the mid-story… Through Any Given Door, a Family Memoir Part II Torn Pictures San Jose, San Francisco, Hawaii 1954 – 1958 by Catherine (Clemens) Sevenau ~~~~~~~~~ 1954 • San Jose, California ~ I’d reach up and rap the doorknocker twice. I’d say, knock, knock. She’d say, who’s there? I’d … [Read more...]
2.39 Kakaroach
1958 • Oahu ~ Claudia and Mom stayed in Hawaii for four months after I left, walking the beach, sightseeing, going to movies, swatting mosquitoes and smashing cockroaches. No matter how carefully my sister cleaned, how much she sprayed, or how many she nailed with a magazine—from tiny … [Read more...]
2.38 What Did I Know?
1958 • Honolulu ~ I remember a Friday afternoon soon after what happened with Bobby: a girl and I were playing the cigarette game on our way home from school, racing and keeping score of who stomped first on the empty packs of Kents, Kools, and Lucky Strikes flung from car windows and littering the … [Read more...]
2.37 Let. Me. Go.
April 1958 • Hawaii ~ I remember that Saturday afternoon. I don’t know where Mom and Claudia were, probably off to the commissary for groceries or cigarettes, so Bobby and I were alone in their apartment. He was propped up with pillows at the head of the bed. I sat on the bottom corner, … [Read more...]
2.36 I Remember Bobby
1958 • Honolulu, Hawaii ~ I have other memories of Hawaii. I remember Bobby. He was blonde, tan, and handsome, a Georgia cracker with a slow Southern drawl and a boyish, white-toothed smile, a swabbie in bell-bottoms of pressed blues or crisp whites. He was nineteen and in his third year in the … [Read more...]
2.35 With Open Arms 1958
1958 • Whittier, Southern Californa ~ On February 1, 1958, Betty married Tony Duchi, the handsome admirer she’d met at Kinney Shoes the prior summer. The first time she laid eyes on him she fell in love with this man who was her measure, who adored her, and who would protect … [Read more...]
2.34 Christmas Eve
1957 • Honolulu, Hawaii ~ I remember that Christmas Eve. I wanted us to have a tree, so I made it from a beautiful branch of dark wood I found near our house earlier that day. At each tip where its small thorns crooked out I stuck a sugared gumdrop, then carefully bow-tied the mid stems with colored … [Read more...]
2.33 Come Hell or High Water
Nov 29, 1957 • Honolulu ~ I remember the Friday afternoon the hurricane hit. I was walking home with a girl from school who’d invited me to her house, me doing a small skip alongside her, happy to have made a friend. I heard it before I saw it. I turned my face to the sky and felt the insistent air … [Read more...]
2.32 Worrisome Prayers
1957 • San Francisco ~ Letter from Aunt Elizabeth to her brother, my father: March 13, 1957 Dear Carl: Just now writing the date, I happened to remember that this is Carleen’s birthday. If it weren’t so late, I would call her. We are having Mass on Wednesday evenings during Lent and with a … [Read more...]
2.31 Needs Improvement
October 1957 • Honolulu, Hawaii ~ Once again I was in a new school. There were four other haoles (mostly the white children of Navy families from the States stationed in the area) in my class and the rest of the kids were locals of mixed heritage, Chinese, or Japanese descent. The locals … [Read more...]
2.30 Manoa Valley
1957 - 1958 • Honolulu, Hawaii ~ Mom and I settled in upper Manoa Valley, a trolley ride from Honolulu. A valley with a higher elevation than sun-drenched Waikiki, it squatted at the foot of a tropical rainforest shrouded in low rain clouds. When they passed, brilliant rainbows broke through, … [Read more...]
2.29 Off to Paradise 1957
October 1957 • San Jose to the Islands ~ A year and a month into Bobby and Claudia's marriage, Bobby was transferred to Barbers Point, a naval air station about 20 minutes from Honolulu. My mother got the notion that she and I would move there too. Mom wanted to be near Claudia, she and Ray had … [Read more...]
