My dad had a first bout with melanoma when I was three or four. I remember one pitch-black morning in a hospital parking lot and another in a family friend’s kitchen, understanding that I’d eat breakfast and watch cartoons there before daycare with the Mormon woman I called “Aunt Donna.” I remember hearing “lymph nodes” over and over again, knowing they were in his armpits. I grasped that he was sick, I think, but I don’t recall ever feeling anxious about it. Every month thereafter he’d drive to UCLA for bloodwork and a meeting with his oncologist. I went with him once; it was the first time I ever ate in a cafeteria. I remember marveling at <quote-01>the flavor of the scrambled eggs<quote-01>, so curiously bland compared to my mother’s. I remember liking them. He made that drive once a month for six or seven years, until his oncologist suggested that he probably didn’t have to anymore; cancer-free for over five years usually means cancer-free forever. Some other team of doctors was treating him for anemia six months later when they realized his cancer had returned with a vengeance.
It was <quote-02>your digging<quote-02> into fathers and fatherhood a month ago, Hoke, that first got me thinking about my father; I mean really remembering him. And now, Wuck, you’ve shared with us an intimate exchange with your own, a man with whom you rarely see eye to eye these days despite the immense mutual respect you clearly have for each other. As I read your letter, I found myself imagining a world in which my father was still alive, in which I was disagreeing with him over politics even as we celebrated Dodgers and Lakers championships, and in which the mere mention of Grammar might have defused a tense moment about his redneck friends—cops many of them.
“Gram Slam!” I can almost hear him saying. “What’s shakin’?”
Back in July, you’ll both remember, I wondered about the effect of committing a memory to the page, if the act of doing so permits the brain to relax its hold on the recorded stuff, lets it all unknowingly slip into uncertainty. Or perhaps the mere passage of time is to blame. Either way, your musings on your fathers have stirred in me remembrances of things past, of my own father, gone now twenty-six years. And so I sit here wondering if I should stick pins in these fluttering fragments of memory before they return to wherever they were hibernating, before I lose them for good as I’m sure I’ve lost others.
Humor me?
The first place my mind goes—rather unfortunately—is a cancer ward. I recall vividly our many trips to the hospital—Conch and I—during my father’s final months, not only to Pomona Valley but to Saint John’s in Santa Monica. <quote-03>I drew a lot in those days<quote-03>, mostly comic book stuff. I’d spend hours in the various waiting rooms, drawing and watching whatever was on the television, eating something from the vending machines to pass the time. I can feel now what I felt then, unmistakable and distinct: <quote-04>something like sadness and helplessness and boredom<quote-04>. Thinking back on those months of his sickness, I don’t think we meaningfully interacted the entire time, my father and I. Our relationship had always centered around doing things—hitting the batting cages or miniature golf course, shooting hoops in the driveway or playing catch in the front yard, <quote-05>running to Builder’s Emporium or Rugg Lumber or to the pool supply store for something or other<quote-05>, grabbing a burger at the A&W with the ballgame on the radio—and once he got sick, he didn’t do much but work and sleep. Probably he didn’t know what to say either. I’m sure he was sad, ashamed in a way. I sometimes wonder what he and my mother talked about all those hours in his hospital rooms with me down the hall doodling away. What a bummer dying is, guys. I think I’ve said as much before. So much better just to be dead, I think.
Speaking of, I’m realizing now that homelife without him didn’t take much getting used to, at least at first. He was a regional manager for a nationwide financial services company and only at his Ontario office one-seventh of the year. This meant he was often away for days at a time during the week, holed up in a Bakersfield or Lancaster Ramada Inn. I have so many memories of homelife with just me and Conch that I have to think hard about the specifics to determine whether or not he was dead yet. Is wrestling on in the background? He’s alive. Am I playing Mortal Kombat II? He’s dead. Which pair of Rollerblades are those? What cassette tape is in my Walkman? Is that popcorn or ribbon on the Christmas tree? When he wasn’t away, he was so early to bed and so early to rise that we rarely interacted during the workweek. Still, he was always home for the weekend, always a rooting presence at my baseball and soccer games, never occupied with anything but our home and family. On Saturdays he’d wake up early and do the yardwork—mowing, edging, trimming trees, the whole deal. I remember the big plastic cups Conch would fill with ice water for me to take out to him. That’s another indicator of whether he’s dead or not. Do we have a gardener? On Sundays he’d golf.
