How Am I Supposed to Know?' 10 Things About My Dad (#4)

Here's the 'When We Last Saw Our Hero' catch-up: During a TV show set in Kentucky, I asked daughter #2 who was born in Kentucky, and she just shrugged. When I exasperatedly told her that my dad was born in Kentucky, she just as exasperatedly questioned, 'How am I supposed to know anything about him?' So I'm scribbling down 10 things for her to know about my dad. I posted Numbers 1-3 earlier.

Number Three Postscript
My dad's recovery from alcoholism gave me a fun look into his childhood. When asked about his first exposure to alcohol, he said it was as a young kid in Kentucky, when he and his buddies would eat the sugar out of the bottom of moonshine stills (someone later told me that Federal agents would monitor the amount of sugar sold at local grocery stores because of the large amounts required to make bootleg whiskey). I don't think my parents would've let me play with my dad as a kid.

Number Four
I love my job. I've always been blessed with jobs that I've enjoyed, even taking into account unfair managers, career-threatening pressures, highly stressful deadlines and, yes, even some opportunities to find employment elsewhere. Overall, I've worked for organizations I believe in and with people that were a joy to know. And that's the message I try to deliver to my kids when we talk about choosing college majors and possible careers: don't worry about money; do something you like because you're going to be doing it for a long time.

What's this have to do with my dad?

My dad was a boilermaker at the Texaco refinery in Port Arthur for, I'm guessing, 30 years. I still don't know what a boilermakers does, but I do know that my dad built and helped maintained the huge oil storage tanks at the refinery. He talked about working with riveters (in the early days), welders, machinists, pipe fitters and crane operators, but I never understood what he did.

To explain to me why my dad never did custom woodwork, a friend of his told me that if two pieces of metal weren't measured correctly and left a gap, a boilermaker just welded another piece of metal on top to fill the gap. No fine craftsmanship there; that explains a lot about my own handyman skills.

He was a member of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers (OCAW) Local 4-23 of the AFL-CIO; and, as a result, he could look forward to going on strike every couple of years and being without a paycheck for weeks and sometimes months. If the strike appeared to be long, between taking his turn at walking the picket line or serving food at the union hall, he'd head to the non-union American Steel to make extra money.

But he would never cross a picket line. When he went to pick up tires that he bought on layaway at the Gibson's in Port Arthur (Gibson's was like an early version of Wal-Mart) and saw that employees were picketing the store, he went to the local motel where union representatives were staying. He explained his situation and returned to the store with a handwritten note giving him permission to cross the picket line; he'd already paid for the tires and his business would not benefit the store during the strike.

Have I mentioned that he brought me bubble gum every day from work? He rode in the back of Mr. Beck's truck and later in his VW bus to and from the plant, and I knew that he'd be home with Dubble Bubble bubble gum every day at 4:30. The gum may have really only been for a short while, but the consistency of daddy's 4:30 arrival and 5 o'clock supper was a constant throughout my childhood (for some reason, my mother called dinner supper and lunch dinner).

Somewhere in here will be the reason I love my job.

I do remember explaining to my dad early in my career how unfairly a manager had treated me. He nodded that he understood and laughed, then said, 'That's the kind of guy we used to take out behind the tanks and explain to him how things worked.'

He never complained about his job. When I think about how a day of yardwork leaves me tired and sore, it pales in comparison to him, in his 50s, climbing up and down metal ladders and through steel pipes (I have claustrophobia) to work in Port Arthur's hot, humid summers and cold, damp winters -- in a volatile environment that could literally explode with a mistep.

He never said it, but I think he realized that bitching and moaning about a job never changed it, so why make yourself miserable? He liked his job, but I think he loved, in a union boilermaker kind of way, the people he worked with.

So, here's the story -- I heard it from several of his friends later in life -- that I think best reflects my dad's attitude and that I'd like to think has shaped my own work ethic:

A co-worker of my dad's went to their supervisor, sometimes called a 'gang pusher,' to complain about working with my dad. The hard-hatted pusher simply said (snarled? growled?), 'If you can't work with George, you can't work with anybody. Go back to work.'

