Everyone's life has a beginning, and mine began April 15, 1964. I was born Timothy Neil Tucker at the McConnel Air Force Base Hospital in Wichita, Kansas at 1:24 AM. My lineage consists of a strong German influence, but also consists of Blackfoot Indian (Canadian), French, Scotch, Irish and Pennsylvanian Dutch. Quite a mix for a little guy with an English sir name and little English blood. I weighed in at 7 pounds 8 ounces, the first born to my parents who dealt with a miscarriage a little over a year earlier.
Thirteen months later, my brother was born two to three months prematurely. He was taken by c-section, due to the discovery of my mother having ovarian cancer. My paternal grandparents drove from Michigan to Kansas to take my brother and me back with them to raise while my mother was in Texas receiving cobalt treatments for cancer and since my father was soon to be stationed in Colorado.
I was separated from my brother soon after we arrived in Michigan. He stayed with my paternal grandparents for them to raise, while I was placed in the care of my maternal great uncle. They had a son who was five to six years older than me, who I grew to believe was my older brother. I was too young to notice the separation and thought of the family I was with as my own. Two years later, I was taken from them and reunited with my real family. It was an adjustment that even my brother found difficult, as neither of us knew each other or our mother and father.
I was just under four years old when my family became united. We moved into a small trailer in Sanford, Michigan. My father operated heavy equipment for a family friend to support us. We had three dogs, all mutts. Red was my father's dog, Stupid belonged to my mother and Shorty was a pup that belonged to me. We weren't even there for a full year, when my father became a department store manager in Saginaw, Michigan. It bothered me at even such a young age to know that my pup had to be left behind. I didn't interact as much with my parent's dogs since Shorty was my pride and joy. I remember feeling sorry for Stupid most of the time. She was a very good and well behaved dog, unfortunately my mother wasn't much of a dog lover.. which seemed apparently obvious with the name she gave her. I came up with "Good Ol' Shorty's" name on my own, inspired from a 45" record of Tex Ritter's single of the same name.
