The Unsuprised Party: Memorable Influencers of My Youth
This diary entry is a love letter to friends, classmates, choir partners, best girlfriends, and teachers from my youth. Let it be known that I refer to the mom who raised me as Edith. I do this with great love and respect, and although our history together was short, and our relationship complicated, I dedicate much of who I am to her. I’ll begin this story with her.
BACKSTORY to my 13th birthday party:
As I wrote about in Start with the Presser Foot Down, published by UC Riverside’s MFA Dept a few years ago, Edith and I lived on Magnolia Avenue in San Bernardino. We didn’t own a car. Edith (after the divorce) was a waitress, and we rented a tiny duplex in a modest working-class area of town. She was responsible for yanking me out of 6th-grade public school about one month before the end of the year. I was shocked at this because by that time I finally felt comfortable who I “thought” I was becoming.
In November of 63, my 6th-grade teacher walked in the room, white as a ghost, and whispered while choking up, that President Kennedy had been shot. There are no other details yet, but we will dismiss class for the day. This became a life-changing event and one of those burned-in memories. Dave and Liz were in that class with me. Dave is now gone, Liz is very much here and well, and I am so glad to have connected with her recently.
By Spring, life for us was fairly normal even though my mother bought every book on the shelves about Kennedy assignation theories. Edith led me to discover a love of reading at a young age. Back in class on the fun level of activities, the kids in our class practiced a lip sync performance of a Bye Bye Birdie scene. We rehearsed this thing relentlessly and it felt like we were transported to high school. The song was The Telephone Hour. Click to see the goofy number. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sPU3ymk2ms
This was so much fun and the first time I wasn’t frozen by shyness in front of a class. But my mother was outraged at seeing this (risqué) musical, thought I was growing up too fast anyway, didn’t like my backtalking, and figured my teacher had decided to fail me due to a poor progress report. She panicked. She told Mr. Emmons she was removing me from school.
The next thing I knew I was marched a few blocks in a different direction (but walkable) to Valley Christian School. I felt like the biggest outsider of all time and a failure. I had no friends here. 6th grade was the beginning of puberty with all the disorientation a new school brings. Feelings of self-confidence were already at a low. But this new place, the teachers, the kids, and the church next door would change my life forever, and in a good way. I would find many missing pieces of my identity and unforgettable experiences that I relive to this day.
I had a good year in 7th grade at VCS. Fast forward to Edith planning a surprise birthday party for me. I was going to become be a teenager in just a month or so in the fall. To my memory and I search it regularly, I don’t remember any other birthday parties given to me, in my life. I went to a few friend’s parties in grade school. I know my mother did have a few small family birthday cakes on my day, but those memories have faded. Even in adult life, I have been treated to going out to dinner. No parties. Was I supposed to outgrow birthday parties? This is an unknown. I remember birthdays at Lincoln Elementary School from 3 to grade 5, my dad would visit me on the playground during recess. Those were the days when schools didn’t have to be locked down. A strange man walked straight across a big field that wasn’t fenced in. Since I was told I would see him during the last recess; I kept an eye out for him in the distance. When I saw him walking, I ran quickly and into his arms.
My dad Carl Jr, always brought me the same gift every year, an unwrapped box of crayons. The large Ultimate Collection contained three rows of colors and a sharpener in the box. I adored that gift. I just looked up all the colors and saw more have changed names (again). They now sell a 152-count version. The color flesh became three new ones, Desert Sand, Almond, and Apricot. In those days my skin color was more similar to Desert Sand. What a revelation. I always took out every color and memorized their names. I kept them in order. That’s because I was a kid very much like Sheldon Cooper in The Big Bang Theory.
I am so much like Sheldon; I get off-topic. On the day of the party, my mother planned to ask the parents of a few girls to be driven over in secret. I never learned if anyone else had been invited or couldn’t make it. The attendees that I remember were Mary, Mary Dell, LeAnne, Teola, and Joanne but there was a sixth girl I don’t recall. All I remember was that the invitees were perfect. Joanne was the only one from church, not my Jr. High. She did attend the same high school as me later, and I remember her during Drill Team tryouts. She made it; I didn’t. All these girls were fun, funny, sweet, and very dear. I had been invited to their homes through the years, most of them, and a few kept in touch till around the start of college.
