History in the Making!

6:43 p.m., May 3, 2011 --


WOW! Just flipping channels and listening to various newcasts, the last one being John King interviewing a former Navy Seal, all I can say is how amazed and proud I am of these guys. Their training and bravery is just about beyond my understanding. From what I’ve seen on several news programs today, it was a harrowing experience. Bravery and fortitude above and beyond for those carrying out the mission as well as for those making the decisions to act.

God Bless America!

My Detroit Neighborhood -- Back in the Day (7 Mile to State Fair, Woodward to John R)

September 18, 2010 –

My father lived at 492 Fernhill as a boy in the 1920s; I lived with him and my mom at 456 Fernhill as a child in the 1940s.

When I googled the neighborhood and rode the cyberspace arrow up and down the streets, I could not believe the destruction and neglect. At least half the houses on Fernhill are gone.

When I saw the empty lot where my house used to be, it broke my heart. How crazy is that! It was more than 60 years ago! My dad's house still standing was a wonderful surprise. In my mind's eye, I can see the street and the people as they were so long ago. I don't know why I care. Maybe it has something to do with being a writer.

On the North side of the street, it appears the house once owned by the Maynards, the Etheringtons, and the Hopps family (492) remain.

On the South side, across from where 456 used to be, the house owned by the Lucich family in the 1940s is also still standing.

Time has not been kind to this little community but it was a wonderful and safe place to grow up in the 1940s.

From Fernhill we walked to the corner of Havannah, turned right one block, and there was our beautiful school, Grayling Elementary. What has happened to this school? The building remains but it is not listed as a Detroit elementary school.

From 456, my friends and I would walk two blocks to Beauman, turn left and pass a little convenience store on the right filled with penny candy or continue a few more short side blocks up to 7 Mile to Brown's Creamery, where my Grandma Hopps, the store manager, would give us delicious double-dip chocolate cones for TWELVE CENTS!

In the summer, my friends and I would walk the 2-1/2 blocks over to State Fair and spend the entire day at the Fairgrounds!

I remember the fire there in 1942. I was four and sat on my dad's shoulders as he and half the neighbors walked over to watch the horror and listen to the screaming horses.

We did not have a car then and my dad rode the bus to and from work. Sometimes I would walk to the other end of Fernhill, to Charleston, (remember when they built that manufacturing plant there?), turn left two short blocks and meet him at the top of the stone steps he walked up when he got off the bus by the viaduct at State Fair.

Or we could walk up Charleston to 7 Mile and turn left a block or two and be at Trinity Reformed Church, where my dad went to church as a boy and my grandma still attended in the 1940s.

Our next door neighbors, the Hoffmans, attended Epiphany Lutheran Church located across the street a little ways from the creamery. It was such a beautiful church, I wished I was Lutheran so I could go there. It is now known as Oasis of Hope Christian Church. 

September 19, 2010 --

Next to our neighbors, the Hoffmans, was a vacant lot. Then came the Etheringtons, then the Maynards, then a small house with a boy I only knew as "Junior". He was constrained by crutches -- a victim of Polio before Salk.

Our vacant lot was a haven for collecting bugs for science projects, playing baseball or "kick the can", or just laying in the grass looking up at he sky at the "pictures" formed by the clouds. One street light stood right there at the vacant lot so we never had an excuse for missing curfew.

The Hoffmans had six children and eventually moved to a bigger house -- right across from Nolan Intermediate. One daughter, Mary, and I kept in touch for a few years. The people who bought their house had a little girl named Sandra and I babysat her a few times before we moved to Oak Park in 1952. Now I can't remember their last name. 

September 19, 2010, Later --

Oppos Grocery -- The steps were so big, I could hardly get up them when I was four. How great was that . . . to have a little grocery store right at the end of your street! That sold candy too!

Back in the 1920s when my dad lived at 492, families would buy their groceries on "credit" and pay Mr. Oppo at the end of the month.

My Grandpa Leo Hopps, the Lathams, the Etheringtons -- all neighbors -- helped each other dig basements under the existing houses back then. At that time, this "corridor" was surrounded by countryside; it was the "suburbs" of the times. I've been told there was an article published 1918-1925 ??? featuring the diverse and cooperative nature of this community; which it was in the 1940s also. Am hoping to find a copy of the article.

