Legacy

Everyone agreed that he was one tough investigative journalist. He didn’t mince words. He told it like it was. He wasn’t afraid to confront any politician or government official that he didn’t think was doing their job. He was fearless, they all agreed. His public persona was one that he liked to sharpen and hone every chance he got. Yep, he certainly was who he was.

When he died, those in the know, those who dealt with him, those who had to work with him day in and day out, they all agreed…that he was a total asshole (their words, not mine). At his wake, few words were minced. Yeah, he was brazen all right, his colleagues agreed. Many said they wished they had his guts, gall, and bravado. Nevertheless, he was still a jerk. Hell of a legacy to leave behind if you ask me.

Then there was a contractor in our community. Many folks claimed he was one of the wealthiest businessmen that no one had ever heard of. At his wake, the consistent message was that he was one tough operator and…that was about it. No mention of any charity work he’d done, no improvements or contributions to his community (it seemed he owned half the place in the beginning), no mention of helping others in need. He just ran his business with an iron fist and made lots of money. Hell of a way to be remembered in the end.

That got me to thinking about my / our respective legacies when the time comes to take a bow and move on to the so-called afterlife.

Me

I grew up without a father or male role model in my life. There was a void of our lives that my Mother chose not to fill with any references or mementos of the man who brought me into this world. So all I have are scratches of tidbits scribbled on a fading memory bank. No good memories, no bad memories, no legacy at all. Nothing of the man who gave me life.

I’ve spoken in the past of my three aunts. From my earliest memories, they seemed like cold indifferent individuals who didn’t particularly care if I existed or not. They really were at the apex of that old time cliché about children ‘better to be seen and not heard.’

My mother with her parents

Horses on my grandparents' farm

What they were really like in ‘real life’ I have no idea. Their backgrounds were similar to that of my Mothers and it was a tough one. There was little to no appreciation for the value of an education. Collectively, they all seemed to have an attraction to men who didn’t value women and had a problem with the drink. By the time they passed, I was either in the service or far removed from my past life. They all passed on and it mattered little to me. Unfortunately, my memories of them are not good ones. That then is their legacy.

Erwin holding our son Brian

My stepfather, Erwin, was a charmer up until the end at age 104. After my mother got ill, we had to place Erwin in a nursing home. He didn’t last long there but his residency was one of mass every morning and sneaking candy into his pew. He loved to sit outdoors and watch the birds and he could still wrangle a card game with the best of them.

My mother only started to slow down near the end of her life and to be honest it was my sister and Sharon who took up the yeoman’s share of caring for her. Marlene and Sharon were saints even when my mother wasn’t. Fortunately, for me my memories began to thin out and dissipate before she got old and ill. I only remember her in fleeting fading glimpses at my past life growing up on Randolph Avenue in Saint Paul. I wish her legacy was clearer than it is. What I remember was good and honest and sincere. She led by example and I became her follower. One could not ask for more.

Sharon and her parents

Other folks have told me about the challenges they went through caring for their aging parents until the end. Everyone faces their eminent demise in their own way. Some are grateful for a life well lived. Some are content with their contributions to society. Others are happy with their children and grandchildren. Others wonder if they’ve prayed enough of late to get them reserved seats beyond the pearly gates.

I’m still pondering my legacy. I hope it’s seen in a life well lived. The solid companionship of a wonderful woman and offspring that warm my heart by their very presence.

It certainly won’t be an accumulation of material goods, second homes, or trips traveled. I hope it’s seen in the accomplishments of my children, the growing success of my grandchildren and a couple of books and plays thrown in for good measure.

If leading by example has any value I’d like to believe I paved a way that my kids and grandkids might want to emulate. As for me, the words I don’t ever want to utter are: woulda, coulda, shoulda.

Fixin' to Die

I’ve reached that point in my life where people I know are starting to die.

Of course, there were others who died back when I was young. But youth and little personal connection meant a somber night at the funeral home because I had to not because I cared. As I grew older there was the occasional unexpected demise of a casual friend or associate but never some-one close enough to move my heart.

