Kathy From Hubbard

Hello again! I want to ask you to do something. Take a minute from what you are doing and just sit quietly for 30 seconds (it’s harder than you think). Now, what was the first three things that came to your mind? Did you think about work, kids, grandkids, God, wife or husband, bills, your future, your past, current problems, health issues, future dreams, why does the neighbor’s never cut their grass, if you left the water running in the tub; what was it? We all have a lot of stuff racing through our heads nonstop all day long (for me, all night long sometimes). Can I get an AMEN?!

Okay, as you are still sitting quietly, I would like you to now close your eyes and think back (it is going to be a LONG time for some of us) to your first kiss. Not the kind your grandmother gave you on the cheek at Christmas time, but the first REAL kiss. That time when you didn’t know what the heck you were doing but you were going to do this. The time you looked that other person square in the eyes and then closed yours and went for it. All those new feelings, tingles, elevated heart rate, mental fireworks in your head and maybe some odd reactions in places you had never had odd reactions before!

I have a lot more time to sit and think than I did when I was working and married. That is a good thing as well as a bad thing sometimes. It is nice that the super busy part of life has slowed way down and the things that occupied my mind constantly now rarely show up. I don’t worry about getting anywhere on time like before, I’m not living my life a week or a month in advance to make sure I don’t mess anything up for someone else. I am pretty much at a point that I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. It lacks “suckiness” for sure. There is always a downside to everything, right? It also makes me think a lot about stuff I never thought much about or small things that now seem to have more value and priority than they probably should. It also is a much lonelier time in my life with a lot less interaction with people than before. God wired me up as an extravert and living more like an introvert is tough for me. I am constantly looking for things to do and places to go. I am used to going into the city daily or travelling all over the country for work. Sitting by myself in a big house alone is akin to a colonoscopy at times. I now know when the mail lady drops off the mail, I know what time the trash guys show up, I know when the family of deer start showing up in the woods in my back yard, etc. GOOD TIMES! I am definitely not complaining about having less stress, its more about having TOO much time to think and a lot fewer things to do.

On top of it all, I have a tendency to overthink things. I’m really not a spontaneous person. I spent my career doing research and building a case to place a valuation on businesses and assets that did not have a primary market. I had to give testimony in court to people who wanted to make me look like I had no idea what I was talking about. The need to be prepared and think things through was a big part of what I did and who I am.

Hey Mark, where are you going with all of this? I’m glad you asked.

So, to “land the plane” I was thinking about things to do when I got back to Ohio this past summer. I was headed back for a few events with family and friends, and I was determined to keep myself occupied even if it seemed a little odd or maybe things others wouldn’t find all that exciting. I also started thinking about people to see that I had not seen for a while and then that got me thinking about some of the fun times when I was a kid. We used to go camping a lot as a family. We went with a number of other families and relatives. We really were not a jump on a plane and go somewhere family but more of a stuff yourself in the car and drive somewhere family. As I was thinking back on those trips, I remembered something that I had not thought about in probably fifty years. From way back in the grey matter I remembered a family camping trip to Sharon, Pennsylvania when I was 14 which is also where I met Kathy from Hubbard, Ohio and experienced my first smooch. That’s what my goofy story will be today.

But First…A Joke:

At a recent family gathering, we decided to open up our wedding album with the kids and the grands. After studying the wedding pictures my six-year-old grandson looked up at Grammy and asked, “Did you marry Grampy because he was good looking?” “Not really,” she replied softly. “Did you marry Grampy for his money?” “Definitely not,” she laughed, “He didn’t have any.” “So,” he said, “you just felt sorry for him?”

A Verse to Contemplate:

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for you for building others up according to their needs, that you may benefit those who listen. - Ephesians 4:29.

Have I Told You This One?

Back to the trip. We loaded up the family truckster, hooked up the pullout camper and loaded up the Akron Rut’s and headed for Sharon, Pennsylvania which is right across the border in western Pennsylvania about an hour from the royal palace on Stevenson Avenue. Going to a different state was a big deal to me back then because we didn’t do it that much. I think I even asked Dad if we had to clear customs at the border. As a seasoned teenage camping machine, the first things we would do once we rolled up into a new place was to check out if they had a pool, ball fields, woods and other kids our age. This place checked all the boxes, and I was about to find out it had one other thing that was going to move to the top of the list from now on: GIRLS!

On this particular weekend, the campsite even had a bandstand, and a local rock band was going to play on Saturday night. Cool!

Well, Friday after the site got set up my brother and I went to check out the pool. This place was really nice. The pool had a high diving board in the deep end, and it also had a teen center that had pinball machines and a ton of things to do. So we were set. As I was heading up the high dive to impress the masses with my latest preacher seat “dive,” my eyes caught the view of this VERY pretty blonde just entering the pool with her family. Don’t ask me what they looked like because there is no way I could tell you because my eyes were locked into a blonde goddess in a blue bikini (yes, I did remember the color of the bikini). My dive changed from a splash dive to a regular dive so I could get out near where they were gathering their chairs.

Over the next few hours, we flirted, and I finally got up enough courage to go speak to her. We hit it off great and I asked her if she would like to go the dance the next night. She said she would have to ask her dad but would let me know tomorrow at the pool. Alright, Alright, Alright! The next day at the pool, I ditched my brother and spent all day wooing Kathy with my 14-year-old ladies’ man moves. Surprisingly, she still wanted to go out with me! We were back at the campsite and my dad asks, “Hey Mark you want to go night fishing with us tonight at the lake?” “That’s a HARD NEGATIVE Pops, I’ve got plans buddy.” So, I put on my best shirt and slapped on some of Dad’s Hai Karate! (If you know, you know!) and headed for the dance. If this were a movie it would have been put out by Hallmark but hey, it was my first big “date.”

