I do it often.
I hear somebody say “I wouldn’t have changed anything…” and I think:
What? The. Fuck!!
Really??
I do like to play Woulda/Shoulda/Coulda.
I have no idea how my life would’ve turned out of I had taken different forks in the road.
I am quite happy in 2019. I like the path that I’m on.
But that doesn’t keep me from having reminiscent fantasies.
Shelly gets subjected to me playing W/S/C sometimes, especially when I talk about “what I shoulda done in 2000.” (That is a story for another day…)
Her reply to “w/s/c scenario 2000”: “But we never woulda met.”
Most likely we wouldn’t have.
And it’s all just guess work as to whether or not an executed “coulda or shoulda” woulda been a better choice.
-=-=-=-
So here’s where I was in March, 1972, i.e. at the forks in the road:
Just out of the Army.
Biggest wad of cash I’d ever had in my life from separation pay.
Best physical shape of my life. The four months of basketball had me in shape.
That spring and summer I thought about what to do next. (Mostly I just got high…)
Four of five months later I was in college at southeast mo st in cape girardeau.
If I time travel back to 3/20/72, here’s my W/S/C:
I woulda found a job as a roadie for a band.
At 23 I coulda done some lifting and hauling and traveling.
When I’m dreaming big, I imagine that I am packing it up and tearing it down in 1972 on Jackson Browne’s first national tour.
I never did sleep all that much, and in my 20’s I’d have considered anything over 150 hours of shut-eye a month excessive. I woulda loved being the first to come and the last to leave.
Just think—if I woulda landed on his road crew in 1972 I coulda been rolling cases and lifting amps and one of the guys he was singing about 5 years later when he released “Load out.”
There is a site that features “song meanings provided by the songwriters themselves.”
They attribute this to Jackson Browne: “”The Load-Out” is a love song to the audience and the crew. I was always tight with certain members of the crew – my manager used to be my crew chief; he used to tune guitars. They always took care of you. Then this one turns into “Stay” – on that, we’re actually asking the audience to stay, because we don’t want to stop playing.”
Just think—it coulda been awesome—or a disaster.
Most likely I woulda been dead before “Running on Empty” was released.
Discipline has never been my strong suit and I do have a tendency toward excess.
I mighta tried to keep up with Warren Zevon slamming back booze.
I coulda been sharing downers with Phyllis Major and ODed too.
Or I coulda been hit by a bus.
-=-=-=
A few Realities:
1. The reality is that I woulda done lots of things differently in Cape Girardeau, but I have absolutely no regrets about that choice. I had good times at SEMO. I have great memories from those days. I have friendships from those days that I cherish.
2. The odds of some guy like me getting a job as a roadie for anybody woulda been slim. The odds of it being for J.B? Not a chance. It’s a nice little fantasy tho.
3. And I’ll always be baffled by people who “wouldn’t have changed anything.” Really??
I didn’t put on fatigues for over four months while I was stationed at Ft. Bragg. I got paid to play basketball. It seemed surreal at the time.
We had a new first sergeant. He was an airborne ranger. He wanted to turn our company of misfits in First Psyops at the JFK Center for Military Intelligence into a lean, mean fighting machine.
He had us doing calisthenics in the parking lot and running several miles in formation five mornings a week.
I developed a very painful case of shin splints. Climbing steps to the 3rd floor of the barracks hurt like hell. Running was out of the question.
I went to the infirmary and got what the Army calls “a Profile.” It qualifies a soldier in six areas: physical condition, upper extremities, lower extremities, hearing, sight, psychiatric.
My lower extremities were not good. There was swelling and pain.
The six month Profile exempted me from the calisthenics and the running,
When “Profiles fall-out” was called at morning formation the group included me, my friend who told me to get the Profile, and several over-weight lifers. For the next hour, while everyone else worked up a sweat, we went on “police call” i.e., we picked up litter.
After a few weeks with no running on concrete, my shin splints were healed, but I decided that I would milk the Profile.
However there was a downside: I had to stop playing basketball on the court next to the barracks. If I was seen shooting hoops, my early morning strolls would be replaced with jumping jacks, squat thrusts, push-ups, and 4 mile runs.
I stayed off the basketball court as long as I could.
I finally decided it was safe to do some shooting by myself early on weekend mornings.
One Sunday a guy came out of the mess hall and came over to talk.
First words out of his mouth: “Nice shooting….are you trying out tomorrow for the team?”
I had no idea what he was talking about. What team??
I asked him some questions. He answered them all. Turns out that Jack was from Kansas City…and he was the assistant coach.
He was optimistic that I would make the cut.
I told him about my Profile.
“If you make the team, head to the Infirmary and ditch the Profile.”
“But then I’ll be back to push ups and road runs!”
“Nope. We skip morning formation and head to the gym.”
I made the team.
The doc did his thing and toasted the Profile. It was a miracle!! Shin splints gone just as basketball season was about to start!
I told my friend the company clerk that I was on the battalion team.
We came up with a plan, and the scam began.
