Oh No! Not Another Brat!

Donald L. Miller

Description

Don recalls growing up in a family defined by abuse and neglect. The time frame of his memoir is from 1942 to 1968.
In 1956, at age 14, Don ran away from home with his younger brother after a one-way argument with his father. “I don’t give a damn if you want to finish watching your program!” Bring the boats in now!” After years of abuse, neglect and a family with no love, this incident broke the camel’s back. The next day, Don stole $35 from his father’s drawer before telling his mom of his runaway plans. “Oh, yeah?” she replied in her usual lackadaisical way, and then continued on with her sewing. The plan was to ride their bikes from Illinois to Florida, unbeknownst to them, a pedophile killer lurked the streets of Chicago.
At 18, Don found an escape – he dropped out of school to join the Navy, where he met many other challenges. He was first stationed in Hawaii, right after it had become a state, and was attacked by a huge, crazed Samoan man, who may not have been fond about the US military being in his homeland!
Several years later he got into a major argument with his wife and took off with the family car. He was going to Hollywood, California to find his sister, even though he didn’t know her last name, or where she lived. A miracle occurred when he got there.
Now at age eighty, the author is going through his toughest challenge: caring for his wife of sixty-one years, who is struggling with the last stages of dementia and under hospice care.
Join the author as he looks back at the obstacles he’s overcome and the lessons he’s learned along the way in Oh No! Not Another Brat!

Sujets

• Personal Memoirs
• Armada de los Estados Unidos
• Biography
• Autobiography
• Navy

Informations

• Publié par: Archway Publishing
• Date de parution: 30 septembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781665729574
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

OH NO! NOT ANOTHER BRAT!
 
 
 
 
 
 
DONALD L. MILLER
 
 
 
 

 
Copyright © 2022 Donald L. Miller.
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
 
Archway Publishing
1663 Liberty Drive
Bloomington, IN 47403
www.archwaypublishing.com
844-669-3957
 
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
ISBN: 978-1-6657-2958-1 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-6657-2956-7 (hc)
ISBN: 978-1-6657-2957-4 (e)
 
Library of Congress Control Number: 2022916528
 
 
Archway Publishing rev. date: 09/29/2022
CONTENTS
Prologue
 
Chapter 1         Trailer Trash
Chapter 2         Jerome
Chapter 3         Gompers Park
Chapter 4         My First School
Chapter 5         New School
Chapter 6         My One and Only Birthday
Chapter 7         Our Dentist
Chapter 8         Going to Dental School
Chapter 9         Hundred-Year-Old Woman
Chapter 10       The Day I Died
Chapter 11       Bottle Collecting
Chapter 12       Falling in Piss River
Chapter 13       Spear Fishermen
Chapter 14       I’m a Flunkie
Chapter 15       Daddy, Daddy
Chapter 16       What’s Wrong with Nana?
Chapter 17       Nana on Our Roof
Chapter 18       My Worst Crime
Chapter 19       The Devil Won
Chapter 20       Laugh Your Troubles Away
Chapter 21       Finders Keepers
Chapter 22       Whealan Pool
Chapter 23       The Great Fossil Search
Chapter 24       Free Baseball
Chapter 25       Milton
Chapter 26       Mrs. Tanski—Last Hope
Chapter 27       God Punished Me
Chapter 28       Dad Whipped My Ass Good
Chapter 29       I Killed Raymie
Chapter 30       My Zoo
Chapter 31       Taxman Lurks in Our Neighborhood
Chapter 32       I Meant Curly
Chapter 33       I Really Liked Grandma Miller
Chapter 34       Schramm’s Toy Shop
Chapter 35       The Little Pisser
Chapter 36       Pace
Chapter 37       Swinging with the Byrds
Chapter 38       The Move
Chapter 39       A Bully Attack
Chapter 40       A Train Ride to Wherever
Chapter 41       BB Gun Fight
Chapter 42       Let’s Run Away
Chapter 43       Onward
Chapter 44       Sleepless in Kankakee
Chapter 45       Cops and More Cops
Chapter 46       Where to Next?
Chapter 47       Looking for Tommy
Chapter 48       Bowling, Anyone? Our Treat
Chapter 49       Who’s Been in My Room?
Chapter 50       Pigeon Poop Loft
Chapter 51       Strangers Kidnapping Us?
Chapter 52       Never Drink and Drive
Chapter 53       In the Great State of Florida
Chapter 54       Girls
Chapter 55       Vero Beach—Bust or Boom
Chapter 56       Grandma Had a Dark Side
Chapter 57       The Lucky Old Son
Chapter 58       Anne
Chapter 59       Approached by a Pedophile
Chapter 60       Visiting Edith
Chapter 61       No One Home?
Chapter 62       A Special Announcement
Chapter 63       The Grand Announcement
Chapter 64       Was I That Damn Stupid?
Chapter 65       Which Way Do I Go?
Chapter 66       The Great Wrestler
Chapter 67       To the Moon, Ruth
Chapter 68       In the Navy Now
Chapter 69       Hawaii
Chapter 70       GED or Bust
Chapter 71       Cecil Ford, My Mentor
Chapter 72       I Need a Volunteer
Chapter 73       The Locals Are Loco
Chapter 74       Sissy Loved Cherry Pies
Chapter 75       Caught
Chapter 76       Safe Refuge
Chapter 77       Mom Is Home
Chapter 78       Welcome Home. Put on a Skirt
Chapter 79       Dad’s Black Hatred
Chapter 80       The Murphy Home
Chapter 81       I’m What?
Chapter 82       Jubilation with a Capital “J”
Chapter 83       The Hearing
Chapter 84       Not Pregnant
Chapter 85       Party Time
Chapter 86       A Surprise Visit
Chapter 87       A Visit to My Old Flame
Chapter 88       A Leave to Remember
Chapter 89       Our Wedding Day Is a-Coming
Chapter 90       Mom’s Vacation
Chapter 91       Help!
Chapter 92       She Really Likes Me
Chapter 93       Unreal
Chapter 94       Rotten Eggs, Anyone?
Chapter 95       Annie, Get Your Gun
Chapter 96       What Red Car?
Chapter 97       Belated Wedding Reception
Chapter 98       A Surprise Guest
Chapter 99       Wes-Pac or Not
Chapter 100     Six-Month Cruise
Chapter 101     Can I Bum a Ride?
Chapter 102     Out of the Navy
Chapter 103     Hi-Ho, It’s Off to Work I Go
Chapter 104     A Sunday Night Drive
Chapter 105     Subassembly Boss
Chapter 106     Hot Dogs
Chapter 107     Got Caught with My Hot Dog Out
Chapter 108     My Last Day
Chapter 109     On My Own Now
Chapter 110     Gomer the Rat
Chapter 111     A Talk with Dad
Chapter 112     Fed Up
Chapter 113     Route 66, Do or Die
Chapter 114     Picking Up Hippies
Chapter 115     Alone Again
Chapter 116     VWs Need Oil Too
Chapter 117     On the Road Again
Chapter 118     Junk Breaks Down
Chapter 119     Through the Desert We Walked
Chapter 120     Finally, a Ride
Chapter 121     Mission Impossible
Chapter 122     A Miracle on Hollywood and Vine
Chapter 123     Off to Work I Go, Hi-Ho
Chapter 124     The New Guy
Chapter 125     Monday Morning
Chapter 126     Going Home
Chapter 127     I Need a Psychiatrist
Chapter 128     The End for Dad
Chapter 129     Dad’s Favorite Stomping Grounds
Chapter 130     Mom Commits Herself
 
