Month: June 2008

Yesterday I hit the wall.  Staggered around most of the morning feeling as if I were carrying a sack of cement or coming down with the flu.  We had been 8 days on the road and I am not used to the heat.  Most of the trip has been pretty mild but yesterday it hit the way upper 80’s and maybe into the low 90’s making walking around outside rough going.

Perked up a bit when we drove to Jack (formerly Stewart)(son of Jacks) Tingle and talked about such things as the nature of the universe and what is it that women want exactly. Carol filled us in on that a good bit.  Also about his band and music in general.  A good visit.

I concluded earlier in the day while reading about the Middle Ages that I am glad I did not live back then.  In fact I am amazed that the people of the Middle Ages managed to live through it.  Sometimes they had nothing to eat, and so ate tree bark and occasionally each other.  Also if you committed a crime or something offensive to the church they hanged you immediately or made you go on some hair raising pilgrimage like clear to Jerusalem and they didn’t have cars back then or even bicycles.  Whole families slept in the same bed that was infested with roaches, mites, lice, ticks, fleas, and rodents.

Perhaps because of the wretched conditions, they drank a great deal. Mostly small beer.  Henry 5 of England, in fact, allocated to the members of his court and other functionaries (even nuns) a full gallon of beer per day.  That’s a lot of beer per day even if small.  As the author of the book notes the intoxication levels must have been pretty high given the level of consumption because the people were small.  Your average male stood 5 foot three and tipped the scales at 135.

Clearly people have been self-medicating for some time.

This was the first day in our trip to SC that a body—this body at least—could walk two blocks and sweat through his t-shirt.  This was later in the day around 3.  Now at 4:30 EST, it’s 88 degrees.  Earlier though a nice overcast blocked the sun; a few drops of heavenly rain fell on us and breezes cooled us down.  But those helpful clouds are gone.

Earlier in the day, round 10, at 204 Bailey, in Clinton, SC, the temp was about 72.  We drove by, after leaving our motel, to take one last look at Steve’s place.  I gave him a buzz on the cell and found he was located at the McDonalds less than a quarter of a mile away right across the railroad tracks.  So we drove over there and chatted with him a bit, learning in the process that all he had about left to do was to wait till 2in the afternoon to sign some papers. 

We drove off leaving Steve in the parking lot, saying we would be seeing him again back in CA in July to clear out the storage area down in Escondido that has the last stuff of Joan and Bill in it.

Then we drove up to Greenville listening to Jack Tingle’s EP as we drove.  Four songs by “The Roscoe.”

Then we walked Main Street down to the Hot Dog place again where they serve weenies not hot dogs.  I got the special: 2 weenies, with chili and onions, with fries, coleslaw and sweet tea, and Carol got a hot dog made out of Angus beef with sour kraut.

Then we walked some more down by the Reedy River and walked over the Liberty Bridge that Butch and Lucy Dean had told us about.  We sat in front of the Starbucks down there, me with iced coffee and read for a while until Carol put her head down on the table and looked like she was going to sleep on the spot.

I read some in a book about the Middle Ages.  From around 700-1000 your average peasant didn’t know what time it was, what day it was, or month or year or even century that he or she was living in. Time was the seasons of the year and the holidays.  Apparently people in the Church kept track of when those happen and informed the peasants accordingly.

Nobody had last names either.  A person was the son of Mike or the sister of Mike or Mike’s brother, and Mike’s brother, Bob, was the father of the son of Bob and so forth.  People were also called by their deformities or hair color.

Last names started popping up as a sign of occupations.  So later on one had Mike, the Miller—shortened to Mike Miller.  Tingle may mark an occupation.  One rumor at least is that Tingle is a mangled form of Tingler, the name give to the town crier, since he went around ringing a bell and yelling, here ye, here ye.  So early Tingles seem to have been journalists or may be just the bearers of bad tidings.
 

Where we last left them

Still extant

Ditto

Beaverdam Baptist near Mountville, SC 

 We drove–Carol, Cousin Lucy, Aunt Doris–down to historic Clinton, SC, to look at the house Brother Steve is thinking to buy at 203 Bailey Street.

Side view.

Front with Carol seated. 

Neighborhood. 

Kitchen.

Shed in rear.

Aunt Doris thinks the house was probably built in the 20’s and appears to her structurally sound.  The roof is new.  The interior will need work. Pull up old carpets, repaint, and other smaller repairs. Brother Steve will see realtor today about final steps.

Brother Stephen has located a property in Clinton, South Carolina.  He likes it at 27,500.

