Jack
Were we both a little nervous?
Entertaining (or being) a guest on a July afternoon….
Telling (hearing) stories about a life closer to nine decades than eight
was out of the norm
for Jack and me.
As I prepared to leave Jack said,
"That went better than I thought it would. I was worried we’d be sitting here with nothing to say.”
“It was lovely. Thank you for telling me about your life. I hope we’ll meet again.”
John (Jack) Kirsch was born on March 6, 1933 in Leavenworth, Kansas.
He raised five children with his wife Beverly.
Blayne
Connie
April
Chris (adopted)
Mike (adopted)
When I pulled my truck up to the curb, Jack was arranging chairs around a patio table. Seated, holding a clipboard with a pencil attached by string was Ingrid, Jack’s next door neighbor, who was working on a word puzzle.
After brief introductions, Jack went into the house to get a glass of water for me. While he was gone, Ingrid and I knocked out three answers from the crossword—teamwork.
As Ingrid put it, the brain tease was full of color.
a colorful herb = mintgreen
rainbow______= trout
a regal color = royalblue
Jack returned.
His smile invited mine to join his.
I began, “You might be curious about why I wanted to talk to you?”
He nodded encouragingly….
“A couple of years ago I went to visit my my Dad and his friend Jean. On our way out of the restaurant, we shared the building’s vestibule with another couple near my father’s age—He’s going to be 84.”
Jack’s eyes and posture told me he was listening….
“Well, while we all held doors for one another, several minutes of polite conversation passed between us. I was struck by the light banter and courtesy….not something I experience much of in my days. I enjoyed it!”
Jack looked down at his hand and pretended to scroll an imaginary cell phone.
“Yes!” I said. “It seems to me humans are losing the joy of person to person connection…..and even though it was outside of my box to ask to talk with you, I felt that hearing your stories might add value to my life. Did your granddaughter tell you I am a writer?”
Jack nodded yes.
“Will it be okay if I write about our conversation…and your life.”
“Well….sure. There’s nothing I don’t want people to know.”
“I’ve written some my own father’s stories down. I’ll tell you the same thing I told him…..I won’t necessarily write what you say. I’ll write what I hear.”
“It’ll be filtered through your experience,” Jack replied.
Jack Kirsch graduated from Leavenworth High School in 1950.
He received an accounting degree from Kansas University in 1955.
As an ROTC participant, Jack was required to serve his country for two years after graduation.
He worked as General Accounting Office auditor in Seattle Washington (with a side trip to Alaska) and then went on to Greenland where he was a 1st Lieutenant in the United States Air Force.
“How was that? Leaving Kansas and traveling around North America? Were you afraid?” I asked.
“No…not much. I was mostly curious.” he replied. “I made friends at church and I had a car to get around.”
Jack mentioned that his father died of a heart attack when he was fourteen. My thoughts drifted to Jack’s mom who went to work first at the local high school, followed by the Leavenworth Army PX.
“How did your mom feel when you left Jack? Was that hard?”
“Well…we understood the two year commitment required by ROTC. Mom looked at it as something to get through. I think what was hard for her was….I never moved back to Kansas.”
Jack attended Harvard Business School after leaving Greenland.
He moved to New York City where he shared a flat with friends.
Jack was introduced to Beverly Schofield by her stewardess sister Wanda, who lived in the apartment above.
Soon…Jack was making weekend trips to Montreal, Canada where Beverly lived. Married in 1962, Jack and Beverly built a life and family together.
“You were a Chief Financial Officer by profession?”
“Yes. I had jobs in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Arkansas. I retired while living in Arkansas. I loved to fly fish there and Beverly was involved with a quilting group. A couple of years after retirement, we moved back to Wisconsin to be closer to our family.”
Beverly died in July, 2020.
Jack saved Beverly the sorrow of losing him…
“How do you spend your time?” I asked.
Jack enjoys family dinners at his daughter’s, he takes morning walks with Ingrid, and hosts his children and grandchildren. Jack’s daughter Connie told me that one night when she came to pick up her dad for dinner, he was playing his banjo.
D-Day by Stephen Ambrose sat on the table between us.
“It’s interesting,” Jack said, “The generals and their egos…how they learned to play on one another. Have you read The Other Woman in the Room? It’s about Hedy Lamarr. She’s from the same town as Ingrid….Vienna, Austria.”
“I haven’t read that book, but I did see a documentary about Hedy recently! Coincidence? I just finished The Choice by Edith Eva Egers—she survived Auschwitz.”
We chatted for a few more minutes.
“One more big question….If there was a highlight reel of your life, what would be on it?”
The question earned me a big laugh.
After a pause Jack said, “It’d have to be family. I’ve had a good life.”