We dated steady during my senior
year in school. I was a cheerleader and
C.B. let me wear his letter jacket, which was a real honor. C.B. picked me up after school one day and I
had to be back for play practice that evening.
We went to Morrell’s for a Coke and I wanted a hamburger, so he bought
me a hamburger but he did not eat one. I
found out later that he did not have enough money to buy a second hamburger for
himself.
I
graduated from high school in 1950, and after attending Southwestern Business
School in Houston went to work at Culpepper’s Furniture Store as secretary to
the buyer. Mr. Creel passed away in 1950
of Bright’s disease due to kidney failure.
C. B. graduated in 1951 at midterm, as he was eligible to play football
one more year, and my parents took me to all of his ball games. We married in November before he graduated,
and he worked, went to school and played football, and although he earned a
football scholarship to Sam Houston in Huntsville, he wanted to go to work and
stay in Baytown. He felt that he should
stay near his Mom to help, and he also thought that I should stay near my
parents. Our first apartment was in the
attic of Mr. & Mrs. Simmons house on Dyer Street, just down the street from
Granny Creel, and I remember Buadda going in and cleaning the apartment before
we moved in. C.B. worked construction
work, service stations, even tried to be a door to door salesman selling WearEver
Cookware, though the only thing to come from that was that we got a nice set of
aluminum cookware! He went to work for Ted’s Auto Parts shortly
before R. L. went into business for himself in Highlands. Then, in 1954, he went to work for
Consolidated Chemical Co., a small plant located inside the Humble (now Exxon)
Refinery, and retired after 33 years, surviving several mergers, and
transferring to their Houston plant ten years before he
retired. C. B. suffered a major heart
attack in May, 1973, and was off work six months before being released to
return to work. I had been working
part-time for R. L. as bookkeeper for his auto-parts, then he started selling
insurance and real estate, and being advised that C. B. might not be able to
work again, I went to Lee College and got my real estate license, and later my broker’s
license, in case I had to make a living for us.
I did work a little in real estate under R. L. and continued to work for
him until we went to Greece in 1988 to see Debbie and Jim for a month.
Afterward I did not return to work. We
were blessed to have Jimmy, Debbie, and Jerry to complete our family.
My parents transferred to Pt.
Neches, Texas, in 1954, so we rented their house out and moved to our own home
on Fayle Street. I had Debbie shortly
thereafter, and C. B. went to work for Consolidated Chemical Company a few days
later on the graveyard shift, however, he was late his very first night because
we were so sleep deprived because of a new baby. He was never late again! In 1955, we bought our first new house in Wooster,
and lived there 40 years. Jimmy was 3
and Debbie was 8 months old when we moved to Wooster, and Jerry was born there
in 1956. In 1995 we bought our house on
Sterling Street when Exxon bought our house in Wooster to turn the entire
neighborhood into a Green Belt around their refinery. While we lived in Wooster, we bought our
first new car, a 1955 Chevrolet. One night
we got a call around 2 a.m. that a possum was after Granny Creel’s chickens, so
C. B. got dressed and took off over to her house and killed the possum. He put it in the trunk of our new car, came
home and went back to sleep, and forgot about the possum, until we started
smelling something really bad. We really
had trouble getting the odor out of that car!
We loved to travel and camp, and
started out with a sheet of plastic, cots, and a campfire, then C. B. built us a
fold-out trailer, which we used for several years. C.B. worked shift-work, and had a long change
week-end off once a month. We graduated
on to a Ford Van, which C. B. converted with bunks, and a fold down kitchen in
the back, which we also used several years.
While the kids were in high school, we bought a Mobil Scout travel
trailer, and I thought I was in a Holiday Inn because we were able to stay dry
and had clean floors and good beds! We
went to Cloudcroft, New Mexico, with R. L., Thelma, Bill, Mark and Mary after
Christmas a couple of years where we had lots of snow. We put the boys in a tent with an extra tarp
over the top of it, and put a small electric heater in it, and R. L., Thelma,
Mary, Debbie, C. B. & I slept in the travel trailer, but the floor was so
cold, R. L.’s shoes froze to the floor!!
The second year we went, we took a larger tent, and put it at the end of
our travel trailer. Early the next
morning, the boys woke us up, so R. L. rolled the window out and told them to
be quiet…people were trying to sleep. Bill replied “That’s nice that some people can
sleep, but we can’t because we’re wet and cold!” Their tent had let the floor
leak and gotten their bedding wet also.
We rode snowmobiles, went inner tubing and had lots of fun. Another year, Buddy, Claudine, Gary and Terry
went with us, and I took skiing lessons with the kids, and Claudine, Buddy, and
C. B. sat in our motor home and laughed at me and drank hot chocolate! The boys took their future wives with them
once, also. We bought our first motor
home in 1974, after C.B. had his first heart attack and was no longer able to hook
the travel trailer to our car. During
that time, Jerry played football on a scholarship at Blinn Junior College two
years, then transferred to Howard Payne University in Brownwood for two
years. Because C. B. was off work during
much of that time or could take vacation time, we were able to attend every one
of his games. Most of our camping was
with family and friends, mostly with Alton and Annette Doucette, as C. B. and
Alton had the same long changes off. In
later years, we traveled to Colorado and Wyoming with Carl and Myrt, Ralph and
Jeannette, Don and Coya to visit George and Dee, Lemuel and Anniedeen, and
Steve and Daris. We joined the San Jac
Wheelers Camping Club in 1978, and met many wonderful friends, and had monthly
campouts all around south Texas and Louisiana, and the hill country. C.B. was especially happy reading maps and
planning our next trip. He read maps
like most people read books! C.B. was
very witty, had a great sense of humor, and loved practical jokes, both
planning them on friends and on the receiving end, also!
