I originally wrote this to read at the memorial service, but I broke down and stopped early and sat down. MY brothers were happy I didn’t read this book to a lot of older folks who really weren’t interested. but some are actually subscribers, so they may see it here now if they are still following me around. So without delay, here is my life with my mother. So you know, my mothers name is Doris, and I Always called her Doris as it was the culture of the camps and places we worked together we went to. The Story will explain this I hope

I first met Doris in January 1958 and I know I had heard discussions about making the trip in December so I could be counted as a deduction and I think they must of been mad about that because the first thing I remember once I got free is somebody hanging me upside down and swatting me pretty good

After that Doris and I were pretty close she carried me around a lot and took pretty good care of me then sometime when I was around 2 we went to nursery school together.  She was getting her masters degree in child development and the nursery school was part of the Syracuse University child development laboratory it was a pretty nice place great big two-story building old frat house with a big backyard and a garage or barn that had tons of toys and bicycles in it I quickly called dibs on one of the tricycles and proceeded to assist her in learning what a bad child could be occasionally running into her with my tricycle and in driving it off the cliff that was behind the nursery school and this helped a lot in her development of learning how to fix bicycles and I think we had a pretty good time at the nursery school for the 3 years I was there. She finally got her degree and graduated and I finally was handed off to my sister to show me around kindergarten and elementary school.  I originally was the king of the house keeping my siblings in order and getting what I wanted through biting scratching and screaming for my mommy and Doris almost always came to my aid when I needed to boss around my siblings but then sometime in 1963 Doris brought home this new toy which she spent most of her time playing with and soon I was 2^nd fiddle to this new creature they called John. 

When I was around 11 I applied for a job at the daycamp that my whole family had all gone to be a counselor in training or CIT as they called it and they told me I had to be 12 to 13 all the CIT’s were 12 to 13 so Doris said to me get on your bike and ride over to the Council and tell them you want to be a CIT they have to see you to really know that you can do it or not, so that was on the other side of town and I was pretty used to riding all over town on my bike. a bike that she had bought me from the Salvation Army for I think $5 and fixed it up for me and it was a good bike so all that training at the nursery school paid off. When I was in the 4^th grade(9yrs old) I changed schools through the anti-segregation school integration program and I went to a school that was a hour bus ride away and I had left all my friends at my old school though I made new friends pretty quick. The new school was just down the hill from Syracuse University and it wasn’t as motivating a school as my old one was so I used to take the bus to school and then skip and go up to Syracuse University and the huge and ornate oakwood cemetary right next to it and at the same time my mother was getting her 2^nd Masters degree in social work, and I would walk right by the social work school and she would occasionally ask me if I would stop in and get notes for the classes that she could not attend because she was working, or they had take-home tests and things like that but because I got to school at 8 o’clock and immediately left skipping my classes I would often get to her classes just as they were starting so rather than getting notes from the class from her classmate that was there. Instead I would sit through the class and then go over the notes with her when I brought them home.

Well back to the CIT JOB. I rode my bicycle the 5 miles out to the East End of town and walked into the camp Council building and said I want to be a CIT and they looked me up and down and I was about 5 foot 2 at that time and probably z hundred and 30 pounds and they gave me the application and said I think we still have a few openings fill this out.  So that was the 2^nd time in my life that she was right about something. After that summer working as a CIT at the daycamp we worked together at a united way overnight camp in rural New York and it was a inner-city low income family camp for kids to go to and it was a pretty nice camp it had a big Lake and had a dozen rowboats, a swim area and I worked as the dishwasher while the regular dishwasher actually attended the camp and the cook whose dishes I washed, pots and pans and stuff, her name was Doris Dombrowski and my mother Doris was the counselor for the Adult women, Mothers of kids attending camp. So she was normally cruising through the camp with 7 or 8 women around her who all had kids at this camp it was the policy or rule at the camp that everybody went by their first name to every kid in the camp so everybody who knew her called her Doris and so if I wanted to talk to her or say something to her or find out what was going on I could not say mommy because the 6 or 7 ladies walking with her would all look around and so I just started calling her Doris and from that time in my life I always called her Doris unless I wanted money or something and needed to butter her up

