Hold My Beer and Watch Me Participate in My Favorite Water Sport, by Ricky

As a pre-teen, I could never hold my beer very long. For that matter, I could never leave it on the table or TV tray for long either. My parents had a modestly stocked liquor cabinet under our built-in BBQ in the kitchen. Jimmy and I did sneak a taste, once only. Neither of us cared for hard liquor but the beer we attacked without hesitation each time he visited until it was all gone, followed by a somewhat lengthy visit to the bathroom to see a man about a horse as it were. My parents were not blind and noticed the disappearance of the containers. After that, they did not buy me any root beer in large qualities when they went to the store.

One day when I was 13, I was attending a Red Cross swimming class to learn how to swim. I had no bathing suit so was wearing a one year too small pair of green shorts. The shorts were not tight anywhere except at the waist but, they were loose at the crotch. Did I mention they were small or perhaps I should have said “too short”? During the classes, my favorite thing to do was to be up to the waist in water at the shallow end, take a deep breath and hold it, dive down to the bottom, then swim underwater to the other end of the pool, all the while slowly rising towards the surface. I would do this repeatedly as long as the female instructors would let me. This was and still is the only way I can swim for short distances.

At the end of the second swimming class, I was walking home with Roy, the brother of another boy who was in my rival scout troop. As we were talking, Roy told me that as I was swimming he could see my testicles through the leg opening of my shorts. Remember, I did say the shorts were too short. The shorts were not a swimming suit so there was no liner in them either. Naturally, I was slightly embarrassed but also titillated as I imagined all those female instructors feasting their collective eyes on me and whispering to each other “Look at that boy’s balls”. Roy’s revelation to me about my equipment, shortly thereafter led to some naked playtime before he had to go home.

So, you can see why as a teen, swimming class was my favorite water sport—just ahead of seeing a man about a horse.

© 26 Oct 2015

About the Author

I was born in June of 1948 in Los Angeles, living first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach. Just prior to turning 8 years old in 1956, I began living with my grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years during which time my parents divorced.

When united with my mother and stepfather two years later in 1958, I lived first at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, I moved to Denver, Colorado where I lived with my wife and four children until her passing away from complications of breast cancer four days after the 9-11 terrorist attack.

I came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. I find writing these memories to be therapeutic.

My story blog is TheTahoeBoy.Blogspot.com

Scars, by Phillip Hoyle

I’ve been lucky to live 68 years with almost no scars. As a result of that I don’t much relate to this topic even though after many years think I can still identify the scar Jeanetta Olson left on the back of my hand from a fingernail cut. I don’t recall the occasion except that it happened in the car during one of our families’ many trips to Topeka to see Dr. Peuzit. Jeanetta and my sister Christy both doctored with him due to polio. The scar now may be obscured by an age spot.

For some years I sported a scar on one of my fingers due to a cut I got from wrangling with a 16mm film take-up reel when I was working as a student minister at Central Christian Church, Wichita, KS. My wife Myrna was helping me to stop the flow of blood from the cut. When Dr. Parrish, the senior minister, came out of his study to help with a bottle of Witch Hazel, we saw Myrna sink to the floor and almost faint. I held my own paper towel bandage while Dr. Parrish worked with her. After that I was always properly careful around projectors and aware that Myrna might easily faint in any medical situation.

I do have stretch marks in the skin around both of my knees, scars due to having dislocated them. I always felt they seemed like nothing when compared with my wife’s proud stretch marks for having born two children.

In my psychic life I have suffered little pathos, so I have little of that kind of scarring. Still, I have become aware of a price I paid due to the many years of living in the closet. I also am aware that if I stay in this storytelling group for another five years, I may uncover scars of various kinds, even if it is only a callus on my right middle finger from writing stories so intensely every morning to have something ready to read. Also I am aware of the slight possibility that I may have so many scars on my feelings so deep that I cannot distinguish touched from untouched. There are a few scars from medical procedures of the last year and a half. Probably from now on in my ageing life I will be able to add a scaring episode or two from these kinds of new experiences every year. Perhaps I will eventually have a book out of them. I hope not.

Denver, ©22 June 2015

About the Author

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE program “Telling Your Story.”

He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com

Compulsion, by Gillian

At bottom, my personality is not one to encompass compulsion. I am essentially too laid back, too relaxed, and also too logical and pragmatic, to be driven to do something which is not logically in my best interest. Or, as one definition has it, against one's conscious wishes. I don't generally let myself go in that direction; and Lord help anyone who tries to push me.

Yeah, that sounds good. Like most such statements, it is not exactly the whole truth and nothing but. It needs a little qualification.

What do I know? What can I know? I who spent the first forty-odd years of life playing a part, pretending to myself and everyone else that I need not be, in fact was not, the person I was born to be. Simply acting a part, of course I was not prey to compulsion. I was not affected by really strong emotion of any kind. An actor pretends an emotion; plays at having it, but does not truly, deep down in the soul, feel it.

When eventually I came out to myself, I must honestly admit, it was completely compulsive. I have often described it as being swept up on the cow-catcher of a run-away train; going wherever it took me, without conscious choice - and that most certainly is acting compulsively.

I cared not a jot whether coming out to the world as quickly and loudly as I could was, in fact, in my best interest. Many of us, had we looked at our coming out in the clear light of logic, would probably have stayed firmly in the closet. On the whole. it was not a welcoming world awaiting us out there.

For some time after coming out, my behavior remained compulsive. For the first time in my life, I fell madly in love. And love, or at least it's for-runner, infatuation, surely is pure compulsion: we are compelled to pursue that person, to be with her every minute of every day, to make it last forever. Fortunately, as we settle into a less dramatic true love which goes so very much deeper than infatuation, we are able to swim free of that rip-current of compulsion and return to a more rational frame of mind.

I say fortunately because, as I began by saying, my personality is not really a good fit for compulsion. I am uncomfortable with it. It scares me. On the other hand, I have just said that the two best things I have done in my entire life - coming out and loving Betsy - resulted from irresistible compulsion. And now I think more about it, I'm not sure that Betsy would agree that I am so free of compulsive behavior. Yes, I am a wee bit obsessed with photography. And screaming Stop!! Turn around! at Betsy in the center lane of 80 mile an hour freeway traffic because we've just passed a perfect photo op. just might be construed as not acting in one's own best interest!

© September 2015

About the Author

I was born and raised in England. After graduation from college there, I moved to the U.S. and, having discovered Colorado, never left. I have lived in the Denver-Boulder area since 1965, working for 30 years at IBM. I married, raised four stepchildren, then got divorced after finally, in my forties, accepting myself as a lesbian. I have now been with my wonderful partner Betsy for 25 years.

Wrinkles, by Will Stanton

Human cells are supposed to repair themselves by being replaced with duplicate, new cells. If that process worked perfectly, then we would look about as young as when we first were fully grown. Mother Nature, however, with her cruel sense of humor, arranged it so that, sooner or later, that replication begins to fail, resulting in malformed or even diseased cells.

Aging is a major contributing factor to this breakdown in replication. So are disease, injury, smoking, chronic drugs and alcohol abuse, and too much sunshine. Unfortunately, cellular deterioration can occur with any cell, inside the body and visible on the surface. I once read that medical research has identified 12,000 diseases and afflictions humans are prone to, many caused by cellular failure. I imagine by now that many more have been discovered.

