I’ll never rake again without thinking of my old man

A couple weeks ago I wrote a column about parenting. In it, I mentioned my old man. The comment was peripheral, at best, to the point of the essay. I barely gave it a thought.

I’ve thought about it a lot in the past few days, though. It turns out that column was the last thing — of mine, at least — my dad would ever read. He died a few days later. Something like a stroke, sudden, unexpected.

In that column, I wrote the following: I love my old man, but as a child, I feared him, too. He put up with exactly zero BS from myself, my brothers and my sisters. I often thought he was unfair and sometimes he was. 

But with him, I knew where I stood. I had my part to play in the family and he had his. If I was bored, he didn’t rush to the psychologist’s office to see what he, as a parent, was doing wrong. He handed me a rake and put me to work in the back yard until I wasn’t bored anymore.

He mentioned that column after it was published, when I went to see him in the hospital. By then he was moving in and out of consciousness and was thwacked out on morphine; I hung around the hospital room for hours, hoping he would wake long enough to speak with me.

Nobody looks good on a hospital bed, but my old man looked bad; gray, tired, used up. Shrunken, somehow. Tubes and wires snaked into him and out of him, to help him breathe, to monitor his vital signs, to deliver drugs.

His breath hitched in small, shallow gasps. His hand felt cold, frail, insubstantial, like the fluff of an August dandelion waiting to be carried away on any errant breeze.

A moan escaped his parched throat as he swam up toward consciousness.

“Sharon,” he said, calling for my mother in his semi-delirium, forgetting she died two years ago. His fragile hand constricted slightly around mine. His eyes remained closed.

“No dad,” I said. “It’s Mike.”

“Big Mike or little Mike?” he said. A joke. “Little Mike” is my 10-year-old nephew, my brother William’s son.

“Big Mike,” I said. “Glad to hear you’re feeling well enough to be a smartass.”

I knew his windows of awareness were by this time opening but briefly, so I quickly told him about the crowds of friends and relatives that had come round to see him as he slept, how the whole family had stopped by during the course of the afternoon. He either didn’t hear me or wasn’t interested.

“I read that column you wrote about me handing you a rake when you were bored as a kid,” he said. “Pretty funny. I wanted to share it with your mother, but … she’s gone, you know.”

“I know, Dad,” I said. His grip, already tenuous, weakened further. He was fighting to remain awake, losing the battle. Then for just a moment, his eyes cleared and he focused on my face.

“Get a rake,” he mumbled, smiling, drifting off. A few hours later he was gone.

“Get a rake” were the last words my old man spoke to me. Somehow, I like that better than “I love you” or “Goodbye, cruel world.” “Get a rake” is … I don’t know … more honest. It’s closer to summing up the often complicated relationship I had with my father.

I’m really going to miss him, especially when I’m bored. Or holding a rake.

Buy my book, "Looking at the Pint Half Full," at Robbins Book List in Greenville, or in eBook format at Amazon.com.

Coming soon: Mike’s Big Book of Parenting

My old man used to tell me that a writer is his own worst critic. That’s never been the case with me; other people are generally far more critical of my stuff than I am. 

Maybe it’s because I’m just not that fussy. I don’t aspire to be the next Thurber or Twain. All I want is to crank out my 600 words, collect my paycheck and grab a beer and cheeseburger in a pub where they keep the volume turned down on the TVs.

I live a simple life, I don’t aspire to wealth or greatness. Happiness, for me, is a small boat that doesn’t leak, a fishing pole and a warm afternoon. The boat and pole I have in the garage; I’m confident the warm afternoons are just a few months away.

But I digress. Frequently. The point is, THIS writer is not his own worst critic.

Every so often, though, I’ll write a column that — for one reason or another — I’m just not crazy about. Maybe it doesn’t strike me as funny, or as funny as I’d like it to be. Maybe it rambles too much and takes forever to get to the point (like this one!). Maybe I’m just thinking about how I’d rather be out in my boat drowning worms.

Whatever the reason, some columns I just don’t like. Last week’s was such a column. I wrote it, I filed it, I plan to charge for it, but for my part, I just didn’t like it much.

But you guys did. (It was the one about “modern” parenting techniques.) I received a ton of reader mail. Not a ton, a half ton. Quarter ton. OK, a dozen letters or so. For me, that’s a ton.

