I love a parade

Last weekend I watched three parades – one from a standing position and two from the shaded comfort of a portable chair (the type that folds into a finger-pinching shape suitable for easy transport). Just to clear up any misunderstanding I should tell you that the parades were on three separate days in two separate towns. To stay in one spot and have three parades file by would be quite unusual and require a great deal of patience.

It’s hard to avoid a parade when you grow up in Minnesota. Most everyone has seen several before their tenth birthday, and by the time they have graduated high school they have most likely walked (or marched) in one or two.

I have seen dozens of parades from the safety of the curb. I have also marched in a couple wearing a high school band uniform, walked in several to support a cause, and drove cars in them during the homecoming festivities of both high school and college.

In college it was a ’73 Chevrolet Caprice convertible that was driven on the downtown mall in St. Cloud past the morning celebrants. In high school I sat behind the wheel of a ’76 Chevrolet Chevette (Herbie’s cousin).

As fun as it is being in a parade, it may be more fun to watch, but not all the time. I remember being scared out of my mind by the Vulcan Krewe of the St. Paul Winter Carnival. It seemed that no matter what parade my parents took us to the Vulcans were there waiting to swoop down on us.

These fallen angels would ride in on the back of an old fire truck. The truck always seemed to stop in front of us, and with the siren screaming they would descend upon the innocent. As terrified children clung to their father’s pant legs these masked demons in their red capes and boots would smear the faces of women with a greasepaint kiss. I don’t think Mom was ever set upon by one of their horde; perhaps it was the frame of my larger-than-life father that protected her.

Time marches on and the Vulcans have been forced to modify their behavior, but thankfully we still have old fire trucks crawling down the main streets of small towns. I think that the parades in small towns are better than those of large cities. Macy’s Thanksgiving parade has turned into such an orchestrated hoo-ha with its Broadway-style shows performing for the cameras that I no longer watch it.

Of course there is a limit on the other end of the parade route where a town may be too small to host a parade. Many years ago Nathan and I were prevented from driving through a town because they had closed the only road through town to hold their parade. So we did the only logical thing: we watched. There didn’t seem to be very many spectators as almost the entire population was in the parade.

There were men driving their tractors down the middle of the street without any banners, walkers, floats or signs to indicate their sponsor or purpose. They may have just been headed to the field – it was impossible to tell.
I love a parade (the title of a song written in 1932 by Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler). I love the cars, trucks and the tractors. The floats with the royalty and their choreographed waves (one-two-three-four-switch sides), and the three-piece bands on hay wagons are small-town standards.

There are some towns that don’t allow politicians in parades. I like that idea, but perhaps they could be permitted under certain conditions: Since they are not royalty they should not be treated as such by riding in an open car or on a float. All politicians (elected or candidate) must walk the parade route. And as a second condition they should follow the horses.

I would even stand in the sun to watch that high-stepping spectacle.

Dining Out

I had a little trouble at the drive-through window of a fast-food place one morning this week. The voice on the other end of the magical speaker goofed up my order, and when I corrected her she got a little snippy with me. I felt kind of foolish arguing with a speaker and a display screen, but at least I got a straw to go with my iced coffee.

In a fast-food environment, particularly with the faceless speaker box, there isn’t the same personal connection you get with a slow-food restaurant (as my kids used to call them). When you have a waiter or a server they are with you for a longer period of time and hence should have a greater interest in your well-being; at least in theory.

There’s a restaurant in town I frequent because they have a bar where I can sit and eat my lunch, drink my iced tea, read the paper, watch eight TVs, and listen to music being played through speakers above my head. I only do this when I am alone, for it would certainly be rude to be so distracted with a dining partner.

I had a meeting in town the other night so I had supper there. The bar stools were filled with people I didn’t recognize (the regular lunch crowd had shuffled out). I took a spot at a booth but I felt a little out of place. I couldn’t see the TVs very well, and the music was hard to hear, and although I brought a book to read, it wasn’t the same as reading the paper.