Much in the same way most everybody likes Kristen or Pat, most everybody liked my dad. He could make anyone feel at home, make anyone feel like he really cared about them. He was funny and understanding, patient and easy going. He liked Jell-O and cottage cheese and the chili from both Wendy’s and Wienerschnitzel. He drank Budweiser and Dewar’s with a splash of water, smoked Marlboro Reds. He loved wearing plaid pants and saddle shoes, listening to the Kingston Trio. <quote-06>He always had chewing gum and LifeSavers on him<quote-06>—sometimes Juicy Fruit or Big Red but always Wrigley’s Spearmint, sometimes Wint-O-Green or Butter Rum but always Wild Cherry. He liked Big Hunk, Abba Zabba, and Look! Bars; Jujyfruits and Good & Plenty; disliked Chinese food, said it reminded him of <quote-07>Vietnam<quote-07>, which he wouldn’t talk about with anyone. He loved a prank, to joke around, to chat over scotch and a smoke, to invite people over for dinner at a moment’s notice. He and Conch made great hosts; they’d often stay up late together after a successful party, basking in the afterglow. <quote-08>I remember once waking in the middle of the night to find them slow dancing to Elton John’s “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” in the light of the jukebox<quote-08>. The only time they ever fought—I mentioned it briefly somewhere above—was when my father wandered down the street to a neighbor’s Christmas party after one of our own without telling Conch. He’d escorted the last of our guests to their cars—helping them with their white elephants maybe—and remembered the neighbor’s coinciding party. He went over to say hello and stayed a few hours. <quote-09>Conch was sick with worry I seem to recall<quote-09>. That he didn’t think it was a big deal made her furious.
“Well, maybe we’ll spend the holidays getting a divorce!” she shouted.
This was his last healthy Christmas, I’m pretty sure. An afternoon away from the house and a bouquet of flowers did the trick.
St. Mark’s was packed to overflowing when he died, just an endless parade of strangers telling me how wonderful he was, how sorry they were for me. I remember a Japanese man who told me my dad had saved his life in “the war,” another who said my dad hired him when no one else would have and helped turn his life around—stuff like that.
I wonder now if he avoided me during those last months of his life, if maybe I avoided him too. I don’t feel, however, like anything went unsaid between us, like any unfinished business remained. Our relationship was still so simple. When my aunt <quote-10>suggested I go into his room toward the end<quote-10> to tell him I loved him, I did it only because everyone thought it was important. He knew I loved him. I knew he loved me. Saying it wasn’t anything. He was delirious with pain anyway, moaning in agony at one moment and talking about getting a present for his decades-dead mother the next.
I remember happy moments too, of course, <quote-11>little things<quote-11>: going to Toys “R” Us on a whim for a new GI Joe, getting lunch together at the Bob’s Big Boy across from his office, tossing a football back and forth while he hand watered a yellowing spot on the front lawn, sitting between his legs and watching the Showtime Lakers or John Robinson Rams on Sunday afternoons, sneaking off to the side patio after dinner to listen to the last inning of the Dodger game and watch him smoke a cigarette in the total darkness. Home games were almost never televised back then.
I remember too our rare times at home alone: once for sixteen straight summer days when Conch went to Spain with her mom and sister, and every year for a weekend in January while she attended her English teacher’s conference in Ojai. How strange it was when her responsibilities became his. There are photographs of just the two of us at the houses of his friends who also had small children. I am three or four or five in these photos and am always wearing cowboy boots and a quilted ski vest, sometimes without an undershirt; this was the outfit I’d often choose for myself, the one I could get on without any assistance. These are from those motherless days.
He did his best, I suppose.
I know that one Saturday we ate all our meals at McDonald’s: a sausage McMuffin with egg for breakfast, a cheeseburger Happy Meal for lunch, a Chicken McNuggets Happy Meal for dinner, orange drink all three times, maybe a hot fudge sundae or a box of McDonaldland cookies thrown in for good measure. <quote-12>We probably did this a few times<quote-12>, actually, the memory is so crystal clear.
I was so accustomed to Conch’s routine, her regular haunts. I knew the nail salon, the hairdresser, the supermarket; I knew the rheumatologist. But my father’s after-work stops always felt novel: the liquor store, the dry cleaners, the car wash. The first time we left Aunt Donna’s and headed for his <quote-13>liquor store<quote-13> of choice, I remember seeing stoplights and churches I’d never seen before, a new McDonald’s.
