Tryin' Like The Devil

Sooo, you were in Randy’s Records the other day (in my best Wayne from Letterkenny voice) … killing time after a hard day at work (don’t ask.) I’d already found a two-record collection from 1974 of one of my favorite country-rock bands, The Flying Burrito Brothers (featuring the always amazing Gram Parsons, the guy who arguably invented the genre), and I was just lackadaisically thumbing through the rest of the new arrival bins, not really expecting to find anything else good. I was actually kind of bored and ready to go home when I glanced to my right at the bins I hadn’t looked through yet, and saw an album I’ve never actually seen in the wild before. At first, I thought it was just wishful thinking, but even after I blinked, the album was still there: James Talley’s 1976 album, Tryin’ Like the Devil.

“Who is James Talley?” you might legitimately ask, and it wouldn’t mean you were an idiot in my eyes because you didn’t know. James Talley is a fairly obscure country singer from Oklahoma who released two pretty amazing records in the mid-1970s. President Jimmy Carter – who, among his other virtues, has great musical taste – sang Talley’s praises and invited him to play at the White House. James Talley is a guy who should have been a star (if intelligence and talent counted for much) but instead faded into undeserved obscurity.

Tryin’ Like the Devil, James Talley's second album, is my favorite – working class outlook (despite Talley’s doctorate in American Studies), great lyrics and melody, and heartfelt singing. I discovered James Talley in the 1990s through Peter Guralnick’s book Lost Highway, a collection of essays about country and blues musicians. According to Guralnick, Talley’s cultural heroes are musicians Merle Haggard, Woody Guthrie, blues singer Otis Spann, and author James Agee, and it shows in his music. After reading the book, I managed to track down digital downloads of Talley’s albums, but had given up hope of ever finding an original vinyl copy of any of his records because they went out of print forty years ago, were never best sellers, and, to the best of my knowledge, have never been reissued. Yet there was Tryin’ Like the Devil staring me in the face at Randy’s today, moderately priced compared to how that place usually jacks up the good stuff.

So tonight, I’m listening to James Talley sing,

“I’m like that pot-bellied trucker drinkin’ coffee,

I’m like that red-headed waitress named Louise,

I’m like every workin’ man, all across the land

Just tryin’ like the devil to be free,”

and happy that the day turned out half-way decently after all.

 

Drawing the Olsens

Christmas Day 1982. Kind of a punk.

I’m sitting here in my classroom after school, watching my daughters – Caroline and Grace – entertain themselves by drawing until it is time to go home. It’s been a long week and I’m not feeling especially motivated to correct papers or record scores, hence the blogging. I’m also feeling kind of blue, and thinking about the past. I have my iPod blasting a playlist of my favorite songs from 1982, and Bruce Springsteen, John Mellencamp, Bob Seger, and The Who are entertaining me …

I’ve mentioned it here before, but this year has the same calendar as 1982. I look at my daughters as they lay on my classroom floor coloring their pictures, and realize that they’ve never seen a year that begins with the number 19, let alone understand that 1982 was a real year, where both of their grandparents – my parents – were alive, healthy, and not that much older than I am now. My brother Phil was a senior in high school, and my one complete semester at BYU – I went there briefly again in ’85, just long enough to get my Spanish credits - was dragging to an exhausting and inauspicious end. My buddy Don and the rest of my friends were still single and ready to cat around every night. I was living at home with my parents and younger brothers, and driving to BYU every morning with my cousin.

There are several memories from November and December of 1982 that I still hold near and dear, twenty-eight years later. I remember lying in bed every morning that winter and listening to my parents quietly visiting with one another while they ate breakfast together, before my dad went to work. Joe and Vera genuinely enjoyed one another’s company. They usually had the radio tuned to KSL so that they could listen to the news while they ate and talked.

Joe and Vera, Christmas 1982. Best parents ever.

As I watch my daughters draw, and I look out my classroom window at the dark storm clouds gathering, one memory from the second week of December 1982 especially stands out. We’d had a large snow storm during the night, which had dumped nearly a foot of snow - I know, big surprise that it snowed in Heber in December. Anyway, the snow made Highway 189 through Provo Canyon treacherous. This was back in the day - boy I sound like an old fart - when the road through the canyon wound along the bottom by the river, instead of following the contour of the mountainside like it does now. It was a winding, two lane road, and was especially dangerous during a snowstorm. My cousin and I opted not to go to school that morning.