I love my job.

How Am I Supposed to Know?' 10 Things About My Dad (#3)

Here's the 'When We Last Saw Our Hero' catch-up: During a TV show set in Kentucky, I asked daughter #2 who was born in Kentucky, and she just shrugged. When I exasperatedly told her that my dad was born in Kentucky, she just as exasperatedly questioned, 'How am I supposed to know anything about him?' So I'm scribbling down 10 things for her to know about my dad. I posted Number One and Number Two earlier.

Number Two Postscript
I'm 6' 1" and usually around 210 pounds, which is about two inches shorter than Mohammed Ali and right in the middle of his range of fighting weight. After my last post, someone described my dad as 'larger than life,' and I laughed. He was 5' 8" and probably weighed 150-160 pounds most of his adult life. Even at that size, when we'd watch Ali, Joe Frazier, Sonny Liston and all the other heavyweight boxers, he'd tell me that he could take them all. And maybe with my height and my heavyweight bulk, he could've. Or, if you read my last post, you'd know that he would've at least made it entertaining.

Number Three
My dad's the one on the right, and nobody knows who Kelley is except that the two of them celebrated V.E. Day (Victory in Europe, ending World War II in Europe). He joined the Coast Guard in 1939 in St. Louis, Missouri, before the United States entered the war, and told me that he enlisted when he saw a poster of a ship-to-ship rescue. He later mentioned an additional sense of urgency to his enlistment.

Prior to joining the Coast Guard, my dad worked as a truck driver, delivering ice to homes and businesses in Western Kentucky. I'd like to think that patriotic duty and the lure of adventure on the open seas drew him to the Coast Guard . . . but the real story seems to involve speeding along a dark roadway, skidding the ice truck on its side around a curve and his sneaking away to St. Louis.

During the war, he became a Chief Petty Officer in the engine room of a frigate, the Tallapoosa, escorting convoys in and out of North Africa. He also spent time in Alaska's Aleutian Islands.

His stories of World War II were always funny. One of the best occurred during shore leave in Oran, Algeria, when an Algerian military policeman stopped a truckload of his shipmates. A buddy of my dad's stepped out of the back of the truck, assuring them that he'd handle it. He casually walked up to the soldier looking eager to improve international relations, then knocked him out with one punch and returned to the party in the back of the truck (I later saw this same episode in a movie, but you have to believe your dad).

My dad showed me how he cooked 'Frog in a Hole,' atop a diesel engine. It's an egg and toast combination that I passed on to my kids and that daughter #1's friends love for her to cook. He talked of friends and wild antics that made me believe that he loved his military days.

During my senior year in high school, I began recognizing the signs that our family really didn't have the money to send me to college. At the time, I wanted to go to the University of Texas, like my cousin Jack, and eventually become an architect.

I knew that my dad loved his days in the Coast Guard, so I stopped by the Navy recruiter's trailer in Port Arthur's Jefferson City Shopping Center. This was a major step for me because the Vietnam War had ended just a couple of years earlier; and I'd spent most of my junior high and high school life scared to death of being drafted and hauled off to a place that I understood only by the nightly news score cards (we always won, killing and wounding more of them than they killed and wounded of us).

I told the recruiter that I'd like to be an architect and that I'd heard the Navy would pay for me to go to school. He assured me that the Navy would pay for me to go to school to become an engineer, which he told me was pretty much the same thing.

Brochures in hand -- probably featuring photos of a '70s version of a ship-to-ship rescue -- and expecting elation from my dad, I excitedly told him and my mom of my plans. His only response was, 'Don't worry. We'll find a way to pay for college.'

I was shocked and didn't understand until about 10 years later, when my dad checked into an alcoholic recovery unit. My older sister and I had never experienced any kind of abuse, neglect or embarassment because of his drinking, so this took us as a HUGE surprise.

He was out of his room, when I arrived for a visit, and I picked up a handwritten note off his night stand. When I asked about the note, he told me that patients in the unit talked in groups about their addiction-related issues, then wrote letters of encouragement to whoever spoke during that session.

