The stain of high school

So many memories from my four years of high school. The crowded hallways, losing the state championship, never being able to get into my locker, being cleverly manipulated into tossing one shoe out a second story window, the "Dream" Team, my lack of a social life, my lack of a love life, the drunk kids during that one presentation of mine, and the daily shame and humiliation I endured in front of my peers (who doesn't experience that in high school?).

But there is one thing I hope to literally carry with me for all time from high school. The staircase sandwich stain.

For years, it was a tendency of my friends and I to eat lunch in one of the staircases of the 300 building. I guess because we wanted to trip up people going up or down the stairs - I'm not really sure. It had a landing halfway up that some of us enjoyed sitting together on. Others enjoyed the actual steps. Regardless, it was our spot.

Anyway, during a routine lunch during sophomore year, Puma, myself, and the guys were eating in our usual places. Puma had grabbed some kind of prepared meal from the airport or something. I remember he had arrived to school because of a trip he made, and just grabbed something to eat he could take to school. Part of the meal included a sandwich that would alter our destinies forever. As Puma unwrapped the sandwich from its plastic covering, it immediately became clear that something was amiss.

Buying food carefully wrapped in plastic, you assume a certain amount of freshness to said food. Not in this case. What he unwrapped was the nastiest, oiliest sandwich any of us had ever seen. Viscous liquid oozed from every pore and it had a smell that began attracting flies.

Puma takes his food quite seriously. He is a not-so-strict vegetarian (he eats fish, and every time I remind him he's not a true vegetarian it irks him to no end) and can be quite picky about what he is eating and where it came from. He was learning that grabbing something to-go from the airport was not the best choice.

Puma proceeded to complain and show-off his disgusting main course to the rest of us. And we were all suitably grossed out as we passed it around.

Suddenly, one of them grabbed it from Puma's hands and tossed it at the far wall. The sandwich slid slowly down the wall, leaving an audible squeak in its wake.

To this day, the portion of the wall that sandwich hit has a large greasy stain on it. I know this because Puma and I visit our high school almost every year and we check on that wall every year, too. That stain still stands. And I hope it stands for as long as that building does.

Some people own bits of the Berlin Wall; keepsakes to remember that mighty symbol of Communist oppression. My hope is to one day own that greasy piece of brick wall. When the time comes for my school to be torn down, Puma and I plan to sneak in and remove that section of wall for ourselves. A keepsake to always remember the oppression of high school by.

The Red (Ant) Menace

There’s a war raging in my own backyard. It’s been raging on-and-off for almost two years. I’ve battled an army of thousands to a standstill armed with nothing more than a garden hose, a shovel, and my indomitable willpower.

The invasion of my homeland began in the summer of 2011. Mom was out checking the yard. Suddenly, I heard shouts and cries from outside. I ran downstairs just as Mom made it back inside. 

She had been standing by a pile of decayed wood when she was viciously attacked by a colony of red ants that had moved into our territory. Large welts appeared all over her legs from the assault.

It was the opening salvo of the bloody conflict to come. Since then I’ve fought hard to protect my homeland from the threat of a massive, yet also tiny, invasion force. 

While maybe not as destructive as World War I and II, the Civil War, the Clone Wars, or the Time War, this has been an ongoing hard-fought war. Every time The Enemy retreats, they eventually return with equal, if not greater, numbers than before.

War reports from the The First Ant War of August 2011 have recently been declassified. I share them with you now so you may better understand the severity of this never-ending conflict.

Day 1: Surprise attack on the Motherland this afternoon. The Red (Ant) Menace is already within our borders. The woodlands have been taken by The Enemy. Mother caught by surprise and forced to retreat. An emergency war council meeting had been called and war is expected to be declared by Congress.

Day 2: First aerial bombardment of enemy colony launched using a standard garden hose upgraded with jet stream firing mechanism. Enemy shows rapid response time, but their defenses are powerless to prevent ranged aerial attack. Recommend avoiding any ground assaults for now.

Day 4: After two straight days of aerial-only attacks, reinforcements were called in today. Our ally’s codename: Big G. Big G assisted in a combined aerial aquatic attack followed by a ground assault aided by a shovel. Enemy resupply station located and destroyed. Big G forced to retreat back home for dinner following the attack and a game of Super Mario Bros.

Day 6: Ground forces discovered two more resupply stations; one destroyed and the other severely damaged.

Day 7: Increased bee activity noticed around woodlands/ant colony. Intelligence reports indicate The Enemy is attempting to form a defensive alliance with the bees. Council is attempting to send ambassadors to the bees informing them we are only interested in protecting our homeland, removing The Enemy from the woodlands, and promising the bees continued use of our natural resources (flowers) for themselves.

Day 9: Second day of inactivity on war front; both sides exhausted from combat. Also, I’ve had other things to do. Negotiations ongoing with bees, though we fear they may take The Enemy’s side. Consulted with Big G today, he suggested calling in a WMD strike to bring a quick end to the war; perhaps even resort to chemical warfare. Council taking it under consideration, but not everyone is comfortable with using such immense firepower at this time. Combat operations expected to resume tomorrow.

Day 10: Poor weather conditions kept the bees grounded, so we launched an attack today. Very limited response by The Enemy. A task force is being assembled to infiltrate the colony tomorrow and assess their condition.

