My Life With Comic Books: A History of A Comic Shop Part # 217

 

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over forty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 49

Mal Howley: age 50

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 20

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #217

   The day after Mal’s father’s funeral, we left early in the morning to begin the very long drive from Massachusetts back to Florida. We were traveling about seventy miles per hour along a highway in rural Connecticut when we were passed by five young men on motorcycles. They must have been going at least ninety miles per hour.  Mal and I looked at each other and thought, “Crazy kids.”

   As the group of motorcycle-rider guys picked up speed and pulled further ahead of us, we saw one of the riders hit something  in the road (like a small rock) and he lost control of the bike. His helmet flew off his head (we had noticed as he had passed us that the helmet was unstrapped) as the motorcycle flipped over and over and his body slammed against the wire guardrail along the left side of the highway.

   I pulled my car over to the right side breakdown lane, asked Mal to call the police to notify them about the accident, and to give them the mile-marker number that I saw posted on the highway. I got out of my vehicle and ran across the mostly deserted highway to the accident victim.  The rider was sitting upright on the road with his leather jacket shifted over his head and his motorcycle was shattered into pieces about fifty feet away. I couldn’t tell if he was alive but I noticed a pool of blood growing on the ground around him. I spoke to him, knowing he most likely couldn’t respond and told him help was on the way.

   The victim’s friends hadn’t noticed that he wasn’t still riding behind them as they sped down the highway but by the time the police arrived, one of his friends had returned to the scene. When he saw the large pool of blood on the ground he freaked out. I tried to get him to be quiet, just in case his friend was still alive.

   The police officer had already called an ambulance but before it arrived, he tried to remove the motorcyclist’s leather jacket. When he did, the front of the rider’s skull fell off. Clearly, he wasn’t alive.

   I stayed there with them until the ambulance arrived. Since there was nothing I could do to help anyone, I returned to my car and we continued our long ride home. Mal and I both talked about how sad this was. The young man probably left his home thinking he was going to have a fun day of riding with his friends. We thought about his parents and the notification by the police about their son’s death that they’d soon get. As I write this story, eighteen years later, I still think about this tragedy.

Next chapter: The Wedding

  

My Life With Comic Books: A History Of A Comic Shop Part # 216

 

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over forty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 49

Mal Howley: age 50

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 20

Richard A. Daher: Mal’s father: age 78

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #216

   In 2003, while we were living in Florida, we learned that Mal’s father had another stroke. Richard had some health issues over the years starting with his first heart attack at age 48. He was a heavy smoker most of his life. He had a stroke that changed his emotional response so that he’d cry when he meant to laugh; but overall, he was a strong physical man. He lived with his wife , Helen, in central Florida, about two hours away from us. Mal’s oldest sister, Ginny, and her husband Denis, lived very close to them.

   Mal and I packed some clothes and drove across the state to the hospital in the town of Celebration, Florida. Richard had been admitted to the Advent Health Celebration Hospital and we were very impressed by the doctors, nurses, and staff there. The hospital (and the entire town!) was planned and designed by The Walt Disney Company in the 1990s to be close the original Walt Disney idea of Epcot (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow). This state-of-the-art hospital facility was beautiful to look at and every staff member we encountered was friendly, professional and helpful. Most importantly, the doctors and nurses seemed to actually care about the patients. In fact, it was not uncommon to find doctors and nurses praying for their patients. I appreciated that since most of my interactions with doctors tended to be negative experiences.

   Our visit with Richard was short. The stroke had severely affected his ability to speak and he had lost the use of one side of his body. He also had a feeding tube down his throat that made speaking a struggle. We knew he needed to rest so we headed to Ginny and Denis’ home.

   Ginny’s home had a bedroom for guests and they graciously offered to let us stay with them. We all had no idea how long Richard was going to be hospitalized so we’d all try to make the best of the situation.

   The next day when we went to visit him, Mal and I were surprised to run into a man we knew from Massachusetts named Stacy Nelson. He used to service our swimming pool back in the 1980s although he had a Master’s degree in nutrition and health. He had moved to Celebration, Florida when his application for residency in the community was accepted. Stacy recognized us too and he spent some time reassuring us that there was no better hospital for Richard to be in.

   Mal’s sister Rose also lived nearby and we would all gather at the hospital once she, Ginny and Denis got out of work each day. Over the next few days, Mal’s other siblings arrived from Massachusetts (Madeline and Richard Jr.), North Carolina (Alan), and Georgia (Carol and her husband Mike). Over the next few weeks there were lots of visitors at the hospital. Even though it was sad to see Richard lying in the bed with a feeding tube down his throat, struggling to communicate, I think he appreciated everyone being there. The stroke affected the muscles of his throat and he had great difficulty swallowing. Eventually, at Richard’s insistence,  the hospital removed the feeding tube and put a line directly into his stomach for feeding. This allowed him to respond to family and friends a little bit better.

