I Still Love You, Dad

One of my earliest strong memories of my dad involves a game of catch in the backyard. I had just started playing baseball and was only beginning to be proficient at catching a ball from more than a few feet away.
Dad was rolling me some ground balls, lobbing a few fly balls, and tossing a few soft liners, one of which hit me smack in the nose. I started crying, but the main thing that has remained in my memory was dad's reaction. His eyes got huge and it was obvious that this event affected him way more than it did me. Of course he had no reason to feel guilty; he hadn't thrown the ball hard at all and it was a sheer accident. I don't even remember if I got a bloody nose. But he was shaken up for the rest of the day. Causing the slightest bit of hurt to anyone -- especially his children -- was something dad could never abide.
Delbert Kenneth (Ken) Franklin was the antithesis of the overbearing parent. He never pushed us to do anything we didn't want to do, and he provided 100% support and 0% criticism in everything we did. I'm not saying that's the best formula for perfect parenting, but that was the only way he knew how to be a father.
My siblings and I had varied talents and interests. I was pretty much all about sports and writing. My brother was an incredibly talented musician/dancer/singer. My sister was something of a hybrid, an All-State athlete with artistic and journalistic skills to boot. Dad, a former athlete with a Master's degree in music from Oklahoma City University, had the ability to give each of us 100% of himself in all of those areas. He was the loudest cheerer at Allison's cross country races, the first one to give a standing ovation at Andrew's musicals and the first one to want to read my newspaper stories and tell me how good they were.
He never got onto a ref for a bad call or onto a coach for more playing time. Part of that was being the most non-confrontational person I've ever known. Part of it was having more unconditional love than anyone I've ever known.
I can only remember him raising his voice a handful of times and never saw him even close to raising his hand in anger, despite his three kids giving him ample reasons to do so.
In my mind, there was never a question of which one of us or our hobbies dad loved more. They, and we, were 100% equal, and this is something that I once took for granted; now I recognize how special it was.
The same can be said for dad's work ethic. Five days a week for 25 years, he came home drenched in sweat after walking several miles in the Oklahoma sun with a heavy mail bag on his back. I can still instantly conjure an accurate nasal memory of the smell of that sweaty postal uniform. The job was taking a toll on him physically and he hated the politicking that kept forcing him to change routes, change start times, or do more work in less time than he felt was physically possible. But he clocked in every day, and when I would meet him for lunch at a fast food place that was on his route, the other mailmen eating with us inevitably told me that they envied dad's always-sunny personality. Some of them made fun of him for it.
That always-sunny personality could sometimes be pretty annoying. When we went golfing, he would be optimistic that the balls I shanked all over the course would turn out to be good shots. He'd yell "Bite!," "Get legs!" or "Turn over a little now" as soon as it was obvious to everyone else that I'd be nowhere near the green. He always thought we'd be able to find the ball that I'd hit into the middle of a dense forest, long after I was ready to give up and move on with the round. Still, those once-a-week golf outings were special times for me, and I've hardly played in the ten years since then because golf just isn't the same without dad.
Now that I'm a father of three with a wife and a mortgage, I recognize the sacrifices that my parents made to give us the best upbringing they could. Mom and dad could have driven nicer cars, gone on more dates or put more money toward their retirement, but instead they spent that time and money on their kids.
For dad and I, that meant playing golf when the weather was nice and going to baseball, football and basketball games together. Dad was a huge St. Louis Cardinals fan and I rebelled by cheering for the Chicago Cubs, a decision that has so far cost me a couple of World Series celebrations. But in the middle of the steroid era, we drove to St. Louis for a three-game series between the two rivals. In the car, dad said he hoped to see Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa hit three home runs each and the Cardinals win two out of three. I told him he was delusional, then watched Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa hit three home runs each and the Cardinals win two out of three. I saw it as a crazy coincidence, but dad didn't act surprised at all. He always expected the miraculous. He always had faith.
Although that series certainly ranks near the top of all of my "dad memories", for me nothing will beat the games.
My family always playing games; that's what we did. Board games, card games, dice games, you name it, we played it. I couldn't even begin to guess how many different games we played over the years. Dad and I liked playing games more than the rest of the family, and often it would be just the two of us.
After I moved out, I loved to come home, get a free meal, and spend the evening playing cards with mom and dad. For mom, one or two games was enough. But dad and I would play until he had to go bed. It wouldn't even be a discussion. One of us would pick up the deck, shuffle and deal. I usually didn't know which game we were playing until dad quit dealing. Four cards was a quirky but fun game called casino, six cards was pitch, eleven cards was gin rummy, etc. We'd talk about sports, school or work until the game neared its end, then all our attention was on the finish. Dad loved dramatic finishes, which was annoying when he won but he would show the same enthusiasm for the game if he lost on the final play. I can still picture our post-it notes filled to the max with scores from various card games. Dad always wrote and circled the letter W under the name of whoever won, although we never made any effort to keep track of who was winning the games long-term.
Then there was the laughing. Always the laughing. Slapstick was by far his favorite, although he could laugh at just about anything, especially himself. There was no mistaking or hiding that laugh. No restaurant big enough to keep everyone in the place from hearing it, no one else's laughter over the same topic loud enough to not be drowned out. If a moment was bereft of laughter, he'd pick up some random goofy object, put it on his head, cross his eyes and make a Three Stooges face until you laughed. And if you didn't laugh, he'd laugh so loud that you couldn't help but laugh at the fact that he cracked himself up so easily.
                                             

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When I was 16, I bumped into a car in a parking lot. I was a straight A student who had good influences for friends and never got into trouble. I didn't want to get in trouble for this either. So I panicked and drove off. Luckily, someone spotted me. I fessed up and got a good lecture (and probably a grounding of some sort) from my parents, and then I had to call the person whose car I hit and apologize. That lady was understandably upset and gave me another good lecture which included calling me a few not-nice names. After all of that, I felt like a loser. I'll never forget hanging up the phone and walking over to my dad, who was standing in the middle of the living room, about to go upstairs to bed. I wrapped my arms around him and just started sobbing. Dad wasn't real good at giving life lessons or expressing his emotions, but he let me hold on to him as long as I wanted, then he told me that I was a good kid and he loved me.
That was quintessential dad. In that moment, I didn't need advice or a scolding. I needed a dad that would hug me and tell me he loved me. Luckily, I had that dad.

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I was already moved out and in college when I got a call from mom that dad was in the hospital. He was dealing with depression and anxiety. That didn't make any sense at all. Dad was never anything but happy, relaxed, carefree. He pretty much let mom make all the day-to-day planning decisions and just went with the flow without complaining. I remember seeing him cry when his mom died -- and that was about the only time I saw him cry.

I dismissed the whole thing out of hand, but I did go to the hospital to visit him. He was acting weird, and showed me a drawing he had made of an apple being eaten by worms. He told me that it represented his heart, which was corrupted and bad just like the worm-riddled apple. 

I looked at him and the drawing in disbelief, told him he was the most loving person I knew and that his drawing was in no way reflective of his heart. Then I got out of there as fast as I could.

I refused to believe that this person was my father. I assumed that in a short amount of time, he'd snap out of whatever this was and go back to being normal. Then I could forget I had ever even visited him at the hospital or that he had made this weird drawing. Let's just get back to normal. Give me my dad back.

That's basically what happened. He wasn't in the hospital very long, and when he got out he was back to being my same old dad. Happy, laughing, talking sports. At least 95 percent of the time. When I was around, anyway.

