a questionable life

by Luke Lively

  I told him I would be back as soon as I was old enough. I was going to hold him to his promise to give me a job.

  The game was on.

  “Who’s ahead?”

  The question had a much deeper meaning for the teenage Jack Oliver than whether the Eagles, 76ers, or Phillies were winning. As the son of a plumber and a resident of one of the less affluent neighborhoods, I felt that I was on the bottom, always looking up. I wanted to be one of the people on top, looking down at everyone else. They were the winners, and I wanted to join them. The view from the top had to be much better.

  I obviously wasn’t the only person with this goal in mind. Who didn’t want to be rich and powerful? I arrived at the same conclusion Chad reached about the meaning of life—“Life is a game.”

  I reasoned that my father had failed because he had believed “life is a job.” If you treated life as a job, you were admitting that someone else was in control. If all you had was a job, you would be working your entire life for others. I knew even then that I would never be satisfied with just a job—I wanted to be in control of my life. Chad was right—life is a game, and the winners were in control. He was living proof.

  But how can a poor kid win? I wondered many times, trying to find a way to take command of my destiny. From my brief life experiences, I could plainly see that rich people had power, and powerful people were rich. I concluded winning was dictated by how much power and money a person could gather. You could never get too much of either. It was me versus them in a competition to see who could gather the most. I was living to win, not lose.

  But I was having trouble finding a way to get into the game. I needed to find a way in—a course of action, a plan. After thinking as deeply as a teenager could think about attaining power and riches, the answer came to me on a snowy midwinter weekend. Stuck inside the house with two feet of snow and bitter temperatures forcing everyone indoors, I found myself playing a game with several of my snowbound friends.

  The game was Monopoly. I decided to develop a strategy—a plan that would help me win the game of life. I wrote it down and added to it as I moved through the game over the years. With some minor changes, I adhered to the strategy for most of my life. While I had lost the notebook paper I had written it on, I remembered my tactics.

  The first step was understanding that getting into the game wasn’t impossible. Everyone who chose to play could be on the board. But space was limited, so you had to decide quickly.

  You didn’t need a lot of money to start. But there was a price to pay. Players had to be willing to lose whatever they had to win. That wasn’t a problem for me. I never felt that I had a lot to lose.

  Winning was also relatively simple. To win at Monopoly you had to take advantage of every opportunity. Gather all of the property and cash you can carry, and be sure to buy Boardwalk and Park Place. Only the best property is worth the effort. Be prepared and keep a Get Out of Jail card handy for those moments the roll of the dice doesn’t go your way.

  Never be afraid to take risks. Draw your Chance card and hope it’s something beneficial. Don’t rely on luck—be ruthless in your pursuit of winning. Beat the other players before they beat you. Take their money before they take yours. When it comes to rules, know the rules so you can bend them.

  Speed was important. Get around the board as quickly as possible, and do your best to avoid paying rent or owing anything to anyone. Never stop to enjoy what you own—it can all be taken away. Pass Go and earn your money. Always stay on course no matter how long the game takes. Distractions will result in defeat.

  In Monopoly there was only one role other than being a player—the banker. Everything revolved around money, so being in control of the money was important. Be the banker!

  Finally, it’s time to cash in and count your money at the end of the game. Who has the most? If you do, you win, and now you can be happy!

  It was hard to believe someone not even old enough to drive could concoct a plan for life based on Monopoly—but I did. There would be only one winner, and I was determined to win.

  According to Chad’s game plan, “know more” and “work harder” were the two keys to success. Obtaining the best education would be my first step according to Chad’s advice. I had always been a good student, but I started focusing more on math and business classes.

  As soon as I was old enough, I decided to see if Chad’s promise of employment was valid. During my junior year of high school, I applied for a job with PT&G. After filling out the job application I told the PT&G human resource representative that I knew Chad personally.

  “Chad promised me a job two years ago,” I said. “He told me to make excellent grades. I have. I’m at the top of my class. I want to work for PT&G.”

  “You know Mr. Jefferies?” she asked, doubting my story.

  “He told me to call him Chad because everyone called his father Mr. Jefferies,” I said. “Just check with him and tell him Jack Oliver is ready to go to work. He’ll remember me—I’m positive.”

  “I’ll get back with you, Mr. Oliver,” she said, smirking.

  As I slid the pen I used to fill out the application back across the counter, I said, “I look forward to working with you.”

  I got the word the next day. Chad remembered me. I was hired part-time in the operations area. After a few months sorting mail I was trained as a teller and began my banking career in earnest. I loved my job. I handled money all day.

  Instead of being proud, my father remained steadfast in his open distaste for my early career choice. “You dress up in a nice suit and work in a big office building. You count out thousands of dollars to people while you work, but you are paid nickels and dimes. When are you ever going to be paid some real money? You’re wasting your time, Jackson. Only rich people’s children will get ahead.”

  I decided I would show my father what could happen when his son pursued a goal. I would not only be a banker, but the president of the bank. Chad was my role model, the person I wanted to emulate. If I could be like Chad, then I could have it all . . . and ultimately my father’s respect.

