Our Life To Now

I was born in one small village in Massachusetts, 1938 and grew up in another village in Massachusetts. There is a town that is made up of four small villages.

Pat was born in one of the cities in Massachusetts, 1939. She lived in the city until the age of eight when her family moved to the same small village that I lived in and where she grew up.

My best friends were my dog Blackey and my buddy Tommy Bull, that is when he was around and not traveling with his mother and father all around the world. My other friend was Bobby Wawro.

Tommy later change his name to Thomas Fenton.

The other friends of my sister and I were Arthur “Sonny” & Anne Trench and Ernie & Pat Bourdeau.

We would all play together out in the woods or the field behind my parents Tommy’s grandmothers’ houses. We would go out climb through the quarry or go to the old power plant down along the Swift River. We would play basketball at the Trench’s house or next-door at Pisarski’s Garage. Joe Pisarski setup a basketball hoop for his son and his friends. The Garage was next door my parent’s house.

Sometimes after school, my sister and I would go to Pat and Ernie’s house and play cards, play in the yard or the barn. Sometimes we would all get together and go play at the Trench’s house.

My dad was the ice man, when there were iceboxes. During the summer I would go with my father on his delivers. Other times my sister and I would play in the icehouse where it was very cool.

I spent allot of my time fishing at the pond across form our house. If I wasn’t at the pond, I could be found on the Swift River fishing.

I was friends with Mike Donahue and I would help Mike around the Grammar School cleaning. In the summer I would go inside the steam boiler and clean the suit off the tubes inside the boiler. It was thought Mike that I got to know Mike’s brother Tom. Tom was crippled up from having polio. Tom taught me how to tie flies and refinish bamboo fly rods. Mike and Tom also taught me how to fly fish. That was some of the best times I had.

In the winter I would go ice fishing with my friend Francis Zobka and his uncles. Francis and I also trapped muskrats and sold the fur. I had a trap line of 50 traps. I did this throughout my teens. Hunting was another love of my loves. I still fish today but no were as much as I did when I was younger. I haven’t been hunting since I was in my early thirties.

As a teenager I would get together with my buddies; Roger Lamb, Donald Mickna and Bobby & Richard Wawro. We had an old car out in Tommy’s grandmothers’ field were we could race it around and were we all learned to drive. We would also play baseball out in the same field.

I still remember the very first day I saw Pat as she came to School holding her mother’s hand. Billy Mundell and I were on the playground at the fence, which was right next to the street. Pat and her family had moved to our little village from the city. She ended up being in the same grade as I.

While we were still in grammar school, Pat, my sister Joyce and I beginning taking dancing lessons. The lessons were taught up stairs at the Town Library Building. The four villages that I mentioned before made up this town. To get to the dance lessons we had to take the village bus. We became very good dance partners and enjoyed dancing together. In our last two years of grammar school and the first two-year of high school we began seeing a lot more of each other.

Pat loved to roller skate so I would walk her down to Crystal Lake skating rink, which was better than a mile from her house. On the way back home one evening we had our first kiss we knew we were in love with each other. From then on it was nothing but good times together. We would study our home work together and do all sorts of things together. After church on Sundays we would go with her parents or with my parents and visit relatives. That is when families were much closer together and spent time together just visiting.

While I was still in high school I began to make things with my hands and began making furniture and many other things in our shop class. I also studied four years of drafting in High School and Pat was also in the same drafting class.

In 1955, while still in high school, I joined the 181 Infantry Unit of the US Army National Guard with the consent of my parents. I was a member of that Unit from 1955 to 1961. I worked my way from a rifleman with the rank of private E1 to gunner - M60 with the rank of specialist E4 - SP4.

Our mandatory drills back then were held every Monday evening from 6 p.m. until 10 or 11 p.m. I would rush out of drill and drive home over the street near Pats house. I did this so I could flash my light on my car when I got close to her house. She would sit in her bedroom window watch for me until I went past and flashed my lights.

I can remember the year 1955 because it was the year of “Hurricane Diane” Aug. 17, 1955. Our unit the 181 Infantry was doing our mandatory two weeks of summer training at Camp Drum, NY, now Fort Drum. Our unit had traveled by train to Camp Drum, but on our return home the unit had to transfer from the train to duce & half trucks. The rails were washed out as we came back into Massachusetts and some of the roads were washed out as well by the floods that came with the Hurricane. When we got back to our home base instead of going home we were put back onto duce & half’s and sent out to do guard duty. Some of us went to Monson, MA and some to Three Rivers, MA.

