Monthly Archives: June 2014
Several years ago, our family reconnected with my cousin, Shirley Wolfe Cameron. Since Shirley and her family moved away from Casper many years ago, we had lost touch with her, and so I didn’t really know much about her except for during her teen years and once after she was married. The teenage years are not much to go on when it comes to what kind of a person someone is, because as most adults will admit, the teenage years find many of us mad at the world, and often most of the people in it. Oh, we all have our good days and bad days, but as teenagers, often the bad days far outweigh the good days. Since Shirley was a few years see than I was, I’m also quite sure that I was a huge annoyance. When it comes to teenagers and adolescents, I’m not sure who is more obnoxious…but I know that I had a well tuned ability to be irritating.
Now that we are both adults, our relationship is so different. Looking through adult eyes, I can see what a wonderful person Shirley is. She has a heart of gold and she is such a generous person. I find myself feeling so very blessed to have her back in my life, because she is such a sweetheart. It’s funny that people can grow up so far away from each other, and yet have so many views and ideas that are exactly the same. I don’t know how that happens, but for us it did. I am so often amazed at how many things Shirley 
and I agree on…good upbringing, I guess. Shirley’s mom and my dad were sister and brother, and I’m sure that would account for the many similarities there are.
Shirley and I have such a good relationship now, and one that warms my heart every time I think about her, or see her Facebook posts…and that would make it every day. She always puts a smile on my face, and since we agree on everything political, we can get each other pretty hyped up when it comes to things that are just wrong. Today is Shirley’s birthday. I love having you back in my life, Shirley, and I know that the whole family feels the exact same way. Have a wonderful day!! We love you!!
My aunt, Virginia Byer Beadle was always a beautiful girl, with lovely hair…and this was according to anyone who knew her. From the time she was a young girl and on into her golden years, that fact has not changed. It was quite likely the first thing people noticed about her. Her hair, at least until it turned gray, was a jet black color, and always in curls. I don’t know if her curls are natural or not, but I don’t remember ever seeing her without them.
One time, her sister, my Aunt Evelyn, and Aunt Virginia were supposed to clean up the house, but Aunt Evelyn had been babysitting the night before…all night, and the baby was fussy. As is typical with siblings when they are young, Aunt Virginia wanted to know why her sister was sleeping rather than helping. When she was told that Aunt Evelyn had babysat all night, Aunt Virginia said, “So then if I have a job, you are saying that I won’t have to do housework either?” Now I have to assume that it was Grandma that she was talking to, but the answer was, “No, you wouldn’t.” I don’t know what they expected to happen, but needless to say, Aunt Virginia went out and got herself a job, and she had one from that day on.
When the time came for Aunt Virginia to learn to drive…well, the family got a real education on just how you didn’t want to drive. It seems that every time Aunt Virginia backed out of a parking spot, she would neglect to look behind her and in the end hit probably half a dozen 
cars. My mom didn’t say how much damage or how the cars got fixed, or even if the police were called, but she did say that every time Aunt Virginia got behind the wheel the rest of the block cringed. Personally, I wouldn’t park behind her, but that’s just me. Eventually she figured it out, and I haven’t heard that she is such a bad driver now.
After Aunt Virginia got married and moved to her apartment, my mom took to going over and spending the night off and on. In fact, she stayed there quite a lot. It would be those nights spent at her sister’s apartment that would precipitate the marriage of my parents, because my dad was a friend of Aunt Virginia and Uncle Jim’s. For her part in our parents meeting, my sisters and I will always be grateful. Today is Aunt Virginia’s 84th birthday. Happy birthday Aunt Virginia!! Have a wonderful day!! We love you!!
Throughout my childhood years, I can say that I never broke a single bone. In fact, to this day, I can’t be sure that I have, but if I did, it was the second toe on my right foot. Since that was never confirmed, I really can’t make that statement with any degree of certainty. What I do know is that I have very strong bones, and when I was a child, I don’t think I thought that was a good thing. Of course, now I know that it is, but back then I wanted to be like some of my friends who had a broken arm, leg, or finger…I just never was.
Apparently, I was obsessed with the whole idea of a broken leg, because at one point I asked my dad to make me a pair of crutches. My mom thought the whole idea was crazy, and she was very surprised when my dad made me those crutches, but Dad saw no harm in it. He carved a set of crutches out of two single pieces of wood. There was no cushion on the top, and believe me, I can tell you that crutches really need them, but a wash cloth sufficed, and I was set. I loved those crutches, and used them for several years.
Thankfully, I never needed those crutches, but it was cool of my dad to take the imagination of his little girl to heart, and give me the desires of my heart…even if they were silly, and something I would look back on later, and laugh about. Mom told me that she couldn’t believe that Dad actually made them, because like most toys she figured it would be a passing phase and in a week or two they would end up in a woodpile or under the bed, but she was wrong on that one. I played with them a lot, for at least a couple of years.
