In 1996, our son Sam graduated from college and while home, drove to a nearby town,  Anderson, IN and bought a tiny, white Chihuahua just a few months old.  Tiny Chihuahuas are good chick magnets. He named him “Skeeter”.  Sam lived the first year after college in Kentucky with several of his friends and of course, Skeeter.

The boys rough housed with Skeeter (which on some level I’m sure shaped his personality) and on one occasion, the boys left the house with an almost entirely un-eaten pizza, saved for later.  The returned to an open, empty pizza box and Skeeter was feigning innocence. But his bloated little stomach and the red sauce around his mouth betrayed him. Sam had to set him outside for a good, long while.

I hope dogs go to heaven. I’m quite certain they do. Certainly no loving God would separate people from their canine friends for eternity.”  In Job 12:10 it says “For the soul of every living thing is in the hand of God.”

REST IN PEACE LITTLE SKEETER……… WE LOVE YOU

Skeeter

Yesterday my wife and I went down to Fishers, IN. to pick up our grandson, who is six, from the school bus when he arrived.

We waited for with many mothers and younger siblings.  When the bus arrived, our grandson climbed down from the bus, holding a Kleenex to his mouth. He ran up to us and said “I pulled a tooth today!!!”, and sure enough in his lower set of baby teeth there, right in front,  was a gaping hole. He was so proud.

As we walked the two blocks to his home, he was all excited,  jabbering and telling us all about it.  He was pulling on his tooth, twisting it, and it fell out.  His teacher took him to the school nurse, they washed his mouth off and gave him a Kleenex to hold on his mouth.  They also gave him an envelope to hold the tooth.

As soon as we got into the house, he called his dad and told him what he had done. Then we had to get a look at the tooth. He emptied his back pack, then shook it out.  There was no envelope, no saved tooth.

He threw down the back pack yelling, “I’ve lost it!!” and fell to the floor wailing.  His heart was broken, his precious tooth was gone.  My wife and I examined the back pack carefully, shook it again and a small, white, envelope fell out.  Our grandson saw it and immediately said “There it is!”  and sure enough, that small, cherished baby tooth was there.  We quickly said “Lets put it where we can find it”.

We took the tooth and envelope and put them on the counter in the kitchen, laying the tooth on top of the white envelope.  Our son then called Julie (his wife) to give her the exciting news.

The loss of the tooth did not hamper the grandson’s eating ability.  After dinner, my wife and I left for home.  Shortly after we arrived home,our son called and asked if we had seen the tooth.  We told him where we had last seen it.  Unbelievably, the elusive tooth was missing again.

About two hours later, the son called again and the fleeting, evasive baby tooth was again found.  He had thought that the tooth might have fallen to the floor when he picked up the white envelope to throw it away.  He had gotten down on his hands and knees, using the flash light on his cell phone had searched the floor and miraculously found that baby tooth.  He, Julie and the tooth fairy all rejoiced and celebrated.  Now they just had to keep an eye on that wandering tooth until morning.

Our adventurous gang decided to go, and when one of our own, Bob Stephenson, provided the car, we were on our way. There was our ringleader; Nick, Bob Stephenson, myself and Max Parker.

Bob was the groundskeeper of the Muncie Reds, a class D affiliate of the Cincinnati Reds.  Class D is one of the lowest levels of Professional baseball.  Usually when a player is signed to a professional contract they are given a signing bonus.  Once received, the first thing many of the players do is to buy a new car.  When the team would go on a road trip, they would leave their cars and keys with Bob to care for them. I remember one player had a new Chevrolet and he had put on Cadillac tail fins which made it a really hot car.  They would give Bob permission to drive them.

Max was a south side Muncie boy, and a fine basketball player.  He was a great shooter and the starting guard with the local team, the Muncie Central Bearcats (i.e. the movie Hoosiers).  He delighted staying with his friends’ families and would just make himself at home.

At the time, he was staying with another friend of ours, Bobby Graves.  Bobby’s father, Tommy Graves, would give his children a weekly allowance every week.  They would line up and Tommy would dole out the money.  Max would just line up along with them.  One week, they were lined up to receive their money and when it came to Max, he said,  “Could I have a little extra? I have a date.”

Max also loved country music and was completely uninhibited.  He would belt out a country tune any time so moved.  They had a country tune that was popular at the time, “Good Night Irene”.  It was like the later Beetle tunes where they just keep repeating a line.  It went “Good Night Irene, Good Night Irene, Good Night Irene, Good Night Irene, I’ll see you in my dreams.”  Max loved that song and would sing it repeatedly.

We finally arrived at Indian Lake and rented a house for the weekend.  It consisted of a front porch which ran across the house and the rear of the house had been divided into two spaces which served as bedrooms.  The partition dividing the room did not go to the top of the ceiling.  There was a space of about two feet.

