She's Back

 

I knew it had been a long time since I added to my rather lengthy story but was surprised that it had been since May of last year.  Many readers have asked when I was going to type out another installment but my answer and my intention was always that I was getting there.

To say it has been an interesting year is an understatement for all of us.  Last year at this time I came down with COVID before the small rural hospital or actually anyone knew what it was.  After two days of them doing nothing, trying to eat cold food with no taste or smell I pulled out the IV, got dressed and had Marshell take me home.  On my way out the door of the hospital the idiot doctor yelled at me that I would probably die. I went home.  Nice! No need to go back there again.  So I have spent a year dealing with the after effects and being very busy.

Being busy was a great thing.  Between the Ardmore Little Theater, plays, costumes and a lot of nice people I managed to keep going. I also had my little furniture painting business, a Board member of the Pauls Valley Library, a huge building/house to take care of and a family.  How could I give up and sit in a chair and feel sorry for myself?  How I got to 2022 from 1989 will start to unfold in the the new series of blogs starting next week.

If you are new to reading my stories it may be impossible to catch up as there are 244 of them.  Some are good, some not as good as they could have been depending on my mood when I wrote them.  We all want to look to the world as reasonable, sane people. It is one thing to tell a friend some big goof up in your life but to write it down on paper is a little daunting.  Maybe my year off of writing and a year when maybe we all took a step back and made me look at things a little differently.

To my new readers, I started doing this back in 2015 when Marshell (my husband) and I took a trip to the East Coast.  A lifelong friend suggested I write a blog. I asked what a blog was and the trip blog was a nightmare to do.  Somehow in the one week trip that ended up being three weeks I missed doing a blog after I got home.  The subject of the blog was hard to come up with.  Needless to say it could not be about how to fix your computer, the thought of doing child-parenting tips or how to pick the right husband were definetly out of the question. The one subject I knew something about was me. For some odd reason I thought that I had been through enough different careers, husbands, places to live that maybe someone might find them interesting, learn something or just get a laugh out of the stupid antics or decisions I made. 

So, next week I will begin where I left off.  Maybe I quit writng because the subject was hard to write about. Sometime it is easier to write about good things not bad. To stop at this point everyone will miss the chance to marvel at the really hilarious situations, friends and child-parenting schemes I managed to do.

Since I always ended each blog with a little cliff hanger hopefully that will make you take a peek next week.

 

SURPRISE!

                                                                            

                                                                            

When I read that Barney was coming to Detroit to do a seminar I tucked away the problems with Charles.  Through the years I became very adept at compartmentalizing problems that I just could not deal with at the time. There was enough for me to worry about without my throwing what to do about Charles into the mix.

The three weeks between when I found out he was going to be in town  days  seemed to drag by so slowly that that I thought his arrival would never happen.  It wasn't that I didn't have anything to do or that I had time to worry about seeing Barney again after more than three years.  My friend, Claire, had talked me into making custom after-five dresses for her wealthy friends.  One with thousands of hand sewed sequins had to be finished.  There was a baby girl due to be born and her room with miles of ruffles certainly could not be late and it was time to make sample costumes for two Ice Show costumes I had no idea of how to make. Actully busy was good.

If I was going to surprise Barney by just showing up at the seminar I needed to get enrolled.  This one was to be at the Renaissance Center in downtown Detroit.  This a group of seven connected skyscrapers built in 1977 on the Detroit River and very upscale. He had definetly moved up in the world with his speaking engements from the small hotels and conference centers he used to be booked into.  Lucky for me he had given me a free pass years ago so I sent it in using the very silly fake name of Kelly Green.  My confirmation and registration forms arrived the day before the event.

I have to admit that I am the world's worst shopper.  If the economy depended on me to keep it afloat it was certainly out of luck.  I had no idea of what to wear, certainly did not have time to go look for something or make something for myself.  A typical Interior Designer I was not.  Most of them dressed to the hit, drove around in expensive cars, wore a lot of jewerly and proposed very expensive decorating to their clients.  I showed up at a new customer's house in my Bronco II usually in jeans and looked like I was ready to work.  Maybe the way I dressed was the reason I had so much business as they realized they would have to pay a "gold-bangled decorator" more money.

When in doubt about what to wear you should always wear something you love and something you feel great in.  My closet did not have too many things that were sort of dress up to chose from.  As silly as it sounds I picked out my favorite outfit which was a Liz Clairborne red print western skirt and blouse and a pair of boots.  I must admit I got lots of interesting looks when I walked into the RenCen but I felt like a million bucks.

I turned in my registration papers with some information about myself and why I had chosen to come.  The only things on the papers that were not totally true was my name and and why I was interested in investment stratagies. If Barney looked over the registration papers before he started the siminar and saw my real name it would ruin my surprise.  I also chose the least conspicuous chair in the room not that all that worked out so well.

Wow!  When he walked out to the podium after a very glowing introduction it felt like the first time he walked up to the table when we were in college.  He was still as handsome as ever with that beautiful smile and the voice I heard in my head often.  The only thing different was a slight graying in his hair that only made him look more dashing.

To my total dismay the very first thing he did was to call to on everyone one at a time to introduce themselves to the group of about fifty people and state why they had come.  I tried to listen to everyone he called on to see what they had to say so I could come up with some reasonable excuse to be there other than to just see him.  Somehow when he called out "Kelly Green" I almost did not stand up because I did not remember I had used a fake name. Finally after he called my name a second time I stood up, said I was Kelly Green and wanted to learn what investment stragies were since I had no idea. Everyone laughed and he literally could not stop laughing or smiling.  I breathed a sigh of relief as it was obvious he recognized me.

After I sat down he managed to carry on in a very professional manner but there were probably more smiles than he usually flashed during many of these presentations.  He would also stop and ask Kelly if she understood things he was telling us.  I always replied in a positive manner with a smile.  Finally there was a break for refreshments.

