My First Half

As I said, the number of smiles per roll of film (kids, you should look that one up) is a good indication of the quality of someone's life.  My parents gave me a good life, and nothing says good better than Christmas!  Note the amazing (ugh) wallpaper.  It came with the house, not our choice.  I swear!  You can see this was back when people took the time, bought the stamps, and sent Christmas cards to each other.  It was the right thing to do.  We'd usually start by decorating the stairs as they came in, then any other white molding or trim we could find.  It was sad when the number of cards started to shrink, as the price of stamps went up, and my aunts and uncles started dying off.  I loved that robe!

Yes, I'd call this spoiled.  But then I still have the sled, so it was a pretty good investment.  People were still awfully interested in cowboys and indians back then, and Chief Halftown, a local TV celebrity, really tilted the scales in favor of the indians.  Oops.  Native Americans.  While I am dressed as a cowboy here, I did have my indian outfit upstairs, laid out on my bed.  "Honest Injun", as we used to say.  Hey, it was a long time ago!
Notice the train platform.  The tree stood on that along with my trains.  It was a 4 x 8 foot platform that took up 99% of the living room.  The tree had to be put on the platform, otherwise we'd have to purposely throw tinsel onto the train tracks.  It was more fun to be pleasantly surprised as they crackled and vaporized.

Mom!  God they used to put me in ties and goop up my hair like I was a little Mafia boy.  My father desparately wanted to be Italian (pronounced EYE-talian) since he grew up in an Italian neighborhood in Philadelphia, but it was hard for him to ignore the English/Irish blood, so the best he could do was to build a little Italian guido.  Also notworthy in this picture, the size of the train transformer (I can feel it hum) and the continuation of interesting wallpaper in the dining room.

I really do believe my father was very nervous about fatherdom, and really would have preferred to not do it at all, but it/I was what my mother wanted, so eventually they let me happen.  I'm sure it did not help matters that (according to my father), one night when I was just at crawling age, he was watching TV with his arm over the side of the chair when I snuck up on him and bit into his hand.  He had no idea what it was, or where the pain was coming from, but his natural reflex was to flick his hand, to get whatever was on there off.  Apparently he flipped me across the room until I met a wall. It probably upset him much more than it did me.  If he was a nervous father before, now he was accidentally throwing his kid across the room!  I had to do something to get back into his good graces, and decided that checking all visitors' glasses and bottles, after they left, would do the trick.  Once my father realized that we shared a passion for Ballentine beer, I think he decided that we'd be OK after all.

Yes, too much beer and eventually you do have to pee.  Take the picture!  Please!!

Lest you think I was only spoiled under threat of snow, they did trash their back yard so I could have a pool, and since I was an only child, they did keep me entertained.  Not a bad half life at all!

They were probably concerned when my interests turned from baseball cards to the theatre, but one must spread one's wings when one hits kindegarden, and mine was held in a beautiful church.  Oh, I'm the boy child on the right.  It was a low budget production, so the sailor's hat was all that could be provided, but I think we made a moving statement on the insanity or war, the existance of fairies, and the fallicy of god.  The reviews were glorious!

All in all, it was a great half-life, thanks to my parents and a cast of hundreds.  If you didn't know it, my mother was from a family of ten, so I had eighteen aunts and uncles.  It was really great.  I spent time with most of them, often at my grandparents house at 20 Main Street in Darby, PA.  But for each perk, there is a downside.  In my second half-life I got to bury them all.

© 2012 John Allison

His First Half

Probably all you have to do is look at the smile on people's faces to know if this was a happy time of someone's life, so here are a few pictures of my father/parents in his first half life.  These are a few pictures of I have of my father probably in his late teens.  He's the catcher in the first picture

the third from the left, in their hats made out of newspapers (everyone used to know how to do this, by the way - do you?)

the happy boy on the far right

And I always loved this one.  I could never get a straight answer on if the little punks in the background were friends of his or not.  A great Philadelphia picture.

I"m not sure who these people were when I was young, before I was born, but they sure looked like a fun couple.

My mother in Fairmount Park in Philadelphia.  What a cutie!  This was a time when people used to do things like go to parks, and every patch of grass in town was considered to be part of Fairmount Park.  Shortly before my mother passed away, she used to tell me the strangest stories.  She liked to tell me how she would try to keep her hips raised with pillows, after she and my father were "intimate", (before I was born) because she was told it would increase the chance that she'd become pregnant.  She always hid it from my father, because he didn't especially want kids.  (great thing to tell your son, mom!)  She also told me once that her sister Marion thought that she should not marry John Allison, because he was a strange thing.  She had spotted him several times, sitting alone on a bench in the park.  What kind of person does that?  He must be a loner - maybe not a good catch.  Sometimes I wish I could just go back and sit there with him, and ask him what's on his mind. I think he had a complicated life a times - divorced parents, a brother who died young.  I think he was entitled to a secluded place, to take a moment for himself, without getting reported!

My father went into the Army during World War II, into the Army Air Force.  He was stationed in bases across the country.  It changed his life.  It let him see a world which he otherwise would not have seen.  While stationed in California, the troops were constantly being entertained by the top talents of the day.  There were times, in the nursing home, at the end of his life, when he would sing an Al Jolsen tune or two - sung in Al's voice.  I always thought of those songs as replays of live shows he saw.  It was a special time in his life.

The happy Army couple.  The only time my mother ever left Philadelphia was to go to Florida to be with her new husband.  It was a very good thing for her.  I think it gave her a bit of a different perspective on the world, and she often thought about going back some day, just to see how it had changed.  The war was a good thing for both of them.

My father would often get a little slap, a playful one, because, as my mother would say, he would "just get silly."  He had an ability to enjoy life, in any situation, and made friends easily.  I think this aspect of him is captured in many photos that I have of him pre-me.  In this Army photo, its easy to spot him.  While it is a casual picture, he and his partner in crime have their arms around each other and he's wearing his "silly" smile.  I'm glad it was a special time for him.  Just as his training as an airplane mechanic was finishing up and he was to be sent overseas, the war ended, so he got to see much of his country without having to see battle in any way.  He could have been a good mechanic but I doubt he would have ever raised a weapon at anyone.

Post-war, pre-me.  I think the married life was pretty good.  They didn't have much money, but occasionally went to see a boxing match, or get a drink, or get a pizza at a sweet little place called The Raven, under the El on Market Street, somewhere around 60th Street, I believe.  He was on a few bowling teams, obviously was a trendsetter when it came to bowling socks, always looked pretty good, and while we didn't have a lot of bowling trophies around, he did win some nice hardware that would keep your tie in place - gold with crossed bowling pins.  By the time I came along, he stopped these things.  I never saw a bowling ball, never saw him bowl.  Perhaps he couldn't afford it; perhaps it was not a time for such luxuries.  Too bad.

Even many years later, they still had their moments.  Taken on the back "stoop", off the back porch at 228 Roberta Ave, where I grew up, and where they both passed away.

This is Hope Reamon.  I have no idea who she is.  She's not related to us in any way.  I just like the picture.  (stolen from an old theatre album in Michigan)

This blog was brought to you by Ballentine Beer.  They may have been the beer of champions, I don't remember.  Look for the three ring sign and have a cold Ballentine as you're watching the Phillies play in Connie Mack Stadium.

© 2012 John Allison