Heads or Tails - "Tool" - 6/29/09

Barb S at Heads or Tails provides a weekly prompt to challenge our creativity. This week's prompt is "tool". As usual, when I participate, I write the first thing that comes to mind. This week is no exception. Here is my carefully crafted post for this week. It is the most factual post I have ever written:

Bernard Madoff is a tool.

Heads or Tails - "Springtime Memory" - 3/10/09

Today's Heads or Tails prompt is "Springtime Memory." I grew up in northern Idaho and the first sign of spring was always a joy after a long, cold winter. I also lived in Wyoming for about ten years (seemed like longer), where winter is even more relentless and severe. I wrote down a few thoughts about early spring in the mountains. If you are curious as to how this piece sounds in guttural monotone, you can hear me read it by clicking here.

Springtime in the Rockies

Vernal sun erases winter frowns as surely as a drug expunges pain
Hearts encumbered by cabin fever released into the warmth
Optimistic blades of grass poke through stubborn snow remaining
Children kicking through the slush, parkas retired for at least today
Skinny deer seeking feed long buried, nourished and hopeful

Garages reorganized, snowmobiles for motorcycles and skis for golf clubs
Windows opened that had been frozen shut, fresh air in, stale air out
Birds arriving from their hibernal roost, voice their delight in song
Their melodies bring welcomed joy to the tomb like silence of arctic cold

Squirrel gangs emerge from their winter hole in the wall hideout

A single flower risking exposure, banking that it is truly spring

A wire brush to the Weber grill, search for “Kiss the Cook” apron
The marshmallow world becomes colorized in growing earth tone plots
Dry creek beds overflow with runoff, water much colder than the springtime air
Audible crazing as ice gives way, the sound of winter retreating
Budding renewal as life emerges from winter kill, a rebirth
Ecstasy in the mountains as survivors gambol in the healing balm
Hibernation ends jubilation begins, forest families take roll
Natural adversaries postpone conflict to revel in resurrection

Before hunger and temperament set Darwin’s laws into motion
All life that lay dormant, rekindled by nature’s new beginning

Heads or Tails - "Getting There" - 3/2/09

This week’s Heads or Tails prompt is “Getting There.” This presents a perfect opportunity for me to vent my disappointment in the rail system of the United States.

During the twelve years I lived in Europe, I used British Rail and Eurail extensively. They were economical, on time, and fast. They directly linked all of the major cities. One would expect to find a similar service from the country that drove the golden spike, linking both coasts, in 1869.

During my entire adult life. each time I have crossed the United States it has been by air or with me behind the wheel of various automobiles. Neither afforded me the opportunity to relax and enjoy the scenery. So I thought it would be pleasurable to take a trip late this summer on AMTRAK. I could use the time to unwind and write.

I was planning to travel from the nearest station to my home, in Myrtle Beach, SC, which I found to be Florence, SC. My destination is the Pacific Northwest and could be flexible; Spokane, Washington or Eugene, Oregon, as I have friends to visit in both cities. If you are not familiar with the Geography of the United States, I am in the extreme southeast and would be traveling to the extreme northwest (see map). I am blessed with a lot of foreign readers. If you draw a line along the projected path of my journey it takes me roughly through St Louis, Kansas City, and Denver (red line). I realize that due to the terrain, distance, and location of major cities, that AMTRAK cannot follow a totally direct route.

What I didn’t expect to find was that in order to travel to the Pacific Northwest, I have to route through New York City and Chicago (black line). What should have been a trip of less than 3,000 miles suddenly became a 4,000 mile excursion. And to go to Eugene, I have to take a bus from Portland, over 100 miles. The round trip cost = about $2,000, and that only gives me sleeping capabilities on the long leg, from Chicago heading west and to Chicago from the west.

As you can probably assume, if I do make this trip, it will be by air. I will see the scenery, once again, from 35,000 feet and saving about $1,500.

When stationed in Taiwan in 1974, I once rode a train from Taichung to Taipei, about 80 miles. Though I shared my rail car on the rickety old train with livestock and produce, it was reliable and direct. They have since introduced a 186 MPH train.