   Mal and I had to go back home to Jupiter several times to take care of some things like paying monthly bills since we didn’t know how long Richard was going to be hospitalized. As it turned out, after a little over four weeks, Richard A. Daher died in the hospital on September 13, 2003 with many of his family members at his side.

   Richard’s funeral was to be held in Saint Michael’s Catholic Church in Hudson, Massachusetts where he had lived for a long time. The whole family gathered the night before the service at Mal’s sister Madeline’s home and they all contributed information and anecdotes about Richard in order to create a eulogy. Mal’s younger brother Alan volunteered to present it at the church and he did a great job. As the funeral service neared the end, the priest was waving the containers of burning incense around Richard’s casket, nearly choking those closest to it with the smoke and stench. Denis leaned over to Helen and said, “Richard got to smoke one last time.”

   After the church service we went to the cemetery and Richard was buried with his wife Madeline. Later that evening we all gathered at Mal’s sister Madeline’s home again and we shared thoughts and stories about Richard. Losing such an important family member made us realize that we should try to make plans for a regular family get-together while we were all still alive and healthy. Early the next morning Mal and I said goodbye and began the long, 26 hour drive home to Florida. 

 

My Life With Comic Books: A History Of A Comic Shop: Part # 215

 

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over forty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 49

Mal Howley: age 50

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 20

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #215

   While we were getting ready for Cassandra’s wedding to Matt, our stores were busy with an interesting event for our customers. Someone, (I don’t remember exactly who it was) was a big fan of the popular newspaper comic strip titled, “Mutts” written and created by Patrick McDonnell. It was a gentle, humorous comic strip about animals, primarily dogs. Our major local newspaper, “The Worcester Telegram”, ran this comic strip in the newspaper as a black and white daily strip and a full-color Sunday strip.

   Patrick didn’t do store appearances often, but Ken (the company manager) contacted the local Animal Rescue League and asked if they’d be interested in being part of an in-store appearance. Once they agreed, the idea of the appearance was presented to Patrick and he agreed to come. He would bring copies of the Mutts book collections that had been released in paperback versions for customers to buy. We also got commitments from local artists Jennifer Lopez of “BizToons” and Suzanne Thibodeau-Gale of “Dear Diary: A Middle School Memoir” and “Dear Diary: The High School Years” to appear.

   We figured that the “Worcester Telegram” would be interested in helping us promote the appearance since they ran the comic strip and they didn’t disappoint us! They did an very nice two-page article about Patrick’s appearance and it was published a few days before the event. The mayor of the city of Worcester declared the day of the appearance, Sunday, July 11, 2004, to be “Mutts Day.”

   When the day arrived, we were happy with the crowd of people who came to meet Patrick. He sold some books and some of the attendees even adopted pets! It was another fun day for everyone!

Next Chapter: I go “back in time” to tell a sad story.

 

 

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty nine years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

 

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 49

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 19

 

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #214

 

   We returned to Florida after spending several months in New Hampshire. Cassandra went back to college and a couple of weeks later, our houseguests began to visit. Scott and Stephanie Goddard, friends from New Hampshire, were our first guests, followed by Mal’s brother Richard and his wife Diane, and their son Keith and his wife Stephanie.

   In February, when it came time for the Super Bowl football game that year, our friends, Allan and Pascale Traylor came to spend some time with us. Then, two weeks later, April and Rick Stephens (friends from New Hampshire) came for two weeks. When they left, Jim and Barbara Foote (more friends from New Hampshire) arrived. In early March, more friends from New Hampshire, Mike and Liz Verhoeks, came for a week. While they were staying with us, Mike’s parents, Lloyd and Jeannine, joined us for some fun. This was followed by a visit with Russ and Jeanne Sample and then, a week later, we had Mal’s cousin Angelia and Mal’s sister Rose stay with us!

   During the time we spent with our guests, we were also working on details for Cassandra’s upcoming wedding. It was a bit more difficult than it could have been because we were living about 1000 miles away from where she wanted the ceremony to take place. Thankfully, for me, Cassandra and Mal had everything under control.

   It was around this time that our good friends from New Hampshire, Barbara and Jim Foote, came to stay with us for a week. While they were here they asked if we would want to buy tickets for a fundraising dinner to be held at The Winnipesaukee Expo Center on May 22, 2004. We had planned to leave Florida as soon as Cassandra was done with college that year to finish the wedding plans up there so we knew we’d be in New Hampshire at that time. It was $100.00 per couple and it included dinner, dancing, and there would be the potential to win some cash prizes. Even though the price was high, several of our friends would be going so we agreed to go.