I wanted to get as far away from that other dude as I could. I didn't want to lend any credibility to this poisoned apple business, didn't want to talk about it. Occasionally I'd ask him or mom how he was doing. I knew on some level he was still struggling, but it didn't make any sense to me and I just kept thinking (hoping, really) that it would go away. It was awkward. 

I told him I was interested in learning how to play guitar, and he bought me a really nice Taylor acoustic for my birthday. (More than 10 years later, I still get compliments on the guitar). Dad was a good guitar player who, prior to meeting mom, had made a living playing and singing in various bars and clubs around town. He taught me the basics, then wrote down the chords and lyrics to his most popular song, one for which he was offered a decent sum of money (1970s money anyway). On the top it said, "By Ken Franklin."

I said with a laugh, "Dad, why did you write your name on the top here? Are you afraid I'm going to take this song and claim it as my own and become famous without ever giving you credit?" He just smiled and shrugged his shoulders. I thought it was weird. Makes more sense now.

Also weird was how dad started bowing out of our card games half the time. I was driving more than an hour to have dinner and hang out with my parents. Mom always went to bed at 8 p.m., but I expected to get a couple more good hours of card playing out of dad. Sometimes that would happen like normal, but sometimes he'd play one or two or zero games instead of 20 and go to bed at 8:30. Said he was more tired than usual lately. Makes more sense now.

What does depression really mean, anyway? Aren't we all sad sometimes? I never thought there was any chance dad would hurt himself. In my 25 years I'd never seen dad hurt a fly, never do anything but walk away at the first sign of conflict.

  

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Our family got together a couple of days after my birthday to celebrate with a dinner at Red Rock on Lake Hefner. I brought my girlfriend Missy, who dad always loved. She enjoyed a good laugh almost as much as he did.

After the dinner, we all went back to mom and dad's house. I said good night to mom and she went to bed. It was just dad and I in the living room. I asked him if he wanted to play cards. He said no, he was heading to bed also. He told me he needed me to pray for him, that he was having some bad thoughts. 

For someone who never shared his personal feelings and emotions at all, who in fairness didn't even know how to share his personal feelings and emotions, this was a massive statement. But I refused to carry its full weight. I didn't want to talk to the guy with the weird drawing. Let's just get back to normal. Give me my dad back.

I assumed that his (and all) depression was a temporary feeling that would eventually subside. Suicide is for people who don't have moms, dads, kids, friends or co-workers who love them. I refused to even consider the possibility that this was a serious medical issue that was relentlessly attacking my father.

On top of all of that, I was the son of a man who never shared his personal feelings and emotions. I'm not good at it either, and I didn't know what to say. 

I know I told him I would pray for him, and I know I did pray for him. But I had no clue what was really going on and I have no idea what I said or prayed in that moment.

I decided to go ahead and drive back to Lawton that night. It was a Sunday, and I had to work Monday afternoon anyway. In the doorway, after my little chat/prayer with dad, he gave me a huge hug. It was just like the one he had given me nine years before, when I hit-and-ran in the parking lot. We were standing in almost the exact same place in the house. Again, he squeezed me tight and told me he was proud of me and he loved me. I told him I loved him too. It was the last thing I ever said to him.

Mom called me early Wednesday morning -- November 17, 2004. Told me dad had abruptly left the house before dawn, still wearing his pajamas. She didn't know where he was, maybe I should come home if I could.

I left my apartment without changing out of my pajamas. I didn't pack anything, just hit the highway. My brain was going a thousand miles an hour, but within minutes all the clues started coming together and I knew I'd never see him again. I didn't know how he'd done it, but I knew he did it. What was an impossibility days earlier was now a certainty. While driving 90 mph up I-44, I slammed my fist against the steering wheel. Again. Again. Again. My hand hurt. I yelled at the top of my lungs. I was pissed at him. At myself. At him. My throat hurt. My heart broke.

By the time I got to the house, my siblings were already there. They held out hope of finding him. My mind wanted to believe that was a possibility, but my heart knew the truth. A friend of the family called to say they saw a car that looked like his parked next to a pond close to our house. I drove over there with my brother-in-law, saw that it was indeed his car parked askew near the pond.

"He's in there," I said, never more certain of anything in my life. I didn't want to be there one more Godforsaken second. I got back in the car and drove home. My brother-in-law talked to someone, and soon enough a firefighter dive squad went in and got him. 

They fixed him all up at the funeral home. The rest of the family went to see him. I refused. A family friend told me to reconsider, that this would be my last chance, that it might help bring some closure, start the healing process. I still said no. I wanted that bear hug and those I Love Yous to be my final memories of him. I still don't regret it.

I couldn't handle the funeral. Every single seat in the church we grew up in was full. The choir loft was full. It was so humbling, an awesome tribute, to know how many people my dad had touched. It was also maddening, knowing he wasn't supposed to go this early. What if he knew he had impacted all these people? What if he knew all these people loved him?...

Every emotion imaginable flooded me the moment I walked in and saw the crowd. I was supposed to be strong for my mom, who was clutching my elbow as we walked down the aisle. I wanted to be strong, but I cried uncontrollably the entire time.

Later, our family drove to Sulpher, Oklahoma, a beautiful place with a bed and breakfast mom and dad would often go to. I took out the Taylor and played this song as we scattered his ashes.

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Ten years. Can it have really been that long? A lot has changed in that time. Dad got to walk Allison down the aisle, but he didn't get to meet her three awesome kids. He didn't get to see the miracle God worked in Andrew's life, meet his wife Jordyn or their newborn son William. Didn't know I married Missy or get to meet our three kiddos, all of which are displaying the same zeal for laughter and life that he had.

He didn't know that I now play card games for a job, that all of those hours we spent with post-it notes at the kitchen table were in fact crucial training sessions for a future career. Who'd have thunk it? I think about it now, at least once a week while sitting at the poker table, and I can't help but smile.

I'm not going to lie, I still get mad at dad sometimes. For missing out on all the things I just mentioned. For not being there for mom. For ruining golf and slapstick comedy for me. For not playing guitar with me. For not playing Chutes and Ladders with my kids. For making me feel guilty for being so incredibly ignorant and not doing more. Ultimately, however, I know that I'm just a kid in the backyard who took a baseball to the face. He never meant to hurt me.

I understand now better than ever how lucky I was to have such a loving and committed father, who was there for every milestone in my life while he was alive. Who busted his tail to put food on the table and allow us to have the experiences in life that we'll never forget. Other kids had nicer cars, nicer clothes. I shared a clunker with my sister but got to watch Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa hit three home runs each in one weekend.

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I still cringe when I see or hear people make jokes about suicide. You know, the whole finger gun to the head and pull the trigger thing. It's ignorant, just like I was until it hit me real close to home. This is a serious thing, yet it seems like the public and even the medical community is centuries behind in dealing with it.

Just like cancer can make a strong person weak, depression and other mental health issues can slowly or quickly damage an otherwise healthy person. I hate telling people that didn't know dad that he committed suicide, because I think it gives the impression that he was moping around the house all the time, when nothing could be further from the truth. He loved and appreciated the small details of life as much as anyone I've known. 

He was healthy, he got sick, it kept getting worse, and eventually the disease won. I'm not going assign a certain percentage of blame to him. I know who he really was.

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My deepest fear is turning into my father. The first time I experienced depression was two years after he died, on my honeymoon. I had no idea what hit me. I couldn't stop crying, wasn't eating and didn't want to leave the hotel room despite being in Arenal Volcano Mountains of Costa Rica, one of the most gorgeous places on the earth.

