Stories for the Fall 2020 Feedback Sessions
Group A
To avoid emailing stories back and forth, please upload on this page the story you wish to discuss this month.
Post your stories a minimum of one week in advance of the feedback session. Those seven days give you and your buddies time to read and provide helpful feedback on each others’ stories.
Instructions:
- Share your story in the comments section on this page. You can either copy and paste the text of your story in the comment box or click the paperclip icon to attach a PDF of your work. Note: it must be a PDF; Word documents are not accepted on the comment app.
- Print a copy of the Story Review Form (below) for each story your buddies share here.
- Read each story a couple of times.
- Complete the Story Review Form after your readings to organize your thoughts, suggestions, and questions.
- During the live Feedback meeting, you will share with your buddy what you wrote on the form, as well as anything new upon hearing their story read aloud.
- Email a copy of your completed Story Review Form to each buddy so they can keep a record of comments and suggestions related to their story.
If there are specific questions you’d like answered, or if you want your buddies to concentrate more heavily on a certain story device, e.g., dialogue, opening, title, etc., please include those requests in the comments when you attach your story. Ask for what you need to help you make your story the best it can be.
The Feedback Guidelines are available below to provide the framework of how Life Writers approaches giving and receiving feedback on written work, both via posts on the website and during feedback sessions.
Feedback Sessions
10/27 @ 6pm EDT
11/17 @ 6pm EDT
12/29 @ 6pm EDT
33 Comments
Deborah Hunt Repp
This is a very short story in my series of vignettes which will be making up segments of my memoires. I’ll try to post this to practice. I would appreciate comments. I do plan to expand and add to the complexity of this story. I looks like the pdf is attached.–Success! Deborah
Norma Beasley
Debbie, wonderful descriptions, delightful presentation…I enjoyed your story immensely! I’m still not sure I understand the famous phrase…”That we have.” What does it mean?
Deborah Hunt Repp
Nothing At All….it was just what she always said at a conclusion
Ada Miller
Love the story. Suggestions: they blossom TO; she wore….black pumps. Her spindly….waist over which she wore…..; she showed a flip side of her personality.; episode description is excellent, I can visualize the whole thing. After pivot right. Put in the great sentence “her stomping scared…” finish paragraph is very good. I liked it and think this reads better.
Deborah Hunt Repp
Thanks for your comments, Debbie
Deborah Hunt Repp
This beginning page regards my early career, leading up to a 25-year career in NYC business as a secretary.
Ada Miller
I have lived in Orlando, Florida my entire life with the exception of the WWII years. Born in Orlando April 28, 1940, the life of every citizen was about to change. One of my most memorable pictures is my one year old picture, running with arms outstretched. We were living at 548 Lake Street and had a fish pond in our back yard. Aunt Jo and Uncle Wiley lived next door with my grandfather Jack Robbins. December 6, 1941 changed our lives when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and the USA entered the war on two fronts, Europe and Asia. My father could not enlist due to serious kidney illness. He sold insurance at the time for Mutual of Omaha and began travels to Atlanta, Savanah, and Beaufort, S. Carolina. A first memory is riding in a stroller in Atlanta, on a side walk with a wall next to the sidewalk. Cecil is pushing the stroller. That is all I remember about Atlanta, but next we moved to Savanah, Ga. where there was a large army base for training. My father’s brother Sylvester and Aunt Sybil had secured a house in a very tight rental market and we moved in. Many memories of this home. My tricycle was stolen off the front porch, older boys made a ride using an eight foot board with skates attached underneath and back braces nailed on somehow. Three or four of us could sit on the board and someone pushed from behind. Have no idea how it was steered but I remember the fun of riding down the street. Another memory is rolling a jar of cream on the floor between Aunt Sybil and I to make butter. Last December at Sybil’s 100 th birthday party, I told that story. In a few months, we moved the short distance to Beaufort where there was a huge marine base, Parris Island. The home we lived in was on the Main Street into downtown and on a bluff overlooking the river. Many memories abound from these years. One day a pretty young woman knocked on the door and asked mother if she had a vacant bedroom to rent. This was Marie and her young husband Dale was a dentist and assigned to Paris Island. There was no place for them to rent and they wanted to be together. They moved in. Not long after, another couple rented the only other vacant bedroom. Then Izzy and ? Moved into the basement. I can remember the cute curtains she made for the little basement windows and the hams my father had bought from farmers out in the country hanging from the ceiling. Can’t remember where the bed was. These were war years with rations and scarcity. Lots of tomatoes were grown around Beaufort and there was a cannery attached to high school property. I went with mother and we canned a lot of tomatoes and brought them home. When I was four, I had pneumonia. This was a fatal
disease at the time and I was a frail child from stories told. Taken to the hospital my parents were told there was only a slim chance of survival. They offered the only hope and that was a new drug being tried, penicillin! It had been tried on the troops with good success. It was given to me and I lived. I had been in an oxygen tent and all that. Memorabilia from this time is a small China piggy bank given to me for my forth birthday. One night, our home dwellers had a large party and they asked me to bring them my bank which they passed around and filled with change. I was so happy that I entertained by singing a song or two. I was always singing, so my father nicknamed me Sing Song for a character in Dick Tracy comic strip. I was five years old in April 1945 and the war ended in Europe. We moved back to Orlando and I started first grade. Do not remember kindergarten so think I never attended.
