Chapter 4 – Years 29 to 37
Everything went fairly smooth for a few years. We even helped my brother and three friends move from California by giving them a place to stay temporarily. I had to have my appendix taken out in 1975. It wasn’t until late 1978 that I started having problems with my back and started missing work. My wife took a job at a nursing home to supplement. By early 1979, I couldn’t work at all. The doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with the X-rays. Sometimes I would get out of bed and my knees would buckle. Things were at an impasse, I didn’t know what to do next.
Finally, a friend suggested an orthopedic surgeon that helped them when nobody else could. I made an appointment and went to this doctor. He told me to bring any X-rays I had. He looked at my X-rays and said He thinks he knows what the problem is, but he wants to get another picture from a different angle. Sur enough, it was a “set back” vertebrae that was pinching my spinal cord. He said there was no guarantee he could get my knees back but it would stop it from getting any worse. The solution was a spinal fusion of the 4th 5th and 6th lumbars. He would take a piece of my hip and use the bone for the fusion. He told me when I woke up from the surgery, that I would feel like a truck had run over me. I laughed and thought he was kidding, but he didn’t laugh.
We scheduled and had the surgery done. When I woke up I knew he wasn’t kidding about the truck running over me. I was so painful I could barely move. They would give me a shot of morphine, and if I closed my eyes and cleared my mind I could sleep about 20-25 minutes. Then I would lay there writhing in pain until the next shot 4 hours later. The doctor comes in the next day and tells me that I will have to get up and walk. I said doctor that is impossible. He said I would still have to in order to heal properly. He had a nurse walk me three times a day. As time went on I healed and my knees became dependable again. He sent me home with a prescription for Percodan. When he cut back my narcotics, I turned to alcohol for the pain. I had drunk before, but I never needed a drink until now. Little did I know the alcohol demon was about to ruin my life.
The doctor told me he didn’t want me to ever drive a truck again, but he would let me if I took a whole year off. The terminal manager at the place I worked came up with a solution. He had been after the main office to give him an assistant to help with all the paperwork. When he told them he had a driver that couldn’t drive for a year they granted him the position. The assistant would be the same status as a dispatcher. Having had management experience it was an easy fill-in. The evening dispatcher then bumped me from my day job and he took it. So I became the evening dispatcher. While I was off sick, I took a correspondence course in gunsmithing. Now, having regular hours, I opened a gun shop in the little town I lived in. They had a lot of empty business sites for rent really cheap. The drinking for pain continued.
Well the gun shop didn’t do all that well. The only think that made money was the actual gunsmithing. So I closed the store and did that from home. Meanwhile the drinking started bringing out all these old feelings. My self-made promise to leave when my child was of age resurfaced. Anytime during the marriage when there was an argument surfacing, I would just sweep it into a closet and try to live with it. I quit trying to resolve any differences. I stayed in the marriage because I didn't trust her to raise my child. I had promised myself that once my child was of age, I would leave. 15 years later, my child is old enough to always know me, but my wife had changed and got her act together. I felt guilty about keeping my promise to myself about leaving. Things got so bad I even checked into a motel with a 12-gague shotgun. I felt so guilty, and I was so drunk I just wanted it to end. I had myself fully talked into going through with that. All of a sudden, I had an argument with another presence in that room. This presence was calm, I was anything but calm. It told me just how everyone would feel about my taking my own life. It reminded me I hadn’t even called my mother that I was having problems. I then realized that I couldn’t make victims out of everybody I cared about. Looking back, I realized this was God sparing me for a future calling.
I told my wife to let me go so I can work things out, and maybe I'll be back. That is when her old selfish character reared its ugly head again. She fought me tooth and toenail to stay together. I got a job driving 48 Continental States and Canada. After about a year of driving and thinking, I came in and asked for a divorce. My daughter typed up the papers and I told my wife to file them, or I would make some new and file on her. By the time she let me go, I knew I wouldn't be back. While driving cross country, I had a co-driver that lived in the same county of Oklahoma as me. He introduced me to a next door neighbor of his he thought would be perfect for me. He said we were both kind and patient and we should get together. I didn’t bother to look her up in the next town as I thought my ex-wife would cause problems. I moved in with a friend and started driving for a local company. It was real good money and involved one day out, sleeping in the berth, and one day at home for most of the runs. We could even lump (unload) our floor loads for extra cash.
