The Orange Peril

They called us Dirty Catholics and we, likewise, thought of them as Dirty Protestants although never actually admitting it!  I always envied them - with their art and music classes and Sunday School.  I so wanted to go to Sunday School instead of Mass!  While I was not able to wrangle an invite to Sunday School, I did sign myself up for Saturday art classes at Islington Elementary which worked until they demanded payment and I was forced to slink out of class.  I was 8 at the time.

We walked to school every day - and back home for lunch - and then back to school and home again.  We had to go through Central Park which was behind Etobicoke Collegiate - a Protestant school!  We were terrorized by gangs of Protestant Youths who would chase us and throw stones (snow balls in winter) and if they caught us, they beat us up!  Yes the Order of the Orange was thriving in those days.  My poor younger sister had a particular bully who targeted her - Paul Woods - he was big and mean and ugly.  I am sorry to say I never went to her rescue - I was too concerned with making my own escape!

We had to cross over a set of railroad tracks on Montgomery Road, the dangers of which, we were blissfully unaware until one of the Scanlons was killed at this crossing.  I secretly felt it was his own fault as the neighbourhood boys delighted in walking the rails, putting pennies on the track in the hope of derailing one - my own brothers included. 

Walking to and fro from school meant appropriate clothing.  God how I loathed our winter snow pants, buckle boots, jackets and hats/mitts.  Once Julian Empy grabbed my hat and threw it on the little river that ran through Central Park.  It was winter and the river was only slightly frozen.  Rather than face the wrath of my mother if I returned home without my hat, I inched myself out on the precarious ice to retrieve it crying the whole time.  I was so afraid I wet my pants.  Whether my tormentor Julian knew this or not, he seemed to have a change of heart, and dashed out ahead of me and retrieved my hat.  'Here's your stupid hat' he said and threw it at me.  I think he had a crush on me.

As soon as the weather permitted (or even if it didn't), we eagerly discarded our winter clothes and donned our TRENCH COATS.  These were so cool - kind of military so I had to MARCH to school rather than just walk.  We all had black oxfords to wear and sans buckle boots, the freedom from the buckle boots was so exhilarating, I felt like I was floating.