Looking back I can’t imagine what the draw was for me, except the imagination of a young mind…a little girl who saw some of her friends wearing a cast and using crutches or a sling. I had one other passing phase in the broken bone arena before it was all said and done…the broken finger phase. That phase was when I took a wooden clothes pin and removed the hinge, and wrapped half of it with white medical tape around it and my finger, so it would look like a splint. I even wore that one to school one day…obviously I didn’t think that one through. My teacher saw it and started to be so compassionate, when she stopped by my desk during study time to ask what had happened. Well, I liked this teacher too much to lie to her, so I told her it was fake. She laughed out loud, right there in class, and told me that it had been a great prank, so I wasn’t even embarrassed about getting caught. She was able to 
laugh and still let me save face.
Like all childish phases, my imaginary injury phase went the way of the wind. After a time you just realize how silly some things are. Having a real broken bone would have most likely been a real annoyance to me, especially since I loved gymnastics. I can’t imagine a bigger annoyance to a gymnast that a broken bone that sidelines you for the season. Still, even though there is no picture that I know of, I will always cherish the memory of a dad who gave in to the whims of his daughter, and made her a pair of handmade wooden crutches, so she could pretend to have a broken leg.
When I think of movie icons, one name stands out above so many others…John Wayne. From the time I was a kid, we watched a lot of John Wayne movies in our house. It was a different time then. Westerns were on the television sets of most homes. And among Westerns, John Wayne was the King of the Cowboys. I have watched every one of his Westerns, and most of his other movies, because I just always liked John Wayne…all of our family did.
We were so excited when John Wayne came to Casper, Wyoming for the filming of “Hellfighters” in 1968. My parents were never star struck type of people, but when it came to John Wayne’s movie being filmed partly in Casper…well, that was something entirely different. They took the family…minus me unfortunately, because I was at a slumber party…to the airport to see him come in. It was a really big deal for our little town, but even more so for my sister, Cheryl. John Wayne has always been a big hero to Cheryl, and at fourteen years of age, she was so excited to finally have the opportunity to meet him. When her chance came, however, she couldn’t seem to speak loudly enough for him to hear her. Finally in a last ditch effort, she pulled on his jacket…because she couldn’t reach his shoulder to tap him on it. She said, “Mr Wayne…Mr Wayne.” When he felt that tug on his jacket, he turned around, and was a little bewildered for a moment, then he looked down at Cheryl and said, “Oh!! There you are!!” She was so short, that he had completely missed her. She got his autograph, and I found myself really wishing I had just skipped that slumber party…ever since that day. My parents also took us out to the highway where you could see the actual filming taking place across the river. It was amazing, but in my mind, nothing like the opportunity my sister got to actually meet this amazing actor.
John Wayne passed away on June 11, 1979, and I can still see that moment quite clearly. I 
was at my in-laws house, and we were all watching television, when the bulletin flashed across the screen. It felt almost like being kicked in the stomach. I couldn’t believe it was real, because John Wayne had been so much a pert of my life, that he was almost like family, and now there would be no more new movies with John Wayne. A great actor was gone. I know that all of my family felt the same way, as well as a lot of other people. I felt like television had reached a turning point, and it wasn’t a good thing. I think I was right in that too, because most of the shows and movies of today don’t even come close to being the classy kinds of shows of the John Wayne Era. Those days are gone forever, like actors of the class and caliber of John Wayne.
When kids grow up and go away to college, It can be a big change for the family. We all think about how the parents will feel when their child goes off to college, but rarely do we think about how the siblings will feel. My grandson, Chris is going to be going to college in Sheridan, Wyoming this fall, and while that is not so terribly far away from Casper, it is beginning to feel quite far away to his younger brother, Josh. The boys have always been close, and when Chris got his drivers license, they really got even closer. They did things together, and Chris picked Josh up from school and work, as well as dropping him off in the mornings. Now, suddenly all that is about to change, and Josh doesn’t really like the idea.
If I had thought about this situation, I would have to say that it would be my daughter, Corrie who I would expect to fall apart, and I’m quite sure that when the time comes, she will fall apart and be totally in tears, but I must say that I just didn’t think about how this would affect Josh. I don’t know why, exactly, because when my sisters have lived somewhere else, we all cried as they left. It is a natural reaction. Nevertheless, it just breaks my heart that Josh is feeling so bad about this, and it is even harder that it is so hard on him this early in the summer…because he has the whole summer to sit and think about the coming of fall.
It is my hope that fall will find both boys so busy with their studies and other activities, that the time will simply fly by and before they hardly realize that school has begun, it will be time for summer again, but of course, I doubt that it will go that fast. Visits home, and all the technology we have these days will help of course, but it still isn’t quite the same as having your brother there to hang out with. I suppose too, that having his mom and grandma pick him up from school those first few days until Josh can get his license will be the most horrible part of the whole ordeal too. There is just no way that we could possibly be as cool as his big brother.
