It Is What It Is

By S J Morgan

The voice of the book is reflective of the author and the life handed her, the values she learned to cherish and take with her through her journey. She learned to make the most of life's situations relying on her sense of humor to cope. Through the disappointments and failures, she recognized her weaknesses and turned to her faith to get her through. She attributes her courage of character, strength, and wisdom to a deep faith and trust in God. She bares her soul and becomes an open book such that you will find yourself laughing and crying, and oft times identifying with life as she lived it. Her ability to accept life "as is" and to find a comforting blend of laughter and sadness is one of the main threads throughout the book. The sharing of her life is unique and entertaining.

• Language: English
• Publisher: LifeRich Publishing
• Release date: Feb 21, 2022
• ISBN: 9781489740526

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Copyright © 2022 S.J. Morgan.

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Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright ©

1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

ISBN: 978-1-4897-4051-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4897-4052-6 (e)

LifeRich Publishing rev. date: 02/21/2022

This book is dedicated to my husband Bill for putting up with my craziness throughout the writing process, to my dear friend Carolyn for encouraging me along the way, and to Laura, my diligent editor.

CONTENTS

Prologue

Chapter 1       Growing Up In The Fifties

Chapter 2       The Rock And Roll Years

Chapter 3       College Years And Beyond

Chapter 4       Retirement And Becoming A Grandmother

Chapter 5       The Final Years

Epilogue

Homegrown Tomatoes

The Size Must Match The Price

Banff And Beyond

The Proper Frock

Bobblehead

I Don’t Do Windows

The Technology Generation

Drop Everything---Let’s Go

Brad’s Rock Garden

Satan Won

Three Crazy Days

Foddling

One Of My Physical Shortcomings

One Simple Seam

The New Shirt

Losing Lucy And Leaving Cracker Barrel

Goat Picking Day

Country Life; What Joy!

Deer Season In Arkansas

Gotta’ Go

Hamburgers…Yum!

Sad Story

Willie, Willie, Willie

Sad Socks

The Word Of The Day

Greens And Other Things

Social Distance Crazy

Saving A Buck, And Other Hilarities

Cherry Pie

Get Me Out Of This House!

Bill Cooks: I Clean

2020 Road Trip

Chickens

One Fine Day

Gray And Other Stories

Political Pondering

Spur-Of-The-Moment Road Trip

What A Productive Day!

Riley’s And Juju’s Special Day

Covid Got Us Both

Well, It’s About Time

Ya’ Just Gotta Love Her

Go West Young Man; Go West

Santa Fe

Cruising Colorado (In A Minivan)

The Desert

Shopping And Other Special Events

God Hears And Answers Prayers

Oh, Glorious Day

The Calm Before The Storm; The Storm; After The Storm

Serendipity

Road Trip On A Shoestring

Biscuits

A Few Things That Make A Happy Me

Christmas Letter 2021 (By Default)

PROLOGUE

August 4, 2021

I’ve been pondering this morning about my life and that of our three children. I’m toying with the idea (and I assure you that at this moment it is merely a thought) of writing a book. And I ask, Do I want to discipline myself to the extent of writing more than just the snippets I write on Facebook? Do I have enough command of the written word to make it interesting? Do I have enough time left to complete it? I know without a doubt the writer must lean on personal experiences or would have to do a lot of research to do justice to any unfamiliar topic; I’m surely not THAT disciplined! Could I write about me and my life in a way that would be entertaining without hurting someone or jeopardizing relationships?

Oh well, all this thinking has made me hungry beyond being satisfied with just my morning coffee. The dwelling on my babies and their growing up years brought cinnamon toast to mind. My goodness, did they ever consume a lot of cinnamon toast in those years. I LOVE cinnamon toast, and I can’t even remember the last time I made it for myself. Back then (pre-healthy eating mania) it was done on plain white bread. Today I will use 21 grain bread made with organic everything and filled with power nuts.

I must say the cinnamon toast was delicious with my morning coffee. But the intensity of thought has brought me to the conclusion that I’m not starting the book today.

