Blocking for Grandma

As I read in the newspaper, see on TV, and hear on the radio, individuals complaining and whining about our involvement in our country’s global fight against Islamic fascist terrorism, I wonder if Americans still have what it takes to sacrifice as we confront the enemies of this Great Nation.

Having seen our country and family members go off to war since the 1940s, I marveled how Americans, at least when I was a young boy, during World War II really made great sacrifices both at home and abroad without complaining much about the difficult times almost all experienced during those troubling times.

I’ll never forget the trauma my family endured when we received a telegram informing us that my Uncle Joe Vazquez (mom’s brother) was wounded in the Philippines during World War II. As my sister and I slept with mom that night, I remember asking her if she thought dad (who was in the Navy and in the South Pacific) was OK. Poor mom, my question about dad’s well being and the tragic news of her brother made her cry uncontrollably for hours it seems. To this day, I regret having asked her that question, for her tears and sobs still haunt me.

I remember mom, along with most of my aunts working long hours at the meat processing plants (Armour’s and Swift’s) and at Consolidated (now Lockheed) due to the shortage of men and specifically to help feed and build the war planes to supply our troops abroad. I have vivid memories of mom kissing my sister and me early in the morning to catch the bus that would take her to her job in North Fort Worth. To add to mom’s woes was having to help her sister, my Aunt Helen, take her daughter, Rachel, who had polio to get special treatments in Dallas at the Shriners Children’s Hospital at least once a month. With braces on Rachel’s legs, it was almost impossible to put her in a stroller. They literally had to carry her while taking turns to the bus stop that took them to downtown Fort Worth, from there, they boarded another bus that would take them to Dallas. I remember them being gone all day until late at night. Some might be asking, “Where were their husbands, or other men in the family, or neighbors?” The answer is simple, “they were all overseas fighting America’s enemies.” Another factor was that gas was rationed and hard to come by, which made it almost impossible for my aunt and mom to get a ride to Dallas from their neighbors.

Speaking of rationing, I will never forget my grandmother sending me to the store to purchase the family’s all time and very hard to get favorite drink — coffee! “Hijo, no pierdas la ficha para el café,” (“Son, don’t lose the ration token for the coffee,”) my grandmother would sternly caution me. As a young boy I was the gopher (go for this, go for that) for the family, thus, I remember the many times I had to go to the store to buy the daily grocery items. Back during the war (World War II), most families were issued on a monthly basis rationing tokens. Simple items we take for granted today like: coffee, sugar, meat, etc. were hard to come by without rationing tokens. Another item that was extremely difficult to purchase was car tires. My Uncle Frank, another of mom’s brothers won a brand new car during the war. Having been exempted from the draft because of an illness, Uncle Frank sold the car because he couldn’t even buy tires for the car he had at home.

Of all the hard to come by items during the war, one item will always be embedded in my mind — nylon stockings. I still chuckle when I think of the mob of women along with my grandmother and me waiting like vultures in front of Leonard’s Department Store that advertised they had received a shipment of nylon stockings and were to be sold on a first come, first served basis. As the doors of the department store opened, my grandmother would shout at me, “de rodillas en el piso hijo, entrale gatiando a buscar las medias!” (“Get on the floor son, and crawl your way toward the stockings’ counter!” As I crawled on the floor towards the nylon-stocking counter I never saw so many women’s legs in all of my entire life. Some were skinny, some short, some brown, some white, and some black. Little by little I would inched my small body towards the counter until I finally got to the edge of the display. Once I got to the display, I would stand up, grab as many packages of stockings my little hands could carry, and then push my way away from the mob of women. However, that was not the end of the ordeal. Once my grandmother would find me, we both would try to get out of the store as fast as we could because we knew women would pursue us to try to buy some stockings from us. I remember pushing women away from my grandmother as she tried to pay for the darn things. Yea folks, as a young boy, you could say I was my grandmother’s blocking guard at Leonard’s Department Store in downtown Fort Worth.

In closing, I sometimes wonder if grandmothers in America today would put their young grandsons through the same ordeal my grandmother put me through in World War II if faced with the same dilemma we were faced with back then. Frankly speaking, I seriously doubt it, because many of us have evolved into a very pampered and spoiled American society.

James H. Reza
4204 Grand Lake
Fort Worth, Texas 76135

Phones: 817-237-6287 (H) / 817-454-3316 (Cell)