September 19, 2010, Later Still --

These are the names/ethnicity from Fernhill neighbors (I think):

Hoffman -- German
Lucich -- Polish
Faust -- German??
Maynard -- Don't know
Griffith -- Don't know
Etherington -- Don't Know
Hopps -- English/Scotch
Oppo -- Polish??

This was a "blue collar" community in the 40s. Many families had parents living with them who were immigrants from "the old country" who still spoke their native language. When did we lose this reverence for speaking a second language . . . ???

I only know of the two churches (still standing) I mentioned; both on 7 Mile, a few blocks east of Woodward (even though the addresses say WEST 7 Mile; I guess because they are WEST of I-75) – Trinity Reformed Church now called Goodwill Community Chapel and Epiphany Lutheran now called Oasis of Hope Christian Church.

Every summer my girlfriends and I would walk up to the 7 Mile Public Library and take out a week's worth of books to read. Back then, milk was delivered in horse-drawn trucks. One time we passed some horse droppings in the road. I turned to my friend and said, "Oh, look at that pile of S---". I was probably 9 or 10. It was the first time I ever dared to speak such strong language; it made my heart race from guilt accompanied by a feeling of "whooosh"-like relief. I went around saying it repeatedly for several more days until it lost its effect and I lost the need.

Maybe that guilt wasn't such a bad thing . . .

* * * * *

December 10, 2010 Update --

Me 'n Rocky (my puppy) were driving down the road the other day and I was thinking, once again, of my old neighborhood and how it was 60 years ago.

SIXTY YEARS AGO?????? AAAACCCKKKKK!!!!!

Rocky looked up at me -- and said -- (he doesn't actually 'talk", I read his mind thru his eyes)

"You need to say a prayer every day for sixty days, representing the sixty years you didn't, asking God to cover this neighborhood with His cloak of Love and Protection so that, once again, families and children will have a safe place to play and live."

So I did. And I am. Counting down from 60, today is #58.

sdb

TECHNOLOGY CRAPOLA

Facebook Asks, "What's On Your Mind" . . .

What's On My Mind? I'll tell you what's on my mind . . . telehone technology CRAP is what's on my mind.

 

What is a phone? A device to call people. It has numbers you dial. And then you make a connection. And you talk.

 

So here I sit at son's home babysitting puppys -- I came yesterday to fix dinner because D-I-L has been gone a week on PI survellience. Unexpected family medical emergency in Louisville required son to join D-I-L and the rest of her family there yesterday.

 

So here I am at son's home. Always travel with toothbrush and Jammies, but this time I forgot charger cord to charge my basic OLD-Style ("stone age" -- numbers only!) Verizon cell phone. So I am about to have dead battery.

 

"Not to worry, Mom, just use the spare cell phone in our bedroom," says D-I-L Becky, calling on MY cell which is about to die. Problem is, I finally figure out that the top "slides" to the side -- VOILA! a keyboard.  But the keys are nano-second size and even though I manage to hit the correct ones with the numbers above the letters, nothing happens.

 

Excuse me???? What is the purpose of a phone?? To dial numbers . . . to speak Via the phone. All this phone does is redial a previously dialed number.

 

Later, after still another call from D-I-L to my own soon-to-be-dead cell phone, I learn not only does top slide SIDEWAYS -- (for texting . . . !!!), it also slides UP! -- for dialing.  Dialing as in PHONE. 

 

The cover -- which slides SIDEWAYS OR UP and DOWN -- of this 5x3 inch piece of CR--I mean technology -- has a screen that looks like my computer desktop screen; i.e., about 25 tiny icon pictures.  None of which say anything resembling "to use as phone, touch/click here".

I am so P-----ed.

Did I mention this TECHNOLOGY SUCKS!?????

If Only . . . (09/06/2010)

JOURNAL ENTRY
09/06/2010
　
Oh, this really is the stupidest thing. My heart squeezing this way. My tears erupting like this.