Jackie Raymond
Conceive, Achieve, Believe—CAB Cincinnati 1941-1948
Intro: Anything the mind can Conceive, can be Achieved, if you Believe CAB an acronym for the above.
So hop in my CAB, buckle up, and we’ll travel through my life, conceiving, achieving because we’re believing. We’ll also learn how a curve in our road is merely a detour and with an open mind and a willing hand we will forge forward again. Look at this as a time of regrouping. Conceive, Achieve, Believe—CAB Cincinnati 1941-1948
It’s summer, 2020, I’m in Atlanta, where I’ve bought a condo with my daughter Darby. Since the end of March, we’ve been in full and partial shutdown due to a viral pandemic.
I’m sitting by the Condo’s pool watching a couple girls, ages l0 to 14 year old girls splashing water in the pool and suddenly I’m at the neighborhood pool in Cincinnati, Ohio. It’s August, 1943, and Cincinnati is experiencing a very miserably hot, muggy time of summer. I’m 11 years old splashing water in the public park pool with my girl friends. We loved this park and spent our summer days there, 9a.m.to 6plus, rain or shine. Its arts and craft section offered all kinds of crafts; basket weaving, painting, sewing, and many more activities for the neighborhood children. We had to pay a small amount for the supplies, but that was waivered for some children. The cemented area around the pool and Club House was used to learn different kind of floor-type games, Hopscotch, jump rope-single or double-dutch. Ping pong tables were available, along with tables for pickup stick, and other table type games. Marble games were played in the dirt to the side areas. When I was eight and nine in Miami I had the largest marble collection in the neighborhood, but I had passed that stage of my life and did more girl things. There was a baseball field for kids to ball games. Much of this was organized by the pool staff. Schedules were posted so all could decide their daily activities. Most parents worked. A lunch was packed and we were on our own. My mother worked across the street as a Supervisor in a dress making factory which, due to the World War 11, had been converted to make parachutes for the War. It was really neat! Workers were allowed to have the white silk fabric scraps left over from the parachutes. My grandma Axtmann, mother’s mother, made me the prettiest blouses from the fabrics.
A City Prison was to the side of this park. Another park was in front of the prison where a large pond was located. In the winter, this pond iced over and we ice skated on it.
Deborah Hunt Repp
Jackie, Debbie here. ‘kids to ball games’ … is this what you mean? Love your opening and the silk parachute blouses.
Jackie Raymond
Page 1….’I Remember Mama’ is a good way to open this part of my memoirs….Mother was really Melba in her young years, Mom to Norman and I, and Granny after her grandchildren arrived. I know what beauty is because I grew up seeing her smile even in the saddest of times. I know what Wisdom is because I’ve learned from your example. I know what Love is because God made Melba my Mother.
First I want to thank our good Lord for sending my good friend Adajo who introduced me to “Writing My Life”, a four week writing course. When I pay money for something, my frugal (or Depression baby) nature locks me a commitment to make sure I get my money’s worth. This time I committed to write daily 350 words of my memoires daily. Writing is not one of my long suits, so this was going to be quite a sacrifice, but I felt in the long run worth it…..at 88 years of age, I’d better get my memories engraved in stone or all those years would be lost.
As I meandered back through my life, beautiful revelations were revealed to me about my mother, for after all, she was the reason I’m here. This little 5 foot 1inch, 100 pound sweetheart of a women’s life came into full view.. Tears rolled down my eyes, as I’m sure the Lord intended, and her tremendous strength, perseverance, resilience and intelligence were revealed. For some reason these things I had never focused on before and failed to tell her.
She was the second of seven children, six girls and one boy, born to Lillian Heck Axtmann and Carl Tettenborn Axtmann on August 27, 2011. Her father and a business Partner became very wealthy in the furniture store business throughout the Cincinnati, Ohio, area. Mother and her six brother and sisters grew up in a big house, servants, housekeepers, etc. Mother and her older sister shared a bedroom in the third floor….often this older sister would lock Mother out, but mother slept in with other sisters. I mention this because it’s important later in the story. When Mother was 15 two devastating things happened that change the course of my mother’s life. Her father was killed in an auto accident 1929 and the Great Depression of 1929 within six months of each other occurred. Her mother, who knew nothing about business or working out of the home, not that anything would have helped, lost everything and the family were forced, with seven children, out of their huge house and had to find housing in a small apartment. Her mother turned to drinking, her older sister got a job in a department store and moved out on her own, and mother at 16 years of age, was left as the bread winner of her mother and siblings. To add to the drama she had one year left to getting her high school diploma, which apparently was very important to her. Somehow, this little 5 foot bundle of whatever, manage to take over head of her family, get her high school diploma, a waitressing job and support her mother, brother, and sisters. As it turned out, she was the only one of the seven children to get her diploma. I further realized that this was l929-30, the Great Depression upon us, jobs impossible, but she got a job as a waitress and quickly learned the better your service was the more your tips were. This serviced her for many years. At nineteen, she had met my dad, Billy, and they became champion ballroom dance partners. Waltz, Oh! how effortlessly they made that look. I’ll share that part of our life at a later time.