I wandered out into the hallway and got a cup of coffee.  One woman came up and asked where I had gotten my darling outfit and not wanting admit I had ordered it from Speigel's catalog I told her it came from Saks.  Always wondered if she went looking for it.  Barney was conversing with several of the other people but kept inching his way closer. I managed to put some distance between myself and the other people and when Barney walked up I just said SURPRISE!  He told me that was an understatement and that he was having a hard time getting through all his speeches.  He also said he had planned on trying to find me the next day and not to jump up and leave when the seminar was over.  I told him I had gone to all the trouble to get there and would stay although I did not think I was learning anything. 

When it was over I hung around looking at brochueres and chatting with some of the people.  One man who appeared to be making a pass told me what a pretty name I had.  I think I got rid of him by being not very friendly and that I was just lucky my parents did not name me Chartreuse.  Barney walked up just as that gentleman made a quick exit. He wanted to know why I used a fake name and I just told him it was all part of the surprise.  He also wondered why I had not called since I had all his information from the ad in the paper. Now what fun would that have been to which he answered that it was difficult to keep lecturing and figuring out that it had been three years, four months and six days since we were together in Philadlephia. 

By the time everyone had cleared out it was really getting late.  I had to decline a trip down stairs to the bar and a trip upstairs to his room.  There was probably a limit as to how late I could come home from an Interior Design seminar. I did wholeheartly agree to a late breakfast the next morning and spending the day with him since his plane did not leave until 4:00 that afternoon.  With a kiss and him saying it was more than he could really hope for in my showing up I drove home wishing I could have stayed.

But there was tomorrow.

Something I Really Should Have Known

Wonder what the odds would have been for me picking up the newspaper that particular evening and actually looking through it and seeing the ad for Barney's seminar?  It had been three and a half years since I had heard from him.  Even that letter took a year to arrive and by that time his contact information had changed.

Needless to say our relationship was perhaps a little different.  It was probably a good thing that we had not communicated in three and a half years as it gave me the time and the space to divorce Dennis and start a new life for myself and the boys.  Things I needed to do by myself without a third party involved.

All of Barney's contact information was in the story about the seminar.  He was still in California but in a different town than the last one I knew about.  It would have been very easy to pick up the phone and call him but maybe a heck of a lot more fun to surprise him. Hopefully it would be a happy surprise if I showed up at the Seminar.  I had three weeks to decide which seemed like an eternity. 

Perhaps I need to digress a bit here. Things had become interesting between Charles and I over the course of the last several months.  My fault for not paying attention or for not admitting that there was a lot I had failed to see before I jumped into a relationship without knowing at least some background.  I knew some basic facts about Charles like how he grew up poor, his business, his children and his ex-wife.  I knew the only vacation he had ever taken out of the country was to Columbia which I thought was strange.  I also knew that he smoked marijuana but figured that was just a habit left over from the 70's. I had actually never tried marijuana, Afterall I grew up in Muskogee. I did once with Charles, got sick, did not like it and never tried it again.  He never smoked it in front of me or the boys.

Charles always had plenty of money.  I surmised that his toupee shop must have done very well as he and his business partner lived very well.  We had a lot of $100.00 dinners at the best restaurants in Detroit, took weeklong ski trips in Northern Michigan and lots of flights back and forth to New York. He was very nice towards both Wes and Wally.  Roller skating together a couple of nights a week and meals at home with the four of us plus Wes's assorted girl friends were always fun.

We had been dating about a year when Charles bought the house behind Wally and mine and it just seemed logical that we should move in with him. It was the late 1980's and everyone was living together.  I guess I was stuck in the 1960's as I really did not feel comfortable living together and not married.  There were times when I would hear Wally stumble in trying to explain to his friends who Charles was.  Usually he mumbled something like "my Mom's friend".  I did not feel like The Mother of the Year in those moments. 

There is really nothing I can complain about in the way Charles treated the boys or me. He decided that Wally needed a bigger bedroom and I needed a sewing room so we were building those in his huge basement. He bought $9.00 a pound cheese for Bowser, our dog, which made the dog adore him. He was a very sharp dresser, extremely neat around the house and a pretty decent cook although nice restaurants were his thing. To make myself feel a little better I actually paid half of his house payment without being asked. But as hard as I tried there were several bothersome items.  His daughters were not overly happy with me being with Charles even though they were grown and lived else where. The house did not feel like home as it was his and decorated in his minimalist style.  But there were other things.

 There was the Corvette. Charles decided to buy a red Corvette but to pay for it he made three $9,000 payments - in cash.  He explained to me that if you paid cash for something over $10,000 it was reported to the IRS.  I let it go at that as I had never seen him use a checkbook except at the shop. But slowly I began to think about the amount of money he and his business partner seemed to have and things were not adding up in a reasonable manner.  The question of where the money came from nagged at me.  I could not see how his toupee shop made the kind of money I was seeing.  Why was the only real vacation he ever took without the family was to Columbia. Drug dealer was the only thing I could come up with.  I didn't think drug dealers liked art museums, snow skiing or any other things we did.  Guess I watched too many movies or television shows where they were really bad looking dudes or I was just my usual naive, stupid self.    

It is much easier to get into a bad situation  than out of the relationship.  Being the most non-confrontal person on the planet there was no way I could just ask him or acuse him. I guess it is always easier to get myself into a mess than to get out of one.  It was also easy to do the Scarlett O'Hara bit and put off thinking about troubling things until tomorrow. I think through the years I had become a master at that.  But I did have a good business even though I never charged enough, a couple of very great friends, an awesome dog and a two pretty cool boys. Life is never all bad.  There are always bright sides to everything. Until now there were only a couple of people who ever heard this story. It was not one of my proudest moments and showed how easily I could fall into really stupid situations.

When I read that Barney was coming to Detroit I could stop worrying about what to do about Charles and enjoy the time I would be able to spend with him.  There was no doubt in my mind that he booked the seminar in Detroit in hopes of us finding each other just as we had several times over the last twenty-three years. 

The New Year

To all of my faithful followers that have noticed a lack of my stories for the last month I want to take the time to let you know they will return.  The interesting thing about writing for me is that you need to be in a special place to get the words to flow out.  This year more than others it has been hard at times. 

