Sep11

A Bit of Comparative Theology

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Every year around this time, people come down on the terrorists who attacked America 9-11-01, but when it’s all said and done and the politicians stop making speeches and the religious leaders calm down a bit, everyone smiles, pats one another on the back and says, “Well, when you get right down to it, Islam and Christianity aren’t all that different. They are both ‘legitimate ways to God.'”

Sure. Poodles and Pit Bulls are both legitimate breeds of dogs to. The problem lies in the way people judge the merits of various religions — by the behavior of the average adherents.

Radical Fundamentalist Christian

Sitting in an average Southern Baptist church at 11:00 AM on a typical Sunday morning isn’t going to show anyone much in the way of incredible devotion to Christ. That’s pretty much the story at most Methodist, Presbyterian, Episcopalian, and even Catholic services. These are the faithful Christians sittings in Grandma and Grandpa’s pew just like their mamas and daddies before them.

Most adherents of Islam are much the same way. The worshipers at afternoon prayers and Friday evening services at the vast majority of mosques are good, decent people who are worshiping Allah the way their daddies and mamas taught them growing up.

Radical Fundamentalist Muslim

Standing in the back of these mainstream, typical worship centers, a person would be tempted to wonder what all the fuss between Christians and Muslims is all about; however, NEVER judge the merits of a religion by the behavior of the typical and the mainstream. If you really want to know about the ins and outs of a faith, check out the lunatic fringe, the zealots, THE FUNDAMENTALISTS. This is where the differences between Christianity and Islam become wildly obvious.

In the simplest language possible, Christian Fundamentalists don’t fly fully loaded (fuel, cargo, and passengers) jumbo jets into some of a country’s most iconic buildings and kill three times the population of my hometown — Islamic Fundamentalists do. Yes, nuts like Eric Rudolph blow up abortion clinics and kill people, but the body count remains in the single digits. Some people will say death isn’t a “relative statistic.” Okay, ask 10,000 people in the world who Eric Rudolph is then ask the SAME 10,000 people anywhere in the world who Osama Bin Laden is. Compare numbers. Repeat ad nausem. I’ll bet the farm Binny will come out a long way ahead of Rudy.

Result of Radical Fundamentalist Christianity

Long before September 11th became a day of infamy, I once worked in a textile plant with an awesome Pakistani man named Javeid who was a devout, but not Fundamentalist, Muslim. He and I would have amicable debates about our beliefs. Even though he was harmless as a mouse himself, he’d grown up in the mean sections of Karachi. He knew Radical Islam up close and personal and he made a point with me that all these years later rings just as clearly as ever. He said, “Shannon, one day, Islam will conquer and destroy Christianity for one simple reason. Crazy Christians handle snakes and drink poison, but there aren’t many of them in the world. Crazy Muslims wear dynamite belts and carry AK-47s, and there are entire countries full of them.”

Result of Radical Islamic Fundamentalism

I don’t hate Muslims and I don’t turn a blind eye to the problems of Fundy Christians, but at the end of the day, I’d a lot rather have a member of the Tabernacle of Christ the King Church of God with Signs Following pissed off at me than be on the bad side of a member of a Wahhabi Mosque.

Something to think about while you wash you feet and remember the dead.

Love y’all.

Sep9

Always Right? Really?

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Were you BORN a jackass or did you have to take a class?

Recently, I was at Home Depot at the butt-crack of dawn so I wouldn’t have to deal with a lot of people. In and out in less than ten was the plan. All I needed was a small bag of mulch and soil to replenish Zelda’s habitat. I guess I didn’t come early enough.

This Cadillac driving old fart went in one door and I went in the other, but I ended up behind him in line. He had a folding ladder on a cart and LAST WEEK’S flyer in his hand. The young lady gave him the total at which point he flew into a rage, slammed the aforementioned flyer down on her counter, and began gesticulating wildly at a picture of a ladder similar to the one on his cart while screaming that the ladder was HALF that price!  I felt a familiar feeling creeping up my spine to the part of the brain that evolved when man had to kill big ol’ mammoths to survive. This guy was beginning to look awfully woolly to me.

The cashier tried to reason with the jerk by pointing out the flyer was for the TWO DAY sale that had ended days earlier and the ladder on his cart was NOT the ladder in the flyer anyway. Instead of acknowledging his mistake, Goober screams at her that he knows the flyer is outdated and the ladder isn’t the one advertised but he couldn’t come in during the sale because he was at the beach and now all the ladders in the flyer were gone  so he wanted the more expensive ladder TODAY  for the price in the flyer and he was the customer so he wanted it NOW.

I was just about to tap him on the shoulder and tell him people in Hell want ice water, and offer him a binkie so he’d leave and I could get my turtle’s mulch. Fortunately, a manager had heard the “debate” and asked the whining,  spray-tanned Baby Boomer to come  to the service desk. I paid for my $3.00 mulch, thanked the girl for being so incredibly patient with an obviously mentally deficient person and went on my way.

Driving home, the whole fiasco reminded me of an episode several years ago when I was on a date with Budge, at a eatery in Spartanburg. Our waitress was working the section alone because the other two girls called in “sick” and it was her FIRST night solo after a week of training. I told her to stay calm and not worry about us. Everything’d be alright.

The other patrons had some differences of opinion. One couple was on an early-in-the-relationship date and oblivious to time passing because they had so entranced each other. A family with two children in diapers got up and left without eating once the little ones began a full-scale meltdown. The three other tables didn’t say much.

That left one particular old fart who berated that poor waitress every chance he got. He sent his food back twice and his wife’s back once. His glass was never full enough. On and on and on for nearly two hours. Finally, he and his wife took their bill straight to the manager and began relating a tale of woe. I only caught snatches of the conversation, but the gist was the waitress was incompetent and an idiot to boot and he demanded a complementary meal or he’d “call corporate.”

The manager folded like a cheap lawn chair when a fat man sits in it, comes back to the section and starts apologizing and fussing over everyone and offering free desserts and all sorts of what not. Then she goes in the back where the waitress has just disappeared when the girl returned, she was trying hard to keep from bursting into tears. The manager reappeared and came over to our table and started her spiel about how sorry she was for the poor service, etc, etc.

I put my hand up and said, “Ma’am, sit down please. I need to explain something to you.” She looked funny at me but she complied and I told her what I’ve told several other jackasses in restaurants since then. I said,

“Ma’am, I’m sitting at a nice table with my beloved. In a little bit, that little girl is going to BRING food to me that’ll be hot, delicious, AND four times more than enough for one meal. We just sit her and wait. On the other hand, my daddy ate twenty year old C-Rations unheated and covered with flies and mosquitoes because it’s what he had in Vietnam. Right now, a gang of little boys and girls are scrounging a massive garbage dump outside Guatemala City for rotten fruit, moldy bread, and maybe a few bones with a scrap of green meat on them to eat. Finally, I could take you in my car not ten miles from here to a group under a bridge trying to fix a bit of stew that will be all they’ll eat tonight and most of tomorrow. I don’t want free dessert, I don’t want a complementary meal, and I surely don’t care what that ignorant jackass who just left said. That girl has worked like a galley slave doing the best she could and I guarantee that jerk didn’t even leave her a quarter for a tip. Thankfully, Mama and Granny raised me to be grateful and generous so I’ll make up for his lack of manners.”

