Tag: writing

Yep.

Daily writing prompt
Have you ever broken a bone?
View all responses

Broke my right wrist and sprained my left wrist.

Back around the end of June in ’82 my father had borrowed a pickup truck with a camper in the bed from one of his buddies at 447 Sqn. so that he and his new wife, my stepmother, could go to Banff for their honeymoon.

Slide-in camper / Demountable camper.

They had no intention of taking Scott and I with them. We got unceremoniously dropped of with out mother in Calgary, AB. Yeah, the same mother that he told Alberta Social Services that had abandoned the family and that the same mother that he had told Alberta Social Services that he had no idea of how to contact.

When Richard and Sue were finished with their honeymoon they swung back through Calgary to pick Scott and I up. We drove back up to CFB Griesbach in Edmonton.

The truck was parked on the street in front of the PMQ.

Richard had gone somewhere and it was just Sue at home.

Scott got on top of the camper and stuffed the vents with leaves.

Just before Richard was due home Scott found me and told me that Richard was going to be pissed off with me for “me” having put the leaves into the vent on the camper.

I didn’t know what the fuck he was talking about, so I went to check out the camper.

I looked at the camper from the outside and I couldn’t figure out what he was talking about, but once I opened the back door and climbed inside the camper I saw what he was talking about. The wind-up vent was plugged full of leaves. There was no way that Richard wasn’t going to notice this.

So, up on the roof I went.

Tim’s truck was a raised 4X4 with proper off road tires. With the camper on the back the roof had to be about 3 metres off the ground.

I got all of the leaves cleared out. It was spick and span.

I went to climb down the ladder and I lost my footing.

I landed on the ground flat on my back.

I had the wind knocked out of me and all I could see was stars.

It took so much effort to start to breathe again.

One of the locals came over and helped me up and walked me back to the PMQ where Sue was.

Sue sent me up to my room with the warning that Richard was not going to be happy when he got home.

When Richard got home he was none too pleased to find what had happened. The fact that I did something stupid that could get him in trouble with his commanding officer showed that I didn’t care about his military career.

The fact that I allowed Scott out of my sight meant that Scott could have fallen off the roof of the camper.

The fact that I wasn’t responsible enough to look after my brother meant thatI should take this as a lesson and learn from this.

My left wrist was burning. My right hand was swollen, numb, and immovable. But neither were anything compared to the headache and vomiting.

My father gave me some of his 222s to help me sleep.

Two days went by and then he took me to the Charles Camsell hospital in Edmonton to get my wrists looked at.

That’s when it was discovered that I wasn’t faking anything.

A couple of the larger bones in my right wrist were fractured. My left wrist had hairline fractures and was sprained.

The headaches and the vomiting had stopped by this point so I don’t think that Richard had mentioned anything to the doctors.

I can’t remember what Richard told the doctors, but I know he didn’t mention anything about falling off campers.

My left wrist got wrapped in a tensor. My right arm was set in a cast.

For illustrative purposes only

Did you know that it’s almost impossible to wipe your own ass when your dominant hand is set in an arm cast? My left arm wasn’t much use either. Hairlines are really super sensitive to force.

I wasn’t Sue’s kid, so that was out of the question. After Richard and Sue got married Sue wasted no time in telling Scott and I that we were to address her as Sue only that we were never to call her “mom” or refer to her as our “mother”. So yeah, wiping my ass wasn’t on her list of agreed upon tasks.

Richard only kept my brother and I because “it was cheaper than paying child support”. Wiping my ass was not very high on his list of priorities.

And as much as I feared my grandmother, she had moved out of the PMQ back in the spring of 1981. Walking from the PMQ at 10215 – 138 Ave over to my grandmother’s apartment at 10611 – 111th St. to get my butt wiped wasn’t in the cards.

Many creative ways were tried and tested to wipe my ass that didn’t involve using my hands.

The cast was only supposed to stay on my right arm for six weeks, but it ended up staying on for the entire summer as Richard insisted that this was the best way to teach me to not fuck around.

A risk……. that didn’t and did work out.

Daily writing prompt
When is the last time you took a risk? How did it work out?
View all responses

The last time that I took a risk of any consequence was when I disobeyed my father’s wishes and I went to the Edmonton Police Service in 2011 and tried to report my former babysitter for molesting my brother and I on Canadian Forces Base Namao from 1978 to 1980.

In 2006 when, I first broached the topic of the babysitter with my father, he heavily cautioned me against trying to report the babysitter because if I insisted on sticking my nose into this I might not like the way the shit was going to smell.

For me, reporting the babysitter was extremely important. After all, up to that point in time my father had blamed me at every opportunity for allowing the babysitter to molest my younger brother. If I hadn’t let the babysitter molest Scott, then Scott wouldn’t have been in non-stop trouble with the law.

Richard was really upset that Scott was so dependent on Richard to meet his needs in order for Scott to stay somewhat functional.

I went up to Edmonton in the summer of 2003 to visit Richard after not having seen him since moving to Vancouver in 1992. I thought that he’d be pleased to see me.

After all, when Scott moved to the Vancouver area in 1996, Richard had contacted me a couple of times to help Scott out with his car. Dead starter one time. Broken throttle cable one time. Wheel bearings another time.

Nope.

I spent more time hanging out with the stepmother that I never got along with as a kid.

Richard barely had the time of day for me, except to explain to me that he was still upset with what I allowed to happen to Scott because Scott was having so many difficulties. Richard whined about having to currently pay Scott’s rent so that Scott wouldn’t try moving back in to Richard’s house in Morinville.

Richard also whined about being “forced” to give Scott his ’83 Mustang GT. Or how he had no choice but to give Scott Sue’s old ’89 Thunderbird after Scott totalled the Mustang on one of Edmonton’s many traffic circles.

When I told Richard that I had obtained my 5th Class Power Engineering certificate and that I was working towards my 4th Class Power Engineering certificate he didn’t care. Just said that no matter what certificate I had my stupid mouth and my stupid attitude were going to keep me unemployed.

