AUG 2, 18 .. AUGUST 2nd 1958 .. SIXTY YEARS AGO TODAY ..<\/span><\/p>\nI will never ever, until I die, or until I lose my memory, forget this date-in-my-history.<\/p>\n
August 2nd 1958 was a Saturday. I was in Westfield, New York, and at (somewhere around) 2 p.m. Beverly Joan Bowers (Bev) and I were married. I was a young, enlisted member of the U.S. Marine Corps, out on boot camp home leave.<\/p>\n
I’d met Bev in the summer of 1957 where we two were working at the Grand Hotel, on Mackinac Island, Michigan. Love at first sight. I looked into her eyes, thought to myself, “This is who I am going to marry.” To some extent, that-was-that. We two had exactly, precisely, one single date, during our 2-3 months on the island. In August 1957, I left the island to return to the University of Michigan. On January 29th, 1958, I enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps and shipped off to San Diego and MCRD (Marine Corps Recruit Depot).<\/p>\n
I got sick (pneumonia) during boot camp and, during the full month of April 1958, I experienced a month-long stay in the U.S. Naval Hospital, Balboa Park, San Diego, California. Lying in the hospital, alone, one day soon, my life was to change. I received a letter that Bev had mailed to me in January in care of at my fraternity house at Michigan.<\/p>\n
Fraternity Brothers, being Fraternity Brothers, did not forward the January letter to me until April.<\/p>\n
So? Bev and I began a letter-a-day (I kid you not, what else did I have to do in the hospital) correspondence.<\/p>\n
Back to boot camp I went. I finished boot camp in July 1958. I wrote Bev I’d be coming back to Michigan on boot camp leave.<\/p>\n
Bev (totally unbeknownst to her parents) got to Detroit the day before my arrival. She was going to wait all night to meet me when I arrived. Somehow, word of this madness got to her folks (who were unaware of who I was) who called my parents who went to Detroit Metro to ‘fetch’ Bev so she did not have to stay-the-night at Detroit Metro.<\/p>\n
A week later, while we two were visiting Mackinac Island, and the Grand Hotel, on the lawn there, I asked Bev to marry me. We did just that, on August 2nd, 1958.<\/p>\n
We had a great life together. Son Robb was born in 1959 at Tripler Army Hospital, Honolulu, Hawaii, while I was stationed at Kanohe Marine Corps Air Station. Son David was born in 1962 in Detroit, Michigan, where I was getting my Civil Engineering Degree at Wayne State University.<\/p>\n
In February 1975, our son David was struck by an automobile while on his way to school in Frankfurt, West Germany. He lived, but two major operations, 8-months apart, and the stress therefrom, sowed the seeds for our divorce in 1979.<\/p>\n
So?<\/p>\n
There-you-have-it. Some mind wanderings that August 2, 2018, brought into my consciousness. Perhaps some history for my two sons to muse over. We did some court-ordered professional counseling to no avail. The final breakup of our marriage was beyond, and worse than, merely being brutal.<\/p>\n
In January 2008, Bev fell in her home in Florida, hit her head, and passed away.<\/p>\n
No one, not a single one of us, is getting out of this life without nicks and bruises and cuts and scars. This life Ain’t-A-Free-Ride for anyone.<\/p>\n
My friend and buddy and professional associate ‘Zilla, was witness to the breakup and chaos that lasted 3-years while I continued to work in West Germany.<\/p>\n
‘Zilla, Thanks for your undying and continuous support during those horrific 3-years.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\nRobb and David, your mother and I were ‘meant to be together’ for life. Our marriage was not a mistake.<\/p>\n
Love Dad<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Thank You Simon .. It was you Simon .. Who ‘coined for me’ .. The saying .. “Wandering the Streets of My Mind.” Patti and I, along with ‘countless’ other… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570,571,156,171,483,179],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-beverly-joan-bowers","category-son-david","category-robb","category-simon","category-very-personal","category-wandering-the-streets-of-my-mind"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31105"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31105\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67599,"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31105\/revisions\/67599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/babakaps.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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