You're not the King or Queen of England. Be nice to each other.

I had a lot more money then AND I’d just gotten my paycheck for the month so I laid a $100 bill on the table, told the waitress to keep the change, took Budge by the hand and walked our happy asses to the car.

I’m nothing special, but I do know one thing. Just because someone is serving you in some capacity, you do not have the right to make their life a little piece of Hell. Stick your thumb in your mouth, suck it up, be thankful for what you’ve got, and act like you’ve got some raising. We are all in this together. Some of us are just more blessed or just plain luckier than others.

Keep that in mind this weekend and make sure to keep those feet clean.

Love y’all.

Sep7

Say Hello to Ed the SpEd Kitty

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Ed is one lucky, and very special, cat!

Ed is a new member of our family of furry babies! When we lost Loki to a tumor, Dr. Melanie, our vet, asked me if I would consider adopting a special needs cat. Budge and I had already decided not to adopt any more kittens because kittens generally are easily adoptable, but older cats often don’t find good homes. With that in mind, I met Ed.

He began life as a contented farm cat living outside all the time. Back at the beginning of summer, he disappeared from his home for seven straight days. When he finally managed to drag — literally drag — himself home, he was in bad shape.

Exactly what happened is one of those unanswerable questions. He might have run into a dog, a particularly vicious cat, or some wild animal. Whatever had attacked him left a wound the size of a half-dollar in the left hand side of his neck. By the time he made it home, the wound had become infested with maggots, which actually might have saved him. Since many maggots only eat dead tissue, they kept the wound cleaner and freer of infection than it would have been otherwise. He was still in serious trouble, though.

His owner brought him to Cedar Lake Animal Hospital and told Dr. Melanie to euthanize him. Dr. Melanie is an awesome vet and something about Ed’s demeanor and the look in his eyes made her refuse to kill him. She told the owner Ed was savable and, even though he’d likely have some neurological damage, he’d likely recover. The owner was adamant that she wanted Ed “put down” because she said she, “DIDN’T WANT A RETARDED CAT.” Well, Dr. Melanie is a pretty imposing figure (she’s over 6′ tall and broad-shouldered) and she loves animals so she managed to “persuade” the owner to sign over Ed’s rights to the hospital.

She treated Ed immediately. The major wound was left open to heal from the inside out, which it did quite nicely after about a month. The first week, though, Dr. Melanie thought she might have made a mistake. Ed could scarcely stand up. When he tried to walk, he would wander in circles, and he drooled constantly. After doing all she could do for him, she turned him over to Mrs. Donita, a local lady who does an awesome job fostering injured animals and getting them up and going again. She spent a month working with Ed and he gradually stopped drooling and managed to get around, even if he did have a tendency to “pull to the left” a bit as a car alignment tech might say.

The Monday after Budge returned from her month in Hawaii, we went to get Ed. We brought him home and set him up in the spare bedroom with his own litter box, food, and water station. We wanted him to be able to acclimate to his new settings gradually. He was able to eat, groom, and use his litter box, so I was hopeful. I was really pulling for him anyway since I know what it feels like to be unwanted because of some differences.

Three weeks later, Ed is doing tremendously! His eyes once had markedly different sized pupils, but they have come closer and closer to normal since we took him. He can walk perfectly straight and even run when the mood hits him. He does have a tendency to fall over on his side when he shakes his head, but he pops right back up and keeps on. He’s started playing with the other cats and they have accepted him very well. I still feed him alone, however, because I have one little one who is a serious piggy and will gently move anyone out of the way to take over a food bowl. Also, Ed eats soft food instead of dry and feeding all my boys soft food would quickly deplete our meager budget. Finally, Ed’s a really messy eater. I don’t mind, but it helps keeping the mess confined to one room. He also maintains his own litter box in his room because he is VERY particular about his box.

He’s doing extremely well, but he does have some reminders of his ordeal. His meow and purr are extremely deep and rough because of the damage to his throat. He walks somewhat stiffly with his back legs and even though he can get DOWN from the bed, couch, table, ect, quite easily, he doesn’t yet have the coordination to jump UP to surfaces yet. Then there’s his head tilt. As you can tell in the picture, he has a more or less permanent tilt to his head. It’s always turned about thirty degrees to his left, giving him a somewhat eternally quizzical expression. I find it endearing.

Ed has been through A LOT. What he’s endured would have killed many lesser beings, but he’s still trucking and we are delighted and blessed to have him as part of the family. He’s a survivor and hopefully, he’ll just keep improving more and more each day! Whenever he’s lying on my chest or lap, he has that purr rumbling that Mrs. Donita said sounded like, “a hot rod ’57 Chevy sitting at a stoplight,” I think about all he’s been through and I’m so glad Dr. Melanie thought of us when she needed a permanent home for him. He’s our little special ed Ed.

Love you, and don’t forget those feet, y’all!

Sep4

Happy 6th Decade, Daddy!

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Daddy as a toddler.

As hard as it is for me to believe it, Daddy turns 60 years old today. I’m betting it’s as much a surprise to him as it is to me since I’ve heard him say on more than one occasion that if he’d known he was going to live this long, he’d have taken better care of himself! It’s a mite too late for that now, Daddy.

Country Music Hall of Fame member Waylon Jennings could very well have had Daddy in mind when Waylon sang the words to one of his most famous songs, “Them that don’t know him won’t like him and them that do sometimes don’t know how to take him. He ain’t wrong; he’s just different but his pride won’t let him do things to make you think he’s right.” A better summary of my father’s general attitude towards life doesn’t exist.

Daddy was born on Labor Day in 1950. Granny had lost my Aunt Judy to death in the hospital two years earlier without ever getting to bring her home. Since Daddy was so healthy and easily delivered, he quickly became the apple of Granny Wham’s eye and he maintained that position for 58 years until she passed away. Daddy was Granny Wham’s heart and pretty much the center of her world. That may seem a wonderful thing, but in many ways, being the center of anyone’s universe is a heavy burden to bear. Granny was so happy to have her bouncing baby boy that early on, she started smothering him with love and attention. It may seem ironic, but a person can be “loved to death” in some senses. That’s a story for another time, though.

Daddy was the typical All-American Baby Boomer boy. He played Termite League baseball for Fountain Inn, roughhoused with the abundance of cousins on Papa Wham’s side of the family, and generally seemed to have a bucolic and idyllic childhood. He and Papa Wham went rabbit hunting together on the few occasions Papa was able to tear himself away from the service station he ran on Main Street and slowly but surely, Daddy grew into a teenager.

Daddy at 18.

When Daddy was 15 and Mama was 13, they met at a local hangout called Curry’s Lake. I don’t know about love at first sight or any tripe like that . . . especially considering what came later . . . but they managed to hit it off well enough to start dating.

Now, as a teen, Daddy had a problem I would later inherit from him — he was a trouble magnet. Some people can fall into a vat of Limburger cheese on a hot July day and still emerge smelling like a sweet spring breeze. Daddy, and later I, had the opposite ability. We could fall into a vat of Chanel #5 and come out smelling like the north end of a south bound skunk. My daddy wasn’t a mean person. He didn’t have a mean bone in his body. If he had any fault it was an undying loyalty to his handful of true friends. Loyalty like that, paired with our atrocious luck, can get a body into mischief. It did Daddy.

