The Seasons of My Life

By John Lentz

The Seasons of My Life is a book that I wish my mother had written. Growing up, I was never very interested in hearing her tell stories of her life. I was always more interested in going out to play. As I got older and had my own family, I was always too busy with my life to sit and listen to her experiences. How sorry I am now that I never really knew my own mother.

This is also a book that I hope my kids and grandkids will someday write. I hope it will also be inspirational to many others to start their own family tradition. How great would it be to pick up a book and read about your parents, grandparents, or even great-grandparents; to know what their life was really like way back when; to know of the struggles they faced, their likes and dislikes, successes and failures, their loves and their regrets, and what made them the way they were.

I also believe this would be a wonderful book for book club members to read. It will get the thoughts and memories flowing back about their own life experiences. I wrote this book so that my kids and grandkids and also the rest of my family and friends will know who I am and why I do the things I do. For others who read it, this book is not for you to know who I was but to get you to think about who you are.

This is the second book I have written. My first book titled Our Journey is still available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. It covers a ten-year period in my life from the time my wife was first diagnosed with Alzheimer's until she took her last breath while in my arms.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Sep 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9798886540017

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The Seasons of My Life

John Lentz

Copyright © 2022 John Lentz

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2022

ISBN 979-8-88654-001-7 (pbk)

ISBN 979-8-88654-003-1 (hc)

ISBN 979-8-88654-001-7 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Spring

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Summer

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Our beautiful baby girl was born in March. I had never gone with my wife to any of her doctor's appointments during the pregnancy. It wasn't because I didn't want to. It was because I was working all the time, and it was not a thing a lot of men did then. Her mother was more than willing to fill in for me, and I am sure my wife would rather have it that way. I have been hearing stories from some of the older guys at work that have been through having a baby before. They were telling me how long I could be in the waiting room once we went to the hospital. I heard some real horror stories, and I certainly hoped it didn't happen to me. I found out from my wife about two weeks before our daughter was born that she was going to have a cesarean section. She told me it was because her cervix was too small to be able to deliver naturally. I'm not sure if that was really the case or if she thought I would be able to be home with her longer having the baby by C-section. At her young age, she was twenty-one now, and I was still twenty. She was a master manipulator. She could say things to people and convince them it was gospel, and it was, the gospel according to her.

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Fall

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Winter

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

A Few Messages to our Adult Kids

About the Author

This is the book I wish my mother could have written. Not because she was a writer, but because I would have liked to have known so much more about her, about her life growing up, about her childhood at home, about going to school, and about her after-school activities. Being born in 1919, what were the things she liked to do in the 1920s? Did she play with her friends, or did she have chores to do? What were her hopes and dreams and aspirations as a teenager? Why did she seem to make such bad choices when it came to picking a mate? Why did I have a different father from my two older sisters? Why did my dad leave when I was three months old? Why did he never come around and watch me grow up and be a father to me? So many whys and not enough answers.

What was it like for her and her siblings during the Great Depression, from 1929 to 1941, when she was not quite a teenager at the start of that terrible time? What was it like for her during World War II, from 1939 to 1945, when she was in her midtwenties? What was it like for her and her family when they received a telegram from the US Army letting them know that her mother's baby brother, the family's youngest son, had been killed. The telegram went on to say that he was killed during the battle of the Bulge during World War II. This battle was a major German offensive near the end of the war. This battle started on December 16, 1944, and lasted a little over five weeks. This was the largest and bloodiest battle of that war. The United States had over half a million men in that battle and eighty thousand of them died, including my mother's baby brother.

As a young teen, growing into adulthood and beyond, these were the stories I was never very interested in whenever they came up. Now my mother, her two older sisters, and anyone else who would know the answers to my questions about all of this are gone. I have this insatiable desire to know more, and I never will.

This is a book I hope my kids, grandkids, and beyond will one day understand and appreciate. It's the type of book I hope they will also write one day and keep this new tradition going for future generations. I wrote this book so that my kids and grandkids and also the rest of my family and friends will know who I am and why I do the things I do. For others who read it, this book is not for you to know who I am but to get you to think about who you are. I hope it will help you get your memories flowing, both good and bad. These are all part of what has made us who we are today. They are the reasons why we do certain things and why we will not to others. It's also a book that I hope will inspire many of you, who I will never know, to do the same thing for your family.

