Let's brag a little here. Great-granddaughter Tara Shuttler, who attends Saltfleet District High School, brings home her report card.

Besides being an excellent athlete in soccer and volleyball, her report card shows her marks to be about 13 per cent above the class averages.

Sheesh. It reminds me of my marks way back when.

But sooooo different.

We North-End boys would never ever have bragged that we made good marks in school.

This would have made us sissies. It was more honourable to be able to point out the names of kids in your age group whom you could "lick."

A black eye or a bloody nose was a greater mark of distinction than a gold star on your report card.

Your position on the totem pole of North-End honour was determined by the numbers of "chips" (of wood) you still had on your shoulder after you had dared other kids to "knock it off" and they couldn't.

The Annual Old North Enders Reunion will be held the second Saturday in July at Wabasso ... er ... I mean LaSalle Park.

By golly, Old North Enders will have to go to the next North-End reunion by car or bus.

All the old steamboats -- like the White Star, the Macassa, the Turbinia, the Corona (remember the moonlight cruises?) -- must have sailed too close to Stelco or Dofasco because they were melted down into steel pipes, girders, rails and wire fencing.

Many readers of this column are elderly.

Hopefully, they can continue to go along with me as we recall:

Memories, memories

Of days that used to be.

Across the Sea of Memory

Come drifting back to me.

Childhood days, wildwood ways,

Among the birds and bees.

You've left me alone

But still I'm at home

With my beautiful memories.

Ted Wilcox is a lifelong Hamiltonian with a passion for sports, community and, most of all, family.