Last week, i returned to a time of innocence.

No,  not “The Age of Innocence.” That’s a movie. i’m talking about the time of innocence. Mine.

And it wasn’t me being innocent, not by any means. But it was my time of innocence. I was a small country town boy in a world of which i was not familiar, and i embraced it hook, line, and sinker without having a clue, even though from my perspective, it was a time i was the smartest i ever was or ever will be. Now, i know too much to be smart.

Three Vanderbilt attendees, 1962-1964, one of whom actually graduated, gathered together in a different world and a different time, like 56 years of time, this weekend far, far, away from that campus on Nashville’s West End. Our lives took us to different places in different ways and made us different from each other.

We have never accepted being different. The core, as this weekend demonstrated, was, is, and will be the same. We embrace our differences. And learn.

We have had our troubles, suffered personal loss, are much less spry with much less hair…okay, okay, Cy still has his hair, but it’s white.

i left home in the late morning Wednesday, drove through Camp Pendleton while a major Amphibious Landing Exercise, a “PHIBLEX” was underway. It brought back other memories, good ones, of organizing, coordinating this rather amazing show of strength through of Navy, Marine, even sometimes Coast Guard joint maneuvers, on that small stretch of shoreline and small area of the camp where I-5 runs right through the middle of the great divide between San Diego and Los Angeles (Thank Heaven!). But those are stories for later. The helicopters launching and landing on the assault ship and landing zone, the Marine track vehicles with one body of the crew projecting from the hatch running pell mell toward the training village, kicking up dust like nobody’s business, remains and an awesome, no,  a majestic sight to behold.

An hour later i make a couple of swoops through the flight arrival area of John Wayne Airport when Cyril Vaughn Fraser, III hops in, and we continue the northward trek to Long Beach Airport where we add one Mister Alan Hicks to the mix.

Thus began a visit to my age of innocence.

We checked into our Air B&B in San Pedro, California, a suburb of Los Angeles. It was about perfect for three old guys. It was a middle to low income neighborhood within walking distance to the downtown, filled with good dining of a number of ethnicities. So we ate, visited the Getty, the Queen Mary, the Ports of Call, and found them all good and interesting.

The three of us enjoy exploring the world of people around us.

And…

We went to college baseball games: Vanderbilt vs. Long Beach State (nicknamed “Dirtbags” and you have to love that) at Blair Field in Long Beach, a lovely old ballpark, which generated recollections of Sulphur Dell, the Nashville  park for the Vols of the AA Southern Association: Boys and girls chasing foul balls, peanuts, even beer, friendly opposition fans, good times.

Vandy lost, 4-3 on pitching woes, errors recorded and mental, and silent bats at the end of the game.

i loved it.

Thursday, kicking around. No game. Lots of catching up. And then, the highlight of the day:

The Queen Mary “Observation Bar.” We sat at the large windows looking over the bow across the bay at the city sky scape of Long Beach. Visiting  the ship, walking the decks, and especially having a drink in the bar makes me feel like i have escaped to an incredible era long gone. This was about the fourth time, i have gone to the Queen Mary. Once Maureen and i spent the night. i thought the stateroom was quaint, romantic, beautiful. Maureen thought it was too small (It was a bit cramped but my goodness, it’s a ship, i thought) and having to maneuver in the tiny head was difficult. For her, i can understand that, but it was a piece of cake for me. In fact, it beat an officers head on a FRAM destroyer. i want to go back and take a tour or two, but i am perfectly happy wandering the decks, dreaming about running into Cary Grant or Greta Garbo and joining them for a drink at the bar. If you are ever around Los Angeles, you should visit if you like to dream.

Then on Friday before the UCLA game, we hit the Getty. i have a post pending on that adventure…later. But we concluded with the UCLA game for Vanderbilt. Jackie Robinson Stadium. Baseball doesn’t get much better than that. The Commodores beat a team ranked higher than them. The Vandy fans almost matched the number of UCLA fans. Met most of them, and those ‘Dore fans are fun. Being men and hungry, we went to a nearby sports bar in

Westwood (You know? Home of John Wooden, the Wizard of Westwood), and the yesteryear college bonding got a shock. Crazy, crowded banks of televisions on banks of televisions with sports events no one was watching because the gazillion gabby students were fiddling with their smart phones. Needed that. Takes one down to earth.

