Floyd hired me as a junior high teacher in Plainwell in 1969. He was my first principal, a fine man nearing the end of his career. His replacement was Burton, an up and coming leader. One was nearing the end, and the second was just starting his climb to the top. I got along with …
Author: Robert
Be Aware and Beware
I read the latest edition of my AARP magazine the other day. I focused on an article regarding scams and the elderly. Seems my age makes me highly qualified in this department. Scammers might call me “essential”. The author outlines a list of several pitfalls that scammers use and the scammed fall for. According to …
For One Hour
There are several popular posts appearing on Facebook. There’s one about golf that keeps popping up. It asks you to name your dream foursome. For me that’s always been easy, I’d choose my three kids, David, Elizabeth, Michael and me. Ruth’s recent resurgence on the links muddies the waters a bit, but if we couldn’t …
Mr. Tiger
I’ve been a Detroit Tiger fan for as long as I can remember. When the kids in the neighborhood played pickup games, we often adopted the name of a Tiger. For several years, I was Frank Bolling. Bill Graham was Charlie “Paw Paw” Maxwell. Bill and Charlie were both lefties. Charlie was from Paw Paw, …
And Vermin
The move to Lake LeAnn was huge. Not only did we purchase a house on a lake, it had two fireplaces. Living on a lake, and having a fireplace, were big parts of my “dream house”. I thought both would provide great enjoyment for a number of years. I was right. Many years passed before …
Varmints
Ruth and I had our first run in with varmints the first year we married. We lived in our house on Stockbridge in Kalamazoo. It was a two story Victorian, with a third story attic, that had been retrofitted into two units. We lived in the lower unit and rented the upper. The exterior needed …
Jimmy Stewart and Me
Jimmy Stewart starred in the 1958 film, Vertigo, with Kim Novak. It’s a psychological thriller directed and produced by Alfred Hitchcock. Stewart plays a former police detective forced into early retirement because a line of duty incident caused him to develop acrophobia (an extreme fear of heights) and vertigo (a false sense of rotational movement). …
The Summer of 69
My wingman got married on May 23, 1969. He celebrated his twenty-second birthday four days later, and I followed him on the 29th. That was fifty-one years ago. That wasn’t the only thing that happened that summer. The biggies in my mind were 400,000 people attended the Woodstock Music Festival, a concert in a New …
My Wingman
Mitch is my oldest friend. We met in 1951 or 52 at the fire hydrant fifty feet from my driveway. He wandered around the block, and I was standing atop my usual perch, surveying the neighborhood. We met, exchanged a few words, and have been friends ever since. That’s my first official memory. We served …
The Walker Girls 2.0
The Walker family moved to Rochester, Michigan and lived in a house on a hill. I believe they moved because of Uncle Jack’s job. It was either that or Aunt Emma simply wanted a different house. The place in Washington was vintage. The Rochester home was new. I don’t know how long they lived there, …