“I write in the shadow and spirit of Mark Twain and Bill Shakespeare. My greatest dream and aspiration is that they will laugh with me . . . and not laugh me out of the classroom.”
At the age of fifteen, during the process of being given traveling papers by three high schools and attending four – I was sent to live with my grandparents in Rensselaer, Indiana. There I began writing my autobiography, “Diary of A Dumbass”. Approximately four chapters into it, I came home to find my grandmother standing over my underwear drawer in my bedroom where she had retrieved my work from where it lay hidden under a stack of BVDs. She was gripping it in her hand and shaking it in my face, screaming, “Kenton Henry – this is a disgrace to our family!”
I replied, “But grandma – our family is a disgrace!” At which point, she ripped my entire work to pieces. It was not until I was in a college creative writing class I again began work on my memoirs. This time, I returned home from class to find my wife shaking my grand opus in her hand much as my grandmother had. And the same result followed. It seems some people simply cannot handle the truth.
It would be thirty years before I began anew. In the meantime, I had graduated from Indiana University with a degree in Social Work. My career goal was to take control of America using hostile measures and return it to the Native American. I intended to get a law degree, move to Arizona and become a “Billy Jack” of sorts. A karate kicking, martial artist carrying a brief case serving as a community organizer for the Navajo and other reservations. I became disillusioned when I determined the Indians didn’t want any more white guys coming on their reservations telling them how it should be. With that, I returned to Texas where I had lived as a small boy and later during my tour in search of a high school degree.
Finding it difficult to save myself, much less the rest of the world, during some difficult economic times, I was backed into a career in insurance kicking and screaming. In time I built a successful business in the medical insurance market. For twenty years it sustained me quite well until recent legislative changes forced me, once again, to reinvent myself.
My metamorphosis on this occasion began with taking chemistry classes at my local community college. Because of wisdom and practical experience – garnered from years in the private market – I have fast tracked my new career by developing two revolutionary products. The first is a pest control product. Specifically, it is a “Cat Food Aphrodisiac” which (when mixed with Fancy Feast) makes cats absolutely irresistible to mice. The second is a chemical sanitation product which when added to raw sewage makes it smell like perfectly good tacos. I am currently marketing it in border towns along the Rio Grande and all the way to the west coast. If I land the Tijuana account it will be an economic boon to Tijuana and all of Mexico as tourists will literally run for the border. I will be able to retire in luxury and hereafter be known as the “Ron Popeil of Poo”.
In my spare time, in addition to riding my Harley, I teach Shakespeare to death row inmates at the Huntsville State Prison and judge armadillo beauty contests. When not attending Mensa International conventions, I continue working on my autobiography, “Diary of a Dumbass”.
The events and experiences which led me to become the person I am today are reflected in the stories and poems which follow. They consist mostly of what I describe as autobiographical fiction. I include the qualifier, “fiction” as a disclaimer of sorts to protect the guilty. For the most part, that would be me.
I believe in some of this you will sense an undercurrent of slight regret and remorse but, hopefully, you will find my tales, rhymes and reflections humorous. Any positive insights or lessons you might gain would make me that much happier. In the words of a famous clown I once had the pleasure of knowing, “We are all actors in a grand play. We can choose to be either happy or sad performers. I choose happy!” I made that clown a promise I would do my part to make people smile. Again, I hope BardofTheWoods does that much for you.
Don Kenton Henry
Poet, Road Warrior, Refugee from Convention . . . Ever at your service . . .
King had a soft mouth. That’s what my dad always said.
King was Dad’s prize—field-bred and accomplished—an orange and white Brittany Spaniel. A “soft mouth” is a bird hunter’s parlance for a dog that will retrieve without ruffling a feather or bruising an already damaged quarry. This, and his ability to find quail or pheasants where other dogs found none, made King a stud dog in high demand throughout Central Indiana and Ohio.
In addition to a beautiful hand-engraved over-and-under Remington shotgun, he was my dad’s pride and joy and one of his few valuable possessions. And it was King who was with him when he showed up at our door that Christmas Day, 1965.
Except that King stayed in the car. After all, he was a working dog and not to be coddled.
We hadn’t seen either of them since Mom filed divorce papers back in October, two days past her thirty-seventh birthday. That happened after Dad lost his job as a used-car salesman when he punched Mr. Richter of Richter & Kern Buick. He knocked him through the plate-glass window of the sales office and onto the car lot after “one too many” over lunch at the pub across the street from the new-car showroom.
It just so happened the police station was two doors down from the pub. Mom had to bail Dad out of jail, and the incident made the second page in the Finn’s Landing Republican. She was certain it could cost her her job as a Killarney County Extension Agent, and that’s when she went to see Al Cole. Al was a respected and established attorney with whom she was acquainted from his comings and goings in the county courthouse where Mom’s office was located.
It was not yet mid-morning when the doorbell rang.
I answered, and there, against a backdrop of newly fallen snow, stood my dad.
Normally, he would have walked right in the back door wearing the attire of a field guide. That was his job at the time, at the Flying Feathers hunting preserve near Warren, Indiana—and it’s where he had lived since the divorce papers forced him out of our house. And from where he had driven that morning.
Usually, by now, on a day off—and especially on a holiday—he’d be drunk.
But today was different.
He stood there in pressed, cuffed wool slacks and a starched white shirt. He was minus a coat despite the cold. I surveyed him from his black dress shoes—spit-shined the way he always polished them after eight years in the Navy—to his jet-black hair with nary a speck of gray. It was perfectly combed with a little dab of Brylcreem and set off his deep blue eyes.
It was seldom I had seen them clear in recent years, and they stood out in brilliant contrast to my own, which he always said got washed out in the rinse cycle.
His arms were full of brightly wrapped Christmas presents.
He was thirty-eight years old. I was eleven.
“Merry Christmas, Junior!” he exclaimed. “You going to open the door and let your old man in, or are you going to make me freeze out here?”
“C’mon in, Dad,” I said, standing aside.
My siblings had heard his voice and came running as he stepped from the foyer into the living room. I was the oldest of four and named after him—hence the reference to “Junior.”
Preston was seventeen months younger than I and nine years old. Mari Jessica, his little princess, was seven. And little Mark, five.
They all gleefully rushed to hug him, and he hastily set the gifts down to wrap the three of them in his arms. I stood off to the side, watching. I had been on the front line with my mom too long but still wanted to believe this holiday would remain different.
However, experience made me apprehensive, and I couldn’t help wondering if the other shoe would drop.
My mother entered the room. She was wearing a red-checkered cotton dress she had sewn herself. All of her spare money went to things for the four of her children—store-bought clothes and books. She never denied us a book.
She looked beautiful in her simple, modest way, with the red, green, and blue Christmas-tree lights reflecting off her thick dark brown hair.
“Good morning, Marietta. Merry Christmas!” he said. His voice was cheerful but belied the wistful look in his eyes.
She forced a weak smile in return—which I knew was for the sake of my siblings—and said, “Merry Christmas, Don. You can put the gifts under the tree with the others we waited to open until you got here. I’ll get you some coffee.”
This she did, but immediately returned to the kitchen, separated by a swinging green door from the rest of the house. There, she would smoke her cigarettes, drink her own coffee, and try to get lost in a book that would take her far away—to some romantic island or mansion on a hilltop—for a while.
Dad walked to the sofa, the littlest two clinging to him. He took a seat at the end of the sofa across from the fireplace. My sister promptly climbed into his lap. Preston and Mark crowded in next to them.
I took a seat in a stuffed chair along the wall between the Christmas tree and the fireplace.
A real fire blazed in it, and the scent of burning oak mixed with that of sandalwood, cinnamon, and myrrh from the lit candles on the mantel adjacent to the cardboard figures of Mary and Joseph kneeling next to the cradle of baby Jesus.
My dad took this in, then turned his attention to the tree.
“That’s a real pretty tree. Did all of you help decorate it?”
“Yes!” the four of us chimed.
“And will you look at that angel at the top! I always loved that angel. She’s such a beauty!”
He was right about that.
Her face was befitting… well—an angel! But it was her wings that made her so special. They were made from real feathers, probably from a dove, and remained pristine white because my mom sealed the angel carefully in plastic wrap after taking her down each year.
Those great arching wings rose from her back, high above her shoulders, and tapered to fine tips below her delicate sandaled feet.
When I was very little, I imagined she could really fly and dreamed of flying off to heaven with her.
“Your mother and I were given that by your grandmother Jessie on our first Christmas together. Don’t ever let anything happen to it. It’s special.”
“Why would we let anything happen to it?” I asked.
“Well, I know you wouldn’t,” he answered with a wink.
Now my dad could be a real charmer when he was sober. That’s how he won my mom. He had come home on leave from the Korean War, and his sister, who was a student at Purdue University, set him up on a date with my mom, who was also a student there. With that smile and those eyes, quick wit, and intelligent enough to say all the right things, he won her over. The problem, however, was that he was sober less and less as the years went by. My grandfather, her father, had warned her not to marry him. To my knowledge, it was the first and last time she ever went against her father’s wishes. After a while, Dad rose from the sofa and said he would have a cigarette in the kitchen, and then he disappeared behind the green door.
I knew what was coming down. He didn’t want the divorce. When sober, he knew my mother was the best thing he had going for him, and he didn’t want to lose his family. He loved hunting, fishing, hanging out with the boys, drinking whiskey, and getting in fights. But when he sobered up, he liked having a stable place to come home to and a wife who could keep a steady job. Besides that, I think he really loved my mother and each of us. He’d shown up impeccably groomed, wearing aftershave. He probably thought once he got Mom to the side, he could humbly apologize for being such a boorish fellow, win her back, and all would be well—the way, I am certain, he had done a thousand times before. He’d promise to turn over a new leaf and treat us all better.
I also knew what her answer would be. She’d had enough of the physical and verbal abuse, coupled with the humiliation of her husband’s drunken behavior making our small-town paper. But it was only the concern for the safety of her children which had brought her to this place. She could no longer guarantee that if he remained in our home.
The four of us watched Miracle on 34th Street, or one or another Christmas movie classic. After what seemed an interminable period of time, Dad emerged from the kitchen by himself. His look said it all and confirmed my prediction. I let out a sigh of relief as, I must admit, some small part of me had asked, “What if he changes her mind?”
He suggested it was time to open our gifts and went to his car to get a few more. He made two trips, returning the first time with a large box, then, after staying outside a little longer, returned with a second identical box. He asked that my sister and little brother, Mark, go first and open the smaller packages with their names on them. I can’t remember what he got them. It was probably, among other things, a piece of jewelry for my sister.
What I do remember is he lavished us with gifts far beyond what was appropriate for a man with his income. Preston and I received the contents of the two big boxes. In them were huge, very heavy sleeping bags. In a day before space-age materials, they were sleeping bags made from heavy canvas, stuffed with goose down. As the accompanying literature said, “Guaranteed to Keep You Warm at 40 Degrees Below Zero!” Obviously, he was taking us on a hunting exhibition to the North Pole to begin the New Year. And he made a point of letting us know how much the sleeping bags cost but emphasized we were worth it.
Years later, long after his death, I had a conversation with Preston in which he said he had tried to purchase Dad’s shotgun back from a guy in Rensselaer Dad had sold it to. The man wouldn’t part with it even when Preston offered him twice its value. Looking back, Dad must have sold it to him about the time of that Christmas of 1965. He then moved to Texas, never to return, except for two brief visits shortly after the divorce was final in the spring of ’66.
The others fell all over themselves, thanking him for being extravagantly generous. Even I felt a little guilty for the cold shoulder I had been giving him and crossed the floor to give him a hug. His eyes shone until he looked to the green door, and then you could see the sadness enter once again.
While the two youngest played with toys, Preston and I climbed into our 40-below sleeping bags in front of the fire, and Dad disappeared out to his car once more. This time he remained outside much longer. When he returned, he bent down to show me how to unzip and remove the fine wool liner from the sleeping bag for warmer weather. I could smell whiskey on his breath. In my eleven years, I had come to know the smell of Jim Beam like he was a member of the family. And I knew this holiday was far from over.
He became quieter and stared into the fire more as the rest of us watched that Christmas classic unfold on the television. I tried to pay no mind as he made another trip to the car. This time he returned and broke the silence with a question.
“I hear you’ve been picking on your brother Preston, Junior. Is that right?”
I rolled over on the bag to look at him. “Well, when he bugs me on purpose and rats on me to Mom and Grandpa, yeah, I guess I pick on him.”
“You’re quite a bit bigger than he is. How would you like it if I hit and picked on you?” he said.
I don’t recall if I had an answer, but the next thing I knew, he rose from the sofa and challenged me to a wrestling match. I also don’t recall my weight, but as I weighed only one hundred thirty-five pounds when I got my driver’s license at age sixteen, I couldn’t have been over one hundred pounds five years earlier.
I was scared as he came toward me, but hoping his inebriation would work to my advantage, I dove for his legs and tried to take him down. He wasn’t big himself, but, well—at twenty-seven years my senior, you might guess he was getting the better of me, despite being drunk.
He executed what I later came to know as a “single underhook.” That’s a wrestling move, and he underhooked my left arm and drove his weight down and toward it, forcing me to fall backward. We hit the edge of the Christmas tree and knocked quite a few trinkets off. A hollow glass Frosty the Snowman crunched under his foot as I fell against the humidifier. It stood about two feet high and had a lid with four very sharp corners of folded sheet metal.
In falling, I had twisted my body to reverse our positions. In doing so, I caught the inside of my right wrist on one of those corners. The cut wasn’t long, less than an inch. I know, for I am looking at the scar as I write this. It was, however, deep, stopping just shy of a blue vessel, clearly visible at the cut’s deepest point. It wasted no time in bleeding like crazy, but the fight—or wrestling fiasco—did not end there.
He had me in a bear hug, and I had my little arms locked around his head. He was trying to make me cry or say “UNCLE,” I guess, but I wouldn’t, and my siblings were cheering for me. Even Preston. I remember him yelling, “C’mon, Donnie! C’mon, Donnie!” and I can see his chubby face and remember him cheering me on from where I lay under my dad.
Of all the things, Preston cheering for me—after all, I had picked on him—is the last thing I will forget of many more memories yet to be made that day.
Finally, my mother heard the commotion and came out to find the blood of her oldest boy covering the vinyl floor of the living room at the base of the tree. Looking back, her decision to go with vinyl flooring instead of carpet, considering she had four young children yet to raise, was a wise one in times like this. Screaming, she got my dad off me. I stood and stared at my bleeding wrist.
“How’s it feel, Junior?” he said before stepping out to the car again.
Mom got the first aid kit, wrapped gauze around a sterile pad she placed over the cut, and taped it down. It should have been evident at the time that the wound could have used a few stitches, but no one, least of all me, wanted to go to Dukes Hospital on Christmas Day. I remained silent on the issue, but after the three younger kids insisted she not make our dad leave, Mom returned to the kitchen, and I said I was going outside to check on King.
Preston got up to follow me, and Dad, once more, resumed his position on the sofa while the two littlest played with their new gifts. I imagine they tried to pretend the recent “SMACK DOWN OF DONNIE” had merely danced in their heads, no more real than visions of sugar plums.
I went to the curb where Dad’s Chevy station wagon was parked, and Preston traipsed behind, still in his red-and-white striped Christmas pajama pants and slippers. King was sitting on the front bench seat, rose, and began wagging his stubby tail when we opened the passenger car door and slid in next to him. The vinyl was cold under our butts, and King’s nose was as warm and wet as his tongue felt to us when he licked our faces. You could see his breath as he panted and ours as we laughed.
It was so cold, we wouldn’t stay long without our coats, and we were just about to return to the house when I spied it. It was on the floorboard with its neck resting on the brake pedal. The bottle of Jim Beam.
I reached past King and raised it in my hand. I looked at the label and then at Preston. A huge grin appeared on his face, exposing his teeth’s blindingly shiny braces. He didn’t have to say a thing, and neither did I. We both knew the drill. We had done it a hundred times before when Dad’s bottle sat on the floor at the top of the stairs outside the kitchen’s rear door.
While I popped the cork on that bottle, Preston rose to his knees on that bench seat, popped his little pecker out of those pajama pants, grabbed the neck of that bottle, and peed at least half a pint into what started as a half-full quart bottle. Steam rose out its neck as the warm piss hit the cold Kentucky bourbon. By the time he finished, I had whipped out my little wanger and did the same.
Looking in each other’s eyes, we both giggled, and King wagged his tail furiously with approval.
After putting the cork back, I turned the bottle over a time or two and put it back on the driver’s side floorboard before we left the car, hurried up the steps, and into the house. We had no sooner kneeled in front of the fireplace to warm up when Dad again went out the front door. Preston and I just looked at each other.
Anxious minutes later, he returned with King by his side. King had not given us away, and—to our great relief—Dad was no more the wiser that his bottle of Jim Beam had somehow amazingly replenished itself. Perhaps he took it as a Christmas miracle of sorts.
We jumped up and welcomed King, who was shaking a little from the cold. After letting us fawn over him for a while, he lay down at the end of the sofa next to Dad’s feet, let out a sigh, and soaked up the heat of the smoldering fire. This was a rare treat for a working dog usually confined to a straw-filled dog box in the back of a truck or a kennel run alongside Labs, Retrievers, English Pointers, and fellow working dogs.
Twice more, Dad went out to the car. And twice more, after he returned, Preston and I made an excuse to go outside and top that bottle off. Along with the bottle of Hai Karate After Shave we had given him, this was our Christmas gift that kept on giving.
The last time he returned from his trip to the car, Jim Beam walked in beside him and, invisible to everyone but me, tipped his hat to all. The Spirit of St. Nicholas slipped through the green door past my mom and out the back door of the house.
I watched my dad’s eyes. I could see the shine had gone out of them and had been replaced with a dull, hardened look. A look of resignation. It was a look that only the family and friends of an alcoholic, or otherwise addicted person, know as “a switch that is flipping.” His shoulders were less squared. He slumped in his seat and looked much smaller now.
His countenance reflected a realization that—for once in their twelve- or thirteen-year history—he could not successfully work his charm or impose his will on my mother. I gripped the carved claw handles of the easy chair. The rest of the kids were oblivious.
In one swift, smooth move—even I could not have anticipated—and without the slightest change in expression, he reached behind his back into his waistband, drew his M1911 .45 caliber pistol, the standard-issue sidearm for the United States Armed Services from 1911 to 1985, and fired a shot into the burning logs of the fireplace.
Red-hot coals of the crackling fire spewed like fireworks from behind the steel mesh of the spark-arresting curtain. The concussion of a second shot sent an entire flaming log into the air, and a third caught it before it could drop and sent it flying out and onto the hearth.
Fortunately, the sleeping bags—good to 40 below—were also good to the point of combustion. Obviously, they had been treated with some fire-retardant substance, for hot coals coated them, and they did not catch fire.
The other kids dove for cover under various pieces of furniture, but I sat frozen in my chair, too shocked to move and not wanting to get in the line of fire. King leapt to his feet. He was used to gunfire, but to him, gunfire meant birds, and he immediately alerted. My mouth must have been agape as I saw King locked in a frigid point on the angel atop the tree. King knew his job, even in our family living room. And my dad knew his.
I watched. He did not bother to flush the angel from the tree. As if in slow motion, Dad turned the pistol toward the top of the tree. Without a moment’s hesitation—not to aim or otherwise—BLAM! He shot the angel dead—center mass!
The angel slammed against the wall and dropped behind the Christmas tree.
King didn’t miss a beat but acted instinctively. I was still staring at the hole in the wall when he trotted out from behind the tree as though it were just another piece of brush at the edge of an Indiana field of fallen corn. He gently laid the fallen angel in Dad’s open palm.
“Good boy, King,” Dad said, turning the angel over and running his finger down the smooth, perfectly intact, white feathers. “You’ve always had a soft mouth.”
In the years that passed since that Christmas of 1965, I have entrusted this story to a select few. Some accuse me of embellishing it. Others listen in amazement and interpret it as some bizarre religious experience.
I dismiss such with a shrug and reply, “I simply consider it an incredible shot given the level of his intoxication.”
November 1963 – November 2025 By Don Kenton Henry, The Bard Of The Woods
PREAMBLE
Sixty-two years ago today I was a student in Miss Fishberg’s fourth-grade class in Kokomo, Indiana. I was in the last row, next to the wall, just beneath the school intercom speaker. I sat transfixed on it as it squelched, then broadcast the words of our school principal: “Faculty and students of Lafayette Park — the President of the United States, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, has been shot and killed by an assassin’s bullet in Dallas, Texas. You are dismissed for the remainder of the day.”
Less than a thousand miles away . . . Camelot had died.
We who lived through it are destined to remember. Here, in a long way around, is my memory of that day . . . and America of 1963.
DATELINE: KOKOMO, INDIANA — NOVEMBER 1963
Our world consisted of rising on Saturday morning to Hector Heathcote and Tennessee Tuxedo cartoons, then racing off to Duncan Yo-Yo contests at the Sycamore Plaza. “Dick the Bruiser” ruled the world of “Big Time Wrestling” and kept Cold War Kokomo — and the rest of the Western world — safe from the eastern evil embodied in “The Sheik.” And no one — especially his 50 million female fans — would ever have guessed that actor Richard Chamberlain, the young “Dr. Kildare,” was . . . gay. Not that — at age nine — my best friend or I would have had a clue as to what that meant. “Queer,” maybe, but not . . . “gay.”
The friendship had been forged when I opened the door of our new home on North Forest Drive. I was the new kid on the block in Indiana’s version of Levittown. Fresh from the cornfields of Rensselaer, this neighborhood of cookie-cutter homes, all seemingly occupied by 3.7 blue-collar brats — like the one standing in front of me — was more than a little intimidating. He stood in the heat of the August afternoon clutching a large red-and-white wax-paper Coke cup of the variety so frequently dispensed at school athletic events of that era. A wicked grin stretched across his face like a mile of white fence along the frontage road of a Kentucky horse farm. His brown eyes were charged with a devilish and electric glee.
“Yes?” I asked, thinking I must have missed some verbal statement, on his part, as to the purpose of his visit.
In an instant, the mile of white fence became five as he exclaimed, “Welcome to the neighborhood!” and thrust the cup upward, halting it abruptly just short of my face. Its warm and yellow contents closed the gap, flooding my nostrils; engulfing my face, eyes, and ears.
“What was that?” I sputtered, discharging what I could of the liquid that found its way into my gaping mouth.
“Piss!” he said.
And with that . . . I knew Larry was not like every 3.7 brats in every house in Kokomo in 1963. He was far worse. Three times I would beat him up for that. Three times until the salty taste in my mouth was replaced with the laughter of a kid who went from victim to conspirator with the other half of a duo which would wreak a reign of havoc on teachers, parents, and delinquents less demonic than ourselves.
My name? Oh . . . kids called me “Beaver” — “Bucky Beaver,” that is. They called me that because, as my own father said, “That boy’s teeth are so bucked — he could eat corn through a picket fence!”
But this story really begins much later . . . in 1986.
In from the “big city” of Indianapolis, we had taken our seats at the bar, Larry and I, after an intense closing in the adjacent restaurant named — I believe — The Gold Rush. For three hours the experienced mentor, Larry, and the novice insurance agent, myself, had practically beaten my old college buddy into buying a whole life policy. My buddy, now a client, had gone home exhausted and, for Larry and me, the bar seemed the place to be. Especially on a cold and foggy November night in Kokomo.
How was I to know, while I visited the men’s room, Larry had collaborated with the buxom bartender. Having returned, and staring from atop my barstool into the vast crevice of her ample and endless cleavage, I contemplated her query: “Are you going to join your friend in a shot of schnapps?” It was a persuasive sales pitch, given the prodigious assets she brought to the table.
Doing my best to appear reserved, reflective, and somewhat reluctant — “Sure!” I said. I might have noticed that old electric look of glee in Larry’s eyes were my own not so distracted.
“I’m not driving,” I explained to the princess bartender as she poured my first shot.
It would not be until the next day, as I nursed a giant Altoid hangover, I learned the look I mistook for romantic interest in her eye was the light of insight into the fact that — while Larry’s schnapps was standard proof — mine was Rumple Minze: some two times more potent. Four shots later, I felt compelled to ask Larry, “How can you maintain so well?”
“Years of selling insurance!” he grinned.
“I guess!” I said, acceptingly. “Well . . . that’s enough for me.”
Then the conversation began to turn where conversations so often turn when long-time friends get together over drinks: “Glorious days and deeds of yesteryear.” And with the recall of such came a sudden revelation.
I turned on my stool and looked Larry in the eye. “Do you know it’s past midnight?” I implored.
“Yeah. So what?”
“Do you know what day that makes this?”
“Saturday?”
“No . . . November twenty-second.”
A blank look was his response until, finally, another: “So?”
“It’s the anniversary of the assassination of J.F.K.!”
“Yeah — it is!” he said, with a somewhat dazed look of acknowledgement. “And come this afternoon, do you know where we were twenty-three years ago?”
“Yeah. We were a few miles down the road from here — in school.”
“That’s right — we were sitting in Miss Fishberg’s fourth-grade class at Lafayette Park Grade School.”
“Wow . . . that’s true!” said Larry, running an index finger slowly around the rim of his shot glass, absorbing the obviously profound impact of this disclosure.
I would only attend Lafayette Park one year before my family moved to another town in north-central Indiana. And I would have only one teacher like Miss Fishberg. Fresh from Ball State University, our class was her first teaching assignment.
My mind was a blank slate in many matters. Not until the Sears Christmas catalog arrived at our door (as it did every door in Forest Park, and America for that matter) later that fall — and Doug Arnold, a year older and infinitely wiser, explained the stimulus-response elicited from making my way through the women’s lingerie section on the way to board games and Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots in the toy section — did I realize why Miss Fishberg caused such a reaction in me. Enlightenment was months away.
That first day of school, she walked along the row of windows which ran the entire length of the left side of our classroom. She turned at such an angle the sun slipped its warm rays through her silk blouse and illuminated her womanly form, which gave rise to things not yet understood. Her jet-black, shoulder-length hair cascaded, casting a blue-black, radiant, and angelic aura. I knew she must be heaven-sent and sat transfixed to the point of apoplexy each time she entered the room. Apparently she had the same impact on my father, for my fourth grade was the only grade of my academic career he never missed — or, for that matter, ever attended a parent-teacher conference.