Me as a Teenager

I guess I became more aware of my own mortality and that of others when my early morning sidekicks began to pass away. It was those scholars of teenage bliss and angst. My early morning rock and roll companions who trudged with me through twenty-below-zero snow banks to deliver the morning newspaper. They sang to me though my transistor radio and told me all about love and loss and my best years ahead.

One of my favorite song-writing poets died recently. Leonard Cohen spoke to me in a dozen different voices and languages; all of which tugged at my heart and soul.

Now even some folks closer to me, in-laws, parents and relatives have passed on. No one is fixin to die but it’s coming around for all of us. My next door neighbor died a couple of weeks ago. We weren’t close and he wasn’t very friendly but we talked occasionally and joked and philosophized about the world. Now he’s gone too.

Like most past generations, death was one of those topics that seldom if ever was addressed among my relatives. It was never broached in my immediate family when I was growing up. Through either a reticence to admit the inevitable, fear, or abject denial the topic was seldom broached. People grew old, got sick and died. Then someone had to write their obituary.

Strange though it might sound, I’ve always admired those folks with the foresight and fortitude to write their own obituaries.

I think it would be a challenge yet immensely rewarding to write an open honest obituary. I believe a funeral should be the time of celebrating a life well led. A finely crafted obituary can share with friends and strangers happy memories over sadness. It forces the writer to address one key question: what is my legacy? What did I do here on earth to warrant the pride and hopefully the gratitude of my peers, friends, family, and others?

All those thoughts and more have been compiled in yet another file folder for a future musical play I’ve love to write. It’s about a funeral and the celebration that takes place there.

Since none of us have the advantage of knowing how long we’re going to live, I think it’s important to reflect on what we can do now that we’re still alive. Beyond the standard of having a will, staying healthy and exercise, I do have a few more thoughts.

We should each day as if it is our last. Not in a morbid kind of way but rather a daily celebration of the wonder of life and friends and family all around us. Helping others even in the most simplest of ways can mean everything to someone else. And lastly, follow your dreams whatever they are. As the cliché goes, life is too short to live it any other way.

Our Final Tabulation

We all know our lives are supposed to follow a certain predictable pattern. We’re born, grow up, grow old and then die. In the ‘Lion King’ it’s called the circle of life. It’s also used to describe life on the African savannah in several books. A similar theme can be found in a Christian hymn written in 1907 and made popular by the Carter Family in 1935. It’s entitled ‘Will the Circle Be Unbroken.’

So we usually don’t allow ourselves to think about death until something jars us back to reality. It might be a near-death experience, a catastrophic illness or the sudden demise of someone close to us. That’s just what happened to me.

Sharon’s mother passed away in October. It wasn’t unexpected. Her health had been deteriorating for some time. But suddenly becoming an orphan is tough on any adult even one as strong as my wife.

Sharon’s friend Steve was a very successful businessman, Rotary philanthropist and loving grandfather. Last Fall he was fine then one day he became unbalanced on his feet and five months later he passed away from brain cancer.

Kathy was Sharon’s sister-in-law. She broke her ankle last spring. She had it set then operated on twice since the incident. A couple of weeks ago she died suddenly from an infection. In each instance these deaths were a grim reminder of the fragility of life and the need to live each day as if it were our last.

Several friends have commented about bad things happening in threes. I hadn’t thought about it before now. Of course growing up, I knew about ‘the day the music died’ and the fact that Jimmy Hendrix, Janice Joplin and Jim Morrison all died within weeks of one another in 1970.

I usually don’t believe in folk tales, old wives stories or fables. But after these three deaths occurred so close together it got me to thinking it. Those were three life-changing events, expected and otherwise, in less than a month and a half.

Folklorists say that the belief that good or bad things come in threes is an ancient superstition that remains a strong belief among many people today. Americans especially seem to have a propensity to see things in threes. For Native Americans, it’s fours and for the Chinese, it’s five.

“It’s very deep in our culture in terms of religion – the father, son and holy ghost,’ explained Alan Dundes, a professor of anthropology and folklore at the University of Southern California at Berkley. He goes to comment: “It’s in our names. We all have three names. And numerous three-worded phrases like ‘win, lose or draw’ ‘we shall overcome’ and ‘snap, crackle and pop.’

