The Casserole Brigade

The Casserole Brigade started showing up two days after Dora Mae’s funeral. There were a half-dozen members appearing from the mist of John Paul’s despondency like soldiers emerging in dim shapes from no-man’s land. To them, he appeared numb and vulnerable, no doubt dazed from the damage his loss had caused, so suddenly and unexpectedly had it burst upon him. Easy pickings.

At first, there were evening treats designed to soften him up for later assaults. A plate of spaghetti or a surplus Chicken Tetrazzini from a dinner for a sister. “My late husband used to call it “Chicken Tetrachloride” but then he always had more money than taste, ahem.”

And, of course, there were the casseroles. They came in every form imaginable and some that, quite frankly, John Paul could never have imagined. There were ham and cheese casseroles, egg and cheese casseroles, egg and anything casseroles, and casseroles made, apparently from whatever lay uneaten in a refrigerator at any given moment. Consuelo Remindez, wife of the late manager of “La Casa Ensinada” even once brought him a Chili Relleno casserole that had nearly taken off the top of his head. His vote for most bizarre was though, for a considerable length of time, a broccoli and corn bread casserole that Emily Kesterson had left at his door one evening with a note that said simply, “We must each find a way to get over our grief.”

She was always the shy one.

She would come late, and on the few times she knocked on his door, she knocked softly, so softly he could scarcely discern it from the noise of the city.

“I’m sorry.” That’s the way she always began.

The others weren’t as subtle. Marcella Goodwin, for example, would catch him in the lobby waiting for the elevator. “Gonna bring you a brand new dish tonight,” she would announce in a voice audible to anyone near. “That’ll be two, counting me, har har.”

Folks felt good about it. John Paul and Dora Mae never did seem that they could afford to live in the building. He must be suffering both emotionally and financially, it was surmised. A little help from the ladies here and there must have been welcome. Everyone commented on how well John Paul seemed to be doing. Besides, he enjoyed the casseroles and welcomed them, most of them at least. As long as he smiled and dined, they kept coming like products on an assembly line.

It went on like this for some time. When those at the morning coffee gathering tried to remember later, reminisces ranged from a month to three months. At any rate, it was long enough for Parker Thompson to start a pool. He called it the “Land John Paul Pool” and it is whispered that he had collected nearly a hundred dollars before the news hit the condo like a tsunami.

One day he just wasn’t there anymore.

“Not here?” Someone asked. “You mean he went on a trip?”

“No,” a daughter explained. “He and a friend moved to New York.”

“You mean he had a girl friend?” Marcella said. “Whose casserole won?”

“No, it was his friend Fred.”

“Fred?”

“Yes, they have leased a place in Manhattan.” Complete silence settled on the room. From that day, no one ever mentioned his name again.

Morning Thoughts: January 28, 2018

I have no authority whatsoever to do it, but I’m claiming this as National Curmudgeon Week, in honor of myself. Today is Brown Shoe Day.

For the young, who have missed out on many funny things in life and are now experiencing an era of ordained non-levity, this refers to the old admission that “I feel like a pair of brown shoes in a world full of tuxedos.”

See, that used to be funny. Time was, one didn’t wear brown shoes with tuxedos. That’s when the saying meant something. Now we live in a world in which it would either be acceptable, considered “awesome,” met with indifference, or unnoticed if it weren’t on a cell phone screen.

At any rate, here are some things, new and old, about which I feel out of step with the rest of humanity. Please feel free to add your own under “comments” or on Facebook. They won’t hurt my feelings. I’m a brown shoe, remember? In the meantime, here is my Top Ten List of unfathomable “Things I Don’t Understand.”

10. Katherine Hepburn. She had a voice like a prostitute’s fingernails being hooked up to a large Marshall amplifier and dragged down a slate chalkboard. She had a figure that would make a popsicle stick look sexy. She had a file of acting moves that wouldn’t have taken more than a kilobyte, and an air of haughty arrogance that would have made her the primary subject of any girl’s locker room of my generation. I’d rather be forced to stare at Steve Bannon’s face or Kim Kardashian’s ass than watch Hepburn in a movie.