They married and on June 22, 1932, I came into their lives. It was really rough. Mother and dad were breadwinners of mother’s family of six, on the bright side—if there really was one, mom and dad had plenty of babysitters, so mother was able to resume her waitress career and family could eat. My little mother was such a strong, fabulous, sweet gentle spirited, bundle of dynamite. WOW!!!
Part 2 July 2l, 2020
Never Say It Can’t Be Done became the Motto of our little trio, Mom, dad and Jackie as it became. Mother and Dad wanted more children, let’s face it, Dad was one of twelve and Mother one of seven, but the Lord never gives us more than we can handle, one child was it. Now let the fun, trials, and tribulations begin. As my Birth story said, Jackie Wenger blew in the Delivery Room on a gentle breeze, bounced on the birthing table, wailed, swung arms and legs, broke into a big smile and immediately ready to go. And I’m still ready to go and explore that wide wonderful world our Great God created. Mother and Dad didn’t have a lot to do as far as caring for me, remember all those sisters she supported and my sweet dear Grandmother.
Deborah Hunt Repp
I can feel the family resilience you portray. Love the ‘bounced on the birthing table’….you are already a dear to the family. Debbie
Jackie Raymond
Jackie’s Birth….. On a cool, cloudy summer day, just after 5:30 p.m., June 22, l932, in Cincinnati, Ohio, gentle winds carried a little pink blanket bundle through the open window of the delivery room at Christ Hospital. Mother Melba Virginia was exhausted. Daddy Bill, was nibbling on a finger nail, which he often did when nervous. The bounce on the delivery table caused a bellowing cry to come from inside the bundle. Opening it brought broad smiles from all present….WALLA!!!! There was a kicking, arm swinging, black curly haired little baby girl. She stopped bellowing, looked around and broke into a big smile. The Mother smiled broadly and passed out. The relieved and delighted Daddy also passed out….the little 7 pound baby girl the commotion startled the little baby causing it to again cry. When Mother and Daddy awakened and delightedly peered at their baby. Baby Wenger, who became Jacqueline Lee Wenger, ceased crying, stared, smiled, started moving her arms and legs and was ready to go. At eighty-eight she’s still ready to go… much slower, but ready to go. Where? That’s another story which requires a trip back into history.
Melba Virginia Axtmann, my mother, was of German/Irish descent. Her mother, my Grandmother, Lillian Mae Heck’s mother was of Irish descent, her father was of German descent. Grandmother’s mother died when she was three. Their father George Heck was unable to care for her and her sister and two brothers, ages one to seven. They were put in an orphanage where they grew up and could leave at seventeen. When grandmother left the orphanage, she obtained a job selling ladies’ cotton handkerchiefs at the big department store in downtown Cincinnati. There she met Carl Axtmann who was working in the Men’s department. A courtship began and eventually a marriage. They lived in an apartment below Carl’s parents. Carl’s mother, Lena Tettenbaun Axtman was a German Opera singer, his father was a conductor, music teacher-voice, piano, other instruments. They had migrated from Germany, Batan—Bushal suburb
Deborah Hunt Repp
Enjoyed the history of the family. Cincinnati was a happening city even back then. An slice of the world back then. Your story is charming and sweet.
Jackie Raymond
Loves of My Life– Animals– Man’s Best Friend is His Dog
MY FATHER WAS A BUTCHER, MY MOTHER CUT THE MEAT—AND I WAS THE LITTLE WEINER-WURST THAT RAN AROUND THE STREET This became my “Swan Song” made up by my father.
A friend is someone who knows you as you are, understands where you’ve been, accepts who you’ve become, and still, loves and is always there for you. In my life that friend has always been a dog or dogs. From crawling stage of infancy dogs and I were like magnets. We’ve never been afraid of each other. Supposedly I’d crawl up to a dog, look them in the face and either received a sniff or a big sloppy kiss. Think even then they sensed my love of them. My first real interactive dog memory was when I was three or four. My only playmate was my dog, he was my best friend. We had a fenced in yard, but who would be a better comrade to teach you how to get out of that fence, but a dog. Watching him dig holes and proceeded to wiggle his little body out that hole eventually sunk in. I eventually dug the hole big enough for me to escape, also, and off we went. Adventure, WOW. My father managed the meat department of a Kroger’s Grocery Store in Covington, Kentucky. One morning my father was pleasantly amused when he heard this little child’s voice say “I would like some of this and this and this” until he looked over the counter and the little voice was coming from his child’s voice and her dog’s whimpering. NOT GOOD AT ALL….Aunts babysitting in trouble. Fence reinforced at base. Jackie got her first spanking and stern rules for stay at home, no roam alone with four legged buddy. The little limerick above, My father….butcher, my mother….meat, I’m the little Weiner-Worst who ran around the streets.
Ada Miller
Love your stories and can picture them. Sorry I cannot print them because I could make some small corrections and clarify some places. Keep writing—-I love reading them
Deborah Hunt Repp
Jackie, This makes me smile. You show the love. A gentle rebuke from your father…fun.