After spending some time in the early spring of 1940, working for the railroad in the car repair department, my uncle, William Malrose Spencer, decided the work was not for him. He quit the job that paid him 38¢ an hour…an amount that made every kid in Holyoke, Minnesota green with envy. With some of the money he had made, he purchased a 1934 Plymouth for which he paid $65.00. I’m sure that was a lot of money to pay for a car back then, but today, we would not get much of a car for $65.00. Nevertheless, in 1940, $65.00 bought my uncle a car that was only six years old, and that is truly amazing. No wonder the kids in town were envious of my Uncle Bill’s great job. At 18 years of age, 
he must have seemed quite grown up.
After leaving the railroad, Uncle Bill returned home in early June…just in time to make hay, which took most of the month of June. Toward the end of June, Uncle Bill decided to head out to North Dakota to work in the harvest fields out there. Although he was only 16 years of age, my dad, Allen Lewis Spencer and their friend, Bob Croft decided to go along. So, they loaded up in Uncle Bill’s 1934 Plymouth and headed out. Their plan was to work in different harvest ready fields along their way.
This all seems like an easy money scheme, until you think about the fact that this trip was made during the pre-combine years. At that time, the grain was cut with a binder and then hauled to the threshing machine, with horses and wagons. Of course, all this was 
done in the heat of the day, and the men didn’t really wear tank tops and shorts back then. They simply sweated it out. The work was not easy either. There was a lot of bending, lifting, loading, and unloading. They worked liked dogs from sun up to sun down, but that was just the way things were done back then.
The guys spent the rest of that summer in the fields of North Dakota, before returning home when the harvest was done. Uncle Bill says that the trip was quite the adventure, but they made a little money while they were at it, so it was worth it in the end.
These days, a trip to the store is a minor part of the day, even if it is a weekly or monthly trip to buy groceries, but it wasn’t always so. Many, and in fact probably the majority of people live right in town now, so it’s easy to run to the store for forgotten milk or bread, but when people live in the country it is a little bit more of a big, planned out trip. In the old west, it was even more than that…it was an all day event…and a lot of people didn’t go to town very often. They bought what they needed in quantity, and didn’t go back in for a while.
Now with the invention of the automobile, people travel a lot of places, not just into town. These days people drive all over the country, and into Canada and even Mexico sometimes. We have become a nation, and indeed world, of people on the move. In the old west, people had to plan trips around the country over the course of several months, because there was a lot of preparation needed to make such a trip. There weren’t hotels and restaurants all over the place to stay and eat at, so food had to be brought along, and cooked over a campfire when they stopped. It’s no wonder they didn’t go places very often. It all just took too long to make it a casual event.
These days, I can’t imagine people being patient enough take the time to get where they need to go in a wagon, pulled by horses…at least not most people. And I’m sure that even in the old west, people often wished there was a faster way. In fact, that is probably how the automobile 
got invented in the first place. Inventions come for someone seeing a need, and in our world, there is a definite need for automobiles.
Nowadays, we have every kind of vehicle imaginable to get us where we need to go. There are sports cars for the fun ride, around town or to the store, pickups for those big jobs, vans for hauling lots of people, and SUV’s the ability to take a lot of things with you and a lot of people too. They come in every color and size to suit each drivers personal taste. I know there are still people who use a horse and buggy, but this girl is a child of the modern age, and I’ll stick to my sporty car…over a wagon any day.
Every time I saw, Bob’s grandmother, Vina Leary Hein and her second husband, Walter Hein, they were always happy and fun people to be around. They loved company…especially their grandchildren. Nevertheless, they were hard working people, who rarely took a vacation…or even a day off. The owned a ranch, and there was always too much to do to be away for very long. The only bad thing about all that they had to do, is that they didn’t have as much time to spend with company as they might have liked. Nevertheless, when company was visiting, the evenings belongs to them and what usually went on in the evenings when company was visiting…cards, or at least that was what the evenings were like when Bob and I would visit.
Sometimes, I wondered how Grandma and Walt ever got together. They were two very different people. Walt would have never left the ranch, and wished Grandma wouldn’t either. For her part, she would really rather not play cards at all, and yet she finds herself roped into it. She wanted to be able to go to town and to visit her family, and he didn’t. It seemed like the odd couple sometimes, and yet, there was something that glued this couple together…love and friendship. They were two very different people who meshed perfectly…even if no one else could see why.
One of the happiest days I saw for them was their 50th Anniversary party. They were so happy. Walt was even open to leaving the ranch and the work for the day. He and Grandma looked so happy, and it was such a fun day. They socialized, danced, and enjoyed the foods. They smiled constantly. I could suddenly see that despite the fact that they seemed so opposite, they were nevertheless a perfect match. And whether we could see what it was that drew them together or not, after 50 years, it was obviously there.