I was sent to the town of Monson and put on guard duty around the town. We did not allow anyone into town unless they were able to prove that they lived in the town.

I remember being put on guard duty at the bottom of a steep hill road one evening. The road went from the town we were on duty in to the neighboring town. In the middle of that night the rains began again and the water coming down the hill towards the brook at the bottom of the road and the water was up to my knees. I thought I was going to get washed away and die that night. The next day we all had to go to the Town Hall in Monson and get shots. I recalls being very sick from those shots. We all stayed in the dorms at Monson Academy a prep school in the town.

Pat, Joyce, and I were in the High School Band together. Pat played the sax, Joyce was the Drum Majorette and I played the base drum. My best buddy in High School was Bruce Eberhardt, who was also in the band. We did everything together, that is when I was not with Pat. I would run home after school which was about four miles instead of taking the school bus home. I loved to run back than before I got my car. I had to wait to get my drivers license because my Dad made me take the driving course at school so he could get a cheaper rate on the insurance. I bought my first car for fifty dollars. It was a 1948 Chevy Coupe that I had nosed and decked and put on fender skirts. I painted it black after I did all the body work on the car.

I remember some of the dumb things that I did when I was young. One time I stopped my Chevy Coupe at the top of a steep hill, and this road went for about a mile. I wanted to see how fast I could go until I reached the bottom of the hill. I put the car in first gear and began coasting down. I forgot one thing that I had it in first gear and so when I got to the bottom I let out the clutch to slow down; “Boom”, the clutch plate exploded. That was one “Costly lesson.”

Another time I was so much in a hurry coming home from guards, so I could flash my lights at Pat, I lost control of the car and ripped off one of the fender skirts in the bushes. This was “Another costly lesson.”

When I got rid of the car I sold it for one hundred dollars.

Pat and I went out with each other until 1957, when we broke up. According to a note in Pat's mother's diary book #1, Pat and I broke up on April 4, 1957. My Dad did not like the idea that Pat and I might get married some day, because we were that serious. The problem was that Pat was Catholic and I was a Protestant and in those times that was a no, no. So Pat’s parents and my parents pushed us away form each other.

Back in 1954 I began working at Jarvis & Jarvis a hospital equipment and caster manufacture. I worked there during the summer when I was out of school. I started in the carpenter shop the first summer building crates to ship the equipment out. The second summer I was in the paint shop were I dipped the equipment that was going to be painted. The third summer I worked on the truck assembly line building the equipment. In 1957 as part of my drafting class I began working part time after school doing drafting at Jarvis & Jarvis in the Engineering Department. There was the engineer and myself the draftsman.

Pat, Joyce and I all graduated from Palmer High School in June 1958.

After high school in 1958 I began working for Jarvis & Jarvis full time in the Engineering Department and began going out with Sylvia Fuller. I attended a College Evening Division school to get my Pre-college Algebra course so I could get into Collage. I ended up marring Sylvia in 1959, she was a Protestant and this was pleasing to my parents. We went on our honeymoon to Maine where we stayed with my cousin Carol and Charlie Dugay. We traveled around Maine and came back and began house keeping in a small three room house that we rented from my fathers boss. The house had a kitchen, bedroom and living room. I put in some work on the house after working all day and before we got married so that after we got married we were able to move right in. At this house we had our first child Carrie and it was quite tight with only three rooms.

In 1961 I received an Honorable Discharge from the National Guard. I got out of the National Guard because; Sylvia did not like it when I was gone from her and my daughter Carrie but I still had an eight year obligation. So from 1961 to 1963 I was attached to the US Army Inactive Reserve; Fort Devens, MA and was listed as a Gunner - M60 with the Rank of Specialist E4 -SP4. I received my Honorable Discharge form that unit in 1963.

My Dad and Mom helped us to get a bigger house, after Carrie was born. It was in the village were Sylvia and I had grown up. At this house we had three more children, Vicki, Robin and Timmy.

