Just a Life: A Memoir

About the Book

This is an account about growing up during the Depression and beyond. I wrote this for my kids, to share a part of my life with them with which they were unfamiliar. I might have focused on some of the hardships of our family, but I hope my mother’s perseverance and her courage as a single parent and later in a disappointing third marriage show through during those tough times. My story is not especially noteworthy except for the opportunities I received and the exposure I received to a life for which I’d not been prepared or could have imagined coming from a small town like Ballston Spa, New York. There is nothing heroic about this story, no special coping with adversity or demonstrations of courage. It’s a story of growing from a child to a man and making good and bad decisions but accepting the responsibility for those decisions. I don’t know if there is anything my kids can learn from this. Perhaps it won’t do anything for them. It doesn’t matter. It’s the best I could do to tell them what my life was like growing up. It’s just another life.

About the Author

Hugh Matson retired from the Army in 1972 as a Lieutenant Colonel after twenty-one years. He completed tours of duty in Korea, Germany, Russia and South Vietnam where he earned the Combat Infantryman’s Badge and the Paddy Rat award. He was a safety officer in the Philadelphia Water and Health Departments. He retired as a McDonald’s franchisee after twenty years. He is the author of Deep Game, Killer’s Gift, The Sun Never Sets in July, Charlie Robinson’s Revenge, The Drummer Boy, Joe Hakkala’s Luck, Galina, and Just A Life: A Memoir. He lives in Gansevoort, New York with his companion and three cats one of which is a Maine Coon Cat.