A Soldier's Story

Today is Memorial Day. I can think of no better way to honor our veterans then to present their story as written by one of their own. This is a soldier’s story from World War II. It was written by my Dad, Jack L. Wilson. There are so few of them left now from the Greatest Generation and their story needs to be told.

After a while I got tired of the long walk to work, and since I was now without a car, I decided to move to a one room efficiency apartment about seven blocks from downtown Indianapolis. I was living there when the war started. I remember listening to the news that Sunday morning, and then walked out to the Romers where Beth was staying and sitting around there until late that night. There was already a line at the Recruiting Office in the Federal Building early the next morning when I got there. After milling around there for a while, the recruiting people finally came out and recorded our names and addresses and told us to go on about our business, and they would get in touch as soon as they were ready to start processing. It was the middle of January before they got around to calling me. After a farewell party at work, I vacated my apartment, gave my furniture to Beth, and arranged to store my stuff with her. At the Examination Center they hemmed and hawed around and finally decided to reject me because I wore glasses. I arranged to stay with the Romers until I could appeal the rejection, and get my case reviewed. I went back to work at Hoosier having missed only a day-and-a-half of work. It was early summer before my appeal came up, and I was reexamined for service. This time I passed even though I was just out of bed from a bout with lobar pneumonia. In August 1942 I was sworn in and sent to Keesler Field, just outside of Bilouxi, Mississippi for Basic Training.

Halfway through the first week of Basic Training they got around to asking if any of us had any previous military training. When they found out I had three years of High School ROTC and six years of National Guard training, I was jerked out of the ranks and made a Drill Instructor, posthaste. Not only that, but after two days of indoctrination, I was put in charge of the platoon I had been a member of. Since we really had no rank, we were made “Acting” Sergeants. The chevrons were sewed on a dark cloth armband that we pinned to our jacket sleeves. We did have the privileges of Non-Commissioned Officers, we just didn’t have the pay. Fortunately, one of the privileges was access to the NCO Club where you could get cold 3.2 beer. Not very potent, but quite refreshing. It was at the club that I got acquainted with a Master Sergeant named Guy Illian. Guy had been in the service since 1932 and was the Senior NCO at the Radar School at Keesler. One day I caught him nursing a beer and looking puzzled. He told me that the school had been asked to develop an electronic device that would identify friendly aircraft when their blip showed up on the radar screen. They were looking for something that would give some kind of a pulsed signal that could be uniquely keyed to identify friend from foe. For some reason, I thought the trouble we had had with the Zenith radios. When I explained this to Guy he grabbed my arm and yelled, “Come with me.” Even though Radar School was classified and off limits to uncleared personnel, some of the officers and research labs were not. Going to one of these labs, Guy had me give a detailed description of what I had just told him while he started connecting electronic components and instruments together. Putting a blip on the screen by electronic simulation, he attached the output of his mock-up to the simulator, and we watched the blip flash in sync with the pulsing action. A few days later the School Commandant requested my presence at a demonstration to be given to some visiting “firemen” from Washington. In addition to the CO, Sgt. Illian and myself were half-a-dozen other people only two of whom were in uniform. One was an Air Corp Major General, and the other was a Signal Corps Colonel. Guy explained to the group that since I had given them the idea, the CO and he felt I should be present. He then proceeded to demonstrate the device. Every one appeared satisfied, particularly one husky older individual that Guy told me afterwards was a Colonel Donoven. At that time, the name meant nothing to me. The CO said something about trying to get my assignment changed so that I could go to Radio School at Scott Field, and then come back to Keesler to the Radar School. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I was getting sick and tired of Keesler and would do almost anything to keep from being reassigned there.

