The Tarnished Shooter

  When it came to fighting, I think the old man expected me to go out into the world, get my ass whipped, get a fat lip or a couple of black eyes from actual fist-flying experience and pick up what I needed to learn on my own. Even at that young age, I knew most animals weren’t stupid enough to hang around and get beat up in a fight they knew they couldn’t win. They just ran away so they wouldn’t get hurt. It is only man, with his fragile ego, that permits himself, to stand there and take a licking even though he knows he is out matched. I guess it is for that reason why guns were invented. If a man was beat by another man all the beat man had to do was pick up a gun and blow the attacker away. TV made sure we all understood it was the American way. Guns are also man’s way of incorporating some checks and balances into the art of survival, or in most cases revenge for being beaten.

  I hated fighting and tried to get along with everyone. I tried to laugh as much as I could, even though I was under so much pressure to be or become someone I wasn’t. I was afraid to let go of all my bottled up anger, because I could lose control and kill someone. Actually beat someone to death. The thing I didn’t know was how at such a young age I had gotten to be so angry. And I didn’t want to get my teeth knocked out over something as foolish as a fragile ego, so I just buried the many insults and attacks perpetrated by bullies. Some of those things were very confusing to me. I think maintaining control of my emotions was the hardest thing to do. At the same time I could feel the buried hurt feelings becoming more compacted and sometimes it felt as if there was no more room and something had to give.

  Protecting the little ones was a tall order, especially considering, all the other responsibilities the old man piled on me. Jack wore glasses and had the same eye problems as the old man; so many times he was exempt from abusive treatment. Jack’s eye disability caused him to be the target of ill-fated comments from mean-spirited kids. At a very young age he seemed to harbor a solitude nature because of the name calling for having to wear thick glasses. Jack and I were very different people and often our personalities clashed. I had an extremely sensitive nature with a short fuse. Jack was easier going and he didn’t let things bother him the way I did.

  If I wasn’t running errands for the old man, I mowed the lawn, did minor repairs on the house, kept an eye on the younger ones by playing Underdog, plus I tried to get passing grades at school. It was a lot for a twelve year old. But I understood that my eyes were an asset to the old man which he used to his advantage every chance he had. And I didn’t mind helping out. Although some days my wild imagination made me think he would get so mad he’d rip my eyes right out of my head so he could use them himself. Impatience seemed to dominate my father as he waited for me or my siblings to get the gist of things. It seemed we couldn’t grow up fast enough for him.

  As if my days at home and school weren’t crazy enough, my nights, beginning somewhere around the age of twelve, started adding more to the chaos. I shined shoes a few nights a week at a dumpy little tavern a block away from the madhouse I lived in. The exterior displayed outdated, faded advertisements on a deteriorating gray wooden siding. During the summer when the doors were open one could hear arguing drunks, smell cigarette, cigar smoke and stale beer as it all wafted out the doors. The stink was overpowering and the atmosphere induced a fear of danger in me. The bar was a rough place. It wasn’t unusual for the police to be called for fights or drunken and unruly behavior practically every night. When I was there shining shoes I witnessed many assaults, usually by the younger patrons who stumbled in looking for trouble.

  The shoe shinning operation was my father’s bright idea. He figured I could make some easy money. At first it seemed like it might be fun because I saw myself drinking pop and eating potato chips all night while listening to a jukebox. In the late sixties most Wisconsin towns had a bar on every corner. To a kid they were interesting places because they were for adults only.

  To indulge my father’s vision of making some easy money at the bar, I dug out one of his oldest, most decrepit looking toolboxes he had stashed under his workbench. It looked like it had been retired before I was born. I cleaned it up, converting it into a shoeshine box. It had a tray that popped out when the cover opened, that is, if it didn’t jam-up. I was under pressure to do the job whether I wanted to do it or not, and had to envision that bent up old tray, full to the brim with quarters, just to get me in the right frame of mind to do that spiteful job.