I called Richard in September of 2005 to let him know that I landed a union position at a local hospital in the physical plant.

Didn’t give a shit.

Not in the slightest.

In fact he informed me that Scott had a job in a “card board box factory” and insinuated that with all of the struggles that Scott had overcome in his life that Scott’s employment meant far more than mine.

In August of 2006, after a night of drinking at various pride events in Vancouver, I called Richard and left him a couple of messages in which I unloaded both barrels on him.

I wasn’t expecting Richard to ever call back, but he did. I had never heard him whimper like this before in my life. He was like a big dog that just got the newspaper to the snout for pissing on the carpet.

It was your grandmother that hired P.S.

I didn’t like P.S. the first time I saw him.

I told your grandmother not to hire P.S.

And yes, my father used the babysitter’s name without any prompting.

My father called me every morning for the next couple of weeks, as if he was trying to make amends for the way things had been.

But everything came to a screeching halt after I told him that I was going to go to the police to report the babysitter.

“Somethings are best left in the past”

“Let sleeping dogs lie”

“If you stick your nose into this you’re not going to like the smell of the shit”

I didn’t make my complaint to the police right away.

I had legally changed my name in anticipation of transitioning and I had too many things on the go.

In February of 2011 I entered into an out of court settlement with another party in which I represented myself. The lawyer for the other party decided to make an offer to settle and after a bit of back and forth we settled.

Because of this settlement I decided to take my chances with the babysitter.

Without criminal charges it would be near impossible to bring any type of meaningful civil action against the babysitter.

And that’s how I ended up contacting the Edmonton Police Service on March 4th, 2011.

And as we all know, things didn’t work out as planned.

I did learn some interesting things though.

And learning things was better than not learning things.

I learnt for example that my father was right, that I wasn’t going to like the smell of the shit if I stuck my nose into the events of Canadian Forces Base Namao.

I learnt that no matter which base we were stationed at, civilian social services or medical staff were concerned about my father.

I learnt that my mother didn’t abandon the family, but that my father used the Defence Establishment Trespass Regulations to have my mother booted out of the PMQ after she threatened to take my brother and I away due to his out of control drinking and physical violence.

I learnt that the child sexual abuse scandal on Canadian Forces Base Namao was far larger than what I could ever have imagined.

I learnt that the Canadian Armed Forces considered a 52 year old military chaplain with the rank of captain having sexual relations with children as young as four years of age after imbibing them with alcohol in the rectory of the base chapel was nothing more than “acts of homosexuality” thus implying that the victims of McRae were just as guilty as McRae was.

I learnt that Terry, my much reviled “shrink” in the days after the sex abuse scandal on CFB Namao, was actually a social worker in the Canadian Armed Forces with the rank of captain.

I learnt that Canadian Forces Administrative Order CFAO 19-20 explained why Terry had such a massive concern about my perceived willing participation in the “homosexual” abuse on CFB Namao and that if I didn’t get my “homosexual” urges under control that I would be going to the Alberta Hospital for psychiatric treatments.

I learnt that due to the military’s official policies against homosexuality which viewed homosexuality as a mental illness, a deviancy, and a character flaw, most parents did not want it known that their children had been involved with “acts of homosexuality” and kept their children out of the investigation.

I learnt that my family’s infamous move from Canadian Forces Base Griesbach, AB, to Canadian Forces Base Downsview, ON, in April of 1983 was not to avoid my social workers “giving me drugs to keep me from being attracted to other boys” like my father had said at the time, but was instead to avoid my apprehension by Alberta Social Services due to their concern for my safety in the home.

I learnt that a flaw contained within the National Defence Act prior to 1998 gave commanding officers within the Canadian Forces prosecutorial discretion over criminal code offences committed by their subordinates.

I learnt that another flaw contained within the National Defence Act prior to 1998 placed a 3-year-time-bar on all criminal code offences, including criminal code offences that do not have a statute of limitations.

I learnt that my father was described by social services as “often telling conflicting stories” from one meeting to the next, and “telling people he perceived to be in positions of authority what he thought they wanted to hear”. In other words, my father was a habitual liar and a sycophant.

I learnt from paperwork that I obtained from various agencies across Canada that everything that my father said during my childhood was basically a lie.

I learnt that the military justice system was defective, but that the CAF, the DND, and their various predecessors had always fought with parliament against reforming the military justice system.

I learnt that the CAF and the DND can use the Official Secrets Act and the Security of Information Act as cudgels to gag anyone who was ever subjected to the Code of Service Discipline to silence.

I learnt that the Canadian Forces Military Police and the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service are soldiers first and police officers second and that nothing in the National Defence Act places members outside of the Chain of Command and as such member of the base military police and the CFNIS must obey the lawful command of anyone with a rank superior to theirs.

I learnt that the Vice Chief of Defence Staff which is not a member of law enforcement has the right under the National Defence Act to direct any CFNIS investigation as they see fit.

I also learnt that the Supreme Court of Canada frowns upon the structure of the Canadian Forces Military Police Group as due to the hierarchy of the Canadian Forces the Minister of National Defence functions as the “chief of police” and has ultimate control over the military police even though it would be the Minister’s office that would be subjected to possible civil actions resulting from the outcomes of military police or CFNIS investigations. This is why civilian police always bring in police from other jurisdictions to investigate matters which may place the city of the first police agency at risk of civil actions.

I’ve also learnt that when people die, it doesn’t really matter for more than a few days, or maybe weeks, before everything goes on like nothing ever mattered.

Nothing.

Daily writing prompt
Describe something you learned in high school.
View all responses

What did I learn in high school?

Absolutely nothing……

I dropped out of school at the start of grade 9. That’s junior high school. I never made it as far as high school.

Had to get out of the PMQ.

1987 was the start of the grade 9 school year for me.

September of 1987 was also two years removed from the summer of 1985.

The summer of 1985 was the last summer that my brother and I spent with our grandmother.

