Deliberate acts of courtesy

In his foreword to “Jailbird,” the late author Kurt Vonnegut wrote about a young Hoosier reader of his books.

“…John Figler is a law-abiding high-school student. He says in his letter that he has read almost everything of mine and is now prepared to state the single idea that lies at the core of my life's work so far. The words are his: "Love may fail, but courtesy will prevail. This seems true to me--and complete. So I am now in the abashed condition, five days after my fifty-sixth birthday, of realizing that I needn't have bothered to write several books. A seven-word telegram would have done the job. Seriously…”

Think or say what you will about Vonnegut, his politics, his beliefs and his leanings, but the kid who dashed off that note might have re-shaped a cornerstone of assurance for the great Hoosier author – and a simple homily to us all: Just be decent to one another.

I can recall a few recent instances.

Why was it necessary for that old woman at the Speedway to call the clerk “stupid” when he was not moving fast enough to juggle her 20-plus lottery combination tickets and a carton of cut-rate smokes? He politely and with some slight embarrassment seemed to take in stride as our small audience who looked elsewhere and pretended not to hear. Guess he gets this kind of treatment on a regular basis.  

Face in the window

I’m told that when clean-up crews came in a few years ago to clear out their house in my boyhood neighborhood, they found whole nations of cockroaches and other multi-legged critters; mountains of broken furniture and fixtures;  and spewing more reeking trash than any network television political commentator. The poor devils assigned this onerous task had to protect themselves in Hazmat suits.

Not sure why exactly the previous owners cleared out, it could have been death or foreclosure or a thousandy-zillion other reasons, but they were gone. And that was that.

I do know that they resided in that decaying enclave for many years, stretching back to the mid-1960s. No one knew much about them; they kept their distance. Except for the pudgy head of that household.   

Indeed, he was the mystery of our little corner of the struggling yet tidy Country Club Manor. He owned the night when the weather was good. Today, they call them “serial voyeurs” and they are described as virtually harmless. Back in my youth, we called them “Peeping Toms” in the same tone you would utter any filthy noun-verb modifier.

His access routes were the narrow, meandering alleys separating yards. And for a fat man, he was fast.

Our phantom made his presence known quite often. Stealth was not his strong suit. His face would occasionally appear in window here and there; his choice viewing area being bathrooms at night when our mothers and sisters would go about their business. He was here, there and everywhere after the sun went down.

Her name is Mrs. Mudd

Occasionally, those predictable surveys come out reminding us of what humans fear most. The usual things are on the list: death, heights, the loss of jobs and homes, claustrophobia, war, poverty, pain, the unknown, and an endless menagerie of creatures which make us break out into cold sweat and the shakes. Such items change with the times, but the one phobia almost always at the top of the list is the most dreaded of all.

Public speaking.

Back in that distant epoch of time of pterodactyls and actual textbooks, students at Evansville Central High School were required to take speech. You carried it on your schedule either the first or second semester of your sophomore year. There was no debate or discussion about it. No waiver unless your tongue had been cut out by some freak accident with a paper cutter or still reeling from injuries sustained like that frozen flagpole boy in A Christmas Story. There was simply no way escaping it.

Up to that time – and even to this day – I have not been known to possess an unbridled, restrained tongue. It might explain why I have risen to such lofty heights throughout my professional career. But entering this official “talking class” struck fear in my heart, as it did many of my classmates, sharper than Wisconsin cheddar cheese. In the end, we survived the crucible of learning the basics of organizing thoughts, making notes and then standing before our disinterested audience to describe the most mundane of objects of our interest.

But for me, it didn’t end there. Following that class, I thought it might be interesting to join the school’s National Forensics League speech team. I had no real skills to offer; no budding oratorical promise to speak of. Just thought it might be fun. Seemed practical, too, given that my bum knee from Osgood-Schlatter disease put an end to football (the diagnosis coming from a family doctor who later encouraged me to join the Army and pumped me up on steroids to combat mononucleosis a month before I reported for basic training).

But as usual, I digress.

An enduring love letter

 It was a week before the first large engagement of the Union and Confederate armies. Sullivan Ballou, a major in the 2nd Rhode Island Volunteers, sat down to write a letter to his wife. It’s mostly a love letter to his wife, but in a larger sense, it was a love letter to America. It was made  famous by Ken Burns' epic PBS Civil War Series and, yet, it resonates to this age.

