The Nuts are on the Road

Deputy Greer, a walk-on minor character in an episode of the X-Files said it best: "all the nuts roll down to Florida." But come election time, they charter buses, hire staffers, declare their candidacy for higher office and begin rolling from one primary hot spot to the next. Debates among the prospective candidates were once focused on the big, pressing questions: unemployment, war, inflation, the economy--issues that directly impact where and how Americans live, work and pursue those things that bring us happiness. These days, however, candidate debates have become the strident opening salvo of a mudslinging contest that now alarmingly includes religion.

When did religion become so entrenched within the voting booth? It didn't belong there when Americans dithered over President Kennedy's Roman Catholicism and it doesn't belong there now. One's choice of faith is highly personal and completely individual. There is a separation of church and state for a very simple reason: it upholds the right of the individual. Our society is a melting pot that strips all of us of our preexisting cultural identities. Africans, Asians, Europeans--we're all transformed into Americans through the legal conveyance of citizenship. Thanks to the separation of church and state, our religion is not subjected to the same process. Instead, it's kept out of the melting pot and, like voting, recognized as a personal, private choice.

It seems to me that candidates who flaunt their religion are under the mistaken impression that embracing the "right" religion will convey popularity. Many of them also believe this is a "Christian" country without bothering to dig any deeper and define what kind of Christianity we practice. Are we Catholics, Protestants, Anabaptists, Adventists, Campbellites, Lutherans, Apostolics, Mennonites or Episcopaleans? The fact is, we're all of those things; we're also Muslim, Hindu, Ba'hai, Buddhist and more. Formally combining religion with politics stands to deepen the divisions between these schools of religious thought and inflame our political process with religious zeal--the one thing it patently does not need. If you doubt that, take a quick look at the histories of Northern Ireland, Bosnia and Lebanon. Each case shows that blending religion and politics is a recipe for disaster.

We should not evaluate any candidate--be he Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry or Mitt Romney--on the basis of his faith or how well we think he practices that faith. Nor should any candidate cloak themselves in religion and present themselves for ordination. Doing so sets a dangerous precedent for institutionalizing religion and robs each of us of our most fundamental right as Americans. The right to choose.

Monkey See, Monkey Don't

My grandmother always said that idle hands are the Devil's playground. Thanks to her, I have a Protestant work ethic built on a rock solid foundation of guilt. Since I'm currently unemployed, I've turned my attention to all the little (and large) projects I've spent so much time and effort ignoring. My reluctance is understandable when you consider my last DIY project: a bathroom remodel.

The room was bearable when I moved in over a decade ago--especially when you consider the fact that the average Floridian bathroom is required by state law to use at least three or more colors in which even Liberace wouldn't be caught dead. If it's not pink, turquoise, black and/or lavender with mismatched toilet, sink and tub then it's NOT a true Floridian bathroom. "Bearable" became impossible one morning, however, when the sagging vanity fell apart in mid shave and left me up to my ankles in porcelain, sawdust, wall plaster and an alarming number of fast-moving bugs. In one fell stroke, I had unbalanced my sideburns, breached the wall and uncovered the Palmetto (Bug) Expressway.

The term "Palmetto Bug" is an exercise in denial. Floridians say "Palmetto Bug" because we cannot come to grips with the fact that these critters--which easily dwarf today's pricey, Italian compact cars--are actually giant cockroaches. They're so big, in fact, that the state legislature is exploring how they might be pressed into service for public transit.

What bothers me most about Palmetto Bugs is their potential to establish a new world order. The only thing holding them back is the lack of opposable thumbs. With thumbs, they would be unstoppable. They could buy lotto tickets with their spare change, hitchhike with purposeful direction and shut the kitchen light switch off behind you. Like cats, they have an uncanny ability to land on their feet in addition to many lives. They have no fear of nuclear holocaust; they may be plotting to achieve dexterity. I freely admit that this is the kind of thing that keeps me up at night.

So, there I was, with a large hole in the wall and a gaggle of Palmetto Bugs giving me dirty looks. Now, I have never been one to let sleeping dogs (or bugs) lie. No, sir. The power of Christ (and OCD) compels me to pick at that hole and make it bigger and find out just what is inside the wall. It took a month or two, but I managed to demolish enough of the bathroom to make me self-righteous.

Who in the world, I asked myself, remodeled this bathroom last? Capuchin monkeys? Because the workmanship and construction methods pointed to someone who did not benefit from the aforementioned opposable thumbs. I took down an inch-thick layer of tile and plaster off this wall. Why they used so much is a mystery, but it's plain that patch jobs had a lot to do with it. "Pile it on!" seems to have been the mantra of the day. Can't find a matching tile? No problem! Just get something really cheap and ugly and then...paint it to match! Tub look less than bright white? Paint that, too!

