Sixty-six years of memories
We were only on a short trek from the Dawson post office for coffee at the Pea Pod in Vanderbilt when the strangest memory crossed my mind.
As I navigated the curves of Route 819 with the care of an octogenarian great grandfather, I was suddenly driving from suburban Dundalk, Md., into downtown Baltimore as a newlywed with my beautiful bride next to me on the bench seat of our 1955 Buick.
On a mission to find furniture for our new apartment on Yorkville Drive, we were surrounded by horn-blowing, bumper-to-bumper traffic. Stopping at a red light, we were bumped from the rear by a driver whose only explanation was that I stopped too quickly. My bad, I guess.
On a special day in June, that beautiful bride (still by my side some 66 years later) and I will celebrate that trip and all our trips.
After a year at Bethlehem Steel and off-day trips back to Pennsylvania, I finally had her by my side where we have planned and dreamed together ever since.
So instead of coffee, my mind was on the trip into the city to find our first joint purchase, a huge and impressive sectional sofa that contained a full fold-out bed. We had already planned our one bedroom apartment to receive guests from home. I remembered the laughs we had when she told me about two huge delivery men struggling to get the heavy sectional up two flights of stairs and over winding banisters. I also remembered how I complained when a year later, Al Lenkey and I had to wrestle the monster couch back down the stairs to the U-Haul for a return to Pennsylvania.
I remembered how happy we were as we made new friends and how much we missed our families back home; and I remembered how we sadly said goodbye to our new friends, when after much agonizing we decided that the mill would not provide a career. I remembered the tears we shared as we loaded our baby daughter in the car, hugged our new best friends, and aimed the Buick toward a new start back in Pennsylvania.
My overactive memory transported me to the life we came back to and the sometimes scatterbrained decisions I made in it; never once without her total support. Fortunately, nature was good. We plugged along, creating our beautiful family and keeping the bills paid. While the wolf was never at the door, he was in the neighborhood.
She signed on when I wanted to manage a new Sunoco station in Connellsville. She learned how to pump gas and drive a wreck truck. When I had an opportunity to enter college at age 30, her advice was, “Go for it!”
When my teaching position was threatened with a layoff and we invested in real estate, she became my official demolition partner; yet, all the while, our kids had Mom at home after school and transportation to school events.
When we were not picking up kids at school or college, Bert was caring for her parents and mine or driving an uncle to hospitals in Pittsburgh.
When our first grand baby was born, she drove happily to Pittsburgh every other day to babysit him. With joy, she split the work-week babysitting with our son-in-law’s mom.
Retirement brought the end of trips to Harrisburg, fewer trips to Pittsburgh, and as life slowed down, a new home with accoutrements designed to fit our elder life.
The distance from Baltimore to the Tri-Town area is about 250 miles. The distance through life is quite a few miles more. It’s been a pleasure to share them with you! Happy 66th Anniversary, sweetheart!
Roy Hess Sr. is a retired teacher and businessman from Dawson.