 And my grandmother, he points out, had eight miscarriages in the decade, he calls it, between Uncle Jimmy's birth and my mother's. And the baby who brought my grandparents to Ohio didn't survive her first week. On that birth certificate, the baby's broken-hearted mother lied about her age. Only 14 at the time, and with a 17-year-old husband, she couldn't tell the truth. This is the life he grew up in. This is what this is.