Loose Ends #17

Remember Sandy, her and Bill had five girls, Cathy, Cindy, Teresa, Betty and Cherry. they also lived in Bonnie's home town of Holton. Sandy had developed arthritis in all her joints and was in pain almost all the time, she was on a lot of medication. She was my favorite of all my husbands sisters, because they moved to Holton we only saw each other once a week, she was such a nice person. She always fed anyone that came to their house, I felt so sorry for her, being in such pain. One day Bill, her husband. came home from work and found her dead, sitting up against the kitchen cupboards. Bill did not want an autopsy, he said she suffered enough, so we can only guess it was the arthritis that was her demise. It was a shock to us all, I still miss her and her wonderful laugh, when she laughed everybody laughed. Bill remarried about a year later, this woman was a carbon copy of Sandy, I mean in the way she took care of Bill.

In 1988 we bought a home in Ferrysburg, right over the bridge from Grand Haven. It was three bedroom, no basement but a large laundry room and the yard was big, Ron and Bonnie lost their apartment and moved in with us but not without the understanding they would pay their way. They now had two children, Sarah and Drew, when Drew was born he seemed to be okay but two day's later he had a seizure and was diagnosed with cerebral pulsey. He was such a sweet baby, smiled at you all the time, the doctors put him on medication right away to keep him from having another seizure.

Ron and my husband were still working at Haworth and Bonnie decided she would get a job. She ask if I could sit the kids, I was looking after them already while she slept late. I had a lot of energy then and I told her I would, actually it was more for getting her out of the house for awhile. I did my house work in the mornings, after lunch and Drew's nap we went to the park, he just loved to be swung in the kiddies swing. Sarah was now five and in Kinder garden and Drew was eight months old, he went to therapy twice a week, to help him with his left hand.

I was surprised when Ron ask Bonnie for a divorce in 1989, we could not figure out the reason. I can guess at a couple things, they drank too much, argued all the time and I found out later Ron was seeing a women he worked with, I don't know if Bonnie ever found out, if she did she did not say. They have been married six years, we went to court and was granted temporary custody. The reason for this is Bonnie took off also and we did not know where she was.

Ron got his divorce but did not have joint custody of the kids, and the Judge thought the kids should have a safe haven while the parents were acting immature. This started a long court battle, because we filed to have the children in our home, with visitation rights awarded the parents. Sarah definitely wanted to stay with us and Drew was too young to know what was going on. This drug out for almost a year and was draging all our savings with it. In the end the Judge gave Drew to Bonnie and Sarah went with us. I knew Drew would not get the care he needed. The Judge also told Bonnie if she came back in August at a new hearing she could have Sarah also. Bonnie never went back to court, I don't know if she understood what the Judge was saying or not. She was ordered to have an evaluation by a psypiaerist, the thing he found out was she could get along well with males, on this is what the judge based his decision.

Sarah was happy but her little brother was not and I worried about Drew all the time, I did get to babysit him a lot but he would cry his eyes out when Bonnie came for him, crying Grandma. We worried until Sarah was 17 years old that her mom would take us back to court, I would like to forget those years. While in her care he had many seizures, because she forgot to give him his medicine, he broke his left wrist and was in the hospital several times. Drew also had to put up with several boyfriends that were mean to him.

In 1996 my husband retired from Haworth, he had been there twenty years, we gave him a nice little retirement party. I was working for a cleaning company and my husband did not stay retired long. He got a job driving a small bus for child development. Doug was going with a women named Kathy, she had three children. They decided to get married, I knew from the start this was a mistake, Doug did not like kids, it was their noise. Her name was Cathy, she was a nice person and very pretty, she also was a working mother, Doug at this time was working in a pizza joint. They had a wedding at her place, it was just family and a couple close friends. They were only married a year, she said he laid around the house and would not work, and she was right. This is too bad I really liked Cathy and her kids, but Doug and her did not get along and only one of her boys liked Doug. So Doug moved to Holland, a town about twenty miles away and he got a job working at D & W supermarket, and we were still fighting through court for the grand kids.

The Wedding #16

It is 1982 now, Ron is 19 years old and dating a girl named Bonnie, she is a year younger than he is. Ron never drank until he met Bonnie, Ron was always criticizing Doug because he drank. Bonnie lived in another town, about 20 miles from us, her parents were divorced. She had three other sisters, Nancy, Kay and Linda, they were not married but Nancy had a little girl Heather. Bonnie's mom had put all her daughters, even Bonnie, on birth control pills right after Nancy got pregnant, at this time Bonnie was going on 15 years old. The mothers name was Barb, she told me this when I first met her, I was shocked to hear this.

