so who am I to have an About Page?

ABOUT ME…WHO?

I was born on a sunny Friday the 13 in Cleveland, a great city on the North Shore of Lake Erie. It was July, in 1934.

My next claim to fame was in 1939, when my Dad and I set out on a cross-country train trip–heading to California. The train stopped for some reason, and Dad got off the train with some other guys for a smoke out in the middle of Arizona. Five-year-old Me, known as Patsy then, was very worried about Dad being left behind…but fortunately the nice ladies who were in charge of me gave me water to drink from a really nifty cone-shaped paper cup. The rest of the journey was uneventful, except when temptation got the better of me and I chomped an enormous bite from a pretty gourd that was intended as a gift for Mom. The gourd memory is not pleasant.

Except for a circle driveway and some orange trees, a wicker chair on a screened porch, and a hideous bite of a persimmon — (which I figured out several decades later was probably rotten,) and some fond memories of my kindergarten teacher, Miss Fairy… I don’t remember California.

There were no jobs in California in those bleak final years of the Great Depression, and our family returned to Ohio prior to the start of World War Two.

CHAPTER TWO — ME AND THE WAR (coming soon…)

91 thoughts on “so who am I to have an About Page?”

    1. thanks so much carol anne… glad you liked it. I did write chapter 2 and 3, but no one can find them. I should track them down. My blog sadly needs organization…I guess I need a menu. 🙂

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  8. What a wonderful way to share your stories. My grandfather used to tell me about riding the train west to Nevada from Iowa. I loved hearing him. And when you write that you were nervous about your father being left behind, I can feel my child-self with that same fear.

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    1. Yes, I can feel the fear too, and I kept my eye on my Dad while he was outside the train. The ladies who were watching me did not let me ramble around by myself of course. I can see the desert, and everything was very still in my mind’s eye…like a snapshot almost.

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  9. You have the same birthday as my best friend! She’s indomitable and regularly hacks into things just for fun. I think you’d like each other.

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  11. What a clever, different idea for your About page. ‘Not gonna lie, I feel a bit jealous you started right out with originality. You write so freely without the “haze” I read so in many new bloggers’ intros. Fess up, you’ve done this before, haven’t you? Thank you for following my blog as it develops. It isn’t nearly as interesting as yours, but I promise to keep at it. I’m very glad to meet you!

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  12. So…I was born in the Midwest…in Chicago. But I lived in Cuyahoga Falls for 6 years. We moved to Virginia to be closer to the kids and grandkids. You will think I’m crazy…but I DO miss the snow! 🙂

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      5. I would love to get out to Tucson to visit one of my BFFs of 50-odd years, but I doubt if I will be able to. That is where my heart was born…everytime I get off the plane there I am overwhelmed by my feeling of being “home.” Actually I’m from here in Cleveland…long story. 🙂

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  15. Happy New Year!! I wanted to pop over to say hi and thank you for “liking” a comment I made on another blog a while back. I’m not too far from Cleveland (I live in Pittsburgh) and have made the trip to Cleveland Clinic on several occasions and back when I was working would visit our Cleveland location.

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    1. how nice of you to pop in to say hi! My oldest son went to school in Pittsburg, and it was almost exactly two hour drive from where we live to his apartment. His roommate was from the same town, so we parents would take turns going to Pittsburg and back. Cleveland is actually a very nice city, a lot of great museums and schools and medical facilities etc…it just gets a bum rap for various reasons. I know the city well because I lived there and worked there 60-odd years ago and got around a lot. 🙂 I really liked Pittsburgh too…it is a great city.

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      1. Wow, it really is a small world. Yes, Cleveland is a very nice city and there were areas that reminded me of some of our suburbs. Our offices were in a high rise that had a hotel located near the lake and the view was spectacular.

