Kerrying On

In the late 1980s, Lynn, a friend of the family, approached my wife, Louise, with an urgent request. She explained that she had signed a contract to run the Santa Claus photo concessions at ten different Los Angeles-area malls. After weeks of searching, she had found nine managers but was desperate to have Louise take charge of the photo booth located a few miles north of our home in Irvine.

Thanksgiving is an interesting phenomenon. It always comes in at number two in the holiday popularity polls, just behind Christmas. That’s a pretty high ranking when you consider how humble the holiday is. It doesn’t come with the ghoulish decorating or the fun-filled house-egging that we enjoy every Halloween.

When my Daughter Becca prepared to teach kindergarteners for the first time, she came to me for advice. Given that the students I had been teaching for the past thirty years were in grad (not grade) school, I told her I had nothing of any use to her (no news there). "Imagine," Becca said, "that I’ve taken a sacred oath to ‘first do no harm.’ Now what advice would you give me?"

Throughout my teenage years, I worked for my mom and dad painting an eighty-year-old boarding house they had purchased. It was a sprawling, artless, clapboard building that hadn’t been given much attention for decades, so it took me several summers to finish the job. It was like painting a giant sponge.

In the fall of 1952, I faced the prospect of attending school for the first time. The whole idea of going to school made me weak in the knees. My older brother had filled my head with bullying stories that gave me second thoughts about ever leaving home, let alone sharing the playground with a bunch of three-and-a-half foot thugs.

The doorbell rang and I jumped to my feet as a flash of pink tennis shoes sped by me in a race to the front door. Becca, my seven-year-old daughter, skidded up to the door, opened it, and found her best friend Crystal standing there.

If you’ve ever watched Pawn Stars, then you’ll appreciate where this story is going. With each new episode, Rick Harrison (co-owner of the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop) along with a few family members and colleagues, haggle with customers over how much a Civil War wooden leg is worth—or it might be a Picasso print.

On September 8, 1958 (the first day I attended junior high school) I met Frank Mustappa. I didn’t know it at the time, but Frank would change my life. Despite the fact that he was a twelve-year-old boy, Frank was surprisingly mature. While the rest of us boys competed to see who could make the most explosive armpit noise, Frank practiced a more sophisticated and subtle brand of humor.

When I entered the eighth grade in 1959, I was given the option to study either Latin or French. I chose French because from what I understood, the French weren’t dead yet. Miss Limply, the school’s French teacher, launched the first day of class by showing a cartoon of the Three Little Pigs. From the confusing muddle of sounds blaring from the projector, I learned only one word—loup—or wolf. It made me laugh because it was pronounced loo, and in England that’s a toilet. Perhaps French was going to be fun.

Two weeks into my sophomore year of high school, I overheard a student speaking Spanish in the hallway. I was taking a Spanish class at the time and was aware of no student who actually spoke the language, so the sound of a trilled r caught my attention. “I am here on exchange,” the stranger explained as I introduced myself. “I am called Pablo and I come from Mexico.”

Unintended consequences—we’ve all experienced them. You have a well-intended idea, give it a whirl, and then something unpleasant results. For instance, you’re trying to assist a colleague at work and you end up slowing things down. Or perhaps you help a friend write code and insert a bug into the program. Or perhaps you point out that a new employee is doing something wrong and he ends up getting knocked out and dragged feet first down a half-dozen stairs while his head bangs on the cement steps. You know, stuff like that.

It was the wish of Bellingham School District No. 501 that starting in the seventh grade, each student write a weekly theme and an annual term paper—and continue this practice throughout all of his or her junior high and high school years. Themes were easy. I would sit down and write whatever cockamamie idea came to mind, turn it in, and then have it torn apart by college English majors who graded my work with a red pencil and hatchet.

One brisk December morning as my five-year-old son Taylor and I skittered across the local mall’s icy parking lot in search of gifts for his two older sisters, Taylor turned to me and asked, “What was your bestest and most favorite Christmas present ever?”

When David Maxfield and I pulled up to the plywood mill, we were surprised to see an ambulance parked out front. We had come to study the impact of an upcoming leadership-training program, but I must admit it was difficult to think about research as we walked by a vehicle that had “Sisters of Mercy Hospital” painted on both sides in large, red letters.

When John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd started rehearsing the 1981 film Neighbors, one of the greatest casting errors in the history of movies was set into action. John, true to type, had been cast as the zany neighbor, Dan as the conservative one. For reasons only the two of them will ever know, Belushi and Aykroyd insisted on reversing roles.

I miss strawberries. Despite the fact that my acquaintance with them began quite by accident, I still miss them. It all started when, as a child, I was foraging in the woods behind my house and stumbled onto a patch of wild strawberries.

It was a Saturday morning in the summer of 1980, the front doorbell chimed, and my seven-year-old daughter Rebecca ran to see who was there. It turned out to be her best friend, Candy, who smiled and asked, “Can you come out and play?” Rebecca took a quick look at her pal, curled her lip, said “No,” and then slammed the door.

One night somewhere in deepest rural America, a fellow driving along a lonely stretch of country road blew his right front tire. After pulling over and scrambling out of his BMW, he walked to the trunk, opened it, and noted with disgust that his jack was missing.

“Call on me!” I quietly implored as I used my left arm to hold my right arm high above my desk. Miss McCloud, my first-grade teacher (and the most wonderful woman to ever walk the earth) had just asked the class to identify the color of the flower in her hand. I waved my arm wildly because I was confident in my answer. To be honest, I saw myself as a bit of a color savant. Plus, I really wanted Miss McCloud to admire me for knowing the correct answer so I could bask in the glow of her approving smile. Did I mention she was the most wonderful woman to ever walk the earth?

On a generosity scale from one to ten—one equating to “painfully cheap” and ten meaning “delightfully generous”—my kids think I’m a one. For years I thought all the “You’re Number One” cards, trophies, and plaques my children gave me on Father’s Day celebrated my best-ness. It turns out it was code. They were mocking my cheapness. In fact, they think my entire generation is cheap.