C. B. went to Lee College a
couple of years, taking courses to help him in his work. Because he had enough college hours, he
offered to substitute teach for Jimmy, who was principal at Baytown Junior
High, but Jimmy was afraid he would whip one of the students and get put in
jail. Ha! I also went to Lee College
and took some courses in computers, bookkeeping, and Real Estate. Even though I became a real estate broker, I
only worked a little in real estate sales with R. L. and mostly kept books for
him and was a general flunky. I worked
for him 20 years and enjoyed working with him and his family. I was able to go with C. B. to some of his
seminars, and also was able to be off when my kids needed me. C.B. and I went to Steamboat Springs with
R.L. and Thelma one summer to a New York Life trip and had a really good time.
On our way home from that trip, Thelma wanted some peaches, which aggravated
R.L., so he pulled in beside a fruit stand that didn’t have any produce in it.
He got out of his car to go to the door of the house, and was met by a huge
dog, that jumped up and put his paws on his chest and scared him and C.B.
nearly to death! We stopped at the very
next stand that had peaches, and bought some!
C.
B. was a volunteer fireman at Wooster, where he helped evacuate several people
before and after Hurricane Carla, and because he had to work at Consolidated
Chemical, we were unable to evacuate, so we had Granny Creel come and stay with
us during the hurricane. Wooster Volunteer
Fire Department served the Lakewood and Brownwood subdivisions, so during the
aftermath of the flooding in those subdivisions, we washed all day several
days, even spreading linens out on our lawn to dry and sun, most of them had
oil on them. Jimmy never forgave us for
helping, because the entire family had to take typhoid shots! C. B. was also a Deputy Constable several
years, doing security services for new buildings and also for the fairs and
rodeos in the area. One year after
Christmas, he found a really nice Santa Suit which started many years of
playing Santa to our family, friends and even for different groups at Humble
and for his plant. He was a really good
“Santa” and really enjoyed the season.
That was the only time he wanted me to drive, because he wore his Dad’s
glasses and couldn’t see to drive, and besides, he loved waving and watching
for the little kids to notice him. He
especially loved playing Santa for our grandchildren and our friends’ children
and grandchildren. His wig and beard totally wore out, so Jim and Debbie gave
him a really nice set that he enjoyed very much.
We were married in Cedar Bayou
Baptist Church and attended there until Jimmy started first grade, then we
moved to Wooster Baptist, where C.B. joined and was baptized. He later became a deacon at Wooster Baptist,
and was active until he had his first heart attack. We
worked with the youth there several
years, and accompanied them on several mission trips to Espanola, N. M.,
Leadville, Co., Manitou Springs, Co. and had planned to go to Pueblo, Co. when
C. B. had his first heart attack in
1974. We were members at Wooster until
1995, at which time we moved our letters to Cedar Bayou Baptist, where Jimmy and
Jerry were both deacons, since we had moved to the east side of Baytown and
after C. B. had recuperated from open-heart surgery. Jimmy and Jerry both moved their families away
from Baytown and left us at Cedar Bayou Baptist, where I still attend.
C.B. had his first heart attack
(one that is normally fatal) in May, 1973, and was off work 6 months
recuperating, then went back to work. He
had two more light heart attacks, and even though he never fully recovered his
energy and stamina, he enjoyed his family, friends, gardening, camping, and
vacations, and even did some wood crafts.
He worked in Baytown at Consolidated, which later became Stauffer
Chemical, and then transferred to the Houston plant in 1979. He retired in1987, after we had traveled to
Athens, Greece, to spend a month with Jim and Debbie. While he was recuperating from his first
heart attack, we made several trips to Brenham, where Jerry was in College, and
to Brownwood to attend all of his football games, and to A & M where Jimmy
and Debbie attended. In 1993, he had to
have open heart surgery, 4 by-passes, and an atherectomy, and from that time
on, we made regular trips into Houston for doctor visits. He was bothered a lot by arthritis in his
back, shoulders and hips and took various medicines for it, but did not enjoy much
relief. He developed diabetes after the
open heart surgery, and was also diagnosed with sleep-apnea, for which he was put
on a Bi-Pap breathing machine to sleep under.
Six weeks after the heart surgery, he was violently sick, had to have
his gall bladder removed. In 2001, he
endured pancreatitis and was hospitalized 21 days, receiving no food by
mouth. He was diagnosed with asbestosis
in 2001, also, and started having some signs of kidney problem in his blood
work. In 2004, we had to rush him to St.
Luke’s emergency room, where he was admitted and had surgery for Fournier’s Gangrene
(flesh eating bacteria.)He was in the hospital 38 days that time. In 2007, he had another light heart attack,
and had a stent put in. It was a
shoulder replacement surgery in June, 2008, with complications, including
kidney failure. After seeing a kidney specialist, he was constantly switched on
medicines and diets, and fluids. After
developing atrial fibrillation in 2009, he had a pacemaker put in, and it
became necessary to administer the paddles on him to shock his heart back into
rhythm, without much success. He had a
total of 5 Cardioversions, and had to have surgery to replace one of the wires
on his pacemaker later in the year, and put on full time oxygen. In April, 2009, he was diagnosed with End
Stage Renal Disease, and put on dialysis, which he endured 3 days a week until
the Lord called him home on May 24, 2012.
Through it all, he kept his good
humor and easy going way and was a good patient!eH
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