December 21, 1953

You should have seen us trying to buy coffee with marks all through Italy – no lire, but some soldiers on the train took pity on us.  They had lire.

We got to Rome about 7:30 and went to the Hotel Constantinople.  Then we ate breakfast and went up to wash our faces.  Then I discovered that I had left my toothbrush, so I went to the drug store to buy one.  I don’t know what kind of mouths they have, but that’s the biggest toothbrush I ever saw.  It looks more like a hair brush.

         No pictures in Rome because it rained.  Saw the Appian Way and one of the Viaducts on the way to the airport.  We are flying with BKS, a British airlines.  We left Rome finally about 1200.  Had a very nice trip and landed in Athens about 5:30 – lost an hour.  We are staying at the Acropolis and we have a private bath with a tub.  The trip over was very nice.

Tonight we had a pretty good dinner here.  The 4 of us were going out, but it started raining so we just stayed here.  There are 2 more girls on this tour who are very nice – Ann and Betty.  Most of the others are older but a nice group.

 

December 22, 1953

This morning we went on a sightseeing tour.  Stopped at the Royal Palace to take pictures of the Guards.  This is where the Duke of Edinburgh lived as a child.

Then we went by the Stadium where the 1^st Olympic Games were held.  It was built in 1896 and is a replica of the one built in 300 A.D.

         Next went to the Temple of Jupiter; foundations laid in 514 B.C. but was finished in 150 A.D.  The gate in front divided the city into the Roman and Greek parts.

Next we went to the Acropolis which means “high city” where the Gods ruled – Athens had its “day of hay” in 450 B.C. under Pericles – Golden Age.  There is the Temple of Athena – goddess of Athens and the Parthenon – “temple of Virgins”.  Paul’s rock is out front where he preached in 51 A.D.  Down below is the Theater of Dionysos, the oldest theater – about Nero’s time.

This afternoon we went by the University – Med. College, Philosophy College and the Theology College.

         We went to the PX of all things.  Also got some “greenback” and do they look good!

The exchange here is 30,000 drachma to the $1.  All the money is paper.  You think nothing of tipping somebody 1,000 drachma – about 3 cents.

         Tonight we went to see “The Robe” (with Richard Burton, Jean Simmons, and Victor Mature).  Greek subtitles.  These are the places where it took place.  When we bought our tickets they gave us about 4 apiece.  Paper must be awfully plentiful around here.

         We really caused an uproar because the usher wanted us to move upstairs.  We didn’t understand because she was speaking Greek.  (She's always causing trouble!)

December 23, 1953

We left a little after 8 this morning for Istanbul and arrived here about 11:30.  We are staying at the Ipek Palace (still there).  It is new and very nice except that we don’t have private baths.  It has been rainy and misty all day.

         A view of Istanbul from the hotel:

After lunch we went on a sightseeing tour.  Istanbul looks just like I thought Turkey would.  It is the only city that is in Europe and Asia.  We went across the Golden Horn which divides the city into two parts – the old – 600 BC and the new – 14^th century.  Then we went down to the waterfront.  Saw a mosque, the New Palace, a clock tower, and at the foot of the tower the 1^st cannons ever made.  Then went by the city square which has a war monument of 1919 in it.  On one side is the Congress of Turkey.

Then we saw one of the aqueducts that is 1200 years old.  Later we went into one of the cisterns underground which catches the overflow of the aqueduct.  It is 1700 years old and was built by the Romans.  This was the water supply when the city was under siege.

        We went into the Suleymaniye Mosque.  He was the greatest emperor and had the mosque built in 1555.  It is on the 7^th and highest hill and can be seen from anywhere in the city.  The acoustics are perfect.  When we went in we had to put on tremendous slippers.  I lost one of mine and some little man got real excited about it.  The lights were strung very low all over the building.  It was tremendous.  There was a service going on.  They worship 5 times a day.

Then we went into St. Sophia Museum which used to be a mosque.  There are no steps at the entrance because the emperors rode their carriages into worship.  It was built in the 6^th century.

Then we went to the Hippodrome where they used to have races.  Now there are 5 monuments there – one is the Obelisk or Cleopatra’s Needle.  This is across from the Blue Mosque – next to Mecca.  It is called this because of the many blue tiles.  We also went in and had to put on slippers.  We saw some worshippers bowing down here.

         Cleopatra's Needle:

           The Blue Mosque:

(Note:  the Blue Mosque is not actually blue on the outside; but the slide being old makes it appear as though it is.)

           There are marble columns here that are the largest in the world – 19 in. diameter.

           Then we went to the Bazaars.  They cover about 4 miles and are all inside.  It reminded me of the markets in Mexico City – everyone trying to sell you something and very junky.  We bargained and I finally got a little ash tray for a pack of cigarettes.

Tonight we went to a Turkish night club and drank Raki (a non-sweet, anise-flavored spirit consumed as an aperitif) – what the Turks drink.  You’ve never heard such carryings on as most of the people did about the place.

Tomorrow we go to Jerusalem, and I have certainly enjoyed Turkey.

You've got a friend

Someone recently made the remark to me that I took things personally even when they had nothing to do with me.  The implication was that this was a regular or normal occurrence.  You might assume that this came from someone who knew me well and had seen regular evidence of this and was trying to help me tackle a problem that could get me in trouble.  But you would have been wrong.  I got this gem from someone via a Facebook message.  And this is someone I have never met, have had mostly periphery involvement with, and who has never really engaged me in any meaningful dialog.  And I don’t think she said it to help me solve a problem.  I suppose I should be grateful that she didn’t choose to call me out on this problem of mine in the post on her wall.  But it begs the question of how do we develop friendships in this day and age of Facebook and Twitter and electronic chat boards?  And do these people really know us, to the extent that they can tell us what our faults are?

Friendships have changed over the years.  In the old days we met our friends in school or on playgrounds or at Scouts or choir practice or swim team practice.  We played at each other’s houses or met at the pool or played sports together and developed those connections over shared experiences.  As we got older, we rode in cars together or ate lunch together at school or had spend-the-night parties with a bunch of friends or talked on the phone for hours.  As young adults, we went bar hopping or hung out at coffee shops or went shopping.  But now there’s a whole different way of meeting people.  Through online chat boards and Facebook and LinkedIn.  It used to be that your best friend was someone that you had done all of the things I mentioned with; today your best friend might be someone on the other side of the computer screen that you have never met or that lives far enough away that you only rarely see her.  And these people you’ve never met or have only met a time or two think they know you well enough based upon things you write online to tell you what you need to correct to be a better person.  They are willing to tell employers that this person would make a great employee even though they’ve never worked together or had any type of professional interaction at all!

It’s amazing that less than 10 years ago, the most popular show on TV was about 6 friends.  Three women and three men, who were best friends.  Some of them were roommates, some developed romantic relationships.  But their friendship existed in the real world, not on a computer or via text message.  When they gently chastised each other, it was because they really knew each other.  They didn’t base it on a flat screen kind of relationship with no context or ability to see the subtleties of tone and facial expression.  Those shows still exist, but how often do people have those kinds of relationships anymore.

 

All of this made me think about friendships, particularly among women, and how they’ve evolved over time.  I considered how different things were in my mother’s day and how strange all of this would seem to her.

 

I didn’t very often wonder about my mother’s friends.  But she always had at least one really good friend everywhere we lived.  There was our next door neighbor Eleanor Anderson in Charlotte.  We all liked Eleanor.  She was a “cool mom”, which sometimes made me wonder why she was friends with my mother, a woman who could never be described as “cool”.  Then there was Dolores Rucci, the across the street neighbor in New Jersey.  Now my mother despised New Jersey with her whole being, but she made friends with Mrs. Rucci so she at least had someone to talk to.  And finally there was Dolly Snyder, our next door neighbor in Atlanta, who later also hired my mother to work with her at the high school cafeteria.  Mrs. Snyder was probably my mother’s greatest friend.

 

There were also the women who were some of my mother’s oldest friends – Miriam Jackson and Pat May.  I don’t really know how my mother knew Miriam but it seemed she knew her forever.  And Pat was her college roommate and later married one of my mother’s cousins.  Pat was the one that always surprised me.  I always thought of Pat as very sophisticated.  She was dark complexioned and had black or very dark brown hair that was always pulled back into a smooth bun.  She smoked and wore pedal pushers.  She had one of those whiskey soaked Lauren Bacall voices.  She had a great rich laugh and I remember her laughing often.  She was exotic.  I thought Pat May was all that and a bag of chips.  She could not have been more opposite of my mother.  And when I was a little girl I wanted to be Pat May when I grew up.

 
And then there were my mother’s sisters and her cousin, who also would be considered her friends.  Amelia Ann and Sara were my mother’s younger sisters, but whenever the three of them got together, except for the fact that they had a physical resemblance to each other, you would have mistaken them for just the tightest of friends.  And their cousin Helen was the perfect fourth to their “gang of four”.  They had their own way of relating to each other that just reinforced how much they loved and liked each other. 
 

My mother would often talk about her friends back in the days when she was young.  She seemed to have a large group of friends, both male and female.  I never thought about it much, since of course I couldn’t imagine my mother as a real person with friends and boyfriends and ups and downs and any kind of a life.  When I read her diary I was often struck by the wide circle of friends she seemed to have.  I don’t know if they were all connected to the Army, but many, if not all, of them must have been.  She had friends to travel with, friends to party with, friends to have dinner with and friends to just hang out with.

 

As my mother’s child, I could never figure out why people liked my mother so much.  She could talk to anyone – and did, much to my dismay – and she was always nice to people, polite and smiling.  Which she tried to teach me to do, but since I was not inclined to follow my mother’s lead on much, I suppose I worked hard to be the opposite.  I thought people would not like my mother because she was fat or because she was plain and wore no makeup or because she was often opinionated.  But as I look back, that doesn’t seem to have had any impact on my mother’s ability to have friends and be a friend.

I think about this now because I was never one to have a lot of friends.  And people never seemed to gravitate to me.  I wanted to have lots of friends and I tried hard to have lots of friends – too hard.  I was always exaggerating things, hoping that if I appeared cool and worldly I would have lots of friends.  That never ended well, of course.  So I ended up with just a few very close friends.  I don’t trust people implicitly and, while I try to make friends, they usually are just like moths to a flame and quickly I seem to repel them or burn them up with too much neediness.  Too bad I didn’t want to learn from my mother….