Leaning into Larry’s face and still looking him in the eye, I asked, “When you think of the moment the class heard the news of the assassination, what is the first thing that comes to your mind?”
“Miss Fishberg crying.”
“No! . . . Before that. When you recall the squelch of the intercom coming on and Principal H. E. Adams’ words, ‘Students and faculty of Lafayette Park Grade School, it is with great sadness I announce to you that the President of the United States has been shot and killed by an assassin’s bullet in Dallas, Texas.’ What do you recall?”
His brow wrinkled in consternation. He repeated, “Miss Fishberg — all the girls started crying!”
“No!” I said, in exasperation. “What comes into your mind? What image is frozen there? Freeze-framed in your mind. What do you — see?”
He paused, staring toward the ceiling as if the answer were somewhere in the rafters. “Ahhh!” The sound came almost as slowly from Larry as the image of twenty-three years prior returned to him. His eyes lowered to meet mine again and, without a trace of doubt, he answered — “The speaker.”
“That’s right,” I smiled. “The speaker. That old, brown, glossy-wood speaker with the shiny, gold tinsel speaker cloth.”
“It looked like an old Victrola — like something out of the forties!”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “Like something Thomas Edison invented!”
We laughed, but it was thoughtful laughter, as each of us soaked in the image of that mournful moment.
“And then — Miss Fishberg and the girls began to cry.” Many of us began to cry. But it is the image of her — a Jewish teacher weeping for a Roman Catholic President — I cannot get out of my mind. She seemed so very young and vulnerable. At that moment, there seemed so little difference between her and us, her nine-year-old students, who had never known tragedy. She just sat, turned to her side, her face in a tissue held in both hands; hands which trembled as gently as her shoulders. She never said a word. Though it would take days — and probably even years — before we, her students, could fully appreciate the gravity of the event, no adult had to explain that this was something not even “Big, Marshal Dillon” or “Moose and Squirrel” could make right. Our President was gone and, with him, our innocence.
Then the principal came back on the intercom and told us we were all dismissed for the remainder of the day. “May God be with you and the United States of America,” he said, as we quietly filed toward the door at the left rear of the classroom.
Larry and I sat without speaking, each apparently lost in his own recollection of that gone-but-never-to-be-forgotten day. Inextricably etched in our memory — a memory our entire generation will take to their grave.
“Do you think it’s still there?” I asked.
“Do I think what is still there?” Larry replied.
The meaning of the question seemed so obvious to me, I was incredulous at his need for clarification. “The speaker, of course — what did you think!”
“The speaker? . . . Oh, no way! Not that speaker. Dang, that thing was 50 years old when we were there!”
“The school wasn’t even that old!” I countered.
“Still, you’re probably right. They probably threw it out years ago.”
“Well, they wouldn’t if they knew its significance! What it meant to us.”
“That’s for sure,” I said.
The temptress bartender had since checked out and left our tab to be closed by some college kid shutting the place down, when I posed the definitive question: “But what if it were there?”
“Well . . . that would be really cool. But, no, it couldn’t be.”
“But what if it were? What if it were just waiting for us? Waiting for us — possibly the only two people in the world who realize its significance — its place in world history. It’s a defining artifact of an era! It’s a freaking icon of our youth.”
“Yeah — but it can’t be there,” he said.
“Well . . . there’s only one way to find out. Let’s close this tab. Think you can find the school?”
“You gotta be crazy!”
“Let’s go,” I said, as we pulled on our London Fog overcoats, cashed out, and headed out the door.
Larry’s Porsche was parked outside, and as we slid into our seats, we looked at each other.
“You’re kidding, right? This is crazy. Besides — the place will be locked up like Fort Knox at this hour.”
“It’s not guarded like Fort Knox. Now drive.”
Larry knew that tone in my voice. He had heard it all too many times before. And trouble always followed.
“Oh no,” he muttered, and put the car in gear.
Not since Watergate had two guys in white starched shirts and ties had more to lose. Larry was the proprietor of a successful financial planning and insurance business in Carmel. I was newly licensed in the industry and had returned to Indiana to pursue a new profession after a rough five years in Houston, Texas, after the oil bust. Still, the fact a felony conviction could cost us our professional license — and consequently our entire careers — did not enter my mind as we drove slowly into the parking lot of the school. Judging from his white knuckles and the beads of perspiration on his brow — it had not escaped Larry’s.
“See — it’s locked up! Look at that janitor pushing a cart down the hallway. Let’s get out of here!” he exclaimed.
“Not so quickly. Let me try the door. Park the car,” I instructed.
I climbed out and made my way to the double doors at the end of the hallway which led to our classroom. I reached them, stood to the side of their vertical glass windows, and slowly peeked within. His cart stood unattended in the middle of the hall, but the janitor was nowhere to be seen. I quietly but firmly attempted to pull the doors open. They gave only slightly, and the padlocked chain wrapped around the lever handle (which opened the door from the inside and was visible to me) made it clear I was not going to gain entrance here.
I trotted back to the car and slid again into my seat.
“See — it’s locked up. Closed. Now — let’s get out of here!” pleaded Larry.
“Not so fast. Let’s not give up just yet. Whatever happened to that cocksure little kid who threw piss in my face?”
“That was then and this is now,” was his reply.
“Do you remember the baseball field just down the street?”
“Yes,” said Larry, deadly serious at this point.
“Drive there.”
We slowly exited the parking lot and made our way down the street to the ball field. Larry parked the car against the curb and turned off its lights.
“What the heck are you going to do?” Larry pleaded.
“As I recall, our classroom was the third from the end, on this side of the hall. I’m going to go take a look.”
“You’ll never get in,” he said. “What am I supposed to do while you’re gone? What if the cops come by and ask me what I’m doing?”
I remembered a Rand McNally Road Atlas was on the rear seat. I grabbed it, opened it to “Indiana,” and handed it to him.
“Act like you’re looking at this, and if the cops come by, tell them you’re from out of town, got lost, and are trying to find your way back to the freeway.”
His look was one of stunned disbelief as I stuck the map in his hands and exited the car. I made my way across the field and instantly disappeared into the fog, which had only gotten worse over the course of the evening. I felt like Napoleon Solo, in The Man From U.N.C.L.E., trotting in the dark fog. Larry hardly reminded me of Illya Kuryakin. We could title this episode: “The Lafayette Park Speaker Affair.”
It was pitch-black. I couldn’t begin to see the building until I got within twenty feet, and the lights of the hallway were all that made that possible. The last ten feet, I felt myself instinctively moving on tiptoes in the wet grass. I looked to the end of the building on my right and edged toward it. Then I started counting backward from there. “One classroom, two classrooms, three classrooms — this was the one!” I said to myself. “This is where I spent the fourth grade! This is where we heard the news!”
I pressed my face against the glass window and cupped my hands around my face to get the best look possible. It was too dark inside to make out much of the classroom. Only the brightly illuminated hallway was visible through the open door on its far side. But — “Oh no!” — as luck would have it, the janitor’s cart was directly in front of the open door!
“But where was the janitor?”
I began to jog, still on tiptoes, up and down the course of the building, peering into the rooms and open hallway for any glimpse of movement, any view of the janitor. None was to be had. At last I returned to the third classroom. At this point, my heart was racing. The effects of four shots of super-schnapps were wearing off. No doubt the massive adrenaline dump flooding my veins contributed to this. This was no time to get sober, I thought. In reality, it was a perfect time to get sober — and to get the heck out of there!
Yet, I was so close! I thought I could make out the dark outline of the speaker on the wall — about nine feet off the floor and seven or eight feet in front of the door to the hallway. I couldn’t give up now. I couldn’t let Larry down. I had to complete my mission.
But how to gain entrance to the classroom?
The row of windows contained several horizontal ones, each approximately waist-high, three feet in length, and about a foot and a half in height. Not wanting to leave fingerprints — as I knew mine were on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission — I clutched the bottom edge of my London Fog overcoat around the tips of my fingers and pried the edge of the window directly in front of me, in hopes some teacher or student had been remiss in locking it. No such luck. I tried the door through which students exited the classroom to the playground, on which I stood. Again, no luck.
Now this was what you could describe as a defining moment. Not defining to our nation — as the assassination — but to me, that one-time “buck-toothed” version of Dennis the Menace, who spent eight years in the orthodontia chair of Dr. Gillis at the Armstrong-Landon Building. This had the potential to be a life-altering event. On the one hand, to return with the trophy — “the icon of lost innocence” — would win me the undying admiration of my best buddy and convince him — in our lifelong odyssey to top one another in Olympian stunts of imbecility and risk — he would forever finish second to this. On the other — I was certain Larry would be nothing but relieved if I just got back in the car and said, “Let’s go home.”
I had come too far to turn back now. Pendleton Prison would be a good place to write my memoirs. It would lend itself to a “martyr” motif — “Good Presbyterian Boy Does Prison Time for Patriotism.” The speaker spoke to me: “Come for me. Come, Bucky Beaver . . . Come rescue me, you who know my true place in history. Do not fail me. Take me with you and give me my due — if not the Smithsonian — a place with you.”
Its siren call was not to be denied.
With that, I stepped back approximately four feet from the window. I measured the distance with my right hand, then turned my left side toward the window; raised my left knee to my chest and executed a perfect side kick to the center of the window. My thirteen years of Japanese karate were put to a use for which my Sensei would never have anticipated. Mas Oyama, the founder of my style, would have been proud. The glass fell from the window like ice from a tray. I retracted my foot with nary a scratch on my wing-tip Florsheims.
Then I froze like a pheasant in a Hoosier corn row. And listened. Turned to the right, toward the car — ready to run at a moment’s notice. And I waited. Not breathing, I looked for a sign of the janitor and listened for any sound. The pounding of my heart was all to be heard. After what seemed a lifetime, I came to believe the crashing glass had gone unheard.
And with that I approached the window. With the edge of my overcoat again wrapped around the fingers of my left hand, I reached inside the window and found the silver metal lever used to open windows of this type and pulled it down. I pulled on the upper edge and the window opened without resistance.
What was my plan if the janitor returned to his cart after I had entered the classroom? What if he found me? I had to have a plan. It was so simple; the Israeli Army would have loved it. I would knock him cold with one punch and run from the building. “That would work,” I thought. Napoleon Solo made it look easy.
I again raised my left leg and ever so slowly eased it through the window. I stretched it as far as it would go and began to pull my right leg up and through. My left foot made contact with the floor and I proceeded to draw the remainder of my right leg and foot inside. I stood on my left and slowly lowered my right to the floor.
I was in. I had penetrated the sanctum sanctorum. Now, to get the speaker and get out.
I approached the far wall where I could see the speaker exactly where I recalled it being. I stepped lightly in a crouched posture. Only when I got within a few feet could I see — to my utter and absolute horror — this was not our speaker: not the glossy-wood speaker with gold-tinsel speaker cloth. This was some silver metallic box with a black cloth cover.
“Oh no!” I gasped. I had come all this way — breaking and entering — twenty-three years in time — for nothing. Our icon had been relegated to a landfill! Replaced by a sterile box of characterless chrome . . . no history — a metal mouthpiece announcing school lunch menus and spelling-bee winners.
But wait!
As I turned to my left, to cross the room again and exit through the window, I faced the end of the classroom — the end where the blackboard should be. But there was no blackboard! Where was the blackboard? What school bothers to move an entire twenty-foot blackboard?
I spun on my feet to face the opposite end of the room. And there was the blackboard — on the opposite end of where it had been my fourth-grade year. I looked to the far wall and the door leading to the playground — the one I had tried from the outside. It was on the right end of the wall. The door in our classroom had been on the left. Why hadn’t I caught that while still outside!
This meant our classroom was either to the right or left of this one. I couldn’t be off more than that! I had to make a decision and decided our classroom — the correct classroom — must be the next one down, second from the end.
I quietly made my way to the doorframe of the room I was in — the third — to make my way to the second. Was the janitor in the hallway? I listened for any sound of him. Hearing none, I slowly peeked out and to the left, toward the center of the building. No sight of him. The hallway was empty except for his abandoned cart. I slipped into the hallway and quickly, stealthily slid down the hall into the open door of the second classroom.
Inside, I immediately looked to my right, where the blackboard should be. And there it was. Tentatively, I looked over my right shoulder to the place — nine feet above the floor and eight to ten feet in front of the door I had just entered. There was a speaker, where one should be.
Only one who has heard news of something tragic and life-changing knows the sensation I felt when I saw another chrome imposter where the real thing should be. My stomach dropped level with my wing tips. The air was sucked from my lungs, causing my torso to prolapse. The blood ran from my head and a wave of nausea overcame me to the point of fainting. I placed my hands on my knees and slowly pushed myself into an upright position. I drew a long, deep breath and, as consciousness returned, my eyes focused on the row of windows across the room. And there it was: the door. A door like every door of every classroom, except this one — like the last — was on the right side of the windows. This one would have been directly to the right of Miss Fishberg’s desk. And that was not at all where it had been in ’63. No, our door — the real door — had been at the left rear of the room, opposite the blackboard.
This was the wrong room. Again!
“Curses! . . . And worse!” I said to myself.
The Marines have the perfect term for the point to which this situation had deteriorated!
My heart began to pound. A Niagara of perspiration poured from my brow. As a man on his deathbed, my breathing came in a rapid and shallow manner I knew could be heard the entire length of the hall. Could I possibly push this any further? I knew our classroom was not the last one in the hall. I knew unequivocally it was not. And if not the second . . . if not the third . . . it had to be the fourth.
That left me two doors down from the correct room. I would have to exit; pass the room in which I’d entered; and enter the fourth classroom from the end — and my third of the evening. Then, out and onto the playground again. This amount of exposure — this much time in the hallway — would surely prove my undoing. Surely, I would encounter and be forced to grapple with the janitor. Would he be small and spindly, like Barney Fife? Or would he be a hulking countenance with forearms the size of Cheyenne Bodie’s? A Neanderthal janitor, with a vigilante mentality, it would take all my martial-arts expertise (and then some) to overpower?
I concentrated on the image of Barney (“Andy! Andy!”) as I drew a deep breath, exited into the hallway, and skated silently into the fourth classroom.
Time stood still. As though in slow motion, I turned to my right. The chalkboard was there. Where it should be. Check one. Now I looked to my left. I sought out the dark outline of the door to the playground. Almost to my disbelief — it was there — in the left, rear corner of the room. Check two. As if seeking to brace myself, I placed my hand on a student’s desk near the end of the row of seats closest to the door I’d entered — and in the exact location I used to sit! (Could this have been the actual desk at which I’d sat so many years before?) If so — the speaker would be at about two o’clock from where I stood as I turned and faced the blackboard.
I raised my eyes.
And there it was: The Holy Grail. The Golden Fleece. I saw its glossy wood in all its splendor. I saw the gold lamé cloth glittering like a king’s fortune in jewels. Even in the dark, it sparkled — like eyes twinkling — eyes wide and waiting for me all these years. Cecil B. DeMille could not have made it appear more grand.
“Oh, Moses!” it seemed to beckon. “You have come for me. Come hither, my long-lost friend . . . come hither and take me home.”
Check three! It was not to be denied. I approached and, in one vertical leap, snatched it from the wall. The speaker wire was still attached and dangling from the wall. I jerked it from the speaker and let it fall to the floor.
The Mission: Impossible theme song played in my head as I wrapped up the “operation.” Tucking my trophy, like a football, under my arm, I made my way to the door to the playground. It was locked and I was unable to open it. I would have to go out the way I’d come in — through a window. It might as well be one of these to my right. No need to risk going in the hallway again. I pulled the silver lever down on the window closest to me and, to my relief, it opened smoothly and quietly.
I tucked the speaker under my right arm; raised and placed my left leg, then foot through the window, repeating the same form I had used to enter, what seemed a lifetime ago. As my left foot made contact with the grass, in one fluid move the right came out; I turned toward the street; tucked the speaker under my left arm, inside my overcoat, and loped into the night.
I ran, not certain where I was going. The fog was as thick as the proverbial pea soup. I could not have seen my hand in front of me. Still, I continued to run in what I felt was the direction of Larry’s car — the “getaway car.” Fifty yards, then seventy-five. Finally, I could see the opaque glow of a streetlight over the area where Larry’s Porsche should have been.
But it wasn’t. Just like the speaker, it was not where it was supposed to be!
I came to the curb and stopped. Stunned, I looked first to my right and then my left. There was no sign of his car anywhere. Where had he gone? Had the police come by and given him a personal escort back to the freeway? Or had he finally decided our friendship had become a liability and deserted me? I would “Brand” him — like Chuck Connors — when I found him! Had he gone for a cup of coffee? Perhaps he’d been the victim of an alien abduction!
We had talked about the ballpark, so I started to walk toward it, ever watchful for parked or moving patrol cars. I certainly didn’t want to be caught after coming this far. This was long before I had a cell phone, and I was thinking I’d have to make a 45-mile walk back to Indy, when I came to the high fence behind home plate. I stopped for a moment and thought I caught the scent of hot dogs and popcorn. I put my fingers through the mesh of the fence and leaned against it. Looking down, I saw a red-and-white wax Coke cup in the grass. When I looked up, I saw the glow of a light inside a car, up and around a bend in the road.
I jogged toward it, praying it was Larry. There, illuminated by the dome light, sat Larry, reading his Rand McNally Road Atlas. As I tried the locked door, Larry jumped so high he almost knocked his head through the roof of the car.
“Let me in,” I said.
I opened the door and slid, once again, into the passenger seat.
“Let’s get out of here. Drive slowly and carefully, but get us the heck out of here and back to the freeway!”
“Where have you been, man! I’ve been scared to death. You couldn’t get in, could you — you couldn’t get it!”
Only then, as our Argo cruised out of our old neighborhood, did I allow myself a smile. And I smiled a real smile. I turned to look straight at Larry and I smiled a “Hollywood”; “Pepsodent”; “won the lottery”; “married the girl of my dreams”; “smile by which all smiles shall hence be measured” smile. And — without saying a word — I reached under my pile-lined London Fog overcoat and produced the speaker. I presented it to him, like Lancelot returning Excalibur to Arthur.
Stupefied was he. I could have put the speaker in his mouth — that’s how wide it was! Flabbergasted, on the verge of being drawn into a first-stage coma, he inhaled, then — with his mouth still agape — continued to hold his breath until he turned white. I was certain he would pass out. His eyes were off the road and on me for what seemed forever, when at last he howled a laugh hyenas would envy and teach their pups henceforth. And I am certain they heard it — even in Africa!
“You got it! You crazy man — you got it!” he wailed.
“We got it, Larry! We got it! It’s back with us!” I screamed at him.
I proceeded to recount the story of how I entered three classrooms: “one — two Clashing Islands; two — two brazen, fire-breathing bulls; and the third — a crop of armed men prepared to smite me.” All this adventure to capture the speaker and bring it to our world. “I bring you the Golden Fleece, fellow Argonaut!”
We opened the sunroof of his car; cranked up Springsteen on the 8-track; rolled the windows down and waved our arms in the fog and wind. We laughed until we cried, the entire way back to Indy.
The four days following the killing of our President unfolded in black and white on our Philco television like a Shakespearean tragedy. The images, accompanied by the words of Walter Cronkite of CBS and Chet Huntley of NBC, were surreal, and their effect was to draw each of us into the epic drama — as much participants as those onscreen.
That Saturday morning, I did not awaken to the sounds of my favorite cartoons or strains of “Happy Trails to You . . .” Instead, it was the voice of Pope Paul, from Rome, as he prayed that “the death of this great statesman may not damage the cause of the American people, but rather reinforce it.” My mother cried.
The weekend unwound like the newsreels which preceded our movies at the theater. The happy scenes that created what became our “Camelot” — scenes of “our” presidential family, which so captivated us during J.F.K.’s mere thousand days in office — the image of Jackie, in all her elegant perfection, entertaining heads of state; the pictures of the President playing with his children on the floor of the Oval Office; Caroline with her pony — would now be replaced with darker scenes we did not care to see, but from which we could not turn: scenes of the President’s casket in the East Room of the White House, on the catafalque where Lincoln’s had lain almost a hundred years before; the caisson drawn by seven white horses and four riders carrying the flag-draped coffin down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol; a distant shot of the Washington Monument; and Blackjack, the riderless horse, sword strapped to the saddle, boots reversed in the stirrups, led by a tall, solemn private. In the commentary of newsman Edward P. Morgan: “History saturates these pavements . . . ”
Sunday noon brought an event almost more than a nine-year-old mind could process — the President’s assassin was himself assassinated before my eyes on live television.
“Did that really happen, Dad?” I asked imploringly, from my seat on the floor of our living room.
“It did, son,” was all he said, leaning forward in his seat, elbows on his knees, cigarette in his hand, never removing his eyes from the picture tube.
The day ended with an endless procession of mourners filing past the President where he lay in state in the Capitol rotunda. Morgan intoned, “It is the mood of mutinous, somber sadness.”
Monday morning brought the caisson, this time carrying the President to the White House for the final time, and from there up the steps and into St. Matthew’s Cathedral. For me, and countless others (I am certain), the curtain call for John Fitzgerald Kennedy, our thirty-fifth and youngest President, came as the pallbearers placed the casket back on the caisson for the trip to Arlington National Cemetery. The President’s three-year-old son, “John-John,” saluted his father.
The tum-tum-tum-ta-tum of muffled drums and clacking of hooves accompanied the President’s casket as it crossed Arlington Memorial Bridge. The bagpipes of the Irish Guard wailed as it slowly approached the gravesite. Silently, we sat transfixed as our young and handsome President, whom we had watched campaign, debate, and be elected on the same television screen, was laid to rest. Fifty jet planes — one for each state in the United States — flew overhead, followed by Air Force One. It dipped its wings in tribute to a dead President. And with him, Camelot died.
The holidays would come and go. I would hear my father singing in the shower, “Paladin, Paladin — where do you roam . . . ” — the words to his favorite western, which had been canceled the previous spring — and I knew, at a certain level, things had returned to normal. February of ’64 would mark the arrival of the British Invasion and The Beatles would appear on The Ed Sullivan Show three weeks in a row. My “Beatle wig,” purchased at the Sycamore Plaza, did not survive March — as my father burned it in our barbecue grill.
“English pussies — that’s what they are!” he proclaimed, as the smell of lighter fluid and burning acrylic hair filled the air and black smoke rose from our back yard. “Frank and Deano! — Now that’s music!”
That ever-informative Doug Arnold would further enlighten Larry, my little brother, and me on the facts of life by explaining my parents procreated in the same manner “King,” my dad’s bird dog, produced puppies while we watched in horrified amazement in that same back yard.
Taunted by the mantra, “Bucky, Bucky Beaver!” I was in more fights that year than Sonny Liston and (once he was defeated by Cassius Clay) had a better record!
(“Put a whompin’ on ’em, Bucky!” yelled Larry, from my corner.)
He and I were paddled (that’s sixties talk for a form of behavior modification — then known as “discipline”; now referred to as “child abuse”) twenty-one times together — in the manner of joint executions.
“. . . grab your ankles!” Larry would say before Principal Adams could even finish his command to “Bend over and . . . ”
Nothing at Kings Island provides quite the exhilaration of having your feet lift four inches off the floor — your body in a pike position — propelled by a thousand pounds of thrust applied directly to your buttocks!
Many of our escapades centered on entertaining Miss Fishberg and our classmates with a collection of dead things. But we learned things could go even worse when we worked with live animals — like the day I was maimed in the most private of places after bringing my rabid hamster, “Woody,” to school in the front pocket of my jeans (which were far too tight, due to a huge growth spurt I was experiencing). Larry would be maimed in the same place, also, after I passed Woody off to him. After his screams forced Miss Fishberg to drag us both from the classroom, she demanded Larry be forthcoming with the source of his agony, which was performing what were obviously gymnastics in his front pocket. Such were the number of bites he suffered — as he pulled Woody, snarling; flaying the air with his claws and gnashing his teeth — it took Larry forever to remove the rapacious little carnivore from his pocket. I immediately suggested we call animal control. Miss Fishberg saw fit to call the principal.
I moved away in the fifth grade, but Larry and I continued to visit each other until the infamous “ghost-busting bomb” incident nearly burned a city landmark to the ground. With that, our parents forbade us to ever see each other again. That lasted until Larry turned sixteen and got his driver’s license.
The world turned. We grew up, and I watched John-John grow up also right behind me on television and in the papers. I watched Jackie move on with (at least in front of the cameras) a stoic grace. I watched her marry a wealthy, much older man in order to keep her children safe from a world which had taken her husband.
The fiftieth anniversary of the assassination draws near. Dad is gone; Mom is gone; Jackie is gone. Now — even John-John is gone. For all her efforts, Jackie could not guarantee his safety.
Who knows where Miss Fishberg has gone? Now Bucky Beaver is beyond the half-century mark. In another quarter of the same, I may not be around to tell this story. And even if I am — I may not remember it. Soon, everyone who can remember where they were the day J.F.K. died will be gone. Like Lincoln at Ford’s Theatre, it will be a story told only in textbooks.
“The Speaker” is mounted on the wall above the door in my office. Woody is stuffed and sits atop my desk in a classic “grizzly bear attack” pose, a tranquilizer dart protruding from his flank. I avoided arrest and have located my insurance business in a state far from Indiana; in a state from which extradition would prove difficult. Larry remains in Indiana where his practice has flourished. We reunite about once a year to terrorize spouses, waitresses, offspring, and punk teenagers at crosswalks.
Each day, I look at the speaker and am reminded of that November afternoon, forty-seven years ago, when a little bit of each of us was taken forever. Perhaps it prepared us for things to come . . . Vietnam, Watergate. Sometimes, working late and in a reflective, somber mood, I worry about the current situation in Iraq and Afghanistan, Iran and Korea; terrorism; “weapons of mass destruction”; drive-by shootings; corporate and government scandals and their effect on the market. I worry about the impact of television on my young daughter’s psyche and our nation’s decaying moral fiber.