Ron's drinking became worse, he would even drive his car the 20 miles when drinking. When he told me they were going to get married I told him he was making a mistake. My husband was really mad but what can you tell a child going on 20 years old that was now drinking too much and not listening. I tried to like Bonnie, but I caught her in one lie after another. Wayne s sisters lived in the same town as Bonnie and our niece told us all about Bonnie and her life style with boys before she met Ron. See this is what happens when you give a child birth control pills and they know they will not become pregnant.

1983, time to get married, we had reconciled our self to the fact they were getting married and had the wedding at our house and the reception will be at the VFW in Bonnie's town. The wedding went off pretty well considering we could not pack one more person in our house, it was a nice turn out. The reception was very nice, we had planned for just the right amount of people, but Bonnie's dad was at the bar and everyone that came in he told them to help themselves to the buffet, these people were not invited, just came in for a drink, we almost ran out of food. I would not have minded but Bonnie's folks did not help pay for anything. I was glad to see everyone have a good time and thankful there were no fights, because everyone was drinking quite a bit.

Bonnie got pregnant right away, so the kids decided to stay with us until the baby was born. Sarah was born on November 14, 1983, such a sweet baby, she had blue eyes and dark hair. The kids got an apartment when Sarah was six months old, about a mile from us. My husband had gotten a job at Haworth in Holland, they make office furniture and sell it all over the world. Ron had just started there also in the factory assembling the office furniture and Bonnie started working as a waitress and I baby sat Sarah.

I liked to go with my friend and look for old bottle dumps, these are dumps that have no garbage in them, we did find some nice old bottles and some day I may write about these adventures. In 1984 Ron bought ne a metal detector, the name of the detector was a White Classic SL for my birthday. I still have it and use it, not so much since I had my heart attack, but the years I did use it was so nice, I would be out on the beach sometimes half the day. I found lots of change, watches, necklaces, pins, tokens and just junk. One time I had just started detecting when a lady came up to me and said a women had just left and she had lost her gold bracelet with diamonds on it right over there by the water. She also gave me the phone number in case I found it, well I did find it and I did charge $20.00 if it was worth a lot to get it back, after all I did not have to return it at all. I phoned the woman (she was from New York), she came over and was insulted that I was charging her for something that already belonged to her. I then told her to take it, and I also told her it was people like her that made us detectors to keep our finds and I turned around and slammed the door, I was so mad and sorry I had called her. Earlier that week I took the bracelet to be appraised and it was worth $350.00, that is why I believe it was worth a $20.00 reward. I had found countless class rings, I tracked down the owner but never charged them anything, was just glad they got them back, because most kids pay for there own.

By the time we moved here the kids were older and doing their own thing and I had time to pursue my hobbies as well. Ron was married and had his own home, Doug was working, and behaving himself, he also had his own apartment. I had planted my first garden and it was such a success, I had tomatoes, squash, corn, potatoes, green beans, carrots and I did not even use fertilizer on the soil. I was also was raising chickens and rabbits, which Doug had brought home and wanted me to take care of them. I raised them until I hurt my back and then Doug's friend said he would take them, he had a farm. I would not have given them to him if I knew he was going to eat them, I was just heart sick, I had made them all trust me and I went and gave them to some one that butchered them. We wanted to buy this home but the owners kid wanted it, he was going to get married, so we knew we were in for another move, we lived here from June of 1979 until September of 1988.

Life Goes On #15

The year is 1977, the year my husband is reunited with his children, he last saw them in 1957. Tonda was 21 and Terry was 20, their age when he last seen them was 2 and 1 year old. Just out of the blue we received a call from Tonda, wanting to know if Wayne Cloud lived here and of course my husband had answered the phone. They wanted to come up this summer and visit for a week and of course we said yes and set a time to come, because Wayne wanted to take his vacation so he could be with them. When my husband hung up the phone he was crying and so happy, at last he could see his kid's.