This was obviously a sucky situation for Missy, who didn't know what to do. She'd been married for 24 hours and her husband was already losing his mind. All I could tell her was that I loved her and had no regrets about marrying her. Those things I knew deep down in my heart. But that was all. I had no idea why I was so sad. Maybe it was because I never really dealt with dad's death head-on, never got counseling. Maybe it was because all the people at our wedding reminded me of all the people at dad's funeral, such an unexpected outpouring of love that I wasn't equipped to handle.

Whatever it was, it went away after about three days and the rest of our honeymoon was awesome. In the eight years since then, I've had a few other, less severe episodes. Not many.

I don't like talking about it, not even with Missy. I'm not good at it. I don't feel like I need medicine all the time for something that pops up less than once a year (so far), and I don't trust the medicine out there anyway. I personally know a lot of people who have been tremendously helped by the medicine, but I also know at least one person who got significantly worse. So I do nothing. This is probably exactly the same thing most people do, up until it's too late. Or almost too late.

In some ways, I already am turning into my father. I'm pretty easy going, I'll usually go along with whatever my wife wants without complaining. I got begged into getting a dog about whom I am at best ambivalent, yet I'm the only one who feeds him and takes him to get his shots and haircuts. I spend my free time reading nonfiction and watching sports. I'd rather eat at home than go out, and I'll eat just about anything. I sweat like a faucet when I work out. I laugh a lot, don't cry much. Still not one to talk about feelings and emotions.

Does that mean I'll be fine for another 20 years and then it will hit me like it did dad? Was he struggling with it hardcore the whole time and just hiding it up until the end? Will I learn from what happened to him and do something different? Has the world around us changed, making it easier to deal with these issues and get help? Or is it harder now? These are things I think about.

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On Monday, November 17, 2014, Addison bounced up to me and asked if we could play a game. Please? Please? 

We played Memory, letting Myra play too although she didn't know what was going on and kept trying to turn all the cards up even when it wasn't her turn. Maddux tried to eat a card.

Addison loves playing games with me as much as anything. Hide and Go Seek is her favorite, but she'll play anything I want for as long as I want to play it. I've even taught her a card game or two.

We always play by the rules and I never let her win. I help her make the best strategic decisions, but what's really important to me is her attitude. When she played T-ball and soccer this year, I didn't care how good she was or what the refs did. I wanted her to give 100% and then I told her how proud I was when the game was over.

This is the only way I know how to be a father to my kids, because it's exactly the way my father taught me. And if I can show my kids half the unconditional love and grace that he showed me, then maybe turning into my father isn't such a bad thing after all.

The $8.80 mirage

My last two trips to the WinStar World Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma have not been fun.
On the first trip, I got food poisoning and was throwing up for about 24 hours. The illness also caused me to miss half of my fantasy football draft, and when I finally felt better and got around to checking my team, I was delighted to see that the computer had drafted me two kickers, two third-string running backs, a backup running back and an extra tight end.
I then proceeded to lose at the poker also.
After a couple weeks away from that dust toilet, I returned to the WinStar World Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma this weekend. The short version of my poker experience there is that I was winning for the first 32 hours (over 3 days) I was playing there and managed to lose all of that profit and a little more in the final 20 minutes of my stay.
The big, final pot involved a James Bond-esque four-way all in. Except my opponents weren't international villains dressed in tuxedos. I was up against a drunk guy who announced he was going all in without looking and then did exactly that, a guy who looked at his hand extensively and still didn't know what he had when the hand was over, and a guy who announced, "F*** it, let's gamble" before moving his chips in.
So we get all in for a lot of money and the dealer is not really sure what is going on. Because we each had different amounts of chips when the hand started, there are three separate pots, and the poor girl is a bit flummoxed. She's not being helped by the players, one of which keeps insisting that he has three of a kind when in fact he has a stronger hand than that (a straight), and the other two of which think they have lost but have actually won at least one of the pots in question.
The only real loser is me, who went from first place to last place in the hand in about 5 seconds and is for some reason trying to help the dealer sort out who wins which pots and how big those pots are.  Finally I snap to it and say, "What am I doing? I'm the only one who lost this stupid hand. I'm out of chips, I'm not buying any more and I'm going home. Good luck figuring this out, I'll see you guys later."
Not wanting to leave empty-handed, I walk over to the poker kitchen to redeem my $8.80 comp before I go. I'm not really hungry, but they have snacks like trail mix and peanut butter crackers that I could buy and put in my cute Thunder purse for next time.
So I go to the counter and there is one gentleman ahead of me. He is briefly arguing with the cashier about something but after 30 seconds he is gone and I step up. Except the cashier lady is now gone. I wait for a minute and nobody comes up. The lady looks right at me, doesn't say a word, walks out of the door right next to me and leaves without acknowledging me. There are a couple cooks in the back but that's it. Finally, after a couple of minutes my blood is boiling a little and I decide I'm not waiting any longer. But after walking away I decide I'm going to spend that $8.80 even if I just throw the food in the trash for spite.
So I walk out of the poker room to the nearest restaurant -- which just happens to be the hot dog and hamburger place I got food poisoning from. They also have shakes so I decide I'll just get a shake for the road. Until I get over there and see that there are about 50 people in line for this joint. I'm definitely not standing in line for an hour for a shake that may or may not give me food poisoning, so I walk to the next-nearest restaurant, Dairy Queen.
There's a much shorter line there, and after waiting for 5 minutes I'm up. I order the Oreo Cheesecake Blizzard, which sounds like it might have just enough calories in it to make me temporarily forget my economic troubles. I give the lady my WinStar Rewards card, which she can't seem to get to work. After consulting with her manager, I am informed that although I do in fact have an $8.80 comp on my card, they can't get it to work. They know the comp is on there, but they can't redeem it so I'll just have to pay. Will that be cash or credit? I asked if they are accepting middle fingers as payment. (Of course I didn't actually do that. But I was only interested in 1100 empty calories if they were free, as my desire to give away money had abruptly come to a halt minutes earlier. So I left Dairy Queen Blizzard-less.)
Depressed by my ability to give away a lot of money and not redeem $8.80, I left WinStar World Casino. The ole Honda made record time coming home, where my awesome wife had homemade cookies waiting for me and I got to see my three precious children.
I just spent 30 seconds trying to come up with a corny tie-in ending but you get the picture. God is good and "My Lucky Life" doesn't even begin to describe it. We'll get em next time, at least for $8.80.

Aunt Sally

Earlier this year, I wrote about losing my poker mentor, Buddy Williams. Now I've also lost the person most responsible for my other career, journalism.
I worked on the newspaper at Westmoore High School for three years, becoming the editor my senior year. During that time, I wasn't really interested in going to college for journalism or ever working in that field, but journalism teacher Sally Burr, better known as "Aunt Sally," pushed me to apply for the scholarship that eventually led to a degree and a career.

Not to go all "circle of life" on y'all, but it is kind of crazy how these cycles overlap like this. I kept in touch with Buddy and Aunt Sally enough over the years to know how proud they were of me for succeeding in poker and journalism, respectively, but what they enjoyed hearing about more than that was my kids.

Buddy passed away just after our first son Maddux was born. Now Maddux is eating cereal, fruits and veggies for the first time and I've never seen a baby gobble up food more ravenously than this boy. He doesn't let a bite dribble down his chin, he sucks it all down immediately and demands more! I know this is corny (pardon the veggie pun), but it reminds me of how I ate up all the poker advice Buddy gave me and how eager I was to sit by him and discuss strategies or just hear old poker stories.

