Was Just Thinking #1

I was just thinking of Grayton Beach. Walton County. Florida. The panhandle. I was thinking how I lived on the beach--off and on, sometimes in ancillary towns--that I lived without air-conditioning or heat. I also remember the sand. We had sand on our feet, on the floors, in the sheets, in our food. Always. And when it was cold it was cold and when it was hot it was hot and we wore few clothes, or many clothes, and ceiling fans and electric fans were important to us most of the year. And I was happy.

The Undead Squirrel: Fort Lauderdale 2007

The royal palm tree in my backyard was not that tall when we first moved into the house on SW 18th Street in Fort Lauderdale. That was in 1997. Now, it was a big tree, but when the fronds died I could reach them and pull them down by hand. Even then there was a squirrel who lived up in the green fronds--after a while he'd/she'd have to rebuild the nest higher up. Now, a royal palm's trunk is not like the trunk of a coconut or cabbage or fan palm. It's like a smooth concrete pole, in many ways, and even a squirrel can't scurry up it, so the animal has to jump to low hanging fronds and get up that way.

Jump to ten years later: the squirrel or a different squirrel is still nesting in the royal palm. But the palm is quite tall now and the squirrel has to climb up the nearby travelers palm then make a leap onto the low fronds of the royal to get to his/her nest. It's a precarious operation but must have been a safe place to live. Well, one day I go out in the yard and there's this squirrel on the ground beneath the royal palm. It's splayed out in grass/sandydirt not moving. I think it's dead. I think it fell from the palm. I left it there and went about my business for a while and then, maybe an hour later, it's gone. It's back jumping up to its nest.

Ah. The squirrel fell and was out cold.

Now it's later--maybe a month or two--and again I go out and again there's the squirrel out cold on the grass/sandydirt. This time I approach it. I stand over it and inspect it. I nudge it with my foot. It doesn't move. It's dead, I think, but I leave it be for a while.

When I come back, the squirrel is still there. I nudge it again.

Nothing.

Dead.

This was before we got our dog and we had raccoons and opossums and such come into the yard at night. So, I get my shovel, dig a hole by the back fence. I use the shovel to scoop up the dead squirrel and carry him/her and deposit her/him in the hole. I cover the squirrel up.

So much for that.

That evening I'm outside again. I go check on the royal-palm-squirrel's hasty grave. But, she/he is not there.

Instead there's the hole.

The squirrel had dug itself out and up.

Zombie Squirrel!

Well, guess it wasn't dead.

It still lives up in that tree to this day but I don't know how the hell it gets up there.

Biking to Jester Park: Des Moines 1975

This is what passed for adventure back then. A group of my friends--most of my core friends, Bob, Bill, Larry, Dave, Randy, Jim and I (perhaps others or perhaps not all mentioned)--decided to bike a few miles north of town to a park called Jester Park. I don't know if it was a state park or county park but it was a ways out of Des Moines and Urbandale, maybe five miles or so. We brought along tents and bags and food to stay the night. It was summer, hot, pleasant, and it was our first real trip anywhere as near-adults.

The planning of it was pretty simple. Yes, we were driving by then but we wanted to bike it, so we knew where the park was and how to get there by experience. Were our bikes in good enough shape to make the trip? Who knew--we weren't worried about that. And remember, this was before cell phones and Internet and GPS and constant connections. So, one we packed our bags and filled our measly water bottles (this was before the selling of water as a drink also), we were on our own.

My parents were unconcerned as were most of my other friends. The only parent who seemed worried was Bill's mother and--sure enough--halfway on the long bike ride down rural roads under the sun, here came Bill's mother in her car checking up on us. Ah, what supreme embarrassment for Bill. But also not a big deal--we didn't tease him about it.

It was a fun ride, though hot and thirsty. It was good to be out there and have the world and Iowa landscape slow down, to enjoy the minutes and the farm fields and the trees.

Then we got to the park, set up camp (I think it was free) and wander around. No one else was there, it seemed. We hunted for firewood, played cards, talked, played catch with Frisbees, baseballs, footballs. We wandered the woods, went to the Des Moines River and got in the water, swam and walked the bank and swooshed around in what is a pretty big river. We cooked hot dogs and canned chili and made sandwiches, had chips and cheese--I don't know how we brought all of that on our bikes, but we did.