Day 11: Ground forces could find no trace of The Enemy. Ants believed to have retreated fully or gone deep underground. Cease-fire has been called in hopes that war is over.

Sadly, that was not the end. Even after the wood was cleared, The Enemy returned the following spring and summer. First in the same location, then in one of Mom’s flower boxes. Both times the colony was forced back into hiding. These two occurrences formed The Second Ant War.

I bring all this up now because recent sightings have confirmed that The Enemy has returned. They switched to a new flower box, but it is undoubtedly another invasion force from our mortal Enemy. The Third Ant War is set to begin.

The Red (Ant) Menace must be stopped!

Things you only see in San Francisco

While I would have preferred less depressing circumstances to allow for my return to the City by the Bay, I found myself back in my real hometown recently. I was instantly reminded just how wacky this place is, and was inspired to share a few things that makes me love this place so much.

• Seagulls overtaking a baseball stadium
• A hipster bowling alley
• An aquatic jetpack
• Cars with large pink mustaches sprouting from the bumpers (although I did see one in Seattle recently. I fear this rare form of car disease is spreading)
• The Running of the Elvises
  
• Food boutiques ("What's that?" "It says 'Authentic Food Boutique'." "That still doesn't answer my question." "I think it's a fancy way of saying 'grocery store'.")
• A hotel for dogs
• A UFO in the bay
• Castro Street (you have no idea until you've been there)
• Men sporting monocles, top hats, and pink beards
• A herd of bison living in a public park
• Authentic hippies (yep, we still got 'em)
• Hunter Pence
  

Really, this is just the tip of the iceberg as far as San Francisco's uniqueness. You can also read about some of the sounds of The City.

And now one special one I saved for California's capitol, Sacramento. I spent a lot of time there, too, these last two weeks. Here's something you will only see in downtown Sacramento.

• A man walking down the street holding a spinal column

I wish I was kidding.



Papa

"Did I ever tell you how I won World War II?"

"No! I didn't realize you flew the bombers that dropped A-bombs on Japan," my 11-year-old self replied. My grandfather, with 75 years under his belt to that point, looked at me and, with a straight face, told me:

"No, no. That's all wrong. The real reason the Japanese surrendered was because they heard I had finished training and was coming for them."

There you have it, folks. You all owe my Papa for saving the world.

Won WWII single handed, raised a family of seven kids, moved his family cross country to the promised land of California, and overcame cancer at the age of 80. Not too bad for a simple man from Bismarck, North Dakota.

My Papa, who told me several stories like that one over the years, can't tell me anymore. He died on April 26 at the age of 87 following a second go-around with cancer.

I've spent the time since then coming to grips with his passing, as well as supporting my family, attending his memorial service, and writing his obituary for his old hometown newspaper.

It's sobering to write the obituary of a loved one. I think that was the moment it all became very real for me. I endured sleepless nights after I was informed of his poor condition in the days prior to his death, and I cried after I got off the phone with my father that fateful Friday evening, but it wasn't until I walked into that house two days after his passing that it really hit me.

My Papa was gone. So many things of his that reminded me of him were still there, but he was gone. The giant red armchair, his overalls for yard work, the HD TV.

Oh, that HD TV. You know he almost didn't let us buy him that? Some of the family wanted to buy him and Grandma a new TV - something bigger and fancier.

When Papa found out, he griped, "But I like this TV. I need it. The Giants never lose on this TV."

That was his favorite line for years. "The Giants never lose on this TV." Wouldn't you know it, after we replaced his TV the Giants won two World Series - the only two championships he saw his whole life.

"I guess it can stay," was all he said after the first championship in 2010.

Following the memorial service this past Monday, I started realizing what people mean when they say your loved ones never really leave you after they are gone. That they remain with you. Papa definitely remains with me. He remains in all my family. He remains in my favorite medium: stories.

Each of Papa's seven children got up during the service and had at least one story to tell about what he meant to them, or something he said or did that stuck with them. Stories of car rides, root beer, and unstoppable left-handed hook shots. And I realized that I too have stories and memories to share.

I'll let you in on another one of my favorites. It was the day I learned my personal connection to Papa was closer than I originally thought.

I was visiting for the holidays during winter break of my freshman year at college. I was attending Washington State University, simply because I had taken an interest in journalism and heard stellar things about that program at WSU. Out of the blue, Papa asks me, "Have they still got that beautiful clock tower on your campus?"

Turns out, after winning World War II, Papa enrolled at WSU on the G.I. Bill. He only stayed for a single semester before returning to his native North Dakota. I guess because he missed what a real winter felt like (although he evidently got fed up with those winters later because he moved to California the following decade).

He recounted for me how he had to take classes, eat, and sleep in Bryan Hall because the small campus was overflowing with veterans home from the war. He described climbing the clock tower at night when no one was around and looking across the starry night sky and dark Palouse landscape.

"There were a lot of beautiful young girls around there," Papa said. "But none of them compared to your grandmother, of course."

My Papa lives on. He lives on in his wife and in his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. All of whom will have stories to tell about Papa for many years to come. We are his legacy, and one I know he was proud of. And it is a legacy I am overjoyed to be a part of.

Not too bad, Papa. Not too bad.