Goodbye

We all know that we have to leave this earthly body one day. Most of us hope to go in our sleep when we are old and have lived a long, full life. If that was my Uncle Walter's hope, then I would have to say that he got his wish. His full life included his escape from the farm by getting an appointment to the Military Academy. He was a cadet there when Pearl Harbor was bombed. He served in three wars. He worked for the CIA during the Kennedy era. He visited every continent. He Enjoyed life, then at the age of 49, married the love of his life, a beautiful woman 18 years his junior. After his last tour of duty in Vietnam, they picked up his new Corvette on their way to Leavenworth, where he was promoted to Colonel. After his military career was over, he designed his farmhouse, built it, and moved back to the family farm, where he and Jackie established a happy life with new friends and friends from years long before. He received his PhD in political science from the University of Alabama. He taught there for a while until he decided he didn't enjoy teaching students to whom he couldn't give orders. (I have to admit I totally understand this decision.) He wrote two historical fiction novels. He won many awards and honors in and after the military. And, finally, he was the coolest uncle, ever. He always drove the coolest cars and sent the best gifts. He was always sending home interesting items from exotic places for us to hold for him till he got back home. He flew himself home in a plane. He wore a uniform. He was somehow mysterious because we saw him so seldom and he was very different from my dad.

Even though he lived a long and full life, there was sadness and many trials. We were all shocked when Jackie died. That was never in his plan. In fact he had planned extensively to take care of her after he was gone. He missed her terribly. He certainly had to endure many indignities of old age, which was difficult for someone who was private and dignified as he.

Even though I know he was ready to go, it is always hard to say goodbye even after a long and full life. He was the keeper of the family history. Even though I tried to glean as much as I could from him over the past few years, there is no way to know what he knew. He always taught me something everytime we talked. I will miss our daily phone calls on my way to work. I will miss asking him about this and that about local and family history. I will miss his crooked, smirky smile. I will miss him.

Sam's Turn

Last week as I was driving my dad to get his blood checked, the conversation turned to government housing projects. I have no idea how, but it did. Anyway, we talked about his Aunt Verna who lived in Elyton Village when I was young. I loved going to her apartment because at the time, I didn't know anyone else who lived in an apartment. Her apartment was so cool because it had an upstairs. I also didn't know anyone else who had a two-story house. I remember playing on the steel barrier poles that kept cars from driving on the grass between the apartments. I remember the little courtyard off the kitchen. Everything about it was small and wonderful to a small child as myself.

I didn't know that my mother's sister, Aunt Agnes, also lived in government housing at one time. This led Daddy into telling the story of how he met my mother. He said that the night before my Uncle Buddy, my mother's only brother, and my Dad's best friend, Roland Lucas a.k.a "Runt", left for boot camp during WWII, they both went to Aunt Agnes and Uncle Gene's apartment to eat dinner. My mother was at the apartment that night as well. My Dad was already serving in the Aleutian Islands. After both my Dad and Runt had been overseas during the War, they were both home on leave at the same time. Runt had used some of the money he earned in the Navy to buy him a new car. He and Daddy were driving around Montevallo showing off Runt's new car, when Runt saw Agnes and my mother coming out of the Dime Store in Montevallo. The Dime Store was in the building where Smitherman's Pharmacy is now. Runt said, "I know them," and turned the car around so to show off his car and introduce my Dad to Agnes and my mother. My dad said when he saw my mom, he thought, "I want to get to know that pretty gal." Runt told my mother that when she met my Dad she started at his feet and moved her eyes from his feet to the top of his head. My mother was relatively tall and wanted a tall man. She found one. Runt, as you might have guessed, was quite small in stature, probably no taller than 5' 5" and my dad is a full foot taller. Well the rest is history as they say. My mom and dad began dating and got married in 1948 at the parsonage of Enon Baptist Church.

Cars by the Creek 2011

Today we took Walter's Corvette to the 10th annual Cars by the Creek car show.This is a car show in Orr Park in Montevallo, less than five miles from Walter's house. I told him last year that we should have shown the car last year. So, when I saw that the show was coming up again, I asked him if we could show it. He agreed that we could, if we could figure out how to do it. David called the organizer and Kathy took Walter to Columbiana to get a tag for the car on Friday because Walter was afraid to take the car on the road without a tag even thought it is less than five miles from his house. I come by my rule-following honestly.

