Too Damn Young to Know

By Richard Ujdur

At our rural two-story farmhouse in North Richmond, California, I, Richard, a seventeen-year-old, sits downstairs at our kitchen table with my older sister, Mary, and my older brother, Tony. My father, Mike, is pouring wine into his brother’s wine glass from a gallon wine jug that sat on the table then pours wine into his glass. You can smell the baccala that my mother, Katie, is cooking. The baccala smell is overwhelming. On the kitchen wall hangs a large 1943 calendar with a large picture of Uncle Sam that reads buy war bonds. On the end of the kitchen table lies a red-white-blue airmail letter that hasn’t been opened. We eat. My dad picks up the airmail letter that was sent from his sister, Toya, who was living in Yugoslavia. He hands the letter to my mother. She opens it and begins to read. As she reads, we find out German soldiers came to my dad’s Village in Yugoslavia and killed his father, sister, Petra, and his uncle, Martin. My mother begins to sob. She hands the letter to my father and he finishes reading the letter. Then he begins weeping. Then he throws the letter on the kitchen table and shouts, “If you kids ever marry a German, don’t ever come back to this house.” Guess what? My sister marries a Yugoslav. My brother marries a Yugoslav. I married a beautiful, loving, fifteen-year-old German girl. Then all hell breaks loose until they find the unconditional love she gives to them. Then tragedy strikes only to bring more love into all our lives. 12/18/2017

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781644240557

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Too Damn Young to Know

Richard R. Ujdur, Sr.

Copyright © 2018 Richard R. Ujdur, Sr.

All rights reserved

First Edition

Page Publishing, Inc

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc 2018

ISBN 978-1-64424-054-0 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64424-289-6 (Hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-64424-055-7 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

This book is dedicated to three women that made my teenage love story come to being. Too Young to Know was a completed screenplay first. Ellen Burstyn critiqued the screenplay for me and gave me valuable advice. Even though I struggled for years sending out queries that never made it to an agent, I never asked Ellen for more help, and I never gave up. Thank You, Ellen.

Ellen Burstyn’s mother, Corrine Marie Hamel, lived alone, and I would go over to her house when she needed help. Before she passed, she sat me down in her kitchen one day. Corrine asked me to tell her about my life and my family, where they came from, and some of the hardships they had to endure. When I finished telling her the story, Corrine told me she loved the story, and said I should write a screenplay, which I did. Thank you, Corrine.

Betty Kemp was my best friend’s wife. Before Betty’s passing, I saw that there was a movie made in 1945 that was titled Too Young to Know. I was very disappointed that I had the same title. Betty told me how to make my title better. She said, just add the word damn, which I did. Thank you, Betty.

Richard R. Ujdur, Sr.

On the front door glass of a mortar brick building, the gold leaf letters stand out. The letters read Calligari’s & Sons Italian Bakery, 111 Fourth Street, Richmond, California. A man exits carrying a brown paper bag that’s filled with French bread. He looks up at the sun. He sighs. He’s Mike Ujdur. He’s in his late fifties, and he has a few deep furrows on his face and a few patches of hair that he missed while shaving. He starts for his older Schwinn bicycle that leans against the side of the bakery building. He wears a very soiled gray sailor’s cap. A very dark-blue tattered sport suit coat that reveals dirt that has been forming around both sleeves and pockets and around the collar for a long time. Mike takes his cap off and wipes his forehead. Mike looks very serious. He places his cap back on. Then he places the bag of French bread in a deep wire basket that’s attached to the front end of his bicycle. He gets on his bike and straddles it. At the bottom of his black suit pants, his right pant leg is torn and shattered from either dragging on the ground or getting caught in the bicycle sprocket. Mike shakes his head, reaches down, and grabs the trouser clip off the bike chain guard. He places it around the bottom of his right shattered pant leg. He starts off. A patrol car comes down the road with two officers seated in it. Mike starts to make a right turn religiously using his raised hand to make the turn. The patrol car is alongside Mike’s bike now, driving very slowly. A patrolman on the driver side of the patrol car rolls down the diver-side door window.

He hollers to Mike, Mike! You want a ride to North Richmond? Well, put your bike in the trunk of the patrol car.

Mike tells the patrolman, No, no. Me okay, Dell.

The patrolman inside the passenger side of the police car hollers to Mike, They won’t take you into the army, Mike, to fight Hitler if you’re all worn-out. Mike!

Mike hollers to Billy, Me fight First World War. Me go again. Me take my .45-90 buffalo rifle. Me kill ’em good. Thank you, Billy. Tell Father Frank Mike say hello.

The patrolmen drive off. Mike continues to peddle down the street. Up the street, a large neon sign attached to the building protrudes high over the sidewalk. It reads Base Hit.