All those letters were extremely complimentary, which I love, because nobody likes hearing how much they stink, even me. Especially me.

Doug took a photo or a scan or something from the print edition and posted it online, then e-mailed the link to people in his address book. If I can get 600,000 more folks to do this, I can shoot a video of me writing my column “Gangnam Style” and be an overnight sensation. Maybe enough money will roll in that I can fish for a living.

Doug also suggested I run for president, in no small part because I seem like the kind of guy who would accept bribes most anyone could afford, thus putting the “little guy” on a political par with Big Oil at last.

My favorite letter was from Deborah, who suggested I write a book on parenting. I think she was serious. She even offered to help with the research and interviews.

As much as I appreciate the confidence Deborah has in me, the idea of ME writing a “how to” parenting book is, frankly, terrifying. I am MUCH better at pointing out flaws in the parenting techniques of others than I am at telling folks how to do it RIGHT. In other words, I’m great at griping, but not much for actually doing anything to make a situation better.

Besides, when I think of all the mistakes I made raising my own kids … oy! Me writing a book on parenting would be like Rush Limbaugh writing a book on how to be a good liberal.

If you need someone to put together a book on small boats, fishing and beer, I’m your man. But the idea of a generation of children raised on MY theories? Oooh … some ideas are just too horrifying to contemplate.

Dwayne also asked if he could repost the column, which for the record, is always just fine by me. I don’t know much about the legal ramifications of this, but I think my columns still belong to me after they’re published, and once they leave my email out-box, I don’t worry much about what happens to them. Just don’t Photoshop Lindsay Lohan’s body on them and post ‘em on porn sites.

Finally, Molly said she and her husband got a kick out of the column and are passing it along to their five kids, ages 7 to 18. All I can say is, “Don’t do it, Molly!” Those kids will grow up hating me for suggesting an occasional swat on the fanny isn’t going to do them any harm and might actually do them some good.

I already have more enemies than I need.

At any rate, thank you all for your letters and emails. They made me feel a little better about what I considered to be a moderately stinky column.

Mike’s book, “Looking at the Pint Half Full,” is available at Robbins Book List in Greenville. The Kindle version is available on Amazon.com.

mtaylor@staffordmediasolutions.com

(616) 548-8273

Sometimes life’s best lessons come with a rake

Why, yes, of course the world has gone crazy. The monkeys are in charge of the zoo. The center cannot hold. Will the last sane person out please turn off the lights?

Pick your metaphor.

The point is, much of modern life makes no sense at all. Common sense is no longer all that common. And nowhere is this truer than in the way in which we now bring up our kids.

For thousands of years, each generation of children was raised in much the same way as the generation which preceded it. Good behavior was rewarded, bad behavior was punished.

A parent’s job was to feed and clothe the child until such time as that child got a) a job, b) married, or c) drafted. An educator’s job was to make sure the child could a) read, b) write, and c) figger numbers.

Beyond that, the kid’s fate was in his or her own hands.

Then came Dr. Spock, self-esteem, organized pee-wee football, baseball, softball, professional piano lessons, soccer, karate, ballet, gymnastics, swimming, upscale preschools, upscale pre-preschools … the list goes on.

Good behavior was still rewarded. So was bad behavior. And mediocre behavior. And no behavior at all. Why? See Dr. Spock and self-esteem, above.

Parents were too busy driving junior to all these “fun” organized activities to actually do any parenting themselves. So teachers were asked to do that job in their stead, and to fit in the teaching thing whenever they had a few spare minutes.

It’s a great system, assuming you’re trying to churn out a generation of pathological narcissists devoid of any sense of personal responsibility. In his later years, Dr. Spock himself backtracked on many of his child-rearing theories, but, oops! By then, the damage was already done.

Too many people had been brought up worrying WAY too much about parenting issues that previous generations had never even considered. There are those, even now, who still contend modern child rearing techniques are vastly superior to those of their parents’ or grandparents’ day.

To which I say, really? Do your kids treat you with the same respect you showed your own parents?  If the answer is “yes,” I’m betting you raised them pretty much as your parents raised you and you’re wondering who this Dr. Spock person is that I keep mentioning.

