I am (sort of) a writer and (for sure) a humorist. Of course, it’s not my fault that others don’t always ‘get’ my jokes. After all, just because I am always talking does not require me to always make sense. I don’t write to be funny. I am funny, so I write. It’s like a politician–they don’t always talk to be believed, they believe they should always be talking. You may not believe this story but it is as true as my French’s Mustard story and it is very true. But, that story is for another time. Truth in the ear of the listener, or so I say, “huh?” LOL
In 1965, I was wandering all over America trying to ‘find myself’ and I ended up in San Francisco. I had a job delivering greeting cards to flower shops. One day, I went into a movie because it was late, I was bored, and wanted some popcorn. I had no idea what the movie was (and I still pick my movies by “what comes up” to this day). I like surprises, even bad ones! I remember the movie was really good but nobody but me ever watched it. It was The Valley of the Dolls. You’d have to watch the movie to understand why, but without going back to pick up my things, I left San Francisco in my 1958 Plymouth Fury with my guitar and a clean pair of socks to go home to Indy! (The trip home to Indy is whole ‘nother story.)
I wasn’t home a month before I met Paula! It was love at first sight for both of us. Literally, love at first sight! My heart skipped a beat! She still makes my heart skip a beat! She made me laugh! And laugh! And laugh! Unfortunately, she was spoken for. You see… she was engaged to my first cousin, Louie. We both were madly in love with each other, got caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. and I was deemed the official ‘black sheep’ of the family. Everyone expected Paula to marry Louie. I was a hippy type, a drifter, a wild and crazy guy… to them. (My aunt used to call me an ‘edumacated’ fool because I went to college and didn’t do anything with it… I actually did do a lot with my life. It just didn’t amount to much. It takes a lot of effort to get NO results! I worked at it!)
I did the right thing, though, for Paula and Louie. I gave Paula up… even though she wanted me to fight for her. She didn’t love Louie like she loved me but he gave her a ring and I couldn’t buy her a spoon. I left and she went back to Louie. So sad! I decided to make it easier for her and him by leaving the state. I was so sad and unhappy because she was my only sunshine and I worshipped her. But alas! She deserved better than anything I could offer her at that time in my life.
I shaved my head, (for some stupid reason that I have long since forgotten). I took nothing with me except my guitar and an extra pair of socks which I put inside the guitar. I gave my 1958 Plymouth Fury to my uncle and headed to Florida on a Greyhound bus. Why Florida? Because that’s where the bus was headed! After all, I had never been to Florida. Maybe I wanted some sunshine? Or maybe not…
I didn’t know the exact destination until I was dropped off in Coral Gables Florida. I lived on the beach for a while, sang a lot of Peter, Paul and Mary songs, had a lot of fun and met a lot of new friends. I met a guy who got me a job managing the largest Owen’s Gas Station in the world. (My hair had grown back by then). I was not good at being a manager… it was just a job. I got an apartment, a used stereo, a new guitar and I purchased a run-down, rusty, and pathetic-looking 1958 Plymouth Fury (my second ‘58 Fury), for $800. If you’ve ever seen the movie ,”Christine”(my favorite, right after Pinocchio). then you’ve seen the car! It was red but mine was white.
Since I worked nights, I had time to brush paint it (after I stuffed the rusted-out holes above the headlights with paper towels and used duct tape to make it smooth). I think I painted it three times to cover the rust. It looked sooo cooool! It had an audible ‘knock, knock, knock’ when it got over 30 miles an hour and it guzzled gas like our Congress guzzles tax money. It had twin four-barrel carburetors and a quarter race cam. It also had a push-button automatic transmission and two wings in back. It could friggin’ fly on the highway. I loved those cars! Still do!
I was young and stupid and nieve, (still am, except for the ‘young’ part). And, I was not very good at being a night manager. I wasn’t really good at anything but talking and that could be debated. Mostly, it was the volume of my talk as opposed to the content of it. I had no fear in those days and I was self-centered, fun-loving, and gregarious to a fault. I never met a person I didn’t like less than I liked myself. I could con an Illinois Senator out of his Senate seat! I digress! Sorry!
Remember when I said I wasn’t all that good at managing a gas station? Well, one day, I hired a young man who was crippled, had a bad right hand, and walked with a limp. I just wanted to give him an opportunity to see if he could perhaps do the job in spite of his handicap. Bad decision! My manager said it was him or me. He just couldn’t do the work and I had to let him go. I cried when I told him. We both did! He was such a nice fellow and tried sooo hard.
Well, after that, all hell broke loose! My boss was mad at me for hiring him in the first place, his father and his big brother came around and harassed me for firing their crippled kin. Of course, the brother was 6‘4’’ tall and looked like a mountain, so I did the right thing–I blamed my boss! I was probably going to get fired the next day and I felt really bad so I decided right then and there that it was going to be my last night as a gas station manager. I was so relieved. I was ready to go!