Our oldest daughter, Addison, started kindergarten this week. Obviously the school thing jives with Aunt Sally's passing, but I think Myra might be the future journalist among our kids. She doesn't know very many words, but a couple of times a day she charges right up to you and starts on a rambling story which includes facial contortions and pointing gestures. She knows how to tell a story, she just needs a small grasp on the language.  

This blog was originally going to be about my recent trip to Kansas City for my friend Chad's bachelor party. When we heard that Aunt Sally had passed, Chad (a fellow Aunt Sally pupil) reminded me of one of our not-so-finer moments as members of the JagWire, a story that took place just down the road from Kansas City. Like me, Chad started in that lonely journalism room about half a mile from every other classroom at WHS and ended up spending about half of his adult life in a journalism career as a copy editor for The Daily Oklahoman. Since he doesn't have three kids to deal with yet, I decided to turn the rest of this blog over to him.
(Above is a picture of part of the newspaper staff in 1997, although I can think of several fellow JagWire members who aren't in the picture. The top row is Aunt Sally, me, Chad and my sister.)

By Chad Anderson

WHS Class of 1997

I can say I never had another teacher quite like Aunt Sally. Tough but fair, with a great sense of humor, she put in longer hours than any teacher known to man. I can trace the path of my career to two high school courses: "Intro to Law" with Richard Bruce and newspaper class with Aunt Sally. The latter was definitely more fun.

I joined the JagWire newspaper staff halfway through my junior year. At first, Aunt Sally was ultra skeptical of me and thought I just joined the staff to hang out with my buddy Matt (aka your usual blog author). My first few drafts were bleeding red after she took her pen to them. But after we put out a few issues and I showed my stuff, she saw me in a different light. By year-end, she named me sports editor for my senior year. By the time I graduated, she was helping me win a coveted OU journalism scholarship. Matt got the same scholarship a year later. 

There are plenty of great stories that arose from our high school journalism days, like when Matt and Lisa pulled the wool over Aunt Sally's eyes at a state competition. But I have a different favorite story.

Let me preface by saying sometime before the events of this story, Matt and I had seen a SportsCenter story involving NBA player Rik Smits, in which the anchor uttered the line "Smits hitting the fan." I don't know the original context but it became an inside joke catchphrase (among many) for the two of us, used anytime something wasn't going so great.

Sometime later, we went on a journalism trip to Topeka, Kansas (don't be jealous!). The main purpose of the trip was for the yearbook staff to visit their publisher. The newspaper staff was invited along. Topeka has to be better than going to class, right? Matt and I hopped on board. 

There were probably at least three dozen kids on the trip. In addition to touring a yearbook publishing plant, we also visited the Kansas State Capitol. For an evening meal, the bus pulled up to a cafeteria that was attached to a mall. Grumbling in line, I figured there were better options than a cafeteria. So Matt and I ducked out of the line and into the mall, searching for a food court. We found one, tried our luck with Chinese food, and sat down to dine in style. We figured we had plenty of time to finish eating and slip back into the cafeteria. We might even stop by Foot Locker on our way back!

Unbeknowst to us, back at the cafeteria, the group was rejected because of problems with Aunt Sally's method of payment, which was probably some archaic school purchase order. So our classmates reboarded the bus, tired and hungry. Aunt Sally counted us off before the bus departed, but ... uh oh ... two students missing!

The first sign that we might be in trouble came when our names were called over the PA system at the mall, as if we were 5-year-old kids who ran away from their mom. (Actually, I guess that's almost exactly what happened.) But before we could say, "Oh, Smits!" we saw Aunt Sally charging toward us. It was the maddest we ever saw her, and we had seen her temper flare a time or two. She snatched us up, made us toss our noodles, and led us back to the bus. The group found another place to eat (I think it was Chili's). But Aunt Sally made us stay on the bus without dinner. 

Of course, we thought the entire thing was absolutely hilarious, so instead of dwelling on our misdeeds, we spent the time on the bus laughing and cutting up. I had my back to the restaurant and was laughing it up, when Matt said, "Smits hitting the fan." I laughed at the inside joke, which somehow made sense with whatever we were talking about.

But then Matt said it again, with more intensity.

"SMITS HITTING THE FAN, RIGHT NOW!"

It was Aunt Sally, boarding the bus, joined by a dude from the publishing company. She delivered a lengthy lecture about how she expected more from us and she loved us. The guy with her, whom we didn't even know, was repeating everything she said, which was quite awkward since he told us he loved us several times and we didn't know his full name. Between that goofball, and the 'Smits' comment, I don't know how I held it together for the duration of her talk. 

My sister took a photography class years later, and had a much different experience than I did. But for members of the publication staffs, Aunt Sally really was like a loving family member. When I heard we lost her this week, my first thought was, "Smits hitting the fan now."

You Need to Watch Your Speed

My philosophy in life is to have 99 good days out of 100, then blog about the bad one.
So here goes.
The first couple hours went pretty well. I got up early, went to the gym, played basketball for the first time in ages and totally dominated (there are no living witnesses to disprove this statement). I then showered, picked up a shake and a few protein bars, and headed to the world-class Lucky Star Casino in Concho, Oklahoma to play some poker.
I was feeling good, re-living in my head all the amazing basketball shots I made, when about a mile from the casino I saw the cop lights.
Eighteen years ago this would have been a source of panic, but by now I've been pulled over a couple dozen times and gotten maybe half that many tickets so it's really no biggie. The only thing that sucked is that, unlike all but about two of my pull-overs, I wasn't attempting to speed and didn't know I was speeding.
The following is the actual, unedited conversation I had with both the voice in my head and the Canadian County officer who pulled me over. I assume his primary job is as a secret service FBI Gestapo agent and he just works for Canadian County on the side.

Officer: You in a hurry, buddy?
Voice in my head: Good one, Barney Fife.
Me: No, I'm sure I was speeding but I really wasn't trying to. Just wasn't paying attention.
Officer: Where we are now is a 65 mph zone, but back by that bridge it's 45 and I clocked you at 63.
(I had forgotten about the classic speed trap back by the bridge, where it goes from 65 to 55 to 45 in a half-mile span for absolutely no reason on a four-lane highway in the middle of nowhere).
Me: Okay.
Officer: That's just too fast. You need to watch your speed.
Voice in my head: Sure thing, skippy.
Me: Okay.
Officer: Where you headed?
Voice in my head: None of your business.
Me: The casino
Voice in my head: Your mom's.
Officer: Do you always take a gym bag with you?
Voice in my head: No, only when I go to the gym.
Me: No, only when I go to the gym.
Voice in my head: Oops.
Officer: What's in that paper bag right there in the center console? Anything I need to know about?
Me: Just some protein bars. (I dumped them out.) Want one?
Officer: No, just making sure it wasn't liquor or drugs. Looked like it could have been. OK, well 63 is just too fast so I'm going to have to write you a ticket. You need to watch your speed. Just hang tight, I'll be right back.
Me: Okay.
(While he wrote my ticket, I never took my eyes off the speedometer, which was at zero. Already getting the hang of this Watch Your Speed thing!)
Officer: Like I said, 63 is just too fast, but I wrote the ticket for doing 55 in a 45. That'll save you a little money and won't go on your driving record. Just sign here.
Voice in my head: It's super generous for you to set up a blatant speed trap and only charge me $188.50 for driving 2 mph under what the speed limit should be.
Me (signing): Okay, thanks.
Officer: Just watch your speed for me, OK?
Me: Okay.