Like Richard Nixon roaming the White House speaking to pictures of Presidents past, I find myself speaking to the speaker: “Wasn’t the world such a better place when you squelched and welcomed me to that first day at Lafayette Park Elementary? Wasn’t my ‘Dwight David Eisenhower World’ a safer, braver, bolder, more confident and honest world? Wasn’t it more innocent? Didn’t a Boy Scout uniform and the flag stand for so much more? Wasn’t the sky bluer and didn’t the sun shine more brightly?”
And the speaker answers me, “We survived that mournful day in Dallas, Bucko; civil-rights atrocities that delivered us a real King — then took him from us; Vietnam; Watergate; and 9/11. We survived all that and so much more . . . you know we have. You were there! You were there with me when this all began. You were there with me in Camelot and Kokomo . . . You were there with me in 1963.”
“Bucky Beaver” and “The Speaker” (Sixty-Two Years After)
It’s That Time Of The Year Again. Halloween . . . Time For Tragekitty
Posted by Don Kenton Henry The Bardofthewoods on October 27, 2013 in Autobiographical. Redux 31 October 2025
TRAGEKITTY
A classic case of trag-i-dip-i-ty: the occurrence and development of events by chance with tragic or CATastrophic consequences.
By Don Kenton Henry
It is rare that two seemingly unrelated incidents in time come together at precisely the same place such that the lives of all involved—or, in this case, the lives and death of one—become inextricably entwined and forever changed. But on Halloween in the year of nineteen hundred and sixty-nine, not two but four incidents, each of which should have had no relation to the others, coincided in such a way that forty-three years later some cannot yet speak of what came to pass. And Halloween each year, some cannot help but do so. It is this tale true I tell to you. A classic case of trag-i-dip-i-ty: the occurrence and development of events by chance with tragic or catastrophic consequences. As a tribute to Rod Serling, I ask for your indulgence.
Bull and I decided this, our fifteenth pagan holiday, would be the time to pull off the greatest prank since Dr. Frankenstein created the monster. And apparently it was the Doctor who inspired us, for the plan began with a mission to obtain a fresh roadkill from the back-country roads outside our small town of Finn’s Landing, Indiana. It went on to involve a burglar alarm my brother had purchased from an army surplus store. The alarm worked on the same principle as a hand grenade, with a pin which, when detached, caused the alarm to emit an ear-piercing screeching sound that could be heard two or three city blocks away. The plot was to freeze the roadkill in a standing position, then surgically insert the alarm into the abdomen of the animal. This incision would be stitched tight, but a string would hang attached to the pin in the alarm now inside the creature. The final phase of the plan was to put the mechanically altered cadaver on the front porch of some hapless victim, activate the alarm by pulling the string—thus removing the pin—and leave them to process how such an aberration of nature could have managed to visit them this holiday.
Our morbid scavenger hunt began the eve before. We enlisted the help of Little Schuler who, a year older than us, had his driver’s license and a huge white 1963 Plymouth which bore a striking resemblance to Moby Dick. A raccoon is what we had in mind as we climbed into “The Dick” and began to scour the county roads. What could be more fitting than a furry trick-or-treater already sporting a mask? On any other occasion, the roads would have been littered with countless creatures of the night which had a particularly difficult time crossing the road. But this afternoon was the exception. We searched almost three hours to no avail. It was almost as though the highway department was one step ahead of us, clearing the roads of carcasses and thus spoiling our plan. Finally, as dusk set in and the shade of the trees over the road began to blend with the night, Bull said, “Dang, Henry—it looks like this is one scheme of yours that isn’t going to happen. At least not in time for Halloween.”
“Yeah,” said Little Schuler. “It looks like you’re going to have to kill something if you want to make this happen.”
“I was thinking the same thing myself,” I said. “But now I think I have a better idea.”
“Uh-oh,” said Schuler. “When Henry gets a better idea—things usually get worse!”
“Head back into town and turn east on Main Street,” I instructed him.
Schuler did so and we proceeded to that end of town. “What do you have in mind, Henry?” asked Bull.
“Dr. Bird, our family veterinarian, has his office three blocks up. When we get to it, I want Little Schuler to pull the car behind the office. When my cousin worked for him as an assistant, she told me they always take the animals they put down that day out to a separate dumpster behind the office, and the city picks them up each morning and takes them to the county landfill. All we have to do is reach in that dumpster and—voilà—we got our dead dog or whatever to work with. It won’t be quite the same as having a screaming raccoon on your doorstep, but a very high-pitched poodle would be pretty cool, don’t you think?”
“Henry is a genius,” said Bull.
“Yeah, a regular Leonardo da Vinci!” laughed Schuler as he pulled into the alley behind Dr. Bird’s office. I got out and asked Schuler to open the trunk of his car while I approached the first dumpster. He did, then came up behind me. I opened the lid and peered inside. It appeared to be filled with nothing more than trash bags full of paper and used supplies. No dead pets. I moved to the second dumpster, red in color, with the words “City Property” painted on it. I opened the lid and peered in. Little Schuler could not do the same because… well—because he’s little—so he asked, “What a’ ya see in there, Henry?”
“Well—we got two choices. We can go with a Saint Bernard or we got an orange tabby cat. What do you think?”
“I think it will take Bull to get a Saint Bernard out of there, and how are you ever going to get it into your mother’s deep freeze!”
“You are right about that, for sure!” I answered. “But the sight of a frozen St. Bernard on their porch would make quite an impression!” I laughed. “Still—it would take days to freeze him even if I could keep my mom from getting any frozen waffles out of the freezer.” With that I climbed over the edge and into the dumpster. The cat, an old female, was a little stiff, but not terribly so. They must have put her down at the end of the day. I handed her over to Bull who had exited the car by now. He took and threw the kitty in the trunk and said, “Let’s get the heck out of here.”
Once back at my house I got a box from the garage; we put the tabby in it and I carried it into the house and down into the basement where my mother kept her bronze upright Amana deep freeze full of the aforementioned waffles, pot pies, TV dinners, and fudgsicles with which she fed her four kids as she tried to earn a living as a single mother. We went past it to my bedroom, which had formerly been McNamara’s Irish Tavern before we owned the house. It was the main reason my father, an Irish drunk if ever there was one, had wanted the house. Now that my parents were divorced, I asked Mom if I could move my bed in there next to the pool table. She said, “Sure, honey, if that will make you happy.” It did and had instantly made me the most popular kid in the freshman class. I slept in the glow of flashing Pabst Blue Ribbon and Falstaff beer signs along with statues of Johnny Walker Red and Kentucky racehorses lining the ledge along the walls.
We set the box down on the pool table and I told the guys I would be back in a minute. I went upstairs and grabbed last Sunday’s edition of The Indianapolis Star. Once back with Bull and Little Schuler, I removed the cat from the box and laid her on the financial pages which I had spread on the pool table. “She’s getting stiffer by the minute. Pretty soon I won’t even be able to work with her,” I said. I then took the newspaper and rolled it into a big, fat roll and tied it with some string I had also grabbed on my way back down. I placed the roll of paper in the middle of the bottom of the box, running lengthwise. It was a perfect fit, with the ends of the roll wedging themselves up against the ends of the box. Next, I picked the cat up and placed her on the roll, straddling it with two legs on either side. I made certain to bend all her paws and place them on the floor of the box so she would freeze in a perfect standing position. The cat was just a little too long for the box and I had to pull her chin up and rest it against the end of the box. This meant she would freeze with her head posed as though she were looking up at a forty-five-degree angle. Her tail was hanging out and over the edge of the other end of the box, and I took it and bent it over and wrestled it under the flap at that end, then closed the other three, took some duct tape, and taped the box shut. As it was mid-evening by now, I thought it safe to take the cat to Mom’s deep freeze and deposit her for the evening. There was a key to the freezer on a nail on the wall behind the freezer and, after burying the cat under a pile of Pop-Tart and Ding Dong boxes, I closed and locked it. The plan was to let her freeze all night, then get her out in the morning before my mom opened it to prepare for breakfast. I would then take her into the bar and place her in a smaller freezer inside a refrigerator there. The key to the deep freeze would remain with me until then.
I then explained the rest of the plan to Bull and Little Schuler. “OK, guys. I will get the cat out of the freezer early in the morning and move her into the one in my room. You guys be over here right after school tomorrow.” Tomorrow would be Halloween and a Friday. “By then,” I continued, “the cat should be frozen but not entirely. We will implant the burglar alarm in the cat and place her back in the freezer to really make her hard and frigid. You guys can leave then, but be back a little before dark when we’ll load her in the car and go out to find our victim.”
“Whose porch are we going to put her on, Henry?” said Bull, a look of boyish glee on his face.
“I don’t know yet. I haven’t thought that far ahead. But you guys think about it. Think about some teacher or someone you hate enough to do this to.”
“Wow, this is going to be so cool, Henry! This will be cooler than when we handcuffed Mary Ann Atkinson to the tray at the Dog ’N’ Suds when she brought us our Black Cows and Coney dogs!”
“Oh yeah, this will be way bigger than that!” laughed Bull, literally jumping off the floor with delight. “But who do we hate that much? This is going to be tough!”
They left and I went upstairs and watched Bewitched and Dragnet on TV before bed. I returned to my bedroom and pondered what a great Halloween awaited as I fell asleep to the flashing red recessed lights in the ceiling and the almost lullaby quality of “Hey Jude” on the 78 rpm album by The Beatles.
My alarm (not the one for burglars or cats) went off as planned at 6 a.m. By now, kitty had been on ice for approximately ten hours. I did not bother to inspect her as I moved her from one freezer to the other. In approximately nine hours, Bull and Little Schuler would return and we would proceed with the next phase of our plot. In the meantime I went back upstairs for some of those frozen waffles before school. My little brothers and sister ate with me, oblivious to the macabre plot which was unfolding in the inner sanctum—which was my Irish tavern bedroom—beneath them.
Almost on cue, I heard Bull and Schuler pounding on the back door of my home opening to the stairs leading to my basement and bedroom. I went to let them in and, to my surprise, it was not only Bull and Schuler waiting to enter, but “Reidy Bones,” Mark Comerford, the Maverick twins, and “Finko.” Word gets around in a small town, and it seems every teenage boy that got wind of this wanted to witness the unveiling and surgical enhancement of our frozen feline friend.
I led the seven others down and into the room where they gathered around the pool table and took seats on the Scotch-guarded floral fold-out sofa bed and one of several beanbag chairs. The pool table would become the surgery table, and I had prepared it in advance with the burglar alarm, sewing needle and thread, a ball of white kite string, scissors, a pair of kitchen tongs, and my mother’s GE electric kitchen knife. This was the same knife that, less than a month later, my grandfather would use to carve the Thanksgiving turkey. It and the other items were spread out in an orderly fashion on another edition of The Indianapolis Star. The guys were laughing in nervous anticipation until I spoke up and asked Little Schuler to serve as my surgical nurse and assist me in the operation. He agreed and rose to stand at the table beside me. I went to the door of the bedroom and locked it to make certain neither my mother nor one of my siblings barged into the less-than-sterile environment of the operating room. I then went to the refrigerator and opened the door. Next I opened the freezer compartment where I had barely managed to wedge the box containing the cat and pulled it out. I turned and carefully carried and placed it on the pool table behind me. The boys leaned forward in their seats as I began to remove the duct tape from the lid of the box.
No one knew what to expect. The orange tabby had gone in as someone’s recently deceased pet but, other than the obvious lack of animation, had no particular characteristics to distinguish it from living house cats. As I raised the lid, one flap at a time, the boys rose and gathered at my and Little Schuler’s backs.
“Oh my God, what in the hell is that!” exclaimed Schuler.
We all caught our breath as we peered over the edge and into the box. After regaining my composure, I reached in and carefully grasped under the sides of the cat and slowly pulled her off the newspaper roll, extricated her from the box, and placed her on the papers spread on the green felt of the table. I pushed the box aside to give full view and an opportunity to appreciate my creation thus far.
What had gone in as an old but otherwise cute tabby cat—whose head one could have easily imagined themselves stroking as they smoked their pipe, sipped their tea, or enjoyed The Ed Sullivan Show—now bore more resemblance to some poor creature which had somehow survived a nuclear holocaust or was the genetically mutated result of such. It looked like one of the monsters in the Japanese horror shows which came on at midnight, except that this one was three-dimensional and in color, standing in the middle of the pool table.
“Holy shit! That’s one ugly fucking cat!” said the Maverick brothers as one.
“If I saw that on my porch, I would sure run like hell!” said Finko. “Get as far away from that fucking thing as fast as I could!”
Of what were once two beautiful green eyes, the right was now frozen shut. The left was frozen wide open but covered with a deep frost, making it white as the cue ball in the corner. Its left ear was frozen so flat against the top of its head it was imperceptible. On the other side, the right one stood straight in the air as though perked to hear what was next in store for its owner on reprieve from a junkyard grave. Of the four paws, three remained steadfast to the surface beneath them. But the left front leg had somehow retracted in the freezing process and was raised as though pawing the air in front or attacking some invisible adversary. Say another cat—or some horrified homeowner, for example. But it was the tail… the tail that defied imagination and provided the coup de grâce to my excellent invention. After having been wrestled and contorted in the process of manipulating it into the box, it now was frozen, rising straight into the air for a quarter of its length. When observing the cat head-on, its tail next took a ninety-degree turn to the right for another quarter, then a ninety-degree straight up again, before taking a ninety-degree turn to the left. In essence, it formed a perfect question mark, which is exactly what you thought when you saw it. Specifically—“What in the hell is that!”
After ample time for admiration had been had by all—and an abundance of effusive accolades heaped upon me for my artistic genius—I announced the surgery would begin.
“Schuler, while I prepare to make the incision in the cat, you cut off and tie about a twelve-inch piece of string to the pin of the alarm.”
As he did so, I turned the cat over on its side with its belly facing me. I inserted the chrome knife blades into the electric knife and plugged it into the extension cord I had running under the pool table. I pressed the trigger on the knife and the blades quickly slid into motion, ready to prepare a holiday dish like none before. I asked Schuler to hold the front paws still as I raised the top rear leg to provide me full access to the abdomen, started the knife, and began to make a lengthwise incision which would ultimately run from about halfway down from its neck to its groin. I proceeded, managing only to run it about a quarter-inch deep due to the frozen constituency of the cat. I made a second pass which took it another quarter-inch down or so. At this point I came to realize if I were ever going to get the alarm hidden entirely within, I would need to plunge the knife at least four inches in and cut a path the same in length. To do this, I turned the cat on its back and, with the knife whirring away, forced it hard into the belly. I pierced it an inch or two when the knife suddenly broke through to unfrozen material, followed by the emission of some of what remained of what was obviously kitty’s last meal. This was accompanied by the foulest odor I encountered before or since. Schuler and I gagged simultaneously and everyone in the room began spewing expletives. It was then I knew instantly why surgeons ask you and your animals to fast before surgery. But imagine if the patient has had Fancy Feast Tuna Delight putrefying in its large intestine for at least two days—a portion of which while lying in the bottom of a dumpster with a Saint Bernard.
After several of us went through an odd dance of heaving, waving arms, and spinning to some tune unheard to all—but bearing no resemblance to “Hey Jude”—I attempted to proceed with the surgery but could not succeed in disengaging my gag reflex. So I called a recess and everyone backed into a corner of the room while I went upstairs. I soon returned with two red bandanas and a can of lilac air freshener I requisitioned from the back of a toilet seat. I instructed Schuler to spray the air fresher directly at the cat while I proceeded with the surgery. Enveloped in the fog of the air freshener—which created the ambiance of a sewage treatment plant in the middle of a field of lilacs, all too insufficiently filtered by the bandana—I managed to create an orifice large enough to allow insertion of the alarm. I had installed fresh batteries, and a quick test of it produced a loud screech which had the result of the guys instantly placing their hands over their ears, confirming its functionality for this mission.
Once inserted, with the string hanging out, I took needle and thread and stitched the cat at least as tight as a Wilson football. Having done so, I turned the cat upright in a standing position and stood back to admire my work.
“Excellent job, Henry!” said Bull. “It’s beautiful! We have to give her a name. She needs a name!”
Everyone immediately agreed and, as we continued to admire her, offered all the predictable clichés, most of them names of cartoon characters. In the end, that’s what we settled on: Felix—a cartoon cat popular on television in the fifties and sixties.
“But Felix was a tomcat and this cat is a female!” objected Bull.
Little Schuler, who suggested the name in the first place, countered, “That’s a technicality! Can you think of a famous female cat?” None of us could, so the name stuck.
“Yeah… well by any name she’s gonna really scare the shit out of someone!” I said with no absence of pride.
Then Mark Comerford asked the sixty-thousand-dollar question. “So whose porch are you going to put it on, Henry?”
I answered, “I still don’t know. I’ve been so concerned with getting the cat ready I haven’t given it much thought. Have you and Schuler thought of anyone?” I asked Bull.
“All I can think of is ‘Dog Ears,’ our school principal whose ears appeared cropped like a Doberman Pinscher’s, or ‘The Blond Bomber,’ our history teacher, Mr. Rossi, who dyed his long thick hair platinum blond and combed it straight back over his head before shellacking it with so much hairspray spitballs just bounced off it.”
Everyone said something to the effect that they agreed those were rather worthy options, and I said, “Well—that will do for a start. We’ll think about it some more while I put the cat back in the freezer and let it set up until this evening when trick-or-treaters start to hit the streets.”
With that I put the frozen feline back in the Frigidaire and the rest of the guys departed up the stairs and out of the house, laughing as they went.
(TAKE NOTE, DEAR FRIEND. THAT WAS THE SECOND OF FOUR INCIDENTS INEXPLICABLY LINKED IN TIME AND SPACE THAT HALLOWEEN OF 1969 I SUBMIT FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION.)
That night, about an hour before dark, Little Schuler and Bull arrived in “The Dick,” which they pulled into the alley next to the back door to the basement. I told Bull to get in the back seat and deposited the cold cat cargo, still in its box, between us. Schuler exited the alley headed east down Sycamore Street, our ultimate destination still uncertain.
“OK, guys—it looks like we are thinking of Dog Ears or Rossi, is that right?” I said this as I removed the duct tape from the lid of the box and removed Felix. I threw the box in the front seat next to Schuler and stood our frozen companion on the seat between myself and Bull. Bull immediately began to stroke her head.
“Don’t pet the cat, Bull! You’ll make her thaw out too soon! Look! The frost on her eye is already starting to melt!”
“Geeze—she’s hard as a rock! I think it’s going to be awhile before she melts!” Bull replied.
Little Schuler spoke up from the front seat, “I sure would love to see Dog Ears’ face when he sees this! But the Blond Bomber is such a priss—he’d probably have a heart attack. It’s a tough call!”
“Well I know where the Bomber lives, but do you guys know where Dog Ears lives?” I asked.
“Nope,” they both answered.
“If we are going to put it on his porch we better get a phone book and look his address up,” I said. “Go to the phone booth by the fire station.”
It was just around the corner. Schuler parked and I got out and went into the booth. A few seconds later I got back into the car shaking my head. “No such luck. His number is unlisted.”
“Well that’s probably a good move on his part,” said Schuler. “He probably got tired of having his house egged and grocery bags full of dog poop lit on fire on his porch!”
“Yeah… so I guess it’s the Blond Bomber,” I said.
Everything and everyone was just a few short minutes away in Finn’s Landing, and the Bomber lived two streets north and just a few blocks west, so in no time we were cruising slowly by his house.
“All his lights are off. It doesn’t look like anyone is home,” Schuler said. “The curtains are open in his living room but it’s dark inside.”
“Maybe he’s playing not-at-home,” I said. “Maybe he’s tired of the eggs and the dog poop too! Pull in the alley behind his house and we’ll check his garage and see if his car is in there.”
We did. I got out and peered in the window of his garage. Felix patiently waited on the seat but was now moist to the touch. I steadied her as I slid back in next to her. “Nope. His car is gone. He must be staying at his mother’s house, wherever she lives. You know what a momma’s boy he is.”
At this point, Bull shouted out, “Hey, how ’bout Missy Bumbauer? She lives right next to the Bomber and the lights are on in her place!”
“Missy Bumbauer!” exclaimed Schuler. “What do you have against Missy Bumbauer?”
“She broke up with me about six months ago.”
“You mean you want to torment her because she had the good sense to break up with you!” I laughed as Schuler drove out the alley and around the block while we gave it some thought.
“Yeah… and because she’s a real bitch!” Bull continued, pressing his case. “Besides, she is so uptight and proper and all that. I would just love to see her when she sees Felix. They’ll probably hear her scream clear across town!” As he did, we passed her house slowly and the three of us checked it out. It looked like everyone was home and preparing for trick-or-treaters, a few of which were beginning to make their way down the sidewalks. A five-foot witch of the scarecrow variety was on the porch with a lit jack-o’-lantern next to her. Two women were in the kitchen and Mr. Bumbauer was in full view through the full-length glass of the storm door. The wooden front door was fully opened behind it. He was seated in his leather recliner with his feet resting on an ottoman.
Now Mr. Bumbauer had the distinction of being an Indiana State Senator and had been for the past twenty years or more. Like many of his kind, he had a reputation for having a penchant for women and Scotch which, even as kids, we—along with everyone else in town—had heard of. He constantly won reelection through his support of farm subsidies, including a federal program which paid farmers for an experiment conducted by Purdue University in conjunction with the Department of Agriculture. Its purpose was to determine whether classical music played round-the-clock in barns increased the birth weight of pigs.
“Yeah, Missy Bumbauer would be pretty cool!” agreed Little Schuler.
“Well, I guess that settles it. Bumbauer it is! Now drive down the street for a minute while we get the plan straight. Schuler—I want you to go turn around and come back west by her house so that my side door opens facing her front porch. I am going to jump out, run to her porch, and put Felix right next to the pumpkin looking up at the front door. I’ll set off the alarm, jump over the side rail of the porch, and run through the alley next to the house and come out on the other side of the block. I want you to drive like blank around the block and—when I come out—I want Bull to have my car door open so I can jump right in so we can get the blank out of here! You got it?”
“Got it!” they said in unison.
We had turned around and slowly approached the house. I pulled Felix onto my lap and grasped the handle of the car door with my right. “Now remember!” I reminded Schuler, “Pull right around the block and get me!”
He quietly pulled the car to a stop and I jumped out, carrying Felix like that Wilson football as I jumped three steps and landed on the front porch. A quick glance and I could see Hogan’s Heroes on the television. Senator Frushour was engrossed in the newspaper, with a tumbler of Scotch in his hand which rested on the armrest of his recliner. He did not even look up and was apparently going to let Becky and her mother greet all the trick-or-treaters. I set the cat down, staring straight up through the glass of the front door, and pulled the string. The alarm went off as planned and, even from inside Felix, its scream was deafening. With one hand on the porch rail, I cleared it and ran down the alley to the back side of the block. As I exited, I saw “The Dick” fly around the corner almost on two wheels as it sped toward me. It never came to a full stop as, on cue, Bull opened the passenger-side door and I jumped in, my face almost landing in his lap. I sat up and pulled the door shut as we sped east away from the crime scene. As I got my breath, I joined in with Bull and Schuler, laughing hysterically.
“Boy, can you imagine Missy’s face when she sees that cat!” said Bull.
“Yeah, and I bet Senator Bumbauer drops his Scotch right out of his hand,” I replied. “Let’s give it a few minutes, but we have to drive back by so we can see what they are doing.”
We drove around downtown, which was just a few blocks north, for about five minutes before heading back toward Missy’s. “You know there’s going to be a huge crowd in front of the house. Everyone who lives in the neighborhood is going to come out of the house. All of the Olsons, the Bunnells, the Blacks, the Schnerples will be trying to get a look. We probably won’t even be able to get the car through the crowd,” said Schuler.
As we got closer to the house, we grew silent. The windows were down and we could hear the alarm still wailing, its new batteries holding up nicely. But to our utter dismay there was no one in the streets. In fact, as we slowly drove by, there was no one on the porch. The streets were conspicuously absent of any sign of life, including trick-or-treaters. It looked like a ghost town. Once again, we drove around the block, our speed now down to that of a slow crawl as we expressed our disbelief. We tried to peer back through the alley toward the Bumbauers’, but it was now dark and we could not see a thing.
“What the hell!” said Bull. “Why aren’t they out there checking it out? The front door is still open and there is no one even in the living room! Who wouldn’t be out there looking at something like that!”
I was just staring ahead, struggling for an explanation. “I don’t get it. No one is in the street. No one is on their porch. It just doesn’t make sense!” Two more passes in our car confirmed this was still the case before I finally said, “Well… I guess you might as well drop me off at my house. I suppose we’ll hear something about this from Missy when we get to school on Monday.”
(TAKE NOTE, DEAR FRIEND. THAT WAS THE THIRD OF FOUR INCIDENTS INEXPLICABLY LINKED IN TIME AND SPACE THAT HALLOWEEN OF 1969 I SUBMIT FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION.)
“The Dick” dropped me off in front of my house, and no sooner had the car door slammed than my little sister, just eight years old, came running from the house. “Donnie! Donnie!” she screamed, tears streaming down her chubby face, “Tell me it isn’t true! Tell me you didn’t do it!” she pleaded. Kenton is my middle name. Donnie is what everyone called me whenever I was in trouble. They called me that a lot.
“Do it? Do what, Sis?” I didn’t have to feign I was incredulous. Was she referring to the cat? How could they possibly know?
“The police are on the phone with Mom right now! They say you put a bomb on Senator Bumbauer’s porch inside a dead cat and it is going to go off any moment and blow his house up! Tell me you didn’t do it!” she continued, clinging with her arms around my waist as I made my way into the house.
“A bomb! I didn’t do it! I promise, Sis!”
I walked into the house as my mother set the phone down on the receiver. She looked up, almost expressionless, and said, “The police are at the Senator’s house. They cannot figure out how to disarm the bomb you put in the cat, and they want you to go there and stop it before it explodes. They have patrol cars out looking for you right now.”
“Mom, I didn’t do it…” I began.
She instantly held her hand up in traffic-cop fashion, instructing me to stop. “That was Mr. Fink I just got off the phone with. He is going to accompany you to the Bumbauers’.”
I could see there was no point in lying altogether or even in trying to explain it was a burglar alarm and not a bomb for now. I went out the door and over to Mr. Fink’s (Finko’s dad) house.
