Chapter 3: Mom and Dad Before My Siblings and Me

Where my mom and my dad were in their lives when they met would have been very different places. Literally and physically.

The time between them.

My mom was likely in her late 20s / early 30s, and had a professional job and had been living on her own. My father was still serving active time in the Navy, which he had been in since he left home as a teenager. This difference is likely important. By the time my mom met my father, she was likely seeing her older siblings all settled into life and several of her nieces and nephews (my first cousins) settling down as well. My father on the other hand, was just barely coming into adulthood, and had never lived outside a highly regimented environment.

Years later, when I met my mom’s older uncles and family members there was a running joke of counting me and my siblings and teasing my mom that she “didn’t want kids” but has “1, 2, and 3” in tow.

What brought them together across time and space. The sailor and the banker.

On my dad's side, I suspect what was appealing about my mom might have been that she was a independent, smart, career woman. She was fashionable and had great taste, and I'm sure her being an older women was also an appeal. It is very likely possible, that she reminded him of his mother- my grandma Dorothy, who he cherished dearly. More on that later.

On my mom's side, I gather the appeal of my dad, was likely that he heavily pursued her. Many of her nieces and nephews were getting married and having kids at this and she was feeling left-behind her peers. I’m sure the attention that he gave her was part of the lure at first, and so when that attention turned to obsession, there were likely other external factors that led her to stay.

In their immediate history, neither my mother nor my father had any examples of healthy, loving romantic relationships.

Whatever point in time this relationship became an unhealthy obsession, it's likely neither would have any clue. I say obsession, because my mom at one point had a restraining order on my dad. He beat her, threatened to kill her, and drew a gun on her. His stalking and aggressive behavior is also the reason that she was asked to resign from her banking job. And yet, she must have been convinced at some point that he would never do it again, that he would change for her. Somehow she believed that her life would be better with him than without.

It’s important to say that at this time, my mom likely was not aware that she was being pulled into my dad's lure. The sister that took her in when she first moved to LA passed away suddenly. She likely felt some impact on her morality, especially as a women in those times in her early 30s and unwed,. Although he was clearly troubled, my dad was promising things that she wanted, a husband, a house, a family. Likely she had some fear that those dreams were getting further and further away. What neither realized was my dad was promising something that he didn't know or experience himself, and definitely did not know how to give.

Los Angeles, California

My dad after retiring from the Navy, took the postal service test and went to work for electronic maintenance in the Post Office. He would remain in this job for the rest of his life until he was forced to retire early for medical reasons. Why he stayed, I have no idea. My father always talked shit about his coworkers (even the ones he “liked” and would hang out with). Everyone other than him was an idiot; the bosses were unfair and disrespectful of his ability and intelligence. My dad was either too prideful to leave and try to learn something else, or he did enjoy some aspect of his work. After finishing his training, he ended up in Los Angeles (LA) working at one of the distribution centers.

He selected LA to be able to join my mom. It’s unclear if they lived together the entire time, but they were together despite my Dad’s controlling and possessive behavior continuing. It’s during this time that I hear from my mom’s family that he would not let her talk to anyone in her family without him being present. This continued throughout my lifetime. The story I heard from my dad is that he felt her family was using her for money – asking for “loans” that were never repaid. My Dad considered this disrespectful to him. As the man of the relationship, no one should be asking his partner for anything without his consent.

But who knows what the actual truth is. My dad, like the woman who raised him, is not known to be an honest storyteller. Also where he learned this idea of manhood is unclear. He did not grow up with any “men” in the household. His Great-Grandpa was dead before he lived with his Great-Grandma, and his own father was not a part of his life until late adulthood. I never found out where he got his twisted ideas of "manhood" from, but its clear it was not healthy.

The tragic firstborn child and the destruction born from her grief.

At some point during this time in LA, my mom got pregnant, and had their first child. My eldest brother, and my parent’s namesake LaMar. LaMar only lived a few months, before he died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) while sleeping in his crib. I don't know fully what happened, but I do know my mom was devastated. As an onlooker from hindsight, the lost of that child that was likely a sign- a gift from the gods that my parents should not be. Something that echoes in my own tale.

This theme would show later in my own life with the death of a beloved symbolic “child”, and a subsequent death of a relationship, but this is where my story and my parent’s story diverge.

In her grief, my mother turned even more to my father. She couldn't stay in their place in LA and didn't want to live there anymore. I can't imagine carrying a child for 9-10 months and then finding them dead. It likely broke something inside that never fully healed. Meanwhile, my dad swooped in, on his best behavior. He promised to buy her a home, they would try again for another child, and this time, he would marry her. A short while after my eldest brother passed, my second brother would be born. Shortly beforehand, my parents eloped and got married at a chapel in Vegas. There was never a romantic story about the proposal, no wedding dress, and never a plan to have a big wedding celebration with family. It was a practical, sterile, checking of the boxes.

Leaving LA and Moving Inland to the "Brown" Valley

My dad could not afford a house in LA, so they looked south as there were many well-to-do suburbs popping up. My mom's older brother and his wife and child, had just done a similar move to the suburbs, so likely she found the idea appealing. My dad bought my mom a house of her choosing, and they moved away from her, estranged cousins and sisters in LA, to an hour away south to the Inland Empire.

In short succession, after my second oldest brother, I were born a little over a year after. Then my younger brother was born a little over a year after me. According to my mom, my little brother was an accident, and was not meant to be. Apparently, I wanted a sister and dropped my little brother in disappointment. Of course, I remember none of this.

But after a stalking, obsession, a loss of a firstborn child, and now isolated in the hot inland suburbs, the story turns now to how this effected “the boys” and me.