When we departed the next morning, I asked him to take me that roundabout way to Aunt Donna’s again. And the next morning, when I asked for yet another route, he provided one. And again. And again. I remember being so impressed with him, <quote-14>so spellbound when we eventually arrived at this familiar destination by way of some utterly foreign route<quote-14>.
And then one morning he simply circled our block before continuing on the same path Conch always took. I mean, how many different ways can one take to Rancho Cucamonga?
“Hey!” I objected.
He shrugged. Again, he did his best.
When I was younger, I’d imagine going back in time and telling him never to stop going in for his monthly check-ups. “Just promise me,” I’d say. Seems like a simple enough request, no?
Sometimes I’d take it a step further and imagine how different my life would be had he not died. For one, my love for baseball would never have lapsed. I’d have practiced more, cared, benefitted from his influence on my male coaches, played through high school almost certainly. He always made sure I was being active, not eating too horribly. <quote-15>He was so happy I hadn’t inherited his chicken legs<quote-15> but also vigilant that I not get chubby. There’s yet another marker to determine whether or not he’s dead: am I fat? <quote-16>Conch and I ate like garbage in the first years after his death<quote-16>. I get it too. Why go through the trouble of making dinner for just yourself and your kid? I was happy with fast food whenever I could get it. He was the one who truly appreciated a well-rounded home cooked meal: broiled halibut with lemon, rice pilaf, buttered broccoli, dinner rolls, ice cream with homemade fruit topping for dessert—that kind of thing. <quote-17>This isn’t to say Conch stopped cooking<quote-17>. We still had the staples. But when my father was alive and home for dinner, we’d always have a square meal. After? Probably I could plan on a Sunday roast and something else midweek—spaghetti or beef stroganoff or chicken and rice or something. <quote-18>Again, this was fine by me<quote-18>.
I could see this other version of myself still being drawn to ComedySportz—I always loved making people laugh—but I don’t know that I’m ever in a play. Our seventh-grade honors teacher, Hoke, Mrs. Thompson, was the first to really prod me in that direction. Those were the worst days of my life—<quote-19>newly chubby, fatherless, and unpopular<quote-19>—and I was grateful for any vote of confidence, willing to give probably anything a shot. Had she suggested drama to the kid I was at the start of, say, fifth grade, I don’t know how interested I would have been. If that’s the case, there’s definitely no Jennifer Garrobo and probably no Kristen Guerrero. Likely there are instead plenty of others, many of whom I wouldn’t have treated nearly as well without my time in therapy with a widowed mother. Would there have been a punk rock band? Hard to know. The allure of that thoughtful, angry music found me at the same time drama did.
What about the more superficial stuff? We would have had a lot more money, certainly; probably my dad would have taken the country club plunge at some point. Had we remained on friendly terms into my adolescence, there would have been lots of golf. I can also imagine having my own car much earlier in life, something new and nice and safe, not a hand-me-down Camaro. Without question, I would have been a worse kid, taken more risks, more liberties. I probably would have also been a much better student. Conch allowed me so much freedom during high school because of our unusual circumstances, our already strange relationship. With dad around there would have been mandatory homework hours, incentives for success, test-preparation courses—rigor and expectation. For sure I would have gone off to college. Where? To study what? No idea. An alternate reality in which I double major in, like, studio art and American history and play second base and catcher for—I don’t know—UPenn or something doesn’t feel far-fetched. Maybe I go on to do something boring and secure like become a lawyer.
Then again, maybe very little changes. Maybe everything plays out just as it did, and I still become friends with all of you in high school, still do theater and play in a band, still go to prom with April Kadlac instead of Becca White and drop the ball with Megan Tulac. It’s possible, sure. <quote-20>I can tell you with absolute certainty, however, that 1868 North First Avenue would be long gone by now<quote-20>, sold in the name of the wine-country bed and breakfast that was always my parents’ very serious dream for retirement. Without an Upland home for all of us to return to every Christmas, what becomes of our extended friend group? What becomes of the three of us? Nick Webber! Long-time-no-see! Tom told me you just had a kid or something? Chris fucking Hoke—salt of the earth, that guy. I wonder what he’s been up to. Or worse yet, I’d have a Facebook page, and we’d interact only through likes and shares.
