Tag Archives: tragedies

tragedies, travel

I’m still here… and pretty soon, I’ll have a lot to say. ;)

Just a quick note to let everyone know I’m still living… We were very busy yesterday, so I didn’t really have a chance to sit down at the computer. I have been adding small updates to the travel blog, but this isn’t a travel blog, so there’s been less time for writing here. I DO have some new topics, though, and pretty soon I’ll be back in full swing.

I do want to mention that I’ve noticed all of the people coming out of the woodwork about the doomed submersible Titan. I know the people who perished were very wealthy and people think of them as “spoiled” and privileged. I can see their points about that, BUT… I still think the way they died was absolutely horrifying. And from what I’ve read so far, I think Stockton Rush had blood on his hands. He seemed very motivated by greed, ambition, and the desire to make a name for himself. Because of that, four other people died with him in his vastly overpriced contraption, although granted, three of those people should have known better. I feel especially sad for the 19 year old, Suleman, who didn’t even want to go on the voyage in the first place. His life was snuffed out before it even began.

Anyway, we’re about to check out Visby, on Gotland Island in Sweden. I will sign off now… Maybe I’ll be back later. Maybe not.

Standard
tragedies, travel

My second day to be 51…

Hi, everybody. I decided to skip posting yesterday because I caught a virus and was feeling pretty wretched. I did put some posts up on the travel blog, but they were mostly photos. I didn’t take too many of them yesterday, because I slept for most of the day, fighting off a common cold. I’m happy to report that sleeping on my birthday was a wise move, as I feel much better today and will probably be mostly fine by tomorrow.

We are flying to Stockholm tomorrow morning, and should get there at around lunchtime. I’m glad to be going, because although I have enjoyed Bergen and there’s a lot we didn’t get to do that I wanted to do, we’ve spent four nights here. I am ready for new scenery!

I suspect our digs will get a lot swankier on the ship, too. At the very least, I can get my laundry done!

I’ve been reading about the men in the Ocean Gate Submersible. Lots of people are posting really ugly thoughts about them, basically saying they deserve to die because they’re “rich, spoiled, tourists”. Frankly, I have a hard time feeling that way about them… especially the 19 year old young man who was aboard with his father. I think it must be terrifying to be trapped in a vessel under the ocean, knowing that if you aren’t rescued, you will die of hypoxia.

I don’t think many people deserve such a horrible fate. I certainly wouldn’t wish it on someone simply because they happen to be very wealthy. Anyway, I do hope they are found relatively safe.

I’m glad my second day of being 51 was better than my first day. I did experience that legendary surge of energy when a cold starts moving to the next phase. Now, I’m pretty tired, and ready to crash. I’ll probably write more tomorrow from Stockholm tomorrow, but tonight, I’m going to dump more photos on the travel blog. So, if you’re interested in that, be sure to click the link at the top of the page.

The featured photo was taken at the top of the mountain overlooking Bergen. They have goats up there who are even friendlier than they seemed!

Standard
book reviews, healthcare, history, mental health, politicians

A review of Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter, by Kate Clifford Larson…

Amazon.com tells me that I purchased Kate Clifford Larson’s book, Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter on October 25, 2015. It was originally published on October 6th of that year, and I believe I bought it based on recommendations from Alexis, who was my #1 reader and commenter for years. I’m sorry it’s taken me almost eight years to finally get around to reading Kate Clifford Larson’s fascinating book about Rosemary Kennedy, and the very dysfunctional Kennedy family. I’m glad I finally sat down and read the book, because it was surprisingly compelling in many “soap opera-ish” ways.

I’ll admit that before I read Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter, I knew almost nothing about the Kennedy clan, other than the fact that they were a very rich and politically powerful Irish Catholic family from Massachusetts, and they seemed to be cursed by many tragedies. I never knew just how many tragedies there were until I finally read this book that’s been sitting in my Kindle queue for so long. My mind is blown on many levels.

Who was Rosemary Kennedy?

Rose Marie “Rosemary” Kennedy was born in her parents’ home on September 13, 1918 in Brookline, Massachusetts. She was the third child and eldest daughter of Joseph P. and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy. Her older brothers, Joe and Jack, were perfectly normal boys, born to wealthy and prestigious parents. Joe and Rose Kennedy would go on to have a total of nine children, eight of whom were healthy, strong, intelligent, and high achieving. Rosemary might have been completely normal, too, except for a terrible decision that was made as she was being born.