We all have different experiences growing up and growing older. I believe you can take siblings from the same parents who have grown up in the same household with what would appear to be the same circumstances and get completely different stories about their childhood. I hope this book will help my children and grandchildren and my family and friends to know me just a little better. Hopefully it will also help them understand some of the choices I have made along the way and why I made them. Right or wrong, as Frank Sinatra once said in a song, I did it my way.

I am not an author by trade. Growing up, I never really liked reading or writing very much. I will tell you, this is the second book I have now written. The first one was published a few years ago and is titled Our Journey, and it is still available online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. I will get into that as we get a little further into what I'd like to call the seasons of my life. I hope you will enjoy this effort of mine and be inspired to start writing the story of the seasons of your life also. I found with my first book, the hardest part of the writing process is getting started. I thought about the first one, it took almost five years before I ever wrote the first line. Once I started though, I found it was much easier to put it all together. I found it was not only easier than I thought it would be, but it was also very cathartic.

As I have grown up, I have heard many older people talk about the seasons of their lives and never really knew what it was they were talking about until now. I have just turned seventy years of age, and I have been doing a lot of soul-searching and reflecting on my life lately. As I look back, I realize that I have actually had four very different phases or seasons in my life. I also realize that I am in the last one right now, and I pray that it's a very long season. When I talk to others of my age, I see that it is basically true of everyone. We all go through several different phases during a lifetime. Although many of us do not think of them as seasons, I do. It seems as I think about it, there have been four really big changes I have gone through. I don't care if you have been lucky enough to have been married to the same person for fifty-plus years, if you have been married five times, or even if you have never been married.

I believe the different phases apply to all of us. There are no time frames as to when each phase or season starts or when it is done. We just move seamlessly into the next season and continue on. The only thing we know for sure is we all start with our spring season. This season starts when we are born, no matter what month the calendar says it is. Hopefully, we all make it to our summer, fall, and winter season. If we do, then the winter season will be our last season and end with our death. There is no going around for another four seasons. The one caveat to all of this is that, not all of us make it to have all four seasons. Just as the beautiful flowers in our garden, some won't even bud while others make it all the way to the winter snow falls. We never know why this happens. We plant all the flowers the same way. We water them and feed them all the same, yet many never get to show their beautiful colors. I believe the only one who knows why this happens is God. When some of our flowers die way too soon, we must continue to love and nurture the rest of our garden, to keep our lives and our garden happy and full of blooms. There is not one single person who has not lost very precious parts of their garden throughout their lives. We must be strong and look at what we have left and continue to cultivate and enjoy the beauty we still have.

As we all start out in our spring season, we are born anew, just as the first buds on the trees and flowers in the spring. We spend our springtime blooming into the beautiful flower we will become never knowing for sure what kind of flower that will be. It could be a pretty rose or maybe a big ugly, prickly weed. It all depends on the love and care we are given. We then move into our summer season. This is where we really begin to grow and blossom. These are generally our late teens and into young adulthood. These are carefree times, and we are just enjoying everything. The wind, the rain, and the storms—nothing seems to bother us. We are just flowing in the breeze, enjoying what every day brings and making the most of it. We then move into our fall season. This is where we begin to take things a little more seriously, and we become a full-fledged adult, with all the adult responsibilities. We realize that our carefree attitude is not going to keep carrying us through this life.

Like all living things, we feel a need to find a mate and start our own family. We begin to settle down, and we think we know what is coming, but we don't. Our fall season is certainly more unpredictable than our summer season was. We are no longer under the umbrella of our parents. We now have to make all our own decisions, right or wrong. We are or will soon become parents ourselves and will begin to see just how much it was that Mom and Dad actually did for us.

After that and if we are so lucky, we move into our long, dreary winter season. This is where we have to make a whole new set of decisions for this long, harsh season ahead of us. We are most likely now retired and are empty nesters. Gone is all the hustle and bustle of raising a family and building a career. If we are lucky enough, our winter season will be just the two of us together, all the time. We have never spent this much time together, alone, and we are not even sure if we can or even want to. But if we play our cards right, we will see that winter can be our most beautiful and enjoyable season of all. There are a lot of activities to do in the winter of our lives. The things we never had time to do before. Hopefully we learn how to enjoy them and each other for a long time to come.