 
In the past 10 years or so, there seems to be a tsunami of online forums and bulletin boards, for every interest in the world.  Mom boards, biking boards, sports boards, boards about singing groups like the Allman Brothers or the Eagles.  I found out when I had my hysterectomy that there was a hysterectomy board.  And then boards for professions.  I discovered the SHRM boards – originally an awkward form of communication to ask questions about all things human resources.  Most of the time you could get answers, but I noticed that personalities started to form and there were some that were very helpful and some that were not.  Some that were kind and some that were overbearing or overly critical of some poor soul who deigned to ask an elementary question or a question that had been asked more than once before.  But it was through this crude, early bulletin board that I got involved in the oftentimes whack world of online friendships.
 

The first board I got involved with was an offshoot of the SHRM board.  People developed their personas and, it seemed, often used the mostly anonymous nature of a board to create the kind of person they wanted to be.  Some were the ones that were always trying to talk about fluff topics and just have fun.  Some were more serious and wanted to talk HR.  And then there were the political types who wanted to debate and, more often, try to impose their perspectives on others.  It was an interesting group of people.  People became “friends” online, which led to gatherings both locally and nationally.  Some people actually became friends IRL, which was a cool phenomenon.  One of my best friends came from my association with that board and I recommended her for a job with my company so we were coworkers for a while as well.  It was fun to travel to other cities and be able to get together for dinner with these “friends” who sometimes became real friends.

But the board became more political and there was fall out for not agreeing with the ones in charge.  There was name calling and meanness and eventually people left and then the board imploded altogether.  I found other boards with their own personalities and quirks.  There are cliques and popular people on boards just as in life, although sometimes they are not the same.  The interesting thing is that they typically form between people who have never actually met each other.  But there will always be strong personalities and people who are just naturals at leading the way.  It’s interesting to watch the evolution of these online communities.  These are the places to tell people that you’ve never met about your baby drama, your child drama, your ex-spouse or boyfriend drama and then to virtually talk about the most intimate details of your life.  I know that if I knew my mother talked with her friends like these people talk with each other, I’d be mortified beyond belief.  It’s a new world.

 

It makes me wonder when we quit making friends the old fashioned way.  At school and work and in the neighborhood and through other real life friends.  When did we start thinking these people on the other side of a computer screen were our bosom buddies and the people we wanted to share our darkest secrets with?  You can share a lot online and, sometimes, share too much, in my opinion, with people you have never really had a flesh and blood relationship with.  And even when you do meet someone “in real life”, you still don’t have that day-in, day-out kind of friendship because you only see them once in a while or maybe even just once.  I know you can make friends with people that you “meet” online, because I have, but you still need that face-to-face to make them truly come alive.  Otherwise, you’re just “friends” with someone’s persona.

 

I look back at my mother and her wide circle of friends and they were all the living, breathing people she could call on the phone and meet at the pool or in the neighborhood or over the backyard fence.  My best friend is kind of a throwback to those days.  She has a wide circle of friends that started from a small group she met at work.  That has expanded over the years to include their friends and even a couple that one other couple met at a bar!  But they’re like a family and they get together at holidays for parties and to talk.  They get together for each other’s birthdays.  And they create special bonds with a few that they meet for lunch and go to movies with or just call to chat.

 
Somehow I missed most of that.  I spent too much time trying to be what I thought other people wanted me to be.  I had no confidence that people would like me for me.  Instead of just being myself, I tried to be someone else and failed.  I look at the life my mother had, full and rich and lined with friends she could have fun with.  And instead of thinking she was dowdy and fat and not worth the trouble, she was nice and sweet and talked to people and listened and she was always smiling.  And she had a boatload of friends and wonderful memories.

The Eat, Pray, Love Thing

I read a book a while back called “Eat, Pray, Love”.  It had been recommended to me, but I had put off reading it.  When I finally did I couldn’t believe I’d waited so long to read it.  It was about a woman who, after a difficult divorce, took a year and traveled to Italy, India, and Indonesia to “find herself”.  She did learn a lot about herself during that year, while she ate pasta, spent time in an ashram and found herself open to loving again.  And although I found myself rolling my eyes at the Oprah shows where Oprah made it seem like “Eat, Pray, Love” was a religion all by itself, I couldn’t deny that her experience spoke to me at a very deep level.  I found myself wishing I could have done the same, but with the security of an income, or at least money to cover the bills that would still go on at home, and health insurance.

I don’t know if I would have traveled the world like that, although the idea of spending time, say, in Italy, Corsica, and Spain sounds intriguing, I think it was more the idea of setting aside my daily life and embarking on a journey to gain clarity and to clear my mind.  There are times when I feel like there is so much crap in my head and no way to use a kind of mental floss to get rid of it.  There’s an undeniable appeal to the thought of not having a schedule, not having to go to work and deal with the stuff you have to deal with daily and the stress of wondering if people like you well enough to let you keep doing it, of being able to just do what you want when you want to do it.  Or even just to get away and explore, do something different for a while.

It used to be that I would never have entertained the idea of doing an “Eat, Pray, Love” kind of thing.  I couldn’t imagine just doing nothing or not having a job to go to or just being able to let go.  I was out of work for 10 months not too long after I got married, which, when I look back on it, was an unbelievably long period of time for the late 80’s, when there were tons of jobs out there.  I feel like it says something about my discipline or my ability to (or desire to) apply myself effectively or my thinking better of myself than I deserved.  Whatever the case, I nearly lost my mind at various points.  I was frantic to find a job, any job, as long as it was in my field, and I couldn’t relax, couldn’t settle down, couldn’t take the time to explore and learn.  The next time I was out of work – only about 4 months – I had learned more about taking time to heal myself.  I had come out of a horrible job experience with a bully for a boss and I was beat up mentally by the time I left.  Having time to undo all of that was a gift.  And now I wish there was a way to have my own “Eat, Pray, Love” experience.