9. Food Trucks. I know. I know. Unload your weapons. It’s my take and my take only. You’re welcome to eat at the nasty things for three meals a day with my blessings. As for me, I worked my way through two college degrees so I wouldn’t have to, and to think, they helped cause Dixie Café to close.

8. Men and boys wearing hats or caps indoors. It’s stupid, unseemly, unsocial, and indicative of a lack of breeding that would make Donald Trump look sophisticated. I know I can’t change history, but could we at least remove them at funerals?

7. Calling anything other than a drink composed of Gin and Vermouth a “Martini.” At long last, have we no sense of decency?

6. Watching movies on cell phones. Has anyone’s life become that meaningless? Hell, we’ll be watching football games on them next.

5. A commercial TV series. Watching five minutes of storyline and fifteen minutes of fast food commercials is no way to change the Universe.

4. Cirque du Soleil. Entertainment, I’ve always thought, was supposed to be, well, entertaining, not weird and scary except in Stephen King movies. It’s only a short, tragic, step from this to watching hordes of mentally impaired Irish-folk tap dancing in unison.

3. Fox “news.” If my only desire in life is to destroy brain cells, having mass quantities of Jack Daniels sipping whiskey and playing the banjo with friends is a lot more fun and educational.

2. Giving the slightest damn about the British royal family. Didn’t we fight a war or two over this?

And…

1. Cars equipped with GIS. Please, please, please … if you can’t read a map, street names, or road signs, don’t drive. Get drunk and go walking along busy streets instead.

Extra Blog Bonus: If by now, you are not pissed off, let me know. You are eligible for a drawing coming up soon.

Morning Thoughts: November 2, 2017

He was a kind and gentle man. Having marched crossed Belgium as a rifleman with the 79^th Infantry Division in 1944, he never harmed another living thing needlessly after he got home.

He had only the most minor of shortcomings, none rising to the level of faults. He avoided fancy doings and digs, preferring the company of his family, other farmers, and his cattle. And, cursed by the lack of a devious bone in his body, he was forever proving to be overly trusting that others were as honest as he. Naturally, people took advantage of him.

I speak of course of my father-in-law, the late Julius Cole of Lonoke County, Arkansas, who loved his daughter more than life itself and tolerated me as long as I behaved accordingly.

There was this predilection he had for fried catfish, and that prompted a classic instance of deceit. I suspect, if it turns out a particular way, there are several spots of an hour or so in Purgatory reserved for the “perps.” It would serve them right.

I mentioned yesterday the legendary Murray’s Catfish Restaurant in DeVall’s Bluff, once the unchallenged best catfish place in America, a title since moved to a new location by the son of the founder.

Anyway, the original Murray’s was not a place you would go to unless you knew you were going to it or were with someone who did. Almost inaccessible, it consisted of a series of mobile homes joined together at odd angles and hosting tables on each side of a narrow aisle. Once in, though, one might expect to see the Governor of our state, a crowd of “bond daddies,” state celebrities, or a congressional delegation, along with locals and national travelers who had wormed the location from someone or other.

Imagine the joy in which Julius received word that a family delegation was coming to town from the Chicago area, and that a “trip to Murray’s” loomed as part of the visit. Joy of joys, he loved that place. The day couldn’t pass quickly enough, although he may have sensed something odd about the plans when they told him to wear a sport coat and tie.

Going formal to Murray’s Catfish place meant making sure you scrapped the cow manure off your boots just before you went inside.

Here lies the sad truth, dear reader. There are two Murray’s in the central Arkansas area.  Yep. You guessed it. They had kidnapped this poor innocent soul for an evening at Murray’s Dinner Theater in Little Rock. One can only imagine the level of crestfalleness. (Is that a word? Let's make it one. It's the only one that seems to fit).

There’s more, the horror, the horror: Murray’s was featuring a musical as the entertainment portion of “dinner theater.”

He never talked about the evening much. When I asked him how it went, he would begin repairing a broken fence wire with short, jerky motions and mutter something about people “prancing around like a bunch of g#%#%*&!%*d idiots.” I never pushed the topic for I was pretty sure he still remembered how to use a rifle.

As for the joyful band of sadists who pulled off this subterfuge? They all thought it was funny.

No true Arkansan would pass this
 up for an evening of song and dance.