She couldn’t have been more than six weeks old. She loved being out in the world, even then. Sleeping wasn’t her deal. Sleeping was for other babies. Babies who didn’t realize how interesting the world around them was. She was a happy easy baby, in all of her non-sleeping-ness.
We’d walk at night. I’d take her to the mall. I’d take her to The Grove. On occasion I even took her to the pier. She loved the lights, the people, the noise. Her eyes twinkled. I know people say babies don’t see everything that early, but I know Bailey saw her surroundings.
While Logan would deal with Morgan and bedtime, I’d take Bailey on evening adventures. It was our thing. Our special time, just the two of us. It was how I got to know my baby girl, without the constant toddler interruption.
Sometimes in the sling, sometimes in the stroller. Los Angeles at night was our place. Old ladies would chastise me. Oh that baby needs to be in bed. It’s cold out. Uh yeah no. Los Angeles in August in anything but cold. Bed…yes maybe. But hey, she won’t sleep there either. I didn’t really care. Old ladies are always like that. They know best. *eye roll*
It was calming for me, this I know. Being out in the night air was good for both of us. She loved it. That’s all that really matters.
We’re people watchers, she and I are. I know where it started.
*********************
He climbs into my bed at 10:15pm. Some nights he sleeps all night, the other nights he wanders. It’s always a guess as to which bed he will be in each morning.
The room is pitch black just how we both like it. I sweep wiff you this night mama, he asks me. Sure my bud, but why? I just wike a big bed. I laugh and then shush him into he falls asleep.
He’s long; all arms and legs these days. I breath him in. The smell of apple body wash still lingers on him. His PJ’s smell like fabric softener. He smells like boy. Clean boy, but still, boy. He snores lightly and sighs in his sleep.
I snuggle him close for a while, then I quietly carry him back to his bed. In reality, he’s kicky and not a great bedfellow.
***********************
Morgan has alwasy been the best sleeper in the house. As a newborn, we’d put her in the crib and she’d just fall asleep. I told everyone they were insane. BABIES sleep! See my sleeping newborn?!? I wanted to hold events and charge money: SEE THE TINY SLEEPING BABY, only $29.99. It wasn’t long before we considered the fact that she slept each night, her saving grace.
Now she reads in bed until she falls asleep. I’d say on average this takes her ten minutes from the time her head hits the pillow. I envy it, her ability to sleep so well. Part of me knows it’s the other side of her ADHD. She literally wears herself out every day. The other part of me knows she got that from her dad.
********************
The pitch black room calms me after a long trying day. My best thinking comes at night. My clearest thinking happens then. I’d take sleep if it would have me, but we seem to be in disagreement tonight.
I leave my window open a crack to let cold air in. I cuddle under tons of blankets. This is how I sleep best. When I manage to sleep that is.
**********************
At least twice a week, I wake up to Bailey in my bed. She’s swift and quiet. If I had to guess, she comes in around 4am. Rarely does she wake me up as she sneaks in. I call her the bed ninja. She, like the newborn she was, isn’t that fond of sleeping. I fear she’ll be a life long insomniac like me. Only time will tell. She tells me she does her best thinking in bed.
***********************
Mama WAIT! STOP! I watch dat pwease.
What is it?
Power Rangers. Dey go Hi Ya! I wike dem.
Okay my bud. You can watch Power Rangers. But we don’t hi ya people, right?
I know mama, I know.
Power Rangers. Funny that it’s still on 20 years later. They’re a bit different than I remember. No more bright yellow tights. Same effed up looking bad monsters though.
I remember having the same conversation with my cousin that I had with my son the other day. He was four maybe. I was eleven and babysitting at the time. Nicky we don’t hi ya the dog, I kept having to remind him. He wore that yellow Power Rangers Halloween costume for an entire year. My aunt bought him five of them, just so she didn’t have to wash it each night.
Four year old boy back then is now a 23 year old man with a baby girl of his own. A strong solid chef whose had to deal with more baby health issues in his daughter’s 18 months of life, than anyone should ever have to.
I look over at my not yet three old son watching the same show and realize he will one day grow up to be a man.
*********************
Are we going to the pool now, he kept asking me. Dude. It’s an ocean, not a pool. Oh yeah, I remember now.
He held my hand all the way from the restaurant on the pier, until the edge of the board walk where we sat and took off our shoes. The second we made it to the water, he wanted to go in. We didn’t bring swim suits I told him. We’ll just get our feet in okay? We walked into the water and the wave came in. It wasn’t even a big wave. Yet the second it started pulling out, he did a face plant. The look on his face was priceless.
We played in the sand, built “porcupine castle” and buried our feet.
Just me and my best friends son. One hour. The same beach that I grew up on.
*****************
Melissa has anyone told you to watch your feet yet?
No. Why, I asked him.