I think it all comes down to your own belief system. The yin and yang of our universe means there will be both good and bad in your lifetime.  Bad luck and good can come in threes, fours, fives and more. It’s all a question of how you want to process these events. If you’re fatalistic it can be grim. If you’re realistic it’s a fact of life. Individual numbers don’t mean a thing.

What does matter is the simple fact that ‘no one gets out of here alive.’ For each one of us there will be an accounting whether we’re present for it or not. We will all have a final tabulation. It’ll either be on our death bed or done by others lamenting our loss. It will be a tabulation of who we were as individuals, spouses, parents, grandparents, friends and associates. It will include who we loved, liked and impacted. It will be the kids we left behind. Then their kids, our grand-children and our legacy with them.

But most importantly we will have to answer whether we made a difference with our lives. Was our existence all worthwhile to others especially those closest to us? And for ourselves, did we make a difference while we were here on earth.

So far, after seventy-three years of living my life as best I can, I think I’m good to go.

 

So I kissed my wife good-bye, told my kids and grandkids I loved them and went for a trail run.  Life is good. I want to embrace it as long as I can.

A Lovely Lady Died Today

My Mother-in-Law grew up in a world ruled by men but raised two daughters who pushed well past those boundaries. Now there is a granddaughter and two great granddaughters who are pushing those barriers out even further. The tracks of our lives continue just as the seasons come and go. A great grandson was born one day. Great Grandma Charlotte died the next. The circle of life had come around again.

Charlotte Faye Schumacher left few trappings of success behind. The house had been sold, her possessions either given to the children or sold at an estate sale. Her material goods kept shrinking with each move from the farm to a house in town to an assisted living facility to a nursing home. Now there was nothing left but for a few mementos passed out to the grandchildren. Nothing left but for the memories…good memories of a life well-lived.

In the end this wonderful woman left the world a much better place through the four children she raised and nurtured into true citizens of the world. They are all good people who followed a legacy born amid those old Nebraska sand farms of the ‘30s and ‘40s.

Row 2, farthest Left in overalls

Charlotte with her Dad

Despite dealing with sometimes crippling anxiety and bouts of depression Sharon’s mom held on to her faith and worked through her issues. Her own mother had died when she was just nine years old and her father died when she was eighteen.

She once told Sharon “You wouldn’t understand what it’s like to lose a parent unless it happens to you. Denis understands.” Charlotte and I shared that commonality of a single parent household. It was a common bond seldom talked about, but understood. We also shared a deep and abiding love for her daughter.

Occasionally we’d talk about growing up without a mother as she followed her father picking berries in Oregon and operating a bar in Nebraska. We related to one another that way and spoke a language unspoken but understood among survivors.

When she graduated from high school in Nebraska, Charlotte taught in a one room school house. She had no formal training. She just took a test and began teaching. She told us her secret was to stay one book ahead of her class. It seemed to work.

Charlotte & Delbert Schumacher Wedding

Then she met a man who was to be her rock for more than sixty-five years. Sharon’s mom used to tell folks she didn’t know how to cook when she first got married. She didn’t mention it was the end of World War II and there were no stoves available. So every morning they had cereal for breakfast. For lunch they had a sandwich. In the evening they went to her Mother-In-Law's for dinner.

In 1957, she followed her husband from Nebraska to Wabasha, Minnesota. She moved there without ever seeing the farm Grandpa Delbert had bought. When Charlotte arrived she found there was no kitchen sink in the farmhouse, but ironically the barn was in excellent shape. I guess that’s what counted in a farm family.

Charlotte told people she never adjusted to living in Minnesota but all my kids can remember were the thrills of finding baby kittens in the barn, tractor rides with grandpa and calling for Shep and Brady, her two favorite farm dogs. It wasn’t ‘Dick and Jane on the farm’ - but it came darn close.

