All White

Shortly after we got to our first teaching position in South Carolina, we were invited by another faculty member at Presbyterian College to a dinner at his house.  When the dinner was presented buffet style, we noted that everything was white.  Turkey, potatoes, gravy–no color anywhere.  It was about as good as it looked.   About all that sustained us during that time was the fried chicken at the Holiday Inn in Greenwood on Sunday.  I used to be so bored in  Greenwood that I would go to the afternoon matinee (they had one showing), regardless of what  film was on.  Several times I had to watch animated children’s films, but that was better than the reality of Greenwood.   Almost always I was the only one in the theatre.   When we finally got an offer to go to another university the following year, we started to pack up immediately, even though our departure was eight months away.   For entertainment,  I used to take walks around town.  One night I walked over to the art teacher’s house and knocked on the door saying “Police, open up!”  I didn’t know it until later, but he told me that he was scared to death since he had been smoking marijuana that evening.  On our final exit out of town we passed (in our UHaul truck)  the remnants of the previous night’s KKK rally outside of town.

Yoder’s

When we lived in Greenwood, South Carolina, from 1972 to 1973,  I used to love to escape to Yoder’s, a Mennonite restaurant in Abbeville, SC.  They had wonderful fresh veggies grown right behind the restaurant.  The noon all-you-can-eat buffet was $2.00, and I always got my money’s worth by making many trips back to the buffet.  One day the manager came up and said that they were taking a poll to determine whether to limit trips back to the buffet or raise the price, and wanted to know what I thought.  I told them I wasn’t sure but would get back to them, pretending I didn’t catch on.  The situation never came to a head because we moved shortly after that.

As Seen on TV

People say some funny things on TV.  Some prison inmates in an interview said they wished the public would not be “so judgmental.”  Some death-row inmates against the death penalty said “Two wrongs don’t make a right.”  In a TV interview when I was in Toledo, Ohio, a local  spokesman for a mainly minority housing project complained that the landlord failed to provide essential services.  When asked if he lived in the project, he said “No, no I doesn’t.”   Another complainant, who wanted an increase in his living allowance from the city, was asked if he had such such services as cable.  “Yes, we have cable, but it’s only basic cable.”  On another trip to Dayton in the winter, an interviewee said “It’s really cold, plus you have your wind factor chill.”  I used to be amused in the late 1960’s at the cult Children of God van, who used to park outside Memorial Stadium  in Austin before football games.  On the side of the van it said ” Children of God.  As seen on NBC TV.”  Daughter Amy once heard on television a jail inmate who had been assigned to a work detail where inmates were required to sleep in tents overnight say “We are being held here against our will.”  An attorney trying to save his client from the death penalty said “Since my client has been on death row, his conduct has been exemplary.”  In an interview of a prison inmate at Huntsville, Texas,  who was commenting on an escapee who had taken a woman hostage, said “He gives all inmates a bad name.”

Sylvia Hulsey

In the second grade at Alta Vista Elementary in Abilene, Texas, we had a music class once per week.  That class consisted of the teacher’s walking up and down to each student singing “Hel-lo,” and the student had to respond with a similar “Hel-lo.”  I hated it.  First, I found it humiliating to “sing” in front of my classmates, who always laughed when my turn came.  Second,  I had to perform right after Sylvia Hulsey, the teacher’s pet, who had the perfect voice, according to Mrs. Brubaker, our teacher.  Every week I dreaded  music day.  Finally,  I refused to participate further,  and would respond by saying “hello” in my normal voice.  This made the teacher very unhappy.  One day she made me stand outside for about 20 minutes alone.  She sent a student out finally, who asked if I was ready to participate.  I said “no,” so I stayed out another few minutes.   Finally the teacher came out herself and had me come back in the class.  She never did pressure me to do this exercise again, but she did note on my report card that my music skills “needed improvement.”

Poor Management

One day we went at 11AM to a restaurant we had never been to before.   When we walked in, the place had the smell of a backed-up sewer.  I asked the manager what the smell was, and he, sniffing his armpit, said “I don’t know.  We all used deodorant today.”  Wrong thing to say.  Reminds me of the time my grad school colleague, Jim Fisher, went in to order a grilled cheese sandwich in Austin.  The waitress behind the counter and the cook were bantering back and forth about who had the smelliest feet.  The smell of grilled cheese and the talk of smelly feet ruined it for him, according to Fisher.  Another time in Austin,  a fellow student was complaining that the last two times he had gone to the local Wyatt’s Cafeteria, someone had vomited in the restaurant.  It never happened to me while I was there, but it sure ruined my image of Wyatt’s.   Right around the corner from Wyatt’s was El Chico’s Mexican Restaurant.  We were irritated because often we would find bitten chips in the hot sauce, indicating that it was being served over and over to multiple tables.  The manager denied it and was quite defensive, so we started putting pennies in our hot sauce so that other customers would complain if it was served to them.

Famous Writers School

One day while in graduate school in English,  I saw an ad in a magazine inviting readers to take a test to see if they had the talent to be professional writers.  I wrote for the test, and received it a few days later.  Part of the test required that the applicant complete  the phrase “Strong as ________, ” and weak as “_______.”  This was obviously a test to see how vivid an imagination the applicant had.  Also, the applicant had to write an essay about what he considered his greatest achievement.   I wrote that my greatest achievement was building my own tool shed, then described how I did it.  For  “strong as” I put “a football boy,” and for “weak as” I put “a sick person.”  When I got back the results, someone had written “good for you!” by my description of how I built the tool shed.  However,  I was also told that the results of the test indicated that my talents could be better used somewhere else.  I showed the test and results to a grad school colleague (whose name  I used when I submitted the test),  and he thought it was pretty funny.  We were both surprised that they did not tell me  that I had great talent and should take their writing course.

Old Timer Gem

When my middle son and I went to pick up a car we had bought, the elderly salesman, who was a real rural Texas country type of guy,  asked him where he went to college.  When Kent said “UT Austin,” the old man asked “Did you play ball down there?”  I love the idea that old timers like this can think of going off to college, and after getting there deciding whether to “play some ball.”

Good Dog

I had a part-time job in graduate school as a bill collector for Gulf Mart stores, a Wal-Mart type of store in the 1960’s.  I would drive to deadbeat customers’ homes at night and try to get some kind of payment.  One day as part of the training the manager and I went to the local television station in Austin to try to collect from “Packer Jack,” the host of an afternoon children’s show.  We caught him coming off the set, saying “bye bye” to all the kiddies, with a big smile.  When we told him who we were and why we were there, his smile evaporated, and he said never to come to his place of employment again.  My boss used to say “Hot dog” and “good boy” a lot.  When I called him once on the phone and said that I had managed to collect $1.00 from a long-time deadbeat account, he was so excited he mixed the two and said “Good dog!”

Economy Car

When I worked as the Southwestern rep for a telecommunications company based in California,  I did my training with the regional manager, based in Dallas.  Salesmen normally try to appear prosperous, and drive big fancy cars, but  I had a Volkswagen Beetle.  One day as we were calling on customers in my VW,  I could tell that the car  did not present the image that the manager hoped for.  I told him that we need to tell the customers that we are driving cars like Volkswagen Beetles so that we can save money, and pass that saving onto the customers.

Region 10 Nightmare

For about 7 months I worked in the PERD Component of the Region 10 Service Center,  known as a “graveyard” for former superintendents.  PERD, by the way, stood for Planning,  Evaluation,  Research, and Development.  There were three of us who sat in this tiny room all day doing dumb, worthless projects.  One day the so-called Director gave me a copy of his dissertation on heath education in 19th-century Texas public schools as an example of good writing.  I had an assignment to work with another department run by a woman with an doctorate from Nova University.  When I turned in the report,  I was told that it was inadequate.  When I asked what was wrong with it,  She said that it had to be “fleshed out.”  The problem apparently was not content, but the fact that it was not long enough.  I rewrote it, and made a lot of categories, broken down into items A, B, C, etc.  This made the report about twice as long, which seemed to satisfy everyone involved.  Before I was given the assignment, the woman with the Nova doctorate asked me if I had ever done a report like that before.  I said that I had not, then she said “So, you are weak in this area.”  I thought that was a pretty funny way to put it.  This was a place where people did not go to lunch but “took” lunch.  When I quit, with much relief, the head of the whole operation, a failed superintendent somewhere, told me that I was under contract, and he did not know if the Board would accept my resignation.  I told him that I sure hoped they would because I would be leaving anyway.  It was an awful place, and terrible waste of taxpayer money.