About 10 pm that evening, I took an old paint brush and I gave the Plymouth Fury a new coat of white gas station curb paint and gassed her up. I put four or five full gas cans in the trunk. (Gas was 29 cents per gallon.) I knew I was headed for another adventure!
I went looking for a movie that would inspire me… something to give me direction, like The Valley of the Dolls did. But there were no movies, no gurus, and no dice to roll! I just wanted to go someplace for no reason and, even then, that didn’t seem to make much sense. I really had no place or reason to go. What to do? Where to go? Why go? I thought I would think of something… as I always did. Fortunately, my guardian angel was going to send me an answer that very evening! Just in time! It snuck up on me. I didn’t see it coming…
Sitting on a bunch of cola cases, back at the gas station, pondering my plight, a young sailor came in. He was dressed in his frilly white Popeye-like uniform and a funny flat cap and looked like a little ‘sissy’ to me. Being an ex-Marine, I didn’t like sailors much. It was like the song, “Old Dogs and Children and Watermelon Wine” by Tom T. Hall… uninvited, he sat down and opened up his mind…
“Ever eaten apples from Plattsburgh?” he asked.
Well, he told me all about them, although I didn’t answer back! He said, “there’s only three things in this whole world worth a solitary dime, but eatin’ three Plattsburgh apples at apple pickin’ time!” He claimed that the apples from Plattsburgh were the sweetest, the reddest, and the most delicious apples in the whole wide world. He was bound and determined to get home for apple pickin’ time.
Evidently, he was on his first leave and hitchhiking to Plattsburgh, New York from Florida. His comments drove me to overcome my disdain for sailors and for a while I let go of my Marine Corps I’m-better-than-you demeanor. I asked him about Plattsburgh, apples, and apple-pickin’ time. And he told me…
Apple pickin’ time in Plattsburgh was more than special. It was inspiring! […So you know… at this time in my life… I had been in the Marine Corps infantry for four years, had two years of college at Los Angeles City College, lived in more than four states for short periods of time, had many jobs, and a failed at almost everything. I felt like a success because my failures hadn’t killed me. (Yet!) I thought I was able to do anything and if I didn’t know about something, I figured it just wasn’t important! I just knew I was smarter than everybody else and it frustrated me that they didn’t know it. You could say I had an ego challenge. Ego was too small a word! My aunt used to say, “That boy ain’t right!” I, actually, looking back, never did anything well, but I did a lot of different things and managed to survive. (No, I have never sold French’s Mustard!) …Now that you know a little more about me, my thought processes, and how twisted I was at the time, maybe the next part of this story will be easier to understand… or not!] So, I asked the young sailor, “If I went to Plattsburgh, could I pick apples?”
He said, “Why in the world would anyone ever want to do that?” In my wild, crazy, and twisted way, I simply said,
“Because I have NEVER picked apples in Plattsburgh! It sounds good!” I told him I would take him. “Imagine what a great story I could make out of that,” I said, “What would make the story really neat is if I drove more than one thousand miles in an old beat-up knock-knock-knock car just to pick apples in Plattsburgh! (Provided we actually make it!) If the car breaks down (and it probably will) it would make an even better story because I would have to hitchhike to Plattsburgh. Whatdathink,” I asked, “Wanta go?” He laughed so hard, he cried. Me too! Except for the fact that I was dead serious. (Which made it even funnier… to me.) He thought I was kidding! I said, “Wait a minute!”
I turned off all the lights to the gas station, all twenty-seven gas pumps, jammed a large cinder block against the door to hold it shut (it was a 24/7 station, so I didn’t have the key to lock it up), jumped in the driver’s seat, and said, “Get in!” As we pulled away, we were both laughing so hard that people must have thought we were crazy. We were! I left everything but my new guitar. I didn’t go back to my apartment, I just hit the highway!
I had a new goal! A new adventure! A new cause! When the car got to over 30 MPH the knock-knock-knock started up and the sailor freaked out! I shrugged and rolled my eyes! Then we laughed again, but even harder and longer than before. “You’re crazy,” he said!
Those were the days! On the way, we found a puppy. In order to make space for it, we stopped in the center of a really big bridge and threw the back seat into the river about seventy feet below. I still remember the splash. Now, the little puppy would have place to play. We laughed for hours over that. I am still laughing today over that!
We did, in fact, in the knock-knock-knock car, get all the way to Plattsburgh, NY. (Believe it or not… I couldn’t make this stuff up!) We arrived and went to the apple orchard first so I could register to pick apples the next day. We drove into town and pulled into the YMCA. The sailor called his parents to come pick him up. He kept the puppy.
