Alright.

I mentioned in my last post that November the third is my personal day of the dead. Here's the lowdown:

My dad, Edward H Cole, was quite a dude. Born on May 15th, 1903 in Telluride, Colorado, his life reads like a Steinbeck novel. His father was the son of an Irish immigrant from Texas. His mother - all I know of her was that her name was Neva (like my sister) and that her family was originally from Wales.
His pop was a railroad foreman in Colorado, and for the first several years of my dad's life, they lived in a converted boxcar near the worksite where my grandfather headed up a multi-racial crew of black, Hispanic and Chinese railway workers. (I've heard stories that he had the respect of his entire crew, despite the immense amount of tensions between the railroad and the dis-enfranchised workers, but that's a whole different story.)
Among the historical events that my dad lived through: 1) The first man-powered flight at Kittyhawk; 2) World War I; 3) The Great Depression 4) World War II (he fought in France and was dissapointed when his superiors found out he was a mechanic - they took him off of the front lines and had him working on tanks and trucks all day.); 5) the advent of radio, movies, television and the computer.... I could go on. He played violin in pub bands during the depression, was a comic strip artist for several local daily papers, wrote poetry and drank copious amounts of Old Crow whiskey.
He married my mom in 1959; he was 35 years her senior.(It might sound like cradle robbing, but I know for a fact that my mom relentlessly pursued him...love works in mysterious ways) I was born August 2nd, 1970 , the last of five kids from that marriage. We lived in Ramona, California until 1975, when we moved to Smith River in Northern California. My dad's Liver was failing due to all the Old Crow.
November 3d, 1975, Edward H Cole died in Crescent City, California at Seaside hospital.

Hence, this will always be my personal Day of the Dead.