Something happened when Daddy was 17. The details depend entirely on whom one asks and I’ve asked enough to reach the point of saying “to Hell with it,” because no two stories match, but the outcome remains the same and if you get a hole in your foot, it doesn’t much matter if a nail or a knife caused it. You just know it hurts. To clear things up, Daddy enlisted in the US Army on his 18th birthday. Enlisting in the Army in 1969 meant one thing and one thing only — an all expenses paid “vacation” to the cesspool called Vietnam.

Before Daddy shipped out, however, he or Mama or both had decided that Daddy might get killed and they’d never see each other again, so someone came up with the bright idea for them, 18 and 16 years old respectively, to get married. Looking back, that turned out not such a good idea, but, as I’ve learned over the last many years, you can’t unbreak eggs. Daddy left his young bride and his family on the tarmac at Greenville Airport on Easter Sunday. I’ve been told that Papa Wham, a veteran of three years of awfully bloody fighting in WWII, told Daddy with tears streaming down his checks that  if Daddy said the word, Papa would put him on a plane to Canada and Daddy would be safe from what Papa seemed to sense coming. That’s another one of those unanswerables life tends to throw us now and again.

Daddy didn’t go to Canada. He went to Vietnam and spent 13 muddy, bloody months in the Central Highlands of the I-Corp region of that godforsaken hell hole driving an M48A3 Patton main battle tank or one of the M113 APC variations up and down the rutted pig-trails that passed for roads in Vietnam’s fourth world backwaters. He did his duty and he did it well. He also had to see a lot that 18-19 year old boys weren’t meant to see. Things no one this side of Hell is meant to see. He lost a lot of good friends. I know some of their names, but not many. Daddy seldom speaks of those 13 months. When I was smaller and starry-eyed with the “glory of battle” and tanks and airplanes, I’d ask Daddy questions. His face would get cloudy. I finally gained enough sense to stop asking by the time I was an early teen. Once he thought I was old enough, he told me some things that occurred. Then I knew why he’d never talked about it before.

Daddy returned from Vietnam a drastically changed man. He was home just long enough to see me born January 6, 1971 before he shipped out to West Germany to finish his enlistment. In its own way, Germany in the ’60s had just as much to offer in the way of pitfalls as Vietnam did, but the enemy was even subtler than the VC. In any event, Daddy came home for good in 1972. He and Mama bought a single-wide trailer and set it up on Granny Wham’s home place.

Daddy went to work at Laurens Glass Works. Back then, drinks, pickles, and anything else worth packaging came in GLASS bottles. Daddy made those bottles. To this day, if I see an old Coke or Pepsi bottle, I’ll snatch it up and turn it bottoms up looking for the “L” in the glass that signified that bottle had its birth down in Laurens. Daddy was blue-collar and dependable to perfection. He always paid his bills on time and kept a nice roof over my head. If he had a bit of money left, he’d buy a six-pack of Miller High Life for himself. If money was short, he didn’t. I was small, but the message I got from Daddy was always unsaid but crystal clear — a man takes care of his responsibilities before his pleasures. That’s how he lived his life.

Of course, somewhere along the way, things went south for Mama and Daddy. I could go into details, but this isn’t the time nor the place and in the grand scheme of things, what difference does it really make? Some of it was the ghosts of Vietnam some of it was other things. The long and the short of it is, it was a damn mess. I really think Daddy and Mama both tried to keep me in the dark so I wouldn’t worry, but that’s one of the disadvantages to being precocious. Anyhow, Mama and Daddy parted ways for good in the late 1970s. The divorce was final a little later on. I’ve always hated it happened, but in the end, it’s another one of those unanswerable questions of life.

Daddy started his next stage of life by marrying my stepmom, Teresa. He and she worked together at the glass plant and they seemed to have a lot in common. I didn’t see Daddy as much in those days. It was complicated. Still, I would spend some weekends with them and we always went to Santee-Cooper for a fishing vacation in the summer. I’d spend Christmas Eve with Mama and Daddy would pick me up on Christmas morning to go to Granny and Papa Wham’s house.

I grew up. Daddy and I didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things as I got older and since we are so much alike in more than just looks, neither one of us was going to give the other one the satisfaction of backing down. Things would have been a lot easier if I’d cared more about having a good relationship with my father and less about being right, but that’s one of those broken eggs it’s a waste of time to cry over. We aren’t as close as it would have been nice to be, but, especially since I married Budge, we don’t fuss much anymore — not that we’ve forgotten how, mind you — but things have changed. Lot of water. Lot of lost opportunities. Lot of missed communication. It’s still a bit of a mess, but it is what it is.

Daddy at 60.

When the Glass Plant shut down, it was a tremendous blow to Daddy. He’d put more than 20 years of his life into that place and now, at nearly 50, he had to start over again. He went to technical college. I helped him a little with some courses and he started a new career as a HVAC tech and then as a maintenance man. It wasn’t the same though and he never was as satisfied so he worked out an early retirement deal and got away from the stress those jobs put on him. I think it added ten or fifteen years to his life.

These days, Daddy takes it a little easier. He has to. Fortunately, after all these years of being haunted by the specters that came home with him from Vietnam, he’s gotten some help from some professionals. I know he hated every minute of it because saying Daddy is a VERY independent man is about like saying the Great Wall of China has a few bricks. It just doesn’t get the point across. He doesn’t travel far from home. He’s pretty well got a route worked out that he rides most days and sees to what he wants to see to. In his spare time, he raises goats.

Today, though, Daddy is 60. He’s carved out his own path in life and he’s managed to secure a pretty safe future for himself and Teresa as the get older. He got me grown, gone, and married and now he’s done the same for my little brother, Nick. Everyone might not care for the way he’s lived his life or the way he’s done things, but if you call him on it, he’ll happily tell you to go to hell. Trust me, I know this.

Of course, as either of us will gladly tell you, Nick nor I matter very much anymore. That’s because Mason Benjamin came along nearly a year ago. Daddy is now Papa and though he isn’t very comfortable around babies, we all know that in a couple of years, when Mason is old enough to toddle around after Papa, Teresa and Mrs. Miller will have a hard time on their hands getting hold of the little one for any great length of time. I know what the little fellow is in for. Daddy’s got a lot of lessons to teach him. He taught them to me and then to Nick.

My daddy is a very special man. He’s not huggy, touchy feely by any means, but he is honest, hardworking, and loyal to those who have proven their loyalty to him. I wouldn’t say he is easy either to get to know or to understand. He likes it that way. It keeps people guessing. I once told Teresa I didn’t think Daddy liked me very much. She said, “Your daddy loves you dearly; he just isn’t great at showing it.” Again, it is what it is.

I’m glad I have Daddy as my father. If you ever meet him, call him Frankie. Never make the mistake of referring to him as “Mr. Wham.” He’ll tell you the same thing I or Nick would and that’s Mr. Wham is buried next to the only Mrs. Wham near the front of Beulah Baptist Church Cemetery. He ain’t wrong . . . he’s just different. Seeing as how I took so much of that from him myself. It’s a little easier now to appreciate.