Midway through this itinerant autopsy I found evidence that a pipe had sprung a leak at some point. Our enterprising monkey (not necessarily a Capuchin although they are quite handy; perhaps something as pedestrian as your average Howler Monkey--not from Goa, though possibly from Mahareshtra) decided that the way to fix the problem was to encase it in cement.

I surmised that this little monkey (let's call him George, shall we? because he certainly seems to have been curious)  may have regretted sealing this leak so completely because he clearly set the wall on fire while soldering later.

I'm not proud. I can take a hint with the best of them so, with a self-righteous heart, godly hands and grandma on my mind I picked up the phone and called a contractor. My next project? Finding the couch.

Tweeting into the Wind (and Snickering a Little, Too)

The rise of social media has me a little miffed. I'm chatting, blogging, tweeting and posting with abandon but I sometimes get the feeling that I've walked into a party in search of someone who's probably ditched me in advance of my arrival. Or I'm talking too loudly in a crowded room that's suddenly gone silent just in time for me to blurt, "Rectum? It nearly killed him!"

Then there's what I like to call social media's dirty little secret: it's a very public barometer of just how unsocial you actually are. And that messes with my self image. You see, sometimes, when I get mad at the world (about every Tuesday at 4), I shut my cell phone off and head for the nearest ivory tower, steadfastly refusing to answer the texts, tweets and chirps that connect us all to Kevin Bacon.

The truth is no one misses me. Online or off, the phone doesn’t stir, the computer doesn't beep--there's only silence. For the sake of my ego, I pretend that there are meaningful people looking for me who are saddened by their suspicion that I am deliberately concealing myself from their company. They're pinging me on Google, scouring Foursquare, poring over Facebook--aren't they? I wonder: if you hide and no one seeks, are you still hidden? Or are you merely overlooked or perhaps misplaced? It’s a pretty simple game but it does have rules you know. I embrace exile on principle. I’m Greta Garbo. “I vant to be left alone.”

And so I am.

People are funny that way. They can give you what you want in a smooth and effortless manner and, thanks to social media, they do. Honestly, I’m such a lucky man. This is my Walden Pond!

All That Glitters Is Not A Nickel

Alexander and Hannah Marquis.

Once upon a time in a land called "The Knobs" there was a girl named Hannah and a boy named Al who found themselves--somewhere between church picnics and fall harvests--smitten with one another. So, things being what they were (and still often are), he asked her to marry him and she eagerly accepted. Al was quite a catch after all. Everyone spoke well of him; he was kind, funny, hard-working and sincerely in love with her. On the other hand, he was poor and couldn't afford much fanfare much less a proper wedding ring. Hannah didn't care. She loved him anyway and so she walked down the aisle in a simple, modest dress and tended their home with a graceful, unadorned hand.

Over the years, many things changed and yet many things did not. They still loved one another a great deal (as evidenced by their ten children), yet they were still poor (again, as evidenced by their ten children). And though he may have wanted to, Al still could not afford to give Hannah the shining gold ring she deserved. Instead, he did the best he could by presenting her with a simple, thin band that he cut from an equally simple, modest nickel.

Years later their children began to fall in love and build their own families; not all of them, however, met with success. Eva, in particular, struggled with her heart's desire. Although she loved her father, she also loved her freedom and she was convinced (wrongly) that she had to choose between them in order to be happy. She left one night on the back of a motorcycle, fleeing The Knobs for the flats of Oklahoma where the man she loved presented her with what had eluded her mother for so long: a shining band of gold.

In the morning, her finger turned a figurative green. Eva's man already had another wife--or so they said. Soon, she was chasing the road back home where her family waited to welcome her and usher him to the door at the end of a pitchfork. Her family didn't judge her (well, not that much), and she soon became her own worst critic and she began to despair. Sadly, her shining band of gold became something she viewed as unearned and undeserved. But after thought and prayer and contemplation, she found an elegant solution that would resolve her public humiliation, her father's private wish and her mother's secret dream: she traded it for a simple, modest nickel.

***

You may find my story to be a little corny, naive even but, aside from a few embellishments, it is a true tale. My great-grandfather Alexander Marquis married Hannah Pennell in the late 1800s and they raised a large family in "The Knobs" of southern Illinois. Their daughter Della Evalee--a "flapper"--eloped on the back of a motorcycle during the Roaring '20s only to have the family run off her duplicitous beau upon their return. She exchanged rings with her mother because, as I was told, she felt badly that her mother--so richly married--should wear a nickel while she--so poorly matched--bore a ring of gold.

When Hannah died in 1944, Della took back her ring while the nickel ring--and the story behind it--became lost. Or so one would think. I found the nickel ring among Della's things during her final illness and gained the story from my mother. Things being what they were (and still often are), the ring disappeared soon after. Or so one would think.

I found the ring again not too long ago among my own things, and I've been wearing it ever since. Unfortunately, my stewardship has not been that kind, and the soft-metal ring is now misshapen and it has lost the markings that identified it as a one-time coin. But the story remains, and that's what's most important. So, this weekend, I am passing the torch, so to speak, and placing the ring in the care of my niece, Eloise. It's my hope that this ring--however cheap and unassuming it may appear--will convey a wealth of meaning to her and the other young women within my extended family as they one day start their own lives and families years from now. Alex and Hannah's ring will, I hope, be eagerly and actively embraced and traded amongst them as "something old" or "something borrowed" when it comes time for them to follow their hearts down the aisle.

A Letter to My Homeowner's Insurance Agent

Hi Mike

Got a question here. My subdivision (Pompano Beach Highlands) is undergoing infrastructure rebuilding with new sewer and water lines being installed. Water pressure up until now had been respectable but nothng to write home about. When they connected the new water line, I was in love. Water pressure was fantastic, every faucet was like a car wash and a hot shower was a lengthy, rewarding experience.

About 7-10 days ago they started doing a bit of "mop up" to all the construction mess. This included prepping driveway aprons and then completing asphalt installation. My water meter box happens to be in the driveway. When they first came through, they said it would have to be moved because it was "in the wrong place." They never moved it. Instead, they paved right over the thing. And that's when I fell out of love: my water pressure was gone.

Instead of turning on a faucet to a consistent, strong flow, I discovered that it would start out  with good intentions--forceful, strong flow rate--and then gradually ease until the flow was about 1/3 of what it had been at the start. I, of course, was not happy.

Yesterday, I had an opportunity to talk to the work crew when they came to excavate the driveway apron in their search for my water meter. They said they would look into it, but that I was responsible for everything north of the water meter.

After about an hour or so, they knocked on the door, showed me a hole (but NOT the water meter), turned on their side of the line (which they had disconnected) and demonstrated how strong and virile the flow rate was--on their side of the still-to-be-seen meter--and promptly pronounced they had nothing to do with it. It was all my responsibility.

Then they filled in the hole. And that's when lost love turned to hate. No more strong flow dwindling to a modest one-third. Now it's a bashful one-third dwindling to a pathetic trickle. Taking a shower now is equivalent to receiving a tongue bath from a chihuahua.

Please tell me that my policy covers this or I'm going to have to get a bigger dog.

Wherefore Art Thou Aggie Twaddle?

The older I get, the more I realize what an enigma my father was and how insufficient my overtaxed memory has become at dispelling the mystery of the man. Time and again I fix his portrait within my mind's eye only to look away and find it reduced to paint chips and sparkling dust.

Now and then I can hear him before the last 30 years of silence picking out a tune on Mom's piano, fists clenched, forefingers extended and stabbing out the notes, singing: "I like coffee, I like tea; I like the girls, and the girls like me!" Sometimes he sang-along with Sinatra's "Young at Heart" on the hi-fi or, embarrassingly enough, offered up a boisterous Tony Orlando & Dawn's "Tie a Yellow Ribbon" which was always sung up-tempo with a load "Whoa!" to properly kick off each chorus.

As I grew up, he practiced routines that were utterly foreign to me, my sisters and our friends and used a language all his own. Dinner at the kitchen demanded cloth napkins, no elbows and mouths closed when chewing. Conversation there was punctuated by Dad's sparse French "Passez-moi le beurre, s'il vous plait" or simply "Ou est le beurre?"  Time alone with Dad was sometimes even more incomprehensible, especially when confessing sin. The private disappointments I authored were often met with the horrified odd exhortation, "Use yer beano Murray, use yer beano!"

In winter, on the coldest of Sunday mornings, he would warm the car before driving us to Sunday School. He consigned us to the backseat where he wrapped us in car blankets knowing we could never be too warm in the brittle snap of February. Thus mobilized, we were a captive audience to his ongoing lecture series on the perils of being a child.

Dad's favorite (and oft repeated) themes included "You Think Money Grows On Trees" (Part 1) which, if he drove slowly or we left early, was followed by a brisk "You Kids Are So Ungrateful" (Part 2). Although wildly popular, "I Would Never Speak To My Mother Like That" could never hold a candle to the masterful "My Father Would Have Thrown Me Across The Room If I Ever (fill in the blank)" which, quite frankly, always brought down the house. 

