Adventure: Supreme Confidence

We must begin with the Speedo. It must be acknowledged. Don’t turn away. Take it in, slowly. Admire the stretch of that front leg. Admire the topsiders and sock tanline and terrycloth jacket, unzipped halfway of course. Better to show off the hairy chest. Hand on hip. Goddamn if that isn’t style. Right there before us all. Cemented in mind forever. Seared some would say. Like a car wreck. Slow down and take a gander. And ya, that’s me on the left. All spindly and gaunt. Toothpick arms and legs, pencil neck. And sis in the middle. Perhaps the only time in her fifty nine years she felt the padded handle of a golf club.

I do have questions, however.

This looks like a pitch and putt but that grass is far too long and shaggy for putting, and yet there I stand, putter in hand. And where is this? My best guess, Cayman Islands. My other best guess is mom working the camera. Poor woman. Remember, she had to look at us the entire time. She was responsible for us, even when we ventured forth looking like this.

Dad had supreme confidence. Where this came from is a mystery. By this time in his life he was financially successful, and that is surely partly to blame. We were rich. Not modern rich, or liquid or garrishly rich like the tech assholes of today, just comfortable. We lived in Hicksville, USA but mom had a Porsche. I knew something was wrong with us. The kids on my bus ride to school had extra fingers. We were limited to ten and did not fit in.

Dad was a problem. His parents were all in on discipline and there was friction. Major friction. This led to military school, being suspended from three universities and a failed attempt at joining the military. He ended up on the assembly line at a local foundry once owned by his grandfather. He went from the bottom to the top eventually buying the foundry and several more just like it. He had an ego. And just like his parents, he went all in on the discipline with us kids. At least he tried.

He was awkward and bumbling and had no grace. His nickname was “Big Outdoor John.” He once tried to mount a front brake on my bicycle by holding the bike between his knees and drilling through the front fork just by eye. When the hole came out at a 45-degree angle he looked at me and said, “Ya, sorry.” He was not good with this hands. Chewing tobacco gave him the hiccups. He had a wild streak that would continue to be his undoing.

America is not a Speedo culture. It might be in places now but it sure as shit wasn’t back then. My dad was the ONLY dad I ever saw in a Speedo. The only place I can think of where a Speedo might have been semi-okay was the local YMCA, a place I found out decades later, my father paid to build. Intense smell of chlorine, fear of the deep end, and dad in his strange contraption. I spent most of my time underwater.

When we traveled as a family it was almost always to warm weather locations. Mom hated cold. We would often arrive to some beachy place like South Florida or the Caymans. The plane leaving the gloom of an Indiana winter and landing in the turquoise promise of salt and sand. I never remember packing anything, but our silver suitcases would emerge from the bowels of the airport and we were off to whatever location mom had picked out.

By the end of the first day we were all burned to a crisp. Indiana skin and the tropics are a cruel combination, but it never stopped us. No one had ever heard of sunscreen. Just oil. Lots of oil. Dad would emerge from the hotel and head straight for the beach, and within minutes the only thing separating him from our ancient ancestors was a micro-thin piece of fabric riding into parts unknown. And dad did NOT have a speedo body. Far from it. In the photograph above, he is as thin as I ever remember seeing him, so when I refer to the Speedo, just think about the above photograph plus forty pounds. Ya, let that soak in. Sobering.

But damn if he didn’t pull it off. I’m not saying it worked. It did not. Of this I am certain, but HE THOUGHT it did and that is all that matters. He would stand on the beach and wait for a foreign female to walk by. He would then suck in his enormous gut which would shift north to his chestal region like some inflated party balloon. As soon as the foreign female would pass, we would all hear the hiss of a leaky tire as he slowly exhaled. He thought he was Burt Reynolds. He was macho. John Wayne was his spiritual guide.

We can all learn from my father. We we can what not to do, and we can learn how to own something regardless of how misguided. There is a big difference between cocky and confident. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. If you have a mission of sorts then you are in command. Want to try something most would consider questionable? Do it. You don’t need to fit in. You don’t need to be everyone’s friend or role model. Whatever little fire you have burning is yours.

When this photograph pops up in our family circle now, it is met mostly with winces. Closed eyes and puffing cheeks as we try and mend our memories. How? Why? Who thought this okay? I’m sure you and your family have moments like this. Captured in Technicolor beauty. This was us, sorry. Nothing to see here, move along. But I’ll take something good from this. I’ll put on my helmet, lower my goggles and go forth with supreme confidence. Whatever I choose to do, I’ll not let anyone question the intent. I’ll open that door and walk through into the glow.