In an email, he writes:

I had contacted Tony Bailey weeks ago when I was looking for a buyer’s agent, so I went by Palmetto Heritage Reality in Laurens today, and we made a short list o f houses to look at.  Tony sold Cindy her house, and knew  her sisters.  In fact all the people in the office knew more about my relatives than I do.  I told the older guy my name, and he said Oh, you here for the reunion?  Anyway, there is this house at 203 Bailey St in downtown

Clinton…an older house, it’s a nice neighborhood of older well kept homes, with big oaks all over the place…it’s vacant, not bank owned, had a new roof, new vinyl siding, central heat and air, done 8 years ago.  Had termite treatment two years ago.  Has a nice fenced back yard, with oak trees, and one big oak out front.  There are sidewalks, you can walk to shopping.  There is a church across the street.  It’s a couple of  blocks from the police station.  There is a free county medical clinic down the block.  It’s near the old mill.  The water heater is new.  The bathroom  is new.  The kitchen counter tops are new.  There is a laundry porch with hook-ups.  Nine foot ceilings, ceiling fans.  Two bedrooms and a parlor.Needs new carpet and interior paint. Might be hardwoods under the  carpet, probably is, since the place is over 50 years old.  The listings says there’s a fridge, but there isn’t.  There is a shed out back.  It has new vinyl storm windows.  Public water and a new sewer line.  City  electric.0.2 acres, an old city lot.  Tony is going to have their guy go crawl under the house and do a verbal prelem on old termite damage and repair or lack

of repair, and go ahead with a regular inspection if I go ahead and make an offer tomarrow.  The owner is asking $27,900.  It’s pretty much what  I’ve been picturing since I started this thing, in a zip code I have researched. Anybody who wants can go see it Thursday, Friday, or from the reunion? There, you all know as much about it as I do.  I like it, and think I’m going to buy it, I’ve got enough cash easy.

Jeez…what a day…yesterday….

Up at 4 AM in the pitch dark.  A neighbor, in his 80’s, who does not apparently sleep, at least at night, kindly gave us a ride to the airport for a 6 AM liftoff.

Things went well till Dallas.  We were scheduled to leave there at 1 or so.  Fat chance.

Brother Dan had warned, flights leaving Dallas are ALWAYS late.  Sure ‘nuff.  We didn’t get out of there till almost 5.  Five hours of sitting in that noisy place.  6 Gate changes.  Who the hell knew what Gate we were going to go out of and constant backing up of the departure time.

We ate beef jerky we had brought with us on the plane and got bad gas. 

But finally we made it to Greenville, about 8 Greenville time. 

We rented along with the car, one of those things—I think it is called a GPS—that talks to you as you drive along, and tells you which way to go.  Pretty cool.

What with the early rising,  and the clock change we are pretty pooped out at the moment.

But the day outside from our room in the Holiday Inn Express in downtown Greenville looks bright and cloudless.

Carol and I almost didn’t take our daily walk out to the bluffs yesterday (June 10) because we were pretty pooped out and the day was overcast and gloomy.  Still we walked out as part of our acknowledgment of our wedding anniversary.

Carol and I were married June 10, 1984 by a licensed professional, a legal minister for the Church of Universal Happiness and Total Bliss.  I forget her name but it was something like Rose Petal Dawn, and she advertised in the yellow pages as willing to perform weddings any place and any time.  I believe she had married a couple while parachuting.

Our wedding took place securely on the ground in the garden of friends.  The day was bright and warm.  Unlike yesterday, June 10, 2008.  A few days ago “June gloom” hit our area with a bang.  The cloud cover that lingers offshore moves over land starting usually in June and sometimes lasting well into July, even August, burning off, for a few hours of direct sun light, in the late afternoon.

So June 10, 2008, was not like June 10, 1984 weather wise.  Also, as might be expected, June 10, 1984, was on a different day of the week (Sunday) than June 10, 2008 (Monday).  But the days are alike in that on both June 10’s, the Lakers were playing in the NBA Finals, and on top of that they were playing the Celtics.  But on June 10, 1984, the Lakers were playing the sixth game of a seven game series.  They won the game but they lost that series two days later.  On June 10, 2008, the Lakers were playing the third game of a seven game series.  They won that game also but if I look at the situation realistically, I have to admit I think the Lakers will lose this series.

I did not watch the game on June 10, 2008, because I had a wedding to attend, being one of the central participants.  I did watch the game yesterday, June 10, 2008.  Kobe Bryant played that game against a whole host of new Celtics, but back in 1984, Magic Johnson led the Lakers against Larry Bird and his Celtics.

That was 24 years ago!

Carol’s Shoe and then my Shoe out on the bluff.