Perhaps if I wrote fiction it would be easier as I could just make stuff up.  Trying to tell a true story is more difficult.  Throwing myself back in time and realizing some of my big mistakes, wondering why I made some of the dumb decisions I made and realizing that perhaps I left a trail of hurt or disappointment in people I cared about is hard.  Digging up old wounds is hard and those stories do not come easy. 

When I discovered what a blog was when Marshell and I took a trip across the country made me realize how much fun it was to write.  I had so much fun although I cringe now when I go back and read some of them.  I have learned a lot in the process of writing over two hundred stories.  The worse speller in the world had gotten much better,  I found I have a love for new words and my high school English teacher would be proud at times that my grammar has improved somewhat.  It has also been fun to leave everyone in suspense at the end of each story.

This year it has been more difficult to get into that special place where current events make it hard to concentrate on past ones. Everyone has seen a great change in life in general.  Change is difficult to accept.  The COVID has made us make or in a lot of cases resist the fact that things are not and maybe will never be the same as before.  What we heed to stop and realize is that we have spent a good part of our lives making changes we never thought we would.  Are you doing what you always dreamed you wanted to do?  Did a marriage or a love affair pan out to be what you imagined?  Life changes happen everyday, some for the better and some for the worse. Change can be for the better or for the worse whatever you want to make of them.

Back in February before there was any information about COVID I was in the middle of a run of a play when I realized I was really having trouble breathing.  Since I did not have a doctor I went to a small rural hospital that had no clue.  I tested negative for pneumonia and strip throat but my oxygen level was low so they would not let me go home.  I had lost all sense of taste and smell, had a dry cough and trouble breathing.  They could not figure out what was going on and after two days of actually no treatment I pulled out the IV and went home.  It was a few weeks later that all the information came out about the COVID and I knew that was what I had.  I tried several times to get tested but was refused a test as I was not running a temperature.  So Marshell and I began our quarantine which we pretty much are still doing.

Slowly all the things I was involved in disappeared.  No more Garden Club, Friends of the Library or Bunko. Little Theater lasted awhile until having all those people in the cast together became not a good idea. No visits to see my children or my grandchildren for months.  I had one friend who had been with me everyday during the time I was really sick was my only social interaction except for phone calls to other friends.

It should have been a great time to dash out a lot of stories as I rather enjoyed the time at home and not dashing out the door several times a day to go do something.  Somewhere along the line the long term effects of having COVID popped up.  When you hear the word "Recovered" that is a laugh.  In July I retained nineteen pounds of water in a couple of days.  I broke down and went to the doctor which showed really bizarre things in a blood test.  I went through tests for congestive heart failure which was pretty stupid when my cholesterol was 120 and my blood pressure runs 120/70.  It also showed I was positive for rheumatoid arthritis, not hardly.  There are other things that pop up which I sort of ignore as I know it is the after affects of having COVID.  But I have to look on the bright side and consider myself very lucky that I am still alive when thousands are not.

This Christmas was very hard to get into the decorating mode. Being in rehearsal for a play that was to take place the first of December caused me to not have time to create my yearly Christmas cards. I missed wandering through the stores for the perfect gifts.  I am not an online shopper but did manage to find some things from small retailers to order.  We saw the children as they are stricter about wearing masks and social distancing than I am.  But for other holiday activities I was happily at home but still found it difficult to put words on a page.  There will be other years for all the usual holiday activities.  Staying well means there will be other years to go to Muskogee and see friends and celebrate our wedding anniversary. There may also be a good chance to write the next story as it is a really good one.

Last year was a tough one for everyone.  We all had to make changes in our lives that have been difficult to accept, some much more dramatic than others.  With the dawn of the New year here I am sure everyone is hoping things will go back to the normal we were all used to.  That may not happen and perhaps the best new years resolutions will be to accept the change and to be more kind, compassionate and forgiving.  There is a good chance that the "new normal" the pandemic forces us into will be much better then the old.  

I usually do not make New Years resolutions but this year I am going to accept the changes I can not do anything about and try to make the changes that will make the world a better place.

Happy New Year everyone!

The Wedding Part II

 

It was nice to be back in the hotel after a day that was fun, interesting, terrifying and slightly funny all rolled into about twelve hours.  I am just pretty good at getting myself into stupid situations.  One minute I can feel like the innocent and backward country bumpkin and the next minute  bask in the ability to go forward unscathed in what could have been a serious situation.

Charles was glad to see me and asked all about my visit with Erin.  I told him how much fun it was to see her and everything we had done.  I did leave out all of the more interesting parts of the adventure.  Somehow I thought it might make it sound like the really dumb things I could manage to get myself into.

The next day dawned bright and beautiful which was a good thing as the wedding was to be in the garden.  Charles and I arrived at the Mansion shortly after lunch with his business partner, Allen and his wife. The wedding was to be at 4:00 followed by dinner and dancing.  I wandered around watching the bustle of the caters, the wedding planner lady dashing around barking orders and the nervous bride sometimes laughing and sometimes in a rage over something. Actually I did my best to stay out of the way.

I had never attended a Jewish wedding much less a Jewish-Catholic wedding complete with both a Priest and a Rabbi.  I must say it was an interesting and really a beautiful event. While the wedding party spent two hours taking pictures most of the eighty guests visited the bar. Once seated in the huge dining room I discovered I was sitting at the head table next to Charles with his daughter, Jamie, on the other side. Things went well with all of the toasts and the speeches but after they were over Jamie stood up and in a very loud voice demanded to know why I was sitting next to her Dad.  Every head in the dining room turned to stare at us.

Naturally I had no answer for that...well maybe I did bit I certainly was not going to say it.  No one said anything.  I was a little surprised that Charles did not say anything but then Jamie had never had her Dad say anything negative to her in her life.  I just sat there wanting to disappear or cry or pop her in the mouth none of which sounded like a good idea.  When no one responded she finally just disappeared.   It was about the same time that Charles' business partner, Allan came and said her and his wife needed to get to the airport as they had an flight back to Detroit that evening.  We had all come in the same car from the airport the day before so Allan needed someone to take them.  Guess who volunteered?  I needed to get out of there as I felt like everyone was discussing Jamie's outburst.

