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SUMMARY
1951 is a journal of the private thoughts and daily adventures of a 17-year-old college student-athlete as filtered through a series of 26 letters to an older, more worldly friend and mentor from the letter writer's home town. Couched in the terms of inexperience, braggadocio, and often exaggeration of newly-found freedoms from many prior restraints, these letters describe the lures of overdue discoveries and previously unobtainable opportunities in the common dialect of that time and place. His dual mottos were "Anything worth doing is worth doing well," and "I can resist almost anything except temptation." In summary, 1951 is a story focused on: a. A poor but basically honest student-athlete who was recruited and then romanced by a perennial cellar dweller team that was destined to become a national junior college football dynasty. b. A little old whistle-stop of a junior college town where a guy could easily get an enviable reputation for doing very little, and a young lady could be ruined for life for doing a heck of a lot less. c. A minor league junior college football coach who everyone believed was so dense that he could not pour urine out of a boot even if the instructions were printed plainly on the heel. However, after assembling his first Alpha Team, he just kept winning anyway. His aces in the hole were: (1) an uncanny ability to lure troubled but blue-chip athletes into the institutionally wide, even community wide deceptions necessary to produce a winning team in a very tough league, and (2) maintaining plausible, implacable deniability. d. The care and feeding of a high-strung herd of somewhat misunderstood student-athletes, all of whom were just trying to get by, or whatever seemed right at any given moment in time. The 26 letters that comprise 1951 are written in the shibboleth rich, esoteric dialect commonly spoken by most young athletes of the southern Great Plains at that time. That language pattern was faithfully reproduced so that it tracks that segment of the semantic calf path, and reflects the vivid if somewhat naïve imagery, culture and life styles that characterize that far less complex time and place. Dave Ferman CHAPTER 1
Friday 22 August 1951 Yoh, Jesse, So what's happening, uglier than me? Long time no see. I bumped into your Mama's Number Two Son back home last weekend. He said that you had gone to take a dump and the hogs had eaten you. But since he was still peddling that ugly old gut-shot, brush-painted, shade-tree excuse for a bicycle instead of popping freestyle wheelies in your stoplight bandit pick-'em-up truck, I kind of figured that the scrawny rascal might be more than somewhat inclined to B.S. the neighbors from time to time. Later that same day, I also saw the merely magnificent Barbara Jean Van Spivey downtown. She was all decked out in her too-tight, just-right blue denim jeans and looking sooo fine. Oh wow! Anyway, ol' B. J. allowed as how you had finally cutout for Big D to seek fame and fortune amongst the manicured literates like you had been threatening to do ever since Hector was a pup. What gives? Wouldn't the little honey do the duurty deed with you either? That's a joke, son. Right after that, I bumped into your mama, who insisted on giving me your new address. I figured that I could either take it in my hand, or get it stuffed up my nose. You know how your mama can be; bless her heart. She is always going to have her way, so why argue with the T-total inevitable? Nobody ever says "No" to your mama. Not twice, they don't. Aye E'se? Bless her heart. On the flip side, you can send those cards and letters to the Kid at 710 West Second Street. That is, you can if you ever learn to write so that somebody at the Post Office can actually read it without a Captain Midnight nickel-plated decoder pinkie ring. That's Great Plains, good buddy, which is a pretty danged wild story all by its own self. If you can take a few minutes away from all of those "crazy little women" and endless parties in Big D that the big kids are always bragging about, I will by-doggies fill you in; book, chapter and verse. Heck fire, I have to tell somebody the scoop pretty soon or I'll blow a doggoned gasket. Like they say in deepest, darkest Wabash Land "The fit hit the shan" or something like that. Your old mung-drinking, newspaper-slinging, shootout-the-street lights sidekick may be in tall cotton and blessed with more danged bubble gum than I can chew; but it took a whole lot of zigging and a bit of zagging to get here. In fact, there were a couple of times that I zigged when I darned-well should have zagged, and that can hurt you real quick if you don't look out. It sure gave me a dose of the heebie jeebies before and even after all of the cards were dealt and the official papers were signed on the dotted lines. Let me guaran-danged-tee you, good buddy, that the past week has been a ring-tailed snorter of the Highest Order. I kid you not. You have probably already heard about my free ride over to Great Plains Juco in that rich sum'bitch's little yellow airplane, haven't you? Well anyway, you should have because it's all over town by now, but the devil is in the details. That frigging hot-rod puddle jumper was some kind of a souped-up, barn-storming, whiz-bang flying machine with one wing on the top, another on the bottom, and a whole lot of fresh air in between. I should have ran like a bandit the second I first saw it sitting there on the runway looking like an oversized praying mantis bug waiting to eat the first freshman jock who was dumb enough to climb on-board. You talk about getting turned every which way but loose. I probably should have guessed that I was in for a heap of hurting when that bandy legged old flyboy hog-tied me into that open front seat hole with about a dozen or so big old web whatzit straps going every which way you could possibly imagine. I'll tell you true, E'se, when he was done tieing me down, about all I could move were my bleary eyeballs and maybe the working finger on my trusty left hand. Like I said, I should have cut out and ran like a scalded ape if I'd had the brains that God