If you read this, I love you, Daddy, and hope you have a great birthday!

And I hope the rest of you have a great day as well.

Love y’all, and don’t forget to wash your feet.

Sep1

Coo coo ca choo, Mr. Brady!

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Mr. Brady circa 1989. He taught me Algebra II and Calculus. Finest math teacher ever.

Fate, if you believe in it, is an odd and capricious thing.

If Larry Brady had been able to fold proper paper airplanes, I would never have learned calculus in high school, so I would have been forced to take it in college — most likely with a thickly accented professor — and failed it miserably thereby not finishing my degree and likely dooming myself to a life of more misery and failure than I already have endured.

I guess one could safely say I owe a lot to Mr. Brady.

Budge and I were talking about math last night. Why, I don’t know. It’s one of those strange conversations married people have. Anyway, Budge HATES math. I blame Dad. Patience is not one of Dad’s cardinal virtues. He scarred her for life when he tried helping her with her algebra homework.

So we were talking about different kinds of math and Budge mentioned that she didn’t understand trigonometry. In about 15 minutes, I’d explained to her what it was, who used it, and why. I also gave her a rundown on mnemonics for the main trig functions. She wanted to know why it was so easy for me to learn and remember all this when she’d had such an impossible time with her high school math classes.

I answered her, “That’s easy; you never had Mr. Brady for a math teacher.”

As he explained to us in class in one of the precious few moments we managed to bump him slightly off topic, had Mr. Brady managed to conquer paper airplane origami at North Carolina State University, he would have pursued a degree and career as an aeronautic engineer. Unfortunately, he couldn’t get the hang of folding the paper the way this particular professor wanted it folded so he changed his major to mathematics and ended up, somehow, as a teacher. I’m not certain on the mechanism of fate, but I do know that fortuitous alignment of the stars resulted in a generation of math students at Laurens District 55 High School being blessed without measure by putting one of the most gifted instructors to every pick up a blue Marks-A-Lot overhead pen into the classroom.

Lest anyone reading this think Mr. Brady was so memorable because he was easy, happy-go-lucky, loosey-goosey, and tried being our friend, PLEASE get a grip. Mr. Brady had a dry sense of humor, genuinely enjoyed teaching, and loved three things above all else — basketball, math, and his two daughters, one of whom was my classmate.

He was friendly, but he was a teacher first. He was one of the most organized human beings I ever met — at least in the classroom. Most of all though, he was decidedly NOT an easy teacher. Earning Cs in his class was honorable, Bs were a sign of hard work, and As — well, As in Mr. Brady’s class were the Maltese Falcons of the LDHS55 math department.

What made Mr. Brady unique was his ability to teach any concept, no matter how abstract or outrageous, to anyone. I am convinced, within two semesters, he could teach a lab rat to play “Ode to Joy” on a miniature grand piano. He knew no less than five ways to do any problem. If, by chance, a brain-dead stoner in one of his classes couldn’t “get it” using one of those five ways, Mr. Brady didn’t get mad or frustrated — he made up a sixth way on the spot, just like he made up all his classroom examples — on the spot. Now, in case that doesn’t impress you, try making up a problem involving L’Hopital’s Rule on the spur of the moment to get an answer that is neat and easy to use as a teaching example.

He was amazing.

Lest anyone think Mr. Brady was one of those Ivory Tower Birds who could only teach the cream of the crop, be advised that he taught EVERYTHING in the math department. Remedial Mathematics to AP Calculus, he taught them all with the same passion and expertise. He was one of the minuscule fraction of teachers who could — and would — teach all students well and without complaint.

We spend a lifetime trying to forget some teachers. Others, we remember, but for all the wrong reasons. We recall many personalities, but precious little of the subject matter they once imparted to us. Mr. Brady wasn’t like that at all. I suppose the best way to finally impress upon you the man’s ability as an educator is to reveal that I made a 3 on the AP Calculus “AB” Exam at the end of his class. I can’t remember how many of us passed with a 3 or better, but it was a typically phenomenal ratio for his calculus classes. He taught me so well and so thoroughly that I still maintain some knowledge of calculus today — 21 years later — having never found a reason to use it.

The man was good. He was a teacher par excellance and I hope that, wherever he is today and whatever he’s doing (he’s retired, but that’s all I know), he’s reaping a generous reward for making two otherwise unbearable years a little brighter for me.

Good on ya’, Mr. Brady, wherever you are!

Love y’all and don’t remember to wash your feet.

Author’s Update September 6, 2006: When I first published this entry on my blog, I sent a copy to Mr. Brady’s daughter, Sally, to pass on to her dad since I didn’t know where he was living or any of his contact information. Sally wrote me back telling me how much she appreciated the tribute, but that she would be unable to pass it on to her father. Unbeknown to me, and to my great and lasting sorrow, Mr. Larry Brady — finest math teacher ever to pace the classroom — passed away in January of 2006 after a series of strokes. I had no idea.  Resquiescat In Pace, Mr. Brady, and thank you so much.

Aug18

We Have a Runner!

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I always loved the First Day of School when I was teaching. Something ALWAYS happened and the events ran the gamut from tragic to downright surreal. As good as my first day stories are; however, they can’t touch the stories Budge comes home with each and every year.

Budge teaches 4th grade six minutes from our house, which I always thought was extremely unfair, but these days it means more sleep for both of us. Anyway, she has a plethora of great tales because, well . . . let’s be honest, the little ones are a sight cuter than the older, bigger models I was used to dealing with.

One year, she and the rest of the 4th and 5th grade teachers were stationed at the intersection of their halls with the main hall directing traffic and making sure everyone got to the right room. The crowd had thinned out noticeably when one of the teachers, Mary, caught site of a backpack wearing a little boy. He couldn’t look up for the size of his shiny new Jansport pack, but he was obviously WAY too small for 3rd, 4th, or 5th grade and that was all that was down on this end of the building.

Mary stopped him and knelt down to look at him and she said, “Now what grade are you in young man?” He replied, and I’ll attempt spelling his pronunciation, “Kinoorgaren!” Apparently, he had been standing in the huge mass of students waiting for the instructions to start to class from the atrium holding pens when everyone started to move. Since he could only see the floor beneath his feet and just a few feet beyond, he fell in with one herd and followed along . . . to the COMPLETELY wrong end of the building. K5, 1st, and 2nd grades were on the other end of the main hall, at least a good football field away. When Mary and one of the other teachers gently turned him around and adjusted the straps on the bookbag so that he had a full field of vision, they pointed to his correct destination . . . and he sat down and began crying tears of heartrending grief. Budge said she felt so sorry for him because, to one his size, that was and expeditionary length hike.

Ruefully, he stood up, dried his tears, and set off towards the far reaches of Robert E. Cashion Elementary, a regular little Admiral Perry or Shackleton resigned to his fate. Luckily, he had been missed in his class and one of the dear, sweet, long-suffering K5 aides had been dispatched to recover him. She intercepted him about a third of the way into his journey and, taking the bookbag from him and extending her hand, which he gladly took, lead him to the land of coloring book, cookies, and sandboxes.