Late in their retirement years her husband developed Alzheimer’s disease. For over two years she cared for her husband at home, tending to his every need. When it was time for him to go into the nursing home, she faithfully visited him as often as she could. They went to mass there every Sunday. She did what she had to do for the man she truly cherished. I Sat Down with God Today.

Sharon and her parents, Charlotte & Delbert

It was her daughter, The Girl with Seven Suede Jackets, who used to tell me of her nurturing upbringing on the farm. Sharon has spoken often about high school class trips and weekend jaunts with her mother acting as her personal chauffeur. She talked about their special trip to England, just the two of them.

Later on in years Sharon took her own grandchildren down to see great grandma Charlotte before the end. At times it was witnessing courage in the face of crippling angst and anxiety. They learned as Sharon did about one generation respecting the next.

Now the only remaining thread in great grandma Charlotte’s life are the four lives she left behind. From them, the many grandchildren and great-grandchildren that are a part of her legacy.

A great grandson was born the day before Charlotte died. In time he will hear the tales of life on the Wabasha farm from his own grandmother. He will learn of its tradition of hard work and faith that is his legacy. And he’ll be able to thank great grandma Charlotte for those memories and lessons in life.

Her legacy lives on in her two daughters, a granddaughter and two great granddaughters born of that same steeled resolve. 

Maya Charlotte LaComb and Charlotte Jane McMahon never knew their great grandma Charlotte very well. But her sterling examples of hard work, perseverance, compassion and caring is a legacy they are sure to carry on.

Charlotte Faye Schumacher could not have wished for anything more.

My Bootleg Years

Living in Amsterdam. 1970

Bootleg: an illegal copy of a video, CD, etc., or an illegal recording of a live performance.

Perhaps that’s what I’m trying to do. Understand those past experiences that defined my life…up until this point. It would seem I’ve entered my bootleg years.

In my lost years, I examined and reflected upon that period between high school graduation on May 3^rd, 1961 and my marriage on May 31^st, 1971. But further reflection of those ten years has left me with a parcel of unanswered questions. It’s much like discovering Ancestry.com and hidden family tracks buried beneath the sands of time. There seem to be a multitude of clues waiting to be unearthed and examined.

Living in Denmark.  1967

Visiting Apple Records.  London 1970

But as interesting as rehashing the past might be, a larger question remains. What do

those past experiences have to do with my present life? What do the tumultuous changes and excitement of the 60’s have to do with my present state of mind? And more importantly, why does it seem to matter so much to me now?

I’ve come to realize and appreciate that those were my bootleg years. Unbeknownst to me I was absorbing, collecting, inhaling and assimilating many of the thoughts and icons, values and virtues, assumptions and goals, ideas and ideals of that period. It became my cloak of many colors that I ended up wearing throughout my life.

But why reflect back on that period now?

My Cretin Classmates.  2011

For one thing, people are dying all around me. Classmates have left our classroom of life. Neighbors have gotten old and frail then disappeared into that large brick building downtown. Others in the prime of their life have suddenly gotten the big C.

But more than the threat of the grim reaper haunting my doorstep is the stark fact that I can’t redo what’s been done…even if I wanted to. I can’t start over again…in most things. I’ve passed through multiple stages in my life.

So how did those ten years mold me into the person I am today? And as importantly, can I allow my head to wander the clouds and still keep my feet firmly planted on the ground as I begun this collective retrospective of my time on earth? Can I do this introspection of mine without bias, apologies or regrets?

Exploring one’s past is like scratching poetry on the beach before the waves of time obliterate those thoughts and ideas. I want to peel back the truth as I know it because it is organic and free of vice. It is pure.

I also refuse to play the mind game: ‘But if not for’…

Our Family 2015

This is it then. It’s all here in this cornucopia of lives and people, places and things that I have lived and experienced, loved and lost, found and lost again, gained and lost again, failed and succeeded.

Now almost organically I am harvesting that lifetime of memories. A plethora of experiences and past moments that offer a brief glimpse into a life lost in the fog of time and a fading memory.

It’s a glimpse at my own legacy and others who have passed before me.

It’s future dates I won’t see.

And who will read my eulogy.