About two months later, one of the PE instructors, another D.I. and I were sent to Fort Belvoir, Virginia on a temporary assignment that for some reason was classified. I later found that the only reason for the classification was to prevent embarrassment to some of the individuals involved. It seems that as the U.S. Government was bringing more and more people into Washington as they geared up to run the “War Effort”, that as per custom they were passing out military ranks to these people compatible with the position they were to fill. For example, the Chairman of General Motors, Charles Wilson, was brought in to coordinate wartime production, and was given the rank of Lieutenant General. Unfortunately, most of these men had never had any military training, so the three of us were brought in to provide the rudiments of military training and military courtesy to them. They probably figured we would be less apt to talk than the personnel assigned to Belvoir. It was hilarious to see the staff cars and limousines coming out in the morning, deposit these people, and return in the evening to take them back to their quarters. For eight hours a day they were ours, and we really put them through their paces in a conscientious effort to make soldiers out of them. After three weeks, the PE instructor and I were unceremoniously sent back to Keesler. It seems we were too hard on them.

After five months at Keesler I was finally sent to the Radio Operator-Mechanics School at Scott Field, Illinois. Sixteen weeks later I graduated, but was retained as an instructor.

To get back to Belvoir for a minute, one day while putting my troops through their paces, an Army Colonel who had been standing there watching for a while, came over during a break and said, “Your device worked like a charm, Wilson.” It was Colonel Donovan. I was told later on that he was the head of the recently organized Office of Strategic Services. So you see, I did meet “Wild” Bill Donovan, and did do some work for the OSS. So I exaggerated a little. As Jerry would say, “Well excu-u-use me.”

I remained at Scott for almost two-and-a-half years. After about a year instructing, I was assigned as a Communications Specialist to the Air Inspector’s Office. I was part of the team investigating accidents, slow-downs, or just plain snafu’s. My role was to see what part, if any, communications played in these events. I enjoyed this phase tremendously, as I got to work on the flight line with all types of aircraft, either assigned, or transient. I also got in a lot of flight crew time in virtually all types of multi-crew aircraft. Furthermore, I got myself qualified as a Communications Security Specialist. This gave me three active MOS’s: Radio Operator, Radio Mechanic, and CSS.

Early in 1945, I was ordered overseas, and started processing in April of that year, and finally got to Tinian in early June just in time for the final accelerated bombing of Japan that culminated in the atomic bombing in August of 1945.

Just a few of the highlights of the trip over. I had my final processing at Fort Lewis, Washington and was loaded on a Liberty ship at Tacoma. Because of all my MOS’s, I was armed fit to kill. As an Airborne Operator, I was issued a .45 automatic and a .38 short barrel pistol as part of my survival kit. As a Mechanic, I was issued a Garand. Finally as a Communications Security Specialist, I was issued a M1A1 Carbine. Talk about Rambo.

As we left Puget Sound and got into the Pacific, we ran into a violent storm that lasted three days. Consequently, we missed the convoy rendezvous and had to continue to Pearl Harbor alone, hoping there were no Japanese submarines in that part of the ocean. All 500+ GI’s were seasick, all the Navy gunners were seasick, and a large part of the crew. After all the good old USS Lindley M. Garrison could roll 45 degrees in calm waters, or so it seemed. The Captain and the first mate were the only completely ambulatory people on the ship. At the risk of sounding phony, I want to describe the first mate. He was about 5’6” in height, and weighed better the 225 pounds. He had a small mustache, and always wore a soft cap. His primary distinguishing feature though was he had an honest-to-God peg-leg. But he pulled the GI’s through almost single-handed. Helping us to and from the rail, laughing, joking, teasing in a good natured way. In the sleeping areas below deck, the bunks were five high. Consequently you couldn’t sit up in your bunk, but had to roll in and out. After the first night, because of the stench, most of us slept on the deck rolled up in our ponchos under whatever shelter we could find. All in all, it took us nine days from Seattle to Pearl Harbor. Even after the storm stopped it took another couple of days for the waters to subside. About that time, the crew discovered that one of the meat lockers had malfunctioned and the meat had all spoiled. Nothing to do but get up a work crew of everyone at least partially ambulatory, have them go down this circular stairs to the meat locker, pick up a crate of the meat, go back up another set of winding stairs to the main deck, and throw the case over the rail. First off, it was mutton, and fresh mutton smells bad enough, let alone after it has rotted. So the procedure degenerated to this; we would pick up a crate of the meat, stagger up the stairs, stagger to the rail, heave the crate over the side, heave after it, and then stagger back down the stairs. And there was seven tons of the damned stuff. Any adjustment we had made towards getting over our sickness was effectively negated by this episode. We probably attracted every shark in the Western Pacific.

