family

The Climbing Bear

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I’d like to share a memory about my dad that was kind of painful for many years, but now I see it as just a human moment that I can understand from a whole different perspective as an adult. The five of us – my mom and dad, brother and sister, and I were at the Kutztown Folk festival. I think I was about 5 years old. Being a folk festival, there were naturally a lot of vendors selling crafts, toys and food.

After a while, we came across a stand that had wooden puzzles and toys. There was a toy that was a simple wooden cutout of a bear that had two strings running thought the legs on each side. By pulling on the rings at the bottom of the strings, one side then the other, you could make the bear climb the ropes.

I toggled the bear up the rope to the top and let it slide back down to go again. After a couple times, I decided I needed to take it home. It was an impulsive toddler gotta have it moment, but I guess my eagerness tugged at my mom’s heartstrings as well as the bear’s strings and she didn’t want me to go away empty handed, so she told my dad they should get it.

Even back then, in the ’70’s, items at festivals like that were pretty pricy compared to your mass produced retail store items. Of course, I was too young to realize that, and we were struggling to get by in those days. My dad had been a milk tester for years, going to farms to test samples of milk for fat content and other things which helped the farmers maintain their herds, weeding out the low producers and breeding the best producers. The testing was becoming more automated as farmers updated their milking and storage equipment. He transitioned from milk testing to working at Bangor Hardware, where he worked for many years. My mom was doing social work for Penn State Extension. Neither jobs paid much and both were on their way out. My mom worked at blouse mills after that.

So, at this transitional time when money was scarce, there was this climbing bear that was putting my dad in a tough spot. He understandably was annoyed at the inflated prices. I don’t remember exactly what he said to the vendor or what my mom said to him, but he voiced his anger at the vendor and criticized them for price gouging or whatever they called it back then. My mom was, in turn, upset with my dad for “making a scene” and I felt guilty for having insisted on getting the silly toy. The moment was totally ruined and I didn’t even want it anymore, but there it was in my hand as we all piled in the car to head home. My mom managed to smooth things over after a while so that I was ok with hanging the climbing bear in my room which I shared with my brother. We both played with it.

I have to admit, I resented my dad over that incident for many years, being just a kid. But I always remembered when that memory surfaced, that he also was very thoughtful in making sure we had enough to eat, or were comfortable. He would always insists that one of us kids take the last piece of cake or pie or a bigger portion of meat. He’d help us in the kitchen making a snack and he’d make sure I got my allergy medicines, sometimes with a spoonful of honey, or a glass of Strawberry Quick stirred into my special allergen free milk. He was always a good provider, but I think that day at the folk festival haunted him. I know as an adult that he had anxiety as I have at times, and he must have felt terribly guilty about blowing up at the seller in front of me and my siblings.

To this day, I enjoy perusing the artist markets and craft vendors at festivals. I’ve acquired many unique items at festivals over the years, many of which I still have. I’ve got some cool stuff from Mayfair, Musikfest, and many other smaller festivals and events. No Walmart for me. Ha ha!

So guess what, Dad? We won. Your hard work and mom’s and both your sons’ over the years brought us out of poverty. No, we never had a lot of money, but we got ahead just enough and we always had each other and our love and God’s love. You were a good provider and a loving dad. Miss you every day.

The Return

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I haven’t blogged in several years, but I’m going to start again. I became discouraged after my account was hacked and followers started saying they didn’t see my posts shared on social media. I also got fewer reads from people just searching me on WordPress. It was also getting hard to think of ideas to write about and life has a way of getting in the way of things.

When I last posted in the fall of 2018, I had been attending a new church and making friends there. I’m still a member of Metropolitan Community Church of the Lehigh Valley and still enjoy a few good friendships made there. Some people have moved on, but it’s still my church and spiritual center. I’m still glad I was brave enough to go to a gay friendly church and start being who I am.

A lot of things have happened since October 2018. I rebuilt my credit and got a new car, returned to the digital department at my work after a stint in microfilming. There was that whole pandemic thing. I had shoulder surgery in 2021 and a bunch of other health issues between fall 2020 and late 2021. I’ve taken lots of pictures, took a couple memorable vacations with my new friends, grew a lot of flowers and did some spiffing up in the house.

The most significant events were both bad ones, though. One is ongoing even now. The other, was the loss of my dad to cancer last year, on St. Patrick’s Day, early in the morning. It was my brother’s birthday that he lost consciousness as we administered home hospice care and my brother did most of it that night as my mom and I fell asleep since we had gotten almost no sleep the previous night. I will always feel bad for my brother to have that happen on his birthday and I’m grateful to my dad for hanging on until after midnight so it wouldn’t officially be my brother’s birthday that he died. And this just a few years after the start of the pandemic made it impossible for my brother to celebrate his 50th properly.

