"You see the trumpet player in the back row? He graduated a year or two before me from Central High School. Do I look as old as he does?"
The trumpet player I was referring to had an oblong head with thinning white hair, and his face looked tired, maybe from a full day of practice or maybe because La Crosse was in the midst of an unbearable heat wave that was sucking the life out of everyone in town. He also happened to be one of my son's high school band instructors.
"Ummm, yes?" she responded, then hesitated as she realized it was not the answer I was hoping for.
"What do you mean? I still have a full head of hair and it's only beginning to gray on the sides!" I couldn't believe it. Just wait until she asks me if she looks good in those new pair of jeans.....
I was thinking of that exchange this morning as I was running around the Central High School track, preparing for my next Oktoberfest 5 Mile run. As always, my mind wanders to things that have nothing to do with the monotony of running -- such as some of the fun things I used to do as a kid growing up in a river town on the Mighty Mississippi.
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Little did I know that the new kid in the neighborhood who was knocking on my door (wearing a Bart Starr football jersey) would some day stand in my wedding as best man. I trusted Doug enough to travel 2,000 miles (to California and back) in a beaten down, cramped-for-space, Chevy Vega right out of high school. Better yet, our parents trusted us (yes, Paul, even my mom) enough to let three 18 year old boys drive halfway across the country through Nebraska, Kansas, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California and back through Nevada, Utah, the Dakotas and Minnesota. I spent hundreds of hours learning how to play euchre with these two guys, most often on the same team, but occasionally against. I could be offered a number of choices, but I would still pick Doug in a game of two-on-two football against almost anyone. Even though we'd be against all odds to win. I guess you could say I have faith.
Faith has always had something to do with our friendship. Paul is a senior pastor at a local church and Doug and I are pretty active in our respective churches. Our common, Christian beliefs and understanding of where we stand in the universe keep us humble and true to our families, wives and children.
But I think we also have faith in each other to be there for each other when needed. We have all lost our fathers, with Paul losing his when he was still in high school. I was at his house when his father fell down the back steps after suffering a stroke. I will never forget the shock and frustration his family felt as we waited helplessly for the ambulance to arrive. I always looked at my own father differently after that, and was thankful for the extra years he and I had together. My father passed away 10 years ago from complications of Parkinson's, and while it wasn't as traumatic, it was difficult to see him go. While greeting people before the funeral, I was surprised to look up and see Paul standing there. How the word had gotten to him I didn't know, but he had traveled some distance to offer his condolences. And just this past year, Doug's father lost his battle against cancer. In the year prior to his death, Doug had wanted to buy a boat to take his dad fishing and to spend more time with him on the river. My best memories of his dad are from high school and years later at annual pig roasts held at Doug's house. Whenever a smile was needed, Doug's dad was game.
Other events have kept us close through the years. Including weddings, and perhaps more importantly the bachelor parties that preceded them. In one memorable night (that still angers his wife), we had planned on spending a few hours on the river in a houseboat celebrating Doug's dying bachelorhood. Shortly after beaching the boat on a sandbar, one of the summer's worse storms hit the area threatening to swamp the boat and those of us still aboard. Perhaps distracted by the storm, we ran the boat's battery down so low that we couldn't get it started when it was time to head back. After some creative mechanical maneuvers, we did get enough supplemental power to turn over the engine. As a result, we didn't get back to the marina until close to four o'clock in the morning on the day of his wedding. I believe the fire in his wife's eyes during the wedding is still smoldering to this day.
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Through the years we've ridden motorcycles (I'm not sure if Paul's Honda qualifies), cars, and boats to destinations that have been long forgotten. Perhaps some day we will add a plane to the list -- how does jumping from a plane to celebrate our 60th birthday sound, guys? We've laid on a country road at two o'clock in the morning, staring at the stars, pondering what we will do after high school and whether we can get a date with that that buxom girl with frizzy hair. I can remember a high school basketball game that Paul and I (as part of the pep band) were playing at. I don't know whose idea it was, but Doug joined us -- "playing" an extra trombone even though he didn't know how to play a note. You would have thought the band instructor would have wondered what Doug was doing there. But I can't remember him saying a word.
Music was a big part of Paul's and my younger years. We both played trombone (one of us better than the other). It allowed us to share many hours playing in concert band, marching band and jazz band, culminating in the recording of two albums during our junior and senior years. Paul continued playing in college, while I continued my search for the perfect rum and coke. There are memories of our time in Madison, sitting at a State Street bar waiting for John Cougar (later Mellencamp) to perform only to find out an hour before the performance that the drummer had broken a leg or something, and the band wouldn't be playing. I still laugh when I think about the day we walked into Metamorphosis Records in downtown La Crosse and had tee-shirts imprinted with our favorite drummer, "Neal Pert" from the greatest rock band ever -- Rush. It wasn't until months later that we figured out that the correct spelling of his name was Peart.
Some of our best memories are on the Mississippi River. During one stormy night, we were coming back to La Crosse through the upper locks and because of a faulty motor, we were almost smashed against the wall by the Mississippi Queen which was trying to tie up before going through the locks. At the last minute, the motor fired up and we were able to pull away from the oncoming hull, as a driving rain poured down on us. Our friends, watching from another boat, thought we were goners.
One of our favorite things to do on the river is take a friend's houseboat out for the night and play cards until we can't think straight any more. Regardless of who wins (and we know who that is), we take time to relive Saturday nights in high school playing euchre. Our wives love to shop, and will spend a weekend at the Mall of America finding the right pair of shoes. But if you ask me, there aren't many things better in life than drinking beer and eating brats, beans and a salad while listening to Packer's preseason football while beached on a sandbar beneath a sky full of stars.
This year marks the first time when none of us have any children living at home, which has allowed us to spend more time together riding bikes along the muddy Root River in Minnesota, spending a weekend at a lake house while lightning etches the night sky with an approaching storm, or training for fitness events like the La Crosse Fitness Festival and Oktoberfest Maple Leaf 5K walks and runs.
You might wonder why I'm bothering to mention any of this in my blog, when our nation is faced with a debt crisis that threatens to bankrupt the greatest nation on earth. Or when the world's last Super Power is engaged in far too many wars, and the prospects of world peace seem more impossible than ever before. Or when Wisconsin is faced with recall elections from an angry group of union officials and teachers.
Perhaps, as I get older, the world looks a lot different than it did when Doug, Paul and I were three kids growing up in God's country, with nothing more to do than ride dirt bikes, play trombones in band and do floaters on the Mississippi. And maybe it does my soul good to look back on those carefree days, and find a reason to believe that there are still many good things to appreciate.
Even if your wife thinks you're looking old.
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