This letter said something like: 'George, I know it must have been awful for you during the war to see men burning in the water, screaming for help, and you couldn't do anything.'

A German submarine had sunk a ship in his convoy, trapping its crew and passengers in a sea of burning oil and diesel fuel. His dreams of an exciting ship-to-ship rescue had become a decades-long nightmare.

I don't think I'm ready to share all of Number Three with daughter #2. In her very sweet, caring way, she'd ask, 'Hey, buddy. What's wrong? Why are you crying?'

'How Am I Supposed to Know?' 10 Things About My Dad (#1 and #2)

This is my dad. This photo is one of my best photos. I took it in the late '70s, and it's been around our house for decades. I think it captures my dad perfectly, in appearance, character and personality, although I did have loan him the hat for full effect.

I'm telling you about this photo and introducing you to my dad because of daughter #2. She shocked me last weekend when we were watching Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (our family's weekly sniff-and-feel-good-about-people time together). The show took place in Louisville, Kentucky.

When I asked daughter #2 who was born in Kentucky, she just shrugged. When I exasperatedly told her that my dad was born in Kentucky, she just as exasperatedly questioned, 'How am I supposed to know anything about him?' He died when daughter #2 was less than 2 years old.

So, here are 10 things about my dad (in no order of importance . . . forgive me if I've already shared some of this with you) that I'll share with daughter #2.

Number One
He was born August 6, 1916 in Dukedom, Tennessee, and grew up in Mayfield, Kentucky, which is in Western Kentucky, and was a teenager during the Great Depression. He was the youngest in his family and had two older sisters -- Kathleen and Ruby -- and an older brother Herman.

Aunt Kathleen and Aunt Ruby visited Texas when I lived in Conroe in the early '80s. My parents drove them over from Port Arthur, and I still laugh when I think of them calling my dad, then nearly 70 years old, by his childhood name: 'Baby.'

Number Two
My dad was a boxer in his teens and 20s. He told me that he was a Golden Gloves boxer, but most of the stories I heard were about his matches when a carnival came to Mayfield or nearby Paducah, Kentucky. Carnivals were traveling shows that moved from town to town during the Depression; and their games, contests, shows and exotic animals were the most excitement a little town like his would see for months.

Some carnivals featured a 'champion' boxer, and when the carnival hit town, word spread quickly (and tickets sold just as quickly) that this champion would box and beat 24 of the 'best' local boxers in 24 hours. My dad usually was one of those 24 boxers; and during the Depression, when jobs and money were hard to come by, he was happy to look good for a few rounds, take a few punches, hit the mat, and then pick up his paycheck from the champ's manager.

He must've been a local favorite because other carnivals recruited him for their Thursday-through-Saturday, best-of-three matches. From what I understand, he always lost on Thursday, but made a valiant, underdog comeback on Friday. Tickets sales 'skyrocketed' (as much as tickets sales would skyrocket in a small town) for Saturday's championship bout; and almost always, he lost after a 'hard-fought' match. And then he picked up his paycheck from the champ's manager.

My dad was 'older' -- 39 -- when I was born (I was 42 when daughter #2 was born, so I laugh when I think about it), but he was very quick when he'd box with the neighborhood boys in his 50s and even when he'd shadow box in his 60s.

I don't think I appreciated just how quick he was until he shared with me how he and a World War II shipmate (he was in the Coast Guard, which was rolled into the Navy during the war) would pick up a few bucks before shore leave. My dad would pull his handkerchief out of his pocket, lay it on the ground and stand on it with both feet. His friend would take bets: my dad would remain standing on the handkerchief and any challenger could try to hit in the head. The story, as told to me, was that he never got hit; however, his ears sure were cauliflowered (a sure sign that a boxer has taken some hits -- could've been from all those carnival losses).

There does seem to be common thread of boxing and money running through all his stories.

