The long walk home

When your Dad and I first met, he didn't have a car, here's the post about his first car. He could sometimes get a ride out to my house but then he'd have to walk or hitch hike back home. Here's the map of his walk. He was very committed to me when we first met, I don't remember how many times he did this but certainly more than once.

He wasn't the only one

When you think of him walking, he wasn't the only one that put in the effort. When he returned and eventually moved back and lived with his Mom out in Maple Lake. I would drive out to see him and spend time with him. There was a little white house on the corner that had 2 bedrooms and an upstairs attic room. It also had a basement. He lived in the 2nd bedroom, the attic, the basement and out in the camper at different times. I looked up the house on google maps and it doesn't appear to be there anymore.

Anyways...I would go there and then leave at the very last minute to get home. I'm sure I sped to get home. For every minute I was late home, I would have to do two minutes of work. Here's my path.

There was this one time....

I don't know if you caught it...what my consequences were for when I was out past my curfew...for every minute I was late, it was 2 minutes of work.

Well...there was this one time. I was at school at the community college and your Dad and I got into a huge fight and needed lots of time to talk it out. Obviously, I don't remember what it was that we fought over anymore it was so long ago. Needless to say, I was late coming home. This was before cell phones and I think normally I would get home about 1pm but it was probably about 6pm when I finally got home. My mother was angry and upset because she didn't know where I was and so she insisted the rule apply here. I was a bit furious and thought it was horribly unfair because it's not like I was suppose to be home at 1am and got home at 6am (although I did that later). She said that I owed her 10 hours of work. I was so mad and told her that it was not only my fault so I was going to make your Dad help me. Which he did...and our punishment was that we had to paint the bedroom. It was the room that was originally my older sisters room(and later after she went to college, I moved into it).

What we also did was write something like LP + AF with paint strokes on the wall. You could barely see it but we had the last laugh by doing that. I think Grandma probably painted over the wall when she got it ready to sell so you wouldn't be able to see it now but it makes me laugh thinking about it.

more from our first trip to Duluth

As you remember, I shared about our first trip to Duluth but I forgot to mention something else. His ride on the bridge.

This is the aerial lift bridge in Duluth. We had been walking along the bridge when the alarms started going off warning people they needed to get off the bridge because it was going to rise to let some larger boats go through. I quickly was ready to leave but not your father! He was feeling young and invincible and wanted to ride the bridge up. And that's exactly what he did. I remember thinking that it was a not very smart thing to do which it was. When he came back down and got off the bridge he told me the operator yelled at him and told him he could be arrested but because he was from out of town, he wouldn't be. 

I did a little research and it turns out that they use to let people ride up and down on the bridge like 10 years before. I'm not sure which year this was but I think it was before the woman was killed. For more information about the bridge, go to here. 

gift giver

Your Dad loved to give gifts to the people he loved. He really spent time trying to find something that I think he both wanted to give and also receive. This made it a tall order especially when one is dealing with limited funds as he often was. I'm not sure that I remember many gifts he gave me, like I mentioned before he loved to give stuffed animals, I didn't much like to receive them.  When I turned 18, he did get me a really fun gift that wasn't practical or what I thought I wanted but to this day, I still love.  He picked up this Rocket gumball machine at an antique store for probably $150 and I noticed one on ebay that sold for over $600 so that's pretty good increase in value but I still don't want to let go of it, it doesn't take up that much space. It's a good memory. 

Your Dad took a lot of time to really think about what would make the recipient happy, it was often unique things that were unexpected. Not to white wash this all too but there were plenty of times where he forgot, didn't make the effort or just plain didn't get a gift for me to acknowledge something(my birthday, valentine's day, mothers day), money was tight but I didn't need much. I would have been happy with a gift of service or thoughtfully homemade but he really like to give gifts. I do remember one of the last gifts he gave me. It was one of those clam shells (see below) that you open to reveal the pearl and depending on the color of the pearl, it could be nice or really nice. I think that sticks out in my mind because I had somehow discovered that I was not the only woman he gave that to that year.

love letters

So I went to the house yesterday to get the grass mowed. While I was there I picked up a few things to bring to the house and remembered to look for the letters that I saved from when your Dad was in the army. It was getting late so I didn't want to read them at the house, I came home and sat on the back patio before it got too dark and I was forced to go inside.

There weren't as many of them as I remembered. As I look back with "grown up" eyes, I realize that he wasn't gone that long, maybe 6-8 weeks before he was home for Christmas. He came home for a couple of weeks and then returned for maybe 8 weeks longer before he was back at home.

We hadn't been dating that long when he left. I also found some letters that he would write me when he was still here but we were apart. I think we had only be dating a couple of months before his recruiter picked him up.

Most of the letters didn't contain much other than he missed me and loved me and he said that A LOT. There was one note (because he was before he went into the military) where he shares his background with me up until age 15 which was how old I was when I was reading it. It was a bit white washed where he didn't talk about much negative stuff. He does talk about not really knowing his brother until they were much older. He talked about talking to his Dad.

It was just very bitter sweet as I read through the letters, his writing was much neater than it was later in his life. He did have hope, hope that after getting out of the army he was going to go to college, that we would be together....that he would be happy.

