The Beginning

by Ed Nelson

  “We have a shower at home and I have to get my hair wet every time I use the shower.”

  “I bet your Mother tells you, you will catch your death going out with wet hair!”

  “How did you know that?”

  “It is what my Mother told me.”

  “It must be in the Mothers handbook.”

  “Remember when I was a kid, antibiotics weren’t available. You could die from a cold.”

  “Wow, that’s hard to think of.”

  “How long ago did you get your Polio shot?”

  “I got the Salk shot in the fifth grade like everyone else. Then I took the Sabin sugar cube in the sixth.”

  “Medicine has come a long way in the last few years. So don’t make fun of your Mother!”

  “Yes Sir, now I better hurry, or I will be late for class.”

  School was kind of strange that day. Some kids were all over me, wanting to talk and hang around me. Others would turn their heads when I came into the class room.

  At lunch I saw Tom and Bill sitting at our usual table. When I sat down they both got funny looks on their faces.

  “What,” I asked, “Do I have a booger hanging?”

  Tom spoke without raising his head, “My parents say you are too wild and I can’t do things with you anymore.”

  I looked at Bill, he just nodded his head and said, “Me too.”

  “Can I sit here?”

  Tom replied, “I am supposed to leave when you show up.” At that he and Bill took their trays and moved to another table.

  I was in shock, I just ate my lunch and left. To this day I have no idea what I ate.

  The other side of this coin showed up in my last study hall. One of the guys who we called a juvenile delinquent, Tom Hamilton said, “Hey Killer, do you want to go riding around with our group after the football game?”

  “No Tom I have other plans, thanks anyway.”

  “Anytime, we could use a tough guy like you when we go to Urbana.”

  Urbana was the next town south of us, and there was a rivalry between the two towns at every level. This extended from the sports teams to the gangs.

  We knew Tom and his friends were juvenile delinquents because they wore leather motorcycle jackets, and wore their hair greased back in a DA, which stood for Ducks Ass, but we couldn’t say that.

  They also smoked across the street from the school. They bragged they drank beer. The beer was three point two percent alcohol by weight. You could get drunk, but you had to drink a lot.

  I didn’t want to be like them. I thought it was neat to wear a black cowboy hat, but not a black motorcycle cap with a short bill. I was happy to get home to my family that night.

  My Dad asked the usual, “How did school go today?”

  I almost gave the ritual, “Fine.”

  Instead I said, “Not so good.”

  “Why?”

  I then explained how the good kids couldn’t associate with me, and the bad ones wanted me to go with them. Mum about went through the roof when I told her I had been called, “Killer.”

  Dad told me, “Rick this is one of those things that time will have to take care of.”

  “How?”

  “When you don’t get in trouble things will calm down and people’s attitude will change. Think about it, we know you are a good kid, but Tom and Bill’s parents haven’t known you for years. All they know is what they read in the paper.

  You don’t come across as running from trouble when it comes at you. As a matter of fact those poor rustlers were minding their own business doing what rustlers do until you jumped in. Now, how would you feel if you were a parent?”

  “It’s not fair.”

  “What has that got to do with anything?”

  That stopped me cold. I could almost hear machine gun bullets rattling off the door of that ship. Life wasn’t fair. I would do well to remember that and learn to live with it.

  “You’re right, I will try not to get into trouble, that will bore the bad guys and maybe the good guys will be allowed to be near me.”

  “Sorry son. That is the way it has to be. I could knock on their door and talk to them, but it wouldn’t change anything.”

  I had a lot to think of before I fell asleep that night. Doing exciting things appeared to have some cost to them.

  Chapter 18

  Once I fell asleep it was sound and I was awake at my usual time. I cleaned up after doing my run and exercises. I was at the school front door five minutes early, but Coach Stone pulled up as I got there.

  It was only a fifteen minute drive to the Country Club. Once there we went into the Pro Shop, that’s what the sign said. Coach had me hold various clubs and finally settled on a set for me to rent for the day.

  He paid the seventy five cents for me. From there we went to the driving range. He handed me a tee and showed me how to tee up in the tee box. Thank you Mum for explaining the difference between tea and tee. I would have been so mortified I never could have come back.

  Coach took me through what he called the mechanics of the swing. He explained I didn’t have to get under the ball. That was why the club face was slanted. He explained how a swing must be repetitive and smooth.

  He showed me how power was achieved by rotating the hips into the swing as the arms came down and turning the wrist through the swing. He explained how follow through was important.

  He had me do several practice swings without a ball. Next he showed me how to tee one the proper height. Then he told me to take a swing without thinking of all the things he just told me.

  Of course I thought about them as I slowly did my backswing. When I started moving forward it happened too quick to think about. The ball went straight but it just barely made it past the two hundred yard sign. I would have to really work to get it out to the three hundred yard sign.

  Coach just said, “Do it again.”

  I must have hit twenty balls, they all cleared two hundred yards but none of them made three hundred. I figured Coach was going to tell me I had no future in golf. I turned around and realized that there were over a dozen adults standing there.