Debbie
Jackie Raymond
Cincinnati 1941 to 1948 OUT Of ALL BAD GOOD CAN BE FOUND I really loved Cincinnati, Ohio, with it’s Museums, the Zoo where the New York Opera would perform Operas all summer at the Zoo’s Open-aired screened Theater. To this day, when I visit a Zoo I can still look at the animals and hear Carmen, Aida, Madame Butterfly being sung, on the other side of the coin, at an opera my mind transforms to the Zoo and it’s wonderful animals. Is it an wonder I became a Zoologist only practicing my love with quite an array of animals in my classrooms, second through sixth grades. At one time, our class had 70+ gerbils. We were conducting Gerbil Genetics. Cincinnati was quite large, third largest in Ohio, in the 1930s. It surrounded by seven hills, like Rome, Italy, that’s why it was named Cincinnati—for Lucius Cincinnatus, a Roman statesman and military leader, 518 BC. Street cars made it easy to maneuver around the city. On Sundays we were able to obtain a $.25 cent Day Pass and at twelve, thirteen my girl friends and I would travel to the many places throughout the city. At twelve years I lived on Colerain Ave, a very busy street, main road running through Cincy. It now runs parallel, a block over, with HWY 75, yes, that main highway that runs from Florida northward towards Canada. My house was four houses down from the Police Station. On school days, I rode the Street Car, called Trolley back then, to school. I not only had books, but my trumpet in its case. Sort of heavy.. The Trolley stop was across from the Police Station where I crossed. Often the Police were waiting to take me to school in their Paddy Wagon, a big Black Station Wagon type vehicle. I think they felt sorry for this little girl with her collection of heavy school things. I entered the Wagon from the back and exited likewise. One of the Police men sat with me. When we arrived at school, the Police man opened the door and helped me out. The first time they exited me at school, WOW was I embarrassed. All the kids on the play ground raced to the school fence to see who was in trouble. The police man was so sweet. He helped me down and walked me to the Gate, waved and said, “See you tomorrow!” I quickly walked to the door where Band members were allowed in to take their instruments to the Band room. All got use to the scene—Jackie, Paddy Wagon, Police man etc, not every day’ but mostly rain, snow and super cold days. Walking home was the best. I had a shiny Buffalo nickel to spend for a snack. Can you imagine having a hamburger place and a chili parlor place right next to your school selling the best mouth watering juicy hamburgers or a six inch hotdogs smothered chili, onions, mustard whatever for $5 cents. Well, I did, a White Castle Hamburger Palace and a Camp Washington Chili Parlor each right next door to my Elementary School. Both of these eating establishments considered the best fast food in Cincinnati, Ohio. Life Was Good.
Deborah Hunt Repp
Well, I did: White Castle Hamburger…
Jackie, I got a bit confused at the end, and wonder if this punctuation might help. D
Jackie Raymond
DARLING, SWEET DARBY LEE RAYMOND, BAPTIZED DOROTHY. Two years, two months after our Bobby brightened our doorstep, the Lord blessed us with our big browned Gerber Baby girl. They were like night and day. Bobby always ready to explore his and other’s surrounding worlds; Darby perfectly happy to let her big, blond, green eyed brother, whom she idolized, do the explorations for her and watch with grand delight. From her leisurely delayed birth into this world, to her present day “laid back attitude,” Darby’s never wanted to cause any dismay to anyone. She was due December first, but seemed to settle in for a long winter’s night and on December 21, (nothing like disrupting Christmas Day) she made her debut, a full pound, 8lb 6oz, healthier than all four others. She cried at first til she got her breath. When she was laid in my arms, her big eyes tried to focus, she wiggled and managed to get her thumb in her pretty little rosebud mouth and settled in to continue her long winter’s rest. On Christmas Day, she and I came home from the hospital. I had a little red ribbon on her and presented her to Bobby one of his Christmas presents. At first he was happy, three weeks later he asked if Christmas presents could be returned? Just kidding, he really didn’t say that. What a delight. She only cried when wet, hungry, which was often. Her milk consumption was double what the others had consumed at her age, but then she was three weeks older than they at birth. She looked like one of the beautiful little Babies on the Gerber Baby Food containers. She had soft curled dark hair, a petite little button nose, which she still has, puffy kissable soft cheeks, and a beautiful perky little rosebud mouth. Wherever she was placed, lying down until around her eighth month, she was so sweet, smiling and happy. She loved talking to herself, often making loud giggly noises like “Goo, giggle, then a cute noisy inhale squeaks. Then funny loud exhale sounds. This con She really delighted in these really noisy sound exchanges with herself. I delightedly chuckled to myself working in the other parts of the house. One weird day, I suddenly realized that I hadn’t heard her little chirpy sounds for some time. I quickly went to our large empty living/dining room where her big play pen was situated in the middle. To my utter horror, surprise and great dismay, I gasped as I saw 70 pound Richard Wilkins, a neighbor child standing with one foot on her face, the other getting ready to stand on her chest. Calmly I said, ”Richard! Stop! Slowly get off Darby’s face and very carefully, get out of that playpen….NOW. Thank goodness, he smiled and slowly did just that. Darby merely twisted and looked upward at him, smiled and wiggled. She was fine, her little pug nose unharmed. Richard was Bobby’s age, maybe ten months older. His parents were our dearest neighbors,
Deborah Hunt Repp
Wow! the description of Richard really got my attention. Well done
Jackie Raymond