In those 35 years, the US has made no rail improvements. For a country that considers itself a major player, we are third world when it comes to public transportation. While most of the rest of the world embraces the train, we have fallen out of love with it. That is a real shame. Many of us might not clog our highways with gas-guzzling, carbon monoxide spewing, automobiles if we had any viable options.

I just checked with Eurail and I can travel unlimited in 21 countries for 3 months for less than $1200. That is their global pass. I could limit my travel for much less money. Maybe next year I will go back to Europe. Anyone want to come along?

Heads or Tails - "Case" - 2/23/09

This weeks Heads or Tails prompt is Case. I wrote the following true account of a suitcase I once owned:

In 1995, my sons were attending college in North Carolina and I was living in Wyoming. It was the summer before their senior year and I found a nice package deal that would allow us to attend baseball games at Yankee and Shea Stadium in New York and Fenway Park in Boston as well as a visit to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. None of us had ever been to any of those venues. The package included all tickets, lodging, and transportation. All we had to do was get to New York City. They arranged their travel from Charlotte and I took care of the rest. A few days of father/son stuff.

Rick and Josh arrived in New York before I did and were waiting for me at my arrival gate at LaGuardia. You could actually do that prior to 9/11, walk right up to the gate. We hurried to baggage claim so we could start our New York adventure as soon as possible. After the normal delay, the bell rang, light glowed amber, and the conveyor belt began to roll. All the passengers from my flight began to circle the carousel, assuming their bags had actually accompanied them on the flight. Experienced travelers are always hopeful, tempered with doubt.

Bags appeared and began their slow journey down the conveyor and around the carousel. It was a packed flight, so there was a pretty good crowd. We had chosen a good position to acquire my bag and be on our way. Even though the baggage carousel appears to be creeping along, retrieving a bag is always done in a bit of a panic.

Suddenly, amidst the assortment of bags, appeared a tube of toothpaste and a sock. Everyone chuckled. Then there were some other articles of clothing and toiletries making the rounds. More laughs and even I made a comment about the poor person whose personal items were on display. The second time around, I made a devastating realization. I recognized one of my shirts. Had I been wealthy, I would have left the airport immediately and just purchased new everything. But had I been well-to-do, I probably would not be the owner of a suitcase that had been patched with assorted colors of duct tape. Though I had traveled extensively in my 20 years in the Air Force, Bataan Death March participants carried nicer luggage than I did. And now everyone on American Airlines Flight 2397 and their friends and family were aware of that fact.

I had no option other than to begin reclamation of my belongings. Eventually, my bag also appeared, gaping open and nearly empty. From the passage of the first items, both my sons had distanced themselves from me, pretending not to know me, so I was pretty much on my own as I scurried about on this sad salvage mission, like a contestant in some sort of white trash game show. When I had recovered most of my property (not too interested in reobtaining the toothbrush), I found that the latch was mortally wounded and the case would never close again. So, we left the airport with me holding the case in my arms like the dead soldier that it was.

The deluxe package billeted us in a four-star hotel in Manhattan, which added to my humiliation, as we were forced into the services of a bellhop. Taking one look at the state of my suitcase, the bellman correctly assumed tips were going to be meager. While for many New York tourists, bellhops and cab drivers are a source of drugs and prostitutes, I employed them to obtain some duct tape and twine, which In Midtown Manhattan are much harder to score.

Heads or Tails - "Legends" Volume 2 - 2/17/09

This is part 2 of my submission to the Heads or Tails prompt of Legends. This is a hodgepodge of recollections about my dad on the 20th anniversary of his death. If you scroll down you will find part 1.

When I played baseball, mom wouldn’t come see me play because she was afraid I would get hurt (I did get my jaw broken by a pitch when I was 10). Dad would not attend because he felt he jinxed me as I usually didn’t play well when he was present. Perhaps I tried too hard to impress him. But sometimes I would catch a glimpse of him through the fence or up in the far corner of the bleachers, quietly watching.