gave a rubber duck. But right then, that fan-danged-tastic little Mary Margaret McDonald and one of her four-eyed, knobby kneed little high-school freshman jailbait buddies showed up to watch my grand sendoff, so I had to just keep grinning and looking extra relaxed until we were way too doggoned far off the ground to call it quits for the day. But make no mistake, I would have if I could have. Anyway, the next thing I knew, the early morning sunshine was warming my nose bone while it was still throwing long, dark shadows across the rolling hills several thousand or more feet below us. As I recall, about that time I was beginning to think that maybe that old junior birdman "wild blue yonder" routine might not be all that bad after all. In fact, I was just starting to relax and enjoy my first airplane ride ever when all of a sudden the whole front end of that doggoned yellow puddle jumper started to pointing more or less straight up at the dadburned sky overhead like a homesick angel headed back to the barn. So there I was, hanging on for dear life and trying like the very dickens to see what the heck was happening when all of a sudden that silly old slopjar in the back seat asked me, re-danged-diculously casual like, if I had ever done a "spin" before. But then, before I could even open my yap to say that I not only had never done one of those spin things before, but also that I sure as heck did not much care to start doing one right then, when the whole dadburned airplane suddenly started to shivering like a goat pooping peach stones. I'm telling you true, we just flat fell the heck out of the sky as the whole blessed world seemed to be whizzing around overhead from right to left. And then, suddenly, there it was again, right the heck in front of me, only it was spinning around and around like crazy, and coming right at this child like there was not going to be any more tomorrows. Not a one. That's when it really hit me that I was just about to frigging die. Right then and right there! So naturally, I hollered something appropriate like "Oh sweet Jesus, SAVE ME and I'll BE GOOD!" at the top of my lungs. However, I could hardly even hear myself making my final amends because that stinking old junker was squalling louder than a banshee with its tit caught in a wash machine wringer, and that silly old twit in the back seat was screaming "Ride 'em cowboy!" and a bunch of crazy stuff like that right into my very own ear phones. So naturally, I gave my soiled little soul to God, but I've got to admit that deep down inside I also wished to heck that I had at least tickled my way into Mary Margaret McDonald's magnificent little knickers just one time before I had gotten myself killed; or for that matter, into any one of several other equally wondrous gals' skivvy drawers in our neighborhood. Then, all of a sudden, the world stopped spinning around, and we were diving straight down like a rock between two big old groves full of elm trees. Fast? You danged bet'cha we were going fast! We had to be going at least five hundred miles an hour if we were going five. The screaming wind noise was like that tornado that blew into Arky Town last year and did over a million dollars worth of improvements. The next thing I knew, that howling yellow buzzard was right down there among those big old trees and purely moving out like a scalded dog with his tail on fire. Then, just when I started to think that maybe we might have an outside chance of seeing one more sunset, we zipped over the top of this little hill and there they were: a whole danged '39 Chevy flatbed truck full of Mexican field hands; right there in front of God and everybody. Well, I am not going to tell you that we had the closest call of all times. But I will say that the blond headed gringo driving that flatbed had blue eyeballs: great big, bulging, bluer-than-blue eyeballs. Somehow or other, we missed those cork soakers and kept right on tooling along inside that little valley for about a half a heartbeat until the next thing I knew I was looking straight up at what had to be the biggest doggoned cottonwood tree that has ever grown on the face of God's green earth. But the funny thing was, there I was, nosebone-to-nosebone with the Final Hereafter, right on the ragged edge of being permanently null and void, and darned if I didn't start thinking again about Mary Margaret's peachy little pink skivvies and wondering one more time about what the heck is that "sleeve job" that you are always giggling about. That's really kind of embarrassing because that was the very moment when any good Christian lad worth his salt should have been trying like the very dickens to focus on the Good Lord's ever-loving forgiveness. You talk about dodging the bullet and escaping "the bowels of perdition." I could tell you both chapter and verse. Somehow or other, we either hopped the heck over or through that sap-sucking tree, then whipped over another rise that later turned out to be the Oil Hill midnight parking lot. Then, suddenly, there we were; right on top of this little old town that was complete with a greener-than-green golf course, several big old water towers, and more danged trees than I'd ever seen in one place before, plus a good sized downtown with a central square and a bunch of red-brick schools and churches sprinkled around here and there among a gaggle of old two-story, white, clapboard houses. I swear on a stack of bibles yae high that every danged house in Great Plains is two stories high and have clapboard sides and a wraparound front porch. Those folks must have some kind of a law or something like that. Anyway, we were still so doggoned low that I was scared spitless that the pilot, old Ross Covington-Davis the Third, would have to stop at the town's only traffic light when it suddenly changed to red right straight ahead of us. But thank goodness, he flew right over that light, and we just kept on shagging it down the Main Drag past two railroad tracks and a faded yellow train station, a couple of bridges over a forest-lined river, and then an oil refinery that was snuggled up against what would tend to remind you of a drag strip for lawnmowers. Unfortunately, that