Dad

William Grant Klave in 1946

It’s hard to know what to say or where to begin to write about my dad. He was not my birth father, but he was the only father I ever had. He married my mother when I was five years old—I was at the wedding. It was a beautiful Michigan fall day; I helped Mom and Dad collect red and gold leaves to decorate the windows of the little country church where they were married. Following the ceremony, we lived in a tiny, gray cottage across the street from my new Grandma and Grandpa’s cottage on Portage Lake.

Soon after the wedding, my new Grandma and Grandpa sold that cottage to Mom and my new Dad, and we moved into the home where I lived for the next 15 years. It was a good life—swimming, fishing and boating in summers, and skating and sledding in winters. Dad built a barbecue pit and a picnic table, and we had glorious backyard cookouts in the summer. He’d water the back yard at dusk to make the night crawlers come up so John and I could catch them and then sell them to the fishermen for a little spending money. In the winter Dad cleared the snow from the lake ice and flooded it so we could have a perfectly smooth ice skating rink. Ah yes, we thought it was a good life.

I’m not sure when I realized that all was not The Donna Reed Show or Ozzie and Harriet at our house. Dad left a steady job to start his own small business, worked nights in piano bars and dinner clubs, produced two new babies, and had no family medical insurance. All these would contribute to stress in any marriage. But it was alcoholism that brought down my parents—our family.

“You Ain’t Much Fun Since I Quit Drinkin’.” Toby Keith

Following a drunk-driving arrest, a judge gave him the option of an alcohol recovery program over jail, and Dad began the long process of putting his life back together. He joined Alcoholics Anonymous, and for the rest of his life, he spent holidays and Sundays visiting and counseling other addicts in rehab centers and at AA meetings. My father was bitter that my mother couldn’t get and stay sober. Their last years together before Mom’s death were not pleasant ones. In fact, I would call their lives “hell on earth.” My cousin Charlotte called it “living in the trenches.”

Dad was sober for the last twenty years of his life, but died before he could receive his twenty-year AA sobriety challenge coin. My brothers and I asked the pastor at Dad’s memorial service to use the Serenity Prayer as a foundation for his sermon, and we led the service in the manner of an AA meeting. I began with, “My name is Donna Klave Hodgson, and I’m Bill’s daughter.” Everyone in turn introduced themselves and told the group how they knew Dad. We sat in silence while we listened to a recording of Dad playing some ragtime on the piano, realizing we’d never have him sit down and play for us again.

Dad, I hope you knew how proud we are of your success in your war on alcoholism. I hope we honored you fittingly given the magnitude of your battle. And I pray that you knew—that I made you know—how grateful I am that you chose to be my father.

Love,
Your daughter Donna

The Shiny Spoon

No one in my family knew when the shiny spoon arrived or where it came from. It was just there one day in the dishpan full of sudsy water in our kitchen sink. It was my job as the older sister to wash the dishes, and my brother John’s job to dry them. At the time, we were around ten and eight years old, respectively. Every night after supper, we stood side-by-side at the sink, washing, rinsing, drying, arguing, and fighting.

The moment I spotted it, I claimed the mysterious, shiny spoon as my very own. Since it was our natures to argue and fight about almost anything, John claimed the spoon as his own also. “I saw it before you did!” he insisted. I know I saw it first in that sink full of dishes. Now that I think about it, though, the possibility does exist that he saw it before I did, even ate with it, but didn’t recognize its value until I claimed it for my own. We humans are like that about many things—even about other humans.

"We [brothers and sisters] have been banded together under pack codes and tribal laws." Rose Macaulay

John and I did everything we could think of to sabotage each other's claims to the spoon. We would race to grab it first, and then blow on it, or lick it, to mark it with our germs so the other wouldn’t want to use it. Sometimes we actually came to blows and wound up slugging it out with our fists or wrestling on the kitchen floor. Of course, we did grow out of the shiny spoon wars, and even laughed and joked about it as we got older.

On a visit with Mom and Dad several years ago, I was helping out in the kitchen and I spotted the shiny spoon in the silverware drawer. In a rush of childhood images, I said to my parents, “Wouldn’t it be funny if I took the spoon and told John I’m holding it hostage? He and I can send it back and forth to each other on our birthdays or at Christmas—make a game of it.”

“Absolutely not!” Mom answered. “You’re not starting that B.S. again. I know how you are when you get something over your brother.”

At the time, I was approaching fifty years old and I was mortally wounded by her words. “Mom, we’re not kids anymore. That spoon is special to John and me. It'll be fun.”

She was immovable. “Forget it!”

