After the birth of our third child, our home was no longer big enough for all of us, so we called it the big house. A lease became available in Oyster Bay. Home sitting on an acre, right on the beach. This house was massive, and the views were incredible. The living room was 40 feet by 60 feet, and one of the features was 13 huge picture windows that looked out over the ocean. These windows each had a 3-foot deep window sill where you could sit and watch the world from. The room was as big as the house we were moving out of. Off this room was a 10-foot by 15-foot entrance area where a big staircase led upstairs. The two doors were both huge. Another room was 20 feet by 40 feet, which I set up as my studio. On another wall was a big opening that went into a dining room that was 15 feet by 30 feet. I built a table that was 15 feet by 5 feet out of cedar that could seat more guests than I had ever invited to dinner before. The highlight of this room was a huge river rock fireplace on the far end, where we would have winter dinner parties with this fireplace burning brightly. You could look through the big glass doors that led to a big deck where you could watch the snow falling. Off this room was a fairly large bedroom that we set up as a guest room. Beside the fireplace was another door that led into the kitchen, where there were several wall-mounted ovens and an island stove top with 6 burners. There was a staircase beside the kitchen access bathroom that was narrow. It went upstairs and also led to the basement. The upper stairs were almost like a servant staircase that led up to 3 more bedrooms. Past these rooms and around a corner, you come to the top of the front staircase and the master bedroom, a very large room with a walk-out balcony that had glass rails so your ocean view was not impeded. Just beside this room was the master bath with the largest tub I have ever seen, it fits both my wife and me with plenty of room to spare.
The stairs that went down took you to a furnace room that held a huge wood/electric furnace that heated the whole house with ease. I called it the beast. Off to the side was a wood storage area that could hold 3 or more cords of wood. This room had a chute that went through a door where you could pull up your truck and load the wood down the chute. There were also 3 shops and a 2-car garage downstairs. There were 55 windows in the house and 75 light fixtures. We had to buy bulbs in industrial-size boxes.
Outside was a lawn on the ocean side with many large trees, and there was a stream that went past the house and emptied into the sea. On the other side of the house were fruit trees that during the season were loaded with apples, plums and cherries. The apple tree had high sugar content apples that would ferment in the fall from the sun, and we had a bear that would come by to lie under this tree to eat these fermented apples. The bear would get quite drunk and, after feasting, he would stagger back into the forest to sleep it off, returning night after night until the fruit was gone. This was quite entertaining to watch.
We had over 200 feet of private beachfront where we would spend warm summer days watching the whales and dolphins swimming by. Sometimes, we would see hundreds of dolphins all leaping out of the sea as they swam by. Sea lions quite often hauled out on the beach, allowing us some incredible close-up views of these large creatures of the sea. Our kids were young, and this was a paradise to them.
Not long after moving in, I was sitting by a window in the living room. As I sat there, I just happened to look out, and as I did, I saw my youngest son, Forrest, just over 2, hanging out the upper-floor bedroom window. I ran through the living room, up the stairs and down the hall to this bedroom. I reached it in time to pull him back in. After this, I put childproof locks on the upper windows.
At Christmas time, my best and lifelong friend spent a couple of weeks with us. Not only was Larry my best friend, but his family was closely connected to my wife’s family; his mom and dad were Gina’s older brother’s parents. Larry’s dad was the pastor up in Alert Bay, where Gina’s dad was from. It was great to spend time with him and his fiancée. My oldest boy was born on Larry’s birthday.
When Larry went back to Chilliwack, he was informed that a position as the official fundraiser for the Harrison Lake Pow Wow Association that he had applied for was his. He called me that night to tell me the news and ask my advice on proceeding with this. I had done fundraising before. We talked for quite some time as I tried to give him advice. He was so excited about this, and his enthusiasm got me excited as well.
The next morning, around 11 AM, Larry’s brother called me up to tell me that Larry had died in a car accident earlier in the morning. I was devastated by this news. I could not get my mind around it. I sat in my basement and just cried. He was my best friend, and I would never see him again. Death comes to us all, but this was just too soon. When we were not yet teens, Larry and I met and became good friends for life.
When Larry was with us, he had gone to his parents’ place for 2 days; they also lived out where we lived. His family had always treated him like he was a loser; this time was no exception. He came back very depressed. They had also treated his girlfriend with the same scorn. When they had his funeral, I was asked to be the speaker. I was honoured but had to turn it down, and I did not even go to the funeral as I was afraid of what I would say to and about them. Over the years, I had seen how they treated him and had never thought much of them. Both his mom and dad were ordained ministers, but I felt they were not good examples of being Christ-like. On the day of his funeral, I sat on our beach with a fire and thought of all the good times we had during the years we knew each other. I smiled through the tears from these memories.
I buried myself in my art, and this helped me deal with this loss. At this time, I was doing well with art sales and had picked up some contracts with clothing manufacturers and print companies that pretty much covered the lease and hydro bills, so life was pretty good. The next year was pretty good.
Then we began to have some trouble with the house that involved rats; we hardly saw them, but the basement would constantly have droppings on the floors, and sometimes you could hear them in the walls, chewing away. I began to search these rats out and discovered that all the insulation in the basement walls was full of droppings and urine. Lucky for me, these walls were only framed in, so it was easy to remove the old insulation. After pulling the insulation, I could see many rat holes leading in and out of the basement. I filled close to 50 garbage bags with insulation, and I must have swept up over 100 pounds of rat droppings.
For some reason, I did not wear a mask, and my health started to go south. I was having trouble catching my breath, so I went to see the doctor, and he discovered that I had an infection in the sac that encircles the heart, which caused it to swell. And it was putting extreme pressure on my heart. I got sick. Being sick harmed my ability to create art, and we found that we could no longer afford this place. My doctor said I would be ill for more than a few months and recovery would be slow. We found a smaller home, a townhouse, where the rent was something we could afford. I spent the next while just trying to beat this infection. They had me on some pretty powerful meds to fight the illness. I did finally get control of it, and eventually, they could not find any signs of it. It’s a good thing my heart was strong. The medication had another effect on me, though. I began to get fluctuating blood sugars and was diagnosed with diabetes.