3.10 Tie Pin and Cufflinks

1959 • San Francisco ~ In the late afternoon on August 7, 1959, my step-mother, while stepping off a downtown bus in San Francisco, fell, had a heart attack, and died shortly after. She was 73. Carleen flew to San Francisco to be with Dad for the funeral; she was more broken up than everyone there put together, not because Irene had died—there was no love lost between them—but because Dad was so distraught. It had been a long time since he’d been happy.

Irene had been widowed twice before marrying Dad and was 19 years his senior. They were an odd match, a tee-totaling strait-laced storekeeper and a bourbon drinking hoity-toity dowager. I’ll bet he was roped like a rodeo calf into this marriage just like the first time around, and like the first time around, hit the ground before he knew what happened. Her daughter, Norma, who was Dad’s age, was one of the girls who worked in the store for Dad. When I figured out that we were related, I asked him if that made Norma my step-sister. In no uncertain terms, he told me no.

my brother Larry, Irene and Dad, Christmas 1958

Irene’s son-in-law suspected Dad had married Irene for her money. He didn’t know my dad. When she died he didn’t want anything from her estate. The only things he kept were his wedding ring, a pearl tie-pin, and a set of diamond cufflinks, along with a tan leather suitcase engraved with his initials and a set of Old Fashioned glasses etched with CJC that she’d given him as anniversary and Christmas presents. After she died, he used them for water; he wasn’t much of a drinker to begin with.

Larry and Dad, Christmas, 1958

It would have been no skin off Irene’s nose to be nice to us, and we missed our dad during those two years, but she made him happy. I have to hand it to him; it was probably one of the few times in his life he did what he wanted, and to heck with what anyone thought.

to be continued…

© 2018. Catherine Sevenau.
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