I love my old man, but as a child, I feared him, too. He put up with exactly zero BS from myself, my brothers and my sisters. I often thought he was unfair and sometimes he was. 

But with him, I knew where I stood. I had my part to play in the family and he had his. If I was bored, he didn’t rush to the psychologist’s office to see what he, as a parent, was doing wrong. He handed me a rake and put me to work in the back yard until I wasn’t bored anymore.

If I was angry or upset, I was encouraged to say exactly what was on my mind, just as soon as I was out of earshot.

My old man didn’t feel an urgent need to make sure my every waking moment was filled with educational activities designed to bolster my self-esteem. Hence, I learned how to make friends, join pickup softball games, climb trees and figure out for myself how to enjoy life.

Why am I on this particular soapbox today? Well, I just read an article about a school in England that has banned the game of hide and seek.

Hide and seek promotes “secretive play,” administrators say. It sends “mixed messages,” they say. It exposes children to “dangerous situations.”

I only wish I was making this up.

My own son, many years ago, was sent home from third grade for breaking the playground rules. He and a friend were playing cowboys and Indians, using their pointed index fingers as six-shooters.

Such brutality, such mindless violence, I was informed, would not be tolerated on the playground.

It seemed crazy to me then and it seems crazy to me now. But then again, I was raised by a man who handed me a rake when I got bored. So what do I know.

Contact Mike at mtaylor325@gmail.com. 

My next book is going to fix everything. Or else.

Last summer, as some of you may remember, I checked myself into the emergency room. Four days later, I exited the hospital one gall bladder shy of what I went in with.

The hospital gave me some lovely parting gifts; hand lotion, a plastic bedpan to be used for regurgitative purposes, a bottle of Vicodin, and a bill for $25,000.

It was that last item that nearly put me right back in the hospital again. 

At the time, I had no health insurance. I do NOW, oh, you betcha. Now that I’m perfectly healthy and likely to remain that way for the next 20 years or so. But I didn’t then, and that’s what counts.

The folks from the hospital’s billing department were as nice as could be; they did everything imaginable to work out payment arrangements. But it soon became apparent, to both the billing department and me, that I just don’t have enough income left at the end of each month to make the minimum payments their bean counters require in a situation like this, for a bill of this magnitude.

The bill was referred to a collection agency. As many of you already know, these places are not typically staffed with the sort of folks one would invite to a summer barbecue. Not unless one were a mob boss who needed someone greased for squealing to the feds.

Collection agents take their job seriously and are willing to skirt right up to the very edge of what the law allows in order to rake in those bucks owed. If the law permitted the breaking of kneecaps, I’m pretty sure there are agents out there who wouldn’t hesitate to wield a Louisville Slugger in the requisite manner.

Fortunately (for me and my kneecaps) they’re not supposed to do this.

Now, before you get the idea I’m complaining about the hospital, collection agency, or any of their representatives, let me assure you: I am not. I received excellent care during my time of need and I owe that $25,000, fair and square. I wish with all my heart I had the money to pay it. I just don’t. 

I’m not proud of that fact (and my mother would turn over in her grave if she knew I was talking money in a public forum; it is, after all, terribly gauche), but this is simply the way things are for me right now, the reality within which I am obliged to live.

At any rate, one of these collection agents called the other day. My caller ID read “unknown”, which is cell-phone-speak for “bill collector.” I answered anyway, hopeful that, this time, we might arrive at some amicable arrangement, even if that meant the bill wouldn’t be paid in full until my 95th birthday.

The collector was a nice enough woman. She told me to give her money. I told her I would love to, but I didn’t have any. She asked why not. I told her. This was a familiar conversation for us both and we were mostly going through the motions.

“Well, I’m looking at your website,” she said.

“Yeah?” I said.

“It says here you wrote a book,” she said.

“Yeah, a while back,” I said.

“Couldn’t you sell more books to make some money?” she said. She was serious. Bill collectors are serious people.

“Um … well, I could, if anyone would buy them,” I said. “But I wrote that book a couple years ago, and I think pretty much everybody who wants one already has one. Some people — those with wobbly tables with one short leg — may even have two.”

“Oh,” she said, still thinking. “Well, couldn’t you write another one?”