Armed with a map, Allam driving and my excellent map reading skills we made it to the airport in plenty of time.  Since we had not had any dinner and I was not in a hurry to go back to the wedding party I went into the airport with them and we had dinner.  Then I watched as their plane took off for Detroit. I really wished I was on the plane with them.

It took me a couple of hours to get back to the wedding.  Charles said he was beginning to get worried about me and I just said I got a little lost.  That was not the whole truth as I was just driving around seeing the sights in order to avoid going back.  It was obvious that Charles was not going to say anything about Jamie's behavior which was disappointing.  She kept her distance from me and somehow I managed to get through the rest of the evening. Detroit was very nice to get back to the next day.

I don't know if Charles was expecting me to bring up the subject or not but shortly after we got home he suggested we go to counseling.  He was a big believer in it and it was apparent that maybe our relationship needed some help.  The first time we went together but the counselor said she thought it might be good for me to come in alone.  I learned a lot about myself like why I was so non confrontational and of course, all my issues with my Mother.  The interesting part of it all was how long it would take me to actually change some of the patterns of my behavior. Sometimes the status quo is just easier. 

Life got busy that fall.  Wally started the ninth grade at Seaholm High School.  Work was very busy plus it was costume design time with the ice show.  Busy was good as I did not have very much time to dwell on the situation with Charles or his daughters.  One evening I was glancing through the Detroit Free Press newspaper which I rarely ever looked at.  It would be interesting to know just what made me look at the paper that day.  As I was flipping through the pages a headline caught my attention or maybe it was the picture.

  "World Famous Speaker To Give Seminar"  and there was that smile I knew so well.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

The Wedding Part 1

 

The Alder Mansion

I have put off writing about the wedding which occurred the middle of August.  Over all it was such a great summer I hated to put a damper on it by telling interesting, eye opening, good time, a little scary time, bad time and the cause of future events.  That in just three days time.  But here goes.

Charles had two daughters.  The youngest, in her mid twenties lived in Detroit.  Jamie was cute and the typical Jewish American Princess in that anything she wanted or needed Charles provided.  Jobs, places, to live and boyfriends came and went very quickly.  The longer Charles and I were together the more she tried to cause problems between us.  If I answered the phone when she called she never said hello but just "I need to talk to Daddy".

Breann was thirty and lived with her boyfriend, Rob, in White Plains, New York.  They had been together for seven years, owned a great old townhouse together and were fun to go and visit.  Rob collected architectural salvage which I thought was just pretty cool.  They decided to get married which was interesting as Rob was Catholic and Breanne was Jewish.

Charles flew to New York several times during the summer to help with plans.  Actually I figured that it was to pay for this or that as Breanne's mother lived in the same area and you can bet she did a lot of the planning.  Weddings have to be huge and expensive in her view. Those were the days before debt cards and Charles did not have credit cards but did all transactions in cash.  Even when it was large sums of cash. It did not dawn on me at the time but the trips to New York were to pay for things.

We flew to New York on a Friday morning arriving around 10:00.  There was a luncheon planned at a restaurant for many of Breanne and Rob's friends and a few relatives. Since I had a college suite-mate that lived in Soho I made arrangements to meet her for the afternoon so Charles dropped me off and headed for lunch.  I met up with Erin who I had not seen since my New Jersey days.

Erin was a high school counselor with a PHD. For years she had lived in an apartment that she rented when all of a sudden her landlord decided he wanted his mother to have the apartment.  Erin had to leave with no place to go.  Rent had gone up all over the city and Erin told me stories about how there were hundreds of women with good paying jobs living on park benches because they could not find a place to live.  Erin went to her parents and they helped her purchase a condo in Soho.

The halls of the building were so narrow that your shoulders almost touched the walls as you walked down the hallways.  The condo could not have been more than six or seven hundred square feet.  It was all one room with a couch that folded out to make a bed, a tiny kitchen in one corner and the bathroom was smaller than most gas stations. The saving grace was that it had a patio, well actually a roof top, that was as big as the condo.  She happily paid $93,000.00 for it so she never had to worry about being homeless again. I rather liked it myself.

We had a great time catching up, wandering around Soho and looking at all the shops. Erin had an Italian restaurant picked out for us for dinner.  It was a very tiny place with only about a dozen tiny tables for two.  Our reservations were for seven and I was starving by then. Interesting was that the waiters could not speak English.  The menu was also in Italian but Erin said to just pick something out and to answer yes to anything that sounded like a question.  She said everything on the menu was out of this world and that you would be happy with it. She was right!

It was after 9:00 when we finished with dinner. I had not planned on staying in the City that late but time flies when you are having fun.  I asked Erin how could I get to White Plains hoping she had a car.  No such luck as it is two expensive to have a car in the City so she pointed in the direction of Grand Central Station so I could take the train.

Grand Central Station certainly lives up to it's name.  Open in 1871 but in thirty years it was obsolete in handling the daily traffic.  It was redesigned with everything grand thrown in.  There was the belief that people arriving to New York for the first time needed to see the beauty and the grandness of the city.  Originally it handled trains coming and going from other places but the need for commuter service in the city slowly transformed it into a regional commuter hub.

After I wondered around taking in all the beauty of the huge building I looked for some information on how to buy a ticket to White plains.  I was directed to a wall of machines that would pop out a ticket to any where. I was completely confused as to what to do when I was approached by a man, not very well dressed and not one I wanted to have a conversation with.  He asked me where I was going and I told him.  He immediately found the ticket window for White Plains and told me how much money I needed.  I gave him the money expecting him to run off with it but instead he put the money in the machine and got a ticket.  I thanked him, he asked for enough money for a cup of coffee but I gave him enough for dinner so he walked me to the correct platform and disappeared.