The summer of 1985 was also the summer that my father went on a rampage in the PMQ on CFB Downsview. He did some very significant damage to the PMQ. It took three military police officers to subdue him.

When my brother and I arrived back in Toronto from Edmonton my father was required to notify the base military police of our arrival so that they could come speak with us. When they did come to speak with us they told us that during their investigation they grew very concerned when they couldn’t find us so they started talking to the neighbours and that’s when they started hearing about Richard’s yelling and screaming and his physical abuse. The military police said that if my father ever lost his temper again that we were to flee the house before calling the base switchboard to ask for the military police.

In September of 1985, my father bought me a birthday cake. This blew my fucking socks off as he had never acknowledged a single birthday of mine since 1976, the year before my mother left. Even though he promised to never forget my birthday again, he never acknowledged my birthday again thereafter.

And his temper started to get out of control again by the spring of 1986. He just knew how to hide his outbursts better as he was under supervision of the military.

By the summer of 1987 my brother had graduated to credit card theft, B&Es, and car theft. He had also grown significantly larger than me and he was even physically larger than Richard. Richard could no longer control Scott. And Scott was now running with a group of thugs. Kids who had been in and out of the juvie system.

As Richard had given up on trying to control Scott, he instead turned to lashing out at me for allowing Scott t have been molested by the babysitter on CFB Namao and this is why Scott was acting as violent as he was.

So yeah, by the time September of 1987 rolled around, I had to get the fuck out of the house.

What would really piss me the fuck off is that in the summer of 2011, when I obtained my social service records from across Canada, I would learn that my family was actually under the supervision of the Children’s Aid Society of Toronto from the time we arrived in CFB Downsview in the spring of 1983.

This pissed me off because when I moved out I had to take my employment from part time to full time so that I could afford to rent a place to live.

Had I known about my family having been under the supervision of the Children’s Aid Society of Toronto, I could have applied to CAST for emergency accommodation. I could have even arranged for the courts to make it mandatory for my father to pick up my bills until age 18. Either of these would have allowed me to finish off school while living in a safe environment.

One of my pet peeves.

One of my pet peeves is when people who don’t have a single emotional scar, let alone a single emotional scratch tell me that I just have to think happy thoughts and that everything will fine.

That all I have to do is apply myself and I can be anything that I want.

What these people will often not admit is that they practically had everything in life handed to them on a silver platter

And these people are usually the first to shit all over me.

They’re usually the ones who are still in close contact with their parents.

Even when mine were alive, one resented me for having “fucked with his military career”, and the other moved on to a new life and wrote me off.

Their parents almost always took an active interest in them when they were young and their parents ensured that they never fell behind in school.

My father would rage out at school teachers when they’d suggest that he participate in activities with my brother and I.

Their parents would have moved heaven and earth to get them treatment if they had endured any type of event that would have caused them psychological harm.

My father obeyed his orders from my military social worker and basically denied me any treatment for the events from CFB Namao.

Their parents provided them with housing and shelter and funds while they went to college, or university, or trade school.

My father was more than convinced that grade 9 was more education than anyone needed and that all I had to do was to get a job and work my way up.

They didn’t have to live on the streets and couch surf for the first few years of their working life.

I was working for a company in West Vancouver in 1993 that had to close down. The regional manager liked me and liked my work, so he arranged for the branch in Mississauga to hire me. The branch manager liked me, but my immediate supervisor Don didn’t. He was always ranting about “No one from the West Coast was going to tell him who the fuck he had to hire”. Plus, he knew I was queer. So out the door I went. EI did a little investigation and my claim was re-opened, but it was going to take about 4 to 6 weeks for my original claim from British Columbia to be redirected to Toronto. I knew better than to call my father. And it wasn’t out of shame. It’s just I knew that there would be absolutely no help.

My father was a piece of work.

When he received his final posting to Alberta in 1990 he invited me to move back with him. He said that “we could try to be a family again”. I think he had found out that I had just finished a 6 month contract job with a company called Canshare Cabling and I had about $30k in the bank. I paid for most of the expenses for the move, plus I also paid for a bunch of new furnishing for his computer area. As I was 18 at the time, I didn’t have an understanding that he could claim these expenses from the Canadian Forces and that he would be reimbursed.

My brother Scott didn’t move with us at the time as he was finishing his jail sentence at the Uxbridge Training School for Boys in Uxbridge, Ontario.

When my father bought his retirement house in Morniville two months after we arrived back in Edmonton, I moved with him into the house, but I only lasted about 2 weeks there before my stepmother got me booted.

My brother didn’t fare much better.

When he was released from jail he was sent to Alberta by the Ontario government. He lived in Morinville with my father and Sue for a couple of weeks before my father unceremoniously dumped Scott off at my apartment. Scott ate through all of my groceries in three days. Everything was gone. Fridge, freezer, cupboards. Everything.

I called up my father and asked him if he could help out with groceries and if he had any idea of how long Scott was going to stay with me before he went back to Morinville. Richard laughed. He said that he was done with paying for my brother and I, that he had paid enough for us when we were kids, and that maybe it was time for that “bitch mother” of mine to start paying some of the bills.

I was able to get hold of Marie, she came into town and picked Scott up and took him to the acreage she lived on with her husband Art. She bought me groceries.

Richard quickly took Scott back to Morinville when Marie reminded him that Scott was under 18 and if she took him in, she was expecting child support payments from our father.

Richard’s attitude was not unexpected and it didn’t shock me as all. He did tell an airforce buddy of his around 1986 that the only reason he kept my brother and I instead of dumping us with our mother is that if we lived under his roof he could control the costs, but if we went to live with her that he’d have to sign his paycheques over to “that bitch” and that sure as fuck wasn’t going to happen.

So no, there was no fatherly love or motivation for a higher education.

But, let’s dial this back into common day.

I’m currently 53 going on 54.

The position that I’m in has no requirement for secondary qualifications.

But if it did have requirements for secondary qualification these secondary qualifications would be red seal Trade Qualifications.