Although I believe that these seasons happen to all of us, they don't always happen at the same time to us all. Some of our springtime may be very short while others may last well into our twenties, thirties, or even our forties. It's the same for all the seasons. There is no telling how long or short each one will be. This is the story of how my seasons have gone. I hope this will help many of you to reflect back on your own seasons and see how they have affected you. I am mainly writing this book for my children and grandchildren, who really have no idea what my life is really like. I hope they will gain some insight into my life and maybe realize a little better why I am, the way I am. Who knows, maybe someday my great-grandchildren or even my great-great-great-grandchildren will read this and know what it was like to be born in 1949. I also hope that it may inspire others to begin to jot down notes and stories or even write their own book about their life's seasons. This could even become a series of family books for our future generations. I sure wish I had a set of books from my family. These notes and stories do not even have to be published; they just have to be written down and saved. Believe me, future generations will not care about spelling or grammar. They will just care about who you really were.

Spring

Chapter 2

My springtime started out kind of rough. I was born at home, on a farm. My mother had no doctor and used a midwife to help her with the birth of her sixth and final child. The first five were all girls, although only two of them made it past the first month of the spring of their lives. When I was born, no one even thought I would make it into the budding stage. I had a severe case of yellow jaundice, and in the late 1940s, this was very serious for a newborn.

My first month or so was very touch and go. Although I am happy to report that I did make it through and bloomed into a beautiful but pesky flower or, as some may say, a weed. As I just mentioned, I had two older sisters, and I also had a different father from theirs. One sister was five years old when I was born, and the other was eleven years old. From the time I was three months old, I was raised by a single mother. I never knew the wonder or the wrath of having a father. I am sure that having two older sisters and being the baby of the family, I was pretty spoiled.

I don't remember it that way, but that was what I had been told. I really don't have any memory of my childhood before the second or third grade. In looking back at the old pictures and listening to my sisters, I know that my mother had a really rough time keeping our family together. But together, she kept us, and together, we stayed. My eldest sister did the most in looking after and taking care of me. We became very close as we got older and stayed that way all our lives. I could always talk to her about anything that was bothering me, and she knew she could trust me with anything she wanted to talk about. My other sister, the one older than me by five years, not so much. That's not to say that we weren't close, because we always were. It's just to say that she was not very nurturing or neat and certainly not very helpful. My eldest sister joined the Navy when I was seven. That left me with my mother, who was working all the time, to keep us together with food and a roof over our heads. This meant that my twelve-year-old sister, who didn't like to cook or clean or watch after me, was now in charge.

So in the middle of my springtime, I had to learn how to fend for myself, if I wanted to eat more than once a day. By the time I was seven, we moved several times. This was a trend that continued into my teen years. Because of this, it was not easy for me to make new friends. I was very shy, and I learned early on how to amuse myself and keep busy while alone.

Let's go back a little to before my mother ever had me. She worked with a woman about her own age, and they became lifelong friends. I would say that this was my mother's closest and best friend she ever had. She and her husband were always known as our aunt and uncle from the time I was born. My mother also became their only son's aunt. You see, their son was born just six months after I was. The two of us grew up together, and he became the brother I never had. My mother loved playing cards, and she and my new aunt and uncle would get together whenever possible and play pinochle all night. They would have us two boys in high chairs next to the kitchen table where they were playing. They would give us both some old cards to play with while in our high chairs.

As my mother would tell it, I would be sound asleep in the high chair well before 11:00 p.m. while my brother from another mother would be up the whole time they were playing, just having a good time by himself. He never wanted to miss any action. And you know, some things never change. All my life, I was ready for bed by 11:00 p.m., and I still am. He, on the other hand, was always a night owl, and he still is. I do remember staying at their house quite often, growing up. I know when I started school, whenever I had time off, for a holiday, my aunt would come and pick me up, and I would be at their house for three, four, five days, or however long the holiday lasted. This gave my mother one less thing to worry about and one less mouth to feed while she worked. It gave them a playmate for their only child. Those times at their house were the happiest memories I have of my childhood.