On the day of Rosemary’s birth, Rose’s doctor was not immediately available to deliver her, on account of a severe breakout of Spanish flu. The doctor had to be in attendance when the baby was born in order to collect his fee. Consequently, the nurse who was tending to Mrs. Kennedy told her to keep her legs closed and actually pushed Rosemary back into the birth canal. Because of those unfortunate decisions, Rosemary was kept in the birth canal for two hours without adequate oxygen. When the baby was born, she appeared to be healthy and normal, but as she grew, her parents realized that she was not developing as her brothers, and later, her younger siblings, did.

Soon, it became clear to her family that Rosemary had significant intellectual and mental delays. However, because the Kennedys were so rich, powerful, and ambitious, they kept Rosemary’s condition carefully hidden from most people. She was apparently beloved by her family, yet she was also an object of shame for them. Her parents– especially her father, Joe– took great pains to keep Rosemary’s difficulties out of the public eye.

When she was still a child, it wasn’t impossible to hide Rosemary’s condition from the public; but as she grew older, stronger, and wanting more independence, figuring out what to do with Rosemary, and hiding her disabilities from the public, became much harder for her parents. Complicating matters was the fact that physically, Rosemary was very attractive and flirtatious. She enjoyed the company of men, and they liked her, too. The Kennedys were concerned that Rosemary would end up falling into a disreputable lifestyle that would put her in danger or, seemingly worse to them, somehow embarrass the family.

Power parents…

Rose Fitzgerald was a favorite daughter of John “Honey Fitz” Fitzgerald, a very politically powerful Irish Catholic man from Boston, Massachusetts who had served as a Massachusetts State Senator, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and the Mayor of Boston. Rose met her future husband, Joseph Kennedy, when she was a teenager vacationing in Maine. John Fitzgerald hadn’t really liked Joseph Kennedy and discouraged Rose from being involved with him. But Rose didn’t listen to her father; the couple were wed October 7, 1914, when Rose was 24 years old.

Joseph Kennedy was quite wealthy, and his wife and children wanted for nothing materially. However, he was very unfaithful and had many affairs, to which Rose turned a blind eye. As I read this book, I learned that Joseph was also very image conscious and ambitious, and he expected his family to present the proper look. Rose Kennedy was also very image conscious and obsessed over her children’s bodies. She weighed them every week, and according to Larson’s book, both parents relentlessly fat shamed poor Rosemary, who had a tendency to gain weight.

Rosemary’s schooling…

Because of her intellectual disabilities, Rosemary Kennedy did very poorly in school. Her reading ability never rose past a fourth grade level. She had terrible penmanship and spelling, even though she apparently enjoyed writing letters. She also had trouble counting.

Although Rosemary was basically sweet and loving, she often had what today we might call “meltdowns”. Because she had trouble regulating her emotions and could not seem to grasp basic educational concepts, she went through a whole lot of different schools. Her younger siblings’ scholastic achievements soon surpassed Rosemary’s, as Rose Kennedy was constantly searching for the right boarding schools for her children. Though the other children were bright, competitive, habitual winners, Rosemary was constantly the subject of anguished letters from harried teachers and headmasters who didn’t know what to do with her.

The family experienced a brief hiatus in their scholastic drama when they moved to England in 1938. Joseph Kennedy was then serving as the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain, so the family was temporarily based in London. Rosemary was placed at a Catholic boarding school called Belmont House, where she thrived. Unfortunately, the Kennedys had to move back to the United States due to Nazi Germany’s attack on Europe. Although Joseph and Rose kept Rosemary in England for as long as they could, it was too unsafe to allow her to stay there permanently. She moved back to the United States and then seemed to enter a negative spiral. All of the gains she had made at Belmont House quickly vanished as Rosemary became even less manageable.

Another tragic decision– Lobotomy…

Rose and Joseph Kennedy kept trying to find a suitable place for Rosemary. They failed repeatedly. Rosemary’s behavior grew more erratic and unpredictable. While her parents were apparently genuinely worried about her well-being, they also worried about how public knowledge of Rosemary’s condition might affect their political status and business standing.