A note: i need to thank Maren Hicks. When we checked into our Air B&B, i immediately pulled out my socks to show to Alan and Cy. You see, i made a small donation to Vanderbilt Athletics, and they, in gratitude, sent me some socks, Vandy socks. i was proud of them but also thought it was quite funny. Alan looked disappointed. He dug into his backpack explaining Maren had received an extra pair and sent them with Alan for me. Well, the first game against the Dirtbags, i had not slowed down enough to change into Vandy socks. The Commodores lost. i wore my pair to the UCLA game. Vandy won. i knew about the high probability of rain Saturday and wore other socks. When Sunday came, i put on the socks Maren had sent. Vandy beat TCU.

So i’m pretty sure Vandy could win the rest of their games this season all the way to the College World Series championship if i wear my or Maren’s Vandy socks when they play.

i always knew Maren was magic.

Saturday was rain, but it was a magic day anyway. Alan and i went to USC knowing we wouldn’t watch a game, but we watched the coaches discuss cancellation while we watched the undeniable front moving toward us relentlessly on Alan’s weather radar app. The Vandy fandom was evident. They began gathering in the stands an hour before game time. Then, those coaches decided to begin with a rain delay. The teams retreated to their dugouts while the stadium’s audio kept playing music. So the teams picked their best players and a dance competition from opposing dugouts began. It was fun. For Vandy fans. USC? Not too many to enjoy the dance. Once they determined there was no way to play a baseball game, Alan and i retreated to an old haunt.

Alan was the “Director of the Southern Gateway” for the Maritime Administration for five years. He was a geographic bachelor in Long Beach, commuting on the weekends back to San Francisco to be with Maren and daughter Eleanor. i began working for Pacific Tugboat Service and traveled to Long Beach almost weekly to conduct training and safety inspections. We made it a night. i would stay with Alan in his bachelor apartment. We would play nine holes of golf and then go to dinner, most frequently at the Whale & Ale, a British pub in San Pedro. Saturday, we returned. Nostalgia. Good British food. Nice folks, older, like us, maybe more. i kept thinking of how things change, how we bring in new, fancy, cleaner, neater stuff, but we throw out decorum, a certain way of doing things.

Sunday, our fourth joined us for the final game, “The Dodger Stadium College  Baseball  Classic” was a double header. Vandy beat TCU,7-4, in their final game near the Southwest corner (i don’t count Los Angeles as being in the Southwest corner; Camp Pendleton

separates us, and the concrete expanse of LA is a world unto itself). Walt Fraser, Cy’s brother and a running mate of mine from the past, came over from his home in Pasadena to join us — i must pause here to comment the organizers and  Dodger management hosed this event up as much as possible; it was almost impossible how to get tickets, almost; the visiting teams didn’t get blocks of tickets; USC and UCLA did (we got ours at the UCLA game); parking was not available until thirty minutes before game time; the gate security couldn’t tell us the right gate to go to when; it was almost as if they didn’t care about fans from the visiting teams, the ones affected by such poor management; LA arrogance and another reason for me to never be a fan of the Dodgers after they left Brooklyn. But the game, the time together for the four of us, the Commodores playing class baseball made it a damn near perfect afternoon (except for the $15 beer).

And then it was over. i hit the freeways back to the Southwest corner.

The experience caused me to revise my take on city traffic. As my daughter Blythe once so wisely observed, “If you are going to make money in the traditional fashion, you are going to have to live in a place, a city where traffic is a problem.” i agreed then and i agree now. In the past, i have chastised Houston, Seattle, San Antonio, Washington, Austin, and others for bad, bad traffic. LA and New York City were givens. But after this past week, i must proclaim LA is the worst. i never really drove during “rush hour.” Most of it was on the weekend. There was never any of that LA crawl of thousands of cars going no where. But it was constant and it was expansive and it was always. Driving in LA requires total focus because there is enough traffic everywhere all of the time some bozo might take you out. i think i wore a good two or three millimeters off of my molars, grinding them without stop. Bonkers, i tell you, bonkers.