Whatever I learned about how a family should be, I learned from being at their house. That was where a mom stayed home with the kids or, in their case their son, while the dad went off to work to provide for his family. It was the perfect Ozzie and Harriet scenario. In the evening, they all sat down and had dinner together. My uncle owned a butcher shop, and he would always bring home fresh meat, milk, fruits, and all sorts of good things. I never remembered having kind of selection at home. Their son, I'm sure, assumed this was normal, but to me, it was a wonderful treat sent from heaven. I always loved having bananas when I was there. That was a luxury we never had at our house.

Every day my aunt would make a nice breakfast, lunch, and dinner, plus snacks throughout the day. I was never used to this kind of food or treatment at home, and it was heavenly to me. I can remember being at their house for most Halloweens. They lived about an hour from us on the other side of town. Since my mother never had a car until I was sixteen, my aunt would come and pick me up and bring me back to their house. We would get dressed up and went out on our own, from house to house.

By the time we got back, our pillowcases were so heavy with goodies. We would dump our candy out on the floor and carefully go through our loot. At those times, I had more candy than I had ever seen, and it was all mine. We had every kind of candy I had ever heard of, plus many I never heard of. We had regular apples, candy apples, popcorn balls, gum, and even some money. I don't remember ever going out for Halloween as a child except at their house. I am sure my uncle would follow us when we were younger, staying just far enough back to let us think we were on our own. He was a great dad, and my aunt was a terrific mother, and when I was there, they made me feel like one of their own. They owned a very nice house with a two-car garage, and it was in a good neighborhood. They lived in that same house until their son was married and on his own. Their son went all the way through school with his same friends. He played all sorts of sports and after-school activities. He had many wonderful friends whom he did everything with, and many are still good friends to this day.

When I stayed over, he had his own room with two of the biggest twin beds I had ever seen. When I was small, it seemed like you needed a step stool to get into bed. They were side by side, and when we went to bed, we would continue playing until, of course, I got tired and fell asleep. I can remember going to the movies during my visits to see a double feature on Saturdays. This would take up more than four hours of the afternoon. We would then come home and go play in their finished basement. I had never seen a finished basement before.

As a matter of fact, I don't remember us ever having a basement until I was a teenager. We would replay scenes from the Westerns we saw that afternoon. This would go on for hours and then continue when we went to bed. During the summers, I would spend weeks at a time over there, and I loved every minute of it. They are by far the best memories I have of my springtime. My mother was always gone to work before I ever got up in the morning, and it was my elder sister who would fix me something to eat. After she left for the Navy, it was up to me to get meals for myself.

First and second grade, I went to a Catholic school. I learned all the different prayers we had to say. I do remember the nuns trying to switch me from writing with my left hand. I know I got the ruler across the back of my hand several times, but it never helped. I am still left-handed. I write, eat, throw a ball, and bowl with my left hand, but I golf and bat with the right hand. I guess, when I learned to golf and bat, I just did it like the others. It took me quite a while before I ever got a baseball mitt. Mainly because there were no hand-me-down left-handed mitts. I never learned to golf until I was in my midthirties. By then, everyone I knew golfed right-handed, and the same was true then. There were no used set of left-handed clubs for sale. I didn't want to spend the money for a new set when I didn't even know if I would like it, although I did, and I still play right-handed.

As I said, my mother never had a car as I was growing up. She would walk three blocks to a bus stop and then take as many different buses as needed to get where she was going. The neighborhood grocery store was about four blocks away. Generally, she would stop there two or three times a week on her way home from work and carry home one or two bags of whatever we needed, rain or snow, hot or cold. When she finally did get a car when I was sixteen, it was a used Ford Falcon. I had just gotten my driver's license, and when she would get home from work, I would pester the heck out of her until she gave me the keys, and I could go out joyriding with my friends.

During my mother's whole life, she never did own a brand-new car; it was always a used one. She also never owned a home. She always rented her entire life. My friends all had a mother and a father. They all lived in homes they had bought, and most would buy new cars from time to time. My mother was a very loving and hardworking woman. I always assumed growing up that my life was the same as all the other kids I knew. As I look back while writing this, I now understand how much these aspects of my childhood affected my adulthood.