  At first, I felt stupid walking in with that old gray, bent-up piece of crap. Everyone turned their head and asked, “What’s in the box Sonny?” Then, one by one, I solicited the drunks lined up at the bar, asking them if they wanted a shoe shine. Soliciting drunks was a difficult task for me, because I wasn’t an egotistical outgoing lad and approaching a stranger to sell myself was something I never cared for doing. With my father berating me for so many petty things I became timid never really knowing what to think or how to act. Sometimes the drunks turned around on their bar stools and told me to piss off, in their drunken monotone of incomprehensible babble.

  Mostly, those old drunks shooed me away like a pesky fly. But, if my father was near, they agreed to get a shoeshine. Who would dare deny the good-looking son of such a large intimidating man the right to make two-bits? My father was over six feet tall with broad shoulders and wrists the size of an average man’s arm. Even wearing thick glasses he had an aura that transmitted he was nobody to mess with. And if I got the job, it meant I had to get to work and grovel around on those nasty old barroom floors—full of cigarette butts, spit, and reeking of spilled stale beer. I had to be careful not to get shoe polish on their grimy old white socks. The sound of loud drunk men slamming dice on the bar over and over was irritating if not maddening. In time their demeanor and alcohol induced smart-ass comments made me want to spin them around a few times and knock them off their bar stools.

  I had observed my father’s mannerisms and wanted to be just like him. I wanted people to be as afraid of me as they were of him. But at the age of twelve, skinny and blond, I was not a menacing sight nor was there anything scary or intimidating about my nature. I was a shoeshine boy. On a good night, if the house was packed, I only made two or three dollars at getting a quarter a shine. I got real good at shining shoes, but I hated doing it. Crawling around on those dirty floors, polishing up some old unthankful drunk’s shoes seemed demeaning. Getting down there on the floor had the feeling of being a dog that could be kicked around. Sometimes, I wondered if it was worth the trouble, but the old man insisted I do it and there was no arguing when he’d made up his mind.

  When my grandmother found out I was spending my nights in a tavern, she said old men sitting at a bar reminded her of pigs at a trough. My grandfather was a drunk, so I suppose she had seen enough of that kind of stupid behavior. Grandfather would soak up anything that even resembled or smelled like liquor. After she told me what she thought about men drinking at bars, every time I went to shine shoes and saw those old drunks sitting there, smoking and talking shit, leaning over with their elbows resting on the bar, staring into a half empty glass—I thought of her analogy and started laughing, because in time I saw exactly what she described—“pigs at a trough.”

  One of my father’s requirements was to grow up and make our own way once we got to be twelve years old. We were required to buy our own school clothes, shoes and anything else we wanted. That way, Mom and him could go out on Friday and Saturday nights and enjoy a few drinks or a fish fry. They would have more money for their own entertainment and wouldn’t be responsible for all our silly childish whims. Many a Friday and Saturday night, they got all dressed up and went out on the town whooping it up. I think it was his upbringing in a Catholic religion and the spare the rod and spoil the child mentality about him that made him dream up his never ending hostilities aimed at me. For some reason he wanted to turn me into an ass-kicking tough guy. Maybe he thought he was helping me by training me to be self-sufficient at such a young age. Whatever he was doing, I didn?
??t particularly care for his methods of operation. He was brutal when it came to enforcing his rules and regulations as to how things were to be. I hated him for it and resented being molded and shaped into the vision he had of me.

  In the summer, not only did I shine shoes, I had three paper routes and did yard work for my money. In the winter, I added snow shoveling to the list. Jack and Joana did some odd jobs, but they didn’t have the responsibility I had. I guess I was the experiment because it seemed Father’s imaginary bulls-eye loomed large on my back.

