more — just ask any one of the boys, they’ll tell you.
It was priceless.
~Melanie Naundorf
Queensville, Ontario
Terry Fox — Our Greatest Hero
I loved it… People thought I was going through hell… maybe I was, partly, but still I was doing what I wanted… There was not another thing in the world I would rather have been doing.
~Terry Fox
I have always been interested in the idea of heroes. As a boy growing up in the 1950s, many of my heroes played for the Montreal Canadiens, such as “Rocket” Richard, “Boom Boom” Geoffrion, and Jean Béliveau. In 1982 I read a magazine article that claimed John Wayne was the last American hero “and we are living in a time when there are no heroes.” I thought, “How awful!” Then I asked myself, “Can this be true?” I was working as a free-lance writer at the time so I gave myself an assignment: Find out if Canadian children have heroes, and if so, who do they regard as their greatest role model?
Over the next few months, I surveyed hundreds of children across Canada and asked them to name their number one hero and give a reason for their choice. I received 564 replies from students aged seven to thirteen, in eight provinces. To my great relief, I learned that healthy hero worship was alive and well in the hearts and minds of Canadian children. The letters I received listed a wide variety of personal heroes, including, Wayne Gretzky, Jesus Christ, Jules Verne, Helen Keller, the men and women of World Wars I and II, Bugs Bunny, the kids’ parents, the police, Mickey Mouse, the kids’ grandparents, Robin Hood, a violin teacher… and many, many more. But out of all the answers I received, the overwhelming choice for children all across Canada was Terry Fox, the twenty-two-year-old from Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, who in 1977 had his right leg amputated due to cancer. As every Canadian knows, he later inspired all Canadians by attempting to run across Canada with one artificial leg to raise awareness and money for a cure for cancer.
Terry began his Marathon of Hope on April 12, 1980 in St. John’s, Newfoundland. By the time he reached Toronto, he had become a national hero. I was assigned by a magazine to run alongside Terry on July 11, 1980 — Day 90 of his run, as the tanned, 150-pound youth ran on one good leg, and his plastic and aluminum right leg, along Queen Street toward City Hall. There, 10,000 people were waiting to welcome Canada’s newest hero. As I jogged alongside him snapping pictures, I shouted, “Good luck, Terry! I hope you make it!” He glanced my way, waved his right hand, smiled and said, “Thanks!”
I saw him again the next day as he ran north along Yonge Street, also known as the world’s longest street, through my hometown of Richmond Hill, a suburb of Toronto, as he headed to Northern Ontario and then west.
Everyone was so sad to learn that on September 1, 1980, Day 143, after running 5,373 kilometres, Terry had to end his amazing journey just south of Thunder Bay, Ontario. Cancer had spread to his lungs and he simply could go no further. He returned home to Vancouver for treatment, and to the great sadness of an entire nation, died on June 28, 1981.
In the years since the passing of this great Canadian hero, more than $700 million has been raised worldwide for cancer research through the annual Terry Fox Runs in 9,000 communities and through the work of the Terry Fox Foundation. Every year, international runs take place that help solidify the good name and generous spirit Canada has always had with people around the world.
Terry Fox often said it was the youth who would carry forth his efforts and work toward a world without cancer. One of the largest fundraising events takes place every year when millions of students across Canada take part in the Terry Fox School Run.
Thirty-five years after Terry dipped his artificial leg into the Atlantic Ocean to begin his odysse
y, my wife Kris and I were pleased to learn that six of our grandnieces and grandnephews took part in the 2015 Terry Fox School Run for cancer research. Earlier that year Kris and I had both been diagnosed with cancer, so the six youngsters — Lucas, Matthew, Jacob, Mackenzie, Scott, and Sarah — “ran for Dennis and Kris because they have cancer.”
The children had been learning about Terry Fox at school and they had lots of questions for their mothers (my nieces) when they got home. Six-year-old Jacob asked, “Did Uncle Dennis have his leg cut off like Terry Fox?” As Lisa assured her son that, no, Dennis did not have a leg amputated, her four-year-old daughter, Mackenzie, asked how Auntie Kris was “fighting” cancer. She was reassured that it was not in a ring with boxing gloves!
The questions continued among the youngsters. When Mackenzie learned in school that Terry had run through Richmond Hill, she asked her brother: “Do you think Uncle Dennis met Terry Fox?” Jacob answered, “No! That was a long, long time ago! Dennis wasn’t even born then!”
When I had heard of these innocent observations I smiled. Then I retrieved from my Terry Fox file the magazine article I wrote in 1980 that includes a full-page photo I had taken of Terry, running with his famous uneven gait. The file also contains a newspaper clipping from a local newspaper that reported my observations of the unforgettable event. I had written at the time: Children, especially, are attracted to the story of Terry Fox because it carries with it such an innocence and pure determination of the crusading, human spirit in the face of great obstacles.
The children took my article and photo of Terry to their classrooms to proudly share with their teachers and fellow students. At a large family gathering that year, on Christmas Eve, I told my young relatives about a park in Richmond Hill, just a few kilometres from my home, that is dedicated to the memory of Terry Fox. The park features a life-size, bronze statue of Terry that captures the strength in his leg and the humility in his face.