We Can All Make a Difference

I love to write. It is odd because, until my first book written in my early forties, I had never considered writing even a short story. I did not know whether I could write; for sure, I knew I could not spell, and who ever heard of a writer that could not spell? I just assumed that writers were all brilliant brainy-acks who read six newspapers each morning and never had a comma out of place. Let me assure you; I’m not one. The fact that I caused not a sliver of worry for the spelling bee kids was only one of my many literary shortcomings. For years, I’ve kept my editor Susan Andres quite busy. In fact, she just finished editing my tenth book, Don’t Trust Anyone over 60—The Life and Times of the Last Eagles, a tribute to my high school classmates, the final graduating class of Dan McCarty High. Thanks, Susan; you do make me look good.
I assure you that, with my abundant weaknesses, not the least of which are those of a literary nature, plus sixty years to become acquainted with each of you on a first-name basis, it is easy for me to remain humble. If that were not enough, I am married.

But I do look forward to writing this Rambling for you each month. Whatever enjoyment I have been told you have received pales in comparison to the joy this gives me. But I also seem to have unexpectedly become the class depository for every Internet story and neat piece of trivia that a couple hundred of graying baby boomers can lay their hands on. Rest assured, I read every one and enjoy most.
So, you can be sure that when I surrender the space allotted for my Rambling to one of those shared pieces, I think it is pretty cool. That’s the case for the below. This story touched me on several levels, being a patriotic vet who loves dogs. For me, few things are sadder than a faithful pup who cannot understand where his dead master has gone, longing only to run with him and fetch a thrown ball. I hope you enjoy it.

Subject: Best Dog Story Ever

They told me the big black Lab's name was Reggie, as I looked at him lying in his pen. The shelter was clean, no-kill, and the people really friendly. I'd only been in the area for six months, but everywhere I went in the small college town, people were welcoming and open. Everyone waves when you pass them on the street.

But something was still missing as I attempted to settle in to my new life here, and I thought a dog couldn't hurt. Give me someone to talk to. And I had just seen Reggie's advertisement on the local news.
The shelter said they had received numerous calls right after, but they said the people who had come down to see him just didn't look like "Lab people," whatever that meant. They must've thought I did.

But at first, I thought the shelter had misjudged me in giving me Reggie and his things, which consisted of a dog pad, bag of toys almost all of which were brand new tennis balls, his dishes, and a sealed letter from his previous owner.

See, Reggie and I didn't really hit it off when we got home. We struggled for two weeks (which is how long the shelter told me to give him to adjust to his new home). Maybe it was the fact that I was trying to adjust too. Maybe we were too much alike.

I saw the sealed envelope. I had completely forgotten about that. "Okay, Reggie," I said out loud, "let's see if your previous owner has any advice”

To Whomever Gets My Dog:
Well, I can't say that I'm happy you're reading this, a letter I told the shelter could only be opened by Reggie's new owner. I'm not even happy writing it. He knew something was different. So let me tell you about my Lab in the hopes that it will help you bond with him and he with you.

First, he loves tennis balls. The more the merrier. Sometimes I think he's part squirrel, the way he hoards them. He usually always has two in his mouth, and he tries to get a third in there. Hasn't done it yet. Doesn't matter where you throw them, he'll bound after them, so be careful. Don't do it by any roads.
Next, commands. Reggie knows the obvious ones—"sit," "stay," "come," "heel." He knows hand signals too: He knows "ball" and "food" and "bone" and "treat" like nobody's business.

Feeding schedule: twice a day, regular store-bought stuff; the shelter has the brand.
He's up on his shots. Be forewarned: Reggie hates the vet. Good luck getting him in the car. I don't know how he knows when it's time to go to the vet, but he knows.
Finally, give him some time. It's only been Reggie and me for his whole life. He's gone everywhere with me, so please include him on your daily car rides if you can. He sits well in the backseat, and he doesn't bark or complain. He just loves to be around people and me most especially.

And that's why I need to share one more bit of info with you... His name's not Reggie. He's a smart dog; he'll get used to it and will respond to it, of that I have no doubt. But I just couldn't bear to give them his real name. But if someone is reading this... well, it means that his new owner should know his real name. His real name is "Tank.” Because that is what I drive.

I told the shelter that they couldn't make "Reggie" available for adoption until they received word from my company commander. You see, my parents are gone, I have no siblings, no one I could've left Tank with... and it was my only real request of the Army upon my deployment to Iraq, that they make one phone call to the shelter... in the "event" ... to tell them that Tank could be put up for adoption. Luckily, my CO is a dog-guy, too, and he knew where my platoon was headed. He said he'd do it personally. And if you're reading this, then he made good on his word.

Tank has been my family for the last six years, almost as long as the Army has been my family. And now, I hope and pray that you make him part of your family, too, and that he will adjust and come to love you the same way he loved me. If I have to give up Tank to keep those terrible people from coming to the US, I am glad to have done so. He is my example of service and of love. I hope I honored him by my service to my country and comrades.

