CHAPTER 1

"Well, the UPS man has dark hair."

This comment resulted in a few queer stares from the doctor, but obviously this doctor had no clue as to what type of man he was dealing with, as a dark haired infant, Nicole LaFrance Kent, was placed tenderly in the arms of his understanding and lenient companion.

This wacky man, Joseph Maughan Kent, had brownish hair, and since both of his previous offspring had been born bald, this momentous, yet painful and stressful, event needed laughter. It is not as if my father was considering the paternity of this little baby; my father just has an extremely sarcastic and warped sense of humor, but it is this characteristic which carried him through his difficulties and challenges.

Born in Weed, California. Now, what a name! Anyone who would deliberately acknowledge Weed to be their birthplace must be a character. Growing up in San Diego in a small house without a father would certainly be challenging, especially with four siblings. Occasionally, he shared stories about his childhood to appease my curiosity.

One afternoon while riding in the family car, a lifeless dog was observed along the side of the road, and this prompted an inquiry, "Dad, didn't you have a dog as you grew up?"

"Yes."

"What did you name him?"

"Happy." A long silence followed as I imagined this big man playing Frisbee with a smiling puppy, but then my realistic father who envisioned my idealistic mind day dreaming about his heroic super-dog, decided that it was necessary to retrieve my brain from a magical world with no pain or worries; just a fantastic place where everyone ate ice cream while running through the sprinklers, and sang lullabies accompanied by their singing dogs. "Yes, and he followed me to school one day, which was against the rules. Then, how does the nursery rhyme continue, Nicole?"

There was no immediate response. It was not that I forgot the famous nursery rhyme where the little dog followed his master to school one day, which caused the other children to laugh and play. Seeing my eyes open to the possibility of this nursery rhyme happening in a real-life situation, he continued, "Happy bit a little girl, and had to be put asleep?"

"Why?" I pleaded through my tears.

"Well, he was taken to the pound after he bit that little girl, and we just could not afford to have him released." Yet, he was becoming annoyed with this story's explanation producing such a drastic response from his child, "Nicole, stop this! If you are going to cry about a story from my childhood, at least, it should not be about a stupid little dog."

And thus began a conversation that would shape my young life. Seeing his distress, I quickly gained my composure over those emotions, and I nodded.

"My father, your Grandpa, did not always live with us. He had problems with alcohol while I was young. While he was not living with us, my mother had to go back to work."

"What did she do?"

"She was a registered nurse. So my mother was working odd hours. That left me at home to clean and cook."

Since my father had always been such a fabulous cook, I was not surprised by this revelation of my father's kitchen duties as a child. I remember giggling as I asked, "Is that why you are the cook in our family? Because mother told me that you had to teach her how to cook when you were first married? She told me that she made macaroni and cheese, and did not know to boil the noodles before adding the cheese, milk, and butter."

"Yes, Nicole, I am the cook. And I helped my mother keep her checkbook balanced. Imagine that, your father acting as his mother's financial adviser at the age of fifteen. And we did not have money to take many vacations like we do. There was no camping at the beach or going snow skiing. Every once in a while we had the opportunity to go to Knott's Berry Farm, after we collected stamps we were given [These coupons were commonly known as Green Stamps, and were distributed at the grocery store as discounts for various things]. However, sometimes a wedding invitation came in the mail, and my mother had to use those coupons, that we were planning to use for a vacation, for a blender or a toaster. Imagine telling a little kid that we had to use our coupons for this new bride, starting her new life and family."

"Is Knott's Berry Farm fun?" Remembering the questions I asked are somewhat embarrassing, because now I know exactly what Knott's Berry Farm is, and I know how exciting these rides at an amusement park can be.

"Of course, and we looked forward to these vacations, so just think about the disappointment felt by five kids at the announcement that their treasured coupons would be used for a wedding gift. And we did not have all that much money for clothing. I had to wash the only pair of pants I had every night, so I could wear them the next day."

"Oh!" Was the only reply a stunned little girl could produce .

"Think about it, only one pair of pants. You know how everyone looks at the clothes others' wear to school? I remember one time a girl asked me, ' Why do you wear that same pair of pants every day? Don't you have any money to buy any decent clothes?' I was so embarrassed. Just think about it."

"Where was Grandpa when this was happening?"

"He was separated from my mother at the time." Seeing that he had my undivided attention, he continued, "My father had some unfortunate problems with alcohol resulting in his hospitalization at a psychiatric hospital."

"What is a psychiatric hospital?"

"It is a hospital to help people with problems in their emotions. So my mother sent him to this psychiatric hospital, however later they were divorced, and then later remarried."