Jack was married and lived off base. After practice he and I would go to his place to shower and eat lunch. Then he would go to work.
The plan and the scam: I had Jack drop me off at the USO after lunch for the next month. I would read newspapers and magazines, shoot pool and play ping pong all afternoon or head to the PX to see if there were was any new vinyl.
That scam only lasted about a month, but it worked like a charm.
And then my not having to “break starch” became legit.
The battalion season ended.
I tried out for…and made…the brigade team.
I didn’t have to hide at the USO anymore. My full-time Army job was now playing basketball.
I was the only guy on the brigade team who hadn’t been on a college team. Our best player, Vann Williford, had been on the cover of Sports Illustrated. He played at NC State and had been named MVP of the ACC Tournament the year before.
The brigade season ended and the next step up was the Ft. Bragg team. Vann talked me into trying out. I didn’t make the travel team, but being a practice dummy was my job for another month or so.
By the time the season ended the first sergeant had given up on whipping First Psyops into shape.
I went back to work as a process photographer in the print shop, locking the door to my darkroom and replying “I’m developing film” anytime there was a knock.
That scam worked well too.
I sure wish I’d been keeping a journal “back in the day.” It would help me nail down some of the tees in the memory quilt with more specificity.
I have started a journal several times. It only “took” once. That was in the journal that I started on October 26, 2012, which starts this way: “this will be page 1 of my journal. I need to start writing every (or at least “most every”) day. We’ll see how I do. Discipline is not my strong suit.”
It’s just one more woulda/shoulda/coulda…
Ron Jon Surf Shop (2002)
We were living at the first place that we lived in Tampa.
Paula, Joseph & Caroline headed for Cocoa Beach to meet up with relatives from Missouri.
My road warrior days were at their peak. I couldn’t get away, other than via Delta or US Airways.
My souvenir was this tee.
Margaritaville—Cayman Islands (2008)
Paula and Caroline went to the Cayman Islands for a gymnastics meet, using some of my frequent flier miles. (Back when they were worth something…)
I have never been to the Caymans.
This is another souvenir from a trip that I never went on.
The tee shirt got a lot of use.
But like many light colored tees, I spilled coffee, chocolate sauce and probably some drool on it, making it an around-the-house tee until it got a place in the memory quilt.
Dr. Seuss nightshirt (2009)
This was a Christmas present from Caroline.
I spilled lots of early morning coffee on it. Some jelly and apple butter too.
It got torn in a couple of places and the tears kept getting bigger and bigger.
Finally it got put into safe keeping. I was never gonna throw it away. Ever.
Thanks to the Memory Quilt it will always be with me.
USF Dad (2011)
Another present from Caroline.
I’ll always remember the day that she and I walked around campus together. I told her that I was envious.
She wanted to know why. It was easy: I loved college. If I coulda made a living going to school, I’d still be “working.”
I made the tactical error of helping a friend sling paint wearing this tee.
The shirt suffered. Bigly.
It never recovered.
But I like where it is now. I especially like the heart-shaped stitching.
Table Rock Lake shore clean-up (2012)
My sister and her husband moved from the prairie of central Illinois to the Little Aunts Creek arm of southwest Missouri’s Table Rock Lake in 2008.
In early July 2011 I moved into their spare bedroom. Three months later I was in an apartment at The Abbey in Springfield. I’m still there, in a different apartment down the hall.
Paula and I “made up” soon after she kicked me out.
I was a bad influence on Don.
Go figure.
Seems like my quest for sex, drugs and rock-n-roll was just a bit much.
RE the shore clean-up tee itself.
I have never actually participated on the official day.
But I always spend some of my lake shore time picking up the trash that some asshole tossed. (Those pathetic littering pricks should be subjected to my “Reverse Rapture.”)
And Paula&Don always reward me with a tee each year.
Rock House “classic” (2013)
This is not the first R.H. tee that I’ve bought. That would be the orange “classic.” That one is in worse shape than the one in the quilt, however I’m not ready to stop wearing it. Someday it will probably be in a quilt.
I didn’t tell Kathy where to place any of the tees.
She picked the perfect place for this one.
Rock House Summer Music Festival (2015)
It was my 4th year back in Missouri.
My fourth R.H. Festival.
It was the first festival after the party got too big for Bruce&Jeanette’s backyard.
I got myself a couple of tees…and even got Violet and The Undercurrents to sign the back of one of them.
I was still just “one of the crowd” back then.
Now I’m the treasurer for the 501(c)(3)…another one of the many good things that have happened to me since I first stepped foot into 41 High Street, Reeds Spring, MO.
Mexican Villa/Springfield Cardinals (2017)
I love a good silent auction. This tee was included in a bundle of goodies from the Mexican Villa.
I have never been inside any of the Mexican Villa locations. (None of the “goodies” were for meals.)
I have never been to a Springfield Cardinals game.
I have never even been inside the gates of Hammons Field.
Maybe someday I’ll eat at the Mexican Villa.
Maybe someday I’ll take in a Double A game here in Springtown.
