The Gray High Heels: The Others Come

By PJ Bailey

My mother probably came up with the idea "if the shoe fits, wear it." In 1959, she purchased a beautiful pair of gray high heels. Only one other person could wear those high heels, and I was not the one. That year came quietly, but then the others came. A mother and six children. How could sixteen people live in a house with three bedrooms and one bath? Who were they? Why were they here? How long would they stay? We had no idea that each of us would be forever changed in 1959, the year known historically as the year of change. Most of us would find ourselves viewing a picture of those high heels long after we saw them in the back of our Ford station wagon as our father backed out of the driveway that fateful day. But those high heels held secrets to a horrible but brave story that now must be told. My father was a man of his word and a man of words. He taught the importance of knowing what to say and meaning what we said. Would words bring us together? Would their leaving destroy any chance of our becoming family?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781098018993

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The Gray High Heels

The Others Come

PJ Bailey

Copyright © 2019 by PJ Bailey

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

The Others Come

Fourth of July Open House

Becoming Family

The Neighborhood

Vinson Valley

The Girls Go Shopping

To Cuthbert and Beyond

Out of the Blue

The Others Leave

A Pause

Long Live the Past!

The Others Return

Acknowledgements

In Memory

SARAH JANE LOTTES

Have you ever heard the beat of a pure heart? It only echoes truth, love and goodness. Sarah, with her lovely heart told me many years ago: Jane, you can do this! I believed her. I still hear her sweet words reverberate each time I write or dream of writing.

Indebtedness

My sincere thanks to Hilary Mulkey. She did not shrink nor hide when I pleaded for her to at least read my manuscript. I understand few will say yes to pleas like mine. I was rather pathetic. But Hilary was willing to read my manuscript and was unafraid to voice words that I could not tell myself. I am sincerely indebted to Hilary!

The Others Come

The year 1959 came in without incident. But then, on the second day, the Soviet rocket carrying the Lunik I space capsule (Mechta, the dream) blasted off from a place called Kazakhstan. It went twenty-five thousand miles per hour (the magical speed known as escape velocity). We had no idea that 1959 would become known as the year of change or escape. But it would be the year that would change our family forever.

We lived in Warner Robins, Georgia, located in the middle of the state. Summers were brutally hot; rains came often enough, making it even more steamy and miserable at times. They matched my tears it seemed, not that I was a crybaby, but changes came too suddenly and without invitation. And weren’t there times when I loved dancing in the rain? I need those times to return. The tears surely were hidden behind a faraway thick cloud of the unknown, sometimes with thunderous arrival or other times with such lightness that others scarcely noticed, which was just as well as I was quite shy and was angry at the unceasing supply of summer disturbances.

For the rains and the tears were not the only thing that came that summer. The others came.

It was a Saturday evening in mid-June. We were allowed to play outside most evenings. We had already bathed and made sure our shoes were shined and ready for church. I have just finished praying and writing on my forehead (with my finger) NO MARES. I have been having scary dreams; NO NIGHTMARES is too long and the mares are the important thing, those little devils!

I once heard one of our neighbors yelling at his brother not long ago. You are not listening. Do I have to write it on your forehead? That seemed interesting, that writing across one’s forehead could make a person’s brain listen better. So I have been writing on my forehead NO MARES, and it works most of the time. I find that I also write reminders (need cheese). It works. Mom tucked us in by 2100 hours. Sorry about that. I mean nine in the evening.

Dad uses his Army time mostly. He says this is the correct way. It is a twenty-four-hour clock. There is no twelve-hour clock in my father’s world. I like to use it also. Midnight is 00:00, and you just add each hour to it, so 1:00 a.m. is 0100. That’s the first hour of the day. Dad says it’s 01:00 or 0100 hours, 0200 hours, and so on; now we are at 9:00 p.m., so we are at 2100 hours and no minutes. Fun, huh? Well, the fun begins when a Z (or Zulu) is added at the end. Then we know something is going to happen. But for now, I’ll try and keep it straight.

We three sisters were having a tough time going to sleep. The rain, now gone its way, had only made it hotter, and it was when Bobbi was cranking out the windows as far as they could go that we heard the phone ring. It was too late for calls to our house.

Dad answered. I could hear only, Yes, this is Otto Bailey. I will accept the call. Hello. Mrs. Newton, please hang up, this call is for me. Thank you.

We shared a party line with the Newtons and the Paynes. Dad said it was a party to everyone’s business. Anyway, I heard Dad softly say, Hello. Rebecca? Yes, I will accept this call.

Becca?

Huh, huh. No, I can be there perhaps tomorrow. Probably late night. I’ll talk to Mother. Tell me the directions. Hold on, my pen.

No, just stay put. Do not go back to the house. I’ll see you tomorrow night.

My sisters had joined in the eavesdropping, and we finally heard him hang up and slowly walk toward his mother’s room.

Grandmother had come to live with us after Grandfather died. He had a long history of millwright work all over the country and a long battle with sugar diabetes. He had lost his left leg in January 1957. The last time he was here was July 30, 1958. He and Grandmother were heading to Florida to see their older son and daughter after visiting with my father’s brother and his wonderful family in South Carolina.

