Reminders

Sunday I was reminded there is still buried treasure to discover. Friendship, the church I attend is having a garage sale and was accepting donations of various items. It’s a strange concept to consider: voluntarily give away something that you had purchased, transported, stored and treasured. Sometimes those are things that we have outgrown, or grown past. We may no longer have a use for them or want them.

My wife, Rhonda, and I are trying to not pass our clutter on to our children – it’s best to part with it now so they don’t have to. So last weekend we went on an archeological expedition and uncovered some old furniture in the granary. The old farm buildings are both a blessing and a curse. We have the room to store stuff, but we store stuff because we have the room.

We had a pretty good idea what was hidden in the building, but until we took the tarp off we were just guessing. There was an end table, some stools, a couple of tables and several chairs we had either bought or had accepted as hand–me–downs. At one time, I had big plans to refinish most of them.

For awhile, I busied myself with the unhappy task of stripping and sanding old furniture for imagined pleasure and utilitarian benefit. At first, it seemed like a hobby I might enjoy with the added result of having something to show for my efforts. It took me a while to learn otherwise.

Several years ago I had refinished a few pieces. One was an old kitchen table with several leaves that I picked up from my days as a garbage man in Minneapolis. It seemed a shame to throw it out; you can see the table in the Mary Poppins’ movie – well maybe not the actual table, but it looks exactly the same.

The problem with a little success, it can lead to excess. Soon I was acquiring pieces with the intention of refinishing them. One was a grouping of theater seats from the old Chaska Rex theater. I bought them one Sunday in the fall at a church sale (that should have been a warning) and brought them home and put them in my barn. Twenty years ago I sold that barn (along with the house and land) and moved the theater seats to the granary at our present home. 

While the theater seats sat empty waiting for the show to start I lost interest and walked out and left them there. After a while one must face reality and admit that time has not stood still. In everyone’s life there are unfinished plans and unrealized dreams. Leaving furniture under a tarp for a decade or two is no sin, but leaving your talents buried might be.

Les Brown, a motivational speaker once said, “The graveyard is the richest place on earth, because it is here that you will find all the hopes and dreams that were never fulfilled, the books that were never written, the songs that were never sung, the inventions that were never shared, the cures that were never discovered, all because someone was too afraid to take that first step, keep with the problem, or determined to carry our their dream.”

Following in my father’s footsteps and becoming an insurance agent was never a dream of mine, even when I started on May 1^st, 1985, but I had to do something for work and that something has allowed me to realize other dreams. This wasn’t always apparent though, I often found myself searching for something else. Yet, with thirty years of memories and experiences, I now realize the treasure that life offers was never buried; I just had to open my eyes.

 

 

Blue Jeans

 My father and older brother had different opinions regarding appropriate church attire.  It was the late sixties, and fashion was a battle front in the revolution. When it came to putting on your best for an occasion Dad was strictly a suit and tie man, whereas Dan preferred jeans and anything that looked good with them. In a way, they both had their own uniforms.

Things were different back then; my older sister was sent home for wearing jeans to school – public school. Eventually the trail was worn thin by kids like my sister and brother and jeans became an accepted part of almost everyone’s wardrobe; jeans were not just for rebels anymore. Now when you get “dressed for the day,” it can mean shopping with your mother and sister or digging in a garden.

As a kid, I remember only three brands of jeans: Lee, Levi’s and Wrangler. Now there might be three grand. In addition to the various manufacturers, there are different colors, washes, weights and fits. They can cost twenty dollars or several hundred. What started off as a simple waist and length selection has become quite complicated, requiring a tutorial to make sense of the choices.

They go from slim and skinny, relaxed and loose, straight and tapered, above or below the waist and boot cut. Levi’s has categorized their line of jeans by style from their original 501s through 541 for an athletic approach and ending in 569 for a looser variety. There might even be a 501c3 for those who find non–profits a better fit.

Some purists suggest you should never wash your jeans.  Apparently this theory completes the cycle. Some jeans are so stiff when you first purchase them they will almost stand up by themselves – the same can be said for clothes that are never laundered.

When I find a pair of jeans I like, I hang onto them. Like my old t–shirts, I wear them to the point of indecency. Because as Mark Twain, a sharp dresser himself, once said, “Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence in society.”

Jeans are not seasonally dependent, and they don’t go out of style. When I buy a pair of jeans I plan on having them for years. In fact, I may pass them down to my grandson in my will.

William Carlos Williams, an American poet (1883–1963), wrote Tract, a poem that begins by professing to “teach you my townspeople how to perform a funeral…” If his instructions were followed it would knock the mortuary business on its rear. It includes suggestions on how to honor the deceased.

“No wreaths please--

especially no hot house flowers.

Some common memento is better,

something he prized and is known by:

his old clothes--a few books perhaps”

I would be eternally comfortable with such adornments. And if you’re taking notes, better dress me in blue jeans and a sport coat. I believe this may put to rest both my father’s and brother’s sides of the argument.

Against the Wind

Dear Tom,

You have had more than your share of undeserved heartache, and this little gift may not ease your pain. Our friendship goes back a long way – back to Bob Seger’s early days. You and I listened to so much Seger together over the years that I still think of you when he comes on the radio.

So to give you to something to grab onto, I enlist Seger’s help with this letter. Every sentence or phrase within quotations is from one of his songs (but, of course, you would recognize them “without any clues”).  I admit it might be a strange way to reach out to a friend. “Call me a relic, call me what you will, say I’m old–fashioned, say I’m over–the–hill. I reminisce about the days of old with that old time rock and roll.”

“It seems like yesterday, but it was long ago.” You and I used to walk or run to school together. “We were young and strong, we were running against the wind.” “I was a little too tall, could’ve used a few pounds.” You were “like a rock, standing arrow straight.”

Growing up where we did, when we did, gave us cause and opportunity to create our own adventures, whether it was “a church house, gin house, school house, outhouse.”

 “We were just young restless and bored, living by the sword.” “And the years rolled slowly past.”

We remained friends through school, often mixing our time together with a bunch of other guys. “Sometimes at night, I see their faces; I feel the traces they’ve left on my soul. Those are the memories that make me a wealthy soul.” “And sometimes when I’m feeling lonely and beat I drift back in time, and I find my feet down on Main Street.”

We would “go in town on Friday, be in church every Sunday.” I “keep thinking back to those high school days; those high school days, all the wild, wild, wild good times.” “Such a fine memory, I think I’m going take it with me.”

Then before we knew it, “sweet sixteen turned thirty–one. You get to feeling weary when the work day’s done.” Family, work and adult–hood settled in, and I asked myself, “Twenty years now where’d they go? Twenty years I don’t know. Sit and I wonder sometimes where they’ve gone. And sometimes late at night when I’m bathed in the firelight the moon comes calling a ghostly white and I recall.”

“Now whatever happened to that crazy boy?” I grew up I guess, but I never forgot you, not even for a minute. “So you’re a little bit older and a lot less bolder than you used to be.” Still, you are a good man Tom, “always willing to be second best, a perfect lodger, a perfect guest.”

And, like me, you want “to dream like a young man with the wisdom of an old man.” You want “your home and security.” I know the pain is there, but soon you will “turn the page.”

For now, “think in terms of bridges burned, think of seasons that must end, see the rivers rise and fall; they will rise and fall again. Everything must have an end.” I know you’d love to say, “Deal me another future from some brand new deck of cards.”

Remember that even though the “night was dark, the sky was blue.” It will get better.

“Ain’t it funny how the night moves when you just don’t seem to have as much to lose?”

“I’m older, but still running against the wind.” Even though “I’ve got so much more to think about: deadlines and commitments, what to leave in, what to leave out,” I will never stop being your friend.

Happy birthday Tom!

Jerry

Sunday Drive

Driving to your relative’s house on Easter Sunday is still common, but taking a “Sunday drive” no longer is. When I was a kid the whole family would pile into the station wagon on a Sunday afternoon and Dad would drive us all to no place in particular; either he or Mom might have had a general direction in mind – but the rest of us were just along for the ride. The weather was always nice (if it wasn’t we stayed home), the AM radio played polka music, and the windows rolled up and down manually. As far as I know, many people did the same thing – driving around on a Sunday with no particular place to go.

Our Sunday drives took us on quiet country roads and through small towns. I remember hearing Mom and Dad talking about somebody as we drove past a farm. One would ask the other “Didn’t she marry that so–and–so from Le Center?”  If a house was being built, they would wonder aloud who was building on the old what’s his name’s place.

Cleary, I wasn’t listening that close, but I do know they loved driving around and looking at what there was to see. Sometimes, we would pull into a driveway unannounced and uninvited. It seems preposterous to me now that our station wagon would just show up with five kids at somebody’s house and we would be welcome there. But, that’s what people did.

Although, I admit, I’m not much for station wagons full of kids rolling into my driveway, I still enjoy driving around – always have I guess. Even in high school my friends and I spent hundreds (thousands?) of hours driving up and down the same streets, county roads and state highways in and around Belle Plaine. We listened to the radio, eight–tracks and cassettes.

Dad used to ask me after a night of cruising around, “Where did you go last night?”

“Nowhere in particular,” I would answer.

“How did you put two hundred miles on a car driving nowhere in particular?” he would ask with a slightly elevated tone.

“I don’t know,” I would say – but thinking to myself, ‘I learned it from you.’ Often it was best to keep thoughts like that to myself.

There are at least two ways to travel: one is to know where you are going and not deviate, the other is to head in a general direction and allow yourself to be distracted and detoured. Which way is best can only be answered when the trip is over.

At one time I knew (or thought I knew) where I wanted to go in life and what I wanted to accomplish. But as I got older some dreams were dashed, and I got sidetracked by the obligations of being a father and provider. Yet, I wouldn’t change a thing as I am happier now than I deserve to be.

I was talking with a friend of mine the other day about this and expressing my surprise at how it has all turned out. She explained it this way, “You just didn’t know you’d be like this at this age.”

No, I didn’t; I find myself now here, instead of nowhere in particular. Still, I am content to keep heading in the same general direction, not be in too big of a hurry, and take it all in – much like a Sunday driver I guess.

Twenty-five years

After nineteen years of working with someone, it is difficult to imagine life without them, but that’s what I am faced with for Ruth is retiring. She has worked with two Kucera men for twenty–five years; the first six of those years Ruth worked with my dad at his State Farm office in Belle Plaine. With my dad just down the road in the same business, I called and visited his office frequently seeking guidance.

When Dad retired in 1996 my brother–in–law suggested that I ask Ruth to come and work with me in my office. I immediately loved the idea. However, apparently Ruth did not; she had other plans that did not include me. But, like any pushy salesman, I did not take no for an answer. After about six tries with increasingly higher stakes, I was able to convince her to make the drive north to Shakopee.

After just a few days of working with Ruth I knew it had been one of the best decisions I had ever made; it still is nineteen years later. She did all the right things: she worked hard, showed up on time and often came in early. She never complained – although I gave her much to complain about. Plus, she has been extremely loyal and laughed at most of my jokes.

But what I treasure most is the way Ruth treats people. She is patient and kind, never arrogant or rude, she does not insist on her own way and isn’t irritable or resentful. Ruth practices a way of treating people that is straight out of 1^st Corinthians, chapter 13. Her love of people is evident, and in return, people are drawn to her.

The business I’m in requires that many questions are asked of the person on the other side of the desk or phone. People opened up to Ruth easily and readily. Whether it was someone she had known most of her life or somebody she had just met, people would volunteer information usually reserved for a confessional or professional.

Ruth comes from a large family and married into a large one. Consequently, she is related to half the county. In fact, of the three people in my office (including myself), two are related. Whether the people hail from Union Hill or St. Benedict, she is able to keep it all straight. I may be one of the few for miles around that she cannot trace a relation back to her family.

It seems we spend our days working only to find out that when it’s over, it was the people that mattered.  “It’s the people I’ll miss,” she said, as she talked of her looming retirement. ‘Maybe not all of them,’ I thought, but that’s just me.

I believe some people make life burdensome, and you would be better off without them, whereas others add life to your years and help you to become a better person. That’s Ruth. Yet, I admit that even after nineteen years of working with her I still do not have her sense of compassion. Yet, I am not heartless, but soon I will be Ruth-less, and I will miss her.