In many ways, I think my mother’s year in Europe was her “Eat, Pray, Love” journey.  Of course, she had a purpose for being there – to teach school, although there was scant reference to it in her diary! – but she had a chance to explore and be awestruck and to fall in love.  She grew up in a well-to-do family and ran with a well-heeled crowd in Charlotte.  She was smart and she knew what she wanted for her life.  As she told the story, she was talked into doing this teach in Germany thing, although I don’t know how much arm twisting went on with that.  She was still young enough to be excited about the adventure and there wasn’t anything that she wrote that indicated that she was scared or apprehensive.  She took things as they came and took advantage of the opportunities that presented themselves.

Mother knew that when she went to Germany that she would travel.  How could you be there and not?  I think of my brother Paul and his family, living in France for 3 years.  They’ve taken advantage of proximity and traveled around Europe and into Asia, just like our mother did.  So she, like they, have had the opportunity for “Eat, Pray, Love” travels, although I’m not really sure any of them thought about the experience as the opportunity to “find themselves”.  In fact, I know my mother scoffed at that kind of thing, so I’m certain she just looked at it as her “grand European adventure”. 

But, in fact, I do think she came back a different person.  She was probably a little naïve when she went.  After all, she lived in a time when women lived at home until they married.  She came from a small Southern city where she wasn’t really exposed to much that challenged her at all or her beliefs.  She wrote about not being able to understand other people because their American accents were different and then struggling in a place where many, if not most, people didn’t speak English at all!  She had to learn to get along in a place that was very different from where she came.  She saw things she had only read about in history books, which I know is always awe-inspiring.  Even though she lived on an American army base where people spoke her language and there was some semblance of what she knew as normal, she still had to learn her way around a foreign country.  She talks about things like trouble along the Iron Curtain, which was not far away, and crime on the base with an uncharacteristic nonchalance.  She didn’t seem afraid, she seemed intrigued.

And she certainly didn’t go with the idea that she would fall in love.  But she did.  She met a man that she liked and she grew to love him.  She traveled with him and then she came home knowing she would marry him.  They were an unlikely pair.  She was a college graduate from a good family that lived well.  He was a college drop-out and came from a family that valued work over higher education.  She was a dyed-in-the-wool Southern woman, plantation Southern, I always said.  And he was a Yankee, born and raised in Michigan, and an Army man.

She never went back to Europe.  Never had a desire to.  She didn’t like to fly, so she didn’t.  She came back home and settled into the life she had planned for and hoped for, as a wife and mother.  She was kind of like Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz” where she never wanted to go beyond her own backyard again.  But she had seen the world and I think that stayed with her.  It made her want more for her children.  She was so excited when I went to Europe the first time, back in the mid-80’s.  I think she would have been thrilled that Paul had the opportunity that he did to live and work in France, although she would have missed him and his family very much.  And she would have loved the fact that George and I took advantage of that to visit Europe again.

But that leads me back to the idea of “Eat, Pray, Love”.  I watched the movie recently and while I enjoyed it, it didn’t give me the same feelings as reading the book did.  Although I did enjoy the thought that Elizabeth Gilbert’s “Love” was Javier Bardem. J  But watching the movie did remind me of those desires again.  I cried a little at the end, wishing I could be as brave as Liz was.  That I could put aside the practicalities and do something like that, even if it just meant living at Wrightsville Beach for a year.  To experience the whole idea of breaking away from the norm and doing something different with my life, like my mother did.  And then coming back a different person.  Elizabeth Gilbert was a very different person when she came home.  My mother was probably just a little different, but she did have an experience that amazed her and changed her, if only a little.  And it took some bravery too, on her part, to do what she did.

These days I feel too old, too settled, too practical to be that brave.  And yet I yearn for it.

I’ve wanted to know how this all started for Mother.  What made her decide to do this?  What did she tell people?  Did she share any more detail with her family than was in her diary?  So George and I went to Charlotte to spend some time with our aunts, my mother’s sisters.  And over a dinner-on-the-lawn meal of fried chicken, potato salad and deviled eggs, they and their cousin Helen told us what turned out to be precious little about Mother’s little adventure.

So Mother and her friend Miriam had decided that they would enlist in this program that would send them to Germany for a year to teach school.  Unfortunately at the last minute Miriam was told she would be going to Japan.  They contemplated not going, because the plan was always to do it together, but then they decided to go ahead and go their separate ways.  So what did Mocha and Granddaddy think about their oldest daughter going off to Germany all by herself to teach school?  Were they shocked?  Horrified?  Unhappy?  Thrilled?  Did they try to tell her “no”?  Unfortunately, we’ll never know.  As Helen shared, we’ll never know what was said behind closed doors, but in public they were very supportive of her decision to go.

So did Mother write home and tell them all about Daddy?  Did she dish all the details of her romance and falling in love?  Again, no.  L  When she came home, they knew she had met someone and that it was serious, but she didn’t share all the intimate details.  It just wasn’t done.