  If my old man could see me now, I thought, alone in my small apartment, what would he think of his boy now? Knowing the answer to my question, I poured another drink. I had a choice to make. Do I stay on the same path that put me here, or do I change directions?

  What happened to my potential? I asked myself, rubbing my hands through my thinning hair. Is there no hope for me?

  I thought about the confrontation with my father. I needed help—something that could give me hope and guidance to make a better choice now.

  I remembered asking a priest about hope.

  Hope isn’t all we have—but if we lose hope, nothing else works.

  —BENJAMIN FRANKLIN PRICE

  7. Where’s Your Hope?

  “WHERE’S YOUR HOPE?” the priest had asked me long ago. The question asked then was pertinent now.

  “I don’t know, Father,” I had replied. “I’ve lost hope. I don’t see any hope—any way that life will get better. I’m ready to give up.” I was attending my first confessional in years. Father Romano was very concerned.

  “Giving up is never a solution,” he said. “That’s what happened with your father—he gave up hope. You must never give up hope, Jack.”

  “What’s left to hope for? Finding a more humane way to kill myself?”

  “Hope is the foundation for all we do,” he said. “Your life can be different than your father’s if you choose to make it so. You don’t have to share his fate.”

  Since that conversation with Father Romano, I had done my best to maintain hope that I would be a success. I had accomplished a lot in my career, but now I was feeling the same way again. I was losing hope.

  I was scheduled to call Benny in less than one hour. Before I called him, I wanted to prepare. I had a number of questions I wanted to ask. I had reviewed his bank’s Web site and profitability statements. While successful, it appeared that the succ
ess had come in spite of a radical approach to doing business. I had already drawn the conclusion that the way Benny conducted business was years behind Philly. But how he ran his bank was not my biggest concern.

  My biggest concern was Benny the man. He was old and did things in a different way. I imagined he had the same stubbornness and adherence to sticking to the “old ways” that I had always scorned. I had thought about the past and tried to understand how I could work with someone in a new venture that might remind me of my father. What had given me hope earlier in the day, the idea of working in a new environment, now seemed like only a dream or a wish—not something that could be realized. I put down the note pad full of questions about his business practices and thought again about the reason I had visited Father Romano.

  Death was a part of life I had never found a successful way to cope with. My only surviving grandmother had passed away six years earlier. I struggled with her death more than I allowed others to see. While she had lived to be over eighty, her death still frightened me. Now I was dealing with an unexpected death. Unlike my grandmother’s, my father’s death wasn’t at the end of a long life.

  It was sudden.

  My mother called me at Tina’s apartment late one night and told me my father had not come home. He was known to drink at a local bar, O’Malley’s Saloon, but the bartender always made sure he had a cab ride home. It was a routine—something we all accepted. That night, he had slipped out of the bar, and according to the bartender, was sober. The bartender said he left before nine o’clock, but now he was nowhere to be found. My mother was worried—so was I, but I wasn’t going to show it.

  “Okay, I’ll be right there,” I said. “He probably got into an argument at O’Malley’s and went to another bar. I’ll find him.”

  We got dressed and drove to my parent’s home. “What do you think has happened?” Tina asked as we drove through the narrow streets.

  “I don’t know,” I said, not wanting to show any extraordinary concern. “That’s my father—always making sure he gets everyone’s attention.”

  “I hope nothing has happened,” Tina said.

  “Maybe he went to one of his girlfriends’ and passed out,” I said, actually hoping that was the case.

  “How is your father doing?” she asked. “I haven’t heard you say anything about him for weeks.”

  “The last time I went home he jumped me—he said I was heartless,” I said. “He doesn’t understand why I wanted to go to college and be a banker. He doesn’t understand because he doesn’t know any better. Poor guy, he can’t admit he’s jealous.”

  “Your father never seemed like the jealous type,” Tina said. “I wish you two could get along.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” I said, as we pulled into the narrow driveway. “That’s his choice, not mine.”

  As we stepped inside, my mother said she had not heard anything from him. It was almost 1:00 A.M.

  “Have you checked the garage?” I asked.

  “No—but I haven’t seen a light on all evening,” she said. My parent’s home had a detached garage. It had a workshop that he seldom used, except to sneak a drink of whiskey. My mother would not allow alcohol in the house, so my father used the garage as his getaway.

  Looking out the kitchen window, I saw no lights in the garage. The door was closed, but I went to check it anyway.

  “I’ll just go take a look,” I said. I wanted my mother to believe that my father would return home, but I knew better. Something terrible had happened—I could feel it. But I had to convey some hope for my mother.

  “Okay Jack, I’ll make some coffee,” she said. She knew what I was doing.

  “Mrs. Oliver, I’ll do it—why don’t you sit down and rest,” Tina said.

  “Thank you Tina, but I can’t sit down right now—it helps to keep busy.” Looking at me, she asked, “Do you think we should call the police?”

  “You know what they’d say,” I said. “I’ll go out looking through the neighborhood in a few minutes.”

