Walden: foreshadowing the Front Porch

Far out! John Denver was singing 'Rocky Mountain High,' the campus Ecology Club was stacking newspapers, and our English teachers had us reading Thoreau's Walden. We were going to live the simple life, peace would dominate the world (peace dominate?), and the planet would be saved. And the boys among us were ecstatic that the draft was over.

I still have my high-school copy of Henry David Thoreau's Walden and Civil Disobedience. In the early '70s, it was kind of like the bible for . . . well, for all those things I mentioned in the first paragraph.

I buy almost all of my books at Half-Price Books, usually 2-3 at a time; and if I run out before another shopping trip, I scrounge something around the house for something else to read. At least three times, I've resorted to Walden between Half-Price sprees, and I've gotten all the way to page 10 (Chapter 1 begins on page 7).

Thoreau's much more self-absorbed than I remember (my friend Laurie would call him a 'diva,' like she did me in my last blog), and I find the passages that our English teachers didn't have us underline to be much more interesting. Who really cares about most men leading lives of quiet desperation.

In the first LONG paragraph of Chapter 1 -- Economy, Thoreau anticipates blogging (at least my blogs):

I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else whom I knew so well . . . Moreover, I, on my side, require of every writer, first or last, a simple and sincere account of his own life, and not merely what he has heard of other men's lives; some such account as he would sned to his kindred from a distant land; for if he has lived sincerely, it must be a distant land to me.

Not sure exactly what he said, but I like the justification for writing about myself, because that's really about the only thing I know. And that's what I love about others' blogs.

Then later in another LONG paragraph about northern overseers being worse than southern overseers (damn yankees!), he wrote:

. . . a prisoner of his own opinion of himself, a fame won by his own deeds. Public opinion is a weak tyrant compared with our own private opinions. What a man thinks of himself, that it is which determines, or rather indicates, his fate.

Then he throws in something about Wilberforce, and I'm still trying to figure out who he is.

I agree with both Laurie and Cath's comments on my last blog (Cath is one of those 'kindred from a distant land'), and I'm impressed at how appropriate Thoreau's comments are to that blog and their comments (I was desperate for another trip to Half-Price Books before I wrote the last blog).

A couple of addenda . . .

#1 -- I really didn't deserve my first true love. She was far more mature than I was and, fortunately, kind enough to not point that out to me. I was crushed when she left but grateful for the time we were together. And I regret some of the stupid, stupid jealousies that were such a waste of time.

She must've borrowed my copy of Walden. On the inside cover -- and I either missed it or didn't understand it at the time -- she wrote: Even love nods occasionally. If I would've noticed that at 17, she and I would be . . . well, probably on opposite ends of the state, carrying on our own lives and never having contact again . . . just like now. But at least I'd be smarter.

#2 -- My last blog, I wrote about wanting to tell old friends, 'You were important to me.' A long-ago friend sent me a note through the TJ Web site and sweetly wrote that she still has a gift -- an Instamatic, light-just-right photo of a Port Arthur landmark -- I gave her in high school.

There's nothing better than hearing, 'You were important to me.'

By the way, I still have the patch at the beginning of the blog . . . the jeans it was sewn on didn't make it. But I do have a T-shirt with it screened on the front.

Is it my breath? Old friends and odd reunions

The night of my high school graduation remains the loneliest time in my life. Picked up my diploma (they didn't trust us enough to pass out diplomas on stage), turned in my robe and went home.

Parents gave me money to go to Bonanza Steakhouse. Went to eat by myself and then back home.

No parties. No friends. Nothing.

Okay, now that I've set the scene for you, this is not about teen angst and whining. So I'm almost sure you're asking, 'What led to an overcooked T-bone and free refills of iced tea (and where am I going with this?)?'

This is a tough blog to write and not sound like a whine. I will anyway, because I have some questions about what happens to relationships.

I've been in contact lately with some high school friends (keeping in mind that I've been out of school for almost 35 years), and the results been . . . confusing? Someone in Port Arthur created a Web site for TJ (Port Arthur Jefferson) alumni -- the school no longer exists -- and it's already attracted more than 3,000 online participants. Amazing!

I've reconnected with some friends through the Web site, and visiting with them has been a real treat. In other venues, I've become good blogging friends with someone who was just an acquaintance in high school, and now she's been a wonderful re-connect with Southeast Texas. Some of these folks seem to be just like me and have picked up like we chatted over coffee just yesterday.

