The 13ths of February 1986, 1996, 2001

February 13, 2026

 

Much like a prior post, “The 27ths of November 1984, 1986, and 1987,” February 13 is another date that three significant events for me

 

In 2001, twenty-five years ago today, one of the best pastors I’ve known passed away.  Buffe Karraker who founded Northwest Church in Fresno.  He was a no-nonsense preacher who knew the Bible and knew how you fit into it. His style was southern, lowkey, yet unyieldingly strong and forceful.  Ann amazing man of God. I was fortunate to get oldest son Jason to experience him a number of times both in services and during a handful of Northwest’s annual men’s retreat.  Unfortunately, Joseph only experienced one of the retreats and none of the Sunday services.

 

Thirty years ago tonight, my father, Raymond Willard Stone passed away.  He was born on June 5, 1923, in a dirt floor house in Holland, Missouri.  The house was along a dirt road, now known as E2, a dividing line between Arkansas and Missouri, just west of the Mississippi River. It’s now a field.  He grew up there for many years. I remember him sharing when we visited the site in 1993, that he played in the fields and would walk down to the Muddy Mississippi to play and fish.  I’m guessing a bit, but I think he was about 10-12 years old when his mother placed him and younger brother Ira in a VFW orphanage in Eaton Rapids, Michigan.  They stayed there through high school.  

 

Forty years ago tonight, Jeannette, my first wife, and I split up for the last time.  We had separated twice before.  The first time while we living in Madera, she moved out. Later, during our one year in Ventura while I was working for my father, I moved out for a couple months.  I knew, and tried to impress on her, a third time by either one of us would be the final time for me.  The separations created an insurmountable amount of unnecessary emotional and financial burdens. 

 

I thought we were doing pretty good.  In fact, when my parents visited us at our East Palo Alto Ave home during Christmas time in December 1985, I remember talking with my dad in the garage about several things. During the discussion, we talked about how Jeannette and I were getting along.  I told him I was feeling really good about things, and thought we were finally over the hump in determining how to manage our relationship.  Funny how things sneak up on you. 

 

On Thursday, February 13, 1986, Jeanette informed me that she had rented an apartment, and had already started to move, buying some furniture and having it delivered there.  I reminded her that this would be the final time. She was committed.  I wasn’t angry, I was just finished. 

I was done with arguing about issues, and I certainly wasn’t going to argue about who gets what. 

We had two vehicles.  One was a 1984 two tone brown Volkswagen Vanagon.  We bought it new on December 31, 1984 while Jeanette was self employed doing daycare at our home.  The other was a bright red 1984 Toyota Corolla that had been a rental car that Jeanette bought for me for Valentines Day, 1985.  For much of our marriage, my primary car was a 1968 Volkswagen Bug. The Toyota was for me to commute to work in, now with decent radio, heating, and air conditioning.

I asked Jeanette which car she wanted.  She wanted the Toyota.  Fine. 

I told her that I would leave the next day, Friday, Valentine’s Day, by the time she got off work.  I would return Sunday evening, and by then, she should take anything and everything she might ever want, because after that, the window closes. 

When I returned home, I didn’t know what to expect.  Maybe I did.  I still didn’t care what was or wasn’t there. No much was there.  She had taken our bedroom set, which was fine with me since she got it during her first marriage.  The boys bunk beds and furniture were still there because she had already bought new sets for them.  The washer and dryer were gone, yet left the refrigerator.  Most of the family room furniture was gone.  Art work and wall photos were gone. Cabinets emptied.  The large heavy console style TV was still there.  Almost all the kitchen dishes, utensils, pot and pans, and cutlery were gone.

There it was. The baseline.  Everything got better from there.  Some things improved quickly, others took longer.

Three thirteens.  All hard to deal with over the years.  Nonetheless, I learned and grew from all of them.  

I miss my father the most.  I always will. 

Western Cable Services | Western Cable Enterprises | Action Flash Barricade

Photos my father took.  

