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Bob and Pain (Click most images for larger versions.)

Bob suffered some major setbacks during our years in Santa Paula.

The first one happened when a TV aerial he and his helper, Pete, were installing fell across electric lines. Bob let go of the antenna's mast as he fell over on his back, but the mast still rested across his right foot. And when the metal pole landed on the wires, he received horrible electrical burns that deformed his toes and would plague him for the rest of his life. Fortunately, Pete could carry on with the business while I helped Bob recover.

In a separate accident while installing yet another antenna, Bob slipped and fell off a roof, seriously injuring his back. That injury forced him to sleep in a hospital bed for the rest of his life. But, I can't remember whether we closed the shop that time or not.

On another occasion, when we were living at 740, Bob sliced his thigh open. He was kneeling on the hardwood floor cutting a hole for a heating vent when the blade of his power saw got bound in the wood. Before he could stop it, the saw kicked back and ran up his thigh—he had defeated the blade guard! I can still see Bob, bless his heart, holding his leg and hobbling down the hall on his way outside because he didn't want to get blood on the floor. While he lay on the front lawn in agony, he pulled off his belt and told Bobby how to make a tourniquet with it. Then, Bob lay there waiting for the doctor—Santa Paula didn't have its hospital...yet.

Years later, I discovered some of Bob's writings and there was one line that jumped off the page: Be contemptuous of pain and thrust it from you. It will make you weak.

In 1962, Bob suffered his first series of heart attacks around the same time June had our first grandchild, Ron Guadagno, Junior—the attacks prevented me from going to Texas to be there for the birth. In Bob's personal papers, I came across a sheaf of faded yellow legal pad pages upon which he wrote in pencil about his attacks. This is what he wrote:

My Heart Attack

I am here as a layman to talk about heart attacks and specifically my heart attack. All my life I had given little thought to heart attacks. They were something for those overweight people and heavy smokers and drinkers to worry about. I was thin, active, a teetotaler, and physically in good condition. The articles I read were about cancer.

People in my family died from cancer and, as far as serious disease went, it was my number one worry. I had heard about people that waited too long before going to the doctor. Then when he opened them up, they were so full of cancer he could only sew them shut and let them die. So, every time I found a lump on my body I ran to the doctor: "What is it, Doc?" But it was never cancer.

I didn't know the symptoms of heart attack. I knew many people had it. Some recovered, some died, but I was never interested enough to find out what it was all about. A little knowledge on my part, however, and I probably would have had a milder attack and an easier time.

So, I hope to interest you enough in my story that you'll remember the symptoms of my attack and, if you unfortunately have them, not disregard them as I did.

Accumulated stress played a big part in my attacks. I had just learned that my tenant for a large building was having plans drawn for a new one. This was no cause for alarm, but I carried it around with me. We had a couple of vacant apartments I was working on quite a bit, and the work seemed to go on and on. I knew I would have to make new targets for Sundays pistol match. My wife had taken the boys to the beach cabin for the weekend which annoyed me because I was putting out lots work yet had to come home to an empty house and make my own meals. I'd been putting off fixing a leak in the roof. All that was on my mind as well as the one hundred and one other things we always plan to get around to.

Being the type of person I am, I wouldn't allow annoyances to surface. I'd stew internally. And it cost me many sleepless nights, no matter how tired I was, as my mind kept churning.

The First Attack

Saturday morning I worked on one of the vacant apartments. I started for home about twelve thirty, just driving along a street, when I had this tremendous pain in my diaphragm. My first thought was, What muscle have I pulled now? (I knew that when you just do physical labor now and then it's easier to strain a muscle.) The pain became more intense, and I felt like I wanted to burp really badly. I was telling myself I should pull over and park, but then the pain stopped.

I was active that whole afternoon. I went to the target range and fired ninety shots, then repaired the target frames—seemed like I was always alone when the range needed work. Then I prepared a new set of targets for Sunday's pistol match. I spent the evening home alone working on an old dinner table I was renovating. I suffered no recurrence of the pain or the "gas" sensation, and had forgotten about it.

The Second Attack

Sunday morning I arrived at the range about eight thirty. I had the frames and targets in my truck. I pulled up to the target mounts and started installing them. Two other members drove up but stood there talking to each other while I finished up the installation.

Very likely at that point, if I had asked, they would have helped. But, I have always been an independent cuss. So, if they wouldn't offer to help, I wouldn't ask for it. Physically, it wasn't taxing but I brooded about it for a while.

The shoot went fine otherwise until about ten o'clock when the pain returned. It hurt so much that I did ask someone to do my work while I sat down. When it came my turn to shoot, I did, pain and all—be contemptuous of pain and thrust it from you. I even won that part of the match.