When I was finished and ready to leave the server brought my receipt and said,
“You guys have a nice day.” I looked around to make sure that someone hadn’t slipped into my booth unnoticed. Not seeing anyone I considered that perhaps there was a character sitting with me that only the server could see – kind of Elwood P. Dowd (the character Jimmy Steward played in “Harvey”) – only different. I left a large enough tip to cover both of our meals, just to be on the safe side.

The wait staffs in restaurants have it tough. I’ve never been a waiter and am quite sure I don’t have the patience for it. Also, servers are expected to anticipate a customer’s needs and satisfy them before they are requested. For example, water, menus, and condiments are usually brought to the table automatically, but not silverware. In some restaurants you must ask for it.

I was eating lunch some time ago with my friend Jeff. He and I try to get together once a month for lunch, and it was my turn to drive to his town. He selected a restaurant at a golf course. It was a fancy place: linen napkins and table cloths, lead crystal goblets filled with water, black menus with gold tassels – the whole she-bang.

After we ordered the waitress brought our salads, which were included with our lunch (you get that kind of treatment at your fancier places). With food now in front of us we looked around the table but we couldn’t find any silverware – no forks, knives or spoons – nothing. We waited patiently and tried several times to get our server’s attention but still no silverware.

Jeff may have started it, or it could have been me, but one of us picked up a crouton with our fingers and put it in our mouth, then another and another. Pretty soon both of us were picking up all the croutons on the salad, even the ones with dressing on them. After that we grabbed the lettuce with our fingers as well. In between bites and bouts of laughter I asked him, “What kind of town do you live in where you have to eat a salad with your fingers?”

Within a few minutes the waitress brought the rest of our lunch. By then we had attracted some attention from the other tables.

“Do you think we could have some silverware for the rest of our meal?” Jeff asked her.

“It looks to me like you’re both doing just fine without it,” she said with a huff as she turned her back on us.

Maybe I should just stick to the drive-through window – at least there you get a straw.

Check please.

Corn

I relish corn in all manners and stages, some more than others: popcorn, corn bread, corn flakes, frozen corn, canned corn, corn nuts, Corn King hot dogs, creamed corn, field corn, corn syrup, ethanol and corny jokes. But about this time of year I start to grow tired of corn-on-the-cob.

We have a garden at our place. I say we, but mostly it’s my wife Rhonda’s garden, as my only contribution is to till it twice a year. Corn, still on the cob, begins to show up at meal times with regularity for a few weeks every August. It’s hard to complain about food when it is plentiful and prepared for you, but please let me try.

My aversion to excessive corn goes back to my childhood; the memories still disrupt my sleep. As part of my training my parents sent me to Montgomery to work the corn pack at the Green Giant factory one summer.

Although it only lasted a few weeks, it seemed more like a few years. The shifts lasted 12 hours and then swung around to let the night shift go to the day shift (and vice versa). I would work 18 hours during those swing days. During those long days that turned into night I witnessed people fall asleep while standing up.

My social life suffered greatly during those weeks. I’m not sure if it was the hairnet worn throughout the day, the corn that clung to my clothing, or the smell that permeated my pores that made me want to stay home and rest in between shifts.

The freshly picked corn was delivered by truck day and night from the fields of Scott, Rice and Le Sueur counties. They kept coming and coming. While I sat outside alone during my breaks I remember being impressed and feeling depressed witnessing this long parade of trucks.

I had two different jobs at the factory. Both of them had comical “Lucille Ball” qualities. On one I stood next to a fast-moving conveyor belt. In front of me cobs of corn whizzed by that had been husked by a (husking?) machine. My job was to quickly grab those that had been missed by the machine and put them down a chute, where they presumably would be sent back to be husked (or rehusked?).

