Kevin Kling's Holiday Inn (20 page)

One young recruit says, “I don’t think we’re going to make it, Sarge.”

“Don’t worry, son,” says the sergeant. “I’ve seen worse.” But things do look bad for the army men.

Suddenly my brother says, “Wait!” He runs into the house and comes out with the two-inch pink Baby Jesus from my grandmother’s manger scene. Brilliant. We know the power of the Baby Jesus, we learned it on the school playground from Mary Marhoula, a Catholic and therefore an expert. According to Mary, nothing could harm the Baby Jesus because his Father, God, needed him to grow up to become sacrificed.

The Baby Jesus is carried to the army men by a one-legged G.I. Joe who says, “I’ve had worse,” and dies. We promise him a Viking funeral later in the day, if we can find some lighter fluid.

The Hessians shout, “Give yourselves up!”

The young recruit answers, “Don’t make the Baby Jesus come over there.”

The Hessians shout, “Who sayeth he is the Son of God?”

The Baby Jesus stands. “I sayeth.”

He’s met with a volley of bullets, but they bounce off his chest like marshmallows. A lot like marshmallows.

The Hessians devise an “A-bomb,” a cinder block, eight by twelve by sixteen inches, from behind the garage. The A-bomb hovers briefly over the Baby Jesus and drops. The Hessians go off rejoicing, to worship idols and eat forbidden fruit.

Minutes, what seems like an eternity goes by, then the A-bomb begins to move, then to shake, then magically lifts up to reveal an unharmed Baby Jesus. Gonna now give them Hessians a little taste of the Old Testament.

The Hessians, in their ignorant fear, cower in a perfect eight-by-sixteen-inch formation. The A-bomb hovers over them briefly, miraculously, then drops on those who “lived by the sword.”

We go into the house for leftovers and gently return the Baby Jesus to the manger scene, where he quietly goes back to civilian life and his day job saving the souls of mankind.

This was my view of war: comic book heroes, daring stories, great warring nations: Spartans, Vikings, Apaches, Ninjas, Cossacks, Romans, Amazons. Legends and heroes greater than mere mortals, all with their own gods of war.

History is written by the winners: His Story. There was a glamour and glory around combat.

Later I would read the speeches of Herodotus, Lincoln, and Roosevelt, and Shakespeare’s
Henry the Fifth
—words that would get the blood to boil. I knew the incredible music of war: bagpipes, marches, drums and bugles, George M. Cohan, the Andrews Sisters, rock and roll, folk music—all arrive at times of conflict.

Ultimately, however, the fighting has been done by individuals. For some, it started as an adventure or a step into adulthood. For most, this task was not a natural act but a duty to be endured.

I’ve been surprised to hear about positive experiences from those I know who have served. My buddy Joe, a Vietnam vet, speaks of the green and the beauty of driving through a field one day in country. He gets a look of serenity that seems like it can’t be associated to the danger he was in, but that’s what he was feeling. There are times, he says, when through the boredom or foul weather or homesickness, something happens. Something simple—dry socks, a letter, a hot meal, a very small gesture—is magnified and becomes a reminder of how beautiful life can be … in perspective. When he’s with other vets, they laugh. The humor is bent and dark, and only those who were there can laugh.

For some of my friends who returned from all the intensity of that war, the pace of everyday life just doesn’t seem to come up to snuff. They tend to drive fast.

My uncle, the one who served in World War II, laughed and joked with my dad and his brothers, but I noticed when he got quiet, he got a deep quiet. I envied this knowledge but wondered how he acquired it. I realized he had seen and done things that few will ever know.

For everyone returning after the conflict, there is the reentry to civilian life, a life that has moved on without them. For some it’s a gentle step. For others, like Odysseus returning from Battle of Troy, another battle ensues, trying to fit in with what he now knows, who he has become, even his wife not recognizing him. Where do you begin the rebuilding? What unwelcome memories return with you? My uncle’s wife has an experience of war as well, without having ever left the country. I can see her watching him in ways other wives do not. Their love knows a terrain, levels uncharted and deep.