The pain had lasted about twenty minutes. When the match was over, other men helped me clear up the range. Then I went home, made lunch, watched some sports on TV, worked on the table and generally had a quiet afternoon and evening with no symptoms. I didn't even bother to tell my wife about the pain when she came home.

The Third Attack

Monday morning I worked at the apartments until eleven thirty then went to the tobacco shop where there's a snooker table in the back room. I started a game with some of the noon hour devotees and had shot about half of it when the pain returned. I was barely able to sit there, taking my shot when my turn came until the game was over.

I drove home and lay down on the bed in our basement bedroom until my wife called about one o'clock to come up and eat. I went upstairs and told her I didn't feel good and didn't want to eat. I lay down again for a while thinking, If I could only burp. Finally, I went out in the back yard and lay across a sawhorse trying to throw up.

When I told my wife of the pain, she asked if I'd gone to the doctor. Well, I finally decided I would. It was two o'clock, and the pain was over two hours old. I drove myself to the doctor's office, but the waiting room was full. When I told the nurse, however, that I wanted to see Doc because of a pain, she must have seen something because she opened the door for me and said to come right in. She had me lie on the table then came right back with Doc.

A flurry of things took place, most of which I don't remember. I do remember a blood pressure test, a pulse check, a temperature check, a couple of shots, and a pill under the tongue. Then the activity slowed, until Doc told me he would do an EKG of my heart. He did. Fifteen minutes later I was under oxygen in a private room at the hospital.

I didn't leave that room or that bed for twenty-four days.

After that I went home and back to bed for twenty-one more days, getting up only to use the commode beside my bed. Then I had to stay in bed for three more weeks, getting up only to eat and use the bathroom.

All in all, I spent a total of nine weeks and three days in bed. Time I could have shortened tremendously, if I had gone to the doctor after my first attack.

(End)

Don't get me wrong, Bob had good times, too.

Although it was difficult for him to demonstrate affection, I know that he loved the kids and got much enjoyment out of their escapades. He also loved his work, his target shooting (lots of awards), chess, billiards (snooker), and photography. He became deeply involved with the 20-30 Club, and the Lions, plus an investment club, and a flying club. In the 40's, Bob flew one of the club's planes from Santa Paula to New York to visit his ailing father. He and some friends started the flying club and called it the Prop Busters, but eventually he owned his own plane. It was a Piper Cub hangared at the Santa Paula airport, and he took the kids up for short flights on occasional weekends. But since I suffered from air sickness, I normally stayed on the ground.

In the Sixties, Bob began teaching an adult education night course in electronics and television repair at Ventura College. He was very good at it and thoroughly enjoyed it. Once, when the administration handed out evaluation forms for the students to rate their teachers, Bob couldn't help have fun with it. During his classes he would constantly fiddle and clean a fake pair of eyeglasses without lenses, pushing his handkerchief through the empty frames. It was just a joke, and most of the students got it, but Bob was tickled when one of the evaluation forms stated that he played with his glasses too much.

Once Bob had the basement darkroom, he really pursued his amateur photography. He especially enjoyed creating a unique Christmas card each year, and would spend many hours working on it. I remember one year he printed our six faces on a round card then pinned another card on top of it with a cutout so you could turn the it and see each face. I hate to think of how many hours it took him to make all those cards. Another year the six of us went up on top of a local hill and stood pointing pistols at the camera. And yet another card showed the four kids crowded around the piano. When the kids began to leave home, he did a continuing series beginning, "And then there were three," down to a final, "And then there was one."

Bob would always come up with something.

In 1951, Bob drew up the plans for "La Cosa," Spanish for "The Thing." Today, you would call it a recreational vehicle, but back then Bob called it a Land Cruiser. The design began with the chassis of a GMC bread truck, and was custom built at the factory in Los Angeles. We wanted to travel the States with room for everyone, so Bob designed La Cosa to feed six, sleep six and sit six. There were three bunk beds on each side, although Bob's had to be contoured due to his back. There were two large bus-style passenger seats and a small bench seat for the boys on the motor housing (they had the best view). There was a small kitchen with a refrigerator, a range and stove, a water tank and a gravity fed sink. There were also a small closet and storage for pots and pans, food and clothing. The worst part was the chemical toilet. Bob contained it in its own little closet in a rear corner of La Cosa, but it was trouble from the start.