Now, as touching as that story was, this one is downright sidesplitting to me. I hope it doesn’t fall into the “you had to be there” category for all y’all.

This first day had gone without incident for the most part, but after lunch, the school secretary came on the PA in a somewhat strained if not downright panicked voice and said, “Mrs. Wagner (the assistant principal), please go to the first grade hall IMMEDIATELY.” Jen had gone to the same high school as Budge, albeit a few years ahead of her, and had run track. That fact, and the fortuitous choice she had made that day to eschew here usual high heels for more sensible flats, saved the day.

To quote several of my favorite students, “What had happened was!” Budge later found out was one of the first graders, a little boy, apparently didn’t care much for school. The day had progressed along quite well as the afflicted teacher pointed out. She’d been going over stuff, they’d had a bathroom break, and generally engaged in many of the time-honored tasks of the first day. One particularly diminutive tow-headed lad; however, had politely raised his hand at least three times and announced to the teacher, “Ma’am, I’d like to go home now, please. I don’t much like it here.” Well, she had been kind to him and explained that he’d need to stay since he was a big boy now and had many things to learn.

Lunch had come and gone and the class was back to working when the little one again said, “Ma’am, I really would like to go home. I’m tired of sitting.” Again, his new status as an engaged learner on the way to becoming a productive citizen was pointed out to him upon which he nodded and the teacher went back to going from student to student engaging in some task. Her teacher radar went off and she jerked up just in time to see the classroom door quietly click shut while a sea of horrified first grade eyes looked on.

Normally, this wouldn’t be cause for alarm, BUT, this particular classroom was next to one of the six emergency doors in the school. Sure enough, she heard the buzzer go off as someone tripped the alarm. Obviously unable to leave the ninety and nine to go look for the one lost lamb, she called the office in an absolute state of mortification resulting in the aforesaid PA announcement and Mrs. Wagner’s re-entrance into the world of distance running.

When Jen got to the classroom, the teacher gave an instantaneous summary of the foregone events and out the door Jen went. Just in time as it turned out. Even though this little one was quite short of leg, he was determined in his course and steadfast in his decision– having asked nicely four times and being refused — to GO HOME. Budge’s school sits about fifty yards off a main county road. Fifty yards is a long way for a little guy, but e’en so, his new school sneakers had already touched asphalt and he was looking both ways to get his bearings by the time Mrs. Wagner caught up with him.

Being an extremely well-mannered youngster, he didn’t put up any fuss when Jen called his name and held out her hand. He merely took the pro-offered palm with a sigh only the thwarted can know, and allowed himself to be lead back to the office. Lest you be worried for the child’s safety, he was not punished. Mama was called and excused herself from work long enough to come to the school and sternly, firmly, but very lovingly explained to our erstwhile adventurer that he must, in fact, remain in school for the majority of the next twelve years. She praised him for being polite but reiterated that, polite or not, he was NEVER to duplicate his actions again. Then, with a hug and kiss on the forehead, Mama returned to her office and the little lad, in the company of Mrs. Wagner, returned to class, where he did, in the end, have a good year and proved to be a capable and intelligent student who was eventually quick with the answer — from the back corner of the room opposite the door.

After all, no need to take chances!

Have a great year all teachers.

Love all, y’all and don’t forget to wash those feet!

Aug5

Didn’t Get the Memo

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My Budge has been out-of-town for the last three weeks, so I’ve not thought about getting a haircut since how I look is much more important to her than it is to me; however, when I looked in the mirror yesterday and saw Bozo the Clown looking back, it was time to go see Roger or Bobby down at Hall’s Barbershop. Hall’s is an amazing anachronism owned and operated by a fourth generation of Hall men. “Grandpa” Hall opened the shop back in the early 1930s, then “Pop” Hall learned from him and took over when he retired and, after nearly 60 years of cutting hair, Pop retired and now three of his sons: Perry, Don, and Roger and two of Perry’s sons: Lee and Bobby. It’s a great place to get a HAIRCUT and not a HAIRSTYLE. It’s also one of a dying breed.

Of course, none of that has anything to do with this story other than the setting where I ran into my buddy. Seeing him reminded me of a story I love to tell.

I cannot use any names in this story because I like my house intact and not incinerated, and I’d like to have a chance to make it to old age. Mentioning names would be detrimental to any of that occurring. Anyway, this buddy of mine has a precious wife (not as precious as Budge, but who is?) who is friendly and warm and caring and about as sharp as a sack of hammers. Actually, she is quite academically intelligent, but when I met her, I realized I’d found, after a lengthy quest, ONE person with less common sense than I have. Still, she’s a wonderful person . . . just a little slow out of the mental gate at times.

For instance, several years ago, the two of them went on a ten-day Alaskan cruise. While they were packing, she turned to my buddy with a cute little bikini in her hands and asked him to put it in the suitcase. He looked at her and said, “Honey, we’re going to Alaska remember? You know, polar bears? Igloos?” She looked him dead in the eye and, with complete seriousness said, “You said we were leaving from a port so I thought we’d go by the Caribbean on our way to Alaska and I could lay out in the sun on deck.” We live in South Carolina.

Trying to keep a straight face, he replied, “Honey, we’re leaving from GREENVILLE AIRPORT.” She said, “Yeah, so?”

Geography . . . it’s not taught as much anymore.

Another time, my buddy got a call at work. It was his lovely, at the time, fiancée’. She said, “Baby, when you heat up soup on the stove, how do you get the Tupperware gunk off the stove eye?” This was not long after she LITERALLY burned water trying to boil eggs.

Still, crazy as all that may sound, her crowning glory came about six years ago in the spring of the year. My buddy was taking her out for breakfast not too long after sunrise. This happened to be the day after the biennial time change. You know, “Spring forward, Fall back”? Well, they were driving into the sunrise and this precious young wife turned to her husband and said, in all sweetness, sincerity and seriousness,

“Hon, I’ve always wondered . . . how does the Sun know it has to come up an hour earlier in the Spring and an hour later in the Fall?”

Life is often much stranger than fiction can ever be!

Love y’all! Don’t forget to wash your feet! 🙂

Aug3

Happy Anniversary, Budge!

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Put a diamond next to a lump of coal and it shines that much brighter. Wasn't she gorgeous? She still is!

It’s been 14 years today since Budge and I married; I have a hard time remembering much before August 3, 1996. I know it sounds clichéd and sappy, but it seems like Dana has always been with me. She found me a long time before I found her. To hear her tell the story, she knew I was coming nearly a year before I did. I’m going to try to explain that last sentence, and I hope I don’t mess it up or she’ll have my hide. This story is the last remaining reason I cling to the little faith I have left. Without exaggeration, it’s the most important story in our marriage.

Dana’s mom, Faye, passed away unexpectedly in July 1993, the summer between Dana’s freshman and sophomore years of high school. The next two years were a dark time for my Budge. See, Dad is a great guy, smart, funny, but he is fully capable of overlooking important stuff right in front of his face. To complicate things more, he was trying to get his new business off the ground and, after about five months, he was seeing Dana’s future stepmother, Sandy. (She and Dad met in the waiting room of the hospital ICU where her husband was dying with the exact same illness as Faye. That’s a tremendous story too, but it’s for later.) Her only other close kin was Rich, her brother, and he was in the Navy moving around constantly.