Dear Sarah: The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days - perhaps tomorrow. And lest I should not be able to write you again I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I am no more.

I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how American Civilization now leans upon the triumph of the government and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution. And I am willing - perfectly willing - to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this government, and to pay that debt.

Sarah, my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but omnipotence can break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly with all those chains to the battlefield. The memory of all the blissful moments I have enjoyed with you come crowding over me, and I feel most deeply grateful to God and you, that I have enjoyed them for so long. And how hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes and future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and see our boys grown up to honorable manhood around us.

If I do not return, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I loved you, nor that when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name... Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless, how foolish I have sometimes been!

But, 0 Sarah, if the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they love, I shall always be with you, in the brightest day and in the darkest night... always, always. And if there should be a soft breeze against your cheek, it shall be my breath -- or the cool air  fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by.

Sarah do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for me… for we shall meet again...

Sullivan Ballou was killed a week later at the 1st Battle of Bull Run, July 28, 1861.

On the eve of a weekend where red-tag holiday sales, triumphant checkered flags will wave and our neighborhoods be awash with the smells of grilled food, let us remember all of those women and men for generations who sacrificed futures for our freedom. The price they paid is the dividend we should cherish.

A weak ode to idiot brothers

I resurrect this piece from a previous entry...

 

IT SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME, back in the summer of 1964. One afternoon, my older brother and I didn’t have much on our itinerary, so we decided to play that time-honored game called “Stretch.” A rather ordinary diversion for boys in our neighborhood.

 

Here’s how it works: You borrow a steak knife from the utensil drawer in the kitchen and go find a decent piece of turf to begin. Then you and the other player take turns throwing the blade to alternate sides of both feet. Perhaps a few inches or maybe a foot. The goal, of course, is to make the other spread their stance to the point where they topple over. If you fall first, you loose. But there was another strategy; alternate the distances between long and short. Really gets into your opponents head.

If you were a true gladiator, you played “Stretch” barefoot. I have a few scars on the top of both feet to prove it.

Our game was going fine until one of us speared the knife into a hard surface and the blade broke. Uh-oh. We got some serious explaining to do now.

So my brother – never one to be short of creative ideas at the spur of the moment – devised a humorous way to defuse the potential wrath we faced. Within moments, the plot unfurled.

The two of us staggered up the driveway, my brother’s arm wrapped lovingly around my shoulder and appearing to support me. I was the “Igor,” clutching the knife handle in one hand with it’s broken blade pressed against my gut.

Mom!!! Mom!!! Come quick!!!!

Boys of a long-ago summer day

A few years ago, while driving through Greenwood – a south suburb of Indianapolis – running some necessarily bland errand. As I was winding south on those narrow streets, I noticed some Little Leaguers on a nearby field and I decided to take a detour and watch the game briefly. 

I walked over to the fence near first base and became a silent spectator. I saw a freckle-faced kid sitting alone in the dugout staring at his friends on the field. And as it so happens, I found myself drifting back through the cobwebs of memory to a time when I played ball myself: Evansville, circa 1967.

I had "graduated" in age to try out for Little League at Harwood Elementary School. The new coach's name was "Joe," too, and he vaguely resembled Jabba the Hut with a bad Beatles' hair cut. It was fairly well known that the only reason he wanted to coach was so that his younger brother could play. When you're the coach you can make such arbitrary decisions. 

As the coach surveyed the talent on try-out afternoon, he had just learned his brother was a few months shy in age of being eligible to play in our league. In fact, as irony would have it, I was barely old enough to play myself. So I found a place on the team as an outfielder, perhaps by default and some modest talent.

Life was good. I had a new uniform. I was part of the team. Then the season began. 

A mantra for all seasons

I DON’T REMEMBER exactly when I first heard it, but it was several years ago. It was a new phrase introduced into the family lexicon. I don’t recall the circumstance when I first heard it, but I do know with certainty it was my Mom  first uttered the expression. It has since been spread with winking humor among my sister Kris, brother George, my daughters Erin and JoAnna, and some of my grandkids. This succinct line has become somewhat of a family punch-line.

