I have been remembering the old days of my youth wishing my grandchildren someday may realize that old can be good. Waltzing down memory Lane bring flashes of sorrow of days gone by that will never be again but with that come sweet and some bittersweet memories as well. I sincerely hope the kids of today will have their own sweet memories of their past too…
GRANDAD IN HIS GLORY…
Grandad and I met through a journalism and english class we were taking. He was a tall, skinny kid with a progessively deep voice. He was always connected with music, even then. Whatever high school musical that would come..he would be in it. By today’s standard Grandad would be a nerd. He went through his roll n’ roll stage that lasted about 4 months. He was always turned on by classical music. When the musical movies became popular he enjoyed the music in them and would collect record albums.
I remember listening on radio to Elvis when he just became popular. I ended up collecting all of his 45″s records. I had quite a early collection that would be worth a bit of money now. I am thinking the wicked witch of the east throw them away…but that’s another story.
MOM MEETS GRANDAD….
My mother was always a room mother while I was in grade school. She was kind and gentle. When I started dating Grandad she would leave the porch light on for me. Periodically Grandad and I would “suck face” while out in the driveway. I could always tell when she was getting antsy when the porch light would flash on and off repeatedly…
Mom was a baseball freak. She loved the Yankees being a New York girl. She would go to many a game and was at Lou Gerhrig’s last speech and game before he died. She also liked speed racing. Every Memorial Day she would listen to the Indy car races on radio, mainly because her only brother raced cars as well…
fAMILY DAYS….
My most memorable days with my parents were Saturdays. My dad would putter in the yard or be building something. He made me the coolest tether ball station. I recall a birthday party I had and he saw to it the laundry tub in the garage was filled to the brim with ice and bottled cokes and the barbeque fired up for burgers. He built my mom her clothes line out beyond the pump house. He built the pump house over the pump station for water for the house. It housed his tools, a large freezer and shelves full of all matter of fruits and vegetables my mom had canned for the season. He was always fixing something.
Mom enjoyed her backyard. She had a picket white fence around the house. It was there, close to the house, where she planted her beloved Iris, sweet peas and calla lillies. She absolutely loved the orange fruit tree she planted in the front yard. I especially enjoyed her miniature rose bushes. Big bushes but filled with tiny little rose buds that didn’t bloom larger than an inch in size.
The years were not kind to mom and she had demons to burn within. She passed away at the age of 49. I look back at the trauma of her passing and can remember the sting it left in my heart. It just did not dawn on me that she would so soon pass out of my life. Her funeral was tolerable, perhaps lovely to some…beautiful flowers, gracious friends and neighbors but for me I had lost my best friend. When I was married and moved across town, in just a phone call I could tell whether she was having a good day or bad. I regret not asking more questions concerning her past…it didn’t seem that important then, but now…..
Hindsight is a great teacher…and I suppose that is why so many old folks like me keep journals of some sort. Perhaps the words of Grandad and Nana may someday ring true. But, if nothing else it will tell of a time our grandkids will never know.
BECOMING OLD MARRIED COUPLE…
Our married life together started when we were still teenagers. By the time we were at voting age (21 in those day) we had nearly all our children. Grandad and I bought a small post war home for less than 11 thousand dollars. Grandad went back to college at UC Berkeley during the peacenik days of the 60’s. Many a day he would walk over students knee deep into sit-ins and demonstrations. Cal is consider the “Harvard of the West.” But he went there because it was the closest university to where we lived and among the cheapest in the state. With a growing family those things had to be considered. To support us Grandad took on a custodian job at our old high school. Many a night we would take the kids and clean erasers, empty garbage and mop the floors. Classes were know to be hard at Cal….so much so that he had to sing a sob story to one of his professors that he was a struggling father trying to get through to support his family…he passed the class with a D- and was happy to have it!!
I tried going back to college but pregnancies got in the way. Seems my education would be given to me by my children…and as an only child myself I had to learn fast!!
CHEAP FAMILY TRIPS….
When Grandad finally started his retail career we made it a habit to get away with the kids now and then. In those days gas was really cheap so jumping into the family station wagon was an exciting way to see the sights. We traveled all over California….spent nights up at Tahoe, camping by the Lake. Summers we would head for Utah. Utah is Grandad’s home state so we would revisit family and old haunts of his past. We especially liked all the National Parks that could be seen in such a short period of time there. During these summer we would always make time for Fishlake…
AAHHH…FISHLAKE…
I was first introduced to Fishlake by Grandad’s Uncle. He was a country gentleman who knew just where to drop a line into the water. Since that time we have gone back with our children who have some lasting memories. It was there our kids learned how to kill and gut a fish. It was there they learned that their mom could cuss a blue streak if you crossed her line. And it was there where they roller skated in the grand lobby of the lodge and suffer the mosquito bites from the night before. It was there where one of our son’s caught the “abino” fish that would never die. He even flopped around in the skillet while being cooked. Do you think anyone ate that fish?…..not on your life!!!
It was on one of these trips that the wind blew Grandad’s cowboy fishing hat off into the Grand Canyon and he went over the rail after it. And it was there I had a near heart attack! We have camped under the stars at Verde Mesa among the old indian ruins. Where all the stars shine so bright it is like day. We have made camp in the parking lot of a shopping center in Page, Arizona having coasted down the hill out of gas. It was late at night and no gas stations opened. We spent a sleepless night huddled in the wagon as the bats sang above our heads. There was the time we pitch the tent in Farmington, New Mexico thinking we would have the park to ourselves when deep into the night we heard strange and loud noices. Thinking it was a bear in our food we peered out to see a sea of late arriving campers all around us. And It was on these trips that I would find petrified pickles and hamburgers stuck to the sleeping bags when we arrived home!!
MOVING AND A FAMILY SURPRISE…
As Grandad’s career advanced, it required us to move. We had a hassle in selling our post war home. Bringing it up to code and adding a carport was expensive. We had to borrow money to meet our living costs. Grandad, being Grandad, was sent to the boonies out into the central valley of California. Lodi, known for it’s grapes and mellow wines, became our home for several years. It all ended up being a blessing in disguise. We were truly off on our own and it was here we became a real family. The kids were growing older, could be trusted to bike all over town without harm and it was here our family was cemented with our last child being born.
1967 was not a good year for me. I lost my mom and I had a life threatening pregnancy that nearly killed me. It was then I was told that the possibility of my getting pregnant again was not going to happen. So when we moved to Lodi we all were under the impression that it would be a time of growing up for us all.
Grandad knew I was pregnant again before I did. Once it was made official we told the kids. I suppose the most moving remark that was made was by our daughter who was nine at the time. She said it had better be a girl or she was leaving town…she did that once already! The pressure was on… but on a sweet December morning our second daughter was born. The children anxiously waited her birth and by the time she came home in a christmas stocking everyone already felt that christmas had come….and yours truly beathed a sign of relief!!
Jingle bells are coming and to be continued…
HO-HO-HO…………..