Aarrgghh!  Nothing.  Oh, well, I suppose we’ll just make up the details and imagine that she begged and pleaded with her parents to give their blessing to the trip.  After all, she was a grown woman, in her mid-20’s.  It’s not like they could really tell her what to do.  But eventually, Mocha and Granddaddy gave in and wished her well.  They were afraid, of course, because she was going off on her own, without even Miriam to depend on, but of course Mother told them not to worry, it would all be fine.  And she bravely went off, not afraid of anything and excited to be on her own without her parents watching her every move.  And so when she got there, she partied all the time and made new friends and dated many men, until one skinny guy with a big nose and ears that stuck out a bit charmed her with his storytelling and his easy laugh.  She got to know him better and then went off on little trips with him – scandalous! – although they were chaperoned. J  And he was smitten with her Southern accent and her demure nature, so he told her before he left that he would follow her as soon as he was able.  And so she reluctantly went back home to wait for him and spent her nights dreaming of him until he was able to return to the States.  And all of Charlotte was mad with curiosity waiting to see what he was all about.  And when he got here, he proposed to her in some ridiculous fashion that was not romantic at all, but they were both practical souls and they thought they were clever and cute and got married anyway.  J

Riding in the car with boys....

December 3, 1953

Last night the Women’s Welfare League put on a grand party.  We ate, played Bingo, and there was a floor show.  It was a scream.  Afterwards we danced.  Then we all went into town.

The fog has been horrible here for the last 2 days.  It hasn’t lifted a tad even during the day.

December 6, 1953

Friday night was “crying hour” once more and a fine time was had by all.

Saturday morning at 0500 we had a ride to Nurnberg with Capt. Ruff.  We had to go up and get our cholera shots.  That night we sat around downstairs and then we all went down for roll call.

Today I went to church.  Then we played ping pong and went bowling.  Tonight we went to the boxing matches.  Then we went downtown for a while.

December 13, 1953

Friday night Tank Company had a party at the NCO Club – steak dinner.  Had a very good floor show.  Had a grand time.  Afterwards we went out on the town.

Today a whole bunch of us went out to Charlie Platkin’s house for dinner – fried chicken and grits.  Sho’ enjoyed it.  Then all of us went bowling.

             Last Thursday one of the boys was killed in the guard house.  They were seeing who could draw their guns the fastest!  Wow – what a headline to then just leave us hanging.  Who was involved?  How did it unfold?  What happened afterwards?  Mother would definitely not have made a good investigative journalist.

This time next week we’ll be well on our way.

December 20, 1953

Friday was the last day of school, thank goodness.  (No kidding.  This woman was definitely not into the teaching aspect of why she was in Europe.  J)  I opened my presents from home Thursday.  Then Friday opened the ones from my children.  We also had a party Friday night.  Felt like I had a couple of Christmases.

Then yesterday we had a party in the afternoon.  Then Willie Moore, Paul Otis, and I went over to Pat and Noble Clark’s.  Then we came home and changed.  Last night they had an egg ring party at the Club, and we went.  Afterwards there was a dance and then ham and eggs.  It was a wonderful party.  So, was Willie Moore a date?  Just another one of the boys that tagged along?  Did Mother dress a little more carefully because he was going?  Put on some powder and lipstick?  I wish we knew more about the “courting” phase they went through.  Was she sad to know she was getting ready to leave on a trip?  Was she worried that he might lose interest while she was gone?  Did she analyze every single thing she did or said around him like I always did around a boy I liked?

We were supposed to have been in Munich this morning at 6:45.  In order to go the party (and what was more important than a party, right?) Jim Ashworth said he would take us to Regensburg to catch the 4:21 train.  We started out about 2:30.  It was so icy we could hardly get into town.  So we stayed at his house and caught the 7:30 train.  We are now on our way to meet our tour in Rome.  We will get there at 7:30 in the morning.  Then we get the plane to Athens – 3 days without a bed.  Right now we are at the Brenner Pass (a mountain pass through the Alps along the border between Italy and Austria), and it’s snowing like mad.  It started snowing really when we left Austria.  When we left Straubing this morning it had snowed just a little.

Every time we cross a border about umpteen guards check our passports and at least two stamp them.  I have never seen as many customs officials in my life.  It’s most interesting.

I really started this trip off in my usual way.

            Maybe this is why Mother always tried to be so organized on trips.  If we were going a long distance, she would send off for a map from the Amoco motor club.  I loved looking at the routes they would select – typically one “scenic route” and one “direct route”.  It was fun to see where we might go.  She was also particular about what we would see and where we would go.

            Traveling in those days usually meant that we were going to visit family.  And that was always a car trip.  Which is probably why I hate car trips. L  The usual m.o. for a trip was to start off at night.  Daddy would blow up the air mattresses and put the seat down in the station wagon so that we could all sleep in the back.  He and Mother would trade off driving.  Whoever wasn’t driving would snooze in the passenger seat with a pillow.  I rarely slept on these trips.  If I did it would be for short periods of time and then I’d be awake.  I still have that problem on a long trip.  When I fly to Europe, the flight over is overnight.  No matter what I do or what part of the plane I’m in, trying to sleep is impossible.  If I get 2 hours of sleep, I’m lucky.