I admitted that, yes, I probably could. I then pointed out that Random House had not recently attempted to kick down my front door in order to present me with a quarter-million dollar advance on my Next Big Novel.

Like a lot of folks — more than you would believe — the nice collection lady assumed every author is a SUCCESSFUL author. I tried to explain that the difference between me and Stephen King is roughly $26 million a year.

It took her a minute to accept my abject poverty (it has taken me considerably longer), but in the end she agreed I was a likable enough deadbeat and could anticipate many long and fruitful conversations with her and her colleagues in the near future.

My fault, not hers, so no hard feelings. And who knows? She may be right. Maybe my next book is the one that’s going to propel me to the New York Times bestseller list. 

So I’ve started working on it. It’s a fictional work about a group of rogue bill collectors who finally flip out from dealing with deadbeats like me and go on a killing spree. 

If it makes enough money to pay that hospital bill, I’m going to mention the collection agent on the dedication page.

Contact Mike at mtaylor325@gmail.com.  Mike’s Kindle ebook, “Looking at the Pint Half Full,” is available online at Amazon.com and in paperback format at Robbins Book List in Greenville.

The Hug-o-porium is now open for business

As regular readers of this column know (Hi, Carrie and Dave!) I’m always looking for some new way to make enough easy money that I never have to work again. I know, I know, I don’t work all that hard now, but still, not having to work at all would be even better.

I was built — emotionally, intellectually and physically — to experience a pampered, uneventful life of leisure, indulgence and extravagance. I would be immensely happy to while away my days as a trust fund baby, living off the fruits of someone else’s hard work and sacrifice; preferably an uncle who died young, leaving me the bulk of his estate, including a nice castle in England and a big yacht anchored off the coast of Belize. 

I do have a rich uncle, one I haven’t seen since I was a little kid, but he steadfastly refuses to die and even if he did he has kids of his own that will undoubtedly inherit his loot.

There might have been a time, when I was still young and marginally attractive, that I could have enticed a rich widow to marry me, but rich widows are tough to come by in my social circle. Rich widows, it turns out, do not hang out at roadside bars, pawn shops or the third floor walk-up apartments of rock and roll drummers.

Not that it matters. These days, I’m too old and ugly to attract a rich widow, or even a widow with a decent 401K. I might be able to attract a poor widow, but that would do little to advance my goal of living a life of leisure, so what’s the point.

Over the years I’ve come up with several get rich quick schemes, but so far, none have panned out. The reasons for my failures differ from scheme to scheme; some required work, which is what I’m trying to avoid in the first place; other ideas were stolen before I had a chance to implement them (curse you, Pet Rock guy!); and some I foolishly abandoned because they simply seemed too ludicrous to succeed (the career arc of Lady Gaga, for instance).

But now I think I’ve finally found the golden egg, that one, perfect stratagem that’s going to rocket my financial portfolio into that rarified ionosphere shared by guys like Bill Gates and the dude who invented the Ginsu knife.

It’s hugs.

That’s right, hugs, the kind you give your grandchildren or your best buddy after you’ve had too many beers. Plain, old hugs. Nothing erotic, nothing weird; just hugs.

“Now, wait a minute,” you may say. “Hugs are free.”

To which I say: they are … now. For centuries, people have just been giving hugs away, never once stopping to consider their potential monetary value. Until recently, that is.

Administrators at a Kindergarten in China’s Jiangdu District recently figured out that students who receive regular hugs tend to do better academically than do kids who get none. Now, being relatively new to capitalism, the Jiangdu administrators are willing to explore all money-making options.

So they started charging for hugs.

I kid you not. Parents worried about the math scores of their son or daughter may now pay a $12.80 monthly “hugging fee,” which covers two hugs daily, delivered by a teacher who promises to at least appear sincere and caring. The kids whose parents are too cheap to shell out the cash can hug themselves as they slowly circle the academic drain.

Teachers say the hugging program creates a “good mood” for learning, at least for the kids getting the hugs. If the hugless kids don’t like it, they’re free to quit school and get a job in a Shanghai sneaker factory.

This all seems morally ambiguous, at best, but that’s never stopped me before. So, without further ado, I now announce the Grand Opening of Mike Taylor’s Hug-o-porium Deluxe! For only one buck, I will hug you.

