Goin' To Nebraska Excerpts

A typical evening

Richard Wall — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 00:41:37 GMT

     The solid thud of a Cadillac’s door slamming shut awakened Richard. He heard his dad yell to the driver as he sped off, “See you tomorrow, Skinny Flint, don’t be late. Tomorrow is payday and we don’t want to be docked any beer money.”
     As he lay on the bed trying to rouse himself from post-nap lethargy, Richard wondered how the evening would go before he left for the train station. He hoped there wouldn’t be any real squabbles among the cast of characters in the family. It was getting near the weekend, so his dad might be in a reasonably good mood, knowing that he was headed to the beer joint the next night. His Mom would make a good last supper, too. He was sure it would be one of his favorites—certainly not Spam. She’d be home soon to talk over the day’s events before she got changed from her work clothes and started her home duties. It was almost like she had two jobs, but she never complained. Tonight, she had to stay up late to take them to the train station. Dad wouldn’t do it. He’d rather watch TV than deal with his mother-in-law. They hated each other.
     “Richard, run up to Guy’s and get me a can of Key Snuff,” was his father’s greeting when Richard approached him in the kitchen as he set down his lunch pail. It wasn’t a request, but a demand. His father placed twenty-five cents in Richard’s palm—not even an extra ten cents for a bottle of Coke and two licorice on the two-cent deposit. Beer and snuff seemed to be about the only things that mattered to his old man. But a trip to the drugstore was OK, especially when Richard might run across some of his neighborhood buddies. Besides, he still had a dime in his pocket that was aching to be spent for a cold Coke. He was thirsty from his nap, sweating buckets in his hot bedroom with the afternoon sun peeking through the slats of the blinds.
     “What if they don’t have Key like last time?” asked Richard.
     “Ah, Judas Priest, get me Copenhagen then, and tell old man Guy to order up some Key. He knows that’s my brand. Don’t be hangin’ around the fire station either. I’m about out of snuff, and those lazy, sonsabitchin’ firemen don’t need to be entertaining some kid doin’ an errand for his father. You can play outside after you get back. I woulda had your useless brother do it, but as usual, he’s nowhere in sight. He probably thinks he’s too old to do this stuff for me now. He’d rather get in trouble than help me out. If ya take Clipper with ya, make sure ya keep him on the leash. I don’t want anything to happen to the dog. He’s the only loyal one in the family.”
     “Yeh, Dad,” Richard responded as he took the money and went out the screen door, not letting it slam. He didn’t want to aggravate his dad. He thought his dad probably liked animals more than people, especially the family dog. He liked the dog better than he liked his sons, but, then, Richard guessed he probably liked Clipper better than his old man, too.
     The dog certainly seemed happy to go on the errand. He already had found his leash and was holding it in his mouth, expecting to go.
     It seemed that nothing Richard or his brother did pleased his father. It wasn’t as if they didn’t get into trouble, especially Robert, but they never did really bad stuff. Robert just seemed to take the verbal abuse as a matter of fact.
     When Richard complained to him about it, Robert just said that’s the way most fathers in the neighborhood treated their kids.

An uncle's insight

Richard Wall — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 21:36:39 GMT

“I bet it’s hard bein’ married sometimes—kind of stuck with the same person. Most people probably change too. I can’t see why my mother married my dad, for instance,” Richard said, getting to the point rather bluntly.
     “Oh, I can. Why, ya wouldn’t be here yourself if she hadn’t! And that woulda been a cryin’ shame, don’t ya see. I wouldn’t be havin’ this grand conversation with ya otherwise.”
     Bud paused to reflect, then continued.
     “Ya woulda really liked your dad back then. I was just a kid about your age when my older sister started datin’ him. He was quite a dandy. He’d come over from St. Paul in his Model T all shined up to pick up your mom for the dances down in Dannebrog or wherever they had a good band playin’. I think he caught your mother’s eye ‘cause he was such a good dancer—she always liked the ones that could dance a lick. Anyway, he’d always come a little early to talk to me about farming like he knew that was what God intended us to be. He’d always give me a candy bar or something sweet. We both had a sweet tooth too. We’d go out on the dirt roads around the home place talking about the crops and livestock—how much he loved his horses he drove plowing before we all had tractors. Real farming stuff. Heck, he let me drive most of the time—somethin’ my mother wouldn’t let me do. I looked up to him, then, like a big brother I never had.”
     “What do ya think made him into the man I got to deal with?” Richard asked, surprised at his uncle’s description of his father as a young man.
     “That’s a tough one. Don’t know as anyone can tell ya why people change, but sometimes they just do. He always was into usin’ alcohol to have a good time when he was young. I think it’s finally catchin’ up with him now. It’s kinda like the egg before the chicken or the chicken before the egg in my way of thinkin’. Did the alcohol change him, or did he change first and just gets liquored up to forget about his disappointments in life? Like I said, he was a born farmer like me. When he and my sister were just startin’ out, tryin’ to make a go of it farming with his parents, they couldn’t make it because the bad years come. The dust storms just kinda blew them off the farm and into the city.”
     Bud paused a moment, then continued. “Them was some hard times, let me tell ya—watchin’ your corn crop wither away in the drought in a couple of days—the dust in everything in the house even if ya tried to put wet cloths on all the cracks in the house and the doors. I think it took away all his hopes and dreams. When a man don’t have that, he gives up on the good things in life and gets bitter sometimes.”
     “It doesn’t give anyone an excuse to be mean, though,” Richard said.
     “You’re right about that, Richard. Don’t give no man an excuse to be mean to his family just ‘cause he had a few hard knocks in his life. Think there was other problems too, though. Still no reason to be the way he is. Just got wore down. He almost died when he was in the Marines from a dental abscess. Think he had a ruptured appendix once that almost got him too. Now, how often does that happen?”
     “Still no excuse,” Richard said flatly.
     “You’re a hard case yourself,” Bud observed, seemingly more sympathetic to his father than Richard.
     “I suppose next you’re gonna tell me that havin’ to work in a crummy factory with a bunch of morons is another excuse,” Richard interjected before his uncle could get to that one.
     “As a matter of fact, yeh, I think that’s another reason. You’re the one askin’ why. I’m just tellin’ ya some things. You can take ‘em or leave ’em. I never worked in no factory myself, but I toured one of those tractor works in Illinois once right across the Mississippi River from you in Iowa. It just seemed like the men lost some of their dignity in those places, especially if they was used to bein’ their own boss on the farm. That grinds ya down, ya know—but maybe ya don’t. And I hope ya don’t have to learn some day.”

Garden therapy

Richard Wall — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 21:36:18 GMT

     Richard and Ganny crossed the gravel street that separated Ganny’s semi-treed property from Uncle Jack’s acreage, which consisted primarily of a large garden surrounding a stately, two-story house. At times obscured by the extended runners of the tomato, watermelon, and pumpkin plants, a well-worn dirt path meandered through the rows of crops and over dams bridging the irrigation ditches. It reminded Richard of Bud’s cornfields on a small scale. It could be manipulated easily with a few shovels of earth strategically placed here or there. Being a city boy, he didn’t know what many of the plants were, but he certainly recognized the tomatoes in various stages of ripening and the melons nearing maturity.
     Even though he was a city boy, Richard could appreciate the value of this fine, well-managed garden plot. He bet that his other grandma would have been envious, although she would never admit it. But then, she had to put up with a bunch of hooligans tramping around in her garden looking for foul balls from the whiffle-ball games.
     “Some garden, huh, boy,” Ganny commented to herself as much to Richard.
     “I’ll say. Uncle Jack must spend a lot of time out here takin’ care of his crops.”
     “Yeh, he does. Gots lots of patience and a farmer’s touch. Not like me. I’d be out here robbin’ the patch all the time instead of tendin’ to the growin’ like ya should. It’s good therapy for him though, since he couldn’t manage the runnin’ of the farm no more with his condition and all. This is just the right size for him. He ain’t no people-person. Never was, but since the war, he’d just as soon be by himself out in the field all day. Don’t have to deal with anyone. It’s even worse now with the nerve damage he got in the Great War when he got gassed. Now he shakes so bad that he’s got to hold his coffee cup with both hands just to get it to his mouth. Then he still spills some on himself and the floor. He’s gotten so self-conscious about bein’ around anyone when he eats that he won’t go out anymore where there’s any eatin’ to be done. Shame, really, to cut himself off so much from the world.”
     Hearing all this, Richard wondered whether it was such a good idea to meet him.
     “Do ya think it’s all right for me to bother him? Maybe he won’t want to see me, since I never met him before.”
     “Aw, shucks, he’s been lookin’ forward to your visit as much as me. He’s heard so much about ya and what a good kid y’are. Besides, it’s adults he don’t like much. He hates ‘em lookin’ at him when he shakes. Thinks they’re makin’ fun of him. And I know you won’t be starin’ at him or makin’ fun of him. You got a lot of respect for your elders. I can tell your mom taught ya that, and I hope maybe your dad had somethin’ to do with it too.”
     “Well, I’d only think it was the right thing to do considerin’ him bein’ a war hero and all. What exactly happened to him to get so messed up? Did he kill lots of Germans?”
     “Don’t know about the Germans. Think he was so sick of the war when he come home, there wasn’t much to tell. He once told me that a man shouldn’t be proud of killing another livin’ bein’. He couldn’t even bleed out a hog when he finally recovered after the war and got back to farmin’. Said it reminded him too much of the fightin’ in the Ardennes where he got machine-gunned by the Germans. He only told me once about it right after he got shipped home from the hospital. Guess it was always like a nightmare relivin’ it anytime he thought about it, let alone talkin’ about it.”
     “Where was he shot?” Richard wanted to get the details. He never knew anyone who got shot.
     “Got shot in the legs, the right one real bad. Shattered his thigh bone. They wanted to take it off when he finally got to the hospital from the Front, but he wouldn’t let ‘em. Said he would die from gangrene, ‘specially after layin’ in a muddy bomb crater with a dead German for two days in between the lines gettin’ mustard-gassed to boot. He told him he’d just as soon die if he didn’t have his leg for farmin’. I didn’t mention how stubborn he can be too. I guess they just had him lay in the bed for months until it healed finally. He told me once that bone splinters still poke through his skin on occasion. Anyway, he’s still alive and kickin’, but he’s got a bad limp instead of a peg leg. His tremor from the gassin’ is gettin’ worse as he gets older. Don’t think he’ll stop shakin’ ‘till they lay him down.”

What might have been

Richard Wall — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 21:34:11 GMT

     With equally solid strokes, Ganny cut slices and placed them on the plates. The watermelon was indeed a beauty. Reddish liquid seeped from its almost auburn innards, quickly filling the plate’s surface. Some of it splashed out on the ground as they hurried outside to some old patio chairs on the rough lawn. Richard noticed that they were the same kind that his other grandmother made him sand down and paint each year back home. Ganny’s, he had to admit, didn’t fare so well. The metal chairs were dotted with chips of various colors that revealed the previous paint jobs.
     Once in the chairs, they commenced to attack the watermelon. Richard was used to eating watermelon with a fork at a table, but he followed his grandmother’s lead by biting off a chunk, chewing the sweet meat carefully to avoid the seeds, swallowing the juices, and spitting out the seeds until he got to the rind.
     “This’s gotta be the best watermelon I ever had,” Richard announced in between bites and spits.
     “Didn’t I tell ya that your Uncle Jack is one champion melon grower?”
     “Ya did, for sure, Ganny.”
     “Well, I wasn’t just whistlin’ Dixie, I meant it. Now, if we’re braggin’ about knowin’ champions when it comes to watermelons—your ol’ Ganny was a champion too at spittin’ seeds. When I was about your age, I was the champion watermelon seed spitter of the Howard County Fair. Bet I can still put one of ‘em out there better than you can, Richey.”
     That was a challenge that Richard couldn’t refuse even if it was from his grandmother.
     “Bet ya can’t,” he replied. With that answer, he took a bite out of the next slice, searched with his tongue for a good specimen, swallowed the rest, and readied his mouth for a mighty attempt. Using the springy chair as a catapult, he reared back initially, then lurched forward while spitting out the seed into the Nebraska air. It was a good effort that landed on the grass about thirty feet away.
     “Beat that, Ganny,” Richard said, his youthful dander challenged by an old woman, even if it was his grandma.
     “Well, I gotta admit that I reckon that was one good effort, and I don’t know if I can match it, bein’ kinda old and outta practice and all, but let me give a shot.”
     She took her bite of watermelon, searched for just the right seed with her tongue, swallowed the rest, and readied her mouth for the attempt.
     With the experience of a professional watermelon seed spitter, she launched the seed with a fluid motion of her upper body, neck, and head. The seed flew into the air and landed fifty feet away.
     “Wow, Ganny, you are a champion seed spitter!” Richard exclaimed, duly amazed by his grandmother’s effort.
     “Just goes t’ show ya—don’t ever underestimate your competition.”
     “You’re right about that,” Richard answered humbly.
     “Me and watermelon seeds go way back. Ya know, it’s good to get humbled now and then. Just when ya think you’re all special and all, somebody comes around to put your feet back on the ground. Keeps your mind in the right place so ya don’t get all big-headed. There’s always somebody smarter or faster or whatever than you are. Don’t forget it. Appreciate what ya got, but don’t forget where ya come from is what I say. Somebody will knock ya down eventually off your high-horse. Just like Grover Cleveland.” She paused, not wishing to go further with her thoughts, and hoping that her grandson did not pick up on the finale.
     Fortunately, Richard was still enthralled with the seed-spitting demonstration. He had not yet developed insight into the nuances of adult thought. His was still the world of today, never imagining that older people had a life filled with passions of their own.
     Instead of acting joyful about her victory, Ganny was suddenly sorrowful, fighting back tears and sniffling as quietly as she could to hide her change of mood from Richard.
     The awkward silence made Richard uncomfortable.
     Finally, she said, “Richey, it’s nothin’ you did. The seed spittin’ just seemed t’ bring up old times and what coulda been. Turned out OK in the end, though. Otherwise I wouldn’t have you sittin’ next to me so I could out-spit ya.”
     “Guess it must be about time t’ go inside. The mosquitoes are startin’ t’ bite,” Richard said, giving his grandmother a chance to gather her thoughts. Even though he was perplexed by the change in her, he perceived that it was best to move on with the evening and not pursue her emotions.
     “Sun is settin’. Another day is gone. Time for this old farmer’s wife t’ hit the hay.”
     “Me too. It was a big day. Sure enjoyed it, though. About the best day of my life, even if I lost the seed-spittin’ contest. Met two great men and got t’ spend the evening with the best grandma in the world.”
     Now Ganny’s tears really started to flow. She turned toward her grandson and hugged him the best she could considering the instability of the chairs and the plates in their laps.
     “Richey, that was worth more t’ me than you or anybody will ever realize. It pays to stick to your principles, ‘cause you’re always rewarded in the end. You’re my reward. Let’s clean up those dishes and get to bed.”
     Richard carried the plates to the sink. Ganny only commented on the specifics as she washed the plates and Richard dried them. What was unsaid didn’t matter. Ganny’s other life was hers, and she didn’t need to explain it to anyone, including her grandson, who didn’t need to know. She could live what could have been over and over in her mind until she died. It would be safe in the grave. She was just glad for what she had.
     After finishing the clean-up and quick trips to the outhouse, they slipped off to their respective bedrooms. Richard heard little of the chorus of the insects as he slipped off to his dreams of baseball heroics, a sheet loosely covering him to the level of his underpants. Despite her fatigue, Ganny lay restlessly in her nightgown thinking of what could and couldn’t have been until sleep eventually overtook her.