Anniversary date

I also remember a day when we were celebrating an Anniversary. We had a date at the local independent fast food restaurant that we'd go to often.  This place had pizza, burgers and broasted chicken. It was called Burger and Chicken Express.  My best friend from high school worked there and my younger sister too.  We brought candles and champagne glasses and bubbly grape juice to make it a little special.  I'm sure he had his usual which was a double bacon cheeseburger with onion rings. Normally, I think he'd also drink root beer but this night was special so we had the grape juice.

Learning to drive

When I first met your Dad, I wasn't even driving yet. I was getting close but still not old enough, I probably had my permit.  My parents (mostly my Dad) helped me learn to drive but I still needed a lot of practice as I was learning to drive on a manual transmission versus an automatic. Your Dad was my "18 years old or older licensed driver" so that I could provide the car and my permit.  Between the both of us,  this got us everywhere. Your Dad helped me become the good driver that I am today. He would often get a ride out to the house and then we'd head somewhere. Sometimes it was to the movies both in the town we later lived in B and D. We'd often go out to eat.

Our first trip to Duluth

I don't exactly remember when it was but we went to Duluth for the weekend when we were still pretty young. I was working at the video store and I think I must have had to work Friday. When I look back, I laugh because we hadn't planned it very well. We left when I got off work which would have been around 9 or 10 pm and drove up. I expect we believed that we could check into a motel when we got there but we didn't realize how popular Duluth was in the summer on the weekends. There were no rooms available for Friday or Saturday night. I think I remember the plan being that one night in a motel and the next couple of nights camping up in the state parks up along the North Shore. When we got to Duluth on Friday and didn't have a place to check in, we decided that we would just sleep in the car in the parking lot of a 24 hour grocery store. I remember waking up early and going down to Canal Park. It was really fun to have our first weekend get away even if we had slept in the car. We spent the day in Duluth and then decided to drive along the north shore with a stop at Gooseberry Falls on our way to camp at the state parks. There's two there and the first one was full so we kept driving and the second one was full too. Thankfully, we found some sort of tourist kiosk or some such thing and found another campground that wasn't on the north shore but further inland. I remember we set up the tent and went to take showers and I think we also paid for a sauna and maybe a pizza. I remember waking up with a really bad headache in the middle of the night. We drove back to Duluth the next day (Sunday night) and found a cheap motel which I remember I got a kick out of it because they had a vibrating bed.

The crane game

Tony LOVED stuffed animals and he loved playing the crane game. There was this place in Anoka when he lived there that would rent movies and made pizza. I think that's what the deal was and they also had a crane game with lots of stuffed animals. It was a machine that he could easily get them to come out. I don't even know how much money he spent on it but he had a huge number of the cheap animals. He kept the good ones but didn't know what to do with the rest. We were both attending the community college at that time and there use to be a little strip mall that also had a Circus Circus in it. We went up there and left the stuffed animals around the place to watch kids come up to find them and see what they did. It was so fun to watch those kids find the stuff animal, look around to see who might have left it. Some kids would take the animals and some would leave it. Your Dad loved to people watch, he liked to know how people ticked, what they thought about and so he was always watching.

the 'rents

So my parents set a rule that he couldn't come over in the house when there wasn't a parent home. I remember thinking it was a very silly rule. Remember, I was only 15. I look back and wonder "What was I thinking!"  Boy, I thought we were mature back then...silly girl!  Anyways, Tony would come over and we would get the extension cord out of the garage, snag the reclining lawn chair and put the little black and white TV on a stool so we could sit outside (obeying the rule) and watch TV together.  I'm not sure that there was anything my parents could have done to keep us apart in the beginning. We just wanted to spend every moment together.

His first car

When we first met, he didn't have a car and I wasn't licensed. I think it took me more than a year before I could get my license. He purchased his first car and I remember him telling me about it. Before he had his first car, he did a lot of walking or catching rides from people he knew and some I'm sure he didn't know. Sometimes he could catch a ride to my house but then he'd walk back to the town he lived in which was almost 8 miles away. This might explain why he was so skinny before he went into the military. He was probably nearly 6 feet and weighed 135 pounds. He likely didn't get enough to eat and expended it working and walking. The towns he lived in were also long distance so we never talked on the phone much (this was before cell phones). Our greatest pleasure was being able to spend time together. Once he bought his first car, he could finally come and go at his leisure. He was so proud of his first car, I remember talking to him on the phone about it and he drove up in this:

I was kinda embarrassed about it, talk about nerdville. I was honest and I think it hurt his feelings. I don't remember how long he had that car but I'm sure it beats walking. I do remember going to see a drive in movie in that car.

As long as I can remember....

Tony loved David Bowie. I think when he was younger, he would be compared to David Bowie and secretly I'm sure he loved that. There was a guy I went to high school that also loved David Bowie who liked to look like him too.  I'm sure he loved other musicians but this is the one that I always attribute to him. We also loved Rod Stewart and Peter Mayer.