Joseph Kennedy had heard about a new psychosurgical procedure being offered at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, DC. Psychiatrist Dr. Walter Freeman, and his associate, surgeon Dr. James W. Watts, were developing a technique that supposedly made “difficult” people like Rosemary more compliant and calm. The procedure was called “lobotomy”, and it involved numbing, and then boring small holes at the top and on either side of the patient’s head while they were awake and restrained. Although the vast majority of patients who had lobotomies did not experience good outcomes, Joseph Kennedy was apparently so eager to solve his issues with Rosemary that he eagerly signed her up for the operation. He did not tell Rose or his other children that Rosemary had the surgery until after it was completed in November 1941.

Like most of the other patients who had served as human guinea pigs for Freeman’s and Watts’ research, Rosemary Kennedy had devastating results after the lobotomy. She temporarily lost the ability to walk and talk, and became even more significantly intellectually delayed. Rosemary eventually learned how to walk again, but did so with a limp. She never regained her ability to speak clearly, and her arm was left palsied.

Heartbreakingly, after the lobotomy, Rosemary’s family basically abandoned her to the care of psychiatric facilities and, later, nuns. She very rarely saw her family for over twenty years, until Joseph Kennedy’s death in 1969. At that time, her family began bringing her back into the family circle. In spite of her intellectual and mental health issues, Rosemary Kennedy was very physically strong and healthy. She died of natural causes on January 7, 2005, in Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin. She was 86 years old.

My thoughts on the book…

It may seem like I’ve given away a lot of Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter in this review, but actually, I’ve just scratched the surface of this incredible story. Kate Clifford Larson did an excellent job researching this book, and writing a compelling explanation of the Kennedy family. I’ve barely mentioned Rosemary’s siblings, three of whom died tragically young, nor have I shared some of the more shocking and outrageous aspects of this story. I definitely came away with an opinion of Rose and Joseph Kennedy, who gave birth to remarkable children who would shape and influence America, yet showed such crass and callous disregard for Rosemary. Yes, it’s true that some of their actions had a lot to do with the mores of the time period, but a lot of it was also just very cold-hearted and cruel, not just to Rosemary, but also to the people who were tasked with helping her.

I do think that this book is profoundly sad, and parts of it are pretty infuriating on many levels. However, it’s also fascinating, given the historical importance of the Kennedy family and the events that were going on at the time. If you’re interested in American and world history, this book may be a page turner for that alone, as it offers glimpses of the current events of the time, and touches on business, politics, health, and mental health care.

While I definitely think the way Rosemary was treated was cruel, I also realize that there were very limited options for people like her when she was coming of age. That was a time when “defectives” (as they were sometimes called then) were forcibly hospitalized or otherwise locked up, sterilized, and/or kept out of society, and away from their families. Rosemary Kennedy was both blessed and cursed by having such a wealthy family. They could afford to send her to different camps, schools, and hospitals, but they were also ashamed of her, and didn’t want her to “ruin” their financial and political successes.

The Kennedy family was also very deeply entrenched in religion. Larson touches on how Rose Kennedy’s deep devotion to Catholicism caused huge rifts with her children, as she insisted that they adhere to her strict beliefs. If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you might already know how I feel about religion, and parents insisting that their children adhere to their religious beliefs. Rose Kennedy’s use of Catholicism in her attempt to try to control her adult children is bad enough, but Joseph Kennedy’s disastrous decisions made solely to protect his image and career were especially reprehensible. Moreover, both Rose and Joseph Kennedy treated some of the people who helped Rosemary with contempt and a true lack of consideration.

Kate Clifford Larson includes extensive footnotes, photographs, and a detailed bibliography. Some reviewers complained that there were too many resources included, and too little text. Personally, I didn’t have that complaint, but then to me, this book included information I didn’t know. People who already know a lot about the Kennedys may find this book to be repetitive. Some even stated that they felt it was a waste of time to read it. Again– this is my review, and it wasn’t a waste of time for me. It does make me think I might want to read more about the Kennedys, however.