My dad gave me two bits of boxing/life advice:
- You gotta roll with the punches (which, at 52, I finally realize is true)
- You gotta bob and weave (a skill to which he attributed his handkerchief-bet winnings)

He tried to teach me how to box, but I was slow, skinny and not very strong. And I weaved and bobbed when I should've bobbed and weaved.

When I was about 13 or 14, we were boxing in the front yard (can you imagine today's response to a father and teenage son fighting in the front yard?). He hit me upside the head with a right cross and floored me. Like most teenage boys, I sprang up wildly, and I caught him by surprise with a right hook in the side. After several days of soreness, he went to the doctor, who told him that he had a couple of broken ribs.

And I think that became Chapter One in his unwritten, unplanned Lessons for Fatherhood. Even with fascinating recollections of carnivals and ship-board bets, that front-yard match and those broken ribs became his most-often repeated boxing story for the next couple of decades.

Daughter #2's going to have to wait for Things to Know About My Dad #3-10.

The Wall is Real; or Bonking the Blog

This is not about running, BUT . . . The Wall exists.

During decades of on-again, off-again underachieving as a runner, I didn't believe The Wall existed. Runners, especially marathoners, speak of The Wall as if it's lurking just around the corner, waiting to throw itself in the path of an unsuspecting, under-prepared runner; but, to borrow from Ghostbusters, 'I ain't afraid o' not ghost.'

Running experts associate hitting The Wall, or 'bonking,' with the depletion of Glycogen, which is the energy source for running up until about 18-20 miles (depending on training). Somewhere around that point, muscles begin to burn fat, which produces less energy, slowing you down, and eventually you slam right into The Wall.

Bonk . . .

Those experts say that better training will help maximize the use of available Glycogen and allow the body to supplement it earlier by burning fat (at least that's what I think I they said). They also recommend energy drinks and carbo-loading to provide additional sources of energy during the run.

I didn't believe in The Wall . . . until Mile 17 of the Austin Motorola Marathon in 2001. The Wall not only smacked me in the face, it fell on me.

Just a reminder for you non-runners or bored runners: This really is not about running.

As a runner, I'd learned how to compensate for fatigue or pain in one part of my body by stressing another part; but after The Wall fell on me, I hurt in places that had never hurt before, and I didn't have a clue what to do.

Fortunately, marathons, depending on their popularity, are lined with well-wishers who'll toss out words of encouragement and lie to you about how good you're looking or how close you are to the finish line. After meeting The Wall, I broke into tears every time anyone even acknowledged my presence.

The Wall had physically, mentally and emotionally crushed me.

Then, running advice jokingly offered by my couch-potato brother-in-law came to mind: 'Right foot, left foot. Right foot, left foot.'

I finished the marathon, carrying Wall bricks for last nine miles, in about five hours. For those of you who are not runners, a marathon is 26.2 miles, and five hours is somewhere south of mediocrity.

But I did finish, and I somehow sprinted across the finish line. And I must've looked good (HA!). While I was recuperating, wrapped in a silver, thermal blanket and drinking whatever athletes drink, an African-looking runner (Kenyans are the best) approached me and asked if I knew where the elite runners were meeting. Yeah, and Elvis and I will be singing with The Beatles right after the meeting.

Why is this not about running?

I think I've bonked on my blog. I've started 2-3 different posts and haven't finished any. The Wall seems to be waiting for me every time I sit down at the keyboard.

I do remember learning to type. The method was to type: ffffffffjjjjjjjjjfffffffjjjjjjjj, etc. That's even more basic than 'right foot, left foot. right foot, left foot.'

So if I can bonk, then 'right-foot-left-foot-right-foot-left-foot' it to the finish line and then be asked for directions to the elite runners' meeting, then I can get fffffffjjjjjffffffjjjj it to cranked back up on this blog.

And if you cheer, I promise not to cry.

First Date: Meeting the Parents

10-year-old daughter #2 has her first date this weekend. She and the Man of Her Dreams have been an item for a couple of weeks now, and tomorrow's pre-teen tryst is their special Valentine's Day event.

