Deb had her first check up yesterday with her oral surgeon. Things are going well, but she will still have a mouthful of stitches for three more weeks, when she returns to have them removed. Because her extraction left a gaping hole to her sinus (right side), the surgery was more complicated than usual. Her face has run the gamut of colours, now settling in to a kind of yellow. The swelling is down, but she can't laugh or cough or sneeze or use straws or a bunch of other things for a long time yet. But she is back to work on her film projects.
Here is a photo of the Summer Solstice sunset from last Tuesday. We walked across the road and visited the tiny park on the Detroit River. The sun is setting over Michigan.
Today I finish up my Patti memoirs....
Part 2: A Trip to Cleveland (to Bid Adieu)
Campaign for Cleveland. This is a good time to mention my fund raising campaign, designed to get me to Cleveland to see Patti off season. Overall, it didn’t go very well. The first year after our parting, I cut a small slot in an old cardboard jigsaw puzzle box. I taped a hand lettered sign to it, and it became my piggy bank to save up for transportation money. The sign simply read “Campaign for Cleveland.” Every visitor to our house in those days was asked to contribute any spare change they might be willing to part with. I embarrassed my mother several times that year, barging in with my box jingling asking for donations during tea parties. After nearly a year of saving, I had just over $14, barely enough to get me one way to Toronto. While that scheme never bore fruit, I was destined to visit Cleveland eventually. Please read on.
Two Major Developments. My life took two sharp turns in the 1971/72 school year. On November 10th, out of a clear blue sky, I decided I wanted to learn how to play piano. So I did. A younger female cousin, who was studying piano at the time, became my first teacher. We had no piano, so I became dependent on their piano for practice. It was about a 35 minute walk each way between our houses, and even during Sudbury winters I walked there and back each day, and I practiced like a demon for 4-6 hours. I would eventually gain enough music background at Sudbury’s community college to go on and study at university (Windsor, and later Detroit). Playing and performing on piano is still one of my major interests, and continues to this day.
The second major development that school year was meeting Deb, in late spring 1972. I was a senior and she was a freshman, so there was a considerable age difference. I had several girlfriends during high school, with some relationships lasting a month or two, and some less than a week. At present I was seeing no one. My friend Bill and I would sit outside the school during our spare period, reading, doing homework, or just lying in the shade. A girls’ gym class happened to be outside during our spare period, and I began noticing a fetching red-haired maiden at play. One day, gathering all my courage, I went to her locker after school and asked if I could walk her home. Little did I realize that my entire future hinged upon her reply. How different things might have been if she had said no. But my request was accepted, and I escorted Deborah to her house after school. To my great surprise and disappointment, she lived about two minutes walk from school! Needless to say, not much was accomplished on that first encounter. But we began seeing one another during lunch hours, and things progressed slowly but steadily.
Through our letters, Patti knew about Deb before most of my Sudbury friends and close family. In one of my letters I compared myself to Charlie Brown, finally gathering up enough courage to ask out the little redheaded girl. With the senior prom coming up, I had already asked a good friend from my Gr. 12 home room class (Sharon McGuinness) to go with me, weeks before I had even met Deb. As the prom got nearer, I thought I was in trouble. But Patti’s advice was to stay the course. She said that if Deb really liked me, she would understand the situation. And she did. Patti was often in the role of a “Dear Abby” to me in my teenage years. Sharon and I had fun at the prom, and afterwards she knew that I was returning full time to Deb.
Spending nearly every day with a girl is very different from spending two weeks each summer. If I had seen Patti every day (or at least a lot more often), there would have been no other girl for me. Patti was much stronger than me when it came to our two week per year relationship. Though allowed to date, I think falling in love with someone else was taboo. But it soon became evident, as that year and the next one went on, that Deb was going to be the love of my life. When it comes to affairs of the heart, there is seldom logic and clear-minded thinking involved. I knew I loved Deb, and it seemed to be reciprocated. And so I wrote often to Patti, hoping to convince her of my leanings. I believe she sort of got the idea, but at the same time didn’t. She figured that because Deb was so young, things wouldn't continue much longer. But Deb was a very mature person, even at 15 when I met her. Anyway, in the summer of 1973, I packed a bag, dipped into my meager savings, and purchased a bus ticket to Windsor, where Jimmy was studying law. Deb knew where I was headed and why.
From Windsor I was on my own. Tunnel bus to Detroit. A few spare hours to wander around downtown, and then board a Greyhound bus. I arrived at the downtown bus depot in Cleveland later that day. I believe I was the only white person on the bus, a new experience for me. Some first impressions on arriving at Edgedale Road that afternoon: the Anderson home was large and suburban, two stories, and despite having six people living there, there was a spare room for me (I wonder if someone doubled up that week to give me the room)! The front and back yards were enormous, with the backyard hemmed in on two sides by the densest deciduous forest I had ever seen. And the cicadas!! I had never experienced such a deafening cacophony.
Though I wanted to get down to business right away, we were never really alone, except when Patti was driving us somewhere. I was not going to tell her my wish for leaving her and going steady with Deb while she was driving us on the freeway. Here are some of my Cleveland visit memories.
