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couldnt do anything for me, and that i should be in privatee reading tests we took each yeaHigh Schoolwent to three highIs: Los Gatos camdeHighOn one hand it was ation frethkids thknew but no real friends aots of trouble Soon afted, the boys Dean called me into his office to say that hewatching me But even before I started i had gone there to summer school for Algebra, andthe football team which started practice before the school school started when i joined theBecause of my extra-large head, they didnt have a modern plastic helmet that fit, so they issued me avery old leather helmet This gave the others on the team something to tease me about they called me, Knute( Ka noot), but instead of rockne they called me "Knute Knockor varsity team It practiced wibreakfoVarsity This way, i got a lot of good experience pretty fast when school started, the first dance was aack and orange number 77 jersey Early in the dance, they called the football team to come down
JimLiggett the varsity quarterback and school hero called out Knute get down heredown thseats, in front of everybody and joined the team this was my introduction to the student body Foryears afterward, a car would drive past, and out the window someone would yell,"Knuknew thepall team was very good We were undefeated, and won almost everygame by 28-0 the exception was one we won by 28-7 i played full time, both ways, as offensive centeive middle linebacker I really enjoyed despent as much time in their backfield as their own backs finally the last game they ran a trap and thgd head of steide, reallyerwneears if that wasnt ty ongoing back trouStanfordAlready I started cuttithink I cut about 1/3 of high school most classest athallenging, and Tom showed me his trick of typing a note and forging mother s signaturethat i dide to forge too muchThis worked until late in my senioyear Mother worked and car-pooled to work leaving the 53 Studebaker in front of the house I sneakeds keys and had a set made for me Some flakey friend and i would cut school and drive to santa Cruz, orthat time, and i boughte base of all roanguages it would be especially useful but with a language you have to
ctually study andd to study i would ace the tests and havebasically except for math never do much homework this would get me Bs (Ds in Latin thoughd Bill ryan and moved to Cambrian Park, in San Josethe yeaat Los gatos, and then the next vear was at Camdeow anybody i told people that i couldn 't play football because of theallyot willing to do all the work itLincolnk, not at this new school without any of my teammates from themy mind Menors nonths with very serious back trouble, and had a spinal fusion operatioch of the year After she recovered from the surgeryMath raceshe divorced Bill, who wasn't needed anymore then we moved againAbraham Lincoln highh years We recorded weekly radio shows, and many in the groupthan 50 outstanding highrpretation I looked around for material and found sspeech teacher took me with him to various service clubs like the rotary in US Bonds The conteClub, and had me give it at lunches, The men at, say the rotary clubMercury and News inthought it was funny the kid imitating a drunk, i was great at math I tookbrabefore i startedschad of everybody My senior year I competedarship, shown in the article to the right i dough; I thought I made an adding mistake in a very complex problemnderstood the probst made a stupid mistake In math, we had thefrom the new math that wasSputnik showed amethat we needed to do better in teachschool So instead of the usual trig and solid geometry, we had set theory, cooperation with the Santaductiveg and diffes
I loved it and dClara County Joint Coundt have the usual hard-bound textbooks, we had mimeographedbooks, stapled togeta senIor Isowler She was the first woman technical graduate from Stanford, thNew Math was new to hedhe end of the year, thrke finished high schwas never more than a couple of pages ahead of us One thing she did other activities cear kebri3-Dlem out for us So i would goarned his Block LG atlass early and try to solve a new puzzleal Forensic League HeCouncil Even though i was newClarke, 2076 Lynwood Terschool, i was pretty outspokenStudent Council members were
Timelected from the social Studieses, and they elected me, even though they didn ' t know me veryThe next yeabody vP, along with a football-playing friend who ran for president Wehe jobs, ithathe speakers needed to have a b average, this was 30 So she pulled me from the spotonsolldatloetation of the graduation theme song"Climb every moule orchestra playing, andeciting dramatically "Climb every moford every stream