Well because of the gators. You see a long time ago this one guy thought that baby gators were tiny and cute and he bought like six dozen of them home. But they got to big for the cage and he had to let them go. The dummy put them in this very lake. That’s why Grandpa makes us wear life vests when we’re in the water. The lake is deep enough…but those gators hang out on the bottom. Just waiting for kid toes to get close enough to snatch. They sure love them some toes.
I spent the remaining days curled up in a ball every time I was in the water. Couldn’t let the gators get me.
I was seven and dumb. My cousin was seventeen and a brat. I only believed him that one summer. The following one, I told the same thing to my cousin who was a year younger than me. The year after that, I told one of my brothers and my cousin told the other. One of those stories you can’t help but pass on. Cousin torture at it’s finest.
I was sixteen the last year my grandparents owned that lake house. I hadn’t heard the gator story in years, but low and behold I happened to over hear my then eight year old cousin telling the youngest cousin the same story.
Little kids in life vest for years and years curling up their feet while attempting to swim. It’s quite the funny sight.
*****************
The four of us sitting on a couch for the first time ever. Covered in blankets in her arctic temperature house. All four of us were on our phones but it didn’t seem to matter. When you meet people through the Internet, you never seem to notice other peoples addiction to it.
Billy the Exterminator on TV. I’m hooked now. Watching that crazy man wrestle an alligator was the coolest thing I’d seen on TV in a long time.
Somehow now, I don’t believe my toes were the only thing I should have been worried about as a kid.
I write these down, because I want to remember. I want to remember a peaceful, easy weekend away with my kids.
*************
Harrison sitting in the backseat of the car on the way into the mountains. He had a half hour, non-stop animated conversion with the Cinnamon Teddy Grahams he was eating. “No eat me. I eat you. You yummy. No pwease, no eat me. Okay you safe. I keep you safe. Hahaha. Now I eat you. No, no, I no bad guy. Yummy ears. Nom nom nom.”
(If he’s a cannibal later, at least I’ll know when it started.)
**************
Bailey: Mommy, you know what my favorite-ist part of this weekend was?
Me: No love, what was it?
Bailey: Getting to eat all the gummies. (I have an I don’t care attitude about candy/snacks on holidays and road trips.)
Me: Out of the whole weekend, out of everything we did, your favorite part was eating gummy candies the whole car ride up there?
Bailey: Yes.
Me: Well good to know. Next time I want to go on vacation, I’ll just buy you some gummies and call it good.
Bailey: Wait no mommy. I have one more favorite.
Me: Okay then, lemme hear it.
Bailey: Renaming stars with you in the hot tub.
Me: Much better babe. Much better.
Bailey: But the gummies tie.
Me: I’m so glad to know I so rank high next to sour gummy worms. It makes my heart feel all special.
Bailey: It should. They are so good mommy. Can I have more?
Me: No.
**************
Morgan: Mom what is this road called?
Me: I don’t know. It’s a number. I’m sure I should know, but I don’t.
Morgan: I am gonna rename this road.
Me: Oh yeah?
Morgan: Yeps. It’s now called mommy almost hit three deers road.
Me: Dude. I almost hit one deer. Not three.
Morgan: Those other two were in the road too.
Me: Like three football fields away. Doesn’t count. They ran off.
Morgan: Mom? I stand by my decision. You almost hit three innocent deer.
Me: They aren’t innocent. Did you see how they almost hit my poor sweet car?
Morgan: Mom, you are so wrong. The deer are the innocent ones. Your car was driving way too fast, like over the speed limit by 8 whole miles and if it hit one, they’d be toast.
Me: Well technically, they’d be more like deer kabobs.
Morgan: MOTHER!
Me: It’s true. They are a menace to society anyway. Freaking partying in the middle of the road deer.
Morgan: *eye roll* Whatever mom. This road has a new improved, very true name.
Me: I’ll be sure to let highway patrol know that.
Morgan: Okay good. It’s settled.
******************
We flew kites. Or well we attempted to fly kites. Ever try kite flying in 30mph winds? Yeah, I’m not sure I recommend it. They look like they are having a seizure up there.
The girls and I sat in a hot tub and renamed stars late on Saturday night. There is nothing better than sitting in a hot tub on a deck at night, in a mountain neighborhood without street lights. You can see everything.
We ate ice cream on a bench in the sunshine. Harrison ate his on a cone for the first time ever.
We sang all the way home in the car.
On Mother’s day, we went out to breakfast. Best breakfast spot in all of Colorado. Too bad it’s four hour drive from my house.
This weekend, the fighting was pretty much non-existent. This weekend, there was next to no whining. This weekend, there was no housework, no dog barking and no errands to run. It was a good weekend. No, it was a great weekend. One I hope to remember.
It’s late at night. We are in bed. Holding hands. Pondering quietly the reality that has smacked us squarely in the face. Neither of us speaks for nearly an hour. I listen to him breath. I play the evening over and over again in my mind. I wonder to myself, is this real. God, I hope this is real.
Finally he speaks. Well that happened fast, didn’t it?
Yeah, I guess it did, I responded.
So….we’re going to be parents then? Dam that’s rad.