Unfortunately, there have been some 'odd' reunions -- odd as in 'what just happened?' -- with those whose friendships I valued. Any renewal of -- for lack of a better term -- childhood friendships just 'poofed' with an e-door in the face, and nothing was left but some cyber-dust. I've been really surprised . . . and sadly embarrassed . . . with who slammed the door. And, unfortunately, no amount of self-examination has given me an answer.

My wife says that I can carry on a meaningful conversation with a tree, and she becomes proudly frustrated when she hears business associates, hers and mine, say, 'Everybody loves George (her words, not mine).' I throw that in as some kind of evidence that I'm a nice guy and not somebody hanging out in an overcoat and black socks.

I guess it must be strange -- and maybe a little frightening, reason for apprehension -- to hear from someone after 30+ years, especially when I think of all the phases of life I've passed through (you should be happy that you didn't catch me in the admitted asshole phase) and assuming that others have changed just as dramatically during three decades.

So what's up? Is it my breath?

I mention my high school graduation because that seems to be a pivotal point in my life, when I packed my emotional and social bags and left Port Arthur behind (although I lived there another 3 1/2 years). My senior year sucked for a bunch of reasons (too awkward to explain here . . . if you were there, don't feel bad; it wasn't your fault . . . really!). It was a powerful enough experience that I've always warned my own children: never abandon your friends. I do believe all that revolved around those seemingly forever nine months resulted in a 1974 Bonanza-night out and a decades-long relationship void with those from my hometown.

I wrote in my very first blog that my wife must think I'm in the witness protection program because I have so few contacts -- well, really none -- from my childhood in Port Arthur. I've also blogged and asked about what happens to people during their lives that makes them grow from the same environment into 180s on the life-outlook scale.

As I've grown older, I've recognized the need to leave the 'witness protection program.' Now, I'm wondering: how do you say, 'you were important to me' to those who have just 'poofed?'

But to those who re-warmed yesterday's cup of coffee and just enjoyed the chat: THANKS!

Dorothy . . . Peter Pan . . . The More Things Change . . .

Daughter #1’s more of a Peter Pan than I am. As independent as each of us is, neither one of us really wants to grow up. She was in town a couple of weeks ago, and every day seemed to bring a new ‘Toto-I-don’t-think-we’re-in-Kansas-any-more’ moment (is it okay to bounce metaphorically from Peter Pan to Wizard of Oz in the same paragraph?).

At that time, Daughter #2 talked about being in the sixth-grade band; and Daughter #1 seemed to accept that her sister was in sixth grade and even 'whoo-hooed' her role as the big dog on the intermediate school campus. Then Daughter #1 realized that her sister will 'grown up' and fighting in the jungles of the seventh grade next year.

‘That can’t be right. I was just in the seventh grade.” Well, maybe seven or eight years ago.

A friend, who helped me unpack when I moved to Fort Worth in 1990, has an older daughter who is a life-long friend of Daughter #1; and Daughter #1 regularly trades Facebook messages with her (she attends Stephen F. Austin State University; Daughter #1 is across the state at Texas Tech).

When my wife mentioned that the life-long friend’s baby brother, who Daughter #1’s known since birth, becomes a teenager this year, Daughter #1 challenges with ‘No way. I’m still a . . . ,’ and then backs down with a ‘when did everybody grow up?’

Our neighborhood -- where Daughter #1 grew up or at least where she kept celebrating birthdays -- is fairly transitional. Families have moved with job changes and schools have continued to open – and kids get shuffled around – to accommodate more families moving into our area. Change shouldn’t be new to her, and she always adapted well.

Unfortunately, her class of friends has seen tragic deaths throughout their school careers --parents killed in motorcycle accidents, parents dying unexpectedly from heart attacks and aneurysms, friends taken by cancer and killed in accidents, and classmates taking their own lives -- but I don’t think she was prepared as a newly crowned adult to mourn the slow death from cancer of a long-time friend’s dad.

Fortunately, life is good, and it does change. Daughter #1 loves to open Facebook, when she’s here, to show her mom the latest baby photos posted by some of her friends from high school. Her display is somewhere between the delight of a child with a new Barbie and the disgust of a teenager served liver when she realizes that girls her age – women – have children. Some are married now, some with husbands in Iraq, and some have begun careers, with rent payments, car payments, cell phone payments and insurance payments all their own.
Daughter #1 is slowly recognizing that her Dorothy has no ruby slippers to help return her to Kansas and that her Peter Pan has no Tinkerbell to keep the magic of Neverland (although, like me, she’ll keep clicking her heals together just to be sure).