But whether that happens or not, I really like the color that this tee adds to my Memory Quilt.
I especially like the birds and the bat.
-=-=-=
There you have it.
18 Tees in a Memory Quilt.
Some stories.
Some that I will never forget.
Some that are more than a bit foggy.
Some memories are noticeably missing, e.g. somehow none of my Oregon State tees made it into the quilt. WTF??!!
Next time. Next Memory Quilt.
Let’s get this outta the way right up front: we are ALL gonna die.
This is one of several docs that will be in the “Black Audit Bag” after I have said my final “Fuck Me!!”
The “BAB” will include not only legal and financial documents. There will be directives, keepsakes, and copies of some the things that will make their way to this blog…starting with this one.
1. Weiss Cemetery, outside Doe Run, MO.
Take Buck Mountain Road south of town; about a quarter mile past the bridge over the creek you take a right on Effin Road. (That is not an F’in joke!)
You’ll see the gate on the right. Drive 150 yards through the field to the gate into the fenced two acres.
A little of me will get buried in the family cemetery.
Shelly will scatter my ashes at the other 4 places.
I need to nail the specific plot in the family cemetery at some point. Close to my folks, but with the appropriate distance.
There will be a headstone. Maybe small, flat to the ground, with only this engraved: Steve Weiss 1948- 20–.
Maybe a stand up stone with more info and an emoji or two.
The ashes that get buried will be in either a Prince Albert pocket size can or my favorite reefer stash box.
2. Cape Perpetua, OR
In 1978 my late mother-in-law called this the most beautiful place she had ever been. The next year a picture from the crest looking south was the cover of the annual Rand McNally road atlas.
It is my favorite place along the Orygun coast….and I’ve driven every foot of the 363 miles of Orygun’s Route 101 numerous times.
Cape Perpetua is about 2 miles south of Yachats on 101. It is a typical PNW headland, forming a high steep bluff above the ocean. At its highest point, the cape rises to over 800 feet above sea level. From its crest, one can see 70 miles of coastline and on a clear day as far as 37 miles out to sea. A great spot for whale viewing.
There are some unique features at Cape Perpetua: Cook’s Chasm, Spouting Horns and Devil’s Churn.
Some of my ashes will get tossed into the latter.
Devil’s Churn is a long, wide crack in the coastal rock that fills with each ocean wave, occasionally exploding as incoming and outgoing waves collide. I can sit there for what seems like forever watching the power of the incoming waves.
3. Siesta Key Beach, Sarasota, FL
The first time I stepped foot on this beach was in early 1989. I was still in Portland and was on an AA&Co. project….sign-off manager on the tax software for S-corp returns.
The project was a pain in the ass. Things were way fucked up at A-plus Tax.
The beach was everything I’d heard…and more.
A couple of years earlier the “Great International White Sand Beach Challenge” said it had the “whitest and finest sand in the world.”
The sand is 99% pure Quartz. It is soft and cool on the feet. In a word, it is AWESOME.
We moved to Sarasota in May of 1989. Our kids were born at Sarasota Memorial on 12/30/89 and 5/30/91.
During the 7 years that we lived in SRQ we hit every beach between Anna Maria and Marco Island.
Siesta Key was hands down the favorite.
Many weekend mornings found us on the white sands of Siesta from 9 am until noon.
I never expect to have mail delivered to me again anywhere in Floriduh…but I hope to spend time on Siesta Key beach again before my ashes do.
4. The Rock House, Reeds Spring, MO
Several of my ramblings and reminisces center around this place.
I’m not a “things happen for a reason” thinker. I’m in the “things happen, that’s all they ever do” camp.
But I do believe that sometimes a place, and the people there, can change ones life.
My life certainly changed because of The Rock House.
2011 was a helluva year for me. In the depths for much of it. My life really started to change for the positive after the first house concert I ever attended: Three Penny Acre at The Rock House on October 8, 2011.
We’re all gonna die, but unless we self-annihilate we don’t know when that will be.
Maybe Bruce & Jeanette will have moved to Baja for winters and Oregon for summers by the time Shelly is “Sprinkling Steve from coast to coast.” A new owner might not want my ashes scattered there.
Maybe this special place won’t be a receptacle for my dust…or for my wake (the details of that party will be one of the directives in the BAB).
That would be a shame.
5. Leadville, Colorado
I used to tease Shelly about her thinking that Colorado is the center of the universe. It was a toss-up between Leadville and Golden as to which was the true center.
The first time I was in the highest incorporated city in the United States (at 10,142 ft) was July 28, 2015.
I just read my journal entries from those 3 days in 2015.
My favorite afternoon there, on 7/30/15, included flash fried brussel sprouts at Tennessee Pass Cafe, beer on the deck at the Pastime Bar, a “george thorogood trio” at the Scarlet Tavern and this line from my journal: “We staggered back to the hotel. (“we” meaning me…)”
Shelly had bragged often about Leadville before our first visit, and not just about her favorite pizza in the world from High Mountain Pie.