My secondary task on that conveyor line was to grab gross or damaged cobs and dispose of them. There was no time for indecision or contemplating the fate of a marginal cob. Some slipped through, but when I got behind I resisted the temptation to catch up by stuffing the cobs in my shirt or my mouth.

The second job I had at the factory was to get my hands smashed by frozen corn cobs. I stood on a ladder above a large container and spread frozen cobs evenly in the container as they exited a chute. The idea was to get as many cobs into a container as possible, but I found the consequences of completing the task contrary to its intended purpose: the frozen cobs flew out of the chute with such velocity and numbers that it was impossible to make any progress without having your hands pummeled with dozens of frozen cobs.

Corn may be the only vegetable that I have a love/hate relationship with. I will no longer eat corn right off the cob; I require it to be cut off. I still have all my teeth so that’s not the reason, nor am I so highly cultured that the very idea of eating right from the cob is beneath me. I’ve just never been a fan of having corn stuck between my teeth, plus with a moustache I have to contend with the smell of butter beneath my nose unless I thoroughly scrub up after eating.

But soon I will no longer have corn coming out of my ears. Fall will come and winter will follow. I will spend my nights reading, writing, watching movies, and eating popcorn.

Trashman

Wednesday nights are a big deal at my house. It’s a time of celebration. That’s the night I put the garbage cans out so they can be emptied the next day by the man in the truck. It’s not as much fun during the winter – so part of my enthusiasm is to mask my reluctance in going out into the cold.

Garbage has a special meaning for me; I spent 12 months of my life on a garbage truck. I treasure that experience and wouldn’t throw it away. It was hard work – so every Wednesday night I celebrate the experience, the memory and the fact I don’t do that for a living anymore.

Garbage was collected differently in the early 80’s than it is today. The garbage was in metal cans, and we picked them up, not by grabbing them with a mechanical arm extended from a truck, but with our hands. Some days 700 cans were emptied. I don’t seek pity or praise – rather I offer the perspective of walking in another’s shoes.

The first six months of my stint as a garbage man were in St. Cloud. I had graduated from St. Cloud State University and was waiting for Rhonda to do the same; she had started a year later than me. At night I tended bar at The Red Carpet (another column?) and drove the trash truck during the day.

Hermie rode on the back. He was not a big man – maybe 5-foot-6, 140 pounds – but he was tough. No can was too big for him to abuse. If people put out too many cans or they had forgot to put there cans out he would holler obscenities at the house. I would get out and help on an especially heavy stop, but he preferred that I stayed in the truck to keep our day moving.

One of my favorite memories is when two toddlers waved as we drove by their house. When I pulled the air-horn in response they both tipped over. When Rhonda graduated in the spring I moved from St. Cloud. The following year we were married, and I began law school. The next year I was out of school with that dream dashed, so I needed a job.

I felt that my degree should account for something but was having trouble finding someone to agree with me. It’s hard to look for work when you’re working, but I found it harder not to work. So I got a job as a garbage man, except this time I was riding on the back of the truck for $5 an hour.

It took more grit than I possess now to get out of a warm car and climb on the back of a garbage truck in an October rain; cold, wet gloves may be worse than no gloves at all. My index fingers were so calloused after a few weeks of emptying cans, that I could pop the metal lids off two tightly sealed garbage cans with one movement.

Glenn, the driver, weaved in and out of the alleys and streets of South Minneapolis while I threw the cans. Rhonda would pack me a lunch, which I learned to share with Glenn in the truck in between stops (don’t worry I wiped my hands on my pants before I ate).

“What’s for lunch today?” he would ask. After we ate he would toss the candy wrappers out the window. “Job security,” he would say with a grin.

We worked for a guy who would haul away anything. Sometimes we would carry hide-a-beds down from the third floor of a house, other days we would back up the truck to a busted-up concrete driveway, open the back end and shovel the chunks into the truck.