As happy as I was for them, the day came when I felt such an aching for Walt. That was the day Grandma passed away. He seemed so broken, so horribly sad, and suddenly almost like a little lost child. It just broke my heart. It became so obvious to me, that Walt loved Grandma with all his being. I wasn’t sure he could live without her, and I suppose he might not have been able to, except that dementia had set in for him, and the foggy memory of her passing, made it easier to bear. Walt lived another six years before he passed away. While they have been gone 16 and 10 years respectively, I still find it very hard to believe that they are gone. Today would have been their 75th Anniversary. I’m sorry that they weren’t here to see this day, but then Grandma would have been 105, and Walt would have been 108, so it seems very unlikely that they would have been here today anyway.
My children and grandchildren have always known that my dad fought in World War II, but I find that maybe they don’t fully know what his part was, or how I feel about it. That is not surprising when you think about the fact that my children, grandchildren, and indeed, even my sisters and I, were not even born when all that took place seventy years ago today. I am pleased that my grandchildren know that their great grandpa fought in World War II, because that tells me that we who are older and at least know about that time in history, have done our jobs, in teaching this youngest generation of our family about the history their family was involved in…pretty well anyway. I was also very proud of my grandson, Chris, because he was interested enough to ask the questions he did about his great grandpa’s service years.
This morning, my grandson Chris sent me a text, tip toeing a bit, because he didn’t know how I 
would feel talking about this part of me Dad’s life, and asked me if my dad was involved in the D-Day maneuvers. I immediately told him that I was very proud of the part my Dad had played in World War II, and that his squadron had provided air cover as the troops stormed the beaches of Normandy. I sent him the links to other stories I had written about my Dad’s World War II service years, and he was amazed at all his great grandpa had done. I know how he feels. The first time I was told about all the things my dad had done, I was amazed too…and very proud.
There are a number of men, and maybe even women, in our family who served their country in World War II, and were involved in D-Day maneuvers, and each one is a hero in my eyes. This was such an important day in our history, as was the war it was a part of, and I would hate to think that our grandchildren and great grandchildren would never know of the sacrifice those brave men 
made. I would hate to think that the heroes of this and other wars would be forgotten by a nation too busy with their own lives and interests to take the time to look back in history and see for themselves exactly what took place. I know many people find history to be dull, dry, and boring in school, but as we age, and experience a few wars, weather events, earthquakes, and other changes in our nation, we realize that maybe we really need to take a look back and see just how we came to be the great nation we are…and remember the sacrifices made by so many to get us where we are today. I want to thank all the men and women who took part in D-Day, World War II, and all the other wars our nation has been a part of. We are great because of God and you!!
Today would have been my mother-in-law’s 65th anniversary, and in her mind it would still be so. She has no idea she is a widow. She has no idea that the love of her life…the man she has known since she was just a little baby, and with whom she shared a crib sometimes…has been gone for over a year now. That is the side of Alzheimer’s Disease that I think is merciful. While she doesn’t remember the things that happened a few minutes ago, or even a few years ago, and she doesn’t always remember our names, she also doesn’t remember that my father-in-law passed away on May 5, 2013. To her, he is visiting the neighbors, working, or out in the garage. I’m glad that is the case. She feels no grief and she doesn’t miss him…because to her, he is still here. She sees him everywhere. When she sees a man in a plaid shirt, she thinks it’s Dad, because he loved those plaid flannel shirts. I wouldn’t wish for her to remember Dad’s passing…it’s just too hard. We can play along. When she asks where Dad is, I tell her that he is in the garage, at Walmart, or at the neighbors. It satisfies her. She also sees Dad in her sons, Bob and Ron, her grandsons, and even in some of the men in the nursing home. We play along. At first it was hard, but the guys are used to it now.
This anniversary, that would have been a landmark anniversary for them, had Dad still been with us, is a bit sad for us…the children, in-laws, and grandchildren left behind, after Dad’s passing. It is always such a cool thing, especially these days, when someone makes one of these landmark anniversaries, because so many marriages don’t last. But theirs beat the odds. They had the real thing…love, and that made all the difference. It’s what keeps a marriage 
together through good times and bad.
Dad was always the bread winner, and Mom was always the homemaker. Together, they raised six children. She cooked, baked, canned, and kept the home and kids in order. He took care of the outdoor things like shoveling the walk, mowing the lawn, working on the cars, and any building that needed to be done. They were a team…and then half of the team was suddenly gone after a little under 64 years of marriage. To us, their family, it seemed too impossible to be true, but to Mom, it simply wasn’t true. To her…he is still here, and will be for as long as she is. It’s the merciful part of Alzheimer’s Disease.
