boyhood sketch 9. BOYS ON TOP FIRST UNITED CHURCH ROOF

To the left of our house at 10 Clark Street, and at the top of a slight hill First United Church and its manse were located. The Reverend Barr was the Minister who lived there. He had two sons, Ronnie and Jerry. We played with them too, nice boys. On this particular day, they were not included. Two other friends accompanied me on this one. My friends were nervous. I had to coax them, lead them, show them how to do it. Eleven-year-old lithe and light bodies lift their weight easily up brick walls using window edges and brick ledges and down spouts, up past first and second stories, higher, higher, until we reached the slate tiles of the roof on the far side of this image. From there we could see above the flat roofline of Robertson Public School that we attended, and every other structure along Church Street. Rubber soled with simple sneakers we climbed the steep, summery hot tiles to a contour on the roof, in which we could actually sit leaning against the next rise in the roof. It was foolish, dangerous, but we didn't think that way. I didn't. It was a challenge, something to accomplish. We were sovereigns of the steeple.