her nose seemed a big issue.........

Growing up in Chilliwack..........1946

The summer before grade 6...Maxwell's moved into the Chilliwack Auto Court (now Southgate Shopping Centre) ......friends and shirt tail relatives of mum and dad from Manitoba...That is the start of a long friendship with Bill Maxwell...the only child of Ralph and Hattie...I came home from Jack Mcdermid's house to find a blond bushy haired kid shooting my bb gun...I was just kind of dumbstruck when mom came out on the porch and introduced me to Billy Maxwell...the Maxwell's were friends of theirs from Winnipeg and were staying next door at the Chilliwack Auto Court.... oh, okay that's cool....so we get into talking and he tells me about his friend Elmer Barkley in Winnipeg ....about his dog Trixi...and the trip out from Winnipeg and wow, look at the fruit trees in this yard....cherries ,pears, plumbs......he said he never seen anything like it.....then around the corner of the house comes a man...and he is mad.....he spots the BB gun and says...You are the ones....you shot through my window ...it just missed my wife's nose.....but..wha..I shot..no..umm....then Dad came out of the kitchen ...he knows this man.....Hello Ted.....it's our neighbor ...way behind us........Mr. Boyd... oh gawd........dad says "your window"?.....yes .....it broke the window and zipped by her nose.....her nose seemed a big issue......let's see that gun......WHACK.....dad busts my BB gun in half....there, that's the end of that.....Dad's glare suggested we appologize to Mr. Boyd.......... what an afternoon....there was more banter.....that'll teach em.....sorry Ted......ok ......jeez.....kids ....so Mr. Boyd leaves .....Dad and Ralph go back in the house...Dad is very p.o.d as the incident really embarrassed him.....I step off the porch and pick up the two mangled pieces of my air rifle.....I can hear them discussing the case in the kitchen....can I possible stick this together somehow...naw...it's had it.....but I put it away in the basement just in case of a miracle ........I don't remember what Bill and I said after that....just that they went home......later on that day I talked to dad about the "shooting" and that I thought there was something wrong with this picture....my BB gun is broken in half ....I never even had it in my hands......and that BB had to travel a long ways (it was a long ways) to go through the glass and zip by a nose........Well my old man was a pretty good guy...and certainly never mean or abusive to me...that day was probably as mad as I ever seen him get....but he knew he had arrested the wrong man....and he also knew Mr. Boyd fudged the story a bit...the nose thing...but what could he do.....hand the gun to me and kick Bills ass...nope...it had to be done that way........but it all worked out in the end and in a few weeks I had a brand new $7.95 Red Ryder Daisy air rifle given to me....I promised dad I would use it safley...... the old murder weapon was a plain daisy air rifle....So I guess in the long run as crappy as the whole day was I came out ok on the deal. Dad sure busted that air gun up good.