Every time I hear this song. "You Were Always on My Mind". Every time. It is so foolish. Because what it makes me think of has never happened. Except in my imagination.

How many years is it now? Twenty-six since our divorce. Two since his passing.

When I hear this song, my heart imagines Richard hearing this song:

And I imagine that when he HEARD this song, he thought of me. That in his heart he has been saying this to me all these long, long years since we no longer have been "we".

I really ought to stop listening to "Easy Listening".

* * * * *

JE 09/30/2008 – A Family Tragedy

Like any tragedy engulfing a family, we are not prepared.

I say we, even though I have been divorced from this man for twenty-five years. But I am suffering along with the offspring of the 22-year marriage that preceded the divorce; that offspring being four grown children, each now with families of their own. Two sons, two daughters. A perfect family. Well, not exactly.

"This man," my former husband, now married nineteen years to another, is dying of cancer. Stage 4, tongue, throat, lungs. Diagnosed four weeks ago. FOUR WEEKS!

When he fell unconscious from his bed the first week after the diagnosis, three of the four siblings rushed madly to Michigan. (We all now live in Tennessee; two of the four having moved here from Michigan just within the past year). Their dad’s wife had called 911 and he was in the hospital when the kids got there.

He was "stable" by the time they arrived but in and out, mostly in, a state of confusion. The siblings, no longer children but strong, responsible adults (like their dad?) with families of their own, questioned and argued with the several physicians and finally determined he was being given too much medication. Once they lowered the dose, his senses returned to him. Each sibling took turns staying the night during the week he was in the hospital and on the last night he was there, my oldest son asked him, "Dad, do you know where you are?"

"Yes," he replied, "in jail."

His sense of humor had returned. That sense of humor, almost always laced with sarcasm, is partly why our marriage ended anyway. It’s hard to so often be the brunt of someone’s sarcastic humor.

Hard on me. Hard on the kids. Certainly not a tool for raising confident, well-adjusted children. Back then, of course, we were unable and unequipped to deal with or understand the "whys" of it. We all just suffered, each in our own way, with the consequences.

We had moved our family to Tennessee in 1980 to start a business on our own and hoping for a new beginning, but when, in 1982, my husband told me he was moving back to Michigan – alone – I was not surprised. Even though he was the one to leave, we both knew we had reached the end of our endurance.

Through the ensuing years, each child, in his or her own way, managed to make peace with their hurt and anger, and for the past few years, all four have managed to maintain a reasonably close relationship with their dad. The oldest (boy) and youngest (girl) had the hardest time, I think. If you believe the experts who describe family hierarchy, I guess it was partly due to their "position" in the family.

Who knows. What does it matter now, anyway. This is a good man, warts and all, who took care of his family the best he knew how and certainly loved his kids. It’s what I’ve told them always. Hopefully, it helped them come to terms with their issues and helped them restore/maintain their relationships with their father. Eventually, I think they all came to understand he was hard on them more because of his own insecurities and shortcomings than theirs.

By then, of course, we were divorced. His second marriage is now in its nineteenth year. I hooked up with someone else for 14 years (8 of those married) and am single again; the kids grew up, married, had their own children. Now they are all approaching middle age and I am seventy and their dad is seventy-three.

As I said, our oldest son, our second son and his wife, and our youngest daughter all raced to Michigan a month ago. A week after we learned the diagnosis. The boys stayed a week that time and my daughter stayed two weeks. Then my oldest daughter and her children stayed a week and then returned to Tennessee. She knew it likely was her children’s last visit with their grandpa.

On the following Sunday morning, his wife called again. The news was not good. The boys raced back to Michigan. Once again, they checked the medicine. Again, he was being overdosed on morphine. Something about the difference between mili-liters and milli-grams. As a result, he was getting 5 times more than the prescribed dosage. Again, they lowered/corrected it. This time, however, he remains less and less alert and cannot navigate except in his wheelchair.

Our youngest daughter drove up again last Wednesday. Her 20-year-old daughter flew up on Thursday; I drove her to the airport. They drove back to Tennessee last Saturday night.

This time the visits all had a different purpose; it was heart-wrenching for each of them when they left.