What I guess I’m saying is that none of this necessarily sounds any good—or better; it’s just a thought experiment I’ve lost myself in over the years, often in the minutes before sleep.
Anyways, there’s no mistaking it: “He dead. A penny for the Old Guy.”
He was as old as I am now during that first bout with melanoma. Why do I mention it again?
<pull-quote>your digging<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Archeology. Nice read on Wuck's Indiana Jones duo months ago.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>I drew a lot in those days<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>as did i. i thought i wanted to be an artist growing up. i used to sell renderings of disney characters to kids in elementary school for a quarter. i remember being especially into the characters from aladdin. i drew superman a bunch too, and the cover art of books i’d read.<p-comment>
<p-comment>this is how my dad got into oil painting. there was a landscape painter at our church who gave me a couple lessons, and my dad tagged along to one of them. i remember being disappointed that his trees looked better than mine. could have been around then that i started to lose interest.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>One-upped by the old man, and boy-genius calls it quits for oil painting.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>I took AP Studio Art as a senior in high school for the same reason I collected all these GI Joes as an adult--because I promised myself I would as a child. I remember Conch taking me to the AP Studio Art show in the UHS Library year after year, marveling at the stuff these almost-adults produced.<p-comment>
<p-comment>Ms. Merhaut, the Studio Art teacher, balked at the idea at first. Usually students take the class for two years to compile their portfolio for the exam. I looked her in the eye and told her I could handle it; that was good enough for her. Lots of filler in a class like that. I certainly would have made good use of the extra year, but one was enough for me to pass. Speaking of filler, I made great use of cut paper collages with esoteric names to satisfy the required number of pieces. I remember one in particular: "Man's Propensity for Evil." Among other shapes were the two disconnected halves of a swastika. Equal parts hilarious and ambitious, young Murph.<p-comment>
<p-comment>The centerpiece of my showcase in the library, for that matter, was a cut paper Christ on the cross surrounded by scores of saluting Nazis. I remember thinking I had to make up for quantity with agenda. To Ms. Merhaut's credit, she placed my stuff right at the front of the library, just left of the rack of newspapers where one would often find Grapey catching up on the daily comings and goings.<p-comment>
<p-comment>One of the librarians--not the aptly named Mrs. Book--was pretty upset.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>I remember explaining my lousy but so sincere understanding of Christ on the cross to you on a long walk around Upland. I remember feeling electric. How deeply you engaged me! No one else outside my youth group gave a good damn about theology at that age. <p-comment>
<p-comment>We rented a movie at Video City, and you probably changed the subject for the walk back, gently, lovingly.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>That was the first time we watched Kentucky Fried Movie!<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>8th Grade? Wow. We must have been recording that video for the History Day Project, "Escape from Sobibor." If so, that would be a funny context for our origin story: before a long talk about evangelical transactions of salvation, you me and Tom spending two evenings pretending to be death camp survivors, on a home video camera, scheming and relying on each other to escape Nazi violence. Some real light-hearted preteens.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>Your memory is a muddle. “Triumph and Tragedy: Escape from Sobibor” was ninth grade, dude, just after Christmas Break.<p-comment>
<p-comment>Our virgin viewing of Kentucky Fried Movie—a weekend afternoon toward the very end of eighth grade—featured you hiding the slippery surprise boobs on screen from your folks and someone stopping by from your church.<p-comment>
<p-comment>Christ on the cross, we watched that movie a lot!<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>christ on the cross, surrounded by nazis.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>something like sadness and helplessness and boredom<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>wonderfully rendered. wow, what a trio.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Empty church basement halls. Cancer ward waiting alcoves. Both your childhood hells felt similar.<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>i like how you put me in a basement. are there even basements in southern california?<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>All the old grove houses in Upland have basements. I can hit a golf ball from my front yard to two of them.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>I guess hells are always underground for me.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>running to Builder’s Emporium or Rugg Lumber or to the pool supply store for something or other<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Reading this in bed now, I can smell the thick fertilizer and ground cover aroma that got into my brain as a small boy following my own father around: his knee-high socks, tight shorts, and dark moustache. And the pool supply. Smells! Ah, the chlorine. You're sending me back to a world I'd lost.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>Where are these scented candles for men?<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Could you write the elevator pitch for an invester, like, right now?