CHAPTER 2 - A GROWING FAMILY IN THE AGE OF MALAISE

  I had known hard work before going to work at Colonial but it was one of the hardest and most challenging jobs that I ever had. For the first two years I worked in the bun room. We boxed and bagged all kinds of hamburger and hot dog buns. Learning this job was very difficult because it took good hand and eye coordination to master it. When I was learning the job we had a supervisor that cursed me about as much as any T.I. that I ever had in the military. If there was a mechanical problem that caused the line to back up that was one thing but I would catch hell if I caused the line to back up. I worked some very long hours. We were off on Tuesday's and Saturdays. On  Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday we worked a regular eight hour shift but on Monday and Friday we were required to work until all the orders were filled. This could mean eight hours in the slow time of the year, which was usually January until sometime in the early Spring. Then there was the rest of the year when you could work anywhere from twelve to sixteen hours on a regular basis. I remember some nights that I worked as long as twenty hours straight and with very few breaks. I hated the nights when we would have a breakdown, especially when you thought that you would have a fairly short night. On those nights you would sit around for hours waiting for the line to start up. I was working these hours and trying to go to school full time.

 For three straight years from the summer of 1972 until 1975 I was going to school continuously during the summer, fall and spring semesters. On Tuesday I went to classes all day at M.T.S.U. with anywhere from two to four hours sleep if I was lucky. Some Tuesdays I had no sleep at all and I still have notebooks where you can see where I nodded off to sleep in class taking notes. When I got home late in the afternoon I went straight to bed most days unless there was something planned. On Saturdays I usually slept through much of my day off. This pace would eventually take it's toll on me. Sometime in 1974 I had my first panic attack. I was watching the kids in the parking lot of a store called Big K while Debbie was shopping and with no apparent reason a sudden feeling of panic began to sweep over me. I literally felt like I was going to die right then and there. My heart was beating so fast and hard that I thought I was having a heart attack. I became short of breath and the experience was so frightening that just the fear of an attack would bring one on from that point on. I would have several in a day sometimes. After a while I didn't want to leave the house and I would lay in the floor in front of the TV scared to move.  My anxiety got so bad that Debbie threatened to divorce me over it.

 I went to the doctor for a physical and when I told him about my problem he just handed me a prescription for Valium. He never asked me why I was anxious or suggested an alternative to taking drugs. This was 1974 and I don't know if anyone even knew what panic attacks were back then or how to treat them. It was probably the late 1980's when I began to hear people talking about anxiety attacks. Over the years my daughter Melanie and Jon have also suffered from anxiety but because of my experience with it I was able to help them through it. I thought that I was going crazy and at first the Valium worked but over time I was asking for higher and higher dosages. In addition I would have to hide my pills from the drug addicts at work. I always hated to take medication and to this day I am like that. 

 One night I just decided to stop taking the pills altogether because I wasn't  going to let this thing beat me. The attacks would continue for years to come but after a while at least I was able to function and I was no longer a recluse afraid to venture out of the house. When I was having attacks Debbie could usually tell but I managed to hide them from everyone else. Anxiety is a form of depression and because of what happened to my father I am determined not to give in to it. I wonder sometimes if my father wasn't suffering from anxiety and the only way he knew how to self medicate was with alcohol and drugs. Long hours at work and going to school full time was the trigger for my attacks. As a result I began to cut back on my hours at school. 

  Whenever we had a violent thunderstorm in Nashville, water would seep through the ceiling and wall in the bun room. On one particular night we were walking around in about two or three inches of water and with all the electricity flowing in that room it was a miracle we weren't electrocuted. On April 1, 1974 a tornado hit near the bakery while I was at work and it left a path of destruction for about two miles. The funnel touched down near the historic battle of Nashville Monument. It was toppled and plate glass windows were blown out at 100 Oaks Mall. Trees were uprooted along Thompson Lane and it also leveled a furniture store along the way. I heard about the destruction of the monument on the news and I drove by there on the way home. The monument was totally destroyed. It had been a familiar Nashville landmark my entire life but I was shocked to see it lying in pieces all over the ground. The only thing left was the pedestal. That night as I sat in my car looking at the damage I thought that it would be rebuilt in a fairly short time but I was wrong. Eventually the bronze angel and the two charging horses that he is holding back would be remounted on the pedestal. The horses represented the North and South. The stone obelisk would not be replaced, however. This was after I-65 was completed and it was in a spot that was isolated and hard to get to. A group of private citizens raised money over the years and had the statue fully restored and moved to a park on Granny White Pike. It was finally rededicated on June 26th 1999. I have always loved the inscription on it.

"Oh, Valorous Gray, In The Grave Of Your Fate, 

Oh, Glorious Blue, In The Long Dead Years,

You Were Sown In Sorrow And Harrowed In Hate,

But Your Harvest Today Is A Nations Tears.

For The Message You Left Through The Land Has Sped

From The Lips Of God To The Heart Of Man:

Let The Past Be Past : Let The Dead Be Dead. --

Now And Forever American!"

  Beginning April 3rd and all day of April 4th there was a super outbreak of tornadoes that was not surpassed until the super outbreak of 2011. There were 40 confirmed F-4 and F-5 tornadoes. In 13 states and part of Canada there were 148 tornadoes. Tornadoes touched down in West Virginia, New York, North Carolina, Virginia, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia, There was 600 million dollars worth of damage in 1974 currency and at one time there was 15 tornadoes on the ground at the same time. Xenia Ohio was nearly wiped out and Louisville was heavily damaged. Three hundred and nineteen people died in these storms. The death toll in 2011 killed 324 people by comparison. Two tornadoes hit Nashville on April 3rd and both of them did extensive damage in South Nashville along Harding Place and through the Mountain View community near Hickory Hollow, Murfreesboro road, and Edge of Lake subdivision. I remember the account of one woman who was taking a shower in an apartment complex when a tornado took out the wall of her apartment. Her wall disappeared and she was suddenly exposed to traffic on Harding Place. I worked that day and I remember standing in my front yard after I got home that night. The lightning was unlike anything I had ever seen before and it was an awesome light show.