We went on our way around the amusement park and met some young ladies who were glad to accompany us. I, as usual, had no money by this time.  I was in line with a young lady to go on the Ferris wheel. I had no money and the young lady was expecting me to get the tickets. I really had no plans, I was thinking of using the old lost billfold routine.

As we were waiting in line to get the tickets, Bob Stephenson came over to me and extended his hand to shake hands with me and to wish me luck, he slipped a $10.00 bill into my hand.  He didn’t say a word other than good luck.  It has been over 60 years and I can still remember that most vividly.  That says wonders about Bob’s character and I have remembered it many, many times.

Max was also on the Ferris with us and he had some young lady with him.  We could not see him, but we could hear him occasionally belting out “Good Night Irene.”  Max had consumed several bottles of that 3.2 Ohio beer.  When Max and his lady reached the top of the Ferris wheel, it stopped and the seats started rocking.  We were about two or three swings behind Max.

The rocking of the swings and the 3.2 beer apparently overcame Max, and he started throwing up over the side of the seat. I’m describing this as delicately as possible, but the vomit went all over the sides of the Ferris wheel and toward the ground.

When the ride ended, our girlfriends left, and we, with a thoroughly chastened Max, went back to our rented house.

Max and I slept on one side, and Bob Stephenson and Nick slept on the other.  As we prepared to go to sleep, Max coughed up a goober (phlegm) and blew it up and out of his mouth into the air.  Again, I’m trying to describe this as delicately as possible.  It soared up, over and through the partition of the rooms and with the precision of a GPS, came down and hit Nick right between the eyes.

Nick was a Greek kid, not too tall, but very stocky and strong. Nick was enraged!  He charged around the partition, with wild, tousled hair and in white shorts and yelled, “WHICH ONE OF YOU SONS OF BITCHES DID THAT?”

I pointed to Max and Max pointed to me.  Bob Stephenson came trailing after Nick and helped to calm Nick and restore some semblance of order.

Even now, after all of these years, when I want to raise my spirits, I think of Nick coming around that corner.

We loved Indian Lake.

Three Amigos Reunited

About a half mile from our house there is about a 45 degree curve.  The folks who live there raise some chickens, ducks and occasionally some turkeys.  The birds run loose and as  you can imagine, they lose some to the traffic.

A day or two ago,  a duck was killed and was laying by the side of the road as I went through the curve.  Today when I went by the area, I saw two young ducks laying by the body with their heads laying on the body of the dead duck.  Apparently the dead bird was their mother.

Sometimes I wish I was not so observant or so sensitive, but then again the fact that someone was aware and had noticed the incident perhaps gave it some meaning, some dignity.  Maybe in some small way it made the world a better place and me a better person?

I hope so.

In 1955 I was in the army, stationed at Schofield barracks with the 25th infantry division with Headquarters Company near Honolulu, Hawaii.  You might remember Schofield barracks.  It was where they filmed the movie “From Here to Eternity” It was the nearest army base when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.

Schofield Barracks, Hawaii

It was a weekend and there were several of us on the second floor of the barracks just hanging out.  There was a commotion out on the street immediaely in front of the barracks building.
To the left of our building was the line company the AAA, the anti-aircraft company and to the right the howitzers, the artilery companies.  Each company four units, A, B, C and D.,with each unit having approximately 50 men.

However new technology can now remove old lovers, spouses and mistakes but it is expensive, time consuming and painful.

Since the celebration of the fourth just passed, I was thinking of the fourth and tatooes.

In the late 40′s, early fifties , the  Cincinnati Reds had a farm club in Muncie (see pic below), called appropriately enough the ‘Muncie Reds’.  It was a class D farm club, whch is the lowest class.  The manager was one, Mike Blazo, a bombastic guy, popular with the fans and the grounds keeper was a high school friend of mine, Robert (Bob) Stephenson.  Nick Liakos, also a high school friend of mine and Bob’s liked to attend the games to harass Bob and enjoy himself.

On this particular July fourth, Nick was there with Bob, myself and some other guy.  It might have been Keith Stevens or Max Parker who sometimes went with us.  Nick had a tatoo and he began haranging me about getting one.  I, of course and as usual, had no money, so Nick said he would take up a collection to get me a tatoo.  Nick said that the guy who had given him his tatoo lived just across the street, on Broadway.

When the appropriate sum had been collected, I couldn’t back out, so we all went across Broadway to visit the tatoo artist.  He lived in a ramshackled framed, weather-beaten house, along with his 4-5 year old daughter and his current girl friend.  He had all ready tatooed both his young daughter and his  girl friend.

