After Aubrey′s navy tour ended, he used his military benefits to begin attending Tulane University in New Orleans. The date of the beginning of his studies is not known to me, nor is the date of his graduation from Tulane University. However, the span of his time in the university lies somewhere between my parents marriage in 1942 and my birth in 1950, allowing eight years for his studies.

The marriage was attended by mostly family of both the bride and the groom, including my dad′s mother (Alcidé DePaoli Sercouf-Buras), who is standing immediately to his right and my dad′s father (Aubrey Frederic Buras I), whos head is just over the left shoulder of my Mom. Also included are my Mom′s parents, the couple to the far right in this photo, (Andrew Joseph Breaux and Elise Marie Blanchard-Breaux) Too, the young girl in the front of the attendees, just to my Dad′s right is his younger sister, Elizabeth Francis Buras, ¹ who in this photo is soon to be ten years old.

The remaining people along the left side and in the back are very likely the siblings of my Mom of whom I know the names of just two from looking at this photo. I do not know the name of the brides maid.

Then, on the 3rd of November 1946, Aubrey and Maybelle had their first child, who they choose to name Aubrey Frederick III, after the child′s grandfather Aubrey Frederick I. Then, during his last year of his university studies, in September 1950, their second child, Tommy was born and named for his great uncle Thomas.

When Tommy was not yet one year old, his father graduated from the university, after which he applied for work at several locations. When his father received the first job offer, a chemical refinery in the north of Texas, his parents made the decision to take the offer.

So, they pack up all their belongings and left New Orleans, taking both of their young children away from their relatives, their friends and their family home to move west across the state line, and northwest into Texas to the small north panhandle town of Borger, Texas.

It was in the year 1951, when my father Graduated from Tulane University with a degree in Chemical Engineering, and was offered a position by Phillips 66 Petroleum. After accepting that position, he then packed his small family of four, which included himself, Aubrey, known by his friends as Al, his wife and my mom, Maybelle, their firstborn son, whom I always called Freddy, and later, just Fred, and myself, the baby of the family, Tommy. We then left our ancestral home along the Mississippi River in New Orleans, Louisiana; this has been our family home, both my father′s ancestors as well as my mother′s ancestors for about ten generations.

This was very early in my life, when I was before the age of episodic memories, so except for the few photos I later received from my mom and the many stories that she told me about that time, (both of which helped me to piece together my life then,) I don′t remember anything from this time of my life.

After leaving our home in New Orleans, Dad then drove his family across nearly one thousand miles to the north Texas panhandle where he had been hired for his first job, in the small town of Borger, Texas. Mom always was a good wife, seeing to it that supper was on the table when Dad got home from work, and the best mother to her boys always making sure that both boys were well fed, kept spotlessly clean and dressed appropriately for the north Texas cold winters.

To the best of my deduction, the date of our arrival in Borger, Texas was early in the year 1952. We remained here in a home that neither do I have any information about, nor do I have any recollection of it. The next photo is of me when I was about two years old during the summer of my third year. As for the home behind me, I do not recall being told the story about it.

After only a relatively short time in Borger, Aubrey was asked by his employer if he would be willing to move to the company′s refinery in the Texas Coast lands which refinery is located southeast of the city of Houston on the ship channel, between the towns of Pasadena and Deer Park, Texas. Again, he conferred with his wife and together they agreed to take the offer, primarily because it would mean an increase in salary as well as what seemed to be a better opportunity. Again, Aubrey and Maybelle packed up their possessions and began the long six hundred and fifty mile drive from the top of Texas southeast to the Coast of Texas.

At first, they were able to find a suitable home on Garner Street in Pasadena of which I do not know the actual address but this is not a location that I have much memory of, in fact, I only have one. That memory was the occasion when my older brother, Freddy was trying to scare me. I recall that it was late in the day, during the twilight and he asked me if I saw that man outside, to which I replied, no. I walked to the front window and began to look outside and he then said, Don′t let him see you, because he will come and get you!

This not only scared me but it also kept me from looking out any window that entire evening. It is funny that I could have so easily been scared like that, but Freddy, my older brother by four years, really knew how to do it to me.

Nevertheless, I continued to look up to my older brother, who later died during the thirty-fifth year of his life from complications with leukemia. Even though he had that ability to scare me like that, I do so miss having him around now.

Now that dad was working at the Pasadena refinery, southeast of Houston, and as the family grew in number, Aubrey and Maybelle would move to progressively larger homes. The next home we lived in after Garner Street was at 1115 Roper Street in the town of South Houston and this location is where I gained a large repository of my childhood memories. So much so that I will get occasional random tidbit of these memory that often come back alive into my thoughts.

