| Biographical Non-Fiction posted June 26, 2021 | Chapters: |
...126 127 -128- 129... 
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A lot of company in the Spring of 1992
A chapter in the book Remembering Yesterday
Frequent Family Visitors.
by BethShelby
For new readers, who may not have read my author notes, this is written in a conversational way as I talk to my deceased husband. When I refer to someone just as "you" this means I am addressing my husband, Evan.
Since Don quit his job just before Christmas in order to come home, he was working temporary jobs while looking for something else. He had always been extremely skilled working with his hands, so he got the idea of designing his own adjustment tables and constructing them. He made the first one for himself and began showing it to other students. They liked his design and were willing to buy their own tables from him. The tables looked very professional. He was able to bend the metal and upholster the tables, so it seemed a good way to make money working from home.
******
In April your sister, Helen, came up to visit us. She had almost had a nervous breakdown after Jimmy and his fifth wife broke up. She had been so excited about the two children, since she didn’t have grandchildren of her own. She felt she needed to get away from home to try to get the breakup off of her mind. She was embarrassed because her son had been divorced so many times.
We put her in Connie’s old room since it had a bath. Connie was sleeping in the room over the garage, but she had left some old toys in that room. One was a doll or a stuffed animal that giggled when the lights were turned off. The first night, Helen took her time about going to bed. When she turned off the light and heard an eerie giggle, it scared her so bad she jumped up and turned the lights back on. After doing a thorough search of the room and closet, she turned the lights back off, and it happened again. This time she was really freaking out and decided it was time to awaken us. We were mystified when she told us there was someone in her room that kept disappearing. After she explained they didn’t let themselves be known until she turned the lights out, we realized what was happening. Poor Helen; she didn’t need that with her nerves already on edge. Later, you and I had a good laugh.
That weekend, you decided we should take Helen to Gatlinburg to see the Smoky Mountains, since she had never been there. After seeing Gatlinburg, we decided to drive across the Smoky Mountain National Park into Cherokee, North Carolina, which is a resort town on the Indian Reservation. When we got into the higher elevations, it was snowing and sticking. It wasn’t so cold that the roads were freezing over, so we kept going. Helen was thrilled to see the mountain with snow coming down. I was pretty excited myself, because this was a first for me to see the mountains being covered with snow. I was glad I had the video camcorder, because I got some beautiful pictures.
*******
In April, Glen finally got his BS degree in nursing. He’d been working as an intern, and this meant as a nurse, he would be making more money. He wanted to get into a specialty program, which might mean they would be moving from the Orlando area. They were talking about putting their house on the market, and maybe, moving back to Tennessee. Carol had been taking some computer courses and she was hoping to take more classes. I think she might have wanted to somehow work with computers rather than patients.
They were still having marriage problems due to their individual personality types. Glen felt if she really loved him, she would be excited to do things with him. Carol admitted to herself, in her diary, she couldn’t say she really loved him, but she didn’t believe in divorce. She had finally accepted the fact he would never be the kind of husband she had dreamed of. In spite of resenting that he kept demanding her time, she was trying to do some things with him in order to keep peace.
Earlier in the marriage, she had made some out-of-town trips riding on the back of his motorcycle. She had gone on the boat with him and had learned how to operate it. She had also taken scuba diving lessons with him and learned, to some extent, to enjoy being underwater with the manatees. Lately, she had gotten certified to operate Glen’s ham radio. He had taken the test as well, but he hadn’t passed it. The one thing she really got upset about was when he insisted that she go with him to the shooting range and learn to shoot a gun. She hated guns and was so aggravated she wasted her ammunition without even trying to hit the target.
Connie and Lenny went to visit them again in Florida on their spring break. In fact, they went three times in 1992. Carol seemed pleased when they came, but we weren’t sure Glen was happy to have them.
*********
Both Connie and Lenny finished their spring college classes in May. Connie did well with her grades. When school would start again in September, she would be a sophomore and Lenny would be a Junior. The week after they got out, Carol and Glen were visiting us and looking in Chattanooga for possible job opportunities. We learned that although it was almost summer, it was snowing again in the Smokies. Everyone wanted to go see the snow in the mountains, so we all piled into the van and went. We had a television set in the van, and the kids had some video games they enjoyed playing on the way up. When we got there it was even more beautiful than it had been the month before. The roads were still passable and there wasn’t a lot of traffic. We stopped near the top, and everyone got out and had a snowball fight. It was a lot of fun.
