Last night, Carl called. Since I moved from home nearly six years ago, I talk with him on the phone only about once per year. From the sound of his voice, he doesn’t seem to have aged a day, even though his 78th birthday was last October. Carl’s the guy that had a key to my place and, while I was at work (doing “911” from 7pm until 7am), would go on in, make a pot of coffee, and watch the races on my satellite tv. I didn’t mind at all, I thought it was great. I remember during my nights off, hearing his truck pull into my driveway, usually around midnight. He’d walk up to the deck, rap on the door with that “shave and a haircut” knock and then come on in. If I was asleep on the couch, he’d let me sleep while making himself a fresh pot of coffee. When it would be finished brewing, he’d pour himself a cup and then wake me up, saying it’s too early to be sleeping and there’s fresh coffee in the pot. We’d sit there, watching tv, and he’d catch me up on the daily goings-on with the old-timers and Lake natives.
If you were to ask Carl how long he’s been retired, and I’ve asked him many times because I like his answer, he’d tell you, “Shit, I retired when I was 22. Left the Navy after World War II, became a plumber [which by the way, he’s one of the best in Missouri, it’s how he was given the nick-name “shitty-fingers” sometime back in the 50’s or 60’s] and went out on my own. I’m not working for anybody that doesn’t know their ass from a hole in a ground. Don’t need ’em.”
At around 3am, Carl would get, put his cup on the counter and say it’s time to go home. He’d say the usual goodbyes while walking out the door. Sometimes, an hour later, he’d call me up on the phone and tell me to change the channel to something that might make me laugh. Usually related to toilet-humor, firefighting, or dispatching.
Catching me up on the happenings in the ol’ hometown, he says I wouldn’t recognize the place now. So terribly busy, traffic-wise, major businesses have sprung up everywhere and the towns have sprawled in to nearly twice the size they were when I left. His truck was wrecked a year or so ago and a tree fell over onto his old trailer. He’s now living in a retirement community, apparently very comfortable. Arthritis has set into his hips now, so he doesn’t so much walk as shuffle.
Carl said that Elmer has a new girlfriend. Elmer’s nearly 80 and is wife Lorraine died of lung cancer a few years ago. I knew them both very well. Well, Elmer now has lung and liver cancer as well, apparently in a bad way. Carl says Elmer’s nasal cannula and O2 tank set aside, he always has a can of beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. That’s Elmer, wild, mischievous, ornory, and raunchy. Anyway, he met this new girlfriend a few months after Lorraine died. He had hired her to work in the shop and they ended up in bed that same night. She stays with Elmer five nights a week and then goes home to her husband two nights a week. Her husband works out of town for the five nights she’s shacking up with the ol’ man. Convenient.
I’ll need to call Carl more often to keep caught up on what’s going on in the ol’ hometown.