DJ Max's blog: "Ponderings!"

IMAGINE MY SUPRISE
 
What a strange life I have had!! Odd that a story should begin that way you may say but read this words and see a few things my way. First lets see that I have no ill feeling for anyone that may or not be mentioned here. I grew up not knowing much ( or so I thought) about my family heritage other then I was named after my grandfather who had died when my father was only 8 years. For some reason this being my 41st christmas.......wait we cant do this like this.....its not...right.
      We find ourselves I guess somewhere back in the early 1900's my grandfather Cecil Harlow Morris b. June 16 1904 d. Jan 6 1935 m. Sept 16 1925 my grandmother Leona Mildred Foote b. 1904 d.1984 I guess lets do this, I grew up with my father in a hospital bed from cancers. He was there and just that "there" and more then likely he wouldnt have been if not for the fact that he was sick and dying for 9 years. Richard F Morris b. August 5 1926 was my father and he had 3 brothers, Irvin, Jim, and Louie.
  I never knew any of uncles very well lets say other then my moms side of the family as they lived in the same neighborhood. I do remember Uncle Jim and Uncle Irv from occassional sunday dinners at my grandma morris' and from the christmas parties prior to my fathers passing away when I was almost 14. Lets just say Id have been alot diffrent if not for my fathers death, though I am a good person today in the past Ive been colorful and worn it well as the tattoos on my body tell. I blame that on know one but fate and myself. Lately Im seeking my heritage as I was saying and I start looking into dates and things as my mother Elizabeth "Betty" Ann Darner b. Dec 13 1939 d. Feb 26 2010  .......*sighs*
       Forgive me as my mind wanders and stops and ponders these day in so many ways......
 Something I think I have definately learned by seeing my great grandma Foote's Autograph Album is that the smart ass humor runs in the family and I never really knew this since I never knew what I call the Morris family though again wow my father I learned early that he liked to be somewhat of a ladies man......ha ha ha lets face it that man was a womanizing, racist ass. He had a hard hand about him and hands like basketballs, I only imagine what he was like when he was heallthy as I never knew him as much more then someone that yelled at me and ........ I dont like talking about this is as it makes people think I was abused when truely I wasnt......Dad had a razor strap and I got it a few times when I was little and from there it was waiting for him to die as he made me not like him very much and I can remember being about 8 years old and plannning on moving away when I would get older. Imagine my suprise when .......One night in early January 1983 my dad had been really sick, this was normal though as many a christmas was spent at the hospital with dad due to the cancer or hmmmmm......
        Lets say this ....I think to much sometimes, back to my uncles anyhow as that is what this is about anyhow. I remember my uncle Louie barely as I have but only 2 memories of him. The first of those being a time that I was very young as I only remember having a zippo lighter of Louie's I was playing with  and Dad was getting upset about me having that lighter though I think I was sitting with my uncle so I was safe for the moment. Honestly after that I dont know what happened that time so long ago. Is it possible that Louie and my father had words that day? I knew through the years that Louie lived somewhere in California and little did I know that my young mind somehow through the years had picked something about Salt Lake City as I recently have been seeking heritage I saw something in regards to a marriage in Utah and the memory of SLC.
           Now as I have continually gotten off base with this christmas tale of wit and spit......dont!!!!!
      This year in Febuary I lost my mom and we had been close over the past few years though for along time I was not the most desireable child and to make matters worse there was 2 of me. My twin brother Elmer A Morris b.  Mar 31 1969 was named for our grand uncle Elmer C Morris b. 1903 d. 1969 m. 1928 to Cecile L Orr b. 1909 d. 1990 .......wow did I ever get razzed for that one, my  grand aunt and I had the same name though she had added an E to the end of her name to make it more feminine. Again doing lots of looking this past year on the net these things and little memories pop out all the time and I eventually earlier in this year start looking into my family tree at first quite slowly and only occassionally........
Imagine my  suprise when I was riding home on my harley this summer when I heard a drummer.........
     I had left the tattoo shop in grand rapids aftter what had become quite a regular project of body art and the story of my life written upon my body and worn proudly. I ride a 1993 Ultra Classic when I make these trips in the good weather and sometimes even in weather I shouldnt though this day in particular the winds were not bad and there was a good sky. The bike had been running well through the year and I had about 40 minute home if I took my time and stayed on the highway......
  Being like my father in the sense that I like women and sometimes more then I should, I had stopped on the way out of grand rapids to meet a new friend from the internet that I had not in person met as of the moment. We had a friendly conversation and regrettably she had things to do with her eduation and I being at that moment at least "unannoucced" I excused myself and left......
       As I pulled down the road I decided to take a detour on the way home and instead of the highway I would simply turn right at the traffic light and head south and maybe drive through Hopkins Michigan.....My dads family was all in that town and I only remember being there once and that was for my Aunt Barbara Chapple b. d.1978 she was my uncle Irv's wife. This summer while searching the net Id come across a listing of people in a cemetary in Hopkins......Imagine my suprise......I had rode about 20 minutes and pulled into a gas station for a soda and a smoke when it hit me......I oughtta go to Maplewood Cemetary and see my grandparents and my great grandparents and my great great grandparents....wow is that ever a long time back....
       I asked the clerk in the gas station on a whim if she knew where the cemetary was though I kind of knew but I didnt have the address on me and I was probably hitting on the girl as well... I had directions though and thought I knew where I was going and little to my knowledge she was wrong and I ended up out the otherside of where I should have gone only reason I say this is that it was starting to get late and the sun would be down soon and that would make it difficult to find my ancestors grave that by this time I badly want to see even if in the dark. After another stop and a smoke, I ask again for directions in a little store on 30th street and the lady there not wanting to send me in the wrong direction, contacts and older gentlemen friend of hers who knows that she is 100% correct and I head off to the family burial plot.......thats funny to me as I never knew of any family burial plot, I had again just over the summer found the information on Maplewood and had since talked to my uncle Irv, though he sounded very tired he seemed almost reluctant to talk to me and I so enjoyed talking to him as he answered the questions I had as best he could and I steered away from things about my dad as I have heard stories of him and his brothers and how they would fight if all 4 of them were together. Irv had told me about the family plot though, so I was finally heading in the right direction and I was going to make it there before it was to dark to see.......
