Memories

In the nearly two years that followed Mothers’ death we had a series of housekeepers. None really did much more than keep house and watch the younger kids who weren’t in school. Our first, after Mother died, was a young import, Vera from Holland, who spoke almost no English, drank beer all day and wore spike heels with short shorts and tight spandex tops.   She didn't even try to keep house. She would give us money and tell us to go to the Quick Shop, about a mile away and buy her cigarettes and “pils”.   Back then we could buy the cigarettes for her and sometimes even the beer.   Not much of a cook either; once she made us scrambled eggs and she put lettuce in with the eggs.   I’m not sure of her longevity at our house but she was gone quite abruptly after my sister and I found her in her underwear, passed out on my dad's bed.   Dad was there, too, so I was sure her "crime" wasn't trespassing. Up until the day my mother died our life had been somewhat...

          I’m sure that my life would have been a lot different had my mother not died when I was 12 years old. She loved her gardening and had been planting pansies the previous afternoon when she complained of pain in her chest and shortness of breath. Dad drove her to the hospital and stayed with her for a long time. We went to bed that night, not knowing of her condition, but not really worrying that there was a serious problem. I remember waking up to the sound of the telephone before the sun had risen that spring morning.   Dad dressed and left in a hurry but said nothing to us.             There were seven kids in our family now, ages 14 on down to about 2. Some of us got up and got ready for school. The youngest kids were cared for by a neighbor. Three of us went to Our Lady of Fatima because Mother wanted us to be Catholic. As a Foreman for a Ford Motor Company assembly plant ou...

Correlation on Violent Acts A story I read a while ago about the expected gun violence over the Memorial Day weekend in Chicago delved into “why” it is what it is and “how” to fix it.  It stated, in simple terms, that the gang bangers who perpetrate a vast majority of the shootings come from an environment where there is little hope for a good education and a resulting opportunity for success in the workforce.  The kids growing up in that environment may not get the kind of guidance and support that others of us get and are sent to school, in some cases, to get them out of the house and into a place where its somebody else’s responsibility to teach them right from wrong as well as their ABC’s.  So they muddle through in mediocrity; some making it to graduation while others just drop out and become invisible.  With no prospects for the life they see out there in the media and no power to change things in their lives they find comfort with others like themselv...

Dad left Illinois during the latter part of WWII and joined the Merchant Marines.  He sailed out of New Orleans, primarily to the Caribbean, Central and South America, avoiding the war altogether. After the war he met my mother, married her and he bought a liquor store on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter.   At some point he sold the business and they moved back to Illinois.  My parents started having children while still in New Orleans. Both my sister Elizabeth and I were born there.  All of the others; Sue, Jane, Leslie, Carl and Don were born after we moved to the mid-west.   Big families were more common back in the day, especially for Catholics. Mother's side of the family were all from New Orleans.  My Grandmother was of German descent named Olga Voelkel.  We all called her Gannie, even after we grew up.  Her first husband was Jewish, named Nathan Dreyfus. We called him Grand Father.  They had two daughters and then divor...

The Howard side of my family was a typical white, conservative, blue collar family with roots in central Missouri and eastern Illinois near St. Louis.  My grandparents had four sons and a daughter in the 1920's living in and around the little towns of Madison and Granite City, Illinois.  They were Bill Jr, the oldest, then Don, my dad, then Frank, Dave and Shirley, the little sister.  Grandpa's side of the family was from Madison.  Grandma's people, the Carr family, were from the Eminence, Missouri area about 150 miles southwest of St. Louis, at the entrance to the Ozarks. My memories of my grandpa and grandma are limited since they picked up and moved to California when I was about 5 or 6 years old, and we rarely saw them after that move.  By that time all of their kids were grown and were having families of their own and only our family and Uncle Bill's family were in the area.   Grandpa became the proprietor of a dry-cleaning business in Rive...

Over the past few years I have begun to recall so many things that have happened during my life.  Most of it has been very good as I have done well.  I have achieved.  I have thrived.  Most of it has been interesting and memorable (to me), and some of it has been bad for me and for others who are, or were in my life at the time.  I could say that everything good was because of my effort and all the bad was someone else fault but that would be dishonest.  Most of what is bad is definitely my fault even though others may have played a part in it.  Bad decisions have bad consequences most of the time.  My blog is only to remember it, to record it, and to pass along a few life lessons. So I will start adding to this on a semi-regular basis.  I will include snippets of experiences that I've had that made an impression on me.  Some of it will be just opinions on controversial issues from the past and current events.  You may not agree a...