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a notoriously bad businessman. What land he kept was leased out to tenant farmers. He was a generous landlord—some say to a fault. He lent his farm equipment to anyone who needed it. You could see it parked in fields all over the valley. And he didn’t have the heart to kick families off his property for nonpayment. So when the Depression hit, the banks foreclosed on most of his holdings. He ran for justice of the peace in Mission, and his only income during those years was his civil servant’s salary and the small fees he’d charge for marrying couples, usually right in his own living room. They called him “The Marrying Judge.”
    My parents met on a blind double date in Mission, Texas, in 1938. My dad was a dashing employee with the South Texas Chamber of Commerce; my mom was a darling, spirited young woman finishing business college. Mother wasn’t even my dad’s date—she had been set up with his friend. Daddy was driving and it was dark, so he only occasionally caught a glimpse of her tucked into the backseat of the car. But once he heard her soft, musical voice, he was smitten. “That’s the girl I’m going to marry,” he told himself. But he was working under a slight disadvantage. It was hot in the valley, and on a dare from a buddy, probably after a drink or two, he’d shaved his head. And he was being transferred to another job, in another town outside of the valley, in two short weeks, so he had to move fast. Fortunately for him, my mother thought his bald head was cute. After a brief courtship, they were married in the Methodist Church in Mission, on a sweltering hot August afternoon. Just as the pastor was asking, “… if any of you know just cause why these two should not be joined in holy matrimony, speak now or forever hold your peace,” the bride and groom were startled to hear one loud crash after another, as the candles arranged behind the pulpit slumped over in the heat and tumbled to the floor.
    The newlyweds moved to Abilene, but didn’t stay long. Daddy kept transferring to new positions all over Texas until World War II broke out and he joined the army air corps. While Daddy was in the army, Mother moved back home with her parents in Mission, where my brother Ed was born in 1944. When Ed started talking, he couldn’t understand why his mother was always calling his grandmother “Mama.” So to keep things straight, he called his mother Little Mama and his grandmother Big Mama. Before long, everybody was calling our grandmother “Big Mama.” It must have started sounding like a Tennessee Williams play inside those white clapboard walls.
    Mother’s younger brother, Wade, inherited his family’s gentle spirit, good looks, and easy way with people. She was as close to him as I was to Robbie and Ed. Wade was a champion tennis player and a junior at the University of Texas when he volunteered for the infantry. He was sent to the European theater, where he quickly worked his way up the ranks to sergeant. Mother wrote him several times a week, and even got some letters back. Then suddenly his letters stopped coming, and the army sent a telegram declaring him “missing in action.” Big Mama retreated to her bedroom and barely came out for the next five months. Nobody in the family told her when all of their letters were returned in bundles stamped “Deceased” and a telegram confirmed his death. My mother never gave up hope that Wade might be a prisoner, and she would sneak over to a neighbor’s house to listen to ham radio reports of American prisoners being liberated across Germany. Then, in the late spring of 1945, the phone rang and it was Wade, calling from a hospital in France. He was gravely ill but alive. As Mother had hoped, Wade had been rescued from a German POW camp.
    After he was shipped home, Wade married his sweetheart, Arlette Fowler, a vivacious, whip-smart girl from Austin. He went on to law school at UT and became an influential member of the Texas State