Follow everyyou tind yonk god thats overThe firelegan wanted to make sure that i wrote aboridenty set three fires as a kid the first one i describe in the section about Tom my brother whle second fire was near the end of the 8 grade I would be graduating in a few days It was afterhamburger patty and put it into the pan i went outside into the garden while it was cooking and i wasso happy i just started singing After a bit i returned to the kitchen and found it aflame, with the firegoing up the wall behind the stove I didnt waitThe fireand hadto make sure the fire was out whatinched before was soaking wet now this was in theLos Gatos It was a twoVictooff the kitcherwent up the stairs, like a chimm and my rooms were filled with smoke, and the smell lasted forwere supposed to wear while shirts, I forgot, and so drove the 53 Studebaker home to gat twas to yet ano
The air forceaduated from high school, the family broke up, ththe end of the fae hadwas born Mother went away to college, to USC on a fellowship for a masterpsychiatric socied at sae state, and de house with tofriends i was not working during school, so i must have gotten money to doededof fio college, but i was just not prepared to do the studying needed i had never had to before, soadn 't learned how to apply myseistered as a double major in Philosophy and psychology I tooktwo Philosophy courses, and was in the humanities program this was advanced for its day a crossdiscipline integratethe gED(GEducational Development)requirements i was learning good stuff in all these classes but could not keep up with the reading, notthe writing needed So poordecided that whatded was to beolder, and if i did something like join the air force i would be older whefter I took their rect and got the highest mfter i got discharged from the air Force i gotthen at IBMmarried Marcia during this time i worked for IBM for six years, then quit to return to college and live onMy New Bearduld visitos Gatos
One day when i was visiting after work tom kept staring at my facewhat was up, asnavgood! I thought it was great! l even told IBM that I had lost my Id card, so theyould make me a new one with a new picture, shown to theve them the old id and kept the one with the cool photo Now itthe only one i have of this beard treatmenmore of my stories as i write about my brother, Tommy (later Tom), and mother, MaxineMaxine919 with hthers original name was wilkie after heather wilkerson David Adams The twins were wilma and wilkie they were the last of several kidsfrom georgia and Bill Adams there were a bunch of older half-brothers and sisters, children of mrWhitus Wilma was the outgoing popular twin, and wilkie, reserved and standoffishAs a girl, wilkie showed some unusual interests She would go by herself to sit by the red river, and talkto Jesus, Not talk to him mentally in prayer, but talk to him physically You were suppose
Tut not in person! Later in lifwas the light of jesus, she told me he was there with heSecretly listeningframe and listen to the wwhat thposed to what they said in public to others and their husbandseet when theding offember her talking of hearing heber ofs to have some loving " She learned tothese women as hypocrites, listening to them talk among themselvesStella's suicideOne event that traumatized her family while wilkie was young was the suicide of an older sister, Stellaf the whitus girls she had moved away from the family to oklahoma city which was a happeningplace at the time and a center of jazz(and probably stylish black men ) All I know is that she committede and that this put their mother Georgia, into deep depression fordont know anyof the story but it is easy to suspect that maybe Bill Adams, physically estranged from his wife georgiat"comfort" from an older step-daughter, a child from Georgia's first husband and that maybe thwhat led stella to leave the family and eventually to her death Surely if georgia had heard about anyof this, it would explain her depression but who knows Another story lost in theThe Ministers attempted sexual assaultal ministers when she waster offered todbelieve her anyway: "A Minister?er charges
She saw therat these ministers were hypocrites too this was the end of her and the baptistsMarriage to Russell Boroughs, Birth of Tommyaped through books, and usedAll she had toger bya, who was concerned fobelallen apart she agreed to the marriage because russell promised her that she could go to college Sheom along the way during this time she changed hete from wilkie to maxineshe had always hated then Tom was born she was 21 and in coout of schhis first twdams So Tom had this vital part of his life living away from his mother she divorced russeMeeting Richardn she met my father richard at oklty where they were both going to schechard was a goohe went to the effort to actually adopt him to afford college richard was in army