Beechwood Mall. This was the hugest mall I had ever seen. We both got corralled into a market research event, agreeing to take part in what we thought would be an easy $5 each for our time. Patti and I, along with about ten other suckers, were herded into a tent within the mall hallway, and subjected to watching commercials, slide shows, and listening to various people talk for about an hour, all concerning underarm deodorant. We had to write paragraphs, too! I was spotted early on as a visiting alien, when the woman in charge asked me if I was from England, due to our weird Canadian/British way of spelling certain words. We eventually were released from our civic duty with two crisp five dollar bills, some deodorant, and some coupons for more of the same. We weren’t on any drugs, but the experience was a hallucinatory one for both of us! We couldn’t stop laughing afterwards.
Ohio State Fair. I would have been happy just to have stayed home and talked things over with Patti, but Mrs. Anderson suggested we go to Columbus for the state fair. Off we went in the station wagon, Patti, Joanne, Leonard, and I’m pretty certain Michele, too. I remember huge crowds, and a day so hot I was certain that we would all melt. Once again I had no time to be alone with Patti, and my time was running out.
On my last day of visiting I got to meet some of Patti’s friends. One of her girlfriends had a piano, so we went there and I practiced a bit and played some pieces for Patti (Level Five in those days). I so wish she could hear me play again these days. In her letters to me she often talked about one or two boys that were really hooked on her (big surprise, not a difficult thing to happen at all). She liked them as friends, but did not want to date them seriously. I met one of them, and he was totally nuts about Patti. I was very happy to see this, and fervently hoped he could someday win her over.
I finally got to talk to Patti about Deb, and what was going on with us. We agreed to break off, at least for a time, and see how things would go. But I knew how things were going. I told her about her friend (John??) who really loved her, but she just laughed, saying nothing. When I eventually got back to Sudbury, I wrote her a final letter, asking her to keep in touch. I got one very short reply, and that was it. She never tried to contact me again.
Deb and I were married in the summer of 1976, and moved to Windsor for university. We have lived in the area ever since. In the summer of 1977, Deb had major knee surgery, and was confined within an ankle to hip cast all summer. I had a summer job working on a tugboat on the Detroit River. But we still headed to Penage for a short visit in August before school resumed. We took a boat ride, passing Ben Isle. People were swimming, and hanging out on the dock, so we pulled in to say hi. Patti was there, looking as beautiful as she ever had, just out of the water. She was surprised to see us, but seemed happy about it. Deb hauled herself out of the boat, with assistance, and someone found a comfortable chair for her, and we spent a pleasant hour talking together. Patti joked with us, and Deb said how envious she was of people who could jump into the lake (not possible for her that summer). This was the first and only time that Patti and Deb met one another, and marked the very last time I would ever see Patti.
In the autumn of 1979 Deb and I went to Cleveland, to visit the art museum (Deb was a fine arts major) and the Dali Museum (since moved to Florida). We ended up at Beechwood Mall for lunch, which was very close to the Dali collection at that time. I phoned Patti to see if she could meet us for lunch! But alas, she had just had some kind of surgery (minor, she said), had just got home, and was still groggy. She wanted us to visit her at home in Pepper Pike, but I told her she needed to rest, and that we would stop in another time. That was the last time I spoke with Patti.
I had always hoped to reconnect, ideally sitting out on the dock at Ben Isle and catching up on news with one another. I know absolutely nothing about Patti’s life after that last phone call, though I think I did call her once again one time, but there was no answer. Life for Deb and I got busy. Teaching school, attending university summer school for many years, travelling, etc. I have no photo of Patti, so if anyone can get one to me, please get in touch! She never liked it when I took her photo, so I tended not to. And if anyone wants to chat about Patti and her life, please do contact me via message attached to this blog.
What brought on this latest attempt to contact Leonard and Patti? I have thoroughly searched the internet and Facebook for Leonard, Joanne, or Patti, or Michele, on and off over the years, without any luck. I had really given up, almost. Then sometime in early May of this year I had a very vivid dream about Mr. Anderson! I have never dreamed about him before, but it stuck with me the next day and the next. Mr. Anderson seldom stood still; he was always moving about and doing something purposeful. So in the dream, he was fixing something or other, fiddling with something, and talking to me. But I couldn’t hear him very well, so I never found out what he was saying to me. So I made yet another effort to find Leonard Jr. Voila! This time Google showed me that he was on Facebook, but that he hadn’t posted in over a year. I can but try! Then I saw a photo on his wall of his daughter, N----. I was suddenly staring into the face of Patti! I was able to message N, and she responded, putting me in contact with her dad. She also passed on the news of Patti’s death 8 years ago, thus setting off my emotions, and suddenly unlocking long sealed off memories. I want to sincerely thank her for being so kind to me.
Some things about Patti's obit sadden me, such as there being no one mentioned in her life other than her family. I suspect that she did not marry, or even have a serious partner in life. Also, no cause of death is mentioned, nor donations to a particular charity. And there are only two lines about Patti herself. She liked to fish and be outdoors, and she was a Eucharist minister at her church. That's not saying much for 60 years of life. It seems as if the obit might have been written hurriedly, amid great grief. Perhaps certain mysteries are left unsolved. Though I still would love to know more about her, I still hope to hear from her brother, Leonard. Patti was a major part of my teen years, and though the memories of those days were seemingly locked away somewhere inside my head, out they came on news of her passing. And I'm glad those memories came out to say hi. Though I will never meet Patti again, I will often think of her and her family, as well as the magical camp on Ben Isle. It was once the summer home of the Princess of Pepper Pike.
Mapman Mike
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