Dad's Memories: My Afterthoughts

Related to Part I:

First Class postage was very stable for a long time. During Dad's childhood it was two cents. During my childhood it was three cents. Also during my childhood, the postman delivered twice a day, entirely on foot - no house to house truck driving.

Regarding the knickers boys wore to school: Dad once told me that some boys, during the first few school days of their lives, deposited something into their trousers, which would slide down until stopped by the bunching of the tucked in pants at the boots. Before long you could tell by the smell. Also, one girl created quite a puddle under her chair.

Strafford went on to become the black sheep of the family. At 12 or 13 he hustled little bottles of booze in the stands at sports events, and eventually became a bookie.

Saved!

When I got out of the Army Strafford offered me a job as a runner. but that was the wrong side of the law for me

Related to Part II:

Tacetta Chevrolet is still in business in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

I do not remember either of the Portsmouth restaurants he mentions, but I do remember the neighboring Olympia Theater. And the Civic Theater, the Colonial Theater, and the Arcadia. That last was the one most frequented by children. On a Saturday afternoon we would see:

• A newsreel
• A cartoon (occasionally two)
• Previews of coming attractions
• A serial (featuring Batman, Nyoka the Jungle Girl, Hopalong Cassidy, and others, always left in some kind of terrible trouble so you would have to come back next week).
• *Two* full length movies

Dad mentions that he began his Civil Service in Portland, Maine, and that is the source of my very first memories. I was ten months old when we moved there.

The "Yard in Portsmouth" is a reference to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, which is actually in Kittery, Maine. Portsmouth is across the water in New Hampshire.

Regarding Dad's Army service "(boy did I hate that shit):" Dad was very short, about five foot one (and had flat feet, so don't believe the myths about flat feet being rejected). He was drafted and did his time at Fort Benning, Georgia. He particularly disliked the heat. Also, the clothing he was issued was too big for him. The worst consequence of this, I think, was during his basic training. When he had to enter a tent filled with gas (probably chlorine and sulphur), he had to take his mask off briefly before exiting. Unbeknownst to him, his too-large shirt filled up with the gas, and several minutes later, when the heat caused him to pull his shirt away from his body, he got a pretty good lungful of the gas. (You know, "lungful" is not a real word according to dictionary.com, but I've used it all my life and it's too late to stop now. Perhaps the dictionaries will catch up.) It was several days before he could smoke again.

During the Pop and Rena years, the family owned a dairy farm which had been in the family a very long time. I have, passed down to me by my father, an 1875 medal for an Ayrshire cow. There was, at some point, a stud bull named Linwood, and for a few years a standard greeting between male members of the family was "How's your Linwood?"

Related to Part III: I caught bloody Hell for my little mention of having heard the Barbee story "at least two hundred times." He denied ever telling it before, but really, I'd been hearing it since my childhood and I was in my late forties at the time of my comment. But the wheel is coming full circle, and I am sometimes caught repeating myself by my friends.

The 110 House Dad mentioned was in Amesbury, Massachusetts. "Was" is the key word here, as the last time I went by the site, perhaps 30 years ago, it had been replaced by a car wash. George Lay, mentioned by Dad, married the owner and was the regular host. We despised each other, but mostly got along for the sake of my dad.

Dad's Memories, Part III

(Intro and Parts I and II in preceding posts.)

(Jr again: A day or so after I received the foregoing,
I received a phone call from you know who. "It occurred
to me that I forget to tell you about my marvelous
musical ability, so I am sending you a little more.")

Addendum (Latin for "dumb addition?")   29 Nye Avenue was the last of "in a row" three deckers, probably sixty feet apart. On the top floor was a Mrs. Worsencroft (called Worsey). She was a fairly good pianist.

We had a nice Mason-Hamlin piano which was Aunt Ruth's pride and joy. Our church organist, Grace James (a 50 year old maiden lady with high black shoes) walked around Brockton giving piano lessons in the home, etc.

I had four lessons and that was it, so at least I faced the piano properly (1928 or 1929, I think).

Worsey often played a real bouncy and busy piece, which years down the road I learned was "The Rustic Dance." Before the summer was over, I could copy her playing note for note (no talent, but a good "ear").

"The Rustic Dance" happened to be in the key of E flat, which is three flats, using many black notes (which most try to avoid). In E flat, when you are looking for your pretty chords, they are in the "naturals," so anything I knew, I could play in E flat (not the best key for singing).

So, I have to thank Worsey for all the money I made playing out for fifteen years, and for my eight great years at the One Ten House in Amesbury, playing by ear (in E flat).

When we went to Portsmouth to live, Barbee had a nice piano, which was also a "player" piano. One afternoon when I was knocking off a tune or two, she asked me for a song which she described as, "You know, Kenny, the one where you get up in the morning and find something." It took me a couple days to figure out that one. What she wanted to hear was "The World is Waiting for the Sunrise."

(Jr again: I believe he is very proud of this, as I have
heard about it at least two hundred times.)

George Lay paid me the best semi-musical compliment when he said, "Kenny, you aren't the best organist I ever heard, but you sure can handle a lounge."

MY OWN AFTERTHOUGHTS IN THE NEXT POST

Preempted Trips

I suppose we all get into ruts, doing things that we like over and over, and my father once told me, "You overdo everything you like." (It's still true.) But Dee Dee was the queen of that.

She and my father had formed a mutual admiration society (her favorite phrase regarding him was "He's so cute!"). He moonlighted at a steak house and cocktail lounge, playing a Hammond electric organ in the lounge. He was a ham and is probably the source of my penchant for entertaining people.

One night following our post-work Chinese dinner, I took Dee to the steak house. We entered the lounge and I introduced Dee to my father. They bonded instantly. As a result, Dee and I spent at least nine out of ten Friday nights going to the restaurant and the lounge. She just didn't want to do anything else.

Now I loved my dad, and I enjoyed these Fridays, but really, there had to be something else in the world that we would enjoy doing. Once in a great while I could talk her into going to a movie, but that was about it, and on those occasions, even when she enjoyed the movie, she clearly regretted not seing my dad.

We did spend a long weekend in Quebec City, and that was fun. I began to think of other places she might enjoy.

Donnie: "Dee, you've never been to Disneyworld, have you?"

Dee: "No."

Donnie: "We should take a short vacation and go there."

Dee: "We could do that."

Several weeks later she went to Disneyworld with girlfriends. Sigh.

Down the road a bit . . .

Donnie: "Dee, have you ever been to Las Vegas?"

Dee: "No."

Donnie: "We should take a vacation and go there."

Dee: "Okay."

Yup. Soon after she went to Las Vegas with girlfriends.

I found this depressing. I never understood it and she could never explain it. Writing this now, more than thirty years later, I find myself actually getting angry about it. I gotta get a grip.

MOVIES. DEE, AND ME

• The first movie I took her to see, The Sound of Music, became her all-time favorite. Later this movie was to demonstrate that she had my number.
  
  She and I broke up and reconciled several times over the years. On a Sunday morning during one of the separation periods, I happened to notice that The Sound of Music was going to be on TV that afternoon. I grabbed the phone and dialed her number, knowing she'd want to see it. She still lived with her parents, and her brother answered the phone. We chatted for a minute or two and then I asked him if Dee was home.
  
  "No, she's out shopping with my mom. She said you'd be calling, though."
  
  "What?"
  
  "Yeah, something about a movie on TV."
  
  
• I took her to see The Bad News Bears (in 1976, the first time around for this title). Their baseball team was competing for a chance to go to Japan. When the Bears won in a cliff-hanger, the movie ended. As we left the theater . . .
  
  Dee: "Phew. I was afraid they wouldn't win."
  
  Donnie: "Naw, there was no chance they wouldn't win."
  
  Dee: "Yes there was. Why do you say that?"
  
  Donnie: "Because otherwise they wouldn't be able to make The Bad News Bears Go to Japan.."
  
  Dee, shrilly: "You don't know that! You don't know that they'll make a movie like that."
  
  A year or two later I noted in a newspaper that The Bad News Bears Go to Japan was about to be released. It was a work day and I called her at her office. She answered. All I got to say was "Good morning." Then I heard, "I know. I saw the ad on TV."

A Hammond Electric Organ

Pretty much all his working life, my father worked two jobs, For years he moonlighted as a short order cook, then as an organist in several lounges.

He had a knack for musical instruments and at various times taught himself to play the accordian, piano, and electric organ by ear. Around 1959, he and his second wife, Pru, visited some friends one evening. The husband proudly displayed his new Hammond electric organ, and my father was entranced. While he was at work a week or so later, a truck showed up at Dad's home, carrying . . . right, an organ for delivery. This was a complete surprise to Pru, but she took it in stride. I imagine this was the first time either of them had made a $1,500 purchase without telling the other. A week later he got home from work and there was a brand new Buick in the driveway.

Dad set about teaching himself to play, and things went smoothly. During this learning process he mentioned to a colleague at work that he had bought the organ. The colleague owned a restaurant and bar and asked if he could call on Dad to play in the lounge on those occasions when his organist didn't show up, and Dad said, "Any time."

That night he got the call. Several years later he told me that he went to the lounge, headed for the bar, and had two quick doubles.

This led to a Friday and Saturday night gig at a restaurant and lounge in Amesbury, the 110 House (now defunct - as a matter of fact it was a car wash the last time I drove by there). He played there during the late 1960s and for much of the 1970s. I often drove up there on a Friday or Saturday night, most frequently with Dee. One anecdote from there:

Dee and I were there one night and the lounge was packed. One table away was a party of six, a couple of whom we knew. In that party was a woman in her fifties and her mother - late seventies or early eighties. You know how every once in a while in a crowded place there'll be a moment when everyone but one person stops talking, and that person can be heard all over the room? Well, during one of those . . .

80ish Mom: "I'd give a million dollars for the feel of a man's hand on my belly again."

50ish Daughter: "Mama!"

80ish Mom: "Well, you know what they say: 'When you're too old to cut the mustard you can still lick the jar.'"

50ish Daughter: "MAMA!"

Customers: (Much laughter and a smattering of applause.)