For many people, wrinkles are the most obvious evidence of aging, along with a few other delightful imperfections, such as gray hair, baldness, obesity, and loss of those youthful facial features. My time spent at the mirror is minimized to those brief moments when I am required to shave. Otherwise, I avoid mirrors almost as often as do vampires.

Speaking of other bad contributing factors, it is well known that chronic stress can contribute to premature wrinkles. Outdoorsy-people, such as traditional farmers and cowboys, often ended up with wrinkled faces and skin like leather. I also have seen a picture of a pair of identical-twin sisters aged fifty. The one who smoked and drank heavily looked seventy-five; whereas the one who did not drink or smoke looked forty. I have seen pictures of men and woman who have abused methamphetamine, and their faces looked like actors from the movie “Night of the Living Dead.” Meth is terribly destructive. On perhaps on a more positive note, there are such things as “laugh lines,” too. So, if your face is very wrinkled, just tell people that you laugh allot.

It is said that facial wrinkles give a face character, showing much of one's life-experience. That makes sense among us superannuated folks. Of course, the young, and also those who admire or even envy the young, would prefer never to show signs of aging. Why else would billions of dollars be spent on face-lifts, botox wrinkle-removal, cosmetics, expensive hairdos and fancy clothes?

Ending on a silly note (and I must hasten to explain that I very rarely, if ever, indulge in humor that possibly can be regarded a repellent) the subject of wrinkles never fails to remind me of a little story once told to me. Now I can inflict it upon everyone here.

Once during one hot summer, two little boys were taken to their great-grandparents' house for a weekend stay. The little boys woke up early the next morning. Hungry and bored, they went looking for their great-grandparents. They climbed the stairs to the sweltering second floor. Very quietly, they opened a bedroom door and looked inside. They were surprised to see their great-grandmother lying naked on the bed. The littlest boy whispered to his brother, “What are those wrinkles all over Great-Grandma?” -- “Great-Grandpa.”

© 13 September 2015

About the Author

I have had a life-long fascination with people and their life stories. I also realize that, although my own life has not brought me particular fame or fortune, I too have had some noteworthy experiences and, at times, unusual ones. Since I joined this Story Time group, I have derived pleasure and satisfaction participating in the group. I do put some thought and effort into my stories, and I hope that you find them interesting.

Grandparents, by Ricky

I never met my father’s father, John Leonard Nelson. He died when my father, John Archie Nelson, was only 9 years old. As the oldest of six siblings (2 girls and 4 boys), he became the “man-of-the-house” and had to help his mother, Emma Sophia (Ungar) Nelson, support the family. He ultimately left school after the 8th grade to work full-time. Emma was a short but not frail woman. After I was born, she lived with us in Redondo Beach and Lawndale for awhile. During that time she would dress me like mothers did back in the early 1900’s; in clothes that looked like small girl dresses. I was too young to care, but when, as a teen, I saw the old photographs of those days, I was embarrassed to have a record of how I had been dressed.

As I grew into my teens, I remember Emma as a thinner elderly lady with silver grey hair and a really nice personality. At that time in her life, she was a live-in “nanny” for a down's syndrome girl, Jackie. I first met Jackie when she was about 3 and the last time before she passed away she was about 13. In all those years whenever we would meet, she would run to me and give me a big hug. I always felt awkward and uncomfortable around Jackie, but I can still see her round smiling face and her radiating pure love to this day. Truly, she was one of God’s special gifts to our world.

In her later years, Grandma Nelson alternately lived with my dad or his oldest sister, Marion, until she finally passed away.

I first saw my mother’s parents, Richard Pearson and Signe (Erickson), when they came from their farm in Minnesota to visit us shortly after my birth. Of course, I don’t remember any of that, but I have seen the photographs of the event. For my 3rd birthday, my “party” and birthday cake were served at the farm because their 25th anniversary was less than 2-weeks after my birthday and our family was there to help celebrate. I don’t remember that event either, but once again, I’ve seen the photographs.

When, at the age of 8, I was sent to the farm to live while my parents divorced, I was able to learn somewhat about them during the 2-years I lived there. Both Richard and Signe were the first children born in America in their respective families, so they were raised in the traditions of the “old” country, Sweden. As such, they were not very “touchy-feely” people. Others would probably classify them as being rather “cold” or “distant” emotionally.

I felt pretty close to both of them; to my grandfather, because I was named after him; John (after my dad and his dad) and Richard (after grandpa). I was “close” to my grandma because my mother was in California and I missed her so much.

While I was there, I was not allowed to do anything with the fun farm equipment, or fun chores, like driving the tractor while plowing, mowing the lawn with a power mower, etc. I suppose that was because I wasn’t raised on the farm from infancy AND because I wasn’t their child only a grandchild. They were very protective of me (irritatingly so).

I was allowed to help feed the cows, stack hay bales onto trailers and then again in the barn. I was no good at milking because the cows were so much bigger than I was and I was VERY hesitant in getting between any two of them in their stalls to install the milking machines onto their business ends. I did watch and laugh, as grandpa would occasionally hand-milk a cow just to squirt milk at all the cats and kittens that would sit on their hind legs and beg like a dog.

Grandpa did allow me to ride on the tractor with him while he would plow, plant, cultivate, and harvest his crops. I could also ride whenever he would mow, rake, and bale hay. I spent many long hours riding with him.

Grandma absolutely refused to let me mow the yard with the power mower. She considered it too dangerous. She did assign me the job of collecting the morning eggs, however. That didn’t even last two days as I was terrified of the rooster or more accurately, of his talons and extremely aggressive behavior.

Grandma made the most delicious dessert, which remains my favorite to this day. It’s called, Cherry Delight and is extremely “rich” in flavor and calories.

Sometimes, I helped her do the laundry, not from any sense of duty but because my part was running the clothes through the “wringer”, (it’s a boy vs machine thing). While grandpa was generally proportionally muscled for his average frame, grandma was a bit on the husky (not fat) side as she was a hard worker who not only managed a two-story farmhouse but also had a nice medium sized garden. Every autumn she would do a lot of canning of her garden vegetables, including the ever-present rhubarb. Even into her older age, she was quite a lovely woman and nice to look at.

Because he spent so much time out in the sun, grandpa resembled one of those ancient cowboys one occasionally sees on greeting cards. He had a very dark tan, but with his shirt off, the sun, reflecting off his alabaster chest could be quite blinding. He was truly a “red neck” but not in intelligence or personality.

One of the chores I got to do, I did because I wanted to, not because they asked me to. I just loved to go out to the fields and trap gophers. My grandpa was the township’s “gopher bounty” paying agent so he paid me 10 cents per gopher trapped. Other farm boys would come over to our farm with their dads and show him the tails from gophers that they had caught and he would pay them 10 cents a tail. I just brought home the whole body. Killing the gophers in my traps was one thing; I did not want to cut the tail off.

I loved all my grandparents and I miss them as much as I miss my own parents.

© January 2012

About the Author

I was born in June of 1948 in Los Angeles, living first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach. Just prior to turning 8 years old in 1956, I began living with my grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years during which time my parents divorced.

When united with my mother and stepfather two years later in 1958, I lived first at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, I moved to Denver, Colorado where I lived with my wife and four children until her passing away from complications of breast cancer four days after the 9-11 terrorist attack.

I came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. I find writing these memories to be therapeutic.