Bill's mother did not show up.

Night came and we had a fire and told stories and fell asleep and got up the next day and did it again. Then we rode home--long, hot, thirsty--and the adventure was over.

We were not young teens then. We had a year left of high school.

And you know what we didn't do?

We did not drink beer or smoke cigarettes, we didn't smoke a joint or eat shrooms or talk about female conquests.

Perhaps we were behind the times a bit. Or maybe we missed that memo that that was what we were supposed to be doing at 16 or 17. I don't know. But, that wasn't us. It wasn't like we were goody-goody kids, that we went to church and looked down on "bad" behavior. Not at all. It just didn't occur to us that there were other options. For whatever reason, we were not interested in such things . . . But now that I think of it, I think Jerry Lamb went on that trip with us. Jerry was one of those guys that was sort of part of our group but sometimes not. He was one of those guys who saw the other options and had no doubt tried them a bit, had tried to hang and fit in with a rougher crowd than us but was either not fully accepted or was on the fence about who to be: nice boring boys like us or one of the "bad" boys. (Of course, there were many options in between, too.) Jerry Lamb. I'd forgotten about him.

Anyway. It would still be a few years down the road when drugs, drinking, driving cross-country and sex became the idea of fun. For then, an independent bike ride to Jester Park, goofing around in a river, stopping in the shade of a tree on a hot day in central Iowa with friends--that was fun.

Jack The Cat: Missoula 1990

His name could have been Zack, but when we heard the neighborhood kids call his name as they came home from school, my wife and I heard it as Jack. This is when we lived in the little cottage on Rollins Street in Missoula. Jack was--we assumed--a stray. He came to hang out at our place all the time, even coming inside and spending the night. He had no collar. But, I admit, he didn't look like a stray.

He was a comical-looking cat. He had the markings of a siamese, including very blue and very crossed-eyed eyes. But he was big and fluffy--sort of Persian, Himalayan, Raccoon Cattish. he was funny and friendly, maybe not that bright but gregarious. I never saw him run from a person or even a dog for that matter. he was a good cat. He was an annoying cat.

he looked a lot like our cat, M.R., though she wasn't quite as fluffy or big or cross-eyed. When we first saw him we thought M.R. had somehow gotten out of the house, but then saw it was not her at all. He began to come around all the time, then demanding that we let him inside. And we did, reluctantly at first. he had a bad habit of climbing screens, the door at least.

I still remember the story Fru has told about him. I worked afternoons and nights at the University of Montana and Fru would be home by herself. One day Jack came by and wanted inside. Fru didn't want to have to deal with him. So, she walked around ducking at all the windows so the cat would not see her. She was in the kitchen and saw home on the porch from the window there and so she ducked again. She was hiding from Jack the Cat. So, as she huddled close to the kitchen floor, Jack jumped up onto the screen and stared at her. So, she had to let him in since he saw her. he was a determined animal.

By the summer of 1990, Fru and I knew we were leaving Montana. She had a job offer back in Illinois and--being quite poor in Missoula--she took the offer. We drove back in her car, leaving my truck, with the idea that I would return, rent a U-Haul and get our stuff to bring to Illinois.

And, that's what we did.

But after my return to Montana, after my renting and packing and loading and goodbyes said, one of my last acts in Missoula was to grab Jack the Cat (M.R. was already gone). I picked him up and put him in the rental's cab with me--I was towing my red pickup. We had a flat in South Dakota (or maybe it was south of Sioux City, Iowa) and the cat had to wait in the truck while I walked to an exit and a phone. But, we made it to Champaign, IL.

Jack the Cat and M.R. settled in as we did. Jack liked to go outside and caused a little trouble by jumping on neighbors' screens, the--when we moved to the place on Miller Street from West Union--he developed the habit of wandering, even crossing the busy street of Church to visit people in that neighborhood: I got calls from people asking if I was missing my cat. Jack had a collar now, with my name and phone # on it.

Yes, we doted over the two cats. Held and Xmas for them and took tons of photos. Yes, they were our surrogate children. But then we had a real child and the cats went back to being just cats very quickly. Still, they were family and they liked First Daughter's crib and she liked them.