Yeah, it is, huh?
*******************************
We were on vacation. 1992 maybe. I’d of been twelve that summer. Driving through Oklahoma. We’d stopped at Sonic, which he’d only mentioned about 73 times that day. Sonic. Jalapeno burgers. Cherry limeade. You could almost see it dancing in his eyes. His idea of heaven, if he were one to believe in such things.
We stopped at the first one we saw. We all ordered huge drinks and burgers. Chili cheese fries to share. We sat outside the car in the humid summer heat. The radio in the car was on. Turned to a silly country station, that he never would have normally made us listen too. Maybe it was Oklahoma that did it too him. Maybe it was Sonic. Who knows. My dad is an odd guy.
The moment was over before it really began.
He jumped up and started grabbing food and shoving it in the car in seconds. I didn’t recognize that look in his eyes. Get in the car now, he said. His voice was raised. He meant business. The man rarely raised his voice. We all got in the car. He drove away like a bat out of hell. He didn’t speak for 30 minutes.
We were all silent as well. No one said a thing, even though he was driving us back in the direction we’d just come from. Considering there were five of between 10 and 14 years old, this was a strange occurrence.
Eventually my step-mom broke the silence. What happened? Tornadoes, was his response. Headed our direction. The radio said tornadoes. More than one. Never again will I deal with tornadoes. Give me an earthquake any day.
It would have been funny, except it really wasn’t. On a vacation once, in Texas, my dad almost lost my mom because of tornadoes. She happened to be out shopping and she nearly died in a storm drain. It was about six months before they got pregnant with me. The town my grandparents lived in was over a third gone, after the tornadoes that day. Three major ones.
We will be going around Oklahoma today, was all he’d say.
***********************************
Family dinner. My family. His family. We’d ordered in. Mexican food. What? It wasn’t like I knew how to cook. Our new condo. It was the first time we’d had everyone there. There wasn’t enough seats for everyone, so a lot of people ended up sitting on the floor.
They believed it was to celebrate the condo. They’d brought us gifts. As we finished opening them, I got up and said, there is actually two more. Hold on one second. I went into our bedroom and came out with two gifts.
White satin wrapping. Purple and green ribbon. I remember that I’d spent an hour at some specialty shop in Beverly Hills, finding the prettiest paper I could find. I even made my friend Kate wrap them for me, because I wanted it to be perfect. One gift for his parents, one for my mom. Two picture frames.
Our butter bean in a frame. Ten weeks. Her first fuzzy photo. The frames said first grandchild.
**************************************
Same vacation. 1992. We’d been in Albuquerque the day before and had gone to Water World. I’d managed to step on a lit cigarette butt and had a blister the size of a fist on my foot. I have always been known for this type of thing. They should have just named me clumsy.
We were camping in Carlsbad. Had been swimming the night before. Every one told me to pop that blister, but I decided limping around was a better way to go. I didn’t want to miss walking down Carlsbad Caverns. I knew if I popped it, I’d not want to walk for days. See, I’d heard a rumor the night before, that Mario Lopez would be filming something at the bottom of the caves the next day. I wanted to meet him. Oh how I loved Saved by the Bell.
I was determined. I didn’t care how much it hurt. I did it anyway. Not because I cared about a silly cave. National monument? Who cares about that? I was twelve. I’d of rather been in a mall. Or at home, spending my days boogie boarding with my friends.
I could have cared less that it had an actual cafeteria at the bottom. I didn’t want to see bats. Or ride the weird elevator back to the top. Nope. I did it too see some cute famous boy.
Saw him too. Somewhere I even have a signed autograph. Totally worth the foot pain.
**********************************
Sometimes I get down, when I realize I have no one here. It can be very lonely. All of my friends live elsewhere. My three best friends, each live in different states, scattered over the US. There are days where I’d give just about anything to be able to go have coffee with them at their houses. To sit and talk. To go to dinner. Something. Anything. There are days when it makes me feel bad to know that without the Internet, I’d have no friends and social life.
Other times I realize how absolutely lucky I really am. I have the greatest friends in the world. People all over the US who I am lucky enough to call true friends. People I can chat with, text with and email with. People I could call if I needed someone to talk too. People who would open up their home to me for a few days, if I was in their area. People who take me, as me; just as I am. You can’t beat that type of friendship. I count myself blessed every day that I have it.
I spent a long weekend in California. A long amazing weekend. It wasn’t amazing because I did extraordinary things. I was just there. I spent time with friends. I played Angry Birds Halloween. I watched my friends son, when she ended up having to take her daughter to urgent care. I got sick on my last night there. Life you know? Just normal life.
It’s the small things though, the small moments that help me stay positive when I am home. The small moments that I can pull out and look at in my head later, on days when I need them. These are the things that remind me that I’m not alone.
Things like spending a few hours sitting on a couch, talking and laughing about the idiocy of sports figures. *cough* Brett Farve *cough* Making fun of a certain pitcher who has now famous facial hair. Joking about his weirdness. Reminding ourselves and each other that just because they do one thing so well that we all know who they are, doesn’t really make them anything other than human beings, who just happen to be famous.