My story blog is TheTahoeBoy.Blogspot.com

Doors, by Phillip Hoyle

Two doors controlled the comings and goings in our early 1940s Cape Cod house in Junction City, Kansas: the front door and the back door. Both were wooden, both had latches and locks, both greeted and debarred. The front door was made of oak, the backdoor of fir. The front door opened onto a stoop where in summer Mother tended flowers in planters; the back door opened onto a screened porch. A second back door to the porch was a frame with screens and a simple hook latch at about adult eye level. I liked the way the screen door whacked like a gunshot when we’d let the spring pull it closed from a full open position. The doors must have been quite strong for they withstood the abuse of two adults and five children, a dog and several cats, neighbors and neighborhood kids, all of whom provided a kind of Grand Central Station feel to the house. The house was open, the doors seldom locked.

Formal visitors used the front door. Even Santa Clause entered there; we had no fireplace. We kids used the backdoor usually because we played in the backyard, garage, or the yards of neighbors who lived across or down the alley.

Thus it almost seemed a ceremonial moment when Dad locked the front door with his key, a ritual that occurred annually when we went on our week-long family vacation. We’d drive west to the Colorado Rockies to cool off during the end of July or first of August. When we returned he would unlock the door and we’d hurry inside amazed at the size of the small house that now seemed so large, an effect of living for a week in a mountain cabin and spending too many hours in a crowded car.

So far as I know no one ever broke into our house. Perhaps it was the time and place or simply good luck. We all felt safe at home, but I learned more. Mother was threatened once when we kids were small. Dad was out of town. Late at night an unidentified man phoned saying he was going to come and get her and the kids. She was ill, hemorrhaging at the time. Following some home remedy, she got out the bottle of wine someone had given Dad for Christmas from a high shelf in the back closet, Dad’s double barrel shotgun out of their bedroom closet, and sat on the kitchen floor in view of both doors with the bottle at her side and the gun across her legs. “No one came to get anyone,” Mom told the story years later, “but if they had, and saw me, they surely would have fled the crazy drunk woman with the gun.” Of course, Mom didn’t open the wine bottle; just had it in case she needed it. With family stories like that, we kids felt safe at home. No one would ever dare come to get us.

I learned that a good door and attentive parents may be able to keep out unwanted visitors but not necessarily prying eyes. On summer nights when the temperatures soared way too high for comfort, my parents would sometimes sleep on the back porch on a double cot that folded out from the glider. I recall Mom’s story of the night she woke up to see a man staring at them through the screen. She sat up hurriedly, nudged Dad, and yelled, “You get out of here.” The Peeping Tom ran but didn’t see the wires of the clothes line that clocked him in the throat. Choking, he got up and ran down the alley. Dad called the police who located the man hiding in the trees at the high school sports field one block to the west. They identified him by the wire mark on his throat.

One night years later when I was in junior high and things were settling down for the night, Mom wearing her robe ran into the living room from the bedroom where she and dad were dressing or undressing, I don’t quite recall. She threw open the front door and looked out. I was surprised and asked, “What’s wrong?” She replied, “Someone was peeking in our window. I think it was Dinky.” I wasn’t surprised at that detail. Dinky was my rather creepy friend from across the alley who was always getting into trouble. In fact, for years when we kids played Monopoly and landed on the JUST VISITING border of the Jail we always said, “Just visiting Dinky,” who to us looked like the cartoon character peering through the bars. I think we were polite enough not to say it when he was playing with us. That night there was no call to the police, but I suspect my parents were more careful about closing the blinds while they were changing clothes. Still they rarely locked the doors except late at night when we kids were all safely in bed.

© 27 Apr 2015

About the Author

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE program “Telling Your Story.”

He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com

Once Upon a Time, by Gillian

Progressive Dinner parties were the in thing, at least with my social group, once upon a way back when. I guess they're still around, but I haven't been involved in one in decades. It must have been the 1970's when I was, because I was still married to my husband and living in Jamestown in Boulder County. Did you ever get caught up in those things?

Between about ten and twenty people gather, say, at our house. We have a drink or two to kick off the evening. Cocktails were popular then, though beer was always my drug of choice; or becoming a wino held a certain appeal, but I never cared for mixed drinks. Most of us, of course, puffed cigarettes as we chugged our drinks in those carefree days. After all, you're already wrecking your liver so what's the point in worrying about your lungs? From Jamestown we convoy to, say, South Boulder. There we gather at another home for hors d'oevres and another drink. Then on to Longmont and another home for what I think we called, back then, the main course, or simply dinner, the term entree not coming along until later. And, needless to say, more drinks. And off to Lafayette, then still a small town out in the sticks, for desert and after-dinner drinks, then to one of those new things called condos for a night cap. Finally off home in different directions, not a designated driver in sight. By some miracle no-one ever had an accident amongst all this. Nobody even got a drunk driving ticket. But of course in those days, even if you were spotted weaving your way along the center line, it usually earned you little more than an urge to be more careful next time, which you knew you could translate freely as, be more careful not to get caught next time.

In the here and now, Betsy and I might go to East Denver in the morning, to take an old friend who can no longer drive, out for lunch. On the way home perhaps we'll make a detour to deliver a favorite candy bar to another old friend in a nursing home. Not so very different from a Progressive Dinner, is it? OK, maybe, but at least we're sober. There is nothing good about the headline, "Great-grandmother arrested for drunk driving."

Once upon a time, my calendar was covered in scrawled names, places, and times. But only around the edges. Essentially everything was crammed into evening and weekends. The big black hole in the middle was all WORK, leaving little opportunity for personal life. The other little squares were crowded with ferrying kids to endless varieties of activities, and adult celebrations.The future was looking wide and bright on a limitless horizon, and we were ready! We celebrated friends' new jobs, new cars, new babies, new homes, new marriages, new lovers, and new divorces: promotions, graduations, undreamed of vacations.

In the here and now, the calendar on the fridge looks very similar. Except that it's reversed. All the crowded-in names and places and times are in the middle, in that space once occupied solely by WORK. The outer squares are largely empty. We, like many older people, really do not like to drive after dark unless absolutely necessary. So we, and our friends and those accommodating family members, plan most things so that we can get home before dark. Somewhat in the same way, if not to the same extent, we tend to schedule activities on weekdays. Weekends are all crowded out with those wild young working folks who have to be accommodated so that they can keep on paying our Social Security.

If we are among the really fortunate, our children's calendars are now covered in times and places they are ferrying us. The very fact that we're still here means we are still having birthdays.

We probably still go on great vacations, but although many of us continue our education in one form or another, we don't bother much about promotions and graduations - our own, that is. Our celebrations have taken on a different view. They tend to be celebrations of the past rather than future.Our calendars have a few too many memorials scheduled on them, our friends number among them too many now living alone, and if someone is moving it is usually to somewhere smaller, and sometimes to a place where they really do not want to be.

So the once upon a way back whenever was a much better place than the here and now? I'd go back in an instant given the chance?

NO WAY!!

For one thing, there's one mighty steep learning curve I had to struggle my way up between there and here. I never want to have to do that again. And anyway, I sincerely love life, here and now.

Yes, the calendar has a few too many memorials and hospital visits, but it still denotes many other wonderful things - like Monday afternoons. The dates I now keep with friends seem so much more meaningful somehow than the endless get-togethers of my youth. The people mean more to me. In reviewing the memories of those Progressive Dinners, I realized that, other than my ex-husband, I couldn't recall who any of the people were. Back then, anything that happened was just another excuse for a party rather than a true celebration of the event, or even the people involved. A "Celebration of Life" as we like to call memorials these days, has a whole lot more sincerity about it, and in some ways more true joy, than all that meaningless round of long ago parties.