  I delivered two hundred papers every Thursday afternoon for a weekly rag that listed jobs and things for sale. I was paid two dollars a week my first year and three dollars a week the second. For a Christmas present, the company secretary handed me a box of Snickers candy bars. At the time you could buy a candy bar for a nickel, so that wasn’t so special. I also had an early morning daily newspaper route for which I had to be down at the distribution center by 5:30 AM Monday thru Friday, rain or shine. The old man made sure I was up and on the job. One morning I was exhausted and didn’t want to get up and deliver those stupid newspapers. He grabbed me by the shirt collar, dragged me to the three stairs that descended to the back door and kicked me in the rear end which sent me sailing down those stairs, at the same time yelling at me, “Get those God damned papers delivered.” I kicked the back door open, jumped on my bike and pedaled down the street in a rage.

  Back then it was up to the paper boy to collect for his route and keep all the records. Often people wouldn’t pay their bill when it was due—it was too easy to give a twelve-year-old the brush off. I hated having to collect the money owed to me because too often, a grouchy old man in boxer shorts would come to the door, grumble at me to come back next week, and slam the door in my face. Those were the guys who cheated me out of my weekly pay. I usually managed to miss the porch and have the newspaper land in some nearby bushes or a mud puddle. Many days I felt like dumping the whole lot of papers in the middle of the street. But I needed the money. If everyone on my route paid, I made about fifteen dollars a week. Along with my other earnings, I had enough money to pay for the things I needed that my parents didn’t buy.

  Some days I worked from sun up to sun down in the blazing summer heat. During the day I cut and trimmed lawns; then most of the night I went crawling around on dirty barroom floors shining shoes. The pay was never enough and there was always more work to be done—more and more money that needed to be made—an endless cycle of physical and emotional slavery.

  With all the work I did, I was on my way to becoming a millionaire, but I spent my money as fast, sometimes even faster, than I made it. Money burned a hole in my pocket for sure. Empty pockets one day and a fist full of quarters the next day. Above all, I got addicted to school yard gambling, usually owing others hard earned coin due to my losses. At school I had to dodge fellow gamblers I owed money to, creating an endless cycle of added anxiety. When it came to clothes, I didn’t always have the best of the best. I liked shopping, but didn’t care for bargain hunting, nor did I have wads of cash for the most expensive on the rack. I was a middle of the road guy, looking for something that would last. Sometimes, I went long periods before I had saved enough quarters to buy new clothes. My old clothes shrank and I was growing like a weed.

  The goody-goody-two-shoes kids at school continually harassed me about my ill-fitting wardrobe. It was another source that fueled more anger. The snobs’ mommies and daddies plunked down the loot for their latest styled threads. I had to work like a field-hand just to cover my behind with a pair of affordable jeans and my feet with decent shoes. A typical day for me meant harassment from snobs and bullies at school, then more ridicule at home from my father for not making repairs to the house. My day ended with wisecracks from drunks at the tavern.

  When I went to bed at night, the day’s events rolled around endlessly in my mind, producing insomnia or nightmares.

  Chapter 4

  Just give me a hammer. When I didn’t have to please the old man or serve punishing time sitting in classrooms, my passion was to build things. I always believed I had been born with a keen intuition and the ability to focus my thoughts and hands to create, or do anything I could picture in my mind. Even though I didn’t do well in school with math, history, or social studies I could evaluate solutions to mechanical problems with limited education and information. All I had to do was look at a couple of pictures in a magazine or book and I got the point. At a young age, I was very mechanically and electrically inclined. I spent a lot of time alone in my room, or the garage, drawing out my own plans and building little crystal radio sets and battery powered electric motors.

  One day I found a couple of rotary-dial telephones in the trash. I dragged the find home, tore the relays out of the phones, and assembled a telegraph system for sending Morse code. Wires ran from our bedroom upstairs to the basement. Jack and I spent hours learning code and sending each other secret messages.