Without going in to the gory details, Dana was alone. She was alone A LOT. I can’t describe the intensity of the loneliness she felt because every time I think about it — every time we discuss those days — I end up in tears for an hour or so then I want to go strangle someone because she had to endure such. Just to give you one tiny snippet, if EVER in 14 years I have had to be away from Budge at suppertime, I make as many phone calls as it takes to guarantee she has someone to eat supper with. It might be one of her friends, it might be Mama, but frost will form on the hinges of Hell before my wife eats another meal alone without choosing to. She does choose to sometimes, but she doesn’t HAVE to and as long as I’m above dirt, I’ll make damn sure she never has too again.

But that’s just a side note. Here’s the real story.

First of all you have GOT to know, by the time Dana and I met, I was engaged not once or twice, but SIX times. I was actually, technically engaged to another girl when Budge and I got together. Now before anyone brands my dear heart a homewrecker, you MUST understand my “Rules of Engagement.” Except for my first fiancée’ who was my high school sweetheart and first real love, I never intended to marry ANY of the girls I gave diamonds to. I was skittish of females in general after the aforementioned sweetheart shattered my heart into a gadjillion tiny shards and then stomped those shards into dust then swept the dust into an incinerator to be completely consumed (I’m not bitter or anything, just saying). I simply realized that at some point in a relationship, the girls started to want to, as Emeril says, “Kick things up a notch” in the commitment department. I then discovered if I gave them a diamond, they considered us to be engaged and started planning a wedding and left me the hell alone. (Did I ever mention I hate two things above all else? Turnip greens and emotional confrontations.) So, the diamonds bought me a lot of peace and sooner or later the girls always decided I wasn’t the prize they had taken me for so they’d hand me back the diamond and break up with me . . . which was totally fine, because it was THEM doing it, not me. Worked like a champ . . . until Budge.

Budge handled that particular strategy a wee bit differently, but that’s another story entirely.

(Just as an aside, if any of y’all other five former diamond bearers are by some miracle reading this , don’t start hating. I’ve clandestinely kept up with all of you and you’ve done just fine without me.)

But I digress.

Dana was alone a lot and she hated it, so she’d often ride up to her old elementary school and sit on top of the slide in the playground and think . . . and pray. She’d do this day or night, didn’t matter. Well, one night, she was in a particularly sad and lonely mood and she looked up at the stars and prayed for the Lord to send her someone to take away the loneliness.

Now, if the story ended there and we got married, it’d be a nice “Awww” moment but no big deal that couldn’t pooh-pooh away by appealing to coincidence. It ain’t like that. Here’s where things go from a Hallmark moment to hairs standing up on my arms like they are doing now. See, Budge didn’t want just anyone. She’s always been awesome that way. Sure she was lonely, but she didn’t plan on settling for any old yahoo. Then, as now, she knew EXACTLY what she wanted and she asked the Lord to send her this exact person.

She wanted someone older, definitely not her own age. Dana has always been an “old soul” and boys her age were just too immature. She wanted him to be stocky, just a little bit taller than her, and have blond hair and blue eyes. Still, not too much to keep the faith by, but I’m seven years older than Budge, I do happen to be stocky (well, I was stocky then. I’m a little rounder than stocky these days), I’m 5′ 10′ to her 5′ 9′ and I’ve got blond hair and blue eyes that she tells me change shades of blue with my mood and the lighting.

Well, then she wanted a guy who had been “around.”

Now, watch me dance around this subject with all the grace of a bear in a ballroom. Budge and her circle of friends were very good girls. With an exception or maybe two, they graduated high school and in most cases, college with their virtue unspotted. They didn’t drink. They didn’t party. The didn’t smoke, and they certainly didn’t sleep around. Wasn’t any of this modern-day “hooking up” crap where so many teen (and tween, sadly)  girls and boys seem to run around with mattresses tied to their backs. The bases hadn’t been moved up like they are now.

With that in mind, Budge — ever the levelheaded practical minded amazing lady that she is — figured it would be best if someone knew exactly what to do on their wedding night and honeymoon and since it wasn’t going to be her, it would have to be him. Okay, this one hit a bit closer to home and I was a little indignant at the implications, but it would be pointless to lie. While I was certainly not a manwhore in my younger and less judiciously minded days, I had accumulated enough “experience” to meet her criteria. Now, moving right along.

If you still aren’t convinced, don’t worry, neither was I until Budge dropped the A-Bomb. She had been friends with one of the most popular guys in school. He was the guy who could sit at any table in the lunchroom, be it Jocks, Goths, Stoners, Preps, anyone. He and Dana were never romantic. She just liked him as the cool and kind person he was. He was such a tremendous part of the school that his death in a one car wreck caused massive emotional devastation to everyone from the teachers on down.

Now, I told you that to tell you this, when my Budge was sitting atop that slide, asking for her future husband in such exquisite detail, she remembered him. She always adored the sound of his name and figured — as long as she was asking — she wanted her husband to be named Shannon. If Paul Harvey was still alive and telling this, he’d say, “and now you know the rest of the story.”

How I ended up with a wife like her God knows because I’ve done nothing to deserve her. In 2 years of dating and  14 years of marriage , I’ve asked Budge thousands of times what she could have possibly seen in me to make her want to risk all she did and give up all she did to marry me. She’s consistently given me the same answer, “I asked for you by name, Silly Goose, and you can’t not marry the man you specifically asked for when he shows up.”

And that’s why I still believe in miracles.

Happy 14th anniversary, Budge! I still love you muches.

Love all y’all too, don’t forget to wash your feet!

Jul31

Woolly Bully, Woolly . . . Boom!

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Not mine, but a very accurate representation! Color's perfect, but the wheels are wrong.

When I was 15 years old, Daddy sold his boat and bought me a 1979 Mustang Ghia. Aunt Cathy called and told me to get up to Granny and Papa’s as soon as I could. I was afraid something was wrong because I really wasn’t expecting Aunt Cathy to be at Granny and Papa’s. I told Mama she hustled me out to the car and up the road we went in a pouring down rain. I should have suspected something because Mama was acting entirely too calm for anything to be gravely amiss.

We turned onto Weathers Circle, and I saw Daddy’s black Chevy truck, Papa’s slate blue Comet station wagon, Granny’s blue Ford LTD, Cathy’s gold Oldsmobile, and a white Mustang.  We pulled in and I tore into the house expecting to find everything in a state of panic with Granny or Papa on the floor and Daddy or Cathy huddled over them. Instead, everyone was sitting down smiling. I was so confused. Then Daddy said, “So, boy, how do you like your car?”

Okay, I may have been second in my class of 399, but I could be a mite slow on the uptake.

I asked him, “What car?”

He said, “The Mustang you passed on your way in here.”