The train ride was fascinating.  The train was an elevated tracks as we went through the city.  People who worked, had been to dinner or the theater came and went from the train. Although the car was pretty empty at times a man with a bottle in a brown paper sack sat down next to me.  This one I did not want to talk to under any circumstance so while he rambled on I looked out the window and totally ignored his ramblings until he got bored and left.

One would have thought that upon arrival in White Plains there would be a station of sorts with people and taxi cabs around like you would see in the movies.  No, there was a platform with stairs to the ground, not a sole in sight and a phone booth. Time passed slowly as I tried to figure out what to do when another train arrived dropping off a couple of gentleman. A taxi arrived, came to a screeching halt and the two gentlemen jumped into an already filled cab.

I managed to get the driver to answer a the question as to how I was supposed to get to the Holiday Inn.  He informed me that his cab was full, going in the opposite direction and their was no room for me.  I guess I looked a little desperate as one of the passengers asked him if maybe they could take me to the hotel.  The taxi driver argued but finally let me get in with a total of seven people in that cab and we struck off.  It did not take me long to decide that perhaps I had not made the right decision.

I could tell by the road signs we were going away from White Plains. In my many lectures I had heard about not being a victim from police officers it dawned on me that you never go to location number two or you never return.  I asked why we were going in the wrong direction and the driver explained that he needed to deliver everyone else first and I would be last.  I wasn't crazy about that thought and there began to be a vote from my fellow passengers as to what they should do. Finally taking me to the hotel first won and the taxi sped back to White Plains. I don't think I took a breath until we stopped in front of the Holiday Inn.

Charles and some of the wedding party were in the bar when I arrived.  I missed the Bachelor dinner but Charles did not seem upset.  He asked if I had a good time and I did tell him about the afternoon and the pleasant train ride.  I did omit the story of what had been a very scary taxi ride as I did not want to look like a total fool for doing something like that.  Jamie kept telling how great the dinner was and how bad it was for me to be a no show.  It did not bother me at the time as I was just thankful to be alive and maybe just a bit proud of myself for getting out of what could have been a very bad situation.

I went to sleep that night thinking about how much fun I had with Erin, how much I loved to be in New York and curious about the actual wedding the next day.  Did you see the movie Crocodile Dundee?  The film had come out the year before and there was a scene where Mike Dundee goes back to New York to meet his girl friend's parents.  The house is huge with a circle drive in front. That was Alder Mansion in Yonkers.

The Alder Mansion was built in 1912, also know as the W.B.Thompson Mansion, as a weekend home all 65,000 square feet of it.  The Thompson family lived there until the mid-20th century and it was willed to the Archdiocese of New York. It became a high school, then a junior college and finally Iona College. Other buildings on the property were repurposed but the mansion fell into neglect.  The Irish American cultural organization bought the mansion and holds events there and rents it out for movies and weddings to raise money for its restoration. It sits 300 feet above the Hudson River with extensive gardens surrounding it. There is even  a tiled swimming pool on the second floor.  

This will be the location of the wedding, the reception, the dinner and the dance the next day.  What a day!

The Best Summer

When I delivered Jean's newly redone hide-a-bed I mentioned that I was going to go pick up Wally at the summer camp he had been attending.  She told me that she and her husband, Jim, had a cottage not very far from the camp.  Since they were going to be up there at the same time I was going to pick up Wally and his friend, Chris, why did I not take an extra day or so and come visit with them. That sounded too good to pass up.

Funny but if I had still been married to Dennis I would never have accepted Jean's invitation.  Dennis would not have gone since he didn't know Jean and he certainly would not have wanted to spend a couple of days in a cottage in the woods.  The "new" me just told Charles I was going to pick up Wally and stay a couple of days with Jim and Jean.  He thought that would be fun for me.

Their place was located a few miles west of the south end of the Mackinaw Bridge. Of all the places I had lived before moving to Michigan there were none more beautiful.  Leaving Detroit and headed north the highway was dotted with small towns almost like ones you see in storybooks.  In between the towns there is nothing but trees and beautiful natural lakes.  If I had a care in the world the scenery could dissolve it twenty miles north of the city.

The location of Jean's cottage - ah, correction - Jean's lovely A-frame home nestled on the side of a hill surrounded by a forest of trees was lovely.  They had built the cottage when their children were small and spent every summer there plus many ski trips in the winter. There was not really a town nearby but on the bank of the lake there was a huge log restaurant and bar where all the people in the area congregated  for food, drink and music.

 The three days with Jean and Jim were really relaxing and fun.  We hiked and swam by day and sat around the campfire each evening.  One of their sons and his family arrived on Friday with his family.  More family stories that made me feel like part of a family that I had missed living away from mine for so many years. It was rather sad to have to head off on Saturday morning to pick up the boys but was invited to come back anytime.

Wally's camp had very interesting instructions as to how to get there.  I was to drive across the Mackinaw Bridge to the Upper Peninsula to Barbeau.  Go to the bar in Barbeau and use the pay phone to call the Pine River Camp which was located on Neebish Island in the middle of the St. Mary's River.  The camp would then send a canoe or a row boat to pick me up.  Those had to be the most interesting instructions on how to get to someplace I had ever heard but in just a few minutes a row boat arrived to take me to the camp.

From the stories Wally had told me through the years about the camp I knew it was not some county club type camp but to see how really rustic it was kind of surprised me. There was a big central kitchen and a lot of small screened cabins for the campers to sleep in.  Everything has a sort of very weathered wood look to it.  The campers bathed in the river and I guess if they ever thought about washing clothes that happened in the river as well.  My reaction to the place was how cool it was!

The boys were  glad to see me and had fun taking me on a tour of the camp.  I am not sure how excited they were for camp being over and having to go home.  One of Wally's favorites parts of the camp was being taken to Lake Superior Provincial Park in Canada for real wilderness camping.  The cost of the camp was not cheap but to see Wally grow in self-confidence and an awareness of nature was well worth the price.

The ride home was lots of fun with Wally and Chris's stories about what they did and all the new friends from all over the country that they had made. We did have to keep the windows of the Bronco open as we flew down the highway.  There was a rather distinct aroma of clothes that had not been washed in three weeks floating through the air. 