Some of the red seal trades that can be attached to a power engineering certificate are Electrician, Millwright, Refrigeration Mechanic, Welder, Pipe Fitter, Steam Fitter, etc. These are all four year full-time apprentice programs. These all require a very heavy investment for tools and materials.

But, it must always be remembered that I didn’t become a power engineer because I wanted to, or because I thought that it was a career path with potential, I got into power engineering because it was the easiest way for me to keep a roof over my head and to keep my bills paid.

Going through life with diagnosed but intreated mental illnesses has always meant that I’ve just taken whatever work I can.

I don’t fit in anywhere.

I am a misfit.

I am accepted at work because I bring skills that are typically far outside the skill requirements for the positions that I occupy.

But I never have the opportunity to get official “qualifications” for these extra skills which means that I am always at loggerheads with others who do have the official qualifications.

And even if I were offered the opportunity to take these course the depression would surely destroy my every attempt.

But I can hear the choruses of the unblemished already.

Bobbie, think happy thoughts!

Bobbie, are you eating properly?

Bobbie, more sleep will cure depression!

Bobbie, you should find god!

Bobbie, you should volunteer!

Bobbie, I know what you’re going through, my cat died when I was 14 and I still miss Pepper, but I soldier on and so can you!

My depression has cost me dearly in life.

T- 722 days and counting

Well, it’s 722 days between now and March 17th, 2027.

March 17th, 2027 is of course when MAiD MD-SUMC is supposed to become legal in Canada.

MAiD MD-SUMC was supposed to have been legalized on March 17th, 2023, and then again on March 17th, 2024, so I’m not exactly holding my breath for this date.

The one things that these dates do give me is a bit of relief.

This relief is the same relief that you feel when you’ve worked a double overtime shift, or you’re on an extremely long flight, and you’re near the end and you get the little kick of energy that perks you up a little to get you through.

These dates also give me a bit of hope.

A bit of hope that if I hold on for just a little bit long that I can end my life with a humane procedure under the care of a licensed medical practitioner as opposed to risking failure through a self administered procedure.

Yes, I fully understand that by ending my life via M.A.i.D. I will be giving the Government of Canada, the Department of Justice, and the Department of National Defence everything that they could possibly hope for.

However, I think I can now die knowing that I at least tried to take on the Canadian Armed Forces and that while I wasn’t successful, I did at least make some people in the DOJ and the DND extremely uncomfortable.

However, I am fucking burnt out and my depression is not ever going to get any better.

I hate the fact that I am able to somewhat function with major depression.

Bobbie, you’re an asshole!

Bobbie, you’re not a team player!

Bobbie, you’re a jerk!

Bobbie, you think you’re better than everyone else!

Having high functioning depression is a fucking curse.

Not having the events from Canadian Forces Base Namao acknowledged in even the slightest really doesn’t help.

I really hope that M.A.i.D. MD-SUMC is approved this time around.

The hospital that I am currently at is slated to transfer the acute care operations to the new site in early 2027.

Even if M.A.i.D. MD-SUMC is approved in March of 2027, there will be an evaluation process that I will have to navigate as well as a cooling-off period that I will have to sit through.

The current site will still be in operation until about 2030 as it will have to support the research programs until the new research facility has been built adjacent to the new hospital.

I have no interest in going to the new site.

I consulted on the new site, and I was a member of the committee overseeing the design of the new site.

I wish I could say that this was a highlight of my life, but it wasn’t.

It was just more proof that my depression and my baggage from the past prove to be easy targets for those who sense these vulnerabilities.

My management team is well aware of my plans to not go to the new site.

So, I get to be the captain of a sinking ship.

And believe me, there are reasons why myself and this current site fit together like hand in glove. If M.A.i.D. MD-SUMC does some to pass in March of 2027 and if I am approved to undergo the procedure I will probably explain why the current site and I both share a lot of things in common and why I think we were made for each other.

Art Wudrich

Came across the obituary for my mother’s second husband, Art Wudrich.

Arthur Leo Wudrich

November 18, 1938 ~ May 18, 2024 (age 85)

Arthur Leo Wudrich Obituary

Art passed away in Calgary at home at the age of 85 years in his sleep peacefully. 

He is survived by his wife of 39 years, Marie Wudrich; sons, Terry Wudrich (Deanie) and  Dwayne Wudrich; grandchildren,  Tyler Wudrich, and Joanne Wudrich; great-grandchildren, Kayden Wudrich and Carson Wudrich; sister Amelia Buhler; brothers Kenny Wudrich, Donald Wudrich (Juverna) and Richard Wudrich (Marilyn). 

Art was predeceased by his sister, Ruth Olson; and brothers, Louie Wudrich, Leonard Wudrich, Albert Wudrich, Harold Wudrich and Emil Wudrich. 

Arthur Wudrich started his career as a Ferry operator in Saskatchewan, until he went back to school and became a refrigeration mechanic. His son Terry and grandson Tyler have followed in his footsteps and continued with refrigeration as a career choice. 

Arthur did move a lot during his career and had many hobbies that kept him busy. He loved to fish, do woodwork and take photos of wildlife. He always loved nature and animals, as do his son Dwayne and granddaughter Joanne. 

Art’s wish was for no services to be held, but for the people that know him please take a moment and enjoy family, nature and what life offers you.

I only knew Art briefly. He was a decent guy.

I first met Art in the summer of 1990 when my father invited me to move back to Edmonton with him for his final posting.

Marie and Art were living out on an acreage by Wabumun just west of Edmonton.

I don’t know how or when my mother and Art first met. Marie and Art were married in 1985. This was just after my father signed their divorce papers.

Art and my mother were together for 39 years.

I stayed with Art and Marie for the month of September in 1990.

When my father, my stepmother, my stepbrother, and I arrived at Canadian Forces Base Griesbach in July of 1990 we lived in military housing on base for 2 months. My father bought a house up in Morinville, AB. My stepmother made it very clear that I was not welcome in her house. When my brother arrived in Alberta after his delay in Ontario, she didn’t want him in her house either.