<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>I think a list of the scents is all you'd need, that and one functioning candle to seal the deal; "Pool Supply Store Saturday with Dad" and "Dad's Briefcase" would be the ones I took along for the pitch.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>"Soccer Team Pizza Party at Chuck E Cheese"<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>lawnmower gas can in the garage.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>He always had chewing gum and LifeSavers on him<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>cinnamon or bust for anthony: certs or trident.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Steve Hoke was a Trident man only and ever.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>Vietnam<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>I'm sure your imagined, alternate reality would include adult Murph asking him.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>I long for those stories as much as any other, for sure. Up there: high school girlfriends, most memorable trips to Chavez Ravine.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>I remember once waking in the middle of the night to find them slow dancing to Elton John’s “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” in the light of the jukebox<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>This stayed with me into the morning, when I first read it. I still want to cry. I also notice an envy. I don't have such a memory, and my parents are still alive.<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>best i got was waking up as a kid next to my sister early in the morning in a hotel room in flagstaff on one of our summer road trips, hearing anthony make a hushed salacious wordplay joke to my mom in the bathroom: you’re the flag and i’m the staff, baby. she giggled. he tried to stifle his own laughter, he must have been on a role.<p-comment>
<p-comment>he’d give her a long hug at the kitchen door every morning before he left for work, and they’d cuddle up next to each other on the couch during movies, sharing popcorn from a woven wooden salad bowl, my mother scraping the sides with the remnants for the butter. but kissing? lord no, never.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>My parents had a lot of long distance in the early years of their relationship. Conch will happily tell you about it if she hasn't already, so I won't rob her of that ("Leaving on a Jet Plane" was another of their anthems; the Peter, Paul, and Mary was their preferred version).<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>i wonder if these spells of separation aren’t good for a marriage. what, honey? no, no, i just read it somewhere, like in a study or something.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>Conch was sick with worry I seem to recall<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>the iphone has saved many a relationship, ruining many another.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Tell me about it.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>suggested I go into his room toward the end<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>he pass at home? what do you remember about the activities immediately following his passing?<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>Yes. Just before midnight. I was awakened just after to sit with Conch by his body before the coroner came to fetch it. There was plenty of traumatizing stuff in the months leading up to this moment, but sitting there with him wasn't bad at all--sad but peaceful.<p-comment>
<p-comment>The next day--a Tuesday--Conch and I made the final arrangements at Draper Mortuary on Mountain, just south of our childhood Toys R Us. I helped with the wording of his obit: "Born in Spokane, a native of Los Angeles, Patrick Joseph Murphy..." After it was lunch at Stinky Stevens. Do you guys remember that place, where the current day Tequila Hoppers is on Mountain, just north of the train tracks? I had a bacon cheeseburger, curly fries, and a sarsaparilla in a glass bottle.<p-comment>
<p-comment>Later that day, my dad's oldest brother--Uncle Mike, long-tenured bartender at the kinda famous Tom Bergin's in LA who'd die in 2001 from lung cancer--came over with his family for the whole condolences thing, to see if he could be of any help. I remember his son, two years my junior, telling me he was jealous that I got to stay home from school the rest of the week. Uncle Mike yelled at him, but I understood what he meant. I was, after all, happy for some hooky.<p-comment>
<p-comment>The rest of the week before the funeral is just a haze of family members coming to visit, some staying before the funeral. One late afternoon that week--probably Friday--three friends from school (I'm not positive, but I think Adam Shear, Robbie Fabricant, and another kid named Zach Bignell, whom neither of you are likely to know) took me out for pizza and video games at Pizza Royal (in the same parking lot as Alta Loma Music). It was an okay enough time. I don't think I've ever been back there--it's still going strong, I believe--but that doesn't have anything to do with my first and only visit.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>little things<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>These memories, these specifics, make me wonder what it is Abram will remember doing with me. How precious our small errands together may turn out to be.<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>totally. grow up already, ben.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>Some guesses: paddling out to Hoke island, walking through the woods, watching the Dodger game (keep it up!).<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>We probably did this a few times<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>god, i love this. there’s a fried chicken and pies place in williamsburg, called pies and thighs. the first time sarah and i tried it out was for brunch on a fourth of july. we went back for dinner that night—couldn’t think of anything else we wanted. i’m now thinking of you, murph, and that burger joint in seattle.<p-comment>