No, of course they were wonderful times. My life has been great, I have terrific memories. But, from my current viewpoint, I have to say it seems almost as ridiculous to wish I were in my twenties as it would for someone twenty-five to yearn to be seventy-five.

© May 2015

About the Author

I was born and raised in England. After graduation from college there, I moved to the U.S. and, having discovered Colorado, never left. I have lived in the Denver-Boulder area since 1965, working for 30 years at IBM. I married, raised four stepchildren, then got divorced after finally, in my forties, accepting myself as a lesbian. I have now been with my wonderful partner Betsy for 25 years.

Handy, by Betsy

I love my family and am proud of my heritage. However, the truth is that I come from a long line of unhandy men and women. I have no recollection of my grandfather, my father, my brother, my husband, my son, uncle, any male cousins, and likewise no females in my family ever fixing anything. They could handle a bad situation and maybe make it better, but never was there a soul in my family who could physically fix an object that was physically broken. They could fix things that were in their realm of expertise such as a human body in the case of my doctor husband and son. My husband and son are MD’s, my father was a businessman and expert in forestry, my grandfather was a businessman. One grandfather, my father’s father, possibly was a man who could be handy around the house. He was an engineer. The problem was that he was always off in some other part of the world building tunnels and bridges, never around the house.

Isn’t there always supposed to be a man around the house who can fix the plumbing, the squeaky door, the stuck window, the lawn mower that doesn’t start, the car that doesn’t start.

It was late in life that I decided maybe I could take on the role of Ms. fix-it. After all, if I failed, I could just say it’s in the DNA. At least I tried. But it turns out that I have been able to fix quite a few things. The key is in having the right tools and knowing what tools should be used for a particular job. I have lots of tools out in my garage—screw drivers, hammer, power drill, chisels, pliers, cutting devices of all sorts, etc. but these are only a percentage of the total number of household tools that actually exist.

One way I have learned something about fixing things is to find a hardware store where they actually give service other than taking your money. Once in the store to ensure the successful completion of a do-it-yourself repair be sure you can describe the problem to the hardware clerk, have the right measurements and sizes, or take the fixture or whatever with you. Find someone knowledgeable who can tell you what tools and parts are needed and how to do it. Often these guys are retired plumbers, carpenters, handymen or such and they are only too happy to demonstrate their knowledge and skill.

When I retired I took up cycling. I soon found myself training for a cross country trip. I learned very quickly at that time that it is a must to be able to fix whatever, change a flat tire, or put a chain back on track, or apply oil when needed, make adjustments when problems arise and you are in a remote place like the middle of the Mojave Desert.

The truth is I really enjoy fixing things. I feel quite creative when I succeed. Many years ago I took up furniture refinishing. I found it a very satisfying activity. Buying old furniture and putting it back together I find to be much more satisfying than assembling a new piece of furniture—the kind you buy on line and have delivered to your door by Fed-ex. Once you open the box (and you do need a special tool for that) you look at the myriad of parts, screw, fixtures that hold them together, scratch your head and decide you will be forced to look at the instructions.

A year ago or so driving by a house in our area we saw an old table at the curb not able to stand on its own, parts lying on the ground, covered in some awful kind of old black varnish and what looked like brown paint. A Tattered hand drawn sign hung crookedly saying “free, take me home. I once was beautiful.” It looked like it could be just the table we needed for our entry way. But it was in terrible condition. I said to Gill, “I can glue that table back together, refinish it, and we’ll love it!” I knew I could glue it because I had the right clamps left over from the old days. The clamps, unused, had moved with me many times over the years. I could now justify holding on to them for 2 decades. We did gather up the table and I did glue it together and refinish it and it is beautiful again—and useful. Very satisfying indeed!

I recently fixed some non-working, ancient door handles when I visited my daughter in Atlanta.

She and her partner had been keeping one door closed with duct tape for weeks—knowing I would be coming there for a visit soon. “Mom can fix it.”

Perhaps the women should have been the fix-it handy persons I could have emulated—but didn’t— as I was growing up. I say could have because the women of past generations did not engage in such activities. Maybe in the kitchen, but certainly not in the shop or the garage. Women were not supposed to get their hands dirty—not even in the garden. In addition to that women were not considered to be sufficiently strong or adept at such things as hammering, drilling, screwing, or working out mechanical puzzles.

Fortunately gender roles have become more relaxed since the late 20th century. My own ex husband was not at all rigid about gender roles. He thought nothing of cooking dinner while I chopped the wood for the fire. I know he was an exception. But why not share roles especially if you enjoy it and are good at it.

I’m not sure how young hetero couples are these days when dealing with gender roles. For those secure in their sexuality, probably they are relaxed and comfortable with sharing.

As for us couples in the gay and lesbian community, most of us probably more naturally fall into the roles we want and play the best. Or we do whatever is most expedient on a given day.

As for the DNA and any genetic disposition toward being handy in my family I can only conclude this is not a dominant gene. My daughters always have things they want me to fix when I visit. They always ask politely and know just the things I like to do and the limits of my ability. Also in their favor when they ask, they always add, “That is ONLY if you want to, Mom.” But they know I’m a sucker for it.

© 30 June 2015

About the Author

Betsy has been active in the GLBT community including PFLAG, the Denver women’s chorus, OLOC (Old Lesbians Organizing for Change). She has been retired from the Human Services field for about 15 years. Since her retirement, her major activities include tennis, camping, traveling, teaching skiing as a volunteer instructor with National Sports Center for the Disabled, and learning. Betsy came out as a lesbian after 25 years of marriage. She has a close relationship with her three children and enjoys spending time with her four grandchildren. Betsy says her greatest and most meaningful enjoyment comes from sharing her life with her partner of 25 years, Gillian Edwards.

Depressed, by Will Stanton

Homophobia, fear, hate, ignorance, and stupidity. Tragically, there still are hate-mongers such as Pastor Steven Anderson of the Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona, who publicly rants and raves that all homosexuals must be rounded up and executed. No gays should be allowed to live; “The Bible says so!” I felt sickened when I saw in November, 2015, that Republican presidential candidates Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee, and Bobby Jindal agreed to participate in one of Anderson's hate conferences. Too many people agree with them.

Thank God, such insane hate and ignorance appears to be diminishing among younger Americans, at least among the more educated and cosmopolitan ones. Even the Supreme Court squeaked by with a five-to-four decision to treat gays equally in marriage, despite unlawful resistance by hypocritical Christians such as the Kentucky county clerk Davis, supported by Huckabee, who refused to issue marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples.

The idea that so many ignoramuses staunchly believe that personal religious delusions override the U.S. Constitution's guarantee of equal rights and separation of church and state is astonishing and depressing. I have noticed also that such people as that county clerk appear to have absolutely no awareness of the concepts of irony and hypocrisy - - in her case, committing adultery, having children out of wedlock with her third lover, yet having her second lover adopt the children, then marrying yet a fourth man. I suppose that none of this counts because “Jesus has forgiven her.” Many Christians ignore her transgressions.

That silver-tongued serpent Huckabee, who as a former governor, should know better than to employ his well practiced verbal skills to exacerbate the situation by lending his supposed authority to the clerk's bogus claims. Also, those opportunistic lawyers pretending that there is legal standing to the clerk's claims is an abuse of the Constitution and the legal system.