   Cassandra finished up her sophomore year in college and we packed up the Florida house and got ready for our trip back to New Hampshire for the summer. One big problem was that now that our dear family friend Mary had moved back up to New York, we had no one to watch our Florida home while we were gone. Thankfully, we were able to ask Mary’s former Florida boyfriend, Alex, if he’d stay in our guest house. He accepted, so we were headed out.

   About a week after we got to New Hampshire, we went to the big fundraiser event with my sister Sharon and her husband Greg, and our friends, Mike and Liz, Eric and Linda, and Barbara and Jim. Each couple who attended was assigned a number for the cash door prizes. The organizers of the event put each couple’s number on the wall near the dance floor and at various times during the evening they’d pull a numbered ball out of a container. If your number was pulled, you would be eliminated from the competition for the cash prizes unless you were in the final fourteen couples. There were several $25.00 prizes, some $50.00 prizes, two $100.00 prizes, a $250.00 prize, a $500.00 prize, a $1000.00 prize, and a $10,000.00 prize. While we all enjoyed the good food (excellent tortellini!) Sharon and Greg’s number was pulled. They were eliminated. Then Eric and Linda and Mike and Liz were eliminated. After dinner, they hung around for a while and then went home. Barbara and Jim stayed with us and at one point I noticed that there were only about thirty numbers left on the wall. I suggested that we go over to the dance floor to be closer to the action as the night was drawing to a close. Unfortunately, Barbara and Jim’s number was pulled right before the first cash prize. I was excited because now I was guaranteed to get some money back!

   The $25.00 prizes were won. Then, the $50.00 and $100.00 prizes were won. This is going to be great! We had a fun night with friends, the food was very good (did I mention the tortellini?), and we were going to win at least $250.00! The $250.00 prize was won. Then the $500.00 prize was given away. Mal and I and one other couple were left on the dance floor excitedly waiting to see what happened next. Someone was going to win $1000.00 and the final winner was going home with the $10,000.00 prize!

   Before they drew the final winning number, I quickly spoke with Mal and then we offered to split the total prize money with the remaining couple. So, instead of one couple getting $1000.00 and the other couple getting $10,000.00, we would each end up with $5500.00. This seemed like a perfect plan to me but the other couple wanted to try to get the big $10,000.00 prize for themselves.

   The suspense was killing us, but when they finally pulled the next number, the other couple ended up with the $1000.00 and we won the grand prize of $10,000.00! With a wedding coming up, we could really put some of this money to good use.

   PS. I had never won anything of significance before!

My Life With Comic Books Part # 213

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.



The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 49

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 19



MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #213



   While Mal and I settled into life in south Florida, our daughter was very busy and involved in activities during her first year at Palm Beach Atlantic University. She made a lot of new friends through sports, academics, and the theatre program. She also went out with some college guys. It wasn’t long before she began dating Matt. Their relationship became serious very quickly and Cassandra believed that he might be “The One.” Mal and I liked him and even though they were both very young, we certainly couldn’t discourage Cassandra from following her heart, since Mal and I were also very young when we got married. Matt was taking classes in college to prepare him for a life as a pastor/evangelist and Cassandra thought she could use her talents of acting and singing to partner with him. It seemed like a good match.

   Cassandra had joined the college cheerleading squad. Although they did do the cheerleading at the basketball games, the squad was mostly a stunt squad consisting of men and women. There were lots of very scary-looking tosses of the smaller women, especially Cassandra. One night, we got an urgent phone call from one of Cassandra’s teammates explaining that Cassy fell during one stunt and she thought she might have broken her back! We rushed down to the college and brought her to the hospital and it was determined that her back was NOT broken.

Mal and I attended most of the basketball games, primarily to see Cassandra cheer. We even got to see the squad perform in Disney World during the college tournament.

   Our steady stream of houseguests continued with lots of friends and family visiting us for some memorable, fun times together including Mal’s sister Madeline, her husband Armand, and their four children.

   Near the end of the school year, Cassandra asked if her fiancé Matt could spend the summer with us in New Hampshire. We had a small extra bedroom in our little Alton Bay home that would work out nicely for Matt and we were looking forward to getting to know him better. Our friend, Russ Sample, gave Matt a job working on his landscaping crew so Matt could start saving money for wedding expenses.

   As summer drew near, we started thinking about leaving our home in Florida to return to Alton Bay, New Hampshire for the summer. It’d be great to be with our fun group of friends up there, but it was unsettling leaving our Florida home empty for three months!