  I asked Coach, “Do you think I might be able to make the team?”

  For some reason everyone started laughing.

  One guy said, “The question is kid, when are you going to turn pro?”

  That’s when I realized I must have found my sport.

  Coach Stone let me know in no uncertain terms the fact I could drive was wonderful. However, I needed to take to heart an old pro golf saying. You drive for show, you putt for dough.

  We went over to the practice green and he gave me a demonstration of how the slightest hill or depression in the green could change the path of the ball. He called it “reading the green”. It was a combination of visualizing the path of the ball, and what speed was needed to follow that path.

  Putting was harder than driving. As soon as my ball was fifteen feet or more from the hole I would miss some. Coach didn’t get on me about it so I guess it wasn’t a total disaster.

  Finally Coach slowly said, “I have seen enough, let’s now play a round and see how you do.”

  The club pro joined us. They both worked with me on what club to use and why. The course had a par of seventy two. Mr. Collins the club pro had a seventy six, Coach a seventy seven and I had an eighty two. My problem was that the ball would fly over the green on par threes. I had to keep using higher number irons.

  By this time I understood that I was doing pretty well for a first time golfer.

  When I expressed this to Coach he replied, “More than pretty well, your timing is perfect. That is probably why you did so well bull riding.”

  Coach continued, “There are many things you don’t know about the game, like the rules for one. Are you interested in going out for the team?”

  “Yes I am.”

  “Good because our fourth man is moving, his dad has taken a job in Lima at the tank factory. We will have to get you some accelerated
lessons. State rules are that I can only work with students for so many hours during the season.”

  “Can Mr. Collins work with me?”

  “Yes he can, but he is a Golf Professional, that means he gets paid for teaching.”

  “Mr. Collins how much do you charge?”

  “It would be five dollars a lesson. I can give you two lessons a week for the next six weeks so that would be sixty dollars plus forty dollars for a good set of clubs along with a bag and another ten dollars for shoes and balls. That is a lot of money for someone your age. Can your parents afford it? ”

  “They can, but I will be paying for my own lessons. Do you want the money for the lessons all at once?”

  “In advance each month will do.”

  I gave him twenty dollars for the rest of September.

  “Since you are joining in the middle of the season Coach Stone will tell me what I should teach each week.”

  We agreed on lessons back to back on Sunday morning starting at seven o’clock. This would fit in with Mr. Collins other weekend appointments. If the weather was too bad and we couldn’t use the outside we would go over the rules and things like golf etiquette. It seems golfers were very polite. I shook hands with Mr. Collins.

  Coach was kind enough to drop me off at my house. He asked if Dad was at home. He had just got there. He and Dad had a private conversation, I don’t know what was said but Dad really encouraged me to play golf from then on. He even volunteered to drive me to the golf course when he could.

  After lunch, Denny and Eddie kept their squabbling down to a dull roar and Mary only spilled her Kool-Aid once, Dad and I went to our old house on Detroit Street.

  Twyla was outside so Dad talked to her for a while. She was ten years older than me and was newly married. She and Mum had become good friends while they lived next door. I think Mum helped her understand and put up with her husband who could be demanding and unthoughtful.

  I knew this because on summer nights with all the windows open you could hear her explain this to him. The neighbor’s three houses down probably heard it all.

  He drove in the drag races and that was all he talked about. Anyway after Dad made nice for a while we opened the old house up. After living there for years it really seemed strange. It also felt lonely sitting empty.

  I had never noticed how beat up the walls were. The house had been built in 1890 so it had age. Every wall had been papered. When seeing it empty you could see every smudge and smear. One thing I noticed was that in several rooms in the corners the paper was torn.

  I realized that the paper didn’t fit squarely with each corner. It made a curve around the corner. Not much, but someone had taken their finger and broke the paper at the curve. Hey, what else do you have to do while you are spending time standing in the corner?

  Dad had the grace not to point this out to me. He did observe that all the paper would have to be replaced. We would have to steam the old paper off and then repaper the room. We went through every room in the house. The rooms were all smaller than I remembered. It was amazing that we all fit in that house.

  The biggest expense was going to be taking the old coal fired furnace out and replacing it with a new gas furnace. Also, the bathroom tub would have to be taken out, as the floor under it was showing signs of rot. I asked Dad if he planned to put a shower in the new bathroom.

  “I haven’t given it a thought, why?”

  “If you do, could we have the plumber install the shower head coming out of the side of the wall instead of the ceiling?”

  He asked me why I wanted that. I explained how nice the shower was but that I had to get my hair wet every time. Dad smiled and said, “My mom would always say I would catch my death.”

  He wondered why I laughed so much at that.

  He made notes and assigned me the chore of mowing the yard and neaten things up after my golf lesson on Sunday.

  Sunday was another quiet day at our house. Dad drove me out for my first golf lessons. The lessons went well. I practiced “chipping, plus pitching and running.”

  After this Mr. Collins took me into the pro shop and helped “fit me” for a set of clubs. He told me this was my starter set and that I would probably own many sets of clubs in my playing days. Fitting was making certain that the clubs were the right length for my reach.