ROTC so he knew he would bective dutypregnant while he was in training, and he just got to see me briefly before he went to Europe To makends meet maxine hadbe at the air bass a red headed doctor whowas friends withof thttention of her only and devottold Richard a malicious story that the twonvolved and my red hair at birth was taken by grandma and i think Richard as proof of the affair Theonly problem with this theory was the Maxine s father was also a red head i think from this timed it to his deatdtraWasrthwas apparently a few weeks late Perhaps the datediscrepancy helped Grandma Eva andSW Oklahoma I think mnce when she went into labor By the time they gotadvanced, and i was bobirtback of the ambulanceady, can' t you wait? Yeaking a big mess And were gobefoome tonight
It was the middle of the night, very late For Mother, she says that this was her firstwhen shdered to it thight, and then she relaxed and then i was born she said they called me " Pinky at the hospital becausof my head of pink fuzz she always took this as if it were proof that i was a late-term bRichard came to see me before he shipped out to Europe He was gone for two years This timaptured in a book I wrote from his emails, "Clarke family storiMaxine thast wanted someone to rely on, and her letters wover the place, one way in orsetin me or my life i didn't see himgoneeach week foofof places to tesemember of him during this time was how afraid i was of his criticism he taught me how to ride a bikeand when i had to ride it on my own, without his help, I remember being afraid, not of falling, but olext part of mstory i do not hy memories of All I know is what i have pieced togetheThe first part is that he thought that i had another fathId to him by grandmEva The next part was that he wanted something steady back at home to look forward to returning toWhen he talked to me of what he felt while in germany he was really dismayed
thing, she got a htd, but i would guess Richard pretty much forced it, and thedoctors at that tight have thought that it would make herany more about this The next thing is that she had a course of electro-shock treatments Mother talkedbit about how these affected her that she was prettyof it' for days after each session Shethat prihis she had an eidetic memory, commonly called a photographicmembered everything thatad Butfter ES t the progression of maxine and richardrriage problems" was hysterectomy, electro-shock, and then divorce Swell guy, huh?kitch
en was on the other side of the wall i remember the burning paen Dad, rushing in with a hose and then the most terrible beating l ever got It was so bad thatmother took me and Tom over to a friends house, where we all spent the night " a while after this, theyed for divorce, and suddenly he was no longer there and we had to move from the house he had builtfoMaxine the writeNormane's creative focus was on writing She had taken creative writing under Foster- Harris atOklahoma University
He was famous at the time as a teacher of fiction writing, especially for the"pulction market One of his books from that period was, The Basic Formulas of fiction "She said that thiswas one of the best creative writing programs in the uSa at the time it was his teaching that enabledher, many years later, to make a small success in pulp-writing for womens magazines so-calledonfessions")and support the family for a couple of years in the 1950s Sheyears working on a$2000 was a lot of money but they kept asking for rewrites, and after rejecting one, told her " put morearted her next draft"」ly stood on the stepsen this wasMoving to californiaOK Motherked somewhere she foundock, AR, then took a greyhound bus to San Jose, CA It was a 3-day trip Dick was supposed to give usWe lived in East Safor abond half of the 4 gMexican school, and i learned about discrimination by being the target of it That summer I learned to
Table of contentsntroduction3444igh SchoolMy New Besecretly listeningoughs Birth of tommyMeeting RichardElectro-shock treatmeMoving to CaliforniaMarvin
like a brothee changesaught in his trap3om the artistemmy in Juvom and the armyWorking at santa Clara County Department of Public Works Spiritualitye to India(or so he said)
T365backgroundarcia2366Matt WSDdru64 in BigPost- Retirement lifeove to India- november 2007885sBooks and booklets i have writte
Autobiography of Richard ClarkeBorn: December 28, 1943 in Paul's Valley OKMother: Maxine (originally wilkie) Adams and Father: Richard Merton ClarkeIntroductionwrite this for several reasons the first is that i am the only one remaining of my generation or olderleft in my family so i am the only one that knows many family stories, i feel like I should write themen i was going to New College that to write about myselwas clarifying and helped me see much about myself that i reallyeems especially of interest in these"elder years
