School Years (Part 1)
Without
a doubt the next six years were our hardest.
Bill had studied physics in college and loved it, but was undecided what
career he should follow in such a field.
He didn’t want teaching, but we knew he needed more education for
whatever he decided. So after the
Christmas holidays he went to the “Y” leaving Jim and me with my folks until he
could find housing for us. Those were
lonesome weeks without him, and even though it was good to be home with my
folks, home was not the same anymore.
Home was with Bill. In the spring
he was able to get us a little house for a few months.
We
spent the summer of 1946 in Coeur d’Alene working for his father. Granddad Ericksen had to have a hernia
operation, so after the operation and while he was recuperating he and Grandma
Ericksen took a trip back East to visit their son Frank, while Bill and I
operated the oil business. It was a hard
summer without any income, and when the summer was over and we returned to
school our finances were very tight.
However, we had made a wonderful decision that summer, Bill had decided
to go into Dentistry. It came like a
revelation after visiting with some young men from the Naval Base near Coeur
d’Alene. We felt sure it was the right
thing for Bill to do. By saving our GI benefits
until we got into Dental School, we felt we would have enough to see us
through, but not enough to keep us during the coming school year. Bill had the equivalent of three years of
college but by changing his major, it would necessitate him taking an extremely
heavy load to get the requirements he needed.
Earning a living for a family had to be sandwiched in also.
As
we had no place to stay at the “Y”, he decided to go ahead and find an
apartment. Leaving Jim and me in Wyoming
with Louise and her family while he went ahead was hard for me. I wasn’t used to the ranch life but I wanted
to do all I could to help Louise with her many tasks. During the three weeks I stayed there we
washed bedding, cleaned house, and I did mountains of ironing and mending. For October conference Royal and Louise took
Jim and me to Salt Lake to meet Bill. By
this time he had found a job playing in a dance band, two, three, sometimes
four nights a week; and he had found an unfurnished basement apartment in Orem
for us to live in.
Bill
was simply wonderful during those years of struggle. Doggedly he conquered his tasks, both at
school and on the home front. We only
had one car, and he had that so I was left afoot. Orem was miles long with only a smattering of
homes and businesses along the street. I
would take Jim in his stroller and walk miles to the grocery store or other
shopping I needed to do.
In
the spring of his senior year at the “Y”, the school moved in some two-story
barrack buildings called Wymont for married student housing. We were one of the first to move in. How happy I was to be close to neighbors and
that wonderful school. Often I would
attend the Devotional Assembly. Jim
loved all the little kids in the neighborhood, and even though he was a little
runaway, I loved living there. It was a
bog hole when we moved in and didn’t improve much during the remainder of the
year.