But we worked together at the family center and the camp a couple of times she was the adult women’s counselor which had a sewing program and a money budgeting program and a cooking program and I occasionally took troubled first-graders or 2^nd graders and had a little group with them teaching them acceptable behaviors and take them out to places that were fun. like the zoo or museums

When I went to high school and started to drive she let me have her car if I would pick her up when she was done for work at her job as a social worker at St. Joe’s hospital.  So I used to leave school and go to her office and there was a big waiting room outside her office I would sit there and read the magazines they always have laying around doctors’ offices and maybe do some homework or something but quite often she would have “emergency patients” that needed to talk to her about some crisis going on in their family and they would often come and sit in the waiting room where I was and while she was finishing up from her last patient they would spill their crisis to me, people love to talk and I was getting pretty good as a therapist

So having a car in high school seemed to be a good way to attract girlfriends.  So I got this girlfriend and she was the top of the class academic person and she appreciated my car and we hung out for senior year and I actually attended school because of her and I wanted to get my driver’s ed course completion certificate.  One day this girl told me she was going to college on the other end of the state in Albany New York and I relayed this to my mother how much I was going to miss her and the advice from Doris was all “thereare a lot of colleges in Albany go find one you can go to you can go to college”.  So I did.  I followed her to Albany and we stayed as a couple for 3 years and then I transferred to the Syracuse forestry College and she followed me there for her Masters a year later.

But her father hated me.  Her father was afraid to drive in the neighborhood we lived in so he never thought I was worthy of her despite my  impeccable manners and honorable intentions.  And again good advice from my mother was “you can’t win if her family doesn’t love you” and so when she graduated from Syracuse she went to ATHENS Georgia for her PhD and I hitchhiked down to see her, but when I Got there her father had ripped her away to Texas leaving me stranded in Georgia with no place to go except back to New York.  So again her advice was excellent on love affairs.  So I am going to miss all the advice she was more than willing to give throughout my life and relationships though she was never particularly gentle about giving advice or opinions about things she was a very smart lady with 2 masters degrees and 5 children who did pretty well for themselves.

So that’s the end of my life with my mother. She is sorely missed and I Personally was sure would probably outlive me. at 93 yrs old, she was still a force to be reckoned with and liked to stay active and busy. Her demise was that she had to have things done when she wanted them done and apparently she wanted a haf ton glass table moved from one side of her apartment to the other and no one was around to help her.so she tried to muscle it herself and she must have slipped off the table a and fell smashing her face on the coffee table and causing a bleed in her brain. Now I know a couple of people that have had brain bleeds, and they are treated and recover, my sister-in-law fell on the ice one winter and they drilled her skull and drained the blood and she recovered 100%. Another person I Know was in a bad bicycle accident and was taken to a hospital in NY and treated with drugs and recovered. But in Florida, the medical people don’t want to do anything on people over 90, Doris had a hiatal hernia she wanted fixed and she had a tough time finding a doctor who would do it. Finally she found someone and they required a full cardiac exam and they found she had a slight valve leak in her heart. SO She had that fixed too with a cardiac cath up though her leg into her heart and they placed a clip on the valve. Afterwards she said she felt much stronger and less fatigued. So when she had this fall and brain bleed I Don’t understand why they didn’t drain it and fix it. but they figure anyone over 90 is knocking on the door anyway and suggested she go to hospice. And honestly while I was visiting her the week before, she was depressed because my brother who used to live across the courtyard from her, had moved way up state and was now 2 hours away. So she had no one to call on for help when she needed it. She said she was ready to go anytime. like many older folks, many of her friends had passed away and she felt her ability to hear even with $25k hearing aids was too bad to have a conversation with anyone. My most important advice to anyone under 50, is to take care of your hearing, it is the door to relationships when you 60-70-80. new ones or old ones.