So I got to the casino down $188.50 and left eight hours later down a bunch more speeding tickets. Good times. Today I pleaded no contest (does anyone plead guilty on those things, and why do they even have two options where the result is exactly the same?) and mailed a check for $188.50 to the Canadian County Court Clerk.

Just to be clear, while I did find this particular Canadian County officer to be a tad hyper-vigilant, I do have a great deal of respect for all police officers. They're putting their lives on the line every day to make us safer while I'm playing a card game and occasionally spewing off blogs and sports stories for very little money.

P.S. Answer the poll question on the left!

Joseph Lee Core, Jr. and Maddux Musser Franklin

Father's Day Weekend would seem like the perfect time to write about Maddux, our firstborn son who came into the world on Jan. 9.
But it's not the perfect time. It's the time I'm forcing myself to write something, because it's been five months and this is the hardest story I've ever written.

How do you write a story that mixes the greatest joy known to man with the strongest sorrow in the whole wide world? How do you write a story that in fact is two of the greatest joys and two of the strongest sorrows? And the hardest part -- Our greatest joy is a constant reminder of another family member's strongest sorrow. In fact, our greatest joy wouldn't be here without their strongest sorrow.

Back it up four years. We rented a condo in Vegas for the month of June 2010. It was an exciting adventure. Addie was 18 months old, she loved the pool and she loved life in general. Missy and I were excited at the news that she was pregnant. But two days before Father's Day, we found out that Missy had miscarried.
Over the next couple of years we tried and failed to get pregnant again, and Missy was convinced that she wouldn't be able to have any more children. So we got into foster care, and that's how we ended up with Myra.
That part was simple enough. Strongest Sorrow #1 followed by Greatest Joy #1.

The rest of the story just isn't fair.
Missy's sister Terri and her husband Joe were also having trouble getting pregnant. They had already adopted an awesome girl, Grace, but they wanted to expand their family with children of their own. Some tests revealed that the problem was with Terri's eggs.
Terri and Joe decided to ask Missy if she would be willing to donate her eggs to help them get pregnant. This wasn't a simple request -- it meant Missy would have to fly to Baltimore (where they lived) several times and then undergo a procedure to donate them, not to mention doing hormone treatments here in Oklahoma.
But it was obvious why they asked Missy. Despite not being blood relatives, Missy and Terri look a lot alike and have very similar personalities. I can say without hesitation that Terri is the most similar to Missy of anyone we know or are related to. And if you know Missy, you know she didn't hesitate to say yes.
We actually went through the whole process twice. The first time, when Missy flew out to Baltimore to undergo the procedure, a test the day before revealed that the timing had been just a little off, so they had to cancel the whole thing and start over.
It was a crushing blow to both Missy and Terri. Emotionally and financially, this couldn't happen over and over again. After a couple of months, they decided to give it one final shot.
The second time, everything came together wonderfully. The procedure resulted in Missy donating an unusually high number of good eggs, and a subsequent procedure resulted in Terri carrying a healthy baby boy.
Because of all the hormones Missy had taken, the chances of her getting pregnant went up drastically, and the day after we agreed to begin the adoption process with Myra, we found out Missy was pregnant too. Terri was about two months along, and the two were on the phone non-stop sharing their pregnancies with each other.
First, Terri found out they were having a boy. Then we found Missy was also having a boy. For a little while it looked like the cousins would get to live very close to each other. Terri and Joe visited and considered moving to the Dallas area before settling in Delaware instead. Regardless, the boys were going to be a part of each other's lives forever.
As the 2013 holiday season began, the sisters were on the phone even more as Terri's due date drew near and the doctors appointments became more frequent. Both babies and mommas looked perfectly healthy.
The day after Christmas is Addie's birthday. We always try to make that a special day for her and so we were having a small party with all of our family who was in Oklahoma City for Christmas. Missy and I were cleaning up the kitchen after the party when her phone rang. Terri had gone to the doctor in the morning and the baby's heart rate was fine. For some reason -- nobody knows why -- as the day progressed he wasn't fine. Terri had to go through labor knowing that her son was already gone.
Losing a child is the hardest thing in the world, and that pain was only intensified by the lengths and bounds Terri and Joe had gone to get this boy in the first place. It was also incredibly hard on Missy, who struggled with the sorrow but also with how to handle her relationship with Terri. Did she need to back off, knowing that she couldn't share her pregnancy news without reminding Terri of her tragedy? Or did Terri need her now more than ever?
Missy got permission from her doctor to fly to the east coast for the funeral services despite being almost eight months pregnant, and the services for Joseph Lee Core, Jr. were beautiful and heart-wrenching.
Barely 24 hours after she returned, her water broke. Maddux was a month early and between the holidays and this tragic event, we were totally unprepared. Missy's labor was long and hard, but after almost 24 hours he came out just fine at 8 lbs, 1 oz., 21 inches long. He had a few minor issues that resulted in us being in the hospital for five days, and that was a really hard time for us, especially Missy. Having just returned from grieving with her sister, she was emotionally and physically exhausted and experiencing the entire range of emotions. It was the best and purest joy to hold our first son, but it was worst kind of sorrow to think about the fact that Terri had been deprived of this very joy for no reason at all.
You question everything. You question God. You cry. You get mad.
We certainly haven't come up with any good answers, any sense of closure. Missy and Terri have done a great job of working through their individual emotional issues and maintaining a great relationship with each other, but that doesn't mean the road will ever end.
For Terri and Joe, one of the most important things is not letting Joseph be forgotten. I can say unequivocally that he will never be forgotten in the Franklin household. We thought the cousins would be two months apart, but it turns out that Maddux showed up less than two weeks after Joseph. We will never look at Maddux without seeing a small reflection of Joseph.

I don't have a pretty bow to put on the end of this thing. I'm not going to put one of those generic "cherish your kids" speeches in here and wrap it up.
Sometimes life sucks.
All I know is that I'm looking at Maddux at this very second, and I couldn't love him any more. So far, he has a pretty serious personality. Unlike Myra, who smiled every second of the day at his age, he likes to furrow his brows and give a menacing look. But he loves being held and being talked to, and he will crack a smile and a laugh when he gets in the mood.
Nothing is greater than the love of a parent for his or her child. That's how God looks at each and every one of us, and that's how the Core family looks at Joseph Lee Core, Jr.

We love you Joe, Terri, Grace and Joseph,

The Franklins

Land of the Cow

According to a recent informal survey, 90% of Americans we know say my wife and I are brave. The same percentage acknowledge that when they say "brave" to our faces, they are really thinking "stupid" in their heads.
"Brave" was by far the #1 answer/reaction when we told anyone we were taking our three kids and going to India for a couple of weeks to visit my sister and her family.
It ended up being a great trip, and I wanted to share a few of the more entertaining moments.