Epiphany! I turned to see Mama smiling too. She HAD known. She and Daddy talked and she’d agreed to pay my insurance if Daddy bought the car. I couldn’t stop shaking as I walked to the driveway oblivious to the fact that I was getting wet. It could have been raining flaming camel dung and I wouldn’t have noticed. This white, four wheeled goddess was my car. I had just vaulted to the tiptop of the pecking order among my friends. All the other first cars I’d seen were rattletrap jalopies one good pothole away from the junkyard while I had a barely used Mustang with the carpet still damp from the car lot detailing job.

I got behind the wheel as Aunt Cathy climbed in the passenger seat. Daddy passed me the keys with two words and a smile, “Be careful.” That moment was the happiest I’ve ever seen Daddy. He looked childishly happy and since I wasn’t used to him or Mama looking happy it shocked me a little. I never saw Daddy happier until the day Nick tossed a bib embroidered with “Grandpa” in Daddy’s lap thereby announcing Mason’s imminent arrival.

I recovered and took Cathy around the block for the first ride in MY new car. Then Mama. Then Granny. I offered to take Daddy and Papa but they politely declined. I hugged Daddy and thanked him, but not nearly enough.

That first evening, I showed her off to my buddies then took her over to see my 15 year old girlfriend. She ooohhed and aaahhhed satisfactorily as her father, who didn’t much like me anyway, stared with murderous intent at me AND the car. All he said (growled actually) was, “Not til she’s sixteen” before going back into the house.

I don’t know if I’ve ever been happier before or since. I got a boss new stereo and tuned the engine just right. If I wasn’t driving her, I was waxing her. I probably changed the oil six times in the time she was mine. We had a way to go without begging a ride. Five months later, my girl turned sixteen, and we went on our first date. She was supposed to be home by ten; we pulled in the driveway at 9:45. I was terrified of her father.

Put it in fast forward for about ten months to early Tuesday afternoon, late July.

I was headed home via Fountain Inn, windows down, Sam Sham and the Pharaohs belting out “Woolly Bully” on the stereo when it occurred to me I should go see Granny and Papa.

FI is a three red light town. I was coming up on the first and saw it was red. Right then, things went all to hell.

My buddy Robby once told me I was the most intelligent person he’d ever known, but I didn’t have sense enough to get out of a rainstorm. Approaching the light, I thought, with perfect clarity, “Oh dear, I must turn left to go back to Granny and Papa’s. I cannot turn left on a red light. What shall I do? Ah ha, I see the next light is green. I can turn left on a green light and go back to Granny and Papa’s. That is what I shall do! I am so smart!”

Anybody spot the flaw in that little plan?

As the Pharaohs reached the final climactic “Woolly Bulllllyyyy” chorus, I once again proved Robby right by sailing through the red light into the path of an old decrepit jeep. I remember it happening in slow motion, looking out the window at the approaching jeep and thinking, “This is gonna hurt!”

It did.

The jeep took me in the driver’s door and knocked me across the console (cool guys don’t wear seat belts) into the passenger’s seat amidst a maelstrom of glass and metal. It seemed eerily quiet for a few seconds, then the world became one huge conglomerate of noise. I leaned up and opened the passenger door of my shattered goddess and walked towards a nearby street lamp. It had a nice wide, inviting base and seemed like a fine place to sit and reflect on what I should do next. The driver of the jeep, which was unscratched save a broken wooden bumper (that’s foreshadowing folks), walked over and said, “Man, are you okay?” I nodded.

Just then, Mr. Wofford Woods appeared in my field of vision. He and Granny Wham worked in the store connected to the street light I was now leaning against. Thankfully she was off on Tuesdays. My reflective period abruptly ended; I moved to action.

Reaching up, I took  Wofford by the jacket lapels and, with what little authority I could put into my sixteen year old crackling voice, said, “Wofford, DO NOT call Mama. I repeat DO. NOT. CALL. MY. MOTHER., and FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DO NOT call Granny.” Then, for the first and, to now, last time in my life, I uttered, “You call Laurens Glass Plant and GET. MY. DADDY!!”

Wofford nodded, strode off, and promptly ignored every word. I realized this when, about seven minutes after I lost sight of him, a light blue ’78 Ford LTD jumped the curb and skidded to a stop in a nova of dust, grass clumps, and broken sprinkler heads. Granny Wham leaped from the car and I knew instantly she’d be taken unawares whilst getting ready to go out because she had on her best slacks but was wrapped in her rattiest housecoat, (If you’re not from the South, you might not know what a housecoat is, but it’s ok), her curlers still in her head, AND a generous amount of pink Oil of Olay she missed with the washrag in the excitement on her face.

I made a mental note to kill Wofford.

Granny was still in her prime in those days — nary a bit bowed with age, infirmity, or indecision. She would have happily fought (and probably killed) a raging tyrannosaurus bare-handed had she felt one of her own was in danger. She hugged me to her in all out mother hen mode and started asking questions. Many, many questions I lacked the ability to answer.  I managed to reach up and gently put my finger to her lips to quiet her and ask, “Where is Papa?” She replied, indignantly, “Frank was shaving and had half his face done and refused to wash his face off and come with me before he finished! He just said, ‘Mama, he can’t be hurt very badly since he had sense enough to tell Wofford not to call you’ and went back to shaving.” Inside, I wept for Papa because Granny calling him “Frank” instead of “Daddy” was the equivalent of her or Mama using my full, three word name.

Soon after, Mama made a similar curb jumping entrance. Luckily, she had been about to go to work on second shift at the textile plant so she was fully dressed. Then the ambulance arrived and Mama talked Granny into going home to get Papa . . . and finish dressing, while Mama rode with me in the ambulance.

We got to the hospital despite nearly wrecking the ambulance and they took me into ER. Remember the wooden jeep bumper? It’s important now. The charge nurse took a pair of scissors and began to cut my jeans off. I was wearing the only pair of Guess jeans I have ever owned. They cost $50 in 1986 money. I was proud of those jeans, so I screamed out, “Don’t do that! My Ima (my other grandmother) can get any stain out of anything!”

So, the nurse said, in the tone of someone who knows something YOU do not know, “Okay, sir, go ahead and take your pants off.” Turns out, what she knew that I didn’t was I had a six inch long, four inch wide sliver of  jeep bumper sticking out of my left leg. As I pushed my pants down, I found the rest of the piece of wood — jammed against my left femur. My hand pushed the wood, the wood scraped down the bone, and I snatched the scissors away from the nurse and cut my jeans of.

I’d gotten X-rayed and scheduled to have a doctor look at me when Daddy opened the curtain, walked in and said, “Looks like I sold my boat for nothing.”

At the time, I was livid that he could speak to me like that with the day I was having. I was pissed. Ten years later, I found out Daddy had driven from Laurens at bat-out-of-hell speeds unaware if I was alive or dead. Then, when he walked into the ER, Granny Wham grabbed him and said, without fanfare or word of how I was doing, “The car is totaled and he HAS to have a car!!.” So Daddy was as mad at her as I was mad at him basically for the same reason. Wish I’d know that then.

Mama took me home about an hour later.  Two days later, Papa Wham took me to the junk yard where my goddess had been laid to rest to recover a few things. I was going to get my stereo, but when I saw the console, I gave up that idea. I started school on crutches the next week. I was out of work for three weeks and my girlfriend cheated on me with one of my co-workers. To this day, I have a massive scar on my left thigh that is all grody and sunken in. Still hurts like crap sometimes too. In my mind, I deserve it for killing my snow white goddess.