I told myself that I would look this gal up after the divorce became final. I tried dating some during this time. About a month before the 6 months final divorce date I went over to the place the gal lived at to see if she was still there. I saw her, from a distance, walk a fellow out to a car and kiss him goodbye. I said, oh well, she has a boyfriend. About three weeks pass. On the way to work one day, I stopped at a convenience store and she was in there shopping. I think, it can’t hurt to ask her if she is seeing anyone. She said she wasn’t, so I ask her out to dinner on the final date of my divorce. When I walk up to her door on that night, I noticed the very guy she was kissing goodbye was sitting inside. I am thinking: What have I got myself into? She then promptly introduced him as her little brother, that was staying with her to help with her youngest. Her youngest, from her second marriage, was taken during a court ordered visit. This had happened right after I was introduced to her. He was only nine months old when he was taken. By the time they found him in California he was a year and a half. Child services had him in the hospital with bruises and cigarette burns all over his body. I guess the dad was torturing him to get back at his mother for dumping him. Naturally the boy had PTSD, and he was a handful.
The following week my gal calls me and asked me to meet her at a coffee shop in town to meet her mother. When I arrive, I recognized her mother as the wife of one of my fellow drivers when I was hauling cement and dispatching. We talked a little and she then recognized me. I used to give her his check when he was out. I knew her step-dad well, and he knew me. He even endorsed to date his daughter. My buddy’s house I was staying at was lonely so I stay at her place a lot. I started sleeping over and got really attached to the little boy. The more I talked with this gal the more I realized we was victimized in both her marriages. Her first marriage she was almost a child, and her husband mentally abused her. She had two children with him. They were now 12, a boy, and 10, a girl. Her second marriage was to a sociopath, and she was mentally and physically abused. She was scared to death this guy would show up with some child support and take the kid again.
By now we are cohabitating for a couple of months, living in sin. I am the only person her little boy even halfway minds. He starts to really look for me to get back of a run. One day going to a store, she passed my terminal where she usually picked me up and he throws a fit. I make quite a bit of money and we both are drinking hard liquor. I then suggest that I adopt the youngest to alleviate her fears. She agreed and we plan to get married. She says they will have to post his town in California, to give him a chance to block the adoption. She is afraid he will show up and try to kill everyone. She had this victim mindset, the kept her mentally unbalanced. I told her if I was in town, off the truck, I would handle this fellow. I am not afraid of anyone. He wants to get crazy with me, I will get crazy. I teach her how to shoot a revolver and I tell her just don’t let him kill you. If he shows up we will handle it. She got out of that victim mindset and became a survivor. She sees him during this time in a grocery store and gives him a steely look like saying “come on.” Next thing, he was gone never to be seen again. We get married and I adopt.
Continued
Everything went fairly smooth for a few years. We even helped my brother and three friends move from California by giving them a place to stay temporarily. I had to have my appendix taken out in 1975. It wasn’t until late 1978 that I started having problems with my back and started missing work. My wife took a job at a nursing home to supplement. By early 1979, I couldn’t work at all. The doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with the X-rays. Sometimes I would get out of bed and my knees would buckle. Things were at an impasse, I didn’t know what to do next.
Finally, a friend suggested an orthopedic surgeon that helped them when nobody else could. I made an appointment and went to this doctor. He told me to bring any X-rays I had. He looked at my X-rays and said He thinks he knows what the problem is, but he wants to get another picture from a different angle. Sur enough, it was a “set back” vertebrae that was pinching my spinal cord. He said there was no guarantee he could get my knees back but it would stop it from getting any worse. The solution was a spinal fusion of the 4th 5th and 6th lumbars. He would take a piece of my hip and use the bone for the fusion. He told me when I woke up from the surgery, that I would feel like a truck had run over me. I laughed and thought he was kidding, but he didn’t laugh.
We scheduled and had the surgery done. When I woke up I knew he wasn’t kidding about the truck running over me. I was so painful I could barely move. They would give me a shot of morphine, and if I closed my eyes and cleared my mind I could sleep about 20-25 minutes. Then I would lay there writhing in pain until the next shot 4 hours later. The doctor comes in the next day and tells me that I will have to get up and walk. I said doctor that is impossible. He said I would still have to in order to heal properly. He had a nurse walk me three times a day. As time went on I healed and my knees became dependable again. He sent me home with a prescription for Percodan. When he cut back my narcotics, I turned to alcohol for the pain. I had drunk before, but I never needed a drink until now. Little did I know the alcohol demon was about to ruin my life.
The doctor told me he didn’t want me to ever drive a truck again, but he would let me if I took a whole year off. The terminal manager at the place I worked came up with a solution. He had been after the main office to give him an assistant to help with all the paperwork. When he told them he had a driver that couldn’t drive for a year they granted him the position. The assistant would be the same status as a dispatcher. Having had management experience it was an easy fill-in. The evening dispatcher then bumped me from my day job and he took it. So I became the evening dispatcher. While I was off sick, I took a correspondence course in gunsmithing. Now, having regular hours, I opened a gun shop in the little town I lived in. They had a lot of empty business sites for rent really cheap. The drinking for pain continued.