  I ended up with a set of Wilson woods and irons. It didn’t include a sand wedge so I bought a McGregor. These along with the shoes, balls, and tees came to ninety dollars.

  The pair of shoes felt really comfortable though it sounded and felt weird to walk around with the metal spikes hitting the floor. He told me never to wear them anywhere other than golfing or in the clubhouse.

  Even I could figure out Mum would kill me if I tore up the carpeting. The new house had wall to wall carpets and she loved them. I liked them because, they were soft and that I wouldn’t have to take them out in the spring, wrestle them over the clothes line and beat the dust out of them.

  He gave me a tour of the clubhouse and the locker room. He showed me a locker I could use and loaned me a combination lock so I wouldn’t have to haul my equipment back and forth.

  This was standard procedure for the school golf team he explained. I asked how one joined the country club. He explained that you had to have a sponsor, voted on at a members meeting, pay a two hundred dollar initiation fee and fifty dollars a year dues.

  I said, “Wow, you have to have a lot of money to play golf!”

  “Money helps but you have to be known in the community to get voted in. They are a little snobbish. Since you will probably be on the golf team you will have a standing invitation to events. They have a monthly dance and the dining room is the best in Bellefontaine.”

  “As long as I don’t have to pay for it,” I remarked.

  “Oh no it is free, as long as you are on the team, and only in season.”

  After that Mr. Collins took me home.

  I had done all my school reading ahead so I just had to mow the lawn on Detroit Street and I was done for the day. I towed the push mower behind my bike to Detroit Street to do the yard. It was easy going downhill and a lot of work coming back up.

  I spent the rest of the afternoon outside as the weather was still holding. I was reading one of the classics I had inherited from my Aunt Merle. I thought going to prison and ending up a galley slave was harsh for stealing a loaf of bread.

  I was early to bed as the next week would start early on Monday. I wondered if anyone would speak to me at school.

  Chapter 19

  Monday started out clear, but it looked like it might rain later. I was able to do my exercises and get in my run. I wondered how much longer I could do this. It was still September and I should be able to run till Thanksgiving. That did make me think, how was I to practice golf all winter? I needed to talk to Mr. Collins about what could be done.

  Again when I started out to school no one was there. I didn’t even see Eleanor. The best description of Monday is that I just went through the motions. At lunch I didn’t want to cause problems or embarrassment, so I sat at a table by myself. Even the delinquent’s left me alone.

  On the previous Friday we had several exams. They were returned in class. I had straight A’s going, so something was working right. It was like I was invisible, last week everyone wanted to know me, now no one would speak to me.

  They weren’t rude, they would say excuse me or thank you if I did something for them but it was like I didn’t exist. I was glad when school let out.

  I boarded a school bus with the other members of the golf team. There were four of them, John Scott a senior, Gary Matthews a junior, Tim Green a junior and Phil Thompson a sophomore. Phil was the boy that was moving. He was the fourth man. That was a polite way of saying he was the fourth best golfer on the team.

  The guys asked what my handicap was. I told them I had no idea since I had only played one round in my life. I explained that I had an eighty two last Sunday at the country club playin
g with Coach Stone and Mr. Collins.

  Phil actually was the one that got excited, “I am doing good to shoot a ninety two out there. You will really help the team.”

  Coach Stone was already at the club, we spent the day practicing our putting.

  Later at dinner I told my parents of my day’s experience. They had no answers other than to be patient. I did tell them that the guys on the golf team treated me well.

  I started reading a new book that evening, it was some old guy talking about shadows on the wall and trying to decide, “What is truth.”

  Actually it was pretty interesting.

  Tuesday was more of the same. Golf practice was more putting. I got the impression that Coach thought this was the most important part of the game.

  Tuesday evening was better. Mr. Weaver stopped by the house to drop off a new story he had written. It was about how our family had changed and reacted to my summer vacation. He also wrote about the high school assembly where I explained that I wasn’t a hero, it was people like Bill Samson who landed on Omaha Beach who were the real heroes.

  He was funny when describing my singing experience. My down to earth interaction with people like Elvis and John Wayne impressed him, by the fact that I didn’t let it go to my head. Capturing the rustlers was what any red blooded American boy would do if he didn’t realize the inherent dangers.

  My family having the cook outs to answer all the questions impressed him to no end. He even described Mary answering the phone. About the only thing left out was Mum’s broom. I wonder why?

  He presented us as an ordinary family thrown into some extraordinary events. Reading his logical presentation of events, I and my family hadn’t any choice in how we reacted. Needless to say we all liked the story, and told him that we would confirm everything he had written if asked.

  He could have left out the part where none of the girls rushed the stage to date a rock and roll star.

  Mr. Weaver then told us it was going to run in the Examiner on Thursday, they would build it up in Wednesday’s edition, to try to increase Thursday’s circulation. Thursday was the day all the weekend ad’s appeared. They were paid for ads on a sliding scale. The more papers they sold the more they were paid.