White great grandmother with children (grandfather, William White, center back row)
Pifer Great Grandparents with children (Grandfather, James Pifer, center back row)
For more than two years now I've been writing about anything and everything. During that time, I've touched on family members and history. For those of you fairly new to these pages, you can take a look at some previous articles to get acquainted with the cast of characters before I take you to 1954.
There is a lot of teasing that goes on about Wikipedia because it can be changed so easily and sometimes you do have to double check the information, but I'm crazy about Wiki because it is where I keep my brain. We all have "senior moments" even if we aren't seniors, but if you can get somewhere in the vicinity of a memory, Wiki can probably find it for you.
For instance, today I was trying to remember songs on my radio when I was five. Strangely enough, I could actually remember one, "Far Away Places", simply because I remember exactly where I was when I first heard it. I couldn't be absolutely sure if the memory was faulty and what's more all the other songs of the era were sort of mushed together in time. What I needed to do was put "Far Away Places" on the radio in 1949.
As you can see from the link above, there it is on the Billboard Hits on December 31, 1948 where it stayed for 18 weeks. Now how about the other songs? Type in a year, any year - In this case 1949 Songs - Look what pops up: 1949 In Music. Now I can click from year to year to put songs in the context of places, which will come in very, very handy. If you can just ask the right question, Wiki will at least get you started on the road to the answer.
So there I am, barefoot (I still hate shoes), sitting on the floor of my bedroom in Fresno (I still don't like chairs). My favorite Childcraft book - the one with the poetry - is open (I still love books). By now in the space of five years, I have been in Los Angeles, Oakland, Walla Walla, Boulder City, and now Fresno. It's been an interesting five years even if I only truly remember about three and a half of it, when a song comes on that just perfectly fits my ongoing love of being elsewhere any chance I get.
Today we will warm up the time machine because my children have been demanding an autobiography for years. Fortunately, there is one whale of a soundtrack. In all fairness I have to tell you about my ultimately self-destructive but wonderful parents and the unusual almost parents, keepers, and volunteers. I was actually, for the most part, kind of given a home by four people with additional add-ons as necessary. As a result, this is going to be a multiple day post.
Mama was born in 1918 in Oklahoma. She lived during the dust bowl as the middle of nine children and made the trek to California. Her father the light of her life died when she was 15. There was an older very strange brother that the family doesn't discuss, but she had younger sisters who adored her for defending them even though they knew she was a victim.
She had a brain that made her valedictorian of her 1936 graduation class. The love of her life in high school was Armenian. In Central California of the 1930s that would be the equivalent of black/white so she was forced into an "acceptable" marriage at 18 to a man who tried to kill her. Was she "wild" after this ... darn right she was. She sang better than Judy. She danced better than Ginger, there wasn't an event that wasn't made better by her telling the story with embroidered notes and gestures, and for a second husband when she was 24 (ignoring the lover in between the official alliances which wasn't done then) she married a man born in Scotland because she was a rebel who wanted different ... and that ended up being:
Daddy who was born in Scotland in 1918. His father saw the "Great Strike" of 1926 coming and he and his brothers and sisters crossed the pond in shifts to take up residence in California. As a result my dad, his brothers, and all of the Scottish cousins ended up in a Los Angeles enclave in the late 20s and early 30s just in time for the depression from which they would disperse throughout the state.
Daddy as the eldest and most responsible at age 8 and protector of his younger brothers, made that 6,000 mile trek with his adored mother and watched over the youngsters while his father worked 16 hour days at the rubber plant. His mother died only a few years later when he was 16 just six months before his HS graduation. It was a date he would mourn by being drunk for the next 40 years and which created a gulf between him and his father for decades.
Was he smart? ... he was doing Trigonometry when he was 13. He graduated HS at 16 in 1934, the year his mother died. He went to work at the railroad as a full charge accountant to escape home and with Pearl Harbor he joined the Army as a Warrant Officer. They fatefully sent him to Fresno, California. Could he dance? God daddy could dance. My earliest memory is standing on his feet to learn how the Fox Trot felt. Could he sing? Not a note. Bullfrogs sounded better, but as a storyteller he was unmatched except by mama.
Between them they told tales, invented escapades that may have been true, and tumbled head long into their future. Side note: They both smoked Pall Malls (Prophetic and pronounced pell mell elsewhere). Their Song was Whispering. It was recorded in 1920 by Paul Whiting and his orchestra and was the first song to ever sell one million copies. As such it has been played and sung by darn near everyone including Bing Crosby, Louis Armstrong, and Les Paul, making it the first song in the soundtrack that provides background to my life.
Whispering while you cuddle near me Whispering so no one can hear me Each little whisper seems to cheer me I know its true dear....there's no one but you
Whispering why you'll never leave me Whispering why you'll never grieve me Whisper and say that you believe me Whispering that I love you
Whispering while you cuddle near me Whispering so no one can hear me Each little whisper seems to cheer me Just whispering that I love you
So these two beautiful, brilliant, talented, and damaged people heading towards their versions of ruin met in Fresno in the Spring of 1942 where they married on Independence day. Look up above. You see where his arm is resting over her belly in the autumn of 1943. That bulge is me. Between them either together or separately with step parents, I would actually live with them off and on for a total of maybe seven or eight (It's hard to add up months) of the next 17 years.
To be Continued with the almost parents, the results, and most of all the music ... The first 30 years are the hardest.
Our little blue planet has a host of problems. Let's see if we can't kick off the new year on a note of hope for the future and may this time next year, find it in much better shape.