Since no good ever came from arguing with my mom, I gave up without another word. The next time I went home to visit, I had a moment alone in the kitchen and I snatched the spoon and packed it in my bag. “Dad,” I confessed. “I’ve got the shiny spoon in my suitcase and I’m taking it back to Texas with me. Promise you won’t tell Mom.”

Immediately upon my return to Texas, I sent John a photo and humorous ransom note, joking that I now possessed our childhood treasure; John didn’t take the bait. Then last week he sent me this note:

Oh by the way Sis,

In regards to your card and joke you guys sent me January 17, 2007, concerning MY shiny spoon, don't think for one hot minute that I have forgotten MY shiny spoon.

Love, John

So, he’s finally ready to play!

Before getting into real game mode I decided to do a little research on the spoon. With the aid of a magnifying glass, I found the manufacturer on the back of the old spoon. I went online and began with Replacements, Ltd., a phenomenal source for china, silver, and other collectibles, old and new. After approximately six hours of fruitless searching, I stumbled upon a photo of a matching fork. I learned my shiny spoon doesn’t even have a pattern name; it’s called INS68—hardly a name for a spoon for which wars were waged and noses were bloodied.

When I told my husband and son that I was planning to write a piece about the spoon for my blog, I mentioned that I might send the spoon to John for Christmas. It immediately occurred to me, “Then I won’t have the spoon. What if he never sends it back? What if after he dies his wife doesn’t send it to me?” Suddenly, I was like Frodo, standing on the precipice, unable to throw the evil ring into the fire below. Maybe Mom was right about me.

I know, I know; the shiny spoon is probably a symbol of sibling rivalry and lost youth. As my three brothers and I get older and older, it’s not the spoon I don’t want to give up—it’s them. The shiny spoon keeps my childhood memories alive and I don’t want to lose them. As Thanksgiving approaches, I’m reminded of the many blessings of family and home, and I’m grateful to have my three brothers and their families. And this year I'm especially pleased that I’ve got the shiny spoon!

Donna

To the outside world, we all grow old. But not to brothers and sisters. We know each other as we always were. We know each other's hearts. We share private family jokes. We remember family feuds and secrets, family griefs and joys. We live outside the touch of time. Clara Ortega

Why I’m Still a Vince Young Fan

Football really gets started tonight for us Texas fans. Down in Austin the University of Texas is playing monster rival, Texas Tech, in a grudge match. Tech stole a victory from UT in the final seconds of the game last year, and we UT fans want revenge. So where will my husband and I be at game time? We’ll be celebrating the 60th birthday of our friend Kyle, a man whose daughter went to Texas Tech.

I’ve got my DVR set up to record the game in case our dinner hosts are cruel enough to want to direct everyone’s attention to the birthday boy and not the TV. Kyle’s a lovely man and all, but this IS Texas and this IS college football.

OK. OK. I might be a little obsessive.

This sports obsession can be traced only as far back as the football season, (also referred to as “fall”), of 2005 when my son Robert was a brand new freshman at the University of Texas in Austin. Robert spent four years in his high school marching band and I was a band mom. I chaperoned the band on the bus to football games, competitions, and on spring trips around the nation. Like many band parents, I believed a football team was there to entertain the fans before and after the halftime show.

Besides, football was confusing to me. Growing up, my brothers had all tried at times to help me understand it. I laugh out loud whenever I recall my brother John’s frustration trying to explain the concept of “downs” to me. At my son’s high school games, my husband Jim and my fellow band parent friends would explain the plays and the calls for me, but it just wouldn’t sink in.

Are you ready for some football?

If you’re wondering what this has to do with Vince Young, I’m getting to that. The first time I saw Vince play was in the 2005 Rose Bowl against the Michigan Wolverines. Robert had been accepted at the University of Texas to begin in the fall of 2005. My brothers each phoned before the game, demanding that Jim and I declare our loyalty. Jim is from Illinois and I’m from Michigan. What was there to declare? We were Big Ten fans to the core.

That night there was magic on that football field and it was all about Vince Young. Even I, a football ignoramus, recognized it. Broadcasters called it the "Texas Two-Step;" call it whatever you like, it was magical. While my brothers grieved that Michigan lost to Texas, I had a secret—I was intrigued by this Vince Young character.

In August, 2005, we moved Robert to Austin and I experienced the onset of ENS: Empty Nest Syndrome. My friends and co-workers fretted over me. “How are you?” they would cautiously inquire. Thankfully, football season started almost immediately. And there was that amazing Vince Young, dazzling me and nearly everyone else who watched him. I got into football. My husband, (who had always been into football), and I watched every game together. I grieved when Vince didn’t get the Heisman Trophy. I was acting weird, even to me.