The financial deprivations were mesmerizing even to a young girl. Some would criticize this tactic of parental teaching, explaining how these are stories that a child should not be exposed to at such a critical age. However, the honesty and directness of my father's conversations has always been constant.

Answering questions was my father's expertise. There were several things I knew growing up. I knew there was nothing I couldn't ask my father that wouldn’t be answered. I knew when my father was angry. Yelling or spanking was seldom used; you just knew when my dad was mad. To discipline he taught by example. Furthermore, his silence and facial expressions told everything. And most importantly, I knew he loved my mother. "Be nice to my girlfriend!" He would always say.

My mother still insists that the respect my father showed his mother was the aspect that had attracted her attention to him as a possible husband. It is not surprising to discover that she believed that she would be the recipient of the respect he showed his mother. For a Mother's Day present, he bought his mother a washing machine. Considering what other high school boys were buying their mothers, my mother realized that Maughan Kent was the pick of the litter.

My mother, born Debra James Whittleton, grew up in an entirely different family in comparison with my father's. She was eleven when she moved to San Diego from Westchester County, just outside of New York City, so she had the East Coast philosophy of etiquette and manners. With the combination of religious and financial differences between these two families many intense dinner conversations and dating experiences followed.

All children love bedtime stories. Well, I was no different, except my favorite stories were about my parents' childhoods. My mother's tales were memorable because I could relate easily to this beautiful woman. I saw this wonder of a wife as a role model, and associated myself with her, trying to imitate every childhood experiences. Because of her wild imagination and the loneliness she felt as a result of her older sisters not having the time to play with her due to age difference, she constructed many games with her bicycle. These stories are very similar to my childhood.

"When I was a little girl, I used to imagine that one tree was the post office, and the next tree was the hospital, and the next tree was the school where I would pick up my kids. We had woods in the back of my house where I would ride pretending to do my errands."

"Mother, what type of bike was it?" I asked with earnest interest.

"It had a basket on the front. When I was seven years old, my brother was born, and one day I decided that I was going to run away and take my brother with me. I wrapped my little brother in a blanket, and put him in the basket. I rode my bicycle until I got tired. Then, I returned home to discover that nobody had even noticed that we were gone."

After hearing this story, an argument caused me to try the exact plan my mother had executed. Of course, the results were very similar to that of my mother's runaway escapade. My mother told me other happy stories from her New York childhood.

"When I was a little girl," these bedtime stories always began with this opening, "there was a girl who lives across the street. She had all these formal dresses, and we loved to play dress up, trying them all on down in their unfinished basement."

This explains why my mother let us keep a large collection of costumes which provided hours of entertainment as I imagined that I was a breathtaking princess. I often pretended to be Shera, Princess of Power.

"And our other neighbors were interesting. There was a mean boy, who was about four years older than me, and his sister, who was two years older than me. In wintertime we had a lot of snow so we would get into snowball fights, and build these barricades out of huge snowballs. These barricades were strong and they lasted a long time. Well, that mean neighbor boy used to put rocks in his snowballs, and they hurt as they hit us. So we, his sister and I, decided that we would start a war with him. We hid behind this protective barricade, and threw our snowballs at him."

Children love to be retold the same story time and time again. I lost count how many times I heard these tales. Motherhood was always a definite for Debra James, just examine her childhood games. Picking up kids at the school with her car/bicycle, waking up her younger brother to watch cartoons with him, playing house with her babies/dolls at "Debbie's rock", which was a large cliff-like rock large enough to support tea parties, in the woods behind her home. But not to say my mother settled for motherhood. Quite the contrary! Education was so important to both of my parents. My mother received her Bachelors degree in Elementary Education, and worked before she took the plunge known as marriage. According to my mother, "You educate the mother, you educate the children."

Another favorite story from my childhood: "How My Parents Met" They had many classes together. My mother was the studious book-worm, my father was the popular athlete who enjoyed teasing all the girls, especially Debra James. “Beet” was a nickname my father gave her as he discovered the way to make her blush with embarrassment. My father and his buddies would sit on the other side of the classroom repeating the word and laugh at this reddening girl. Being high school sweethearts, their families knew that they would probably get married eventually, but it did not happen right away after high school graduation. After my father got out of college, he decided it was time to pursue his high school/ college girlfriend -- who had already graduated, moving to Los Angeles, California to work as a schoolteacher. After going through high school, college, and being indecisive about marriage, they finally were married about a year before my father entered dental school.

Several reasons contributed to the decision to have children, but why couldn't they wait until he was out of dental school? Well, the logic is there, despite what anybody might think. It was simple: while my father was enrolled in the dental program, my mother was guaranteed medical coverage and maternity care. Therefore, there are two older children that came before me named Joseph Maughan and Jennifer while my parents were still in SanFransisco attending dental school.

And thus began my little family.