They came in June, the weather was made to order, it was so nice and warm, no humidity yet. Tonda was married to Dave and they had a son two years old named Travis. Terry was not married, he had a girlfriend, he was going to bring her but she changed her mind. We stayed up almost all night when they first arrived and Tonda's son kept getting up because we were making too much noise talking and laughing. We planned a big family party so they could meet their four aunts, one uncle and at this time 15 cousins. The party was a success, I was glad to see everyone come and of course Uncle Tom brought his harmonic, we never got together without Toms harmonic, he tought his self to play, you just hummed a song and he picked up on it and played it. Terry had brought his guitar, he also tought himself to play and was making recordings, so all in all we had a good time. The week just flew by and we were telling them goodbye, but now we could keep in touch.

We found a house on Lincoln, it was a two bedroom farm house, with out buildings, it even had a pump with a handle over by the barn. We had well water, it was so clear and tasted good, we had it tested to make sure it was okay. While we were living there people walking by or bike riding would stop to drink out of the pump. We lived there from 1979 until 1988, this property looked like a park, we not only took care of the yard but we cut and raked the orchard. I had a lot of birds out there, I cataloged them and I had 24 different kinds, the prettiest of them were the Baltimore Orieols and the Scarlet Tanagers. We not only had apples, one little pear tree and our yard had about ten black cherry trees in it. The only time I did not like the cherry trees was when they started to fall, the yard was a mess and had to make sure they did not get tracked in. Now you can see why I had a lot of birds, not to mention I was feeding them.

Doug was dating now and getting in a lot of trouble, he was running with the wrong crowd of young people. His girlfriend was smoking dope and drinking, at this time she was just going on seventeen, her mother was divorced and she had about five children, her name was Pat. Doug decided he wanted to live with them for a while, I did not agree with this but Doug was nineteen and working, I just hoped he would behave himself. The year before this he had a wild fling at stealing, first he took a case of beer right out of a beer truck, the driver came out of the store and caught him. Doug got in his car and drove off with the beer, the driver wrote down his license plate number as he drove off. The sheriff came out to talk to us, Doug had just came home, the sheriff talked to him and did not arrest him because they had not drank any of the beer.

Doug only lived with Cindy's family for a few months, her mom told him to go home she had enough to feed. I was thankful he settled down and did not get into any more trouble. We had just got a dog from a farmer, we named him Jake, he was Shepard and Lab mix, all four of his legs were Shepard color, his ears look like a Lab, his body was black and his head had both breeds colors. I loved him dearly, he became my best friend, I let him run during the day and he never went on the road, he had too much fun running the fields and hunting gofers.

In August of 1979 my older sister June committed suicide, she had become an alcoholic and could not face the world any longer. One night she drank too much, she went out into the garage, closed the garage door, got into the car and started it, her husband did not find her until the next morning. My sister, bless her heart was never happy with her station in life, she had married into money and had too much time on her hands, she was not happy with the children she had adopted. She always told Stella and myself how lucky we were to have had children and she was unable to have any. She was born into the era that women should marry, have children and be a housewife. She also lived too long with my aunt and she was not happy we came to Michigan, it was like we messed up her plans to be an only child, also she was very moody. I loved my sister very much and I would give anything to have her back, I don't know maybe I did not do enough for her or help more with her problem. She took too many pills which she overdosed and almost died. The funeral was a closed casket, I guess the carbon monxide on her body was not a pretty site. I know this sounds crazy but to this day I will find myself talking to her and telling her I still love her and miss her every day of my life, my sister was only 47 years old.

More Moving #14

We were lucky to have rented a house before we moved to Grand Haven, Wayne s teacher knew the people. What happened is the woman that owned the house passed away and left the home to her son. He did not want it because he lived and worked in the upper part of Michigan, about two hundred miles away. Derk was the son, he wanted us to take all the furniture, which was better than mine, so I told him yes.

Wayne s new job was with Gardner-Denver Corporation, it had two other companies in the United States. I went to work at Michigan Plastic Company, I also worked for them for awhile when we lived in Muskegon on Glade Street. I quit because I could not keep a sitter, they did not like the hours or wanted more hours. I took second shift, the boys would only be by themselves two hours, Doug was 12 and Ron 9 years old, thank goodness nothing ever happened, the year was 1972.

Outside of my husband having back surgery, nothing eventful happened at this house but we did have a lot of fun. In 1973 we bought a house on Robbins Road, the kids liked it a lot, Doug was going into Jr. High, so the school was by us and Ron did not like to change schools, until he found out he could have his friends over anytime. The house had a big woods out back and they explored to their hearts content. Ron climbed pretty high up in a tree and a branch broke, he cut his lip on the way down and broke his left arm, I will put a photo of this on my photos. We had a lot of parties, actually the girls at the shop decided to have a party every Friday, taking turns at each of our homes, this idea only lasted about a year, we were not heavy drinkers like them.