Since I was already up and dressed, I decided to make myself useful. After shoveling my parents’ sidewalk and driveway, I took my shovel and walked down Center Street a block to Clarence and Hope Olsen’s place. Clarence and Hope were an elderly couple - they had to be in their eighties - who lived with their adult son Joe, who was mentally retarded. Joe Olsen was a neighborhood fixture, standing beside the road for hours and watching the cars go by. When I first read the book To Kill A Mockingbird as a teenager, before I saw the movie, the Radleys reminded me of the Olsens (not that Clarence was comparable to the mean and cruel Mr. Radley), and Joe Olsen was who I pictured as Boo Radley.

As a teenager, I spent many hours in boring church meetings entertaining myself (and friends and family) by sketching various members of our LDS ward, especially Clarence, Hope, and Joe. It sounds cruel and disrespectful now, but at the time I didn’t mean it that way; they were just really interesting people to look at, which meant they were a lot of fun to draw. I never cartooned or caricatured them, I just sketched them as they appeared. Which was probably bad enough. Clarence and Hope were both quite feeble - I think Hope was a little senile at that point - although Clarence still worked in the insurance sales office that stood next to his house.

When I got to the Olsens it was still before eight o’clock in the morning, and the house looked quiet. Even then, I think I figured I owed them some compassion; I don’t think they ever knew that I drew pictures of them, but even so, I wanted to do something kind for them. I had their sidewalk and driveway shoveled before anyone was awake in the house. My goal was to escape without the Olsens knowing who had shoveled them out.

I wasn’t fast enough. As I was putting the finishing touches on the sidewalk, Clarence’s stooped figure emerged from the house. I remember Clarence, despite his advanced age and the proximity of his office to his house, was dressed in a suit and tie. At that point in his life, Clarence was slack-jawed and a little difficult to understand when he spoke. However, he seemed grateful and muttered his thanks, which kind of embarrassed me. I didn’t want the Olsens to know I’d shoveled their sidewalk; it was a lot more fun doing it anonymously. It wasn’t a big emotional moment anyway; Clarence didn’t throw his arms around me and tell me how grateful he was. He just mumbled thanks and I told him he was welcome.

I returned from an LDS mission in late 1984 and was a little surprised to go to church and see both Olsens still living. Joe was no longer with them; he had been institutionalized after Clarence and Hope were no longer able to care for him. Not too long after my return both Clarence and Hope died. A few years later Joe met a tragic end when he got separated from his group while on an outing in the mountains near Kamas. Joe spent the night in the mountains and died of exposure. It’s a sad story, but sometimes that’s how life is.

1982 was a long time ago, now. The music from that era brings back a lot of memories, both good and bad. My parents and brother Phil passed away a few years ago. My buddy Don hasn’t been in touch for quite a while, and I’m a little worried about him. I still see other friends that I grew up with, and I’m grateful for their continued friendship, although we don't always see eye-to-eye on some things.

Anyway, I like watching my daughters draw. I’m glad I passed that on to them. I just hope that they’ll shovel the snow once in a while as well.

Reasonably Inexpensive Nostalgia, Part 1

We’re going to Logan for our annual Cache Valley Vacation. I love Cache Valley. I spent five of the best years of my life there trying to get through Utah State University. Going to Logan makes me nostalgic, almost as much as going to Heber does. Cache Valley is one of my “Gee Whiz” places, as in “Gee whiz I’d sure like to live there.” Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be practical to give up my years in my current school district and start over in one of the two school districts in Cache Valley. Logan will just have to stay a great place to take a fall vacation.

We have some big plans, including taking the girls to a corn maze at the American West Heritage Center. The Wife hopes to meet up with an old friend for a girls’ night out as well. Something about getting her eyebrows waxed. Sounds like fun.

In the unlikely event anyone actually finds my life interesting, I’m going to keep a running journal of our time in Bridgerland ... 

Thursday, 9:00 PM ... The Wife and I watch TV in our own motel room. I’d almost forgotten what it was like to watch an actual television. Most of my video viewing at home now is either a download or on DVD, usually on my computer. Fortunately, The Wife had the foresight to book a suite, so our TV is not tuned to an endless stream of Sponge Bob or iCarly reruns, as it normally would be at home. That’s what the girls are watching in the other room.   