We did a lot of other family things with Carol and Glen like going to some of the area parks and playing Frisbee. Once we went to Lake Ocoee and took pictures of the whitewater rapids leading into the lake. We also went to Cade’s Cove near Townsend, Tennessee. A drive through that park is like going back in history. Many old cabins and farmsteads are still there and there are many wild animals like deer, elk, wolves, and occasionally, a bear, so Glen and I had our cameras handy.
********
Thus far into the year, not a lot was happening on the world stage which triggered our interest. George H. W. Bush was still president, and in spite of saying, “Read my lips: No new taxes” when he ran for office, in March he raised our taxes significantly.
One other noteworthy thing was the maiden voyage of the Space Shuttle Endeavour when the spacecraft was successfully launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This happened in May. It was also the first time three astronauts had walked in space at the same time. The flight lasted nine days before it returned safely to earth.
*******
Before the summer was over we would have another visitor, who almost outstayed his welcome. Jimmy came to visit and to look for work. We’ll have more to say about that next time we talk.
Evan is 63 and a retired drafting supervisor from Chevron Oil.
Beth is 54 and has had a variety of jobs. She is presently working with a local printing company.
Carol is 30, a nurse at Florida Hospital in Orlando. She is married and living in Florida.
Glen Egolf is Carol’s husband. He is 27 and soon will get his nursing degree from Southern College in Orlando.
Don is a twin. He is 29 and attending Life Chiropractic College.
Christi is Don’s twin. She is working as a receptionist at a chemical plant and doing massages on the side.
Kimberly Dye is Don’s wife. She is a nurse working in Atlanta near Don's school.
Connie is our youngest daughter. She is eighteen. She is a freshman in college.
Lenny is Connie's boyfriend. He is a sophomore in college. Gina is Lenny's Sister.
Helen is Evan's sister.
Jimmy is Helen's son and Evan's nephew.
For new readers, who may not have read my author notes, this is written in a conversational way as I talk to my deceased husband. When I refer to someone just as "you" this means I am addressing my husband, Evan.
Since Don quit his job just before Christmas in order to come home, he was working temporary jobs while looking for something else. He had always been extremely skilled working with his hands, so he got the idea of designing his own adjustment tables and constructing them. He made the first one for himself and began showing it to other students. They liked his design and were willing to buy their own tables from him. The tables looked very professional. He was able to bend the metal and upholster the tables, so it seemed a good way to make money working from home.
******
In April your sister, Helen, came up to visit us. She had almost had a nervous breakdown after Jimmy and his fifth wife broke up. She had been so excited about the two children, since she didn’t have grandchildren of her own. She felt she needed to get away from home to try to get the breakup off of her mind. She was embarrassed because her son had been divorced so many times.
We put her in Connie’s old room since it had a bath. Connie was sleeping in the room over the garage, but she had left some old toys in that room. One was a doll or a stuffed animal that giggled when the lights were turned off. The first night, Helen took her time about going to bed. When she turned off the light and heard an eerie giggle, it scared her so bad she jumped up and turned the lights back on. After doing a thorough search of the room and closet, she turned the lights back off, and it happened again. This time she was really freaking out and decided it was time to awaken us. We were mystified when she told us there was someone in her room that kept disappearing. After she explained they didn’t let themselves be known until she turned the lights out, we realized what was happening. Poor Helen; she didn’t need that with her nerves already on edge. Later, you and I had a good laugh.
That weekend, you decided we should take Helen to Gatlinburg to see the Smoky Mountains, since she had never been there. After seeing Gatlinburg, we decided to drive across the Smoky Mountain National Park into Cherokee, North Carolina, which is a resort town on the Indian Reservation. When we got into the higher elevations, it was snowing and sticking. It wasn’t so cold that the roads were freezing over, so we kept going. Helen was thrilled to see the mountain with snow coming down. I was pretty excited myself, because this was a first for me to see the mountains being covered with snow. I was glad I had the video camcorder, because I got some beautiful pictures.
*******
In April, Glen finally got his BS degree in nursing. He’d been working as an intern, and this meant as a nurse, he would be making more money. He wanted to get into a specialty program, which might mean they would be moving from the Orlando area. They were talking about putting their house on the market, and maybe, moving back to Tennessee. Carol had been taking some computer courses and she was hoping to take more classes. I think she might have wanted to somehow work with computers rather than patients.
They were still having marriage problems due to their individual personality types. Glen felt if she really loved him, she would be excited to do things with him. Carol admitted to herself, in her diary, she couldn’t say she really loved him, but she didn’t believe in divorce. She had finally accepted the fact he would never be the kind of husband she had dreamed of. In spite of resenting that he kept demanding her time, she was trying to do some things with him in order to keep peace.