After a few days on Oahu for jungle warfare training we proceeded on to Tinian. The services were starting to amass a potential invasion fleet in the Marianas at this time. The two mile channel between Tinian and Saipan was virtually shore-to-shore ships of all types. My original orders had been to join an advanced B-29 base on Okinawa, but 20^th Air Force Headquarters changed them to keep me on Tinian and assign me to one of the Groups in the 313^th Bomb Wing. I eventually ended up in the 6^th Bomb Group, but was bounced around from Squadron to Squadron and eventually wound up in the 24^th. The group of us coming in at that time were designated as combat replacements, and the several qualified Radio Operators in the group were used as substitutes. Consequently, we seldom flew with the same crew twice. All in all, I got in seventeen missions before the end of the war with a large part of them being on planes that dropped mines in the Shimonoseki Straits, the main Japanese ship channel. The usual mission was about seventeen hours.

After the fighting stopped I got in on a prison camp search mission. This involved flying to Japan, then over to Kunming, China and back to the Marianas. Monotonous, to say the least.

After the fighting stopped, the next major event was the typhoon in October of 1945. I had just been transferred to the 24^th Squadron and had just moved my gear into a 16-man squad tent while awaiting the construction of a pre-fab barracks when the storm struck late in the afternoon. I was tired and had just laid down for a nap when the wind velocity started increasing. I put my gear beside me on the bunk wrapped my poncho and shelter-half around the whole thing (including me), and dropped off to sleep. Some of the idiots were actually holding on to the tent ropes while the tent was trying to get airborne, which it finally did. I was one of the very few who got a little rest before the main part of the storm hit. Fortunately the eye of the storm passed just west of Tinian. The edge of the storm that hit us had wind gusts in excess of 120 knots. (That’s as high as the anemometer at headquarters went before it blew off the building.) Everyone battled to get to the field and try to save the planes. We managed to save all but one liaison plane which was twisted up by the storm. On Okinawa, which caught the full brunt of the storm, they lost all of their B-29’s. We were flying emergency supplies into them for weeks. Its hard to describe the damage on Okinawa. Ships as large as cruisers were blown completely ashore. Other ships had bows snapped off, as the wind twisted them about their anchor chains. Ships jammed together were commonplace. To give you some idea of the wind, we could eat in the mess hall by crouching over the tables since the wind was blowing the rain straight through the upper screened half of the wall on one side, and out the upper-screened half on the other side. The rain was absolutely parallel to the ground. I suppose we could have stuck our heads up and got our faces washed while we were eating.

At first I had toyed with the idea of staying in the service, particularly since the Wing Commander guaranteed me Master Sergeant three months after I re-upped, plus a $5,000 bonus for reenlisting. I later found out that I was the only triple-threat man left in the XXI Bomber Command. The Wing was being transferred to the Philippines. I acceded to your Mother’s wishes though and got out so I could go to college and finish my undergraduate work. I had already picked up several courses by either correspondence or extension.

Consequently, I was scheduled to leave Tinian in January of 1946. In preparation for checking out we had to send all personal stuff, other than toiletries, that were not Government issue home. So I duly packed all medals, citations, records etc. and mailed them home. We were standing at the end of the runway when the mail plane (a B-29) took off. All takeoffs from North Field were to the east towards Saipan. As the plane cleared the runway, we saw one of the engines smoking and finally conk out. With insufficient altitude, when the plane staggered with loss of power, the wing tip hit the water and the plane cartwheeled almost to Saipan. Fortunately, the crew was saved, but the mail was lost. Not only that, we found that some idiot had put all of the Wing records including all personnel on the same plane, 201 files, the whole shebang. The only thing we had to identify us was our dogtags. They were finally able to reconstruct enough paperwork for us to get started home, but with no 201 file, no flight records, no citation records, no pay records, no shot records, no nothing, things were in a “mull of a hess” to say the least. In fact some of the men had trouble getting credit for all of their overseas service. We were one unhappy Bomb Wing to say the least. Not even a pep talk from General LeMay, the XXI Command Commanding General helped.