We lived here about three years and had many a fond memories. We had purchased a camper that slept six, we went camping almost every weekend, our favorite camp site was Whiskey Creek, no the creek was not flowing with whiskey, there use to be a distillery up around those parts years ago, there was a 1800 home on the property, the only building still left of the homestead, it still had the old brass bed upstairs, still in good shape. I started a new hobby, it was looking for old antique bottles, the ones you find in old dump sites, we did alright and accumulated a lot. We would pack a big lunch on weekends and all of us would go look for a dump to dig, the boy's took their BB guns and shot the bottles we did not want. We always did a lot with the kids, they remember the trips we took and we set around to this day reminiscing about those times. Doug always tells us how thankful he was for all the memories we made for them while they were growing up., he said that was the best time we ever had.

Gardner Denver sent out a notice they were moving to New Jersey and the employees that wanted to go with the company would still have a job, only a certain percent went, because you had to find your own place and move yourself. Wayne started looking for a job immediately, even though he really liked to work for this company, we could not afford this move. Once again we lost the house and found a two bedroom duplex. One day Doug had left for work, when all of a sudden he came back, he found a newborn baby squirrel lying in the road, he brought it home. He said he almost ran over it with his car (my car), it looked so helpless and blood was coming out of its nose, probably when it hit the road.

We raised that baby squirrel, at first in a bird cage, on a heating pad with towels on top. Feeding him was a real problem, I thought I would choke him on milk, I made up the same milk formula that I nursed my kids on. When he got bigger my husband built a big cage for him, we put a small piece of fire wood in the cage so he could climb on it and some med. size branches to crawl up. I wanted him to know the smell of the outside, this is for when we released him, because outside does not smell of rugs. I kept fresh dirt in the pan every day and you won't believe this he went to the bathroom in it, every time we let him run the house he would head for that pan to do his business, tell me squirrels are dumb, he was a grey squirrel, with white belly.

Coast Guard City USA #13

The City of Grand Haven is located on Lake Michigan at the mouth of the Grand River, for which it is named. The city was first called "Grand Haven" in 1835 and the community was incorporated as a city in 1867. It was founded by French settlers and a fur-trading outpost was established. In the mid 1800s the city developed into a logging lumber business and ship building. During the early 1900s Grand Haven was a manufacturing hub for the area building everything from automobiles to car parts to furniture to lighting and pianos.

The Grand Haven Lighthouses were first built in 1839 on the south pier marking the channel into the river. The current lighthouses, painted red were built in 1875 (had an outer light) and 1905 (inner light). The lighthouses are connected by a lighted catwalk which runs along the pier to the shore. The very first lighthouse they built right on the beach, it washed away with a violent storm. They decided to build another one up high up on a sand dune across the street from the first one with the light keepers home attached. When the pier was built they built a new lighthouse at the end, which is still there today. The one built on the dune was torn down, leaving only the keepers home, which is still standing today.

The city has around 100 miles of bike trails, a state beach, boardwalk, charter fishing fleet and a Great Lakes port, where it imports limestone, slag, cement and coal while exporting sand. Our Grand Haven State Park was recognized for having one of the top 5 beaches in the US by Good Morning America. In the summer months our lakes water temperatures can reach the low 70s. The State Park hosts the AVP Pro Volleyball Tournaments throughout the summer months. There is a campground at the state park near the pier and lighthouses. The waterfront locations bring tourists from all over the state for boating, sailing, jet skiiing and wind surfing.

Grand Haven is home to the United States Coast Guards "Group Grand Haven", which c cordinates all Lake Michigan Coast Guard activities. The city hosts the annual Coast Guard Festival, which draws U.S. and Canadian vessels along with parades of bands and other activities. The yearly attendance for this event exceeds 100,000 people over the two week period of the festival. Grand Haven is also officially designated as "Coast Guard City, USA" by an act of Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton. The act was Public Law 105-383 enacted by the United States Congress and signed by the president on November 13, 1998. I would like to say the Coast Guard activities when first started only family and friend's could attend. In the early 1900s they changed them to include the city residents.

The town also has a large Musical Fountain was built on the opposite bank of the Grand River from the city center in 1962. It plays nightly in tourist season. When it was built, it was the world's largest such fountain. It purportedly is still the largest fountain with colored lights, although the largest fountain overall is now in Las Vegas. During the summer months if you don't go down early to watch the fountain, you will have to hunt for a space to put your blanket or lawn chairs.