Earlier in the marriage, she had made some out-of-town trips riding on the back of his motorcycle. She had gone on the boat with him and had learned how to operate it. She had also taken scuba diving lessons with him and learned, to some extent, to enjoy being underwater with the manatees. Lately, she had gotten certified to operate Glen’s ham radio. He had taken the test as well, but he hadn’t passed it. The one thing she really got upset about was when he insisted that she go with him to the shooting range and learn to shoot a gun. She hated guns and was so aggravated she wasted her ammunition without even trying to hit the target.
Connie and Lenny went to visit them again in Florida on their spring break. In fact, they went three times in 1992. Carol seemed pleased when they came, but we weren’t sure Glen was happy to have them.
*********
Both Connie and Lenny finished their spring college classes in May. Connie did well with her grades. When school would start again in September, she would be a sophomore and Lenny would be a Junior. The week after they got out, Carol and Glen were visiting us and looking in Chattanooga for possible job opportunities. We learned that although it was almost summer, it was snowing again in the Smokies. Everyone wanted to go see the snow in the mountains, so we all piled into the van and went. We had a television set in the van, and the kids had some video games they enjoyed playing on the way up. When we got there it was even more beautiful than it had been the month before. The roads were still passable and there wasn’t a lot of traffic. We stopped near the top, and everyone got out and had a snowball fight. It was a lot of fun.
We did a lot of other family things with Carol and Glen like going to some of the area parks and playing Frisbee. Once we went to Lake Ocoee and took pictures of the whitewater rapids leading into the lake. We also went to Cade’s Cove near Townsend, Tennessee. A drive through that park is like going back in history. Many old cabins and farmsteads are still there and there are many wild animals like deer, elk, wolves, and occasionally, a bear, so Glen and I had our cameras handy.
********
Thus far into the year, not a lot was happening on the world stage which triggered our interest. George H. W. Bush was still president, and in spite of saying, “Read my lips: No new taxes” when he ran for office, in March he raised our taxes significantly.
One other noteworthy thing was the maiden voyage of the Space Shuttle Endeavour when the spacecraft was successfully launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This happened in May. It was also the first time three astronauts had walked in space at the same time. The flight lasted nine days before it returned safely to earth.
*******
Before the summer was over we would have another visitor, who almost outstayed his welcome. Jimmy came to visit and to look for work. We’ll have more to say about that next time we talk.
Evan is 63 and a retired drafting supervisor from Chevron Oil.
Beth is 54 and has had a variety of jobs. She is presently working with a local printing company.
Carol is 30, a nurse at Florida Hospital in Orlando. She is married and living in Florida.
Glen Egolf is Carol’s husband. He is 27 and soon will get his nursing degree from Southern College in Orlando.
Don is a twin. He is 29 and attending Life Chiropractic College.
Christi is Don’s twin. She is working as a receptionist at a chemical plant and doing massages on the side.
Kimberly Dye is Don’s wife. She is a nurse working in Atlanta near Don's school.
Connie is our youngest daughter. She is eighteen. She is a freshman in college.
Lenny is Connie's boyfriend. He is a sophomore in college. Gina is Lenny's Sister.
Helen is Evan's sister.
Jimmy is Helen's son and Evan's nephew.
Since Don quit his job just before Christmas in order to come home, he was working temporary jobs while looking for something else. He had always been extremely skilled working with his hands, so he got the idea of designing his own adjustment tables and constructing them. He made the first one for himself and began showing it to other students. They liked his design and were willing to buy their own tables from him. The tables looked very professional. He was able to bend the metal and upholster the tables, so it seemed a good way to make money working from home.
******
In April your sister, Helen, came up to visit us. She had almost had a nervous breakdown after Jimmy and his fifth wife broke up. She had been so excited about the two children, since she didn’t have grandchildren of her own. She felt she needed to get away from home to try to get the breakup off of her mind. She was embarrassed because her son had been divorced so many times.
We put her in Connie’s old room since it had a bath. Connie was sleeping in the room over the garage, but she had left some old toys in that room. One was a doll or a stuffed animal that giggled when the lights were turned off. The first night, Helen took her time about going to bed. When she turned off the light and heard an eerie giggle, it scared her so bad she jumped up and turned the lights back on. After doing a thorough search of the room and closet, she turned the lights back off, and it happened again. This time she was really freaking out and decided it was time to awaken us. We were mystified when she told us there was someone in her room that kept disappearing. After she explained they didn’t let themselves be known until she turned the lights out, we realized what was happening. Poor Helen; she didn’t need that with her nerves already on edge. Later, you and I had a good laugh.