But what doesn’t change? I crossed a small bridge during a recent walk – after Daughter #1’s ‘OMG-I’m-growing-up’ visit – and saw a teenage boy sitting on a large rock, not doing much of anything but throwing rocks in the water. His posture and his careless-but-sometimes-intense throws were mine about 35 years ago, when I sat on the Port Arthur seawall and threw rock after rock into the Intercoastal Canal.

If I would’ve asked the boy was he was doing, I’m sure he would’ve replied, ‘nuthin.’ But I almost guarantee that every rock – just like each rock I tossed – was labeled: girlfriend, school, college, car, parents, job, money, boredom, sex, drugs, drinking or – another apparently un-changeable – going to war.

When I crossed the bridge again, he’d moved, now to a nearby picnic table, where he stared at clouds while kids played on the toys of a nearby playground. He was sitting on the bench seat, leaning back with his elbows on the table, head tossed back and his face turned toward the sun. My picnic table – whether I walked from my rock on the seawall to Rose Hill Park or drove to Port Neches Park – was – like this young man’s – one more spot that wasn’t home. And every cloud that passed over had a rock namesake: girlfriend, school, college, car, parents, job, money, boredom, sex, drugs, drinking or going to war.

While I was weighing Daughter #1’s ‘life’s-coming-too-fast’ against my recognition that teen angst is eternal, I thought about the soul searching, life choices, missed opportunities, twists of fate, stupid comments, smart moves and the sheer luck of living. And then my IPod pulled up Jimmy Buffett’s ‘He Went to Paris.’

He went to Paris looking for answers
To questions that bothered him so
He was impressive, young and aggressive
Saving the world on his own

But the warm Summer breezes
The French wines and cheeses
Put his ambitions at bay
Summers and Winters
Scattered like splinters
And four or five years slipped away

Then he went to England, played the piano
And married an actress named Kim
They had a fine life, she was a good wife
Bore him a young son named Jim
And all of the answers and all of the questions
He locked in his attic one day‘
Cause he liked the quiet clean country living
And twenty more years slipped away

Well the war took his baby, bombs killed his lady
And left him with only on eye
His body was battered, his world was shattered
And all he could do was just cry
While the tears were falling, he was recalling
The answers he never found
So he hopped on a freighter, skidded the ocean
And left England without a sound

Now he lives in the islands, fishes the pilin’s
And drinks his green label each day
He’s writing his memoirs and losing his hearing
But he don’t care what most people say
Through eighty-six years of perpetual motion
If he likes you he’ll smile then he’ll say
Jimmy, some of it’s magic, some of it’s tragic
But I had a good life all the way

And he went to Paris looking for answers
To questions that bother him so

How Am I Supposed to Know?' 10 Things About My Dad (#5)

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 1-4 earlier.

Number 5

My dad was so trusting, and his friends and family (okay, me) knew it. I played that trust for a few minutes; a friend of his took him for a 'ride' for 18 years. If MTV practical joker Ashton Kutcher knew him, my dad would've easily been 'Punk'd.'

PUNK'D BY ME
Some time around 1993-94, my parents, my wife, daughter #1 and my son spent Thanksgiving with other families at Sid Richardson Scout Ranch near Bridgeport, Texas. I was working for the Boy Scouts, and a tradition had started a few years earlier that those staff members and their immediate families who couldn't be with their extended families for Thanksgiving would meet at Sid for a huge, community meal. Sid has a large dining hall with cabins and dorms to accommodate the more civilized camper.

After dinner, I was talking with my dad on the porch of the dining hall. Jim Gidley, who was responsible for the local camping programs, was building a fire down near the lake for . . . you guessed it, s'mores.

Knowing how trusting my dad was (and thinking that he would appreciate a good practical joke), I tested an old Tenderfoot Scout trick on him. I told him that I couldn't find the tool that we needed to help build the fire, so I instructed him, 'Go ask Mr. Gidley where I can find a left-handed smoke-shifter (for you non-campers, there is no such thing as a left-handed smoke-shifter).'