Back home it was back to work for me, Wally hanging out with his friends, a couple of camping weekends with Charles and Bowser and Wally made a few trips to Cleveland to see his Dad and Wes popped up at our house for visits.  The big news for Wes was that he finally turned eighteen and the race car was ready to drive.

In September Wally started high school at Seaholm High School in Birmingham.  It was an interesting school in that you could find kids of every nationality and many different languages among the 1300 students. I was never real sure how comfortable he felt with changing schools so many times. But Seaholm was certainly considered one of the best high schools in the state.  Would you believe the official mascot was The Maple Leaves?

In early September Wally and I drove to Norwalk, Ohio to watch Wes get his NHRA Competition license and race for the first time.  I could not remember a moment of Wes's life when the only thing he wanted to do was to drive a race car. Since he was old to enough to draw race cars were the only thing he drew.  He never missed a chance to go to the drag races and he would disappear.  Dennis always worried he would get run over, I figured if he did someone would come and tell us as he had met and talked with every race driver at every race we had ever been to.

It was really a fun evening and just the beginning of watching Wes fly down the track through the years.  People would ask me if I was worried about him going so fast.  Actually I wanted him to go faster as that was his dream.

If I had to pick one of the most fun summers I ever had that would be the one.  There was one exception however that I have left out.  Maybe I should just not tell the story but then THE WEDDING triggered some very important events.

The Interesting Summer

It was both a good and a bad thing to find out how far behind I had gotten with my income producing job while spending four months playing ice show.  Bad thing as there were a few customers who thought I had died but a good thing that I still had a roof over my head and food to eat thanks to Charles.

Several good things happened as far as work went.  I had a neighbor lady stop by and asked me about my decorating business.   She and her sister were both from Ireland and liked to go back every summer for a visit.  Both were married to husbands with good salaries and lived in nice houses but they were adamant about making their own money to fly to Ireland.  They cleaned a couple of houses on Thursday and Friday but heard I did painting and they thought that might be fun.

Stroke of luck in that I had been putting a huge job off lacking the time or the energy to do it myself.  I hired them for the next week.  Those two were amazing  in that they made instants friendships with the customers, were both very well educated and best of all  they were meticulous in painting and cleaning, so meticulous that they cleaned a room before we painted.  I was not a fan of spending a day or two taping anything off as it was much easier to be neat to start with.  The three of us flew though paint jobs in record time, there was lots of laughter and we went home with not a drop of paint left anywhere even on our clothes.  

While I was playing Dorothy Hamill ice skating I did not have time for my Thursday's with my friend Claire.  Our lunch and visits to Saks and Macy's got put on hold and I guess Claire needed an excuse for me to hang out again and be a friend.  Her house was pretty well completed but she always had something she thought she needed to purchase.

What was funny about our shopping trips was that both Claire and I were the two worst shoppers to enter a store. Claire had money to spend but nothing was ever perfect enough to buy.  I had no extra money but it was sure fun to try on $700.00 dresses to see how they were made and how great I could look if I had money. After checking all the clothes out we would go hide in a corner and I would make sketches and notes on ones we liked.  Claire figured since I made all those beaded and sequined ice show costumes I could certainly make something up for her.

Charles thought I worked too much and did not charge enough.  He once to told me for the hours I put in I should be a millionaire. There were beginning to be cracks in the relationship.  With his daughter getting married in New York at the end of the summer and the youngest daughter, who lived in Detroit, I began to get the impression they were not too crazy about me. 

There were things you learn about someone after you move in with them.  I had a problem living with him and not being married even though I did not want to get married. There were times when I heard Wally trying to explain just who Charles was to his friends which was difficult. There were other things that popped up as the months went by.

I knew almost from the first time I went out with Charles that he smoked marijuana. His explanation was that it had been the cool thing to do since the seventies.  Maybe  for some, but I had missed that whole hippie, marijuana generation.  I had been too busy going to school, having Wes and Wally and drag racing. I will admit that at the age of thirty-eight I did try it once but hated it.  It was certainly not what I wanted Wally to think was okay although he knew Charles smoked it as you could smell it in the car at times.  After I tried it once Charles never smoked it in front of Wally or I.

In June, actually on my birthday, Wally graduated and finished the eight grade which was middle school.  Charles had gone to New York for wedding plans so Wally and I went to see Dick Clark's Musical Show at the Pine Knob Event Center.....outside.  Wouldn't you know that it decided to be 45 degrees that evening in June.  We wore winter clothes and wrapped in a blanket but had a great time.  The show was decades of rock and roll hits with the dances and music by The Temptations, The 5th Dimension and several other groups. When you are having fun maybe you do not notice your are actually freezing......in June!

That was a good beginning to a very busy but a very fun summer. Wally and I had certainly taught Charles to love camping.  He missed going when we were involved with the ice show so there were several trips with Charles doing his favorite thing about camping.

When we stared the ice skating lessons a few years before the teacher, Jean, was also the director of the children's ice show number.  She was the one who suggested that I try out for the show so Jean was responsible for my involvement.  We became very good friends during the past couple of years and one day she asked if I could upholster her hide-a-bed.  Since I never said no to any thing new, I yes.  After all my business card said complete interior design. Was I actually going to admit that I had no clue as to how to recover a hide-a-bed?

The hide-a-bed was an experience but a good learning one.  First I learned that if you are going to redo a hide -a-bed, leave all the metal bed part at the customer's house.  Have you ever picked one up?  They are much easier to work with without all that heavy metal on the inside.  It really isn't difficult you just take the pieces off in the order the manufacturer put them on, use them as a pattern for the new fabric and staple away. I am not going to say I did not have a few frustrating moments but it turned out really nice.

Ever since the 20th Reunion of the Muskogee High School Class of 1964 I had kept in Touch with Lisa and Gretchen, two of my fellow classmates.  It was now time for the 25th reunion the end of June.  After the disaster that the 20th which was due to my dear husband at the time I wondered if I should even go.  Luckily he was now the ex-husband and there was no way Gretchen and Lisa were going to take no for an answer.