The Air Corps finally sent us over to Saipan on a LCI (little one). From the docks at Tinian Town, up the west side of the island, around the to part of Saipan to the east side of the island was almost a three hour trip. To keep from getting sea sick, I tried to sleep on the way. When I awoke up in Saipan I found I had been immortalized for posterity. There were some correspondents going with us, and one was a female illustrating artist who thought that my sleeping posture in full equipment typified the America GI, and drew my picture for Life magazine. Don’t remember ever seeing it though. We stayed on Saipan for about eleven days processing for home. Our usual entertainment after dark was to go to the outdoor movies. It was a little disconcerting at first to not only have to be armed ourselves, but have an armed guard patrolling the back of the area. It seemed the Japanese holdouts on the island would sneak to the edge of the jungle, and watch the movie. Although there were several shots fired at different times while we were there, there were no reports of any casualties. About a week after getting there though, the report circulated through the camp that seventeen Japanese holdouts had surrendered on Tinian. The only place I could figure out they had been hiding was in the prison camp in the center of the island.

Anyway, we were finally loaded onto an escort aircraft carrier, the USS Kwajalein, for the trip back to the states. Our confidence was a little shaken as we boarded the ship for at the head of the gangway was a plaque saying that Kaiser had taken a tad over nine days from the laying of the keel to launching. Our confidence was shaken even more when the Navy crewmen checking us in told us there was a crack in the hull from the flight deck to down below the hanger deck, but that it probably wouldn’t get any worse unless we ran into bad weather. The bad weather didn’t start until the second day after we left Saipan. Then some waves started crashing over the flight deck. When the ship was on a wave crest, you could almost jump through the crack. Then when it clanged together when the ship hit the trough between waves it would sound like an artillery shot. I don’t know how true it was, but we were told that the Captain was ordered to beach it on one of the islands northwest of Oahu. Instead he talked them into letting him take it on into San Pedro since the ship was going to be retired, and so was he. The storm finally stopped a day and a half before we got to San Pedro. Needless to say, we were glad to leave the ship.

I was discharged at Camp Atterbury in Southern Indiana in February of 1946.

Iris and Roses

I needed to get my car serviced yesterday and decided that since it was a beautiful day I would walk home. I took my camera with me and was rewarded with some gorgeous flowers. The sweet smell of roses and iris made the walk home wonderful.

Adventures in the Netherworld

This old house has a dark, dank basement. It is a spooky place with pipes and crawl spaces and old bricks and stones. It gets wet when it rains. It would be a good place to set a horror movie. My little girl cat Pixie may look dainty with her tiny little paws and shiny black fur and large gold eyes. Looks can be deceiving. One thing Pixie is not is a lady. She is a rough and tumble little tomboy. Naturally the basement fascinates her. I had to get things from the basement today and decided to let her have her fun.

Pixie discovered a crawl space that a human can’t get into. She jumps on the ledge besides the stairs and immediately heads for her favorite cave. It would drive Mom frantic when she would do that because Mom was afraid that Pixie would get lost, scared, and couldn’t find her way out. One things Pixie loves the most about her crawl space is that it has neat echoes. She was hollering away today listening to her voice reverberate all over the basement. She is a noisy little girl at the best of times and was in caterwauling heaven today.

I could hear Pixie as she roamed around and suddenly she was on the pipes overhead. Her mouth was going a mile a minute. I looked up and she had managed to get a dead leaf hooked onto her whiskers so I reached up and got it off for her. It had been bugging her but she didn’t want to take the time to reach up and get it off. Besides that is what I am here for to cater to her every little whim. Her whiskers unencumbered by that pesky leaf and off she went again.