little bitty lawn turned out to be Great Plains' one and only excuse for an airport. The next thing I knew, we had hung a batch of hard left turns, each one hairier than the last, and had used up what was left of our altitude, our air speed and any vestiges of rational thought. I tell you true, we were ricocheting along the ground, skipping and bouncing and cutting fancy dii-does hither and yon while I finally got sorted out enough to barf up all of my cookies down the left side of that flying fliver, thereby forming a string of bilious green puke from the front seat back to the tail wheel and beyond. I do believe that I must have tossed up stuff that I had eaten two or three days before. So there I was, thanking the Merciful Lord Almighty that I had gone to the potty before we had cut out from home, when we came backfiring and bee-bopping up to this dinky little shack where this old baldheaded, banjo-butt galute was waiting for us, looking mostly like a manure salesman with a mouth full of free samples. Of course, I was hoping like the very dickens that this grubby old rotter was not Great Plains Juco's semi-infamous Coach "Scrapiron" Scarpoli, but it turned out that he most certainly was. All of that would have turned my whole and entire day to clabber for darned sure if it hadn't already been purely shot to Hades anyway. But the surprising thing was that even if he is two axe handles across the beam, that old sonova'gun turned out to be one real slick old rascal who could and did talk almost all of the rest of that day about my two most favorite subjects: namely smash-mouth football and Yours Truly. I kid you not. That old boy could talk a mile a minute without hardly ever repeating himself, so I know that he wasn't just blowing it out of his other end like some of the Big Eight and Missouri Valley recruiters have been known to do. Like a great man once said "It ain't bragging if you can do it," and he darned-well can do it with bells on. I mean, not only did he know just about everything there is to know about what a wondrous fine broth of a lad I really am—despite some eee-roneous rumors to the contrary—but he also knew that I'd druther kick footballs than eat ice cream, and I really do love to eat chocolate ice cream with some nuts in it and a dollop of whipped cream on top. So help me, Hanna, he knew all that and a lot more to boot. In fact, Coach Scraps even knew that this child has always been more than somewhat partial to chicken-fried steaks, crispy hash browns, big three-scoop chocolate malts, and lemon meringue pie in season: all of which just happened to be the "House Special" at this super dooper chow hall in the purely elegant Worthington Hotel where we chowed down right after we checked out all of the wonderfulness of the newly bigger and better semi-horse-shoe-shaped football stadium and athletic complex that I probably should have noticed about the time that I ducked my sweaty brow under that howling junker's hood in honor of that last cottonwood tree just before we blew into town. So that's what we did, and I was impressed. I am telling you true, good buddy, I have never seen anything quite as good looking as purple and gold together on a football uniform. That game jersey purely did look fan-damn-tastic on me even without the shoulder pads. I tell you, even the white home-game jerseys with the gold numbers outlined in purple were something else again. I loved 'em a lot, lot, lot. And those shiny gold helmets with the purple stripe down the middle: man, I could just see those beauties shining in the stadium klieg lights while the crowd goes crazy like at Madison Square Garden, the band is playing their wimpy little hearts out, the pom poms are whipping around ever which way, and all of that good stuff is swirling around in a glorious blaze of purple and gold. "Lawdy, Lawdy, Mizz Claudie have mercy on me." Then there were those elastic gold game pants with the thigh pads that do not have to be taped to stay in place, and nothing but the top dollar step-in hip pads like only the first-string backfield guys wore back home. And you talk about ankle tape up the wazoo, not only one but two whirlpool baths, and other mind-boggling good stuff like that. It was all there. Yae verily, old Emma and Emmett's Number Two Son was purely in deep cotton and rapidly learning to be very easily satisfied with nothing but the very best of everything. You've probably heard how slick some of those sweet-talking Yankee carpetbaggers can be. Well, let me tell you true; that old Coach Scrapiron, that sly old coot, he could fair-thee-well talk a starving dog down off a meat wagon if he had to. By golly, that old boy never did—not for one cotton-picking minute—stop jabbering about all of the wonderfulness of being a Varsity Big Shooter as a freshman instead of just another poor piddly-pants blocking dummy pogue for the Big Kids at one of those four-year type schools like Tulsa, Okie State, Arkansas or even K-State that had recently taken such a shine to this child. But then, again, my Momma never did raise any fools, so I was already pretty well clued in about what those bigger schools were up to when they just flat offered all of that good stuff like regular trips to the Horn of Plenty, free room and board in a freshly painted and swamp-cooled dorm, as well as more or less guaranteed grades if a guy would just get wise to himself and sign up eee-mediately if not sooner for freshman Hammer & Saw 101, Phys Ed., Art Appreciation, or some of those other slopjar courses like that. You know, some of those Big Shooter schools that had pulled my chain had purely promised darned-near everything but free samples at the women's dorm if a guy would strap on one of their GPJC jocks stenciled with the initials of their very own athletic empire. In fact, there were some that would just about take a guy to raise to keep him from flat frittering away his whole and entire life by tucking his family jewels into one of those things having the wrong school's initials on it. Man, you talk about a license to steal. Well welcome to the Juco Hog Heaven of the Sunny Southland.
CHAPTER 1
The Story Continues Click Here |