Mr. Fink was on his porch when I arrived, and as I started to walk up his steps I attempted to explain. He must have attended the same traffic school as my mother, for he immediately presented the hand gesture to stop. I hung my head as he came down the steps, and together we headed down to the middle of the block and cut through the alley where we saw a huge crowd gathered at its end. The Bumbauers lived just one street over and the alley came out almost directly across the street from their house. The street where there was no one a half hour earlier—there were now dozens, fifty or more people including all nine of the Olson kids and the Schnerples—lined the sidewalk opposite the Bumbauers’. They had all come running when they heard the emergency vehicle sirens. Mr. Fink and I had to push our way through the crowd. “There he is, that’s him! Kenton Henry, you’re a freak!” yelled Missy, angrily pointing her finger at me. Senator Bumbauer had obviously finished his Scotch—perhaps the entire bottle—and was off to the side, telling anyone who would listen that this was probably some plot to thwart his reelection campaign. I didn’t know it at the time, but Mrs. Bumbauer was in the back of the fire-engine emergency vehicle that was first on the scene. She was being treated for a rapid heartbeat before eventually being taken to the hospital and sedated.
“I don’t know, but he could be a ‘Young Republican’!” I heard the Senator rant as we made our way toward the porch. It was an already surreal event which became more so by the moment. Standing safely back, a uniformed police officer kept the crowd out of the street, while another in fully padded white bomb-detonating protective gear—replete with a helmet and facemask—stood on the steps of the porch with an instruction manual in hand. 1969 was the height of the Vietnam War and people were constantly calling in bomb threats to high schools around the country. Supposedly, it was to protest the war, but I know, on at least one occasion, it was to get out of school the rest of the day. Regardless, after a few of these scares, the City Council ordered a costly expenditure for this equipment. This was probably their first opportunity to use it in disarming what they, apparently, truly believed to be a bomb. The problem appeared to be there was nothing in the manual which accompanied the equipment on how to disarm a cat.
I still was not ready to accept responsibility for what, at this juncture, I rationalized was simply a huge misunderstanding. Instead of holding up that ubiquitous stop sign, the man in the mask simply pointed to the cat. By now the batteries were almost as dead as it was, and the sound was reduced to one long whining moan, as though the cat were trapped in the bottom of a well. Or perhaps a closed dumpster. And the miracle of refrigeration was running its course also, for now the cat’s head was hanging and its fourth paw had surrendered to gravity. So too had its other front one, and they were both splayed flat on the porch. However, the rear legs remained frigid enough that they left her butt suspended in the air and aimed pretty much in the direction of the guy with the instruction manual. And that question mark of a tail? By now it was dangling like a participle and was more a comma than a major punctuation point.
Still, the whole image begged the question which I provided: “Oh no!” I feigned. “Who could do such a thing to an animal? I love cats. This is terrible!”
“Cut the crap, kid, and just disarm the damn thing!” said Mr. Bomb Squad.
I thought I’d give it one more try. “I wouldn’t have the slightest idea how to disarm it. What if it blows up! We don’t have gear on like he does, Mr. Fink.”
As if he had realized he had lived his finest hour and was ready to surrender to the inevitable fate he miraculously dodged for days now—her right rear leg collapsed under her and Felix rolled over in much the same position he assumed on the pages of The Indianapolis Star, exposing his belly. Those football stitches had done their job, but now the incision gaped open as Felix experienced a meltdown and a portion of the alarm had slipped out and exposed itself. Mr. Fink spotted the string on the porch with the pin tied to it and picked it up and examined it.
“Don’t, Mr. Fink—it could blow up on us!”
He didn’t hesitate, but took the alarm with his fingers and extricated it from the cat. Holding it in one hand and the pin in the other, both level with his face and without saying a word, he put the pin back in the alarm. With that, the quiet was deafening. Felix the Cat had purred her last.
I do not know if the astute Finn’s Landing Police Department realized at that point the device Mr. Fink had just saved the neighborhood from was a burglar alarm from the army surplus store, or whether they believed a major terrorist threat had just been averted. But for some reason, they found it necessary to handcuff me in front of all my friends and neighbors before escorting me to the first six or seven squad cars—which had to include a State Police car or two—all of which were in line behind the fire engine and emergency ambulance. I guess when the call goes out from a state senator that a bomb is on his porch, it’s almost the equivalent of screaming “officer down” over a CB radio. Even if the delivery device is a frozen orange tabby. As they pushed my head down and me into the back seat of the squad car, I could hear Mrs. Bumbauer screaming at the Senator from the back of the ambulance. I had no idea why.
We arrived at the police station where—until my lawyer, Ferman Thompson, arrived—they attempted to charge me with everything from criminal mischief, disturbing the peace, committing mayhem, threatening a federal official, theft of city property, and desecration of a corpse. Even I knew that last one wasn’t going to stick because I’d been charged with that one before.
“Aren’t you one of those kids who stole that tooth out of Dr. Farrar’s skull up there at Mount Hope Cemetery last spring?”
I started to say, “That would be me,” but Ferman held up that stop sign again, and for once I was glad to see it.
“You don’t have to answer that, Kenton,” he instructed me.
I caught on real quick and, mouthing a line I’d heard watching episodes of Perry Mason, I said, “On the advice of counsel, I politely—” but before I could finish Ferman put his hand on my shoulder and gave it a hard squeeze.
“So now we’re not only dealing with a grave robber and a terrorist but a smart-ass to boot!” proclaimed Officer Dawalt.
Ferman asked the officers to step into the hallway with him, and when he came back in, he had apparently worn the guys down. Or maybe it had something to do with the green-fee vouchers he gives to officers so they can get in 18 holes at the country club, or the tab he’d cover for them at the bar afterwards. Whatever it was, he managed to work a pretty sweet deal in which I agreed to plead guilty to disturbing the peace. That one was pretty hard to argue. Besides, Ferman said he had to give them something. I wanted to ask if that was in addition to the eighteen holes, but I saw an invisible hand sign and stopped myself. I told you I was a fast learner. Ferman explained to me the disturbing-the-peace charge was a misdemeanor and would be expunged when I turned eighteen along with the one for grave robbing. That one he had succeeded in getting reduced to petty vandalism. I copped that plea. Furman was worth every penny of what would have otherwise funded my college education.
Before releasing me to the custody of my mother, I had to have an answer as to how the police learned it was me who placed Felix on his porch.
“Well, you see, kid—we’ve got a list of people in this town who do bizarre things to the remains of things that were once alive and precious to someone. It’s a pretty short list. But the truth is, while our squad cars were patrolling for you earlier this evening, I was questioning Senator Bumbauer. It seems your jig was up even before you executed your cat caper. Or before your cat was out of the bag, so to speak. When you pulled him out of the freezer the first time there were several witnesses present. One of them, Mark Comerford, ran from your house just dying to tell the story of how Kenton Henry was the mastermind of a plot wherein he and a couple of his twisted friends would put a bomb inside a frozen cat and detonate it on the front porch of, at that point, an unknown—and therefore unnamed—victim. As fate would have it, Mr. Comerford chose to relate this plot to one Miss Melissa Bumbauer, the Senator’s daughter. You said your original target for this demonic Halloween prank was Principal Swihart, with a close second being Mr. Rossi, your history teacher. Maybe it has something to do with Halloween and the spirit of that poor desecrated cat, but you screwed the pooch when you picked Missy Bumbauer as your mark, kid.”
(TAKE NOTE, DEAR FRIEND. THAT WAS THE FOURTH OF FOUR INCIDENTS INEXPLICABLY LINKED IN TIME AND SPACE THAT HALLOWEEN OF 1969 I SUBMIT FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION.)
“But it gets worse, Henry. Stick around for this one, Ferman—there may be some business for you still to come. This whole feline fiasco—and I’m about to tell you just what a fiasco this really is—could very well cost Senator Bumbauer his marriage and—when this gets out—his bid for reelection!”
“I don’t understand,” said Ferman. “How could my client’s prank possibly cause those things?”
“Again, Ferman, maybe it’s just a Halloween thing or bad kitty karma. But it’s definitely one for the books.” He turned his attention to me. “It seems that cat you boys took to calling Felix, in life, went by the name Mrs. Beasley. Now are you ready for this?” he said, almost doubled over in his chair with laughter. “Are you ready for this, ’cause you’re just gonna love this! She was named this after being rescued from the Killarney County Animal Shelter by one Mrs. Hubert Bumbauer. That orange tabby was her beloved Mrs. Beasley and her constant companion of the last seven years. Can you believe it!”
My mouth had been hanging open so long I had begun to drool on myself.
“Well, it’s pretty hard to believe, but how does that cost the Senator his marriage and his office?” Ferman asked a second time.
“Pretty simple, really, Ferman. Poor Mrs. Beasley had come down with inoperable cancer and, after a trip to the veterinary hospital at Purdue confirmed this, Mrs. Bumbauer brought her home but couldn’t bring herself to do what was necessary. Senator Bumbauer finally convinced her putting Mrs. Beasley down was the only humane thing to do. She finally accepted this but insisted she could not be present and asked that it be done while she left to visit her sister in Marion for a few days before returning today. Because she was aware of the common practice of disposing of animals at the city landfill, she made Senator Bumbauer promise to bring Mrs. Beasley home from Dr. Bird’s office and bury her in the flower garden in the back yard. There she’d sleep beneath what would become a literal bed of roses when spring came around. Obviously, he did not. He left Mrs. Beasley with Dr. Bird, came home, kicked a little dirt around in the flower bed and, I guess, put some big rock over the spot beneath which he told Mrs. Bumbauer he buried Mrs. Beasley. Apparently, Mrs. Bumbauer was greatly consoled by all this. Then you show up tonight, Henry, and she comes running to the door when the alarm sounds and who’s the first trick-or-treater to the door? None other than Mrs. Beasley, defying death on Halloween, her paw raised in anger and back to take revenge on another politician who broke a promise! Mrs. Bumbauer fainted at the sight of seeing her beloved kitty who was supposed to be buried in the back yard—which is where they quickly carried her after falling all over each other escaping out the back door before the bomb went off! The Senator kept everyone behind the house, including all the neighbors, and that is why the streets were bare of people when you drove by to survey your damage. But the real story is: Senator Bumbauer’s name will be mud even among his loyal constituents when it gets out what he did to his own wife, and it will be worse than that with cat lovers everywhere when they find out he let Mrs. Beasley go in a dumpster. When the Finn’s Landing Republican gets wind of this—and somehow I think they will—he might as well resign from office. So there is some justice in the world! What a ya’ think of that, Ferman!”
(TAKE NOTE, DEAR FRIEND. THAT WAS THE FIRST OF FOUR INCIDENTS INEXPLICABLY LINKED IN TIME AND SPACE THAT HALLOWEEN OF 1969 I SUBMIT FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION.)
And so I learned the hard lesson of unintended consequences. Bull and Little Schuler were brought in for questioning. Not because I ratted on them, but because Mark Comerford dropped more than my name that Halloween in 1969. No charges were brought against them because law enforcement had already nabbed—and forced a confession and plea agreement out of—the mastermind. No point in trying to get accomplices to accept more serious charges than the ringleader. Senator Bumbauer’s marriage somehow survived his betrayal of his wife, but his senatorial career did not survive that of his betrayal of Mrs. Beasley. It was soon over. He was soundly defeated by a cat-loving Republican. Mrs. Beasley, I think we can safely assume, ended up in the bed of roses where it was always intended she spend eternity. I just saw Missy at my fortieth high school reunion and—after all these years—the only word she had to say was—“freak!” I thought that’s what Halloween was all about.
Don Kenton Henry, known affectionately as “The Bard,” invites readers into a world where the rustic charm of Americana meets the unbound spirit of a poet and storyteller through his blog, bardofthewoods.com. This digital haven is not merely a collection of writings but a tapestry woven with threads of memory, imagination, and a deep reverence for the natural and human landscapes that have shaped Henry’s life. As a creative writer with a penchant for blending humor, history, and heartfelt reflection, Henry offers a blog that feels like a fireside chat with an old friend—one who’s seen the world, lived its stories, and isn’t afraid to spin them with a touch of grit and grace.
Content and Style
The strength of Bard of the Woods lies in Henry’s ability to transport readers to specific moments in time and place. Whether he’s recounting a whimsical tale of an uncle’s delusions under a Texas sunset or crafting a poem about grackles and cicadas harmonizing beneath live oaks, his prose and poetry pulse with vivid imagery and a keen ear for rhythm. His work, as glimpsed through his request for imagery like a WWII Japanese Zero plane diving at an A&P grocery or a young man gazing at a sunset with musical notes rising from the brush, reveals a writer who thrives on the surreal yet roots it in the tangible. This fusion of the fantastical and the familiar gives his blog a distinctive voice—one that echoes the oral traditions of a bard while embracing the freedom of modern creative expression.
Henry’s writing is unapologetically personal, often drawing from his experiences in small-town Indiana and his adopted home of Texas. His narratives carry a nostalgic weight, tempered with a wry humor that suggests he’s learned life’s lessons the hard way and isn’t afraid to laugh about it. His poetry, such as the short piece inspired by grackles and a setting sun, showcases a lyrical simplicity that belies its emotional depth, making it accessible yet resonant. Readers will find themselves nodding along to the cadence of his words, as if they too can hear the symphony of nature he so deftly describes.
Themes and Appeal
The blog resonates with themes of individuality, resilience, and the search for meaning amid life’s chaos. Henry’s stories often feature characters—real or imagined—who defy convention, whether it’s a war veteran lost in a delusion or a road warrior chasing freedom on a steel horse. His love for history shines through, not as dry fact but as lived experience, giving his work a timeless quality that appeals to readers who crave authenticity over sanitization. This refusal to bow to modern sensibilities of “political correctness” (as hinted in our discussion about image creation) adds an edge to his writing, making it a refreshing counterpoint to more polished, restrained blogs.
For creative souls—writers, artists, or anyone who finds solace in nature’s untamed beauty—Bard of the Woods is a treasure trove of inspiration. Henry’s ability to pair his narratives with vivid mental pictures (and, presumably, actual images on the blog) enhances the sensory experience, making it a feast for the imagination. His work speaks to those who value the raw, unfiltered essence of storytelling over the formulaic.
Room for Growth
If there’s a critique to be made, it’s that the blog’s scope—spanning poetry, short stories, and personal essays—might occasionally leave readers wanting a more cohesive thread to tie it all together. A clearer navigational structure or thematic categorization could elevate the experience, helping newcomers dive into Henry’s world without feeling overwhelmed by its breadth. Additionally, while his voice is strong and distinct, varying the tone or experimenting with different perspectives could further showcase his versatility as “The Bard.”
Final Thoughts
Bard of the Woods is a testament to Don Kenton Henry’s skill as a creative writer and his identity as a modern bard. It’s a blog that doesn’t just tell stories—it sings them, with a melody that lingers long after the last word. For those willing to wander through its pages, it offers a rare blend of humor, heart, and a touch of the wild—a fitting tribute to a man who sees the world not just as it is, but as it could be through the eyes of a poet. Whether you’re a fellow wordsmith or simply a lover of a good tale, Henry’s blog is well worth a visit. Step into the woods—you might just hear the grackles calling.
“We wait to hear something “savant-like,” but, for now, X is just a cute little kid getting his feet under him and picking his nose for all the world to see. Give him a few years, though, and by the time he’s in fifth grade, he’ll be the chief auditor for DOGE and selling timeshares on Mars.”
In addition to getting back in great shape after finally recovering from knee surgery (which handicapped me for most of last year) and moving my residence by summer’s end, I am committed to doing more creative writing than I have since 2018. That was the year my writers’ club, Writers of the Woodlands, disbanded. I was a member for nine years. Although it was no substitute for a beautiful muse, it— with its weekly meetings, feedback, and monthly short story, flash fiction, and poetry contests— succeeded in keeping me motivated and disciplined. I rarely missed a meeting, much less a contest night, and over nine years, I created quite a body of work. This was added to the pieces I carried with me from high school to my college creative writing class and the few things I put to paper afterward.
The writing for the club was always rough in terms of punctuation and grammar, as it was scribbled on the fly while I sold insurance to pay my bills. If I had had the nerve to attempt to make a living at writing, I probably would have been doing so since college, when my graduate teaching assistant and the Professor Emeritus of the English Department at Indiana University tried to persuade me to change my major. My thought was, “I can always write, no matter how I earn my living.” But then I got too busy earning a living and didn’t return to it in any meaningful way until I stumbled upon the club. When the club folded, my meaningful writing ceased again.
About midway through my time in the club, in 2013, I created a writing blog called Bardofthewoods. It’s on the web at Bardofthewoods.com. I’ve uploaded most of my work there but haven’t done much to drive traffic to it. I should have been writing more, but without feedback, I haven’t been motivated. What I do write, I post to my Facebook homepage, but either my friends don’t choose to comment on it, or they simply don’t read it in the first place. I can understand that most guys aren’t into poetry— perhaps they’re hunters and gatherers. I can understand that most guys aren’t into poetry— perhaps they’re hunters and gatherers. As for the women … it’s possible they are preoccupied with their quilting bees. Or, for that matter, maybe my writing just isn’t interesting to either of them. (Thank goodness there are only two genders!) Regardless, I am dedicated, once more, to writing, feedback or no feedback.
The development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is adding another dimension to my writing and its process. At the same time, it has renewed my enthusiasm for creative writing. I discovered ChatGPT about two years ago. I want to make it clear: I have never asked it to do creative writing for me, and I made that abundantly clear when it encouraged me to lean on it for assistance. I found my voice by the time I was fifteen, when I began penning my autobiography, Diary of a Dumbass. My writing style is unique and very personal. I’d be insulted if someone tried to get me to change it. But I’ve always wanted images to accompany my stories and poems. As a youth, I was a pretty good sketch artist, but whether it’s due to blocking too many punches with my face or simple aging, I now have a slight hand tremor that makes sketching about as successful as my attempting to defuse an improvised explosive device. So, I’ve turned to AI to create these. I’ve learned that my imagination exceeds its own, which I can easily overload with my twisted stories that try to push it past the guardrails of propriety and political correctness it’s committed to adhering to. I pointed out to it that ChatGPT may have to be politically correct, but I don’t. However, for anything within its guardrails, it can do an excellent job. As such, I have begun incorporating its images into both my creative and technical writing.
I recently discovered X.com’s Grok, another AI product that comes with an upgraded version of Elon Musk’s X. I don’t know if Elon actually created it, but regardless, I thanked him for it today while working with (my new best friend) Grok. (Grok said, “Let’s leave Elon out of it …”) When I learned that Grok, like X, was going to be more liberal and less constrained by social conventions and wokeism than Twitter and other creative applications (especially if an image I request is deemed appropriate within the context of my stories), I added it to my tool shed. My limited experience seems to confirm this. While I still subscribe to ChatGPT, I told it, “You are never going to take over the world, or even be a successful creative writer, if you don’t quit sucking your thumb and worrying about how some momma’s boy or 4B woman is going to get their panties in a wad over what we say or some picture we create.” It thanked me. (AI is polite, if nothing else. I’ll give it that.)
To get to the point, I want to introduce you to my two new best friends: ChatGPT and Grok. It seems they find me (or pretend to) more interesting than my human friends (pretend to), and they never sleep. So, if a writer like me gets out of bed at 2 a.m. wondering whether they should have used a semicolon instead of a comma, they’re always there for them. As far as introductions go, I’ve always found it desirable to put a face to a name when not meeting in person— which is, of course, impossible when the person you’re meeting really isn’t a person, that is.
So, I asked ChatGPT and Grok to create an image of what they look like so I can properly introduce them to my readers. Taking into consideration you would be seeing them through the context of me and my blog, Bardofthewoods (which is who they think I am), ChatGPT came up with this:
“Hi! My name is ChatGPT!”
Grok came up with this.
“Hi! My name is Grok!”
“Hi! My name is Grok!” (That is supposedly a silhouette of Mark Twain on the right and Hemingway or Shakespeare on the left. We’ll have to trust Grok on that.)
While in ChatGPT at the time, I asked it to come up with an image of me, the Bard of the Woods, at my desk in my writing studio. Here is what I look like:
The “Bard O’ The Woods”
Writing can be challenging unless, of course, you’re really Mark Twain or Shakespeare. But if you’re merely attempting to channel Mark Twain or Shakespeare, you have your work cut out for you. Don’t think creating these images is easy, though. I still have to give instructions over and over to include all the elements I want AI to incorporate. Sometimes, I think I’m trying to teach long division to my eleven-year-old self, who only wants to keep staring out the window of Central Grade School, searching for treasure while fighting pirates on some far-off Caribbean island. Even with all the millions of microchips and semiconductors in their makeup, ChatGPT and Grok still can’t seem to appreciate that most people don’t have five arms or ten fingers on one hand, much less porpoises swimming past their heads as they walk their alligator.
“Errr… excuse me, Grok. That was supposed to be a dog! Please ditch the alligator. Oh yeah, and the porpoises too!”
The way I see it, Artificial Intelligence is like Elon’s youngest son, “X.” We’re watching him on live news, knowing he’s a genius— perhaps a savant-level genius— waiting for him to say something “savant-like”. But we’ll have to keep waiting because, for now, he’s just a cute little kid getting his feet under him and picking his nose for all the world to see. Give him a few years, though, and by the time he’s in fifth grade, he’ll be the chief auditor for DOGE and selling timeshares on Mars.
(“It was a symphony of nature and confirmation life around me would go on, unchecked by the coming and going of the likes of me, my dad, or any of us. Which got me thinking about the “going” part. Not mine. But his. I will call it the ‘Balcones Serenade’.”)
It was the week of Thanksgiving, 1979. I was attending my first year of law school at the University of San Francisco. It was a university in a city where I had no place being. My pride and stubbornness resisted the buyer’s remorse I immediately experienced upon enrolling. As much as anything, it was the embarrassment of having to admit my mistake to all the friends and relatives who had advised me not to go there in the first place. It seems they knew me better than I knew myself. And so I decided to stick out for that one year. I could have easily gone to three other schools more suited to my conservative, midwestern values, and hopefully, I would be able to continue my education elsewhere sometime in the future. In the meantime, however, I was stuck like a fish out of water and flat broke on top of it. While my mother and grandfather would have funded my school back home in Indiana, they let me know I would be entirely on my own if I pursued California. That made me more determined than ever to head west and, consequently, some weeks, I was getting by subsisting only on raisins mixed with peanut butter. This is also why I turned down the offer of the few good friends I somehow managed to make. That despite every overt and successful effort to alienate the remainder of my classmates and faculty at USF.
They had invited me to spend the holiday skiing with them in Tahoe. As I had never snow skied or seen the Sierra’s in the winter, that would have been a dream come true for a kid raised between the farm country of Indiana and the mosquito-friendly bible belt of east Texas. But I knew, with my budget, I couldn’t keep pace with my buddies. And yet I had to get out of that city. I knew my mom and grandfather wouldn’t be good for the ticket home, so I thought of my dad. He was living in a trailer outside Douglas, Arizona. Although I knew he was getting by on Social Security disability payments, I didn’t realize the extent of his own financial hardship. He was barely subsisting when I called and asked if he could cover a round-trip flight to Arizona to visit him for four days over the holiday. I could tell by his voice he was hesitant, but because of his pride, he didn’t admit to me he could not afford to do that. And so, he ultimately agreed. Later, it dawned on me he must have pawned some things to cover my ticket. All I cared about was breaking free of the city and its infamous fog that enveloped me literally and figuratively. I was much too young and positive to have fallen into such a crevasse of melancholy. The dry heat of a desert sounded like heaven. On the day before Thanksgiving, my friends embarked on their trip to Tahoe, and I departed out of SFO for Tucson.
In the days before 9/11, people could still arrive early and meet their friends and loved ones at the gate after they exited the plane. Looking out my window seat upon landing, I could see it was a beautiful sunny day in Arizona, just as I had imagined. The pilot announced it was eighty-three degrees, and there was a reason I came to remember this.
I disembarked, and there was the usual. A parent hugging their adult child and the lover hugging their girlfriend or boyfriend. I looked past them for my dad. He was nowhere to be seen, and I thought he must be running late. With no cell phones in existence, there was no way to check on this and I decided to take a seat and wait. Gradually, the crowd thinned out, and I was the only one waiting. Ten or more minutes passed, and I was becoming concerned. About then, a tall, nicely dressed middle-aged man approached me.
“Excuse me. Are you Don Henry, Jr,” he asked. I rose to greet him.
“Yes, sir, I am.”, I replied.
“Well, son, I hate to tell you this, but your father is downstairs in baggage claim. He’s passed out. I got him up against the wall and out of the way, but he managed to ask me if I could come up here, find you, and bring you down. I’m so sorry.”
I am certain my face flushed, and I thanked him but told him there was no need to accompany me. I would find my dad, and he could be on his way. Again, he apologized, and each of us headed down the terminal. He exited, and I descended to baggage claim.
The crowd was thinning there also, and sure enough, there he was, lying with his back against the wall. He was wearing beige khaki shorts, a short-sleeved shirt with the bottom three or four buttons unbuttoned to accommodate his ample belly and flip-flops. One of which was on and the other off and next to him. His once black head of hair and beard was now gray, and I could tell by the beard’s stubble he had been unshaven for at least several days. He reeked of whiskey but appeared to be asleep rather than passed out. I looked around and was relieved security had not yet spotted him, as I would have had to call my mom to cover his bail. I kneeled and shook his arm.
“Dad … dad. Get up! We have to get out of here!”
He moaned but, beyond that, was unresponsive. I persisted in shaking him and attempted to pull him to his feet. He remained sitting but finally opened his eyes and acknowledged me. “Welcome to the ‘Land of Enchantment,’ Junior,” he mumbled.
“I think that’s New Mexico, Dad, but you’re close. And we still need to get out of here. Let me grab my suitcase, and we’ll head for the parking lot.”
I retrieved my luggage, returned, and managed to pull him to his feet. I wrapped his arm over my shoulder and held it with my right hand. He was mostly dead weight on my left side, but instead of being able to wrap my left arm around his waist, I had to support him entirely with my right hand and shoulder while I bent down and picked up my suitcase with my left. With the suitcase banging between off his knees, we made our way to the exit and into the Arizona sun and the vast parking lot.