Overall

I’m glad I read Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter, by Kate Clifford Larson. I would recommend it to history and political science buffs, but also to anyone who enjoys true stories. However, I would caution readers that this story is pretty sad and infuriating in some parts. Also, I would caution that this book is not strictly about Rosemary Kennedy, but is more from the perspective of her family. You won’t be reading much about what life was like from Rosemary’s perspective, as Larson doesn’t seem to do a lot of original research.

If I had known more about the Kennedys before I read this book, I might have had a more negative opinion of it. But, since I learned new things by reading it, I honestly don’t think of it as a poor effort. Some Amazon reviewers who obviously know more about the Kennedys than I do did take issue with the fact that the book is more about the Kennedy parents and, to a lesser extent, their children, than Rosemary herself.

As an Amazon Associate, I get a small commission from Amazon on sales made through my site.

Standard
condescending twatbags, mental health, narcissists, nostalgia, psychology, Twitter, YouTube

“Don’t make me break my foot off in yo’ ass!”

Years ago, I got hooked on the old comedy show, Mad TV. I still laugh at some of the hilarious and decidedly not politically correct skits and sketches they did on that show. One that is sticking out in my head this morning is “That’s My White Mama”. That sketch was a parody of the 70s sitcom, That’s My Mama, which was about a single Black guy whose “tart tongued and opinionated mother” wanted him to settle down and get married.

That’s My Mama aired 39 episodes from 1974-1975. I was two years old in 1974, and we moved to England in 1975, so I didn’t see the show when it originally aired. I do remember there were reruns in syndication, but I never actually watched more than an episode or two. I probably would have liked it. My mom told me that when I was very young, the only show I liked on TV was Good Times.

An episode of That’s My Mama… I never knew that Ted Lange (aka Isaac the bartender on The Love Boat) was on this show…

I am old enough to remember That’s My Mama, and years ago, I got the joke when comedian Artie Lange created his parody of that show. Again, I didn’t see it when it originally aired, because I was in Armenia. But I saw the reruns.

“Don’t make me break my foot off in yo ass!”
“You don’t want to wake up my mama.”

As I’m thinking about that sketch, I’m also reading about Artie Lange’s life. He’s yet another funny man who’s experienced a lot of sadness and tragedy in his life. It seems like some of the most hilarious people have the saddest real life stories. Lange has struggled with drug addiction, run ins with the police, poor academic performance, mental health issues, physical health issues, and a father who became a quadriplegic after he fell off a ladder and broke his back. It’s amazing that even in the wake of so many personal struggles, Lange was still able to be funny.

Yesterday, I wrote about how Ex has apparently had a very difficult time letting her adult children spread their wings and fly out of the nest. I mentioned how, when younger daughter got married, Ex repeatedly called and texted her during her honeymoon. There younger daughter was, probably doing certain things for the very first time, and Ex was interrupting her with invitations to go swimming and eat pizza. That was just one of many revelations we heard about; there were many others and, of course, I’ve been observing for over 20 years. This is a “mama” who doesn’t want her children to live their own lives on their own terms.

This morning, I noticed that Ex was back on Twitter. Someone was trying to organize a group trip to Scotland for all the Twitter folk who like to watch Outlander. Naturally, Ex, who has made no secret about her “dream” of visiting Scotland, expressed a desire to participate. A bunch of people– mostly women, from what I can see– seem very excited about the prospect of the event.

Ex wrote:

This would really be amazing although I feel like a wallflower already… I think I’d feel like one in person, as well.

Bill told me that he and Ex rarely went to “nice” restaurants, because Ex felt uncomfortable in them. They also couldn’t afford to dine in nice places, because Ex was constantly buying stuff– everything from depression glass to new cars– off of Bill’s single paycheck.

When the organizer said she should “save her pennies” to afford the trip, Ex wrote:

Yes but how many?!?! I’ve got three autistic children and desperately need other things, a computer, a car, acting scholarships for my daughter… how could I possibly?!?!

Um… she has five children, four of whom are legal adults, and two of whom are married, and have their own families in other states. Her youngest is 16 years old. He has severe autism, and obviously needs his mother’s help, which he actually gets from Bill’s older daughter. The other two “autistic children” are adults, and they both function well enough to go to college. One of the “children” she writes of is my husband’s 31 year old older daughter, who is reportedly in graduate school, so Ex can sponge off of her student loans.