I hope the situation is improving in the general population, at least in the areas of the nation that are not so backward. In our time, two generations ago, otherwise even decent people, through ignorance, tended to lack understanding and acceptance of gays. There was so much fear and rejection. So many LGBT adults spent many years feeling isolated, lonely, unfulfilled, depressed. This obviously was especially hard on young people, struggling to come to terms with their own orientation and need for friendship and love.

In my hometown, there was a successful, upper-middle-class man who had built a lovely modern home in one of the better parts of town. I remember my classmate's mother telling him to stay away from that house because a very bad man lived there. What was so evil was that the man was deeply enamored with youth and beauty, which led him into a ill-fated situation. The laws of that time still are on the books in this country that an adult may not have relations with a seventeen-year-old. Yes, I know seventeen is legal in Britain, and even sixteen is legal in France, however, not in America. He was well aware that he was risking fate entertaining seventeen-year-olds in his home.

Naturally, young guys potentially are less trust-worthy because of their immaturity and relative inexperience. So inevitably, one of them talked. The police came to the house and placed him under arrest. A court date was set, and he was released on bond.

Word rapidly spread among the townspeople about this “shockingly evil man.” The man's whole life fell apart. He knew what his fate would be in the courts and subsequently in prison. He fell into a deep depression. He felt helpless, hopeless, and that his life had come to an end. So, he put a hose into the tailpipe of his car, turned on the engine, and committed suicide. It was reported in the newspapers, which probably satisfied the readers' enjoyment of local scandal. I can just imagine that many people probably said, “Good riddance!”

Man feeling despair

With young people, statistically more gays commit suicide than straight kids. Remember also that teens, in general, tend to be more emotional than rational. Some emotional upsets may seem to be “the end of the world.” They may too easily think that life is just not worth living.

In one high school, not far from where I lived, one teenager, who was straight, generally was regarded as the most popular boy in school, and with good reason. Sometimes, it appears that some people “have it all” - - extraordinary good looks, intelligence, charismatic personality, athleticism, you name it. Naturally, probably all the girls in school fawned all over him, each one hoping to be chosen as his girlfriend. Inevitably, there always is the possibility that a few boys have similar dreams, too. There was one boy who did become obsessed with his idol.

Out of desperation, the gay teen approached his idol and, best as he could, presented his case for their becoming close friends, perhaps even becoming intimate. I frankly do not know whether the straight boy truly harbored hateful feelings toward gays or, instead, if he merely was frightened of what others might think of him if he hung around this school pariah. Either way, his rejection was humiliating. The gay teen felt absolutely crushed. His despair and depression increased to the point that he felt that life was not worth living. He thought, however, that he would leave this world demonstrating to his never-to-be love the depth of his love and the worthlessness of his life without love.

Quite often when persons contemplating suicide make the final decision, they ironically lose their sense of impotence and inaction; for they now have a plan. This was the case with the gay teen. He made sure the object of his love was home, then drove over to his house. He honked his horn to draw attention. The straight boy came out onto the porch and saw him sitting in his car. Certain that his love was watching, the teen put a shotgun to his head and pulled the trigger.

That horrifying incident was so tragic. A young life lost. Yet, can you also imagine the impact of that terrible scene upon the straight kid? What did that experience do to him? It is safe to say that this trauma would remain in his memory to the end of his days. We here in this room can feel the pain of this tragic story. Unfortunately, however, there probably still are many people who might say, “Good riddance.”

Boy who feels that life is not worth living.

© 2015

About the Author

I have had a life-long fascination with people and their life stories. I also realize that, although my own life has not brought me particular fame or fortune, I too have had some noteworthy experiences and, at times, unusual ones. Since I joined this Story Time group, I have derived pleasure and satisfaction participating in the group. I do put some thought and effort into my stories, and I hope that you find them interesting.

Culture Shock, by Ricky

“Culture” is a word that strikes fear into the world's families of bacterium as if they know that shortly following the culturing will be an anti-biotic of the lethal type for all or specific families. A situation quite shocking from the point of view of the bacterium.

“Culture” is a word that creates feelings of loathing in the stereotype masses of the American populace. For some reason they feel that quality music in the form of opera, symphonies, and songs where one can actually hear and understand the lyrics is not of any worth. Thus, they vote to stop government support for these enterprises. As for TV entertainment, the masses do not seem to like a broadcast which does not contain lots of violence, sexual innuendo, or cheap humor.

These same masses will support government spending taxes for the things they prefer, for example baseball, football, and soccer stadiums. (If such things are good for business, shouldn't business pay for it and not taxes?) But worse of all is their tendency to label those who do like quality music, songs, TV, screen play, or drama productions as elitists (at best) or snobs (at worse).

“Culture” is a word that creates feelings of joy or happiness in the stereotypical well-to-do (previously referred to as elitists or snobs). This group also tends to view the “less fortunate others” as undesirables for friendships and as a drain on the public treasury. Thus, they vote to cut social programs that support the poor, as the poor are viewed as lazy and uncouth leeches.

Of course these stereotypical views are not totally accurate and there are those of us who enjoy activities and recreations that fall into both camps. Sadly though, we are a minority.

“Culture Shock” commonly occurs when persons from one background encounter persons from another. An example is when “Johnny-Reb” moves into “Damn Yankee” territory or vice versa; or when a “New Yorker” moves to San Francisco; or when anyone from the east or west coasts moves into the mid-west or America's “heartland” (the “fly-over” parts from which many gay men and women escape and move to either of the coasts).

One example occurred in my own home. My oldest daughter married a man from the Republic of Georgia. After he obtained citizenship here, he arranged to have his parents move to Lakewood and live with me and them. His parents grew up entirely under the authority of the old Soviet Union and its economic and social “values.” Maria grew up on a collective farm and so worked hard as she grew.

One day, my daughter took her mother-in-law to a discount store to buy her a new purse. While trying to decide which of many different styles to buy, Maria began to cry. When asked why by my daughter, she replied that there were too many choices and she could not make a decision. Maria was faced with “culture-of-plenty” shock.

Other “shocking” opportunities occur when military, police, gang, generational, and sexual orientation cultures have values that clash.

I have not experienced culture shock per-se. What I am experiencing is culture confusion. Being a closeted gay boy since my young teen years, I lived in the straight world most of my life. When I finally officially “came out,” at age 63, I was gently exposed to the gay “culture” of senior men. Then I learned a little of other sub-groups of gay culture; some of which apparently don't “play-well” together, physically or politically.

So just as Maria experienced culture shock trying to adjust from a Soviet life of “little” to an American culture of abundance, So in my case, I am trying to understand all the subtleties of the elusive gay culture. Since I do not generally expose myself to the sub-groups of that culture, I am not likely to ever comprehend them well enough to form a cohesive or unifying understanding.

© 26 November 2012

About the Author

I was born in June of 1948 in Los Angeles, living first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach. Just prior to turning 8 years old in 1956, I began living with my grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years during which time my parents divorced.

When united with my mother and stepfather two years later in 1958, I lived first at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, I moved to Denver, Colorado where I lived with my wife and four children until her passing away from complications of breast cancer four days after the 9-11 terrorist attack.

I came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. I find writing these memories to be therapeutic.