I found her (without her dad), and we sat down and started to enjoy the band and get to know one another better. After about an hour I got the courage to ask her if she wanted to take a walk. It was a clear night with a full moon, I had Hai Karate on, how could she say no?! So, we start walking away from the dance knowing that we were both told we had to back as soon as the dance was over. We find a nice spot and sit down in the grass, and she reaches down and holds my hand and tells me she thinks I am such as nice boy (I KNOW!). As mentioned previously, I had never REALLY kissed anyone before, but apparently, SHE HAD! We start to smooching and I can remember thinking I had just found my newest best thing to do in life! WOW she was a good kisser, even from someone that didn’t know anything I could tell what REAL good was! We commence to lip locking for what seemed like two seconds and then all of the sudden I stopped and said to her “Oh no, do you hear that?” “No",” she said, “I don’t hear anything.” “Exactly, the band isn’t playing!” We ended our night under the moon at the submarine races and I walked her back to her family’s campsite. Her dad was waiting, not very happy and had two questions, “Who the h+@# are you?” and “Where have you been?” I never had a door slammed in my face before so that was also another first for me!

The next day, I strolled over to her campsite to see if she wanted to go swimming or whatever. Her Dad meets me at the front door of their camper and let me know in no uncertain terms that she was grounded and would not be available for any further socialization (being grounded in a camper must be really awful). My summer romance had come to an end before it had barely started. I failed to realize that kissing apparently impacts your ability to hear music playing. I was smart enough to get her address the day before, so I followed up via letter a few days later and we started my first long distance romance. You know how those turn out, right? I got back home and met other girls and went steady and fell in love with a few of them and eventually I met Michelle when I was starting high school and that ended my dating other girls. We were together from 1975 until 2021. I have a special place in my heart for all these beautiful ladies and feel very honored that they would want to hang out with me.

Jump forward to 2023. I am back in Akron and bored so I’m out driving around and I see a road sign that says that Youngstown, Ohio is 40 miles away. Through all my traveling I had never been there and thought what the heck, let’s go to Youngstown and get some lunch and have a look around. Off I go. As I’m getting close there is an exit sign for Hubbard, Ohio. I’m thinking to myself “Why does that seem familiar?” I have never been here but for some reason it triggers my memory banks. Oh crud, I know why…Kathy From Hubbard! I take the exit and pull into a town that could have been anywhere Ohio. A small community with one high school and everyone is fired up for the local football team’s game on Friday. I drive around and sightsee a little bit and start to wonder if I could find the house she lived in. I try and remember that address she gave me fifty years ago and “Elizabeth Street” comes to the frontal lobes. I’m sure that can’t be right, but I go ahead and stick it into my phone GPS and sure enough there is an Elizabeth Street in Hubbard. Then I think the street number was 300 something, maybe 323? I plug that in and sure enough there is a 323 Elizabeth Street. I can’t remember what I had for lunch, but I can remember THAT?! So, just for grins and giggles I head to the address and check out the house. We could have been neighbors. If that was where she grew up it looked a whole lot like the house I grew up in my community. I’m certainly not going to knock on the door and I’m not sure either of us would remember the other so off to Youngstown for lunch I go and then back to Akron.

The next day my sister and I went to Detroit, Michigan to catch a Braves and Tigers game. We had a fun time on a great day and as we are heading back on the three-hour drive home, I told her about my trip to Hubbard and the other story of my brief summer fling back in 1974. She was intrigued and started asking me questions about her. I said, “All I remember is that she was a very cute blonde who was a great kisser and seemed like a really nice person and that she was from Hubbard, Ohio and was my age or maybe a little older.” My sister went to work on the Internet and Facebook and about halfway back she has a LOT of information about Kathy and her family. I was pretty amazed and a little concerned that maybe we were going down a road we should not be going down. But we kept digging. I found out she was married with a couple of girls and grandchildren. Her husband had suddenly died in 2019 which in a weird way was another thing we had in common, losing a spouse. Even though I had not seen her in fifty years and wouldn’t know her if she walked right by me, I still felt sorry for her and her family. As we drove on, my sis kept digging and she says, “Oh no!” I had heard that before and knew it wasn’t good. She had been scanning some obituaries and sure enough she had passed in 2020. What a letdown and what a tough thing for her family.

Once we made it back to Akron, we both were a lot quieter and talked about how odd and awkward that was. It left me wanting to know more about her but there’s no way to follow up with people that don’t know me from Adam to ask about her. It was also weird how within the span of a few hours there was this excitement and happiness about solving this mystery and then it ends only to add on to the sadness I have been wrestling with for a few years now. However, it was a nice respite, and it appears that she had a very nice family, and she was loved by many. She even had started her own business, a coffee place on Main Street. Good for her! Kathy From Hubbard, I am glad to have known you for a few days and you will always have a special place in my heart.

A Prayer:

Heavenly Father, remind me that You are bigger than any of my weaknesses. Thank You for Your presence, power, and fellowship. You are my safe haven.

Book recommendation:

Finding Meaning - The Sixth Stage of Grief by David Kessler (2019).

Music Recommendation:

Feats Don’t Fail Me Now by Little Feat (1974)