   We were surprised when we got an email from Mary, one of Adam’s close friends, asking if she could spend some time in Florida to get away from city-life and “decompress.” We considered Mary to be part of our extended family and we knew she was honest and trustworthy. We were thrilled that she would keep an eye on our Florida property and it could help her out at the same time so we agreed to have her stay in our guest house for three or four months.

   While we were in New Hampshire, Mary got involved in a church in the area. After some training/counseling she used her theatre background and created a Christmas musical program for the teenagers in the church to perform. She wrote, directed, choreographed and even made the costumes herself.

   Mal, Cassandra, Matt and I spent lots of time during the summer doing preliminary planning for the wedding. Mal and Cassandra did most of the work but Matt and I helped make the hand-crafted wedding invitations by cutting out some of the more than twenty different parts. The wedding was going to be in July of 2004 so there was plenty of time to get things done without any rushing or panicking. We were all hoping for a peaceful and fun planning process. Cassandra and Matt (mostly Cassandra) knew exactly how they wanted each detail of the wedding day. Since the wedding was going to be in New Hampshire and Cassandra and Matt were headed back to Florida to begin their sophomore year of college, there were several important parts of the wedding that needed to be settled before we all returned to Florida. They found a church in Laconia, NH and the reception would be held at a hotel in Manchester, NH. The only problem was that it was also the same weekend as the big Nascar race in Loudon, NH and there were very few available hotel rooms in a fifty-mile radius. The limited number of rooms available were also very high-priced…some were double the “normal” price just because of the demand. Many of Cassandra and Matt’s college friends, and almost all of Matt’s family would be coming from hundreds of miles away and they’d need hotel rooms! We were able to convince the hotel where the reception was to be held to secure twenty rooms for us for a slightly less crazy price.

   We returned to Florida in mid-August so that Cassandra could be involved with the “Welcome Week” activities at her college. We had about a week before houseguests arrived again!

My Life With Comic Books: Part # 212

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 49

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 18

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #212: We Meet Some Friends!

   I had been buying and selling things on eBay for a few years at this point. I really enjoyed the entire process of finding an interesting item, listing it on eBay, and finding a buyer who was excited to own the item. EBay is a lot of work and it’s sometimes difficult to end up with successful transactions but I do it all anyway. I had listed a fairly rare set of The Man From Uncle paperback books that came with the original cardboard slipcase that had illustrations on the sides of the characters from the TV show. When the auction was over, I noticed that it sold to a collector in Wellington, Florida. Wellington was about 30 minutes away from our new home in Jupiter, Florida. Before I could pack up the books, the buyer asked if he could pick up the books in-person to save the shipping expense. We agreed to meet halfway in the parking lot of City Furniture in West Palm Beach. Mal and I figured we could look for the much-needed furniture while we were there.

   When we got to the parking lot, we met Ric and Liz. Ric was a serious collector of James Bond and The Man From Uncle memorabilia. Liz was a talented seamstress. We chatted about our mutual interests (I’m a big-time collector of The Man From Uncle stuff!) and enjoyed meeting them both. We exchanged contact information with each other and suggested that we plan to get together for dinner soon. Within a week or so, we arranged to meet up at a restaurant to get to know each other a bit more. Over the next several years, we usually got together with Rick and Liz at least once a week. It was nice to have friends in the area.

   I must admit, it’s not like we didn’t have lots of things going on to keep us busy. We had set up our “guest house” to include two queen-sized beds in the bedroom, a pull-out sofa bed in the living room, a dining room, full kitchen, and a full laundry room. We moved into our Florida home in early August and by September 19^th we were already welcoming our first houseguests. Friends from New Hampshire, (The Bassett family), who’s daughter Jocelyn went to college here, came to south Florida for Parent’s Weekend at Palm Beach Atlantic University. They stayed for four days. Three weeks later, my parents drove across the state from Bradenton, Florida and they stayed with us for a week. The day after they went home, Mal’s sister Ginny and her husband Denis came for a visit for several days. Two weeks later, we had a family we barely knew come to our home for a week-long vacation. We had no more guests until after Christmas that year because we flew back to New Hampshire to celebrate the holiday with family and friends. Shortly after we returned home to Florida, Mal’s sister Carol and her husband Mike, and their three children, came for a week-long visit. On February 13^th, Barb and Jim Foote, our friends from New Hampshire, came to spend a week with us. The day after they left, my sister Sharon and her friend Ellen (and her son Kory) came for a few days. When they left, our friends Paula and Phil came for a weekend visit. One of our daughter’s college roommates (Jamie) called and asked if her mother, Sue, could stay with us for a week while she visited her. While Sue was here, Jamie and several of her friends stayed in the guest house too. A week later, two good friends from our time in New Hampshire, Mike and Liz Verhoeks, came for a week.