I had a job working at Agriseed. I often would go in at night to water the hybrid corn plants in the greenhouse there. It was on such an evening as I left and turned on Church that I saw Jack. he was in the side of the road and his gut was split open. Dead. I had to go back and get a box and a shovel and scoop him up. I didn't go to work that night.

Fru and I were, of course, full of grief. Grief tempered that he was only a cat, but still real grief. And it still bothers me to this day that I had taken him. He no doubt did have a home--lack of collar or no--and I had, essentially, stolen him. And if he had remained in Montana, no doubt Jack or Zack would have lived a long life.

Getting Hit: Urbandale 1973

I played football in junior high and high school. I was a good football player--but not so much in organized ball. While a star in sandlot ball, I was always a second stringer when I put on pads and helmet. Why? Some of it was my own general timidity and foolishment, some was that I saw football as a game of finesse not one of brutishness--as said: foolishment. Anyway, I quit football my senior year (the year the Urbandale Jayhawks won the state AA title--my usual luck, though can't say being a member of the 1976 State AA Champs of Iowa would be one of my biggest accomplishments).

But what I'm recalling is a short episode during practice one day when on junior varsity. It was during punt coverage. I was on offense and, best to my memory, ran downfield after the ball was kicked and almost got in on the tackle. So, there I was standing after the play was over when--WHAM--some kid comes and slams me from behind. Blindsided. After the whistle. I get myself up and look at him, some guy I knew but did not know, and he yells at me that the coach said I should have done this or that on the coverage.

I was bewildered. Not because of the hit but because of the penalty enforced upon me--this blindsided wham by coaches orders. I didn't get angry (one of my many failings in the game of football, but I didn't know that at the time). I just looked at the kid and then at the coaches who were yards away and shrugged it off, went back to practice. Yet, that stays with me. It was demeaning and embarrassing. Who was this kid to just come knock me off my feet when I was completely unaware and defenseless? Who was that coach (not the head coach of varsity who was a nice guy--for a football coach at least) to think of and then order such a thing?

Man.

And that incident is one of those incidents where I wish I could go back in time. I'd like to go back and when I got hit I'd like to pick myself up and--first off--yank off the perpetrator's helmet and smack him in the goddamn nose. Then I'd like to run up to the coach and tackle him and smack him in the nose. Perhaps that would have impressed them. maybe that's what they wanted from me.

But, though a big guy, I wasn't that kind of guy.

Here's what kind of guy I was: I was a wide receiver, but due to my lifelong bad hearing and general shyness, I got in the wrong line for practice and became a lineman instead. I was big enough to be a lineman and that's where they kept me. So, one practice as a lineman--tackle--and again during punt drill where I was blocking the rush, I recalled the instructions which was hit your man but if the man next to you misses his block, pick up that man. On the play the person next to me was one of my good friends. When the ball was snapped, I saw him miss his man and so I came over and picked him up. My man was not picked up and glided in to the punter, almost blocking it. For this I was yelled at, by both coaches and teammates. They asked why I didn't pick up my man. I said nothing. I didn't want to blame my friend for not picking up his man, so I just said nothing.

That's the kind of guy I was.

Changing Friends: Iowa City 1979

So, I moved around a lot as a kid--and around a lot as an adult. So, I became used to change, to saying goodbye to states and towns, to houses and neighbors, to friends. But this was a bit different, in Iowa, as we had stayed in the Des Moines area for a good nine years or so. I had gone through half of seventh grade on through all of high school in one place, in one state. I had developed good solid friendships with quite a few people and intimate friendships with a core of maybe four or five people (basically all guys--I had yet to understand that you could be friends with "girls", something the younger generation seems to understand better than mine). But them we all graduated and most of my friends went to Iowa State University in Ames, maybe forty-five minutes, maybe an hour, from Des Moines.

I didn't go to college. No right away.

Yes, I stayed in touch with them, visited etc. I worked full time and made new friends from that job. But then a year later (and after a short stint in Key West), I did go to school but I went to The University of Iowa, in Iowa City, not to Ames. Ah. In the state of Iowa, there is a big distinction between the two . . . and as the years went by, my new college friends began to replace my old high school friends.