Conceive, Achieve, Believe—CAB— Cincinnati 1941-1948 Intro: Anything the mind can Conceive, can be Achieved, if you Believe— CAB an acronym for the above. So hop in my CAB, buckle up, and we’ll travel through my life, conceiving, achieving because we’re believing. We’ll also learn how a curve in our road is merely a detour and with an open mind and a willing hand we will forge forward again. Look at this as a time of regrouping. It’s summer, 2020, I’m in Atlanta, where I’ve bought a condo with my daughter Darby. Since the end of March, we’ve been in full and partial shutdown due to a viral pandemic. I’m sitting by the Condo’s pool watching a couple girls, ages l0 to 14 year old girls splashing water in the pool and suddenly I’m at the neighborhood pool in Cincinnati, Ohio. It’s August, 1943, and Cincinnati is experiencing a very miserably hot, muggy time of summer. I’m 11 years old splashing water in the public park pool with my girl friends. We loved this park and spent our summer days there, 9a.m.to 6plus, rain or shine. All types of arts and crafts were taught by the hired Park Staff. Basket weaving, painting, wood and metal crafts, sewing were just a few of them. We had to pay a small amount for the supplies, but that was waivered for some children none were denied. The cemented area around the pool and Club House served as an area where we played different kind of floor-type games, Hopscotch, jump rope-single or double-dutch Extended roof tops Ping pong tables were available, along with tables for pickup stick, and other table type games. Marble games were played in the dirt to the side areas. When I was eight and nine in Miami I had the largest marble collection in the neighborhood, but I had passed that stage of my life and did more girl things. There was a baseball field for kids to ball games. Soft ball was the Much of this was organized by the pool staff. Schedules were posted so all could decide their daily activities. Most parents worked. A lunch was packed and we were on our own. My mother worked across the street as a Supervisor in a dress making factory which, due to the World War 11, had been converted to make parachutes for the War. It was really neat! Workers were allowed to have the white silk fabric scraps left over from the parachutes. My grandma Axtmann, mother’s mother, made me the prettiest blouses from the fabrics. A City Prison surrounded by a twelve foot grey stone wall, was to the side of this park. In front of the Prison, separated by a narrow two lane driveway was another park. In the middle of this park, a large fountain pewdman-made pond with a beautiful In the winter, this pond iced over and we ice skated on it. Walking everywhere throughout my neighborhood was all we knew. This area was quite vast. From my house to my school, the library, movies and church was probably three (3) miles. Having so many places, factories with a large park across from them was at least half a mile. Then there were bars with tables for eating. One of the bars also had a stage for a little band and a dance floor, yes for dancing. On Sunday afternoons the stage hosted a Jam Session. Four to eight men world come with their instruments, saxophones, bass fiddles, drum. piano was there so only a player was needed. Cincinnati was a big Meat Packing City with slaughter houses, one for sheep and pigs, and across the street the cattle slaughter house and, yes right on my Colerain Ave. There was also a Potato Chip factory mingle in there. As you can, walking was always a delightful adventure, especially after school. School was out at 3:00 and I had ‘til 5:00 to get to Mother’s Factory, two (2) miles away. That left me with ample time to roam, visit, and generally slowly meander along my beloved Colerain Avenue. My walk usually began with the either $.05 cent White House Hamburger or $.05 Camp Washington Chili Hot Dog, unless My Uncle Chic has invited me to have a ham and cheese double-decker sandwich at one of the Bars where he’s having his after work glass of beer and I have a glass of Ginger Ale. Another stopping place on my trek home. I’m sitting by the Condo’s pool watching a couple girls, ages l0 to 14 year old girls splashing water in the pool and suddenly I’m at the neighborhood pool in Cincinnati, Ohio. It’s August, 1943, and Cincinnati is experiencing a very miserably hot, muggy time of summer. I’m 11 years old splashing water in the public park pool with my girl friends. We loved this park and spent our summer days there, 9a.m.to 6plus, rain or shine. Its arts and craft section offered all kinds of crafts; basket weaving, painting, sewing, and many more activities for the neighborhood children. We had to pay a small amount for the supplies, but that was waivered for some children. The cemented area around the pool and Club House was used to learn different kind of floor-type games, Hopscotch, jump rope-single or double-dutch. Ping pong tables were available, along with tables for pickup stick, and other table type games. Marble games were played in the dirt to the side areas. When I was eight and nine in Miami I had the largest marble collection in the neighborhood, but I had passed that stage of my life and did more girl things. There was a baseball field for kids to ball games. Much of this was organized by the pool staff. Schedules were posted so all could decide their daily activities. Most parents worked. A lunch was packed and we were on our own. My mother worked across the street as a Supervisor in a dress making factory which, due to the World War 11, had been converted to make parachutes for the War. It was really neat! Workers were allowed to have the white silk fabric scraps left over from the parachutes. My grandma Axtmann, mother’s mother, made me the prettiest blouses from the fabrics. A City Prison was to the side of this park. Another park was in front of the prisowhere a large pond was located. In the winter, this pond iced over and we ice skated on it. Walking everywhere throughout my neighborhood was all we knew. This area was quite vast. From my house to my school, the library, movies and church was probably three (3) miles. Having so many places, factories with a large park across from them was at least half a mile. Then there were bars with tables for eating. One of the bars also had a stage for a little band and a dance floor, yes for dancing. On Sunday afternoons the stage hosted a Jam Session. Four to eight men world come with their instruments, saxophones, bass fiddles, drum. piano was there so only a player was needed. Cincinnati was a big Meat Packing City with slaughter houses, one for sheep and pigs, and across the street the cattle slaughter house and, yes right on my Colerain Ave. There was also a Potato Chip factory mingle in there. As you can, walking was always a delightful adventure, especially after school. School was out at 3:00 and I had ‘til 5:00 to get to Mother’s Factory, two (2) miles away. That left me with ample time to roam, visit, and generally slowly meander along my beloved Colerain Avenue. My walk usually began with the either $.05 cent White House Hamburger or $.05 Camp Washington Chili Hot Dog, unless My Uncle Chic has invited me to have a ham and cheese double-decker sandwich at one of the Bars where he’s having his after work glass of beer and I have a glass of Ginger Ale. Another stopping place on my trek home.