He regaled us with stories about women he had tatooed.  One woman had  Rum on one breast and Coke on the other breast. There was a polular song at the time called “Drinking Rum and Coke Cola”.  One women had an arrow on her inner thigh saying “this way up”,  and another with twin pistols, one on each side pointing to her bikini line.

The tatoo artist had his initials inside his mouth and on his male reproductive member he had tatooed a fly.  He said that he wanted to finish it off with a barber pole.  (I hope I have been discreet about describing these).

My tatoo was my name “Robbie” tatooed on my upper left arm.  Since it was summer, my short sleeve shirts covered it.  I was very careful when I was at home, so my mother would not see it.  One Sunday morning we were both on the porch and when I reached  down to pick up the Sunday paper, my sleeve went up and my mother saw my tatoo.  She said “Don’t you know that will never come off?”  I said “It better not, I paid a dollar and a half for it!”  Seems like I have always had a smart mouth.

My mother was right, as she seemed to always be, and that tatoo is still with me.  I showed it to my grandson recently.  I hope I didn’t give him any ideas…………………

1950 Muncie Reds

]]> http://bobby1213.wordpress.com/2011/07/07/tatoo/feed/ 2 bobby1213 1950 Muncie Reds http://bobby1213.wordpress.com/2011/07/05/library/ http://bobby1213.wordpress.com/2011/07/05/library/#comments Tue, 05 Jul 2011 14:25:42 +0000 Robert Robinson http://bobby1213.wordpress.com/?p=64 ]]> A couple of days ago I went to the library to get some large print books for my sister, who has a vision problem.  I parked my car behind a van which was directly in front of me.  As I was getting out of my car, I noticed the back end of the van in front of me.   On the rear window, it had a figure of Tinker Belle, the little fairy figure from Peter Pan in the upper left corner of the rear window and a similar figure on the upper right corner of the rear window.  In the center of the window in large letters was the message:

“IN MEMORY OF MY SON CHRISTEPHER ALLEN DENT.  On the left of the window was the birth date June 18. 1988 and to the right, the date of death June 18, l988.

Here was a person who had lost her child on the same date that it was born.  As the meaning became clear, I felt an immense sadness.  How tragic.  This ole cowboy bean to began to mist up.  Sometimes I think that I could cry at a volleyball game.
When I was a small boy and would cry, my sisters would whack me in the ass and say “A man is not suppose to cry”. Right or wrong,  I have always  consciously or unconsciously tried to follow that maxim.

I wondered if this was her first child, if it was still born, how long it had lived, if she had held it in her arms, what about its father, was he still with her.  The many questions were unclear, but I was clear about one thing, this pain and sorrow had touched her at the core of her soul.. I wondered if time had helped to heal her suffering.

I had to get my hair cut and went to the local barber shop.  When I entered, there were about 5-6 older guys there, only one of them was there for a hair cut.  There were 4-5 barber chairs, only one of which was being used for its original purpose, the others were filled with the fellows who were there in the shop.

They were talking about the weather being cold.   One guy said that he had an electric mattress cover.  It was not an electric blanket,he pointed out,  but a matress cover.  You put it on the matress and it really makes you warm. He said it was low wattage, like Christmas tree lights.  This was so that if you peed on it you wouldn’t get electrocuted.

Someone asked him where he got it and he said his wife bought it.  They asked how much it costs and he said not much, his wife was tighter than bark on a tree and her saving money had enabled him to retire.  He had been married 50 years and he said Boys its tough waking up to the same face for fifty years and someone replied How about her!!

One fellow asked if anyone had an air matress and one person did, he said you had to blow it up. This reminded him of a good ole boy he knew who had a blow up doll.  He dressd her up and everything, and she even had a name.  Said she treated him better than his wife.

In talking about the weather, they got onto the TV weather people and one guy told them about a weather man who had a little gal from the north and they were at the water front covering a hurricane.  He said she was standing there beside him and a big wave came in and she just disappeared from the TV screen.  Then she came crawling back on the beach, all wet and bedraggled.  This prompted another srory about a weather man who on a really windy day said that he had to grab his little co-anchor by the ankle to keep her from raising off into the sky.

Another  person asked about the political crisis in Egypt. Another fellow said that Katie Coric’s scrawny little ass was over there now and that she might start world war three.

You find a lot of wisdom and humor in the barber shops.  I can’t wait until my hair grows out.

Our new little grandbaby

Love Grandpa and Grandma Robinson

I thought about that expression in the wedding vows, richer or poorer, in sickness and in health.  Sometimes you can see a dignity, a  nobility in the human spirit, something that makes you proud  to be a part of the human race.  They were facing lifes final battles the same way they had started out, together.