My story blog is TheTahoeBoy.Blogspot.com

Acceptance, by Ray S

Ever since I was old enough to reason, or maybe un-reason, my person has been split right down the middle. Picture an amorphous form waiting to take its shape of the character in this scene or act of the particular time in my life of this play. It is like going onstage when you hear your cue, sort of sink or swim, and you keep looking for direction and there isn’t any. Then a lot of directors appear, the play becomes complicated, and the form becomes an enigma.

In another scene there develops the discovery of the body and other like bodies. At this time it is taken for granted; no awareness of the condition except it is pleasurable and fun. (Boys will be boys.) It will be in another scene when labels appear—like pansy and sissy. “Queer” wasn’t a popular term at this time.

All the while the other side of this split enigma was craftily shaped into an acceptable heterosexual form. The deep seated need to fit in and be like everyone else took over and a fully, if not flawed, developed actor emerged on the stage. If there was any conflict burdening this act, it was sufficiently ignored so as to successfully convince this actor and his companions that he was a he. There never was an option if you had to play this role.

The big scene (known as chewing the scenery in theater talk) came when the subjugated enigma half rises in protest, and we see the two halves shouting at each other. The straight one screams, “I don’t want to be gay!” The gay half waits patiently through this anguished tantrum until his accomplice, Eros, rears his head.

All the while a play within a play has been unfolding. Everyone goes to college, everyone has a sweetheart—hetero that is. Every sweetheart finally secures an invitation to matrimony. The act and actors are quite convincing. It is all going well according to the traditional storyline, even to the advent of the securing or arrival of an heir and heiress.

Meanwhile Hetero and Homo carry on their secret conspiracy, and the act progresses. The final act or death scene arrives for the actor playing the role of the long-suffering wife.

According to tradition there is a play script for how to get into the sincere role and character of the bereaved.

If you look closely, the enigma halves have started to merge. Still, as a result of living a lifetime of the many roles this show has required, there remains a deep resentment from having had the guilt tacked on to the charade that this bit of theatre produced.

For a curtain call at the end of this drama, a person has emerged onstage to declare, “I am me.” I celebrate my gay place in its entire acceptance knowing that it is my life and not the lives of all those other characters I tried to fit into.

It has been a long, tedious story to relate, the play filled with regrets and joys, but the best result in this script is finally being able to be me. Like it or not!

 © 21 December 2015

About the Author

Solitude, by Phillip Hoyle

Little Tony stopped by to save me from my solitude. I actually have a lot of it even though I live with two other people. They tend to be quiet; I tend to go off to my art studio or to my computer, and sometimes I just watch TV alone.

Tony’s text Saturday evening had read, “R u and jim at the bc tonite? I could use a drink or 2.”

I responded, “Sure. What time?”

“I’m almost home. Maybe 15 or 20.”

“Ok probably just me but I will invite Jim. Park at the house. See u soon.”

At the Black Crown we discovered singers doing their best to the piano accompaniment of a player who surely was doing her best, but their bests attracted neither Tony nor me. He suggested a bar downtown, so we drove to it where he drank three mixed drinks to forget the anger a work situation had produced in him the day before. The bar was full of young people. Like so many times in my Denver years I was the oldest patron present. I drank a beer as we talked about a number of common memories.

We left just in time to avoid getting a parking ticket and drove south out of downtown. On Broadway we stopped by a bar where years ago we used to go dancing. Even though the lights were really nice and the music quite acceptable, only one lonely or independent man was dancing. Tony smoked a cigarette, and then we left.

We drove back downtown to the X Bar where I knew there would be lots of activity. The place featured very loud music, video images, and many people dancing. Tony insisted on buying another drink. I said, “Sure, a Miller Lite for me.”

We stood around listening to the music, looking at the young people, mostly gay and lesbian, a few transgender folk, probably undetectable bisexuals as well. Perhaps a few straight couples out for something different on a Saturday night. The energy of the place was high.

We talked swaying a little and finally he began to dance a little, somewhat like years ago when we went week after week to the Denver Compound to dance on Saturday nights. I saw his characteristic moves and began doing my own.

A young Hispanic guy started dancing alongside us, enjoying what I took to be his favorite song. He was cute, fun to watch, moved like the supplest of sinews, and as he danced, smiled with beautiful face and dimples. We enjoyed his movements and beauty. We danced for about twenty minutes. Then a young woman came up to me and began to dance with me, to touch me, to actually feel me up. I thought, uh oh, this one has had too much to drink, but we danced as best we could. Then I noticed my friend Tony was dancing with a young man, someone maybe his own age or close to it. I was so pleased for Tony. He needs to be dancing with someone not old enough to be his father, and he seemed to love it. I had a bit of conversation with the young woman as we kept dancing. Then the guy who had been dancing with Tony came over to me, and we started dancing. The woman started dancing with Tony. I learned some things about them, that she, a single mother, was his best friend, that he was living with his mother in Albuquerque due to the breakup of a 20-year long relationship in New York and to her disintegrating health, that he had driven up to see her and take her out since she rarely has the opportunity to do much of anything besides work and take care of her two-and-a-half year old, that he’d really like to get laid but couldn’t because he was with her, that they assumed Tony and I were a couple, and they wondered how long.

Finally Tony and I told them goodnight, left the bar, and he drove me home. I recall looking at the time as we were leaving—1:39 a.m. I hadn’t almost closed a bar for many years. In fact, I hadn’t been out dancing for several years. I realized just how much I miss the activity. I had danced a lot in my first five years in Denver, almost always the oldest man on the floor. With Tony I learned to be very expressive in the dance. He and I always enjoyed our evenings out.

Tony dropped me off at the house and said he’d wait until I got in the door. What is he? A youngster taking care of the elderly? Anyway, I waved from the doorway as he pulled away.

I hurried to the basement where my computer was waiting. There I began this story of my temporary delivery from solitude and, of course, sat alone as I typed, enjoying being alone just as much as I loved dancing with my friend and the other youngsters.

Denver, © 2013

About the Author

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE program “Telling Your Story.”

He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com

Right Now, by Lewis

[Prologue: I wrote this piece amid the shock and horror of the shooting this past Friday at Arapahoe High School and the first anniversary of the much more lethal event in Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut. It seemed appropriate for the subject matter because it seems to me that our society must turn its full attention away from deterring acts of terror born of religious intolerance at home or abroad and toward the growing problem and many times more destructive issue of home-grown terrorism and we must do it RIGHT NOW.

As I have mentioned here on more than one occasion in the past, I grew up with guns and hunting. I was good at it. It was an outlet for the anger I felt inside for whatever motivation lie behind it. My victims were birds, mammals, insects, reptiles, amphibians and the occasional street lamp. Their sacrifice sated for a few minutes or hours my need to feel that I was nobody to mess with, that I could make an impact, that my anger was something to be respected.

Sometime during my middle school years, I outgrew that emotional deficiency. Some boys don't. In their teens-to-early-twenties, their hurt and pain overpowers their sense of decency. It is no longer sufficient for them to punish surrogates for their oppression. Their oppressors become their parents, peers, even strangers. Their victims can no more comprehend what's going inside their heads than the lowly sparrows I brought down by the dozens.

One day, a neighbor saw me shoot out a street light. The police came and took away my pellet gun. My dad had to drive me downtown and sign a release to get my gun back. It was embarrassing. I never attempted something so stupid again. Perhaps the police had the right idea--take the gun out of my hands until a person of responsibility helped me get it back. I can't help but wonder if society would have been better served if someone had taken my weapon away before my angry rampage got as far as it did.