The actual length of the hug may vary depending on whether you are an overweight, smelly guy in need of a shave, or a nubile, Swedish stewardess, but rest assured, the hug delivered will be sincere, caring and filled with the genuine empathy that only Mike Taylor’s Hug-o-porium Deluxe can supply.

Visa and Master Card accepted at most locations.

Contact Mike at mtaylor@staffordmediasolutions.com or call (616) 548-8273.

If ignorance is bliss, then I’m generally happy

Ignorance is bliss. There’s a lot of truth in that statement, but, as I recently learned, ignorance is bliss only if one remains ignorant indefinitely.

The moment you wise up, all previous incidences of ignorance come back to haunt you and you’re worse off than you would have been had you never been ignorant in the first place. This is the kind of realization that comes to you one way only: The hard way. 

I received my harsh slap of reality shortly after New Year’s Eve, when I went to download to my laptop the digital photos I had taken at the party. Viewing them on the big screen, I couldn’t help notice they bore almost no resemblance to the actual event, not as I remembered it, at any rate.

Let me back up a sec. Early on New Year’s Eve, Sweet Annie and I were at my place getting dressed for the party. This was, for Annie, the culmination of four weeks of shopping, circumspect planning, color matching, and extensive consultation with her daughters and myriad fashion experts at Macy’s.

For me, it was a matter of looking in the closet to see if anything was A) clean, or B) if not clean, at least not inordinately smelly.

I lucked out, kind of. One of my black sports jackets was mostly clean, say 87 percent, which puts it well within the range of what’s considered “acceptable” on the Man Scale. I also had a pair of slacks in there, still on a hangar! They were of a different fabric than the jacket, but they were black, so, close enough.

The only speed bump was the lack of a nice dress shirt. Nothing white, nothing black. (These are the only two colors I trust myself to “match” when it comes to fashion.) The only clean shirts I had handy were plaid. I chose the deepest blue of the lot, hoping it would be dark enough at the club that nobody would notice it wasn’t black.

My good dress shoes were left in storage in Detroit when I moved here nine months ago and I still haven’t picked them up. But I had a pair of black cowboy boots handy. They hurt my feet and made my slacks look a little short, but by this point, I just wanted to be dressed and on my way.

Annie was gussying up in another room. I’ve never actually seen her getting ready for date night, but I assume there’s some sort of alchemy or other magical process involved because she always emerges looking like Michelle Pfeiffer in her prime, which is way too good for me but I won’t point this out to her if you don’t.

“Do I look alright?” she asked.

“Mrbrl fdlerich,” I said, unable to articulate clearly due to the slackness of my jaw and the way my tongue was hanging out.

“How about me?” I asked when I’d regained some motor control. “Does this go together?”

Now, in addition to being real purdy, Annie is kind-hearted, to a fault, some might say.

“You look great,” she lied.

We had fun at the party. At the time, I thought we were really styling; Annie in her clingy, indigo dress, me in my black, thrown-together, sorta suit. A younger, hipper version of Bogie and Bacall. Or maybe an older, less hip, version of Brad and Angelina.

Either way, I figured we were looking good.

Then I saw the photos. It turns out I was half right. In all the pics, Annie looks like a runway model; slim, elegant, the Socratic ideal of feminine refinement and sophistication.

And there, lurking next to her, troll-like, is me. Dressed in the plaid shirt, the high-water slacks, the scuffed-up cowboy boots. Jim Neighbors in his “Gomer” days. The president of the chess club at Senior Prom.

Not Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, after all, but Dianne Keaton and Woody Allen. Beauty and the Beast.

“Why in the name of all that’s holy, did you let me leave the house looking like that?” I accused. “Why didn’t you tell me the shirt didn’t match, that my pants were too short, that my boots were scuffed? Why, Annie, why?”

“Because I love you,” she said.

This sort of smart-alecky answer is just like her.

“Wouldn’t it be easier to love me if I didn’t look like a yutz?” I countered. For this, she had no answer.

So we agreed that, sometime next month, we’ll drive out to 28th Street and pick out a new “Sunday go to meetin’” suit. Annie will pick it out. I’ll pay for it.