Mom had called shortly before it was time to go to Muskogee and wanted me to go on a horseback trip and camping in the Canadian Rockies at the same time as the reunion.  It did sound like fun but so did hanging out with people I had grown up with.  Much to Mother's dismay I chose the reunion over the all expense paid trip to Canada. I am not sure she ever forgave me for not choosing her trip but somehow the reunion sounded like more fun.

I flew into Tulsa and was met at the airport by six of my classmates.  When I told them that no one in Michigan knew what Chicken Fried Steak was we all headed off to locate some which is very easy in Oklahoma. That was the beginning of the most memorable weekend of my life.  I probably should not tell the whole story of the weekend but as long as I do not use names I may be okay. 

My high school class had five hundred kids in it.  I never felt like I was all that popular but I tried to be nice to everyone.  Many of the people I hung out with that weekend were not ones I ran around with while in school.  Actually I was pretty sheltered since my Mother thought if you went to a seven o'clock movie you should be home by nine-thirty or that why would you go to a slumber party when you have a bed at home?  It was a blessing that I had no parent or husband to stop me from having fun.

Four of us girls had a motel room at the Holiday Inn, the official hotel of the reunion.  Friday night was a meet and greet at the Elks Club.  Good thing for name tags as many had changed a lot in twenty five years while others looked exactly the same.  I hadn't changed that much but was maybe forty pounds thinner than in school.  There was lots of talking, laughing and beer drinking until 2:00 in the morning when the Elks Club shut down.  There was a group of about twelve or so that really did not want to call it a night.  One of the male members of the class decided we should all go over to his house so off we went.

Interesting what a group of slightly inebriated people can think of to do.  Our answer, although I just smiled and agreed not planning on participating, was a wet T-shirt swimming party.  Shorts and t-shirts appeared and dress up clothes disappeared and a swimming party it was. I begged off for awhile until someone presented me with a shirt and a pair of shorts preferring not to look like the prude in the group I joined in.  One of the guys cooked breakfast and at 6:00 in the morning we headed to the motel.  Much to my surprise it was really fun.  There were a couple of first time events in that one evening.  More beer than I ever drank at one time and the first time I ever stayed out all night.

There was not much time for sleep as Gretchen had a beauty shop appointment at 9:00.  Then there was the picnic at Honor Heights Park at noon followed by getting ready for the banquet and dance that evening. We were all pretty well behaved that evening partially due to the fact there was a group of us that stayed up all night.  It was hard to believe the weekend was almost over. The next morning a group of us met for breakfast which lasted almost to lunch as no one wanted to leave but I had a plane to catch and we all finally hugged each other said our good byes. 

The most interesting thing about the weekend was that it felt  so good to be around all those people you grew up with.  It was so easy to talk to everyone sort of like you just saw them yesterday, not that twenty five years had passed.  With all the moving around I had done, all the friends I had made and left when I had to move on I really felt like I had come home.  Before we all parted it was decided that from now on there would be a reunion every five years which sounded great to me.

Wally headed off to camp for three weeks and got one of his friends from school to go with him.  I told Jean I was going to go pick him up when camp was over as I was curious about where I had been sending him every summer.  Jean and her husband, Jim, had a cottage on Lake Michigan not far from the camp and invited me to come up and visit with them for a few days on my way to get the boys.  Ahh...the nice thing about being self-employed.  Taking time off from work was so easy.  

With Wally gone to camp I had three weeks to catch up on work which was pretty easy to do.  Work kept me busy enough that I did not have time to stop and think then about how some aspects of my life were perhaps about to change.  Dennis and I had been divorced for three and a half years.  Charles had been the only person I had even dated and although he was really good to both Wally and I and let me do things Dennis would never have dreamed of letting me do.  But maybe the seventeen year age difference was not such a good thing. Did I love him or was he, just as a divorce book said, my transitional male.

It was certainly becoming an interesting summer.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

 

The Best of the Ice Shows

With Christmas over it was time to get to work  on the basement.  Wally desperately needed a larger bedroom and one that wasn't a short cut to get to the family room.  With both costumes and draperies to be made I needed a place to sew that did not involve crawling all over the carpet to lay things out.   

I did not realize until we started the project that Charles did not know anything about carpentry or carpentry tools.  He had a few tools but the few times he attempted to use them should have made Wally and I aware that this was going to be very interesting. Luckily in my previous life I had helped on a few construction projects and had a full set of Time Life do-it-your-self books. In order to attach the studs to the exterior concrete walls Charles purchased a RamsetHammerShot0.22 Caliber Single Shot Tool.  In plain English that was a gun that shot nails through the stud into the concrete.

Anyone who knows me knows that guns are not my thing.  The only time I ever fired one was when I had a cute guy ask me to go rabbit hunting in the snow in college.  I fired the gun once to scare the rabbits away so they would be safe.  Needless to say the RamsetHammer thing scared me to death. But Charles happened to be a real gun loving person who owned a lot of vintage firearms as well as those things people use to kill each other. So, Wally and I would cut the studs to length and Charles could fire away.

When all the walls were built and in place it was past the time I needed to be working on the ice show costumes so the rest of the basement was going to have to wait.  I was very excited and pleased that Wally made the cast.  It was also a little scary from the aspect that he was only fourteen without ten years of ice skating behind him.  The good thing about Wally was that he had been roller skating since he could walk.  The conversation from roller skates to ice skates is very easy.  Put a pair of roller skates on an ice skater and get ready to watch them fall down.  There is something about the weight of the wheels that they have a great deal of difficulty in knowing how to handle the wheels over little thin blades.

From the first of February to showtime the last weekend of April always seemed to just be a big blur of busy days and nights.  Between Wally and I there were seven costumes to make and one that I was in charge of. Add into that I did have a business, Wally had school and poor Charles only got to see us coming or going out the door.  By the first part of April you begin to wonder if you are going to live through this, why did I ever sign up for this and everyone just gets sick of rehearsal and everyone in the show.