My 70+ year old dad walked the 150 yards down to the lake, which was too far for me to hear the conversation, talked with Mr. Gidley, then trudged back up the hill. As he got closer to the porch, I asked him what Mr. Gidley said.

My dad replied, 'He told me to tell you to go to hell,' and gave me that 'smart ass' look and laugh.

PUNK'D FOR 18-YEARS
My son's mom and I were born two days apart in Port Arthur's St. Mary's Hospital. Both of us are the youngest in our families; she has two older sisters, and I have one older sister. Our dads had worked together at Texaco since the '40s, and like any group of co-workers, everybody knew their wives were pregnant.

I was born first, and my dad was so proud. In a world of blue-collar working men, most of them World War II veterans, having a son must've been like winning the title fight or hitting a home run to win the World Series. My dad followed a long-lost custom and passed out cigars to friends at work while he bragged about his new son. When the phone rang and the caller asked for George, he'd ask, 'Do you want to talk to George Senior or George Junior.'

My son's mom and I grew up in the same town and both attended St. James Catholic Church, but we didn't meet until the summer after high school, when we were 18 years old. When I told my dad who I was dating, he said, 'I work with her daddy. She has a brother about your age.'

I'd just met this girl, but I knew enough about her to correct him, 'Daddy, she doesn't have a brother. She has two older sisters.'

For more than 18 years, my outgoing, very trusting dad would ask my future father-in-law, 'How's your son?' And, for more than 18 years, my tight-lipped FFIL responded in his typically Cajun mutter, 'He's fine,' never admitting that he'd had a third daughter instead of a son.

Punk'd for 18 years, but one of my dad's best traits was that he loved to be around people, and he trusted them, maybe the most important gifts he passed on to my sister and me (and I see it in both daughter #1 and daughter #2).

My dad died in 1999, and the visitation at the funeral home became a real celebration of his life, as his former co-workers and friends approached me with 'George' stories: 'good man,' 'always smiling,' 'always happy,' 'always playing a joke on somebody' . . . WHAT!?

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.

I'm Madder 'n Hell, and I'm Not Going to Take It Anymore (or something like that)

I haven't been a political person since some time around the third grade, when I plastered a George Wallace for President bumper sticker on my notebook. We had an All the Way with LBJ bumper sticker ripped off our car, and I thought that was probably the worse thing a hateful person could do during a political campaign.

A couple of years ago, the power of an individual voter hit home in a local school board election, when a candidate (fortunately, one of the good guys) won by 31 votes. And I believe that people will do the right thing, especially when their local interests are at stake. Last year, a previously non-existent group of voters in North Fort Worth derailed an 'old-time' political machine in the school board election, and the board took a positive 180-degree turn in its direction.

Unfortunately, I'm waiting for the right sound bite to sway my decision on presidential candidates. I took a survey a few months ago that said I was most closely tied with the guy from North Carolina with the nice head of hair. Wish I could remember his name. Last week, I was a Hillary fan, until I heard her stumping on TV and she sounded like a New York yankee (no, not one of the baseball players). So my vote's still pretty much up for grabs.

What I'm REALLY not liking is the fear that many are showing as they lambaste Barack Obama and try to associate him with everyone from Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein to the snake in the Garden of Eden. Yep, I think it's driven by fear of 'them' and not by any sound political judgment. Ditto re: Hillary and those other 'thems.'

Did you know that there's documented proofed that Obama hid his Muslim heritage behind his Catholic-school upbringing? Or that there are movies of Hillary and her 'friend?' Give me a break!

In 2005, my daughter was selected homecoming queen at her high school, the first in the new school's history. She's never been one to seek that kind of recognition, but she is very nice, well-known and 'will give the time of day' to anyone . . . a fact proven by the freshman/sophomore voting block that said she acknowledged their presence. I was very proud of her and knew that she has a valuable life skill in meeting and remembering people.

Ironically, I thought of a childhood friend from Port Arthur, who couldn't have more defined whatever our word might've been for nerd, geek or just plain bizarre. His older sister and mine were friends. I believe our dads worked together, and I knew him and his older brother through Boy Scouts and school.

My strongest vision of him is from high school, although he never changed much in comparison to the time or his environment, sporting high-water pants pulled up at the waist, wearing thick glasses and topped by a shock of squirrelly blond hair. My memory may be tainted related to the actual specifics, but you get the idea.

But he had what I would now consider an incredible life skill: he would walk through the hall between class periods and would greet everyone by name. It was in an irritable machine-gun style, but he knew everyone.