  Another one of my hobbies was raising pigeons. I built a coop in the garage and an outside cage off the coop. Then I took my BB gun down to the railroad bridge and winged a couple of birds. My father gave me his CO2 powered pistol that shot BBs as fast as I could pull the trigger. I brought the wounded pigeons back to the coop and nursed them back to health. A couple of months later they mated and had young ones called squabs. At times the squabs were born weak and sickly. A couple times I removed dead squabs from the coop. After finding so many dying, I went to the library and checked out a book or two about how to raise and care for sick young pigeons. After I skimmed the books and gained some experience taking care of the birds, I could tell by looking at them if they were healthy or sick. Many days I fed sick and dying squabs cod liver oil for various problems, forcing it down their throats with an eye dropper. Sometimes I imagined my hands emitted rays of light, or a magical energy that would immediately heal the sick pigeons. A few days later they were hungry and getting stronger. Before I knew it I had a flock of about twenty healthy pigeons.

  Like humans and other animals, in a flock of pigeons there is a king of the roost. The king took the highest cubby in the coop and he was always the first to eat. The king would strut around with his chest out and peck at the others when his space was invaded. What I observed in the pigeon coop was quite amazing. Being the king of the roost didn’t have much to do with the size or age of the bird, it seemed like the king ruled through a natural invisible energy or acceptance by the other birds, as if he was born to rule the roost.

  I loved to watch my birds fly around the house and neighborhood. I wished I could be up there with them flying free. The old man was always on me about keeping the pen clean. He also hated all the pigeon crap that accumulated on the rooftops and sidewalks around the house. One day I closed the gate on the outside pen so they couldn’t get in to eat and eventually the whole flock found somewhere else to roost.

  A few weeks after I closed the gate on the pigeon coop for good and had my fill of the telegraph system I decided to build a go-cart. I thought nothing could be more fun than having my own little car. I thought it would be more fun than taking care of a bunch of birds. Jack and I got busy and took apart one of our old self-propelled lawn mowers that didn’t work very well. I was glad to tear that piece of junk apart. It was a lawn mower that caused me all kinds of grief out on my lawn cutting jobs.

  We poked and prodded around at the local scrap yard and spent hours looking for the mechanical parts we needed. We built the base out of a greasy old scrap piece of ¾ inch plywood. We incorporated a piece of square aluminum tubing for a vertical steering lever. If I pulled the lever towards me, the cart went right, if I pushed the lever forward, it went left. The clutch was hand operated using a pulley system with fan belts to a jackshaft and a chain to a rear wheel. Driving it—I had my right hand on the steering lever and my left hand on the clutch. It seemed like it took us forever to build because we basically engineered everything as we went. Some things didn’t work right at first so
we had to take it apart and start over again.

  The finished go-cart looked homemade, but it was an engineering feat Jack and I were proud of. It didn’t go more than ten-fifteen miles an hour, but it sure was fun to drive around the neighborhood’s back alleys and parking lots. I figured it was illegal to be driving it around on the sidewalk or parking lots, but the old man didn’t care so neither did I. After all rules were only interpretations of what a group of people thought was acceptable or not acceptable. Lightning wasn’t going to strike me dead for riding around on a homemade go-cart.

  Three or four weeks after it was finished, on a hot, sunny, summer morning, I was cruising around on the sidewalk just two houses down from our house when a fat, pipe-smoking cop stopped me. He observed me for a bit then turned on the siren and red lights. He reached over and rolled down the passenger window on his squad car signaling me to approach. I slowly walked up to the window, poked my head into the cop car and asked him what he wanted. He wanted to see my driver’s license. I said, "I’m only twelve years old—I don't have a license and besides this is just a go-cart—I don't need a license to drive it." The cop didn’t want to hear my philosophy about what was legal and what wasn't.

  He had to be the one in control. He ordered me to sit in the back of his squad car and treated me like I had done something truly despicable. He puffed away on his pipe with such an air of superiority as if his only purpose in life was to make sure I knew he was the boss and rules were rules. Rules I had to obey. He asked me questions and at the same time writing me a ticket for driving with no valid driver's license. About fifteen minutes after I’d gotten into his car, he reached back over the front seat and handed me a big pink colored carbon copy of the ticket, at the same time telling me I would have to appear in court. Then he let me out and said. “Have a nice day!” I said, “Yea, thanks for nothing.” He had turned my fun morning into a load of petty crap.