Southern Ohio (pronounced O Hi' Yuh) was, when I was ten years old, a primal place, almost magical in its appeal to young boys. This was a land where indoor plumbing was mostly found in the heart of small towns, not in the homes. Every interesting event happened outside in the natural setting of the south. Fishing was a national pastime here, and hunting a fact of existence. Most of all, shoes were optional, usually reserved for church or school. On this day, I found myself seated in a little overstuffed trailer, near a pretty woman holding an infant.
Grandpa had brought me there, I know now, to sing for his friends. He had the most wonderful way of manipulating me. He would strike up a conversation with someone knowing full well that I couldn�t keep from putting my opinion onto the table. I didn�t then, and still don�t like to be ignored. After all, I was a visitor here, and by right, everyone should be focusing on me. I always thought that they should be trying to pry speech from my lips instead of having to interject with my opinion just to be noticed. This conversation was no different, but I had it all worked out in my head. If grandpa asked about the baby, I would ask for permission to hold him. That was sure to get me noticed. On those rare occasions when I was allowed to hold a small child, the child�s mother was sure to be completely focused on my every action.
Grandpa took a second to light one of the Raleigh filter cigarettes that he and grandma had always smoked. When the smoke began to drift up through the air and join the ages of tarnish on the yellow ceiling, he made his move. �Jamie, aren�t you the one who collects all of those Kenny Rogers albums?� I caught him grinning, but he wasn�t actually looking at me, so I suspected nothing.
She smiled. �I have every one of his records Gene. You know that.�
�I love Kenny Rogers! I know two of his songs by heart.� I blurted. I knew, from experience, that I was not timing my entrance to the conversation right. Those types of outbursts were most often greeted with silence back home, among my parent�s friends, in Toledo. This was southern Ohio, though, and the rules about children speaking were different among these people. Added to fact that my grandfather was subtly manipulating me, I was about to get all of the attention I wanted. All that and more�
Jamie favored me with a smile. �Sing one for me Gimbo.� She leaned down right toward me, and smiled so genuinely that I stumbled for something to say. She looked directly into my eyes, and I was captured. They were dark and almond shaped eyes. The type of eyes that, to this day, can bind me to a will that is not my own. Fire flooded the skin of my face, and colored it red, I�m sure, to match it�s heat. Anxiety and embarrassment prevented me from matching her gaze, and pushed my eyes downward. Down over teeth that were the color of pure snow. Down past waves of dark hair spilling onto her shoulders. Down all the way to the silent child resting in her arms. I would have agreed to anything in that moment. Comfort only again achievable through granting her simple request. Silence dragged until she again spoke. �Do you want to sing with the record? I can put it on.�
�No. I told you I know this one by heart. Do you want to hear The Gambler?�
�Whatever you want to sing Gimbo. I�m ready.� She winked one of her dark brown eyes at me.
�Just give me a second to get ready.� I needed the extra time. Looking at her, I�d forgotten the words, but I found them quickly enough.
�On a warm summer�s evenin��
On a train bound for nowhere�
I met up with the gambler�
We were both too tired for sleep��
I began to sing, slowly and softly just as the song demanded, and it took hold of me, as singing always does. I don�t know if the room faded from my view, or if I closed my eyes, but at that moment I was truly nowhere on this earth. Floating in an empty void, with only my voice for company. I was marginally aware that my hand was cupped behind my ear so that I could hear my own voice clearly. The voice of the master, Kenny Rogers joined me, and warmed me. Singing the song to me just as I sang it to them, but staggered, so that I could hear exactly how each note was supposed to sound, and match my song to the task. Phrase by phrase, he fed my lips the words. Pausing at the end of each set of words, and patiently waiting for me to repeat them. I concentrated fully on the stresses and pitches, the tones and volumes, under the tutelage of my instructor.
(You got to know when to hold em��)
�You got to know when to hold em��
(Know when to fold em�)
Know when to fold em��
(Know when to walk away�)
Know when to walk away�
(And know when to run�)
And know when to run��
I lost myself in the words. My voice, a high pre-puberty tenor that has since dropped into a formidably average baritone, resonated in my mind. It felt wonderful and alive. In that moment, with no music, and with no other sound, I was a singer, crooning to his fans. Even the famous Kenny Rogers' voice took on a note of approval. (Can a disembodied voice smile? Because I think I heard this one do exactly that.)
