House Pics

Uncle Jim

Uncle Jim
Since a cousin's gathering just before Christmas I've been reconnecting with the seldom seen but often remembered cousins on one side of my family. This reconnection has largely centered on memories of what we called "the Country", the 100 acre farm near Dickson that was the childhood (roughly speaking) home of our aunts and uncles and parents. Some of my best memories of this era centered around my Uncle Jim- James McCord to give his full name. The childless husband of my Aunt Harriet Marie, and many years her senior (in part due to lying about his age), he was an uncle by marriage and not by blood. In spite of, or maybe because of, having no kids himself he was always kind to and fun with the kids. He wore his hair long and slicked back with Vitalis, kind of like John Mellencamp- and looked a little out of step for the day. He often called me "Glenn, Curt-tail, Shirt-tail Britches Yates", which kind of annoyed me and kind of gave me a kick at the same time. He also called me, "Old Buke" the meaning of which is still unknown to me. He drank coffee from a saucer and smoked unfiltered Lucky Strikes- only the health nuts smoked filtered cigarettes back then, and he made money in a variety of exotic ways. Sometimes he'd hunt jimson weed, sometimes working day labor, and when he got sick he and my Aunt sold Watkins products door to door. He was a good storyteller, and he had lots of good stories. He got bitten by a rattlesnake once, and had to drag himself a couple of miles back to the farm for help. My favorite story about Uncle Jim, though, was one that I never heard him tell, but I did see him live. I heard the story from my Aunt and from my Mom, and it is worth telling again here.
By the time I knew my country Uncle Jim he was as kind and engaging and mostly as normal a guy as you would run across. He was also "deeply religious," as they say, not that unusual for country people in the South in the 50's, or today for that matter. He was not always that way,though- and far from it even. At one time he was a bootlegger and alcoholic, and he was the only one of his brothers who did not spend time in the penitentiary for some kind of malfeasance according to my Aunt. This didn't mean he wasn't just as rough as the rest of them, I think it's just that he wasn't caught. For the first ten or so years of marriage Aunt Harriet said Uncle Jim was drunk much of the time, and would often come home from a night of drinking and even beat her. Very hard to imagine now, but that's what she said. Of course she prayed for him a lot, and I'm sure for her situation as well, but back then if you had a bad marriage you pretty much just had a bad marriage, and that was that. In any case she continued to pray for him, and one night she was washing dishes with Mammaw (my Grandmother) Yates and she heard Uncle Jim singing as he was coming home. "He's drunk again" was what my Aunt said to my Grandmother, but Uncle Jim came in excited and told them that the Lord had taken away his drinking, and he wasn't ever going to need it again. The encounter became like the one in the Gospels when the local church group had been praying all night for the release of Peter from prison, and when he miraculously showed up later that night they adamantly objected that it had to be his ghost. In other words, there may have been lots of hoping and praying, but apparently there wasn't much believing and praying. My grandmother, who I never really knew all that well, surprisingly took him at face value though and told my Aunt that something was different, and that if he said "the Lord took it away," to believe him. She turned out to be right. According to my Mother and my Aunt, this is what had happened that night...
Uncle Jim had shown up at a beer joint and was hanging out with his buddies. He said he was about to grab a beer when he heard a voice say to him, "Don't touch that- I don't ever want you to touch it again." According to my Mom it was an audible voice, but whatever kind of voice it was it was powerful enough to cause him to listen. He had a bottle of some kind of liquor in his back pocket and took it out and started to head outside. His buddies asked him where he was going, and he said he was going out back to smash the bottle. His pals thought that a waste, but he went out back anyway, smashed the bottle, dropped to his knees, and gave his heart to Jesus on the spot.
Audible or not, there isn't any doubt to me that that was the voice of God, and it was pretty well evidenced by the next twelve years of his life, where he was a changed man. Like Ebenezer Scrooge, who learned to keep Christmas well, he learned to keep life well. To say he never made much money is beyond understatement, but he was invariably cheerful, even when he was missing half of his tongue from throat cancer. My last memories of him were of an emaciated but still joyful man at the VA Hospital in Nashville, and according to my Aunt his final words were the sweet and fitting words of Paul- "I've fought the good fight, I've kept the faith, I'm going to be with Jesus." It's always been my hope to close things out with the same verse myself.

