Broad Is the Way: Stories from Mayerthorpe

4 Not by Bread Alone

four Not by Bread Alone Within weeks after Jim and I arrived in Mayerthorpe, I invited the Ladies’ Aid to meet in the parsonage. When it was time for refreshments , the woman who had offered to help serve the lunch asked whether I had made the coffee. I said that I had made tea, assuming it wouldn’t matter. But I could tell by the woman’s face that I’d given the wrong answer. Afterwards, I kicked myself that I hadn’t caught on that coffee was the drink of choice in the community—at least among the women. I hadn’t taken in the significance of a percolating coffee pot on the back of the stove in every home in which I’d been since our arrival. I’d simply followed the practice in my parent ’s home of serving tea in the evening—never coffee—lest you might not sleep well. While we were eating lunch, one woman commented that she’d never seen such large pictures in anyone’s parlour. She was particularly struck with Tom Thomson’s Spring Ice. “What a beautiful oil painting. Did you paint it, Mrs. Norquay?” Trying not to embarrass her, I fumbled to explain that it was only a print, a copy of a painting by an artist of whom I was particularly fond. An older woman who had lived in Edmonton for some years after a career teaching in one-room rural schools asked if she could look at our books, which we’d shelved in stacked orange crates. She said she loved books, but with neither a library nor a bookstore in town, she hadn’t had anything to read since she’d come to Mayerthorpe to be near to her married son. She couldn’t get much out of reading Eaton’s catalogue. Then seeing, a copy of Spengler’s Decline of the West sitting on top of our improvised bookcase, she read out in a puzzled, almost angry voice, “Decline of the West—what’s that about? Why do Easterners think we’re declining?” I struggled to explain that Spengler wasn ’t talking about the western provinces but about the decline of Western civilization. Her look indicated this answer hadn’t helped. 21 The president quickly intervened, saying we needed to decide where the aid would go for their next meeting, thus saving me from having to explain what Western civilization meant. But I knew I had touched a sore spot and hoped I hadn’t made it worse. I was beginning to realize that I had a lot to learn about getting along in the community, about bridging the gap between myself, with an essentially urban background from southern Ontario, and the people we would be working with. I wondered if I’d inadvertently created more questions about my suitability as the parson’s wife, not only in the minds of the good ladies but also in my own mind. Jim had been in the community a full year before I turned up, and he seemed to have had no trouble getting along. Everyone appeared to like his easy, relaxed way, a manner I put down to his having been brought up in a small village in Northern Ontario. I thought uneasily that I might be the problem in the partnership. When I told Jim about the meeting, he said, “Well, better remember to have coffee next time.” I said that it hadn’t occurred to me that I should have immediately stoked up the stove and made coffee for the ladies. Jim, with a twinkle, said, “You’re some sociologist not to have noticed that coffee is always the drink of choice for women in this town. The men probably prefer something stronger.” “I’ve got to stop assuming my way of doing things is the way they are done here,” I replied. “Trouble is, I don’t know when I’m doing it, until I’ve said or done the wrong thing. It’s going to take me a while to get used to things. But we are in a bit of a cultural desert.” “Well,” Jim said, “we’ll have to figure out how to make the desert bloom. We’ll have to create some kind of oasis or you won’t be happy. We’ve lots of books between us. Some might be of interest. What do you think that lady would like to read?” “I’d be scared to ask...