Christmas Presents: Life in Progress

By Lloyd Casey

Lloyd Aloysius Casey - born December 18, 1926 in Anaheim, California; will die anytime from June 12, 2007 to perhaps 2016 in Dublin, Ohio.

Casey married Mary Grace Wells of Baltimore, Maryland on September 3, 1949. Charles Mark was born on June 28, 1950, Kevin Emmett on May 27, 1952, John Patrick on March 15, 1954, Paul Francis on July 11, 1956, Colleen Ann on March 14, 1959, Christopher Wells on August 7, 1963 and Kathleen Mary on January 14, 1969.

In January 1980, Casey considering that he might be dead by 1981, made an effort to write some thoughts about life to be given to his and Gracie's children as a Christmas present. Still being alive in 1990 he did another Christmas present and then again in 2000. He quit but did write special requests. This book, to be given to each of the seven in 2007 is the last of such Christmas presents.

Other than trying to be an acceptable father, he had numerous adventures. If he becomes what society considers "mature" before he dies it will be a surprise to himself and those who know him. His signature sign off on correspondence, love, peace, joy, pretty well sums up what he has valued.

2007 is a year to end this. Gracie and Casey are alive and in reasonably good health. All seven are alive and making the best of their lives. We have thirteen grandchildren and four great grandchildren. What more could anyone want?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 13, 2007
• ISBN: 9781465325891

Book preview

Prologue

East Los Angeles, California, pre-Christmas, 1931. My oldest brother, age eight, was in charge while our parents were out. They were probably at the corner store where they would buy food. My two younger brothers, ages four and soon to be three were in the room where the four of us slept. My next older brother, age six and a half, was living with our mother’s parents in Anaheim. It takes an hour to get there in the Model T Ford.

In the room where our parents have a bed there is an electric cord hanging from the ceiling with a bare light bulb screwed into the fitting at the end of the cord. On the wall near the door is a plate with two buttons. One button made the light go on. The other button made the light go off. I was pressing the buttons and the light was going on, off, on, off, on, off. My oldest brother told me to stop. I didn’t stop.

Then there was a loud pop and pieces of flying glass everywhere in the dark. My joyful excitement instantly turned into fearful dread. There was just enough light from the next room to start finding all the pieces of glass which were on the bed and floor. There was no way I would find them all. My older brother told me he would take a light bulb from another room and put it in our parents room. He was able to unscrew what was left of the bulb and get another bulb in the fixture. I knew he would tell our parents what had happened.

My father became as angry as I had ever known him to be when he heard what had happened. He grabbed me and was about to give me the worst spanking I would ever remember when my mother screamed and made him let me go. The picture of that moment is still easily reproduced in my head these seventy years later.

Three days later was Christmas morning. We each found a pair of socks and a used toy. We were told Santa Claus had brought them. When my Dad had grabbed me and Mom was screaming, my oldest brother had looked into a bag they had dropped. Later on Christmas day he told us the socks and toys had been in that bag. The story about Santa Claus was not true. I also became aware in the next two days that the make believe Santa Claus brought new and more presents to the kids whose Dads had jobs.

Moapa, Nevada 1935. Dad got back to a steady job with the Union Pacific Railroad in 1934. By accepting a clerk opening at a place sixty miles north of Las Vegas. A branch rail line went from Moapa to communities called Logandale and Overton in a small but fertile valley along a spring driven steam called the Muddy River. The farmers in those communities were able to get tomato plants started in March. The plants were shipped to locations in the East where they were put in green houses until they could be planted outside. Freight trains stopped to pick up the plants. Other trains stopped to fill their water tank. With rare exception the passenger trains just barreled through at sixty miles per hour.

We lived in a railroad building which was one half warehouse, one quarter station house and one quarter where we lived. There was no indoor plumbing and no electricity. We had five gallon containers we kept water in which we got out of a tank car of water from Las Vegas. We used kerosene and what we called Alladin lamps for light. We all slept in a screened porch on the side away from the tracks. Mom and Dad in one bed, Vincent and Donald in the next and me, Arthur and Bob in the third bed. In 1936 Mom and Dad were 38 years old and we were 12, 11, 9, 8 and 7.

Fifty yards down the track were two other railroad houses. The man who knew how to use the telegraph key, Dad’s boss, his wife and two daughters lived in the first house. The daughters were ages 11 and 8. The man who lived in the third house was in charge of the Mexican laborers who maintained the tracks. The workers lived in a box car another hundred yards down the tracks on a siding.

On our side of the tracks was an abandoned two room adobe built jail, a falling down wooden shack which was formerly a bar, a three room place which was post office and living space for the woman who lived there and a two room school building. On the other side of the tracks was a bar, a one room general store, a warehouse and a two room place for two school teachers.