I was still doing drafting and still working at Jarvis & Jarvis from 1958 to 1960. In 1960 was promoted to Design Draftsman working with the Production Designer. The Engineering Department had gotten larger in the last two years. In 1963 I was promoted to Production Design Assist to the Production Engineer and in 1965 promoted to the Production Engineers job, developing new products.

Back in 1964 I joined the Village Fire Department and in 1968 was voted to the position of Fire Captain for the Department by the men of the Department. In October of 1968 the Village Mills burned down and it was the biggest fire in the USA that year. And in that same year I began collage nights at the City Technical Community College. I was going for a BA in Engineering and spent two years nights, maintaining a GPA of 3.00 but, I did not finish nor received a degree. Because it was also the year “1968” that I found out Sylvia was cheating on me with my 2nd cousin Roland Coto.

I found this out when my good friend and work buddy Kenny Clark and I went deer hunting in Maine. We were supposed to stay at Roland’s house, but when we got there Roland was not there, so we went back to his sister Carol and her husband Charlie Dugay’s house. They told me, that Roland went to Connecticut to visit our cousin Arnold Jarvis. I thought that, that was kind of strange, because Roland knew we were coming up to stay with him.

Sylvia and I were having problems and she was acting strange that time and I was not trust her. I called my sister from Maine and told her about my feelings. The feeling about Rolland’s sudden departure and asked her to drive by my house and see if there was a car at my house. She did and found that Roland car was at my house while I was in Maine hunting.

On our way home from hunting I told the guys to stop the car and I grabbed my rifle and loaded one round. I got out of the car and took aim down the road at the car that I knew was Rolands. My friend Kenny stopped me. I just wanted to kill him! When I got home, I confronted Sylvia with the fact that Roland had been there while I was away. She lied and said that he was not there. I latter found out that Kenny had called his wife to tell her that we were coming home early because there was so much snow we could not get onto the woods to hunt. His wife called Sylvia and that is why I did not catch them in the act. Shortly after this happened, Roland moved down to our village to work. One night after I got out of school, I found Roland coming out of my house and at that point I decided to get a divorce from Sylvia. I moved out and moved in with my parent’s and into my old room and filed for divorce.

It was also the year of my tenth high school class reunion, which took place just before I went on my hunting trip to Maine. That was when I saw Pat for the first time in 12 years. After my divorce in 1969 from Sylvia and in the fall of that year I looked up Pat! I knew she was divorced from her husband because my sister had given me that information after my divorce. My sister and Pat had stayed friends over the years.

Pat had married John Farrell in 1959. She had three boys, William, Kenneth and David whom we all call “Gary”. Pat wanted to name Gary, Gary David Farrell, but Pat’s mother said “NO” because he would be called GD Farrell, so he was named David Gary.

When Pat got out of High School she went to comptometer school. From that schooling she got a job working for A & P Bakery in the office. This is when she met John and they got married. She quite the A & P job because she was going to have Billy. After having Billy she went back to work for another supermarket as a cashier. The owners found out that she could run a comptometer, so she ended up as assistant bookkeeper and payroll clerk in the office. She had to quite this job because her husband had taken off with the car for two weeks and so she could not get to work and had to quite. He came back and they moved to another town and it was at this point she had Kenny. Then she went to work for Buxton Wallets and after getting laid off she went to work RCA winding coils for TV sets and after which she had Gary. Shortly after Gary’s birth John had not changed his drinking an abusive ways so she filed and divorced John.

I began going out with Pat again and I would take her, her three boys and my four children out with us.

Pat and I married in 1970. We rented from Pats father. He had a house that had belonged to his father-in-law. We stayed there until we completely fixed up the home I had with my first wife.

After moving into our home new home we had a new addition, our daughter Krista was born 1971 and we started “PINE TREE CRAFTSMEN” a small furniture and gift shop which was on state route 181. Along with the furniture and gift shop we also opened a bait and tackle shop known as “THE BAIT BOX”. The furniture shop grew, so in 1973 we sold our place in the small village and moved to a more central location in the state.

Our new home located on U.S. route 20 was an early 1800's home. Shortly after moving into it we found out that it was going to cost us a lot of money to heat the house with that the old steam furnace. So we ended up having a new hot air furnace put in which added to the cost of the home. That same summer our well went dry and we ended up having to put in a new artesian well with more cost added to the home.