I finished, and let the song die out, still swaying a little in time to the music. There�s something in applause that makes it sound different from clapping. People applaud by accident. They plan to clap, and you can hear that if you try. Clapping praises a worthy effort. Applause signals perfection. I could also hear that there are three sets of hands applauding, and, of course, mine wasn�t one of them. I was confused as the room came back into focus. I looked around the room, and as I expected Jamie's hands are striking one another, the baby nestled snugly in her lap. Grandpa was also applauding, but to my dismay, he was not looking at me. I followed his line of sight across the room to the dingy trailer's open door, and beheld him for the first time.
While singing my song, I hadn�t noticed that my audience had grown by one. He�d clapped as hard as everyone else had when I finished singing. His long blond hair, which was pulled back from his face, spilled down the back of his black T-shirt, and was held there by a black ball cap bearing the logo of a whiskey maker.
�Hello Bill. How are you doing.� A simple greeting I�d heard my grandfather say a hundred times, but I�d never heard that tone from him before. Icy and acidic, his voice sounded like a rust hole on a truck.
In gratitude for the applause, (It seems a petty reason to me now.) I was willing to give Bill the benefit of the doubt, but grandpa�s judgement was seldom wrong, and I was wary.
Looking at him, there seemed to be something unpleasant lingering just beneath the surface. Menacing and predatory, he felt wild like a tiger behind bars at the zoo, agitated because he can do nothing but pace� back� and forth... He smelled dirty. His stale sweat and cheap beer odor assaulted my nostrils. I watched Bill as he realized that he was clapping, and put a hasty end to it, hands clenched into fists. With a sniff he dismissed my grandfather and stalked through the cluttered room. He gracefully avoided a grocery bag stuffed with newspapers as he passed by Jamie. His air dismissive, like a house cat ignoring a mouse. Then he did something so quick, that everyone in the room flinched. His hands shot out and snatched the baby from Jamie�s embrace. One breath later, he was sitting directly across from me in the narrow but stretched room. Somewhere, early in this activity, his words drifted to my ears, full of spite. �Give me my son.� I was alarmed by the casual way those words rolled from his mouth. Compliance was expected, not requested in that voice.
�How are your Reds doing Gene?� he paid little attention to the child in his hands (and committed the simple crime of regarding my grandpa as an equal).
�They�ve got a chance Bill. They aren�t out of the pennant race yet.� The baby began to cry as grandpa stood. �Jamie, I�m gonna take Glenn home and settle in for the evening. 'You need anything before I go?� The acid was gone from my grandfather�s voice, but not to my relief. A coiled viper, asking for permission to strike replaced it.
Crying became wailing, and my attention was called across the room to the dangerous man holding his child. Bill had taken the child and turned him upside down. His tiny and tender head was a strange rose color and growing more so with every moment. Wailing roared through the room. Bill had an odd look on his face. Intent and questioning, I can only describe it, by what I�ve seen later in life, a bully twisting the arm of a smaller child simply to hear which sound will emerge.
�Bill, let me hold him.� There was a tone of pleading in Jamie�s voice. �He�s scared.� That last was almost a whisper.
Bill didn�t even look at her. His eyes remained locked on the baby�s face. �You got dishes to do woman. He�s fine. I�m just funnin� with him a little.�
She turned from him in complete obedience, and walked toward me, her eyes leaking in two solid streams. She saw me looking at her and blushed. Her face almost matched the color of her child�s. Silence stretched and tried to take hold of the room. The Baby�s head was very red now, but curiously, he�d stopped crying.
�Bill. Give her the child.� My grandfather�s voice was a flat monotone but he was on his feet his stance threatening, from the left side of the coffee table, to the smaller man. At that moment, he ceased to be my grandfather. He became, instead, a general giving orders to a recruit, and a viper unleashed all at once. I understood my fear of Bill. It was natural. But if I truly feared the caged tiger torturing his cub, the viper, who was my grandfather terrified me. I wanted to cry with Jamie. I wanted to stop it all. To do anything I could to avert the approaching conflict. All I could think to do was sing.
(Life's events are, almost entirely, strings of coincidence. We only really remember the, often strange, way they link together when the result is either very happy, or very stressful.) I�d heard for years that old �Music calms the Savage beast� clich�. It was the wrong thing to do because I only knew two songs by heart. I loved both of them, and sang them many times over, but I�d already sung one that day.
�Everyone considered him, the coward of the county�� I managed to squeak this out of my throat. My audience's reaction was as immediate as it was varied.