In spite of the traffic, the five days were simply magic from the past. Friends like we hadn’t skipped fifty-six years. Frat brothers and more sharing an old house (ah, the spirit of Maple Manor, another story). Innocence of a different kind revisited. As Bob Seger sang and i have repeated many times, “i wish i didn’t know now what i didn’t know then.”

Magic innocence. Revisited. Thanks Alan, Cy, Walt, and thank you, Maren. i really believe those socks are magic.

The promise of heavy rain didn’t quite meet the prognostications. We got enough to dampen the hardscape, maybe as much as a quarter of an inch. Boo. As much as i brag about the weather in the Southwest corner, lack of rain is a dangerous thing in the high desert. Then i wonder, as i have many times,  why we humans decide to take a place so charming it is almost perfect and ruin it by overpopulation.

Richard Henry Dana published Two Years Before the Mast in 1840. It remains one of Alan Hicks and my favorites. We discuss it, read it again, try to figure out what the West Coast cities were like in 1832-1834 when he sailed into what is now called Dana Point, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, and San Diego. When he arrived on his merchant ships, the population of San Diego was about 200, everyone included. In Los Angeles was about 400, and  Santa Barbara had in the neighborhood of 600 souls. In San Francisco Bay, Dana and his shipmates found one deserted log cabin.

When Dana returned in 1874, thirty years later, San Francisco’s population had grown to 100,000; Los Angeles had over 10,000; Santa Barbara had grown to 2,000; and San Diego? Well, Dana reported it was pretty much the same, about 200. Why? High desert. That is about all the folks the water supply could support.

So we pumped water in from the Colorado River, came up with air conditioning to expand development into the hot of the desert, away from the coast, and Voila! We got about about three million in the county, about half of whom live in the city proper.

Ugh.

Yesterday, another of my friends took a swipe at California. It seems like everyone i know east of Yuma has this hate thing for anything Californian. Those knocks at California, by the way, doesn’t exclude me from the attack.

It was Lebanon High School’s Class of 1962 forty-fifth reunion, 2007. i was there for the second time having been included by those generous and caring folks because i grew up with them but attended Castle Heights Military Academy instead of the public high school (my mother got a deal; i bitterly opposed the idea but my pleas went unheard and going to Castle Heights was one of the best things that has ever happened to me: still, i felt very much a part of those high school contemporaries and was honored to be included). i’ve gone to all of the succeeding reunions except last year when i fell ill just before departing the Southwest corner.

Anyhow, i was there in May of 2007, when i struck up a conversation with the venerable Stratton Bone, someone whom i respect a great deal and who is married to the beautiful Marty Smith, one of my favorite women of our class and who, by some marriage twists is a relative.

Stratton was his usual congenial self until right at the conclusion when he seemed to find my choice of a place to live as bad. He belittled the state of California, its politics, its politicians, and by extension, its voters, regardless for whom they voted.

Since i’ve began using email and been on Facebook every so often, good friends put in some nasty comments about California and its policies. Some very recently. Some of these emails and posts make fun, but most are ugly and mean spirited, like the senders (or copiers and pasters) are superior and Californians are evil.

My initial reaction is to get angry and respond. i don’t like to be hated. i initially consider the rocks over the wall to be hateful, but then i just feel sad. Ignorance needs an outlet apparently and folks need to feel superior like they know the answer. Can’t say i’ve seen anyone come up with an answer that works yet.

i have, because of the roving nature i didn’t even realize i had, been to many places. i have spent significant time in my hometown of Lebanon, Tennessee. Newspapering took me to Watertown, New York, at the edge of a Thousand Islands and queen of the snow belt. The Navy allowed me to learn about Newport, Rhode Island; Norfolk, Virginia; Long Beach and Los Angeles, California; my Southwest Corner; College Station, Texas; Sasebo, Japan; and Jacksonville, Florida; Since the Navy, i’ve added Tri-Cities (Kennewick, Richland, and Pasco), Washington to the list. There are many other places i have visited.

