Dear Mikey,
I too looked at my "retirement fund" and decided despite the required
seven days and two eight hour shifts in week 15 of the construction
season, that I would not be denied completely. No summer vacation, no
weekends. At 11:00am Wednesday morning I go to leave the office and
find little Edward (10, he also has baby blues, you met him as a
brunette) and sports a white blond buzz cut, on the computer. He says:
"Dad, what's the matter, you look all stressed out?" I said, "Edward,
it's eleven o'clock and you didn't go to camp. Did you practice piano
or read?" His reply: "No Dad, it didn't work out". In his large and
convoluted world, I am trying to figure out all the distractions that
have contributed to the "not working out", but before I can respond he
says: "look Dad, how about I go with you? You could use the company."
Yep, OK, no problem. We hit the road to go to meetings and do errands.
At 1:00pm after a sumptuous lunch at Richter's we drive by the Hertz
place where we pass a 2002 white Mustang Convertible. Yep, we leave the
truck in the lot and drive out new men. We finish the day out; my
little assistant is a great hit. Mom makes pizza for dinner and then we
cruise in the stang to the beach. Football, tag and swimming under the
last long rays of light. The Coast Guard Cutter is burning orange off
shore and the training vessels from New Haven Harbor with their red
sails are cutting the blue horizon on one of the summer's best days.
Life is good.....
Best to you and family and all the BP paparazzi.
Leland
-----Original Message-----
From: Darling, all I want is that you should be a pinhead -- Arlene
Croce [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
[log in to unmask]
Sent: Friday, August 09, 2002 11:19 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Travels with Peanut
The following is from my masons journal , it was written just after the
PTN confrence the best way to enjoy iit is to print and read at your
leisure
Travels with Peanut
My two and one half year old, Mary, blew off the babysitter
and said she wanted to spend the day with Da -Da .
Such decisions have a ripple effect in the trickle down economy of day
care negoation and are not to be taken lightly.
I positioned my cigar and with arms folded took a defensive stand
behind
my best rock face and screwed it into a puss. .
Nutt-ing doing ;
she reads me like a book ,
When I look into those baby blues... I am toast.
I don't know what it is,
I hold my own at board meetings , leveled teamsters on the take
and backed down rough necks on drilling rigs;
but bargaining with the "Peanut" and those baby blues..
.is treachery.,chicanory and piracy on the high seas of kids with
winners take all..
With the market down and my portfolio in shambles;
I punt to the winds of sanity and give in to the therapy
of road trip with Mary; sometimes known as Peanut..
Playing hooky from my worldly responsibility and how important I am is
a necessary elixir to my financial depression. I let it ride and take a
ride. .
I packed peanut and Louise ;my hunting dog ,
up in the old open air pick up, and under buttermilk skys take the
cruise at 45 mph the back country roads . letting the air and the
smells of the coutryside permeate the ol GMC as we ramble down sunken
roads of hardwood and pine where moo cows nod howdy and the hay is in
second cutting...
Louise , the Airedale ,rides shotgun and sticks her scruffy head out
the window and acts the bearded dowager as the scratchy A.M receiver
lets Peanut and I sing country Western off key.
Its 97 deg out but we don't care ,
"Peanut" sports a tiny N.Y Fire dept tank top ; cheap sun glasses is
barefoot with a diaper that has Minnie Mouse on it.
As the C&W plays , Mary bouces along caterwalling and
takes turns putting her sunglasses on Louise who lets the glasses fit
lopside and finds it old hat, .
We tend to like to visit the little tie rail, cross roads , of fried
green
tomatoe cafes.and two pump filling stations that dot these dirt roads.
We only stop at places where Mary knows the waitresses and she knows
alot of waitreses; They make a fuss over her and it usually gets da-da a
free cuppa and a piece of pie, which does nothing for the waistline,
They ply her with suckers and gummy scooby doos which I confiscate with
complicated flim flams . as she diaper dances past old jukeboxes and
patrons frozen in time..
Deep woods Mississippi suffers from the benefit of No 50's
modernization ,.
60's renovation, 70's restoration , or 80's preservation .Dotted among
vast timber tracts are ; Little outposts of turn of century store fronts
Windblown vernacular oddesseys of "last picture show" emporiums where
the screen door with the tin sign slams your butt and encapsulates you,
helpless in depression era wonders of stacked canned goods alongside
chill boxes with bottled Dr. Pepper .
You pay at the manual cash register hung with assorted moon pies
that are decorated from above with fly paper ribbon from a tin ceiling
. . Dogs sleep all over the porch; and you can curl up with "The News
of the World " or "The Enquirer " on some cane chairs provided you lean
back on them.