Walter arranged to have the man who works for him, Roy Smith, drive the car to the car show. I don't think he trusts anyone else with the car even though I assured him that David or I could handle it. David was excited about maybe being able to drive the car. I was a little nervous about that because David has very little experience driving a straight shift car and no experience driving a car without power steering or power brakes. I had confidence that I could handle the driving part, but was a little fearful that something unexpected might happen and I know that the car is not insured for the full value of the car. I would die if something happened to that car when David or I was driving it. However, all turned out well. David got to drive it a little way to move it close to the trees so that the photographer could take a picture of it, I got to drive it back to Walter's from the park and the car won second place in the '70-'79 stock car division. Honestly, I am not sure how many cars were in that category, could have only been two, but Walter didn't seem to mind.

The history behind the car is what makes the car special, not the fantastic restoration job that he paid dearly to have done. Walter bought the car through the PX in Saigon when he was overseas during the Vietnam War. When he got back stateside, he and Jackie picked up the car in St. Louis and drove it to Leavenworth, where he was going to be stationed for the next few years. He said driving that car with that big engine was something else on all those straight, flat roads through Missouri and Kansas. Of course, back then (1970) the price of gas was about 25 cents a gallon and gas mileage was not even a consideration. He ended up driving the car for a number of years including two or three when he was working on this PhD and teaching at University of Alabama. He drove the car from Bessemer, where they lived, to Tuscaloosa every day. Finally, about 20 years ago, he parked the car in the barn and covered it with a cover, where it stayed for the next 15-16 years. The tires were rotted, the brakes didn't work, and the car had not been started in all those years. In 2007 Jackie talked Walter into getting the car restored for her to tool around Montevallo in. He found a man in Alabaster who restores cars and had it towed to him. The process took many months. Unfortunately, Jackie became ill and died before the car was ever finished.

He is not sure what he wants to do with the car after he is gone. His current plan is for Delores and me to decide what to do with it when the time comes. At one time he had thought about donating the car to the American Village because Jackie volunteered there before she died. He has recently changed his mind about that because he knows that they would just sell it for the cash.

I am not sure what the final resting place for the Corvette will be. David, Steven, and Bill would love for it to be our garage, but I am not feeling it. I am glad that Walter got to show off his car a little today. He seemed to really enjoy it. I know I enjoyed driving that car back to Walter's house. On the straight part of Hwy. 25 between Montevallo and Calera, I admit that I punched it a little just to see what the old, big muscle cars feel like. My best comparison is the same g-force feeling you get when you take off in a speed boat and the bow of the boat comes up out of the water and the stern seems to sink a little. Maybe our garage wouldn't be such a bad idea after all.

The Civil War Vet

Walter met a Civil War veteran when Walter was about 14 years old. His parents took him to an all-day singing at a church between Montevallo and Centerville and the veteran was there. He was in his nineties by then, Walter estimated. The veteran's name was Mr. Honeycutt and he was seated in the shade of a tree so that people could come to meet and talk to him. My grandparents took Walter up to shake his hand and talk to him. Walter said he didn't really know what to say to him, so he asked him what battles he was in. The vet answered, "I weren't in no battles, sonny. I were a guard in 'S-a-i-lma' (Selma)."

In case some of you young readers or city-folks don't know what an all-day singing is, it is an annual church event that occurred in small, country, protestant churches. The church would invite many gospel singers and singing groups to come to their church for the day. After regular Sunday service there would be "dinner on the ground" which is another way of saying a picnic-style potluck somewhere outside on the grounds around the church. After the dinner was eaten, everyone would go back inside and participate in a gospel-style singing. This was before air conditioning, so the churches would be hot. The windows and doors would be opened to let in some air and most people had paper fans to fan themselves. Sometimes the groups would sing without the congregation joining in and sometimes they would invite the congregation to sing with them. Usually there were several groups that would take turns leading the singing. People from other country churches within several miles would come to the singings. They were usually held on the same Sunday of each year, such as the third Sunday in July for Enon Baptist and the second Sunday in June for some other church, etc. It was weekend entertainment for people back then. Since there was almost always a small cemetery associated with the each church, the grounds of the cemetery would be cleaned up before the singing because families would bring flowers to put on the graves of family members before the singing. Many rural churches have maintained part of this tradition, but now it is called "homecoming" instead of all-day singing. It usually no longer lasts all day and the dinner is in a "fellowship" hall in the air conditioning.