You know what? i’ve found all of them to be places i could live. Yes, they had their faults, their drawbacks for my ideas about living and government, even weather — even the Southwest corner has some weather drawbacks; but not many — but i found really nice things about each of those locales, things i would enjoy like landscape, weather, attractions, and yes, even people. i could throw rocks at each of them, but i choose to remember them as good places to live with good people, and like everywhere some pretty bad human acts as well.

In this vagabond life of mine, i have been lucky enough to have wonderful relationships with a number of women before ending up with my soulmate, an incredible woman who has a few faults — she and i love each other and understand the nature of what each of us find are not particularly pleasing about each other. With those other women in my life, most have continued a strong bond with me. They are friends, not just friends, close friends, who remember the good times and the continuing good things about our relationship.

Back many years ago, a woman rejected me. i certainly wasn’t the best mate one could hope for, but i had tried to make the relationship work. i committed to it and i kept finding good things about this woman, in spite of some things of which i was not…er, enamored. She dumped me, professing not to love me. She then spent the rest of the time i knew her looking for, inventing, revising history, to prove i was something despicable, something to hate. She finally made it. We no longer have a relationship. It hurt. No, it still hurts. i’ve gotten smart enough in my old age to realize any attempt to reach out to be friends would only cause more negative, hurtful reaction. It ain’t worth it.

Sort of like people inventing and repeating negative things about where i live.

i have friends out here in the Southwest corner who are not thrilled, no, abhor the politics of California, not to mention the crazy costs of living here. There are a number of things i don’t like about California politics, just like there are a number of things i don’t like about any state’s politics (that i know enough about to have an opinion). Because of the financial climate, Maureen and i have often discussed moving. In 2014, we even scouted out homes in Middle Tennessee, and looked at homes for sale on Signal Mountain during many Christmas trips. My friends bitch about living here, some even have researched preferred places for relocation.

None of them have left, and i will be surprised if many do. We certainly have decided to live here for the rest of our lives, barring unexpected events.

You see, the Southwest corner is a nice place to live, just like all of those other places. There are good people here, even people with whom i disagree on several issues who are trying to do what’s right for all of our inhabitants. And yes, there are some pretty self centered, despicable characters who are only interested in themselves and amassing great amounts of wealth for themselves. Just like everywhere else.

The most surprising thing about this to me is so many of those folks who throw hate at anything with which, or anyone with whom they disagree claim they are Christians. Oh yeh, some of their stuff sounds like it came from the Bible, but just like the hateful group of people in the Muslim religion, they rely on sound bites, incomplete quotes, and a massive twisting of the words to come up with their hate. And that stuff the supposed Christians claim for support comes mostly from the Old Testament, like “and eye for an eye…” and slaying lambs, even sons to gain favor with the higher being.

i’m too old to try and change them. i’ve lived my life attempting to do the right thing. For everyone. Some people have interpreted that to fit their needs. Okay, i can live with that.

You see, one of my patron saints is Mose Allison, the Mississippi bred jazz and blues piano player who wrote many songs i found meaningful. i remember two of his songs when i get those nasty, uninformed generalized comments about where i live or even when someone finds my behavior or words lacking.

You got it, Mose:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4olfgtgLp8

and:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOWrsXDuwDE

i feel a bit better now.

This post has been produced from my aunt’s photo albums. i was going to post them in a Facebook album as i have been doing for quite some time, so relatives and friends of my family past and present could enjoy them and download if they were so inclined. Yeh, i know, all of you whippersnappers, i could have put them in “dropbox” and made it accessible to those folks. But that’s a lot of work. Even worse, it is a lot of technical work, and as much as i see the benefits, i am too old to get into that stuff…at least for now.

But when i scanned these today for the purpose of the Facebook album entry, something struck me  to lead me to putting them here first with my comments. i will post them there later for my original intent.