When I was staying with Marie and Art out on their acreage, the engine on my car blew a lower radiator hose and I ended up destroying the engine while driving to work in Edmonton.

No big deal, Art made his garage available to me to use to swap the engine out in my car. He even came with me to West Edmonton Pick-A-Part where I grabbed a used engine out of a scrapped car in the scrap yard. And being an industrial refrigeration mechanic Art had all of the good tools at his disposal.

I found a car that had significant rear end damage but with low milage. Pulled the valve cover off the engine to check for wear on the cam shaft and tappets, and to see if there were any signs that the head had ever overheated, checked for oil leaks around the head. Pulled the plugs and they looked clean.

I took the opportunity to upgrade my car from a 1.4l to a 1.6l engine with the more advanced carburettor.

Took me the one weekend to have the dead engine pulled out of the car and the new engine put in. Art even helped me haul the old engine to the wreckers for scrap.

Art was impressed that I had done the engine swap by myself and that I was meticulous and tidy and cleaned everything up. This I owed to Bill Parker, Bob Wrightson, and the other guys at the base auto hobby club on CFB Downsview.

Art wanted me to get into the refrigeration trade. He said that he was certain that he could get me taken on as an apprentice, and that with my mechanical skills and my electrical aptitude that I would do well.

Sadly though, the events of CFB Namao had occurred just over ten years prior and I was still bearing the fresh trauma of my father’s anger and Captain Totzke’s derision. I was more than certain that I was too much of a failure to be anything like Art.

I moved to Vancouver in the early winter of 1992. Being on welfare since the summer of ’91, Edmonton wasn’t a pleasant city to be in. Unless you have a red seal trade, there’s really not much work in Edmonton except in the low paying service industry.

I had tried to get in contact with my mother a few times between 1992 and 2013, but the company that Art worked for had service contracts for large industrial gas compressors and Art and Marie would often move to the area where the job was as the job would often take a few months from start to finish.

I didn’t see Art between 1992 and December 2013 when I had to track Marie down to ask her questions about answers my father had given to me when I examined him for federal court.

Art would have been about 75 at this time. My mother was 67.

I saw Art and Marie two more times, but the last time I spoke to either of them was back in 2017.

Marie and Art had moved on with their lives, and Marie had petty well written off anything to do with her involvement with my father.

Art didn’t seem to appreciate my desire to know more about the relationship between my mother and my father and my extended family.

But still, Art was a good guy.

It was last week that I had found out that Art had passed away in May of 2024.

I often wonder what would have happened in my life had my father been 1/8th or even just 1/16th the man that Art was.

So now, it looks like it’s just Marie and myself that remain.

And after we’re gone that will be the end of the dysfunction that was my family.

50 forever.

Well, Tuesday would have been Scott’s 51st birthday.

But looks like he’ll be 50 forever.

Is he in a better place?

Nope.

Is he in a worse place?

Nope.

We didn’t believe in heaven or hell or the imaginary friend in the sky.

This existence is all we get.

In many ways I’m jealous of Scott.

For Scott, there’s no more pain and there’s no more suffering.

He’s no longer plagued by daemons of what could have been or what should have been.

No more memories of growing up, of the babysitter, of our grandmother, or of our father.

All that shit is gone.

What killed Scott?

Was it the ketamine, his epilepsy, or his heart condition?

Officially the Alberta Coroner will only say that his death was due to a ruptured spleen after a fall.

What caused the fall the medical examiner can’t say because his body was fairly decomposed when he was found.

2 weeks in an apartment in the Edmonton summer will cause a body to break down fairly quickly.

But if I had to speculate as to what the root cause of my brother’s death was, I’d have to say that the Indian Residential School System would probably factor in as a significant contributor. I’d also say that the desire of the Canadian Armed Forces to hide the true extent of Captain McRae’s child sexual abuse exploits on Canadian Forces Base Namao were also a significant contributor.

In life, every action has consequences.

Some consequences are felt immediately.

Some consequences appear as ripples at a later date.

Grandma was a very angry and disturbed woman from her time in Indian Residential school.

She was not a loving or caring woman, except for her alcohol. She loved and cared for her alcohol.

My father was not much better. He was already a heavy drinker at 16 when he joined the Royal Canadian Navy in 1963.

Grandma should never have had children.

But she did.

My father should never have had children.

But he did.

Luckily neither Scott nor I reproduced, so the dysfunction ends with us.

From the time I left the house in 1987 when I was 16 until 2013 I never really had much dealings with Scott.

When I went up to Edmonton for a couple of weeks in the summer of 2013 I mentioned to him that I never thought that I would have ever spoken to him again.

Scott knew from reading my blog back then that I was having some dealings with a constable from the Morinville RCMP detachment and Scott asked me if I could arrange a meeting with this constable as he wanted to know if this constable could read his CPIC file to see if there was some explanation as to why he was frequently being pulled over for traffic stops.

I did arrange for a meeting between the three of us at a Tim Hortons in St. Albert on the St. Albert Trail. Just after my brother started asking about what his CPIC file contained the constable kinda feigned a radio call and said that he had to go.

When I talked to the constable by phone the next day he said that there were issues on Scott’s CPIC file that would have warranted his arrest, and that he didn’t want to do that as this constable was familiar with what we went through on CFB Namao.

When I collected my brother’s belongings and his remains last August, the one thing that I did notice in his passport was that he had tried to enter the United States of America but that he had voluntarily returned to Canada.

Scott had quite the criminal history.

Some people may say that Scott’s criminal history was his own doing.

But it wasn’t.

Scott’s criminal history was 100% Richard’s fault.

When we lived on Canadian Forces Base Downsview in North York, Ontario my brother started running with a bad crowd.

I think that was the difference between Scott and I.

Scott wanted to be popular and to have friends.

I was majorly depressed and just wanted to be left the fuck alone.

Scott wanted to hang out and belong.