I write this out of a feeling that--as many times more complex is the problem of mass shootings today--we must seriously consider how we can diminish the odds of something like the Columbine or Aurora massacres from happening again. I will now make such a case.]

When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. When the only tool you have is a gun, every problem looks like a threat. A gun quickly turns a coward into a drunken cowboy who shoots first and asks questions later. In fact, if you have a gun, you don't even have to wait for the answers because you're guaranteed the last word.

I'm sick and tired of hearing the press talk about the "senselessness" of these school shootings. Are they really unable to put two and two together? People do senseless things a million times a second in this country but nobody dies. They knock things over, they kick things, they slam doors, they curse, they stomp around, they pull their hair out, they spit, they foam at the mouth. Sometimes, they may even get what they want...and nobody dies.

But you put a loaded gun in their hand and reason and dialogue and common sensibility goes out the barrel. In the New Town, CT, shooting, Adam Lanza cut down 20 children and six adults, including himself, in about 5 minutes. By the time police arrived, it was all over but the sobbing.

This is not an issue about Second Amendment rights, as the NRA would have us believe. (More on the Second Amendment in a bit.) No, it is about sales of guns and the profitability of the gun manufacturing industry of which the NRA is a vital part. Look at the front page of Friday's Post and tell me that the horror and pain on that teenage girl's face is the price we have to pay so that every paranoid gun-hugging freak out there in our once-admired nation can own as much fire-power as his delusional mind can conjure up. I don't believe it, not for an instant. No, this is a battle between a society that values life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and the most destructive, greedy, and self-serving industry that calls itself a champion of liberty.

Quoting Tom Diaz's brilliant new book, The Last Gun, "An American's chances of being killed in an automobile accident are about one in 7,000 or 8,000 per year; of being a victim of homicide, about one in 22,000 per year; and of being killed by a terrorist, about one in 3.5 million per year." Yet, over the decade between

September 2001 and September 2011, American taxpayers have spent over $1.3 trillion on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and homeland security, while backtracking on the issue of freedom from domestic terrorist threats birthed by Second Amendment demagogues.

The "Oligarchy of Five" sitting on the current U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted the Second Amendment as if the first half doesn't exist. This is odd for a bunch of "strict constructionists". True, the language is quaint and the syntax poorly constructed. "Four-score-and seven years ago" is also quaint but we still quote that part of the Gettysburg Address.

Still, the Second Amendment follows the First and even the right of free speech has been found to be limited. A citizen is not allowed to shout "fire" in a crowded theater. (The way things are today, one might be on more constitutional grounds yelling, "open fire".) Neither can you slander, libel, incite violence, obstruct justice, or disrupt the peace. Nevertheless, the NRA argues--successfully, if recent trends are any indication--that citizens should be allowed to "keep and bear [any and all] arms", including weapons designed for the military.

Why the need for so much firepower? Well, in a vast number of instances among NRA members, it's for protection from the very government that wrote the Constitution. So, in essence, the Supreme Court--one of the three co-equal branches of government--has ruled that the Police Power of that same government does not have the right to bar modern-day, would-be Enemies of Democracy from owning the most lethal hand-held weapons on the face of the earth. Is that not the very epitome of insanity?

It seems that the real enemy is not as likely to be found wearing a long robe so much as a bullet-proof vest or a backpack. The man who kills me is more likely to look like my son than a foreigner. Just because it's hard to pick out the real enemy, does not mean that we have to throw up our hands and say, "Well, that was really a tragic occurrence. Let us pray for the families of those dead and those lucky enough to still be alive. May it never happen again." No, we need to change the way we look at the gun problem and we need to do it RIGHT NOW.

16 December 2013

About the Author

I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I wasn't getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth. Soon after, I retired and we moved to Denver, my husband's home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group was there to light the way.

Scarves, by Gillian

I know those of you who've been in this group for some time are just tired of hearing me whinge about poor battered Britain in the years immediately after WW11. Well, too bad! It happens to be the environment I grew up in and so the time and place which generated many of my childhood memories and so my stories.

And here we go again!

In the U.K., children began (and still do begin) elementary school at the age of five, not six as we do here. So in 1947 I began the daily walk to and from the same little two-room school where my mother taught. That winter has gone down in history as one of the worst U.K.winters ever, with snow on the ground for over two months and bitter cold. I developed a bad cough and what appears in my memory as a constant cold, but then most kids were sick, as I'm sure were many adults. Most of our houses were cold and damp, without central heating - for which there would have been no fuel anyway - and few people had adequate clothing and food which were still severely rationed, as were most things until well into the 1950's. Frequently, even if you had saved enough coupons, whatever you wanted was simply unavailable anyway.

My mother decided that to survive the bitter cold, we needed scarves. But we had no clothing coupons as my growing feet had gobbled them all up in a new pair of boots. So she would knit them. Now, I doubt that wool was actually rationed, but it was not to be had. If you had old knitted garments that were simply beyond further darning, you unravelled them and saved the worn and kinky wool for future use. My mother had a cardboard box, which probably should have been sacrificed, as just about everything had been, to the War Effort, always spoken of in capitals. Somehow this tatty old thing had survived and Mum used it for storing various balls of recycled wool. We took them out reverently, handling them like cut glass. The cats had been banished from the room lest they decide that wool is a perfect plaything. I recognized some scarlet wool which I knew came from an old sweater I had had when I was little, (I now considered myself quite grown. I had started school for goodness' sake!) and which I had worn until it threatened to inhibit my breathing. Some very ratty gray wool I recalled came from out-at-heel socks of my dad's. Where the rest of the bits and bobs came from I had no idea. It didn't matter anyway, they were moving on!

Perhaps a more skilled needlewoman than my mother would have been able to knit patterns, or at least stripes, with all the different colors. But Mom's skill level was, shall we say, elementary. Before the War, when there was material available, she used to teach basic knitting to the six-year-olds. It was always facecloths, knitted on big fat needles so they came out looking more like fishing nets for the Little People. I suspect it was invariably these easy square pieces more because of my mother's limitations than that of the kids. But my dad and I both had faith she could do scarves. What is a scarf, after all, but an elongated facecloth? She just started out with one color, tied the last piece of it to the beginning of the next, and created quite an interesting hodgepodge of colors. But Mom's knitting was always a bit erratic. She would start out tense, her stitches too tight. But soon she would be distracted by some entertainment on the radio and the stitches got looser and looser. Before long the scarf was taking on a somewhat rolling countenance, swelling and shrinking like ocean waves. Also, to be fair, the fact that the wool was of different thicknesses did nothing to add to the consistency of the stitches. So each scarf ended up with very wavy edges, and considerable variations in width and thickness. If I could only recreate them now, I'd think they would have a pretty good chance of becoming THE fashion accessory.

My father did have a scarf but was badly in need of a new one. His apparently dated from some time Before the War and he had worn it During the War but now, After the War, it was in rags and must not have offered much protection from the bitterly cold winds of that 1947 winter.

We didn't talk of decades in those days. All of life was divided into three time periods, always spoken of in Capitals as was The War Effort. There was Before the War, During the War, and After the War, sometimes simply referred to as Now. Before the War was a wonderful place of endless sunny days, with peace and laughter; a land of relative abundance. During the War was the land of stoicism and heroics and carrying on and making do and tightening belts and stiff upper lips, and a lot of pride. But Now, After the War, was disillusion and resentment following rapidly on the heels of the euphoria of the long-awaited peace. What had it all been for? So many dead, even more homeless and everyone was broke. Rationing and shortages were even worse Now than they were During the War.