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Wir sind Helden

I've been brushing up on my German lately by listening to webcasts, radio streaming, etc. My employer doesn't like us doing
that since it uses so much bandwith, so where possible I've been downloading webcasts and buying German music. A lot of German music seems to be dark, industrial, death-metal type stuff. There's also a subset of that Bavarian folk-polka music. It sounds corny, but some of it is really, really good- especially live. Using the word polka does it a bit of an injustice- kind of like calling Nancy Griffith or EmmyLou Harris country. It is technically true, but doesn't really capture the essence. Anyway, or in German, sowieso, I've discovered a band that I like as well as any band I've heard in a while. Some of it is that the lead singer- "Fraufronter", or something like that- is really cute and her voice matches her looks. She looks a bit elfin, like the blonde-haired female singer from sixpence none the richer, but a bit less pixieish. The band is "Wir sind Helden" (we are heroes), and they're worth checking out on itunes or someplace. I like every one of their songs except one about giving someone an elephant. Maybe something gets lost in the translation. If you find them, let me know what you think. They have a website with videos, a couple of which are really good as well.

A Christmas Carol

“A CHRISTMAS CAROL”
(with apologies to David Sedaris- this is more or less a personalized rewrite of one of his essays. I liked the concept so well I wanted to recreate it with a local flavor)








Once more the excitement of the Christmas theater season is upon us, and a staggering array of fine works are again out there to overwhelm the culturally-minded. Not least among the choices is the first one this critic chose to review, a sometime modern, sometime period adaptation of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", put on by one of South Nashville's hidden treasures- the fifth grade class of Norman Binkley Elementary School.
While at times the dialogue seemed stilted and the acting seemed wooden, the synergy of 19th century England and 21st century converted schoolroom cafeteria could not be held back. While Ben William's Ebenezer lacked some of the spirit of say, Alistair Sims, it was at least as powerful as say, Keanu Reeves. Ben, as did most of the Norman Binkley thespians, chose to portray his London character with strong southern schoolboy overtones. This creative "Hee-Haw meets Debtor's Prison" version of the young lads kept the play from sinking into the sentimentality that the old tale often finds itself mired. And young Tim, played by Rami Mishu, was a positive show stealer with his Chester-like limp. The assorted nationalities and ethnicities of the actors at first took some getting used to, as well as the blue jeans and even tennis shoes worn by some of the 19th century Londoners, but after a while the audience was able to appreciate the conflict this produced.

The finest scene, and this critic suspects it was part of an ingenious rewrite, was when Bob (Sean McCurdy) Cratchit hoisted Tiny Tim on his shoulders to set off to church. The scene quickly took on a fine Mel Brooks quality as Bob struggled valiantly to lift Tim, and Tim struggled valiantly to stay lifted. At last they achieved a kind of equilibrium as Bob wobbled around with Tim as though he were carrying a sofa. Well to this critic's delight the whole party came crashing down, cardboard spats and top hats flying everywhere. The only set in this minimalist interpretation, a cardboard wall painted vaguely (and incomprehensibly) to resemble a 15th century castle, came crashing down with the lot. The comic pathos was palpable. If the rest of the holiday season proves this festive, then this is one critic who won't be saying, "Bah, Humbug!"

The Sad Man

by Glenn Yates


Grey shirt, grey slacks, teeth still white, standing out in stark contrast with his grizzled, weathered face. Forty-three years, mostly unkind, the last three nearly unbearable. Only the cheap wine could dull the pain, and only dull it, never make it go away.

He was sober now, though not by choice. Sober, but sick. Sick and disgusted and craving drink. He no longer hoped to change, no longer cared what people thought, or at least no longer had the power or will to affect what people thought, so he tried not to care. In his mind’s eye he saw her face and though he felt unworthy to even think of her, but he could not help himself. It pained him, but pain was an old friend, and he deserved the torment he told himself.

She’d be twenty-nine now, the same no-longer-young age he had been when they had met. She’d smiled at him that first day like no one had ever smiled at him before, and his heart had come alive. He’d never before been in love, rarely had even been infatuated, but now against his wishes he was taken prisoner.

The first year he strained against it, but with every warm breeze, every snowfall, every fireplace on a winter night, her voice and gaze would haunt him. At last he could restrain himself no longer and made his heart known to her. He cringed for the thousandth time at the thought. She was flattered, he supposed, but uncomprehending. Word got around and his career was ended. The double blow of her ultimate rejection and his public humiliation
had been too much for him to deal with. Despondent, he began to drink.

Fourteen years now. Fourteen years he had watched himself spiral down, bit by bit, day-by-day, until he had become the unrecognizable animal that he was today. The cold pavement reminded him of this, reminded him, as it seeped into his back, that only animals live like this. Why? He asked pitifully, beginning to cry softly. One month, maybe one day, and it might have all been different. A secret love might have remained secret, that gaze might have been his forever. Now it was not the gaze, only the memory of the gaze that must last a lifetime. And it is not enough.