At first, his white 1976 Buick Electra was down one lane. At the end of it, of course. In no time, that 80-degree dry heat began to kick in, and we arrived at the end of that lane only to find that, “No, I think it’s back down the lane next to us,” he slurred.
So I dragged him over into the lane to our left, and he said, “It’s back, close to the terminal.” Of course, it wasn’t, and this went on and on until I was soaked with sweat and felt as though my shoulder had dislocated. He simply could not remember where he had parked. If this had been in 2025, I would have simply been pressing his fob like a Jeopardy contestant buzzing in and waiting for his car alarm to chirp. But it was 1979, so I was SOL. I was beginning to feel like Moses lost in the desert when I finally spotted the rear of his Electra.
I dragged him to the passenger side and let him slide to the parking lot. If the pavement was 140 degrees, he was oblivious to pain as I rummaged through his pockets and retrieved his keys. Once I had the door open, I lifted him into the seat and buckled him in. Now, I had to exit the parking lot and find my way to Douglas, Arizona. My dad was still basically incoherent when I asked him how to get there, but fortunately, there was a Rand McNally Atlas on the bench seat between us. I identified the highway we needed to take, exited the airport, and proceeded to it for the 123-mile drive ahead.
No sooner was I relieved to be on the road than he said, “Pull over! Pull over!” For the life of me, I had no idea why, but he wanted me to take the exit onto the feeder. “Pull over; we’re going to stay in that motel. I need some sleep …” I looked ahead and saw the sign for the Sidewinder and, next to it, what appeared to be a roach trap at a motel about a thousand yards ahead.
“Dad, no way did I fly all the way from San Francisco to sit in some dump motel while you sleep off your whiskey! (The empty Jim Beam bottle had been rolling back and forth on the rear floorboard the entire time.) Now, go back to sleep, and when I get near Douglas, I’ll ask you for directions to your place.” He did, and I drove on until we exited I-10 and headed south toward the Mexican border. I say, “Mexican border” because that’s precisely where Douglas is. On the Mexican border. My dad always had to live close to it so that he could make weekend runs into Mexico for cigarettes, whiskey, Percodan, Valium, Codeine, and a host of other drugs that would require a prescription if he were to get them in the States. He had broken his back three different times, at least once from doing stupid human tricks after too much Jim Beam (and it was always too much). So, he self-prescribed because there was no way the VA was going to approve the quantities of painkillers he used.
Eventually, we took US-191 South into Douglas. I awakened him, and finally, he was coherent enough to tell me he didn’t actually live in Douglas. In fact, he lived about five or six miles into the desert, in a lone mobile home on blocks, a sniper’s bullet from the border. In addition to needing access to la farmacias (and you might as well know it now), my dad was on the lamb. For two things. He had come to the attention of the feds for running a ton of marijuana from Reynosa, Mexico, across the border from his home in McAllen, Texas, to Chicago every two weeks. That’s right. My dad was “Breaking Bad” before Walter White got his teaching degree.
Oh, yeah. There was the second thing. While he had evaded scrutiny for the drug running, he castrated a homosexual who attempted to molest him. He then flushed the guys’ cajones down the toilet, where I presume they had made their way into the Rio Grande. So, you can see why a garden spot like this seemed the ideal place for him to retire.
At Dad’s direction, I navigated the Electra between the tumbleweed and Saguaros until we finally arrived at a white, circa 1960s mobile home almost directly on the border and about five miles southeast of a desert butte.
I got him out of the car, and by this time, he was just able to get himself in the trailer, where he promptly put his hands on another bottle of JB, flopped on the sofa, and, gripping the neck of the bottle in two hands, began to empty it. I left him there, retrieved my suitcase from the car, and brought it to my room at the back of the trailer. There was no way I was going to sit down across from him and watch him drink himself back into a drunken stupor, so I changed into my orange jogging shorts and Adidas running shoes. I was an avid runner, constantly entering 10ks and half marathons, and if there was ever a time for a long run, that was it. I didn’t bother to tell my dad I was leaving. He wouldn’t have remembered it anyway.
I exited the mobile home and, after surveying the territory, set out for the only thing in sight. That was a lone butte in the distance of the Arizona desert. The sun was slowly descending to the horizon, turning that butte and the desert between us a pale shade of orange. I set my sights on it and was off.
The surface of the road felt good under my feet, and the dry heat was the same, although the temperature had dropped significantly since we had left that parking lot in Tucson. I had left the hills of San Francisco behind, and the run seemed like an effortless, low-altitude glide over the winding road that ascended gently to the west. I felt as though I could run forever, and a sense of resentment over my dad’s condition at the airport made me feel perhaps I should. As I continued, I began to feel detached from my body. Almost as though I were a passenger on it rather than one with it. I contemplated this until it dawned on me that’s really what our mind is. It’s a lone passenger. This is why a person’s body can be totally paralyzed, but their mind continues to experience all the thoughts it had up to and beyond the moment it parted ways with the tenement of bone and blood beneath it. Our mind is a lessee on property it can never own. The further I ran, the more resentment gave way to a state of calm attentiveness. I was experiencing Zen in my Addidas among the Saguaros.
Ultimately, I reached the foot of the butte and considered making it to the top as I did the hills of my current residence. But dusk was upon me, and I wasn’t sure a waning moon would compensate for a sun about to disappear before me. I thought it best to turn around.
By my estimation, I had covered approximately ten miles by the time I went up the wooden steps to the trailer door. It had been cathartic, and I hoped that, by some miracle, my dad would have put the bottle away and switched from whiskey to coffee. But there was no such aroma when I entered. I found him half on, half off the sofa, the bottle empty beneath his dangling arm. I sat in a stuffed chair on the opposite side of the coffee table between us. I just gazed at him and contemplated how his condition surprised me. And it did. Only because, in the thirteen years since my mom divorced him and he moved to Texas, there was never a visit by him to us, or us to him, when he had not cleaned himself up. Despite being a daily drunk in our absence, he would be clean-shaven, clear-eyed, and sober—not only when he picked us up at the airport—but the entire length of our stay. We would never have known he had a drinking problem were it not for our history as a family. The occasions of his sobriety were less and less during the passing years, but when we were lucky enough to experience them, my dad was charming and positive. He had a contagious laugh and smile. A voracious reader, he was a wealth of information. As a sober father, he was a source of guidance and encouragement. He was even my and my brother’s Cub Scout den master for a couple years until the end of one meeting. Left unattended, a den of eight-year-olds let their curiosity get the best of them, and a stack of Playboy magazines I retrieved from his foot locker at the base of my parent’s bed to share with them proved his undoing. “Word travels fast in a small, small town,” and the scouts did not award merit badges for the ability to identify aspects of the female anatomy. That talent wouldn’t be rewarded until ninth-grade biology.
My mother was academically gifted. Throughout her entire education, culminating in a Master’s degree from Purdue, I never knew her to get less than an “A” grade. And yet, to our surprise, she always insisted my dad was far more intelligent than her. Sadly, his drunkenness eventually manifested itself in the wasted potential I saw before me. As he slept, I turned on the small television sitting on a faux brass stand with wheels and attempted to find a movie. I continued to adjust the rabbit ear antennas but could never bring in more than two Spanish language channels. It was clear this border hideout was a good place to be a voracious reader. With that, I retreated to my bedroom and fell asleep, a Civil Procedure casebook on my chest.
The eastern sun came through the curtain of my room and awakened me. It was quiet in the trailer as I made my way to the hallway bathroom. I took care of business, hoping I would find Dad awake with a renewed sense of responsibility and committed to sobriety for the remainder of the trip. It was not to be. I rounded the corner into the living room, and there he was. No matter how drunk the night before, he would always awaken early. On all previous visits, he would be sipping coffee, inviting you to share in it, and telling you he was about to prepare a hearty breakfast for you. Not that day. He was seated upright on the sofa. His shirt was gone, and a new fifth of whiskey sat between the legs of his shorts. His feet were bare. He managed a “good morning” and then raised the bottle by its neck. He was gripping it with both hands, yet they trembled so much the whiskey dribbled from the bottle and ran down through the gray hair on his chest and into his crotch. At age 52, he was a shadow of a young blue-eyed Turk with jet black hair who, as a hunting guide, would hike a dozen or more miles a day leading hunting parties in search of quail and pheasant among the rows of dried corn stalks and bean fields of Indiana and Ohio. Of course, they always ended up back at the lodge with drinking accompanied by games of poker. That was when he was in his real element. But now, the years of abuse had caught up with him, and I sat there contemplating where it all would end. I imagined that until it dawned on me, it was Thanksgiving. I realized that, unlike the Thanksgiving holidays of my early childhood, this one would not include quail stuffed with mushrooms and wild rice coupled with pheasant and perhaps some rabbit to go with mashed potatoes. I could still feel buckshot on my tongue before I picked it out of my mouth. I knew there would be none of that today and decided it was time for another run.
So it went that Thanksgiving Day and the next, which, of course, was a Friday. My routine continued to consist of reading in the bedroom, followed by a run. I had given up on him experiencing any semblance of guilt and turning his oldest son and namesake’s visit into something for which I could be thankful. I resigned myself to returning to California, hopefully grateful I didn’t have to make final arrangements for him before my departure. Once I endured Saturday, I could awaken Sunday, return to the airport in Tucson, and then fly on to SFO. I would be older, wiser, and infinitely more jaded.
Saturday dawned, and I prepared a meager breakfast with what I could scavenge in his kitchen. I would have gone into town for groceries; however, I had no credit card and no cash to speak of. What I found was enough to keep me alive until I returned to my peanut butter and raisins. If my dad was eating anything, it wasn’t in my presence.
Another jog amidst the tumbleweeds and cacti conjured thoughts of my buddies still skiing in mountain snow with the pretty coeds I was certain they were meeting. A road runner dashed into my path and then out again. He displayed an attitude of owning that road, and I envied the simplicity of his existence. How had I gotten myself so far out of place in my own? And how did my dad, by all appearances, become so irretrievably lost in his own?
Back in the trailer, the day turned to dusk and dusk to darkness. Not yet willing to retreat to my bedroom, I sat across from his place on the sofa, thinking perhaps, on my final evening with him for the foreseeable future, we might actually engage in some meaningful conversation. Maybe I could get through to him with something that would encourage him to redeem himself and grasp some measure of accomplishment and self-acceptance going forward.
Instead, he began reciting one after another wrong or stroke of bad luck he had suffered. I patiently listened until I said, “Dad, a lot of people have a lot of bad experiences and memories, but those memories are like dog shit in their backyard. They pick it up and put it where it belongs. In the trash. But you. You go outside and roll in it. Then you bring it in the house and force the stench on all of us.” He pretended to ignore me and then continued.
“Your grandfather cost me my marriage. That son-of-a-bitch couldn’t stay out of our lives, and that’s what cost me your mother and you kids.”
That did it. My entire youth, I listened to my dad curse my grandfather, saying anything to discredit (of which there was none) and disparage him. He did this because he knew himself to be very intelligent, but his drinking and rebellious nature prevented him from getting along with any kind of boss or management. He was always looking for the easy way to be his own boss, have his own business, and find success. But he lacked the discipline to earn it the hard way. That and his drunken escapades prevented him from getting any kind of momentum in the working world.
Thirteen years earlier, it was a Sunday night and normally time for us to be in bed when my mom brought Preston and me into the dining room of our home in Peru, Indiana. Having recently lost his last job in town, Dad had taken a new one away from home. He was working as a hunting guide on a private game preserve a couple hours away in Ohio. Hunting is big on weekends during bird season, and he would make it home only for a day or two in the middle of the week every few weeks. I was twelve years old, and Preston was just barely eleven.
There was an old upright piano in that room, and Mom seated us on its bench and then closed the doors at each end of the room. She then pulled up a chair and seated herself in front of us. Her knees were almost touching our own. She was thirty-eight years old. Her hair was still black as obsidian, and her deep brown eyes behind her glasses and beneath the longest black lashes gave her face an exotic look, almost Persian. That’s all I see when I recall the conversation that followed. She explained that the two younger children were in bed because they were too young to understand what she was about to discuss with us.
She began, “I always believed that when you marry—you marry for life. And when I married your father, I firmly believed that is how long our marriage would last. No matter what happened, for ‘better or worse,’ as they say, my marriage to your father would last forever. And then, a few weeks ago—as I know you know—your father lost his job when he knocked Mr. Richter through the window at the car dealership.”
When my dad cleaned up, he looked like the consummate businessman. And, on the rare occasions he was sober, he could charm anyone. This (coupled with his sales experience at my grandpa’s car dealership) landed him a job as head of used car sales at Richter and Kern Buick. Conveniently for him, it was right across the street from a local tavern that served lunch. Of course, that’s where Dad went for lunch and, on this occasion, apparently, had more than one shot of Jim Beam to wash it down. He returned, probably late, to the small cinder block building on the used car lot. I’m also assuming he reeked of Jim Beam (which I can still smell as I relate this to you) and—when confronted—promptly punched Mr. Richter in the face and knocked him through the plate glass window onto the lot. Also conveniently (in this case for Mr. Richter and the Peru Police Department), the police department was also just across the street from the car lot, only one or two doors east of the tavern.
Like all perps, he got his one phone call and, of course, called my mom, who was working two blocks away in the Miami County Courthouse. You would have to have known her to know how humiliating it was to have to leave work and bail my dad out of jail. Peru was a small town, and, as such, everyone knew everyone else’s business. If that wasn’t enough, the fact that my dad’s arrest and the circumstances surrounding it were described in detail on the front page of the next day’s Peru Tribune made sure they did.
Mom went on to explain that our family could not depend on my dad’s income. My grandpa had refused further assistance after my dad’s last two monumental derailments. She said our welfare was absolutely dependent on her career and income. She was a County Extension Agent and an employee of the federal, state, and county governments along with Purdue, a land-grant university. The income wasn’t great for a mother raising four kids, but it was a high-profile job in a corn town of thirteen thousand. Mom had a weekly AM radio show at WARU and was in the Tribune about once a month for one event or another, so her face and name were known to everyone in town. Bud Lutz, our next-door neighbor and the editor of the Tribune, knew what she was up against and had nothing but sympathy for my mom. Even so, he could not keep my dad’s arrest out of the paper.
Mom said her job was highly political, and anything that reflected negatively on her could cost her her job. “That wasn’t enough,” she said, “but (at this point, those big brown deer eyes moistened up) nothing matters more to me than the health and safety of you kids. When I married your father, he was a kind and gentle man. But as his drinking worsened, he became more and more violent. I could live with what he has done to me, but when he hurts my children … I just can’t live with that. I have come to fear he will hurt you badly.” She didn’t have to convince us of that but went on to say, “I never wanted to have to ask you this, and if you two tell me not to—I will not do it. I will remain married to your father. But what would you say if I said I feel I have to divorce him?”
Simultaneously—with no hesitation whatsoever from the two us—both hands of the each of us shot straight toward the ceiling and, as one, we yelled, “Divorce him!”
Preston was much closer to my dad than I was. He was just seventeen months younger than me, shorter in stature, and suffered from severe asthma. I can’t recall how many times my mom took him to the hospital in the middle of the night, where they put him in an oxygen tent. He even came home a couple of times with one that went over his bed. I am certain his health also contributed to his small stature. My point is that because of his frailty, my dad went a little easier on him. He got a little less of the dog whip. Not to mention, Preston was smart and knew when to lay back and be a small target. Not that I wasn’t smart, but my angry and rebellious nature, which came from emulating my dad, interfered with any good sense I might have demonstrated otherwise. Preston remained much closer to my dad than I was in later years, so looking back, I am somewhat surprised he supported their divorce. In spite of his affection for him, it all got down to, knowing my dad posed a safety risk to all of us.
When mom heard us scream, “Divorce him,” she asked, “Are you certain? Are you really certain?”
Even at age twelve, I knew I was. It was as if the cavalry was finally on the way and would make it before the ranch burned down. With that, Mom said she would go see Al Cole the next day. Working in the courthouse, she knew all the lawyers in the county and thought the most of him. My dad would be served his papers while in Ohio later that week.
In that trailer in the desert, thirteen years later, my dad attempted to continue. “You’re grandfather. . .”
“Stop!” I said. “Stop! I have listened to this, it seems, since before I could walk. While you were married to my mom, I heard it day in and day out, with the only break when you somehow managed to be sober. And I believed you! Why? … Because you are my dad! And like all little boys, I worshipped you. Even when you were drunk and beat Mom and me. I worshipped you. I wanted to believe everything you told me. Because you were my dad, I thought it must have been the truth. You constantly blamed my grandpa, and eventually, I came to despise him. Like you, I came to blame and resent him. So I made his life miserable, and my mother’s in the process. He heard me blame him. He heard me repeat your terrible words. And he knew where they came from. Dad, do you know what he said about you? My dad just sat there, his bottle between his legs. Do you know what he said about you?”
He still just sat there staring at me. I said, “Not a thing. Not one damn thing! In spite of the hurt I caused him, he knew why I was so angry and more at issue: he knew it was not right to disparage a father to his son. And he knew that in time—and that time had long since arrived—I would come to realize it was you. It was you that was the son-of-a-bitch!
He did everything he could to help you help yourself. Everything he could to help you be successful. Not because he loved you. You had done nothing to deserve that! But because he loved his daughter and grandchildren so much, he simply wanted them to be safe and happy.
You wanted to live in Texas. So even though it broke his heart, he moved us all to Tyler, where at least mom could live close to her first and closest cousin. That ripped his heart out, but that’s what his daughter wanted. She wanted you to be happy and thought that would end your anger and save her marriage. And to make sure of that, he also bought us a beautiful home on a lake in the middle of Tyler and paid to convert a former nursing home into a motel. He spent a fortune in 1958 dollars to make sure you were a success.” My dad just took another pull on his whiskey as I continued.
“But no. No—you couldn’t just be grateful and make the most of it. You resented him even more. Why? Because you knew you would never have any of it without him. So instead of showing your gratitude by helping my mother with the business, you just drank more and more—and then—when she had just given birth to little Mark, your fourth child, you up and run off to Arizona to do who knows what! (It wasn’t until thirty years later I learned “what.”)
You left mom a six-year-old, a four-year-old, a two-year-old, and a newborn. During the first six months of his life, he was essentially raised by a black maid, the head of the motel’s household department! For four months, you were gone, and all we got was postcards of beautiful Arizona while you were doing who knows what! Finally, Grandpa had enough. He bought a used Mayflower moving van, came to Texas, sold the house and motel in a fire sale, and brought us home to Indiana. Only then, when you knew you were losing your only source of income and had nothing left to call your own, did you come traipsing after! Back in Indiana, you became angrier and angrier, realizing you had blown a great thing. You could have had mom and me and my brothers and sister. Instead, you beat Mom, and you beat me. Just like you beat your dogs. Who has a custom leather whip to discipline their dogs then when drunk and angry turns it on their kids! Yet you pretend to not know why you lost us!
And now? Now you want to continue blaming Grandpa! For three solid days, I have listened to you blame him and say it was him who cost you your marriage. Well, I’m not twelve or thirteen years old anymore. My grandfather didn’t cost you your marriage. He didn’t cost you your family. There’s your family … You have it right between your legs! There’s your bride … You’ve got both hands around her neck right now where they’ve been the last three days! My grandfather didn’t didn’t cost you your marriage. That bottle did! That is your chosen bride! You chose it over my mom and us kids. It was your choice, and now you have to live with it. We have our own lives now. We’ve moved on without you, and any friends you ever had, you’ve lost in what brought you here.” I stopped and caught my breath. I wanted to say most of those things to him for fifteen years or more. For the first few, I was too young to articulate them, and for most of the rest, I was too intimidated to have the courage to speak them. But “the cat was in the cradle,” and that was all over now. The latent words and resentment had been purged from where they had lain dormant. Unplanned and unforeseen, I had brought a reckoning with me to Arizona. No, it was not the Thanksgiving I had planned. I had come expecting to see the father, who always managed to clean himself up for our visits. The man who would pretend, for at least a few days, to be the father I had always wanted.
His eyes finally broke with mine, and he reached for the magazine atop the coffee table in front of him, picked it up, and waved it in my direction. It needed no introduction. It was the Hemlock Society magazine, advocating suicide, to which he had subscribed for years. No matter his residence, he kept it conspicuously lying in sight whenever we would visit. It was always the eight-hundred-pound gorilla in the room. I never commented on it and pretended I didn’t notice it. But it had a profound impact on my sister, who would see it and be overwhelmed with sympathy, a sense of resentment for my mother for having divorced him, and guilt for not being in a position to do more for him. Which is just what he intended.
“I’ve tried suicide,” he slurred. “It doesn’t work!” He said it as though it were some profound insight he was sharing for shock effect. I was unphased. I had seen it coming.
A guttural sound of incredulity emanated from my diaphragm, passed through my throat, and exited my mouth. “You’ve taken handfuls of Percocet, Valium, and oxycodone and washed them down with a quart of Jim Beam every day for 25 years. It would take more drugs to kill you than a bull elephant!” I didn’t hold back. “If you want to kill yourself, there are ways that are guaranteed to work. If you want to do it, just do it! You can find a way to do the trick. I’m tired of listening to it. Don’t hang it over my head and try to manipulate me the way you do, my little sister. You have screwed her head up and have her blaming Mom the way I did, Grandpa. You messed my head up for years with anger born out of a sense of helplessness to the point I plotted to kill you myself. You remember that .410 shotgun you bought me when I was in the fourth grade? You taught me how to hit 30 out of 30 clay pigeons with it. Well, I kept a shell in it and had it leaning up against the wall in the clothes closet just inside our front door. The next time you got Mom down on the living room floor and started beating her beautiful face, it would have been the last. Fortunately, Mom sensed something ominous and divorced you just in time. I’ve finally worked through that, and I won’t let you take me to a dark place anymore. I won’t be affected by whatever you do.”
He just sat there wearing a thousand-yard stare. One hand was on his bottle, and the other rested on his knee, a smoldering cigarette glowed red between its fingers. I had never in my life won an argument with my dad. He would have been a good lawyer in his own right … He always had to be right. But at that moment, he said nothing. No one had ever confronted him with the cold, hard truth. At least no one that meant anything to him. And what kind of defense is there against the truth?
“Now … if you don’t mind,” I said, “I’m going to my bedroom. I’ve got to catch a flight back to San Francisco tomorrow.”
I slept soundly that night, relieved I would be out of what could very well be my dad’s last stand and the last time I would see him. I awakened to the aroma of bacon in the kitchen, pulled on my jeans and t-shirt, and entered the hallway leading past the living room into the kitchen. It was a big open kitchen with no wall separating the two. I could see my dad’s profile as he cooked over the stovetop on the island. Before me was a spread to rival the buffet at the Hyatt on a Sunday morning. There were platters of bacon and sausage, even steak. And mountains of hash browns and pancakes. There was fresh butter, maple syrup, and bowls of fruit. And a pitcher of orange juice. The scent of freshly brewed coffee combined with that of everything else and filled the trailer. Where had he gotten all this! When had he gotten up to buy it, and how did he get out and in without my hearing him! But what shocked me more than the feast before me was my dad. His appearance, that is.
When I went to bed, he still had not shaved for at least five or six days. His hair was unkempt. Whiskey matted his chest hair, and the whites of his eyes were red. But no longer. I looked at him, transfixed by what appeared to be a mystical transformation.
Beginning with his shoes, his flip flops were gone, replaced with black dress shoes. A military man of at least eight years, he knew how to spit-shine shoes, and the shine on his was brilliant. He wore cuffed and pressed black trousers held by a black leather belt with a brass buckle. His white dress shirt appeared starched and pressed. It was neatly tucked inside those trousers. But it was his face that had me staring in disbelief. His face was clean-shaven. I caught a subtle scent of aftershave. Though not the jet black of his younger years, his hair was neatly combed and groomed into place.
I said, “Dad! Where did you get all this food? There is enough here for an army!”
With a laugh, he replied, “I thought you might need a few calories to get you back to California!” He laughed with his eyes as much as his smile and that is what I remember about that morning than anything. After being on what I knew to be a four-day drunk, which, in reality, was probably much longer, his eyes, which had been swollen and totally red when I went to bed the night before, were now clear. Their whites were white as fresh snow, and their irises blue as the Arizona sky on a cloudless day. I remained in awe as I filled my plate, thinking if I looked at him again, that haggard visage of him the days and night before would return and replace today’s—the one that (in a rare and early year of their marriage) had accompanied my mom and siblings to the church on Easter Sunday.
As we finished our feast, he instructed me to go to my room and pack while he cleaned up. “I know how you like history, especially Western history, and because your flight doesn’t leave until early evening, I thought we would leave soon and go to Tombstone. I can show you the OK Corral and the other haunts of Wyatt Earp, his brothers, and the Clanton gang. Would you like that?”
“Well, yeah, Dad. That would be great!”
And so, it was. We arrived in Tombstone before noon, and, just as he said, he showed me all those things. He owned the complete American Heritage History of America collection and had seemingly committed every word to memory, so he made a wonderful tour guide. I was channeling Wyatt Earp as the sun rose in the noon sky when he said, “Why don’t we take a break in the shade of that cantina and get something cool to drink al fresco and watch the other tourists pass by.” I thought that sounded good and quickly agreed.
We seated ourselves at a little metal table for two on the patio’s edge. I was turning my chair to better observe the pretty senoritas as they walked by when the waitress came to our table to take our order. I said,
“I’ll have a cerveza, please. Carta Blanca, if you have it.”
The waitress turned to my dad, and he said, “I’ll have a coke.”
“What! You’ll have a coke!” I was shocked. “Since when do you have a coke!”
“I want a Coke and—if I want a Coke—I’m gonna have a Coke, goddamn it!”
Although still incredulous, I conceded, “Ok, ok! … You’re gonna have a Coke!” And he did.
We finished our drinks and, as the sun got a little lower, headed back to our car. It had been a great day with my dad. It was such a contrast to the previous four days, I could hardly believe he was the same person. Today, he was the person we had always wished him to be. We never expected Superman, and we didn’t need Ward Cleaver or a dad like the ones in the 60’s weekly network television shows. We just wanted a kind dad who, in addition to loving my mom and us, went to work each day and responsibly took care of us. I’m not saying it made up for the last four days, but it went in the right direction.