These are some of the “fancy” trucks that my dad and his younger brother owned for their company, Western Cable Services.  They certainly weren’t at the point yet of buying new large equipment.  They usually picked up used vehicles and equipment at military or utility company auctions.  Not in the best shape, yet generally still useable and fixable.  

I remember the three trucks below and drove them all at some point.   

My dad and uncle chose tan as the company vehicle color, obviously with some exceptions.   If I recall correctly, the yellow one was purchased at a Southern California Edison auction.  They took it in to get a cheap tan paint job and were told there’s no way that tan paint could cover that yellow, so they had it repainted a similar yellow to cover scratches and such.

 The middle lineman’s/installer’s truck came from Pacific Telephone.  At the time, their trucks were originally painted dark green (what looks like a thin yellow cover is actually a canopy structure at a neighboring property behind the truck).  The utility bed on the back was interesting.   You can see a slight dome shape over the front of the bed.  The bed had an open design, but the metal roof had sections that slid open and closed.  Inside the bed along the sides were various sized metal storage cabinets and drawers.  There was a pipe rack added to it when it came to Western Cable.  You can see that brace coming up off the right front bumper.  The rack was used for two things.  First, it held conduit pieces that were used on telephone poles when the cable TV line ended at a pole and transitioned to underground.  The cable was put in the conduit and attached to the pole to protect it.  The rack also held boring pipe for when they had to bore under a street.   They removed the manual crank up extension ladder that had been mounted on the truck.  The little bump on top of the cab contained a sealed roof mirror that could be adjusted inside the cab.  When the crank up extension ladder was originally on the truck, this allowed the operator to raise and extend the ladder to generally line it up with a pole or somewhere mid-span, and then the operator could back up the truck, watching the mirror, to hit his target.   The mirror on this truck was essentially useless for our company’s needs.  They did have a couple trucks that left the ladder in place for use.  I just haven’t found any photos of them.   

The final truck of the three was a flatbed truck for general use.  One photo shows a fourth truck, a trusty old pickup truck.  I don’t remember that one.   Wouldn’t be a kick to own any of these now, restore them, and take them to car shows?  

I don’t know where in Southern California the photos below were taken, the location don’t look familiar to me, but I would have been in school when these were taken.   

I do remember the trucks and the old red air compressor.  

Although they ended up eventually buying at least a couple Ditch Witch trenchers (originally used, then new), I don’t know if the one pictured was owned by them or rented. 

I don’t remember when the Ford pickups were acquired, but it was probably sometime in late 1968 or early 1969.

 

My uncle and dad purchased or leased two identical new tan Ford pickup trucks (Maybe that’s why they picked tan for the other trucks?  I don’t know.)  They were standard models.  No air conditioning, AM radios, crank windows, 6 cylinder engines, no power anything, with a three-speed manual transmission stick on the column. 

These two Ford pickups are 5^th generation, which covered 1967-1972, and my dad bought a new 1969 Chevrolet El Camino (tan of course) after he needed to give his pickup truck to a foreman on large contract.  You were just a little thing, yet when we lived in Madera, dad loaned it to me and I drove it for a while, so the El Camino had to be at least eleven years or so old at that time.  Another car I wish I still had! 

After my dad and uncle went their separate ways, dad wanted a similar name as Western Cable Services and took my suggestion of Western Cable Enterprises.  He also changed the logo for his new company from a triangle to a series of three green overlapping boxes that contained the company name.  Nothing fancy, but it worked.   I think I saw one of his old business cards a couple weeks ago amongst all this stuff I’m going through but can’t find it at the moment (I have stacks of stuff around me I’m working through).  I'll edit this post should I find it, or a photo that includes it.   