Most of us change from high school (although someone told my wife and daughter #1, when asked if I was really a nerd in high school, that I was exactly the same as I am now). So I thought, 'Man, this guy has probably thrived since he left school. What a gift, to have some kind of relationship with so many people!'

Because of daughter #1's success, I looked him up online, found him on the Port Arthur ISD alumni Web page, and sent him an e-mail. We exchanged some e-mails, and I could tell that he'd gone through some difficult times.

He and his brother both married what I would call 'mail-order brides' because 'American women just didn't know how to treat men.' He'd expressed a huge amount of pride in his young son, but was looking for another teaching job (apparently he's worked in school districts around the state and had a problem with another supervisor, 'teachers just aren't allowed to teach').

I'd just moved from an 'uncomfortable' job situation to the job I have now (and I love it!), so I thought I'd share some of my Pollyanna-ish encouragement. He continued to exchange e-mails with me anyway.

Then, after Hurricane Katrina obliterated New Orleans --when you couldn't turn on the TV without hurting for displaced families or get angry over horrible personal abuses, or fume over an unresponsive, hopelessly non-empathetic federal government -- I was part of a distribution list for an e-mail he distributed.

After a rant about New Orleans Blacks bringing the Katrina disaster on themselves, the e-mail ended with 'Watch out, Whitey!' I don't remember the exacting wording of my Reply All, but the intent was 'Take me off your f***ing e-mail list!!!' I guess the All in Reply All were 'watching out' because they promptly shared their disagreement with my stance on the post-Katrina re-socialization.

And then I thought: here's a man who grew up in a nearly mirror image of my home, slightly more nerdy than me, but loves his family and has some valuable life skills.

And I asked myself then and continue to ask: When do people get so bitter? How do they become so unhappy? What the hell happened!?

God, I love my life.

So don't tell my that you've seen Obama riding a camel or Hillary strolling arm-in-arm with Rosie O'Donnell and Ellen DeGeneres. Tell me how your candidate's going to bring young people home from Iraq and Afghanistan, and how he/she will balance the budget, address immigration, eradicate hunger, get people off the streets, and help me pay for my kids' college.

Whew! I feel better now.

P.S. If you think I'm naively loving a cushy life, let's chat.

Next Time, No Nose Tap

I am unbelievably romantic and loving and, unfortunately, just a little (a LOT) off the wall. If you cataloged everything my wife has said during the last 15-20 years, the entry with the most hits would have to be: 'You are SO strange.'

My final year in college was 1977; and I worked most of that year at KYKR, a country (country/western is what we called it then) radio station near Port Arthur, usually late-night or 'graveyard' weekend shifts . . . (yes, this is all going somewhere)

Thanks to my dad, I already had a pretty full repertoire of country classics, but months and months of singing country songs LOUDLY, trying hard to stay awake (no worry, Mr. Joynt; microphones off, studios empty and always awake), etched the lyrics of hundreds of country songs, some truly awful, in my facts-need-not-apply brain.

One of the advantages from that era is that old country/western music helps keep me awake, especially on late-night drives. My wife and I were returning from Austin this evening, and KSCS, one of the local country stations (Nashville country . . . patooey! her regular choice, not mine), was airing its regular Classic Country Saturday night . . . (yes, this is still going somewhere)

My yankee wife, who I've said before loves all things Texas, loves contemporary country music, but hates classic country. And now she especially hates Tom T. Hall.

The disc jockey (or whatever he's called now) intros Tom T. Hall's 'I Love.' I start bouncing with excitement all over the cab of my truck (as much as driving will allow me anyway), and I start to droan along with Tom (my wife is shocked/disgusted that I know the lyrics).

I love little baby ducks, old pick-up trucks, slow-moving trains, and rain
I love little country streams, sleep without dreams, Sunday school in May
And hay
And I love you, too

When I get to I love you, I look at my wife and on too, I playfully tap her on the nose.

Maybe I need some advice for the lovelorn, but I have begun to believe that maybe women really don't like being compared to baby ducks, pick-up trucks, trains and hay. And that maybe they don't like being thumped on the nose at 70 MPH. And that maybe they just don't like Tom T. Hall.

She's just lucky that Tom and I didn't belt out . . .