Ever the dutiful disciplinarian, Dad always strove to ensure that, by the time we reached church, we were indeed ready to come to Jesus. Sadly, faithful, dogmatic repetition of these time-honored themes didn't phase us. We were awful kids.

I say that in hindsight, of course. Back then, we were golden, Teflon, unimpeachable--the glowing, ripening apples of our grandmother's eye! Except perhaps for one tiny, irreducible flaw passed down to us from our mother: we were always late. No matter where we were going, no matter where we had been, somehow we were always, always late--no mean feat for children raised in a town that thrived on time. Elgin watches aside, we were a tardy people who made others tardy as well and that was unforgivable. Dad had a strange and exotic name for someone who kept him waiting: Aggie Twaddle.

"Come on Aggie Twaddle," hands fixed at 10 and 2 and thumbs thumping out the measure while he fought the urge to honk. "Let's go Aggie Twaddle," locked doorknob firmly grasped in one hand and car keys splayed in the other ready to poke the engine to life. "Are you ready Aggie Twaddle?" innocent expression fixed over Mom's left shoulder in the mirror even while the anxious eyes gave it all away.

Who, I have always wondered, is Aggie Twaddle and where in the world is she going? Is she just another fleck of fallen paint chip or does she have more to say on the subject of Arthur Macdonald Ferreira?

I doubt he realized it, but Dad's lessons might have made more of an impact at the time had he been more forthcoming about his own life. His family were strangers to us and infrequent visitors to our home. Reunions--seldom held--were private affairs looped around Dad's poker table, fortified with gin and tonic, scented with menthol cigarettes and punctuated with the foreign vowels of Boston's streets.

What they discussed over those long nights is unknown, but they had no shortage of history for review. Their father died early in life and left their mother, Jeannette, destitute with four children to raise in the growing dust of the Great Depression. Though still a child, Robert, the oldest, quickly grasped what few adults could: Jeannette was unsuited to her fate, oblivious to their peril and incapable of escaping her condition. Resolved, the children closed ranks to protect her. Robert quit school to work mean jobs and feed the family. Arthur and George scoured the nearby railyards every day, buckets in hand, searching for stray bits of coal to dull the teeth of their New England winters. Their sister "Kargy" took charge of the household as best she could.

I'd like to think that this painful, hard-won knowledge would have made Dad's lessons more meaningful to me as a child. Surely all these moments and scattered bits of information would have cracked the hard, glossy shell of cynicism my sisters and I wore so openly. And my father's witness--the mysterious Aggie Twaddle--perhaps most of all, would have spoken volumes about the hopes and dreams of a child who would later become the man. Ironically enough, she would have done so without saying a word.

Who was Aggie Twaddle? Released on Christmas Eve 1922, the silent movie "Broke and Back Home" was pure Horatio Alger with its rags-to-riches plotline. It tells the story of Tom Redding's journey back to respectability and introduces us to the people he meets along the way--including our very own Aggie Twaddle. Even though her name only appears in the cast listing and no mention of her place in the story is made, I can imagine what she might have meant to my father. He would have been 10 at the time, and the storyline would have gripped him. When his apparently wealthy father dies and leaves only debts, Tom Redding is deserted by all save Mary Austin. Desperate, he goes west and successfully develops an oil well. Later, Tom returns home in the guise of poverty, secretly buys up property and then rubs everyone's noses in his good fortune and gets the girl when he reveals that he's rich. Small wonder that, just seven years later, Dad turned his back on Boston and struck out for California in hopes of finding a little good fortune of his own.

Whatever part Aggie Twaddle may have played in Tom Redding's life, it's clear she made a lasting impression on my father and, in turn, on me. What's funny is that I didn't have far to look for her at all. I just needed to be willing to look.  She was a resident in my father's every home, a passenger in every car and a sympathetic friend with whom he synchronized his watch every time I made him wait. She's present in my home and mind as well now, no longer a discarded or decaying bit of portrait paint. Instead, she's taken on some dimension and loaned a bit of it to Dad. She's given him some color and definition, filling in the background with meaning instead of shadows and adding purpose and perspective to the lines around his eyes. I'm still filling in the gaps, but his portrait is far from incomplete. I'm not worried though. After all, memory is a work in progress, too.

In Praise of the Third of July

Despite the fact that the Fourth of July marks the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the founding of our country and the launch of modern democracy, the holiday hasn't carried much weight with my family for almost 30 years. I guess, in a way, we can take it or leave it.

