My Wise Old Grandmother - Russel Ray, 1960-1962

1960-1962
Sometime after my sister was born, we moved
to Palestine, Texas, where my dad worked for
Missouri Pacific Railroad as a Road Foreman
of Engines.

I only have three memories of our time in
Palestine. One was when mom locked me out of
the house because I didn’t come home in time for
lunch. Since I was tired, and it was hot outside, I
crawled under the car parked in the driveway and
went to sleep. When I woke up, the car was no
longer there, and no one was home. I have no idea
how long I was sleeping there in the driveway.

My second memory was when I came home after
dark—seems I was never getting home when I
was supposed to. Ronald and my dad had locked
me out, and when I knocked, Ronald answered
the door and told me to wait there because dad
had a surprise for me. The surprise was a totally
black and rotten banana. I don’t know if it truly
was a surprise from dad, or if it was my big
brother being, well, a big brother.

And lastly, I remember the house. I’d love to find
it again someday. It was a corner house with one
side at street level and another side at the top of a
set of long steps which went down to the other
street. I used to love to run up and down those
steps. Unfortunately, no one knows the address.

Dad died shortly after we moved to Palestine
of a self-inflicted gunshot, and mom then moved
us to Logan, Utah, to be closer to her mom (see
Figure 4) and her many relatives in northern Utah
and southern Idaho. My Grandma Lillie had a hair
salon in downtown Logan; when Jim and I went to
Logan in 1998, the salon was still there, although I
don’t think it had the same name.

I don’t have many memories of our time in Logan,
although I do remember visiting relatives each
weekend in Logan, Hyrum, and Wellsville. Almost
all of them had horses, ponies, and carriages, and I
always got to ride in a carriage behind a beautiful
pony. Very exciting for a young child.

My only other specific memory is of Ronald and
me constantly bothering mom for some new ice
skates, so one day she put us in the car and we
left to get some new skates. Unfortunately, the
roads were icy and mom was drunk. She missed a
curve and ran up the side of a mountain and back
down into a ditch, coming to rest hard against a
telephone pole. I was okay because I was in the
back seat, but Ronald had a big gash in his fore-
head from hitting the window or dashboard, a gash
that required stitches and left a scar that is still
visible today.