REMEMBERING PETE AND SOLO

Jim made chicken salad for lunch today. I was suddenly transported back to a restaurant on Monk Boulevard in Montreal and became again an 8 year old girl who was captivated by the icecream making machine in the window of what I grew up calling "Pete's Restaurant". I would always stop in front of the window on my way home from school and watch as the green pistachio or tan maple walnut icecream 'pooped' out of the pipe into containers that would then be put in the freezer for sale in cones. One very hot day, I was convinced I was not going to be able to walk the last 3 1/2 blocks to my house without a drink of water. I don't know what posessed me but I went inside and asked the man at the counter for a glass of water. The man, whom I later knew as Solo, graciously and gravely presented me with the coldest most refreshing drink of water I remember ever having drunk. This for a while, short or long I don't remember, became a ritual.

Five years later. January in Montreal. Elvis had just appeared for the first time ever on the Ed Sullivan Show and Mary Yersh, Kay Frate and I were giddy with it. We walked down the middle of snowy Springland Street in the tracks left by passing cars, giggling and nearly wetting ourselves with laughter over Mary's very excellent, very funny immitation of Elvis' performance. We were going to Pete's for vanilla cokes and to play some of our favourite tunes on the juke box. Pete or Solo made these specially for us from the fountain Coke machine and a dash of vanilla.

Some years later Pete's had moved right to the corner of Springland and Monk Boulevard. Its official name was the Ville Emard Restaurant. I was pregnant and had cravings for their oh so yummy chicken salad sandwich which I phoned ahead for and went to pick up on a fairly regular basis.

Who were these men, Pete and Solo? I know almost nothing about them. Not even their surname. I think they were brothers. I think they were Greek. They were young men when I stood watching the icecream machine 60 years ago. If they still live they are now very old. But the thing I do know about them, and the most important thing to know about them is that they were good men. Hardworking honest new Canadians who treated an 8 year old girl with dignity and respect and who continued to do so for all the years I continued to frequent their establishment.

The last time I was in their restaurant was in 1996 when I was visiting another childhood friend who lived in the neighbourhood. We went for barbecue chicken. Pete was behind the counter, greyed and very handsome in his later years. He claimed to remember me. And maybe he did.

CELEBRATING BATWINGS

I'm talking those flabby flaps that develop on women's arms as they hit middle age, not the leathery appendages of flying mice. Until this morning I felt pretty negative about them. Lots of yuccckk factor. I haven't worn anything sleeveless in over twenty years!

I used to have really nice arms, firm and shapely. So I started thinking back to when that was. It was when my kids were little enough to need picking up. That period of my life lasted about ten years spread over three children. So I started imagining I was talking to a grade 11 class of girls about body image in one's later years; about how easy it is to criticize looking older and to buy into the youthful image that western women seem to want to retain forever. In doing so I've reversed my attitude toward my own growing decrepitude. Here's how.

I started remembering. The six to eight feedings a day, the naps, the "uppy uppy Mommy"s, the into the car and out agains, the too tired to walk any mores, the cuddles, the book readings, the rockings. Such happy precious memories.

From now on when I look in a mirror I will no longer see those old bat wings. I will be remembering love and the babes these arms embraced. Along with my stretch marks and soft belly, they are the badge of being a mother. How can I not celebrate that?