More about George Sr.

The History Lesson:

He was born in Newark, NJ in 1913. He was the oldest of 7 boys and 1 girl, Ann. His father died when he was in eighth grade, which forced him out of school and into the work force to support the family. It seems to me that one can only be so great by accident. He was a man with no high school education so he became a salesman, a shoe salesman to be exact.

He had met my grandmother, Edith, while they were kids. The story was that their mother’s started away with the wrong baby carriage and that’s how they met. He married her when they were 18 and he never remarried after she passed on. He never even dated another woman after she died in 1987; he was alone until I moved in with him in 2000.

In the 40’s, immediately after my father was born, my grandfather was drafted into WWII. I don’t think he was supposed to be drafted, and I think he truly resented the government for it. I think he was too old. He was also a new father, and there was no other man in the family to take care of his wife and newborn son. He didn’t return home, not even once, until my father was 5-years-old.

Grudgingly, he went to war. He was shot in the Battle of the Bulge, sent to a field hospital, and sent back into the fight. He also lost more than 80% of his hearing in his right ear.

After he served his time, about 4 years, he returned home from the war to a poor and repressed society. He tried to get back into the work force and noticed that jobs were not only scarce but the pay was nonsensically low and workers had no rights. He was so upset, so completely troubled about it, he got together with a friend and started to picket and demonstrate. Eventually he and a friend and possibly a few others started a labor union, but not until they had been arrested numerous times for trying to organize.

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I could go on and on about him for quite a while, and I will, but not now. Not tonight!

I need to get my ass to bed now because I have to be up quite early. I am going to move my rather large television and the rest of my hanging clothes and other odds and ends out of my old apartment and into my new one or into storage. One or the other, it’s out of my old place and then my move is officially over. Hip-hip hooray!