I have nothing wise to say. The picture says it all.

 

Kat is almost 26. She has so much in her. I wonder where she got it.
She has more guts and intelligence than either of her parents. She has learned not to stuff her emotions which has caused her parents so much grief. I could learn a lot from that girl. I have done a lot of stupid things in this world, but she is NOT one of them.

 


This picture is of my friend Ken and me. I visited him when he was in Houston working as an entertainer at Six Flags in 1976.
The shirt he is wearing is one I bought him. I thought it was pretty smashing. He was a good friend while I was in college and we still keep in touch. I was able to visit with him when I took a trip I won to New York City a few years ago. Can you believe I thought I was fat? What was I thinking??

 

This picture of is my parents (on the right) and two men I do not know. It was taken in 1949. They were at the Sinaloa club in San Francisco. When I googled the club, I found it was a very popular Mexican club that served good food and great music.

Going thru a bunch of family pics

 


I have been going through family pictures and scanning onto a cd. It has taken almost 20 years for me to
be able to do this. Everytime I tried to open the trunks that held the pictures, I would open it up and quickly close it back again. Finally, time has soothed the rough edges of grief and I can look at the pictures with a smile instead of tears. It is a journey that I need to take.

This picture is of my parents, taken in 1949 on a sales trip to California.

I am posting a few for mostly myself, but hope a friend or two will look with me.

Be sure to bid...once in a lifetime chance to own a piece of history

War or disease...take your your pick

Gee, and I thought all I had to worry about was what kind of hand sanitizer to buy!

So, How was your day??

In a hidden and poor, neglected part of town there is a small and very lackluster Pentecostal church. The church is nestled amid small, cramped homes and large factories. If you did not know the area, you might not find it. The church is made of cement block and sits at the corner of the block. I drove around twice before I could figure out that the front door is the back door. The church parking lot is fenced with a large gate. The lot was bare of grass and had 3 older cars parked by the door. The air conditioners against the church’s outside wall had a locked chain link fence around them with razor wire on top. In this rundown area, west of the river and filled with other small rundown houses, the AC’s copper pipes are as dear as gold. As I walked into the church, I was faced with two closed doors. One was marked with someone’s name, as it is in Spanish, I have no clue. This church was not made for Sunday school or singles night. This church had one purpose; to give its parishioners a place to pray and praise God. The other door had no label, but I decide this is the room I must to enter. HAVE to enter, because I really do not want to go into that room, but with a hesitant turn of the door’s handle, I ease into the room. I almost hope I am in the wrong place, could turn away and say, “Well, I tried.” to go home to my dinner and bed. The room is dark and cool and I turn my eyes to the right to avoid the unavoidable on my left and face 3 Hispanic women sitting in the pews with fans of newspaper waving in the air…waiting, waiting, waiting. I am in the right place. I look for a familiar face, but was greeted by unfamiliar faces with curious eyes. I said “Buenos Dias” (part of my very limited Spanish vocabulary) and am greeted with “Buenos Tardes”. Sigh, knew I had it wrong, but at least I tried as I repeated the correct phrase and smiled at the three as they returned the smile. Finally, I can wait no longer and I look to my left…and turned my head towards the altar area to see what I had been avoiding; a small white coffin…barely 30 inches long. I take 5 steps and I am at the side of the coffin. In that room, it is the only spark of light and color. The women I had smiled at were in dark clothes, the pews were a dark,dirty and the floors painted a black brown. The walls were concrete and painted light brown. The windows were draped. Peeking out of the coffin was a soft, pink bunny rabbit propped against a little brown girl in a girly, pink dress. Her hair was combed up and back into soft, brown tresses. Her eyes were closed and at peace. Her small cheeks plump and pink against the brown skin. I touched the rabbit and brushed its soft fur and gently touched the arm of the child. As I stood I wondered that I had never seen her without all the tubes and wires of the medical equipment that had tied her to her room as they fed and breathed for her. For over a year she never left her room except to go to the doctor. Her parents tied to the home with a child who would never talk or walk…their only child in this country. I am almost grateful her parents are not here. I was not sure I could stand the pain I knew would be in their eyes; the sadness that I will be there in one way or another for the rest of their lives. What can one say to a parent who has just lost their child? I have comforting words before to other families and they always felt so flat and empty. What words can take that pain away? I stand for a few more minutes and then turn to leave. Quickly, I leave the room to go outside into the Oklahoma August heat and get into my car. I turn the air conditioning up and the CD on high. As I drive out of that small parking lot and turn away from the church, I say a silent prayer for them and for myself. I listen to the music of my CD and try to drown out the sight of that child who will never grow up.

 

http://applephoneshow.com/

My new Mantra

"People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never
forget how you made them feel."

Maya Angelou

July 5th

Had a wonderful night last night!
Good friends and good food.
Then disaster struck....daughter took my only lighter this am.
Damn.

Feeling my age!

Got up and dressed. Bent over to put on my shoes and sneezed while bent! Instant back pain.
Crap, have not had this kind of pain in months. Called in to work and am now home with heating pad and advil.

Decided to catch up on my email and found this site:
http://www.evanwashere.com/StolenSidekick/ (click TEXT to open new page for site)
TEXT

Let me know what you think.