You know how it's funny to watch pharmaceutical commercials where the list of potential side effects is far longer and more terrifying than the symptoms the drug is intended to treat? It's not quite as funny when it happens to you.
I've always had a problem with motion sickness, particularly on long flights. I've never thrown up on a plane but I've been close a couple of times, so before this trip Missy wanted me to see a doctor about getting a prescription for it.
The doc ended up giving me some patches called Scopolamine, and I put one on a few hours before our 16-hour flight from Dallas to Dubai. (From there we had a 3-hour flight to Delhi and a 2-hour flight to Northeast India).
A few hours into the flight I started feeling quite weird. It wasn't motion sickness, but just a general uneasiness in my head and stomach. I got up to stretch my legs and quickly felt very dizzy and lightheaded. I stumbled in the general direction of my seat, evidently knocking over a flight attendant before collapsing into my seat. I lost feeling in my hands and feet and wasn't breathing well.
For some reason, the flight attendants thought I was having blood sugar issues (which I have never had) so they made me drink some sugar milk and eat a candy bar. I went along with that because it meant I got to drink sugar milk and eat a candy bar. They also hooked me up to an oxygen tank.
After a few minutes on the oxygen, the woman sitting next to me said, "Excuse me, but I notice that you have a patch under your ear. Is that a motion sickness patch?"
I said yes and told her the name but explained that I wasn't having my usual motion sickness issues. Then she asked if I had ever used this patch before. I said no.
She said she was a doctor and that she tells her patients never to take the Scopolamine patch for the first time on an airplane. She said the side effects I was experiencing were common and strong, so I should have taken the patch at home to test it first. Plus, the side effects are often diminished after multiple uses. Slightly too late for that at this point. Then she told me to go to sleep.
Lesson learned. I went to sleep for awhile before another, far less serious but nonetheless quite irritating side effect kicked in -- dry mouth. I couldn't get enough water. This lasted for a couple days after I took the patch off. I probably drank two gallons during the rest of our travels and peed about 57 times, but 45 minutes after one drink I'd feel like my mouth was a desert.

We made it to Delhi, where we were staying the night and began to get the full India experience. We had booked a Western-style hotel that advertised itself as being 15 minutes from the airport. Then we found out it was really 50 minutes from the airport. Then we got into a cab and it took almost two hours to get there.
I use the term "cab" loosely. This thing was more like a go-kart. My mom, wife and three kids were crammed in the small back seat, while I rode shotgun, literally sitting on top of the engine.
It didn't take long to realize that the cab driver had no idea where he was going, and he didn't speak English. It was hard to blame him for being lost, since there's no real addresses and most streets have no names. The "address" of the hotel (which ended up being really nice) was just a general area, "Precinct 21" or something like that. Once you got to Precinct 21, you just drove around until you found it.
Also, I was pretty sure we were all going to die that night in one of two ways. Way #1 was that Indian drivers are crazy!!! Each road is roughly the size of one-and-a-half U.S. lanes, but they drive at least three-wide. You have pedestrians, bicycles, motorcycles, cars, vans, and semis going both ways in these tiny roads with no lane markings or procedure. People just honk all the time. That meant they are coming and you'd better get out of the way. There are a few traffic lights, which are entirely ignored by everyone.
After driving around for 15 minutes or so, our driver pulled over and asked me to get out. He then lifted up my seat and poured water on the engine, which my buns could have told him was running quite hot. Then he continued driving, seemingly in circles, until we were out of Delhi and into the countryside. This is Way #2 I figured we'd die. Since I knew the airport was in Delhi and our hotel was in Delhi and Delhi is one of the most populated cities in the world, it didn't make sense for us to be in the middle of nowhere at any point of this cab ride. Six Americans and all their luggage at 1 a.m. in Delhi seemed like a pretty easy target. I figured we'd pull off and get ambushed. Indeed, the cabbie pulled off again. This time, he walked around to my side but just stood there for a minute. Then he poured some water on his face. Then he poured a little on his index finger and brushed his teeth with it. Then he got back in and started driving.
Finally, after wandering around for another 30 or 45 minutes, he pulled over and asked someone for help. We were at the hotel in less than five minutes. (The drive back to the airport the next day took 50 minutes).

The Indian culture is fascinating. Everyone knows the cows are sacred, but there are all kinds of animals all over the place over there, just wandering around amid millions of people. We saw goats, pigs, chickens and donkeys just roaming around. They belong to nobody.
India is largely Hindu, so there are thousands of gods everywhere that people worship. The crazy thing is that in a third-world country with extreme poverty, the gods live in luxury. Near my sister's house there's a massive marble temple with two gods inside. It was probably three stories tall. Outside the door was a big bell you were supposed to ring to wake the gods up before you went in to worship them. Within yards of this idol mansion, hundreds of migrant workers lived in small huts with dirt floors and no electricity or air conditioning, eating almost nothing besides rice and vegetables.
Aside from spending great quality time with my sister and her husband and watching her three kids play with our three kids, this was the best part of the trip, just being immersed in the culture and getting an appreciation for their daily lives.

There is a fairly new Western-style shopping mall close to their house, and that provided quite a bit of entertainment.
The people there haven't quite gotten the hang of elevators and escalators yet. When we walked to the escalators for the first time, my brother-in-law Matt said "Watch, I guarantee we'll see some people who have never seen an escalator before."
Sure enough, we didn't even have to wait. The people right in front of us stood, staring at the escalator and then back at each other, trying to figure it out. Finally, one of them took the leap of faith and screamed in excitement when they started moving down.
A different time, we were going down in the elevator, and it stopped one floor above where we were headed. When it stopped, there was a man on the other side whose nose was basically pressed against the door. He couldn't have been any closer to the elevator without being in it. The doors opened, and he just kept standing there. We motioned for him to come on, but he just stared at us. Finally, the doors closed, almost trapping his nose in them, before it continued downward. I almost died laughing.
We went to the Subway at the mall, which was slightly different than an American Subway. Of course, there were no beef products (the meatball marinara is my favorite), so we had to try something different. I ordered a pepperoni melt, then was told it would cost extra to toast it, which would seem to be the only way to put the "melt" in pepperoni melt. Then when I asked for lettuce, tomatoes and veggies, I was told no. All I got was pepperoni and cheese. I asked if I could pay extra for veggies. The answer was no.

The first full day we were in India, I went to play basketball with Matt and some of his friends. I was extremely jet-lagged but figured it would help get me over that. So we start playing, and as usual I'm jacking up 3-pointers without really warming up at all.
My first three shots were airballs. Like, not even close. I know I'm no Ray Allen, but I usually don't embarrass myself on the basketball court. It's the only sport I consider myself halfway good at.
The next couple shots barely grazed the front of the rim. I was a little surprised but figured it was just the exhaustion. My head was still a little dizzy from the Scopolamine and jetlag. One of my teammates said, "You're going to have to shoot it harder." I said thank you, I realize that.
After the first game, which we lost thanks to my horrible shooting, the same guy says to me, "You know this is an NBA 3-point line right?" I did not know that, nor did it ever cross my mind while I continued bombing treys. I think I was able to get my overall 3-point percentage into double digits before the end of the day.

 There were a lot more great memories, but I've written enough for now. If Allison or Missy remember something else that should be added I can just tack it onto the end. Like I said, we had a really great time and it was an experience to remember. I'm glad we were "brave"!

Myra

It's often the most unexpected things in life that end up providing the biggest blessings.
That's certainly the case in my life as it relates to foster care.
Foster care wasn't even on my radar until a few years ago. I spent the first 25 years of my life terrified at the thought of having my own kids, much less taking care of someone else's. Even after meeting and marrying a woman who grew up in a children's home, I still never considered the possibility that I'd end up doing it.
Fast forward to yesterday, when I woke up and groggily sauntered into the living room. The first thing I heard was Myra (the girl on the left in the above pic) saying "Daddy. Daddy. Daddy. Daddy. Daddy." I looked and she was hanging upside down from her grandma's arms. When we made eye contact she burst out laughing. A couple hours later many of our closest friends and relatives came over for a party to celebrate the fact that we have officially adopted the precious sweetheart I now can't live without.

