When our family (soup to nuts and everything and anything in between) rural store and family home was deliberately destroyed by arson in 1973 in Clearwater, B.C. it was a real life frightening Halloween night for our family.
Veering away from the true terror of that awful night, I’d rather share the ‘Grand Piano Memory’ instead.
I think one of the saddest material losses from the fire was being unable to remove our beautiful grand piano as the fierce flames ripped through the store, warehouse and towards our home in the back. The piano was a gift from our Mom, Mary, for all our hard work as three young kids on our Mojave Desert chicken ranch before we immigrated (sponsored by her, a Canadian) to Canada in 1971 to live permanently in our favourite place since birth, Clearwater.
Moving to Clearwater was the greatest gift she could have given us for sure, because to the three of us, Clearwater was paradise on Earth. She lined us up when we sold our ranch and asked, “Where in all of the U.S. and Canada would you like to live and in unison we said, 'Clearwater!' True fact.
We came to what is now known as Wells Gray Country every summer and it was our ‘on golden pond’ so to speak. Swimming lessons at Dutch Lake, the exciting thrill of swimming at icy cool Raft River Falls, picking baskets of delicious strawberries grown by our Aunt Hettie and Uncle Bob Miller at Miller’s Nursery, fishing for trout on Clearwater Lake. So many wonderful memories.
A big moving van brought all of our furniture and belongings from California all the way to Clearwater where our parents would begin searching for a business to buy and in that van was our beloved baby grand piano.
Did you know it takes three men to move a grand piano? One on each corner. Not easy to manoeuvre. As the store renovations came together we lived in a mobile home at the Wildwood behind the motel there in the interim home our parents purchased. It was two bedrooms with an addition, yet somehow that grand piano was squeezed in, and we were enroled in lessons in Kamloops every other week.
This piano was no run-of-the-mill piano by the way, it was truly ‘grand’ and filled many an evening with sounds of our practicing. Scott’s forte being Für Elise, Grace the expert (she eventually became a Royal Conservatory piano instructor) and me, well I was a Love is Blue and Somewhere My Love kinda girl.
This particular instrument was real gold filigree inside, a point of pride for our mom who didn’t play but had always wanted to learn. It was signed upon purchase by Joanne Castle and Bob Ralston from the Lawrence Welk Show (youngsters should Google that if interested). It was a beauty. Lawrence Welk was a weekly entertainment/variety show back in the day in the U.S. and Canada, like Ed Sullivan who introduced such famous acts like The Beatles. Lawrence Welk was famous for polkas, classical, old-fashioned dancing and singers. Joanne Castle was a honky tonk piano player and Bob Ralston was a classic on the show.
I haven’t played the piano in years, but sister Grace has her own grand piano now and is an incredible pianist. Isn’t it lovely that something as simple as the memory of such a beautiful instrument can bring such comfort and even inspire. Maybe it’s time to create another ‘grand’ memory. Anything is possible and nothing needs to be lost forever.