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      2. There are similarities. We lived in Pittsburgh area for awhile, on a hill in a subdivision…the hills there differ from the flat terrain here. Then there’s the Browns-Steelers connection. 🙂

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  16. Thanks for the follow on 1sojournal. I’m doing the prompts for the poem a day challenge, but the blog is filled with bits about writing as I used to teach that before I retired. Hope you enjoy,

    Elizabeth

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    2. what lusious prompts… the dark, shimmering,face,room,candle,dance prompt brought an instant poem! I’ll write it, don’t know what to do with it, put it on my site I guess. I love your site…

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  19. Pingback: A Reading Writer’s 2-Year Journey – A Reading Writer

  20. I’m a grama too, but a tad younger – a misfit of the 1960’s.
    Been writing forever though. 😉 (four decades plus.)
    And I’ve always liked Friday the 13ths – my hubby proposed to me on one!

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  21. So did you ever write the next chapter? I would love to read it. I am just a youngster, born in 1952 in St Marys Pa, not all that far from Cleveland when you consider how big this country is.

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    1. I think I did, I’ll have to go back and check. That was one of the first things I posted whe I started the blog. PA is right next to us…my daughter-in-law is from Sharon, Pa. I wish the still lived in PA now they live in Minnesota.

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    1. thanks for letting me know. hmmm, I need to post more often; for years I posted nearly every day, its time I get back to that. I have a zillion things to do and do none of them. (story of my life)

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      3. I need to stop messing around. This morning I have to go for physical therapy at 11. This is the second session, and I will do maybe six more weeks twice a week. The issue is weakness, especially concerning my left leg, the bones themselves are apparently good. The PT place is in our city, about ten minutes from where I live. Still…I resent any time away from writing tasks. (rolls eyes…di I really say that?)

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      4. Bravo! Does the physical therapy involve exercises you can do at home? I’m asking because 6 weeks doesn’t sound like a very long time. Think of it as an investment in the next 20 years of your life.

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      5. Yes, there are exercises to do at home. I’m glad it isn’t more than six weeks, that’s a long time to me because of the time it takes…get up, shower, drive over there, do the therapy, drive back home…shoots the whole day. I rather enjoyed it though while I was there, it’s a pleasant place and the exercises were really relaxing and not bad at all.

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      7. yesterday I hurt so much after the work-out of Thursday’s therapy that I could hardly move. Yeah, I hate that distraction of getting ready and going to regular sessions…it eats up the time I like to spend hanging on my computer and messing around. 🙂

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      13. Son2 gets shots in his knees now and then, something similar to Cortisone. BTW my physical therapy is going well, and it seems there is already some progress. Glad I started early before the condition worsened…weakness. My doctor is mad at me now (about the ear infection and the antibiotic and my big fat mouth) I hope he doesn’t expel me. yikes

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      15. The therapy does seem to loosen up some of the joints, though I have a lot of aches. The most pain (discomfort, I have a high pain threshold) I have is exercising on the “bicycle” machine…pain in my arms not legs.

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      19. Yes. That was on the bike-thing, the working of the “arms” were hurting my upper arms, so the tech gook them off (the machine.) I thought my legs would ache from the knee-action but not.

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      22. I’m delighted that the treatments are working, but we’ll have to start a new comment threat again as Frosty is full up. Btw….what are you doing climbing ladders?!?

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      28. I know it’s dumb, but I have been overwhelmed by this political business for two years…for much of that time I had the feeling (fear) that no one would ever “get it.” People here still group the Russians in with Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. That’s the Historian in me I guess.

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      29. I understand. And you’re not alone, it’s just that you’re closer. There’s been a low grade fever for the last two years that spikes but never goes away. It affects us too, even in Australia because our dipstick conservatives have been heartened by 45’s success and our own, homegrown extremist RWNJ [right wing nut jobs] have hijacked policy too.
        I feel as if I’ve been angry for 2 years. Sometimes I just have to pull away or go insane. 😦

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      30. how true! 45s stupidity is starting to overwhelm his other traits…even his idiot base is turning against him. Pulling out of Syria is a gift to the Russians… it’s insane. I am against war in general and that one in particular, but even the bigshot Republicans are against this move. How in the hell can they allow trump to do the terrible horrible things he has done to the country? The Flynn judge was using the T-word (treason) in court the other day, in sentencing Flynn… finally…finally they are getting the message.

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      32. He is trying to confuse the meaning of collusion, which to me is hanging out, plotting, discussing, planning, various activities. That actually is collusion, quite like conspiracy I think.

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