During construction projects, they rented barricades to put along the road in the construction site.  They were pretty darn basic at the time.  These days you see orange barrels or the thin plastic delineators with a heavy base blocking off lanes.  Western Cable even occasionally used some of the original road flares, which were basically metal round balls with a flat bottom, filled with non-explosive fuel (diesel fuel maybe) with a very thick wick on the top.  You could light them at the end of the day, and they would burn a flame all night long, acting like warning lights along the construction zone.  They were stinky and smokey, to the point the heavy black smoke sometimes negated their safety factor.   

As the products improved, they got safer.  In the picture here, you can see in the background one of the more standard barricades of the time.  

The original version was made of wood, designed like a sawhorse, and was extremely heavy.  The next generation were like this one and used angle metal for the frame/legs rather than heavy full 3”x4” wooden frames.  About the time my dad and uncle decided to go their separate ways, my dad came up with a way to hopefully save money and make a little extra too.  I mentioned renting the barricades was normal, but it was costly, and my dad didn’t like some of the renters.  So, he decided to start his own barricade company too.  This allowed him to purchase barricades from the manufacturer at a discounted price and occasionally rent them out if his construction business was slow.

I don’t remember the name of the former barricade company in Ventura that my dad didn’t like, but the name started with a letter near the beginning of the alphabet.  Calling dad’s barricade company something like “Western Barricade” didn’t cut it for him.  Why?  Because of the telephone book.  Companies were listed by category in the yellow pages, then alphabetically.  He didn’t want to be listed after the competitor, especially being a new company.  He was searching for names, and I (as a brilliant Junior High school student, hahaha!) came up with the name, Action Flash Barricade.  The name put it at the beginning of the yellow pages category listing, and my dad used it.   The barricade above was one of the original ones he purchased.  The removable blinking light on top took two lantern batteries.  Barricades without lights were fine only for day use.  Ones with flashers needed to be used at night, and were rented at a higher cost.  There was a small hole on the side of the weather resistant battery case where you could stick a long skinny poker (like the long end of an Allen wrench, only with a loop to use on keyrings) through the hole to push a switch to turn the blinking light on when used at night, and off when the sun was out.  Although, most workers never bothered to turn them on and off, so the batteries wore out faster than they should.  Stealing the blinking lights themselves became a thing then, so a security bolt was created to hold it onto the barricade.  I had a couple of new ones in my bedroom that flashed constantly 24 hours.  So cool….hahaha!  Also, on the one above, the name and phone number for Action Flash Barricade were painted below the word “CAUTION.”  This allowed law enforcement or public works to contact us at any time in case one got damaged, stolen, or needed to be replaced or serviced.  On the lower panel, it was a routine thing to stencil the name of the company renting the barricade.  Here, it says dad’s company name, Western Cable. 

Later, my dad started purchasing a different type of barricade.  The new ones were pretty fancy for the time.  The one shown here is the only photo I have found of one.  

It was made of all metal and was much lighter than the wood ones.  Plus, they were slimmer so more could be stacked onto a truck or trailer.  The top panel was a piece of sheet metal with the blinker light built into it, so there wasn’t a removable blinker to steal.  The metal legs spread like the original ones to allow for stability.  The small box on top held a single lantern battery for the blinking lamp.   A countersunk Allen screw secured the battery in the box.  Plus, it had a sensor to turn the blinker light on and off automatically for night and day. 

While working for my dad, one of my unpaid tasks included maintaining these barricades.  This included repainting the yellow bottom panel and stenciling the names of renters on it if they were rented out to someone else.  If my dad lost a cable tv construction contract to a competitor, he’d usually offer them a cut rate for renting barricades from us so he could reap a little income off the contract, plus it gave him an excuse to go to their job site and watch the competitor work.  If the barricades were in a reasonable driving distance of our home in Ventura, it was usually me going out to a job site after school or weekends as needed.  I’d sometimes go out and drive through after dark to ensure the lights were working, the barricades weren’t pulled out of place, and replace batteries or whole barricades as needed.  We also rented construction signs and traffic cones.  In fact, just a year or so ago, I donated the last dozen or so old traffic cones to our church in Clovis.