There was a Paiute Indian reservation four miles away on the Muddy River. The reason the school building had two rooms was because the Indian children were bussed to it. In one room were grades one, two and three. In the other room were grades four, five, six, seven and eight. The Indian children would spend two or three years in each of grades one, two and three. In addition to the seven of us in the railroad houses along the tracks there were eight children from three farms along the North part of the Muddy River.

After three years in Moapa Dad bid on and got a job in Las Vegas as a crew dispatcher. We moved to Las Vegas in August, 1939. Bob was in the fourth grade, Arthur in the fifth, me in the sixth, Donald in the eighth and Vincent a freshman in the high school. During my fourth and fifth grade in the Moapa school I was one of four other students. Each class was in one row of seats. The teacher, Sadie Ryan, would go from row to row teaching English, then history, then geography and so on. Since I heard what she was teaching in the next rows when I got to Las Vegas I was ahead of what was being taught in the sixth grade.

Las Vegas was a city with 10,000 residents. We now lived in a house with indoor plumbing and electricity. Boulder/Hoover dam was being built twenty miles to the East on the Colorado River. The railroad yards were filled with materials on their way to the construction site. In addition to that excitement was Fremont Street with gambling halls on each side of the street for three blocks. On South Second Street was a block with houses of prostitution on each side of the street. The Mormon church was the largest among the others; Catholic, Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian and Lutheran. After three and a half years in Moapa, Las Vegas was an almost incomprehensible experience.

Chapter One

A Four Day Beginning

Thursday, August 31, 2006

I have made a decision. All the pages of thoughts, memories and blathering which have accumulated since Sunday, January 6, 1980 are going to be done using a computer rather than a typewriter. It may take me six months. Here goes.

Sunday, January 6, 1980

It was in 1958 or 1959 when I bought this typewriter. I thought I had lived quite a lot and the idea of writing had been in and out of my consciousness from the time I was a sophomore in high school. That was in the school year of 1942/1943. God had given me the sixteen years from the forties to the fifties which eliminated the thought of writing by hand as an excuse not to write. Then came the twenty-two years of numerable excuses not to write. Some of those numerable excuses were seven children, seven job changes and four moves. In 1958 we were living in San Mateo, CA. The moves were to Clayton, CA, Yakima, WA, a different house in Yakima, WA and then to Northglenn, CO.

I may have another thirty years; then again, I might not have one. Whatever time remains is not what is on my mind. Two years ago as I went from one job to another at age 51 I decided to enjoy as much as possible each day. Just take life one day at a time. Make whatever I could of the day and accept whatever happened without celebration or regret. That idea came from a poem by Rudyard Kipling entitled If. One of the couplets in the poem went If you can meet with triumph or disaster and treat these two imposters just the same. At age 51 I had some triumphs. Our marriage continuing being one and seven children being seven more. I had had a share of disasters in failed political campaigns and disappointing job experiences.

Three years ago I went off by myself to a friend’s cabin in Wyoming to get a start on writing something. That didn’t work. The few pages of mixed thoughts which resulted from that will be added to whatever gets done this year. The motivation for sticking with this is to turn it into a Christmas present for our children. This year they are ages 30, 28, 26, 24, 21, 17 and 11. It may not be, but I have the hope some or most—maybe all—of them will be interested enough in what I write that it will be read.

I was fascinated by the stories my grandfather Casey told me. He was in his late seventies. I was eighteen or nineteen. He lived in Norfolk, VA. I had grown up in Las Vegas, NV. As a result of being in the navy and ending up in Charleston, SC when the war was over I was able to get up to Norfolk and become acquainted with my grandparent Casey’s and two aunts. I felt I’d had a lot of adventures having joined the navy in August, 1944 and by 1946 being in Idaho, San Francisco, Pearl Harbor, Honolulu, almost to Japan, through the Panama Canal, to Philadelphia and New York before getting to Charleston.

Grandpa had been to every continent while serving on ships with sales. He proudly proclaimed he sailed when men were made of steel and ships were made of wood rather than me being a wooden sailor on a steel ship. He had been born in Skibbereen, County Cork, Ireland but was brought to Massachusetts along with four older children by his widowed mother when he was only two. He ran away from home at age 14 and served on merchant sailing ships until he was twenty-three.

I fantasized a lot when I was eighteen and nineteen about doing things like that. Richard Halliburton wrote a book entitled A Royal Road to Romance. It was about adventures he had in many parts of the world. His last adventure was to sail a Japanese boat called a junk from Japan to California. He was never heard of after being in a storm at sea. That was in the 1920’s if my memory is right. My big adventure prior to joining the navy was learning to fly. I did that in the fall and winter of 1943 when I was sixteen turning seventeen. My goal was to be a pilot in the war. One eye didn’t see good enough so I had to settle for the navy.

Because one eye didn’t see the same as the other it caused a problem with depth perception. Depth perception is important in seeing how far the wheels were from the ground when landing. The airplane had a single top wing and one engine. I learned to land very well by just closing one eye. My eyes are still good enough at age fifty-three for me to get by without glasses. I’ve wondered a lot as to how at fifty-three I am as healthy as I am.