Epilogue
Hospice
PROLOGUE
My editor asked how I could have been such a lonely boy, having seven siblings. In my eighty years I’d never thought about it—until she asked. Our tyrant father never took any interest in us kids, and our mother was always taking care of the little ones. We were a bunch of birds fighting for the proverbial worm of attention from our mother. It seemed she only cared about us when we were young, and I don’t remember her ever saying the words “I love you.” Could this be why we kids had no interest in or affection for each other? It felt as though we were all on separate islands.
I was so terribly shy throughout my childhood. There were times when I’d walk into a roomful of people and feel as if all eyes were looking at me. My head would tense up; my face would get red; and my eyes would water. Possibly a few tears would slide down my red cheeks.
I eventually overcame my shyness, and some might say I’m quite the opposite now, always striking up conversations with complete strangers. Come to think of it, that’s how my mother was.
I’ve done some outlandish and attention-getting things throughout the years, such as making unique floats for the local parades and running in seven marathons, starting at age forty-eight (in 1991, I ran the Chicago Marathon, which was held close to Halloween, wearing a devil mask the entire race). Then there was the wheelbarrow race where I pushed a barrow at Rockford Speedway with a fellow employee’s wife hanging on for dear life. Didn’t know I would have to do it twice since I’d qualified for the finals.
It seems I always needed to be doing something to keep myself busy. I’d made a stained glass window, painted pictures on old barn wood shingles, drew portraits and paintings, wrote poems, practiced yoga poses, played horseshoes, jogged, and visited old abandoned houses to find antiques and old beer cans.

Once, I woke up early and decided to jog all the way to work, which was seventeen miles away. I was never, ever late for work, and on that day, true to form, I arrived as the bell rang. I was a little sweaty and smelly, but I made it.


In 1993 I made a Stamp Man costume for the Fourth of July parade from thousands of postage stamps I had acquired through the years. It was more of a collage. Each stamp fitted like a puzzle piece with none of them overlapping each other. It was a challenge. I then glued them onto of roll of wallpaper as I worked nights, in addition to my full-time job, at my wife’s twenty-four-hour answering service. When finished, I secured the ensemble on a blue plastic tarp. It became my twenty-foot-long cape. I also made a tall dunce hat covered with stamps. It was a hot Fourth of July, and I was dressed in black, about ten feet tall with the aid of homemade stilts, wearing shorts covered with stamps. My kids and grandkids walked behind me holding up the cape (hoping not to be recognized by anyone). My car was in front as I walked, a large Elvis Presley stamp towel on its hood. Inside, my wife was driving. With the help of a tape recorder and loudspeaker in car, the song “Stamp Man” rang out. It was an edited version from the Batman original. About halfway along the mile course, as we were going up a hill, one of my stilt straps broke and I took a big tumble, making a belly flop on the blacktop street. My famil