I like beer. It makes me a jolly good fellow
I like beer. It helps me unwind and sometimes it makes me feel mellow (makes him feel mellow)
Whiskey's too rough, champagne costs too much, and vodka puts my mouth in gear
Aw, this little refrain should help me explain, as a matter of fact, i love beer (yes, he likes beer)

(I tried really hard to find a 'my hero' Tom T. Hall photo that resembled him on that evening in the late '60s, when they poured him onto the stage of Woodrow Wilson Junior High for his Port Arthur CavOILcade performance . . . dang it! no luck)

Junior High Running Advice II

One of the best bits of running advice I ever received was on my one (yes, one) day of football tryouts in 8th grade. I eavesdropped on two coaches as they watched a classmate, Harris White, run 50-yard sprints. Harris was a Black kid whose running style was very relaxed, most noticeably, his palms open instead of fists clenched.

I finished this post on my running blog with a look at my own running style, but here I'd like to think more about Harris and why those coaches noticed him.

A LITTLE BACKGROUND

Port Arthur schools first integrated, more or less, when I was in junior high, some time around 1968-69 (I say more or less because I think PAISD has been under a federal court order to get it right for about 20-30 years).

My dad was a boilermaker at Texaco and had grown up dirt poor in Kentucky; and, as we watched America's civil rights wrestling match on TV, he talked about his Black friends (but Black wasn't his word of choice early on) that he grew up with and worked with. As a result, it never occurred to me to get angry because Blacks were at MY school (in all fairness, right in line with the times and region, we did talk about how those kids came all the way from n----- town to go to our school . . . in Port Arthur, all the way had to be maybe a couple of miles). Unfortunately, a lot of people were angry, and hallways would explode with the bump of a shoulder or a misunderstood look. Although tempered a little (but not much), those kinds of fights continued through at least my senior year (if you were at Thomas Jefferson in 72-73, you may remember All-State quarterback (and moron) Larry Meyer tossing a Black kid over the railing and down the stairwell).

Pretty sad, too. Even those of us who avoided trouble still ignorantly stepped on toes. I remember losing the key to my gym locker and innocently asking one of the Black guys if he could break into my locker for me. His look told me that I could have just as easily been telling him to move to the back of the bus. STUPID! (as a I write this, I'm thinking about Ray Lyons, a chess teammate -- manly men! -- and wonder how I may have treated him)

BACK TO HARRIS WHITE AND THOSE COACHES . . .

Ken Jenkins works out with me some evenings at the Y. He's an assistant principal at the alternative high school in Irving ISD, and we've talked a lot about the integration of schools when we were kids. Ken's Black and grew up in a small town near Corsicana, Texas. He's a few years older than I am and was on the first integrated football team at his high school. He's shared stories that are torn from the Remember the Titans script about mixing Black and white athletes. Ken ran track at TCU (I think) about the same time that Jerry Levias broke the color barrier in football at SMU.

He told me that white fans soon warmed up to the idea of having Black players. Most had never seen football played that way. Their team had figuratively gone from 0 to 60 over the summer, from farm boys playing three-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust to wide-open FAST football. I believe now that's why those junior high coaches noticed Harris White. They'd never seen an athlete move so quickly and smoothly and so relaxed.

A SIDE NOTE . . .

The first game of Ken's season was against an all-white school, and he fielded the opening kick-off. His return of the kick-off for a touchdown probably is what swayed a lot of those East Texas fans. Unfortunately, a white cheerleader ran onto the field and hugged him after he crossed the goal line. Both were in the principal's office Monday morning.

The funniest part of that game is the first play from scrimmage. Ken was the running back, and the coach called his number on that play. Ken said that when he heard the play, he stepped out of the huddle, looked in shock at his coach, pointed at himself and mouthed 'ME?' I believe everyone in the stadium understood his question, including the opposing defense. Ken never said how far that play went.

FOLLOW-UP

I'm a REALLY slow runner; but if I ever see Harris again, I'd like to thank him for a relaxed running style that makes me at least feel like I'm running fast.

I'm not sure if Harris played football in high school. He was really fast, and I'm pretty sure he ran track. Thomas Jefferson's football teams (in Port Arthur, before I offend anyone) were REALLY bad in the early to mid-70s, so I kind of doubt if his speed had been tapped.

