This past week our furnace broke down just in time for the first cold week of the season. We spent a couple nights wrapped in blankets, and then decided to move into a hotel while it is being repaired. On the way to work this morning, my mind drifted onto a train of thought (you know how that goes) of memories I had not thought of for a long time. Here is the scattered recollection:
My parents grew up in Kansas, my mother in Topeka, my father in an orphanage in Kansas City. They met in McPherson Kansas while attending college. My father worked for a man who installed appliances (and furnaces) in the small town, and this boss became a surrogate family to him.
The business owner’s names were Mark and Mary. Through the years, they became my adoptive grandparents, and we would spend our summers there. From the time school got out in June to when we started again in August, we would travel out to the middle of the prairie and spend the days doing stuff kids do growing up.
Mary had a large garden out back, and a side “house” where she would can all of the things she grew. I was never a big fan of this, as I remember having to eat all the things that grew in the backyard. What kid likes to eat vegetables? Not me. There were many nights I remember sitting at the table refusing to eat a green pepper stuffed with God-knows-what.
At the table, I would sit by Mark. It was confusing at times in the names, sometimes it would be “grandpa”, sometimes it would be “Mark”, as if nobody had decided collectively on the proper naming convention. I still don’t know what to call him when I tell stories about Kansas.
Mark was a hard working man. He would be out the door by 6, and return home 12-14 hours later. Old school all the way, he would come in, sit in his recliner, and wait for dinner to be on the table. His clothes of choice after work were a pair of tan cloth shorts, a white v-neck t-shirt, black dress socks, and slippers. A short man at maybe 5′ 5″ on a good day, he wore the old army style black rimmed glasses that were so thick you could start a brush fire with them.
Sitting next to Mark, staring at a plate of of vegetables I didn’t want to eat, he was smacking away like a toothless muppet on his meal. He looked over at me and smiled, then hit me in the arm much harder than a 9 year old could take. “Don’t like that food?” he asked with a grin. I didn’t say anything, quietly scared of voicing that I didn’t want to eat it. He leaned closer and whispered “Some of it is pretty bad…but sometimes you just have to force it down to make her happy.”
I can’t remember if I ate it, but I remember his look when he said it. An old man even back then, he knew how to get through life without ever complaining about anything. Hard working, stubborn, but kind.
So here I am now, with a broken furnace that I am not able to fix myself (thinking about a “grandpa” that could), and finding that I am complaining about circumstances that piss me off. I guess there are a couple things I could still learn from Mark if I just slow down to remember.