He started in 1949 as an underground miner at the Bunker Hill mine. Through his hard work and thirst for knowledge, he worked his way topside to the assay office. At his retirement ceremony, the company president in tribute said, “it’s a good thing George has no formal education or he would have my job.” All the engineers and geologists that worked with him and for him were astonished. They all assumed he was a geologist.

His first time going underground was one of my favorite recounts. He brought his lunch in a paper bag, not wanting to spend any of his precious little money on a lunchbox. The entry to the mine is a train that goes in for a couple of miles and then there is a inclined shaft that takes the miners down to the different working levels of the mine. The men sit in what is called a skip. The men essentially sit in one other's laps, wedged up against the man behind you. It drops at about a 60 degree angle. Having worked in that mine, I can easily picture the scene. The skip drops very fast and timbers fly by just over your head. Dad said he smashed his lunch flat and actually wrung it in his hands. That day, on his way home from work, he bought a lunchbox.

For most of my youth, mom worked as a baker and went to work very early. As a result, she typically would retire early. Those evenings were my favorite times with my dad. We would typically have a late night snack. Often, much more than a snack. He loved to oven broil a rib steak. He liked his “just knock the horns off and slap it on a plate,” though he would let it cook a bit longer for me. We always ate our steaks with sliced “maters” and “light” bread. Sometimes we would eat Eagle Brand Milk spooned right from the can. Mom always scolded us for that, but it didn’t stop us. We loved Vienna sausages, though he pronounced them vi-eee-nahs. We made what he called poor man’s milkshake which was ice, evaporated milk, sugar, and vanilla extract shaken up in a mason jar. Sometimes he would fry bologna. He taught me the art of dunking my cookies in milk, which I have passed on. He loved to hand-churn ice cream. It was amazing ice cream, but an awful lot of work. It was not official until he recited: "I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream."

As you can see, my healthy eating habits began early in life. Dad was a small, but powerful, man, 5'8", never more than 160 pounds. He could eat anything he wanted and stay fit. I, on the other hand....

I regret that dad and I never shared a beer.

Dad never played sports as a youth. Such things were considered frivolous on a depression era tobacco farm. As a result, by the age of 12, I threw too hard for him to catch me. After he endured a few bruises and damaged fingers, he drew a strike zone on the cinder block wall of our garage for me to pitch to. I threw at that target for years. He would go to the park and shoot baskets with me but he shot underhand, which kind of embarrassed me. I was a jerk. I would give anything to shoot with him now.

He was an expert swimmer and the master of the shallow dive. He could dive into 3 feet of water. He claimed, he learned that as a boy swimming in the swamps of Georgia and diving off of cyprus trees. I have no reason to doubt that. He once dove into the North Fork to save our dog, Trixie, who was being swept downstream. He nearly drowned, but he got her out. We had her for 17 years. She was supposed to be my dog, but we all knew who's dog she was. He loved that dog. She always shared in our late-night kitchen raids.

He bought a set of World Book Encyclopedias when I was about 10. Through the years, he and I both read the entire set. Every year we would receive a yearbook update. We both loved reading those too. The set came with a CYCLO-TEACHER-LEARNING-AID that we played like a board game. I credit (or blame) that practice with the ridiculous amount of useless knowledge that I have bouncing around in my head to this day. Mom thought we were out of our minds. She loved reading the TV Guide, Reader’s Digest, and Family Circle.

Dad and I would go bowling occasionally. It was a special treat for me. It became almost traditional for us to go on holidays, after dinner. My dad was not a very good bowler, but he really enjoyed it. There was one particular house ball that he liked to use. It did not fit him very well, holes were way too big, but he had some success with it. I will never forget. It had the initials WLC engraved on it. That was how we could always find it. He also took up golf and we played together a few times. He held the club cross handed, the same way he held a bat. I tried to get him to change, but he did better that way, so I left him alone.