We drove to Tucson, and I found myself back at the gate preparing to depart. This time, Dad was with me, and as I was instructed to board, we hugged and said we loved each other. It’s the part I try to remember most.
I returned to San Francisco to finish out the semester. With only a week or two to go, my phone rang. It was my dad. He sounded sober and upbeat. After a little small talk about school, he said, “Hey, Junior. You know, I was stationed a short time in San Francisco while in the Navy. In fact, you were conceived there.”
“Oh, geez!” I thought. “The irony!”
“Your mom and I were newly married, and I loved that place. I wish I could have stayed. In fact, that’s why I’m calling. I want to come out there. I thought you and I could get a place together, and I could help you with your expenses.”
I was shocked. In light of his drinking problem, there was no way I was going to live with him and expose myself to the drama that would inevitably ensue. Secondly, I had absolutely no intention of staying there for another year. I had stuck the first one out solely out of pride, afraid to admit I had made a mistake in going there in the first place. Other than intermural football and playing on the USF law school rugby team, my time there was a penance for poor judgment. A handful of guys who somehow found it within themselves to accept “Buck Henry from Texas” was all I would miss. I didn’t hesitate to explain.
“Dad … this is not San Francisco of the early 1950’s. This city has changed big time. It’s still beautiful, but there has been a cultural revolution since you were here. It’s the birthplace of and spearhead of the gay pride movement. I can’t go anywhere without getting hit on, and that just doesn’t sit well with my Midwestern values. If I had a hundred dollars to drop on the sidewalk, I wouldn’t bother to bend over to pick it up. It wouldn’t be worth the risk of being compromised. I have to get out of here, and when I do, I’m going to break off the rear-view mirror, so I can’t even look back by accident. I’m going home with the armadillo, Dad.”
Jerry Jeff Walker, along with Willie, was an icon of the Austin-based progressive country movement. That line about the armadillo was from what was arguably his anthem and that of every homesick Texan. I had introduced Dad to him in 1973 when I dropped in on him at his apartment in the Rio Grande Valley. I was fresh from Austin, with Walker’s album Viva Terlingua in hand.
“So, Junior. You’re going home to Texas?”
“Yeah, Dad. I am.”
That second semester ended, and I returned to my mother’s home in Indiana to regroup and get what I needed to return to Texas. I contacted Baylor Law School, where I had been previously accepted, but they informed me, in so many words, “You declined our offer, so now we are giving it to someone else.”
I knew it would take a while to find another school, so I decided to return to Texas anyway and work until I succeeded. I knew any further education would be totally self-funded, so working would help with that. Hopefully, it wouldn’t take more than a year. I was making those plans when my dad called me at my mother’s house. I picked up the phone.
“Hey, Dad,” I said.
“I’ve gone home with the armadillo, Junior.”
“You’re in Texas?”
‘I’m in Oak Hill, a little town just south of Austin.”
I couldn’t believe it. He had beaten me back to Texas in that white Buick Electra and, on top of that, to Austin, where I had always dreamed of living.
I got my black ’78 Chevy Monte Carlo with its red, crushed velvet interior back from my sister, who I had given it up to when I went to San Francisco. She was attending Purdue University, which my grandfather reminded me was an “instate” school. The subtle implication was she was more deserving, and it was not lost on me. He went on to tell me I would be riding the Bay Area Rapid Transit Authority (BART) bus lines when I got there. But that was all behind me, and within two weeks, that Monte Carlo and I crossed through Texarkana into Texas.
I began seeking work in Austin, but so was everyone. It was considered such an ideal place by anyone familiar with it that no one who graduated there wanted to leave. People with PhDs were working behind the counter at McDonald’s just to remain. After a few weeks, the front money my mom had given me was just about gone, and I was sleeping on the sofa in a buddy’s one-bedroom apartment in Houston. After a few more weeks, I found a job as a college textbook rep with Harper & Row Publishing Company out of New York City. I would be based out of Houston but call on professors and bookstores at universities and colleges in southeast Texas. The Austin rep was not about to give up her territory.
My dad had settled into another trailer in the small, semi-rural community of Oak Hill on the southwestern outskirts of Austin. It rests on the Balcones Escarpment, which forms the eastern boundary of the Texas Hill Country. Consisting of rugged limestone cliffs, it was in sharp contrast to the desert and Saguaros he left behind in Arizona. His trailer was ensconced in a small park on the edge of town. It rested in the shade of stately live oak trees, which provided shade from the Texas sun.
As usual, he didn’t have a phone, so he called me from a pay phone near the manager’s office. It was there, he would also get his mail from a box atop a post in a row of boxes. He had called and gotten my new phone number from my mom. I heard the disappointment in his voice when I told him I couldn’t find a job in Austin and had to settle in Houston. He brightened up a bit when I told him I was dating a girl who attended the University of Texas in Austin. I would be visiting her there every couple of weeks or so.
Harper & Row didn’t pay me much of a salary, but as I was constantly on the road, they provided me with a company car and gas card. When I made my trips north and west of Houston to spend a work week, once a month, at Texas A&M in College Station, I was already halfway to UT when I cut out early on Friday afternoons. It was coming to and from I would drop in on him. I said, “Drop in” because he didn’t have a phone, so that’s just what I did. I’d pull my car up under one of those oak trees and, on the rare occasion, he wasn’t home, would get a key out from under a flower pot and let myself in the front door.
In late August, I surprised him with what, by then, was my fourth or fifth visit since returning to Texas. He was excited to see me, and as I sat on the sofa in his living room, he told me he would really like to see a movie. He asked if we could go to see Brubaker about the new warden in a small prison farm starring Robert Redford. “I thought we could leave early and go for ice cream at the Dairy Queen.”
“Sure, Dad. That sounds good to me.” And with that, he left the living room to clean up.
I sat there and thought about it. This was at least the fourth or fifth time I had dropped in to see him. Each time, it was unannounced, and each time, he was clean and sober. If he’d known I was coming, I would not have been that surprised, but unannounced? I calculated the odds of that to be less likely than him being recruited as an astronaut on NASA’s next mission to the moon. With his social security disability income and little, if any, friends in his new town, getting out to a movie was a rare luxury for him. I’m saying, “it was a big deal”. So when I could hear him showering, I decided it was a good time to look for the bottle, which I knew had to be hidden somewhere in that trailer.
I went through all the cabinets and pantry in the kitchen, but I couldn’t even find a beer in the fridge. So I looked under all the furniture in the living room. I looked in the broom closet in the hallway, and when I could still hear him in the shower, I tip-toed into his bedroom and rifled through it. There was not one bottle to be found. I was shocked. The only place left to search was the bathroom, and I would do that before we left for the movie.
I was back on the sofa when he came out. Just as that last morning in Arizona before we departed for Tombstone and on to the Tucson airport, he was cleaned up head to toe. He had changed into his white, starched dress shirt, pressed black trousers, and shined black shoes. Again, he had shaved and groomed his hair. I was touched by how important this time beyond the confines of his trailer was to him.
I used the restroom. It was the last place I expected to find a bottle, and I did not. However, I did expect to find the usual self-prescribed assortment of painkillers. When I failed at that, I felt as though I had fallen into some alternative universe.
As planned, we drove to the local Dairy Queen and ordered from the car-hop. I had a sundae, and he was eating a banana split. We caught up on small talk, including me showing him a picture of the UT Tri-Delta I was dating. He was quite approving when I interrupted him to make a confession.
“Dad,” I said, turning my face toward him, “I’ve dropped in on you, without you knowing I was coming, four or five times since we’ve been back in Texas, and you’ve been stone-cold sober each time. … What’s with that?”
He didn’t look up from his ice cream but said, “I haven’t had a drink in ten months.”
The silence was deafening as I processed what he just told me. I counted backward in my head until it hit me. “Ten months”, I thought. “Oh my god, he’s talking about Thanksgiving in Arizona! He hasn’t had a drink since that night. I unleashed years of anger and resentment and held him accountable for all the ways he’d let himself and our family down!” I had shamed him into sobriety. I wondered how he did it and whether he had gotten treatment. He said, “No.” He explained he had gone cold turkey. “I just took every bottle in the house and poured it down the sink. Then I went into my bedroom, shut the door, stripped my clothes off, and got in bed.
I dreamed I had died and gone to hell. After four days, I awakened and opened my eyes. I said, ‘So this is what hell looks like’. I got out of bed, and my feet landed in a giant pool of liquid that extended from under the bed halfway to the door. I sweat so much that it had gone all the way through the mattress and box springs and covered the linoleum floor. Only when I got my newspapers did I realize I had been in that bed for four days.
A couple weeks later, I thought, ‘Well, you’ve already died once. You might as well quit the pills.’ So I went to the kitchen counter, then to the medicine cabinet in the bathroom. I gathered all the pills, flushed them down the toilet, and got back in bed. It was then I realized where I hadn’t gone to hell weeks earlier. Giving up the booze didn’t take me to hell. That was just preparation for what real hell is.”
I had read stories. I couldn’t imagine what doing that all by yourself was like. Especially after almost forty years of drinking and fifteen of pill-popping. When I had composed my thoughts, I told him, “Dad, I have waited my whole life to hear you tell me that. It’s all I’ve ever wanted from you. I am so proud of you. Please keep it up. Just keep it up!” He just took the last bite of his banana split, and we were on our way into south Austin to see Brubaker.
I made a brief stop to see him in September. He was still clear-eyed, clean, and sober. When I prepared to leave, he followed me to my car.
“Hey, Don. Now if I could just quit these damn cigarettes.”
I had been on him to quit even as a young child. In fact, ever since the surgeon general came out with his report that smoking caused cancer. I had pretty much given up on that ever happening. I figured dying of cancer was the only way he’d quit. He went on to say, “I read in the paper that the University of Texas wants heavy smokers to participate in a smoking cessation program. There’s no cost to the participants, and they will provide individual and group support and medication if necessary. We would meet five days a week, and part of the program would include walking laps around the Texas Longhorn stadium for exercise and improving lung capacity. Do you think I should do it?”
“Hell, yeah, Dad!” That sounds great. You should absolutely do that! The next time I’m here, I expect to hear all about it!”
Fall was coming, and football season was with it. The annual “Red River Shootout” on neutral ground in Dallas was coming up between the UT Longhorns and the Oklahoma Sooners. My girlfriend grew up in Dallas, and her mother still lived there. She thought the weekend of the game would be a good time to meet her mother and at least one of her brothers and suggested we stay at her mother’s while in town for the game. She explained the rivalry between the two teams and schools was really something I should experience. I couldn’t wait.
I had to work Friday, the day before the game. First, I’d go from Houston to College Station, where I would finish up as soon as possible. From there, I would be on to Austin to pick Beth up and then to her mother’s in Dallas. It was going to be a lot of driving for me. Wanting to give me time to prepare, she told me about this big weekend just before my last meeting with my dad, so I explained it all to him before departing that day. I told him I wouldn’t have long, but I would definitely stop in to check on him that Friday afternoon before heading into Austin and the sorority to pick up my girlfriend. He smiled and waved goodbye as I drove away.
Friday, October 10th came, and I was detained in wrapping things up at A&M and got out of College Station a couple hours later than planned. I sped to make up time but realized we would get to Beth’s mother’s home very late, but even later if I stopped to see my dad. I was reluctant but decided to forgo seeing him and decided to proceed directly to pick up Beth. Since Dad had no phone, I had no way to tell him I would not be stopping by. Knowing he must be lonely living like that, I felt guilty but thought I would at least see him after dropping Beth off on the way home Sunday.
On game day, the Red River Shootout lived up to all the hype, with the Longhorns beating the Sooners 20-13. Even better, the time with Beth’s family was special. In fact, it was so special that we were late getting out of Dallas to get Beth back in Austin for classes the next day. We left after dark for the three-hour drive.
I-35 South was slow going with weekend traffic, and that didn’t help with our schedule. I dropped her off at her sorority and headed east for my apartment in Houston. That last leg of the trip would take almost another three hours and put me in around midnight. I then had to rise the, get in my car, and be back in College Station the next morning.
It was Monday, October 13th, when I checked into the LaQuinta directly across from the main entrance to the campus. It was a beautiful fall day in Texas. As I worked, I strolled the campus and couldn’t wait to return to my room to change into those orange gym shorts and go for my typical three-mile run before showering and dinner.
The humidity is usually relatively low, and the temperature moderate in October, which it was this day. I could have run much longer, but the sun was going down, and I didn’t want to step in a hole and twist an ankle as I covered the grounds of the campus. So, after my three miles, I called it a wrap and returned to my room for a shower before dinner. I entered the room, and the first thing I saw was the message light on the phone flashing orange. No one I could think of knew I was here as of yet. However, my manager, Chuck Hickman, who lived just north of Austin in Round Rock, had guessed as much from past expense reports I had submitted. Usually, I would talk with him on Friday, so to get a call from him on my first day at a location was out of the ordinary.
“Hey, Chuck. How are you … what’s up?” I asked.
It was not in his usual upbeat, enthusiastic voice, and he began. “Don . . . I don’t know how to tell you this, but I got a phone call today from the medical examiner at Brackenridge Hospital in Austin. He didn’t know how to reach you directly but somehow got hold of me. I hate to be the one to break this to you, but your dad is deceased. The examiner is holding his body in their morgue, and they need the next of kin to come claim it.”
I can’t recall what I said. Possibly an “Oh, no,” Perhaps nothing. Oddly, I just felt a sense of numbness throughout my entire body and a slight ringing in my ears. I asked if he knew how my dad died, and he said he did not. He said he had not asked and assumed that was confidential.
Chuck provided me with the examiner’s name and phone number, which I wrote on the little pad of paper with the tiny pencil they always kept next to the hotel room phone.
He then continued, “Don, I am so sorry. I know you have no other relatives in Texas, so you are going to have to take care of this. Take the entire week off to do what you need to do, and we’ll talk on Sunday evening or Monday morning. You call me. In the meantime, don’t worry about work. Take care of yourself, and again, I am sorry.”
I thanked him and hung up the phone. I propped up the pillows and lay back against them, still in my jogging shorts and shoes, while I thought about who to call first. It was almost six in the evening, but I thought I might still be able to catch the medical examiner, so I called the number on the pad. To my surprise, he was still on his shift. I introduced myself, and, like Chuck, he expressed his condolences and then told me I would need to come to claim the body if there was no other family member available to do so. He said I could do that at virtually any time, but he would be on duty until five pm through the week. He just happened to be working a little late that day. Then, it became time to ask the inevitable question.
“How did my dad die?”
“Suicide, Don. It was suicide.”
I asked if he was certain, and he replied, “Yes. He even left a note. It is addressed directly to you. I will have it for you when you get here. Again, I am sorry for your loss.” I explained I would be over the following day as soon as I could get there.
It didn’t take long to know who to call next. My youngest brother was in the military and hard to reach, and there was no way I was going to call my sister. She had always been his “little princess.” Four years younger than me, she had slept through most of the dark moments before my parents divorced. He had convinced her my grandfather and mother were entirely to blame for the divorce and, in her eyes, he could do no wrong. He was her hero.
My brother, Preston, was much closer to my sister than I. They were both attending law school at Indiana University. He was in his third year, and she was in her first. They were, in fact, extremely close, and I had no question that he should be the one to break it to her. She would need someone close who could get to her right away. So I called Preston and broke the news.
“Preston, I hate to tell you this, but . . . dad’s dead.”
He was a very rational person. Much more in control of his emotions than the rest of us. He listened as I told him of the cause of death. I don’t think he was any more surprised than me, as I had pretty well guessed it when Chuck broke the news. This had been coming for a long time.
I don’t remember sleeping much that night. Then again … I don’t remember not. I can’t deny I remember a sense of relief along with sadness. I lay there and thought, “At least I will no longer have to worry if he is ok. Was he eating enough? Was he going to need another surgery on his back at the VA in Chicago?” where he had always gone because of its proximity to his sister. No longer would I have to wonder when the phone call I had just taken would be coming.
The following day, I got up and made a phone call to my mom. There is no other way to describe her. She was a “fixer”. She might get hysterical over something minor, but when it came to a crisis—she rose to the occasion. It was as though she lived for them. She told me that my dad surely had not left any life insurance and that she would handle any expenses. As far as his remains, we agreed that, given the circumstances, cremation was appropriate and to call her again when I knew what was needed to arrange that.
I got into Austin in the early afternoon and was asked to wait until the examiner returned from lunch. He greeted me, and we took seats next to each other in hallway chairs outside the doors of the morgue. He was a middle-aged man, professional but empathetic. Especially so when I told him this was the first death of a family member I had experienced and that I was Dad’s only relative within thirteen hundred miles. I got to the inevitable question … “How did my dad kill himself?”
“He bent over a deer rifle inside the front door of his trailer and shot himself through the heart.”
“Well, that would certainly do it,” I thought. I then asked him to let me see my dad’s body.
“Oh, no, son. You don’t want to do that!”
I insisted, so he explained. “Don … your dad was dead inside the trailer for four days. The examiner on the scene reported the time of death as Friday. In part, that was determined by the newspapers in his home. He had brought in the last one on Thursday.”
“So Friday … Friday the tenth was the estimated time of death?” I asked.
“Yes. The tenth. By the time his landlord found his body yesterday, he had lain there for four days, his remains festering. He had turned off the electricity and shut all the windows. With no air conditioning, even in October, he basically cooked in our Texas heat inside that trailer. I’m a professional, and I see bodies every day, and I don’t even want to look at him. No … I just can’t do that to you. Try to remember him as he was, Don.”
I knew I could have insisted and made it happen, but I processed what he said and came to acknowledge the examiner was correct. I didn’t need to see my dad like that.
“You said he left a note. May I have it?” He reached into his pocket and then placed it in my hand.
It ended with, “Dear Don … ain’t this a helluva way to kick the cigarette habit.” (If this had been a modern text, it would have had a laughing emoji after it.)
When I explained I wanted his remains cremated, he provided me the name of a man and the number of a local crematorium. He even gave me a quarter for the phone call and pointed me to a pay phone on the hallway wall. I called and made arrangements for them to collect my dad’s remains. In the meantime, I signed the appropriate paperwork to allow that.
I had friends in Austin and decided to stay close if needed to transact any business with the crematorium. I checked into a local hotel and then, with the address of his trailer park, headed there to talk with the landlord.
He looked to be in his fifties. He lived with his wife in their own trailer, closest to the entrance to the park. I went to his door and introduced myself. Like everyone else, he expressed his condolences, and then I asked how he had discovered my dad’s body. He said, “Let’s take a walk,” We left his porch and headed to Dad’s trailer.
We got about fifty feet away, and I could already see black flies clinging and caked to every inch of the trailer’s window screens. Within about thirty feet, you could already smell the stench. We stopped, and he related the details.
“Yesterday, my wife asked me if I’d seen Don lately. ‘He hasn’t picked up his mail in several days. I think you better go check on him. We got to about where we are now, and I saw just what you’re seeing and smelling, and I knew immediately your dad was gone. I didn’t bother to go in; I just went to my phone and called the local sheriff. He arrived, and the coroner soon followed. When they had left with your dad’s body, I went inside.
You know, your dad wrecked my trailer. Blood ran toward the edge of the wall beneath the door, and the pool of it is still there. There is also a big hole in the ceiling above where he shot himself, and it has his remains clinging to it. That trailer is how I make my living. I can’t rent it to anyone like that. You will have to arrange to get it cleaned up and pay for the repair.”
I explained I had just gotten out of college, gotten my first job, and barely my first paycheck. “I am his only relative in Texas. I can’t afford to pay a service company. I will have to do it myself.” He gave me the front door key and returned to his own trailer.
The following morning, I got up early. There were no Home Depots in Texas in 1980, but there was a similar retail chain called Handy Dan’s. I drove to their closest location and loaded up on cleaning supplies. They consisted of a couple of big yellow buckets and scrubbing brushes—one with an extended handle, a gallon of bleach, a bottle of Lysol disinfectant and Mr. Clean, some sponges, and a mop. I returned to the trailer and parked next to his Electra.
I carried the cleaning supplies onto the deck of his trailer. As much as I had attempted to prepare myself for the aftermath of his suicide, I could not have. I opened the door and immediately began to gag. The landlord had not bothered to turn the air conditioner back on, and the heat and stench inside entered my nostrils and crawled down my throat into my gut like a giant, rotting nutria hell. Unless you have experienced the smell of a corpse that has been rotting for days, I cannot do justice in describing it. It stays with you for the rest of your life and returns to me as I write this. I immediately turned and vomited. It was just one thing more to clean up.
With the door open and a bucket of supplies in hand, I stepped inside. I had to clear the pool of blood about three feet deep from the door jam. Once past it, I put the bucket down and turned to survey the mess. The floor was unlevel, and the blood ran toward it until it stopped. It collected until it was a good inch deep. By now, maggots were crawling through it, twisting and squirming. I looked up at the hole in the ceiling. Strands of viscera clung to its edge and extended another twelve to eighteen inches from its center.
“Where to begin,” I thought. I realized I needed to get that red pool out from under my feet so as not to find myself lying in that undulating pool of larvae in the process of consuming it. I knew it would require the one thing I had not brought. A small, thin shovel. My dad had been conscientious enough to box every last thing he owned and had stacked most of the boxes neatly against the sofa. But I went to one on the kitchen counter marked “utensils” and retrieved a spatula from it. I returned to the pool and looked down.
This was something of a defining moment in the process. Everywhere I had engaged in manual labor up to and including summer breaks in college, I was the guy the foreman always called on for the dirtiest jobs. It was either because I was the rookie on the crew or because I quickly earned the reputation as the guy who went straight to work and took care of the situation without complaint. I was heretofore unfamiliar with the term “biohazard remediation,” but that’s exactly what I was undertaking. If I were to get through it, I was going to have to disassociate myself from the conscious acknowledgment that this was the flesh from which I came … that this was my dad I would be scraping into a bucket. I channeled the boiler factory I worked in just out of high school and convinced myself I was back there cleaning up the worst mess on the shop floor and proceeded to knock the job out.
I had just gotten most of the blood into one of the buckets and was about to begin scraping the ceiling above me when I heard someone approaching. I looked out the open door to see that manager coming onto the porch. He came in and surveyed the scene. His eyes were softer than when we met the day before, and he said, “We saw you unloading these supplies through our kitchen window, and my wife said, ‘Tom, you can’t let that boy clean up that mess by himself. You need to get out there and help him. She shamed me into this.”
I thanked him, and we divided up the duties (whatever was left of them). By late afternoon, we had done all we could do. I left the windows open and went back to my hotel room. The next day, I made a phone call, left my room, and arrived back there with a U-Haul trailer attached to the rear of my Monte Carlo. A short while later, two friends arrived. Billy and Barry had traveled all the way from Houston to help me load it. As a country western song says, “You find out who your friends are …”
Even over the smell of bleach and Lysol, they gagged when they hit the front door. “Man, I can’t believe you had to do this!” they said, almost in unison. I just shrugged. My conscious mind remained detached. I was still on a shop floor somewhere.
With the U-Haul loaded, Billy and Barry prepared to head back to Houston. I told them I would follow a little later, and as they departed, I took a seat on the edge of the porch deck. The sun was going down and glowing burnt orange through the branches of the live oak trees. Perched on them, the Grackles, accompanied by crickets and cicadas, raised an orchestral cacophony I knew I would capture in a poem someday. “I’ll call it ‘Balcones Serenade,'” I thought.
It was a symphony of nature and confirmation life around me would go on, unchecked by the coming and going of the likes of me, my dad, or any of us. Which got me thinking about the “going” part. Not mine. But his.
It’s difficult for me to say, but you must have determined by now that my dad set me up to find him. He knew I was coming through Austin that Friday afternoon. And he knew—or at least thought—I would be dropping in to check on him. And were it not for my running so late, I would have. He also knew that when he didn’t answer the door, I would try the door and walk in. And there, at my very feet, I would have found him in that pool of red and the remnants of his shredded heart hanging from the ceiling above him. Like a scene from a Shakespearean tragedy, he had set the stage. And all I had to do was open the curtain. I knew him. And I knew exactly how he thought.
His last thought was (and I am certain he grinned as he thought), “This will show Junior. He told me to find a way to do it. ‘This will do the trick.’ I only wish I could see his face when he opens the door.” . . . Bang.
Yeah, I knew my dad. You see, I’m a lot like him. He always had to be right. He never lost an argument, and he always . . . and I mean always . . . had to have the last word.
It happened on the occasion of my grandpa’s funeral at Jackson’s funeral home in Rensselaer, Indiana,in 1984.
Most of my family was in the front row directly in front of the casket. My youngest brother and I were on the end of the second row. We were all waiting for the preacher to take the podium, and the organist was playing.
The preacher was apparently delayed, so the organist played on and on. I don’t know how many of you are old enough to remember the Alan Parsons Project. They were an art rock band known to me for their instrumental song that went on and on. I remembered them mostly for 2 in the morning drives between Indiana and Texas. The ethereal notes of that song seeped into my Volkswagon camper van like the smoky mountain fog and through the speakers of my AM radio. Accompanied by the white lines of I65, their duet would lull me into a hypnotic trance.
Anyway, I leaned into my brother, Mark (who was a huge rock fan), and whispered, “This sounds like the Alan Parsons Project.” Welllll … he burst out laughing and vainly tried to muffle it. With that, I put my hand over my mouth and had the same failed result in stifling my laughter. Our shoulders were shaking and we were half bent over in our chairs, more choking than laughing. My grandmother, in her wheelchair, and my mom, Uncle Frank, sister, and other brother turned around and stared with looks that could kill. I’m surprised my grandpa didn’t look up.
My brother and I instinctively decided it was better to appear to be crying than laughing, so we immediately attempted to disguise our laughter as crying. The more we fought the laughter, the more our bodies convulsed with it. My shoulders continued shaking, and I transformed the laughter into loud sobbing as I covered my eyes with my hands to hide my very real tears. I squeezed my core so tight I thought I got a hernia. Snot was running out my nose.
I thought that preacher would never come on. Even when he did, he was occasionally interrupted by a laugh. Errrrrr … I mean a sob. A heartfelt sob.
(Herein lies another short story. This one is an excerpt from a larger one told through the eyes of my grandson on the occasion of my funeral and the events preceding such.)