Our world was back then was this thing call family. It was tangible. It was constant. It was even tribal, i guess. It was beautiful. Perhaps it was because when it was. After all, there was a war going on. Perhaps it was because it was in “Brigadoon.” After all, it was a small town smack dab in the middle of Tennessee, and like most of the small towns at the time, people grew up there, most stayed or didn’t wander far from home. i’m not smart enough to figure out why or even how. But it was family beautiful.

There was this wonderful woman, who came up from the little hamlet of Statesville where her forbears had found sustenance among the fertile patches of land between the creeks and the trees and the bramble of the woods where game was plenty. Her husband, a man of strength and labor by fate, brought her into town so he could work at the pencil mill…well, not really town yet because they first moved out on Coles Ferry Pike and only later to town but even then there was a garden and a root cellar and a wood-fired stove inside and the family grew up there, and she hung on through the first seven years of my life, long enough for me to remember her caring.

And Mama Jewell had family, eight children, and i lost count on grandchildren, among of whom were my cousins like big brothers to me living across the street on Castle Heights Avenue. Graham Williamson, the fiddler who babysat his cousin while his band practiced in his home and let the young boy sing “Kaw Liga.” The family Jewell saw after each other and my father went with Graham to the West Side Hotel to get the body of Graham’s father, and Aunt Naomi Martin, nee Jewell, the older sister had taken Graham in when her younger sister Virda died in her twenties, and Naomi and George Martin raised Graham like he was their son along with their natural son Maxwell Martin who followed in his father’s footsteps being like a brother  to my father and they all, including me fished on the Tennessee lakes with a passion.

Then there was the maternal grandmother, the one who held her family together like glue and bounced around from house to family house to help take care of her grandchildren or work tasks for her daughter and son-in-law and Katherine “Granny Prichard had a rough life but still managed to enjoy it, her family and her friends. Like Daisy Lawrence who wasn’t Lawrence at the time (Susan Rockett, help me out here), still carrying her maiden name, and they lived across Clearview Drive on West Main Street from each other and became close friends, more like family for the rest of their lives, and more like family for all of us, and became the resting spot for Florida travel amidst the citrus groves.

And the man who took her from Lebanon to the citrus groves was a strong and intelligent business man, but his love of family, even the extended family seemed to have no bounds. And when Katherine “Granny” Prichard was tending to her young husband who we now believe suffered from asthma, she gathered up her family and went to the citrus groves where Euless, forever known as “Uncle Euless,” by all of us, and Daisy, forever known as “Aunt Daisy” by all of us, Lawrence took Katherine and her ill husband in and let them stay in the log cabin next to the big house until Joe Blythe Prichard wanted to go home for his final resting place and the family of six gathered in the ambulance-like van and headed north, back home to Tennessee.

But the Lawrence’s kept coming back to Tennessee, and the Jewell’s and the Prichard’s, and the Hall’s kept going to Gotha, Florida, and Uncle Euless seemed to like me and liked me until he too left us. And in this photo is the new Dodge, which remained a running usable vehicle for long afterwards, and there is no name on the woman resting her arm on that Dodge and i wonder if she might be “Aunt Ella” who was another extended family member.  And the roads to and from Gotha, Florida to Lebanon, Tennessee should have had a rut from all that back and forth: US 231 to Murfreesboro, US 41 through Chattanooga through Georgia until deep into Florida, cut across on US 44 to US 27, around 700 miles, but of course there was family along the way where we stayed.

And the bonds were strong. Then in the spring of 1962, i did not have a girl to ask to my graduation dance at Castle Heights, i just didn’t think those Lebanon girls liked to have more than one date with me. But family came through. My mother and grandmother talked to Aunt Daisy and her son, Douglas, and her daughter Juanita (Susan, did i spell her name correctly?) Browning. You see, the family ties run deep and the Browning’s daughter Susan was a year younger than me. We’d never met, but all parties agreed she would attend my graduation weekend with me.

And she did and she was beautiful and wonderful. Still is. i think about my feelings during those wonderful change of life days and how i felt about her. Sometimes i wonder…but she has a wonderful family in Georgia, and i have mine in the Southwest corner, and we are still family, and that is the way it should be.