I know, I know, nothing new there. And it wasn't like I didn't stay in touch with that core group of pals, but I soon quit coming home on weekends while in school, then quit coming home in the summer and then quit all together. Not quit school, but coming home at all . . . But by 1979 the situation was evident that my college pals--Matt, Brock, Mike and others--had replaced Bob, Kevin, Larry and others as my closest friends. And they--college pals--remained my main contacts for the next ten years or so. Then I got married, started a family and the closeness to all friends began to fade a bit.

But here's the thing. Jump ahead another, say, another twenty years, closer to today's date: I'm still married, my kids are venturing into college (about the same age I was in 1979) and my closest friends are not from Urbandale High or the University of Iowa. I still have a core group of four or five good guy friends but the are scattered about. And, I'm still sort of in touch with some of the people from my past. But--of those old friends, it is my high school buddies I talk to the most. My college pals, my best friends who I was closest to, rarely contact me and I, in turn, rarely contact them. Do I know where they live, do I have their phone numbers and know what's going on in their lives? Yes--sort of. The same with my high school pals. Yet I've talked more often and have physically seen the older group more often in the last ten years than the latter. I don't know why this is.

But I think we--my college friends--are about due. I think we will resurrect the old feelings and make an effort to see each other. No doubt we will all realize why we have other friends but, still, it would be good. It will be worth the effort.

Okoboji: Urbandale 1975

Ah, we took numerous trips up to Lake Okoboji which is in the northwest corner of Iowa (more or less). By we I mean Bob, Kevin and I. I don't recall the first time I visited the place--Okoboji a rather renowned spot in Iowa due to its natural lakes and natural beauty, to its original theme park in Arnold's Park and some other small claims to Iowa-centric fame--but I do know it was with Bob (Bob my first real friend in Urbandale who lived down the block from me on 65th). We were old enough by then to be on our own. I believe I was able to drive, but perhaps the first time it was just Bob and I with his parents. I know his parents bought a little plot and had a trailer--maybe not that first time but after that--where you could walk down to the lake. There was more than one lake. There was Lake Okoboji itself, then there was East lake Okoboji, or maybe East and West lakes, and then there was a smaller lake. There may be more, as the area was known as Iowa's Great Lakes. I think. Anyway, Bob's parents--nice people--also bought a small boat to keep on the lake. I believe Bob and I slept on the boat one time. But it was after all of that that we--Bob, Kevin and I--came up to the lake for a long summer weekend. I know I'd driven at least once in my Ford falcon Wagon (1966) that had been the family car for years and years and still ran (and whose stereo wiring--which I had installed--had actually caught fire once and whose brakes gave out on me while coming down a hill in Urbandale while coming back from a trip to Okoboji) but I know we also drove up once in Kevin's old black Volkswagon Beetle. But his parents--Bob's--had let us stay there and we, Kevin and I anyway, drank beer and motored about the lake in Bob's parents' little motor boat and there were a couple of girls staying in a trailer nearby--druggy-ish girls from Colorado or some such, one a little too young and the other a little too hip to have much to do with us--and we just generally did our inane things that we did at that age. But I do recall I was taking a dump in the bathroom of the trailer when all of a sudden Bob comes rushing in (I didn't lock the door) because his parents had pulled up outside. His mother and father had driven up and shown up without announcement, without ever telling us that they would. That was not nice--I mean, we were good guys, not into much trouble except some beer, which we were old enough to legally drink--and here they were showing up out of the blue as if to check on us, as if to catch us in some transgression. Really. And if we had been doing anything more than just taking a dump and having a few beer cans around? (And Bob did not even drink.) What if we'd had the girls over, what if we were smoking cigarettes and--god forbid at that time--marijuana? What if we had trashed the place and sunk the boat and who knows what? Would they have been happy to find that out? Didn't they think that at our age at that time that there were some things they best not know about? I mean, we were still pretty innocent and caused no true or even rowdy trouble, so why show up unannounced?

Oh well.

It wasn't long after that that Bob and I parted ways, fell out of friendship with each other. Kevin and I stayed good pals for a long time but I have not seen or barely heard from him in maybe two decades. And Okoboji? I don't know. I can't quite recall its charms. To me, it's now just an Iowa-centric place.