Dad and I would watch the Miss America Pageant every September. We didn't just view it, we judged it. With pen and paper, we would try to pick the top 5 and the eventual winner. We didn't fare too well, as I knew nothing about women (nothing has changed there) and he nearly always favored Miss Georgia, his home state (whose one and only winner was in 1953). We could never pick Miss Idaho, because she always looked like she was there by some sort of hung chad voting mistake. We always wondered why they could not find one pretty girl in the whole state. Even inbred states like West Virginia occasionally were represented by a pretty girl. Though they did not always win, every year, Miss Texas and California were knockouts. Even a young boy who knew nothing about women realized that. Bert Parks was the MC for years. I don't think he ever did anything else, at least nothing he was famous for.

Every Friday night they broadcast boxing on the Gillette Cavalcade of Sports. He never missed it and I watched it with him. I will never forget seeing a man killed in the ring on live television. His name was Benny “the kid” Paret and he was killed by Emile Griffith. We also watched wrestling together (I am not sure he knew it was fake. I sure didn’t.) and the baseball game of the week. His favorite television shows were anything with Jackie Gleason, Dean Martin, or Red Skelton.

One day, in the early 60s, the FBI came to our house. They were there to interview my dad because he was an acquaintance of a man named Leon Bearden. He and his son were the first to ever attempt to hijack an airliner to Cuba. Dad kind of enjoyed the excitement this event brought into his fairly routine life. The hijackers had failed in the attempt, but it was still pretty big stuff. You can actually read about it here. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,895543-1,00.html Dad recalled for the FBI, that Bearden had always openly carried a lot of weapons and was volatile, but neither was uncommon in the rough mining town we lived in. He knew a lot of guys like that.

Dad was an amazing fisherman. He took me fishing a gazillion times. He had a real knack for catching fish. He could be using the same bait, from the same boat, fishing the same depth and he would catch fish when no one else could. I have many wonderful memories of us fishing and one, vivid, bad memory. We were miles up a tributary of the North Fork of the Coeur d’Alene River and had caught a “mess” of trout. It was getting dark, so we put our gear and catch in the trunk of the car and I, inadvertently also put the keys to the car in with them. We had to walk miles until we could catch a ride home to get the other set of keys. It gets extremely cold in the mountains at night, even in the summer. Our jackets were with the keys. Dad wrapped his flannel shirt around me and he got so cold that he ended up getting ill. I mentioned earlier that dad was a quiet man. He didn’t yell at me. He knew how bad I felt and didn’t feel he needed to add to it. But there was not much conversation on the trip down the mountain.

Dad was also a great hunter. When I was growing up, practically the only meat we ate was wild game. Dad rented a meat locker above the Coast to Coast store and kept it filled. We had deer, elk, and bear. Elk steak is still my favorite of all meats. Not much of that available in South Carolina. Dad did not want me to hunt. “Too many crazy people shooting at anything they hear.” I think my mom had a lot to do with that decision. As a result, I have never been a hunter.

When we lived out in the country, at Rose Lake, a black bear was raiding our garbage can every night. One night, dad decided to sleep in the car with his rifle and when the bear started to rattle the can, he would shoot it. Sure enough, he was awakened by a racket. He rolled the window down a bit and stuck the barrel of the rifle out toward the sound. About then, one of the neighbor’s big dogs put his snout to the window, right in my dad’s face. Dad said he fired, but not the gun. He immediately went back in the house and forgot about the bear.

One of the best examples of dad’s demeanor is a bad prank I played on him. I turned the flame of his lighter to maximum. When he lit his cigarette, the flame actually burnt the end of his nose. His reaction: “won’t last a week that way, son.”

When I was a teenager I didn't think my dad was very cool. I have come to realize he was very cool. I really miss him.

Heads or Tails - "Legends" Volume I - 2/16/09

The Heads or Tails prompt “Legend” made me ruminate about my dad. My dad was George Washington Wainright Jr. March 25th will be the twentieth anniversary of his death from cancer. As I hurtle closer to his age when he died, I find myself reflecting on his life. Unfortunately, I never got to really know him as an adult. By the time I was mature enough to conduct a lucid conversation with him, I was in the military and primarily living overseas. He never really got to know his grandchildren, but their few memories of him are fond. Unfortunately, there are scant few photos of them with him.

