Where the Penguins Went to Roost

Before Sharon’s health issues prevented me from venturing out on my bicycle this spring, I had a ritual dearly loved and enjoyed. My Springtime bike rides into St. Paul and Minneapolis were classic-at least in my mind. They would begin innocently enough; unplanned, scheduled or routed. Just another Saturday morning jaunt to discover or rediscover parts of the Twin Cities I hadn’t been to for a long time. It was a return (abet, just passing through) to those parts of the city that had affected my life so many years ago.

First stop on my journey of discovery always began at the Dunn Brothers coffee shop in the Longfellow neighborhood of South Minneapolis. The earlier in the morning the better. The perfect time for insomniacs, running and biking fanatics and one oldster reclaiming his past.

After a less than nutritional breakfast and some reflection, it was time to begin my journey of discovery. It might be down Lake Street to downtown Minneapolis. It might be down the River Boulevard to the University of Minnesota or south to Minnehaha Park. Today, it was a quick decision to head east toward the rising sun and my old haunts in Saint Paul.

F. Scott. Fitzgerald used to live in a row house with the plaque out front before fame and alcohol cut short his writing career.

There’s a story here and a poem too (Under Cathedral Dome) but Alice wouldn’t approve and besides that was another era long since past. It’s probably best left unspoken now…unless it shows up in some future novel.

Then it was a drop down off of Ramsey hill to what was once the edge of downtown Saint Paul.

This would have been the first of several marginal rental properties we lived in before my mother built our home in Highland Park. Not surprisingly, the entire neighborhood has turned over several times now or morphed into empty lots. The playground in the background is now United Children’s Hospital.

My mother’s first and only grasp at entrepreneurship came right after she got married. It was a small café they called ‘Frenchy’s Eats’ named after my father who was French-Canadian. The venture failed miserably because, according to my mother, the help stole from her and my father drank away the profits.

At the other end of the block from ‘Frenchy’s Eats’ is the bar where legend has it my father drank almost every night. It was a half a block and a total lack of responsibility away from my mother’s dreams and aspirations. I’ve written a play entitled’ Frenchy’s Eats’ which explores that period in my mother’s life, my own life later on, and the ensuing repercussions that flowed downstream.

The only memory I have of this rundown six-plex is a phone call my mother received one evening. She started crying… then my sister started crying…so naturally, I started crying. I was six years old at the time.

Years later, I found out that the phone call was from a grandmother (on my father’s side) informing my mother that my father had just died in some old flea-bitten hotel in Missoula, Montana. My mother told us he was on his way back to Minnesota from the west coast… after an absence of four years from our lives?

We were always warned not to talk to or go by the DPs. They were displaced persons mostly from Eastern Europe who were resettling in Minnesota after the war. I learned much later the building was a way-station for these refugees because they had to be quarantined for a certain period of time. The units are all condos now.

The Little Sisters of the Poor have been doing God’s work since 1855. They were feeding and housing the poor long before I was born. They’re still doing it today.

Wilder Nursery was one of the few day-care operations for indigent folks back when. For my mother it was a God-send. There was this older black woman who was a playground supervisor. She liked me. Kids can always tell when an adult likes them. She called me ‘butterball’ probably because I wasn’t the thinnest kid on the block. It was my first taste of affection from another human being and made me feel warm all over.

On our sporadic outings from Wilder Nursery, we would go down to Irving Park. Back then, it was old and tired and a sad reminder of its glory days back in the twenties. I led my gang of four- year-olds from the nursery. We would run around and scream at the other kids and pretend we were cowboys. I had a vivid imagination even back then.

I’ve often said I’m grateful that my mother gave me life and raised us in this house instead of an apartment. There are a lot of memories there. Mostly good ones and I never once felt different from the other kids on the block because I had a house to live in like they did.

The nuns were housed in this large building across the street from the little French church downtown. My sister and I had to walk by the nun’s residence each morning coming up from the streetcar line. We were always worried we’d meet up with the nuns on their way to school. Dressed in black and white, strict, stern, never-smiling, a walk with them for any distance was pure torture. But by eighth grade, as only a group of smart-ass boys would agree, that was where the penguins went to roost each night.

I was conscripted into service as an altar boy right after fourth grade. My slot was the 11:30 mass every Sunday. So, for years I’d get up at 4:30 to do my paper route and then waste a good part of the morning until I took the bus downtown for mass. I argued for an early morning slot but the priest liked the schedule just as it was. It pleased my mother to see me serve God every Sunday but it sure screwed up my Sundays for other things.