I often think of the aviary for parakeet that my dad built there even though I never was allowed to enter it, in fact I can remember that dad would say to me, "Don′t go near the parakeets because they are raising their babies." Also, at one point, the family acquired a puppy, which because it was kept in the garage and kept barking all night long, or rather it was more like a squeak than a bark, we decided to name the dog Squeaky.

Two, when I became five years of age, my parents bought for me my first two-wheeled bike. Oh how many great times I had on my new red Schwinn bicycle.

This is also where I began to have additional siblings, first a sister, Elise, born in November 1953, who was named after my mom′s mother, my grandmother, Elise Marie. Her husband, my grandfather was Andrew Joseph. The additions of this sister inceased our family number to five.

In September 1955, my brother, Barry John, came home from the hospital. Then, another, Debroah Anne, soon after. Next, in August 1959, my third sister, Rebecca Sue came home from the hospital. By the end of the year of 1959, I was in my ninth year of life and now our family has grown to a total of eight people. Too, it was during this same period when our family had outgrown another home, the one on Roper Street. Therefore, my parents began their search for the next place to live, one which would have enough bedrooms and baths for this now large family of two adults and eight children.

The search began in earnest, we would all pack into the 1959 Plymouth station wagon, and go on a drive into the subdivisions of the then town of Pasadena to look at homes. The locations where Dad worked was at one of the several refineries that lined what was called the Houston Ship Channel. The Channel is a widened and deepened natural watercourse created by dredging Buffalo Bayou and Galveston Bay.

This time, dad wanted to have a home that was much closer to his work and so began to look in a fast growing area not far from the ship channel on the eastern edge of the city of Pasadena, which was within the school district of Deer Park, Texas, the smaller town just to the east of Pasadena. The search continued for some time until mom and dad found a home builder that they liked, especially because he had some home plans which already had been drawn which they could examine.

It was during the early part of 1959 when my parents found not only an available lot for building their next home, but met a builder who was building on the same street. His name was Ed Louden and after looking through his available home plans, Mom and Dad decided on a home with four bedroom, two bath rooms, kitchen, den, separate living room, dining room and laundry room. To my mother, it had every thing that she wanted and to my Dad, the cost was only $17,000.00 and well within his price range, especially since he was now the supervisor of the plastics division of the chemical refinery where he worked.

It was a perfect time for this builder to start on this home, as he was ready, willing and had just completed the other homes he had been working on. By late spring, the foundation was formed and poured. The the stick work began soon after, some time during May or June. It did not take long for the new home to become under roof and our family would often travel to the building site on weekends. Driving there from our current home at 1115 Roper Street, South Houston to the new home on Yorkshire Avenue, in Pasadena was only 8.2 miles and took our family less than a half hour to get to the new home building site. In fact, it took more time just to pack up everyone into the 1958 Plymouth station wagon than it did to drive there and we as a family would go often during the home building.

By the end of the summer of 1959, the home was complete on the outside, all the doors and windows were installed, the roof was shingled, the bricks were installed and the workers were inside the home and installing the interior features. As the seasons changed again with winter approaching the south Texas coast, the new home was fast approaching completion and our family of eight was busy getting ready for the move to the new home.

By the end of the year in 1959, the home was completed and ready for the arrival of then new occupants. A moving company was contacted and they arrive at the old home during the last week in December and began packing all of our belonging into boxes. This was during the age and time when a moving company did all or at least most all of the packaging. They arrived on Tuesday, 29 December and by the end of Wednesday 30 December, with all the help that I provided them, the movers were done with all the packing. The next morning, the truck pulled out of the old neighborhood and headed for the new home. The movers asked if I would like to ride along in the truck, so I asked my parents and got permission to do so. The family got into the family car and with my dad driving, lead the way along the 8.2 mile now, very familiar route to out new home.

It did not seem for the mover to take very long to move all the boxes inside. Too, they put the furniture in the place where ever my Mon said ti should now go. When all was said and done, and this day came to an end, this family of eight people spent New Years Eve in their new home and began their first day on 01 January 1960. I was nine years old with we begin our new life in this home.

It was during the month of December 1980 which my parents were out for a company party when another driver slammed into their car, killing my Dad almost immediately and put my Mom in the hospital for about two weeks. After that tragedy, my mother lived alone in the Orange Brick Home for nearly the remaining portion of her life.

It was only in 2008, during the last year of her life, did she need full time care and my youngest sister, Susan offered to have her come live with her and her family. However, that eventually caused a strain on her marriage so, there was need to move Mom into an assisted living home. Not long after that, Mom died on 01 November 2008 and was buried at the Grand View Memorial Cemetery in Pasadena, next to Dad, which site is not to far from the locations of their Orange Brick Home.