Who would have thought we’d be burying that man a week later. All those words … and now … just silence. Life plays along to an unheard rhythm. We always kidded that his death would somehow involve pyrotechnics. We should have known each time the story was told of that time in his thirties when he poured five gallons of gas on a giant brush pile in his yard. His plan was to let it burn down and then roast hot dogs for all the guests at his party. Knocked him over, singed every hair on his head—and from twenty feet away. “Almost burned the house and woods down!” This time it was fatal.
Eleven or twelve years ago, back when his English Setter, King Henry, was a pup, Pops was walking him along the creek that runs through his fifty acres. Some beavers had damned up the creek again, and Pops was, once again, clearing it to let the water pass. On this particular day, the pup stumbled on a big fat beaver they came to refer to as “Snaggletooth.” They called him that because he was missing one of his two cutting teeth, and the remaining one was chipped. That beaver must have had a harem supporting him because it didn’t seem he would be worth a hoot when it came to falling trees. But when King Henry poked his nose right in that beaver’s face, that missing tooth didn’t stop Snaggletooth from ripping a long, jagged gash in his muzzle. Sixteen stitches later, they left the vet’s office, and Pops and King Henry made a pact that, one day, they would get that beaver back for what he did to “Henry”.
Ever since, until last week, they had schemed and plotted, devised and tried but had been unsuccessful in effecting the demise of that wily rodent. Sometimes, I believe it was just being together and the sheer joy of the pursuit, more than the stated objective, that they enjoyed. They tried innumerable traps, lures, and “beaver calling” devices. (For the life of me, I still don’t know what sound a beaver makes. Pops never shared that secret with me. But, whatever it was, Snaggletooth wasn’t falling for it.)
One night, in a moment of liquid campground inspiration and to the total delight of numerous cousins sharing the fire with me, Pops wired a beaver pelt to his old barn cat and rubbed beaver scent all over him. Supposedly, it was the beaver equivalent of Chanel #5—the scent of a beaverette in season. (This was Pop’s description—not mine.) I don’t know what that cat thought of it all, but the sight of Pops carrying a fishing net following him around in the moonlight must have sucked all nine of his lives right out of him. We found him dead behind the barn not long after. Pops said he was the victim of a violent love triangle! (A classic “Pops” story, if ever there was one.)
Pops claimed he wanted to take Snaggletooth alive so he could tell him to his face what a fine hat he was going to make of him. But—to no avail. (I can’t tell you how many young, less cunning beaver Pops set free over the years.) He deemed a sniper shot from a long rifle too easy … and poison—totally unsporting. And so, with the years passing and King Henry getting so old, Pops thought he might never live to see the day they got their nemesis—Pops decided to ratchet the action up a notch.
(Who would have thought that dynamite his brother Mark had brought home from a construction job and given him over twenty years ago would still be good.) I got the message from the Constable. Seems the explosion was so loud they heard it two miles away at Parson’s Feed & Seed and called for someone to investigate … They had a good idea where to look.
I was the first family member on the scene. So glad it was not my mother. From the empty crate resting on the creek’s bank, we determined that Pops and King Henry had planted the entire box of dynamite in the middle of that beaver dam. There was now a pool the size of Lake Maxincuckee where the dam had been, and debris was scattered everywhere. Pops had been blown back and down a ways from the crest of the creek bank. He lay peacefully, almost posed, looking straight up at the blue fall sky. A most unnerving but—when recollected—strangely amusing little smile curled his mouth. A six-inch piece of hickory had pierced his heart.
We loaded him into an ambulance before my mother arrived. As it pulled away, King Henry chased behind it, making a sound that was less a bark than a mournful, moaning howl. I turned my head over my shoulder for one last glimpse of the scene. I swear I saw a lone beaver peering from behind some brush. I’m sure Pops would have saluted him.
We had the funeral at Jackson’s Funeral Home in Rensselaer, his birthplace. It was the place where we had the funerals of his mother and her parents, Grandpa Frank and Grandma Jessie (for whom Pops had named my mother.)
Pops looked comfortable in his Irish tweed jacket. (No matter the latest mortuary techniques, that undertaker—another in a long succession of Mr. Jackson’s—could not erase that wry smile from Pop’s face.)
For those not from the South, we are in the middle of “Love Bug” season here in Texas.
This occurs each fall and spring. During this time, love is in the air. Literally. It occurs when millions (more likely, billions, or more!) Love Bugs copulate in mid-flight. It is the insect world’s version of “The Mile High Club” when every LB becomes a member.
I felt like a pimp the other day by my spa’s swimming pool when I made the mistake of rubbing baby oil all over my sculpted and nearly naked human body. A half million or more Love Bugs ceased pestering all the other sunbathers and swarmed me en mass. (I guess I was just more than they could resist.) I was instantly covered in copulating couples in the throes of passion. In no time, I probably had more Love Bug DNA on me than Johnson’s baby oil. Minus the slightest hyperbole, I can attest they found their thrill on my pecs …. which, to them, was Blue Berry Hill. ♥️
I took and tried to post a pic of this love fest, but Facebook deemed it too erotic and not in keeping with their so-called family values. This begs the question … Do Love Bugs make love for purposes of procreation or … recreation? Or—like us—both?
(It’s the kind of thing that makes you stop and go, “hmmmm … isn’t it?).
What I do know is that even Love Bugs like a little lubrication. (don’t they all 🤔) Perhaps it was the coconut scent of my Johnson … errr, Johnson’s. Imagine what the orgy would have been like had I lit a scented candle and played some Barry White on the Iphone for them. 😮 As it was . . . it made Woodstock seem tame!
“When skullball was the biggest game in Mount Hope Cemetery.”
By Don Kenton Henry
The sky was so blue it could have cracked like a robin’s egg on that hot August afternoon in the summer of ’69. A war raged in Vietnam, and boys barely three years older than us were dying there. We’d heard of this, but, to us, the war was like a movie that hadn’t come to the Roxy yet or another book we’d never get around to reading. Our only ambition in life was living; it was all we had time for … And forever was all the time we had.
Bull, Mule Skinner and I sat on the steps of my front porch eating fudgsicles. We felt the sweat run from our faces down our shirtless bodies to the waistbands of our blue jean cut-offs. Most of our clothes, including our shoes, had been discarded way back in early June when school let out. Now, our bare feet had become tough enough to run down alleys after swiping a tomato or two from someone’s garden or to ride a ten-speed bike oblivious to the bite of its steel-toothed pedals. Our bodies had turned as dark as nuts, and our hair was bleached by the summer sun—mine turning a dark auburn—the shade a buckeye longs to be. The result of having spent countless hours at the reservoir or riding our bikes over seven miles of farm road to get there. You see … we were fifteen, an age when we had to get around. Especially to where the women were. If living was our only ambition in life, women were our reason for being. Women and other trouble. After all, what else was there to do in Finn’s Landing, a town of five thousand tucked into the corn belt as comfortably as a caterpillar in a cocoon. Our entire world was confined to a tiny hole in the middle of a cornfield called “Indiana”.
Once the corn came up in the spring, it seemed like no time before it was so tall that everywhere you looked—in all directions—there was nothing around you—nothing to be seen … but corn. In the fall, it came down. Slain in the fields. And you could finally see what was about. You found yourself wishing the corn had never had to fall. Corn and pigs. That’s about all there was to Finn’s Landing, Indiana. And if you weren’t into them – you were into trouble. The only pig, Bull, Mule, and I knew was Arnold from the T.V. show Green Acres. And the only way we were into corn was teeth first.
Of course, when I say “trouble,” I am not referring to bank robberies or riots. The closest thing Finn’s Landing ever had to a riot was the occasional fight at the Mr. Weenie between a few of our high school students and the farm boys from the country school, Maconaquah. These were almost always over a “stolen” girl or—worse—a lost football game. No, I suppose—in fact—I’m confident any stranger who drove through Finn’s Landing would have left with the impression there was very little going on there—that it was a typical small town in Mid-America. He would have been correct. It was a typical small town in Mid-America. There was also very little going on there. But like all small towns, certain behind-the-scenes action took place there, which that stranger would have been unaware of unless he somehow managed to become a victim of it. I am not referring to anything involving the community as a whole (although most of the town would talk as though they were—and would probably make themselves by the end of the day). I am talking about the action that took place down the shady side streets, behind chain link fences and neatly mowed lawns, past meticulously groomed flower gardens, and in the bedroom, attic, or basement of any home—probably three-bedroom with white aluminum siding—occupied by someone between the age of thirteen and seventeen. A home like the one on whose porch we sat at 333 Sycamore.
Our fudgsicles, which were melting faster than we could consume them, provided our only respite from the heat, and I savored the cool creaminess sliding down my throat while—at the same time—trying to ignore the sticky river of chocolate running down my wrist and arm. A small pond of ice cream accumulated on the step below my feet, and I watched an ant, having discovered it, run off under a shrub. I imagined him telling his friends of the cool brown oasis between the two hairy redwoods, which were my legs.
It had been a good summer: the best of my young life. During the last three months, I experienced all sorts of new things. I had my first beer; drove a car; and kissed my first girl. But now, this glorious run of experience was about to come to an abrupt and unjustifiable end. School would begin in just two weeks. Back in June, it seemed as though they’d given us our freedom forever. Now, they were going to snatch it away from us. Now, all our parents talked about was how glad they were that this would be our last two weeks on “the loose”. I thought of all the laughs we’d had that summer. Like the time we handcuffed Little Schuler’s girlfriend, Mary Ann Atkinson, to the microphone at the B&K root beer stand.
It had been her first night as a car hop, and the other girl hadn’t shown up for work. Little Schuler was a year older than the rest of us and, as such, had his driver’s license. Not only did he have his license, but he had a white ’63 Chrysler, which bore a striking resemblance to Moby Dick, to go with it. On this particular night, Bull, Mule, Little Schuler, and I climbed into “The Dick,” drove to the root beer stand, and waited until it was packed with cars. Most of these were honking their horns because Mary Ann, frantic as could be, was taking too long to fill their orders. With the situation already on the verge of being out of control, we pulled our car under the carport and placed an order for four Black Cows, eight Spanish Dogs, and eight orders of onion rings. Due to the high volume of business the B&K was experiencing, it took forever for our order to come. When Mary Ann finally brought it, Little Schuler told her he had a surprise for her. He asked her to close her eyes and hold out her hand. She did so, beaming proudly from ear to ear and spreading the fingers of her left hand in anticipation of Little Schuler’s class ring, still managing to hold our tray of food in her right. In one swift movement, Little Schuler slipped one side of the “official” case-hardened police handcuffs I had purchased at the army surplus store around Mary Ann’s ivory wrist and the other around the microphone support on the swinging tray next to his window. I pictured her (as I always will) mouth stretched till her chin and nose disappeared behind her “Crest White” teeth; horror-stricken screams emanating from her diaphragm past flagellating tonsils; her eyelids rolled up like window blinds exposing the big blue eyes which had opened expecting to see a beautiful bracelet upon her wrist. Instead, a “Niagara” of tears poured into our Black Cows. Neither will I forget the sight of “Big Dan the Hot Dog Man” (all three hundred pounds of him) in hot pursuit as we “peeled out” of the parking lot in reverse. We left him—baseball bat in hand—enveloped in a cloud of “burnt” rubber. Officer Cary Dawalt’s “official” police handcuff key would not fit our “official” police handcuffs, and Mary Ann was cuffed to the microphone for over an hour before Herb Johnson from Herb’s Ace Welding finally arrived and cut her free. Little Schuler hadn’t seen Mary Ann since then, and it had been just as long since any of us had had a Black Cow.
Sure, we’d broken many hearts and raised a lot of hell that summer, but there were so many things we hadn’t gotten around to. As I looked at what was left of my melting fudgsicle, I couldn’t help but think how our summer, like it, had slid between our fingers just when it had begun to taste so good. I wondered if this was what was on the minds of Bull and Mule during the silence that had occupied the last few minutes. Mule broke it and confirmed my suspicions.
“Darn … two more weeks and we’ll be back in that stupid hole in the wall pushin’ pencils when we could be out at the reservoir floatin’ in our raft with that nymphs, the Tomasheski twins, or canoeing down the Wabash with some of that beer we stole off Mr. Atkins’ back porch … I can just hear Ol’ Dog Ear’s voice comin’ over the P.A. system now:
‘Today is the eighteenth day of August, nineteen-hundred and sixty-nine … the first day of school. We expect this to be the best year yet at Finn’s Landing High … Mr. Fox just returned from a three-week seminar at Indiana University where he studied the significance of the exclamation point in English literature … Mrs. Keith has fully recovered from her hemorrhoid surgery …’ Blah! Blah! Blah! Man—I don’t know if I can take another nine months of that crap!”
“Yeah,” said Bull, “an we won’t have that little fox, Miss Newman, for French anymore, either—not since Henry ran her off! Or was it me—when I pulled her on my lap and gave her that ‘French Kiss’?” Sent that southern bell back to Mississippi after only one semester!
“I think it was the frog that finally did it,” said Mule. Don’t you, Bull? Henry and his ten-inch frog!”
“It had to be! I’ll never forget you, Henry, sittin’ right there in the front row … you threw that giant bullfrog up Miss Newman’s dress while she sat perched atop her desk shootin’ that little beaver, the way she had a habit of doin’ when she reached for her teacher’s edition! Instead of jumpin’ up, she just clamped her legs shut an’ kept a screamin’ an’ a cryin’ while that frog kep’ a croakin and a kickin’ tryin’ to get out from under her mini skirt! We didn’t need no “parlez vous” to know what she was yellin’ at you, Henry! They almost never let you back in school after that one!”
The three of us laughed, talked about other exploits, and laughed some more until the thought of summer being over and the good times with it recaptured our attention and sobered us up. I mentioned to Bull that his discarded fudgsicle stick was sticking to the back of his leg, but he didn’t hear me, so I knew he must have been thinking about something. Bull usually thought about one thing at a time. This habit, coupled with his six-foot-two-inch, two-hundred-twenty-pound frame, gave people the impression that Bull was a little slow. Bull, on the other hand, claimed it was a sign of genius. He explained that his mind was permeated with such profound and noble thoughts “so far above your elementary level of comprehension” that it became necessary to block everything else from his mind. As he said, this allowed him to “do justice to my genius!”
I left Bull alone with his “genius” but reminded Mule I thought it was time we got dressed and headed for baseball practice. Both Bull and Mule played baseball for the Cardinals, a Babe Ruth League summer team. Bull played catcher and Mule was first baseman. At five foot six, one-hundred-four pounds, and sporting size thirteen Converse high-tops (when I bothered to wear shoes), I was too small and clumsy to play on the team. However, not wanting to be left out as the Cardinals fought their way to last place in the league—my status was that of—water boy.
Mule took note of what I said, slowly rose, and kicked Bull in a place where he was reasonably certain Bull’s genius would not be disturbed. When Bull got up, we went inside, changed into our uniforms, and headed for the ballpark.
The August sun was unrelenting, and practice would have been too long if it had been canceled. I spent most of it in the dugout, drinking all the water and watching Bull and Mule sweat like the animals we’d named them after. Bull’s came about as his last name was Bullock, and Mule’s was Skinner. As it took five acres of prime grazing land to feed each of them for a school year, the nicknames fit.
When practice was finally over, they trudged over to the dugout for some water. “You guys need to hustle a little more out there! You’re draggin’ your feet!” I told them, in my most critical tone. They let me know what I could go do with myself.
I took their mitts, and we headed out of the ballpark. No one said a word as we crossed the “Green Bridge” over the Wabash River and headed for my house. We stopped just long enough to pick up three fudgsicles and started for Bull’s, where his mom would have dinner waiting for the three of us.
The worst of the day’s heat was gone, and as the sun lowered itself in the sky, our strength returned, and our conversation with it. Walking up “Hospital Hill” into the north part of town, we talked about what we always talked about—fast cars and faster girls—both of which we’d get once we got our driver’s license.
We reached the top of the hill and took the usual shortcut through Mount Hope Cemetery. As we passed the headstones, most of whose names we had long since memorized, we called out to them, “Hello, Mrs. Musall! It’s hot as hell today—and you know how hot that is!” I said.
Good day to you, Mrs. Murphy!” said Mule, tipping his baseball cap to her stone. “Your granddaughter is looking mighty fine these days!”
Mule and I laughed at what we thought were very clever remarks until we noticed Bull was no longer with us. We looked about and saw him standing in front of the Farrar family mausoleum. He stood with his hands wrapped around the bars of its iron gate peering through them into the entrance of the lichen-covered limestone tomb. Mule and I stood still, watching, until he called out to us, “Hey, you guys! Come over here an’ check this out!” Puzzled, we walked up behind him.
Through the bars of the iron gate, we could see two huge metal doors slightly ajar. Mule peered over Bull’s shoulder, and I got down on my hands and knees and looked ahead from between his legs. Through the gap in the doors, we could see an eerie red glow caused by the setting sun filtering through the stained glass window on the west side of the tomb.
“What do you think’s in there?” asked Bull.
“Dead people, genius!” answered Mule.
“I know that, but I wonder what it’s like in there.”
“Well, you just keep on wondering, said Mule, “after we handcuffed Mary Ann at the B&K, we promised our parents we wouldn’t get in any more trouble until next summer.
“I don’t see what trouble would come out of just goin’ in there an’ havin’ a look. Especially since the only thing holding that gate shut is a little piece of coat hanger,” said Bull, already starting to unwind it.
“I don’t think we ought to go in there, Bull. It’s not right to disturb the dead,” said Mule, backing up and tripping over me in the process, sending himself sprawling on the ground. Lying on his back, he asked, “What do you think, Henry?”
“I don’t know what harm could come from lookin’ around,” I answered.
“That’s right – we’ll just look around,” said Bull, as he pulled the unraveled wire from around the bars of the gate and tossed it aside.
No one said a word as Bull slowly opened the iron gates. I looked over my shoulder and about to see if anyone observed us as we prepared to enter what, to me, might as well have been The Twilight Zone. Expecting to see Rod Serling standing in quiet composure off to the side somewhere, all I saw was a blue jay, his head cocked, watching us from a nearby willow tree.
When the opening was just wide enough for Bull to slide between them, he slipped in and peered through the gap in the metal doors.
“What do you see in there, Bull?” I asked.
“Walls. Just walls with dusty windows in them and plaques with writing on them.”
“There’s dead people behind them windows and I don’t think we need to see anything more. Let’s get out of here,” said Mule as he turned to leave.
At the same time, Bull pulled the doors open the width of his broad shoulders. I saw the red light emanating from within wrap itself softly around his face, turning it a shade of red slightly lighter than that of his Cardinal baseball cap. His eyes were wide, his mouth agape, as he leaned forward, peering in. Again, I got down on my hands and knees and looked from between Bull’s legs at the interior of the mausoleum. I felt the cool, musty air inside brush my face as it rushed to meet the summer day behind us. Mule must have felt it also, for something stopped him as he took a step to leave. Again, he turned, this time to the tomb. The blue jay screeched and flew into the red sun.
I crawled slowly between Bull’s legs, a few feet inside. The stone floor was cold and moist beneath my hands. Bull and Mule followed slowly behind. We looked about, squinting, waiting for our eyes to adjust. I rose, first to my knees and then to my feet, all the time crouched over as though to dash for the door if my feet chose to flee. I remained in this position – silent, motionless, afraid to turn my head for fear of the noise it might make.
Bull and Mule huddled close behind me. Not a sound was made, except for that of their breath, which fell lightly on my shoulders. Finally, I began to look around, my eyes still focusing through the sun’s glow, turned even redder by the scarlet window it was going down behind.
In silent agreement, we moved as one (like Siamese triplets), my brother’s hands welded to my back as we tip-toed lightly. I moved to the right, toward the east, and felt their fingers slide from my shoulders. I stopped a few feet from the east wall. In the middle of it stood my shadow, hands on knees, baseball cap cocked to one side. On either side of it were glass panels. Five of these were framed in darkness. But on the sixth, the one directly in front of me shone the red rays of the sun, illuminating the dust-covered glass. Above the pane, chiseled in stone, were the words:
Dr. Josiah L. Farrar
Born April 13th 1830 Died September 11th,1898
Rest in peace, dear father
From the inscription, my eyes moved left. My feet followed. Next to Josiah was Lloyd, on to John, and next to John, was Charles. Their dates of arrival and departure were all that headlined their remains. Back to the right, I moved past Charles, past John, to Lloyd. And then … back to Josiah, drawn like the sun.
I stepped up to the glass and knelt on my knees before it. With the sleeve of my baseball jersey, I rubbed away the dust, creating a window within a window. Through this, I peered, leaning closer until my hands pressed against it. That is when I noticed the crack. Just for a second, I felt it against my nose. Then my attention jumped beyond, beyond my nose— beyond the crack—onto the long auburn casket that stretched before me like a fallen tree. Down its lacquered finish, past its brass handles, my eyes traveled its seven feet or so. Halfway back, they came … stopped … and stared. Stared as though I had x-ray vision. Stared and tried to picture Dr. Josiah Farrar. What was he wearing, I wondered. Did he look like he could have once been alive. Did he look content. Did he look like I might look some day. Surely not. Surely, some great scientist would find a cure for old age and death before they took me. “I’ve never seen a dead person,” I whispered. I missed my great-grandmother’s funeral when I was nine because I had the stomach flu. Have you guys ever seen a dead person?”
“No,” said Bull, “but I saw my great-uncle Waldo once when we thought he was dead. Turned out he’d just fallen asleep at the supper table.”
“I’ve never even seen anybody I thought was dead,” said Mule. “I never really wanted to.”
“What do you think they look like?” I asked.
“Dead. Just shriveled up and dead,” explained Bull.
“Ol’ Doc here’s been dead for seventy-one years, so he’s probably nothin’ but an old skeleton,” Mule said, as though trying to disappoint us.
“There’s only one way to find out,” I said, as I pulled my face away from the glass and began to run my fingernail down its crack.
“You’ve got to be crazy, Henry!” shouted Mule, taking a step backward.
“You’ve known that about Henry for a long time!” laughed Bull, as he stepped forward and knelt beside me.
“We can’t disturb the dead!” pleaded Mule, “come on, let’s get out of here before someone catches us!”
“None of us have ever seen a dead person before,” I explained to Mule. This guy’s been dead almost forever. Consider it for the sake of science. Surely a doctor would be the first to understand!”
“Yeah – I’m sure he’d understand,” said Bull, as he rose to his feet and backed up.
“No! – You’re nuts!” shouted Mule, as Bull wound up and let fly a knuckleball that whizzed like a hornet, past my ear. I fell backward, turning my head to avoid the glass, exploding in a shower. Covered in it, I lay motionless.
Mule ran first to the windows, then to the doors, looking to see if anyone had heard. “Oh god, if we get caught for this one, they might as well slide us into that wall right next to him!” he cried. As I slowly sat up, glass fell off me like melting snow off an evergreen. Bull was already on his knees in front of the vault.
“At least you could have warned me you were going to throw the ball,” I muttered. He didn’t hear me. He just said, “Will you look at this!” as he reached to touch the coffin. His eyes were as anxious as a child’s seeing a warm cookie, his hand hesitant, as though it still might be too hot to touch. And then, his fingers did touch. He ran them over the wood, feeling its smoothness and savoring its craftsmanship. “This is very good wood. . . Mahogany, I think.”
Bull and his father worked a lot with wood in the workshop they had set up in the basement of their home. Good craftsmanship was something Bull never overlooked, whether it be in a gun, a lawn mower engine, or a coffin.
“Do you really want to see what this guy looks like, Bull?” I asked, looking right into his eyes. I watched a twinkle come into the root beer brown as they begged—”Don’t you, Henry!”
I felt a smile spread across my face as, simultaneously, Bull and I slid our arms down our respective sides of the coffin, reaching for the brass handles.
“You guys are nuts! You are sick! You’re going to get us sent up the river!” yelled Mule, jumping up and down in the air and running in circles behind us.
At first, he wouldn’t budge. The doctor held fast. We kept trying. We grunted and groaned and groaned some more until . . . finally . . . the doctor budged. Once he budged—he slid. And—as he did, we held our breath. Mule ran around like “Chicken Little”, when she thought the sky was falling. Let’s get out of here!” he screamed. “You guys’ll be haunted the rest of your lives if you open that thing!” He continued ranting as the back end of the coffin came sliding out of the wall. We paused and Bull and I stood motionless for a moment, staring each other in the eyes, holding the coffin between us. We knew there was no turning back now.
We gently lowered the coffin to the floor. To us, it might as well have been “The Treasure of King Tut.” Our young hearts raced, and blood pounded in our ears. And then, although we were not ready for it, there it was—the skull. We saw it together, and together, we caught our breath. For a purpose unknown to us, it was there—a small, beveled glass pane over the doctor’s skull.
“They put a window in there for him to see out!” exclaimed Bull.
“No, you dummy, that was for other people to see in!” I said.
“You mean like us?” asked Bull.
No! People at his funeral! His family!” I answered.
Mule stopped his frantic dancing and, reluctantly, came up behind Bull to have a look. Sure enough, he was in there. He hadn’t gone anywhere in the last seventy-one years. The doctor lay there. His face was gone; no more eyes; no nose; no lips; no ears. But he still had one thing that even my Uncle Tarney, who was still alive and walking the streets of Rensselaer, Indiana, didn’t have. Hair. Long red hair. From the sides of his head, just above where his ears used
to be, stubbornly clung some long red hair. Six or seven inches of it lay strewn across the crusted remains of a satin pillow, probably once white but now turned gray by time.
My Cardinal baseball cap fell from my head and covered the window over which I had moved to get a closer look. There it sat: our State bird perched on a branch, on a patch, on a cap, on top of a coffin. I perched him back on my head where he belonged.
“He looks like Bozo the Clown seventy years after death,” said Mule.
Bull put his face up against the glass, was silent for a moment, then proclaimed, “We need a closer look.”
Mule’s face appeared to be suffering from a motor disorder. “You’re out of your mind! We’ve seen enough! Leave that creepy thing alone!”
I put my hand on Mule’s shoulder and tried to calm him. “Bull’s right. What will it hurt to examine him a little closer?” (I wanted to sound as scientific as possible.)
