If you are following along here’s where we have been:

Prologue, Chapter 1, and Chapter 2.

It was in the springtime of my nineteenth year. I had a decent enough job doing vinyl plastic fabrication. I shared a two bedroom apartment in Huntington Beach, CA with my older brother and I was driving an almost new 1974 Datsun pickup truck. My girlfriend was a 17 year old hottie named Bridget, whom I wasn’t in love with, but she loved sex almost as much as I did. And I had just acquired an adorable German Shepherd puppy I named Angie. So life was as good for me as it had ever been.

I recall picking Bridget up from her job as a sales clerk in Westminster Mall. She got in my pickup and immediately announced “I’m pregnant”. I was stunned at this news and blurted out “Damn it! If I knew you were going to get pregnant I wouldn’t have got the dog!”. And so began my reluctant journey into fatherhood.

Bridget and I both agreed we were not ready or equipped to be parents. She was a Catholic though and abortion for her was not an option. So we decided instead to give the baby up for adoption. Bridget’s parents were quite conservative and had never approved of me anyway and they were very unhappy with the news of the pregnancy. So we decided it would be best for all concerned if she moved out of the house and we’d get a place of our own until the baby was born. We made all the arrangements with the County adoption agency and we were provided free prenatal care and monthly food stamps. And so it came to pass that we were living together in a small apartment in Midway City.

We were of course unsure when the child had been conceived, but the doctor estimated a due date in October. Now, I was big time into softball in those days and I happened to be playing in a tournament on a Sunday afternoon in early September. Bridget was there with me and around about the third inning she came to me complaining about not feeling well. I told her to go sit down and wait for the game to finish. At the start of the fifth inning my sister-in-law, a registered nurse, told me Bridget wasn’t well and I really needed to take her home. I remember making a big deal about apologizing to my teammates–“sorry guys, I have to leave now because someone has a tummy ache”.

On the drive back home every few minutes Bridget would start moaning loudly in pain. I was 19 and of course knew everything so I told her “it was just false labor, after all, you are not due until next month.” She persisted with her intermittent moans so as we were passing the hospital I pulled off the freeway and told her “Fine. We’ll go in here and they will tell you the same thing I’ve been saying!” And that is where two hours later my daughter Renee was born.

The next day I briefly saw Renee sleeping in one of those baskets in the maternity ward. Then I had to hurry off to work. My employer had moved to Pasadena, CA over an hours drive away. So I get to work and I can’t stop thinking about my helpless baby girl. At lunchtime I told the boss I was leaving and rushed back down the freeway to the hospital. As I entered Bridget’s room the woman from the adoption agency was handing her the papers to sign relinquishing custody of our baby. I shouted “stop! wait! I want to talk to Bridget first.” The adoption woman left and I said to Bridget “let’s get married and keep the baby instead”. Bridget said “okay”.

That was by far the best decision I’ve ever made. Bridget’s parents didn’t think so. Her father was livid and threatened to have me arrested for statutory rape (Bridget was still 17). I told him good luck with that. I had just turned 20 and still had some rebel in me I suppose. Anyway, he didn’t involve the law but he made things more difficult than they needed to be. Wouldn’t allow Bridget to marry so we waited for her 18th birthday in November. And he forbade Bridget’s siblings from attending our wedding ceremony. Petty bullshit. He came around in time and we were cordial but I never forgot how he treated us when we had nothing.

Well, I say we had nothing but that’s not entirely correct. We certainly were not prepared to have a baby in the house. That first night Renee actually slept in a dresser drawer. But we did have friends and the next day they held an impromptu baby shower and they filled our place with all things necessary to get a newborn started out right. I’ll never forget that either.

Life changed. We rented a two bedroom house next door to my parents (a loving grandma makes the best kind of baby sitter). I found a better job in route sales and about a year after Renee was born I started my government career as a letter carrier (mailman) with the United States Postal Service. With that new found financial security (and health insurance!) we felt it was time to plan for an addition to the family. And in March of 1978 Renee had a baby brother named Kevin sharing the house. Kevin actually arrived on his due date and having done the required natural childbirth classes I was present in the delivery room when Kevin entered the world. It was a beautiful thing to witness.

Being a parent makes you see things differently, or at least it did for me. For one thing I didn’t want to raise my kids in Orange County. We vacationed frequently in Arizona and just a few months after Kevin’s birth my transfer request to Prescott was accepted.