Since the muffler came off of the Plymouth Fury when we pulled into the YMCA parking lot, I gave him the title to the car. Knock-knock-knock and all! It turned out that his dad worked on cars. In those days, kids didn’t have cars unless their parents were very well off. He must have been seventeen and he was just ecstatic. He was so grateful and when he was telling his mother about me and the trip and the dog and the knock-knock-knock car, she laughed so hard she couldn’t stand up. All of us laughed and laughed and his parents agreed to come back the next morning and take me to the apple orchard. I came to pick apples in Plattsburgh and I just couldn’t wait ‘til morning. I don’t think I slept a wink.
We laughed all the way there and they agreed to pick me up at 8 am. I thought apples were picked and put in bushel baskets, but they aren’t. They put them in very big wood boxes. I asked the foreman how much I needed to pick to get paid and he said one fourth of a box. Great! I can do that! I had a ball picking apples in Plattsburgh! As I worked, I sang every song I knew. I picked ten or twenty apples, and then I ate one. Picked ten or twenty, and ate one. They really are the best tasting apples in the world! I took a break about every twenty minutes. I laughed the whole time and talked to everybody, while telling my story over and over. Nobody got anything done that day. It took me eight or nine hours to pick one fourth of a box but I finally did it. They wrote me a check for a little over $6 and I stuck it in my pocket and we laughed all the way back to the YMCA. I kept saying “I picked apples in Plattsburgh! Wow! Doesn’t that have a nice sound to it? I picked apples in Plattsburgh!
By this time, aside from my $6 check, I was completely out of money. But the sailor and his family didn’t know that. This was a great inspirational time for me… no money, no car, no job… nothing to lose! Time to be on the road again! Why not head home? So, I took my check, my guitar, and nothing else down to the highway and hitchhiked my way home to Indy. [By the way, this trip back is a whole ‘nother story ! It’s called, “The Bridge.” Yes! It’s in the book… alongside my “French’s Mustard Saga.”]
Is it true that even a bad memory is better than no memory? It’s just occurred to me that people don’t fear their death as much as they fear losing their memories. You can’t have a memory of the future, so your present is your memories. How precious a memory is! That’s not a question. I repeat, how precious a memory is! I wouldn’t trade this memory for all of the bank bailout money and a Big Mac. No way! I kept that $6 check for twenty long years before it eventually got misplaced. What I wouldn’t give to recover that $6 check!
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I have told this story 1,000 times. I picked apples in Plattsburgh! The story of a wild and crazy guy who helped a young sailor to reach his home and family in a wonderful little town called Plattsburgh just in time for apple pickin’ time. Why did he do it? He just wanted to be able to say, “I picked apples in Plattsburgh!” What a story! What a trip! What a ride! In your life, strive to do this just once! I dare you!
And… just for your information… I have mellowed a bit and I still love to laugh (though I don’t laugh as often as I used to). Thanks to karaoke, I still sing. ‘Puff the Magic Dragon’ is still my best song. And ‘Why Me, Lord’ is still, in my opinion, the best song ever written. I do know this: I received soooo much more than I gave on this adventure. Giving and helping without expecting anything in return always has a reward in the end. Don’t do it for that reason, though. Do it because it’s the right thing to do. Two rights never made a wrong! There is always a good story in good deeds!
Aren’t memories great? When you are old, whether you are rich or poor, your memories become the calendar of your life. Imagine how I must feel when I sing a Peter, Paul and Mary song and go back in time to those moments? Someday, for you, it might be Randy Travis or AC/DC.
I ended up with a great story, a lot of wonderful memories and I helped someone in a way I am sure he will always remember. He probably has told this story 1,000 times, too. The reward is in the fact that I can tell the story and relive it. For me, it had a happy ending…
Because, when I returned to Indianapolis… I was lucky enough to marry that young lady! Paula gave me three beautiful wild and crazy girls that became the treasure of my life! For the last 38 years, when I wake up and Paula is still there, I think to myself “I guess I fooled her one more day!” Do you realize how hard it must be to put up with and live with the likes of me for 38 years? Like Jiminy Cricket, she deserves a medal! I believe that the secret to a happy life is to marry up! If your boyfriend or girlfriend makes you laugh, marry them! Don’t let them get away! Never let them go! Give them memories not diamonds or fancy clothes. Well, maybe diamonds wouldn’t hurt… but make the moments memorable! When a woman is old, she won’t remember what the diamond looked like but she will always cherish the memory of the moment.
It’s not what you say, it’s how, when, and where you say it. Talk is cheap. Tell your loved ones you love them by doing something that creates a memory! A memory for BOTH of you! Then pick that special moment in time to say “I Love You!” I don’t do that enough… do you? I may not be lucky in finance but it seems I am lucky in love. Money only matters if you are NOT lucky in love. Why? Because you can’t take money with you when you die but you can take all of the love! Do this: Love more than you are loved, gather memories, share them, treasure them! Laugh more! Go make a story to tell!
…Are you inspired yet?
Roy Lee Barrett
Roy Lee Unchained 