Chapter 3

Aside from playing cards, my mother also loved to dance. In the mid-1950s, there were plenty of places that couples and singles could go and dance the night away to the sounds of the big bands. My mother would always get a ride or take the bus to enjoy these occasional nights out. She always wanted me to learn these dances, and when a good song would come on the radio, she would try to show me how it was done. Of course, I was too shy, or I thought I was too cool for that. I never wanted to learn, and that is one of the big regrets I have to this day.

My mother did meet another man during one of her nights out and seemed to really like him. I was about seven years old at the time. I am not sure how long they were seeing each other, but they decided to get married. I am sure that my mother was thinking it would be a good stabilizer for her and her children. Of course, this meant another move and another school for me and my sister. We moved to an upper flat in a Polish neighborhood.

Now the way I remember this marriage and the way my sisters remember it are two completely different stories. I remember that he seemed like a nice guy. He was a truck driver and was short and had a stocky build. He smoked Camel cigarettes and always wore a black tight-fitting T-shirt. Naturally, I thought that he must have been a tough guy. He had a nice, relatively new, maybe 1955 or 1956 black Ford coupe. His parents lived about an hour away on a nice lake. We would pack up and spend a weekend with them every so often. Now this was something I don't remember my friends being able to do. He would also let me sit on his lap and steer the car whenever we went anywhere, of course, without my mother. He did have son that was about three or four years older than me. He would stay with us once in a while on the weekends. I would have to share my room and twin bed with him. I did not care for that or him very much.

I remember him as a hoodlum, tough-guy type, and he would always push me around when no one was watching. I do remember that this new dad I suddenly had seemed very good to me. He bought me a red Schwinn bicycle with a horn box, fenders, and white wall tires. A bike, let alone what appeared to be a new bike, was something I had never had before. It was the nicest bike I had ever seen. He also showed me how to lift weights since I was such a skinny little boy. I think he wanted to toughen me up and be more like his son. Since he had a car, he would also take me to different lakes on the weekends. He would let me play for hours by myself in the water while my mother was working. I do remember one time he bought me an air mattress and let me play out in the water all day. I had never had or seen an air mattress before, so I remember having a great time, lying on my stomach and paddling all over. I wasn't much of a swimmer, so this was great for going out farther than I should have or could have on my own. I must have been on that mattress for hours. When it was time to go home, I had trouble walking. My legs were sore every time I took a step; I could barely move. The back of my legs were just throbbing every time I took a step, especially behind my knees.

When he finally came to see why I was taking so long, he noticed my back was all red. The back of my legs, arms, and back were so badly burned from the sun there were already blisters forming. When I ultimately got to the car, everything hurt as I tried to sit. I didn't want to cry, but I did. I never had a sunburn before, and it hurt so bad. When I bent my legs and sat back in the hot vinyl seat, it hurt even worse. I don't know how he got me to sit still in that hot car for the ride home, but he did. I know the ride home was excruciating, and when we got there, my mother was not very happy with him, with what had happened to her little boy and how irresponsible my new dad been.

Besides that incident, I remember the few years of that marriage as a fairly good time. He used to decorate cakes all the time. I am not sure if he was selling these cakes or just making then for friends. Either way, they were the most beautiful cakes I had ever seen. There was also the time he took me to a Halloween party. That was something else I had never done. It was mostly adults, and he was dressed as Emmett Kelly, the clown. He also dressed me up as a little clown. My mother must have been working, and he was babysitting me. I remember having fun and being out late. The bad part of this whole tryout of a marriage was when his son came to live with us for about six months. Again, I had to share my room and bed with him. I remember most nights sleeping on the floor. Not sure if it was because he kicked me out of my bed, or it was just easier for me. Of course, this happened at the start of a new school year. I was so embarrassed to even have anyone know I knew who this new bully was at our school. Even though he was a few grades ahead of me, there was always talk of this new troublemaker picking fights.

My sisters, on the other hand, as I found out years later, thought this was one of the most miserable times of their young lives. Apparently, our new father did not hit it off with my sisters. He did everything he could to try to get my middle sister to leave the house, even though she was barely a teenager at that time. My eldest sister told me, many years later, when I had my own family, the story of why our stepbrother came to live with us.