   The guest house was convenient for our guests and for us. It allowed our guests to enjoy their own space and we were told that the time spent there was quite relaxing. We enjoyed showing many of our guests around the area, especially West Palm Beach’s interesting shopping/restaurant district called City Place, Jupiter Beach, and many of our friends also wanted to visit Disney World. Mal and I bought annual passes for Walt Disney World because, for Florida residents, it was only $235.00 per person and that included the parking fees. We lived about two hours away from Orlando and it was an easy trip. We went to Disney World fifteen or twenty times the first year we lived in Florida!

   In the middle of the month of April, Rick and April Stephens, two more friends from New Hampshire came for a visit. We picked them up at the airport in West Palm Beach and went directly to a local restaurant called “Schooners” that specialized in local seafood and had a definite south Florida feel to it. We enjoyed a nice week of relaxing times at the beach, lounging around our pool, and playing boardgames. At the end of the week, they borrowed one of our cars and explored the west coast of Florida. They were considering buying a second home over near Naples, Florida because they had heard so many nice things about the western side of Florida from friends. After spending several days on the west coast they decided to look at homes in the Jupiter, Florida area. Of course, we would have loved it if they would end up living near us!

   Two days after Rick and April went back home to New Hampshire, my parents came for another visit. We took them out on a fun casino boat out of West Palm Beach and we attended a play that Cassandra was in at her college.

   Cassandra was enjoying a busy first year of college. She studied hard, enjoyed some club sports, was a competitive cheerleader, participated in the theatre productions, and she still found the time to date. In the middle of her freshman year of college, she began dating Matt, also a freshman from western Florida. Our lives were about to change again!

   Pictures: Our little guest house!

My Life With Comic Books: A History of a Comic Shop Part # 211

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 49

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 18

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #211:  Is This The New Normal?

   We were now living in a new place where we basically didn’t know anyone. We tried to meet people at common areas like grocery stores, shopping malls, churches, etc. The people we met would ask, “What brought you to Florida?” We’d reply, “We followed our daughter down here while she attends college.” Usually, they’d follow-up with something along the lines of, “Oh, do you have any other children?” I’d quickly glance at Mal to determine if I should say that “We HAD two children but one died in a car accident?” The problem with this is that it usually evokes a sadness and pity from the person you just told and that makes things awkward very quickly. If we say, “No, we only have one child” it lessens the importance of Adam as an integral part of our family. If I sensed that we weren’t trying to establish an ongoing relationship with this person, I’d frequently opt for not mentioning our son. I always felt terrible doing this but I didn’t want to upset these people.

   Here are other things that were now part of our new “normal”…

   Not sleeping very well because a hundred “what ifs” and “why didn’t I’s” go through your head.

   Reliving that day continuously.

   Having the TV on the minute we wake up to have noise because sometimes the silence could be overwhelming.

   The difficulty of deciding how to honor Adam’s memory, his birthday, and the anniversary of his death and just try to survive these days. Mother’s Day and Father’s Day are sad too.

   Seeing so many of Adam’s friends growing, maturing and entering exciting new phases of their lives like marriage and kids and wondering what Adam would be like now. Then, realizing that it doesn’t matter.

   The new normal is disliking bodies being referred to as cadavers when you know they were once someone’s loved one.

   The new normal is having people afraid to mention Adam. It’s also making sure that others remember him.

   Normal is how almost every happy event in our lives now has a sadness because Adam isn’t here.

   Normal is now wanting to plead with parents to stop screaming at their kids.  

   Normal is having difficulty listening to people compare anything in their life to our loss unless they have lost a child. Even if your child is thousands of miles away from you, it doesn’t compare.

   The new normal is now being able to relate to other grieving parents, crying and talking together over our lost kids and our new lives without them.

   I know that everyone in this life has awful stuff they’re trying to live with and I do try to be sympathetic because for them, whatever situation they’re going through may be the worst thing they’ve ever experienced.

   These are some of the things we were dealing with back in 2002 and many of them still apply today (fifteen years later!).

   Eventually, we met some very special people who became great friends...(more on that soon.)

Next chapter: Florida weather.

  

My Life With Comic Books Part # 210

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 49

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 18

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #210

   Now that we were living in Florida, we were trying to enjoy the vibrant lifestyle of South Florida. We visited the ocean beaches that were close by and went to some weekend festivals held around the eastern part of Florida. We didn’t know very many people here and any “new” people that we did meet were usually sales clerks at furniture stores while we attempted to furnish our new home. We missed our close friends from New Hampshire and Massachusetts and it was difficult to get to know “new” people since we didn’t work at normal jobs and we were no longer involved in our kid’s school. While neither of us is shy, it’s hard to connect with strangers without having something in common. We hadn’t found a church to get involved with yet although we went to several church services in the area. It was basically just Mal and I, together all the time.

