After kindergarten, Caroline, Valerie, and Melanie were enrolled in St. Rose Catholic School. They soon were known as the “Martins’ girls” by everyone involved there. We introduced French to the girls at an early age, sending them to Mme. Bouleray after school, from whom they learned to sing French songs, and bake cookies “a la française.” She was a local celebrity, a singer, and chef. She also gave cooking classes combined with dinner for adults, that we enjoyed for a while.
We quickly became very involved with St. Rose school, Mary with the mother’s club and I joined the dad’s club, to mostly do maintenance work on the weekend. Sister Thaedus would say, “I need a crew next Saturday to paint the hall,” and eight or ten of us showed up! A few years later, the two clubs merged to become a more structured Parents Club and Mary and I were its first president.
When they reached the age of seven, Caroline, Valerie, and Melanie had their First Communion, an important celebration in the Catholic Church. They were so pretty in their formal white dresses and I was so proud of them! We always had a party with close friends and family and a nice cake, of course. We felt secure being part of St. Rose Church. We volunteered a lot and we were chosen to be Eucharistic Ministers, distributing communion at Sunday Masses or taking it to shut-in parishioners.
My brother Bernard came for a visit. We had such a great time. One afternoon, coming home, I noticed the girls playing with new toys. I realized that he walked with them to our neighborhood toy store to spoil them. He said right away, “Don’t say anything.” What a good uncle!
Caroline started to play organized soccer when she was six years old, followed by her sisters when they were old enough. Soccer became very popular even among adults who never played growing up. Mary joined a team of friends and I did also. It became our social life. We often had
weekend parties before our Sunday games. We also bravely coached our kids youth soccer teams. When she was ten, Valerie joined a soccer traveling team for several years. We tried to go to the weekend tournaments, often taking turns to accommodate everyone’s schedules. We were very busy!
In 1979, my mother came in the fall toward the end of my grape harvest. She spent her time taking Nick for walks in his stroller around the neighborhood. She would play simple card games with her granddaughters, “battle” I think. She would hide certain cards under her skirt so the girls could win. They’d ask their mom, “Why is Mamie putting cards under her skirt?” This was a playful side of my mother I did not know as she was very stern and dominated by my father when I was young. After a few weeks, Mary asked, “When is your mother going back home?” My mom explained, “It’s the last time I’ll make the trip. I’ll stay a little longer.” She also graciously gave us enough money to expand our house with a master bedroom upstairs. I understand now how much she cared.
Around that time, my niece Muriel, Bernard’s second daughter, came to spend the summer with us. We had a great time, and she improved her English. We went camping in Oregon, a new activity for her. At sixteen she was already a smoker. She’d come to me and say in her sweet voice “Tonton, peux-tu m’acheter des cigarettes?” and I always did.
We had memorable camping trips on the Eel River, always with Ronni and Danni Madrid and other friends, featuring many kids running around, playing in the river, campfire shows at dark. Every summer, Danni and I organized a giant all-day picnic at Geyser Peak winery where I worked,
along the Russian River. We started the fires at 7 in the morning. Danni cooked a piglet on a rotisserie pit and I did a lamb. Families started to arrive about noon and stayed into the evening. Lots of beer and wine were consumed along with good food. We played soccer, volleyball, kids’ games, hay rides through the vineyard. It was a lot of fun. Life was good.
Nick and I enrolled in a YMCA-sponsored program, Indian Guides. It was a small group of dads and their sons, bonding over Native American traditions. We went camping along the Russian River. We were supposed to build a small boat to compete in a floating race on the river. Nick and
I designed ours from a giant zucchini cut in half, with a sail, and we came in first!
When the girls each finished 8th grade, we sent them by themselves to spend the summer in France. They stayed with their uncles and aunt, at villas on the ocean or the Mediterranean. They met other teenage kids and learn to communicate in French. I was very proud of the connections between
our American and French families.
When the girls were in high school, it was time for homecomings and proms. All this was totally unknown to me, exclusively American. I remember being in Macy’s department store with Mary and Caroline, a sophomore in high school, trying on dresses for homecoming. I couldn’t understand why it had to cost $100—a fair amount of money at that time. She got the expensive dress, of course, but I was still learning to accept American traditions.
Christmas 1981, we all went to France. We stopped in New York for two or three days. It was beautiful this time of the year. Nick stayed with Mary’s family friend one afternoon and we took the girls to Radio City to see The Rockettes. What a show!
As we finally arrived to Bordeaux Airport, a large suitcase was missing, with mostly the kids clothes. The next day we went to a children’s clothing store in Sauveterre to properly outfit them for the holidays. The owner of the shop, a friend of my brother Bernard, told him, “Can you believe it?
An American family came in the store and bought a lot of dress clothes without blinking an eye!” “That was my brother, you know,” he answered. We were the talk of the town.
I relived some of my old Christmas traditions. We went in the woods to cut a tree. I recreated a crèche as I used to do when I was growing up. We placed our shoes by the tree, close to a fireplace. The four of us siblings and all our kids gathered in Augey for Christmas, around my mother, the
last time we were all gathered in the family home.
In the mid eighties, Bernard was diagnosed with cancer. We were all in denial as to the severity of his illness, since the word cancer was not part of the conversation. He went in remission for a year or so. When he came for a visit, we played tennis and had a great time.
In 1987 after my grape harvest was complete, I went to see my dear brother. I stayed at his house all the time. I took him to his doctor’s appointment, and to visit friends. He was brave and never complained. I made sure that his older children, living with their mother in Bordeaux, kept contact and came for a visit.
Before I was ready to go back home, my mom asked me to stop by her house. I arrived with my nephew Thomas. My mom took me to another room and I could sense that she was troubled. She said, “Every day after lunch I pray the Rosary asking God to take my life instead of the life of your brother, but my prayers are not answered. You will not see him alive again.” A tear rolled down her cheek. I never saw my mother crying before. I still could not believe that my brother was going to leave us. He was not even 50 yet.
I called often, his wife Dominique answering the phone often saying he is resting and can’t talk, and other times Bernard pretended he was better and would be fine. In February, a friend of ours was on a trip selling wine in Los Angeles. He told me, “If you want to see your brother alive one more time you better go right now.” I made an excuse for my going over and I spent the last five days of his life by his side on his hospital bed at home. So many people came for the funeral mass, the church too small to hold every body. I stayed a few days to be with my mom. I was at a loss.
A few weeks later my sister called to let me know that our mother was in the hospital but it was not too serious. She died a few days later, alone. Shocking news so soon! I think that she gave up on life after loosing her son. Mary flew back with me for the funeral. What was happening? Mary and I started to have difficulties in our marriage. I was not able to give Mary the emotional support she needed. We started to live apart.
The following year, Melanie, Nick, and I went to Washington, D.C. around the 4th of July. We sat on the National Mall to watch the splendid fireworks on Independence Day. We visited all the sights, including Arlington Cemetery to see President Kennedy’s grave with the eternal flame. I was very proud of sharing my new country heritage with my children.