The experiences in Leadville exceeded the lofty expectations. (So did the pizza…)
We’re spending her birthday this year in Leadville. I’m looking forward to it.
There are legal restrictions regarding scattering ashes. Not in water. Not on private land. Yada Yada Yada.
I don’t care.
My ashes won’t care.
Shelly, the urn is in your court….
In 1989 we moved to Sarasota…and became parents.
I was now managing tax software projects for AA&Co.
Same company. Different job. Different culture (or lack therof…).
It’s a doody (1989)
I have no idea who gave me this tee shirt, or when I got it. But it was before Joseph arrived on 12/30/89.
We had been married 14 years when out-of-the-blue Paula announced that she wanted to have a child. I was surprised. Shocked is more accurate. I was 40; she was 37.
We decided to keep it a secret in case there were complications.
And boy-oh-boy, did we keep it a secret!!
There were a couple of going away parties in Portland that May. It was her first trimester. She didn’t have a drink, and a few people noticed and commented. But that was easy to explain: she was my designated driver. Only a handful of people knew what was on the horizon.
We didn’t tell our parents until after Thanksgiving.
Keeping it a secret from them had a reason at first: we wanted to ride all the roller coasters at Six Flags that May of 89, and we knew that it would freak out both of our mothers if they knew she was pregnant. (The doctor had given her the go ahead.)
Then it became a joke. We would laugh about what we’d say to them when they “forgot” his birthday.
When I finally broke the news, my Mom didn’t think it was all that funny.
“Mom, I’ve got some news…we’re gonna have a baby!”
“Oh, oh, oh…that is wonderful. When?”
“In just over a month…” was greeted with stony silence.
She got over it..in time.
The delivery didn’t go as planned. Her water broke before sun up. She insisted that I go to work anyway.
Early afternoon she called and said it was time to head to the hospital. I had a boom box and a few mix tapes for the birthing room.
Paula spent the next few hours on a gurney in the hall, attached to some monitors. All the birthing rooms were taken. In fact all the rooms in the maternity ward were occupied. It was awful.
She was moved to a traditional room for awhile, and finally to a birthing room. She dilated to 4 cm and no more…for hours!! At some point she decided she had had enough of this “natural child birth” and gave permission for an epidural.
It never happened.
Before the anesthesiologist arrived, one of the monitors went berserk: the fetal heart rate was crashing.
They spirited her off for an emergency C section, leaving me standing in the hall. I hadn’t slept in 24 hours. My mind was racing….I was scared shitless.
An hour later I saw them both. She was asleep. He had 10 fingers, 10 toes and a gleam in his eye.
It was all good.
She had to stay a couple of nights. I snuck a bottle of champagne into the hospital for new year’s eve, On the drive home, after I struggled to get him into the car seat for the very first time, was when it really hit us: our lives had changed. And we had no idea what we were doing!!
Seventeen months later Caroline showed up. Straight to the birthing room. Vaginal delivery. 10/10/gleam.
Two kids in diapers is great fun, eh?
AATTG Beach Party (1993)
This was the first office-wide beach party in Sarasota for AATT-whatever.
My Tax Director team had been having “release parties” since I first transferred from Portland in ‘89. We had some fun times at a tiki hut bar at Azure Tides Resort.
The party at Nokomis Beach was OK…but couldn’t compete with those flings at Azure Tides.
I got this tank top because I was on the beach party committee.
Stressed out in South Carolina (1995)
We took a family road-trip to Myrtle Beach.
I kept getting sucked back into what was happening…or not happening…at the office.
E-mails. Phone calls. Conference calls.
We stopped somewhere in S.C. for potty breaks and snacks.
This was before cell phones. (Thank you baby Jesus!!!)
I called into the office on the incoming Watts line. (Remember pay phones and Watts lines??)
The three of them came out of the 7-11 with this tee for me.
I loved it.
I still do.
This tee had been threadbare for awhile, tucked away in a box like most of the shirts in my memory quilt.
Now it is where it belongs.
1041 Summer Project (1995)
Things were always changing in SRQ.
AATT-whatever had a new name. Again.
I had a new job: Director of Development for the Individual market.
My years of reporting to Chicago were over.
My direct boss was in the same building as me, but there was still this crazy “matrix management” nonsense.
My involvement with this project was minimal: get them the staff and the tools they needed, and get out of the way.
The team rewarded me with a tee shirt and a project that delivered quality and delivered it on time.
Tee shirt gap
I left AATT-whatever in 1996 and moved back to Portland.
No tees from my time at Stockamp & Associates. But there are some denim shirts that might make Quilt #2, if/when there is one.
No tees from my time at Jackson Hewitt.
I burned any article of clothing that would ever make me think of Sport Clips.
The shirts from years beginning with a two are up next time….
Seven month’s ago I threw a party. A rarity for me. I’ve never been much on throwing parties.
Called my party “The 25,590 Day Shindig,” celebrating 70 successful trips around the sun.
Held it at a place which will receive a tablespoon or two of my ashes after these bones burn.