Things like spending a day running errands with my best friend. Do I care that we went grocery shopping? Nope. We did other things too. But I don’t care that we did the normal things that all of us have to do every week. Doesn’t matter. I spent a day with my best friend. That’s all that matters.
An afternoon spent with this amazing woman, who drove a total of 18 hours this weekend, with her three children, to spend a few hours with friends. Priceless she said in her post and I have to say, I fully agree. At the end of the afternoon, we both stood there, continuing to talk, not wanting to leave the mall, even though the reality was, we were both going home to change, to then have dinner together. But she knows, as well as I do, how precious these minutes can be.
Dinner at a cozy restaurant with four friends. A conversation that covered a little bit of everything. Simple, easy, fun. Trying to hug people enough times until we meet again.
A day spent talking with friends, about sleep training, how fast the newborn phase goes and laughing about the most coveted baby toy on the market sounding exactly like a dog toy. Nom’ing on tiny baby cheeks.
Playing swords with two crazy little kids one night. Watching him play soccer a few times. Laughing as she does crazy things, such as eating an entire spoonful of butter at brunch, instead of her muffin. Knowing that I adore these kids as much as I could possibly adore kids that aren’t mine.
Was I sad to go home yesterday, yes. I always am. However, I’ve gotten better about it. I know now, there will be a next time. I’ve proved that to myself. These are my people, there will always be a next time.
I drink these moments up. Soak them into me, as deep as they’ll go. All the way to the bones in my toes. I hold onto them, knowing that it will be awhile before the next time. It’s not the same, as if I lived close to all these people, but it’s still great. I’ll take it when I can get it and know, that they are all here for me, even when it’s just over this crazy Internet world.
I have some things I need to tell you all he said. People kept talking. He stood there in front of us until everyone stopped. It only took a minute or two. He had that ability. He had a presence. He wasn’t super tall. He was rather skinny. He didn’t raise his voice. He just had a presence.
When he had our attention, he said: so I need to be honest with you all. This year, this class, all of you, will be the last children I ever teach. At the end of the year I will retire.
I remember being shocked. He was the most loved teacher in our school. He was old, but not old. My mom now says, he was only in his late 40′s at the time. He was tough and real and never took shit from anyone. But the entire school wanted to be in his class. The staff loved him, all the parents loved him, he was that guy. The guy that you hope knows your name. He taught fifth grade. We were ten years old. I remember wanting to be in his class from second grade on.
He continued talking.
This year is my last year teaching, because I have a disease called ALS. Also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. I am one of Jerry’s kids. He explained to us his disease. Explained how it would debilitate him slowly. That it attacks your muscles and would eventually attack his heart and lung muscles. He explained what being one of Jerry’s kids meant. Most of us sat there and cried. I found out this summer, he told us. They’d been testing me for various things for a year. We figure I’ve had it for up to five years.
The kid next to me raised his hand. He was the morbid kid. I’d swear there was one in every class. Jeremy was ours. The kid who read Stephen King Novels at recess. We all made fun of him for that. His death and dying weird fascination, I think made us all nervous. (Then again, he’s a heart surgeon now and probably makes more money than the rest of the class, so um Jeremy? I’m sorry. Yay Stephen King novels at ten years old.) That day though, he asked the question we all wanted to ask. Are you dying?
Yes, was the answer. But you know, we are all dying. One day, we all die. I’m a lot older than any of you. It’s just god’s plan. I guarantee you though, I won’t die on you this year.
I could have stopped teaching, he said. But I thought to myself, if I have three good years left, which is what they tell me, I want one more year to influence you all. I want one more year to do some good in the world. To teach you. Teaching has always been my favorite thing to do. I will do it for one more year and then I will travel with my wife and children for however long I am able.
I picked each of you by hand. The 22 of you in this class need to know, that I hand picked you. They don’t normally let us do that, pick kids ourselves. Normally what happens is your teachers from last year get together and place you in the following years classes. Yet this year they let me. Each of you is here for a reason. You don’t have to know why, just know I wanted the honor of teaching you all.
Then he answered some questions, explained to us that all of our parents would be in the class at various times helping out and then he moved onto our math lesson. Oh wait, one more thing he said…..sometimes I can’t feel my boogers. So y’all just tell me if you see them okay? We all laughed. The fact alone was that a teacher just said boogers out loud. It was funny. It broke the ice. He in one sentence went from being the guy who is dying, back to being our silly teacher.
Mr. A was a great teacher. He was insane though. Or insane to a ten year olds mind. He made us learn Square Dancing. One day a week (the day without art, gym or computer class) for the entire year, he made us Square Dance. He was convinced we may need it later in life. It’s very popular don’t you know? Square Dancing. Snort. We never got to pick out own dance mate. He did it for us. Square Dancing at ten years old. It was torture.