The Old House

Delores and I went to Montevallo to begin the difficult discussion with Walter of, "What are we going to do when you need more help than Mary and Roy can give you?" Allison, the caring and insightful hospice nurse, was at Walter's when I was there two weeks ago. She told me that it would not be long before he was going to need help most, if not all, of the time and suggested that we begin planning in that direction. I thought about our options on my drive home and decided to ask Delores if she thought Kathy and James (her daughter and her husband) would be interested in moving to Montevallo to take care of him. He could pay them a nice salary to supplement James's retirement and still be less than half of what he would have to pay based on most any other scenario: hiring people to rotate through 24/7 through an agency, hiring individuals to do shifts, or hiring someone as a live-in. James is going to be discharged from the Army as soon as his recuperation at Walter Reed is finished, probably in two months or so. Kathy is a stay-at-home mom and is the perfect temperament for taking care of old people, patient and kind. Delores mentioned the possibility to Kathy and she was quite excited. It seems like an almost perfect fit. Kathy and James wanted to move to a rural area after he retired anyway and James can't do physical labor for at least a year after his surgery.

The main problem that we saw was about where they could live. Walter is very peculiar about his house. He designed it and is very proud of and attached to it. Right after Jackie died her brother, Kenneth, moved in with Walter to help take care of him. Kenneth stayed about three months until Walter accused him of being a mooch. His words were something like, "I'm not running a flop house." We were reluctant to bring up the subject of them staying with Walter in his house even though the house has two stories, one with three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a large bonus room, which Walter can't get to any longer because of the stairs. He lives downstairs where there is one bathroom, a den, kitchen, dining room, living room, and office-turned-bedroom. We were trying to come up with alternative living arrangements for Kathy and James where they would still be close enough to Walter to be available on a moment's notice 24 hours a day.

That is what brings me to the "Old House." There is an old house that Walter had moved from the site where his house now sits to a spot about 100 yards from his house. This is the house that my parents and sister and I lived in while the house where I grew up was being built. Part of the house is Antebellum. Delores, Walter and I went out there yesterday so he could tell us about the house and Delores and I could see what kind of shape it was in so to determine if it was an option for Kathy, James and Fiona, their three-year-old, to live in while taking care of Walter. There is a front porch on the house that was added when it was moved to its present location. The front porch is where another room used to be, but was in too bad a shape to move with the rest of the house. The house was built in several sections at different times. The room that is on the front of the house to the left of the door on the porch is part of the original house, which Walter believes was built in 1840. There is no proof of the exact date. The original room of the house is built with post and beam construction, which shows that it was built before the Civil War. The majority of the house was built after "the War" meaning the Civil War. The older parts of the house were built with square nails. I remember seeing those from my childhood. When my immediate family lived in the house the front porch was where the side of the house is now. The original front door with glass side lights is still there, but now it is inside the added-on room instead of off the front porch.

Inside the Old House

There has been a bathroom added into the house as well as a sink and refrigerator in a rough kitchen. Walter said the water has been run to the house, but was never hooked up to the house. It is a small matter to get the plumbing finished in the house. There would have to be a septic tank put in before the bathroom would be usable. There is electricity throughout the house. Roy has been painting in the house using paint that is called "white wash" but is actually paint and costs $50 per gallon according to Walter.

Delores and I walked through the house piecing together memories of our time living in the Old House. The wind would whistle through the house which was creepy to little girls at night. It was hot in the summer and cold in the winter. We both remembered the book shelves that were right inside the front door that held our much-loved Worldbook Encyclopedias. I remembered the Christmas that we spent in that house and where the Christmas Tree had stood in the living room. I remembered that I got a convertible car for my Barbie doll  that year. I believe that was also the year that I had pneumonia and couldn't go to Mammaw's house for Christmas, so Momma pulled me around the old house in a red wagon to entertain me while everybody else was at Mammaw and Poppa's. Delores remembered sitting in front of the window fan reading her books in the summer. We remembered the old tree that we played under that has since fallen after being struck by lightening. We all three sat on the front porch for a while to let Walter rest before going back to the big house. It was quite pleasant there with a nice breeze.

The Old House is in the background of this photo.

Delores and I were both surprised when I started the difficult discussion about what Walter wanted to do in the next step of his life. He quickly agreed that Kathy and James coming to take care of him sounded like a good idea. Even more of a surprise was when it was his idea that they live in his house. He said, "It seems such a waste if they didn't live here in this big house." So it seems that is the direction we are headed. Next weekend Delores and I are going to start the process of packing up pieces of Jackie and Walter's lives that are stored in the upstairs so that room can be made for next and, probably, last phase of Walter's life.

 The family land, the big house, the old house, his books, the photographs, the history, all these things are so important to Walter. He is the holder of our family history. I want to hold on to him and all that he holds forever, but I know it will not be possible for much longer. 