I think the toilet came out of a porta-potty. It was just a big, round, 18-20 inch wide can with a handle that set inside another can with a cold, metal seat on top. A vent ran up the wall behind it, but it didn't help much. On our first short test trip, we put too much of the chemical solution in the toilet and it sloshed all over the floor. We didn't do that again, but big bumps and uneven roads had the same effect, even when the level was low. Plus, I don't know what was worse: the smell of our waste or the smell of the chemicals. Either way, emptying the toilet was the worst job on our trips, plus a never-ending cause of bickering among the kids.

There weren't any dumping stations back in those days so, normally, we had to dig a hole first, lift the inner bucket out of the toilet, carefully carry it out of La Cosa without spilling, and then dump it in the hole trying not to splash, too much. And it stank! It was a horrible job, but we did it constantly during all our trips: months and months of traveling in La Cosa.

During summer vacation in 1952 and again in 1957, we made two very long trips around the United States. In '52 we took a southern route so we could visit my father in Florida. From there we went up the Eastern seaboard, visiting other relatives, and finally staying for a spell in New York, before the return trip home. In '57, our route was northern through Yellowstone and the Dakotas, but again winding up in New York. And like my first trip west in '37, I wrote down impressions during those summer sojourns. For instance:

• It would take years to see the United States with the children, because they want to investigate every hill, cave and swimming hole.
• After traveling a while in hot weather you get so you start looking for youngsters on bikes with towels!
• So many windows showed tired colors inside.
• It is easier to be a good citizen in a small town.
• Niagara Falls: suddenly you're there—like the Grand Canyon.
• Sometimes one has to see spots where history occurred to feel an interest in same.
• You can become saturated with too much travelling—law of diminishing returns sets in.
• Began the trip believing in Duncan Hine's "Guide to Good Food," but wound up asking townspeople and gas station attendants for their recommendations.
• Parents who can't swim pass on their fear of the water to their children.
• Always watching for Burma Shave ads, everyone reading them out loud, and Barry asking what they mean.
Burma Shave ads:
• I know he's a wolf, said Red Riding Hood. But Grandma Dear, he smelled so good.
• A beard that's rough and overgrown. Is better than a chaperon.
• Thirty days has September, April, June, and the speed offender.

During the kids' Thanksgiving breaks we'd take La Cosa to the Mojave Desert or Death Valley; there was something about the barren stretches of sand and dunes—colors you had to look for but always found, life hiding under stones and in the parched soil—that restored me, cleaned the slate and opened me up. I loved the desert when it wasn't too hot. On the longer Easter breaks, we liked to go to Lake Havasu on the California-Arizona border, back before developers spoiled it's pristine beauty.

One time, on a Havasu trip, we towed two boats behind La Cosa, one upside down on top of the other like a clam. We got lots of stares, partly for the way they were stacked, but also because of the funkiness of the boats. The one on the bottom was a beach-weathered, dented aluminum row boat, and propped over it with galvanized pipe frames was a homemade, airplane-canvas-over-metal infrastructure...thing. I can't describe it, except to say it was nearly flat, very long, fragile and even odder looking because it was the one that was upside down. Bob's friend and avid aviator, Bill Hackbarth, made it, and we had a five horsepower Johnson outboard engine to attach on the back. We were quite a site.

On the '57 summer trip, we went through Illinois so Bob could compete in their state pistol championships. The finals were on a Sunday, and Bob won! On Monday we were back on the road, leaving Springfield, when a siren began screaming behind us. Bob told us that a motorcycle cop was pulling us over, but he didn't know why. We all huddled nervously in La Cosa, waiting to see what was the matter, as the cop pulled up to the driver's window.

The policeman handed Bob a newspaper and said, "Saw this article in our paper about you and wanted you to have it before you left town." And with that he waved and sped off. We were flabbergasted.

The headline of the article read: "Californian Takes Pistol Championship," and it went on to mention Bob and La Cosa—RV's were a rare novelty in the Fifties—with a brief description.

We all breathed a heavy sigh of relief and laughed away the tension. We had forgotten that printed on the side of La Cosa, along with "Santa Paula, California," was "Bob Simmons" Not much detective work there, just a surprise.

I remember another surprise that happened to us in the Fifties.

A friend in Santa Paula, Del King, opened a brand-new Union '76 gas station on Main Street next door to the Union 76 Oil Museum. To celebrate the grand opening, he raffled off a horse. Bob won...again! The horse's name was Spike, and we boarded him for a time at some stables in town. But eventually, we gave him back to Del because we just didn't ride him enough. Owning Spike, however, prompted us to get horse riding lessons for the kids, and while the lessons lasted, the kids would go once a week to the Ling Dooley Ranch riding school about five miles west of town on Foothill Road. But, none of the kids got excited about horses. At least, not the way they did about television.

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