Apparently, he had been in trouble with the police, and I don't remember the reason. His choice was to either go and live with his dad, which was at our house or go to juvenile detention (juvenile jail) for six months. My mother, not wanting to be the bad guy said he could come live with us, as long as he stayed out of trouble. I am sure she knew it would be a mistake, but she was still trying to make her marriage work. It was working for her husband and son but not for the rest of us.

As it turned out, this experiment of having a dad didn't last very long after that. My elder sister and I talked about this segment of our lives several times after that. He absolutely hated my middle sister, and I am not so sure there wasn't some slight foul play with my elder sister. Whatever it was that finally ended it, my mother knew it was not working for her children. That was the most important thing to her. That was the last time my mother ever brought a man into our house. I'm sure this was a good thing for my mom, my sisters, and for myself. I know it must have taught my mother a valuable lesson also, because she never tried that marriage thing again. At least, not until we were all out of the house and well into raising our own families.

Chapter 4

I had always wanted to have a dog. There were always dogs around, no matter where we lived. I could always make friends with them much easier than I could with other kids. Since we moved so many times and it was hard for me to make friends, I remember thinking a dog would always be my friend and could move with us. Whenever the subject came up, my mom would always say, we couldn't have one where we lived. Every place we moved, she would say, No dogs are allowed here. Looking back now, I think the real reason was, she sure didn't need another mouth to feed and something else to clean up after and worry about.

When we were still living in the upper flat and after my temporary dad had moved out and was no longer in our lives, I was home alone as usual. One day, when I was out playing by myself, this cute little black-and-white cocker spaniel came running up to me. He wasn't very old and was very playful. He seemed lonely also, so of course, I started playing with him. I would throw a stick, and he would bring it back to me. I would run around, and he would chase me. This went on for quite some time. When I started to leave to go home, this dog started following me. There was no one around watching or looking for this dog that I could see. I couldn't believe he kept following me. I was several blocks from my house, so I kept walking, and the dog kept running after me. He was jumping on my leg and wanting to still play. By the time I got to our house, he was still by my side, and I really wanted to keep him. My mom was still at work, and my sisters were not home. I went around the back of the house and called the dog, and he followed me. I wasn't sure what I was going to do now, but I knew that if he had followed me this far, he was mine, and I was going to keep him. I started going up the back steps to our second floor flat while coaxing the dog to follow me. To my great surprise, he did. When we got to our back door, I didn't want to take him in the house because I wanted to talk to my mother first. So I coaxed him up another flight of stairs to the attic area. I opened the door, and he followed me in. It was dark and hot in there, but I knew my mom would be home soon. I played with him for a few minutes in the attic and then closed the door and left him there. I couldn't wait for her to get home so I could tell her about my surprise. I went in the house and started watching TV.

By the time my mother got home, she started making dinner and talking to me. I had forgotten about the dog. When she and I were having dinner, she started hearing this howling coming from outside. It was late summertime, and the windows and door were open. There was no such thing as air conditioning then, so you could hear everything that was going on outside. She went out the back door to listen and heard it again coming from the attic. By this time, I had remembered about the dog. I was out there with her, and she went up the stairs and opened the door. There, looking at her was this cute black-and-white dog panting and so happy to see someone. She immediately looked at me and asked me whose dog this was. I told her that I didn't know whose dog it was, that he had just followed me home, and I put him up there until she got home, but I had forgotten about him being there.

Well, she brought the dog in the house and feed him and gave him some water. He was so thirsty and hungry and happy to be out of that hot attic. She said she would have to check around the next day to see if she could find the owner. I was so thrilled that the dog was going to stay overnight. He seemed happy also, so all was good, at least for now. After we had the dog for a few days, my mom said that she could not find the owner. She also said, we couldn't keep him either. So where would the dog have to go? I had no idea. I just wanted him to stay with us.