He made us sit in desk groups of four. Two boys and two girls to a group. If you were a girl, you had a boy next to you and across from you. Every few weeks, we’d come in on a Monday and he’d of completely rearranged them again. We’d get to play the fun game of, find your desk again.
Once a week a parent came in and did some type of project with us. My mom did paper mache somethings. I can’t remember what, but I remember doing it. Others did science projects, cooking class, music….one woman even tried to teach us yoga.
Mr. A threw major Halloween, Christmas and Valentines day parties. We learned how to make Latkes for Hanukkah. We made kites for Chinese New Year. He thought any holiday deserved to be celebrated, so we celebrated them all. We’d learn about it one week and then the next week, all extra activities would be about it.
He took us, along with a ton of parents, camping for three days at the end of the year. He said it was good life training for us city kids. We needed to learn about dirt, trees and rocks. No other class or teacher did that. We all raised the money for this ourselves. We ran bake sales. We washed cars. It was a major class project.
If we went and told him a boy was teasing us, he’d say, awwww he’s just sweet on you, you go on now and tell him thank you. Ha. We never got sympathy on that.
He told us stories of “back in the day”. He could have written for Bill Cosby. Seriously.
He made us act out the stories we read. He made each of us, read out loud and take turns writing things on the board.
He didn’t tolerate back-talking, name calling, fighting or the petty drama that ten year old girls tend to thrive on, in his class.
He knew all of our parents and siblings by name.
He was a great teacher. I strove to get all A’s in his class, even though I had trouble with math and spelling that year. We all strove for greatness in his class. Not because he was sick, but because he believed in us. He believed we could be great. He believed in us. In turn, we believed in him. I’ve never since had that great of a teacher. I’ve had quite a few good ones, but none that I’d call great.
He did exactly what he said. He taught us for that last year and then he took off in an RV for nearly 18 months with his wife and two grown children. He lived in my neighborhood, so I saw him a few more times once they got back. Each time he looked more like an 80 year old man, than a man around 50. When he passed away, halfway through my 8th grade year, 700 people showed up at his funeral. 700 people. Family, friends, teachers, students old and young, showed up to pay their respects. They literally closed school that day.
20 years later and I remember him and that year, more than any school year prior. The man left his mark.
We’d just arrived in Vegas. Literally, I believe we were on a tram to baggage claim, when we over heard the conversation. “Can you believe we saw Brad? Isn’t he fine as shit in person? No one will believe us, you know? I wish I could have watched them film longer. I wonder when the movie comes out. Around Christmas would be my guess. Who knows? What are they calling that flick again? Ocean’s Eleven.”
Kate and Emmy and I looked at each other. We knew right then and there, we had to find them. Our husbands and boyfriends rolled their eyes at us. It was my 21st birthday weekend. Our first trip to Vegas, where all of us were actually legal. Not our first trip mind you, just our first legal trip. We did all the regular things you’d expect on a birthday weekend. Drank 3ft margaritas. Rode roller coasters. Went to clubs. Danced. Danced. Drank. Danced some more. Gambled a bit.
We looked for them everywhere we went. Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, George Clooney. We knew who was going to be in that movie. You don’t live in West Los Angeles and not hear rumors. We never found them. Best memories of my 21st birthday weekend however, are from looking for them. We were convinced we’d find them. It made the weekend more exciting. You never knew what could have happened.
On the cab ride back to the airport, the cabbie says: did you hear about the movie Brad Pitt was filming? Yeah, they finished three days ago. It was pretty exciting. Turns out, they’d left the day we arrived. We spend three days looking for people who’d already left. We laughed our asses off the rest of the way to the airport.
***************************
It was one of those vacations that I didn’t really mind as a kid. My siblings did, but I never minded. Long car days were fun for me. It meant I had a reason to wear headphones, read books and ignore the world. I liked that. It was the way I got along with my dad and step-mom best.
I was twelve that year. We were a day from home, when the car broke down. In Death Valley. In August. It had to of been 112 degrees outside. My dad is a mechanic. Normally he could fix anything. We could tell by the way he was swearing and kicking the car, that he couldn’t fix this.
Like magic, a tow truck driver pulled up. No idea why, but he showed up, just happened to be driving by. We’d only been sitting there for ten minutes. He towed us to his town. Three kids in his front seat, singing They Might Be Giants, Little Birdhouse in Your Soul to him. My parents paid him in beer.
Tonopah, Nevada. That was his town. It’s as exciting, as it sounds. It had one hotel, where we took up residence for nearly a week. Turns out a transmission on an old Suburban has to be ordered. To save time, my dad had it ordered to his shop in LA and had my aunt drive it to us. Yes, this was saving time.
We spent five days there. We roller bladed in the hallways during the day. We swam in the pool in the evenings. We ate three meals a day at the only restaurant. My step-mom didn’t care when we ordered mozzarella sticks for lunch, or pancakes for dinner. The waitress gave us shit for ruining her coffee every single morning. We spent tons of my dads money on video games at the restaurant/casino/game room.