All this is in a town with a total area of 7.4 square miles of which 5.8 square miles of it is land and 1.6 miles of it is water. Route US-31 runs through the city along a boulevard and goes over the drawbridge over the Grand River at the northern city limits. Route M104 runs easterly from US-31 in Ferrysburg, through Spring Lakr and toward 1-96 which runs north and south.

All this information can be found on Wikipedia. One more thing I would like to tell about the Coast Guard ifestival, there is a large arts and crafts in the city park during the festival, vendors from all over come to sell and they have such a variety you can't imagine. We are so glad we choose this town to move to and we are still here, I love the activities in the summer, this town is so packed with tourist down town it is hard to walk. One more thing they have is a large carnival and where do they put it righ smack in the middle of town on main street.

I will be back with my stories, but just had to tell you about this beautiful town. There is one problem we are having too many condos built and some of them are right down town. I don't like to see the old building torn down to make room for them. If they take the old look away from Grand Havens town I am afraid it will effect the tourist trade, this is why people come here, it is so quaint. Thanks for taking a trip down memory lane, I only scratch the surfaced the surface with the history of Grand Haven, if you will look on a US map you will see us between Muskegon and Holland.

To a New Town #12

We moved back into town, it was another upstairs apartment. It was September 24th., 1962 and we were getting ready to celebrate Doug's second birthday. My mom wanted to give the party to help us out, she has really changed since she could not drink, but her cancer was not getting better. Doug received a lot of nice presents, mom got him a tricycle, it was blue and white.

The kitchen door lead to the roof, it was flat, with a fence around it, high enough so Doug could not climb over, besides Doug was not a climber, it also had a gate to lock. My husband brought up sand for Doug to run his little cars in, the only time he could not play on the roof was in the morning, the sun made it too hot. Wayne had four sisters and a brother, boy did they love to play poker and cribbage, we spent lots of time visiting them, in those days we did not have a lot to spend., but we had a lot of fun.

It was June 10th, 1963. time for Ronald to be born, I got to the hospital at nine thirty and he was born four hours later. What a sweet baby, he had just fuzzy blond hair and blue eyes, just like his brother Doug. His blood and mine were not compatible, the doctor was going to order a blood transfusion at first but changed his mind. This kept us in the hospital one more day. Doug was glad we were home, he didn't pay much attention to Ron at first, he gave him a hug and a kiss on the head. My mom was so loving toward the kids but Wayne s mom was on the cold side, she hardly held the boy's at all. I was guessing she still held a grudge because her son did not go back to Jolene and the kids.

Wayne finally got a good job, it was with Railway Express, I don't know if you will remember this company. This company unloaded all their goods off the train and delivered it just like UPS does today, the only thing I don't believe UPS delivers the heavy things Railway Express did, for instance bath tubs, pool tables and etc., I believe UPS only delivers up to fifty pounds. They went out of business at the end of the 1960's, and that ended Wayne s job.

My husband went back to college, to learn illustrating, he went to school in the mornings and worked at the gas company in the afternoons. We had purchased a home in town, life was getting better for us. The kids were growing like weeds. Doug was five and the doctor said he was old enough to start ear surgery. One thing I didn't know was peoples ears stop growing at the age of five years, any way that is what the plastic surgeon told us. They could not at this time build him a ear , but they did a very good job, it took a little over a year to complete.

One thing happened while we were going to the hospital, we left early because we had to go about thirty five miles to another city. The museum was right by the hospital, so I thought Doug would like to go in and look around. They were having pioneer day's, and making lots of different homade items, like clothes, shoes, soap and etc. Before I could stop Doug he ran his finger across the lye soap and tasted it, I took him by the hand and told him what ever he did do not swollow, just keep spitting. We ran to a drinking fountain , turned it on and ran the water in his mout, all the time telling him not to swollow. I ask him when it was over why he did that, he said he thought it was a big cake with frosting. By the time we got to the hospital his tongue was bleeding a little, the doctor said it was a good thing I did what I did, the lye could of eat a little of his tongue, kids!