We didn't always feel this way, however. Back in the 50s, 60s and 70s, my extended family gathered at my grandparents' home where we'd picnic in the back yard and listen to the cicadas' song rise and fall like a lazy siren. At twilight, my sisters and cousins and I would play "kick-the-can" with the neighborhood kids and pursue one another through Miss Purdy's yard and the Mayberry's bushes. And finally, when the night had fallen into a pool of velvet dark, my Dad would pile all of us into the station wagon and we'd drive all over the county as we chased the fireworks shooting overhead.

All of that was lost when I went away to college at the University of Missouri-Columbia. With my grandparents gone, the house on Oak Street was sold to strangers. And after years of anxious waiting, my father announced his plans to abandon suburbia and retire to a 10-acre "farmette" he'd found a few miles outside Jeff City, the capital of Missouri. It was a nice spread as these things go: a small barn for boarding horses, 8 acres of fenced pasture, a chicken coop, a workshop and all kinds of old tools, plows and implements hidden in the weeds. Every other week Dad would find one of these ancient, blackened marriages of iron and rotting wood, drag it to the front yard and slap a "FOR SALE" sign on it--entrepreneurial to the end.

The farm was Dad's dream and his long awaited chance to raise Black Angus cattle, board horses and weed  two acres of scraggly lawn to within an inch of its life. For him, it was heaven. Mom, on the other hand, was presented with water in the basement, snakes in the rec room, bright orange kitchen countertops, "harvest yellow" appliances and a quarter-acre of flower garden to tend--a little less divine for her, I think.

"Living the dream" was difficult for Mom, and she was very lonely in those first few months. I was never home (I lived on campus), and my sisters and the rest of the family were 400 miles away.  Dad, sad to say, was a stranger to Mom's mood. He was too busy slapping aluminum siding on all the outbuildings and hiring the crack-shot 4H kid next door to shoot down the pigeons that were always roosting on his pristine, aluminum-sided barn.

My sister Donna, however,  knew Mom's mind and plotted a surprise "mission of mercy." She convinced my sister Susan, cousins Colleen and Becky along with Mom's brother Dean and my great aunt Della to squeeze into Uncle Dean's posh Safari van and drive eight hours for a brief visit over the holiday weekend. The idea was good, but the timing was a little off because the 4th fell on Monday. Since some of them had to work on Friday (July 1) and everyone had to be back at work Tuesday morning (July 5), Saturday (July 2) and Monday (July 4) became travel days. It was a cold hard fact that seemed to strip the holiday of everything we had come to expect.

When they arrived--tired, cranky and late--Mom was very happy to see them but at a loss as to where to put them because she hadn't fixed up the guest bedrooms yet. So, most of them just sprawled on the new living room carpet. Mom asked, "Does anyone want a pillow?" Uncle Dean, already going comically deaf, looked up, smacked his lips and enthusiastically said, "Jell-o? Jell-o? I'll have some Jell-o!"

Mom was disappointed to learn that they would only be staying two nights. But Susan, Becky, Colleen and Donna were not dismayed in the least; shopping, they swore, can work miracles and make memories. Armed with $150 cash and an ounce of determination, they hit the fireworks stands along I-70 and scored sparklers, worms, bottle rockets, cherry bombs and Roman candles. Cruising up and down the aisles of Wal-Mart, they grabbed kiddie pools, disposable barbecue grills and Chinette dinnerware which, the next evening, made for a macabre yet festive family reunion as we celebrated the Third of July.

"Third of July! Third of July!" we cried as we ran up and down the driveway with sparklers blazing in our fists. "Third of July!" we screamed each time we set off a bottle rocket and sent Dad hunting through the grass to find and dispose of the leftover stick. We sang camp songs ("Peanuuuuuuuuuut Peanut Butter--Jelly!"), told ghost stories, and when the night fell into the velvet dark--something the Chicago suburbs can no longer do--we sent our own fireworks into the sky and called everyone to follow.

It was one of the best times in my life, and it's probably my most cherished family memory. Yet, Mom and
Dad and I missed out on the perfect finish touching for that weekend. Driving home on July 4, Uncle Dean took "the back way" up Route 47 where he spied scores of eager locals waiting for the DeKalb County fairgrounds to open for the evening's fireworks show. He pulled his glorious Safari van to a stop near the gate, rolled down his electric window and yelled, "Cancelled! Cancelled! Go home! TOO DANGEROUS! Cancelled!" before starting off again on their way home.

My sisters and cousins, of course, were tickled pink. And me? I was and am just a little green with envy for having missed a moment that has since become family legend.