Right now we’re watching American Chopper, one of my all-time favorite programs, while eating Thai take-out. It’s been a few years since I’ve seen a new episode of American Chopper. I didn't realize Paul Senior and Paul Junior were on the outs. I always thought Paul senior was the proverbial prick with a heart of gold. Turns out he’s just a prick. He still has a great mustache, though.

Friday, 3:45 AM ... I wake up, as usual. I realize where I am and that I don’t have to get up to beat the crowd to the gym today. I laugh out loud. The Wife thinks I’m nuts. I eventually fall back to sleep.

7:00 AM ... I wake up for good this time. There is an Anytime Fitness here in Logan, and I am eager to check it out. Unfortunately, the bathroom light and fan are on the same switch, and the fan is incredibly loud. The fan, which is only slightly less noisy than Paul Junior’s Chopper, wakes The Wife and kids. Once the kids are awake they never go back to sleep, so The Wife won’t be able to either. I guiltily slink off to the gym.

When I get to the gym my electronic key doesn’t work, although supposedly I can use it at any Anytime Fitness in the state. A guy inside takes pity on me and opens the door for me. I am impressed with the size of the facility and the amount of exercise equipment. I get on a treadmill and begin my morning run. I set my iPod to a playlist of favorite songs from 1990-91, when I was attending USU. I hear “Why Should I Cry For You” by Sting, “Mansion on the Hill” by Neil Young, “Hard To Handle” by the Black Crowes, and “Series Of Dreams” by Bob Dylan, among others.

About a mile into the run the left side of my right knee starts to hurt. Being the masochist that I am, I just ignore it and reach my goal. Usually the pain stops by the second mile, but today it doesn’t. I realize I’m not twenty-five anymore and vow to use an elliptical tomorrow instead of a treadmill, even though I don’t want to. I hobble over to a nearby Wal-Mart and buy some Arthricream, which of course makes me feel even older.

11:00 AM ... I take the kids to the Bluebird Restaurant - one of our favorite places, and a place we go every time we’re in Logan - for lunch. The Wife stays at the motel to catch up on her sleep. We get to the Bluebird and the kids, after a perfunctory stop at the table, head to the candy counter. The hand dipped chocolates they sell at the Bluebird are the best. Since I at least sometimes pretend to be a responsible parent, I make the girls come back to the table for lunch. Fortunately for Grace, a grilled cheese sandwich is on the menu. The girls eat quickly and immediately return to the candy counter, where I buy them all something.

After leaving the Bluebird we head up the street half a block to one of my favorite reasons for visiting Logan, Books Of Yesterday. Susan and Caroline are thrilled to be there as well; Gracie less so. Within five minutes of entering the bookstore, Grace finds me and proclaims that she needs to use the bathroom. Since there isn’t a restroom in the bookstore, we have to leave. Rather than take the girls back to the motel and disturb The Wife, I tell them that we are going to the grocery store instead. Grace then tells me she really doesn’t need to use the restroom. I tell her “tough”, and make all three of them use the restroom at the grocery store anyway.

When we leave the grocery store I take the girls a block and a half northwest and show them the house my parents lived in sixty years ago while my father attended USU when it was still USAC, and had to milk cows on campus early in the morning. My mom told me they lived in a little two room apartment in the back of the house, where she was pregnant and homesick. I have the girls pose at the entrance to the part of the house where my parents lived and take their picture.

A little family history never hurt anybody.

2:00 PM ... The Wife takes the girls swimming in the motel pool, so I have the next two hours to finally hit some of my old favorite haunts solo. I start out at Books of Yesterday. B.O.Y. looks like an earthquake struck, leaving piles of books everywhere. I’m looking for a couple of twenty-year-old crime novels by Walter Mosley, Devil In A Blue Dress and A Red Death, in the original editions that I used to own. Sure enough, B.O.Y. has them, and they are reasonable priced. I don’t even have to look for them very hard, surprisingly, considering the state of the store.