We continued both businesses “PINE TREE CRAFTSMEN” and “THE BAIT BOX” at our new location. We also began doing antique furniture restoration. Our operations included stripping, repair, refinish and upholster of antique furniture. We also manufactured antique pine reproduction pieces and all that work was done by myself with the assistants of Pat and our good friend Bobby Gibb.

We did work for dealers as far away as New York City. Some of our work went out to as far as Texas. We began showing our reproduction pieces at the Boston Gift & Furniture Show selling through a catalog that we designed and had produced. The catalog went out to many furniture and gift shops throughout the New England states.

Along with getting married in 1970 I was promoted to Sales Service Consultant for Western United States helping customers with their needs and applications for Jarvis East. Jarvis & Jarvis name was changed when the company was sold to Jarvis East. I worked in this position until 1975. In 1975 I was moved to the Engineering Department to generate production routing sheets for standard and special jobs. I applied standard times to all the production jobs.

After all the cost we incurred by making the move to our new home, Pat went to work at K-Mart. She also worked at the Smoke House restaurant. We both worked weekends at the Local Newspaper. For awhile we were both working three jobs to get back on our feet and it paid off and we got back on our feet.

Around 1974 I was invited to join the local Fire Department, when they found out that I had been the Fire Captain in another Fire Department. I became the Asst. Fire Chief and EMT Chief for the Local Vol. Fire Department in 1975. I also worked part time as an EMT tech for Gold Cross Ambulance Service out of two of their Offices on weekends. Also in 1975 I rejoined the US Army National Guard; 104th Infantry Headquarters Company. I obtained the Rank: E6 SSG and was a Medic Squad Leader. I took my training at Fort Sam Houston, Texas. I received an Honorable Discharge in 1984. In 1976 I was appointed Police Officer and Civil Defense Director for our Local Town.

During this same period I was also doing the following jobs part time. One was Lieutenant Instructor for the Massachusetts Fire Academy. The course was on Plastic in Fires and I was certified by the State of Massachusetts and Massachusetts Fire Academy. I taught in central and western Massachusetts Fire Departments. I became an EMT Instructor & Examiner Registry of Emergency Medical Technicians for Hampden County, Massachusetts. I was also certified with the National EMT Association for the State of Massachusetts. I taught courses at Hospital, Redevelopment Hospital and the City Technical Community College. I was also an Instructor in Advance First Aid and CPR for Hampden County, Massachusetts and was certified with the American Red Cross Springfield and Worcester Massachusetts Chapters. I was certified as an instructor American Heart Assoc. of Springfield, MA and was the one of CPR Instructor for Hampden County EMT Association of Massachusetts. I certified as a Defensive Driving Course Instructor for the National Safety Council’s Driver Improvement Program of Hampden County and with all of these certifications I was able to qualify the EMT’s and also certify Firemen and Police Officers as first responders.

Pat also got involved in these actives and also joined the Fire Department and became an EMT. She later became the very first Woman Police Officer on the Local Police Department. She worked full time as an EMT for the Local Ambulance Service during the day when everyone else was out of town working. Our town was a small town of less than nineteen hundred people in town. There was only one industry that made artificial medical parts with a hand full of workers so there was no place to work in town. Our little ambulance service covered two other towns and was a busy service.

In 1978 at Jarvis East Division I was given the job of Assistant Production Forman were I helped supervised 45 employees and was put totally in charge of the welding department. I stayed in this position until 1980 when and was promoted to the company Production Scheduler. I scheduled in all raw materials and scheduled all the production going out of the Plant.

Winters started to become too much for Pat and I to cope with. The kids were gone, winters bad, time for the south and warm weather. So I stayed with my job until October of 1989. The company giving me my retirement through December, 1989 and it was time for Pat and I to moving to Florida and warm weather.

In October 1989, I with the help of my mover friend David Olson of “Olson Trucking” moved Pat to FL. We had purchased a nice one story manufactured home which was located in a 55+ retirement community.

Then I travel with my friend David to see the USA. I worked for Dave and the Paul Arpin Moving, Company until February of 1990. Then in April until October 1990 I worked for the News-Sun Newspaper as a paper delivery driver. Pat went to work for the 55+ retirement community as a telemarketing person.