Now we wait.

I have cried at least once every day since we learned the news. I thought I had made peace with myself and Richard long ago. We did the best we could. I wish we could have figured out how to stay together. But we couldn’t. It is the one big regret of my life; the one thing I would change if I could. But I can’t.

I have stayed at his home several times through the years with the kids for special occasions. We get along. Mostly. But still, there is that biting wit of his. Which he always manages to find a way to use. And still, it hurts. But except for those few occasions when family visits or holidays bring us together, I don’t have to deal with it and so I live my life in peace and harbor no animosity.

Every day since we learned the diagnosis, I have prayed God will comfort him and fill him with the knowledge of forgiveness. For I have come to believe the reason husband and father was so hard on all of us was because he could not forgive himself. For what, I’m not exactly sure except I now know things about his childhood and his relationship with his mother that could explain it. So I have come to believe I understand. It doesn’t matter now anyway.

Paul Newman died this past Friday. I cried about that. And wondered why it hurt so much. I had always admired Paul Newman; he was a great actor but I think he was also a good man. Someone who tried to make the world a better place. I never heard otherwise in the news or tabloids, and I believe he and his wife had a good, solid marriage. At least it seemed so to me, a casual observer. So it occurs to me I am identifying with his wife and imagining what it would be like for her to lose such a life partner.

That’s when I realize my hurt goes deeper than what I feel as her loss; I’m crying for mine. Mine and Richard’s. A loss of a different nature. And my heart and mind fill with these words, "I’m sorry. I’m so sorry."

I want this dying man to forgive me. For my failings as his wife. I should have tried harder. Been stronger. Wiser. Somehow.

I believe everything happens for a reason. We just don’t always know the reason at the time. Sometimes we figure it out later. Sometimes we never do. But there is a reason. For everything. Like Andy Andrews says, "Every . . . Thing . . . Matters".¹

So I cry and try to understand and sort through these emotions. If every thing matters, then it mattered, there was a reason, that Richard and I fell in love and got married and had these four wonderful children.

I cry because I was unable to deal with his insecurities. Because I wasn’t good enough or strong enough. Because I couldn’t fix it.

I was given life. A life of possibilities. And challenges. Like everybody else. A life full of challenges and opportunities for me to grow, to become a better person.

If only I had set a better example . . .

If only I had been stronger emotionally . . .

If only I had been wiser . . .

I was supposed to help this man overcome his demons. So he could learn to forgive himself. And us.

* * * * *

"Maybe I didn't love you
Quite as often as I could have
Maybe I didn't treat you
Quite as good as I should have

If I made you feel second best
Girl I'm sorry I was blind
You were always on my mind
You were always on my mind"

If only . . .

_______________________________
Richard died on October 6^th, my dad’s birthday, and I drove with my youngest daughter from Tennessee to Michigan to attend the funeral.
_______________________________
1 Book and NPT Special, "The Seven Decisions," Andy Andrews, http://www.andyandrews.com/

Save Historic Old Buildings and Fix Welfare at the Same Time (2/22/2011)

The Solution

(This is the Kind of Liberal I Am)

There are people who work . . . and then they retire.

There are people who never work . . . because they are mentally or physically unable. 

We, the people who work, desire to help those who cannot help themselves. We are willing to share a portion of our earnings with them.

There are people who never work . . . at a job . . . they "work" the system.

We, the people who work and then retire, have a name for these folks. We call them "deadbeats".

The Government’s M-O-N-E-Y comes from people who work. The people who EARN the money for those who DON’T have a right and responsibility to decide how that M-O-N-E-Y is spent.

I am a people and I am exercising that right to help decide how to spend the money.

I have a plan.

Remember Ross Perot? He said if you have a problem and come up with a possible solution, implement that plan in a "test" area. Set up one pilot program and test it. If it works, implement it elsewhere.

My test area for my pilot program is in Detroit, Michigan; Caldean Town, as it is now known. I grew up there. Back in the "olden days".

When I lived there, back in the 1940s, it didn’t have a name, it was just a neighborhood. A GREAT neighborhood. I lived a block and a half from Grayling Elementary School at 456 Fernhill. One and a half blocks from school and one and a half blocks from the State Fair Grounds.