I was the type of kid that the popular kids picked on for entertainment.

Richard had absolutely no interest in the either of us.

I had my after school and weekend jobs.

Scott had nothing to do but hang out with the thugs he called friends.

And these guys were literal thugs.

Auto thefts, B&E’s, robberies w/o weapons, credit card fraud, etc…..

And this was all before he was 16.

Richard, our illustrious father, was too busy kissing ass and polishing knobs in the Canadian Forces to climb the ranks to give a shit.

Scott’s troubles and his frequent stays in group homes and detention were solely due to Richard’s inability to give a fuck about anyone other than himself.

But to hear Richard tell it, Scott’s issues were solely due to:

  • Grandma’s drinking
  • Grandma’s cruelty
  • Our mother’s absence
  • Insanity that ran in out mother’s family tree
  • Me not raising my brother properly
  • Me letting the babysitter on CFB Namao molest Scott
  • The parents of the other boys not raising their kids right.
  • Schools not teaching Scott properly.
  • The civilian public schools not using corporal punishment like the schools the Canadian Forces ran for the kids of military families.

Richard was a complete skinflint.

As he told his airforce buddy Jacques Choquette once after Jacques asked my father why he doesn’t just drop Scott and I off with our mother, “As long as I keep these kids under my roof, I control the costs. If I send these kids to their mother, then I’ll have to sign my fucking pay cheque over to that bitch, and that’s sure as fuck not happening”.

So no, there were no hobbies, no activities, no trips, no going to the movies, no going to sports games, no fucking nothing.

Scott’s legal troubles would plague him well into adult life.

It’s too bad that Richard died back in 2017.

It would have been nice to have seen Richard tortured and tormented by Scott’s death.

My dream home

Daily writing prompt
Write about your dream home.
View all responses

What would my dream home be like?

I don’t know.

I never lived in a place that I would call a “home”.

And I never lived in any place that I would call a “dream home”.

The houses I lived in were all fucking traumatizing nightmares, and I don’t mean that they all had the same fucking paint scheme no matter which base they were located on. Living in an abusive dysfunctional family in military housing on military bases was the traumatizing nightmare.

I grew up living in Private Married Quarters on Canadian Forces Bases.

And with my rage prone alcohol fuelled father, these weren’t homes.

They were houses.

It’s where I kept my shit.

It’s where I slept at night.

It’s where I was absolutely terrified to ask my father for help with school homework as that would launch him into a rage and fury.

From the time my mother left in 1977 until September of 1985, I never had a birthday. In 1985, no doubt due to my father’s rampage in the PMQ during the summer of 1985, I had a “birthday” of sorts. A small cake and a $20 bill. And a promise that he would never forget my birthday again. That was the last birthday of mine that he ever acknowledged. I guess once he realized that the base military police were not going to inform the Children’s Aid Society of Toronto about his massive meltdown in the PMQ in the summer of ’85 he didn’t have to pretend to give a shit about me any longer.

My alcoholic grandmother living in the PMQs and raising my brother and I didn’t make things any easier. If I had to take a wild guess, I think that my father got his mental issues from her. As much as he would claim that she was an alcoholic that was cruel to his children, he was the exact same.

When my father received his final posting in June of 1990 to go back to CFB Edmonton in anticipation of his retirement, he and my stepmother bought a house in Morinville, AB.

I lived in an actual house for the first time in my entire life. Not a military PMQ. Not a rooming house where I rented a room after I moved out of the PMQ on CFB Downsview when I was 16. An actual house, with walls that you could hang pictures on without fear of pissing off the base construction engineers.

Yeah, my stepmother had me booted out within a week of us moving from CFB Griesbach to Morinville.

She apparently did the same with my brother when he finished his sentence at the St. John’s Training School for Boys in Uxbridge, Ontario and moved to AB to stay with our father as Scott was still only 16 when he was released.

So yeah, never really did live in a real home as a kid.

I’m happy with my bachelor apartment.

It’s not too big.

Growing up in my father’s house it was either “go the fuck outside and stay the fuck outside until the lights come on” or ” get the fuck up to your bedroom and stay there” or “get the fuck to school”. There were no weekend nights playing boardgames or watching Disney on TV or any other family style of activities.

And that’s why I like my apartment.

I’m either sleeping all day, or I’m at work, or I’m out and about trying to keep my brain from ruminating over and over about what I could have done differently in life.

My apartment, just like the PMQs, is just a place where I store my shit, and go to sleep.

What is my dream job?

Daily writing prompt
What’s your dream job?
View all responses

to have a dream job, I suppose one would have to have dreams.

And dreams are something that I’ve never had, at least not for a long while.

Growing up, especially in the aftermath of Canadian Forces Base Namao, my only dreams were to die. To die and have my father blamed for my death. That was about my only dream.

I always had dreams of Richard going off to prison for a very long time

When we lived on Canadian Forces Base Downsview in Ontario, my father and my stepmother used to use Canada’s Wonderland as “Richard’s and Sue’s Discount Babysitting Service”, or at least that’s what Scott called it.

Back when Wonderland first opened up, and I think for the first season or two, it had introductory unlimited access and unlimited rides for $29.95. Richard and Sue would drop

I used to dream that I’d get kidnapped from Canada’s Wonderland, that I’d get murdered, and that my body would then be found by a hiker in the woods. And that after identifying my skeleton, the police would go talk to Richard, and Richard would lie, and lie, and lie, and that he’d eventually fess up and that the judge would sentence him to prison with extra time added on for his lies.

But, that never happened.

I’m now 54 years old, and I still dream and ponder about how life would have worked out for Richard if I had been kidnapped and killed.

So far as dream job goes, I’ve never had a dream job.

I wanted to join the Canadian Forces when I was younger, but that never went anywhere due to the recruiting centre “obtaining some information” about me that indicated that I was an unsuitable candidate for service. I think this had to do with Captain Totzke’s paperwork being in my father’s service file, which would have been available for the recruiting service.