My dad was diagnosed at about that time as well, and had surgery to remove a very large tumor from his colon in June 2020. Somehow, it took about six months to diagnose, even though the tumor was quite sizable. He went through chemo like a champ and fought it for three years, until just a few weeks before his 91st birthday. No one could have done better and we will always be proud of him.

The other negative event is one that I’m going to post a lot about. I have been subjected to a form of relentless, brutal harassment known as gang stalking. There are many, many online forums about this and much misinformation by the creeps that do it, trying to discredit those who share their experience. It’s not just harassment. It’s assault. Years long, cruel and sadistic assault. It’s usually completely without provocation, as it is in my case. People are targeted for mostly political reasons, often at a young age. It’s a scheme to prevent people from succeeding at anything and becoming a force for progress in the world. It’s all done very subtly, which makes it impossible to prove or put an end to. The victim, or target, is left to face it alone because no one believes or understands what’s happening. It’s extremely insidious and cowardly and provokes many to rage. I believe this is the cause of much violence in this country including mass shootings.

It’s my mission to expose not just those doing it to me, but the whole network, which is nationwide, probably even worldwide. I also hope to explain what I think is the motivation behind this horrible practice and why I was targeted. The world would be a far, far better place without these extremists and those they recruit to help them in gang stalking. One thing I’ll address is that the participants are not all necessarily right wingers. The organizers are. They recruit people by slandering and falsely incriminating the targets and they are using us as guinea pigs to perfect their methods and weapons for a wide scale attack.

I’d say that’s enough for my return to blogging. I just want to say that I am doing just fine mental health wise and I have never experienced paranoia, nor do I have any tendency for it. I have only mild bipolar depression and have never had a manic episode. I have my father’s good heart and tenacity. I have persevered through five years of this already and I will make it through!

The contribution

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As we pulled out, I waved to my family. My aunt commented that my mom was really crying, and she seemed surprised that it was that hard for her to see me go for two weeks. I hadn’t been away from home for more than a night before that.

I was going to stay with relatives for two weeks and come back to our family reunion with them. It was the summer between 6th and 7th grades. We didn’t have middle school then, so the coming year was the first of junior high. I had kind of been manic in the latter half of the school year, though it would be years before I knew that’s what it was. It was kind of good in that it broke me out of my shell. I was always very shy and quiet. Unfortunately, that returned by fall and lasted for a few more years.

So, we were off, amidst the tears. I realized years later that my mom was crying because she felt so bad about my brother not getting to go too. My aunt had called my mom and made the suggestion.  I guess there wouldn’t have been enough room in their car for everyone on the way back with luggage and all, so only I was going.

It begs the question, why extend the invitation at all if it was only going to be for one? Then I thought maybe my mom should have declined the invitation. I guess she didn’t want us both to miss out. My brother and I were just 14 months apart in age, he the older one, and we did everything together.

My brother was gracious about letting me go. While he was close to our cuz too, he knew that I always had a special bond with him. I’m sure he still felt left out, though. We didn’t get to do a lot of things, or go places, because we didn’t have the money and my parents didn’t get much vacation. I don’t know if they had any paid vacation. My mom was working at a blouse mill and my dad worked at a hardware store.

Once at my cousin’s house, I had a really nice time. It was early in the summer, and the weather was great.  As I said, my cousin and I had a special bond. We only saw each other once a year, but we always picked right up where we left off. They lived in a city, and we went to museums and other fun things.

We also ate out two or three times. Near the end of the trip, my aunt asked me for money for those times we ate out and they had paid for everyone, including me. I was surprised that she was asking for it, but being only 11, I didn’t protest. The problem was, that I had only $13 at the start of the trip, some of which I had spent on a puddle jumper at the Children’s Museum.

My aunt’s response to that information was, “You mean your mother sent you out here with only thirteen dollars?”  Instead of feeling angry at her, I was embarrassed and ashamed. I felt inadequate. I was aware that my family was poorer than most everyone else I knew, but this was kind of a painful reminder. And, she still took the my money. I had wanted to get my brother a souvenir of some kind. My aunt said I could pick something out of a box of items she picked up here and there for our annual Christmas gift exchange via mail.

I selected a fancy plastic ruler with “wood” grain through the middle. I’ll never forget the disappointed look on my brother’s face when I presented it to him.

Well, that was more than three decades ago. (Is that possible?) I must admit I still feel resentment when I think of that incident, but I have forgiven it. I remind myself of her good qualities, which I’ll share with you now. She was fun to be around and had an infectious laugh.

My uncle worked for the post office and he used to joke that she gave him job security, because she sent cards to everyone for birthdays and anniversaries and such. She was very good about that. She kept track of everything. She worked hard selling Tupperware to help support the family. She actually won a sales contest not long before my visit. The prize was the station wagon we rode in.

She also had diabetes for as long as I could remember. She was on dialysis for the last ten years of her life, until heart complications took her too soon. I think she was 72, so she made it pretty long, considering. We all still miss her.