Well the gun shop didn’t do all that well. The only think that made money was the actual gunsmithing. So I closed the store and did that from home. Meanwhile the drinking started bringing out all these old feelings. My self-made promise to leave when my child was of age resurfaced. Anytime during the marriage when there was an argument surfacing, I would just sweep it into a closet and try to live with it. I quit trying to resolve any differences. I stayed in the marriage because I didn't trust her to raise my child. I had promised myself that once my child was of age, I would leave. 15 years later, my child is old enough to always know me, but my wife had changed and got her act together. I felt guilty about keeping my promise to myself about leaving. Things got so bad I even checked into a motel with a 12-gague shotgun. I felt so guilty, and I was so drunk I just wanted it to end. I had myself fully talked into going through with that. All of a sudden, I had an argument with another presence in that room. This presence was calm, I was anything but calm. It told me just how everyone would feel about my taking my own life. It reminded me I hadn’t even called my mother that I was having problems. I then realized that I couldn’t make victims out of everybody I cared about. Looking back, I realized this was God sparing me for a future calling.
I told my wife to let me go so I can work things out, and maybe I'll be back. That is when her old selfish character reared its ugly head again. She fought me tooth and toenail to stay together. I got a job driving 48 Continental States and Canada. After about a year of driving and thinking, I came in and asked for a divorce. My daughter typed up the papers and I told my wife to file them, or I would make some new and file on her. By the time she let me go, I knew I wouldn't be back. While driving cross country, I had a co-driver that lived in the same county of Oklahoma as me. He introduced me to a next door neighbor of his he thought would be perfect for me. He said we were both kind and patient and we should get together. I didn’t bother to look her up in the next town as I thought my ex-wife would cause problems. I moved in with a friend and started driving for a local company. It was real good money and involved one day out, sleeping in the berth, and one day at home for most of the runs. We could even lump (unload) our floor loads for extra cash.
I told myself that I would look this gal up after the divorce became final. I tried dating some during this time. About a month before the 6 months final divorce date I went over to the place the gal lived at to see if she was still there. I saw her, from a distance, walk a fellow out to a car and kiss him goodbye. I said, oh well, she has a boyfriend. About three weeks pass. On the way to work one day, I stopped at a convenience store and she was in there shopping. I think, it can’t hurt to ask her if she is seeing anyone. She said she wasn’t, so I ask her out to dinner on the final date of my divorce. When I walk up to her door on that night, I noticed the very guy she was kissing goodbye was sitting inside. I am thinking: What have I got myself into? She then promptly introduced him as her little brother, that was staying with her to help with her youngest. Her youngest, from her second marriage, was taken during a court ordered visit. This had happened right after I was introduced to her. He was only nine months old when he was taken. By the time they found him in California he was a year and a half. Child services had him in the hospital with bruises and cigarette burns all over his body. I guess the dad was torturing him to get back at his mother for dumping him. Naturally the boy had PTSD, and he was a handful.
The following week my gal calls me and asked me to meet her at a coffee shop in town to meet her mother. When I arrive, I recognized her mother as the wife of one of my fellow drivers when I was hauling cement and dispatching. We talked a little and she then recognized me. I used to give her his check when he was out. I knew her step-dad well, and he knew me. He even endorsed to date his daughter. My buddy’s house I was staying at was lonely so I stay at her place a lot. I started sleeping over and got really attached to the little boy. The more I talked with this gal the more I realized we was victimized in both her marriages. Her first marriage she was almost a child, and her husband mentally abused her. She had two children with him. They were now 12, a boy, and 10, a girl. Her second marriage was to a sociopath, and she was mentally and physically abused. She was scared to death this guy would show up with some child support and take the kid again.
By now we are cohabitating for a couple of months, living in sin. I am the only person her little boy even halfway minds. He starts to really look for me to get back of a run. One day going to a store, she passed my terminal where she usually picked me up and he throws a fit. I make quite a bit of money and we both are drinking hard liquor. I then suggest that I adopt the youngest to alleviate her fears. She agreed and we plan to get married. She says they will have to post his town in California, to give him a chance to block the adoption. She is afraid he will show up and try to kill everyone. She had this victim mindset, the kept her mentally unbalanced. I told her if I was in town, off the truck, I would handle this fellow. I am not afraid of anyone. He wants to get crazy with me, I will get crazy. I teach her how to shoot a revolver and I tell her just don’t let him kill you. If he shows up we will handle it. She got out of that victim mindset and became a survivor. She sees him during this time in a grocery store and gives him a steely look like saying “come on.” Next thing, he was gone never to be seen again. We get married and I adopt.
Continued
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