Maybe it has something to do with the early years of growing up. There was whooping cough prior to kindergarten so instead of starting at age five I started at age six. Then there was measles, chicken pox, boils, ring worm and many runny noses. Three years later we were living in Moapa, NV in a railroad building without running water or electricity. We swam in a stream which cattle walked through. It was normal to dodge the manure floating by. We must have picked up a bunch of antibodies as a result. When we got to Las Vegas four years later there was scarlet fever and pneumonia. By age fifteen my body had built up such a strong immune system I’ve had good hearth ever since. I’m no doubt lucky in inheriting some stout hearted genes.

Along about 1966 I started smoking cigarettes rather than cigars. I had gotten involved in a county political campaign and cigarettes were more acceptable for an aspiring politician than cigars. I became addicted to them. I was forty years old at this time and had been on an idealistic adventure for three years trying to teach adult Catholics that they were Christians. This adventure, being a layman working for the Catholic bureaucracy offered no fringe benefit such as retirement so I looked upon nicotine as an alternative form of retirement. It would kill me before I got there. Nothing about retirement appealed to me.

Life has always been, in my mind, an adventure. The adventure of two persons—hopefully a loving adventure—brought an egg and sperm together to get my life—any life—going. I have done a great amount of reading over the years on almost every idea anyone has written as to what comes after life as we know it. I’ve opted for those who say life never ends. I like the quip, It isn’t difficult to believe in life after death. The difficult is to believe in life before death. That was humor during my cynical period. I hope I have passed through it and will not visit it again.

People peak at a variety of times in regard to all kinds of things. The first time I was aware of this was in the eighth grade. There was a boy who was through puberty fast. He was taller, stronger and better looking than every other boy in his class. This was in Las Vegas Nevada. Each class from first grade through eighth was divided into three rooms according to perceived ability of the students; one room for the smartest, another for the average and the third for the dumbest. In the eighth grade there were one hundred kids; thirty-three and third kid in each room. This was 1939/1940. I believe it had been figured out by some doctor of education at Stanford University. None of us kids ever questioned it. The only unreasonable thing was the kid who was taller, stronger and better looking. Three years later as a junior in high school he was shorter, weaker and not as good looking as many of the other boys. He peaked too soon.

I have not yet peaked in regard to the word maturity as that word is interpreted by the majority of sociologists who try to categorize life. I don’t think I’ll ever make it. I’d like to peak at the next big life event; the one going from this temporal experience into the eternal. I have been very close to ten or more people who have made this move. A very pretty blond sixth grade girl went through it long before she should have. She and her father were killed at a railroad crossing. Because of her death I was moved from the classroom for average kids into the room with the smart ones. The blond girl had been in that room. Her death opened up a desk. Since we had come from Moapa and the two room school house I was put in the dumb room because the Las Vegas educators figured any one from Moapa would be under educated. I liked it there but got moved to the average when a desk became available. I never felt right about getting to the smart class because a very pretty blond girl had been killed. It was a relief to become a freshman in high school where everyone was together.

I’ve been close to people in their teens, twenties, thirties, etc. who have moved on to eternity. The frequency of being close to people who die has been increasing. That is part of the motivation for doing some writing here in 1980. I’ve read several stories and poems about the situation of the person who had this or that special gift and was just about to leave their contribution to posterity when death beat them to it. I’ve managed to write to here plus the stuff I wrote while in Wyoming so there will be this much if I get killed or die tomorrow.

I used to take Communion to a widower who lived all by himself in a tiny old house in north Denver. The first time I saw him it was like seeing my grandfather Casey. This man had beautiful white hair worn in a crew cut. His eyes were clouded over by cataracts. He had lived in Ireland long enough to remember it well and then had been in heavy construction the rest of his working life. One son lived in Texas, the other in California and a daughter who had become a nun had died. The communion of my visiting with him was a stand off with the Communion of Christ’s presence in the bread. One day he prayed that God would remember he was still where he was. He figured the only reason he was still alive was that God had forgotten him. This morning I helped at a Communion service in a nursing home. It made me think of my old friend who was never despondent, bitter or had any negative mood; just an observation about being forgotten said with a sense of resignation and a touch of humor.

Grandpa Casey had that. I believe my dad has it. I’ve been calling him most every Saturday. The first thing he says is, It must be Saturday. This sort of thing could happen in my own case. If it does, I would like to believe I’d be one of those who can find something, even being forgotten, a point to smile about. But if my alternative retirement drug, nicotine, and my social lubricant friend, alcohol, do what the lemon suckers say, I’ll probably get into eternity unexpectedly soon. A 105 year old who died in 1979 attributed his longevity to smoking, drinking and having a helluva good time. The sourpusses of the world will never accept that newspaper story as true.

Monday, January 7, 1980

Money is a big subject in this society. It was that way