Anyone who’s been following college football for awhile already knows how the 2005 football season ended. The University of Texas Longhorns were the national champions and beat USC in the final moments of the 2006 Rose Bowl. Once again Vince Young had cast his gridiron magic on everyone and everything. After that season, my brothers began to call me on the weekends in the fall and we would talk football. Now Jim and I long for football season the way you long for the holidays or summer vacation. And it’s possible I owe it all to Vince Young.

Jim and I both agree that getting caught up in UT football took some of the emptiness out of our syndrome that year. We felt closer to Robert watching his team play each week and then talking about the games with him on the phone. We’re calling my obsession with college football my post-midlife crisis now.

Like all University of Texas fans, I was disappointed when Vince left school early to play for the Tennessee Titans pro team. While his pro career has certainly had its challenges, I remain a fan—he’s the guy with the magic to make me love football.

Now it’s Colt McCoy and Hook ‘Em Horns! Have a great football weekend y’all!

Donna

Life Begins Again on Labor Day

By the end of August I start to feel like I live in the Land Down Under. While the northern two thirds of the nation is wishing for a few more days of glorious summer and thinking about all the things they didn’t do while the weather was good, I’m celebrating that I can finally walk outside after 9:00 AM. While people in cooler parts of the nation are thinking there’ll be no more cookouts for awhile, I’m thinking, “Crikey! I can finally stand it outside long enough to burn a couple of hotdogs on the barbie.

I was up in Michigan in early August when the temperatures soared up into the low nineties. At my hotel the clerk was boasting about their 102 degrees—with the heat index. Heat index? Down here in Texas, we don’t need no stinking heat index! It’s 102 degrees without it. We need wind chill factors! Our temperatures here in the DFW Metroplex have dipped down into the low nineties this past week. We’ll call it “plummeting” when they drop down to eighty.

“. . .to lie sometimes on the grass under the trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the sky. . .” John Lubbock. “. . .is to be eaten alive by fire ants.” Me

If you drive through my neighborhood on an average summer day in July, August or September, you don’t hear the laughing voices of children playing in their yards; you hear the hum of air conditioners. Up north where summers are wonderful, they’re way too short, and down here where summers are brutal, they’re interminable. Since my son is all finished with school, it doesn’t matter to me anymore, but kids here are robbed. It is so unfair that during the summer, when the kids are home from school, it’s too damned hot to go outside and play. When we do get a fine summer day sometime in late October or early November, kids down here are stuck in a classroom all day.

While some of you are getting out the stadium blankets and thermoses for your football games, we’re still packing sunscreen and towels to absorb the sweat at ours. If you don’t believe me just watch one of the Big 12 or SEC college football games on TV. Those aren’t tears you see rolling down the fans’ cheeks. That’s pure sweat!

“Oh, it’s a long, long while from May to December.” Anderson; Weill

As the days get shorter and minutely cooler, and the angle of the sun gives the sky a golden glow, I start to feel a surge of energy. It’s possible that the energy is actually the high I get from my allergy medicine in the fall, but I don’t care. I love the end of summer and the beginning of winter. The electric and water bills start to free fall and I finally get a reprieve from the weeds in my yard. The lawn service guys stop mowing sometime in November so I have money to spend for Christmas shopping!

With autumn just around the bend, I begin to really miss the pungent smell of just-raked leaves burning by the side of the road on a gray, November morning. Yes, it’s bad for the environment, but it’s not illegal to remember it. I also miss the taste of ice cold, just-pressed apple cider and fresh cake donuts at the cider mill in my hometown. Hmmm. And no, of course I don’t miss thawing out my car for thirty minutes before I can drive it to work early in the morning. I’m nostalgic—not insane.

Donna

An Extraordinary Woman

Since beginning this blog in January, I spend more time remembering and thinking about things past than I probably have since graduating from high school in 1966. I joined Facebook in an attempt to connect with old friends and classmates and have been blessed with the recovery of some “lost treasures.” Barb is one of them.

There are two memories of my friend Barb that always come to mind when I think of her. First, I picture her in her maroon and white cheerleader uniform, leading cheers at the pep rallies in the high school gym. The other memory is of a moment in World Geography class. Some of the girls were participating in a “character assassination” of another cheerleader who happened to be absent that day. Barb turned away and refused to take part, leaving me with a most powerful memory for more than forty years.

We caught up with each other on Facebook in May, and she has graciously given me permission to share some of her writing. I have deleted some names and comments for her privacy.

Barb wrote: May 2, 2009

“I teach yoga classes a couple of nights a week and fitness classes at the Senior Center which is just a blast and very rewarding. My toughest challenge is that for the past five years I've been treated for ovarian cancer. There's good and not so good that comes with knowing and being treated for a chronic disease. I continue to live a full life, remaining fairly active and totally enjoying being grandma to my three year old granddaughter.”

I wrote that I have the most terrific kid on the planet.