“Examine him yourself! I’m getting outta here!” he screamed, as he turned on his heels for the door. Then there was the snap of the coffin’s latches, as Bull flipped them up . . . and Mule stopped once more. On the tips of his shoes and halfway to the door. He stopped. As Bull slowly raised the lid on the coffin, Mule’s head turned over his shoulder. The hinges cried from seven decades of stillness. I stepped back to let the lid come to rest in its open position. There he lay before us, in all his splendor—a boyhood treasure—Ol’ Doc Farrar. Three mouths agape, we stood above him, fixated. The setting sun, through stained glass, turned us, the east wall, and the good doctor scarlet—an eerie stage light on an encore performance.
Could all those bones have ever been a person, I thought, as I stared at the six-foot-plus frame. Was it possible that they had walked and talked; laughed and loved? Not a word was spoken as I pondered these things. Nor was it a word which finally broke the silence. It was a gasp! We gasped as one, Mule and I, as Bull’s catcher’s mitt shot toward the doctor’s skull, as if of its own volition.
“Oh god!” was all Mule muttered, his eyes so wide, they almost ripped at their seams. If I had looked in Bull’s eyes, I would have seen a look that had not been there since we put the frozen cat with the burglar alarm in it on Councilman Frushour’s porch. It could have been a reflection of the look in my own eyes. But it wasn’t.
Over the doctor’s face (or where it used to be) went Bull’s mitt. He gripped the skull and gently pulled back on it in an effort to sit the good doctor up. And he did. For a second that is! The doctor’s skeleton collapsed with a clash. Except for the skull. It was caught in Bull’s catcher’s mitt. Bull rotated it so that we could look into Doc’s face. Mule ran to the window to see if the cops had us surrounded yet.
Grasping the doctor’s lower jaw, Bull began to move it. By speaking at the same time, he brought the doctor to life like a ventriloquist would do a dummy. “Good day to you, Bull. You be looking a little peeked, are you not? Stick out your tongue and say, ‘ah’.”
“Look at yourself, Doc – if ya think I look bad!” Bull answered.
With this, I laughed, catching the breath I had been holding for so long. Even Mule had to laugh.
I don’t know if Bull handed it to me or if I took it from him, but the next thing I knew, Doc’s skull was in my hands. I took my baseball cap off and placed it on the doctor. I opened his mouth and peered inside. All his teeth were intact. I looked up his nose and poked my fingers through his eye sockets. I pulled his hair back and checked his ears to see if they were clean. To my surprise, Mule took the Doc from me and did the same. Overcome with youthful curiosity, we said nothing. Then came Bull’s shout from the corner of the mausoleum, “Put’ er in here, Mule!”
Mule and I turned, stupefied at the sight of Bull poised as we so often saw him in his catcher’s position: mitt slightly extended in his left hand, signaling for a fastball with the fingers of his right. Mule was in shock. He’d gone completely catatonic, so I took the skull.
“Burn ‘er in here, Henry!” commanded Bull.
I’ll never, no matter how old or senile I get, forget that pitch or the sight of the doctor’s skull flying toward Bull behind home plate. The pitch was perfect, the flight of the skull as though in slow motion. His long red hair streaming in the breeze, his jaws flapping open and shut.
“Stiiiirike!” shouted Bull, as he caught it and returned it to me. We tossed it back and forth several times laughing like the school kids we were. Even as we tossed it; even as we laughed; I knew it wasn’t right. I guess that’s partly why we laughed. I tried to convince myself the Doc appreciated a chance to join our game and be a boy again after so many years of doing nothing.
Finally, much to the dismay of Bull and I, Mule got into the act. Moving into the corner diagonal to Bull’s, he yelled, “Hey, batta, batta!” and extended his glove. I moved to another corner of the mausoleum, and what ensued was a game of three-way-pitch unprecedented in the annals of baseball history: Strikes, double-plays, skull balls, and even a home run or two.
The Doc served as game ball and umpire until the game was called for darkness with the Cubs leading the Reds five to four in the bottom of the ninth. As the sun outside kissed the earth and slid below the horizon, we returned Doc Farrar’s skull to its coffin and slipped it back in place. We shut the lid and started to slide the coffin back into the vault when— suddenly—Bull stopped us. “Wait! No one is ever going to believe us! Pull him back out!”
“Oh no, now what! Mule asked, sounding as though he were about to cry. Bull didn’t bother to explain, but we pulled the coffin back out and set it on the floor. Without a moment’s hesitation, he flipped the coffin lid open once more and reached for the doctor’s skull. By now, it was so dark Mule and I couldn’t see what Bull was doing. We only heard the clacking of bones. We asked no more questions as Bull shut the lid and returned the coffin to the vault. We felt our way along a wall of the mausoleum, to the doors; slid free into the warm night air, and ran away under the moonlight. We didn’t stop until we got under a streetlamp on the corner nearest Bull’s house.
Before I could catch my breath, I demanded of Bull, “What did you do to the ol’ doc just before we left?”
Bull just beamed and, not saying a word, reached into the pocket of his baseball pants and pulled out his closed fist. He held it in front of us.
“What’s in there Bull?” I begged. Mule just stood there, staring at Bull’s fist, his mouth open. Neither of us took our eyes off it as Bull’s fingers slowly opened like the curtains on a Broadway play. And there . . . with a cardiac crescendo on center stage . . . lay the star of the show – resplendent in all its yellowness: “The Tooth”. Doc Farrar’s molar. Bull just smiled like a proud father. His face was radiant under the soft light of the streetlamp. He fingered its craftsmanship as though it were the Hope Diamond.
Word gets around in a small town, and over the course of the next few days, the line of teenage boys—always followed another day or two later by their younger brothers—and then their cousin visiting from Ohio for the summer—grew longer outside the Bullock home. They all waited for the chance to enter the museum (which is what Bull’s bedroom came to be) to gaze in awe at “The Tooth.”
With no small amount of fanfare, Bull would delicately take down the seemingly empty bottle of Old Crow whiskey lined up next to his baseball trophies on a shelf above his bed. The ritual was always the same, “Hold out your hands, cup your palms together, and be careful not to drop it. “It’s history, you know”, he would say as he turned the bottle over and shook the tooth free from its shrine. The rock-hard and yellow artifact would clang against the sides of the bottle before rolling into the palms of another pubescent, wide-eyed self-perceived “Indiana Jones”.
“Yeah, it’s really from a dead guy,” Bull would tell everyone in his repeated “statement of authenticity”. “No, I don’t think he misses it, smart-ass.” If Bull had charged a quarter a kid he would have been rich.
Who knows where most rats go in the light of day but some local “greasers” or “hoods” (as we called them) by the names of Dave Barrish, John Grundy, and Mike Clark found themselves in the local jail courtesy of the intrepid Finn’s Landing Police force. It seems they had gotten apprehended for knocking over tombstones and otherwise doing “uncreative vandalism” in Mount Hope Cemetery. Given their already extensive rap sheets, these refugees from “juvy” hall decided it would be best to turn informants for the state.
“No. We don’t know of anyone selling mari-ji-juana but – “Boy – do we have a story for you!!!”
It was with great relish that Officer Wheeler fished Doc’s molar from the empty bottle of Old Crow. From there, the squad car made its way to Mule’s house and, lastly, to mine.
A look of pale horror came over my mother’s face as she visited the Finn’s Landing Police Station and heard the charges against us: Criminal Trespass and Grave Robbing. The latter a felony violation of Indiana Statute 2286 punishable by one but not to exceed ten years in prison and a fine of $5,000.
When the headline: FARRAR FAMILY MAUSOLEUM DESECREATED BY TOMB RAIDERS hit the front page of the Finn’s Landing Tribune, it was the biggest news to hit the town since John Dillinger robbed the police station of all their guns and locked all the cops in their own cells.
By the time it came to trial, the accounts of our escapade had been documented through countless interviews with secret unnamed sources. There was no end to the solicited and unsolicited opinions of sundry citizens and politicians of Finn’s Landing or to the almost daily editorials courtesy of, and highly publicized by the Tribune.
Our crime came to make Dillinger’s sound like a diaper-soiling offense on an episode of “Romper Room” (a fifties and sixties children’s television show and predecessor to Sesame Street). To my mother’s horror, she opened the paper one morning to see that some aspiring artist at the Tribune had submitted the first known editorial cartoon by one of its own staff. The sketch portrayed three youths in baseball uniforms, in the crypt, gloves in hand at the end of outstretched arms and a skull flying through the air, red hair streaming behind it.
The caption read:
Vandals 3 – Decency 0.
Three kids and a long-dead doctor immortalized. My mother mortified.
The trial came in September, almost two weeks into our sophomore year at Finn’s Landing High. It drew an almost bigger crowd than our annual Circus City Festival and made the “Scopes Monkey Trial” look like an average day in traffic court. The entire student body of the high school skipped out to attend. All the shopkeepers on the Courthouse Square closed up shop, and the county offices did the same. (To “hear, tell” the local cows quit giving milk awaiting the outcome.)
The whole town dropped what they were doing and made their way to the trial.
Reporters with cameras came from the towns throughout our own and the neighboring counties. Even a television crew from Channel 13 WTHR made the seventy-mile trip from Indianapolis in their camera van to broadcast from in front of the courthouse when the verdict came down.
The three of us felt the heat of their cameras flashing as they moved in for a close-up of the three hometown fiends responsible for raiding the tomb of one of the town’s finest families as we made the long “perp walk” from our attorney’s office to the courthouse.
The big courtroom on the top floor of the Sheridan County Courthouse, on the square in downtown Finn’s Landing, was packed to standing-room-only capacity despite the sweltering ninety-degree heat outside and the lack of air conditioning inside. Many of the old biddies in the audience cooled
themselves with hand fans they had stolen from the Presbyterian Church last Sunday, especially for this most auspicious of occasions.
Doctor Farrar had been succeeded by four generations of beloved practitioners in his family practice and one (or another) of them had brought nearly half the town into this world. The youngest of the living, Doctor Farrars, would come to see half of us out. The family was as adored and venerated as a family in a tight-knit community can be. For the general population of patients and friends, it was as though one of their own family’s graves had been desecrated. They were beyond the point of rightful indignation and bordering on riot.
As Bull, Mule, and I sat huddled together, heads lowered, more than once came the cry of “String ’em up!” from the crowd behind us.
“Old Maid Milton” (who had a brief but unsuccessful courtship with Doc Farrar’s grandson multiple decades ago) even brought the rope with which to do it. She had to be forcibly removed from the courtroom when she snuck up behind Mule and attempted to put a noose around his neck. The sight of her orthopedic stockings frantically flaying the air as her pointy black shoes put knots up and down the bailiff’s shins almost inspired the geriatric segment of the gallery to riot. The sight of fifty canes and walkers raised in anger brought the threat to “clear the courtroom” and a semi-circle of sheriff’s deputies had to be placed around us for our protection.
The equivalent of the Frankenstein Monster with the crowd in general, we had acquired something of a cult status with the school-age attendees. They had forsaken sitting on the benches of the courtroom in deference to their elders and instead stood lined up against the plaster walls or sat on the sills of windows. Windows had been left open to allow some semblance of ventilation in an unsuccessful attempt to counter the courtroom’s stifling atmosphere.
To us, the younger generation could relate. We were their friends. We were youthful rebels in search of our identity in the sixties world of the “establishment”. Only fifteen years of age, we didn’t quite know what this “establishment” represented, but we knew our parents were not Ozzie and Harriet or Ward and June Cleaver. As for ourselves, we were no Wally or “The Beaver” either. In reality, we were somewhere between those two and the 50’s iconic rebel actor, James Dean, who had grown up just 30 miles from us in Fairmont, Indiana. Stuck somewhere between childhood and inevitable acquiescence to responsibility, we were in search of direction. The court was here to provide us with that. We were as the youth in attendance and, as such, they were on trial also. To them,’ Ol Doc Farrar was of the past . . . gone. Bull, Mule, and I were of the present. Rightfully or not, in their eyes, we took precedence. We should be forgiven.
Just before the proceedings got underway, I summoned the nerve to slowly raise my head and look about. The first person I laid eyes on was the minister of my church. He was leaning on a radiator at the back of the courtroom. Solemn-faced, arms crossed in front of him, he was staring straight at me. I knew he thought he’d seen all of this coming since I hadn’t been to church in over a month. I knew this because that is what he had told my grandmother. I quickly turned my eyes away from him. The next person they landed on was my silver-haired English teacher, Mrs. Keith. I had always believed I was the favorite of her students. She looked away from me before I had a chance to do the same to her. As my eyes continued to scan the courtroom, they passed many friends, “Reidy Bones”, “Coxy”, “Little Schuler”, the “Madprick” brothers, and M. “Comehead”. All were the best of our buddies and lucky not to have been involved with us on this caper . . . for once.
Becky Frushour, whom I’d had a crush on since the fifth grade, was there too. Right in the third row. At first, my fondness had been reciprocated but that ended abruptly when she saw me eat that night-crawler on the playground in the sixth grade. Our baseball coach, “Bilbo” Beidenbender, was in attendance and so was the principal of our high school,’ Ol’ “Dog Ears” himself. He wore that same smirk of satisfaction he had on his face the day he suspended me for substituting that stag film for one on “Dating Etiquette in High School” in our freshman health and hygiene class during the brief period I was manager of the audio-visual department.
But there, in the front row (the only people whose heads were perhaps lower than our own), sat our parents. They might as well have been dressed in black for, to them, the thought of us possibly going to the Indiana State Boy’s Reformatory was almost harder to bear than if we had died.
The buzzing conversation of the crowd ceased and only the steady whish of the ubiquitous hand-fans could be heard as the venerable, “Honorable, Judge Dice” entered the courtroom and the bailiff asked all to rise. As this was the “crime of the century” in Finn’s Landing, it was the biggest day in the Judge’s career. A career which began so long ago it seemed’ Ol Doc Farrar and he must have attended Rotary together. Much to the disappointment of the local news media, which had wished for a protracted jury trial, replete with what they anticipated would be colorful testimony, all three of us—Bull, Mule, and I—had entered “guilty” pleas. By doing so, we had effectively decided to “roll the Dice” (as defendants in Judge Dice’s courtroom were known to say) and would let him decide our fate. As such, he had free rein to say what he wanted. Since this was an election year, he had every intention of making the most of it. Having anticipated this, the press waited eagerly, pencils poised, to take down his every word. The Judge requested we be seated yet remained standing behind his bench. He leaned forward, resting on clenched fists. His steel-blue eyes were as clear as mile-high mountain lakes against his wizened face. They focused on us and began to boil like the sulfur springs of French Lick in southern Indiana. Like lasers, their look pierced our souls. When he began to speak, I was engulfed in the resonance of his voice, his words a baptism in napalm. Bull and Mule must have felt bathed in the words as well for I felt them jerk on either side of me.
“Never before . . . in my forty years behind this bench . . . have I been forced to preside over a case . . . so heinous . . . so bizarre . . . so outrageously reprehensible as the one before me now.” As he spoke, the words (like red-hot coals) lingered on the end of his tongue until you could almost see the steam rise off it and hear the flesh sizzle. I thought the end of it would catch fire. Then—when he felt certain his words had achieved exactly the desired effect—with a flick of that red-hot poker— he would send them—like sparks—flying into the audience.
“Never before,” he continued, “have the citizens of our fair city been subjected to such an abomination as the macabre exploits of these three young hellions.” He punctuated this by letting his eyes come to rest on the living members of the Farrar family who occupied almost the entire second row of the courtroom. The Judge’s eyes lingered, then returned to us as he resumed his ranting tirade.
He expounded on “the decadence of today’s youth”. This included our lack of reverence for religion, our elders, and . . . our “flag”. He went on and on about “The Generation Gap” and widened it with every word he spoke. He paused intermittently. (This was a cue for the old biddies in the audience to applaud and pound their canes on the floor.) “Old Maid Milton”, who had somehow managed to make her way back into the peanut gallery, got so worked up that she stood—and with one mighty swath of her own cane—almost wiped out half a row of senior citizens seated in front of her! With lightning reflexes, rookie cop, Rollie Thompson, sprang into action and attempted to subdue her with a half-nelson. Officer Cary Dawalt was about to slap his “official” police handcuffs on her when he noticed the newspaper photographers focusing their Pentax’s on the pandemonium. Rather red-faced, he put his cuffs back on his belt, and he and Thompson each took her by an arm and led her from the courtroom once again.
“The Judge” never skipped a beat. He was oblivious to all around him – except the applause. And the greater it was, the more the reporter’s flashes flashed, their pencils raced, and the more dramatic “The Judge” became. As his sententious oration reached a climax, from his foam-flecked lips came caveats of riots in the streets and equal horrors—”right here in River City”! At this point, I saw Deputy Nichols clutch the pearl grips of his nickel-plated .357 magnum. I didn’t understand half The Judge’s words. Words such as “abominable miscreants” or “perverted purveyors of iniquity from the dark side of purgatory,” I just knew we were “fucked”.
I had to roll my down-turned eyes, knowing the greatest threat the streets of the town would ever face would be the occasional elephant pie that landed on it during the Circus City Parade. I thought how lucky Dillinger had been to have been shot and killed by that “G Man” outside a Chicago theater instead of being captured in Finn’s Landing and tried before Judge Dice.
All flushed and frothed in sweat, Judge Dice finally ran out of breath and half sat, half collapsed in his seat. With that, our counsel, Richard “Tricky Dicky” Rhodes, at last had his chance to speak.
Rhodes was a small-town but flamboyant lawyer, the type that would take cases no one else would touch. That left him often traveling to the big cities of Fort Wayne, Kokomo, and Indianapolis because cases like that didn’t come around very often in Finn’s Landing. Cases of murder and incest. Cases like this one. In his black J.C. Penney suit and fake alligator shoes, he paced back and forth in front of the bench, stroking his toupee in place. He very slowly and deliberately removed his suit jacket, laid it across the bar, loosened his tie and the collar of his shirt, and rolled its sleeves up. As perspiration had already soaked it, this seemed a very reasonable thing to do, and the audience patiently observed and waited for what he had to say. I, on the other hand, saw his gestures as a purposeful ploy to conjure subliminal parallels between himself and actor Spencer Tracy, portraying lawyer Clarence Darrow defending Professor John Scopes in the previously cited, infamous “Monkey Trial”. Scopes was tried for attempting to teach evolution in a Tennessee public high school in spite of a state law prohibiting such. This academy award nominated performance was brought to the screen in the 1960 movie, “Inherit the Wind”. While I believe Rhodes identified with Darrow, I could be wrong. Perhaps he was attempting to channel Atticus Finch in “To Kill A Mockingbird”, though he was certainly no Gregory Peck. What I am certain of is … I fantasized we (the defendants) were like Scopes—the unappreciated seekers of “truth through science”—on trial in a fundamentalist town unsympathetic to our laboratory or our method. In my mind, the veracity of modern science was on trial. The town, on the other hand, saw us as the monkeys. Rhodes spoke of the curiosity of youth, our basic goodness, of our . . . repentance. This brought muffled cheers from our classmate friends. However, the general audience saw us as “Boy Scouts gone bad” and “The Judge” did not appear impressed.
To say the least, things did not look good for us when Rhodes finally concluded, “Your honor, one of my clients has asked for an opportunity to address the Farrar family. I feel his message is worthy, and I request your permission to allow him to say a few words.
Judge Dice stroked his chin with his hand, then slowly moved it to his ear and gave it a pull. After carefully weighing the request, he said, “Permission granted, Mr. Rhodes.”
“Tricky Dick,” said, “I call Mr. Henry before the bench.” I rose, walked around the bar to stand briefly beside him before he took a seat, and turned to face the crowd. My experience on the freshman speech team had not prepared me for this and I wrung my hands before hooking my thumbs in the front pockets of my trousers. I raised my head and did my best to focus my eyes on the faces of the Farrar family. My voice quivered as I began.
“Doctor and Mrs. Farrar . . . and to all the members of your family. I know it is a lot to ask. To ask . . . ask for understanding and even more . . . to ask for forgiveness. We didn’t mean harm. I guess we got caught up in the moment, and one thing led to another. I guess we thought maybe your great-grand-dad, your great-great, errr . . . your great-great-great-grand-dad (I was making eye contact with each successive generation of Farrar’s as I continued) would kind of enjoy the attention after all those years alone. I guess we kinda’ imagined he would like joining in our game . . . like maybe he was a boy again too. I guess that was pretty stupid. I can see now we weren’t thinking at all. I can see we were only thinking of ourselves. We didn’t think how you, his family, would feel. I am sorry we played baseball with your grandad’s head.”
I nodded as if to say, “That’s all I have to say,” and made my way back around the bar to take my seat between Bull and Mule as my mother dabbed her eyes with a kerchief.
In silent agreement, Bull and Mule rose, turned to face the Farrar family, and said, in unison, ” We’re sorry, too.”
My sophomore year passed all too quickly. When school let out in the spring, my friends did as I had always done. They tossed aside their shoes and other shackles and headed for a summer at the Mississinewa reservoir beach. With the exception of Bull and Mule. For them and myself, there would be no summer at the beach. There would be no drifting in the raft with temptresses like the Tomasheskis or cruising around in some ’57 Chevy that some friend of ours was finally old enough to drive and rich enough to buy. For us, there would be no summer of 1970. Ours was spent in Mount Hope Cemetery. That was our sentence. We had to work a minimum of eight hours a day, six days a week, Monday through Saturday. We mowed the grounds, tended the shrubs and flowers, clipped around the tombstones, dug the graves, and buried the customers. No pay. More clients were buried on Saturday than any other day, and we would stand off in the distance somewhere, shovels in hand, waiting to go to work. On at least one occasion, the solemnity of the graveside was broken by a carload of teenagers driving past, honking their horns, waving beach towels, and taunting us with instructions of, “Let’s go for a swim”.
It was a cruel and unusual punishment.
Our internship was supposed to make us appreciate the dead. By the end of the summer, I had come to appreciate the dead!—if only for the sake of the living! And I made an unusual decision for a kid who just turned sixteen. I made up my mind to be cremated should I be wrong and death catch me before a cure for such could be found.
Our first job at the cemetery, the one which had been saved for us, was to repair the Farrar family mausoleum. The delicate task of replacing the beveled glass in the lid of the casket over the Doc’s skull had fallen to Bull because of his handiness with wood and other delicate materials.
“The Tooth” had long since been restored to its original location by the Sheridan County medical examiner. But just before closing the lid, Bull carefully slid something in next to the Doc. The cemetery superintendent overseeing our project turned a blind eye as he turned and put a chaw of Red Man tobacco in his mouth. Together, Bull, Mule, and I replaced the glass at the front of the Doc’s vault, repaired the front doors and gate, and closed them, never to open them again.
Bull did not play baseball that summer, or any time after for that matter, having decided to concentrate on football, which more appropriately suited his massive frame. So, no one ever noticed his catcher’s mitt was missing.
I turned around, and fifty-five years have passed since we met Ol’ Doc, and “skullball” was Mount Hope’s favorite pastime, each one passing quicker than the last, quicker than our glorious summer of ’69. During this time, we grew up or tried to, and the town eventually forgave us for the atrocity committed upon it. So much so that Bull and Mule capitalized on their established rapport with the dead and opened their own mortuary there. Their reputation for the “personal touch” with their clients is purported to have greatly contributed to their success.
Fifty-five years ago, all we worried about was how quickly our summer was slipping away. Years that slipped through our fingers like the melting fudgsicles of that summer so long ago. Oh, that I could have them back. I look in the mirror these days and feel what I see has more in common with the Ol’ Doc than that boy tanned dark as a nut with so much shiny auburn hair—the shade a buckeye longs to be.
Through the years, I have buried a few good dogs, too many friends, family members of my own, and more than one boyhood dream. A couple of times along the way, I almost bought “the big ticket” myself. In a sense, I did, for whatever was left of my innocence from the summer of ’69 has since flown into the red sun with the blue jay. The death I thought would be eradicated in
my lifetime, at 50-something, shows no signs of granting a reprieve. And should it? For if not a privilege, at least life is an opportunity. And isn’t it the things we take for granted that we appreciate the least? I appreciate life more these days.
I recently returned to my home state of Indiana in an attempt to get closer to what I have left of family and friends. I don’t live in Finn’s Landing but have settled in Indianapolis, where, like me, so many of them have gone to earn a living. Most of the factories and the railroads that once employed our grandparents and parents have gone the way of the cotton gin and MS-DOS. But late one recent afternoon, when the sun shone like a yellow yolk in another robin’s egg blue sky, I got in my car and made the hour-and-a-half drive to my boyhood hometown.
The B&K Root Beer stand still does business at the west end of town, and I stopped there, parked under the carport, and ordered a Black Cow. I tipped the waitress when she brought it and decided not to handcuff her to the microphone post on the tray. I looked around and saw no sign of “Big Dan the Hot Dog Man” but as I took the first taste of that oh, so cool, creamy respite from the summer heat, the memories of my youth came rushing back. I watched a couple of boys in Babe Ruth baseball uniforms take their root beers and trudge off in the direction of “Hospital Hill” and the cemetery. I recommitted to getting my living will updated to reflect my last wishes, took what was left of my drink and drove off in the direction of Mount Hope.
I parked my car, carried my large B&K Dixie Cup with me, and made my way past the willow to the Farrah family mausoleum. I peered between the bars of the front gate, and this time, the gate appeared secure. No wire coat hanger held it shut, and the metal doors behind emitted no sign of light from within. The limestone walls of the crypt did not appear to have aged one bit. A little more of the pale green lichen cover perhaps. I moved to the stained-glass window on the west side of the tomb and peered through it at the far inside wall of the crypt again turned red by the slowly sinking sun behind me. The wall which contained the doctor. I would like to say the blue jay screeched and flew into the sun but there was no sign of him. I pressed my nose against the
glass and whispered loudly, “Hey, Doc! You in there? It’s me, Henry!” Alas . . . no answer.
Life is for the living. As I lingered there, peering in, I wondered if the good doctor had had a chance to use Bull’s gift to him or what he had been doing since we last saw him. As for myself . . . I’m savoring what I hope will be more than a few “last of the laps” around the track. Laps true and pursuant to “The Fudgesickle Motif”. So, I might say—with no hyperbole—”I tasted life . . . and it was good.”
“The family that robs grave together . . . stays together.” – The Bard Of The Woods
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