St. Louis grade school was run with an iron fist by the French nuns. The entire school consisted of four large rooms, two per floor. There were two grades per room. The bathrooms and cafeteria were in the basement. Some of the nuns were nice but never overly friendly. Some (in retrospect) were psychotic and dangerous to small children and helpless animals. But that was a different era.

It was in first grade that the dear old nuns informed my mother that the French spelling of my name was Denis, not Dennis. I’ve been Denis ever since. I learned at an early age that one doesn’t challenge French nuns.  Shortly after I graduated, they tore down the school and put up a parking lot.

Cretin High School was a true turning point in my life. I was lost and scared and absolutely clueless. But somehow, I made it through four years and got a good education. After that, there was no turning back. While I was done trudging up the hill and avoiding the penguins, I was still on my quest for a lifetime of learning. My kids have already thanked me. My grandkids can thank me in the future.

When I was a Younger Man

On the surface, it might seem conceited of me writing yet another article about myself. Perhaps it’ll be mistaken as some self-absorbed treatise on the wonderment of youth and the trials (slash) tribulations of growing up in the 50’s in the Midwest. Like some opening act or shadowy prelude to my oft-mentioned ‘Lost Years’ during the Sixties. In reality, it’s a sobering realization that the complexity of youth is often realigned as age and maturity gain some foothold on one’s memory.

My Mother appears in these two pictures; the first on her wedding day and the second with some skittish grade-schooler in her own backyard. Yet her presence can be felt in every picture…one vision then, another now.

I can’t say the pictures unleash a floodgate of fond memories drowning my consciousness with warmth. But nor do they harken back to a darker period in my life. Instead, the photos tell a simple story. It was what it was. That would be defined as growing up in a single parent household and raised by an emotionally-vacant woman who was just trying to survive under some very tough circumstances. And she did it with little to no support from other family members. Boyed by her Catholic faith and the resiliency of her rural upbringing this woman made the best of numerous life-changing events in her life.

My mother came from an agrarian culture, much like the woman I would eventually marry. Beneath that façade of modesty was one tough, hard-working and determined woman. With little more than her own mental smarts and street-learned determination my mother made her way through a hard-scrabble, ever-changing world…with two kids under tow and no husband at her side.

I look back at these pictures of myself now and see them quite differently than I have in the past.

I used to see a scared kid unsure of himself with no father or father figure to guide him along. Now, I see a kid heavily influenced by the work ethic and penny-wise attitudes of his mother. She started working at age five by cleaning out the chicken coop. I started working in seventh grade with my first paper route. We both always had/have side hustles going on.

I used to see a teenager desperate to find love and affection and someone to be close to. Now I see an ordinary kid just like every other kid I knew who was searching for love…only I didn’t know it at the time.

I used to see kid so proud of his ROTC training and the Lieutenants bars pinned on his shoulders even if it was only in high school. Now, I see a kid who got the message early on that education was everything and he was determined to pass that on to his own children and grandchildren.

I used to see a young man in his hippie beads trying to express himself with a mother who never quite understood why. Now, I see that same young man in his hippie beads and understand what she was smiling about.  I think I’d be smiling right there alongside her now.

Age and maturity have finally brought clarity to the reality of those pictures now. It’s too late to tell her now but if I could…..I’d tell my mother:

I’ve never said it before, Mom, but you did good. With very little help and lacking any formal education you managed to pull off what a lot of other married women and single mothers weren’t able to do.

You built your home with your own hands; making sure your kids got a good Catholic education. You even managed to finally find the joy of love later on in life. And near and dear to your heart, you were loved by your grandchildren who still treasure their memories of you long after you left for that Novena in the Sky.

I’m sorry I wasn’t able to see the whole picture when I was growing up there alongside you. It was cloudy and vapid back then…and it’s taken a long time for me to put that puzzle together. I should have told you how very proud I was to have you as my mother. I’ve never said that to you before.

But I’m saying it now.

Self-Made, Not Quite

I used to think of myself as a self-made man. I had pulled myself up by my own accord. From starting a paper route in seventh grade to being one of the first in my extended family to get a college degree. I had traveled abroad when no one else had ventured very far. Lived as an ex-Pat in Denmark. Ended up with my own business, real estate investments and then entered the last chapter of my life as a published author.