Deborah Hunt Repp
My parents were horrified that their sweet, young girl would move in with a man. That just was not done in Iowa! They flew to Boston to meet this man. At an awkward dinner meeting at the Sheraton Plaza hotel’s formal gold and cream-colored dining room, Dartmouth Farmer Charlie and Diminutive Louise held their own as Rick tried to schmooze them into believing that he only had my best interests at heart. They didn’t buy it. But 2 years later when he had married me, he was accepted reluctantly by the family.My parents were horrified that their sweet, young girl would move in with a man. That just was not done in Iowa! They flew to Boston to meet this man. At an awkward dinner meeting at the Sheraton Plaza hotel’s formal gold and cream-colored dining room, Dartmouth Farmer Charlie and Diminutive Louise held their own as Rick tried to schmooze them into believing that he only had my best interests at heart. They didn’t buy it. But 2 years later when he had married me, he was accepted reluctantly by the family. My parents were horrified that their sweet, young girl would move in with a man. That just was not done in Iowa! They flew to Boston to meet this man. At an awkward dinner meeting at the Sheraton Plaza hotel’s formal gold and cream-colored dining room, Dartmouth Farmer Charlie and Diminutive Louise held their own as Rick tried to schmooze them into believing that he only had my best interests at heart. They didn’t buy it. But 2 years later when he had married me, he was accepted reluctantly by the family.
Ada Miller
Am sure you have noticed that your stor y repeated three times. Such is tech and Word computing. I do like what you are telling and anxious to read more. Want to hear about Rick.
Deborah Hunt Repp
Thanks Ada. It is a process each day on the computer and I’m learning. Rick was a scoundrel!
Deborah Hunt Repp
https://writingyourlife.org/lw-group-a-stories-oct-2020/#comment-30065
The Shoes
In the 1970s I was a naive junior secretary. My parents suggested that secretarial work was suitable for young woman like me who received average grades had limited high school science and math background. I acquiesced to their suggestion. I recognized I was a frivolous 16/17-year-old, with a carefree attitude. I just wanted to flee the Iowa home nest. Women doctors, professors, engineers or lawyers were few. Women directly out of college or high school did not aspire to advanced degrees. They usually became nurses, teachers, or secretaries. I needed to fit in. Women in the 1960s had not yet paved their way into the boardroom.
When I was dreaming at age 14-16 about my future, I recall that I wanted to work as a secretary to the smartest, richest, businessman in the country. My idea was a bit flaky, broad and unfocused, but I did narrow the idea down to wanting to work in a major city for a company, not a government entity.
My mother had attended a small women’s 2-year college in Missouri in 1940. My parents thought I would be protected there. I knew instinctively they meant safe from boys/men. In hindsight I believe it was a sensible and correct suggestion on their part.
After the two years, I graduated with an Associates in Arts Degree. My parents and I implemented their next recommendation: a European summer trip with the college arts instructor and about 25 other giggling female graduates/idiots who toured 8 European countries in 22 days. The world was a kinder and gentler place back then. I believe the most outrageous thing that happened to us was when as we left the Vatican tour and jumped on a crowded Rome bus, a young priest pinched Sally M. on her tempting, young derriere.
After that world-wind trip, I trained at Boston’s Katharine Gibbs Secretarial School for one year. Upon completion, I had decided to work in Boston. Upon completion, my mother made a special trip to the city to help me find an apartment. Her visit reassured me that I was truly on my own. She was with me for a couple of days in Boston to get me settled. We shopped at Filene’s for new working wardrobe for me and bedding, pillows, curtains, kitchen set-up and the like. But in several months, I learned a hard lesson, which is: that a single woman never rents or lives in a basement apartment in a city.