Dark and spooky corners were a challenge. In Pixie zipped to check everything out. Who knows maybe a pirate hide their chest of gold there. Up, down, around, through, in and out she went. I heard a nonstop monologue of the all the fun places she was exploring. By the time I finished she had been all over that basement and was absolutely filthy. I washed her off with baby wipes much to her dismay. She had worked hard at getting that dirty and couldn’t understand why I wanted her cleaned up again.

Looking over today's spooky old basement and a black cat, maybe it would have to be a horror comedy picture after all.

Activist Teachers

A person is not born an activist. A child at the start is only interested in its own wants and needs. A child doesn’t understand about others. A child knows when it is hungry or wet or tired or cold. It is only when a child gets older that it starts to realize that there are others who also have needs and wants. Learning to care for others is something that is taught. I was not born an activist. I learned to be an activist through men and women who were my teachers in life. Many of these men and women were priests and nuns in the Catholic Church that I grew up in.

If you look at the story of the Civil Rights Movement you will see priests and nuns, ministers and rabbis, religious members from many faiths marching and protesting and going to jail as they fought for the rights of every man. These were the people who taught me that all men have the same rights. They taught me that all men are equal.

I grew up in California. I grew up when the Farm Worker’s Union was being started. I knew priests and nuns who were there fighting along side of the farm workers. They believed that the farm workers had the right to a better life. Some went to jail for their beliefs but they continued to fight.

Some men like the Dalia Lama fight on an International scale. He is a man who has been a conscience to the world for many years. He has tried to teach compassion and non violence towards all. He is first and foremost a teacher. One of my first teachers was a Franciscan priest named Father Bruno. Our parish and a parish down in Southern California “adopted” Father Bruno and his parishes in the rural and very poor Philippines during the reign of Marcos. Father Bruno needed a way to get around to the poor in outlying places. The women in the two parishes decided they would collect enough Blue Chip stamps to buy him a jeep. I spent many, many hours gluing stamps into books as the women went from parish to parish and collected stamps. In the end they had enough to buy a baby blue jeep and send it to the Philippines.

On his trips back to the San Francisco Bay Area I had a chance to learn from Father Bruno. I learned the problems of the poor when there are dictators like Marcos to oppress them. I learned about a lot of dictators from him. I learned about how to help others. I learned to be an activist. Father Bruno was arrested by Marcos regime and imprisoned. He was eventually deported and they confiscated that baby blue jeep that we sent to help him reach his parishioners. Father Bruno came back to the Bay Area and immediately asked to be assigned to one of the poorest areas so that he could continue to help those in need.

Talking to these men and women over the years I have learned that all of them believe that they are doing what Jesus commanded of them. They believe that they are living their faith by helping others. These were my teachers and I am thankful that they were a part of my life. I am thankful that they taught me how to be an activist.

Bedazzled or Thoughts on Moving

I moved to Indiana in September 2004 at the request of my mother. Mother’s health was getting increasingly fragile and there were things that only a daughter could do. I put most of my things in storage and started a new phase of my life as a caretaker. We are coming up to the first anniversary of Mom’s death. It has been a year of reflection and as I try to ready the house for sale and pack for my move to North Carolina I find I am seeing familiar things with a new eye.

My parents were both depression kids. Their view of life was polar opposites. My Dad felt that her had enough depredation growing up and he believed in spending the money he made so that he was surrounded by beautiful things. He made this house into their dream home. My Mom was the coupon queen. She saved and horded and nothing was thrown away until it disintegrated. I have been going through her things. She bought clothes on sale at thrift shops. The clothes were a bargain and she might wear them one day. I am giving 16 unopened bottles of shampoo and conditioner to the local safe house. She had coupons for them and they didn’t go bad and she might use them one day. We haven’t had to buy paper towels at all as Mom had so many of them piled up in closets.