* * * * *

Roy and Frank Banducci are the bar owners of the Base Hit Bar that’s been in Richmond for the past one hundred years. They sponsor the Richmond Merchants baseball team. They played some of the local teams like the North Richmond Spiders and other city teams that are close by. They’ve always had the best team and the best players (more money and more beer too). Their players loved to play baseball. I played for the North Richmond Spiders team. I lived with my mother, Kaite, and father, Mike, and my uncle, Matta, on a small farm in the suburbs of Richmond. I’ve worked on the farm growing up. I had to milk the cows, feed the chickens, rabbits, and the pigs too. There was no baseball time for me, but I would sometimes try to make time to play baseball. There were times I had lied to my dad when he would ask me at our dinner table if I had dug a sack of potatoes that day. I would tell him yes, but me and my school buddies would dig two sacks of potatoes so I could play after school the next day. My dad never found out. I would pitch for Mr. Charlie Reid, but I wasn’t very good and if my dad found out, he would burn up my bat and glove like he did one time. The farm was for work, not play. When I did scrounge up some time to play baseball, I did pitch at the all-dirt ball field. Also, there were lots of parked cars all around it. There were no fences around the ball park. The participants would sit on their car fenders, car hoods, and some would even sit on the top of their car roofs. They would drink boozes and holler as we played.

We played mostly on Sundays. When I was pitching on the mound, the cars that surrounded the ball park would blow their car horns when their team made a round or when something excited them. The spectators on their cars would at times holler, White boy, throw the damn ball! For some reason, the other team could always hit well, and I didn’t last too long on the pitching mound. Charlie knew my home situation and let me have those very precious moments. He knew I wasn’t that great of a pitcher. Thank you, Charlie. Growing up in those days, there were no knives or guns during a fight. If you lost the fight, that was it. There was no retaliation. There was respect on both sides that was instilled in us from childhood. Maybe it was because of the fact that we were made to go to church on Saturdays: it was our day to confess our sins and tell what we had done during the week like drinking. All the kids smoked and put mirrors on the tops of our shoes. Some nights, we would cruise down to Roy Banducci’s Hotel at the end of Enterprise Street in North Richmond. The hotel was two stories high with many large windows at the top and bottom that look over the Wildcat Creek and the Wildcat Marsh. At the bottom of the hotel, there was a large kitchen, and it served many tramps that jumped off the Southern Pacific Railroad train that ran within a few yards from the hotel. All the tramps were always fed. Once in a while, we would see our town mayor in the hotel and lots of City Hall employees in there too. On occasions, we would see one of our local judges, and sometimes we would see Superior Court Judges from Martinez California partying up in the hotel with girls that were running around the bedrooms nude. Why do you think we’re here? To get invited. Most of us had our license at the age of sixteen. I had mine at fourteen because I lived and worked on the farm. On Sundays, we went to church.

We would wear our one button roll suits. We took the bread of Christ and were blessed by father Smith. Ten minutes later, we were playing basketball in our one button roll suits cursing when the basketball didn’t go throw the basketball hoop. I was pretty damn good, I have to say. Let me stop here and tell you how strict my dear beloved father was. To this day, I still laugh at this one occurrence that happened years ago. My brother, some friends, and I built a wooden basketball stand on a large open dirt field right across the farm where we lived. It had a wooden pole to hold up and a backboard. The basketball rim was a barrel hoop that came off a small wine barrel. One evening, we were playing there. My father came out of the big barn across us. He called me to come. Dodi ovdje muzara krava—Croatian words meaning Come, milk the cow. We were having a great time competing against one another. (I said to myself, I’ll milk the cow later. No big deal, Papa.) My father called a few more times. I just kept playing. My father walked up to us with a ripsaw in hand. He walked up to the wooden pole that was holding the backboard up. He began sawing.

I was yelling, No, Papa! No!

The boys that were playing basketball with us were in total shock. The basketball pole and the backboard came crashing down to the ground. A big cloud of dirt came flying on top of us.

My father waved the ripsaw at me and at the boys, and said, You boys mind your papa. See!

He pointed to what was the basketball stand. Richie, I tell a you, come milk cow. You come milk cow now!

He walked off smiling, still waving the handsaw in the air.

* * * * *

Mike is now at the front of the Base Hit Bar. He stops and straddles his bike. Roy asks Mike if he’d like a beer.

Mike thanks Roy and says, No beer today, Roy.

Roy always offers my dad a beer, and my dad would stay and drink with Roy at times. Years later, they will be playing pinochle together. Mike starts peddling down McDonald Avenue. He turns left on Fifth Street to Doc’s pool hall.

* * * * *

We all played pool at Doc’s at one time or another. When you first walk in to Doc’s pool hall, the cigarette smoke would burn your eyes until you got used to it. Sometimes you have to take a break and go outside. Doc spent time outside smoking also. I don’t remember anyone that died from the cigarette smoke inhalation from Doc’s pool hall.

When I was very young, my dad took me to the mechanics bank in Richmond. I was ashamed at the way he looked: the beat-up, soiled cap, and the soiled suit coat and pants. When we walked into the bank, I was surprised. My dad was treated with royalty. Another time, my dad and I walked into the Richmond City Hall to see the police chief. All the secretaries that were typing on both sides of the aisle stopped typing, and they all stood up to say hello to him as we walked by each one of them down the aisle. He was well loved by everyone.

* * * * *

Mike is pedaling down the two-lane road called Seventh Street. He comes to what we called the big bridge. The Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe train is barreling down the train tracks. As it starts to cross the big bridge, the train wheels begin to squeal as it slows down to almost a stop. Mike stops peddling the bike