I accepted a $125 weekly salary secretarial job working for a Partner with leading money management executive. The firm was one of Boston’s oldest, elite, and most successful companies. My first boss was a 32-year-old gentleman, naturally a Harvard graduate. He was kind, understanding, and a good teacher. I must have shown some promise or aptitude for business/finance, as he asked if I would like to learn how to read and understand a balance sheet. I eagerly agreed. His teaching and faith in me regarding that one small accounting exposure, helped me to gain the courage to better myself.
My career in Boston was a stepping-stone to adulthood. I always look back fondly on my years there: wandering around and people watching from a bench in the Boston Commons and Public Gardens, Faneuil Hall, The Freedom Trail, Back Bay antique shops, the Boston Library, tea at the Ritz Carleton, and especially the trendy boutiques on Boylston and Newbury Streets. It is a beautiful City, then and now. There I discovered there was an alternative to plain, midwestern old-lady underwear and clothing! I planned fun trips to Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, and The Cape on weekends with girlfriends. I loved the vegetable market shopping in Haymarket Square for weekend treats. The City just oozed history and I lapped it up. On Saturdays I would go to the Isabella Stewart Gardner house and museum. Describe this place.
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After working about 2 years, I met a very suave English stockbroker who lived in New York City. Over a two-week period, he swept me off my feet: flowers (red roses) delivered to my desk; cocktails (two Manhattan’s —a new drink for me!); a tipsy dinner at the famous fish restaurant Anthony’s Pier Four; and an offer to spend the weekend in New York City at his place.
After this brief courtship, I told my parents I was moving to New York with him. My parents were horrified that their sweet, young girl would move in with a man. That just was not done in Iowa! They flew to Boston to meet this man. At an awkward dinner meeting at the Sheraton Plaza hotel’s formal gold and cream-colored dining room, Dartmouth Farmer Charlie and Diminutive Louise held their own as Rick tried to schmooze them into believing that he only had my best interests at heart. They didn’t buy it. But 2 years later when he had married me, he was accepted reluctantly by the family.
My mother cried when she told her Original Bridge Club ladies back in Iowa that Debbie had succumbed to an older, divorced, Englishman. Horrors! Rick then packed me up and drove me to his high-rise pad overlooking Central Park and New York City. And so, I began my love affair with husband # 1 and New York City.
The stockbroker was my ticket to New York City. I was in love with Rick and he was the answer to my dilemma of the moment in Boston: a Back Bay stalker who was throwing bricks through my basement windows because I had dumped him, calling my workplace, and following me in his car as I walked home. I leapt at Rick’s offer to move in with him in New York City.
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Deborah Hunt Repp
Deborah Hunt Repp
Vignette Business Career Jobs
The Shoes
In the 1970s I was a naive junior secretary. My parents suggested that secretarial work was suitable for young woman like me who received average grades had limited high school science and math background. I acquiesced to their suggestion. I recognized I was a frivolous 16/17-year-old, with a carefree attitude. I just wanted to flee the Iowa home nest. Women doctors, professors, engineers or lawyers were few. Women directly out of college or high school did not aspire to advanced degrees. They usually became nurses, teachers, or secretaries. I needed to fit in. Women in the 1960s had not yet paved their way into the boardroom.
When I was dreaming at age 14-16 about my future, I recall that I wanted to work as a secretary to the smartest, richest, businessman in the country. My idea was a bit flaky, broad and unfocused, but I did narrow the idea down to wanting to work in a major city for a company, not a government entity.
My mother had attended a small women’s 2-year college in Missouri in 1940. My parents thought I would be protected there. I knew instinctively they meant safe from boys/men. In hindsight I believe it was a sensible and correct suggestion on their part.
After the two years, I graduated with an Associates in Arts Degree. My parents and I implemented their next recommendation: a European summer trip with the college arts instructor and about 25 other giggling female graduates/idiots who toured 8 European countries in 22 days. The world was a kinder and gentler place back then. I believe the most outrageous thing that happened to us was when as we left the Vatican tour and jumped on a crowded Rome bus, a young priest pinched Sally M. on her tempting, young derriere.
After that world-wind trip, I trained at Boston’s Katharine Gibbs Secretarial School for one year. Upon completion, I had decided to work in Boston. Upon completion, my mother made a special trip to the city to help me find an apartment. Her visit reassured me that I was truly on my own. She was with me for a couple of days in Boston to get me settled. We shopped at Filene’s for new working wardrobe for me and bedding, pillows, curtains, kitchen set-up and the like. But in several months, I learned a hard lesson, which is: that a single woman never rents or lives in a basement apartment in a city.
I accepted a $125 weekly salary secretarial job working for a Partner with leading money management executive. The firm was one of Boston’s oldest, elite, and most successful companies. My first boss was a 32-year-old gentleman, naturally a Harvard graduate. He was kind, understanding, and a good teacher. I must have shown some promise or aptitude for business/finance, as he asked if I would like to learn how to read and understand a balance sheet. I eagerly agreed. His teaching and faith in me regarding that one small accounting exposure, helped me to gain the courage to better myself.