            

I like it much. It’s a universal phrase that seems to fit right in any language. The words fit quite nicely in situations when you don’t know what quite to say, or when you don’t know what to cough up when you disagree. Suffice it to say that…

            

When you get the notice in the mail from the IRS and you feel the dragon blowing fire up through the esophagus when you learn for the second year in a row you’ve underpaid. They want their money now and you ain’t got it. Everybody’s gotta do what they gotta do.

            

You’ve been separated from your significant other for a few months and you get the latest car-insurance premium that’s higher than Cheech and Chong on meth. It’s been adjusted because you’re considered single. For you see, your former significant other told your agent in private a few months before leaving you that the “divorce should be final” by the next payment period. Everybody’s gotta do what they gotta do.

Call of the mild -- and strong

SHE SLIPPED INTO THE ROOM, made her way to my Dad’s bedside and stealthily took his vitals. He stirred a bit and an eyelid strained open a bit to observe this early morning invader, recognizing her beyond the haze of his sedation and a smile weakly blossomed on his face.

Sorry to bother you, George – I mean Buck – but I gotta get this information for the charts. What can I do for you? she asked, gently touching his forehead and peering into that sliver of an eye looking back at her. Okay, let’s move you a bit and let you get a look outside, okay. It’s cold but it’s a pretty day outside coming your way?

A shift of a few centimeters gave the man a glimmer of a salmon-colored sunrise erupting beyond his window. His visitor reached for his hand; she smiled and winked at me as she left the room. Other cases to evaluate; other patients to see. And I suspect each received the same respect and level of care, and the depth of comfort that my Dad had received.

About a week later, he was gone. Just like that on a late Sunday night. It was a few days before Thanksgiving, and I was grateful my Dad finally was at peace.

But I recall most clearly those final few weeks when he drifted between this world and the next marking time in his room with my Mama, sibs and close family and friends. It didn’t occur to me then as it does now. Curing disease often doesn’t happen in this dimension, but it always does in the next. The human body comes only with a limited warranty. That is why the Manufacturer installs us with souls, I believe.

An uncommon wealth

The road bumps you along low-slung hills and sharp peaks, slumping banana and trees and a thousand explosive and subdued shades of green. The nearby volcanoes are draped with clouds. Almost like something out of Jurassic Park. 

Our bus bumped and swerved as it slowly made its way to a place that was very familiar to some of us, who had been there a time or two before. Here and there, boys rode horses and herd cattle and waved as we drove by. Young girls chased pigs along a dried-up creek bed. And mothers walked dusty pathways carrying bundles on their heads.

For some in our group, this was a homecoming of sorts to the remote Nicaragua village of Abagansca. The name of this place – loosely translated from some nearly forgotten Indian tongue – means “river with little black pebbles.” I had been there twice before -- and my heart was beating faster with anticipation as our ride came to a halt. 

Keep your eyes on the road, dummy... I wanna collect my pension!

Youngsters who are driven by their grandparents are less likely to suffer serious injury if they're involved in a crash, says a new study in the journal Pediatrics. Those findings come from researchers at the University of Pennsylvania, who says that even though grandparents are in an older group that has a higher risk of severe crashes, youngsters driven by their grandparents suffered fewer injuries in crashes and were actually safer than children driven by their parents.

Chalk one up for us fledlging geezers. Gen-Xers and you other hyphenated inheritors of societal labels, take note: You can’t teach youngsters driving safety skills from Grand Theft Auto and other video games.

I initially learned mine from my Dad while heading down that mirage-glistening road to Folsomville to family get-togethers in the early ‘60s. With his foot comfortably stomped on the pedal at 60, occasionally he’d let me and my brother and, in years later my sister, take the steering wheel of that family car.  Learned fast eye-to-hand coordination that no computer game -- not even Grand Theft Auto -- could ever teach. Especially with a nervous, screaming Mom riding shotgun.

You’ll kill us all, Buck!

Mothers transcend DNA and Hallmark cards

In the next few days, mothers throughout America, and other places around the globe, will begin receiving myriad messages of thanks, gratitude and love. It’s an ancient ritual, giving a nod to fertility and the continuance of life. In our country, this tradition is traced back to Julia Ward Howe, whose words became the lyrics to the Battle Hymn of the Republic became the rallying theme of the Union during our Civil War.

