collect timber harvested during the summer and fall from the few remaining first growth forests around the interconnected finger lakes of the Kawarthas. Dad bought the cedar cladding for the cottage from Mr Blewett. Uncle Reub told me he thought the Blewetts could be descendants of the very first white men who came through Lake Chemong with Samuel de Champlain in the seventeenth century, that their real name was probably Bleuet, the French word for both cornflowers and blueberries. That was exciting. That meant my swimming teacher was in my school history books.
Now the sawmill was less active. Mr Blewett couldn’t compete with the prices at Beaver Lumber, where cheap pine from British Columbia was sold, so he retired his tug and added a marina and marine gas station. We hoisted our fourteen-foot cedar Peterborough boat up to the rafters of our boathouse for the winter, but cottagers with more valuable boats were starting to store their boats at the Blewetts’. These were handmade twenty-two-foot mahogany Shepherds, built 200 miles away in Niagara-on-the-Lake, or even more expensive mahogany Chris-Craft, built in Algonac, 300 miles west, across the St Clair River in Michigan. The sawmill owner’s wife, May Blewett, pumped gas at the dockside gas station and also gave weekly swimming lessons to the summer children. At the end of each August, if we passed our tests, she dispensed Red Cross and Royal Life Saving Society pins with our names engraved on them.
Mrs Blewett was older than our mothers, in her forties, and always wore a white bathing cap when she swam. All our mothers, especially Grace and Glory’s, were small and slim. Mrs Blewett had the robust shape of the local women, a large chest and an equally large bottom. She was what my mother called ‘buxom’.
‘It’s fresh today so we’ll practise artificial respiration on land then towing in the water,’ she told us. ‘Pair up everyone,’ and we did so with people we were comfortable with, Grace with Glory, Perry with me, Steve with Rob.
‘Do you remember what we learned last week?’ she asked. ‘Put your victim on his side, open his mouth and remove any seaweed. Then onto his front and press your hands firmly just below his shoulder blades so you hear him breathing out. You’ll be doing this to each other so get going now.’
Before Perry said anything I decided I’d be the victim, lay down on my stomach and put my hands under my shoulders, so Perry had my elbows to pull on when he was told to do so. Perry was almost a year older than me but we were the same height. His mother didn’t cut his curly light brown hair all summer and by the time we returned to Toronto at the end of August I thought he looked like a girl.
‘Ready, children? Rescuers, keep your hands flat and press firmly on your victims’ backs to expel water from the lungs.’
Perry pressed hard and quietly, and involuntarily I expelled air from my lungs. Rob pressed on Steve’s back and Steve emitted a really loud, exaggerated moan. The other boys in the class all laughed.
‘This is not a laughing matter!’ Mrs Blewett told him. I thought it was like being back at school and that wasn’t right. It was summertime and we were free to do whatever we wanted to, especially never wear shoes.
‘Now pull back on your victims’ elbows to make them breath in good air.’
Perry pulled my elbows up towards him. It didn’t do anything to my lungs but I intentionally breathed in, loudly.
‘Bruce, you are not on stage in Toronto!’
Mrs Blewett’s bare feet were inches from my head. ‘If you don’t take this seriously you will never learn how to save a drowning victim.’
Perry kept pressing and pulling and, having nothing else to do, I thought about how I would do this to Angus. Then we switched and Perry was the drowning victim.
Rhythmically I pressed on his back then pulled on his elbows. It was fun and I wondered whether next week I could practise on Grace instead.
After we finished attempting artificial respiration we sat in a horseshoe on the grass while Mrs Blewett told us how to break loose from a drowning victim who has grabbed you, then tow him to safety.
‘Steven, come here so I can demonstrate how to break a death grip.’
Grinning back at us, Steve went over and stood behind Mrs Blewett. Steve was fourteen years old, the oldest of us. His hair was curly like Perry’s but darker. Although he was much shorter than my brother, who was already almost six feet tall and catching up fast with our dad, whatever we did Steve made all the decisions. Rob had light skin and freckles. He burned easily. Steve already had a good tan, but not as good as mine. I never burned. It took only a single sunny day to turn me the colour of the inside of a Caramilk chocolate bar.
‘Grab me tight around my neck,’ she told Steve and he did so.
‘No! Tighter!’ she said and now he pressed himself firmly against her back.
Looking at us sitting in front of her, with Steve behind her she said, ‘I’ll do this quickly first then in slow motion so you see how to break the victim’s death grip.’
Her hands came up to Steve’s arms around her neck and suddenly Steve let out a high-pitched howl and his arm was in an arm lock.
‘Shit, la merde! You broke my arm!’ he exclaimed.
‘No I haven’t. It just hurts a little,’ Mrs Blewett replied.
‘Now in slow motion I’ll show you what I did.’
‘Are you going to hurt me again?’ he asked.
‘No. This is a slow motion demonstration.’
Once more Steve went behind her.
‘There’s something on your neck,’ he said, wiped it off then wrapped his arms around her throat once more.
‘Children, when a drowning victim puts you in a death vice this is what you do.’
In slow motion she grabbed one of Steve’s hands with one hand and the elbow of the same arm with her other, then pushed up on the elbow while pulling down on the hand. Steve theatrically released his grip and, with the grace of a trained ballerina, Mrs Blewett pirouetted around behind Steve and put his arm in an arm lock.
‘With your one hand keeping the victim in an arm lock, use the other to cup his chin while you tow him to safety,’ she explained to us.
After practising this on each other we were ready to practise in the lake.
During our lesson the weather had got bleaker. There were whitecaps on the water and Mrs Blewett told us that as the weather was now so bad she would demonstrate towing on the shore side of the landing dock, rather than the lake side where we usually had our swimming lessons. The water was just as cold there but much calmer. All she needed was a volunteer to be the rescuer and Steve suggested Rob who, showing how manly he was, immediately dived into the water. Mrs Blewett used the new aluminium ladder to gently descend into the lake, all the time explaining to us how to tow properly.
The class, around twenty of us, all boys except for Grace and Glory and Mr Yudin’s daughter, Sandy, and two girls I didn’t know, lined up on the edge of the dock while Mrs Blewett grabbed Rob from behind and he broke her vice-like death grip, swung her arm into an arm lock, cupped his hand under her chin and towed her slowly past all of us. Mrs Blewett’s blue bathing suit was coming undone, her chest looked like two white archery targets with big red bullseyes. None of us said a word, not even the girls.
‘I’ll