How did we get here? Like I said, my wife grew up in a children's home, where her parents modeled God's love by having about 10 foster kids under their roof at any given time at Cookson Hills, a Christian ministry located just on our side of Arkansas border in a town called Kansas, Oklahoma. My church growing up had supported Cookson Hills, but I had never visited until I started dating Missy in college. It was definitely cool and touching to see kids who in most cases had zero advantages or hope outside of Cookson thrive in the loving environment there. The mass-produced food they ate didn't taste good, their clothes were donated, and they had just one TV for the household of 12, but the support network there made all the difference in the world to those kids.
It took me five years to get around to marrying Missy, and another three for us to settle into our careers and move from Lawton to Oklahoma City, where we wanted to live permanently. When that happened and Missy brought up the idea of foster care again, my normal reaction would have been to say no. It doesn't take a lot to stress me out, and we already had a kid. But something inside gave me a peace about it, and it felt like the right thing.
So we went through 10 miles of red tape to get approved, which took almost a year, and then we dove right in. Way, way over our heads. It was only a few days before Christmas 2012 when we got a call about three children who had been in an extremely traumatic situation and needed a place to stay for the holidays.
We said yes and took them in for about 3 weeks, but in no way were we prepared to provide them what they truly needed. We had no experience with kids older than Addison, who was not yet 4, and no time to prepare a house that needed to expand from three to six occupants. More important, we were not equipped to help them emotionally deal with the traumatic event that had shaken their lives, and since it was the holidays it was hard to find professional help.
Nevertheless, God is good. Our church, Draper Park Christian, had so many families willing and able to provide Christmas presents, food, clothes, diapers, etc. (The kids arrived with nothing more than the clothes on their backs). I know the kids could feel that we loved them and were trying the best that we could. And of course, Addie was a sweetheart who made fast friends with all of them.
It quickly became apparent that this would not be a good fit for our family long-term, and in mid-January 2013 they were placed with a relative. I believe we were the right family for those kids for that amount of time, even if it was an extremely stressful three weeks.
At the end of January, we got a call asking if we would be interested in taking a 3-month-old girl. This seemed like a much better situation for our family with one problem -- we were set to move into a new house on Jan. 31. We asked if it was possible for the girl to be temporarily placed somewhere else for a few days. They asked if we could take her on Feb. 5. So we moved in and took Myra five days later.
All she ever did was smile. She only cried when she was extremely tired or extremely hungry. The rest of the time she just kept a huge smile on her face, with an occasional chuckle. Everyone who met her commented on her joyful demeanor.
We -- especially Addie -- fell in love with her from the first day. I tried to guard my heart a little, knowing that the state had a right to remove her from us any day. In fact, that's the goal of foster care, to reunite the child with a parent or relative. But in this case (and in about 50% of all foster care cases), that wasn't able to happen. Soon, we received the great news that we would be allowed to adopt her.
When she came to us, she had five names (one first name, two middle names and two last names). Four of them were spelled differently in different documents the state gave us. We decided to keep her first name, give her our last name, and for the middle name we combined the middle names of both of her grandmas. Myra Alisue Franklin. Although the adoption process took far longer than we would have liked, all Myra did was smile, and on March 25, 2014, it became official.
Two weeks after that, we loaded Myra on a plane to India to spend a couple weeks with her aunt, uncle and cousins, the first of many great adventures we will share with her as our beloved daughter.
Today, Myra is almost 19 months old. She is walking all over the place (especially wherever she's NOT supposed to be) but still has that perpetual smile on her face. She loves to point, give kisses, say "aww man" and play peek-a-boo.

I've tried my best to describe the huge blessing Myra has been. Even though we had another child of our own since getting her, our family would have a huge hole if she weren't a part of it. She brings so much already, and I can't wait to see what God has in store for her future.
I know foster care isn't for everyone, but I would strongly encourage you to pray and think about whether it's right for you. There are so many kids out there who have done absolutely nothing wrong, living in a state shelter and waiting for someone to take them in.
Our lives were forever changed by one of them.

No Soup For Me!

About six years ago, my car was broken into at Riverwind Casino. The perp snatched a few personal effects, the change I kept in the ashtray, and a company laptop belonging to the Lawton Constitution (sorry boss!).
Two years ago, I had some Beats headphones stolen from the food court at Riverwind Casino.
I had accidentally left them there for about 5 minutes after eating and someone grabbed them before I could return. I figured it was mostly my fault and bought some smaller, more easily transportable and cheaper headphones. Life goes on.
These events, while mildly disturbing, were not surprising. A casino full of degenerate gamblers is probably not the safest place to keep things you don't want stolen. And when you go to said casino multiple times per week for seven years, you're bound to have something stolen from time to time.
More perplexing, however, is that I've now had my stuff thrown in the trash can by casino employees the same amount of times I've had my stuff stolen.

I got a small bag as a giveaway at a Thunder game a couple years ago. It looks like a small Thunder jersey but the shoulder straps are the handles. Basically, it's a purse. I carry snacks, gum, headphones, a phone charger and the occasional miscellaneous item in there. I usually keep it under my seat or on the bottom of one of the food trays.
Shortly after the Beats theft, I was playing at Riverwind and decided that a stick of Winterfresh gum would surely hit the spot. But when I looked down to grab my bag, it was gone. I looked all over the surrounding floor area, to no avail. I was quite stymied.
The only person I remembered even being in the area was one of the dealers. So I saw him walking by a second later and asked if he had seen my bag.
"Yes," he said. "I threw it in the trash."
"Why would you do that?"
"Looked like trash to me, just sitting on the bottom of the food tray." This message was conveyed with less than zero percent remorse. Not that I was expecting a teary-eyed apology, but...
"I have quite a bit of stuff in there. It weighs a lot more than a couple of Burger King wrappers. Could you please remove it from the trash can and give it back to me?"
It was right on the top of the trash, much like the eclair that George Costanza ate out of the trash on Seinfeld. The dealer probably wasn't happy about retrieving it from the trash, but then again I also wasn't happy about him retrieving it from the trash. Fortunately the bag saved any of the items within from touching other garbage.

On Tuesday I was playing at Riverwind, losing pot after pot while Rychy made fun of me as usual while he stacked his chips up to the ceiling. I had hoped that a chicken tortilla soup from Taco Bueno would cure my hunger pangs and fuel me on to a comeback. As I ordered the soup, I felt an equally primal urge, an urge to urinate. However, there were already a couple of guys up from the table so I decided I could hold it til they came back.
They were gone for about 15 minutes, and then my food arrived. I was pretty hungry so I went ahead and ate half the soup, but when the other players returned I decided to make a quick trip to the can. I might have been gone for a total of 90 seconds, returning to find the food table completely empty. I assumed this was some sort of hilarious prank so I asked where my soup was and everyone burst out laughing. I didn't understand the fifth-grade humor (plus when you're losing even things that are kind of funny become un-funny), so I asked again.
Obviously, it was in the trash can.
Turns out, legendary poker professional Tony Lay had ordered two beverages. Although these beverages had not yet arrived, he wanted to secure room on the food table sitting between us. This food table would probably hold 20 such beverages, and my bowl of soup was occupying roughly three beverages worth of space. He assumed that since I got up from the table I must be done eating so he asked one of the dealers to throw it away, which the dealer did. The fact that it was half full, still hot, and that I had taken a bite five seconds earlier and made no mention that I was done was evidently of no concern.
It really wasn't a big deal, but it was funny that when Tony got his drinks, he had both of them in the very corner of the tray, nowhere near where my soup was, while the rest of the tray was completely empty and my soup was in the trash.