After Books of Yesterday I go to Hastings, another old favorite. Hastings has a couple of obscure Dylan CDs for really cheap, but I resist the temptation to buy them. I figure I can find them on Amazon. I finally go to Borders, which didn’t exist when I lived in Cache Valley. After Hastings, and especially after Books of Yesterday, Borders is a let down. It’s way too modern, and the book and CD selection is way too obvious. I prefer the cheap thrill of finding a book I really want in a pile in Books Of Yesterday. I don’t spend much time at Borders. My time is up anyway, so I buy a couple of pizzas from Little Caesar's and head back to the motel. When I arrive Susan is playing with a little boy I don’t recognize in front of the motel. Susan has a made a new friend, as usual.

I’m hungry, and after all the bookstore browsing, my knee is throbbing. I’m hoping to get off it and eat a piece of pizza. Just gonna hang out with the women in my life for a few hours ....

A River Runs Through It and the Meaning of Life

  

Me with a favorite book, September 1993

I’m working my way through Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It this summer for the hundredth time, and thinking about family.

I first read A River Runs Through It over seventeen years ago. I came to the book by way of the Robert Redford movie, which I saw with a good friend at a movie theater one snowy winter night in Heber the first year I taught school. I liked the movie so much I bought the book, and as good as the movie was, it couldn’t hold a candle to Maclean’s original story. Norman Maclean is a great writer; he’s one of my favorites. The man’s prose is like most authors’ poetry; A River Runs Through It is a very beautifully written book. Maclean uses fly fishing as a metaphor for - and counterpoint to - life. Maclean’s description early in the story of his brother Paul’s fly-fishing ability and technique is some of the best writing I've ever read, and you don’t have to be a fly fisherman to enjoy or appreciate it.

 

Running through Maclean’s book like the river in the title is family. A River Runs Through It is funny, but Maclean isn’t a comedian and doesn’t go for cheap laughs. Instead, the humor comes naturally from growing up home-schooled by his Presbyterian minister father, and with his argumentative younger brother. One of my favorite parts of the book describes the one and only fist fight Maclean ever had with his brother, and their mother’s unfortunate intervention in that fight:

 ... I did not see our mother walk between us to try to stop us. She was short and wore glasses and, even with them on, did not have good vision. She had never seen a fight before or had any notion of how bad you could get hurt by becoming mixed up in one. Evidently, she just walked between her sons. The first I saw of her was the grey top of her head, the hair tied in a big knot with a big comb in it; but what was most noticeable was that her head was so close to Paul I couldn’t get a good punch at him. Then I didn’t see her anymore.

 

The fight seemed suddenly to stop itself. She was lying on the floor between us. Then we both began to cry and fight in a rage, each one shouting “You son of a bitch, you knocked my mother down.” 

She got off the floor, and, blind without her glasses, staggered in circles between us, saying without recognizing which one she was addressing, “No, it wasn’t you. I just slipped and fell.”

 

So, this was the only time we ever fought.

When I first read that passage it reminded me of the relationship I had with my younger brother Phil, except we definitely fought more than once. When we were kids, we would pound on each other one moment and be best friends the next. Even as teenagers we still occasionally settled things with a punch up, and yet no one else could ever settle things that way with one of us if the other was around. A River Runs Through It gained unexpected poignancy for me a few years ago when Phil, like Macleans’ brother Paul, died an untimely death. Like Maclean, there wasn’t much I could do to prevent Phil’s death, and I’ve brooded about it ever since.

 

Despite that ending, A River Runs Through It is not a morbid book. Another aspect of the book that keeps me coming back is Maclean’s love of - and almost reverence for - the mountains in which he grew up. I can relate to that. Like Maclean, I spent several summers working for the US Forest Service when I was younger, and I miss being in the mountains every day.

 

Rereading A River Runs Through It also reminded me that one of the great things about my Forest Service years was the opportunity I had to retrace the path my grandparents - my mother’s parents - made (almost literally) through the mountains during the early and middle parts of the twentieth century. They were from the same generation as Norman Maclean, and ran a sawmill set in the Uinta Mountains, east of Heber. Maclean’s parents had a cabin in the mountains because they liked to fish; my grandparents had a cabin in the mountains because they had to earn a living. Thanks to some exploring I did as a Forest Service employee, and thanks to some great road trips with a favorite uncle, I learned my way around the areas in the mountains where my grandparents (and parents) lived and worked.