Yes, sons, daughters, grandchildren and others are scouring the stores to find the right gift, order the sweet-smelling bouquets, zero in on the right trinkets and prepare to offer them at the Altar of Motherhood. We hear in advance from this oddly wonderful sex, Oh, I don’t want or need any of these things. I already have so much!

They cheerfully accept the crude art of their kids, marveling at the intricate, abstract designs of family stick figure holding hands. Their own visages being grotesquely portrayed with weird hair-dos and body shapes which  would stun Picasso. The scrawled messages have more misspellings and reversed letters than a hostage note written by the backwoods boys who got whacked in Deliverance.

And for adult children, it’s not much better. The brief notes we write are weak footnotes to the sentimental screed found within the mass-produced greeting cards we buy.

I’ve been around long enough to know what mothers are, more importantly, what they do. They clean up the messes their children make from birth and sometimes into adulthood They wipe snotty noses and other gross places; grimace against projectile vomiting from sour tummies;  and listen carefully for cries during the night denoting pain or sadness or fear. Especially when some invisible Boogeyman has invaded a darkened bedroom.

They endure mindless prattle and answer questions Einstein and Oprah could never answer. Their eyes mist up when they hear correct recitations of the ABCs, counting numbers and fill-in dialogue from Dr. Seuss books. For you see, such imagination needs a nudge.

The fine art of miscommunicating

Things I have learned about communicating and interacting with others... 

When they've sounded "Taps" in Army boot camp ending the training day -- it's not really a good idea to strut up and down the barracks hallway, impersonating your drill sergeant when you think he's gone for the day.

Suppose you're in the fifth grade and in the school spelling bee in a crowded gym with your Mom looking on. You misspell a word and they "ding" you out of competition. And you react by muttering an expletive you've heard a gazillion times before.

When you get an e-mail from a "friend" in your office asking for your opinion about corporate's  "latest and greatest idea. " Never -- EVER --  hit the Reply All button.

If you're in a foreign country, say, like Nicaragua, your Spanish-speaking skills won't necessarily work if the stranger you're trying to speak to turns out to be a visitor from the Mideast. 

You meet a celebrity, a guy who has co-starred in 1960s beach movies with Annette, and the best thing you can mutter is, "Boy, you sure do have a lot of kids to be such a short guy!"

That when you are young newspaper reporter and writing a crime story and on deadline -- and the sheriff's last name is "Dick" -- be careful of typos that place the word-article "the" before his name. Some folks reading it the next morning might think you're editorializing and the sheriff doesn't think the mistake is very funny. A related lesson? Copy editors sometimes are neither.

Say you're 12 years old and shoplifting a necklace for a girl in your class as a Christmas present, and you turn around to the man who has been trailing you and say, "Sir, this may seem like a strange question, but why are you following me? I hope you don’t think I’m shoplifting!"

You have just been introduced to give a presentation to a large crowd, and as you stand to approach the microphone you forget that you're still furiously trying to dry-rub away water that has spilled onto the front of your pants.

That an uptight elderly third-grade teacher -- with hair the color of moldy Velveeta cheese  -- monitoring the school cafeteria will never believe you when you tell her that the reason you didn't eat the mashed potatoes is because of an allergic reaction that will cause you to bleed from your ears and eyes and eventually kill you if you eat them.

Yep. Always lessons to be learned.

Legend of a fall

Okay. The last week has passed, and in the last few days so have the cliché queries the sympathetic comments, the rhetorical questions and all of that.

No, me and my girlfriend didn’t get into a slugfest; nor did I dare to take on a burly bunch of bikers at a local tavern. Didn’t walk into that proverbial door by accident.  I didn’t back-end some slow-driving goober along U.S. 31, and, as it were, there was no failed athletic attempt to be heroic at the end of the game.

Truth is, I fell in my driveway while taking that olive-drab, 96-gallon behemoth our city officials describe as a trash container. Near dusk, I attempted to navigate a full load of my personal flotsam, jetsam and wood planks to the end of the driveway. But that journey took a turn. And drop.

Lost my footing down that heavy rock trail half-way to the curb. Feet slid out like an errant ice-skater and dropped heavier than three large sacks of Idaho spuds. Boom! Face down flat against the heavy, sharp-edged gravel. Like any neo-geezer I lay there stunned for a few seconds. Then insult crowned injury.