Imagine my suprise.......when I was about to give up and go home and all of a sudden I knew wasnt alone.....
          I had found the cemetary at Hopkins/Ohio Corners, I rode into Maplewood from 17th street and about 3/4 of the way to the end of the center road to the top of a hill and dropped my jiffy stand down I leaned the glide over to her left and stepped off the bike not even knowing just how much the next hour or so was going to mean for me yet. I lit a cigarette and started wandering the far end of the cemetary and quickly found my earlier mentioned Aunt Barb as well as my grand Uncle Elmer and grand Aunt Cecile and by this time Ive actually covered about 1/3 of the place and it was getting quite dark and being in an unfamilar area in the fall on the back rodes on a motorcycle......"bambi bugs" suck....anyhow Im thinking I may have to come back another day and tell myself its been an hour you tried so just start heading back to the bike after all its at the far end of the place anyhow and about then I started talking to myself but talking to my grandma morris out loud as she was the only in the "family plot" that I ever met. Though I knew the others were there and above all my grandpa morris who always wished I could have met just once and as I asked grandma to show me where she was at so I could come and see her and say hi and finally meet my grandpa and her parents and grandparents .........Imagine my suprise.......I am at a loss for words when it comes to how it made me feel at the moment that I walked up and saw them all lying there and right in the center of the place under a huge oak tree.......wait a minute!!!!
Imagine my suprise..........memories come flooding back from places not known and faces unshown as I sit here alone
      I  remember hearing once how my grandfather had died after being thrown from a horse and breaking his neck when he struck an oak tree, it seemed that I remembered him being buried under that same oak, over the years I knew that wasnt the case and Uncle Irv had already told me that he died near the Otsego Dam when he was thrown from a horse.....however apparently I somewhere must have over the years heard someone speak of the cemetary that my grandpa that I am named for was buried in as he is under the largest oak tree in the place along with his wife and her parents and her grandparents as well as even her sis Alice A Foote(Kellogg) b 1990 d 2003 and her husband Frank Kellogg b d 1993 Wow I was standing there in the dark looking at my own name on a tombstone, thats an odd feeling in itsself though the feeling of just being near that much of my fathers family was overpowering and I still didnt know or even fathom the real history of the people I was in the presence of......granted these people are deceased but that does not mean they are gone for they live in each and everyone one of those that are still alive more probably then any of us even realize.......I regrettably had to leave that night and head for home to clean my new tattoo though it was very late when I did get on my hawg and ride out of there for my house in Portage Michigan about 40 miles south......
 Imagine my suprise........as I see the children of my siblings and friends growing as time is passing....life is changing always if you dont change in life you dont grow is the way I always felt and I look and see how I have changed from a young man that was wild and crazy to a more subdued version as I found my thing in life which was harley davidsons, I absolutely love them and went to school even just to be able to work on them and always will have one of my own. I have an adopted son Frank James McPherson b. May 8 1987 this was not an on paper adoption let me say first off......Frank is alot like myself though only smarter for staying out of trouble in his younger years. This past summer I taught Frank to ride and he had helped me to assemble a bike that I had in pieces so I let him ride that when I wanted a riding partner. He will be a great rider someday.......
  It was right around Thanksgiving this year and the weather had been good though a chill was in the air on an early saturday morning  when my son and I pulled the bikes out of the garage and got suited up to go up to the family burial plot to take some pictures of the headstones. I had since the last time being there done alot more work on looking into the family heritage and heard of Streetsboro Ohio and knew that there was already a family tree for the Page lineage. My great grandparents were Benjamin S Foote b. May 5 1855 d. 1918 m. Dec 1883 to Olie Bell Page(Foote) b. 1867 d. 1948 in Hopkins/Ohio Corners Michigan. My great great grandparents were Eli H Page b. March 13 1838 d. 1915 m. 1861 to Amelia A Lane b. 1841 d. 1918 
Imagine my suprise........when I was surfing the net to see if there was anything new about me........
             I came upon a collection with only one day left for my inspection or Id have to wait a couple weeks. I found the other night at the WMU Archives of Local History 2 collections donated by my grandmother and her sister Leona and Alice Foote. I had heard when I was little that grandma had been researching our family tree and had asked several times over the years if I could see it never really knowing what it would consist of our how far it may go back. Nobody ever knew what I was talking about, when I would ask. Grandma had  been gone now for many years. I was elated to find 4 boxes of letters and family information yesterday at the archives Dec 23 2010.......I took pictures of so many things including my second great grandfathers account books and letters and autograph books that go back to the 1860's and wow I couldnt have asked for a better christmas present then the things that were in those boxes and the thought that grandma wanted us to know of the family and to cherish it for that is all we have in the end is family and nothing more. Reading the letters of so long ago and the diary of Eli H Page makes me think how things were back then so much simpler yet so much harder as this country was forming at that time and industry hadnt grown so large that most of us wouldnt last a month living as they did then, But they had to be strong people as they did survive and prosper or I wouldnt and you wouldnt and she wouldnt be here today. Ill continue my ancestoral search as it fasinates me more everyday!!!!
                               IMAGINE MY SUPRISE!!!!........WHEN I FOUND MY NAME IN THE PAGE FAMILY TREE!!!!!!!!
       Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!!!!!!

