Eileen and Larry Somers

I'm trying to declutter my office and life. This scrap of paper has the list of things that was on my dad's radar in 2015. I liked to write down the things that he ranted about and say, "Which thing is most important to you? What would you like me to work on?"   As I told Ann, worrying was his hobby. She tried to fix all his issues, but he was really good at finding things to be upset about!    Getting the garage floor replaced was a big one. It was old and cracked. The unevenness made it a trip hazard. It took me two days to clear everything off the floor! The guy did a nice job.  There were a lot of things we didn't get to . . . but the list is now in my recycling. And memorialized here. I also had a "Happy Holidays" money envelope with this. My dad loved to say he did all his Christmas shopping in one place and no one wanted to return it! He'd go to the bank and withdraw money. Getting those little envelopes was a predictable (but delightful) gift...

Told by Tom as told to him by Larry: Grandpa paid Al and Dad fifty cents per rat to kill rats in the barn. That was a lot of money back then! That's how much damage they could do. So Dad and Al got busy and soon rid the barn of rats. But the boys wanted more money, so they went to friends and neighbors barns and killed more rats, bringing them home for the bounty. Unbeknownst to grandpa, he was paying to rid the entire neighborhood of rats!

Told by Tom as told by our dad: Grandma Somers had chickens and the neighbors had chickens, but didn't fence them in. The neighbors' chickens ate the meal put out for grandma's chickens. So grandma lamented to dad about feeding the neighbors' chickens all the time. Dad asked for extra eggs from grandma and said he would take care of it. The neighbor boy was a friend of his and when dad went the next morning to gather eggs, he was pulling two or three eggs out of each nest. He commented to his friend, "These chickens are very prolific!" The boy went home and told his mom and the next day, the neighbors put up a fence.

Told by Tom: Grandma Somers wanted a rock garden in her yard. (According to our mom, going to St. Quentin back in the day was like going into the wild, wild, west with dirt everywhere. There were no flowers, no trees, no grass. Our grandma liked beauty and had the only house with greenery.) Dad didn't really want to build a rock garden, but he wanted to make his mom happy. He told grandma that he was going fishing with his brothers and then he had to go to work. He would pick up some rocks in the stream and put them in the trunk of his car. He got home from fishing and grandma had had a load of rock dumped off in the yard, but dad had to go to work. So grandma had our Uncle Al make her the rock garden. Uncle Al didn't care, and grandma knew it. She knew Larry would do a more careful job, so when she saw him again she asked him to come out and look at the job Al did. She asked dad, "So what do you think?" Dad didn't want to work on it, so he said, "I think h...

As I've gotten more of my parents' papers to sort through and recycle or shred, I sometimes think about having some "time capsule" moments. This piece of paper in my dad's writing is one of them. It says "I would like to learn an effective method of studying that will enable me to retain knowledge and help me to compete with other students in the years to come. I would like to learn efficient reading, note taking, also how to better concentrate upon the things that I do." This was when he was taking classes at Normandale Community College after he retired. It was before his hands started getting so shaky. It was before he lost his vision to macular degeneration. It also brings to mind his stories of school in Canada. He only "went through the eighth grade" but told us that he had learned all the curriculum through the tenth grade because of the one-room school house model. He loved to tell stories about going to night classes at "...

I don't want to start another blog specifically for our dad, Larry Somers. But as I sort through papers and think of things I'd like to "keep" while I clear clutter, I think I'll just add them to mother's blog. I don't think she'd mind. I found this in with my dad's financial papers (my parents didn't get rid of very many pieces of paper . . . ). I hadn't realized that he started working at Suburban even before Louise was born! I knew that it was the only job I was cognizant of him having and that's because it *was* his only job during my lifetime until he retired! He had so many stories about working at Suburban Wood Products. Most of them reflected his unhappiness with his job there. As a kid, I once asked him why he didn't quit if he was so unhappy. That didn't go over well! I didn't realize until I was an adult that his negativity was part of his identity. It's sad that he lived a "glass half full" ...

My mother does NOT like to have her photo taken, but sometimes she'll be a good sport about it. Here are a few of the more recent pics of her. (e.g. Last five years)