Although he was born in Montréal and spend his first year there, Stéphane’s first memories were from St-Sulpice. Small suburb town on the St-Lawrence river, their home was on “Chemin du Bord-de-l’eau” with a nice view of the majestuous body of water. He lived there from about age 1 to 4.
His main caretakers were his paternal grand-parents who took him home when he was 6 days old. A temporary arrangement until his parents, Serge and Louise, would have time to settle things. The arrangement proved to be permanent as things would really never “settle”.
Early memories were of that old two stories, typical Quebec’s country house. A nice quiet life for a young child with a spectacular view. He remembers “Mémé” his grandmother who was always there for him. “Pépé” his grandfather who would go to work everyday in Montréal. Lise his aunt that was still living there as she was a student and about 18 years old at the time.
Once, Mémé and Pépé would leave for a week with one of Mémé’s brother (Armand maybe?) to go on a fishing trip on the “côte nord”, a wilderness area about 500 miles northeast of Montréal. During that time Lise took care of Stéphane. It was the first time were he was separated from Mémé. During that time, Stéphane was sad, barely ate and would watch the window constantly, waiting for his grandparents’ return. This is despite being quite found of Lise.
Stéphane was about 18 months old when his father, Serge, and his uncle, Gaston, finished their prison terms. They got arrested and sentenced for 18 months at about the same moment as Stéphane was born. That was his first memories of his father: Serge and Gaston would carry him outside play with him and eventually, bring him up a large tree next to the house. From his small size, Stéphane though that this was incredibly high and once at their peak altitude he took a look down at Mémé and scream “allo Mémé”! He remembers it as a joyful thing while Mémé was convinced that he was terrified.
Later, Stéphane remembers the winter. Probably the winter of 1967 when he was two year old, going of three. There was a small stream behind the house and a small foot bridge over it. A little pathway would link the house to the service station at the back. The path would be cleared of snow all winter which was a fun walk for Stéphane.
The service station belong to Mr. Joyal. He was nice to Stéphane and would frequently give him candies. Service stations at the time were major thing in the countryside. There were no self-service for car so an attendant would come over to fill your gas tank. Further, they would check the engine oil level, your tire pressure and clean your windows! Service stations were also a place were they actually performed mechanical work on cars. They would carry small items like peanuts in a distributors and candies. Imagine how fun that was for a young child to be able to take a walk and see all that world!
Serge had a small british car, an “Envoy Epic” as it was known in Canada. It was in fact a Vauxhall Viva (HA). When Stéphane was three, Serge would come to visit and bring him for a ride. He even let Stéphane hold the steering alone and steer the car on the highway. Stéphane was thrilled. Is it when he grew such a love for driving?
That car was a redundant memory. One was linked to a TV show that Stephane saw at the time. It was an episode of “The outer limits” (“Au delà du réel” in french) in which flowers were taking over people by spraying spores upon them. Stéphane was very scared of the episode and developed a fear of red flowers. Now, why red flowers? The TV was in black in white! In any case, red flowers! One day, Lise show up in the car with a red flower attached to the dashboard (it was 1967 after all!). She tried to get Stéphane to board the car but when he saw the flower he was totally afraid and ran away. Lise had to remove the flower otherwise Stephane would not come even near the car!
One day, Stéphane was enjoying some play time with his cousin François who was only 8 months younger. At age three, they were both alone in the second floor of the house. What was strange (you won’t probably see that today) is that the stair was unprotected from upstair but had a door down the stairs. Eventually, what was bound to happen, happened. Stéphane fell down the stair while sitting on his small three wheel bike. Him first, the bike next. Then banging himself on the door, than slammed by the bike. Stéphane cried. There was a group of adult in the kitchen across the door. One of them ran to open the door and took a crying Stéphane in his arms. Then Stéphane saw Mémé across the kitchen, on the other side of the table. She was just finished with a batch of “sucre à la crème” (cream tablet). That was one of Stéphane’s fondness memory of that time. The sweet taste of the “sucre à la crème” after a traumatic event. He always like Mémé’s “sucre à la crème” the best. It was tender and creamy as others’ were hard.