[There is a list of places. Shelly will be hitting five spots based on the current list. Maybe you’ll see her at one of them.]
Music for The Shindig was provided by some very talented folks who I was fortunate enough to have met at the magical place where we held the party: The Rock House in Reeds Spring, MO.
Lucky me heard both of the bands who played my party for the first time back in the fall of 2011, pretty soon after I moved back to MO.
Unbelievably lucky me, and a music room full of my lucky friends, listened to these same bands at The Shindig on 10/6/18.
I now call these singer-songwriters friends. And vice verse.
I am a lucky old coot.
I saw two of the guys who played The Shindig (Jeff and David) on a recent Wednesday in KC. They play together now on most Wednesday’s at Mike Kelly’s Westsider.
When I first heard them they weren’t playing together: Jeff played with Bob; Dave with The Nace Brothers.
Things change.
These guys playing together once a week is a good change.
The Nace Brothers played the Rock House on April 6.
They have a different bass player than when I first saw them in 2011.
The new guy (Chase) is one talented young dude.
The band changed.
From where I sit, it is a really good change.
My friend Jeri, who haven’t known all that long, saved me a seat at The Westsider that recent Wednesday.
I met her because of a band called the Rainmakers…in which Jeff plays lead guitar.
Jeri recently retired. She moved to Kansas City from Houston. (The one in Texas county, Missouri.)
Things change.
The move to KC looks good on Jeri.
-=-=-=
The subject of my shindig came up for a bit that Wednesday, as it seems to quite often. Heard the word “epic.”
Seems like a good time was had by all, but I will make one change at the next Shindig that I host.
(I don’t know when that might be. Certainly no later than on or about day 27,393, 9/13/23.)
I expect this change to result in some grumbling. Tough shit.
There WILL be Name Tags.
At the 75 year marker, I’m gonna follow through on an idea I had before the party on October 6, 2018:
Everyone….and I mean EVERYONE….will have on a name tag.
Everyone WILL provide some info.
Everyone will be GLAD they filled out the answer to 5 questions.
Everyone will have one (and probably several) conversations with someone that they would have only smiled at if they hadn’t been wearing a 3×5 name tag.
Everyone will thank me for the conversation starter. I’m confident of it.
My name tag will look like this:
NAME: Steve Weiss
BORN: Bonne Terre, MO
HOMETOWN: Springtown, MO
CONNECTION to Steve: I am Steve.
PASSIONS: Music; vegetable gardens; roadtrips; March Madness; staying connected with people.
-=-=-=
One thing will NOT change. There will be a guestbook for “Shindig…Round 2.”
I love the guestbook from that day in early October, 2018. I pick it up every once in awhile for a quick spin.
Some people wrote only a dozen words. Others took up most of a page. I love each and every entry.
Reading a few pages from the 25,590 Day Shindig guestbook always helps me accomplish the Jimmy Valvano trio: “To me, there are three things we all should do every day. We should do this every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And number three is you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that’s a full day. That’s a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you’re going to have something special.” ESPY Awards, March 4, 1993.
I watch that full speech a couple of times a year.
The 37 second clip gets watched more often than that.
-=-=–=
Roll with the changes.
Laugh.
Think.
Tear up.
And Be.
Just Be.
In May, 1982 I started in the tax division of the Portland, Orygun office of Arthur Anderson & Co. It was the biggest of the then “Big 8.” AA&Co. was born in 1913 and expired on August 31, 2002 after being convicted of obstruction of justice for shredding documents related to its audit of Enron.
I was 33 years old in May of ’82 with a “post-bacc” in accounting from Oregon State University.
The “typical” AA&Co. hire was fresh out of college, 22 years old and starting in the audit division, or just out of law school or a Masters of Tax program and assigned to the tax division.
I was older. My course of study was non-traditional.
And my overall GPA, including my 3 years at a junior college where I amassed a 2.3, was not up to snuff by AA&Co. standards. Not to mention that before campus interviews in the fall of 1981 I didn’t own a suit or tie, had shoulder length hair, a scraggly beard, wore mostly denim and tie died tees. And even though I had “slowed down” I still drank lots of homemade wine, and smoked lots of dope.
I wasn’t an officer in Beta Alpha Psi or Alpha Kappa Psi. I wasn’t even a member.
People at the school of business and in the career center were shocked when they saw my name on the sign up sheet for interviews with the public accounting firms.
The shock increased when the word got out that I was one of few to get an house interview with Andersen.
You coulda knocked a lot of people over with a feather when they heard that I had an offer to go straight into tax at AA&Co.
I was one of those shocked and surprised people.
-=-=-=-=
On my TriMet bus rides that May of ’82, after my first few days in the office and after meeting most of the other 50+ people in the tax division and comparing “pedigrees,” the voice in my head was very active:
“What the fuck have you done this time? What the fuck were you thinking?!?”
“Good fucking luck lasting the 2 years you need to be certified!!”
“What exactly does “Marine corps of the Big 8” fucking mean?”
One of the selling points of AA&Co. was the training facility in St. Charles, Illinois. First year tax staff spent a week there attending “Basic Tax.”