I’m probably lucky that I was never enlisted in the Canadian Forces. I don’t really know how well my psyche would have held up in an environment where the truth isn’t based upon reality but is instead based upon the whims and desires of the chain of command.

If I had enlisted in the Canadian Armed Forces I’d probably have to have hidden so deeply in the closet that I’d be somewhere in Narnia.

Working in bowling centres was never what I’d call a dream job. But seeing as how I brought skills to bowling centres that most bowling centres wouldn’t be able to afford, I was always afforded a lot of leeway. I don’t know how well me being trans and going on hormones would have been tolerated at some of the centres, but other centres would have been okay.

There was one guy I worked for in Vancouver. He owned an electronics installation company. He started the company with money that he got from his parents. He couldn’t understand why I just didn’t get some money from my parents and start something up that I liked to do.

Two problems with that. There was never going to be any money from my father, or my stepmother, or my real mother. I don’t blame Sue. I didn’t burst forth from her crotch. Richard? Yeah, fuck no. His responsibility to my brother and I ended when he ejaculated. My mother? Richard having the military chuck her out of the military housing on Summerside destroyed her and turned her into a husk of herself, especially with Richard’s bullshit about her just abandoning the family and running of with a guy named Gus from the P.P.C.L.I..

People often ask me why I’m so leery about guys like Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Donald Trump, or the various others I’ve known in my life that often portray themselves as self made and living the lives that they lead after years and years of hard work.

I worked under a general manager once who only got his job because his father knew one of the board members of the company. His business degrees were worth less than used toilet paper. His managerial skills consisted of overt threats and convincing people that other people were out to get their jobs. Yes, this manager ended up getting replaced, but not before numerous people who had been with the company for years up and quit. Of course, as fate would have it for the well connected, he ended up failing into a job with more pay and more prestige.

I had a co-worker that wasn’t all that bright, caused far more harm than good, but as he didn’t have crippling depression and debilitating anxiety he could glad-hand his way into positions that he didn’t belong in.

It’s as they say, if you can’t dazzle ’em with brilliance, baffle ’em with bullshit.

If it wasn’t for Errol Musk and his involvement with emerald mining, especially being compensated with roughage that he could then process and keep the proceeds from, Elon wouldn’t have been able to jet set from South Africa to Canada and then into America. According to Errol, any time that Kimbal or Elon needed money for anything, the safe was wide open. If it wasn’t for Maye Musk being Canadian, there would have been no back door for Musk to entre America through.

Musk didn’t found Paypal.

Musk didn’t found Tesla.

Musk did assemble SpaceX, but without SpaceX being awarded a multi-billion dollar contract from NASA for flights to resupply the International Space Station, SpaceX would never have become anything. What’s even more amazing about SpaceX is that it received its first contract with NASA without even having a rocket ready to go.

Jeff Bezos nearly lost everything in the early ’90s with his early attempt at a being a book reseller on the early Internet. Luckily for Jeff, a near 1/4 million dollar loan that his parents facilitated kept him from insolvency and allowed him to start what became Amazon. And now Amazon both via patents and just the sheer magnitude of his empire, Bezos can prevent any and all competition.

William Henry Gates the 3rd is NOT the plucky little guy that started from nothing. The Gates family is a well established and well monied Seattle family going back generations. Bill Gates and Paul Allen both went to the same exclusive school in Seattle. Their respective families were able to get them access time on mainframe computers where they could hone their programming skills. This was at a time when access to mainframes was about $1,000.00/hr. This was before the advent of home computers.

Bills mother was a socialite who hung out with the wives of board member of IBM. This was at a time when IBM was looking to release a personal computer. IBM had the hardware, but they didn’t have an operating system. However it happened, Bill’s mother found out from a wife of an IBM board member, and Bill’s mother told Bill.

Bill Gates then did what any kid with access to easy money did, he bought a licence from a small company in Seattle called the Seattle Computer Company for their product called “Quick and Dirty DOS”, rebranded the QD-DOS as Microsoft DOS and sold a lot of units of this new “MS-DOS” to IBM, and quickly pissed off the Seattle Computer company.

Did I mention that Bill had one of the most influential Seattle lawyers as a father and the founder of the Seattle First National Bank was his grandfather?

Donald Trump is the ultimate Nepotism Baby. Donald would be nothing if it wasn’t for the real estate empire that his father built in New York city. This empire was built from tax payer dollars that were paid to Fred Trump by the US Govt. to build housing for American troops returning from WWII. The fact that the Trumps are even in America is solely due to the fact that when Friedrich Drumpf immigrated to America, immigration requirements were almost non-existent. Friedrich Drumpf immigrated to America he only to avoid a prison sentence in his home country of Bavaria which he was given for failing to enlist for compulsory military service. Friedrich also had no proper documentation when he came to America as Bavaria had stripped him of his citizenship. If Friedrich Drumpf were to try to immigrate to America today he would be refused entry.

Fred Trump was one of the most reviled slumlords in American history. The many scams of the Trumps are far too numerous to list here, but they are publicly available for review.

Needless to say that Donald wouldn’t have reached where he is today if it wasn’t for his family’s money.

Almost everyone in a position of influence these days got there solely due to family money.

This isn’t to say that I would have had a happy life if I had family money, but having family money opens up a lot of doors for a person.

I’ve had co-workers that fell into good positions in life solely due family money or family connections.

And quite honestly I do get rather sick and tired of people telling me that if I wasn’t such a lazy asshole and such a whiny crybaby that I could have simply applied myself and I could have easily been something.

A lot of what the world is these days is people using their family capital to build their personal wealth and empire. And once they build that wealth, they use every means at their disposal to prevent challengers. Microsoft, Apple, etc. don’t own thousands upon thousands of unused patents for no reason at all.

But having family money early on would have allowed me to go to school, maybe to have travelled when I was younger. Maybe bought a house. And afforded myself the ability to have recovered from the trauma of CFB Namao, of my grandmother, of my father, and of Captain Terry Totzke.