I also find it interesting that Ex includes needing “acting scholarships for her daughter (who is supposedly also an autistic ‘child’)” as her responsibility. Especially when we learned that Ex’s eldest child actually won a scholarship to an acting school in New York City, but Ex sabotaged it. Now she wants her youngest daughter to find an acting scholarship in Scotland? What if she actually did find one? Would Ex let her go without trying to fuck the whole thing up for her?

Another poster wrote this:

I hope I can make it. I am still not working. I really want to go. And I haven’t even got my passport yet so that’s gonna take some time being out of work is not fun but my rotator cuff injury dictate what I do at this point.

Seems to me that if this person (who is not Ex) has this many obstacles, she should probably not plan on going and focus on improving her situation so she can make realistic plans. I only included her response, though, because Ex followed up with this comment:

I’m with you! I’m about to have surgery on my ankle/Achilles tendon!! Ugh…

And when I read this, I couldn’t help but remember Artie Lange’s funny parody. I said to Bill, “Does she need surgery because she broke her foot off in one of her children’s asses?” In all seriousness, it doesn’t surprise me to hear that she needs surgery. She broke her foot when she and Bill were married, because she was gardening with bare feet. I’ll bet it’s the same ankle that is causing her issues now.

Ex’s final statement on this event, upon learning that tickets to the event in Scotland were “limited”, was this:

Oh Lordy… tickets limited and everything eh? I’m guessing no room for wallflowers after all?

Hmmm… a ploy for sympathy, perhaps? Or some other “pity play”, as H.G. Tudor would put it?

I suppose I’m glad to read that she’s not making plans to go to Scotland, in spite of having so many needs. In the past, she would have just gone, regardless. One time, she went on a trip to an LDS temple, instead of paying the mortgage on the house that she and Bill once owned, and she eventually let go into foreclosure. She claimed the Lord would provide, as she went to the temple, where she claimed that Heavenly Father would not let her spend her life alone. This was a very typical response she had to any serious responsibility she had– the Lord will provide… or maybe more accurately, someone else can be guilted or suckered into taking care of the problem. It never seems to occur to her that her actions have consequences that affect people far and wide. Her choice to go to the temple, rather than pay her mortgage, helped cause the house to go into foreclosure, which affected Bill, and by proxy, also affected me. And I’ve never even met this bitch in person!

I can see that Ex doesn’t care too much about flying anymore, either. One of the excuses she gave Bill for not allowing us to have visits with his daughters was that she was terrified of letting them fly, due to terrorism and the prospect of them dying in a plane crash. I guess she’s over that fear now, since it no longer suits her purposes. 😉 Of course, the real reason she didn’t want them to visit was because she couldn’t stand to allow them out of her sphere of influence, and she was afraid they might want to live with us instead of her and #3. She couldn’t bear the idea of them bonding with their other parent, and getting a break from her relentless ploys for attention and demands for complete obedience and control.

I realize that Ex is mentally ill, and she has real issues that stem from her own traumas. However, I also know that Ex is fully aware that her behaviors are wrong. How do I know? Because she doesn’t let that extreme “control freak” side of her show on social media. Based on what she puts out for public consumption, she’s a devoted mom, and super friendly and “cool”. If you know the truth about her, though, you realize that this is an elaborate facade, designed to recruit new victims.

It also occurs to me that the person who is organizing this event to allow online friends to meet offline is really opening herself up to potential exploitation. But then, I guess one does that whenever one meets someone in person. You just never know what lurks beneath the surface of a person’s outer layer. By all superficial appearances, Ex is a very “normal” person. But the reality is, she’s anything but normal. She has raised four of her five children to adulthood, but she’s still clinging to them and using them to form an identity. She’d like them to treat her like a child and give her that idyllic childhood era back. But she’d also like to be in charge, call all the shots, make all of the decisions about money, and have the ability to kick people out of the house and lure them back in at will…

Younger daughter briefly mentioned that Ex did kick her out of the house once. But then, when younger daughter got married, she wanted to intrude on her honeymoon and get her and her new husband to move back to where she lives… perhaps even in the same house! All I can think of is that it’s a miracle that younger daughter is so functional and sane, given what she’s been through in her life. She truly is a model of resilience.