Jamie laughed through the tears a bubbling, accidental laugh that slipped past her lips. My Grandfather laughed, but not the goodhearted warm laugh that I knew to be his. This was a harsh and cruel laugh, which lent an air of insult to my pathetic lyrics. Bill didn�t. His eyes narrowed, and focused on me for the first time that I noticed. I shook, but I wasn�t cold. I gripped my arms tight, but I couldn�t stop. My bladder became a lead weight below, throbbing and painfully hot.
(Everyone says that time slows when extreme events happen. I can tell you that this is definitely the truth. I see this event from time to time, when I close my eyes, and it always takes an eternity to unfold.) He raised the baby above his head with both hands. His son�s body knocked the hat from his head, spilling blond hair over his eyes. His wiry biceps flexed into perfect balls of muscle and his hands snapped forward. He threw his son at me across the room! Oh my god� he threw the baby! My mind screamed. In the back of my mind, I noticed the intense burning of my bladder emptying.
The Baby�s arms floated out uselessly to his sides, and backward with his motion. He toppled end over end once and faced me. Are all infants� eyes really blue? These eyes were the color of the sky at noon. A pale ice blue, but also bloodshot and as wide as little saucers. I covered my face with my arms, bracing for the impact I knew was to come, but I couldn�t stop watching. His little face grew in my vision until it blocked the whole room from sight. Suddenly the child changed direction, and as I flinched, I saw Jamie for the first time since her dismissal. She caught the boy and fled outside with him. Not bothering to open the screen door, just shouldering through it. I ran after her, determined to protect the woman and her child if it cost me everything.
Both men remained in the trailer for a long time. Jamie and I stood behind a big tree some 50 yards from the trailer door. She never took her eyes from it. Neither did I. I�d placed myself resolutely between the trailer door and her, legs wet, the evening winds chilling me already.
�Jamie, I�m sorry.�
�Just be quiet Gimbo. I need to think� Neither of us looked at the other.
We stood silently together, the three of us, waiting and watching for the brown trailer�s door to open. Silently, I wept in apology for causing all of the evening�s events. Couldn�t I have just kept my mouth shut this once? I berated myself, wordlessly, all the while hoping that it would be my grandfather that emerged from the slim door. I was chilled, yet sweat formed, beaded and rolled off of my forehead, soaking my brow. Occasionally a drop of it would flood one of my eyes with stinging pain, forcing me to blink uncontrollably, and wipe furiously at the affected area with my trembling hand.
A long time passed, before a shadow formed in the doorway, obscured by twilight. Jamie took a hesitant step backward, poised for flight even as I was ready to fight (however ineffective it would have been). When at last the shadow became my grandfather, I collapsed inside. Relief flooding me, a sigh exploded past my lips.
�Glenn, get in the truck.� His voice, though soft, still held the tone of command. I was only too happy to comply. Finally we were going to escape all this madness.
Grandpa stayed behind to speak alone with Jamie. I watched from the sprawling truck windshield as they embraced briefly, and then grandpa came to take me from that place�
We began the long drive in silence. I studied the surrounding countryside with disdain. I hated this place, this sprawling farmland with its twisting country roads. Later, back home, I�d call this land �Outhouse Country.� It was a cruel and uncaring generalization, but one that I treasured. I held the inhabitants of this place in even lower regard for a long time. Calling them �The Barefoot People,� I searched long and hard for jokes to tell about southerners. I looked at it one final time and rejected that place, with all of its cruelty and reality.
�I�m never gonna� sing for nobody again Grandpa.� I meant every word of that oath.
He looked at me briefly, but said nothing in that moment. Instead, he lit another of the comforting Raleigh Filter cigarettes, and took a long drag. His hands trembled, and I knew in that moment that he was still the man that I'd loved and respected before this day's events. The viper was gone, thankfully, from his manner.
�Gimbo, you�ll do what you feel is best, I�m sure. You�re a smart boy, but take a little advice from an old man. OK?� I loved him even more because he wasn�t talking down to me. �Your cousins can�t do what you can. They can�t sing the way you do. It�s your gift.� He threw the smoked butt out of his window, and lit another with the truck lighter. �It�s your gift, not theirs, so don�t you give it to them. Use it your way, but don�t give it to a drunk fool, and his foolish woman.�
I think back to the time I spent in �Outhouse Country� with �The Barefoot People� from time to time. The memories are fonder now, but still tinged with that anxiety. When I think of my grandfather though, even today, he�s driving down that twisty country road in his ghostly old Ford pickup, smoking his favorite cigarettes, and listening to the Cincinnati Reds play baseball on the radio. And he�s always wearing shoes�
-Glenn E. Petersen
November 1999