The woman who ran the hotel, took pity on my parents and brought us her VCR and her grand-kids videos, as well as a ton of bored games to play.
In truth, that was the best vacation we’d had with them, in years.
************************
We were playing in the garage when we found it. One of those old Pepsi tins, stuffed full of money. Folded up fives and tens. Rolled up ones. Crumpled twenties. The thing was completely full.
What do we do, my brother asked me? We show grandpa. It’s his garage, it has to be his money. Maybe he lost it. We went in the house and made him come outside with us. He was a gruff old man. He loved us, you could tell, but he was tired of kids being around by then. We were interrupting his nap time. He was about 85 years old and we were his great-grandchildren. I was probably only seven years old, which would have made my brother barely five.
His eyes got all big when he saw the money. Oh now, what do we have here, he asked? We told him how we’d been playing and the ball had bounced too high and well we climbed up to get it and found this tin.
Did I ever tell you about the pirates? The pirates, oh those pirates. You could see the twinkle in his eye, as he told us this story. I bet this was their money once upon a time. Pirates Grandpa, I asked? In Texas, really? Well why do you suppose this town is called Wichita Falls? Because of the falls at Lucy Park, I said? Oh no, that is just what’s left. Once, there was a great ocean here. The falls were huge. Like that place up north, those Niagara falls. Yeah, like that. That was back when I was a boy, back when pirates roamed freely. You had to be careful around them, because some weren’t all that nice. See this scar here? He lifted up his shirt sleeve. This was from a fight with a pirate. Dirty rotten scoundrel. Thought his chips should be free. I wasn’t scared of that one eyed man. Anyhow, somehow when they left, they just took the ocean with them. It’s been all hot here ever since. Bet this money was theirs, he said. Well it’s ours now.
Truth was, he only used cash. He always had mom and pop type shops. Potato chips, pies, Christmas trees, handyman…he’s done it all and sold it all. They’d have a little shop and when it got to where he and Grandma couldn’t run it themselves, they’d sell it off. He didn’t like to have employees. Too much work, he’d say. He dealt only in cash. He’d forgotten about that tin, I’m sure. He used to have them all over the house and some probably buried in the backyard. Until my uncle made him take it all to the bank.
That day, he gave us each ten dollars as a finders fee.
We weren’t around him much after that and he died about two years later. This memory is my defining memory of him. Pirates in North Texas. Snort.
You can see past memories HERE, if you’d like.
A photo tells a tale, if you listen close enough. That’s what I tell my girls when they ask me about certain photos hanging on our wall. When they were toddlers and I’d grown tired of reading Blueberries for Sal and The Giving Tree for the nine millionth time that week, I’d have them pick a picture off the wall and I’d tell them the story behind it.
If you remember someone, they are never really gone.
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A portrait, taken sometime in the mid-30′s. Sepia toned. A nice looking woman. You can tell by the quality of the photograph, the look in her eye, the pretty outfit and the pearls around her neck, that she came from a wealthier family. She could be any one’s relative. She’s mine though. My great-grandmother.
What you can’t see is what tells the story. Even if she were alive now, she’d tell you that the photo was a long ago memory of a life that barely existed much past the photo being taken.
She lived in Poland at the time. She was married. She had not yet had her first son, my grandfather. This was German invading Poland. This was before her husband would be killed, before her father would force her to leave in the night with her five year old and newborn sons. Before she’d make a year long trek to America, leaving behind everything she knew.
You can’t see that this was one of only a handful of photos that made the trip. Somehow this is the youngest photo I have of her. I’m sure there were others at one time, but this is the last one remaining.
She looks strong. She looks like the type of woman you didn’t cross. The kind of woman, who could give children that look. The look that meant knock it off this very second, or you may not live to see tomorrow.
You can’t see the woman who would tell her grandson one day, you better treat this girl right, she’s special. She was talking about my mom. She adored my mom and my mom adored her right back.
The woman in that photo was strong willed. She was opinionated. She had her entire life ahead of her.
Then again, to you, it may be just an old photo.
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Her and him. Us. It was Christmas. I was two and a half. They were just six months old. It’s a little blurry, as all pictures taken by my grandpa were. The couch is old, one of those multi colored ones from the 70′s. You can tell by looking at it, by the colors, the fabric. The tree is in the background, or you’d think it was summer, by our clothes. Of course in southern California, even Christmas can be shorts weather.
Five people squashed together in a photo. Such a small thing. A little 3×5 photo. A mom, a dad, three babies. I’m on his lap, she has one baby on hers and the other is propped up in between them. I’m not sure which is which. I’m not sure my mother could tell you at this point.
This is it. The only picture in existence of the five of us. My proof that we once existed, our family.
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A princess and a pumpkin. A tiny girl princess, all dressed in pink. A new baby pumpkin, with chubby baby cheeks. Sitting on a green couch. In the photo, the princess is leaning over and kissing the pumpkin. Adorable. Absolutely adorable.