What I am finding most of all is memories. Mom and Dad kept all the cards they received. I have put them in a scrapbook to share with their granddaughter and great grandchildren. There are old letters that were too special to throw away. I found my Dad’s trunk with his letters as a newly wed while he was in the Army in World War II. I have multiple boxes full of photographs and slides. I am slowly trying to get through them and scan them into my computer so that I can put them on discs and send them to my brothers. I find myself going I remember getting that for Mom or Dad. I see the image of Mom wearing a certain outfit. It is hard giving all the clothes away but I know that someone else will be wearing them and a part of Mom will continue to be tangibly here. Sometimes it hurts and tears come. I had to stop and take a break when I got to the drawer with Mom’ pajamas. Mom was so frail and she felt the cold so bad. A couple of years ago Wal-Mart carried some pajamas that were exceptionally warm. I got her a warm robe to go with them. One of my strongest memories is seeing Mom in the recliner wearing her blue fuzzy robe and holding her cat Pixie on her lap.

I am moving down to be close to my niece are her family. Bernadette is a daughter to me. She has three children aged 13, 15 and 17. She begged me to move down after Mom died. This move like my last move is to be where I am needed. It doesn’t make trying to get everything done and moved any easier but it does make the heart lighter to know that I am loved and needed.

I am moving from a physical caretaker to a caretaker of memories. I will be writing down all the things that I remember about my parents. The memories need to shared with their only granddaughter and their two great grandsons and great granddaughter. I will be taking down boxes of genealogy materials. One of the most important things that I will be taking down is a black cat with gold eyes named Pixie. Pixie was Mom’s cat. She gave Mom unconditional love and added five years to the life of a woman with a heart that only pumped 15% of normal. Pixie was with Mom when she died. I promised Mom I would take care of her.

My theme music at this time is courtesy of Kermit the Frog and “I’m moving right along.”

First Mother's Day

This is the first Mother’s Day without Mom being here. It feels strange not having her here. Last year I made her a picture of a teddy bear’s picnic since she thought I should have one on my Farmville farm. Of course I had to put her Pixie in the picture. She was a first too. The first cat Mom ever had. This is the story of that historic first where dog loving Mom faces the realities of a black cat with mischievous gold eyes.

In the early Spring on 2006 my mother warned me to be careful driving on the driveway as a mother cat had given birth to four kittens in our storage shed. Mama cat was black and three of the four kittens were black, the fourth one was a smoky gray. Of course Mom wasn’t going to get fond of them at all. Of course anyone who believed that would probably buy a bridge sight unseen. Mom bought food for the mother cat so she could be close to her kittens and not have to forage for food. When the kittens got older Mom bought kitten food since the kittens needed good food to grow up healthy and strong. When mama cat had enough of this mothering thing Mom continued to feed the kittens because after all they were orphans now.

I learned to pay closer attention to Mom when I had dismissed her question of “would you like another cat?” I figured it was one of those generic questions about the litter we had outside and said “sure, maybe the gray one” figuring of course that she didn’t really mean that we should take one of the kittens in. After all I do have Merlin, the world’s biggest mama’s boy.

One morning as I came down to get my morning coffee a little black cat pranced out of my mother’s bedroom to greet me. I stared at her and asked “does Mom know you’re in here?” She looked back at me as if to say “do you know that this is my house?” When I asked Mom that afternoon when I came home from work she immediately put it down to me saying I wanted another cat. She later let it slip that this cat was the brave one of the litter and would come inside and explore. Mom feed her deli meat as treats and would hold her on her lap. She couldn’t figure out why the kitten didn’t want to go back outside any more. And so it came to pass that Pixie entered the household and quickly became the alpha cat. Merlin never stood a chance.

Mom declared that she wasn’t going to love the cat. She had her heart broken when her dog Ruffles died and she wasn’t about to go through that again. Pixie had other plans. I could tell from the start that Pixie had Mom wrapped around her little paw. Being responsible pet owners we had her spayed when she was old enough and Mom fretted the entire day since the cat would be kept over night. She was afraid that Pixie would be scared and think we had abandoned her. She was afraid something would go wrong with the operation and we would lose her. She was afraid that something would go wrong with the recovery and Pixie would be in agony. I knew that none of that would happen but then I have owned cats all my adult life.

