August 10, 2015 Treo Holdings LLC David Andrew Thorneycroft P.O. Box 349 Dallas, OR 97338 Jerry Seinfeld, Comedian George Shapiro Shapiro/West & Associates 141 El Camino Drive Suite 205 Beverly Hills, CA 90212
Mr. Seinfeld, I think you're the best comedian - dry witted - you know, sometimes nothin' but a cymbal. Thank you for taking the time to read this letter. True, authentic stories about brothers growing up around grandma and great-grandma wins and that's another reason to write you this letter. I'm writing you because I have a funny, dry-witted story and bursting to tell. The story involves our late grandma and great-grandma. What's funnier than a couple old ladies shopping at the Goodwill store, haggling & bitching trying to read the small tags and get a deal? It's naming a book store after our grandma. My brothers Darren (David) and Scott grew up a mere 17-minute car ride to the Pagoda Chinese restaurant (leveled the year after she became permanently - um, level) - where we'd eat then go to grandma's on some occasions.
Introducing Me and My Brother's Her: Our Grandmother Her story: grandma arrived in Portland in 1920. She graduated at Portland's Lincoln HS in 1930. She was a ballerina and Scott preserved her shoes from the 1920s. She told me a romantic story about our grandfather Reg and how they met. He was a handsome, skinny 19-year-old, flipping burgers at a Hawthorne burger stand. And she enjoyed at age 18, watching him work: "how dedicated to the job and handsome and kind of tall 5'10" to her 4'10". She said "David, I will always love your grandpa Reg but the cards just weren't there, so I promised to go to the Rose Festival every year" after their divorce in '67 (hip grandma!) and they did. I remember in 1981 in the HS marching band I saw them to the right. They looked happy together unlike all the family gatherings in which he often sat on the piano bench behind everybody. The back story: At 55, grandpa Reg was worn-out, old with narcoleptic apneaimpaled health, cigarette-smoking pot-belly whom grandma moved to the hallway closet due to the house-shaking, snarling, cough and spit. If great-grandma had a problem, it meant grandma had a problem by default. So, when Reg became unemployed, (painting signs on merchant's windows downtown) they convinced him to take a job in Seattle as they knew some jeweler that paid good. The women took
charge of the households right away and they lived a charmed life, each having their own home, and with Reggie in Seattle Mon-Fri (he didn't make it back every weekend) and given time she dated Wayne, husband 2, for 10 years until before they divorced. Given the fact she didn’t read many books, the majority of her life she seemed to always look like a lady, smell like a rose and give her advice. Now, about her advice, it wasn't always revolutionary (like that vibrating belt tummy-buster in the basement) because her last piece of advice - and you, know I'll take good advice whenever and wherever I can get it, even if it's from a 94-year old, "oatmeal, 2 pieces of toast and an orange at breakfast never coffee" - her advice was, you ready for this? To "stay away from cheeseburgers". That was it, she was serious and I'm on my own now, grandma! Whoop! Whoop! For most of her long, 94-years she prepared her advice using the National Enquirer. First published in 1926, grandma would buy every issue of the National Enquierer weekly, and never miss reading that and the Oregonian. Yes, it's a little funny, but wait. Something happened in Terre Haute 1920 as their family suddenly decided to drive from Terre Haute, IN to Portland, OR using the automobile Oregon Trail route in 1920. The story goes: Walter, our great-grandpa would shoot the food they ate, mostly fowl, and set up make-shift camping spots. Grandma never forgot "how good of a shot he was and how it tasted so good cooked over and open fire, uhhm!". I was shocked, that was the first time I've ever heard a southern whoop call out of her, ever. She talked about that experience up until her death on the first day of spring, 2006. We never met Walter he died of a heart attack at age 50. Us brothers would kid our friends that our grandma and great-grandma, Big Mom, “came to Oregon from Indiana along the Oregon Trail on a covered wagon”. "Liars!", they'd say. Great-grandma and her strange name: everyone who knew her called her Big Mom. The fact is, both women were only 4'9", 116 pounds soaking wet! I know both were 4'10' in the past like my beautiful daughter Chelsea "bring out my daughter Chelsea 4'9' and I'm not telling". Those fine, southern belles shrink with age. Big Mom however, had a red-headed bitch, step-sister temper and ruled all roosts in the family and in her businesses. Now for the kicker: Grandma Reada - born LaReada, a name fitting for a southern Indiana belle - which her mother changed to Reada so her precious, only child wouldn't be teased in her new school in Portland's Hawthorne district - with a name like LaReada (they thought she was the smartest actually having the word read in it). But, being belles they sounded terribly out of place on Hawthorne. Apparently true, for one that doesn't read a whole lot, she was a very smart lady whom always said she played her cards right and I believed her.
The bookstore honoring her name: "Reada's Books" a fitting name as she would always recommend reading books, but just not read them herself! Now for the finale: Big Mom, born: Grace Mae Fagg married Walter Michael Pearman in the winter of 1911 - LaReada was born June 28th, 1911. Did someone say "go pack the car"? Leave town. Are we "pregnant out-of-wedlock" 1911? Leave town...single cymbal crash. However, they stayed in Terre Haute until in 1920 and then something happened. No one could ever figure it out and it's still a mystery to this day. My Auntie Valerie June told me this story: Big Mom was 87 when she wanted (demanded) to go back to Indiana and see her old friends. Now, it's 1980 - 60 years post Terre Haute - and they packed up the Buick and a few sandwiches, off they went. Big Mom always had a little chi Wawa. and on the trip she would put a blanket on her lap and the poor little dog, shook all the way there and peed in her lap the whole time. She didn’t even notice and didn't want to stop, "keep, Valerie, going or we'll never get there!". When they arrived at the house where she said her friends lived and with the address written on the paper; she got out of the car walked over to the house in question. She didn't knock on the door or ring the bell, she merely looked in through the windows, peeping for 15 minutes, being extremely nosy. She walked back to the car, the dog and the piss-soaked, crocheted doggie blanket. As they drove back to Hawthorne, she never realized and bitched the whole way home. PU. Thank you for listening to our story.
Sincerely,
David Thorneycroft
Cc'd: Darren, Scott