I know that knowledge isn’t cheap. My uncle’s deep solitude came at a price, and there are truths I could recognize but will probably never know. I do know that at some point in life, he made a choice, perhaps because of his allegiance to God, country, or family, and for that he would risk life and limb. That choice is related to me, and I am connected and indebted to him.

Another Christmas in the early 1980s. I’m in London, flat broke and missing my family. I decide to see a play as a treat and to take my mind off the terrible time I imagine they’re having without me. How can they laugh and enjoy themselves with me not there? I walk to the West End and plunk down my last two pounds, about four dollars, to sit up in the nosebleed section. The play is
The Dresser,
staring Tom Courtenay and Albert Finney. The action takes place backstage in a London theater during World War II. An aging actor, his dresser, and a town of misfits try to perform a play while air raid sirens blare and bombs rain down. The play is really about the relationship of these two men and the bonds created through triumph and adversity.

An elderly couple sits next to me, and occasionally they lift their glasses and wipe their eyes. I wonder if they lived through the devastation depicted in the play. At intermission, the man tells me he fought in World War II. This play brings back a lot of memories for both him and his wife.

The play is also full of songs. As the second act begins, an old phonograph plays “A Nightingale Sang in Barkley Square.” The man takes my hand in his and sings along. In fact, the entire audience joins hands and sings along, swaying to the music. Me too, without really knowing the words. After the song ends, the man continues to hold my hand. During some of the next scenes, the bombing of London, he squeezes a little. Then another song begins, and his grip loosens.

THANKSGIVING  

Thanksgiving is a big holiday in my family. Before the meal we always bowed our heads in prayer. In my family it was called “saying grace.” A time to pause and reflect on our good fortune, to say aloud we missed someone who couldn’t be with us, to bless those who were there. It was a purposeful reaching to the sacred, time spent with “grace,” that brief sensation we feel when in contact with the divine.

When I was a kid, I loved visiting my grandparents’ farm. We had lots of unstructured time. Now, they call it boredom, but I was never bored. I have never been bored. Sure, I’ve sat through some plays where I’ve wanted to be somewhere else and a few shows where I would’ve fallen asleep if I hadn’t been the one talking, but I have never been bored.

I thank my Grandma Kling. My grandma taught me the beauty in the mundane.

Her name was Grace. She was the grandparent I felt furthest from, growing up. While my other grandmother was ample and smelled like cookie dough, Grandma Kling was frail and thin and smelled like frail and thin. There was always a little fear surrounding her. She ran their farmhouse in that systematic Germanic way that would’ve made her ancestors proud.

Above her stove was a cross-stitched plaque that read, “
Rein geht gut … komme besser raus.
”

“Go in good … come out better.”

No truer words were ever stitched. Grandma’s kitchen was an artist’s studio, and whatever my grandpa provided as a medium, in a gesture she transformed, teased, poached, or pickled.

“If you leave here hungry, it’s your own fault.”

Pickled everything.

“If you don’t see it on the table, you don’t need it.”

If Grandpa could cut it off, Grandma could pickle it.

“Don’t ask for what you don’t see, it’s good training for later in life.”

Grandma spoke as if she were always inventing another cross-stitching to hang over part of your life.

“Desires of any kind lead to nothing but trouble.”

She ran a tight ship.

With livelihoods relying on fickle weather, crop selection, and market values, faith plays a large role in farmers’ lives. Every Sunday found them in church. No one missed church for any reason. If you skipped for a fractured leg, it had better be compound.

It was during a sermon at my grandparents’ church I heard a phrase that would forever change my life. While quoting Genesis, the pastor said that God said, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.”

This gave me pause. What a curious thing for God to blurt out.

