The mind is a funny thing. As I have mentioned, I have been doing a lot of puttering around the house (cleaning the grout, dusting, vacuuming, scrubbing the floor, etc.). It is interesting the shit that will go through your mind while doing these activities.
For whatever reason this morning I was mopping the floor now that my tile grout had dried and I got to thinking about the summer that Jennifer and I got married.
My Dad had decided since there was going to be a big family gathering when the wedding occurred that several of the buildings around the ranch needed to be painted. Now most of the buildings on the ranch are white (barn, garage, milk house, etc.). However my Dad let my sister Cindy who was around 14 at the time pick out the color for the window trims on the garage and milk house. So she chose this color called "Tahitian Luau". Jennifer always got a kick out of that name. Now Tahitian Luau is a interesting color of green. It is almost fluorescent but it is not. However it certainly stood out.
Jennifer and Cindy were on Tahitian Luau duty painting the trims. I was on duty with dad painting the barn and the garage. Now we did not paint all of the barn, just the south end of the barn. Which is no small job. Anyway, Jennifer was having a bit of a conniption with my father on how we were planning on painting the peak of the barn. It is a pretty tall barn and our hydro lifter on the Farmall H Tractor would not reach high enough to get the peak. The hydro lifter had a platform type attachment and we put a 10 foot step ladder on the platform and I would just be able to reach the peak to paint. Dad would lift the hydro loader as high as it would go and then I would get the 10 ft ladder positioned and climb up and do the painting.
Well needless to say, Jennifer did not like this setup at all, the safety professional in her was going ape shit. Anyway, she I guess she realized that I was still on the folks insurance at this point and she had not yet locked the old ball around my ankle. She probably figured there were more fish in the sea if I fell to my demise. So she does what every safety professional does. She voiced her concerns and got the hell out of there. She just went and painted Tahitian Luau where she could not see the incident if/when it happened. Let the cards fall how they will.
It was a little comical watching her and her future father-in-law battle this out but I was stuck smack dab in the middle, either way this went I was coming out a loser. Long story short I painted the barn, but got a royal ass chewing after it was completed and was informed that once I was on our insurance that shit like that was not going to happen. I don't know if I should have been insulted or not with her line of thinking. However, she was always good at looking at the bottom line and protecting her investments.
The good new is that a few years later Dad had the south end of the barn sided with aluminum siding, so we won't have to paint the peak again.
Anyway, the human mind really is a interesting computer that can really screw with you and it is funny where and when some of these memories come up.
Later today I am going to a small gathering to celebrate the life of John Fagan. John passed away a week or so ago. He and his wife Marian have lived here in Mesquite for many years. Marian was Jennifer and I's grade school librarian and their son Jay was in our class. John did not want any services so Marian is just having a small gathering at their house today.
It was funny how Jennifer and I reconnected with the Fagan's. We knew they lived here but had never run into them. Then one day Jennifer and I went out to lunch and went to a new cafe that had recently opened. Well when we got to the restaurant there was a small line and there was a group of ladies in front of us. One of them was Marian. I told Jennifer I think that is Mrs Fagan and she said I think you are right. So I stepped up and asked are you Mrs Fagan and she said yes. Then I told her who I was and we had a nice little visit and exchanged numbers.
A little while later we arranged to get together for lunch. John, Marian and another lady from Butte (Linda Young) who happens to be neighbors with the Fagan's and who also grew up in Elk Park (very small world) came out to Sun City for lunch. We had a very nice afternoon and visited all about Butte and Elk Park. I will tell the story about meeting Linda another day, it is also a small world story.
Anyway I was honored that Marian asked me to come to the gathering.
When we were in grade school their son Jay was a good friend and he was our flag football team quarterback. He was the biggest kid on our team and as such could throw the football the farthest. Well he continued to grow and went in to play college football for the Grizzlies and actually played in the NFL for the Washington Redskins as a replacement player during the NFL strike.
Sadly we had lost contact with Jay after grade school. He went on to East Middle School and Jennifer and I went to South Central. We played football against each other but that was really the last time that I had any real contact with him. He now lives in Oregon and works in the lumber industry managing a lumber plant. I believe Marian plans to relocate up in that neck of the woods to be closer to him and his family.
Well I better get back to work, I got just a little more floor to scrub and the have some errands to run before I head to the gathering. I wonder what tricks the old mind is going to play on me now that I got that story off my mind.
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