At some point in 1989-1991 him and I went to the cities to go see the Indigo Girls concert. I think we had both just learned about them and I wanted to go BAD. The tickets were sold out but I was willing to pay a ticket scalper so we went down there two hours before the show. When we got there, there was a couple of guys with a sign "We need two tickets" already waiting. I asked them if they had talked to the ticket office yet and they hadn't so I let the office know that the line started with them. About 5 minutes later a woman came up and sold her tickets to the two guys so we were first in line AND we got there sign. Pretty quickly after that, the ticket office knocked on their window to get our attention and we were able to purchase two FRONT ROW tickets at face value and I was ecstatic! We dumped the sign in the garbage and went off to have dinner at some ethnic restaurant, maybe thai or something.  On our way back to the show, there was a long line of people looking for extra tickets and someone dug the sign out of the garbage and was using it. I'm not sure that the front row was the best place for that venue, I remember the music being SO LOUD that I used cigarette filters in my ears to try to quiet the noise level. It was a good night and one I never forgot.

This picture of David Bowie looks a bit like your Dad when he was younger.

I don't remember,,,

I don't exactly remember when in the spring of 1985 that I learned that Tony was getting out of the Army. He had back problems which I remember being something about a minor birth defect something about a lower form of spina bifida which is how he got out of the Army. When he came home, he was in a really good place, I think with the money he wasn't use to having allowed him to buy some clothes. What I remember was his jean jacket and his jeans that matched.

Here's a pic of something similar.

Believe it or not, there was a time when I was thinner and could actually wear your Dad's jeans and jean jacket. I wore that jacket until it fell apart, I wrote on it with black permanent marker,  all sorts of stuff, the lining came out.  Here's a pic that's a little bit like the jeans. They pockets snapped up or down and were different colors like the jacket. I could wear them too.

The challenge was for him to figure out what to do next. I believe he might have lived with his buddy J (maybe this was before he left for the Army) for a while and he worked at Mosquito Control. I remember him saying that some of the guys would walk into the convenience stores and fill their waders with food. I don't  know if your Dad stole or not. I do know that he was just living a very subsistence life, his biggest concern was getting enough to eat and it's hard when you're bouncing around quite a bit.

Christmas break 1984

Remember, my memory is crappy but I'll tell you what I do remember. He was coming home for Christmas, and I met his mom and sister (for the very first time) at the local mall in my town. His sister was 11, I think and I was 15. We went to pick him up but I don't remember if it was at the airport, bus or train station. I probably don't remember because those details weren't important to me. What was important is that I got to see him as soon as I could. On the way home, his mom drove and his sister was in the front seat while we were in the back. He looked very different because that's what basic training does, puts you in the best shape of your life. He had a washboard stomach and very short hair, looked very good.  His mom wanted to stop off at the local bar to buy him a beer. I think she was very proud of him. We snuggled in the back seat all the way home. I don't remember how long he was back, my guess a couple of 2 or 3 weeks. I don't know if we went "up north" to spend Christmas with Grandpa and Grandma or if that came later. He gave me my first promise ring for Christmas. I knitted him a scarf that was a steel gray-blue. It didn't look so good at the beginning of it but got better as it went on. The other thing I really remember it that I was so sick when he left that I could hardly talk. It was really bad saying goodbye when you can't talk and it's worse crying when you can't speak.

He and I had exchanged letters while he was gone. He looked very good and I think the army was very good for him. I sometimes wonder if things would have been better for him if he had stayed in.

When I first met him...

I hardly remember this anymore...I was 15 and my best friend from high school (DA) was dating (JG) and Tony was a friend of J's. I don't remember exactly how we realized we were interested in each other but pretty quickly when we realized that, whenever we could, we spent time together. I'm not sure if I knew the living situation for him at the time. I believe he was in a foster home in the same town that J lived in (I'm trying to keep identifying information out of this). He would have been 6 months past 18. I believe his foster home let him live there as long as he needed to get on his feet. His plan was to join the army through the delayed entry program and he did leave pretty quickly after we met, I'm guessing a month or so. The official date we started dating was 9/20/1984.

  I remember feeling pretty dramatic about his leaving. I'm not sure if I knew that he was going or not. I think I might have known just before he left, he was going to try and get out of it but in the end, he called me from a motel where he was going to be staying before they shipped him to Fort Leonard wood, Missouri or it could be Fort Lee, Virginia. He had basic training at one and then AIT (advanced individual training) at the other. He was able to come home between the training for Christmas break.

first post and what this is about

When my Dad died almost 7 years ago, I had a tough time so I wrote about my Dad a lot. I think it helped...looking back to think about all the really great times with my Dad and how important he was to me. The legacy he left me in who I've become.

Now that my son's Dad has died, I'm back to the writing board. I'm back to help work through my grief and to think about the memories of my ex-husband, the father of our son and our time together.

I met Tony when I was 15, it's incredible to think back to that time when I thought I was so smart and had it all together. We had good times and hard times but I knew him for nearly 30 years and now he's gone and that's really hard for me to comprehend sometimes.

I'm also writing this for my son, because I often thought of Tony as my memory too (he was SO good at remembering things that slipped my mind) now I'm one of the closest to the memories for my son of his Dad. I remember the stories and can share them because his Dad cannot.