There was the night that Mom came up in a panic because Pixie had gotten out and Mom was afraid that the wild animals would get her. She was afraid that Pixie would get lost and couldn’t find her way home. So I got up at midnight and threw a coat over my pajamas and went outside with a flashlight. I had to gently tell Mom to hush since I needed to listen for the bell on Pixie’s collar. I found her playing in the bushes and picked her up and handed her to Mom. I went to bed with the sound of Mom scolding the cat for worrying Grandmother. Grandmother? Right she wasn’t going to fall in love with this cat.

Pixie was an explorer. I had to go home on my break more then once because Mom couldn’t find her cat. I have found her in closets, under beds, under furniture that you have to be boneless to scoot under. One of her favorite hiding places was to zip into the basement and get into one of the crawl spaces. She loved to yell and listen to her voice echo. Mom was reduced to tears more then once because Pixie was in there and she wouldn’t be able to find her way out. She was crying and scared. Every time I enticed her back out I would hand her to Mom and get the wipes because the cat was covered in cobwebs and dirt. Every time Mom would scold her for worrying Grandmother.

One of my favorite moments was when Pixie pulled out Mom’s aloe vera plant for the umpteenth time and Mom sat her on the cabinet and proceeded to scold her. “Look at me young lady,” Mom said. “Did you pull out my plant? How many times have I told you to leave my plants alone?” I had to escape upstairs before I lost it completely. The look on Pixie’s face was priceless. She knew that she was going to be back in Mom’s good graces within a few minutes and she was.

I would call Mom every afternoon to see how she was. My workmates knew that I would get a Pixie report. Mom had finally admitted she loved her cat and every one would now know all about Pixie and how smart she was. How she was the brave one of the litter. How sweet she was, etcetera.

Mom died last May 26th. She had a very bad heart and we knew she was living on borrowed time. The last five years of her life was enriched by a mischievous little black cat with gold eyes. Pixie was with Mom when she died and stayed with her until my brother got home from work and discovered what happened. This little cat that Mom fell in love with returned the love to her and was with her for her last journey.

Happy Mother’s Day, Mom. I miss you and so does Pixie.

Is May Over With Yet?

My brother asked the other evening if we could just not have to deal with May any more. Could we just go from April to June. I know what he means. On May 4, 1999 we suddenly lost Dad to a heart attack. He was planting a shrub and keeled over and was dead before he hit the ground. He had turned 80 in January and was so proud of the that. On May 26, 2010 Mike came home he didn’t see Mom but he saw Pixie walking out of the bedroom and went in to see if Mom was okay. She had died suddenly during the night. I am spending this May going through all of their things so we can sell their house and I can move.

I have been watching the Harry Potter movies. I wish real life was able to wave a wand and get things to do what we wanted. I want a “sort” spell that would go through this house and sort everything out and get things where they need to be now. I need a “pack” spell that would pack up what I am taking to North Carolina. I need a “help me” spell and the people I need to sell the house, fix the move, get the apartment ready, sell the excess furniture, etc. so that I don’t have to try and do it all appear and do their jobs. Most of all I want a “restore” spell so that Mom and Dad are alive and healthy and all the plans we had could be fulfilled.

Unfortunately my life isn’t a fantasy movie. I feel like just crawling back in bed and staying there until June but that isn’t feasible. If I don’t do what needs to be done then things will never get done. I need to finish going through their things. I need to finish getting the house ready to be sold. I need to get my things moved down to North Carolina. I need to feel like the whole world isn’t yelling at me. I have never felt so frazzled as I do now. I took the time off in the winter to just get through the holidays. My plan was always to get things ready in the Spring and then Spring came before I was ready. I’ve gone from thinking I can handle everything to wondering if I can handle anything.

Maybe I should just take today off. It is not the best day to go through my parent’s things. I should curl up with a book and hold the cats. Both of them are restless and wanting affection today.

Is it June yet?