  As I stepped off the back porch, I remembered the many times I had jumped off of it when I was a kid, my vault carrying me over the bottom two steps, into the yard to shoot basketball. The old man had fashioned a backboard and rusty rim on the side of the garage. It was still there. My mother did not like the way the grass died on our backyard court, making the yard a dust bowl in the summer, but she tolerated it. Shooting basketball with me, while rare, was one of the few times my father interacted with me while I was a kid.

  I opened the garage door and stepped inside, reaching for the light switch. I flipped the fluorescent lights on. After blinking quickly, they beamed light into the cramped and cluttered garage. I did not see any signs of my father. I walked around and everything looked normal. As I turned to walk out, I looked at the workbench, where my father kept his liquor in the overhead cabinets. I was getting ready to open the cabinet to check out his supply, when I noticed something different. On the top of the bench was an envelope. As I stepped closer, I saw the envelope had my mother’s name written on it. It was my father’s handwriting. I picked the envelope up and saw that it was sealed.

  While it was addressed to my mother, I did not hesitate a second before opening it, my heart pounding faster, not knowing what to expect. He was capable of just about anything. For all I knew this could be a good-bye note telling my mother he had run off with another woman. He had a history of indiscretions. Or maybe he was finally following through on his fantasy getaway to Alaska. That was unlikely.

  But as I unfolded the lined 8 1/2 by 11 sheet of paper, I thought of another option for a getaway he had discussed. There was a family tradition to be upheld. Unlike his father and his father before him, my father said if he wanted to end it all, it would not be with a gun. He would be different.

  I turned the light on over the workbench and read his message to my mother:

  Dearest Carolyn,

  I’m sorry I have never been the husband you deserved. My life has been a waste. I was selfish. You and Jackson have suffered too long. I can’t seem to let go of the past. I can’t change. I’m lost. No hope. Forgive me.

  I only have one option. I love you forever.

  Your Loving Husband

  I rushed out of the garage, across the yard and into the kitchen thinking about what was I going to say. I knew which getaway option my father had chosen. My mother stepped into the kitchen as I was getting ready to pick up the phone.

  “Would you do me a favor and turn on the television to see if the Phillies won?” I asked my mother, hoping she would go into the living room so I could call the police without her hearing the conversation.

  “Are you all right, Jack?” she asked.

  “I need to make a private phone call,” I said. My mother looked shaken. “Tina, would you and mother step out for just a minute?”

  “What are you holding in your hand, Jack?” my mother asked, looking at my father’s note I clutched in my left hand.

  “Let me use the phone,” I demanded. “Both of you please go into the living room, and I’ll be right with you.”

  They left the kitchen, and I heard Tina turn on the television—both of them knew something had happened. I picked up the phone from the wall mount and dialed the police number on the adhesive strip on the phone’s handle. The strip had been on the phone as long as I could remember, along with all of the other emergency numbers. This was the first time anyone had used any of the numbers. A lady at the police department answered the phone. I told her what I had found and my suspicions. She said they would assign a car immediately to check out the area around the Ben Franklin Bridge. Even at this time of the night, driving across town from southwest Philly would take twenty minutes, so a police car dispatched in the area would be on the scene immediately. At least I hoped so.

  I walked quickly into the living room. My mother was sitting motionless with her hands folded in her lap with Tina beside her. “I’m going out to look for him,” I said. �
��I won’t be gone long.”

  “Do you know where he is?” my mother asked as I opened the front door.

  “I think so,” I said. “I’ll be right back—I promise. Tina will stay here with you.” Tina nodded and put her arm around my mother.

  I jumped into the Volkswagen and drove as fast as I could to the Ben Franklin Bridge. It was early fall—a mist from the river was rising, making the bridge less conspicuous as I closed in. I parked on the side of the road and climbed over the barrier to the walkway. I saw no one in the light fog. I started running down the walkway hoping I would see him.

  At the third light on the bridge I stopped abruptly. I leaned over the railing and aimed my flashlight toward the river. The fog made it difficult to see anything other than the swirling mist in front of the light. I aimed the beam of light to the left toward one of the bridge’s massive concrete supports. I thought I saw something so I ran closer and leaned over, beaming the light downward. I could not believe what I was seeing. Lying against the concrete base jutting out from the bridge was my father—his body twisted from the impact. I shouted out “Dad!”—something I never called him before—but there was no response.

  Just then I saw a police car making its way across the bridge. I waved my light at the police car. They saw me. I showed the policeman where he was and passed him the note. The moment did not seem real.

  I stayed at the bridge with one of the officers while they sent a patrol boat to the base of the bridge to retrieve his body.

  As I drove to Jefferson Hospital behind the police cruiser, the reality of this nightmare began to emerge. I had yet to call my mother and Tina—I did not want to tell them over the phone. Before I called them I had to identify my father.

  The police officer stepped into the waiting area and asked me to follow him. We walked through a maze of corridors until we entered the morgue. We walked into a room with four corpses covered in white sheets, lying on metal tables. The officer directed me to the fourth body. I did not know how I would react. He pulled back the thin white sheet from the face. It was my father. I could not look for more than a second. I looked up at the officer and said, “It’s him.”