All right, that's enough. I deploy this evening and have to drop this letter off at the shelter. Maybe I'll peek in on him and see if he finally got that third tennis ball in his mouth.

Good luck with Tank. Give him a good home, and give him an extra kiss goodnight—every night—from me.

Thank you,
Paul Mallory

I folded the letter and slipped it back in the envelope. Sure, I had heard of Paul Mallory; everyone in town knew him, even new people like me. Local kid, killed in Iraq a few months ago and posthumously earning the Silver Star when he gave his life to save three buddies. Flags had been at half-mast all summer.

I leaned forward in my chair and rested my elbows on my knees, staring at the dog. "Hey, Tank," I said quietly. The dog's head whipped up, his ears cocked and his eyes bright. "C'mere, boy." He was instantly on his feet, his nails clicking on the hardwood floor. He sat in front of me, his head tilted, searching for the name he hadn't heard in months. "Tank," I whispered. His tail swished. I kept whispering his name, over and over, and each time, his ears lowered, his eyes softened, and his posture relaxed as a wave of contentment just seemed to flood him. I stroked his ears, rubbed his shoulders, buried my face into his scruff, and hugged him.

"It's me now, Tank, just you and me. Your old pal gave you to me." Tank reached up and licked my cheek. "So whatdaya say we play some ball?" His ears perked again. "Yeah? Ball? You like that? Ball?"

Tank tore from my hands and disappeared into the next room. And when he came back, he had three tennis balls in his mouth.

If you can read this without getting a lump in your throat or a tear in your eye, you just ain't right. In our cynical world ruled by the 24/7 news cycles, we seem intent on shining the spotlight on everything and everybody, trying to discover the blemishes and warts that we all possess. Maybe we should all just give it a rest. While the above might be fictional, similar situations happen daily. Yes, we have all had some low points in our lives and things we wish we could have changed. But placing our lives on a balance scale—the good and the bad—we would all be hard pressed not to agree that our lives have been blessed.

I view a veteran as someone who, at one point, wrote a blank check made payable to “We the People” for an amount of “up to and including my life.” In my forty years since graduating from high school, the attitude in America toward vets has seen a roller coaster ride. From a low in the way many returning Vietnam vets were treated to the height of patriotisms displayed just after 9/11. The best I’ve ever heard it put is "The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him."

Whether Paul and Tank actually lived is not the point. I believe it is that we all can make a difference in the lives of those we share our brief stay on Earth with, be they human or of the four-legged persuasion. Try this month to look for someone whose life you can touch in a positive way, and if you do your month will soar.  And after all, that is what Eagles do; they soar.

Keeping the Spirit Alive,
Richard Parker

Milestones

Last week, I passed another of those milestones in life as I dropped my granddaughter off at FSU to begin her freshman year. The three days prior, I drove alone, nearly two thousand miles on a business trip, armed with only my memories and Cousin Brucie of the Sirius satellite radio sixties channel. This combination is guaranteed to conjure an eclectic range of emotions from a warm smile that can instantly turn to a belly laugh and then trigger a single tear disappearing into an increasingly graying beard, all in the span of a single Beach Boys love song chorus. Yes, the boomer generation has morphed from the “don’t trust anyone over thirty” generation to a bunch of crybabies craning their necks for one more glimpse of the golden days of their youth.

This month’s Rambling is the by-product of the convergence of a quartet of thought-provoking ingredients that came together on that “perfect storm” of a drive: a hefty chunk of alone time, the fond memories of days gone by, the best music ever created, and another milestone of life fading in the rearview mirror. Yes, indeed, time marches on as we each pass the milestones of our life.

In the early years, our milestones passed with the blazing velocity of a Florida Softshell Turtle, waddling under the blaze of the subtropic sun, and with a lack of fanfare that could easily induce a much-needed afternoon nap for an aging boomer. These milestones did not seem like much of a happening as they passed; they just happened, as we continued to plod though our life. That first day in the first grade, Jr. and Sr. High, and graduation all come to mind interlaced with other memorable milestones.

The milestone of that first all-by-yourself bike ride around your home block was eventually replaced with the grand theft of that first awkward, yet long-awaited, kiss. Today, it is impossible for me to hear Tommy James sing “I Think We're Alone Now,” without sparking an inner glow as I remember that wooded area behind the 25^th Street Little League ballpark located just a handful of blocks brom my boyhood home. The small patch of trees was strategically located just outside the floodlight-bathed area that was our pre-Internet social gathering place. This place whose lack of direct lighting, proximity to a required periodic accountability check for the ever vigilant eyes of parents, was shrouded in low-hanging scrub oak branches and a comfy foliage-covered ground, combining to make the perfect place to recline into the newfound bliss of adolescent experimentation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIeRqPFJvXM&feature=related

 

Children behave
that's what they say when we're together
and watch how you play
they don't understand
and so we're running just as fast we can
holding onto one another's hand
trying to get away into the night
and then you put your arms around me
as we tumble to the ground
and then we say