            We almost never stayed at a hotel.  My parents were too cheap plus they always thought we would “act up”.  Also why we rarely ate out at a restaurant.  My memories of the few times we got to eat out were sitting in the car at a Shoney’s drive in.  We did stay at a motel in Cherokee, NC once and it had a pool!  That was the big deal for us whenever we did stay anywhere.

            Riding in the car.  It felt like I spent my entire life riding in the car.  And I think that, because of that, I grew over time to despise riding in the car.  It’s a little better to be the one driving, but to have to ride in the car for more than about 3 hours is a little like torture to me.  And then to top it all off, I was riding in the car with my 3 younger brothers.  Good times.

            We always had a station wagon.  Sometimes it had that way back seat that faced out the back of the car.  The last one we had, had the seats in the back that opened up to face each other.  I hated having to sit in the way back.  First of all, I get a little nauseous when I ride in the car.  So sitting anywhere but the driver’s seat is sort of problematic.  But sitting way in the back, where the air doesn’t circulate as well, and sitting facing where we’ve just been, well, it’s just not pleasant.  And then to have to deal with brothers who want to pretend to puke in a bag or just act up in general made it even less fun.

            My mother, I think, was also not a fan of riding in the car with us.  So on the longer trips, she would give us Dramamine.  Whether we needed it or not.  And often she gave us 2.  To knock us out.  She even said so!!  The good news about Dramamine was that it did make you sleep.  The bad news about Dramamine is that it made you feel pretty cruddy when you woke up.  She only gave us Dramamine on the daylight portions of the trip.  Maybe if she’d given me one at night I could have slept….

            My brothers often brought toys and things with them in the car.  George frequently brought a little piano which he would play incessantly and sing songs about his dolls, Johnny West and Chief Cherokee.  John and Paul brought army men and then spent much of the trip yelling about all the places they saw - “keeno place to play army!!”  Because of my carsickness, I couldn’t read or even spend a lot of time looking out the window.  I had to sit with my head back and my eyes closed.  If only we’d had noise-cancelling headphones or iPods back then….

            Inevitably there would be yelling at each other and fighting and that’s when Mother would say that she was going to have Daddy pull off on the side of the road and she was going to drop someone off.  Nice.  Secretly, however, I was usually praying for just this kind of outcome. J

            Mother always brought a cooler full of snacks and drinks.  God forbid that we should stop anywhere and actually eat at a restaurant.  Sometimes we got to stop at McDonald’s, but that was rare, since my brothers wouldn’t eat a hamburger the way it was made.  McDonald’s is NOT the “we do it your way” place, so in order to get hamburgers with no pickles (couldn’t just take them off) or no mustard or no onions, you had to wait for them to make a new order so that they could make a few that way.  So Mother brought soft drinks and sandwiches and raw vegetables for us to eat in the car.  Or maybe stop along the side of the road and eat at a picnic table.  (Hurry, get back in the car and drive off before John knows we’ve left!! J)

            I had a time warp experience a few years ago when I went to Huntsville, Ontario with my brother Paul and his family for a vacation.  They own a little cottage up there on Fairy Lake, which is a wonderful vacation spot.  We left after work on a Friday and drove until we hit the NC-VA border, which was in the middle of the night.  Thankfully, we got to sleep in a hotel the rest of the night.  Then we drove from VA to just south of Buffalo, NY.  As we drove, we played with the radio and picked up the TN Volunteers radio network broadcasting the Georgia-Tennessee football game.  It was staticky and, of course, too pro-Tennessee, but we were able to listen to most of the first half.  My nephews were asleep and Paul was in the way back of the minivan and he kept urging us to turn up the volume.  We finally lost the station about the time that Georgia picked up a fumble at the one-yard line and ran it all the way back for a touchdown.  Go Dawgs!!  Luckily we got to the hotel in time to see the end of the game.  Big win for Georgia that year. J  Day 3 was a shorter drive from Buffalo to Huntsville.  But it brought back the old memories of sitting in the way back and trying to catch a nap and my nephews, who were almost 3 at the time, talking and yelling and crying and fighting in between watching DVD’s of Bob the Builder and Jay Jay the Airplane and Thomas the Tank Engine.

Willie Moore

December 1, 1953

We got in Sunday night about 01:15.  We had to wait about an hour in Regensburg.  The RTO was closed and the German waiting room had no place to sit down, so we went across the street to a restaurant.  There was a grand orchestra there.

Yesterday afternoon we got a ride to Munchen with Ickie 6.  We got the validation for Egypt, etc. on our passports.  Then we went to the Tour Agency and turned everything in.

Last night about 11 o’clock Willie Moore (so this is actually the first mention of Daddy.  I wish we knew how they really met.) and I decided to fix us some hamburgers since the sandwich woman was gone.  We couldn’t find any so we scrambled eggs, etc.  It was pretty good.  That’s the 1^st time I have done that since leaving home.

This afternoon we took all of the children in to see Hansel and Gretel.  A German girl’s school – Catholic – put it on in English and invited us.  It was precious.  It was a scream when they tried to use our slang expressions.  They had very elaborate costumes and settings.  We thoroughly enjoyed it!

It's interesting that Mother never discussed in her diary how she met Daddy or anything about him really.  As you'll discover, she is very matter of fact about her relationship with him and doesn't really romanticize it at all.  They did travel together later, but not alone.  And there are some pictures of the two of them together, but you'd be hardpressed to know that this was a special guy to her.