“Code and Regs” for each of the 20 of us sitting around a horseshoe formation. Before my first day in the Portland office I had never touched either of them.
It was intense in St. Charles. A room full of lawyers and M.T.’s trying to impress each other….and me wishing I was invisible.
The voice in my head was very active with lots of F-bombs that first week in St. Charles.
A pair of mahogany doors that represented “confidentiality, privacy, security and orderliness” were the entry to every floor of every AA&Co. office worldwide.
I expected that I might be hawking doors sometime soon, after a quick washout, so I bought this tee.
I was promoted to manager on June 1, 2016.
A manager’s primary responsibility: Bill & Collect.
A manager was also responsible for quality control, client relationships, staff development, tax technical expertise…and NETWORKING (ugh?!?).
Networking meant civic involvement in some shape or form.
In many cases that involvement meant JOINING.
I have never been a joiner. Not then…now now…never. And networking ain’t ever been my thing either.
However none of the above responsibilities were optional.
The office had a list of “opportunities” for new managers.
Often these were targeted, e.g. “we’d like to develop a relationship with the leadership at Wilson Widget, and they are active in ‘fill-in-the-blank’ ”
Or they might be volunteer opportunities for worthy causes.
I picked two worthy causes that sounded good to me, didn’t involve “joining”…and that met my responsibility requirement for the rest of time in PDX: Junior Achievement and the Oregon Symphony.
1. JA got me out of the office for 4 hours a week during office hours. There were 20+ other corporate volunteers. We were assigned to a school, where we would work with a teacher and their class to develop a business plan for a product chosen by the students. It included selling the product and producing financial statements.
There was a competition between the 20+ volunteers, based on net profit generated.
My JA experience is mostly a blur.
2. I was a “fund raiser” for the Oregon Symphony.
Each year I was given a list of previous donors and targets. My task was to call everyone on the list and ask for money.
I was also expected to come up with some $$ from people who weren’t on the list.
I exceeded my goal both years.
I got tickets to the symphony.
I saw Yo-yo Ma and Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg.
Eighteen tees.
Eighteen stories.
Some stories longer than others.
Some of the stories more meaningful than others, as to who I was and who I am.
Thanks to a friend for the idea. Thanks Harry Styron.
Thanks to his law school friend for transforming a bunch of shirts, ages two to fifty-one, into a colorful quilt. Thanks Kathy Tibbits.
Gonna break the telling into thousand word (or less) pieces.
It starts with hoops…
MAJC #1 (1968)
I was 5’10 and 140 pounds my senior year in high school. I changed high schools every year. I never made the basketball team in high school. In fact, the first team that I tried out for and “made” was at Ft. Bragg in 1971. (There is a story there….)
I added 4 inches and 40 pounds the summer after I graduated h.s. and started to come out of my shell.
I could shoot. I had good mechanics and form. I had quick hands. But I was skinny and puny…and an unassertive, introverted wallflower. My introversion resulted in lots of alone time growing up. Just me, a hoop and a basketball. I spent lots of time shooting a basketball all by myself.
At Mineral Area Junior College in Flat River, MO I made friends with a few of the guys on the juco team. I made friends with several local guys who had been good high school players. They put me on their intramural team.
I was not the best player on the intramural team that took the trophy at MAJC. But I was the most improved. I was never a scorer. I was a shooter.
(Note that my alone time after high school…and there was lot of it my first two years of college…added a fourth component: whiskey. Many afternoons I’d slam a few shots and take a couple-of-hundred jump shots on the blacktop court at Emerson Elementary School…where I had attended kindergarten. Over 30 years later I learned that my uncles knew about my jack-and-jumpshots time. )
There wasn’t a 3 point shot then, but in rhythm from 21 feet I could be deadly. And I had become fearless on the court. I liked guarding bigger guys; loved blocking out; liked to bump and bang.
Back “in the day” there was a thing called “town team basketball.” It was more than just a bunch of guys shooting some hoops and drinking beer. There were tournaments. There were sponsors. It was competitive and physical, especially the one held in Bismarck, MO. Lots & lots of bumping and banging.
In the spring of 1968, 7 of the guys who had played on the Mineral Area team the past 2 seasons got a team together. Most of them went on to play at 4 year colleges. I’m not quite sure to this day why they asked me to play on their team. I think they just needed an eighth to make the count even. Plus there was the shooting…. and the 5 hard fouls that I had to give.
I was mostly a practice dummy on the Blake Mattress Company team. But I always got some playing time, even in the finals of the Bismarck tournament. It was a barn-burner….and one of my favorite memories.
A few of the guys I played intramural ball with were in the stands at the finals. Somebody asked them “aren’t all those guys from the college team?”
“Yeah, except for that guy with the ball…”
And right then I buried it. On the next trip too.
I had 4 of our 103 points.
And a heckuva memory.
-=-=-=-=
MAJC #2 (1972)
I was fresh out of the Army. My brother had just finished his two years on the team at MAC. Seven of them got a sponsor and entered the tournament at Bismarck.