 

My cousin Jim recently e-mailed me a photo of one of the cabins my grandparents lived in while they cut down trees in the mountains. Here it is:

Not exactly the luxury mountain cabin common nowadays, is it? There wasn’t a jetted hot tub in it, anyway. The cabin doesn't exist anymore; it was only meant to be a temporary accommodation for my grandfather and his family while they worked. The Forest Service demolished it fifty years ago.

 

Finally, the lesson Norman Maclean teaches in A River Runs Through It is that our families define us. Who we are and what we do with our life is shaped by our family, for better or worse. Ultimately, we have our free will to choose our own path through life, but our family sets us on that path. As Maclean writes, near the end of the book:

Now nearly all those I loved and did not understand are dead, but still I reach out to them.

  

A River Runs Through It is a great book. Check it out if you haven’t already.

 

 

 

Remembering Veterans...

Ten years ago I wrote a monthly newspaper column for the late, lamented Wasatch County Courier. I didn’t get paid much for doing it, but I had a lot of fun. The main focus of my newspaper column was history, especially Wasatch County history.

Today I'm posting a column I wrote for the Courier back in 1999. I always liked this column, because it dealt with two things near and dear to my heart: family and patriotism. Bear in mind that it was originally published the week before Christmas in 1999, so add ten years (now eighteen years) to any historical references. I’m posting it here today because it also applies to Veterans Day. This article may not contain the greatest writing in the world, but it came from the heart:

Joe Thacker and friend

"I'll Be Home for Christmas" has always been one of my favorite Christmas songs. Bing Crosby recorded it back in the 1943, at the height of World War II. “White Christmas” was more popular, but for my money, nothing can beat the emotional resonance of “I’ll Be Home for Christmas.” I’ve often wondered what that song meant to the Heber Valley men and women fighting in the second World War, and to the families they left behind. I can’t really know, because I wasn’t there. I can only imagine how poignant Bing Crosby’s song was for those people during that terrible time.

I also recently reread the book Citizen Soldiers by Stephen Ambrose. Citizen Soldiers is a history of World War II from D-Day to VE Day, told by GI’s who were there. I highly recommend this book. Ambrose’s tale of the Battle of the Bulge, which was fought the week before Christmas 1944, inspired me to talk to a relative who participated in World War II. I asked my uncle, Joe Thacker, about his war experiences. Uncle Joe spent three Christmases in the service of his country.

My uncle Joe Thacker is the son of Ray and Mima Thacker. He grew up in Charleston, along with his three brothers, Dale, Vern, and Dan, and his three sisters, ReNee, Vera, and Marva. All four of Ray and Mima’s sons served in World War II. Dale was in the Navy in the North Atlantic. Vern served in the Navy in the Pacific. Dan trained for the invasion of Japan in Oregon.

Uncle Joe served for three years as an army engineer. During Christmas 1943, Uncle Joe was in Louisiana completing basic training. He spent Christmas 1944 on the island of Leyte, in the Philippines. Uncle Joe was part of the Philippine invasion force, and has some amazing and scary stories to tell about that battle. On Christmas Day 1945, after the war ended, Uncle Joe was on a boat headed for home. That was probably the best Christmas of all.

Uncle Joe’s memories of the Christmases he spent during the war are bittersweet. He remembers the camaraderie he felt with his fellow soldiers. Their loyalty to one another and the devotion to duty they felt got them through the homesickness and the rough times. They supported one another. Uncle Joe said that remembering the real meaning of Christmas, the birth of the Savior, also helped ease the pain of being away from loved ones at home.

Uncle Joe commented that, although it was difficult to be away from home at Christmas, it was harder on the folks left behind. My Grandmother Thacker briefly kept a journal during the early months of 1944. Each entry details how lonesome she was and how miserable and cold the weather was. Receiving a letter from one of her sons serving in the military gave Grandma a lot of happiness. She missed her sons and worried about them every minute of the day.

Grandma Thacker wasn’t the only one who missed loved ones during World War II. Millions of Americans sacrificed time away from their families to secure the freedoms we enjoy today. Some even gave their lives so that we Americans could continue to live the way we choose. The next time we sing a Christmas carol, especially “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” let's remember the sacrifices the men and women who serve our country have made to protect our freedoms.