That weekend, you decided we should take Helen to Gatlinburg to see the Smoky Mountains, since she had never been there. After seeing Gatlinburg, we decided to drive across the Smoky Mountain National Park into Cherokee, North Carolina, which is a resort town on the Indian Reservation. When we got into the higher elevations, it was snowing and sticking. It wasn’t so cold that the roads were freezing over, so we kept going. Helen was thrilled to see the mountain with snow coming down. I was pretty excited myself, because this was a first for me to see the mountains being covered with snow. I was glad I had the video camcorder, because I got some beautiful pictures.
*******
In April, Glen finally got his BS degree in nursing. He’d been working as an intern, and this meant as a nurse, he would be making more money. He wanted to get into a specialty program, which might mean they would be moving from the Orlando area. They were talking about putting their house on the market, and maybe, moving back to Tennessee. Carol had been taking some computer courses and she was hoping to take more classes. I think she might have wanted to somehow work with computers rather than patients.
They were still having marriage problems due to their individual personality types. Glen felt if she really loved him, she would be excited to do things with him. Carol admitted to herself, in her diary, she couldn’t say she really loved him, but she didn’t believe in divorce. She had finally accepted the fact he would never be the kind of husband she had dreamed of. In spite of resenting that he kept demanding her time, she was trying to do some things with him in order to keep peace.
Earlier in the marriage, she had made some out-of-town trips riding on the back of his motorcycle. She had gone on the boat with him and had learned how to operate it. She had also taken scuba diving lessons with him and learned, to some extent, to enjoy being underwater with the manatees. Lately, she had gotten certified to operate Glen’s ham radio. He had taken the test as well, but he hadn’t passed it. The one thing she really got upset about was when he insisted that she go with him to the shooting range and learn to shoot a gun. She hated guns and was so aggravated she wasted her ammunition without even trying to hit the target.
Connie and Lenny went to visit them again in Florida on their spring break. In fact, they went three times in 1992. Carol seemed pleased when they came, but we weren’t sure Glen was happy to have them.
*********
Both Connie and Lenny finished their spring college classes in May. Connie did well with her grades. When school would start again in September, she would be a sophomore and Lenny would be a Junior. The week after they got out, Carol and Glen were visiting us and looking in Chattanooga for possible job opportunities. We learned that although it was almost summer, it was snowing again in the Smokies. Everyone wanted to go see the snow in the mountains, so we all piled into the van and went. We had a television set in the van, and the kids had some video games they enjoyed playing on the way up. When we got there it was even more beautiful than it had been the month before. The roads were still passable and there wasn’t a lot of traffic. We stopped near the top, and everyone got out and had a snowball fight. It was a lot of fun.
We did a lot of other family things with Carol and Glen like going to some of the area parks and playing Frisbee. Once we went to Lake Ocoee and took pictures of the whitewater rapids leading into the lake. We also went to Cade’s Cove near Townsend, Tennessee. A drive through that park is like going back in history. Many old cabins and farmsteads are still there and there are many wild animals like deer, elk, wolves, and occasionally, a bear, so Glen and I had our cameras handy.
********
Thus far into the year, not a lot was happening on the world stage which triggered our interest. George H. W. Bush was still president, and in spite of saying, “Read my lips: No new taxes” when he ran for office, in March he raised our taxes significantly.
One other noteworthy thing was the maiden voyage of the Space Shuttle Endeavour when the spacecraft was successfully launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This happened in May. It was also the first time three astronauts had walked in space at the same time. The flight lasted nine days before it returned safely to earth.
*******
Before the summer was over we would have another visitor, who almost outstayed his welcome. Jimmy came to visit and to look for work. We’ll have more to say about that next time we talk.
Evan is 63 and a retired drafting supervisor from Chevron Oil.
Beth is 54 and has had a variety of jobs. She is presently working with a local printing company.
Carol is 30, a nurse at Florida Hospital in Orlando. She is married and living in Florida.
Glen Egolf is Carol’s husband. He is 27 and soon will get his nursing degree from Southern College in Orlando.
Don is a twin. He is 29 and attending Life Chiropractic College.
Christi is Don’s twin. She is working as a receptionist at a chemical plant and doing massages on the side.
Kimberly Dye is Don’s wife. She is a nurse working in Atlanta near Don's school.
Connie is our youngest daughter. She is eighteen. She is a freshman in college.
Lenny is Connie's boyfriend. He is a sophomore in college. Gina is Lenny's Sister.
Helen is Evan's sister.
Jimmy is Helen's son and Evan's nephew.
 Recognized |
I'm continuing to recall memories of life with my deceased husband, Evan, as if I am talking aloud to him. I'm doing this because I want my children to know us as we knew each other and not just as their parents.
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