If these are Twilight zones l'll take em .
The East Village has retro ; this is real deal.
Here you can still find 50's floral patterns on the shoulders of
country girls who prove to you they are more comfortable without shoes ;
(or bras)
as they sweet drawl you over tail gate produce in dazziling
displays of
sweet melons, garlands of peppers, "mate-rrs, "and white and golden
corn
that can melt in your mouth. ..
As Mary inspects kitchens with young silver haired Grandmas who push
cookies I get caught up on local sports and gossip with men in white
shirts and suspenders who chaw in rocking chairs and use the red dirt
road out front as a cuspidor.
They love to talk story and pontificate the finer points about the .
Braves
(and their working mules) both who seem indcernable to me this late
in
the season.
They complain good naturally about the next cross roads down the road
as "Ticky" or strange. . Humanity always amazes me ; no matter how poor
one place is another is always worse. I must say down the road is
unusual. Mary and I like to go there because because the people are
just a little more "different"or
"Diverse" as I like to kid my wife , Belinda
Geologists like it because it was an impact zone ,for a meteor about the
time of the dinosaurs. This leads to speculations that the in habitants
are "walk ins" (exterteresstial visitors) trying to act normal but out
of sync with their bee hive hair dos; make shift clothing and 40's
small town quirky simplicity of Barney Fifes and red neck geniuses
settled around a town square that time has forgot.
We make the town square after a 15 min drive through corn fields.
To pass muster with the extreterrestials -Da-da poses as the
country
rube with an old upturned "yeller"straw with Jap shades that sit
crooked on my nose then let Mary run interference as we thump mellons
and meander through bric -a -brac of old tail gates full of farm tools
and pictures of Jesus. No UFO's here
A gaggle of Mennonite Women in white caps and identical house dresses
in
red checkered cloth eye Mary as if she needs a bath....she dosen't but I
get the picture
Old farmers with cracked and weathered faces and necks red from the sun
sit by pens of rabbits and squawking fowl talking story and spitting
chaw into the red earth.
We pet baby goats and tug on homemade ice lollys
and listen to their banter on how the miners who were buried alive ;
requested "chaw" to be sent down the rescue pipe. Smiles all around
followed by more spitting.
Just then tow head Country children run barefoot through mud and mowed
grass followed by yapping puppies.. .Mary trys to follow and I catch
her by tables of farm women with broad worn work hands who sell
homemade jams and jellys and dried flowers .
They laugh at the "Chillun" running and crow with drawls so thick
you
need an interpeter to make sense of it..
We move along after getting jam on our faces near where
a gospel station plays out of the chrome dash of one old pick-up that
sits in front of a revival tent
Mary picks up tempo and bounces on those little legs mimicking the
tinny old gospel ......."Victory for Jesus ...My savior... fur ever"
....
With the cheap shades on and dancing while holding Louise with a
clothesline leash...
Im not sure she fits the image of being saved
...
."He (jesus) lifted me and saved me "....blares the radio
.
Worse yet
Im not sure I want to know the pint sized Lolita ;
as she is bouncing her "booty" in front of the church ladys who
close in to .... "save "her
" He lifted me and saved me with his sacred blood"...Oh Victory fur
Jesus"...
Push comes to shove, Finally I come to my senses and I "Save " her.
..managing to just escape the impending revival..tent .by a reverend
with a beard that could double for Mr. Natural ..
'Have you been saved brother?" he asks
"Are dogs allowed ?" I respond
"why No..
"Then I guess I will stay with the unwashed ...... perhaps next time"
..
Getting saved in Mississippi is not the same as say when your wife
saves you at a cocktail party... .the ramifications are much more
complicated .; for one you have to give up cocktail partys
not an option as my therapist won't allow it
Too bad; as there are folks here who get saved every week Besides It
looks like fun getting dunked in the river ; then going off and falling
in sin ( getting drunk) ,or worse..... only to get dunked .. .and saved
again
Up North its different
you get hosed once a week at the collection box;
and once you make communion you are perpetually saved
its more expensive that way ,
but at least you can still share beverages with your friends . .. ....
. and forgo the pond water once a week
No walk ins today......it must be mid week...but no telling what we
would of found in the revival tent. Besides its time for Marys nap By
afternoon we make a job site and Mary lays down with Louise in the
truck under the shade of a grove of peach trees while I hob nob with
the masons and contemplate the little things .
Michael .
--
To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to:
<http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>
--
To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to:
<http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>
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