   Our home was very conveniently located and I could walk to a nearby shopping plaza that had a video rental store (remember those?), a grocery store, a bank, a few restaurants, a horse supply store (our neighborhood was an equestrian neighborhood) and a mobile Post Office truck. One evening, Mal mentioned that she was in the mood for an ice cream sundae from the nearby McDonald’s so I walked over there to buy one for her. When I got there I noticed there was a large display of classic cars participating in a Cruise-In Car show. Before I ordered Mal’s ice cream, I walked around looking at these interesting cars from the 1950s and 1960s. I had a fun time talking with the car owners and I kind of lost track of the time. I didn’t have a cellphone back then, ( I didn’t think we needed TWO cellphones since Mal and I were almost always together ) so Mal had no way to contact me while I was at the car show. Once I realized I had been gone for far too long, I bought the ice cream and walked quickly home. I found Mal crying and shaking. She assumed something awful had happened to me. My absence brought back terrible memories and thoughts about Adam’s accident for her. It was inconsiderate of me to spend so much time there when she was expecting me to be back home with her ice cream within a few minutes.

Next chapter: The new “normal”

  

My Life With Comic Books: Part # 209

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 49

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 18

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #209

   We were all packed up and ready to begin our trip to move into our newly purchased home in Florida. My sister Sharon and her youngest son Jake drove our Toyota Camry packed with stuff and Cassandra, Mal and I rode in Cassy’s Toyota Highlander packed with more stuff. We left our other car parked at our Alton Bay, New Hampshire home. We’d somehow get it down to Florida some other time. We didn’t all own cell-phones at that time and those who did have them were on restrictive monthly plans with limited minutes available. So, I bought a set of Motorola Walkie-Talkies so we could communicate between the two cars. We stopped for the night after we had driven about ten hours.

   The next day we had a total of fourteen hours to go before we reached our new home. I remember how excited I was as we left Georgia and entered Florida. It was the beginning of a new chapter of our lives. A new place and new people.

   The long ride went smoothly but it was getting dark by the time we arrived in Jupiter, Florida. We had no furniture or beds so we went to a local Wal-Mart and bought some sheets and towels and all just slept on air-mattresses on the floor. Our furniture and household items were scheduled to be delivered by the moving company sometime the next day.

   The next morning, we got a call from the moving company. The driver would be arriving at our property early that day. I explained to him that there was no way he’d be able to drive into our property in a forty-foot long tractor trailer truck so he’d need to park on the road and carry everything about fifty feet to our home. He told me that he only had his fifteen-year-old nephew with him to help carry our stuff. I expressed my “displeasure” with his unprofessional planning and urged him to somehow find additional help. My contract with the moving company did not require ME to help unload the truck. A couple of hours later he arrived with some “day laborers” that he found from a nearby prison program. These two guys worked very hard on a very hot and humid summer day in South Florida and I was pretty upset when I found out that the moving company driver was only paying them each twenty dollars for their hard work! (When the work was done I gave them each fifty dollars and apologized to them for the terrible treatment by the moving company driver.)

   Around noon, our elderly neighbor, Anne, came by to meet us and she generously brought us pizzas, soda, paper towels, toilet paper and more! What a thoughtful lady!

   We spent several days unpacking our stuff but we really didn’t have much furniture….just a couch, some chairs, a huge desk, and a few other small pieces. My sister was a big help because she kept urging us to keep working. We did take some short breaks to go to the ocean beach that was only six miles from our new home. Swimming in the ocean in South Florida was very different than swimming in the ocean in New England. Instead of freezing-cold ocean water, the temperature of the water at this beach was in the mid-80s! On one of these visits to the Jupiter Beach, my daughter Cassandra and her cousin Jake asked a lifeguard if there were sharks in the water. He laughed and said, “Of course there’s sharks! This is where they live!” It didn’t stop us from enjoying the beautiful ocean though!

   After Sharon and Jake flew back home to New Hampshire, Cassandra started her first year of college at Palm Beach Atlantic University. She immediately immersed herself into the many activities available at the school along with her college courses and theatre productions. She joined the competitive college cheerleading squad and spent hours each week practicing. On the other hand, other than shopping for furniture, Mal and I had very little to keep us busy. We really only knew Anne (the nice lady across the street) but she rarely came out of her home.