It was just one of those days just about perfect in my mind. You know, like Crosby, Stills and Nash’s “Our House:” two cats in the yard (except ours are in the house; predators, you see). And it was even better as we returned to a long ago (well, by my standards; by my daughters, it is more like ancient) ways we worked in the evenings…and yes, i lit the fire while she put the flowers in the vase.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

It was cool and rainy, like the Southwest corner used to be in February. Not Tennessee rain, mind you, not at all. In fact, it really didn’t rain. It was more like heavy mist (but that is another story, a golfing story). Last night, we had about a quarter of an inch, more than we’ve had in about two months. More is predicted today. Our highs for this week proper are only touching 60, a veritable blizzard. But again, that is another story.

Yesterday for some reason, i was more productive than usual, on a bunch of fronts. i was proud of myself, and then came dinner. Maureen was at a meditating class. She says they are teaching her about history and the different kinds of meditateion. i declined to join her. Six Mondays of studying meditation just doesn’t quite strike me as fun. So going back to those old days, i once again cooked supper.

Once upon a time in the old west…well, at least in the old Southwest corner, i had some sort of control  of the kitchen. Or at least, i thought i did.

It was when Maureen’s and my marriage really began. My time on the Yosemite and our year in Jacksonville, Ponte Vedra Beach really, had been beyond magical.  We were married July 30, 1983 and then i was gone for nine months. You know, those deployments Navy folks just seem to get caught up in. So the really married stuff began in 1985.

We came back in late April. That’s when the real married stuff began and lasted for …well, i was going to say “a year,” but it really was for the rest of my life.

When we returned to the Southwest corner in 1985, i  cooked supper quite a bit when Maureen worked, but i then realized cooking was an escape for her, something she loved to do. She’s damn near a gourmet chef. When she cooks, which is nearly all the time now except for grilling, we have dinner. When i cook, we have supper.

Boy, did we have supper last night.

Here’s what we had:

Jim’s Stuff he makes with okra but zucchini substitutes for okra…or what is better known as “What the hell was that?”…and there is a story about that as well, but not for polite folks.

Ingredients:
Zucchini
Mushrooms
Diced tomatoes
Bacon/sausage
Yellow onions
Worcestershire sauce
Seasoning (critical but what strikes me at the moment)
Siracha sauce
Soy sauce
Bay Leaves
Mustard (doesn’t have to be the fancy kind, but it helps)
Molasses (sorghum, of course)

Cut it up,

Cook it slow in a cast-iron skillet

Serve with cornbread and rice or potatoes and red wine

It helps to have a martini while  you are doing it, makes you more creative. Bombay Sapphire up with olives in a chilled glass. But i gave that up a while ago. So i had a beer.

Maureen and Sarah loved it. Me too. i may get called on to cook supper more frequently, but not dinner.

Sarah retreated to her room. i lit the fire. Remember “Déjà Vu”? We never turned on the television. i did not write, i did not read. i sat in my chair next to the fire, propped my feet on the camel saddle Maureen had made into an ottoman, closed my eyes, and listened.

A rare moment.

i have a lot of music in my history. It’s sort of like my life. i like them all but i’m not an aficionado in any of the genres. But i do have my favorites. And last night it was my classical favorites: Handel’s “Water Music” — to this day, i remain thrilled my daughter Blythe chose that for her wedding music — and Dvořák’s “New World Symphony.” Cy Fraser introduced me to both back in 1963.

i listened quietly and thought:

The world ain’t all bad, and i am one very, very lucky man.

About two weeks ago, i began to post on Facebook daily “laws” from my now defunct “Murphy’s Law” desk calendars. My Aunt Evelyn and Uncle Pipey Orr sent me one of those calendars as a Christmas gift in 1979 while i was deployed to WESTPAC. They sent me one every year until my cousin, Nancy Schwarze, sent them while her mother still was alive. When my aunt passed, i began to get my own calendar and wrap it “from Santa” every Christmas until this past Christmas when they quit publishing the annual desk calendar. Fortunately, i cut and pasted the laws on my notebooks and scheduling paperwork for many years. i now share them on Facebook.