Well, my aunt and uncle on the other side of town was the answer. My mom must have called them and asked if they would like a new dog. They all drove over the next day and fell in love with him immediately. I would miss him, but I knew I would see him when I went to their house. They all loved him so much, and every time I was at their house, I could play with the dog that I had found. They named him Skippy. I think my uncle must have always wanted a dog also because most of the responsibility for caring for their new best friend fell on him. He would walk Skippy every morning before he left for work, then again, every evening after dinner. As their son and I got older and could take over the walking duties, my uncle wanted no part of us taking that job over. My uncle continued to walk him every single day and night for the rest of Skippy's life. They became the best of buddies, and if we weren't playing with the Skippy, he would always be lying beside my uncle no matter where he was. They had him for about thirteen years before Skippy died. They absolutely adored him, and he could not have had a better life. Whenever I was at their house, it was like I had a normal childhood. I spent much time over there until I reached my midteens. By then, through no fault of our own, their son and I started to grow apart. As I have said earlier, my aunt and uncle took an interest in and could afford to have him in all sorts of sports. He seemed to enjoy baseball the most and was very good at it. I, on the other hand, started to feel more and more that I didn't fit in with his group of friends. I still and always will consider him the brother I never had. We still act like family, and I always include him and his family in any of our special family events, and they also include me.

Chapter 5

Even at home or in elementary school, I never felt as if I fit in with the kids whom I perceived to be the rich kids. I was always shy and never talked much. During my time at school, there were two types of boys. There were the frat boys and the greasers. It was like the real-life Happy Days. Fonzi and his group were the greasers, and Richie and his friends were the frat boys. In grade school, I used to have a good time with a few of the frat boys in my class, but I would never hang out with them after school. Even though they only lived a few blocks away, it was perceived that they lived in nicer houses and certainly had nicer things. They always dressed like the kids in the Sears catalogs. It was as if I had come from the wrong side of the tracks. So after school, I had one very good friend and a few others that we would hang out together. By this time, I began to notice, even more, that it seemed everyone I went to school with had a mom and a dad. Even though it was normal for me not to have a dad, I began to feel inferior. Even though these boys that I hung around with came from families with a mom and a dad, I felt more comfortable with them. If things had been different in my life, I think that I could have fit in very well with the other group of so-called rich boys. I never realized how much I must have missed not having a father until I was around kids with one. I knew that I always felt somewhat ashamed and out of place because of it. My mother couldn't afford to buy me a lot of things that I thought I needed to be able to fit in. I do think that this is what brought out my rebellious stage in my early teens.

I remember, at Christmas and birthdays, I would always thumb through the Sears catalog toy section and fold over the pages of all the things I wanted that year. I would study the pictures and read about what these toys would do. I spent hours looking at all those new toys. I could imagine playing with them and how happy I would be. When the time came to open the presents though on Christmas morning, it was always the same, clothes. I never got any of those toys I had spent so much time pondering over. I know that I must have blamed my mother for all the inadequacies I felt growing up, never feeling as if I really fit in anywhere. As I look back on it, I realize how much I really learned from my mother even when I didn't think I was even listening to her. She was one very strong, very determined, and very dedicated woman. She would not let anything come between her and her children.

My clearest memories of my life at home start when I entered the fifth grade. I do remember before fifth grade, we moved at least three times after I started school, and every time, I went to a different school. This probably had something to do with the fact I never really liked school from early on or never made friends easily. By the time I would make a friend, it was time to move and start all over again. It was hard for me to talk with other kids, so it took me awhile to even become friendly. When I did make a friend, it was usually just one or two before we moved again. In the fourth grade, I found out about band class. It seems I always wanted to play the drums but never had the chance. Maybe I liked the drums because I thought they made the loudest noise. I went home and asked my mother if I could sign up for that class. She agreed, and off I went to band class. When asked what instrument I was interested in playing, I told them the only one I wanted to learn would be the drums. I never thought I would get a whole set of drums, but I was excited to get at least one to take home and practice with. Instead, they gave me a pair of drum sticks and a little eight-inch square block of wood with a piece of rubber on top. That was what we were to practice on. There was no noise at all, how boring. I should have gone for a trombone or something else. At home, I would turn it upside down and at least be able to hear some kind of noise while I practiced. I never did get to play on an actual drum set that year. I did learn how to read music and was getting pretty good at hitting my little pad while reading the musical notes. The teacher told me at the end of the year that I was doing very well. She said I would be moving up to the real band the following year. I was so excited