Looking back, I’m pretty sure I’ve never been as happy as I was for those ten months. I’ve had other cars. Some of them were awesome, but you never forget your first.

I guess Robert Frost said it best, “Nothing gold can stay.”

Of course, Dallas would say, “Stay gold, Pony Boy!”

All of you, stay golden too.

Love y’all and make sure to wash your feet!

Jul29

The Thunder Rolls

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A sight you don't want to see in the middle of a large lake in a small boat.

It’s been the week for late afternoon thunderstorms around here. The last four days, around 6ish in the evening, thunder starts growling around and the wind picks up. Eventually, a log-floating, frog-choking deluge descends from the sky. The whole affair lasts about an hour to 90 minutes from beginning to end and when it’s over, the air outside is either much cooler or much more humid depending on the whim of the weather gods. It’s the price we pay for living in the South.

I hate it.

I am irrationally, completely, and utterly terrified of thunderstorms. As far as I know, I always have been. I don’t really know why. I’m intelligent enough to know how they start and what they are going to do. I know that thunder’s just a noise; lightning does the work. Doesn’t matter. Storms put knots in the pit of my stomach. It’s not the lightning or the rain. It’s the wind. I don’t mind lightning streaking everywhere and I can tolerate huge booming rounds of thunder.

I don’t do wind.

Once the trees start swaying, I look for a place to hide.

Of course, it would stand to reason that some of my most vivid memories from childhood involved storms of one caliber or another. I recall sitting by candlelight when I couldn’t have been more than four or so. The storm had knocked out power to our trailer. I remember standing outside with Papa Wham when I was still in single digits and a massive streak of lightning turned night to day for a brief second. I remember a little grey tree frog that rode out a particularly nasty storm squatting firmly on one of the sticks we used to hold our trailer windows open. I remember Mama trying to calm me down by singing “Keep Me Safe ‘Til the Storm Passes By.” Lots of storm memories. Two stand out incredibly strong.

I was four or five and playing in the backyard at my great-Aunt Betty’s house. As usual, I was completely oblivious to my surroundings until I looked up at the cotton field and saw Uncle Raymond coming down the dirt road leading out of the field like all the imps of Hell were behind him. He skidded the old red and white Ford truck to a stop in a outburst of dust and pebbles and when he jumped out, he was running and shouting, “Shannon, get in the truck quick.” I got scared for three reasons. One, Uncle Raymond NEVER came out of the fields before near dark. He always worked a full day as a sharecropping cotton farmer. Two, Uncle Raymond NEVER ran. A fast mosey was his normal top speed and he didn’t hit it often; and three, and most worrisome to me, Uncle Raymond NEVER called me by my given name. He always called me Cottontop or little man or some other pet name. Never “Shannon.” I didn’t have time to wonder much as I climbed into the truck because Uncle Raymond was already on his way back with Aunt Betty in tow. He was explaining as he hurried her along, but all I caught was one word — tornado.

At the time, I had no idea how he knew a tornado was coming, but I found out later that one of the “big men” who owned the field and drove the big cotton harvesters kept a weather band radio on loud at all times. Storms come up quickly in these parts and the last thing anyone wanted was to be caught in the middle of a cotton field with lightning striking everywhere. Lightning tends to strike the tallest object around and if you’re a six foot tall man in the middle of an open cotton field, guess what the tallest object around is?

We took off in the truck and Uncle Raymond drove us to a culvert or tunnel under the highway. He parked in the middle and I guess he could tell I was terrified, because he patted me on the head then he fixed my “linus blanket” over the back of the seat like a tent. From inside that tent, I heard the twister pass over us. You’ll hear people say a tornado sounds like a train rushing by, but that day, it sounded like the Horsemen of the Apocalypse. After about an hour, we went back to the house and other than a few limbs blown down and a shingle or two off the house, everything was fine. Uncle Raymond dropped Aunt Betty and me off and went back to the field like nothing had happened. Like he ran his family from tornadoes every day.

My second storm memory involves Daddy. I was ten, maybe eleven, and he and I were out on Lake Moultrie fishing for catfish. He and Teresa, my stepmother, took me to the Santee-Cooper lakes every summer on a fishing trip for about six or seven years that I remember. Usually, all three of us went out fishing. It wasn’t unusual for Teresa to outfish us all. This particular run, though, she’d stayed in the room at the landing.

If you’ve never seen Lake Moultrie, it’s basically a big, deep bathtub. Lake Marion, at the other end of the Diversion Canal, is bigger in area, but it has a lot more islands and is generally much shallower. We were in the middle of Lake Moultrie and I couldn’t see any land. Anyway, Daddy and I were having a good afternoon of fishing and I was enjoying one of the rare occasions of him and me just being together.

All was well until Daddy looked behind us. After he did, he turned around to me and said, “Shannon, put your life jacket on.” I usually asked many, many questions, but, like Uncle Raymond, Daddy never used my name. He mostly called me “Son” if he called me anything. I put my life jacket on before I turned around to see what Daddy saw. It was a squall line all the way across the sky. In front, the sky was robin’s egg blue, but behind, it was black. Really black.

My Daddy is, and always has been to my knowledge, utterly fearless. I’ve never known him to be scared of anything. I’d never even seen him acknowledge a situation might require a little worrying. Well, I still don’t think he was scared and if he hadn’t had me with him, he probably wouldn’t even have been worried, but he knew that I hated storms and tended to panic AND he knew that I swim like a 1940 Packard Super Eight Touring Limo. I wasn’t panicked yet. I was with Daddy and Daddy wasn’t scared of the Devil, much less a puny storm . . . that was already making whitecaps on the lake’s surface. I did get a little concerned, however, when Daddy put his OWN life jacket on. It was the only time in my life I’ve ever seen him do that. Still, I was with Daddy and he was just being cautious. What he did next though, pushed me right to the edge of meltdown. He cut the rope off the anchor and lashed one end around his waist, then he took the other end and tied it snugly around my right foot.

The wind and whitecaps were picking up when Daddy started the 70hp Johnson outboard and spun the boat around. Luckily, we were running before the wind. It helped some. Daddy never drove the boat fast as a general rule, but this day, he had the throttle wide open. We were aiming at for the Diversion Canal, which was very sheltered. We’d get wet, but we wouldn’t have to worry about capsizing or hitting anything and we’d gotten wet before.

It had been a ten minute boat ride out to where we were fishing. The race to the canal took twenty, even with the wind at our backs. The last little bit, the rain hit us and, if you don’t know, raindrops feel like BB guns shooting you when you’re in a boat moving 30mph. We made it to the mouth of the canal, though and as soon as we got about a hundred yards in, the water smoothed right on out. It rained buckets and we got soaked, but we were safe. I knew the danger was passed when Daddy reached down and took the rope off my foot and smiled at me.

So there you go. I hate storms. Panic in them all the time and I’ve gotten to panic a lot lately.

Love y’all. Sorry this one was so long. I got carried away since Budge isn’t here for me to talk to!

Take care, and wash your feet, but not in the tub if it’s lightning outside!

🙂