I know that there are people who work harder than this every day, and I respect them for it. It was brutally hard work and not what I went to school for, but it was a job and I was getting paid. Those days as a garbage man are gone, and on Wednesday nights I think of them when I take out the trash.

Fence

There weren’t a lot of summer job opportunities for 12-year old boy in Belle Plaine in 1971. You could deliver newspapers, mow the neighbor’s grass, or bail hay when the farmers called. Few people were willing to give a kid a chance to prove himself –you had to know someone. Apparently, I didn’t know enough people.

But I knew Jim and Jim knew his parents and his parents knew someone who needed their fence painted. The job was too big and boring for just one, so Jim asked if I would help him. It was the perfect summer job for me. It was only a couple blocks from my house, it was outside, little skill was needed, and I got to spend time with a friend.

From one side the outside surface of a board could be painted, along with the inside surface of the other side. Sometimes Jim and I would paint on the same side of the fence, other times on the opposite side.

We talked and we worked. We talked about girls, sports, teachers, and planned adventures. Sometimes we spilled paint, missed a spot, and went too fast or too slow. But by working together we were able to get the job done without a lot of flip-flopping or excessive name calling when things didn’t go right. And we were just kids.

Kids call each other names, adults label each other, and the meaning is the same. The intent is to damage the other person or group. When an unflattering label or name is attached to a person or a group it hurts the target and also reflects poorly on the person applying the label.

If an argument or position is so weak that name-calling must be resorted to, then silence may be a better option. Now that Michelle Bachman has found herself in first place after the Iowa straw poll I’m waiting to see if her opposition will be called chauvinists or misogynists. After all, some state that those who oppose President Obama’s policies are doing so only because he is black. They must be racists; there can be no other explanation. At least that’s why I hear from some of his supporters.

Tea party members are either “terrorists” (Joe Biden) or “hobbits” (John McCain). It’s difficult to defend or explain away such a charge without getting into a childish exchange of “No, I’m not.” Yes, you are.” “No, I’m not.” “Yes, you are.”

Unless there is clear hard evidence to support damaging labels, let’s do away with them. We may be on opposite sides of the fence, but we should be able to accomplish common goals without painting each other with labels.

And just in case you need to know the color, we painted the fence red. The woman who hired Jim and me, a couple of white boys, to paint her fence, was black. She gave us a chance, and I will never forget that.

Signs

Some signs are easier to explain than others. I have seen hand-painted signs stuck in the ground along country roads that read “Eggs”, “Cucumbers” or some that say “Produce.” I hope the last one refers to things grown and raised for sale instead of a command of “get to work.”

I was driving through Wisconsin the other day with my friend Mark when we saw a sign that almost made us turn around and stop in to inquire, “Kittens $20.” No need to worry, this is not the second column in a series about kittens – this one is more about economics.

Clearly we should have stopped in to satisfy our curiosity about these cats. Instead we chose to theorize. Having seen numerous signs over the years for “Free Kittens,” we wondered if these kittens were special, even rare for this part of the country. Maybe it was just the opposite, perhaps the $20 was offered as an incentive to anyone who would take a kitten. Real money could have been made if the litter was large. Whatever their intent, no cash or cats were exchanged.

The signs seen in the downtown areas of small towns don’t require much thinking to determine their intent; “For Lease,” “For Sale.” The downtowns, those main streets that were a town’s commerce center, are dying as businesses either dry up or move away.

This situation is certainly not new, but it seems to be getting worse. When I was a kid growing up in Belle Plaine the town was much smaller than it is today, and yet in the downtown area there were four grocery stores, two hardware stores, two drug stores, a variety store, two gas stations within a few blocks of downtown, a shoe store, a couple clothing stores and several other businesses. Many of them are gone, or have moved out closer to the highway.

I don’t know for sure why this is happening. I suspect that it is due to several reasons such as shifting traffic patterns, competition, and changing market conditions, but I keep going to back to how Dad looked at supporting local businesses many years ago.

Dad had an office in downtown Belle Plaine and he was disciplined in where he shopped. He shopped in Belle Plaine. When I asked why he didn’t go elsewhere he explained it to me this way: He needed to buy his bread at the local bakery, so the baker would have money to buy a watch from the jeweler next door, so the jeweler could get his car fixed from the garage down the block, so the mechanic could buy his groceries to feed his family and the grocer would be able to keep his store open. He felt a responsibility to these merchants and he didn’t want to break the chain.

Well the chain broke and no business or store is immune. Border’s, the large book store chain, will shut its doors soon. At one time they were considered the big bully on the block that was responsible for the demise of the local independent bookstore. Now, unable to compete with Amazon and Barnes & Noble, they will close their books.

Sure it’s convenient to point and click and shop at one stop, but what will happen to the local retail merchant? This isn’t about me and my silly little office. This is about saving local businesses or soon we may be left with only the big box stores and a mouse to shop with. So please shop local when you can, or at least buy a cat to keep the mice in control. There only $20.

Patience

Patience is a virtue. Perhaps, but I think it depends on the situation. I can be very patient or insanely impatient. For instance, when I am considering a purchase of a limited commodity I do not want to see if it is available tomorrow.

But when it comes to staying power I can linger longer than anyone or anything, including a cat. When Olivia, our resident female feline, has a litter of kittens it’s a challenge trying to find them.

She selects a secret and secluded place. If she suspects you are following her to find her kittens she will not return to them; instead she will bide her time until you give up. But I can be stubbornly patient.

Last year after she had been downsized from her pregnant state I sneaked into the barn after I saw her jump through the missing pane of a window. Being too large for the window myself I opened the barn door. When she heard the door she walked back towards me.

She was being rather coy, but I knew her tricks. I ignored her and went about the business of picking a post to lean on while I pondered. She sat down in front of me and gave herself a bath. After about 20 minutes or so she tired of this and crept over to the firewood pile. Looking around to make sure I wasn’t watching (I pretended to have my eyes closed) she jumped into an old metal tub. There, among the barks and twigs I had saved for kindling, were her kittens.

This year it got a little more complicated. We first discovered the litter in a hollow beneath a bale of hay. But because we had found them she moved them. Finding the second location was not difficult. I spotted her heading to the barn one afternoon, but when she did not emerge from the lilies below the window I went looking. There they were, gathered in the greenery. Of course now that the cache of kittens had been discovered she would move them.

This third hiding place was the most challenging. Taking advantage of my busy schedule Olivia enjoyed a couple weeks of solitude with her kittens. But they were approaching a month old and if we had any hope of having tame barn cats, they would have to be found soon.

Saturday, after my morning constitutional with Buddy the dog, I noticed that Olivia was hanging around the front steps. With the whole day ahead of me I thought “I have you now.” I made some coffee to accompany the toast topped with strawberry jam that had been laid out for me. Taking the morning paper I seated myself next to the window.

While reading how Democrats and Republicans were waiting to see who would blink first over the debt crisis in Washington, I saw Olivia head for the barn. I scurried through the house to a back door so I could sneak up on her. By the time I got outside she had disappeared. One year she had hidden them in the hostas, but that was too predictable so I continued to the barn. Once she spotted me she went into her routine. But once again I waited her out.

Soon she made her way to a corner where there was a large set of warehouse shelves. Among other things on the shelves were a bunch of windows leaning against the wall. When I saw her climb behind them I headed back to the house for the flashlight.

When I returned I couldn’t find her. Climbing onto the shelf and through the cobwebs I rifled through the windows but she was nowhere to be found. Then I heard the sound of a content cat purring. Getting down on my knees I spotted her on the barn floor beneath the shelf. With only four inches of headroom it was a good hiding place.

This time we made the first move. My son Nathan helped me dismantle the shelf and we moved Olivia and her kittens to the smoke house where they would have room to grow and play. All things come to those who wait. Sometimes.