In 1990 we purchased a lawn service and started “Bob Coto’s Lawn Service, Inc”. I was President/ Owner until 1994 when we sold the business. Pat worked took care of the books for the business. After we sold the business she went to work at a department store and then worked as a server in a restaurant before ending up working at the Boat Corral Marina.

After selling the lawn service I went to work for Banyan Woods Apartments as a maintenance man until late 1994. Then I went to work for One Stop Auto Parts, Inc. as a counterman and local delivery driver until early 1996.

In 1996 I also went to work for the Boat Corral Marina as a boat mechanic, but after three and half months of listening to the fighting between father and son, I went back to One Stop Auto Parts, Inc. In mid 1996 I was given the position of Second Assistant Manager and ASE P2 Automobile Parts Specialist until they closed their doors.

I then collected unemployment for twenty-six weeks, the first ever in my life. Just as the unemployment was about to run out Alan Jay Automotive Network hired me as a parts counter Specialist. I took early retirement in 2002 and continued to work part time for Alan Jay until Pat and I purchased some land and moved our home in the beginning of May.

We had to pay rent for the land in the 55+ retirement community with all the rules and restrictions that they had we could live cheaper and live free from there rules. We now owned the land and made our own rules. Then I had to totally retire in the middle of 2002 to be able to work full time on our home and to get it ready for us to move into. Pat was working full time at the Boat Corral Marina and we were living in Pat’s father’s house after he had passed and before her and her brother sold the house.

The contractor moved the house by taken it apart and relocated it onto our land. Every thing went very well and we moved into our newly relocated home. We now have our home on our own lot with a two-car garage which is 24' x 30'.

I had to build entrances decks to get into the house so that we could get our final OK for occupancy. I had to do a front and a rear deck before we could get moved in. We moved in and then I had to finish up the decks and the utility room so Pat would have place for her washer and dryer. We wanted the room big enough so she could have a place to do her crafts that she liked so much to do, a place where she could have every thing she needed.

It was completed but we soon found out that we needed to cover over the upper part of the deck, because of the summer sun just pouring in the back windows which face directly south. So here comes the next thing to do. Now with house complete it was time to get me a work shop that I could do my wood working. After I set up my woodworking shop it was time to get the outside landscape done. Then we started on the inside with new dining room cabinets and installing new insulated windows. We refinished the walls and put up wall paper new moldings and painted the new woodwork in the room.

We next moved onto the den and living rooms first by opening the wall between the rooms with a half wall. Refinished all the walls in both rooms and than put up wall paper on the one common wall of both rooms and the half wall. Then we painted each room a deferent but blended color and painted the new woodwork in both rooms. I think I need to explain the refinishing of the wall. The walls came with wood stripes covered with the wall paper covering that was on the walls. We took the strips off the walls and taped and compounded the joints the same as would be done in any sheet rock job. We also had to prep the walls to except the new wall paper or paint. After we finished the den and living room we moved to the hallway area and prep the walls for the same matching wall paper that was on the den and living room common wall because the arched entrance to the hall was on that wall. My next woodworking project was to build our entertainment center.

I was also from time to time working in my gardens. The gardens are a work in progress and have been so for the past three years. Developing them into what they are today. Pat loves to walk through the gardens, but she is not one that has a green thumb. She does have other gifts of talent with a thread and needle doing her cross stitch canvases and she is very talented when it comes to knitting and crocheting.

In 2005 our summer project was our new pool and deck along with screening the upper deck.

It is 2006 and we have now installed all new insulated windows throughout the home. We have finished off our bathroom the guest bath and bedroom and our office area/computer room.

Its 2007 and we have completed better than half the kitchen walls and cabinets. We have a more cabinets to build and install and counter top for the new cabinets still to be built along with a new sink. The cabinets are a work in progress and the things that we have left to do now we can take our time at doing.

After the Boat Corral closed Pat worked part time at Sassfras Used Book store until it closed. She then went to work for three days a week at a Feed and Western Wear store.

We have purchased a camper trailer so we can go and see some of this country. But for now the higher gas prices have put that on the back burner. We both have learned to take life one day at a time and to really enjoy each day. To enjoy all the things that God has gives us and to LOVE each other with all our hearts, minds and soles.

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This page was created: January 26, 2009 and Modified: February 7, 2009

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