Grandfather had always dreamed of living in Florida. He was amazed at its beauty, the different trees and the sand, and, of course, the ocean. He was rocking Jon, our youngest brother, telling him about the ocean when Jon suddenly reached for his neck for a hug and sent both falling back in Dad’s green rocking chair, and all we saw were three legs high in the air and then heard giggles that were shortly joined by our own laughter.

Grandmother and Grandfather arrived in Miami late that next night. He lay in bed that night and said to his wife of over fifty years, Look at this place! It’s Miami, Florida. I never saw such a place. It has the most fascinating trees I ever saw.

During the night, he had what the doctor said was an occlusion or a heart attack. Dad got the message, and he and Mom went to Miami to help prepare his burial. Bobbi would be the boss until they returned.

Dad moved Grandmother from her home in Dothan, Alabama, the following November, to our house in Warner Robins.

Warner Robins was known as Wellston when Mom and Dad first came here in 1941. The population was forty-six, but those building a new air force base came in the thousands. Dad first helped with construction and then began repairing aircraft; he said he never handled so many spark plugs! By 1943, he saw that the war was going on longer than expected and wanted to join the Navy. The Navy did not like his having color blindness. He had an offer of work in Brazil; but when the Signal Corps offered to train and to pay him as a radio repairman, he didn’t refuse.

However, by September 1944, he let the Army know he was available. The Army was not concerned with his color blindness but sent him directly to Ft. McClelland. He would go with the 3rd battalion, 383rd Regiment, 96th Infantry Division to California, Hawaii, Eniwetok, Manus, Leyte, Okinawa, and back to the Philippines. He left behind Mom with their small children, Barbara (Dad called her Bobbi) and William (his friends called him Beetle).

Bobbi, born in 1942, seemed to be Dad’s favorite. She had dark brown hair, freckles that multiplied with the South Georgia sun, and green eyes of what we called cats that matched whatever color she wore. She was beautiful and daring. She would never have any childhood diseases, which meant that Mom would have her in every sick room until she left for college, hoping she would be spared those grievances in adulthood. She never had even a pink eye. She could recite anything she read and was a genius with mathematical computations.

William was tall and lanky until he started boxing at the first gym in town. He wore his black hair in a ducktail in back and curled in front. He would have to work hard in school, loved anything about wars, and excelled in football. He was intolerant toward bullies. Teachers, mayors, children. Didn’t matter. He would defend those vulnerable; hurting those who offended others without cause. He was expelled for two days just last May. Mr. Fowler taught William’s social studies class and was known to push (physically) students around if they were not doing exactly as he demanded. It was a Friday, and the story goes that Myron Thompson had not stood up when Mr. Fowler called on him to tell the class the eight national capitals of the United States. William sat next to Myron and knew he probably had been up all night with his mother who was ill. His mother and he were the only survivors of a house fire last year. He lost his father and two brothers. His mother had been bedridden since. Mr. Fowler was marching toward Myron. William had watched him push students around, but that day, William moved right in front of Myron’s desk.

I will take that question, sir, William said, not as a request, rather a statement of fact.

Mr. Fowler started walking even faster and with much distain (at least William said his face appeared like red stain).

Mr. Fowler had pushed many students over the years, but when he attempted to push William, he found himself being pushed with William’s body. William used no hands; he just began leaning on the teacher and giving each answer ending in a suitable push: Philadelphia (push), Baltimore (push), Lancaster, York, Princeton, Annapolis, Trenton, New York, and with Washington, DC. came a rather gentle push that ensured the teacher hit the blackboard. The two-day time-out was a time of much congratulations from students and surprisingly from our father. The rest of the year was without incident, and Mr. Fowler would be allowed to teach for several more years.

While Dad was at war, Mom would stay in Cuthbert to live with her mother and youngest sister. Mom worked in a slaughterhouse. They all missed Dad. From a ship in Manila Bay, he was watching what he called the most beautiful sunset he would ever see when he heard the war was ending.

On his return, Dad heard the air force base was rapidly gaining a reputation as a significant and strategic base in the South. Some of the thousands of personnel predicted to work had already begun duty training. Dad was hired, but they wanted him schooled in radio and electronics and paid him again to get that education. The color blindness, again, did not seem to be a factor. Of course, Dad always had ways of compensating for such things. They would send him to Philadelphia, New York City, or to wherever they dictated. He would stay in the Army as a reserve for several years. He moved his family to the Ziegler, an apartment complex that had been quickly built on the main street that housed hundreds of base workers and their families. My sister and I were to be born on March 2, 1947, but on February 10, Mom went into labor. Jean apparently was to be born first, but the doctor told Mom that we struggled right at birth and I won first prize. I came at 0200 on the tenth, one long hour ahead of Jean. I was large, bald, weighing six pounds eight ounces. I had my Dad’s dimples. Mom was heaving up turnip greens she had eaten for supper and told the doctor that she was too tired and sick to continue.

The doctor said, Mrs. Bailey, you have to hold on until this second child comes.

Mother just knew the second would be a boy (the doctor had twins, a boy and a girl, didn’t he?), so she had our names planned, Paul and Paula. Paula had come. Now for Paul. But no, the girl came reluctantly. She was shorter but weighed the same as her twin. She had thick black hair and large blue eyes