But tonight is the prequel to the Big Event. . . . we meet the parents, and here's how I anticipate the evening (at CiCi's Pizza by the way) going down: Them (those very strange people we don't know) and Us (well, you know us). . .



When daughter #1 was in fifth grade, she had boyfriends, but they never talked on the phone or saw each other outside of school. They were just 'going together.' We'd ask how she knew they were going together, and she'd say, 'We just know.'

This non-contact courting continued through middle school and even began to include just as confounding break-ups. 'How do you know he's breaking up with you? We're still not sure how you knew you were going out.'

'A friend of his told a friend of mine who told me that he was thinking about . . .' and the 'about' could've been pizza, football or spitting on the sidewalk. When she finally started 'dating,' we really didn't know because she and a group of her friends would meet him and a group of his friends at the movies.

But, more importantly, we didn't meet any parents until several boyfriends later during daughter #1's senior year, and that's when we ran into them at a nearby bar.

Daughter #1 and the Man of Her Dreams have been planning this date and pre-event parents' meeting for the last two weeks (I can hear her upstairs now talking to a friend on the phone about what she should wear). She came home from school yesterday, Valentine's Day, with an armful of, as she described, 'a foot and a half tall teddy bear, a big balloon and chocolate . . . from Brazil.'

This is developing into a true courtship. Daughter #2 says that Man of Her Dreams tells her that he loves her every day. She also says that his life has changed since he's been seeing her . . . his friends think he's REALLY cool now (daughter #2 can never be faulted for her lack of confidence).

And daughter #2 did make it a point to call daughter #1, who's currently boyfriend-less (yessssss!), to let her know all about her new 'honey.'

So, tonight at the all-you-can-eat pizza buffet, we get to meet 'them.' And I get to talk to kid whose teddy bears, balloons, Brazilian chocolate and daily 'I love you' are making me look real bad.

Go Ahead . . . Make My Day

Pardon the mixed metaphor (or whatever you'd call it) . . . I know none of these unpleasantly dispositioned movie characters ever said that . . . but I'm sure each of them lit up the screen with something appropriate to my current mood.

No more than 5 minutes after daughter #2 comes home to tell me that one of the 'populars' -- I'll just refer to her as the Bully Bitch -- shoved a cupcake up her nose, my wife calls just in time to stop me from e-mailing her teachers to demand Bully Bitch's head on a platter.

However, she tells me that daughter #1 just called her to share the conversation with her ex-boyfriend in which he expressed his burning desire 'to be truthful:' For the two years they dated (and pretty much co-habitated during their year at Tech), he continued to see his previous girlfriend.

For those of you picking up the phone to dial 9-1-1, no need to worry. I don't own any guns or sharp knives . . . but I don't think a spineless piece of lying wormshit has the balls to castrate anyway.

As for the Bully Bitch, daughter #2 has some pretty sharp claws.

Whew! Glad we could talk.

Friday Morning Wake-Up Call

There's no more forced personal reflection than the rip-off-the-covers-toss-you-out-of-bed-and-show-everything wake-up call of being in Wal-Mart and hearing Rodney Atkins sing 'These are My People.

In celebration of my 5-minute family reunion at the neighborhood store around the corner from our house, I'm sharing one of my favorite songs -- all about finding true love at Wal-Mart -- by one of my favorite past-times: 3 Fools on 3 Stools (if you have the chance to see them, go! if you have a choice, their later shows are a little more raucus, and their Annual White Trash Party in October is . . . well, unabashedly trashy).

Here's a link to 3 Fools leader Doc Wesson singing about a minute of 'Discount Love Affair:' http://www.tackytunesfromtexas.com/Audio/TT_02.ram

And for those of you with any talent, here's a link to the lyrics with guitar chords for Discount Love Affair by Doc Wesson

And here's what I sing at Wal-Mart to stay on my wife's good side:

I met her at Walmart
She thought I was real smart
As I walked her down the isle
She looked at me and smiled
And said "You're a good shopper!"
I met her at Walmart
Now she's my sweetheart
No matter what you're lookin' for
You can find it at the superstore.