About This Site

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When I was a child, racial tension in my small hometown did not exist.  There was no them, only us.  Everybody was white.  The caste system was in effect, to be sure, from the apex of the Caucasian ladder to the depths of the pale trash heap; but all of us were white.  The only American-Indian I was familiar with was riding the range on a horse named Scout with Clayton Moore.  The Cisco Kid represented the Mexican contingent, and, because the only TV channel we got did not carry Amos n’ Andy, black people remained absent.  If there was an African-American living in town, he would have been blonde, from Johannesburg, and named Günter.  Racial diversity did not exist.  Well, that’s not exactly true.  One summer we had a lifeguard at the lake who was Hawaiian.  He was pretty dark.  A lot of us kids marveled at the depth of his tan and the sometimes strange way he talked, but the real marvel was his total relaxed ability in the water.

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I remember my 10^th birthday – and not only because birthdays that end in zero are milestones, but because it was one of the few times I actually went anywhere with my mother.  On the evening before that auspicious day, she and her husband loaded me, Merv Fritz, and Wes Roy in their car and took us to a Dairy Queen in the city for banana splits.  After the Dairy Queen, we went bowling.  After bowling, we went to the Steak n’ Shake, for goodness sake!  A little perspective here – these were the “good old days”, over 50 years ago, before fast food, in the time when families still ate together, at home, while actually sitting at a table.  Then, after Steak n’ Shake, came the really big deal of the evening.  We went roller skating!  Such an event was huge!  Wow!  More perspective – back when Andy, Barney, and Aunt Bee were living in Mayberry, how many times did Opie get to go to Mount Pilot for his birthday?  Opie and I had a lot in common.  We’d never heard of soccer moms, play dates, or that hideous term “Stranger Danger”.  We spent summer evenings on the porch, or catchin’ lightnin’ bugs, or at the free movies in the park.  We hung out with friends until after dark, and something like a cell phone could only have been used by Flash Gordon, Dick Tracy, or Captain Video and his Video Rangers.

Playing God

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A young woman and I were visiting the other day and she confessed to me that she was a Catholic.  While I subscribe to no particular religion myself, I certainly begrudge no one else his or her faith, but she seemed apologetic at her confession, saying that she wasn’t even sure if she believed in God.  Her face showed some uncertainty, as if she thought I would think less of her.

To “believe” in God, it seems to me, indicates that in some way God requires our belief to be validated.  I find that ridiculous, as ridiculous as I find a god who would demand my worship to make himself feel good, or would adopt a set of rules and regulations so complicated and stringent that only a few of us could ever qualify for the team.  In an effort to help her understand, I told the young woman about fish.

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Many of us that live in rural areas of the Heartland suffer somewhat during heavy winter snowfalls.  Unlike city dwellers, three inches of the white stuff usually doesn’t make us gnash our teeth and rend our flesh – we’re not civilized enough.  Eight to 10 inches of it, however, can be inconvenient.  When that kind of thing happens, I become inflicted with memories of The Good Old Days…

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Christmas Eve.  From the time I was a young child until my late 20s, I spent it at my favorite Aunt and Uncle’s farm.  My Aunt Myrna and Uncle Wayne, their son Gayle and his family, my grandparents, my mother and stepfather, me, and in later times, my wife, all gathered every year.  Entering from the cold into that farmhouse reinforced the fact that there is no scent on Earth like a home on the eve of Christmas where country women are cooking holiday dinner.  The tang of sage, the odor of baking sweet potatoes, the light dusting of flour on the countertop where homemade noodles and handmade rolls were just created combines with the warmth and humidity of a farmhouse kitchen to manifest a palpable texture in the room.  A pungent blanket of airborne taste that smacks of Currier and Ives, Norman Rockwell, and home.  It cannot be duplicated in a restaurant, or even in a city for that matter.  It requires cold, country, and family tradition.

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About 10 years ago, for the first time in quite a while, I went home for Christmas.  Well, that’s not exactly true.  Home is where my wife and I live.  I returned to where I spent my childhood, where I walked the river, hunted pheasants, stalked the elusive catfish, sledded on snow, skated on ice, horsed around with my friends, and spent time with my grandfather.  At the time, I had not lived in that area for over 25 years, and I found the memories of it more pleasing from a distance than recalled at close range.  Still, I went.

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Her name is Bethany and she is the niece of a friend.  I first met the young woman when she was about 8 years old – a loud, angular, elbowy girl.  She was below average in looks, not superior in intellect, and seemed to have trouble relating to adults.  She and I were not significant members of each other’s world, and I had little reason and even less opportunity to pay attention to the child, so I didn’t – but I do recall thinking that she took up too much room for a child her age and size.  I would see her every year or so, out there on the periphery of my universe, and as I watched her get older, I watched her get larger and heard her get louder.  In retrospect, I see it as a cry for love and attention.  At the time, however, she was just annoying.

Those Less Fortunate

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I never saw him wearing anything except a white t-shirt, blue jeans, and the ubiquitous boy’s footwear of the time – black and white Keds tennis shoes.  He was a year or so older than I, but pale and smaller, with a shock of floppy blond hair.  He lived with parents that I never met down the river road a bit closer to the muddy Sangamon than my house.  He didn’t go to school either – a wondrous achievement in my nine-year-old estimation, not having to deal with the boredom, peer pressure, and politics of grade three.