Then last week, one such post read:

From my “Murphy’s Law” desk calendar archives – “Pfeifer’s Principle: Never make a decision you can get someone else to make.”

i have an example of how this works out in practice.

Something happened a long, long time ago in a land far away, even farther away than my hometown from the Southwest corner. Watertown, New York, 1972. i had just taken over the sports editor job at Watertown Daily Times, living a dream i had since JB Leftwich taught me how to be a decent sports editor on The Cavalier, the Castle Heights Military Academy’s award-winning newspaper. A year before, i had concluded (i thought) my active duty obligation of serving three years as a Naval officer. My folks, Castle Heights, JB, a learning period (in many, many ways) of college and work, and the Navy, taught me well, especially my parents and the Navy about responsibility and accountability.

There are no guilty parties in this story. Every one of the characters were doing their job as best they knew how. They behaved in a manner they believed was best for their newspaper and protecting themselves. They were good people and good friends. Then there was me. The troublemaker.

One of the things really annoying to me then and just as much so now was the previous day’s results and scores of sports contests not being posted in the next day’s newspaper. This made me glad to have worked for afternoon papers. The Times did a good job posting national scores and any local scores covered by staff — at the time of this story, i was the sports staff; so only one sports event was covered live each day. So the results of a significant number of local events were reported a day late. The now ubiquitous answering machine did not become widely used until the mid-1980’s, and of course, voice mail, and mobile phones were the stuff of science fiction in 1972.

i wondered how we could get results in time to publish in the next day’s paper.

After some research, i discovered no one had charged local high schools to call in the results of their games and matches because there was no one at the newspaper to take the calls. Everyone went home when the afternoon paper had been put to bed. i myself, after getting to the office each morning between five and six, went home between two and three in the afternoon, took a nap, and covered a ball game about half of the evenings.

i puzzled over what to do. The local coaches seemed delighted, even anxious to designate someone to phone in their results. i went to my boss, the publisher-in-waiting, super friend, and college brother John B. Johnson, and asked if i could get some part time help, perhaps a high school student. John thought the idea was great and gave me permission. i think he suggested the young man whom i hired.

Before my help came to work, i laid out my plan. i would have him come to work around five, man the switchboard until around 11:00 so the designated person, even the coach, could call in results and statistics of their contests. My plan was to have calls forwarded to the sports desk, but the system could not automatically forward calls to an extension. So we would have to answer the calls at the switchboard. Obviously before this could work, he and i had to know how to operate the switchboard.

The morning before my assistant’s first evening, i went to the switchboard operator to learn how to operate the switchboard so i could train my man on his first night. It was a relatively simple thing, but when i asked the operator, she said, “I can’t do that without permission of the business manager.”

i thought she made a good point. And even if she had the authority to let me use the switchboard, the business manager should know the situation. i went to his office and explained.

He said, “I can’t make that decision. The general manager will have to give me the okay before we can do this.”

Good point. The general manager should know, i agreed. i went to the general manager.

He said, “That is not my decision to make. It’s the business manager’s area of responsibility.”

i left his office perplexed and stood in the hallway considering my options. i did not want to pull strings and go over their heads to my friend. That seemed a little awkward to me. Then i had an idea. i walked back into the general manager’s office and asked:

“If the business manager says it’s okay, then it’s okay with you, right?”

“Of course,” the general manager genially replied.

i trekked down the hall and entered the business manager’s office.

“The business manager said it was okay with him if it’s okay with you. Okay?” i suggested.

“Great,” the business manager genially, even enthusiastically replied. After all, the two managers were sports fans.

i went to the lobby and approached the switchboard operator.

“The general manager and the business manager both said it was okay for us to man the switchboard at night. So is it alright with you?”

“Absolutely,” she genially replied. She was a sports fan also. And with that i was trained and my man began his part-time job and scores of local high school sports event began to be printed in the next afternoon’s newspaper. It was a great success.

No one realized no one had actually given me the go-ahead, and no one was the wiser.