I wrote this 4 years ago this next week..........I intend to add a new chapter this coming christmas eve!!

                                                            LOYALTY

                                                    In Order To Be Loyal

                                                      To Someone Else,

                                                   You Have To Be Loyal

                                                          To Yourself.

                                                 If And When You Dont Feel

                                                      That Same Loyalty

                                                   Is Being Shown To You,

                                               Tell That Mother Fucking Cunt

                                                                To

                                                      Suck Your Cock!!

This thought provoking poem was written by a young woman, who was in jail for drug

charges and addicted to  methamphetamine. She wrote this poem while in jail. As you will

soon read, she fully grasped the horrors of the drug, as she tells in this simple yet

profound poem.

  She was released from jail, but true to her story, the drug owned her. They found her

dead not long after her realese, the needle was still in her arm.


                                 "MY NAME IS METH"

                       I destroy homes, I tear apart families.
                    Take your children and that's just the start.
                I'm more costly then diamonds, more precious then gold.
                      The sorrow I bring is a sight to behold.
                     If you need me, remmeber I'm easily found.
                   I live all around you, In schools and in town.
                    I live with the rich, I live with the poor.
                    I live down the street and maybe next door.
                     I'm made in a lab, but not like you think.
                       I can be made under the kitchen sink.
                   In your child's closet and even in the woods.
               If this scares you to death, well it certainly should.
                 I have many names, but there's one you know best.
                I'm sure you've heard of me, my name is crystal meth.

                       My power is awesome, try me you'll see.
                      But if you do, you may never break free.
                      Just try me once and I might let you go.
                      But try me twice and I'll own your soul.
                  When I possess you, you'll steal and you'll lie.
                     You do what you have to, just to get high.
                   The crimes you'll commit for my narcotic charms,
                 Will be worth the pleasure you'll feel in your arms.
                You'll lie to your Mother, you'll steal from your Dad.
                   When you see their tears, you should feel sad.
               But, you'll forget your morals and how you were raised.
                  I'll be your conscience, I'll teach you my ways.
                  I take kids from parents, and parents from kids.
                     I turn people from God and separate friends.
              I'll take everything from you, your looks and your pride.
                    I'll be with you always, Right by your side.   

 "I found this poem at the local correction center where I do my urine screens. Yes, I to

am addicted to methamphetamine, though I am today clean and grateful to be that way and I

truly mean to stay. I am wanting to share this poem with you. I beat a cocaine addiction

many years ago and have also quick using alcohol several years ago. I thought for sure I

was stronger then I trully am, I am to this moment of this day obviously still an addict

though I traded one addiction for another. I write these notes down to remind myself that

I am sick and will always be sick. I have at the time of this writing been clean

completely from any drugs at all for 2 weeks(01/05/2010 my last date of use for meth). I

hope that these words both mine and hers will keep some people some where from ever

starting to do this horrible drug or any others and if helps even one person, then I have

served my purpose and I still have meaning in life as the tears drop from eyes, I still

remain clean, though I crave everyday."

                                             Harley A.K.A DJ Max of S*E*R