Soccer Riots

Endless Loop

I've been thinking a lot about soccer riots of late, as have we all. For many years they have been a mystery to me. That soccer could excite enough passion to even have fans show up I found inexplicable, to think that soccer excites enough passion for people to riot and kill I found incomprehensible. It seemed to the American in me about as understandable as a chess club riot. That soccer, one of the most boring sports to watch ever invented, cannot be the draw was clear to me- but what was the draw? What is the explanation? Was it the sight of men urinating into rolled up newspapers because apparently there are no bathrooms in Europe? Was it the beer, or wine, or whatever it is they drink at these events? Was it the fashion show put on by the fans wearing clothes that would be out of style even in Canada? Well I decided it was all that and more. Like many mysteries it took some unraveling, and I realized that a chain of events has led soccer to where it is today....

It all started, as the story goes, with Aztecs or Accountants or somebody kicking around the heads of their slain enemies. This should have been a tip-off. While that was fun while it lasted, it became clear to the Aztec marketing people that if the sport were to survive some changes would have to be implemented. Rules, for instance. And while famous for math, or was that the Mayans, they still decided on a game that would require no more scoring in a day than could be counted on one hand. Shorts and cleats and standardized goals were added next, and not being wasteful the Azzies made the nets from the intestines of their now headless enemies. Plus the goals could be played like a harp after the game, so the arts community was able to get behind it. With no cable TV or country music the game faced little competition and grew daily in popularity. The men, needing any excuse to get out of the house or to keep from building any more ancient ruins, or was that the Mayans again, came to the games in droves. Eventually it was discovered that you could keep the ball from decomposing or cracking open your own skull when "heading", by using balls made from rubber, again invented by the Aztecs or somebody like them. Now the game took a quantum leap forward, and was now only rivaled by human sacrifice and sheep-shearing as the spectator sports du joir. No one can pinpoint the exact time when soccer surpassed these other popular events, but it was probably around the time when rational, sensitive people realized that there was a little too much cruelty already in the world, and sheep shearing was banned. Now there was no stopping the plague-like spread of the sport, as Old World travelers coming to the New World, like burglars on crack, carried off everything they could lay their hands on, valuable or not.

Initially watching soccer was given as an option for penance by the Catholic Church, and since there was a lot of sinning back then the crowds grew to huge numbers, especially in France. As the Catholic Church lost power to the godless heathen existentialists, the crowds no longer came for penance. Old habits die hard, though, and the people kept coming anyway. At this point some fan, most historians think it was Bruce Springsteen, had had enough. After watching for about 6 hours waiting for something to happen alcohol-use reared its ugly head. Bruce had now run out of beer and money and was becoming sober, and soccer, like baseball, is not a sport intended to be viewed sober. Already angered by shoddy treatment from critics and producers, and agitated by the beer vendor's refusal to believe that "he was good for it", Bruce grabbed another, smaller fan and began using him like a club to "persuade" the vendor to part with some product. Quick as lighting the violence spread as it is wont to do, and all hell broke loose. Latent childhood anger at being subjected to caning and watching Punch and Judy awakened the British fans from their soccer-induced stupor and for the first time ever they began having fun at a soccer game. Players, realizing there was actual action going on somewhere, leapt into the stands to join in the fray. Hundreds of fans were killed and maimed, more than could be in a week's time in D.C., and all in one place for easy viewing. Well who could resist entertainment like that? Soccer was the perfect background tableau as well as catalyst for this riotous behavior. Fans, angered over gun control or whatever, would watch the soccer for as long as they could stand it, and then the violence-deprived Europeans would begin to beat one another senseless. Pretenses were kept up, with a wink and a nod, that it was passion over the game's outcome, but anyone who has ever watched an entire soccer game knows better than that.

And thus the mystery of soccer popularity finally was clarified for me, and now I understand why in a peace-loving country like the U.S. soccer is doomed to failure. Still, while I'd rather have my appendix removed by cats than watch soccer, I understand and appreciate the need for soccer and will defend with rocks and broken bottles the right of fans to enjoy it. I take up the cry with my Liverpool, Madrid, and Sao Paulo brethren, "If soccer is outlawed, only outlaws will play soccer".

Last Chance

The curved wood sure felt soft,

Slick and smooth, held aloft-

Catching the morning sun like a living jewel.



The boy stepped up to the plate,

Glowing eyes, uncertain fate,

Two out, one on, all up to him.



Sweating hands, beating heart,

Swinging, swaying, a false start.

Lunging, closing eyes, forgetting skills.



Last chance now, clenching teeth,

Shutting out the noisy grief,

Chaos swirls around his wiry frame.



It’s just a game, just a game-

Such thoughts are meaningless to him,

Doesn’t realize glory may yet come for him again.



The pitch is fast, the stance is good.

Solid leather meets hard wood,

The arc of flight so beautiful, the whole ballpark grows still.


Time has frozen, his mind takes,

A picture time will not erase.

Clearing the fence by at least three feet,

Who knew life could be so sweet?




by Glenn Yates circa 1990