Thereason has to do wi(along with Matt Alspaugh, minister at the local Unitarian Universalist Fellowship) in Mexico startinglate 2018, From Age- ing to Sage- ing One process that we go through in this course is life review aarvesting the past This involves looking through your life, reviewing it seeing what you can learnquestion of"Now what? "So this writing is, for me, a part of the process of harvesting my life, ang g oifetime wisdom, which nobody really seems to want very muchdon't know who the readers will be other than children and their children maybe a few friends?guess this is primarily work i do for myself (and Carol) Even of family readers my guess is that few wiSince i write this largely for myself,be pretty honest ags that are stupid andether to tall it as a chronological story ame otneeaking the story in pieces makes sense to melyst in theeeding at IBmmarriage to marcia, going to new college, the years at National Semiconductor in productionyears I turned myself intotant and system designer/implementer the yead now the life in mfeel like the mexico life will be the final incarnation of this life
Timeoriginsom what I know from family stories, most of my grandparents were from the british Islands witlstrong Irish component Except for the branch that probably goes back to the comanchesainly Irish, wat comes from james clarke whoNMareva Kirkpatrickhicago Illinois She told me of heBelle devine, who had i think come fromWilliam(Bill) Adams, was bornfaom Mississippi That is all that is known Because of his largeamie clarkeave come to think there is a lot ofDallas 1916the Indian School as "Georgia Savage was born around 1880, to an amman and his indian wifewho died when the baby girl was quite young She was raised (very poorly by her father and endeen sne weWasComanche because they had a big reservaear Brazos
Maybe her father wOld family storiesClarke Storiesulu belle devinevine, from ireland when Lulu belle was a youngmigrant, she worked in a boarding ha skinny man came to stay at their house He brought withhim many books Lulu belle was immediately attracted to what seemed like this man of learning Theymarried, and he taught her to read opening up the worlds in his books Maybe this was the story ofEva' s grandmother, instead of he mother My memories are not clear and i dont really know when thegratedere is no one left to askAnother major story froa eva was in 1913when she wyoung Eva and took her to Texas, where he was going took eva bsomeone to cook and clean they went from theTexas byorses pulling"Kirk' s Fixit Wagon " This is about oneDallas
ooked like she wasthe wagon, she really was not One horse died andked next todoubletree haThey got a very shouse, and Kirk opened up a harness repair shop this did not last long, as automobiles were replacingAnna Mae ClarkeThere is another Clarke story about Anna Mae Clarke, the daughter of james son, Hal James arrived inNew Orleans16he gotiverbobawdy and rowdy talk of the rivebad that hal (and his wife I don' t know anything about her) thought they had to dog schooof the wife, the Harrisons, related to the presidents Harrisons, and Lord and Lady harrisoast the family had high class connections whang from patterns This was new technology at thended up with maybe the first dressmaking shopd getmade from a paris high fashion patSewing patterns were invented about 1860, with a fewcompanies getting into the business over the next 40 years
maybe anna maybe learned to use patternsabout 1890Clarke cousins in Ft WorthThere was another Clarke cousin who started the first carwash in Ft Worth, maybe about 1915 His wifehad a patent for an improved carbide gas light the lights on cars before they had electric lights Electric1912, So maybeCarbide lamps were still being instae clarkee nad women who wereavatars anors dating back into the eaaded his fixit wagon to a fixit shop, withBut horses soon becameTHE FuIT Shopbolete so he opened a gas station on theg sodas IhIss where she met her future husband richardKirks Fixit Shop 19
Adams storiesMy mothers mother was born with the name of georgia When she went to Indian boarding sclas born during the time of the indian wars, so not good to be an Indian, i think, and it was especiaated indians indiscy Her mother died when she was a young girl, and her fathool i guess it was a pretty terrible place so she could not wait to get out to get free of the schooWhitus was a tough old farmer type he complained when she madetoowhen she wasjes, unassisted so he built a"birthing shed away from tlouse, so the noiseSome time latht two young children from town and locked therthe birthing shedforbade georgia from giving them food or water and hit her when she tried A fewater after thedied he buried thunmarked graves on his land we have no idea who these children were, butguess at illegitimate children from another womaner for lunch andson in his food, arsenic It takes a few hours to dies from arsenic poisoning, and you get real thirsty