Well… I’ve probably gone on enough about this. I never got around to practicing guitar yesterday, so I think I’ll log off and tend to that. Besides… I spend too much time fascinated by Ex. Don’t want her to break her foot off in my ass.

Standard
memories, nostalgia, tragedies, Virginia

German road signs that make me fall down rabbit holes…

A few days ago, when Bill and I were heading home from our trip to the Black Forest, I looked up and noticed a road sign for a town called Hirschberg. Google tells me that Hirschberg is a town in the northwestern part of the German state of Baden-Württemberg (as well as a place in Thuringia). I’ve never been there, and before Monday, I had never noticed that sign. But seeing the name of that town brought back some very old memories from my hometown of Gloucester, Virginia.

This is something I’ve noticed in Europe and the United Kingdom. A lot of the place names here, and in my home state of Virginia, come from surnames. A lot of places in Virginia, especially, are named after places in older establishments. Take, for instance, the town of Kilmarnock, Virginia. It shares that name with a place in Scotland. I guess people from Scotland settled the town in Virginia and named it after their original hometown across the pond. I have to agree, having been to both places, the landscapes are kind of similar.

In any case, when I saw the name Hirschberg, I was immediately reminded of a tragic story from my childhood, over 40 years ago. The date was March 23, 1981. I was eight years old, and a third grader at Botetourt Elementary School. In March 1981, I had only lived in Gloucester for about nine months. My parents bought their business, The Corner Cottage, in the spring of 1980 and we moved to Gloucester on June 21st of that year, the day after my 8th birthday. I experienced quite a culture shock in Gloucester, because we had come from Fairfax, Virginia, which is a MUCH more populated place. And we’d only been in Fairfax for two years; prior to that, we lived on Mildenhall Air Force Base in Suffolk, England. In 1981, I still felt kind of like a foreigner in the United States, having spent three of my conscious years abroad. I wasn’t fitting in very well in Gloucester and, truth be told, I hated it there.

My next sister, Sarah, was sixteen years old on March 23, 1981. She was soon going to be 17 years old, and she attended eleventh grade at Gloucester High School. I would graduate from there myself in 1990. In 1981, 1990 seemed like a million years away. And in 2022, 1990 seems like it was yesterday.

In 1981, the principal at GHS was Mr. Donald W. Hirschberg. I didn’t know anything at all about him, but I do remember Sarah talking about her life at GHS. She probably mentioned the principal, too. She seemed so grown up to me at that time. I remember she was studying French and was even allowed to come to Botetourt to “teach” French to some of the gifted kids. At the time, one of my friends was one of Sarah’s “pupils”.

I don’t think Sarah was at Botetourt on Monday, March 23, 1981, though. That was a day that is still remembered by a lot of my peers because it was the day that Mr. Hirschberg’s wife, Nancy, and their twelve year old daughter, Julie, would die in a horrific car accident. I’m not absolutely certain, but I think another child also died in that crash. I make that assumption because I found a Facebook post about the accident that mentioned another girl who died. Strangely, I don’t remember hearing as much about her.

I was still very new to Gloucester in 1981, so I never had the pleasure of meeting Julie. She was three years older than me, and went to what was then called Gloucester Middle School and later became an elementary school (after I had finished GMS myself). I do remember the accident, though. It happened at a time when Gloucester had very few traffic lights. I know it’s a cliche, but in 1981, that county was still very much covered in farmland. We had a McDonald’s and a Pizza Hut that served the whole county. Gloucester Courthouse, which is about a mile or two from where I lived, had really disgusting water that tasted like sulfur. Our house had well water, which was only marginally better. I remember turning on the taps and seeing rusty water.

I’m not totally sure where the fatal intersection was, but I know I drove past it many times. Route 17 runs from north to south through Gloucester. It’s the main artery through the county, and it’s virtually impossible to avoid driving on it if you’re traveling through Gloucester. I actually think the intersection was one very close to my home. For years, there was nothing but a stop sign there, where people would wait as traffic coming down Route 17 barreled down the highway. Since 1981, the farmland has been turned into a huge Walmart complex. People probably don’t zoom past that intersection anymore, because it’s now heavily moderated by traffic lights. If that wasn’t the intersection, then it was one not far from there, and I would have passed it many times over the 19 years Gloucester was my actual home.