"We Killed a Man"

I feel a sense of urgency to write down as much as I can of what Walter can tell me. This is a story he told me as we drove home from Columbiana, where we had eaten lunch.

Somewhere on Hwy. 25 between Calera and the railroad track that is just before you turn to go to Walter’s house, is a spot that he said an incident occurred that made him more afraid than he had ever been in his life. He was riding home from a basketball game with his coach, Coach Collins. They had been to Birmingham somewhere to play a basketball game and were returning home at night. The Coach was driving and hit a man who was walking along the road and killed him. The Coach sent Walter down into the ditch where the man had been thrown to find him and see how he was. Walter said it was the worst thing he had ever seen. He said he had seen many dead bodies since then, but that one was the worst thing he had ever seen. He said both of the man’s legs were broken and the bones were sticking through the skin and his pants. The coach sent Walter to the nearest house, which was about ½ mile behind them. Walter said he ran as fast as he could (Walter was quite fast in those days, the fastest runner my dad had ever seen, Dad said) to the Argo house. He said that a car came alone and Walter flagged it down. The car stopped and Walter put his foot up on the running board of the car and told the driver that he needed to help them because, "We killed a man down the road" and he needed to get help. He said the man just put the car in gear and drove away as fast as he could without helping. Walter said that looking back on it, he guessed the man thought they had murdered somebody. Walter finally made it to the Argo house and they came out to help. I am not sure what they did. There was no 911 in those days. I am not sure if the Argos had a phone or if they got in their car/truck and went to the scene to help or both. This is an incident that Walter has told to me several times. It made a huge impression on him as it would on any high school kid with that horrific experience. I wanted to get it written down as soon after I heard it again, so that I would not remember the details that Walter had remembered.

The Dreaded "A" Word

The dreaded "A" word. I have known that Walter has been declining cognitively, especially in the past few months. However, today was the first time that any of his healthcare providers actually came out and said that he has Alzheimer’s or some other form of dementia. The hospice nurse came to see him while I was there. She talked to me about how his physical health is declining and how his memory is also rapidly declining. He forgets to take his medicine regularly even though Mary sets it out for him every morning. The nurse said that one day she came and he had forgotten to eat his breakfast which Mary had put on the table for him. I know that last week when I came, he had not taken his medicine until I noticed it and gave it to him. He is having more and more difficulty carrying on a conversation because he can’t remember what he has said earlier in the conversation.  I kept hoping that it was just a side effect of his congestive heart failure (CHF), his brain not getting enough oxygen. The nurse said that CHF does not cause this type of memory loss that his Alzheimer’s had most likely entered another phase of the disease. I told her that no one had ever said to me that he had Alzheimer’s. In fact, the last time I took him to his primary care physician, I told the MD that I had noticed a significant decrease in his cognitive abilities. The MD performed a short test in the office, asking him things like what day is it, what did you have to eat for dinner yesterday, to repeat three words that he told him earlier in the test, and to retell a short story he read. Walter got several questions wrong and some right. MD said that he didn’t do too badly on the test, it was almost in normal range, nothing out of the ordinary for someone his age. He never mentioned Alzheimer’s or dementia. The nurse said she was almost positive she had read in his medical record that he had Alzheimer’s. She said the MD may just not have wanted to say something in front of Walter. I think it would be nice if he had told me, however.

When I related this story to Daddy when I got home, he said that Jackie was told he had Alzheimer’s a number of years ago, but refused to believe that he had it. He was taking a medication for it for a while, according to Daddy. I don’t know how that got dropped.

His mind has been so important to him. He is a very brilliant man. He has an engineering degree from U.S. Military Academy. He rose to rank of Colonel in the army and commanded many troops in war and at home. He has a PhD in political science and taught the University of Alabama for a number of years. He reads constantly, and not fluffy stuff like I read. He reads classics and biographies and history books. He has always encouraged me and my sister and our children to get as much education as we can, “It is never time or money wasted. It is something no one can ever take away from you.” For a disease to take this away from him seems unusually cruel.

I never knew that someone with Alzheimer’s retains their long-term memory while losing the short-term memory. He can do some amazing things remembering events from 60 or even 80 years ago, but he can’t remember if he has gotten his mail today.

This may sound terrible, but I hope his CHF gets him before the Alzheimer’s gets too advanced. I would much rather see his physical health fail than his mind.  

He turns 90 September 21, 2011. I want to give him a big party. I hope he will remember it.