Being a parent truly is “till death do us part”. Not so much for marriages. Bridget was 23, working at Prescott’s upscale restaurant, and running with a fast crowd. Sometimes she would stay out all night. I finally put my foot down and she told me “I don’t want to have to come home after work and be a wife and mother”. We got divorced and she gave me custody of the two kids, now aged 5 and 3. And thus began my journey as a single father.

Lord almighty, but it was tough going those first few months. I was a letter carrier which meant starting work at 0630. So I had to get up early, get the kids to daycare, do my job, pick the kids up, feed and bathe them, get them in bed, and then collapse in sheer exhaustion. And then get up the next morning and do it all over again. I’m not ashamed to admit that when I needed help I cried out for my mama. And she of course was there for me. We decided the best option was to send the kids home with her to the farm in Oklahoma. I would either come get them when I was ready or move there myself when a transfer came through. And that’s how it turned out that my kids were raised on a farm.

And what a life they had! Horses and cows and country living. Surrounded with love from Grandma and Grandpa and great Grandma Pernie. Granted, I was never any great shakes as a father, but damn it, sometimes I did get lucky. I did eventually move to the area, but I left the kids where they wanted and needed to be. I was pretty much a weekend dad in those days, but it all worked out for best.

HaHa! I guess that’s enough of the proud papa bullshit. On with the story. Well, it came to pass that I got to know a woman (actually, I got to know LOTS of women in those days, but that’s for another chapter) named Beckie. She was a widow with a one year old daughter. After dating for awhile, I moved into her fine home in Poteau, Oklahoma. She was and is a good woman and great with the kids. And then in 1986 I accepted a big promotion with the Postal Service in Columbia, SC. Now what do I do?

Well, as much as it pained me to yank the kids from my mother’s embrace (and it pained her much more I know) I wasn’t going to leave them behind. Beckie consented to my proposal to marry and so the deal was done. I’d have my kids and someone to help me raise them. How about that?

I’m not a totally selfish bastard. I promised the kids we’d find a place where we could bring the horses, and I did keep that promise. We lived out in the wilds of Lexington, SC and they went to school in nearby Pelion. It was a small high school and both of them excelled in sports and did well academically. Beckie was a Speech Pathologist and found work in a nearby school district. And I was busy kicking ass in my new career field of labor relations. More on that in a future chapter.

And so that was our life. When your kids reach high school age they are doing their own thing and parents are confined to keeping an eye out so they don’t go too far astray. I was lucky that my kids focused on athletics (well, and Renee was also into boys) and didn’t make the mistakes I did in high school. I spent a lot of my free time with them in the basketball arena, baseball diamond, and at the track.

Of course, even when your kids are grown, they are always your kids and an important part of your life. Just not a daily part. When it was all said and done and I had all those newly freed up hours previously spent at sporting events, I thought to myself “now what?” And sadly, I realized that the only thing I had in common with Beckie was our mutual interest in raising the kids. Yeah, I was that kind of motherfucker. So I started an affair with the woman who eventually became wife #3, which of course necessitated divorcing Beckie. I remind myself that whatever bad karma I may have in relationships was probably earned then and there.

I would also be remiss if I don’t talk about my other child, Beckie’s daughter Avery. She was only one when I met her mom and I’m the only father she has ever known. Unfortunately, I was a distant dad to her at best, and once I divorced her mother, I was almost completely absent from her life. Of course, Renee and Kevin considered her a sister and they all stayed close. As did Beckie with my kids. By now I had taken another promotion in Arlington, VA and they all remained in South Carolina. I was odd man out so to speak.

It was only as an adult that I came to terms with Avery and I think for the most part she has forgiven me for the hurt I caused her, however unintentional. Now we hang out when I’m visiting, and she even came here to the Philippines a couple of years ago to join me on vacation.

And life moves on. I disappeared to Korea for almost 12 years and now I hang my hat in the Philippines. The kids have kids of their own and are living their lives just fine without me there. It is great that Beckie is still a mom to them and even their real mother reappeared in their life when she retired and moved to South Carolina.

And the wheel in the sky keeps on turning. Childhood ends. The rebellious teen years pass. But this chapter of my life will never end. Indeed, I’ll live on through my children. That’s a legacy I can be proud of!

Winter is here again oh Lord,
Haven’t been home in a year or more
I hope she holds on a little longer
Sent a letter on a long summer day
Made of silver, not of clay
I’ve been runnin’ down this dusty road

Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
I don’t know where I’ll be tomorrow
Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’