Hello Everyone.  I love doing research for my book on my father.  Since he was in show business in 1949, the newspaper people kept track of everything he and my mom did.  So I have lots of articles on their “doings”.  For instance, the following is a portion of an article from a California newspaper about their New Year’s Eve party 1949:

USHERED IN STYLE
Father Time stopped the clock at Norma and Eddie Green’s
when celebrities and socialites gathered there New Year’s Eve for one of the most exciting parties of the night. Among those who heralded the “baby ‘ with heaping plates of the ‘Good Luck” menu, were,  Hortense . . , all done up in beautiful black ‘after-five’ dresses; Mabel, who played the piano while Betty . . . .sang “A Little Bird”, with Ethel Gordon, who did her celebrating in a green satin crea- tion trimmed in rich brown fur; Paulette Coleman arrived on the scene wearing a red dress that called for that second look from Tony, and a host of others. Eddie, the genial host, was still greeting New Year rounders as ye ole scribe made her departure.

Ethel Gordon was our family doctor’s wife and Paulette was my mom’s best friend, the people whose last names I left off were folks in the entertainment field.  Articles like this one allow me to imagine those parties that my parents hosted.  The house that we lived in at the time is still there and i can still see the women in their gowns milling around.

After my father died in 1950 those types of parties ended.  What I remember most in the years following his death is that on New Year’s Eve my mom’s Uncle Uly would come over and bring hogshead cheese (ugh!), and his rifle. My siblings were born and my cousins would be there and mom would let us stay up till midnight, when Uncle Uly would shoot off his rifle.  Mom would cook a pig with an apple in its mouth and everyone would sit and eat, and the adults would get drunk. Once I myself became an adult I went out to party on New Years, didn’t even think about cooking and I usually got drunk (Hap……py New Year!).

I don’t get drunk anymore, and I pretty much stay inside on New Year’s Eve, just in case someone shoots off a rifle.  I don’t do New Year’s resolutions because I know I won’t keep them, and I don’t like stress.  The thing I am happy about this year, that I know will carry me through 2015, is that my family, me, my daughter Melony and my grandson Edward, are closer than ever.  We are all speaking to each other, our individual personal lives are happy and we are all healthy.  My siblings, my nieces, nephews, and long-lost cousins and all their family members, are celebrating this year together, in one way or another, and I don’t think I could be any happier with how this year has turned out.

With love for my family, and may everyone out there have a peaceful, prosperous and a Happy New Year.