Barb wrote: May 2, 2009

“Married 34 years this fall and I beg to differ. I have the most terrific kid on this planet. Christopher has given me the greatest gift of love and support in that he has never considered my slowing down with this insidious disease. We've skied up ski hills, cycled, hiked, rock climbed and watched hours of House and NCIS on TV together. Sounds like you have a similar bond with your son, extraordinary love and support.

My husband and I loved our visit to Austin a few years ago. The hill country is amazing. We made it out to the Enchanted Rock. What fun! I agree that Michigan is the most beautiful place on earth.”

I wrote that I hadn’t heard from her in a while.

Barb wrote: July 26, 2009

“I'm on a fairly rugged chemo schedule this summer. It goes like this. Fourteen days of chemo followed by fourteen days break to "recover." Actually I'm holding up well under the assault and have had some positive results.

If all goes as planned, next Saturday I will be participating in a triathlon teaming with my son Chris. He will do the swim and run. I will do the twenty-mile bike ride. It's a bit of a crazy plan but I would have it no other way. Me and my boy! I'm sure you get it.”

I wrote that I’m amazed she would compete in a triathlon with the chemo.

Barb wrote: July 27, 2009

“I no longer remember what it feels like to live without a bone deep exhaustion. For the past few weeks my bones have been sending out shooting pains a result of having to rebuild the red/white cells and platelets. Often this occurs in the larger hip and thigh bones, so it's fairly startling. Five years later, I confess, I continue to do battle with paralyzing despair. I'm just not ready to leave this special life of mine. I feel so blessed. This disease has slowly opened my heart, my self, my compassion to such extraordinary heights. I've acquired a treasure trove of wonderful rich memories. Would I have known enough to cherish these moments without the disease, certainly not on the scale that I do now. Exercise is my friend, from a peaceful yoga session or walk to testing myself on the bike or ski's or at the gym. I'm alive and kicking and I plan to remain that way until ‘the fat lady sings.’

Your friends confronted with a similar battle, I hold in my heart. We're all in this together.”

Barb sent me her “Bucket List” on July 29, ending with this thought:

“Now I have my hopes pinned on the 20 mile ride August first. It’s challenging to say the least when I’m working my way through another 14 days straight of chemo. It would be far easier to quit. Yet so boring! When my Lance Armstrong Live Strong Jersey arrives I plan to wear it every day if I have to, to keep my spirits up.”

Note:

I’m waiting to hear back from Barb about the triathlon. When I do, I’ll let you know how it went.

Donna

Jean

Funny thing, Donna, I remember that same Mom. Where in the world does one begin when describing my mom? Known to her friends as Jean, (short for Imogene), my mother was a very unique lady in many ways. One thing was for sure: you did not mess with Imogene and I mean that with the utmost sincerity. I didn't have a lot of warm, cuddly moments with my mom; that’s just how things were way back then. Now don't get me wrong. Mom did a lot for us four kids, you know—roof over our heads and food in our bellies, if you get my drift.

Well, enough of the introduction to my mom. As you can imagine, the warm moments I do have with her will be forever cherished. One such memory was around 1960. It was right about Mother’s Day on one of those beautiful spring Portage Lake, Michigan days. I was heading out in the row boat over to Mud Bay to do some fishing; Mom was sunning on the dock and asked if she could go along. I said, "Sure, Mom." Mom climbed in the back of the boat and off we rowed.

I was looking forward to showing off my fishing skills and making sure my mom knew that all my past fishing trips had not been wasted. Well, guess what? Not one darn fish—not even a minnow. On the trip back Mom assured me that the trip had not been a waste and that she had enjoyed the little excursion. As you can imagine my pride had been severely tested.

We were close to home and Mom, always the observant one, had noticed some weeds in about 12 foot of water, and she suggested that I wet a line and try my luck. I reluctantly baited my hook with a crawdad and got down to business, cause as we all knew when Mom suggested something, well. . .by now you get the point. Can you imagine my delight when I quickly caught two smallmouth (keepers) bass? She never brought that fishing trip up again; it remained a private moment between Mom and me, and I thought this would be a nice time in my life to share it with all of you. For all you avid bass fishermen, that spot became one of the Klave boys’ favorites; and to get to it you row straight out from the Bartlett’s yellow house. If you want more detail you'll have to ask Donna.

By the way Mom, point well taken and I didn't give up.

Happy Mothers Day, Mom!
Lv. John

Note: I found this damaged old promotional photo in a cardboard box with other old pics and memoirs. Mom was a "chanteuse" and sang with my dad's dance band. She was quite glamorous in her day. Thanks to my brother, John, for sharing this personal memory about a very talented, complex, and truly original woman: Our Mom.

Donna