Commentary by Wayne Lee
This is probably the most difficult column I’ve ever had to write. Just because it’s so personal. I was at the Eagle Point Senior Center the other day when one of the regular attendees pointed out a box on a table in the back that she said had been there for weeks and asked if I knew anything about it. So, I went back and opened the box and couldn’t believe what I found.
It contained some of the most personal memorabilia of my life. Inside were the records of my life just out of college including the coroner’s report of my younger brother’s death in a traffic accident when he was just 22. There were also items including his death certificate and documents and sympathy cards from his funeral.
I even found a copy of an old newspaper from the first job I had as a community journalism major just out of college. I was hired by a weekly community paper called the Orangevale News and my picture was on the front page announcing I had just been promoted to editor of that esteemed publication the day after my birthday in 1981.
The memories came flooding back not only of the few years I spent gaining much needed experience reporting, editing and photographing all things in the community, but the pain and the heartache of losing my only sibling. He had always been a pain in my ass because he was mom’s favorite and I was always the “piece of garbage that would never amount to anything” as mom repeatedly told me.
I could write a book about the family dynamic but in short, he was her favorite and I, who was a constant reminder of the man she divorced when I was eight, took all the heat of her frustration of being a single mom trying to get by. Whenever he did anything wrong, it was my fault because I was supposed to be responsible for his behavior even though I had no actual authority and he knew it.
Once we were both out on our own, he came forward to establish a relationship, asking me for advice on a variety of subjects and just as we were building bridges, his life suddenly ended.at the age of 22 in a fatal traffic accident. Now I was the only child, and my mother was forced to reestablish with the son she had thrown out of the house when I turned 18.
After my own failed first marriage after 25 years (she cleaned out our bank account and ran off with a man who I though was a good friend), out of the blue mom invited me to start over in Eagle Point and I loaded up my meager possessions and ventured north in 2005 and the rest is history.
There were also old photos including pictures of my mother as a child as well as pictures of my first two children before Mom disowned me once again. She hated my wife so much, she told me her wedding gift could only be for me and not the both of us. That’s how I got my first 35mm camera as I started my budding journalism career.
I even found a binder of my mother’s pictures including photos taken in 1983 of the high school she attended in Chicago from 1950 to 1954 (I came along in1956). So many memories, both good and bad, washed over me and I couldn’t understand how someone could be so callous as to just dump that box at the senior center and walk away without a word. But I’m grateful to have that box and maybe someday my offspring will find it as important as I do.