Then the magic happens.  The sets begin to be built, bleachers fill the empty space around the ice, the forty foot tall curtains are hung and the arena takes on a totally different look.  You can begin to see how awesome this show will be and how the routines you have spent hours learning fit together.  The Las Vegas number has a huge slot machine with a teflon ramp the skaters will fly down, the Gypsy number will have a huge circular box that will move across the ice with skaters on top and all those glow in the dark orange costumes will be beautiful as the skaters fly across the ice under black light in the Main Street number.

From opening night through all eight sold out performances you tend to forget how many hours and how much work it took to get through the show.  Wally did really well skating with all the seasoned skaters.  He even got over the fact that he had a pink spandex suit with huge ostrich feathers on his shoulders or how much he hated the sixties costume with only fringe covering his belly. I can remember that years later he said none of his friends ever got to skate in an ice show. I took that as a positive comment.  Hopefully he will be ready to be in the show again next year as it was fun to have him in it with me.

Real life was hard took go back to.  There was always a feeling of let down for a week or so after the show was over. Wally was finishing up middle school and the final band concerts with the best band teacher ever was hard for him. He had summer camp to look forward to and Wes would get his dragster license that summer.  Charles' daughter in New York was planning her wedding for August.  All in all, it turned out to be a very interesting summer.

Much Happier Holidays

 

Well, after two months of living "in sin" as my Mother put it things were going pretty well.  I somehow managed to be a nice polite daughter as Mother raged on how awful I was.  It really did not bother me that she said she would not come to visit if I was living with "him".  Naturally she would not call him by name as it might sound like there was some possibility that one day she would change her mind and like him.  I would miss the shopping trips tp New York and lunch at the Plaza Hotel with her, but I would not miss having to act like I was the perfect twelve-year old daughter she expected me to be.

I always hated holidays when I was growing up and all the years I was married to Dennis.  My parents were not good with the extra time off work that meant they had to spend more time together.  Holidays gave them too much time together in the house. Usually they were not speaking to each other after the first day.  Thanksgiving was always quiet as we had no big family get togethers.  A few times Uncle Tom was invited to come over for dinner which made for the only pleasant Thanksgivings we ever had.

Dennis had grown up with tons of family around for every holiday.  There were years when we went to Warner and joined in the melee but most of the time his parents came to our house.  Seems like I spent the day cooking, then cleaning up while everyone else watched television or took naps.  I was never a big fan of turkey but only liked the dressing.  That was a good thing since there is that chemical in the turkey that causes drowsiness and I certainly could not have gotten things cleaned up if I had eaten any.

Thanksgiving with Charles was a big deal.  Since Christmas was not his thing Thanksgiving had to be special.  The first year we were going together I had his daughter, Jamie and his ex-wife for dinner.  His ex=-wife, Claire, liked to point out that I could be quite attractive if I wore more make-up and nicer clothes.  It was quite humorous as she said all this while standing in front of me with more make-up than the cosmetics counter at Saks carried and so much bling on her clothes you were temporarily blinded by the sight.

But this year Wally went to his Dad's for the eekend while Charles, Jamie and I flew to New York.  Charles's oldest daughter, Brianna, lived in White Plains with her significant other, Rob, so the family was gathering at their home.  It was really a fun weekend with the announcement that Brianne and Rob who had lived together for seven years decided it was time to get married.  The wedding was to be in the spring so there was lots of talk about the wedding plans.  Charles and I managed a trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  They were having a special showing of the work of Diego Rivera, the artist who painted the twenty-seven murals depicting the history of Ford Motor Company and the Industrial Revolution at the Detroit Institute of Arts.  It was outstanding but my favorite section of the Museum was the Egyptian section with all the artifacts from the Pyramids.  Every time we went to New York Charles had to go visit the Museum which made every trip fun.... even with Claire tagging along.

When it came to Christmas Charles wondered if we were going to have a Christmas tree.  Guess he did not realize that in the Christian world the Christmas tree is one of the best parts of the holiday.  So, we went and got a tree.  He got to learn the art of putting it into a stand that was made for a much smaller tree an how much work it was to make it the most beautiful tree in the world.  Some how he did not realize the tree did not need to have a bare two-foot trunk or that he should have gotten the salesman to cut it off.  A Skill saw is difficult to use on a tree that was too big to hold still.  When Wally carried seven moving boxes in from the garage Charles did not know they were lights and decorations that would take two days to get on the tree.  Wally and I had lots of secret smiles over his learning process.

The best part of the entire holiday was Charles asking me if he should take Wally shopping for gifts for me.  I thought it was incredibly sweet as Wally never had money to go shopping unless I gave it to him.  They went one evening and both came back all smiles.  Wes arrived on Christmas Eve, so it was a fun day.

After Christmas Wally, Charles and I went skiing at Cadillac, Michigan.  They had night skiing which Wally and I tried once.  Once was enough as you could not see the moguls in the dark.  We both went flying a couple of times but did not get hurt.  This was the beginning of snowboards being used.  I was happily skiing along when suddenly, I had something hit me in the back and I went flying.  Some jerk on a snowboard hit me and then just kept going.  No more night skiing for me.

Wes stayed at Charles's house while we were gone and worked at the skating rink in Troy.  Somehow Bowser got the remains of the Pumpkin Pie and chowed down on it.  Pumpkin Pie does not seem to set well with dogs and Wes needed a lesson in how to clean dog poop from carpet.  It was a good thing Charles loved Bowser more than any of us and just felt sorry for the poor Bowser.

All in all, Christmas was the best especially since my friend Claire had a Black-Tie Christmas Party.  Charles rented a Tux and I got all dressed up and we both had a wonderful time.

Ron had cast Wally in the ice show so in January we started going to the ice rink in Birmingham to get Wally's skating up to par.  Most of the guys in the show were past the age of thirty and had been skating since they could walk.  The younger guys were all junior champions of one sort or another.  This plus all the costumes I oversaw and the ones I had to make for Wally and I were going to keep me terribly busy for the next few months.  This was going to be an interesting year with the ice show.