Showing results by author "Paul C. Slayback" in All Categories

The author picks up right where his first autobiography left off, in the fall of 1952. At the age of 14, he was shuttled from Duluth, Minnesota, to Lansing, Michigan, while his father headed to Florida. Such trips had been part of their regular routine ever since the author’s mother died; this time, he was left in the care of his married older sister, Lorna. Yet as heartbreaking as it was for the author to hear his father abruptly tell him to "learn to be happy on your own," it hardly sets the tone for the remainder of the memoir.

For Clarence, a two-year-old Minnesota boy, the terrible twos were terrible. His mother was killed in an auto accident, boiling water scalded his arm, and a rooster nearly pecked out one of his eyes. Things weren’t much better at six. Tumbling into a stream, a broken bottle pierced his elbow and doctors contemplated amputating the arm. At eight, his luck changed.