Mr Whitus would ask,"Water, water " Georgia replies, Would you let me give those little babiesvater ?After he died, she andmonths later, she packed all the kids in a wagon and left for Oklahoma ThereBill Adams, myFrom this valley they say you are leaving102 She told mother that she hadstory to anyone many years later Mother talked to one of the whitus grandkids He told of doing familyork, and he had tried hard to findd ofadrecords, public records, and there was nothing It waskefell offGrandbig fahisful period Maybe he had fortyut then thcrops, ge literally bet the farm and lostey went from prosperous to poofrom a big house, to a small rented one by ww2 grandpa was sheriff of the ciBill AdamsAltus OK
TimeHere are two storiesut her father who she admired all her lifeBill Adams and Negro guests for Sunday dinnerBill Adams was not your typical Oklahoma farmer One sign of this was the heof the other white folks in the areaBill Adams and the kKkof this dBill Adams was visited by a group of hooded men on horseback whout of his house and started threateninge stood on the porch with a shotgunof them by thd started calling thdispersed and bill Adams never had trouble with the KKK againChildhoodMy lifeshaped by my mother, Maxine She hadShe hated to constwhen as a toddatshe put nekeep the3, i figured out heto open screen windows by unlatching them and then i would climb out the window and ride my trikehe block sheddnt She back home from her i learned that curiosity is good, and to believe in myselfoffeAsf my beliefate teens i was talking tothink that god訐nd it by looking within And if God does not exist, I can t think of anything better to do than to lookat do you think of that?, "I said challengingly
Why, son, thats sound theologMy mother and father divorced why fatheback from ww2 i was 2 He did notapprove of how mother raised me, and tried to"bring order He also teased me about being fat, whichost of my life Itke eithd not live with himself after the wagiven up on the marriage with my mother Whatever the case he took a job where he traveled duringand was only home for the weekend it stayed this way until they divorcedwas diagnosed withwas 6shoes as a kid into middle school and i would fall when i ran (my mother would go to the playgroundbed ) By thed to belasting effects I was fortunate; this was before the vaccine and many of my generation were not soe big inTiuence was my brother, Iom, He was 4 years oldeaymates After I came from the hospital, i guess I cried a lot mother caught him putting a pillow overmy face " I was just trying to geto shut up Tom asked, after a few days, if mother could return me
To the hospital withch more important that he would have otherwiseHe was my hero, my model, and my opponent There was a time that I said to make a good decisionuld do andg differentght he could out smaiand out-trick anyone He would practice on me We shared a bedroom, and for a long time he wouldakeized stories andne each night afternt to bedpednager get over my fear of heights to help me get over these fears he took me out on the hillsidesear our house on 52 JacksGatos He would take me to a place where there was someththat I was afraid to cross or climb He was patient with me and sometimes would secure my foot withhis hands He taught me how to get through these things that scared me and helped me gain the skfidenceo do But, in high school in my junior year one day i thought to myself that 2+2=4, but if you ask fouple you will get six different feelings
So numbers and facts are not the problem, peoplechanged my approach When i went to college for a while i studied philosophy and psychology butopology I leaive in cultures, and cua set oThis view made sense, and was useful later when I was in marketing, which really just dealswith sets of ideasWe moved many times, in Oklahoma and then in Califort elementaryols and3 different high schools, I had few friends; i was always the new kid with the ever changing life i neverhad the long-term friends that many people do i think this probably added to me being a bit of a lonero was a latch-key kid befogs From about the 6 grade mother worked fuadult edschd and time to fiwas lonely enough that I saved lunch money so i could offer to buy a soft-serve sundae if somebodfamilyWith too much unsupervised time I explored in this Los gatos hills above the house at 52 JacksonThere was a forested slope, and above there were a few houses Some were vacation houses I think, andunoccupied most of the time i figured out how to break in to one of theedhooped in the house Later when we moved to the house on Massol Ave in Los gatoswould sometimes, when no one was home at our house andndgas casino playing caolice office They asked me about break-ins, had i seen anything And theyed me a joker from theckow tnIsbreaking into neighbors houses (except for one time later in high school when i stole some booze fror