I first saw him as he came walking up the road past my house as I was in the yard struggling to realign the handlebars of my Huffy heavyweight, knocked out of shape by a minor crash into the ditch in front of Randy Clinton’s house as I attempted to avoid running over his mother’s yappy little dog.  He – the boy, not the dog – stood in the road and watched my labor for a moment.  I said, “Hi, Kid,” and he smiled and came closer.  I never even knew his name, but I did realize that he was different.  Kid was not like the rest of us.

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Ah, yes – the holiday season.  Most retailers and some consumers believe it starts in mid-September and continues through January 15. We are besieged by The Great Pumpkin, regaled with stories of The Pilgrims, who were, incidentally, not The Pilgrims but only pilgrims, beaten over the head by the Jolly Old Elf in such a perverted evolution of greed that the real Saint Nicholas is a lathe in his grave, and ushered into an uncertain future by an old man carrying a scythe eager to be reduced to an infant in diapers.

Bitter?  Not me.  I think the whole thing is a hoot.  It is the time of year when the overriding constant throughout the season of celebration was only recently released from prison.  Yes, Virginia, there is a Martha Stewart.

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Amos Beals was an immense man, at least to my little kid eyes.  Distantly related to my grandfather, Amos lived out in the country on a hardscrabble farm and was perpetually clothed in a railroad engineer’s cap, bib overalls – or “biblicals” as he called them – and brogan shoes.  A shirt was optional, depending on the weather.  He had hands the size of my baseball glove, a sudden roaring laugh, and a speech impediment that sometimes made him difficult to understand.  He had three sons, all significantly older than I.  His eldest was Max, who I hardly knew because he was off in school at the University of Illinois learning about animals and husbands, or something like that.  Bobby, the middle son, was a quiet and thoughtful young man with quick dark eyes and a gentle way about him.  He was a genius with horses – a horse whisperer long before the term was coined – who taught me to ride when I was very young.  Dale, the third in line, was a raucous blonde-headed fireplug – reckless, fearless, hard-charging, and my favorite.  He burned brightly and died at only 31 in an altercation between his motorcycle and an immoveable object.  The prospect of going to Amos’ place on a Sunday afternoon made suffering through church even more painful.  An hour is a very long time in the life of a child.

Amos and the boys were country to the bone.  They kept hens for eggs and fried chicken, cows for milk, butter, and cream, cattle and hogs to butcher for meat, an orchard for fruit, and a garden for veggies.  They fished in the summer, trapped in the winter, and hunted all year long.  Between the house and the barn was a low shed with fenced pens on two sides.  The north side housed the bird dogs, the south side was where the ‘coon hounds stayed, and the beagles ran loose.  Such was their country life until Amos ran afoul of prosperity.  Success sneaked up on Amos Beals, a man who was fully ready to work from dawn ‘til done just to get by.  When his eldest son, Max, announced his intention to marry, Amos went down the road a ways, cleared an acre or so of cornfield next to the road and, with the help of Bobby and Dale, began to build Max a three bedroom house with an attached garage.  As they were pouring the driveway, a fella from the city drove by, stopped, and offered Amos about three times what the house cost him to build.  Amos took the money, went down the road a little farther, and began building Max a four bedroom house with a basement.  He sold that manse at a very handsome profit as he and Dale were planting a maple tree in what was soon to be the front yard.

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When I was young, every 4^th of July, my grandfather would load us up and drive to the big fireworks display at the football stadium in a nearby city.  He said the airborn bombs “put him in the mind of” World War One.

When the United States entered the First World War, my granddad was 20 years old.  A bricklayer by trade, a professional boxer by design, and a semi-pro baseball player by choice, he – and many other young men – were pressed into service.  My grandpa left school when in just the 4^th grade to work and assist his widowed mother.  He was not an educated man.  Oh, he knew his letters and ciphers, read the newspaper and such, but he was a man of simple needs.  So when the call came to war, he went without question.  He took his oath to protect and defend very seriously, and he did as he was told.

(Kill the Bass Drummer)

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I want to start this piece by saying that I have a great deal of respect for those men and women who have served or are serving our country in the military.  My grandfather fought in France and Germany during World War I, my father on Iwo Jima and Guadalcanal in World War II.  My dear wife, while not in the military, spent four years in Afghanistan working to support the troops in hostile areas complete with bombings and rocket attacks.  I, myself, spent a full day and a half in the United States Air Force, and I certainly appreciate those who have given even more than their lives, who have had their minds disrupted, deleted, or even destroyed because of the horrors of war.

At age 14, I took employment as bass clarinetist with the Elk’s Band, a group of fine concert musicians who played in various locations around central Illinois and west central Indiana.  Our repertoire consisted of classical pieces, the occasional show tune, and patriotic numbers by John Phillip Sousa and his ilk.  One fine Sunday, all 42 of us climbed aboard the bus and headed for Danville, Illinois, to play a concert at the VA hospital.  The director rose to his feet as we neared our destination, and cautioned us about the upcoming venue.

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When I was a lad, kite flying was popular among me and my peers – a ragtag crew of Cub Scout, river-rat little leaguers.  In those days, one could not journey to the local mart and purchase some exotic piece of airborne art for a few bucks.  Oh, no.  The best we could manage was a trip to Baumgartner’s Dime Store and buy, for a hard scrabble 50 cents, a common paper and split lav kite that, with the proper tail attachment, might actually fly – and it had better, because one crash with the delicate craft most always meant its demise and the total loss of half a buck, a small fortune when cokes were a nickel and comic books a dime.