On The Road With Denny D

You know the drill I'm lying back on a long white lounge chair. It looks comfortable but it really isn't. There is a headrest its job is to keep my head in place. My head is not the problem. It's my neck or rather the pain in my neck. Today is just a cleaning. It should be quick. At least that's what I tell myself. The hygienist is a sweet girl and she wants to talk. I am wearing dark glasses. Strangely, there are two complimentary things they give you at my dentist:  A TV to watch and glasses that make it almost impossible to watch. I politely engage in conversation until she sticks a little mirror in my mouth. I wonder what's going through her mind. "Holey plaque Batman this going to take a while" I stop talking but she continues for my listening enjoyment. The is a TV hanging from the wall.  A renovation show is on. I'm looking through glasses once worn by Roy Orbison and wishing I could find the remote to either turn the TV up or turn her off. I fi...

Measuring up It’s the fall of nineteen-seventy-five.  And like every fall our mother is measuring us up, probably to see if she needed to buy school clothes. There is a door frame next to the kitchen etched with our measurements. The door frame where our young lives are marked up with lines and names.  I’m looking at the measurements. Mine and my brothers. I am hopeful but I know they have hit my mark and are way past it. My mark is stalled. My mother tells me to straighten up and stand tall, but four feet six inches only goes so far.  She balances a ruler on my head, and with a pencil, marks the spot.  Next to the spot, she writes my name. Only she doesn’t have to because nothing has changed. Writing my name at this point is for lack of a better word, pointless. Everyone knows the lowest mark is mine.  She convinces me that my growth spurt will come. I, like I always do, shrug it off. I had another worry on my mind. High school. I was wondering about measur...

Whoops   The secret to staying young is to never act your age.   When I was a teenager and even in my early twenties, I would surround myself with younger kids. These kids were my nieces and nephews. I was known as Uncle Denny.  There is nothing like the sound of children's laughter and there is nothing like making children laugh even if it's accidentally, which is what this next story is about. I grew up playing street hockey and I was glad to see we had some up-and-comers to introduce to the sport. It didn’t matter if I went to their house or if they came to mine hockey was going to be played. On this day my nephew is playing goal.  He might have been six or seven at the time. His brother is playing defence. His dad and I were offense. I never had a fast slapshot and that shot was not allowed. However, my wrist shot was fast enough and just as deadly.  Ouch!!! In a regulation hockey net, my nephew stood like a garden gnome in front of a chain-linked fe...

It was a Saturday and like most Saturdays we had to find things to do. When we were not playing in the backyard or on the street we ventured elsewhere. Elsewhere always led to an adventure and the best adventures required bicycles.  Our destination was Fast Eddie's to play pinball. Fast Eddies was located on Oullette Ave and Riverside Dr. The route we took was always the same. The path always started with the Saint Jules path. We would stop a second just to make sure our hockey card mufflers were still in place and continue to Pillette Rd. We headed north towards Seminole St. From Seminole, we'd ride west to Walker Rd. Walker to Ottawa St, Ottawa to Howard Ave. Howard to Giles Blvd then west to Oullette Ave. I don't know why I felt I had to tell you this, maybe just in case you wanted to bike from the east side of Windsor to downtown.  Kreske's was a department store located on Oullette Avenue. We couldn't just pass it, we had to stop in. This store had everything a...

      Grade Eight   The Saint Jules path (as the kids would call it) was the way home after school but that path would have to wait, I was making a detour. The note that had me standing up in front of the class awarded me a walk home with the most beautiful girl in school. She had long brown hair, big brown eyes and a smile that melted this young boy’s heart. She wore a black dress with big yellow flowers and black pants underneath. Her brown and tan lace-up shoes had a little heel so I looked up to her. literally.  She knew walking home would have raised some eyebrows from her mother so we agreed that the park down the road would be the best place to part ways. Alice Street Park was a field and because it had a slide and a pair of swings they had to call it a park, I guess. It wasn’t a very big park. One square block.  It was surrounded by three roads. Alice faced south.  Norman was on the east side and Olive Road was to the west...

There was a time when I couldn’t wait to go to school. Of course I'm assuming here because I can't remember a time when  I did. There was also time I couldn’t wait to get home after school. The home part was great getting there was not so great. It was grade six I had just found out that the one thing I was good at was not appreciated. Sister Kinga made that clear. But the sting of the pointer had passed and I was drawing more things. I know I said that I had to draw escape routes for after school, well, not really but escaping the punishment I would receive on the corner of Westminster and Empress was real.  I will not go into detail about how often it happened but I will say it made me shut down even more. At home it was different. At home I could hide. My bedroom was my safe place. I would wash off the hurt and lay in my bed and draw. My parents never knew what hit me and I wasn't going to tell them. It was a different time then.  It might seem strange to say but I'm...

 Forgiveness When I wasn't drawing cartoons or planning my escape routes for after school, I looked out the window at the church across the street. I will not go into detail about how I was bullied but the threat of being bullied found me searching for something outside. My life was different, but I was still upset with God for taking away my friend so early in her life. I was mad enough to shut down and distract myself from the truth. The truth was I was heartbroken in many ways.  Eventually, time heals all wounds and memory fades. At least the power that memory had on me.   Hope One day I was playing strikeout with my brothers. Strikeout is a variation of baseball.  A batter’s box is drawn on brick with chalk, replacing the catcher. All we needed was a pitcher and a kid to play the field. I was the pitcher, and my brother was at bat. The ballpark was between the wall of the gym and Norman Rd. The outfielder came out of left field. The church. Which was more l...

Grade School   Bricks, mortar and windows   Saint Jules looked like every grade school back in the '60s. It was a huge cookie-cutter brown brick building. All the classrooms had large windows, and every window had a smaller window underneath that when opened barely let in any air. Take your seat Our small desks survived generations of abuse. Each one had a hole at the top right-hand corner that once held ink wells.  The writing surface was also a lid hiding the contents inside. My desk contained coloured pencils, a yoyo, a baseball glove with a red, white and blue sponge ball and finally a brown lunch bag, on the days we didn't run home for lunch.  Inside the lunch bag was nothing too special: a PB and J sandwich wrapped in neatly folded wax paper and a red and green Macintosh apple. Sometimes we would have a treat: a few strawberry wafer cookies or ginger snaps. The sandwich I would devour minus the crust but the apple, I would shine up take two bit...

Have you found Jesus? How many times have you heard someone say that? I was at the coffee shop the other day and I saw a lady sitting at a corner table. She was sipping a cup and chatting with a friend. I could have sworn she was my cousin. I didn't want to appear rude, so I walked over. On the way, I noticed she wasn't my cousin, and I apologized for my intrusion. She said, "No problem" and she continued with "Maybe there was a reason why I was sent to her table. Have you found Jesus?"  My response was "Yes I have" We both shared a "God bless you" I knew she wasn't Catholic because she never said" And with your spirit" I politely smiled and walked back to my table. There were other responses I could’ve used for the, have you found Jesus question? I could have used. "I am a believer, but I am no homecoming queen" or "No but I'll let him know you're looking for him if I do” This was from one of many pag...