| Biographical Non-Fiction posted October 5, 2022 | Chapters: |
...166 167 -168- 169... 
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Birthday, Halloween and company in the fall of 1996.
A chapter in the book Remembering Yesterday
1996 Is Winding Down
by BethShelby
| Background The family is living in Chattanooga. The children have left home but live nearby. Beth's father has moved in and she is his full time caregiver. |
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.
In 1996, we had our first frost on the 21st of October. One day the leaves were still green and overnight we suddenly got all the fall colors. I hated to see cold weather, but I loved the transformation. Having a sunroom with a lot of windows on two sides made our view a lot nicer. We already had a second-floor deck off the master bedroom which gave us a nice view to the east. Your favorite season had always been the fall. Growing up in the country, you had been a hunter, and you had enjoyed that. I was thankful you didn’t enjoy shooting animals anymore. Dad never liked fall. He said it reminded him of death.
On the 29th of October this year, all the kids made a big deal about your birthday. Carol had taken you to dinner at a nice restaurant a couple of evenings earlier. I had given Dad his bath and helped him to bed earlier, so I could go. The following day, we did the same thing with Don, but he insisted on a movie as well. We went to see one with beautiful scenery called Alaska. It was a survival story as children searched for their father who was lost when his plane went down.
On your actual birthday, Connie made a big cake and decorated it to look like a Halloween pumpkin. She and Charlie came over, and we had pizza and later the cake and ice cream. I didn’t get so much attention on my birthday. Just kidding! We always made a big deal over everyone’s birthday.
The weather was really chilly on Halloween night. Don and Kimberly brought Loren over in a cute Cinderella costume, and they took her around to some houses to trick-or-treat. Since kids had to climb a steep incline to get to our house, we only had nine or ten trick or treaters show up. Christi came over dressed like a witch to give out candy. Becaues so few showed up, there was a lot of leftover candy.
With all the sweets around and the celebrating going on, you and Dad both came down with a bad cold. It was bad timing because your sister, Maxine, called and said her son, Gary, was coming up and would bring her and Helen for a visit on the 2nd of November. I knocked myself out getting the house spotless and buying groceries for meals, so I wasn’t feeling so good either.
Gary had brought Maxine and his wife, Cindy, up to visit us two years before. He wanted her to see the Christmas lights at Rock City while she could still enjoy them. That visit wasn’t long after she was diagnosed with brain cancer. Her mother and other relatives still lived in this area and Gary wanted to visit them. Gary was still broken-hearted over Cindy’s death. We avoided talking about it.
All three of your family claimed to be blown away by our new sunroom. Gary even brought Cindy’s relatives over to see it because he thought it was so neat. We had company for three days and you took them over to the Ocoee river to show them where the white-water rapids for the Olympics were held. Maxine and Helen did some Christmas shopping while they were here.
Carol was involved in a bad wreck on her way to her work at the hospital. A car came from a side street without seeing her. She swerved off the road to avoid being hit and plowed into a telephone pole. The man who hit her pulled over and called the cops. He told them it was all his fault. Carol's airbag exploded in her face, and she was pinned in so tight she couldn’t unbuckle the seat belt.
She was sort of in a daze until the police arrived and helped get her out. It turned out the man who hit her worked at the same hospital she did. As soon as she realized she wasn’t badly injured and just bruised, he took her on to work. The car had to be towed to the shop, and his insurance took care of the repairs and got her a rental car. You had to pick her up from work and go with her to pick up the car.
It took a long while to get her car repaired, but as soon as she got it back, she went to Georgia to visit Glen’s relatives. Glen was remarried, but they’d managed to stay friends. They seemed to be getting along better than when the two of them were married. Glen’s wife was trying to get pregnant, but she wasn’t having much luck. Glen never really wanted children during the eight years when he and Carol were married.
Connie told us she was having problems when she stood up suddenly. She felt like she was about to pass out. Of course, that had us concerned. Charlie was sure it had something to do with the weird heart rhythm pattern the doctors found before she went to work at summer camp and met him. He bought her an alert bracelet to wear, so someone could be notified if she did pass out.
She visited her heart doctor, and he did an electrocardiogram and a stress test. She seemed to be okay at the moment, but he did tell her there was a possibility she might have to have a pacemaker at some point. Charlie worked in the hospital lab, and he saw her blood work. He said it showed she was low in iron.
Christi and a male friend she often sang with got a gig to entertain for an evening, and they would be paid $100 each. Carol and her friend Roy went to see them sing. Carol said they did a great job, but she wished Christi wouldn’t talk before she sang. To her, it sounded like she was apologizing for being alive. Christi wasn’t confident enough, and she did tend to do that without realizing how it sounded. She might say they didn’t have long to practice, or something similar, to indicate she normally sounded better.
One of the girls Connie worked with in the evenings at Provident Life Insurance brought a kitten to work and gave it to her. Connie fell in love with it, but she and Charlie were in an apartment with a no-pet policy. They were hiding the kitten, knowing if anyone found out, they would likely be evicted.
In November, we went to the polls to vote, with very little enthusiasm. You and I weren’t impressed with either Clinton or Dole. More as a protest than anything else, we voted for Ross Perot again. Of course, he didn’t have a chance. Carol voted for Clinton because she didn’t want to waste her vote by voting for Perot. Charlie liked Clinton, because he was for cleaning up the environment. He and Connie voted for him. Because the economy was good, Clinton easily won a second term.
In the world news on November 12, a Saudi Arabian flight ran into another plane, causing both planes to go down over India killing 349 people. It was one of the worst air disasters of all time.
The holidays would be coming up soon. This was always the busiest time of the year for me. You enjoyed Thanksgiving and Christmas more than I did. I got tired just thinking about all the work involved. Thankfully, you were willing to help and did everything I asked you to do. I could have never managed the holidays without you.
THIS IS US:
Evan is 68 and a retired drafting supervisor from Chevron Oil.
Beth is 59 and has given up working in the printing field and is home taking care of disabled father.
Carol is 33, recently divorced, and a nurse, working at a hospital in Chattanooga and living in an apartment.
Don is a twin. He is 31, a recent graduate of Life Chiropractic College.
Christi is Don’s twin. She is working as a receptionist at a chemical company and doing massages on the side.
Kimberly is Don’s wife. She is a nurse working at a Chattanooga hospital.
Lauren Elizabeth Jane Shelby is Don and Kimberly's baby, age two.
Connie is our youngest daughter. She is twenty-three. She is a senior in college and also working part time.
Evan is 68 and a retired drafting supervisor from Chevron Oil.
Beth is 59 and has given up working in the printing field and is home taking care of disabled father.
Carol is 33, recently divorced, and a nurse, working at a hospital in Chattanooga and living in an apartment.
Don is a twin. He is 31, a recent graduate of Life Chiropractic College.
Christi is Don’s twin. She is working as a receptionist at a chemical company and doing massages on the side.
Kimberly is Don’s wife. She is a nurse working at a Chattanooga hospital.
Lauren Elizabeth Jane Shelby is Don and Kimberly's baby, age two.
Connie is our youngest daughter. She is twenty-three. She is a senior in college and also working part time.
Charlie is Connie's husband as of June 30, 1996. He works as a lab tech in Memorial Hospital.
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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