So there I was on Monday, October 3, 2022, speeding down the Autobahn, suddenly remembering Gloucester in the early 80s. I saw that sign for the town of Hirschberg in Germany, and it made me think of twelve year old Julie… a girl I never knew, but heard a lot about when I was growing up. Knowing how Gloucester was in the 80s, I feel very sure we would have probably met at some point. Back then, Gloucester was the kind of place where most people knew each other. I don’t think it’s like that anymore, though. I do still know a lot of people who live there, as a number of my classmates either never left or have returned with their own families.

I got curious about Mr. Hirschberg, too. So I looked him up, and discovered that he died in 1998. He had moved to Poquoson, a city not far from Gloucester, and remarried a woman with the same first name as his late first wife’s. Mr. Hirschberg, at age 61, wasn’t that old when he passed. I wonder if he never got over the grief of that terrible accident. People on Facebook were still discussing it as recently as 2011, with some saying they would never forget that night. A few said it was the first tragedy of their lives, and the first funeral they ever attended. Some said that they still think of Julie and the other girl who died every time they go through that intersection.

I think about the fact that Julie was just three years older than me, and it appears that she was a very popular girl with a lot of promise. She was involved in many community activities and probably would have gone on to live a very productive life. It amazes me that her life ended the way it did– so suddenly, tragically, and randomly, it seems. It could have been any one of us who met that fate. I wonder what she would think about me– someone who never met her, but was one of her contemporaries– thinking and writing about her 41 years after her death, reading about her on the Internet, which didn’t even really exist for regular people back in 1981. I wonder what she would think about people in the “You grew up in Gloucester” Facebook group, still remembering her in 2011 and posting about that dreadful day in March 1981. Julie never experienced Facebook, but I bet she’d know it well if she had lived to see adulthood. I never knew Julie, but I knew a lot of her friends, and they still miss her so many years later. That amazes me.

I haven’t been to Gloucester since 2010, when my mom finally sold the house I grew up in. I was astonished by how different Gloucester was then. It was weird to walk through the house and see things I hadn’t seen since we moved in back in 1980. Our house was old, and kind of weird, so there was a big plumbing pipe coming up through the floor in the tiny room that had served as my bedroom in the early 80s. It had been covered by my twin sized bed for many years. Now it was laid bare, looking as strange as it did in 1980. Even our house is very different now than it was in 1980. My parents doubled its size in 1984, when they added on a new kitchen and a knitting and needlepoint “shop” for my mom to run. My dad had a new custom picture framing “shop” built in 1997, knocking down the weird building that was erected there some decades before. Now, it’s owned by the lady my dad hired in 1989 to help him frame pictures.

Isn’t it funny how the most random things can cause a person to fall down a rabbit hole of memories? Or, at least that’s how it happens for me. I used to wish I was born in 1968, so I could be closer in age to my sisters and have more of a relationship with them. But now I’m glad I was born when I was. I think it was the right time. I don’t know why my mind takes me on these tangential rides, but I have a feeling someone else out there still remembers Julie. I’ll probably be “visited” here by people from Gloucester, who can recall the spring of 1981, too. I am not a Gloucester native, but I know a lot of people are, and they have long memories.

I was pretty fortunate to grow up in Gloucester, even though I hated it in the 80s. My sisters were all Air Force brats, so they were moved constantly. I don’t know if they really feel like they have a “hometown” like I do. They’ve settled in different places, but their childhoods were nomadic. I used to be envious of them, but then I became an Army wife and experienced that lifestyle myself. I think it would have been hard for me as a child. It’s hard as an adult. It’s nice to know that there is a place where people remember me, even if no one in my family lives there anymore. I’m glad to have some roots… although I doubt I’ll be moving back there. I don’t think I fit there anymore. It’s like the old Neil Diamond song, “I Am… I Said”, when he sings:

Well I’m New York City born and raised
But nowadays
I’m lost between two shores
L.A.’s fine, but it ain’t home
New York’s home
But it ain’t mine no more

Yeah. I can relate to that.

Just because it’s a great song that still works in 2022.
Standard