And I will wear it when we go out next New Year’s Eve. 

Of course, had it not been for those pictures, the purchase of a new suit would not have been necessary. Ignorance is not only bliss, it turns out, it’s cheaper than knowing the truth.

Buy my book, dammit!!  I'm not getting any younger and have to find a way to get rich without working hard before I get too old to enjoy it!!  Click the link at left or visit Robbin's Book List in Greenville, where you can pick up a paperback copy for under eight bucks!  Whatta deal!

My track record is not good when it comes to parents

Traditionally, I’ve had problems with the parents of girls I date. It started in fourth grade, when I got caught holding hands with Genevieve Castinetta and only began to abate as I approached my current age. These days, the parents of most girls I date are dead.

I would never wish anyone dead, but I have to admit, the fewer girlfriend’s parents there are in the world, the fewer people there are that hate my stinking guts.

I’m thinking about this at the moment because of the lunch I had this past weekend with my ex-wife three times removed (meaning, she’s three exes back in the unhappy queue of otherwise intelligent women who decided, at some point, that I would make a good husband).

Linda’s a wonderful woman and we’ve remained friends over the years, in part because of the two (now grown) children we share. Having lunch together gave us a chance to catch up on the kids’ problems, her husband’s recent surgery, my recent surgery ... the kind of stuff old people talk about when they haven’t seen each other for a while.

Eventually the conversation turned to Sweet Annie, my honey for the past four years or so.

Linda, who is familiar with my problem getting along with parents, asked the obvious question.

“How’s her dad like you?”

“We get along,” I said. “He’s a tough, old Irishman. I like him.” Which is true; he is and I do.

“Yeah, but does HE like YOU?” Linda pressed.

“Well … better than most,” I admitted. “He puts up with me.”

Linda nodded knowingly. She didn’t say anything more about it, but I knew what she was thinking. She was thinking of the day, 35 years ago, that I met her mother.

Linda and I had only known each other a week or so. We met at a party, went to the beach together the next day, and decided that same evening to get married, which we did, exactly three weeks later. 

I was very young and impulsive. I’m not sure what Linda’s excuse was.

Her mother and step-father lived in Florida. When Edna and Al (fake names) heard of our impending nuptials, they drove straight through to Michigan to meet the somewhat dazed and confused groom-to-be (me).

They were waiting at Linda’s apartment when I arrived there from work. Edna and Al both seemed like nice folks; all smiles and congratulations, happy to be meeting the guy that was marrying their beautiful daughter. It was the first time I could remember a girl’s parents liking me, or even pretending to.

Alas, the warm, fuzzy feeling was not to last.

Leaning against the dining room wall, in a heavy, expensive frame, was one of the worst paintings I had ever seen. It had not been there that morning. 

It might have been a still life, but it was impossible to tell for sure. The composition was terrible, the form and style lamentable. The technique reminiscent of something a third-grader might resort to if he was in a big hurry to get to recess.

It was awful in every way.

“Well, what do you think of it?” Al asked, winking slyly.

Now, in my defense, I was at the time working as a commercial artist for a large publishing house. Before that, I had for years studied art in high school and college. I knew something about the subject, or thought I did.

I assumed — as any sane person might — that Al had purchased the painting at a garage sale and dragged it here as a joke of some sort. His sly wink seemed to confirm this supposition.

So. For the next three minutes, I proceeded to explain, in excruciating detail, exactly why this painting was horrific beyond all understanding.

If I had been half as smart about people as I was about art, I might have noticed the faces of those around me: Linda’s, stunned; Edna’s, crestfallen; Al’s, furious.

“…and that is why this is the worst paining I’ve ever seen,” I finished proudly, certain I had impressed my soon-to-be in-laws with my critical pontification.

It was at this point I noticed nobody looked particularly impressed.

“Edna painted that for you,” Al rumbled slowly, “as a wedding present.” 

Linda and I were married two weeks later and, despite the fact I was barely old enough to shave, we managed to stay together for five years. Edna and Al went back to Florida with the certain knowledge their daughter had thrown her life away on a fool.

In the long decades since, I have grown a little wiser. Not a lot, but a little.

Still, I’m kind of glad Sweet Annie’s dad doesn’t paint.

Contact Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.