Funny story about that day? I was convinced we should have dressed the princess as a devil instead. I remember saying, we are NEVER having Halloween again. NEVER.
That was the day, the first time of four times at least, that the princess cut her own hair. Badly. That was a day of a three hour tantrum, when I couldn’t make her hair grow back, like they do on Dora. That was the day that I threw out the Dora DVDs. All of them. The books and toys too. The day I outlawed Dora in my house. That was a day alright.
Somehow though, we still went out. We took our princess and pumpkin to a party. The princess dazzled everyone by being the charming princess that I knew she had in her. Somehow? It ended up okay.
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I think he was three at the time. Maybe it was the summer he turned four. Little bowl haircut. Yellow and red cape. Sitting on a little black and green Power Wheels trike. You remember those? The little three wheel ones? They sat so low to the ground. He is sticking his tongue out at her, as he always did. I believe every picture of my brother from two to twelve, he was making a face.
He was riding around the pool. We weren’t supposed too, but my aunt was watching us that week. We failed to mention that rule.
That photo was minutes before he and the trike fell in. Her back was turned when it happened. She was sitting talking on the phone, smoking her cigarettes. Luckily her son, my sixteen year old cousin jumped in and fished him out.
He was fine. No one told my mom for years. Man was she pissed when she found out. My brother told her, what mom? I’m alive. How does it matter now? Ah, a person unfamiliar with the what-if game.
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Black and white photo. Taken in 1972. She’s leaning against the hood of a car. If I were a car person, I could tell you what kind. But alas, I am not.
It’s a long skinny photo. It took me years to find a frame for it.
Long hair, clothes right out of That 70′s Show. It’s the carefree look in her eyes, the smile that I’d assume was for the boy taking the photo, that makes me love it. A woman I know possibly as well as I know myself, yet a woman I’ll never know. My mother. Before she was my mother. Before she’d even met my dad.
Innocence. Carefree. Beautiful. My mom at eighteen.
It’s one of my favorite photos of her ever.
He talked in a quiet voice as he showed us around. It was almost finished. An impressive building on a big lot. He walked us through rooms, bathrooms, playrooms and kitchens. Each new room, he asked us something. What do you think of the paint color? Aren’t these windows nice? This refrigerator is the nicest brand there is. He looked at us for our reaction to all of it. It was so unlike him, that it kind of unnerved me. He was the strong, silent type generally. He spoke more to us in that house, than he did in the following three days.
The flooring was still covered in plastic. The smell of fresh paint in the air. Each of the bedrooms was pained a different color. It was a hot day, but the AC wasn’t on yet. Every window in the place was open. There wasn’t any furniture, but he told us it was waiting to be delivered. Just waiting for the paint to dry, he said. He told us what kinds of furniture he had for each room.
Then he showed us a few other small hidden rooms. One was the tornado shelter, which is common in Texas. The other was a panic room. A room that could be locked on the inside. It had a phone, and shelving. There were gallon jugs of water in it, but nothing else yet. There was still lots of space on the shelves. It was the first time I’d heard of one (pre Jodie Foster movie) and the only time I’ve ever seen a real one.
I knew why it was there. I’d seen the bruises on my aunt. I remembered the night, two summers prior, when my mom and Grandpa left in an instant and came back a few hours later with my aunt and her four kids. All of whom were beaten and bruised. At that time though, my brother would have only been seven maybe and I don’t think he’d been old enough to get it. I knew what the house meant, what it stood for. I knew why he’d built it for free.
My brother didn’t. Grandpa explained it to him. He showed him the room. He explained why. Why the room needed to be there. Why the locks were on the inside. Why there was a phone in it, a phone that had it’s very own line. Why we would never see the house again. Why he would never talk about it in a newspaper, or bring it up at church or the Officer’s Club at lunch on Sunday.
It’s for the women and children, son. He choose his words carefully, but he was brutally honest. So only girls will be allowed here, he asked? Well no, some little boys too, I’d bet…but no men. Never any men, unless they are fixing things.
Well if no men can come in, why did you build this special room? Just in case. I built it, so that every woman and every child who ever comes here, can sleep a bit easier, knowing it’s here if they need it.
He did a lot of things wrong in his life, or so he’d tell you if you asked him. I wasn’t patient enough. I was too hard on your mom, on all my kids. I had a temper. I didn’t know how to be a dad. I didn’t know that just providing for them wasn’t enough. I could be an angry man on occasion. I’ve said dumb and rude things to your grandmother. He always told us, people aren’t perfect and he’d never been perfect. That he wasn’t perfect now, he’d never been perfect and he was sure he wouldn’t be tomorrow.
But women and children should always be safe.