Nearly everyone that knew him is gone now as well. I have come to realize that his legend will die with me unless I document some of it here. He had a life before I knew him which included two other children and he has two other sets of grandchildren that he never met. But that is another tragic story. I will randomly write some of my favorite anecdotes and remembrances of him here, hoping to keep his memory alive for future Wainrights. I am going to submit this as several posts. With all the memories swirling through my head, I know it will be a long-winded rambling. Many people don’t tend to read extra long posts. I know if I come across one with more than a few paragraphs, I move on without reading, unless it captivates me. My attention span is very short. The photos I am including require little explanation. A few comments: It is hard to find any photos of my dad as a young man without him having "a snoot full" as my mom would say. You can see that he always had time for me. I hope I was half the father as he was in that respect. I never heard my dad swear, which is amazing considering the environment where he labored, a hard rock mine. He may have sworn at work, but never at home. I on the other hand cuss like a drunken pirate. I try to watch it around my grandkids, but occasionally something will slip. My grandson, Carson, will scold me,"Grandpa, we don't say that." I tried to tell him I had turrets, but I don't think he bought it.

I inherited dad’s intelligence, potential for addiction, love of baseball, fishing, and Hank Williams. He also bequeathed to me his facade covering underlying sadness and hopelessness. He was a highly functioning alcoholic long before rehab was fashionable and available. A very gentle soul, he was honest and kind-hearted. I don’t think he had an enemy in the world. Dad had a calm about him very much like Gandhi. Though I think, unlike the Mahatma, his was somewhat alcohol induced. That being said, dad did not drink for 14 years as I was growing up. To my recollection, his drinking had no negative effect on my life. He was never abusive or offensive, just sad. Though we were poor, I never wanted for anything. But I think it is impossible to tell who he was without discussing his alcoholism. The following are memories of him and thoughts about how he has affected the lives of his lineage.

I see some of his traits in my own children. Much like dad, my son Josh enjoys the way the world looks through beer goggles. As Josh and I tend to be a bit boisterous, dad was a very quiet and soft-spoken man. In that respect, my son Rick is the most like him. He was independent and self-reliant, as is my daughter Carly.

He passed on his ability to type like a sonofabitch with two fingers to my son, Josh. I can type pretty fast but use the home keys and all my fingers.

Dad was a good guitar player and singer. He made up some great songs but never wrote them down. So they died with him. I received his love of music but was not blessed with his ability to make it. Luckily, that talent was passed through me. All of my kids are musical. I have songs in my head but they quickly turn into poems.

Dad had terrible sinus problems. I can remember him being very sick with them and having to go to an ear, nose, and throat specialist in Spokane for very painful procedures. This was well before Claritin. He passed that condition down to us. We all suffer from allergies.

None of us received his resourcefulness. There was nothing he couldn’t fix. I doubt he ever paid an artisan to repair anything. In the early 1960s, he took his malfunctioning television to a repair shop. He was quoted a ridiculous amount to fix it. In those days televisions were repairable, and a television repairman had all the rectitude of today’s lawyer. Dad took the TV home, traced the schematic, and repaired it himself. He immediately enrolled in a correspondence course and before long he was a part-time television repairman. Because he was honest, word soon spread and he had more work than he could handle. He finally tired of middle-of-the-night calls and closed shop. He never taught me any of his handyman skills and in turn, my kids are equally helpless. He once said that once I got interested in fixing cars I would do nothing else. He always expected that I would make enough money to afford to pay others to fix my stuff. Bad plan dad.

Volume 2 will be posted tomorrow.

Heads or Tails - "Love Story" - 2/10/09

This is my first time participating at Barb's Heads or Tails. I probably couldn't have picked a worse time to join in. With Valentine's Day looming, this weeks prompt is predictably "Love Story". For many of us, Valentine's Day is the saddest holiday of all. I am certainly not qualified to write of love. I will leave it to the professionals. I have included some song titles that speak to me of love, or anti-love. It seems others have shared my experiences with love. I don't want to come off as bitter, that is not the case. Some people are not good at golf, I am not good at love. At least no one ever cut their ear off because of golf. That being said, at the end of this post is a photo of the only love that I can be absolutely certain of, unconditionally.