Chorus:
I think we're alone now
There doesn’t seem to be anyone around
I think we're alone now
The beating of our hearts is the only sound

Look at the way
We gotta hide what we're doing
Cause what would they say
If they ever knew
and so we're running just as fast as we can
holding onto one another's hand
trying to get away into the night
and then you put your arms around me
as we tumble to the ground
and then we say

Chorus

Children behave
that's what they say when we're together
and watch how you play
they don't understand
and so we're running just as fast we can
holding onto one another's hand
trying to get away into the night
and then you put your arms around me
as we tumble to the ground
and then we say

I think we're alone now
There doesn’t seem to be anyone around
I think we're alone now
The beating of our hearts is the only sound

Next, it was the milestones of college for some, the military for others, with both the prelude to a lifetime of hard work for all. Some of us zigged while others zagged, thinking little of milestones, as we entered and exited matrimonial amalgamations, some at a frightening pace. The ebb and flow of these unions littered the landscape of our lives with offspring and step-kids that would cause us to bite our nails, hold our breath, and on occasion, beam with pride as we pinned a bit of our dreams to their lapels. As the younger generation began to pass their milestones, we were slowly, yet steadily, relegated to the unholy trinity of spectator, cheerleader, and, sometimes, safety net for their journeys, which ambles on with an eerie resemblance of our own less than perfect passage. Yes, indeed, time marches on.


With a mishmash of battle-hardened experience, a splash of pride for remaining upright and out of jail, mixed with maybe just a dash of regret, we march toward more of life’s milestones, some of which we willingly seek, and some we would have given anything to avoid. The passing of a parent is by far one of the worst. The event is accompanied with a rush of memories, of words left unsaid or deeds undone, and an undeniable emptiness of being alone for the first time in our life. So many times since my wonderful mother left for her heavenly home, leaving my brother and me only one fragile life away from becoming an orphan, I have thought of something I wanted to share with her or a question I wish I had asked. But, indeed, that milestone, now passed, makes both impossible, adding just another small regret of life.

But through this all, we all still have many exciting and bright moments to look forward to. In my case, nothing shines more brightly than the love I have for and the excitement I feel, as I watch the lives of my grandkids blossom.

Because of falling in love, now more than three decades ago, with a woman a few years older than I, whose family seems blessed with the “I can’t wait for kids” gene, I find myself, at age 60, blessed with three wonderful grandkids: Brittney, 18, the catalyst for this Rambling and the state’s newest FSU Seminole; 15-year-old McKenna, who would bleed Gator Blue and Orange if cut; and my namesake, 12-year-old Beau (how is that for a Southern name) Parker Cole, whom we might need to send to UCF or Miami just to make sure the state is covered and that there is never peace in the family during Thanksgiving dinner.

 

Let me warn you, the word step has never been nor will it ever be a prefix to any of this group. As Sister Sledge put it, “We Are Family.” That sense of family has this lifelong Gator fan willingly trading in his decades-long and perfected Gator chomp for a Seminole chop.

This past week at 8:30, “the family” converged on the south parking lot of Kellum Hall at Florida State University. We looked to be a cross between a supply-laden wagon train beginning its journey west and a band of gypsies heading to the carnival. Our unstated, yet universally, understood twofold missions: 1) to move Brittney into her dorm and 2) to, one last time, embarrass the hell out of her. I believe that most viewing our well-orchestrated operation from the sidelines would agree that we kicked the ball through the uprights on both counts.

We all brought our level of skill, expertise, and resources to the party. While Britt and her mother followed the rules, patiently waiting in the long line of students signing in and retrieving their dorm room key, I greased the palm of a maintenance man at the back door of the dorm to gain early access through the bowels of the almost fifty-year-old building. It was worth the well-placed cash to see Brittney’s face when she arrived at her doom door to find the 700 cubic feet of “absolute necessities” lining the hall on both sides of her door ready for the Keystone cop-type act that would follow, as she, her mom, and her Wow (Parker-speak for grandmother) attempted to stack, store, and eventually cram it all into 50 percent of the 150-square-foot dorm room.

Well, after the microsized microwave, coffeepot, and octopus bedspread had been properly installed, and all closets, drawers, and desk had been stuffed to just past capacity, I began the less than exciting task of taking the 500 cubic feet of “not-so-absolute necessities” back to the half dozen vehicles that had arrived at the 161-year-old campus a mere three hours earlier.
                                                              
Too soon, it was time for us to leave and allow Brittney to begin her new life, one in which she will set her hours, choose what and when she eats, and succeed or fail on her merit. As I pressed the accelerator and gained speed heading east on I-10, I thought back on the past eighteen years, years in which my primary concern was to keep her safe and protected, the many business trips that it took to earn the money to make this day possible. Now, I was just driving off and leaving her to fend for herself. I could not help thinking that the on-ramp in my rearview mirror was another milestone passed.

Good luck with your milestones, Brittney. Pa loves you… more than you will ever know.
                                                                                                                    
Keeping the Spirit Alive,
Richard Parker