My Grandpa, he’s been gone 21 months now. He died two weeks before Harrison was even born. But he made this world a safer place for as many people as he could. He left behind a legacy. Five daughters, one son. Fifteen grandchildren, too many great grandchildren to name. 350 people showed up to pay their last respects to the man, because he was that man. The man you could count on. The man who kept his word. The man who showed up for church early to see if anyone needed to be picked up. The one who showed up with groceries for a wife, when he knew the husband had taken off the week prior. The man who would take bikes that we outgrew, to children in the poorer parts of town. He was that man. The one who had forty rental houses and kept them all in pristine condition, as if each family who lived there were his own wife and children. If I’m in his town and meet someone, chances are, they either knew my Grandfather, or have at least heard of him. Oh you’re his granddaughter? Oh it’s so nice to meet you. Your Grandfather was a great man. Yes, that he was.
It’s always followed by a story of how he helped them out this one time, or how he helped out someone in their family this one time. Always.
He also left behind one beautiful shelter, one safe haven in this world, that wouldn’t have been here, if it weren’t for him.
I sometimes wonder why he showed it to us and no one else. My own mother never saw it. She knew about it, but he never took her to see it. I am not even sure my Grandmother ever saw it. Maybe it was just that day he happened to need to go there and he happened to have the two of us with him. Maybe he wanted to someone to understand and we were the most receptive. We were young enough to not be so jaded and think that he was wasting money, yet old enough to understand. Maybe we were just his favorites. Snort. It doesn’t matter, I’m just grateful that he showed us.
I know I write about him a lot. In these memory posts; in general. Outside of my mother though? He is the person who made the greatest difference in my life. I miss him. So, I write about him. To always remember.
We all decided to show up for Thanksgiving. We knew Grandma’s cancer had spread. We knew it may be the last year her and Grandpa would both be around for the holidays. We all showed up. All of their six kids. All fifteen grandchildren. Great-grandchildren.
The blizzard hit the day before we left. I can’t not go, I told Logan. We have to go. I don’t care how long it takes us to get there, we are going. We packed the car that night and left at 4am Wednesday morning, the day before Thanksgiving. It took us seven hours to get 150 miles. By the time we got out of Colorado, I believe I’d heard the Simpson’s movie play in the backseat twice and Shrek 2, three times.
Doesn’t matter really. Didn’t matter how long it took us. We gave the girls tons of junk. I literally threw sugar back at them all day. I didn’t care. We made it.
The look on their faces, on Thanksgiving, when they walked into a house full of family? Was priceless. I’ll never forget that day. I’ll never forget how little he looked. How she smiled when Morgan showed her how she could play the piano. That day was the last time I heard him say more than one word at a time. That was the night he had the stroke.
It was worth it. To be there that day. To be in a room filled with the craziest people around. People that don’t get alone. People who do get along. Drama put aside for one day. To surprise them. One last time.
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Six kids sitting in various places on top of the car. Beetle Juice at the Drive-In on a Saturday night. I couldn’t have been more that seven years old. We had blankets and snacks. Popcorn, orange soda and Twizzlers. My first Drive-In experience. We saw more movies there than I can count. Went at least once a month until they closed it down when I was in High School. But this was the first time for all of us.
Beetle Juice, Beetle Juice, Beetle Juice.
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If you can’t drive this car the right way, pull it over right now. I was a touch bossy. He yanked the steering wheel and the car swerved and hit a truck.
He was two. I was almost five. We had been parked on the top of a hill. My mom had gotten out to put something inside the house. She’d removed the keys. However, she had also let us both out of our car seats. We, of course, had climbed in the front. He was pretending to drive and somehow pulled the car out of park.
We hit a truck, about halfway down the block. My mom was literally running after the car. We hadn’t had time to get going to fast and the damage was minimal. The owner of the truck was pissed though. Called the cops on my mom and everything. I don’t remember much of it. I remember telling him to pull over if he couldn’t drive. I remember the woman going bat shit crazy on the cops who laughed at her. Her truck had expired plates, it hadn’t moved in three years and she herself had unpaid tickets.
I possibly saved us. By being bossy. The end of the street was a hugely busy street. If we’d kept going, we’d of gained speed and most likely gotten hit by both sides.
When my brother tells me I’m being too bossy, I remind him of this. Then I remind him that someone who is dumb enough to run into a parked car, isn’t one who gets to talk.
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He throws himself on the ground. It’s very difficult being 20 months old, you know. He is not really crying, but trying to act like he is. He’s not really screaming much, just saying no mama, over and over again. He is flailing about. After a minute or two, he stops. He looks around, to see who is paying attention. When he realizes no one is, he gets up, walks over to his train table and starts playing.
A tantrum is only worth it to him, if he has an audience. My boy, he likes his professional audience.If he’s not getting a laugh, or if someone isn’t available for clapping purposes…well then he’s not sure he’s interested.
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Oooohhh, poohhh qwuirly.
What is she saying, I asked Logan? I have no idea, he said. She’s been saying it all day. Say that again baby, mama doesn’t understand. Oohhh pooohhh qwuirly. Uh huh. Maybe we don’t need to know.
Driving from Los Angeles to Denver for vacation. She was about to turn two. It took us two entire days to realize that she said that whenever she saw road kill. Oh poor squirrely was what she was saying. I believe she thought it was the squirrel from Ice Age.
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