  

1959, My First Camping Trip, Big Pine, California

This is the closest I ever made it to climbing Mt. Whitney.  It would be interesting if the "east side" experts here recognize any of the views or locations.  

This was my first camping trip with my parents and I remember my parents saying we were camping at Glacier Lodge.  I believe this site is the Big Pine Creek Campground adjacent to Glacier Lodge, just outside Big Pine, California.  I don't know what the ownership or relationship of the campground to the lodge was in 1959.  I researched it some, and it was interesting to learn the glamorous history of Glacier Lodge, and fate of the lodge and its replacement.     

All-in-all, it was a great trip with some hiccups.  

It rained during this trip, and my WW II Army veteran dad was using a dark green Army surplus canvas tent.  When it started raining hard in the middle of the night, he made me get out and help dig a drainage trench around the tent.  Inside the tent, he told me not to touch the roof of the tent, and then I did, causing a leak inside.   Hence, I learned why not to touch it.  My father was not pleased.  

I don't think this was my mother's style of camping.  She doesn't have her normal happy smile on.  As a family, I don't think we ever tent camped like this again.  We only tent cabins and RVs after this trip.      

I was four years old at the time, and the VW in the photo was our new (white) 1959 Bug.  I remember the car well.  Not long afterward, we moved to Tucson, Arizona.  My parents would drive across the desert at night to visit family in So. Cal. in it while I curled up in the cubby behind the back seat to sleep.  The bright red Coca Cola metal ice chest stayed in family use until the late 1970s.  It was a workhorse of a cooler.        

Some history of Glacier Lodge: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glacier_Lodge 

David and Dorothy Stone

Our neighbor's campsite.

1959 Volkswagen Bug (white)

A Wonderful and Cool Anniversary

 

Ok, I’ll preface this with, yeah, we didn’t take many photos.  But, it’s similar to our trip in March, so they’d be about the same.  

We knew we wanted to get out of the summer heat for our anniversary, and we succeeded.  On Sunday, July 7^th we headed over to our new favorite getaway town, Cayucos.  We stayed in Space number 7 this time.  Space number 9 last time.  What we didn’t foresee was another, different, health issue that mostly grounded me—again.   

As we left the Fresno area heading toward the coast, it was exhilarating to watch the temperature slowly climbing as we crossed the San Joaquin Valley into Avenal and Cholame, and then started dropping.  Late morning temps were in the high 90s° F headed to a high in Fresno of 113°.  In Cholame it was 101°, but by the time we got to Paso Robles, it had dropped to the mid-90s again.   

The trailer was looking a little dirty, so we found Golden Hill Self Wash in Paso Robles, and were able to wash off the storage yard dirt.  Kari was much happier.  The spray from the wash was like an outdoor swamp cooler.  It felt refreshing.  

Heading west on SR-46 out of “Paso,” toward SR-1, it was fun counting down the temperature as it dropped the further we went.  We stopped in a large dirt turnout a few miles short of SR-1 and enjoyed lunch in cool weather and a distant ocean view.  

Arriving in Cayucos, there was a nice Marine Layer, and it was 63°, substantially lower than what we set our air conditioner at home.   It was heaven.  The whole week was just the same.  We kept an eye on the Fresno temperature, and just smiled at each other.  

As we were preparing to come here for our March trip, I dropped a heavy hard plastic box on my right foot, with a corner striking the top center of my foot.  It was excruciating, I could barely walk, and it was restricting the first few days during our visit.  I felt terrible not being able join Kari walking around town.  It slowly got better, yet still hurt for weeks.  

After returning from the March trip, we had several projects we wanted to complete before the summer weather hit.  The finished removal of the aforementioned orange tree from hell was one of them.  Up and down a ladder, twisting around to hang new curtain rods and curtains, older plants dug up and removed, replacement plants put in, and finishing touches on repairing the heavy front water fountain.  Finally, adding an awkward to install shelf over the bed in the trailer.      