<p-comment>these occasions are fantastic for holidays, but running it back over an extended period of time could get depressing.<p-comment>
<p-comment>although, i think of older folks and diner culture. there’s a charm to it, no doubt. there’s a polish diner in the east village—pretty famous—called veselka. sarah, tisdale and i ate there before going to see the joker last year. we went back a few weeks ago and sat outside with ben. god, it was fantastic. a young dude down the way sat with a beer and pack of smokes on his table next to the brothers karamov and an omelette—so me, fifteen years ago. if i lived in this neighborhood, i told the waiter, i’d be here all the time. plenty are, he said.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>liquor store<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Next to Stater Bros? That was a place of mystery to me. John Cain and Eddie McOrmand, I think, first dared me to enter, for beef jerky. I feel the anxiety still, thinking about that place my parents warned me about.<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>sinful, those liquor stores. sinful.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>He frequented two: one on the north side of Foothill just east of Campus now called C&M Classy Mart, and one on the east side of Euclid just south of the now levelled Rugg Lumber; the building is vacant at the moment but was most recently called Euclid Liquor and Deli. I preferred the latter because it had some sports collectibles cases in the very back. I'd usually score at least a pack of baseball cards and one time--I shit you not--a non-alcoholic beer. I remember drinking it out of the can by the pool. It was pretty gross.<p-comment>
<p-comment>I wonder now if this was from one of those motherless weekends, one of the last perhaps.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>That sealed your distaste for beer for the rest of your life, perhaps.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>so spellbound when we eventually arrived at this familiar destination by way of some utterly foreign route<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>so good, this. two things:<p-comment>
<p-comment>as a kid, i remember always wondering what was at the top of grove ave. we’d always turn off on fourteen street, what the hell was up there? i think i first went up to the dead end on my bike, or my rollerblades. well this sucks, i thought.<p-comment>
<p-comment>my family once drove to some new restaurant after church for lunch. i remember nana and grandpa were with us, my dad’s folks. my sister and i were were so fascinated by all the new sites we passed, we decided to swap seats for the ride home in order to see everything the other saw on the way there. whomp whomp. same stuff, only in reverse—a disappointing lesson in relativity.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>This is it, Wuck (twice!).<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Equally usable for standup routines or sermon illustrations.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>He was so happy I hadn’t inherited his chicken legs<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>the reverse for anthony, i’d imagine. my mother likes to compliment my dad’s legs.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>Conch and I ate like garbage in the first years after his death<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>i remember hearing how conch cooked all of grammar’s first meals, puréeing all those veggies and the like. has there been a renewed vigor in the kitchen for you all since grammar’s arrival?<p-comment>
<p-comment>i’d imagine conch is reliving a bit of what the house was like before pat’s passing with grammar around. it's a nice thought.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Get this, Wuck: that first night when Grammar came home, the night I drove out from Homeboy to surprise the Murphs and meet my squirming godson, I stayed the night at their insistence. The next morning, like most Murphy house mornings for me, it was just me and Conch. She glowed about this antique, wooden high chair she found on eBay or something that was EXACTLY like Murph's when he was a baby. She showed it to me with totally unhidden joy, like a retired man with the hot rod in his garage he always wanted. <p-comment>
<p-comment>She told me the meals she made for Murph as a kid--which she planned to make all over again for this grandson that had just arrived. Who was sleeping, at this very moment, now, in this very house. I'd never seen her so thrilled. Renewed vigor, indeed.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>She did it up early on, for sure. Alas, he has become a rather predictable toddler--chicken nuggets, mac and cheese, grilled cheese, cheeseburgers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, cheese quesadillas, spaghetti and meatballs, carrot sticks, goldfish crackers, apple slices, etc.--despite our hopes of him becoming a young gourmand. He is at his most elegant, maybe, with a plate of shallot-fried rice?<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Same with Abram. So much for those books Rachel was given, "Kids In France Eat Everything." Doubt it.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>I'll say it. Fuck kids in France.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>That one's in the works with a different publisher, I think.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>This isn’t to say Conch stopped cooking<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>i see her need to document her recipes for the year’s staple parties (st. patty’s, christmas—forever a new menu for each) as similar to the my desire to catalog the tunes casey and i have written.<p-comment>