Once again I was the only member of the team who hadn’t been on the local juco squad.
That team made it to the finals too. But no first place trophy.
-=-=-=-=
walkinback (1980)
This tee shirt was a Christmas present. It “commemorated” a trip to Pamelia Lake, in the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness of Oregon.
We had hiked to the beautiful lake at the foot of 10,497 foot Mt. Jefferson a few times before. It’s only 2.3 miles from the parking lot to the lake’s shoreline. Elevation gain of about 800 feet.
The hike had always been very pleasant, ending with snacks, weed and wine.
The tee was in remembrance of a cross-country ski experience.
Not all that pleasant for me…on my way in or out.
Four of us on the trek: my ex, and my two friends who had grown up in Wisconsin. Paula and Jim were both naturals on cross-country skis. Kevin was decent. I was horrendous.
None of us remembered from our hikes how much the trail twisted & undulated. Lots of up and downs.
I was down a lot. I have no idea how many times I had to pull myself out of the snow on the way to picturesque Pamelia Lake.
I had a fairly new pair of levis on that day, and every time I fell on my ass I would leave a couple of blue marks in the snow. My friends thought it was funny. I laughed with them, as they laughed at me.
I told them that I only had about a dozen more falls left in me, and after that I would walk back.
They didn’t think I was serious.
If I had it to do over again, I probably wouldn’t have taken my skis off for the last half mile…or at least put them back on after I learned how hard it was to hoof it.
Walking turned out to take even more effort than the falling…staining the snow levis blue…and dragging my clumsy self back to vertical.
But if I had skied back to the parking lot, rather than walking, my friends would never have given me this awesome tee shirt!!
On September 21, 2017 I walked away from a silent auction as the winner of a one hour flight in a speedy single engine Cessna.
Five-hundred sixty-four days later, on April 7, 2019, Wayne and I flew to Farmington, picked up Dad, and flew back to Springfield. Total time in the air: 2 hours, 5 minutes. (Wayne is the pilot. It’s his plane. He donated the $750 dollar flight that I picked up for only one-hundred-and-eighty dollars.)
-=-=-=
When I found out that I had won the flight, my first thought: “what the hell am I gonna do with this? who’ll go flying with me?”
As I walked to the car, I flashed on the obvious solution: help my 91 year old Dad have a new experience.
I called him as soon as I got into the Prius. I told him how much fun I often have at silent auctions….and that tonight I had won something with him in mind.
“Dad, have you ever flown in a small plane?”
“Well one time your Mom and I….”
“Not commercial dad. I’m talking single engine. Seats 4. Max. And everybody wears headphones….”
Dad was up for it!
And it looked like we might take the flight within a month.
Dad lives 200 miles east of Springfield. A few times a year he stays for several days at my sister’s at Table Rock Lake. One of those times was gonna happen in late October.
Wayne, Dad and I put 3 pm on 10/22/17 on our calendars.
Our one hour flight would take us down over Jasper, Arkansas and over Lake Taneycomo, Table Rock and Beaver Lake.
Dad would see fall colors and lots of water….a couple of his favorite things.
We didn’t fly on October 22, 2017. Low, heavy clouds.
Wayne said we could go up, but all we would see below us would be clouds.
We decided to postpone until Dad’s next stay at Paula&Don’s.
-=-=-=
And then things changed.
Here is the entry from my journal the next day, 10/23/17:
“exchanged some texts with wayne. he tossed out the idea of flying over to get dad and then flying him to springfield. i like the idea. called the lake and left a message to that effect. hopefully we can make it happen.”
It took another 541 days until 4/7/19 when Wayne asked: “do you have the need….the need for speed!”
I’m not sure how many times after that day in late October two-thousand-seventeen that we would shuttle Dad from/to his place in Doe Run via automobile. At least 5 or 6 times.
There was conflict after conflict.
…a schedule conflict with the travel days for Wayne (he owns a business with operations here and in Chattanooga)
…a schedule conflict with the travel days for me (I told my sister she could take my seat if I was gonna be out of town on a date that worked…but she’s “not interested in flying,” aka chicken)
…we didn’t give Wayne enough lead time (yeah, this is another way of saying “schedule conflict”)
We got close to flying a couple of times. But close only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades and slow dancing…not in getting Dad an experience.
Finally, we were able to make all the schedules mesh and put a flight on our calendars. Early in the afternoon of Sunday, 4/7/19 I would meet Wayne at the airport. He and I would fly to Farmington and pick Dad up and then the three of us would fly back to Greene county.
-=-=-=
And then it seemed that once again it wasn’t gonna happen: the weather looked like it was gonna put the kibosh on the day! Fuck me.
I have little or no faith in “crack meteorologists” and their forecasts, but 10 days out I started paying attention.
It didn’t look promising from the get-go…and then it got worse.
The first few days the “experts” were calling for some rain on Sunday the 7th. By the time Wednesday the 3rd rolled around their forecast was for afternoon rain and thunderstorms on Sunday.