Love is a battlefield
Love don’t love me
Love hurts
Love and pain
Love is a mutt from hell
Love is dead
Love is a killer
Love in vain
I don’t want your love
Love is blue
Losers in love
Love don’t live here anymore
Love is a stranger
Love’s a hard game to play
Love is a cannibal
Love’s a deadly weapon
Love for sale
Love should be a crime
Love pains
Love will tear us apart
Love to see you cry
Love under fire
Love song for no one
Love on the rocks
Love crimes
Love really hurts
Love lies bleeding
Love kills
Love me no more
Love is the fall of every man
One sided love
Stranger to love
The love that we lost
Unlovable
Tainted love
When love dies
The end of a love affair
U don’t love me
Unforgiven love
When love and hate collide
Tough love
Too late for love
There must be more to love than this
Whatever happened to true love
Too much love will kill you
When love cries
She loves everybody
The line between love and hate
This can’t be love
This aint a love song
The trouble with love is
The remains of our love
There’s not much love here anymore
Love can knock you over
Love is nothing
What do you do when love dies
Wasted love
What is love
We’re sending our love down the well
Walk away from love
Used to love you
We don’t make love anymore
What the hell is love
The price of love
Victim of love
The lonely side of love
Unloved
The game of love
The love I never had
Violent love
Slap of love
Where did our love go
That aint love
When love turns to blue
When your lover has gone
Where does love go when it dies
String of bad love
When love fades
When you took your love away
When the wrong one loves you
When will I be loved
When love is over
So how come no one loves me
Sometimes love just aint enough
The girl I never loved
When love goes wrong
Suffocated love
Strange lover
Out of love
She loves me not
Should have loved me when you had the chance
So sad to watch good love go bad
Scars of love
She can’t love you
Never love again
Since you took your love away
Where has the love gone
Psycho love
I’m not your lover
Our love’s in danger
Nobody here to love
Prisoner of love
She don’t love you
Why don’t you love me
Without love
Wicked love
Where is the love
Price of love
Who needs love like that
One of us is in love
No love
Wounded in love
Pain is love
You don’t love me
Love’s so cruel
My love is dangerous
Who will love me now
You don’t know what love is
Only love can break your heart
One-sided love affair
You can’t make a heart love somebody
Woman without love
Never had a lover
Without your love
My lover’s gone
Love is rare
Love is strange
Never gonna fall in love again
Nobody loves me
No more love
Never felt love
Lovesick blues
Misery loves company
Never love you
Love is dangerous
Love fades
Love’s a loaded gun
Love’s unkind
Love and napalm
Far from love
Love ain’t worth making
Kiss your love goodbye
You’re not in love
You’re love is driving me crazy
You used to love me
You’ll never find another love
Love’s a slap in the face
Love bites
You took your love away from me
Life’s too short to love like that
You love me to hate you
Love and other bruises
You give love a bad name
Just wasn’t love
You say you don’t love me
It’s too late to love me now
It hurts like love
You don’t love me anymore
If you died I wouldn’t cry cause you never loved me anyway
I’m the man who murdered love
I’ll never fall in love again
I just don’t love you anymore
Hate to love
I’m not in love
I’m outta love
I wish I’d never loved you
I never loved you anyways
I love the dead
Love stinks
I don’t love you
He don’t love you
I love you like a ball and chain
I can’t be loved
Gone is my love
He loves you not
Falling out of love
Guess you didn’t love me
I don’t need love
I can’t make you love me
Your love is driving me crazy
Fractured love
Got love for sale
Gloomy love
Fool for your love
50 ways to leave your lover
After the love has gone
Aint Love a Bitch
Don’t kill for love
Desperate love
Faded love
Fools fall in love
Demolition love
All out of love
Don’t say you love me
Anti-Love Song
Betcha she don’t love you
Bye bye love
Chloroform the one you love
Casualty of love
Crazy love