<p-comment>actually, scratch that—her recipe books amass with a will of their own, whereas i’ve always longed to have written such a sizable catelog as, say, dylan’s. she’s more the artist than i in this respect. such beauty, connie. what reverence. to you and yours!<p-comment>
<p-comment>where i might thrill at needing to purchase a new notebook, i can hear her complaint: guess i got to get a new recipe book. more books on an already crowded shelf—jesus, mary, and joseph! although, i can also picture her then smiling up at me with pride as she shows them off.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Riffs and Recipes: An Intergenerational Digital Collab of Catalogued Feasts and Songs (download on iTunes for $9.99 this holiday season, the perfect gift for your 2020 Zoom family cooking)<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>Again, this was fine by me<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>my mother always packed me a lunch. it would be ready in the fridge the night before, waiting for me to take to school the next day. from elementary school, right on through high school, i use to throw them away and use my allowance to buy cafeteria food. it’s a deep seeded point of shame in my life, makes me well up now to even think about it. my poor mother: all those hours, all that food.<p-comment>
<p-comment>unless i got a burrito. fuck that cafeteria food then.<p-comment>
<p-comment>why, when my mother would pack me a zip lock baggie of cool ranch doritos, would i sooner toss them and pay for a cafeteria single serve bag of the same?<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Man, those latenight love-made meals tossed in the garbage? Oof. Hits me like the baby owls. The sweetness of your contrition in this comment makes it all the more true.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>I know this sadness for sure, sometimes tossing a ham sandwich or thermos of chicken noodle casserole into the trash in favor of the preferred hot lunch. I was exclusively buying by seventh grade, though.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>newly chubby, fatherless, and unpopular<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Three gut punches, you naming this. I only knew you as the snarky kid hunched over his muscled, comic-book illustrations of American Revolution historical figures, in the front-left portion of her classroom. Man, you knew how to skewer me and draw the class's attention to my fruitiness, flirting with April Nicholson several seats behind you. <p-comment>
<p-comment>I sat in that seat, I now remember, writing my first death poem--after my Uncle Don, my dad's only brother, died suddenly when his Cessna went down off the coast of the Phillipines. I knew somewhere in my brain that Francis Murphy's dad had died. If I could go back in time, I'd go sit down at lunch with that chubby, mean, hilarious kid with braces, and ask him . . . I'm not sure what.<p-comment>
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<pull-quote>I can tell you with absolute certainty, however, that 1868 North First Avenue would be long gone by now<pull-quote>
<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>Like Back To the Future: our friendships instantly become translucent, existentially at risk, in this scenario.<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>i wouldn’t have ended up at carnegie mellon, would never have met casey. i simply auditioned for the colleges you did, murph, wanting to go wherever you ended up.<p-comment>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
<p-comment>This feels like a big reveal, or something you've said to one or either of us before? It makes so much sense, such a sweet love letter.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>I've heard you say as much before, though I still find it kind of hard to believe. The eventual allure of Carnegie Mellon was the offered financial package? Where else did you get in?<p-comment>
<p-comment>As for following me around the country, Southern California is great this time of year.<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>yup. i honestly can’t recall which i was waitlisted for, which accepted me, and which were a no-go.<p-comment>
<p-comment>sarah and i are planning on looking at some places/neighborhoods when we come out in jan/feb with ben.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
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<avatar-hoke><avatar-hoke><author-name>Hoke<author-name>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
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<pull-quote>the flavor of the scrambled eggs<pull-quote>
<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>when i was a kid our church had a men's breakfast once a month. i would go with my dad and help out. i'd peal apart the pieces of bacon, stir the pancake batter, stuff like that. i can’t recall a difference in flavor, but i remember the look of the eggs in the warmer tray, piled high, and grey beneath the surface. gross.<p-comment>
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<avatar-murph><avatar-murph><author-name>Murph<author-name>
<p-comment>Have you never had my mother's scrambled eggs (or mine)?<p-comment>
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<avatar-wuck><avatar-wuck><author-name>Wuck<author-name>
<p-comment>not sure. i remember you instructing pat to put mayo in the eggs at harmony ranch. the range of textures one can get from an egg with the heat alone is remarkable. i don’t have the patience to really do the low and slow approach right; sarah wishes i did, and i’ll humor her on occasion. i prefer a bubbly over easy from a hot pan, the edges crispy.<p-comment>
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