Mum also already had a scarf from Before the War, but it was flimsy and, though pretty, not made to provide warmth. Not only was it from Before the War, but it came from some mysterious place called The Twenties. Most of the things my mother had, seemed to have come from The Twenties. She never referred to it as The Nineteen-Twenties, so I had no idea that she was talking about a time. I envisioned The Twenties as being some huge department store loaded with wonderful things - even more exciting than Woolworth's.

Now, three strangely serpentine scarves lay proudly stretched out on the table. My mother watched proudly, waiting for Dad and me to pick the one we wanted. Dad shook his head.

"By heck! This'll be a decision."

He gazed solemnly at me and offered a grave wink. I wanted to giggle but somehow knew I must not. Instead I entered whole-heartedly into the game. I gave a little girly squeal, which I have to say did not come naturally to me, and wriggled in excitement.

"That one! Can I have that one?"

Mum wound it around my neck, Dad and Mom each wore one and we looked appreciatively at ourselves.

"By heck!" said my dad again, "that's just grand!"

I have often thought, looking back, how absurd the three of us must have looked when we were out together in those ridiculous scarves; like escapees from some Dr. Seuss book. But in those days, everyone wore strange combinations of mend-and-make-do clothes, and nobody thought much about it. The aim was warmth, after all, and that we got.

Success went completely to my mother's head. A few days later found her once again studying what was left of differently colored little balls and scraps of wool, and various needles, then at my eternally red, raw, and chapped hands.

"Gloves," she was saying rather doubtfully to herself. "We all need gloves."

A fleeting look of panic crossed my father's face, to be replaced instantly by a bland smile.

"Ay, that'd be grand." He winked at me. "But mittens," he added, "they'd be warmer."

"Ooh yes, mittens! Mittens!" I echoed, though I'm not sure I knew what mittens were. But I knew what gloves were, with all those fingers sticking out of them and, young as I was, I knew, as my dad did, that Mum's knitting was not up to gloves.

"Yes," she agreed with great relief. "Mittens. Mittens are much warmer."

My dad was away for the next two weeks. He was an engineer, and deemed too valuable by the powers that be to be allowed to volunteer as canon fodder. Instead he worked at a huge factory a long way, at least for those days, away from home. To get to work he had to take two buses, then a train, then another bus, then walk two miles. He also worked very long very erratic hours, and so stayed in a rooming house near the factory for several days and sometimes weeks. Whatever they made at this distant factory was classified as Top Secret, another phrase which was always capitalized, so Dad never, in his whole life, talked about it. The question, what did you do in The War, Daddy? went unanswered for many a child as so many adults lived in terror of contravening the Official Secrets Act (in capitals) by saying too much, and disappearing into some distant dark dungeon. My dad did say, in some unguarded moment, that if the most exciting thing you did throughout the war was wash milk bottles, they'd find some way of sweeping it in under the Official Secrets Act.

When my father returned home this time, he was greeted by three pairs of mittens, all more or less identical except for size. The colors of all were the same random multi-colored blotches as the scarves and, on closer inspection, the shapes were not so different from the scarves. After all, with a little imagination, mittens are little more than short scarves folded over across the middle, the sides sewn up, and elastic threaded around near the open end to fit them to your wrist. But wait! What about the thumb? I had watched in fascination as poor Mum tried to knit the thumb part but could not seem to get the hang of it. After many failed attempts, she fell back on her old favorite, the elongated square. She knit what was in fact a very tiny scarf, folded it over as in making mittens, and sewed up both sides. Then, having left an opening when closing up the side of the mitten, she stitched the end open of the tiny mitten to the opening in the side of the big mitten and, voila! a mitten complete with thumb. Though in fact they looked, lying flat on the table, like nothing more than the old knitted facecloth with a miniature facecloth attached.

"Ay, that's just grand!" Dad slid his hands into his and held his hands up, waggling his fingers open and closed. I learned later that they were way too big and would have fallen off if he had not held up his hands, and the little thumbs, as I also discovered about mine, were way too short and not quite in the right place. Who cared? They were warm! I simply tucked by thumb into my palm where it stayed nice and cozy, and ignored the little thumb addition. I must say, though, it gave me a better understanding of why hominids didn't get far with the use of tools until they developed opposable thumbs!

Again, in hindsight, I marvel at the vision of this engineer, too valuable to be allowed to fight, turning up at this huge, Top Secret, factory, in those wildly colored, sadly misshapen mittens.

Especially in combo with the equally wildly colored and misshapen scarf, it conjures up quite a picture. And in a time and place where men rarely wore anything other than dark, conservative, clothes! But, to be honest, it wouldn't surprise me if Dad didn't wear them once away from home, though he always wore them when he left and when he returned. What makes me suspect this is that I caught him out in another way. I went to where he was planting potatoes in the garden, to tell him tea was ready. He started for the house and then stopped. Pulling the mittens from his jacket pockets he winked at me.

"Mustn't go in without my handbags," and he slid them on. And always after that I noticed him popping them on before returning indoors.

Oh, and I was so delighted with that term. Handbags. Hand bags. It described them perfectly. Bags to put your hands in! For many years after that, when Mom mentioned her handbag - it was never called a purse in Britain - I would giggle and my dad would wink solemnly, which only made me giggle more. My father said much much more to me with his wonderful winks than he ever did in words

I know this is where I'm expected to say how much I loved those mittens and that scarf, and carried them everywhere with me like Linus with his blanket. Sorry! Not so. I was ever grateful for the added warmth, but they ... what is the word? To say they frightened me is way too much.

But perhaps they did make me a little uneasy. They had something of living creatures about them as they constantly changed shape. The bigger gaps in the relaxed stitching snagged too easily on things; particularly on little fingers. There was an occasional dropped stitch in there too, increasing the problem. The wool was old, some of it several times recycled and so, brittle and thin. It broke here and there, causing further unraveling, as did the slow mysterious undoing of my mothers knots. I seemed eerily to me as if they were slowly but steadily unknitting themselves, some future day to disappear, returning to little variously colored balls of yarn.

After clothing rationing finally ended, after fourteen years, in 1954, we had the luxury of store-bought gloves and scarves and my mother was relieved of the challenges of knitting. But for sure nothing ever again had such character. Nor did any clothes ever again represent so much love and laughter. My mother taught me that for those you love, you do what you must the best you can. And that is all any of us can do. And my father taught me to see the humor in just about anything, and to be ever solicitous of the feelings of others.

I searched through my old photos after I wrote this, hoping to do a show and tell of those mittens and scarves. No luck. Then of course it dawned on me. Mom did have an old camera which came, of course, from The Twenties, but even if it had still worked there would have been no film available over many years.

And that reminds me of one of my dad's favorite expressions. It's not original, it was a common saying used by many at the time. It's also probably the longest sentence my father ever spoke.

"If we had any eggs, we could have bacon and eggs, if we had any bacon."

© March 2015

About the Author

I was born and raised in England. After graduation from college there, I moved to the U.S. and, having discovered Colorado, never left. I have lived in the Denver-Boulder area since 1965, working for 30 years at IBM. I married, raised four stepchildren, then got divorced after finally, in my forties, accepting myself as a lesbian. I have now been with my wonderful partner Betsy for 25 years.