Bruce and Augusta Sterling

 

Bruce Sterling

A Lesson in Self-assertion

He was 12 years old and to me -- his 5 year old brother -- he was giant; self-assured, intelligent, arrogant, and a little mean.  He was lean, tanned, incredibly strong and sported a shock of dishwater-colored hair.  His great joy in life seemed to be in teasing his younger siblings.  Sister Peggy received the brunt of his teasing, probably because she was tough and did not go crying to mama whenever he teased her.  Boy, could she run.  Bruce found it necessary to run at top speed to catch her; she certainly had my admiration.  He pretty much left Fanny alone cause her defense against him was to cry and whine very loudly which would bring down the wrath of father, Charles -- who was known, in a fit of temper, to punish his mules.  "You must first get their attention by hitting them with a 2X4" he claimed.  Dorothy - the oldest sister - was close enough to his physical and intellectual equal to somehow know how to handle most of his teasing.  

But, much was expected of this 12-year-old.  He had 3 younger sisters and one brother.  (Little did he know that he would ultimately have 3 more brothers and another sister.)  He was expected to milk several cows twice a day to help support this struggling family.  This milking exercise resulted in him having very strong hands.  He demonstrated this strength by bending a metal Coke bottle cap between the thumb and forefinger on one hand.

Having recently survived the great depression, Charles had a job helping to build Moore Air Base north of Mission, TX.  He had a long commute of about 15 miles each way on a rough, washboard, caliche  road every day.  While he was gone, Bruce was in charge.  Bruce hated milking cows.  But to add insult to injury, he not only had to milk cows but was forced to listen to his very rigid and evangelical aunt Augusta preach to him as she milked cows in the next stall.  For a time there seemed little he could do to stop this large, strong woman and her incessant proselytizing so maybe he took out some of his frustrations on his siblings.  No one could live up to aunt Augusta’s standards.  She was, after all, a woman who had sacrificed her own social life to care for her aging mother.  She never married and was strong on principal.  According to a family rumor, she once told a boyfriend that he could either smoke or maintain their friendship.  Evidently, he must have loved to smoke.  

Anyway, Bruce finally realized that the one chink in her armor was religion, so maybe he swore off religion for her benefit.  This caused him some trouble later on in his life because he married a Catholic woman, but that is another story.  This vengeful act seemed to empower Bruce; no one would ever push him around again - he was his own man.