On Friday it looked like not only would the weather be too nasty to fly on Sunday…if the forecast was right, we probably wouldn’t even wanta drive across the state that day.
It looked like I was gonna be driving Dad home on Monday, and it would be back to the drawing board.
Wayne and I talked at noon on Saturday. He was optimistic that there would be decent weather if we pushed the time back a couple of hours. It wouldn’t be great weather, but Dad would be able to pick out some landmarks.
I told him that sounded good to me, but that I did have a couple of questions: “You don’t happen to be a doctor or EMT, do you? And are you concerned about ferrying a 92 year old across state who has had a pair of “three nitro days” in the past week?”
Wayne laughed. “No, I’m not a doctor. You don’t want to take a chance and postpone again do you?”
He was right. None of us are getting any younger…and none of us are promised tomorrow.
I’ll always remember April 7, 2019.
We woke up at our happy place, Shady Acre Motel, after a great Saturday evening of music by The Nace Brothers at The Rock House.
We had brunch and mimosas on our balcony at The Abbey.
Then I headed to the airport to finally meet Wayne after almost 18 months of lots and lots of text messages and several phone calls.
The flight in both directions went by too quickly. A tail wind got us there in 55 minutes. Randy and Dottie had driven Dad the 5 or 6 miles from his place outside Doe Run to the Farmington airport. It took us 70 minutes on the return flight. There were some scattered clouds. Otherwise, the weather was perfect.
Dad loved it.
I loved it.
So did Wayne. (He took a great selfie. Dad is the oldest person who has ever flown with him in the 30+ years he has flown. Wayne is a fantastic pilot. Perfect landings, even with a 20mph crosswind in Farmington. I have flown in small planes several times, and never experienced better touchdowns.)
I made two FB posts with pictures that afternoon. {In my journal I often include an annotation for FB posts.}
-=-=-=
FB at 4:46 pm
On the ground in Farmington.
Greene County…here we come!!
{picture of wayne, dad, me in front of the plane. taken by dottie.}
-=-=-=-=
FB at 7:42 pm
We had the need.
The need for Speed.
Melvin, Steve, Wayne…pilot extraordinaire.
It was a great day.
It was a great day to fly.
{the selfie that wayne took of us. when we took off from spfd he asked me “do you have the need?” and he asked dad the same thing. he told me that it was from the movie top gun…and then I remembered.}
-=-=-=
My social media day on 4/7/19 started with this FB post:
FB at 8:23 am
This will be me and my 92 year old dad this afternoon…his first time up in a small plane.
Details and pictures later.
{link to “treetop flyer” by stephen stills}
It ended this way:
FB at 8:10
Perfect ending to a wonderful weekend.
Saturday night at our Happy Place.
Pizza.
Final Four.
Friends; Music; Music by friends.
Hotel sex.
Mimosas on the balcony.
Flight with Dad.
Binge watching with my baby.
Pie.
Red sky at night.
Perfect.
{picture of a red sunset from our balcony}
-=-=-=
Flying cross country for a job interview can be a bit stressful, even when you know that it’s a long shot.
Add in that I had to “play hooky” for a couple of days from AATT-whatever. (The interview was before I surprised my boss with my resignation…)
That was my situation.
The interview was in Portland. I was living and working in Sarasota. I was flying out of Tampa. Not only were the connections better out of TPA, but on a day when I had “called in sick” I also thought there would less chance of bumping into someone I knew.
Wrongo.
You know what they say about best laid plans….
-=-=-=
It was an early Thursday morning flight.
The waiting area at the gate was packed.
And there sat my boss…on the same flight to O’Hare as me!!
What? The. Fuck!?!?
I didn’t panic….not too much, anyway.
I thought about changing my flights, but for several reasons that wouldn’t work….primarily because the interview spanned two days, starting with a dinner a couple of hours after scheduled touchdown in PDX.
For the next 20 minutes, until boarding, I concocted my story in case I ended up needing one. I don’t think it woulda been believable, trying to explain calling in sick and then catching a 6am flight.
Fortunately I never needed to stammer and stutter while spewing obvious bullshit.
-=-=-=
The boss was flying first class, which meant that I had to walk right past him to get to my seat. I had flown on the same plane with him enough times to know that he usually went to work as soon as he got into his seat.
That’s what he was doing this morning. He had his head down, a stack of printed out e-mails on the tray, a pen in his hand.
He was focused.
I managed to sneak by him on my way to my seat several rows from the back of the plane.
I was holding my breath, with my fingers crossed, as I got past him and into coach as quickly as I could.
When the plane landed in Chicago I was in no hurry to get into the terminal.
I guess I musta been living right.
Or more likely: I was just very, very lucky.
-=-=-=
At our weekly one-on-one the following Monday, his first question was “How are you feeling?”
“I was really nauseous last Thursday morning, but I was feeling better by later in the day. And I still had a bit of ‘nervous stomach’ on Friday.”
BTW, a couple of months later, after some follow-up interviews…and after I had given my notice at AATT-w…I got the job in Portland.