Maybe I shouldn't be surprised.  Mother was always pretty matter of fact about their relationship.  She clearly loved him and the feeling was mutual.  She thought he was the greatest person ever and she certainly put him up on a pedestal for us.  I can remember making a comment once that Daddy always had an answer for everything and that he always acted like he knew everything and she said "well, he does!"  And I think she believed that.

So today, on Father's Day, I'll take a little break from writing about my mother to talk about Daddy.  He's been gone for 22 years.  Hard to believe it's been that long.  He was an amazing father.  Back when the stereotype for most fathers was that they went to work all day, came home and just vegged out in front of the TV, that wasn't the reality of my father.  He did work all day and when he came home he would often sit in the den and read, but he also paid attention to my brothers and me.  He talked to us and listened to us and made time for us.

I remember that on Saturdays Daddy would make us all sandwiches.  He would get out all the sandwich fixin's and would make us whatever we liked.  He often, on the weekends, would make chili for dinner or waffles or biscuits for breakfast.  He was an engaged dad, spending time with us doing things we liked.

I have frequently said that Daddy was the perfect father for a daughter.  He treated me as though I were the greatest thing ever.  He was firm but fair with me, but he also let me know that he thought I was terrific, even when I really wasn't.  My mother told me once that before I was born, Daddy said he hoped I was a girl.  He thought the first child should be a girl, so I'm sure he was thrilled when he got his wish.

He was always there for me when I needed a shoulder to cry on or needed a hug.  I remember when I was in Girl Scouts one year, I desperately wanted to be the Secretary.  I'm not sure anymore why that was so important, but it was.  The way the "officers" were chosen was that you picked a piece of paper out of a Girl Scout beanie and if you got something with writing on it, that's what you were. I do know that I wanted to keep the minutes (I guess I've always loved writing!), but when I pulled out the paper, it said "Treasurer".  I was heartbroken.  Daddy tried to tell me how important a Treasurer was, but I was having none of it.  So I went to bed that night and woke up crying about it.  He got me up and took me into the den and told me a story about a bad dream he'd had as a boy, where he woke up saying "but I don't want to be a reindeer!"  It sort of made me chuckle, although I didn't want it to because I wanted to stay sad.  But that was typical Daddy - trying to help you feel better.

I remember going to see him once at his job.  I was working then too - this was after college - and he was working at the BellSouth building in midtown Atlanta.  I went to visit at lunchtime and he first showed me his office, which was actually a cubicle, with an unfortunate view of the Georgia Tech football stadium.  I told him he should ask to be moved, but he said he was afraid if he did that he wouldn't have a window anymore and the window made the cubicle tolerable.  But when he took me around to introduce me to his coworkers, it was apparent to me how much they admired Daddy and that made me feel good.  At his funeral, I remember turning around and seeing that the church was full.  Full of all the people he had worked with that had liked and respected him.  I was so touched and I knew he would have been too.

Daddy was the one that suggested I get into HR.  He had majored in Personnel in college and spent a couple years doing that at BellSouth, although most of his career he was a Training Manager and course developer.  But he thought that would be an ideal career for me and, for many years, I agreed with him.  He was also my career counselor, helping me prepare for interviews and reviewing my resume and giving career advice.  I got laid off from my job at a commercial printer the Friday before he died and I never got to talk to him about that and get his good advice.

There were certainly times when I didn't think Daddy was so fabulous.  I think my junior high school days were the time when I was the most rebellious and fought against him the most.  By the time high school rolled around, that had ended.  Daddy always believed in me and believed I could do anything.  He was always encouraging and supportive.  After he was gone, I felt like my anchor was gone, that my life was kind of adrift.

The day my father died, I wasn't expecting it.  In hindsight, maybe I should have.  He had been diagnosed with lung cancer, which I later learned had a small long-term survival rate.  But I didn't know that then and so I wasn't ready.  Not that you ever are, but I truly wasn't ready for him to be gone from my life.  My brother Paul called the house that morning with the worst news I've ever had in my entire life.  I was distraught.  I remember going upstairs to take a shower so that we could drive over to my mother's and my then-husband asking me if I was ok.  I thought "I'll never be ok again" and I really didn't think I would.

Time goes on and yes, eventually you learn to live with the inevitable.  But I still cry sometimes when I think about Daddy.  And I still miss him.  Every.single.day.  I always will.  I remember the day he died, when my aunts got to the house, one of them said "oh, at least he got to walk you down the aisle on your wedding day!"  And he did.  The thing about that was, when I got engaged I had initially thought I'd get married the middle of October.  But when it came time to set the date, I actually set it for late September, prompting questions from those who thought it would be later.  I couldn't tell you then why I felt so strongly that I had to pick that date, but had I picked the middle of October, he would have been in the hospital.  So it was a gift that he was there with me.

My brothers and I talk about Daddy a lot.  When Mother was alive, we all did.  And we always talk about the fun times and laugh a lot about the Daddy stories.  We were very fortunate to have had such a great dad.  I think we are all who we are today in large part because Willie Moore was our father.  He was simply the best.

I love you, Daddy.  I miss you.  I'll never forget you.