A couple hours later, I took a break and talked to Missy. Before I could start complaining, she told me that while the two girls were playing outside, Addison decided to dump dirt all over herself and our foster child. So Missy has to drag them into the bath. While in the bath, our foster child decided to poop, and Addie decides to pick up the poop with her hand and show it to Missy.
Kinda made me glad to be at a poker table getting half a bowl of Taco Bueno soup thrown in the trash,

Buddy

Today, I watched Buddy Williams' fourth-place finish in the 2003 WPT World Poker Open . In it, there's a nice feature (starting at about 37:30) on Buddy where he talks about getting his start in the game.
He said he went to a private poker game as a young man and noticed that a particular player won every time, so he sat next to that player and watched what he did. Soon enough, he was becoming a winner in the game.
A year after Buddy gave that interview, a different young man walked into a different private poker game, hoping to learn as much as he could from the best poker player in the room. Luckily, Buddy let me sit next to him, and his graciousness and knowledge has without a doubt changed my life.
It sucks that the world lost Buddy Williams on Tuesday. But there's no doubt that he left a legacy (as well as a lot of fond memories) that will last a long, long time.

I got swept up in the poker boom of 2003 just like a lot of people did. I was barely out of college, living in a new city (Lawton) with a lot of free time and not much else. I started playing micro-stakes poker with my friends and immediately fell in love with it. I had a pretty good card sense and started winning a little bit, but I didn't really know what I was doing. After a year my entire poker bankroll might have totaled $800.
One of the guys I played with, John McGavic, said I should go to Buddy's game. Buddy was already a poker legend in Lawton (you get automatic poker legend status when Phil Ivey stacks your chips for you), and I was brimming with excitement at the prospect of playing with him. I asked John what the buy-in was and he said $200. So I showed up at Buddy's game with exactly $200 in my pocket and soon realized that $200 was the absolute minimum buy-in. In fact, it was common for people to win or lose a couple thousand dollars in the game. Common sense would dictate that it's unwise to buy into a game for 25% of your entire poker budget with no backup money, but at that time in my life I listened to common sense about as often as I obeyed the speed limit.
I can still clearly remember having my entire $200 at risk about 30 minutes into the night. I was all in on the flop with top pair, trying to dodge Jim Shaw's flush draw. My heart was beating through my chest. Had I lost that pot, I have no idea what I would be doing today, but it very well might not involve poker.
Not only did I win that pot, I got several other really good hands and wound up winning about $800 -- basically doubling my entire bankroll. I still remember calling my future wife Missy the very second I hit the parking lot to share my excitement.
That night, I had gotten the last seat at the table, which just happened to be right next to Buddy. I was thrilled to be next to him and had hoped that my play was impressing him. I absolutely couldn't get enough of his old-time poker stories involving Stu Ungar, Doyle Brunson, Amarillo Slim and all their crazy antics. I kept prodding him with questions, and he never seemed to grow tired of answering them.
The thing that surprised me, however, was that Buddy loved to talk strategy at the table. Not in the way that most of today's pros talk strategy, where they ridicule the bad players and hurt the game. Buddy had a way -- which is hard to describe -- of making everyone at the table feel like equals. If someone put in a lot of money on a weak draw, Buddy might say, "We'd be having a totally different conversation right now if he'd hit it. Besides, Jimmy's got so much money it don't matter to him anyway."
I decided that from then on, I was going to be the first one at the game, so that I could choose the seat right next to Buddy and learn from him, just like he did all those years back.
Buddy immediately recognized that I was someone who had a passion for the game, and maybe some potential too. He would talk differently to me than he would to the rich guys constantly chasing bad draws. He'd ask me for my thought process during a hand, then share his. When two other players were in a big pot, he'd ask me what I thought they had, or he'd ask how strong a hand I would need to call in that particular spot. He would lean over and whisper to me, so that the guys who were actually in the hand wouldn't hear us and it wouldn't affect the outcome. I could have read every poker book ever printed up to that point in history, and it wouldn't have been as educational as sitting next to Buddy once a week for two years.
Think about this from Buddy's point of view. He had absolutely nothing to gain by helping me. I was a young nobody showing up at his poker game once a week. I didn't have any money. I wasn't a customer at his full-time business, like most of the other players were. I could either lose a little money in his game and be gone forever, or I could win a fairly significant amount of money from his business patrons. Not to mention the fact that he was playing against me with his own money.
And all I did for him was stack his chips when he won a pot.
I traveled north to Newcastle and south to Randlett just to play with Buddy and learn more. When I started branching out to a different form of poker (pot limit Omaha), Buddy was the guy I called after a session to ask about a tough hand. When I started considering quitting my job at the paper and playing full-time, he told me how difficult it would be and laid out many of the challenges. But he also told me he knew I was good enough to do it. As someone with an extremely conservative personality when it comes to money, I was at first easily flustered by the losing streaks that go along with playing poker. Many times, it was Buddy's encouragement and confidence that allowed me to keep my head.
Our friendship wasn't just about poker. When I bought Missy's engagement ring, he was the second person I showed it to. (His brother Ronnie told me I was stupid for buying it at a jewelry store instead of a pawn shop). I introduced Missy to him and they immediately hit it off. When Addison was born, I showed him new pictures on my phone every week.
After I moved to Oklahoma City, I used to love Tuesdays, when he would come up to Riverwind and I would get to play with him again. I still tried to snag the seat next to him and stack his chips. But soon, his health started taking a turn for the worse. I would call sometimes, not nearly as often as I should have.
I'm far from the only person Buddy impacted in a positive way. Several fellow poker pros have told me how Buddy helped them, and I can't think of one person who didn't enjoy being around him, whether at the poker table or away from it.
Rest in peace, Buddy. I owe you more than I could ever repay.

P.S. -- Random thoughts and memories

• That first night I played over there, I was worried about etiquette since I had never played in a private game before. When Buddy's helper brought me a bottled water and a cup of soup, I tipped him $10. Buddy threw up his arms and said, "You trying to make me find someone new? Robert's gonna quit me and go work for you if you keep giving him those red chips!"
• Ronnie was always telling Buddy he needed to get a newer and nicer wheelchair. The thing was definitely old and ricketty, but I guess Buddy liked it.
• The dynamic between Buddy and Ronnie was amazing. They had polar opposite personalities and poker styles, and if you heard them talk you might think they hated each other sometimes. But it was quickly apparent that either one would die fighting for the other one without batting an eye. I love Ronnie too.
• When I first started playing, I would never bluff. One time I won a pot with a bet and someone at the table said they thought I had bluffed. Buddy said, "You could take every penny Matt's ever won on a bluff and put it in your eye, and you wouldn't even feel it." He had a boatload of great phrases like that for everything and everyone.
• There was a cocky teenager constantly hanging out around Buddy's game, watching the action and telling everyone how bad they played. He wasn't old enough to play himself but was convinced he was better than all of us. Finally one night, Buddy says he's sick of hearing this kid squawk and tells him he can sit in the game. I figured the kid didn't want to go broke the first hand he played, and the kid was constantly talking about how I never bluff. So I bluffed him right off the bat. He showed his pair of kings and made a comment about how unlucky he is and how I obviously made my flush on the river. I complimented him on his fold and showed him a pair of 4s, which cracked Buddy up. Ten years later, Jesse McVicker is still the guy who thinks everyone else stinks at poker. But he was smart enough to learn a lot from Buddy too and I'm glad to call him a friend.