The Old Man As Bullfrog
Age robs so many aspects of manhood - strength, stamina, flexibility, at worst all hair and in least the lustrous color of youth is replaced by silver. A young man is a mere tadpole, navigating the shallows of life, but an Old Man operates in the deep end of the pond, belching and croaking at anything swimming by while clinging steadfastly to what remains of his lily pad. Still, the one thing Old Frogs and Old Men do well is reminisce as we’ve seen and lived through both drought and flood.
I recently found myself back in the pond of my youth, Houston, for a high school reunion. While there, I arranged lunch with my two Boyz in the ‘Hood from nearly 50 years ago, Eddie Okruhlik and Joe Jackson. I had seen each separately in the last few years, but in tandem I was cheered to recognize our merry trio had evolved to cut fine figures of bullfrogs.
We had met just as Joe entered high school, stair-stepped by two years, Joe the oldest, then me two years younger and Eddie O two years further back. Joe as oldest was our trailblazer and transportation since he got his driver’s license first. We lived on the same street and were linked by the Brotherhood of the Ball. We played anything that had a ball, football, basketball, baseball, golf. We didn’t know anything about soccer in those days or we would have played and the only ice in Houston was in sweet tea so we didn’t play hockey. We did enough damage and injury to each other, it’s probably good they didn’t issue big sticks.
Eddie was probably the best athlete despite being bow legged and the youngest. He quarterbacked at the same Catholic school Gary Kubiak, coach of the Broncos, played at later. Joe and I went to Spring Branch, which was a big 4A high school. I tried to play a little basketball that was conveniently forgotten and Joe ran track, but our careers paled next to Eddie’s.
It didn’t take long for the escapades to come flooding back.
There was the time to support our golf habit the trio sneaked onto an Atascocito Golf Course water hole and pulled out golf balls saved in our mothers’ pantyhose. We were right under the greenkeepers house trying to be so quiet when a crawdad or something attached itself to Joe’s leg inside his cutoffs. Joe did a better job suppressing his screams than Eddie and I did our laughter.
Eddie recalled a time that has stuck in my mind for 40+ years of the three of us driving up to Joe’s dad’s cabin in Dayton after a flood to clean up and hang out. We got there around 11 p.m. and had to wade in standing water that was up to mine and Joe’s chest as we walked along a road we followed only with our feet. Eddie, being about 13 at the time, had water up to his shoulders. None of us would admit to being scared but the flooded woods were pretty spooky. Eddie talked a blue streak to keep his courage up and once in a while he would step in a pothole and his words would garble and gurgle. We laughed each time that happened, but nobody laughed when one of the producing wells that dotted the woods flamed up like a mushroom cloud suddenly. I think we all screamed that time thinking we had been nuked by the bogeyman.
Eddie also thanked me for all the times I hauled him around after I got my license. My maiden voyage with my Dad’s new ’69 Chevelle was for Eddie and I to go to a Spring Branch basketball game, a walkable distance of about eight miles round trip. Of course, I had a few girls houses I needed to drive by to prove I was driving. Eddie convinced me to take him all the way to the house of a pretty eighth grader named Mary who lived a couple zip codes away. When I got up the next day my dad wanted to know where in Hades we had gone in 75 miles. I didn’t realize my dad was paid mileage by his work. He noted his odometer at the end of every day and so I was busted. But, Eddie ended up marrying Mary and they’ve been together almost 50 years. I wasn’t grounded too long so everything worked out.
Before I got my license, the three of us had an adventure at Surfside beach that was only illegal by circumstance. On the last wave of the day, Joe wiped out and the mega surfboard he had at the time flew up and came down, hitting him in the thigh and buckling the muscle. Eddie and I managed to get help and rode with Joe in the ambulance to Lake Jackson hospital. Joe’s dad was at the cabin and his mother didn’t want to drive to Lake Jackson by herself and so my mother came. The catch was my mother didn’t drive. Joe was being given anesthetic and was in a lot of pain. We had Joe’s dad’s pickup and Mrs. Jackson’s car and only one qualified driver. I was 15 and had only driver’s Ed in the classroom though I had driven my sister-in-law’s car on the ranch. The biggest catch, besides lack of driver’s license, was the pickup was standard shift and Mrs. Jackson couldn’t drive it either. I was elected default driver with Eddie as my copilot. God must have been riding between us.
This was a big Dodge or Chevy pickup, the years have dimmed the manufacturer’s medallion. The road between Freeport and Spring Branch passed through a bunch of little towns, all with maximum stop lights and county mounty law enforcement. This was before we ever got to Houston, which had to be crossed by freeways since we were coming from the Southeast and Spring Branch was Northwest Houston.
I killed the engine at least 30 times at the first six stop lights before Eddie and I hit upon a plan to coast up and try to time the light so we never had to shift down to a standing stop. This didn’t always work and eventually I got the hang of the clutch and stick shift after grinding a couple of teeth off the transmission. I look back now and getting that truck home in one piece without arrest was one of the most harrowing times of my formative years. Also one of the great achievements.
We compared notes on the ensuing years and my friends determined I had weathered them with the least wear and tear. Joe had come back from a couple of heart attacks and Eddie had battled a mysterious blood sugar problem that affected his legs despite not being diabetic. Of course, we had lived in the pond long enough to know some calamities lurk out of sight under still waters of apparent good health. An Old Man’s body is always a ticking time bomb. We enjoyed our steak and potatoes without regard or salutation to prudent eating since there were no wives around.
Joe and Eddie made plans to get together again in the future, which was gratifying. I had seen each of them a few years before on a trek through my hometown, but they hadn’t seen one another in almost 40 years despite living about 20 miles apart. I guess I was a catalyst in a way to bring my two old friends back in touch and I’ll accept that role though I wish I lived closer to see them more often.
After we walked out of the restaurant, we determined we needed a photo to commemorate the occasion. We cut a funny sight - three old farts trying to figure out how to take a “selfie”. I texted the picture to each of them and to my wife. She texted back the picture looked like a gathering of Old Men.
She was right as that picture made a thousand words redundant. Yet here I’ve burned a bunch anyway trying to put this reunion into perspective a good while after the event. I had to let the afternoon percolate.
I look at that picture and I acknowledge the white hair and gray beards. Yet I can also look closer and see the young guys I knew clearly. I know how Joe tips his jump shot though the knowledge does me no good as he can jump higher than me. I also know Eddie O doesn’t telegraph anything on a layup, he can use either hand and his body control will allow him to hang just a little longer than you to get the shot off. The memory of how much vitality we once had cuts like the sharp edge of a broken looking glass.
Old Men talk over old times. It’s what we do. There are so many disadvantages to becoming an Old Man but one advantage is perspective gained from stacking years. An Old Man can look back across the breadth of his life and identify for certain who his friends were. I can look at Eddie and Joe and say for certain they are my friends, both yesterday and today.