Freezing their asses off in Nordeney

November 27, 1953

We left Straubing at 1900 hours Wednesday night.  Changed at 0500 in Hanover.  Changed again at Bremen.  Then at Ernden West got a bus to Norddeich (in Northern Germany on the North Sea coast) but we had to change halfway there.  There we got the steamer to Nordeney (one of seven populated East Frisian islands off the North Sea coast of Germany) where we got a horse drawn omnibus to the house.  This is an island in the North Sea off the coast of Germany and Holland.  It took us 20 hours to get here.  This is a big summer resort, but it sho’ is cold now.  The land up here is very flat.  Very, very few Americans come here but this is where Hilde’s father is from.  We are staying with an aunt and uncle who speak no English.  One cousin and her uncle’s helper speak some English, but when they are not around it’s nip & tuck in sign language.  There is a stove in one room and we stay in here.  Upstairs is freezing and we use a pitcher and wash bowl to wash in freezing water.  Slept under feather beds and everything else we could find.  I don’t believe I have ever been so cold.

I can certainly empathize with that feeling of being so cold.  I remember a couple of times when I thought I truly couldn't be colder.  The first time was my freshman year of college at the Georgia-Georgia Tech game.  It was the Saturday after Thanksgiving and I had gone back up to Athens for the game.  I went with several friends and for once we actually had seats on the 50 yard line!  Student tickets were always a gamble and there didn't seem to be a rhyme or reason to where you ended up.  So this was exciting.  But wouldn't you know it, it was not only very cold but it was also raining.  Steady, cold rain.

I clearly was either drunk or stoned or maybe both, because I wore some ridiculous sandals (with socks, though) to the game.  When it rained in Athens, it always seemed like everything flooded.  I always got wet clear up to my thighs, no matter how I dressed.  My shoes would always be soaked.  So here I am at a football game in freezing cold rain wearing completely inappropriate shoes.  I can remember that no one wanted to sit in the stands, so it was incredibly crowded under the stadium ceilings.  We finally gave up and headed back to the dorm.  My feet were frozen and at that point, I just slogged through the water.  When I got back to my dorm, peeled off the shoes that were now ruined, and put my feet up against the heater, I couldn't feel my feet or the heat. 

To make matters worse, Georgia lost the game.

The other super cold experience I had was when I lived in Cincinnati.  The high temperature was -4 and the wind chill was -64.  The Bengals had a playoff game that day and I remember seeing people with no shirts on at the stadium.  I was glad I was inside and my heat worked!  I had to drive to Columbus that afternoon to pick up a coworker at the airport for a meeting we had the next day.

The airport was freezing and when Valerie came off the plane, I nearly died.  She was wearing a light coat and open toed shoes!!  I remember saying to her, "Valerie, did you even bother to look at the weather up here before you left?"  I think she had no clue how really cold it was.

It was bitterly cold still and the wind was awful.  We had a room along the outside of the hotel and even with the heater turned up to the max the room was icy cold.  We stupidly never went to the front desk to ask for a different room.  So we spent a nearly sleepless night huddled under whatever covers we could find, shivering.  The next morning we spent a lot of time in the bathroom with the heat lamp on.  I know that I didn't feel warm until we got in the car.

          Yesterday we stayed here so the relatives could come and look at us.  This morning we walked around the island.  Everything is closed because it is winter.  Every time we go to somebody’s house or somebody comes here, we have to drink something – what, I don’t know.  And they are always bringing out something to eat.

I’ll bet we have said less this week than we ever have before.  (Considering how chatty Mother was, this had to be terribly hard for her.)

We have spent our time shaking hands.  Every time someone comes into a room you shake hands and say “guten tag”, and every time someone leaves the room you shake hands and say “auf wiedersein”.  Since a lot of people have been coming and going, that’s what we have been doing.

You ought to see us trying to talk to these people!  It’s really a scream.

November 28, 1953

Last night one of the uncles took us to a dance.  I think it was a benefit for a children’s school.  We were the only Americans there.  We have certainly gone native since we have been here.  We have nearly frozen to death – no running water or heat.  (Ok, this is where I would have had to take the first train back home.  I am not good with no conveniences.)

           This morning we walked around the town again.  Went to school and to an English class – very interesting.  There is a windmill in front of the school.  We also saw this indoor swimming pool that has waves in it.

November 29, 1953

Yesterday afternoon we went down to the harbor.  It was most interesting.  Then we went over to one of the uncle’s for tea and dinner.  You know they really bring out the food.  I have never seen so much and it is all good.

This morning we got the omnibus down to the steamer at 7:30.  Right now we are in Bremen.  Because we had to change here coming up, we thought we did this time too.  We got off one end of the car and right back on the other end.  It was a scream. 

Darn it!  This train is cold and I wanted to get on a warm one.

You know I think we really amazed them what with my sauchen (I have no idea what this word is - whether it is real, she made it up, or it's another of her amusing misspellings), our making sandwiches, our wearing our boots all the time and being cold, and my wearing two pairs of gloves.  (I wonder if I’ll ever thaw out!)  The thing that really threw them was our drinking water.  They told us it would give us lice.

The whole week-end we spent shaking hands and the chief topic of conversation was Hilde’s snozzle.  That was an experience I shall never forget and thoroughly enjoyed, but I don’t want to go anywhere that doesn’t have central heating until it gets hot.  (I am with you there!)

           Oh yes!  There are quite a few windmills around there.  The land is so low and flat with a lot of cattle and sheep.  It looks like what I imagine Holland looks like.

Here is the house they stayed in at Nordeney:

And Mother and Hilde feeding chickens while they were there: