Sipping From the Dixie Cup

Hockey’s Stanley Cup Finals are going on now; perhaps the most difficult championship to win in all of sports. After an 82 game season, 16 of the League’s 30 teams play through three grueling, best four of seven elimination rounds, until the last two left, in this case Vancouver and Boston, scrap for the Cup.

But those guys are the one of a million who become professional athletes. The rest of us mere mortals never get that far, playing for fun or love of the game, recreation or social activity. And while some a lot of these weekend warriors end up competing for the ultimate prize, a team or individual championship, most of us probably don’t. Like me.

My freshman baseball team was abysmal. And though I was on a few good softball squads they were never that good. And the junior varsity and soccer teams I played on had been just a little bit better, we might have been mediocre. But once, I was lucky enough to achieve the thrill of complete victory and play on a real winning team. It happened during the first year I played organized hockey and during my senior year in college.

But it might not have happened at all if I hadn’t mouthed off after attending a Spokane Flyers hockey game with some of my South Warren dorm pals- another inept Flyers loss- and suggesting a bunch of rag-tag college kids could’ve skated circles around them. Like, maybe, us. This was clearly an exaggeration and clearly not true because the Flyers players had been grown up playing the game and made any of us look silly for daring to step on the ice with them.

Nevertheless, this started a discussion of who’d actually played hockey, either on ice or roller skates. And when nearly everybody said they’d had at least some puck experience, the wheels were put in motion to see if we could make it happen. Not to play the Flyers- beer talk or not, nobody was really that naïve (or stupid)- but put together a South Warren hockey team and play in a league.

We started close to home, the college, however due to insurance and financial concerns, Whitworth wouldn’t let us form a Club team. But if we were serious, the assistant A.D. suggested we contact the Spokane City Recreation league. With several divisions of men’s and mixed hockey teams to choose from, there was probably at least one we could hook up with. And after a few calls, one did; a beginner’s league that they labeled the Rookie League.

But players in this league weren’t all exactly “rookies”; you could only play in the Rookie League for two years before you had to move up to an Intermediate League, or drop out. However if you did stop playing for at least one full year- for whatever reason- and then decided to play again, you could re-enter the player pool as a Rookie once more. Made it easier to catch on to a team, I guess. I don’t know. But there were a lot of guys in this league who’d played before.  So Rookie league or not, we better have a clue about what we were doing.

And though talk is cheap too, getting into the Spokane City Recreational Hockey League wasn’t. We had to find a sponsor, and the sponsors’ fee was 500 bucks. Whitworth College (now University) wouldn’t sponsor us but Whitworth Pizza would; which only seemed fair since so many of us had spent much of our summer savings on beer, pizza and Foosball there over the years. So they owed us. They even purchased matching jerseys for everybody, which was very cool. And after papers were signed and sponsor fee paid, the Whitworth Pizza team was welcomed into the league.

But the sponsor’s fee only got us into the league. Getting on the ice was another story. Each player had to furnish their own equipment if they didn’t already have it, including a helmet and come up with fifty dollars each game for ice time and insurance. Though there was plenty of good and affordable used-equipment on sale at the Arena, a lot of the initial enthusiasm waned and many of the guys decided to drop out before we even had our first practice. Lance Jones, Rob Houlton, Kelly McEachran, Bossingham and me, were the only ones left still willing to commit to going forward, and McEachran dropped out after the first couple of games. But we still had a pretty good South Warren contingent.

To round out the roster, the league assigned us some players from the sub-list who hadn't yet been picked up by a team, including a girl named, Brenda Murphy, then placed us into the mixed C league, mixed meaning girls could play, which was why we had Brenda. But- surprise-our first game was in one week. The season was already a couple weeks in and Whitworth Pizza would have to play twice a week for the first two weeks to catch up. There was hardly any time to get prepared, but with a full team of 14 we managed to scrape up enough cash for an hour of ice time to have a practice- from midnight to 1 a.m. two nights before our first game- and by our opening night, I suppose we were as ready as were going to be.

Our first game was played on November 8, 1977 versus a team sponsored by Pepsi. The rules in the Recreation Leagues were the same as the NHL, except no overt contact. Bossinghgam was our goalie, but not because he knew how to play the position; because he was so wide we figured he'd probably stop most pucks, if only by accident. Wrong. He wasn’t a sieve, but let in a lot of softies, including the first two shots Pepsi took and we lost handily, 8-1. But we were all kind of nervous and, to his credit, Dennis got a lot better the more we played. Even our girl, Brenda, was good too.

We had another game two nights later, (which we also lost), and two the following week that we somehow managed to win. And after that, except for the two weeks at Christmas, we played at least one game a week- from Thanksgiving till the start of May. Games were on Monday or Wednesday nights, usually at Eagles Ice Arena on East Francis, and started at either 7, 9 or 11 p.m. I was named team captain, for no other reason than it’d been my hair-brained idea to field a team in the first place. I was honored, though, and wore the ‘C’ proudly.

And as captain, part of my pre-game responsibilities were providing the official scorer with a roster of all players “dressed” that night and get the ice fee paid. Meaning, before taking the ice, I had to collect everybody’s dues in the locker room and the fill out the score keeper’s log and pay up before I could join the rest of the team in the pre-game warm-up skate. And that was all fine and good. But if we came up short on the ice fee guess who made up the difference? The captain. Of course, nobody ever bothered to mention that to me till the first time we were two players light.

The game that night started at 9:00 and when I told the off-ice crew chief we’d be undermanned wouldn’t have the full team fee, he said we had till 9 sharp to get two more players or the rest of the money, or face a forfeit. Are you kidding? That may not have been exactly what I said, but it’s at least it’s the clean version. When I skated back to my teammates warming up in our end of the ice, though, to explain the problem all I got was a bunch of “I gave at the office” looks. So I ran back upstairs to the locker room, dug though my wallet and came up with the extra money. Not easy, when you’re in college. But now I know why they made me captain. Suck-er!

Okay, so I was a barely passable captain but, for a California boy, I turned out to be a passable hockey player. I’d played a lot of roller hockey and those skills kicked in and helped me adapt to the frozen game and playing on blades quickly. I was generally a forward, left wing or center (although I could play defense in a pinch because I skated backwards pretty good), and was real good on face-offs. Though a quick skater, I was more a grinder than a shooter. I liked going into the corners to dig out the puck and make a pass. And every now and then, I could even put the puck in the net- if I was lucky or the goalie was retarded.

But I was so small, when going into the corners or into scoring position around the net, I often ended up eating someone’s elbow. It didn’t discourage me though, that’s how the game is played and if that’s where the puck was, that’s where you had to go and get it. And more often than not, I was fortunate enough to come away it or make a good pass.  But I learned the intricacies of giving back, too. The face wash (rubbing a sweaty glove into an opponent’s face) and the slash (chopping at an arm or ankle with my stick), were my weapons of choice. I even learned how to get away with it, too, without the ref noticing.

 

Though our team started slowly, losing three of our first five games, we eventually started to win. Then in the last month Whitworth Pizza really went on a roll, reeling off 7 straight wins to close out the season. There were 8 teams in our league, but only the 4 with the best records at the end of the schedule made the playoffs. And except for the last place team, the other seven in the Rookie league were very close competitively so without that win streak at the end, we might not have made into the playoff tournament. But we did, finishing in third place overall and once in, set our sights on winning the whole thing.

We didn’t start off so well, though, losing the first game in the first series. Both the semi-final and final rounds were a best 2 of 3, and one more loss and we’d be done before really having a chance to get started. But we came back to win the next two games which advanced us into the Rookie League Finals playing against Pepsi- our very first opponent. In contrast to our opening round, we won the first game in the Championship series, but lost the second, setting up game 3 as a winner-take-all. And with less than three minutes left in the third period of the final game, we were ahead 4-3. Nobody was saying it out loud, but everybody on the bench was thinking it- three minutes and the championship was outs. All we had to do was keep playing the way we had all game. Steady and under control.

But I inadvertently tripped a guy and got a two-minute penalty. I couldn’t believe they'd call something that incidental and trivial at that spot in such an important game and it kind of set me off. No it really set me off. I followed the ref and was giving him an ear full. I could’ve easily earned another two minutes for continuing to argue, or even a10-minute misconduct. But our best player, Galen Oates, grabbed me by the jersey and “guided” me to the penalty box; then, practically, shoved me in. "Sit down and shut the hell up. We’ll kill this off and then we'll all go celebrate. So clam up and don’t say another word, okay?" Okay. I got the point. I clammed up.

However, 2 minutes can seem like forever when it's your penalty time. It seemed to tick on slowly and endlessly. At last, though, it was almost over.  But with 10 seconds left in the penalty and less than a minute to go in the game, Dennis couldn’t control a rebound and Pepsi tied it, 4-4, on the power play goal. A power play caused by my penalty. I came out of the box glaring at the ref, but when I skated back to the bench it was with my head down knowing I may have just cost us the championship. Neither team scored in the last few seconds, but Pepsi was really carrying the play. When the horn sounded, we were merely hanging on and, quite literally, saved by the bell.

But after six months of games, two rounds of play-offs and 60 full minutes of hockey in the deciding game,  it was going to come down to an overtime to determine our league championship. My line started the overtime period, but Pepsi still had all the momentum. They were pressing hard and quickly had us scrambling around, unable to gain control of the puck and pinned in our end. In another few seconds it just seemed inevitable they were either going to score and win the game or one of us-probably me again- would  take another stupid penalty and put them back on the power play.

Fortunately, Dennis made a stop and froze the puck, drawing a whistle and sparing us further damage. It also allowed us to change lines, getting my tired one off and Galen’s fresh line on. And it didn’t take them very long to turn the tables on Pepsi and finish the job. In fact, they made it look easy- the great players always do.

Lanny Armstrong won the face-off and Galen took off down the wing. Probably the fastest player on our team, in a flash was behind the defense where he scooped up Lance Jones’ long lead pass and put a beautiful quick wrister past Pepsi’s goalie from about 15 feet out. Just like that, at 1:45 of the sudden-death overtime period, it was end of game, end of season and say “hello” to the champs. As the ref signaled the puck was in, everyone from our bench jumped over the boards, tossing away our gloves and sticks, and raced into the dog pile of happy Whitworth Pizza players at the end of the ice where Galen had scored the winning goal. It was crazy.

After the mobbing subsided, we went through the congratulatory hand shake line at center ice with all the Pepsi players. That part was really cool. Being at war with each other for three long and hard-fought games, to then come together, victors and vanquished, and hug like brothers, acknowledging each other on a great effort, great game and great season was pretty amazing.

 

Then somebody put on a tape of Queen’s “We are the Champions of the World” on the arena sound system. At first, nobody was quite sure what to do. I mean, we all knew what the pros do when the Stanley Cup is awarded; take a victory lap with the Cup. But we had no trophy or cup to skate around with. Thinking on her feet, however, Lanny’s wife found a Styrofoam Dixie cup in the stands that somebody had been drinking coffee from. Taking out a felt pen, she wrote CHAMPS on both sides and passed it down to Lanny. And as “We Are the Champions” blaring over the loudspeakers, everybody took a turn, triumphantly holding that ridiculous Styrofoam cup over their head- our Dixie Cup trophy- and passing it from one player to the next on a couple of slow victory laps around the rink. It was an awesome moment! But this is where it gets a little crazy.

The party continued at Savage House Pizza on North Division. Beer was flowing like water and everybody was in a happy mood. And being a lightweight, I was soon beyond happy, quickly graduating to completely tanked and silly. It was about the third pitcher when I lost track of all sanity and inhibition. With the jukebox playing “Dancing Queen” by Abba, I jumped up on one of the tables and started dancing. Not very good, but at least in time with the music. That was goofy enough. But nobody had changed clothes after the game and with my sweaty jersey still on, like the guy at the end of “Slap Shot” (the movie), I began doing a mini strip tease.

Everybody in the room was laughing and hollering and shouting, “Take it off!” So, now jerseyless and still on the table swaying with the music, I kicked off my shoes and then removed the torn wool undershirt I'd wore underneath the jersey. Twirling it in the air with arms proudly raised, cheers and hoots serenaded me from all corners of the room. I was a hit- standing on a table in a public restaurant with half my clothes off, dancing to Abba, I was a hit. The girls especially kept whistling and egging me on. I was a young and in the best condition of my life, so it wasn’t necessarily a bad look Even so, I'm pretty sure I must've looked like a complete buffoon. But I was enjoying myself too much to care and wasn't minding the attention of the ladies, either. They thought I was cute.

When Abba ended, instead of bringing the burlesque show to a merciful end, another quarter was put in the jukebox. “Stayin' Alive” by the Bee Gees came on which, apparently, was Lanny Armstrong cue to jump on another table and keep the act going. Only he was less deliberate than me and was practically down to his skivvies before the first chorus. Then two other team members found tables to climb on and join in the merriment.  At least there was safety in numbers, but anyone walking in at that moment would have been treated to at least a PG-rated floor show of four toasted, half-naked hockey players, semi-dancing and semi-stumbling on tables, singing, laughing and acting like drunken kids who'd never tasted alcohol before.

 

But with the commotion rising, the Savage House night manager poked his head into the party room and, observing the debauchery taking place in his otherwise family friendly environment, in a loud voice brought the festivities were to an immediate cease. ”Okay, that’s enough! Party’s over! Now!”  It was almost one in the morning and nearing closing time anyway, but I suspect he would’ve called a halt to the party if it’d been one in the afternoon. He seemed pretty uptight, though, and less than pleased by the slap-happy shenanigans.

 

We'd had our fun, though, and were willing to comply. It was late, and though the music was still playing, we knew it was time to wind it up. So all four of us jumped down from the tables and began putting ourselves- and the room- back together. But as the rest of the team, wives, girl friends and others began filing out, the manager pulled the four dancing queens aside. “You four that were on the tables; don’t come back. You’re not welcome here anymore”. The guy was actually pissed.

I thought he was joking. But Lanny didn’t and his loud, beer-fueled protests attracted the attention of the rest of the team, who came swarming to our defense. When Lanny told them what was up it got close to getting ugly. A couple of our bigger guys got right in the managers grill, causing him to back away. But he didn’t back down. “All right then, you’re all done.” Pointing at Lanny he barked, “You and the rest of you Philistines, I don’t want to see any of you in here again. Now get the hell out before I call the cops. We’re closed!”

Gotta give him credit. The guy had balls. Ten angry hockey players were about ready to pummel him, but he stood his ground. Fortunately, Brenda, a couple of the girlfriends and the bartender stepped in, too, which helped defuse the situation and restore peace. And with a few parting curse words, Lanny, me and the rest of the “Philistines” exited Savage House, apparently banned forever. I’d never been called a “Philistine” before, too. I’d have to go look that one up. But once outside, instead of re-storming the place everybody relaxed and we all started laughing.

We won! And got kicked out of our own celebration. Does it get any better than that? A team thrown together late and mostly made up of players nobody else wanted had just won it all. Perhaps all the partying and suds had clouded my appreciation for the moment and the achievement. But when it finally sunk in that I was the captain of a championship hockey team, (and been banned from a local eating establishment, all in one evening), I think I laughed my head off all the way home. All silliness aside, though, May 4, 1978 was one of the most superb highlight nights of my life.

And I did eventually eat at Savage House Pizza again, too. I just never went there in my hockey gear.

Lonely Boy

 

Lately, there's been a stray cat showing up on our back deck, presumably looking for a hand-out. The cat is fluffy, timid and with an annoying meow. We already have two other cats living on the premises but I'm kind of taken with this mangy stray, and want to keep it. There's something about the way it looks at me.

 

The disheveled feline seems so starved, not just for food, but attention; so much so I can't walk away from him. The very audible purr I hear when I pick him up or stroke his matted fur is a clear signal the cat is merely living to be held and loved. I've even given it a name, "Jake", even though I don't know if it’s a boy or girl cat. And I hate to admit it, and hate re-examining my life, but there've been lots of times when I've felt just like this lonely stray.

 

Though I wasn't neglected and often told I was loved, I never actually felt or believed it. One friend familiar with my story even suggested this poisonous seed of self-doubt was planted right at the beginning, when my meter had barely begun running. I was a “blue baby"- born with lungs full of fluid and unable to breathe on my own- so I spent the first week and a half of life inside an incubator. Hooked up to tubes and monitors, I wasn’t held or picked up until ten days old. My friend said all my insecurities started then. However I've usually dismissed this theory as hooey.

Then a few years ago, a medical professional suggested this striving for unconditional love may have started around the age of three, when my older brother, Larry, got sick. Very sick. And from what I can gather, I think that's when my little world got turned upside down. Passed from relative to relative, as Mom and Dad fought the good fight with Larry during his numerous hospital stays, I kind of got lost in the shuffle. Not on purpose of course. But sadly, the outcome for childhood leukemia was even worse in 1958 than it is now, and after six months Larry lost his battle to survive.

 

But for the kid left behind, at a very vulnerable time in any child's development, this could’ve been a pretty traumatic setback. Who really knows, though? Too young to figure it out or understand it then, and too ‘wise and sophisticated’ now, this notion is easy to reject as well.

However something happened. Why else would I come all this way through life and so often still not feel of value? Not even by my Creator. All I know is, somewhere in my early years I quit seeking approval and valued attention at home and turned to getting it from friends. 

I was 7 and on an outing with the Tait's, our neighbors across the street. We went to the State Capital in downtown Sacramento. After touring the building, the Mom’s spread out a picnic lunch on the grass outside in Capital Park. When everybody was done eating, the grown-ups chatted and cleaned up and the older kids ran off. But instead of following our siblings, my closest chum in the neighborhood, Mary Tait, looped her arm around my neck and steered me in the direction of a big garden area and walked with me side by side enjoying the spring flowers. 

 

Of course, I had no interest in flowers and girls still had cooties then but, suddenly, that botanical patch of ground was the most beautiful spot on earth and I didn’t want Mary to ever turn me loose. She made me feel warm and good inside and though we only strolled that way together for about ten minutes, for a little 7-year old, it was the best ten minutes of my life. Somebody liked me.

So it was like that all through grammar, middle and high school; goofing off and hanging out with best friends that came and went over the years; Gary McKenzie, Steve Dunnigan, Mark Johnson, Jeff Barth, Phil Alexander. Always the runt of the group, these guys and others took me under their wing, protected me, valued me and made me feel valued.

I had best buddies in college too, and - since Mary- finally not all of them were guys! I remember the night I took my first real girlfriend, Kelly Adams, to the Spokane County Fair one warm September evening. After a spring of mild flirtation and a summer break of exchanging letters, it was our first actual date. Of course, most guys had a real girlfriend well before turning 20. But as with most things in life, this rite-of-passage took me a little longer. And as we wandered the midway that starry evening, Kelly asked me to buy her some cotton candy. I was feeling generous, and kind of wrapped around her finger by that point, too, so gallantly forked over 50 cents to the candy man.

He handed over the mass of spun pink confection and I watched her gleefully dig in.  Kelly swallowed some of the stuff, took a breath, and then stuck the fluffy mass in my face. "Want some?" she asked with her mouth still half full. I obliged by taking a small nibble from one side of the wispy glob. But she didn't pull it away; instead she moved a step closer, forcing me to keep chewing too. A couple bites later we'd eaten our way through and shared a gooey sticky kiss.

Then before resuming our directionless walk, I took the picked-clean cotton candy stick and flung it in a nearby garbage can. But when I turned back around, I walked right into a giant hug. Kelly didn't warn me it was coming, either; she just hugged me. Tightly. But we were right out there in the middle of everything, and I briefly considered whether I should be embarrassed. However, the deliberation lasted less than a heartbeat, overridden by the sudden joy of finding myself enveloped in Kelly's genuine act of simple affection. And as her arms gripped python-like around my neck, I bowed my head on her shoulder, inhaled her hair and closed my eyes in gratefulness.

 

Kelly held me even snugger, and feeling like I'd just awakened from a long coma, my mind flashed on visions of blissful butterflies and beautiful birds. Inside I felt the welcoming warmth of the sun (even though it was after dark) and heard scenic music. And I wasn't even high; but imagined this must be how good it feels when you glimpse heaven for the first time.

People and clutter and din were everywhere.  I ignored the surroundings, though, and encased Kelly in my arms in response, like we were alone in a private place. We weren't, but held on to each other as a small quiet island unto ourselves amidst the noisy fray on the arcade's ocean of asphalt.  Yet all this transpired without a word, and in less than 10 seconds, it was over. But when it was, this may have been the warmest and most precious few seconds I’d ever had; at least in my first 20 years.

But back to reality, and back to the present.

 

I’ve decided that these little golden moments, and other similar ones I’ve been blessed with though life become so much more prized and cherished over any experience I’ve had with family, is not because I dislike my family. I like them fine. But family has to like you. Friends don't. They choose to. That’s a big difference. Kelly chose to like me. Mary chose to like me. My buddies in school chose to like me. So I guess when I've been lucky enough to receive any kind of care or affection, no matter what or how much, it's always seemed to mean more coming from a friend than a relation. 

Of course, days like that at the Fair with Kelly, and at the park with Mary, and with my friends in school don't happen anymore. Though the joy was always real, I always knew it wouldn’t last, either. Troublesome or inadequate people don’t deserve it; that’s what I used to tell myself, anyway. And I was both. Besides, you grow up, mature and you're just not supposed to have warm, fuzzy feelings anymore- about anything. You’re not supposed to get too close to people. At least, not put it out there on display. You’re supposed to be stoic, take things in stride for what they are, don’t get too high or too low. Frankly, I think that sucks. Who wants to live like that? Who made those rules, anyway?

However life's too short to dwell on how good or bad the past made me feel anyway. Would I like another night at the Fair again? Another day in the park? A day in the sun? Sure. I might, too. You never know. But I know it’ll never be like it was when I was young. Those days are gone. I'm here, now. And if I stay stuck back there or wish whatever happened back there, good or bad, will happen again, I won't get anywhere.

Still, when life hands you something special, you don't want to lose it. Happiness is addictive. And when I was younger, the drive to hang onto it sometimes made me get too clingy. Sometimes I nearly smothered it to death; or the dear ones I derived it from. And I came close to driving some of them off. Eventually I learned, and usually the hard way, that in order to preserve these relationships- and my own sanity- I’d have to take a step back. A few I had to let go. Happily, most of the friendships survived and though some are now long gone, I remember them all- the good times, the good feelings, the special moments. They’ll each remain here in my heart forever.

But time moves on and, to my everlasting surprise and gratefulness, God has blessed me with tons of friends and now a great wife, too. From early childhood and through middle aged adulthood, I have not had to travel the roads of life alone.  Yet in the depths of a dark and sleepless night, it doesn't mean I don’t sometimes still feel like that stray cat, keeping solitary vigil out on the back deck; his lonely cry for attention, hoping to be held, hoping to be wanted, hoping to be loved. Meow.

After all this time, though, and for a grown man, don’t you think that’s pretty dorky to admit? So call me a dork. Meow.

 

You Don't Say

What's in a word? Well, plenty if it's uttered over the public airwaves.

I continue to work in broadcasting and though no longer on the air, most of my career has been spent behind the microphone. At times, I was pretty good too. And while in real life I don't always know when to shut up, on the air I was usually able to stick to the 30 second/one thought rule: one topic per break and keep it half a minute or less. But there are two things even the dumbest of announcers should know: at all times in a control room, watch what you say when the mic is off, and watch what you say when its on.

Surprisingly, these are not always easy lessons learned.

During the summer of 1983, I was working at KKPL, Apple-FM, in Spokane. Apple-FM played a broad mix of Top 40 type music and one of the popular songs at the time was the theme from the movie, "Flashdance"'. "What a Feeling", by Irene Cara was one of those songs in Apple's heavy rotation that seemed to come up every stinkin' hour, though it was more like every three and a half. But I'd heard it enough to be more than mildly fatigued of it.

It was about 8:30 in the evening, and for about the gazillionth time was about to back announce "What a Feeling" again before going into a spot break. But instead of just doing a straight read, I decided to be glib. "Stereo 96, Apple FM with that singing wench Irene Cara and the theme from 'Flashdance', blah,  blah, blah.." Having discovered the word "wench" in college and, for some reason finding it an amusing little word, I had to stifle a smile at my cleverness. Of course I'd used the word before, though never on the radio. But I understood its meaning-

"Wenches are, generally speaking, peasant women of a special variety. They're known to often lure men into their beds through the use of ale and other alcoholic beverages. Wenches usually mean no harm to the men that they have enthralled, and are just after a good time like everyone else. In rare instances, wenches may actually be male, however this is often difficult to ascertain due to copious intakes of ale."

Harmless but fun was what I was shooting for. Besides, I'd said it only in jest and mainly for my own amusement. During an otherwise ordinary air shift on an otherwise ordinary summer night, I was bored and decided to be creative. All alone in the Apple FM studios with a 'Flashdance' poster staring at me from across the room, I couldn't help notice that the actress in the movie, Jennifer Beals, was kind of wenchy, So the comparison wasn't exactly inaccurate.
But apparently a lady listener failed to find any glibness in my remark and called to let me know it. As she spewed venom at me from the other end of the line, it was clear she'd missed the humor, clearly missed the movie and the video, and was clearly offended by my choice of words. She found the term demeaning and insulting, and showered me with demeaning and insulting words of her own, for not knowing any better.

When she got tired of cussing me out, she calmly threatened to call the next day and speak to somebody in charge. This is where I could've been a horse's rear end and thrown it back in her face- free speech, don't listen if you don't like it, etc, etc. But instead, back peddling like a confused sprinter, I quickly apologized, asked for a mulligan and lied. “I wasn't aware what that word meant and promise you'll never hear it out of me again.”

"Well see that you don't", she snorted. However, she seemed satisfied she'd got the last word in and before the call ended actually wished me a "pleasant rest of the evening". Okay. I wasn't going to win the argument with this particular female caller no matter what I did or said. So I was okay with taking the high road, taking the loss and conceding the discussion. The woman sounded less annoyed than when she first called, so I mentally chalked her up as another "satisfied customer". But just for the record, after she hung up I looked into the receiver and shouted.  “WENNNCH!” and felt so much better.

A few years before that, though, I was doing a Sunday morning shift on KDRK-FM. KDRK shared the same building with sister station KGA, the big 50,000 watt AM country station I cut my teeth on as a young broadcaster.  After finishing a 6 p.m. to midnight show the night before on KGA. I went home, got a couple hours of sleep and dragged my bones back in to do the 6 a.m. to noon shift on KGA’s sister station, KDRK-FM. By 6:00, I'd already swallowed half a pot of coffee and was as ready as I was going to be to start working again.

The first half of KDRK's Sunday morning programming was a line-up of back-to-back half hour public service type tapes, with a couple of religious shows thrown in as well. Between the first and second of these taped segments, I played a spot and read the weather again, and at 6:30 started the next program. Then I stopped paying attention because there wasn't anything else to do till 7. So I had a half hour to goof off, read the Sunday paper and drink more coffee.

KDRK's weekend overnight guy, Dave Dryden, hadn’t left yet so we made ourselves at home, buzzing around the studios and shooting the shit. Both of us were still quite hyper, probably from drinking too much coffee, and being at an age when it was still possible to survive and thrive on little sleep. Dave was leaning against the window, blocking the morning sun, and I was sitting in the "captain's chair" (the stool at the FM console) in the KDRK control room. By then the conversation had degenerated into telling tawdry jokes, each trying to out-tawdry the other. Frankly, for two guys in their early twenties running on caffeine, there's little else to do in a deserted radio station on a Sunday morning.

“Hooked On Books with Henry Morgan”, was the show playing on the air. It was bone dry boring and surely nobody was actually listening to it; Dave and I certainly weren't. But Henry Morgan's voice should at least have been coming out of the studio monitors, and ten minutes into the program- ten minutes too late- it dawned on me it wasn’t. Henry wasn’t droning on. The room was way too quiet, and- duh- it suddenly occurred to me something might be amiss.

I gave Dryden a puzzled look. ”Do you hear anything? Why aren’t we hearing anything?”

Alarmed, I turned to look at the board and saw the needles were registering. Well, that was right. And then it hit me, like a right cross to the head: the mic's open!  After reading the weather forecast, I'd inadvertently- carelessly would be a better choice of words- left it on. The simple solution would be to quickly close the mic and move on. No harm, no foul. But no, I didn't do that. Nope, since I was already right there at eye level and hovering over the darn thing, I chose that moment to compound the problem and bellow directly into it:

“Oh, (F-bomb), the mic’s open!!”

Not, “Oh darn the mic’s open”; not, “Oh look, the mic’s open”. Nope. I used the granddaddy of curse words to express my momentary agitation. I held back nothing and just let it fly.

Oh, (F-bomb), the mic’s open!!”

So surely, my career was over. I knew I’d be immediately axed, the FCC would pull my license and I’d have to go back to selling hockey gear full time again. The whole freaking world had just heard me shout the "F word" in the heart of a Sunday morning over a booming Spokane FM radio station. Every old lady within 300 miles would soon be calling to complain and asking for the name of my boss so they could all call on Monday to demand that “filthy talking announcer be fired immediately!”

Dryden was just howling. But I didn’t think it was so funny--I was terrified. Any second, I envisioned the hot line lighting up. (The ‘hot line’ is a private line, usually colored red, that’s used only by staffers, and especially program directors, to reach the studio. Naturally, anytime it lit up the mandate was, "Pick it up or DIE" because we knew it was either Tom Newman (the KGA p.d.), Dennis Bookey (the FM p.d), or Del Cody (the freaking station owner). But no matter who'd be on the other end of the hot line, I knew I was about to professionally die. There was nothing I could do but wait so I remained glued to the console in the FM studio and did just that- waited quietly for the executioner to call.

But he never did. Nobody did.

When Dave stopped wetting his pants with laughter, he reminded me of the time Newman had left the mic opened and cursed while Paul Harvey was on. And the time Bookey blew it by accidentally leaving a private heated phone conversation with his wife to get on the air. He said if it could happen to those guys- guys that'd been around longer than me, guys that were bosees- then I shouldn't feel so bad. "Just live and learn, and then don't do it again" was Dryden's parting advice before departing the premises.

So I caught a break.

And not a word or mention was ever made of the incident because, fortunately, it happened during the black hole of the broadcast week, the place where ratings and listenership goes to die- Sunday morning. The reason nobody called to complain was because nobody was listening. But just to be safe, for the next few months whenever I worked, I taped a little sign over the microphone. The sign said, "Off", to remind me to disengage it when I was through talking. And I never again accidentally peppered the airwaves with profanity again. Or the word 'wench'.

But there may have been this one time when I was really tired and may have let something slip about Ronald Reagan and goats; or maybe it was aliens. Or maybe....oh, never mind...

 

 

 

 

Love Story

This weekend is my wedding anniversary. 18 years with the lovely Amy. Which is pretty cool.

 

But if I was an honest man- and I like to think I am- it'd be safe to admit that not all 18 years have been blissful bliss, and as a husband, though I haven't failed miserably, like anything in life I have room for improvement.

 

Our marriage is not the kind you read about in a fairy tale or see glorified in a Hollywood romance movie either. It's had its ups and downs, just like any human relationship. We ain't perfect, though Amy's a lot more perfect than me. But thinking back to May 29, 1993, I find it hard to believe we've been together so long. It seems like I just blinked my eyes and here we are. Where did the time go?

 

And, gosh, I was such a dweeb on our wedding day. I couldn't even say "I do", correctly. When asked if I'd take Amy as my wedded wife, though I knew I was supposed to say "I do", I momentarily forgot, panicked and blurted out a bewildered. "Yeah." Fortunately it was enough to make us legal, because a few minutes later, standing under a mild blue sky, dotted with a few cotton ball clouds on a Saturday midday at the Nevada County Fairgrounds, Pastor Sam Floyd pronounced us husband and wife.

 

A lot has happened in the 18 years since that beautiful spring afternoon. Though I swear I don't feel any different, it'd be hard to deny that we both are; in some ways anyways. We're not the wide eyed young couple off to see the world together; instead much of our time and energy is now spent just making our way through the world. Living does that to people. You grow, take a few steps back, evolve, take a few steps forward, regress, etc, etc…

And with no cookie-cutter roadmap stamped out for us when we started, like everybody else, we've just had to find our way. But every year when it comes to thinking about our marriage, our anniversary and our time together, I don't think about all the changes, problems or crises, small and large, that Amy and I have faced over the years.

 

For a few minutes, I like thinking back to the first time I ever laid eyes on her.

I'd just started attending Abundant Life Community Church. Actually I was dragged kicking and screaming, nagged by my often overbearing but well-intentioned Mother. I only did it to get her off my back. But before making a quick get away after the first and (I hoped) only ill-at-ease Sunday, I was coerced by Pastor Sam into attending a singles night the following Friday at his house. Truth be told, I only went because Sam told me Jacque (a girl I'd liked and pursued for quite a while) might be there too. I didn’t go to meet Amy or renew ties with God; I went chasing a skirt.

It was kind of an uncomfortable evening, though, because I barely knew Pastor Sam, and didn’t know any of the other people at all. And the only person I did know and wanted to spend time with- Jacque- wouldn't sit still or stay close long enough to even dabble in some superficial small talk. Sigh. I hated then, and still don't like today, being placed in a group with a bunch of strangers. Church singles strangers, work strangers, strangers in general. It makes my blood pressure soar and I came very close to slipping out that night when nobody was looking. But as the event wore on and Jacque did her best to ignore me, I did happen to notice a different girl sitting on a piano bench in the corner.

 

She didn’t talk much and I'm fairly certain she didn't notice me; I mean, come on- what’s to notice? However, when I glanced at her across the room that night, I knew I was looking at the sweetest girl there. Quiet and shy, like me, Amy Galpin had a real nice smile and pretty eyes. As I checked her out, hopefully without her knowing I was checking her out, I took exceptional notice of her eyes; they were innocent and doe-like. Amy’s brown eyes reflected a soft-hearted, gentle spirit that immediately captivated me.

 

But as the evening dragged on, nothing of substance ever happened with Jacque, and Amy and I didn't say two words to each other. So that first singles night was hardly the stuff of magic. I eventually stopped chasing Jacque when she started chasing after a Grass Valley cop. No way could I compete with a man in a uniform. Still, it took another couple of years-- yes, years—before I'd screw up the courage to even ask Amy out. And after a disastrous first date, there was reasonable doubt about there’d ever be another one.

But I got a second chance and it wasn't long after that, the relationship took. And less than a year later we arrived at our wedding day. So that pretty much brings us up to date; life continues to hurtle along, I'm now a lot older and the world remains cold and harsh. But not nearly as my world B.A (Before Amy). She’s been my anchor, my number one fan, my comfort and my joy. I couldn’t have been any more blessed.

So we observe our anniversary on Sunday, I'll catch a glimpse of Amy and for a few minutes find myself once more basking in the glow of young love and the new life we began together that Saturday in May, now so long ago now. But I won't be seeing my barely 40, though still youthful wife; instead I’ll be looking again at the sweet, serene 19 year-old girl with tender brown eyes who I first saw sitting quietly across the room at a church singles get-together, on that cold November night in 1989. 

Though the love came later, it was the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Happy Anniversary, Babe.

This Is The End...Not

Hmmm….so the Rapture or second coming or end of the world as we know it, as prophesied by mere mortal and Family Radio's head honcho Harold Camping, didn't happen.

Just as I suspected.

Not that I don't expect Jesus to return someday or that Judgment Day is a real event. I do. I just never believed it would happen this past Saturday simply because some old geezer with a microphone twisted the Bible to fit his own agenda and said so. By the way, Harold, in Biblical terms it's never a good thing to be thought of as a false profit or practicing Heretic.

But two days after the world clearly didn’t end the man is still too stubborn to back down. Not only was a retraction not issued, or at least a mea-culpa uttered under his breath, we didn't even get a sincere "Just kidding." Nope. All we got was another end date.

Instead of May 21, the new and improved Judgment Day is slated to occur five months from now, on Friday, October 21. You see, the first date was just a slight miscalculation. Stuff happens. But this one Harold has -again- guaranteed. So mark your calendars. It'll be here before ‘ya know it. And hey, think of all the money we'll save not having to buy Halloween candy this year. Woot-woot! Goodness, doesn't this man get it?

But just like this past weekend the same thing is going to happen come October. Life will go on and Christians all over the country will once more be subject to ridicule, lumped in with this old fool and his loony followers. Late night TV hosts and atheists everywhere will again have a field day mocking and ripping our beliefs. Once again, it’ll be open season on the faithful. And once more the Lord's name gets universally dragged through the mud. Thank you very much, Harold Camping.

Now, I don't suppose or pretend to know when Jesus will come back. All I know for sure is someday he IS coming back. But I won’t be hearing about it first on Family Radio- or any other outlet. However as a deep thinker, which for my purposes is someone who loses sleep worrying about problems that don’t actually exists, Camping's end of the world prediction had me brooding all night.

I call myself a practicing Christian and believe, to the core of my being, that I’m saved because Jesus died on the cross for my sins. But as my brain kept turning this "prophesy" over in my head, I wondered if I've lived right enough, my faith strong enough to preserve my salvation. I wondered if His grace was enough. What if October 21 comes- or whenever Judgment Day really is-and Jesus comes, but I don't have enough of the right spiritual stuff for to be taken back to Heaven with Him?

What if I get left behind?

I imagined waking up October 21 in the same bed shared with the lovely Amy, but finding she’s not there. Not in the shower. Not in the kitchen. Not in the living room. No place. Next I checked the garage and noticed her car there but she wasn’t. Anyplace. The cats were still there, and I watched traffic move down our street like any other morning but, somehow, between going to bed and waking up, the world had drastically changed.

All I got when I called the in-laws was the answering machine. So I called the brother-in-law. But again, at 7:30 on a workday morning, nobody picked up the phone. It just rang and rang until going to voice mail. Next I called Pastor Sam. But nobody answered at his house either. Weird. Quickly I got dressed and decided to drive to work. Somebody HAS to be there. After all, I'm blessed to be working at a 24/7 Christian radio ministry, on the air coast-to-coast and streamed worldwide. As I get out to Highway 49, I’m transitorily reassured to hear K-love on the radio and commuting with other drivers during the hour between home and office.

But occasionally channel surfing I keep hearing breaking news accounts of millions of people suddenly missing. The Rev. Billy Graham. Actors Kirk Cameron and Chuck Norris. Pro athletes Andy Pettitte and Kurt Warner. Sngers Michael W. Smith and Rebecca St James. All gone. Along with countless other souls who’ve suddenly and mysteriously turned up missing. Other bulletins were coming in, too, with terrifying reports of catastrophic earthquakes rattling all parts of the globe, and swarms of F-5 tornadoes, flash floods and other natural disasters occurring in this country as well. Listening to the alarmed announcers detailing one disaster after another, one would think the world had ended.

At work, my key card allowed me into the office and, as usual, the first thing I heard was the sound of our station playing over the internal intercom. It seemed like any other workday morning. Except I'd walked into an empty building. The on-air studio, the news and production rooms- they were all vacant. In the lobby, all the phone lines were lit up with incoming calls, but nobody was at the front desk to answer them. It was eerie.

Alarmed, I went quickly back to my desk and called my supervisor but, like everyone else I’d tried to reach that morning, could only raise his voice mail. Frantically, I placed calls to several other colleagues, but again, only got their voice mail. As the sound of our station kept playing in automation, I wandered the halls looking for another living soul. Anybody. But the only creatures drawing breath on our expansive campus were the lizards in the well-tended ground cover outside. Everybody at K-love is a Christian. I am too. But I guess my co-workers all led better lives than me because my search for a friend came up empty. In an office occupied by nearly 300 people on any given work day, I found myself completely alone.

I knew the music on the radio would play on its own for another week or ten days, depending on how far in advance it'd been programmed. But there'd be no d.j.'s or news breaks; just the control room computer segueing seamlessly from song to song to spot break and back to song, all on its own, and with no human intervention. The daily logs would run out at some point, though, the computer would stop and all 200 stations across the K-love Radio Network would go silent. Forever.

Just like the office. No talking, laughing or friends and co-workers moving about. Nobody getting coffee in the break room. Nobody having meetings. I was alone. I wanted to call Amy, to hear a friendly voice and tell her what was going on. But then I quickly remembered. She wouldn’t be answering her cell. So I wandered in shock back to the workspace I share with three other people. Like everyone else, they were missing in action, too. I looked around the room then stared out the window. Taking a deep sad breath, I picked up a few personal items off my desk (for reasons I can't quite figure out) and left the building, likely for the last time.

Driving home again, everything looked as it did when making the same drive the evening before. There was plenty of traffic, stores were open; people were coming and going. But the world had become a foreign place. Everybody I knew and loved and cared about had been taken from me and I was the only one left behind in a land of non-believers, wondering how I screwed up my eternal salvation and wondering how to go on living. Or even wanted to go on living. I knew doing myself in would surely condemn me to eternal damnation, but what the hell. What else would there be to look forward to?

Fortunately, I didn't have to devise a way to take myself out because my eyes blinked open. During all my ‘deep thinking’ I must've drifted off for a few seconds. Or the rest of the night. As always Amy was still by my side. It was dark outside, but the world was apparently no different than it'd been before I’d gone to sleep. I closed my eyes again before getting up and thanked God it’d only been a dream. And that my Eternity is secured only in the pages of the Bible and only by His mercy and grace.

Not the false teachings of a whack-job loud mouth 90-year old preacher-man who, when soon standing before Him, is probably gonna have a lot of 'splainin to do.

Just Another Day at the Office

July 16, 2007. It was supposed to be just another routinely run of the mill Monday; just like any other day in the middle of an otherwise routinely hot Northern California summer. But it wasn't. It wasn't like that at all.

Here at my place of employment, EMF Broadcasting, Mike Pendeault worked in Desktop Support. Residing just a couple cubes down from mine, Mike was the guy IT usually dispatched whenever there was a PC problem.

 

On moving days, Mike was also the "Bekins Man"; anybody being shuffled from cube to cube, cube to office, or office to cube (all which seem to occur around here about as often as Lindsay Lohan gets arrested for something) always knew it was time to go whenever Mike showed up. He made it happen, unhooking all your electronic gear from one work station and re-connecting it at the next one. 

 

I’ve gone through this semi-frequent rite five times now, since moving into our new complex several years ago, so I saw Mike often.  Always around, always with a funny story or really bad joke, Mike (or "Big Mike" due to his tall and imposing stature) was a staff favorite. I liked him. I think everybody liked him.

 

Right up till that routine Monday when he dropped dead....here at work, as many of us helplessly looked on.

Everything seemed absolutely normal.  But just before noon time, with great difficulty, Mike began coughing. Loudly. It sounded like he had something caught in his throat, like he’d swallowed wrong. At first I didn’t pay a lot of attention, because in the ambient background of the work environment, people are coughing, hacking or clearing their throats all the time. At almost the exact same time, I got called down to my supervisor’s office for a brief pow-wow on a spot I was working on. So it didn't quite register that something might be terribly wrong. 

 

But five minutes later when I came back, whatever was happening to Mike had intensified and grown worse. He wasn’t coughing anymore, instead he was making loud, bellowing gasping sounds and concern had spread throughout our work area. Somebody called 9-1-1, while Jason Hollis did what he could to assist, or at least keep Mike calm. I was only a few feet away but might as well have been in another state, I felt so utterly useless.

 

However in the confined space where Mike lay struggling for his life, the last thing the situation called for was a crowd. So I stayed where I was as Big Mike's gasps for air became more and more in vain. Mercifully, the paramedics were on sight in less than 5 minutes and began feverishly trying to stabilize him and figure out what the problem was.

 

They cut off his shirt and hooked him to several monitors, including an EKG. Everybody stood back and watched them pump him full of drugs, but Mike continued to gasp, crying out in mournful pathetic pleas- “God help me please. I can’t breathe. I can’t BREATHE!!”
He said it over and over. It was scary, and becoming increasingly apparent that Mike's condition was grave and deteriorating.

I have no idea what his vital signs registered, but clearly they weren't very good. One of the EMT’s kept saying things like, “Hang on Mike....Stay with me.....Don’t leave us, Mike.....C’mon, stay with us”. I don’t think they ever got him completely stable. But when Mike stopped writhing I guess he was stable enough to transfer to the hospital. That’s when the three EMT’s lifted Mike’s 6'5“frame onto the gurney and quickly wheeled him out of the building to a waiting ambulance.  By then though, he wasn’t responding—in fact, he wasn’t moving at all.

It was 12:55 p.m. when Mike died on the way to the hospital.

From the time he’d started going into convulsions till the end, less than 45 minutes had passed. Later, after it’d sunk in that Mike was gone, it snuck up on me that the ones who’d been in that room as the paramedics continued to frantically work on Mike, had been witness to a man truly in the throes of death. I was one of them, and it became surreal to recall exchanging "Good mornings" and following Mike through the employee’s entrance and into the building that morning at around a quarter to nine. 

 

He had no idea he had just over four hours to live. Nobody did.

 

Then I thought back to the conversation he and I had at the front desk, about an hour and fifteen minutes before he’d be pronounced dead, where, as usual, Mike was trying to solve somebody's computer issues.

 "Hey, the printer in back isn't printing. Can you take a look?" 

 ”Yeah, when this bad boy straightens up and flies right again (nodding to the PC in front of him), I'll come take a look”

I remember the words sounded like Mike, but his voice was kind of tired and he looked a little tense and distracted. But I didn’t make the connection that anything might be wrong.

Then I kept thinking about Mike's last words. I couldn’t get them out of my head. ”God help me please….I can’t breathe...I can’t BREATHE!!” It was only a few minutes later, while sitting at his desk, and before getting back to that printer, that the trouble began. And an hour later, he was gone. He was 42 years old.

 

Yet Mike’s work space, like his outward appearance, remained eerily, but familiarly, disheveled. His cup of coffee, nearly full, had gone cold. There was a half eaten banana on the counter top, along with several manila folders. Their contents were strewn about, half in and half out. A couple boxes of printer paper were stacked in a corner. His backpack, wallet and keys were tossed on a shelf over his laptop and PC, both continuing to run in sleep mode, the screen savers both gone black. The red light on Mike's phone indicated an unanswered voice message waiting to be heard. And out in the parking lot, his car was still exactly where he'd left it earlier that morning.

 

Everything appeared just as it would on any other work day. So mundanely routine, it was as if Mike had just stepped out for a minute or gone to the restroom, or another part of the building to work on a colleagues PC problem. It looked like he’d be right back. Except he wouldn’t. Ever.

 

There were tears and an uncomfortable silence throughout the office the rest of the afternoon. You wanted to work, you wanted business as usual, you wanted to hear people laughing and talking and moving about, and for the environment to feel “normal” again. But nobody could concentrate on working and nothing was normal about the rest of that day.

The event was too difficult, if not impossible, to understand. Mike was only 42. There didn't seem to be a way to wrap your arms around it. It was all so...so final. The coroner said he died of two pulmonary embolisms, one in each lung. There was nothing anyone could have done and by the time help arrived, it was too late. The doc's called it "just one of those things". But that was small consolation to those of us who saw what "just one of those things" actually looks like.

Yet Mike had got out of bed that day, took a shower, brushed his teeth, put gas in his car and drove to work to start another Monday. It was a Monday like a thousand other routine garden variety Mondays, but Mike hadn't the foggiest idea that this particular Monday would be his last day on earth, and no clue that by lunchtime he’d go out into Eternity and taken to Heaven.

 

Somebody described it in Gulf War "Shock and Awe" terminology. Shock, that a seemingly healthy human being we worked and laughed with, and who'd walked among us that very day, had been taken so quickly. But there was also a reverent awe knowing that Mike, as a committed believer, had been instantly taken into the presence of his Lord and Savior.

Stuff like that just doesn't happen every day. Not at work anyway. At least, it’s not supposed to. It was supposed to be a random run of the mill back-to-work Monday, just like any other day. But it wasn't and there was nothing random or run-of-the-mill about it at all. For Mike, that Monday was an end and a beginning- the end of his earthly life and the beginning of life everlasting. At last, there was nothing left for him to fear, or fix. Mike’s work here was done. God had called him home.

And for me and the rest of us in attendance that Monday, as Mike's life abruptly, then gently slipped away, it was an up close and personal reminder that tomorrow- and sometimes even today- is promised to no one.