My career in Boston was a stepping-stone to adulthood. I always look back fondly on my years there: wandering around and people watching from a bench in the Boston Commons and Public Gardens, Faneuil Hall, The Freedom Trail, Back Bay antique shops, the Boston Library, tea at the Ritz Carleton, and especially the trendy boutiques on Boylston and Newbury Streets. It is a beautiful City, then and now. There I discovered there was an alternative to plain, midwestern old-lady underwear and clothing! I planned fun trips to Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, and The Cape on weekends with girlfriends. I loved the vegetable market shopping in Haymarket Square for weekend treats. The City just oozed history and I lapped it up. On Saturdays I would go to the Isabella Stewart Gardner house and museum. Describe this place.
_________________________________________________________________
After working about 2 years, I met a very suave English stockbroker who lived in New York City. Over a two-week period, he swept me off my feet: flowers (red roses) delivered to my desk; afterwork cocktails (two Manhattan’s —a new drink for me!); a tipsy dinner at the famous fish restaurant Anthony’s Pier Four; and an offer to spend the weekend in New York City at his place. After this brief courtship, I told my parents I was moving to New York with him. My parents were horrified that their sweet, young girl would move in with a man. That just was not done in Iowa! They flew to Boston to meet this man. At an awkward dinner meeting at the Sheraton Plaza hotel’s formal gold and cream-colored dining room, Dartmouth Farmer Charlie and Diminutive Louise held their own as Rick tried to schmooze them into believing that he only had my best interests at heart. They didn’t buy it. But 2 years later when he had married me, he was accepted reluctantly by the family.
My mother cried when she told her Original Bridge Club ladies that Debbie had succumbed to an older, divorced, Englishman. Horrors! Rick packed me up and drove me to his high-rise pad overlooking Central Park and New York City. And so, I began my love affair with husband # 1 and New York City.
The stockbroker was my ticket to New York City. I was in love with Rick and he was the answer to my dilemma of the moment in Boston: a Back Bay stalker who was throwing bricks through my basement windows because I had dumped him, calling my workplace, and following me in his car as I walked home. I leapt at Rick’s offer to move in with him in New York City.
Ada Miller
I love this story. If it was a book I would keep turning pages.
Jackie Raymond
LOVED THE FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE YOU USE TO DESCRIBE BOSTON, ‘THE CITY JUST OOZED WITH HISTORY AND I JUST LAPPED IT UP’ RIGHT ON. YOU’RE DESCRIPTIVE WORDS OF DARTMOUTH FARMER CHARLIE AND DIMINUTIVE LOUISE. GOOD STORY, JACKIE
Deborah Hunt Repp
Thank you for kind words. Mother Louise was a sweet peach and Charlie was a growling bear–great combination for parents, Debbie
Ada Miller
here is my story
Deborah Hunt Repp
Your words about turpentine made me want to learn more. What a tract of land back then. The Swan — wonderful name. Keep on writing. Debbie
Jackie Raymond
A WINTER THAT CHANGED THE COURSE OF MY LIFE
It’s l948, we’re in Cincinnati, Ohio, Camp Washington suburb to be exact. It’s late January, two months into what seems like the worst winter my parents had experienced in many years. Outside, as usual, the snow continues to fall. The excitement of the initial snow fall, that year Thanksgiving day in late November, long past. My father comes in from outside where he has just finished shoveling hard and soft packed snow for the umpteenth time. He’s working six days a week as a butcher, meat cutter and managing the Meat Department of Schneider Grocery Store. Sunday is his only day off. He’s had it with shoveling snow and is not a very happy man. Shivering my father announces, “This is the last winter I will be shoveling snow, we moving back to Miami this summer”. I cried out, “But I have two more years of high school.” My father replied, “There are high schools physical activities did a 360 degree somersault. in Miami.” And that was that! We moved to Miami that summer, July, 1948, to be exact. My life drastically changed in more ways than just weather.
Deborah Hunt Repp
SNICKLES AND SASSY GO ON AN ADVENTURE
Snickles was a little 4-month-old, special designer kitten. He was born in Texas at a breeder who specialized in breeding Ragamuffin cats. One can only assume that he was the runt of the litter because he was very tiny, with long sparse brownish fur. He was a timid kitten. Nevertheless, he boarded a plane at the Dallas airport in Texas. Snickles, who had not been named yet, had been placed inside a strong brown carrier which the airline promised to handle with expert care. He did not know it at the time, but he was on his way to Orlando Florida to meet his new owner. When he arrived in Orlando, unbeknownst to him he was met at the airport by 2 kind souls. One was an English lady, was a great cat-lover and who was tiny just like he was. She had a pixie face framed with spiky gold hair whisps which was the current fashion rage. The second person was the lady’s good friend, Michael, an older gentleman teacher of world history.
Sassy was a 3-year-old beautiful long hair white Ragamuffin cat with peach, gray and beige splashes under her luxurious coat of thick white fur. Sassy belonged to an elite class of designer breeds just like Snickles. She lived in Palm Beach, Florida and was cared for by a funny older kind lady who had too much money and not enough to do. Sassy, or ‘Christmas Star’ as she was known to the cat world, was a prima donna, if you know what I mean. She ate special food and drank water from a special dish that had come from Elizabeth Arden many years ago. After several years of growing from a thin, skinny, crossed-eyed kitten, Sassy grew into a beautiful, regal princess.