Maybe then I could have discovered what a “dream job” was.

When I was 10 years old I was given an IQ test as part of a psychiatric evaluation by my civilian social workers in an attempt to ascertain what the fuck was going on in my brain.

136 +/- 6 was the result of my test.

At work I’m reviled by everyone there.

Every attempt that I make to bring my section into the modern era is met with heavy resistance. Almost every initiative that I’ve tried to institute to ensure compliance with the Safety Standards Act just meets with more stubborn resistance.

I know that I shouldn’t be here.

But power engineering was the only way that a “poor” like me could get into a union position that would protect me and allow me to move out of the life of poverty that the Canadian Armed Forces and my father had assigned me to.

I thought that power engineering was my ticket to the future, but then I very quickly realized that power engineering is just to ensure that there is a warm body in the plant so that mgmt. can assure Tech Safety BC that they are meeting the requirement to have a warm body in the seat as required.

And that’s it.

Nothing more than glorified plunger jockeys.

Yes, I know that I’m too smart for my position and that my knowledge and my abilities intimidate other people.

Yes, I know that I am a complete asshole for not teaching people how to do what I do because I do it so easy.

Yes, I can troubleshoot computer networking issues. But it’s not because I received special training. I just read the books and read the manuals.

I don’t like computers. I don’t play computer games. I don’t edit videos. I don’t make music.

But I can RTFM ( Read The Fucking Manual).

I am also not afraid to call or email tech support for guidance.

It seems like anything that I do at work unleashes the rage of my co-workers.

Run a fibre optic network between the Generator Control system in Phase II over to the Burrard Building power house to eliminate a long standing communication issue with the 600 volt breakers in the Burrard Building?

“Why the fuck is that asshole sticking his fucking business into this, why doesn’t he fuck off and stay in his own lane?”. “The Fuck is wrong with him, the asshole isn’t a licenced electrician so he shouldn’t be touching any of this fucking shit!”

Troubleshoot a long standing communication issue with the Phase II Delayed Vital MODbus network?

“Is he even fucking certified to work on this? What if he destroys a breaker?”

They may think that I don’t hear them, but I hear them.

Their voices, and their sideway glances, and the conversations behind closed doors are easily overheard.

These are the things that I’ve heard all of my life.

“Bobbie’s just trying to make me look bad”

“Bobbie’s just hiding this knowledge from me. If it was easy for a moron like him to learn then he should be able to teach me. Sure, I don’t like computers, I don’t even own one, but he should be able to teach me how to set-up a MODbus to IP gateway ’cause if Bobbie can do it how fucking hard can it be?

“If he wants to work with networking or electronics, why the fuck isn’t he taking a diploma course?”

People have asked why I’m not going to the new hospital even though I was involved on the design committee for the new site.

There were two individuals in particular that went to every extent possible to make sure that I understood that my presence was not wanted on the committee and that I was to stay in my own lane and that anything that I had to say was limited to my power engineer certificate and that anything that I had to say beyond this was not going to be accepted.

These two persons in particular, well there’s a third, but I don’t have to deal with him, made sure that I understood what my place was and that freaks like me aren’t welcome in their new state-of-the-art playhouse.

Get a diploma?

Get a certificate?

Fuck, I don’t even want to get out of bed, how the fuck am I supposed to have enough strength to overcome my daemons and get a fucking diploma or a certificate?

And besides, I’m not fucking 18 years old, or even 24 years old.

I’m 54 fucking years old.

No savings, no real estate, no fucking nothing.

So no, there is no dream job.

There’s just the fucking eternal hell of knowing that I’ll never have the opportunities that should have been mine. That certain assholes will always dangle these opportunities in front of my eyes to ensure that I know that they know what I’ll never have.

p.s.

There was a study that that looked at the outcomes of children with high IQs. It was started in the 1920s in California by the father of the modern IQ test, Lewis Terman. These children were traced all throughout their lives. What surprised Lewis Terman 30 years into this study was that his hypothesis that IQ levels were hereditary was wrong, the parents of the children with high IQs that went on to have better incomes had higher educations, had better jobs, lower divorce rates, and more books in the household. Almost all of the kids that came from poor families with lower education levels and lower expectations of their children ended up as “failures” of no significance that “wasted” their talents.

Okay…….

Daily writing prompt
Write about your first name: its meaning, significance, etymology, etc.
View all responses

As a kid I never liked the name “Robert”.

I despised my full name, but that’s for a different post.

While my family lived on Canadian Forces Base Shearwater in Nova Scotia people like Bill Parker or my uncle Al always referred to me as Bob, Bobby, or Robbie.

No matter how much I preferred Bob or Bobby my father and my grandmother were always of the opinion that my birth name was Robert and that’s what I would be called.

It wasn’t until my infamous August 2006 telephone call with my father that I became determined to change my name.

The telephone call was the first time that I had an inkling that my father knew more about the events on Canadian Forces Base Namao than what he had ever admitted to.

In the aftermath of the telephone calls I had decided that I was going to seriously look at changing my name and possibly going through hormone therapy.

So, I decided that I wanted to work on my name first.

I tried different first names, but I always came back to Bobby, or more specifically Bobbie. What I really liked about Bobbie is that it is a unisex name. Bobby is generally a male name. Bobbi is generally a female name. And Bobbie is gender neutral. Tracing the history of Bobbie through the years it has gone back and forth between being a male name and a female name.

Nothing fancy about the name Bobby / Bobbie / Bobbi. They’re all the diminutive spelling of Robert / Roberta.

And the plan was that once I underwent hormone therapy that I would simply drop the “e” and go with Bobbi.

But then I had to do a stupid thing and I went on to pick a fight with the Canadian Armed Forces and the Department of National Defence.

The fight was going to be inevitable. There’s no way that the shit from 1978 through 1980 was going to stay hidden and buried in the past.

So, 17 years after my name I’m still Bobbie.

At least I’m on Estradiol and I’m sprouting beewbs……….