That was me or so I thought. Raised by a single mother, no male role model in my life, no guidance, no direction, no lucky breaks, just some poor schlep trying to make it on his own. I saw that analysis, not as some congratulatory tour of self, but rather an honest appraisal of my upbringing. Problem was, I had left out the people, places and things that molded me into the person I am today.

Yes, I had done all of those things and I still hunger for success. But it wasn’t just my work ethic, ambition or chance encounters that got me to where I am today. Nor was it some serendipitous turn of events that helped me along the way. Who knew what really happened to me growing up? Turns out that Malcolm Gladwell did and it was truly eye-opening.

In his best seller, ‘Outliers,’ Malcolm Gladwell makes a very convincing argument that “In understanding successful people, we have come to focus far too much on their intelligence and ambition and personality traits. Instead, Malcolm argues in ‘Outliers’, we should look at the world that surrounds the successful – their culture, their family, their generation, and the idiosyncratic experiences of their upbringing.”

It's a fascinating concept and he uses some very convincing examples of successful people like Bill Gates and groups like the Beatles to prove his point. So, it got me to thinking. Were there events, encounters or timelines that helped me along the way? If so, it probably began with a small two-bedroom bungalow my mother built by herself in St. Paul, Minnesota.

The house itself was of less importance than the fact that it gave me stability and a base from which to explore my world. It was a nest I could always retreat back to where I felt safe. More remarkable is that it was built by a woman with a sixth-grade education and a job as a short-order cook. Her brother worked on the house during the day and my mother at night.

Starting a paper route in 7^th grade because my mother needed financial help seemed like a no-brainer to me. It was my first introduction to compound savings, resisting the temptation to waste money on frivolous things and the real possibility of building a nest egg for college.

Of my three Aunts, Coletta was the most successful of the four sisters. Her three sons were always held up within family circles as icons of success. Milton, the insurance executive, Jerry, the Hamm’s Beer supervisor and Ronald (Buzz), the doctor.

In my mother’s rural German Catholic culture, nuns, priests and doctors were considered ‘blessed people’ and above the rest of us. Without a word spoken, the message was very clear. Buzz, the doctor, was the pinacol of success. He went to Cretin High School and St. Thomas College. He was one of the cool kids. I knew I wanted to follow in his footsteps.

Only 265 young boys out of 650 were chosen to enter Cretin High School. Someone dropping out and cousin Milton’s influence with the Christian Brothers got me in as a freshman. Un-denounced to me, I was placed in the non-college track of studies. I was expected to, hopefully, graduate and get a job or enter the service. College was definitely not in my future by their standard of the times.

Yet it was, more than anything else, the environment of an all-boys military school that reinforced my own self-image and desire for more. I certainly knew I wasn’t one of the chosen elites, the best of the best in our class. I wasn’t even in the same classroom with them. But I did become an ROTC officer, joined a couple of after school activities and started to believe in myself.

My savings ran out after two years at St. Thomas College so I transferred to the University of Minnesota and promptly flunked out after two quarters. Uncle Sam gave me a job for two years and St. Thomas welcomed me back, curtesy of the GI Bill. Living in Denmark introduced me to an entirely different world outside of Saint Paul, Minnesota. It also heightened my interest in a myriad of subjects from urban housing to the universality of music. Once back on home soil, I began my real life.

An ad in the Minnesota Daily, student newspaper of the University of Minnesota, caught my eye. It was for a writer at the Minnesota Department of Public Health. Having no other options and apartment and car payment due soon, I took the job. Then a desire for more writing opportunities carried me to public television and my future career in video production and distribution.

When Sharon decided to marry me, I became locked into a lifestyle that has done us both very well. Starting my own business, Sharden Productions, while still working in public Television, gave me the capitol to invest in real estate. Sharon’s mastery of the maternal skills as well her own work ethic reinforced our success as a family entity.

Malcolm’s book ‘Outliers’ helped me see a much bigger picture called my life. Reflecting back on a lifetime of hard work and sacrifice, I now understand it was also a lucky confluence of many different factors that added to that equation. My dysfunctional yet lean upbringing fueled a desire for more. Education played a pivotal role in quenching a lifetime thirst for knowledge. Controlling my own financial future brought a comfortable lifestyle.

Most importantly, Sharon, as my life partner, conscience, advisor, critic and guiding light gave me the normal family life I never had growing up.  In the end, that’s about as good as it gets.