I freely admit the obvious, I’m not in shape anymore—except maybe the shape of plump.  During all those projects, I beat myself up pretty badly for things I once was able to do much easier.  And frankly, I probably should still be able to do them without the damage I caused my body.  I felt like I strained or pulled muscles, ligaments, and everything else in my legs.  Knees, which my doctor had previously shared suffer unfixable damage with age, hurt so much I could barely walk.  

And somewhere, somehow, for the first time in my life I pulled a hamstring in my right leg.  Hopefully it’s the only time.  My gosh it was painful.  I communicated my woes with my primary physician via the handy app, and he confirmed my suspicions.  He told me to continue to stay off my feet and keep cold compresses on it.  The hamstring slowly got better as expected.  Not so much the knees, especially my right knee.  On this trip, sadly I was once again severely limited to walking distances.  (I am going in for a consultation with my physician soon.)

The trip continues.   

I was able to walk around town a little bit.  Twice we walked to Bijou Bakery for breakfast.  They have a great seating area under a large canopy.  The bacon quiche and pastries were delicious.   

Spending several days in the coastal climate is always a reminder for me about growing up in similar climates.  We really enjoyed our time, reading, relaxing, and Kari taking Parfait on long walks around town.  As she walked, she noticed several properties for sale.  That led to wondering how outrageous the real estate market is in Cayucos—and it is—to realizing once again, the only way we could move to a place like this is to win the lottery.  Kari purchased tickets, knowing that with any winnings we have already agreed to give have the net to our church.  We’ll be staying in Clovis. Our church is getting an extra dollar this year. 

Our time in Cayucos briefly overlapped with Fresno friends.  On our second to the last night, we had dinner at one of our favorite restaurants, Luanda Garden Bistro.  We dined in a recessed garden patio with Fresno friends Chris and Bill Trollinger and former Fresnan Sharon Van Loon who is now a local in the area near Cayucos.  On our final night, we joined those three again at a home next to our RV park rented by Fresno friends Tina and Gary Kinsey, who were hosting a traditional taco night for their large family gathering.  It was crazy, delicious, and very fun.    

We broke camp the next day and headed south to Ventura, stopping for lunch in a dirt pullout along US-101 north of Santa Barbara for an ocean view trailer lunch.  

We noted how trashy the highway is thanks to discourteous people tossing their litter out.  By coincidence, as we ended our lunch, a CalTrans team showed up and started cleaning the area.  Some heroes wear orange.  

Ventura County’s Hobson Beach Campground was our destination for three nights. 

There really isn’t a view of the Pacific Ocean from the campground site due to the protective rock wall, yet the sounds of the ocean are constant.  I was a bit worried it would be noisy at night because there were so many children running around during the day, but at 10 pm, the only sounds were the ocean.  The campground also has a snack bar with good food, and the showers clean.  

On Tuesday, July 16, our 36^th wedding anniversary, our first full day in Ventura was fulfilling the primary need to dos, first, visiting the grave of my parents.  

Stepping back to November 16, 2023, I mentioned in a prior post I was in Ventura for my aunt’s funeral, who is buried a short dis from my parents.  After her service, I went into the office to inquire about my parent’s grave.  Their flower vase was originally donated by the Ventura South Rotary Club.  The base is basically two pieces.  One is a tube that is permanently installed in the ground, and the other piece was smaller in diameter.  One way in the hole, and there's a metal cover for the hole.  Pull it out, flip it over and put it back in, and boom, flower vase.  It was always off center and at a different distance from the headstone as compared to others.  It’s always hard to find, and it never seems the groundskeepers flipped the lid back up to cover the hole.  I have measurements and photos from prior visits to help, but we usually have to dig around stabbing the ground at an angle with a long screwdriver to find the edge of the tube because without the top in its proper place, grass fills it up.  So my office visit in November 2023 resulted in submitting a work order to have the vase checked and moved.  There was an understanding that I might need pay for a replacement, but they would contact me if there was an issue.  I never heard anything, so my presumption all was well.   