August 9, 2021

I’ve decided today is the day I will start my book – my autobiography. Or maybe it will be an autobiographical novel. No, that would be too demanding. I’ll just call it a memoir.

By the way, if you are reading this you know I survived its writing, and if you find anything in this book that is not accurate, remember it’s the way things have survived in MY memory.

CHAPTER ONE

Growing Up in the Fifties

The Preschool Years and Elementary School

In December 1945 the Second World War, the one that tried to end what the first one had failed to do, was over. The celebrations and kissing of strangers in the streets had passed, the young soldiers had come home, many of whom had come broken physically or mentally or both. The war-weary lad who had married before or during the war had come back to his bride. But in many cases, her returning soldier was NOT the same; so much had changed in him, and to him, in the war. Yet he had a wife, one who had welcomed him with loving arms, unlike those who had received the dreaded Dear John letter while away fighting the enemy. Those guys came home broken no matter what else they had endured while serving their country. Whatever the condition in which he returned, he needed a HOME to come back to. For those of limited funds (and there were many) finding a place was one of a multitude of difficulties he faced. There were so many men and their wives and in many cases their children (their war babies) needing a place to call home. Such was the case in Texarkana, Texas and Texarkana, Arkansas for that matter.

Shirley Jean (that’s me) was one of the war babies; I was born on December 1, 1945. My daddy, Travis, hadn’t gone off to war. He had been called to go like every other red-blooded American boy after December 7, 1941, but when he showed up and took the medical examination and all the other things required that day, he was told that he didn’t qualify. He didn’t know why. He said he never went back to find out why either. He was satisfied that the military equipment he hauled on flat-bed 18 wheelers all across the land of the free and the home of the brave qualified him as patriotic. He didn’t wear a uniform of the United States Army, Navy, Air Force or Marines. His brother Thurman did, though, and he made it back in one piece. But my mom’s cousin Dale never made it off the shores of Corregidor in the Philippines and he’s still there to this day buried with thousands of other brave young men.

My parents, Travis and Geraldine, met in January 1943 in a small town in south Arkansas. Geraldine was quite the looker in her teen years, tall and shapely. It was love at first sight for Travis even though he was only eighteen and she just 15. EVERYONE, except the two lovers, believed they were too young to be considering marriage, but they weren’t about to wait for anyone’s approval. So, they borrowed a car, a Model A Ford, and drove to some other county to some justice of the peace, and Geraldine lied about her age, and she came home a married woman (child). Her dad went ballistic, however I’m not sure folks back in 1943 knew of the term ballistic considering it was before the age of the ballistic missile and all. Nevertheless, Geraldine’s dad WENT BALLISTIC!!! Her mom, ever the calm and sensible one, sent Travis home that night without his bride and told him to come back in the morning so we can discuss this. He came back, they discussed it, Geraldine went home with her new husband, and one year later their first born, Billy entered their lives. Then a mere 17 months after that, I arrived. It’s quite certain my mom named me Shirley because she could just envision her little angel dancing and singing On the Good Ship Lollipop, blonde curls bouncing and dimples sparkling right along with Shirley Temple. However, Mom never would admit that was the purpose for the name. Her Shirley HAD blonde hair, but no curls or sparkling dimples or an angelic voice and she definitely didn’t know how to dance. No matter, I was loved even though my parents struggled in their youth to know how to express that love equally between their boy and their girl.

My dad didn’t go across the waters for months or years, but he WAS gone for weeks on end. And my mom was alone much of the time in their tiny little one-bedroom apartment with two babies doing the best she could. Her family wasn’t far away and was available in an emergency, yet everyday life was spent alone while Daddy was away. With little money, very few worldly possessions and the stress of those little ones, tensions ran high between the young couple, and often they found it difficult to focus on their emotional needs or the emotional needs of their little ones. It wasn’t so bad for me; I was the apple of my daddy’s eye because at seventeen months I fell ill of what was probably a stomach virus. I was lethargically unresponsive, probably from dehydration, and was ordered by the doctor to be placed in the hospital. In the 1940s little was known of how to treat a baby going at both ends and consuming nothing! The doctor told my parents (my very young parents) their baby girl probably wouldn’t make it through the night. They were scared beyond words but my grandmother, ever the calm and sensible one, took charge realizing I hadn’t kept anything down for days. She went home, got some fresh cow’s milk, boiled it, poured it in a baby bottle, hid it in her purse and snuck it into the hospital. She got that contraband fresh cow’s milk into her very sick little grandbaby and, as you can see, I MADE IT. There is no length to which a grandmother will not go for a grandchild. At least that’s the kind of grandmother that Billy and I had; we called her Mommy. As far as my dad and I were concerned from that day forth I was Daddy’s Little Girl.