A Pirate Legacy

Yes, I am a pirate, 200 years too late
The cannons don't thunder, there's nothing to plunder
I'm an over-40 victim of fate, arriving too late, arriving too late
- - A Pirate Looks at 40 as sung by Jimmy Buffett

A Pirate Looks at 40 is one of my all-time favorite songs; and, even though I've been on the straight and narrow most of my life (okay, all of my life . . . I'm pretty dull), I'm still waiting, at the drop of an eye-patch, to pick up a cutlass and plunder the nearest frigate.

Just like almost any kid, I thought my parents were the dullest people I'd ever met. Now that I know how dull children can make you, maybe, as Buffett sings, . . . it could me my own damn fault.

BUT I do think there are hints of a pirate legacy in family . . .

My dad cited his first taste of alcohol as a young kid in Kentucky eating sugar from the bottom of moonshine stills (gee, dad. wasn't that illegal?).

As a boxer, he often took on the 'champion' from whatever carnival might be passing through Mayfield (and probably Paducah). Except he knew that he would take the fall on Thursday, but then he'd be able to beat the champ on Friday, which, of course, set up the sell-out for Saturday night (the champ alway won in the ring, but my dad had money in his pocket).

My mother was eating a hamburger and fries in a Port Arthur cafe, when a would-be suitor plopped down in the booth across from her. As he talked, he reached for French fry, and she warned him not to touch her French fries. He laughed and reached for another fry. My mom, in her own swashbuckling way, swiped her knife off the table and stabbed the back of his hand . . . 'I told you not to touch my French fries.'

After my parents married and my dad went to work at Texaco in Port Arthur, his friends warned him the Cajun women sleep with knives under their pillows. He believed.

Role Models

Escaping the Witness Protection Program

I think my wife believes I'm part of the Witness Protection Program.

She's from Baltimore, and I'm from Texas. I've spent time with her family in Maryland and have met some long-time family friends and even some high school and college classmates. My wife's met members of my extended family, mostly at my Aunt Dorothy's beach birthday parties (yea, Bolivar!) or at weddings and funerals; and, although she's visited Port Arthur, she's never heard anyone say, 'I knew George when . . . .'

I grew up in Port Arthur, which for those of you not from 'round here, is about 90 miles east of Houston, 10-15 miles from the beach, and a quick drive 'cross the river' to Louisiana. Except for a high school friend now married to my ex-wife, she's never met high school or college friends from my life in Port Arthur. As a result, she must think that I made it all up and that I'm hiding from . . . well, somebody. Upside . . . at least I'm important enough to have to hide.

So, who cares?

As my kids have grown older and are beginning to leave home, I'm more disappointed that they've never connected with their heritage (my mother's was born in Jeanerette, Louisiana, and grew up in Port Arthur; my dad's from Mayfield, Kentucky, and moved to Texas after World War II).

Tell my kids that they're Cajuns -- coon-asses to some -- and that boudain, dirty rice and gumbo are heavenly delicacies (sorry, I'm not a crawfish fan), and they'll look at you like you're . . . well, just about as out of touch as their dad. I left Port Arthur right after college, didn't look back and didn't visit much, and before I knew it -- after I realized that my kids thought Cajun was a chicken sandwich at Wendy's -- my parents were old and soon died.

We live in suburban Fort Worth and have no family within a six-hour drive; no family that my kids know well within the two-day drive to Baltimore (don't cry for me, Evangelina; we have friends here from all over the country . . . all over the world actually, some we've known since our arrival in Fort Worth in 1990).

If you're still with me, you're asking what's set me off?

1) Nobody in my family will eat boudain or gumbo. Dirty rice is out of the question, just on name alone.

2) I Googled "'Port Arthur' and 1974" last week, and found the blog site of a former high school classmate who I knew but not well. We chatted (why couldn't any of us be that interesting in high school?), and she closed with 'Good luck finding other TJ classmates.'

I realized that I sounded like I was looking to re-live the 'glory days (or in my case, the gory days) of high school. In reality, I think I'm Googling for that recipe to mend the disconnect between our Chili's-Home Depot-Staples-Target-Dillards (and a bunch of teen-trendy. one-word-name mall stores) suburban lifestyle and our diluted Cajun heritage.

By the way, did you know that in Baltimore they steam their seafood and not deep-fry it? After rassling for a couple of ounces of crab meat, I ask for a cheeseburger.

So . . . know any good Cajun recipes? And if you know me, but don't know anybody named Corleone (remember the Witness Protection Program? . . . oh, come on; it wasn't that bad!), holler at me.