1964 1/2 Mustang

 

My new bike

 

The Day After

Well, yesterday was the 16th anniversary of my 39th birthday! Yippee, skippee! It is official, I now qualify for all of those wonderful discounts that "senior citizens" drool over. I can shop Ross Dress for Less on Tues. for an extra percent off, I can go to the movies cheaper and eat those wonderful senior citizen meals that Denny's offers. Can't wait to start looking for other ss deals.

My tongue is screwed very tightly into my cheek at this point!!

The Gary and his mother surprised me with a wonderful gift. I now have a brand new and very shiny Schwinn, Jaguar bike sitting in my livingroom! Now if I can just remember how to ride one. I truly love it. My dear daughter, Kat is drooling over it and is sure she will be riding it soon. Does anyone know how to size a bike helmet? When I learned to ride a bike, we didn't wear them...not sure they even made bike helmets WAY back then. I did not learn to ride a bike until I was 12. I had one with training wheels at one point, but never got past that point when it disappeared. So at the advanced age of 12, I took the plunge and a friend taught me. Unfortunately, she lived in a trailer park and the the pavement was gravel. I picked pieces of that crap out of my body for days. But ride, I did. They lived somewhere by the airport and we decided to trek that way. We rode about 14 miles that day and then I spent the next week walking with a funny gait. I remember being very proud of myself.

I traded that bike in for a 1964 blue Mustang at the age of 16. My mother had divorced my stepfather, Frank Doubek and she kept custody of the Mustang. I loved that car. It was turquoise, sleek and a blast to drive. I was living with my grandmother at the time and we fought over when and where I could drive the car. I was limited to taking her on her errands, which really sucked. She had quit driving during WW II when rationing was going strong for gas and tires. She put her car up on blocks and never picked up a set of car keys again. Somehow, she could not understand why I wanted to drive to school instead of taking the school bus! Hated that damn bus. Really frustrating, it might have made me a little more popular at school (or not), but I never got a chance to find out.

All in all it was a great birthday, even if it was my55th.

Later.

Father's day and birthdays

On Tuesday, I will be 55! How in the hell did I get here and who is that old woman in the mirror?

Thought about calling my father today and then thought better of it as he has not called me in over 20 years. Tomorrow is my half brother's birthday and mine is the day aften and then the next day is my father's. Always thought it was a cruel coincidence that they would be so close. I imagine that they will celebrate my half brother's birthday today (45th).

Had a nice hour with John Long last night and he mentioned that he thought it interesting that the majority of our group is either the oldest or only child. Many of the group had or has a father that only a mother could love, so to speak. I have not figured out exactly what that means, if anything. I do know that those of my friends club are bright, verbal and often caustic. Which is why I love them. I also know that the parents we receive is truly is the luck of the draw. My mother always made me feel loved and special, so I am very lucky there. My children have both parents in their lives, but their father was an alcoholic for most of their lives. He is doing better now, but I fear that it has left a deep depression that they will have to work through as they age. Co-dependency runs deep in my family!



So happy birthday Johnny, Jr and Johnny, Sr. Happy father's day, Dad. I wish you could have loved me more.

I am pissed

The birthday boy called us today. It seems that in the two hours no one was in their apt. his laptop and camera were stolen. He will survive from all of this, but it sure sucks. I hurt for him and wish I could still make all the hurts go away by rocking him and tucking him in bed. Dammit, his apt. is on the third floor of a locked in complex. I hope the person that robbed him finds himself in the middle of a block when a huge semi knocks him into oblivion. I hope he burns in the hell I usually don't believe in and is poked with live electrical wires. Well, I feel a little better now.
Just a little.....still want to rock my son to sleep and tuck him in bed.

Some of Zack's Pictures

When I met Zack he was out of college and not doing much of anything (unless you call carousing and drinking anything). But, he was and is an artist. When his life became complicated he quit doing much art. I suggested that he enter some of the work he has done to a local art show. He offered six works and these 3 were accepted. He is in shock, I think. He has never had any art on display at an art venue since in college. I hope this gives him the push to continue.
RJ

Story of friends

When I was a youngun' I was alone a lot. We moved from town to town so that my no good father could fleece ( to defraud of money or property; swindle) another whoever out of whatever he could. We might be there a week or a month or even through one semester of school. It is really hard to make friends when you are on the move that often. I was either ahead or behind in school.
I think by the time I hit 7th grade I had been to 12-15 schools in either OK or TX. Because we moved so much, I didn't have a chance to make any long term friendships. Books were my friends and I read any and everything I could put my hands on. I loved comic books, because they were transportable and eaily read in the backseat of a car. My cousins were really, really poor and whenever we visited, I was popular because of the comics. I never had any left by the time the visit was over. I was an only child and there were 5 of them. Visiting them was always treat, I used the comics as an entre into their world and they shared theirs with me. We would visit the inevitable outhouse, swim in the local plot of mud, gather blackberries and swat wasps. I learned to love the smell of honeysuckle and the taste of mud pies. After we left, I would look at my sunburned, bug bitten body and hoard the feel of companionship as I sat in the backseat of the car reading my new comic books, listening my my father's inevitable country music coming from the car radio.

So why am I bringing up all this debris of my past? Well, I have friends today. I have some really great friends that make me laugh out loud, give me moral support, piss me off and spread their love over me. Sometimes I feel I am not worthy of them. I feel I am peeking into their lives and not giving them back all the wealth they have given me. Perhaps, it has something to do with all the moves and transitory relationships I had as a child. I do not know, but I do know that now I am so very, very lucky to have these people in my lives.