It was G-R-E-A--T! The school was G-R-E-A-T, the State Fair was G-R-E-A-T, the neighborhood was G-R-E-A-T!!

All the houses on my street had big front porches and the neighbors sat outside or joined each other on their porches most summer evenings. There was a vacant lot and street light two houses down and we kids would play Kick The Can or baseball in the evening. In the daytime we would often lie in the grass gazing up at the clouds and find all sorts of critters and objects – in the grass and in the clouds.

This was a working class neighborhood. Lots of factory workers. Several families had two generations living together; parents from the "old country" who didn’t speak English, or spoke it brokenly, and their grown children; first generation Americans.

Did I say it was a G-R-E-A-T place to live?

I have written a story about the serendipitous fact that my dad lived at 492 Fernhill in 1919 attending Grayling school when it was new. Twenty-five years later he and my mom and me lived six houses down from his childhood home, at 456, and I spent seven delightful years as a grade school student at this beautiful school. 456 Fernhill no longer exists, 492 is Still Standing. YEAY. More than half the homes on both sides of this street are gone.

Have you seen Grayling lately?

http://www.detroitfunk.com/?p=5052

SAVE GRAYLING SCHOOL . . .clean out the trash, repair the destruction by vandals, and use this beautiful structure for a pilot program to implement my plan . . .

. . . to save an historic building
. . . to restore dignity to a neighborhood
. . . to help folks who need help . . . temporarily.

TEMPORARILY is a word that should never have been taken out of any plan to assist those in need.

THIS IS THE PLAN (being sent to Congress).

Stop . . . immediately . . . ALL welfare monies. I know I know, this creates a gap until the new plan is in place. I don’t know how to resolve this – but you guys in Congress are the ones who are supposed to be able to solve problems, not little old 73-year-old ladies like me – so figure out a way. If you can bail out Wall Street and General Motors, surely you can fgure this out.

In every community there is a "Grayling School", one or more buildings that would be suitable.

Stop giving the money directly to the people. "The People", as in the deadbeat dad who uses his welfare check to buy drugs or booze, or the welfare mother who leaves her children home alone at night while she goes out and parties. Or the guy standing in the welfare check line talking on his Blackberry. If these folks are few and far between, as some would have us believe, then it won’t be a big problem to solve.

(If the people are going to ‘give’ their money, they have a right to demand accountability.)

This plan does not include, is not for, a recipient who meets the criteria of wise use of the money. If a working dad or mom can maintain a safe home and sufficient care and supervision of their family, these are the folks who set the standard. Criteria like proof of not being on drugs, not being an alcoholic, not being a shopaholic, history of paying bills on time.

(If the people are going to ‘give’ their money, they have a right to demand accountability.)

For the rest . . .

Restored Grayling Elementary is now a temporary home for those in need. When I attended school there, there was a kitchen and lunch room on the basement floor, along with a large gymnasium. Restore the kitchen, lunchroom, and gym. 

Restore the beautiful old library. Fill it with books and 2-3 computers. (Computer use to be scheduled and limited and based on meeting certain requirements.)

The money that was once given to individuals is now used to maintain this self-contained community – a place to house and feed the people in the community who need it. The library provides a place for learning and relaxing. The gym is a place for exercise, stress relief, and running off excess energy – something both children and adults need.

The classrooms can be turned into living quarters for individual families. Most classrooms are big enough to house a mom and/or dad and two children. A few classrooms can be combined to house larger families.
One or two classrooms can be turned into learning centers for the adults who want to improve their earning skills.

* * * * *

Grayling Elementary is one school in one community. Every community across the country has buildings like this that could be restored and turned into centers for helping those in need.

I worked hard to earn my money. I am now retired and struggling to live on $1300 a month which includes a $400 mortgage payment. I worked hard to pay my taxes and live within my means. The Government – who uses my money and speaks for me – has a right to say to those who ask for help --

"This is the money of the people. They have set aside their hard-earned funds because they have compassion and want to help. You do not have to accept this help. But if you do, the people say, this is what you must do in return."