In the few days before the party, I figured out the surprise. My mother tried very hard to keep things on the down low, but it was difficult. The day of the party I came home from school and was dressed already in a nice top and skirt. We all dressed nicely for school then. Mary had changed before she came, but the rest were in skirts or dresses. The problem was my mother needed time to finish preparing the décor, table, cake, etc. and most importantly, for the arrival of the kids she needed me out of the house. She sent me over to Mrs. Malone’s across the street. Mrs. Malone had become Gramma Lou to me, a wonderful woman from the South with hilarious stories. She reminded me of Edith’s mom who died when I was 8. It didn’t seem too odd to be told to go to Lou’s, but I felt I was NOT supposed to go inside my apartment yet. Since it was my actual birthday, Monday, September 27, 1965, a month into eighth grade, Edith had almost everything prepared. The girls arrived, and dropped off quickly; Edith shuffled them inside to wait for me. I vaguely recall seeing some sort of movement at my place that gave it away. My heart began pounding. I was excited! Was this going to be… a party?
My special day was documented in several photos with a small camera with those crazy bulbs that flashed and then you popped them out and put in new ones. Film of course. You never knew what the photos would end up looking like. My mom worked at SAGES and it was easy for her to drop off camera film at the store, and she got discounts! (There will be photo links at the end of this diary writing.) I never knew if any of these girls saw these pictures or had their own. Some remind me of the Instagram site today. We took selfie (type) photos, silly facial poses, and goofy poses. There were very few photos of adults. I either didn’t keep all of them, or they became “lost” but all the images mean so much now. I have SO FEW PICTURES of my life. Sadly, this is what happens when you rely on film. They are decaying right before my eyes. I have scanned many dozens of these things to preserve them. These memories are a pot of gold in a box.
I include in this blog post links to party photos, a few school photos, and the eighth and ninth-grade class photos, with the eighth-grade signatures on the back. I am more surprised by what people wrote to me on that group picture than ever before. If you haven’t done so, reread what people have written in your yearbooks. It’s an eye-opener and can be devastatingly beautiful.
I am both happy and sad when I see all of these images. I have lost the ability to speak, text, or correspond with some of my dearest classmates and roommates as they are gone now. When you reach the age where folks are dropping off from being on earth, it puts everything in perspective and feels very bittersweet.
I will very much miss not ever being able to contact these dear ones again. Two of these were at my surprise party. I only discovered the obits fairly recently.
All comments to this blog are welcomed~
Mary Margarete Sutyak: d.2011 https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/denverpost/name/mary-sutyak-obituary?id=19894092
Rich Godfrey: d.2011 https://www.bobbittchapel.com/obituaries/Richard-Godfrey/#!/TributeWall
JoAnne Vaught-Kirkner: d 1997 age 43 (attached obit-incredibly moving) Click to enlarge. You can use the hand tool to scroll from top to bottom. https://marsha.smugmug.com/People/Memoirs-and-Memories/i-nL4gqLt/A
David Irmscher: d 2019 (drowning) neighbor, school and choir friend from 3rd grade to 12th : https://sierrawave.net/san-bernardino-man-drowns-at-lake-mamie
Deb Tingle: d 2022 She was my roommate at Pasadena College. We were roomies sharing apartments in Pasadena/Redondo Beach. We were each other’s maid of honor in our weddings. https://obituaries.neptune-society.com/obituaries/fairfield-ca/deborah-tingle-10566809
All of the images I speak about in this blog can be found here: https://marsha.smugmug.com/People/Memoirs-and-Memories This album is set up to be like a scrapbook. When you go inside this album to view each image, to the left you’ll see an info circle where the mouse hover says “photo details” That is where I have commented on each one. There is also a comment button on the left. If you’d like to leave comments please feel free to do so! Comments will appear under the photo details. Comments can’t be edited so if there is an error you can delete it and then make a new one.
If you would like to see more albums of the 6 or more years I managed to freelance as a family/pet/event photographer (after retiring in 2012 from American Airlines), you’ll see a few samples and galleries to click on here: https://marsha.smugmug.com/Events
For one particular family I became friends with I have 5 years of photoshoots including their dogs here: https://marsha.smugmug.com/LeahMatt-DeVost-Family/n-pcTC4L
NOTE: I am very much into memorabilia regarding San Bernardino. I love everything I can find about SAGES! https://www.sbsun.com/2023/05/22/credit-for-sages-original-inland-empire-superstore-experience-goes-to-milton-sage/
San Bernardino was home to the 1st McDonalds. Has anyone been to the small museum? https://familydestinationsguide.com/mcdonalds-museum-california/
I went to and photographed an event held at the San Bernardino Train Station/Railroad Museum for their 100 year celebration: https://marsha.smugmug.com/Photography/San-Bernardino-Pioneer-Days