2.28 Gaggle of Girlfriends 1957
1957 • San Jose ~ Things were bad between Betty and Mom. My sister wanted to do what she wanted to do, and Mom couldn’t control her. Betty moved out in her senior year and took over Claudia and Bobby's San Jose apartment when Bobby was transferred from Moffett Field to a naval air … [Read more...]
2.27 Year of Change 1956
A year of family comings and goings ~ January 1956 • My maternal grandmother, Nellie Chatfield, at the age of 82, died in Chico, California. She outlived her husband by 14 years along with two of her ten children. Gordon, her sixth child, died in 1948 (the year I was born) from injuries … [Read more...]
2.26 Lovebirds
1956 • San Jose ~ Claudia was secretly relieved when Mom said she’d have Bobby shipped out. She didn’t know how to say "no" to him, even though it hurt so bad to have sex. She would marry him when she was older, after she’d finished school, when she'd gotten a job teaching junior high. But Bobby … [Read more...]
2.25 The Great Pretender
1956 • San Jose ~ Betty was part of the older crowd and on Saturday nights she and her girlfriends ice skated at the El Camino Skating Rink. All the cute boys were there, circling the arena, showing off to the girls and skimming across the frozen floor backward to the music of "Rock Around the … [Read more...]
2.24 Hoity-Toity
1956 • San Francisco ~ When they married, Dad was renting a small place on Clayton Street in the Haight. He moved into Irene’s fancy two-story Victorian just two doors up from the flat where he first lived on Belvedere. Her place had soaring ceilings and velvet ottomans, a step up from the Formica … [Read more...]
2.23 High Finance
College Income and Expenses ~ Larry misunderstood the workings of scholarships, assuming one had to be an A student to qualify. There weren't many in those days available anyway. It cost about $1,500 to go to school, and that's how much he earned each year to pay his way. Between his powerhouse … [Read more...]
2.22 Wedding Bells
June 16, 1956, Upland, California ~ Our wedding was at the First Methodist Church in Upland, a lovely brick church my family attended since before I was born. Many supportive family friends from through the years joined us as well as our relatives. The minister, Dr. Lee, said that if I guaranteed … [Read more...]
2.21 An 8×10 Glossy
June 1956 • Upland ~ The first time my parents were together after their divorce was at Larry and Marian’s wedding. I have an 8” x 10” glossy reminder of the occasion: the respective parents are flanking the bride and groom, Marian’s parents to her right, smiling big and happy and Larry’s to … [Read more...]
2.20 Small Holy Cups
San Jose ~ During the time I lived with Mom, I was hospitalized several times for malnutrition and dehydration from vomiting spells. The first time it happened I was five. I only remember a couple of episodes as those recollections are tangled up inside me. It will only hurt for a second. … [Read more...]
2.19 Conversations With God
1956 • San Jose ~ Reading was good company. I read whatever was in front of me. I read all four sides of the milk carton and the Cheerios box and the C&H container. I read the editor’s notes and publication dates and fine print in the front of True Detective and Reader’s Digest and … [Read more...]
2.18 Perms
Carleen always gave us a Toni the day before school pictures; she was making us beautiful. She shampooed our hair, yanked our snarls with a sharp-toothed comb, then sat us in a row at the yellow Formica kitchen table. With old bath towels draped over our shoulders, Betty, Claudia, and I perched on … [Read more...]
2.17 Buttons and Bobbins
San Jose ~ I don’t remember Mom being home much. Betty remembers her buried behind a paperback beneath a cloud of smoke, sleeping with her black eye-mask and feather pillow over her head, yelling at us if we disturbed her. She’d cook herself a rare sirloin steak when none of us were around and if … [Read more...]
2.16.1 Thou Shalt Not Steal
1956 • San Jose ~ By third grade I was in my third school and had lived in over twice as many houses. It made me anxious, moving all the time. It seemed that as soon as I’d figure out how to get back and forth to school or to the dentist or to church, we’d move. I spent a good part of my time … [Read more...]