Chapter 11: Do you have any particularly vivid memories of your grandparents?

Originally written March 1, 2021

Papa & Nana, perhaps their wedding day? Sometime in the early 1920s

I never met my grandparents on my father’s side, but nearly all my memories from my childhood involve my maternal grandparents. My mom, my brother, my sister and I moved in with Nana and Papa in the summer of 1960, just a few months after my sister was born.

We’d lived in Albuquerque for about a year during mom’s short second marriage. One of the main things I remember from that drive to Albuquerque in the summer of 1959 in my mom’s little Nash Metropolitan was an incredible sadness I felt over my fear that I’d ever see Nana again.

I was so happy that we returned to Oklahoma to live with my grandparents. We lived at their huge home at 1645 Camden Way from that summer of 1960 to the summer of 1968, about a year and a half after Papa died.

Nana was with us through my high school years, my college years and well into my early adulthood, in fact more than five years after my daughter Molly was born.

So yes, I have plenty of memories of these two wonderful grandparents, nearly all of them sweet, many of them “vivid.”

One of these I already mentioned in a previous chapter, in which I wrote about Papa reacting to the televised murder of Lee Harvey Oswald, yelling repeatedly,  “They shot the son of a bitch!” (Papa died a few years later on January 3, 1967, the same day as the guy who shot that son of a bitch.)

Back when Papa was much younger than I am now

But one of my most treasured memories of Papa came out of an Everly Brothers concert we saw. This was at Springlake amusement park in Oklahoma City circa 1965: The whole family — brother Jack, sister Mary, my mom, both grandparents --went.

Papa wasn’t the intense music nut that I became. But he did love music. I remember him bringing me records sometimes when returning from trips to Kentucky to see his mother, who still lived near Paducah. One of those records that directly affected my musical tastes was a country compilation LP that included such songs as “90 Miles an Hour (Down a Dead End Street)” by Hank Snow, “Detour” by Jimmy Walker and “Night Train to Memphis” by Roy Acuff.

He liked Peter, Paul & Mary’s “Puff the Magic Dragon” and he’d frequently start singing it in the car – though he thought the title was “Press the Magic Button” and it would always piss me off when he sang it like that. And though I’m not sure that he actually liked The Beatles, he loved the idea of The Beatles and was delighted that my brother and I liked them so much. When our friends would come over he’d ask them, “What do you think about those long-haired boys from England?” – which kind of embarrassed me, though I remember it fondly.  

When the whole family packed into his Buick to go see The Everly Brothers at Springlake, I’m not sure what Papa was expecting. Probably just a nice summer night outside listening to music with the family. But it turned out to be more than that.

This was during something of a slump in the Everly’s career, as was the case with so many first-generation rockers in the wake of the British Invasion.

But they sounded great that night. However, as much as I loved the show, I didn’t love it nearly as much as Papa. Like Don and Phil, Papa was born and raised in Kentucky and something about those storied Everly harmonies sounded like home to him.

At that point in my life, I wanted to be a lawyer like Papa when I grew up. But after the applause died down after the show, Papa turned to my brother and me and said, “Boys when you grow up, I don’t want you to be lawyers. I want you to play guitar like those Kentucky boys.”

Jack took that advice more literally than I did, though for me it was a parental permission to let my obsession with music be a major force in my life.

And I got a sweet, cosmic affirmation of that a couple of years later, a few months after Papa (and Jack Ruby) died. I was listening to the radio and the DJ announced a brand new song by The Everly Brothers. It was what would become a minor hit for the brothers, “Bowling Green” in which every verse contains the line, “A man from Kentucky sure is lucky.” I took that as a message from Papa from the great beyond.

Here’s a live version of that song on Ed Sullivan:

One of my most vivid memories of Nana came near her end.

On November 9, 1986. I had eaten dinner with her and Mom. While I was over there, Nana had gone on a tear, criticizing my brother’s girlfriend (at the time) and her children. Jack wasn’t there to defend himself and I got mad at her. I argued back that there was nothing wrong with this woman and that her kids were cute and whatnot. Nana seemed bemused with my arguments, which of course only made me angrier.

I was still pissed when I got home. But something inside told me that I ought to call her up and apologize.

So I did.

I told her I was sorry and that I loved her.

She didn’t seem surprised that I called but I could tell she appreciated it. I felt better also.

Nana with her first grandchild, Molly. I always said Molly being born added five years to Nana’s life. Molly was five when Nana died.

I’m not sure how long after that call it was, Nana called me back that night. She didn’t really have anything to say. I now suspect that she knew something was up, but didn’t know how to say it.

I’d been watching – SYNCHRONICITY ALERT! -- The Everly Brothers on TV, doing some performance at Disney World.

I wasn’t rude to Nana, but I managed to get off the phone fairly quickly. Told her I loved her again and that I’d see her later.

That part turned out to be untrue.

I went back to my TV. (And wouldn’t you know it, some of that is preserved on Youtube!)

Early the next morning — about 6 am I think, my mom called. She’d just gotten back from St. Vincent Hospital, where Nana had died.

That fear and that sadness I’d felt as a child riding in my mom’s Metropolitan to Albuquerque more than 25 years before, all came back with a vengeance.

Only this time it was true. I’d never see Nana again.

The only consolation I had was that I didn’t let her die while I was angry with her.

Below, one last word from those Kentucky boys: