“Your life story would not make a good book. Don't even try.”
-Fran
Lebowitz
I view autobiographies and memoirs to be mostly exercises in
vainglorious excess. There are some people I admire and am indeed
grateful they've taken the time and effort to chronicle their lives. I
do not consider myself to be a member of that select category.
That said, I made a promise to my late grandmother that I would write a
book about myself that would include a synopsis of her early life. Her
request may seem odd, especially since I was only thirteen at the time
she made it.
And the idea was prompted at the recommendation of a fortune teller.
Grandma occasionally invited a number of mildly irrational ladies to our
apartment for coffee and snacks, and each attendee would also get a ten
minute session with an odd woman who foretold future events via
cartomancy: removing cards at random from a standard deck, and assigning
significance to them based on the order in which they were chosen.
Even as a teenager I put no faith in prophets who used public
transportation and chain-smoked unfiltered Pall Malls. I still don't.
But I overheard my grandmother's guests praising the oracular card
shuffler's previous prognostications. Grandma herself swore a prediction
from her last party, made by the lady with the blue hair and pack of
well-worn Bicycle brand cards, had accurately foretold an event of such
personal significance that she could not reveal it to me.
While the ladies filed into and out of the front bedroom, I had to
deliver the day's Daily Messengers and Pittsburgh Presses to the 50 or
so houses on my newspaper route. It took about an hour, and when I
returned, the apartment was empty, except for my grandmother. She sat at
her favorite station, her bedroom window, so she could watch life
transpire on Ann Street. When she noticed me, she motioned to me to join
her.
“Mildred (the fortune teller) told me something you should know,” she
confided conspiratorially.
“Gram,” I protested, “that's crazy. You know I don't believe in that
stuff.”
She nodded her head, glowered over her wire frame bifocals, and wagged
her index finger at me. “Listen, mister high honor roll. You may think
you're smart, but you're not old enough to know everything. Now sit
there and listen.”
Grandma rambled on for quite a while, but the gist of her monologue was
this: Among other improbable events, I was going to become a published
author when I grew up, and one of the things I would write would be a
book detailing my life story, which would in part prominently feature my
grandmother and tales of her hard scrabble youth cooking pies in a hotel
in rural West Virginis. It was going to be a potentially lucrative
venture, she hinted, and insisted I promise to carry through with
Mildred's premonition.
“Okay, okay” I said, “I promise.” I gave her a kiss on the cheek and
went about my business, since arguing with my grandmother was never a
productive exercise. Especially when it involved supernatural mandates
from elsewhen in the spacetime continuum.
I passed the dining room table where the ladies had been seated and
noticed one of my Model Rocketry magazine issues sitting on top
of a stack of newspapers.
Aha!
That particular issue contained an article I had written. It was my
first piece accepted by a real publication, and I received an impressive
$75 stipend for my efforts- almost $700 today, adjusted for inflation-
not bad for a 13 year old's first submission. I'm certain my grandmother
had passed the magazine around to impress her guests, including the
fortune teller lady, which made her prophecy of me becoming a published
author something less than prophetic.
Although, to be precise, she said that was something I'd achieve as an
adult. Apparently my teenage efforts in a hobby magazine didn't count.
I did become a “published author” when I grew up, although it has
never been my primary vocation. I attribute that circumstance to my
family's unreasonable expectation to eat on a daily basis. Still, not
counting the output from my brief newspaper career, I've written several
hundred magazine columns, scores of technical papers, and reams of
software documentation.
But, alas, no book describiing tales of adolescent pie baking in West
Virginia.
Grandma passed away in 1979. She had seen me get married and present to
her a great-grandson and a great-granddaugher: events she confided had
also been predicted well in advance. “She even said you'd have a boy
first, and then a girl less than two years later.“ My daughter had
indeed arrived only 20 months after my son's initial appearance. This
only strengthened my grandmother's certainty that the harrowing story of
her early years would be documented and published by yours truly.
So, why have I waited so long to fulfill my grandmother's request?
Frankly, I was hoping I'd accomplish something impressive and noteworthy
or hit the lottery and then dictate everything to a ghostwriter who
would do the heavy lifting. It also seemed a bit presumptuous to write
an autobiography or memoir until I was a bit closer to, as Monty Python
so eloquently put it, running down the curtain and joining the choir
invisible.
I turn 70 on September 11, 2024, which was my father's age when he died.
(Technically, since he was born in February and passed in October, I
won't reach the end of his life span until May 18, 2025.) While I'm in
relatively good health- far better than he was at that age, at least-
the inevitability of mortality weighs more heavily each day. I've had
several friends and acquaintances shuffle off this mortal coil in the
past year, some after long illnesses and, more disturbingly, some
literally dropping dead in their tracks in mid-sentence. I scan the
obituaries every day, and I've noticed the average age of those
wandering into the Elysian Fields getting closer to my own, and many
bite the big one even earlier than 69.
An autobiography, a strictly chronological account of my existence,
would resemble the caption of a cartoon I've had hanging in my office
for the past 30 years: “That's the way it is- interminable periods of
boredom and brief moments of intense excitement.” So I'm opting for the
memoir form instead- a subjective collection of narratives that describe
only the interesting bits.
Another reason for the delay is to guarantee there isn't anyone left who
posseses a memory superior to mine or, even worse, is prone to
litigation. There are still a few of my early contempories around, but
their good natures and, frankly, lack of interest should avoid any
unpleasantness.
I've always written in the short form, 1,500 words or less, and that's
what I'll be doing here. I'll pick a topic, incident, or experience, do
1,500 words on it, and post it here. Grandma and the fortune teller
expected this effort would be in book form- well, welcome to the 21st
century, ladies.
This category of blog post is tagged on the site as the KGB Wayback
Journal. Each entry will be numbered, and you can access other
entries by clicking on KGB Wayback Journal in the Categories: box
immediately below this post, or by navigating to the archives
page and looking under Categories: for a specific
numbered entry.
It's taken 56 years, but I'm finally keeping my promise. I do have what
I think are interesting glimpses of personal events to share, and
glimpses of West Virginia hotel pie baking in the early twentieth
century.
I have no set schedule for publishing additional material, but I'll
attempt to do my best. After all, it's only 557 days to May 18, 2025.
.
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