This visit, no matter what we did, we couldn’t find the vase at all.  Over twenty years, and this was a first.  Not wanting look weird, but the two of us were kneeling over a gravesite, one with a hand trowel and the other with a long long screwdriver, stabbing away probably looked rather odd to someone paying attention to us.  I was beyond frustrated that I couldn’t find it.  Kari kept checking while I drove to the office and waited for them to finish with another client.   I shared the situation about the vase, when I was there in November, the work order I wrote out and handed in to them personally, and our current frustrations.  There was keyboard typing, file cabinet checking, and hushed conversations off to the side. 

The resulting report was, they had no record of the work order I had submitted.   Yet, for a fee of $25, they would locate the vase by the end of the day, but recommended in the future to call in advance and pay the fee and they would locate it beforehand.  Not knowing Kari’s progress, I declined their offer for today and left the office.   

Kari hadn’t had any luck, so I went with Plan B.  I dug a small hole with the trowel, stuck the flowers directly in the ground, added water and compacted the dirt around them.  

I’ll call in advance next time.   

Consolation came in the form of required delicious corn burritos from Foster Freeze.  I’ve talked about them before, and I’ll talk about them in the future.  But that’s enough for today.   

The final stop before heading back to the trailer was a stop at McConnell's Fine Ice Cream on Main St.  Barbara Streisand had mentioned it in her book, especially the coffee flavored ice cream.  Kari bought a selection, and they were all good, especially the coffee.  I saved it for home in Clovis, and topped it with something my mother did, chocolate syrup with a topping made of crushed cornflakes and peanuts mixed with melted brown sugar and butter. Yum!

Our anniversary dinner was a grilled steak, small red potatoes that were mashed, and salad.  Simple and delicious.  I only wish I left my nicer shirt on before taking our anniversary selfie photo.  I'm still crazy in love with this woman.  I'm a blessed man.  

Wednesday, July 17^th was live person visitation day. The morning started with a visit to our campsite by former Buena High School classmate Tim Hoctor.  When we head into Ventura, Tim is one of the folks we always wonder how he’s doing.  I’ve always really liked Tim, but in all honesty, Tim and I weren’t the closest of buddies.  We attended different Junior High schools so we didn’t have that bond.  At Buena, we had classes together, hung with the same common folks, and attended the same parties and events. 

Tim, as a career realtor, was really helpful after my father died when we were preparing to move my mom to Fresno and sell their Ventura home.  Since I was working in the Bay Area at the time, Tim would occasionally stop by and see my bedridden mom as we were getting the house ready for market.  Later, Tim shared that he always enjoyed talking with my mom (just that makes one feel good), but added something she shared with him.  I think it was the last visit with my mom, and Tim asked her if there was anything else he could do for her.  She said, he could go outside and smell the grass for her.  Tim said it was an emotional moment.  We had a great chat getting caught up with each other’s lives, mutual friends, and travel adventures.  

In the afternoon, my cousin Bill Stone and his wife Shelly hosted us at their home.  Kari had never met them, and it was really nice getting caught up and sharing with them.  They included their current desire to move to Oklahoma so they could be closer to their daughters and grandchildren.  They surprised me with a photo album that had a lot of photos of my father when he was younger, many during World War II.  I’m going to enjoy going through it and exploring some of my father’s past that he didn’t like to talk about, something not unusual for many WWII veterans. 

On July 18^th, we headed home, back to the heat.  It was our first trip over the Grapevine with our little rig.  It performed very well.  Lunch was parked at the Taco Bell in Wheeler Ridge so Kari could run next door to In-N-Out to pick up burgers. 

The only incident, or close call, was north of Bakersfield on SR-99 approaching Merced Rd off-ramp.  Some people just gotta drive like idiots.  Enjoy the video.