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Saturday, November 7, 2009

2119 Lincoln Ave

This house is located in San Jose, CA and is the house I grew up in when I was in elementary school. The house belonged to my Grandparents until they sold it to my father. Originally purchased for around $11,000 back in the 1940's. I found that it is for sale again currently for $850,000 Holy Crap Batman! The house is zoned as commercial property so that's part of the reason for the high price tag. When I lived there it looked much different. It was white and the front yard was simple grass, no hand rails or any of the other stuff. The building you see behind the house was actually the garage at the time. Both the house and garage have been completely remodeled. Old photo of me and my sister in the kitchen I loved that old house. My room was up in the attic, it was a huge attic with a vaulted ceiling and hardwood flooring, real hardwood flooring. The staircase was in the center of the house and went down to a small room with 3 doors leading into the various bedrooms and the kitchen. There was an open arch as well that led into the family room. The greatest thing of all was the huge metal grill that was laid into the floor, also hardwood, at the bottom of the steps. Beneath this grill was the furnace and when it was on you could stand on the grill and feel the blast of hot air rising all around you. The furnace was down in the basement which was accessible from a staircase in the kitchen. I lived there until my father sold the place to a high school friend of his, Pat Amato who had a Shoe Repair business down the street. Amato purchased the house and had it remodeled. He continued to run his business out of the place for many years and eventually sold it. I don't know who the new owners were but they turned it into a salon. That was many years ago and it may have changed ownership several times since then. Labels: Dad, Family

9:14 AM | Posted by Dave

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Saturday, April 19, 2008

Closure... No One Gets Out Alive

I attended my fathers funeral today. He's buried at the Weaverville Cemetery after being cremated. It was a sad day for me. I shot some video, I captured the sermon and some clips of the graveyard. I don't know what I'll do with them, maybe nothing. There was probably 35 people who showed up. Not the small service I had anticipated, but still, these were people who knew my father and came to pay their respects. The pastor talked for a bit before the actual ceremony which lasted about 10 minutes. Afterwards we all made our way over to the Weaverville Volunteer Fire Dept. where there was a memorial. The memorial consisted of tables full of food which people had made and brought to share. There was an enormous amount of food. My Dad would have approved, he loved to eat. One thing that happened at the service back at the cemetery which I have to talk about in my next podcast was just like something right out of that movie Meet The Fockers. Unfortunately, I had turned off the camcorder and didn't capture any of the ensuing chaos on video.. A family arrived after the service had begun, it was the two parents and 3 or 4 small children. The parents quietly joined the group and the kids began running around the cemetery. They were chasing each other and crawling over tombstones, running over graves, out of control. Nobody said anything because to do so would have interrupted the pastor. Well, the sermon finished and everyone was just standing about talking. The kids were still running around. My Dad was cremated and his remains were in a box that was placed upon a rickety stool. This stool was placed on some astro-turf which was laid out over the grave site. Beneath this astro-turf was a hole. After everyone leaves the caretaker buries the box and cleans up the grave site. About 5 minutes after the service ended one of the children slowly approached the grave site. Nobody really took notice of this and the child proceeded onto the astro-turf and walked around the stool. As he did so he stepped over the hole beneath the fake grass.. Oh my God.. he fell into the grave.. as his body disappeared the astro-turf got pulled down into the pit with him. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion.. The boy vanished.. The astro-turf was sucked into the grave causing the already precarious stool to tip over.. It fell away from the hole, and as it did so, the box with my fathers remains catapulted into the air.. It flew back up and over the hole.. I swear it was surreal, everything was in slow motion.. the box was tumbling through the air.. I heard my step-mother scream and everyone moved toward the box all at once, reaching out as if going for a pass in a football skirmish.. The two people next to me knocked heads and went down.. There was a wash of sounds as everyone was either screaming or gasping.. Nobody caught the box as it tumbled end over end through the air and then landed with a dull thump upon the earth.. It was at an angle and for a split second it got absolutely silent as everyone focused on the box, waiting to see if it broke open and my fathers ashes were scattered into the winds.. Then gravity took over and the box made one final roll onto its side and lay motionless.. It did not break.. At that moment everything seemed to snap back into normal speed and there was a flurry of activity as people ran for the box.. One of our family friends named Dan grabbed it and picked up the stool. Someone else was pulling the kid out of the grave and Dan reset the stool as he shouted angrily for someone to take control of the child. Afterwards, it was rather humorous. My Dad would have found humor in it. Perhaps this was his way of repeating the fact that he did not want a funeral service... Labels: Dad

8:41 PM | Posted by Dave

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