When Billy was about four, he had a bout with boils. They were caused by a staph bacterium (We didn’t know that at the time.) which was not surprising since Billy spent so much time playing in the dirt. He got boils; I got styes. He got them so bad that the infection moved down to his hip bone rather than rising to the top of the skin. The doctor put him in the hospital, the one that was run by nuns. Everything about that place scared me. I was already familiar with it; driving down the street in front of it was enough for me. I’d hide my eyes so I wouldn’t have to see the nuns in their all-black habits as they walked from the hospital to the convent across the street. The doctor lanced the boil on Billy’s backside deep enough for the infection to drain; it took about a week before he could come home. Children weren’t allowed inside the hospital to visit (I wasn’t about to go in anyway), so Momma stayed with Billy, and Daddy and I talked to him at the window of his hospital room.

Other than these two episodes of illness, Billy and I were seldom ever sick. One would be correct in saying we were two scrappy little kids who fared quite well playing in the dirt, splashing in puddles, and drinking out of the water hose when we got thirsty. Healthwise we were good, but Billy didn’t fare so well emotionally; the stresses of life created a tension within him that made finding his place in his world difficult.

Our family didn’t stay in the tiny one-bedroom apartment long. Affordable housing in post-war Texarkana was scarce. There were many, and I do mean many, more apartments and duplexes (half-houses) and whole houses to become home for us. At one time Momma counted up and declared throughout their early years of marriage they moved 22 times in 21 years, and only one of those was away from Texarkana. It was to Magnolia, Arkansas where we lived a few short months before moving back. I’m sure you’re wondering Why? Well, Momma explained that money was so tight and apartments they could afford were as scarce as their money. She was forever on the search for a better place for a better price and more than once they got notice that This apartment or house (or our half house) has been sold; you have two weeks to vacate the property or… the tenants in the attached apartment were just plain intolerable; they were the strange ones figuratively and sometimes literally, as well. But Momma was so adept at finding a better place that on one occasion she found the place, packed up all our belongings and moved us single-handedly before Daddy got back from a trip. When he got home, he didn’t even know where he lived! She said one of their friends joked that anytime they heard Geraldine rattling the dishes in the kitchen, the chickens in the backyard laid down and crossed their legs ‘cause they knew it was time to move! But that’s just a joke for sure because my mother had NO desire to have farm animals of any kind or ANY animal for that matter. She forever refused to allow Billy and me to have a pet. She gave in once and allowed us to get a parakeet who promptly got out of his cage and ate a LARGE serving of bacon grease from the bacon-dripping can she kept on the stove. In the war years, and well afterwards, bacon drippings were a valued commodity used for seasoning up most anything. There were no little jars of seasoning for fish or beef or chicken or even beans, but there was always bacon grease, provided the family could afford bacon often enough - thus the valued commodity. But the grease didn’t set so well with poor Petey the parakeet. He’s buried in the backyard of a half-house our family rented over on Bowie Street. (More about Bowie Street later.)

Momma was the money-manager, and she could squeeze a dime until it squealed. She always said, Money for God first, then the bills, save a little if possible, and buy food with the leftovers. That’s the way it was done in our family, so beans and potatoes graced our table more often than meat of any kind; even Spam was a luxury we couldn’t afford. But we never went hungry.

Going to church as a family was VERY important to our mother but Daddy didn’t feel the same. Daddy was NOT interested. There was more than a little friction between the