   We spent some time each week shopping for furniture and other stuff we wanted for this home. We had three bedrooms, a family room, and a dining room in our “main” house to furnish and the guest house needed furniture for the bedroom, dining room and family room. We also needed pool furniture and a table and chairs for the outside area of the covered patio. But, as those of you who really know me will understand, I was more concerned with buying televisions for the house and getting our cable hooked up. Adelphia Cable (the now out-of-business cable company) couldn’t get our cable turned on for a couple of weeks and we had to have a TV available for them to establish the connection. We went to Circuit City (the now out-of-business electronics store) and inquired about the new JVC “flat screen” television. This TV was one of the first televisions to change from the rounded tubes to a flat screen. It was still a cathode-ray television and it was huge. I asked the sales clerk how much the TV weighed and he estimated that it weighed about 100 pounds. I bought the TV and the clerk said he’d bring it out to the front of the store while I went to get my Toyota Camry. When I pulled up to the front of the store it was clear that the box was far too big to fit in the car so we unpacked the TV and with the clerks help we struggled to fit it into the back seat. Mal had to get in the back seat and push down on the seat so the TV would just barely fit. The TV weighed about 200 pounds. We carefully drove home with the TV in the back but when we arrived home we found that we couldn’t safely get the huge, heavy television out of the car. It was too heavy and awkwardly sized for me to carry alone and Mal couldn’t help carry it. Eventually, we moved a plastic storage bin next to the car and worked at sliding the TV out of the back seat onto the top of the bin. The problem was, we didn’t know anyone in the area that could help us move this heavy television. It sat in the garage, balanced on the top of the bin, for a couple of weeks until the cable-guy arrived. It’s a strange thing to know no one around you!

Picture: Sharks near the shore at the Jupiter, Florida beach!

                

  

My Life With Comic Books Part # 208

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 49

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 18

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #208

   The summer of 2002 went by far too fast as we were getting ready for our daughter to head off to college in West Palm Beach, Florida and we were preparing for our big move from New Hampshire to Jupiter, Florida. Our purchase of the home went quite smoothly as it was professionally handled by our real estate agent, Grace Noble.

   I arranged to have all of the utilities turned on as soon as the house in Florida was purchased by us because air conditioning needed to be kept on at all times, especially during the hot and humid Florida summer, so that no mold would develop inside the house. Along with hiring a local company to take care of the pool, we continued to contract with the previous owner’s landscaper to maintain the lawn and yard until we got down there later in the summer.

   Ken, the manager of my comic book and collectible stores, had everything under control so I had no fears about moving so far away. He could handle any problems that might arise and if he needed my input on anything, we’d try to resolve things by phone. Still, it was a big decision to move over 1400 miles away!

   All of our furniture and boxes of stuff were packed into a rented storage area waiting to be moved to Florida. I wanted to hire a professional company to move all of this stuff to our Florida home since it was such a long distance away from New Hampshire. I had seen advertisements for a moving company called “Ray’s Moving and Storage” and since they claimed that they specialized in moves from New Hampshire to Florida, I thought I’d get an estimate from them for the move. The company sent a representative to my storage area to work up the price for the move. While they measured the furniture and boxes, I mentioned that about a hundred of the boxes contained books and record albums. Lots of heavy items. A few days later they gave me the price quote and although it seemed like a lot of money, I agreed to hire them to move my stuff.

   We had a very special group of close friends in New Hampshire and moving away from them was going to be difficult and life-changing. These were people we truly loved and who loved us in return! Nearly every week, we spent three or four days a week with them. We played cards, we ate lots of food, we vacationed with them, we ate lots of food, we raised our kids together, and did I mention that we ate a lot of food? We planned to come back up to stay at our cottage in Alton Bay, New Hampshire each summer so we’d have at least two or three months each year with our group of friends. Even so, although we were excited to begin our new life in south Florida, we knew we’d miss them all. It was an emotional “goodbye.”

   Mal and I owned two cars; a Toyota Camry and a small Eclipse Spyder. Our daughter, Cassandra, owned a large Toyota Highlander. We needed to get all three cars down to our new home in Florida but we didn’t feel comfortable with the idea of either Mal or Cassandra driving a car alone. My sister Sharon, always up for something different, along with her youngest son Jake, offered to drive one of the cars to Florida. We decided to leave our Eclipse Spyder parked at our cottage in Alton Bay, NH and we’d try to figure out how to get it down to Florida sometime in the future. We packed the other two cars up with valuable collectibles and items that had important sentimental value and got ready to make the trip to Jupiter, Florida.