We lived on Glade Street for six years, when Wayne graduated from college he started looking for a job, he gratulated with a 4.o average, I was so proud of him. Some of the happenings on Glade Srreet were as follows. In 1968 Wayne had melanoma cancer on his face, and thank goodness they removed it all. 1969 we vacationed in the Upper Pensula of Michigan at Cooper Harbor, what a beautiful place that was. 1970 Wayne gratulated from college, he was one of the top students, he always felt odd because he was in his late thirties. 1971 we put our house up for sale, we moved in here in February, 1966 and now it is 1972, time to go, the kid's both started school from here.

One note about the grandparents, this was such a sad time for us. Wayne's dad had his last heart attack and passed away in 1963, he must had at least seven real bad attacks before he went, they had to tie his hands to his bed he was thrashing so. 1964, Waynes mom had a stroke at work, they put her on life support, she lasted three days and they removed it, she only lived for a few minutes. September 1965, my mom had cancer and was going back for one more surgery, blood clots developed and went into the lungs, the doctors could not save her. 1966 my step dad Leon. he had been battling cancer for a few years, he also passed away. We had four years in a row, the grandparents were all gone, we missed them and I was so sad for all the grandchildren that will never know them, because most of them were so young.

Along The Way #11

My son Douglas was one year and had just learned to walk. He had the cutest way of starting off, he would crawl to whatever was the closet to him, climb up and turn around, for just a moment he would look around, grab his shirt and take off. He did this for about two months, but he was getting better at walking. When he fell down, even in the middle of the floor, he put his hands on the floor and almost jumped to his feet and start there, I was so proud of him, he had no hearing in his right ear, they say your balance is from your hearing, but this never stopped him.

The apartment we found in town was perfect for us, but I missed living out a ways. I just want to clear my husbands name, he is Charles Wayne Cloud, some people call him by his first name and others by his middle, he wanted me to call him Wayne, even though I liked Charles. Our apartment was by the store he had found work. We moved within six months because the landlord lived in the front apartment and their kitchen was on the other side of our bedroom wall. Their cupboards also was on the wall up against our wall and she slammed dishes all the time and we did not get much sleep.

Doug had a cute thing he did while playing, he would go in his room and push his toy box up against the door so I could not get in. I actually had to go outside and look in the window to make sure he was okay, he looked so smug sitting there getting one over on ole mom. While living here his uncle spilled a very hot cup of coffee and Doug just happened to be sitting on his lap. Doug had a long sleeve shirt on and it soaked up the coffee fast. He had a very bad burn, about four inches, the doctor said put nothing on it and watch for infection, I was amazed how fast he healed and the big blister never broke, so he had no scar.

Our next apartment was half a block from a school, it had a imitation fire place, looked just like flames coming from the fake coal. One day I was in the basement washing clothes, Doug was sitting on the top step watching me he was eating a cookie. I finished loading the washer and turned to go up the steps and no Doug. I ran through the apartment looking for him with no luck. We lived three houses from the school yard so I went that way and all I saw was a school yard full of kids., it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. I ran back home to call the school and see if they would help me, my heart was pounding like a drum. I decided to go out in the yard one more time and when I looked between the houses there he was, I was too happy to be mad at him, I just hugged him to me and sat down on the ground and cried, I was so happy to have my son safe and sound. He did not know what all the fuss was, after all he was only one and a half years old.

We moved a lot the first four years and I really was getting tired of it, we never had the money for a down payment because Wayne could not find a job that paid good. Our next apartment was upstairs and I worried about Doug falling down the steps because the only way outside was steps on the side of the house, no inside way out, I also worried about a fire, what would we do. Our car went on the fritz so Wayne had to walk four miles to work and back. One thing happened there that made us start looking for another place, in a hurry. The owners of the house lived down stairs, you could not want for a better landlord, they spoiled Doug rotten and were so good to us. Phil, their son liked Doug a lot, when Phil would come home from school, if Doug was out he would push him on the swing or just sit down and play with him. So you can imagine our shock when we read the paper, Phil had killed his girl friend. We became afraid at first and then we wondered what would make such a nice person do this. The paper said they got into an argument in the car, he choked her but he said she was not dead. He was going to leave her, then he became afraid she would tell on him, so he finished chokeing her, she was sixteen and he was seventeen years old. What a waste of two lives, we really felt sorry for both families.

It did not take long to find a little house to rent and so back out to the country. I became pregnant for my second time, I was glad because Doug would have a brother or sister to play with, even though there would be almost three years difference in their ages. I picked out for the girls name Susan and if a boy Ronald, I always wanted a girl but just wanted the baby to be healthy. We only stayed the summer in this house, it was too far from my husbands work, so we started looking again.