There is NO FREE LUNCH . . . really. But there is reciprocal help for those in need.

Music and Movies . . . (Journal Entry, 6/12/2001)

Pearl Harbor –
The Gladiator –
Once Upon A Time in America --

Movies I recently watched; entranced by the genius of the intertwining of story and music.

Always it is music that moves me, filling me with emotions I can’t express and barely understand, taking me to a place I want -- need??? -- to dwell. For now; for these moments of reflection. Why?

Pearl Harbor --

Sadness, pain, mother love???

I sense the spirits of these youngsters milling about the music filling my heart and I am overcome with feelings of grief and love. For children I never knew. Survivors who are older than me. Non-survivors who are forever younger than me.

I am in the moment; it is where I want to be, to experience and absorb these feelings. Why?

The spirits of these heroic dead call out to me from the music. These "spirits" draw me to the place – what place? – where they reside. I want to be there with them. I want to hold them and wipe away their tears. I want to lay my hands on their wounds and heal them. Touch them with hands that carry the love of a nation so they will feel our thankfulness for the sacrifice they made.

Why do I feel the need to experience this, to be "there", wherever "there" is. Even though it rips my heart in two, it is not a frightening place. In my own spirit I wander there in my mother’s mantle, embrace the valiant warriors, no more than boys, and press them to my breast. And, once again, I am reminded that War is at once humanity’s most despicable crime and it’s finest hour.

The Gladiator --
Once Upon a Time in America --

What is the genius of these composers who capture the spirit and emotion of the events portrayed in these movies? They tap so creatively into the feelings and emotions I am experiencing and being musically gifted they are able to set it to music.

Suddenly a random thought pops into my head about the difference in time remaining –

-- from babyhood to eternity and
– from me (old) to eternity

Maybe being closer affects my thinking. Maybe this is just a part of growing old and accepting the inevitability of the end to this life. An easing into the place we know as eternity. Is this God’s/nature’s way of preparing us, taking us, inch by inch, into this world beyond our world?

Or is this just crazy, wacky old me, again . . . ?

Where Have All the Strong Men Gone . . . (Journal Entry 08/04/1998)

The events are real.  A situation a relative had to deal with and resolve.

It renews a train of thought -- and question -- I have had for many years.   The series of events that actually occurred become a perfect example to illustrate my point.

It seems to me it STILL is and probably ALWAYS WILL BE a man's world.

Women's Lib came along and fought for and got some recognition and justice for women.  So now, supposedly, we are equal.  We can screw around just like the men.

Except some of us don't really want to screw around.  Okay, we don't make a big issue of "you can't F--- me unless we're married.  We've learned that getting married in order to have sex is a very STUPID reason to get married.

So some of us don't hold out anymore. 

But something bad has happened along the way.  Women are STILL getting screwed.  Just in a different way.  Here is my illustration:

Along comes this guy.  He is attracted to the young woman.  Crazy about her in some ways.  Possessive at times.

So he barrels into her life.  Helping her financially.  Buying a car (in his name but she has it to use whenever); building/fixing/painting things in her house.  Helping her pay for her horse, for God's sake.  Spends weekends with her. 

Time goes by.

Now he comes over during the week, as well.  She cooks for him, nurtures him whatever way he needs nurturing

It begins to look like a long-term thing.

Then he drops the BOMBSHELL..

Along the way they began to talk about "things".  Now he wants to "move in".  He tells her:  "I would have to live with someone for at least three years before I would know whether or not we should be married."

Fortunately, the young woman has the good sense to say "no way, buster."

She knows what a terrible example this would set for her children.  Plus, I hope she realizes by the time they lived together for three years there would never be a marriage.

He will have gotten disappointed or angry or whatever enough times that he will think, "Oh, I guess she isn't my dream girl after all."

GIVE ME A BREAK. 

THERE IS NO DREAM GIRL.  THERE IS NO DREAM GUY.

You COMMIT and work it out.  Or else you don't.

So here we are, girls.  Still getting the short end of the stick.

Peter Pan is alive and well. 

My question is, "Where have all the strong men gone?"