   Before we left, we got a phone call from the owner of Ray’s Moving Company. He explained that once his truck was fully loaded with our stuff, he found that weight was significantly higher than he had estimated and we’d now be charged an additional $1900.00. I questioned his professionalism and honesty because in my opinion, he should have done a better job in calculating the actual weight of all my boxes. He had full access to everything I owned in the storage area and it shouldn’t be my fault that he underestimated the weight. I told him I thought he deliberately underestimated the weight in order to give me a lower price for the move so I wouldn’t consider any of the other moving companies. He refused to honor the price quote he gave me and insinuated that if I wanted my stuff, I’d need to pay him the full amount he now demanded. I felt I had no choice but to pay him. He controlled the situation because he had possession of nearly everything I owned.

   With all of the details seemingly taken care of, we began the twenty-six hour drive to Florida.

   Epilog: A year later, while I was working as a volunteer at our Alton Bay neighborhood snack bar, the owner of Ray’s Moving Company came to buy a cheeseburger. After I cooked it for him I told him that I had originally estimated the price of the cheeseburger at $2.50 but for him, the price is $8.00. He didn’t understand my point but I got a chuckle out of it.

Next Chapter: The Florida Adventure Begins.

  

  

  

My Life With Comic Books Part # 207

A brief introduction:

My name is Paul Howley, owner of the Eisner Award winning pop culture collector’s store known as “That’s Entertainment” in Worcester, Massachusetts and a second store in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Some people have called me the “luckiest man in the comic book business.” (I’m not) My stores have been around for over thirty years and it’s been a long and interesting combination of events and people that have brought these stores to this current place. It is not my intent to boast or brag about my store or my life. I just want to tell you my story. In many instances, my wife remembers things a little differently, but this is the truth as I remember it.

The Current Cast of Characters:

Paul Howley: age 48

Mal Howley: age 48

Adam Howley: my son, age 21

Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 18

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP:  Part #207

   As our planned house-hunting time in south Florida was nearing its end, even though we had visited dozens of interesting homes, we hadn’t found a house that we were ready to buy. Mal and I carefully reviewed the listing information sheets of many of the homes one night and then, with no decision made, we went to sleep. The next morning, Mal told me that she had prayed for some insight and when she woke up she felt that she wanted to go back to see the property with the guest-house.

   Grace Noble, our real estate agent, dutifully took us back there. As we remembered, the house wasn’t very dynamic looking but it could meet our needs. It had a nice lot of nearly two and a half acres including lots of tropical south Florida vegetation that created a nice wall of privacy between the house and the neighboring homes. The completely screened-in swimming pool was a nice full-sized pool (not the usual small suburban Florida pools we had seen in our house hunting). The house was one of only five homes on a private unpaved road and it was conveniently located within walking distance to a shopping plaza that contained a grocery store, restaurants, a bank, a video rental store, a cell-phone store, and a full-service mobile Post Office van. At first, we were a bit concerned that this shopping plaza might be too close by but there were enough trees to completely block the plaza from view. The guest house was the biggest “negative” thing about the property for us. We certainly didn’t need this extra space and the property “asking price” reflected the inclusion of this guest-house.

   The owners had listed the home for sale at $529,000.00. The property had only been on the market for eleven days and the real estate market in south Florida was pretty strong at that time. We decided to make an offer of $464,300.00 for the property and we were actually shocked when the owners accepted our offer. The only contingency would be a satisfactory home inspection. Normally, I don’t hire home inspectors because I’m pretty good at spotting potential problems but since Florida is quite different from any other area I’ve lived in before, especially because of the potential for termite infestations, I hired a professional. The report came back indicating that things looked pretty good. We were feeling confident that this was the right property for us to buy.

   We had a couple of days left before had to drive back to New Hampshire and we had a lot of little details that needed to be completed to ensure that the home purchase would smoothly move forward. One issue was obtaining home-owner’s insurance. I assumed this would just take a quick phone call to a local insurance agent and I was surprised when I was informed that no insurance company would be interested in selling me insurance on the property because it was considered to be in a “hurricane-zone.”  The property was only six miles from the ocean, and even though there hadn’t been a hurricane in Jupiter, Florida in over forty years, the devastation of Hurricane Andrew in south Florida was still too much for insurance companies to overlook the possibility of another hurricane hitting Florida. We called our real estate agent and told her that we obviously couldn’t buy the property if we couldn’t get insurance on it. She called the sellers and they called their insurance company and convinced them to offer us an insurance policy on the home. Instead of the $500 per year that we were accustomed to pay for an annual insurance premium, this policy was over $6000 per year with an $8000 wind-related deductible! We wanted the property enough so we purchased the insurance and set everything in motion to buy the place. Grace would get everything taken care of and we could complete the transaction through the mail since we needed to get back to New Hampshire now.

   Next chapter: The summer seems short as we prepare to leave our amazing friends.