In Sunday school, as I worked on a Play-Doh topographic representation of the Holy Land, I reflected on that sentence. If God said, “Thou shall have no other gods before me,” then there clearly were other gods. God said so. God doesn’t lie. I believed that. Why would he? Nobody could beat up God. Just to make sure I asked the Sunday school teacher.

“Mrs. Walker, can Jesus’ dad beat up Buddha?”

“Yes, Kevin, Jesus’ dad can beat up Buddha.”

“Can Jesus’ dad beat up Allah?”

“Yes, Kevin, Jesus’ dad can beat up Allah.”

“Can Jesus’ dad beat up Odin?”

“Well now that’s a tough fight, but yes, Kevin, Jesus’ dad can beat up Odin.”

I tasted the dough. Mmmm, salty. Not as good as public school dough, but pretty good. So if God said there were other gods, then there were other gods. Gods of love, hate, color, and song. Gods that lived in words, in places, in deeds.

But the true god, God God, was in charge of them all. This meant God was capable of, no,
required
to maintain complexities. This thought stunned me. God is complex. Where would it end? How far could this go?

I heard the Sunday school teacher’s voice.

“Kevin, Kevin Kling.”

“Yes, Miss Walker?”

“What are you doing?”

“What?”

“Your lips. Your lips.”

A bluish-green outlined my lips.

And when I looked down at the Holy Land, I noticed I’d eaten over half of the Fertile Crescent.

But now it occurred to me if the great patriarch could be complex, so could the great matriarch, Grandma.

My grandma’s favorite thing to do was to drive into Brookfield, Missouri, a town of about five thousand, and sit in her car at an angle parked on Main Street. This town always smelled like tractor grease. It seemed like it was always windy, and there was always a different three-legged dog running around. But through my grandma’s eyes, it contained a world of wonder.

Grandma liked to keep a running commentary. Her favorite place to park was in front of the drugstore because you can tell a lot about someone by what they bring out of a drugstore.

“Look,” Grandma said. Around the corner came a man, head down in concentration. As he walked past I could see his lips move. Grandma explains, “He counts his steps, every step of the day. He was in the war.” Which war I don’t know. Grandma said she went to grammar school with him. He used to pull her hair. Now look at him. She stares. Grandma had no problem with staring at people.

A woman walks past. As she walks, she develops a sudden hitch in her step. Then we watch as her drawers slip from under her dress and fall to the ground. In one beautiful fluid motion, she catches them on the toe of her shoe and kicks them into the air. The drawers do a one-and-a-half flip into her waiting pocketbook. It is incredible. Without missing a beat, Grandma says, “I would’ve left them.”

“Why is that yellow car there?” She points to a parked yellow car. “Whose car is that?”

“I don’t know, Grandma.”

“Why is that there? Whose is that? … Oh, look,” she says. “That restaurant closed. It opened on the day of a funeral. Who would have a mind to do such a thing? Kevin, never open a restaurant on the day of a funeral.”

“All right, Grandma.”

All of a sudden she sees one of her friends.

Grandma rolls down the window.

“Charlene, Charlene.”

“Oh, hello, Grace. What brings you to town?”

“It’s my hair day.”

“Yes, that’s right. Well, isn’t that nice.”

“Yes.”

“Say, Grace, who owns that yellow car?”

“Well, I don’t know.”

“I don’t either.”

“Well.”

“I know, honey, I know.”

“All right, Charlene.”

“All right, Grace.”

The man who counts steps walks by, and now I can see his lips move. “… 5,067, 5,068, 5,069 …”

Suddenly Grandma says, “Don’t look.”

I look.

Grandma says, “That woman. She spits.”

She points to an elderly woman in blue jeans. Now I don’t mean to brag, but at age ten I considered myself somewhat of a spitting expert, known on the playground for distance and accuracy. But this woman launched a stream that seemed to do her bidding even in mid flight. It went around a fire hydrant before striking a paper cup. Then she shot me a look and smiled.

“Disgusting,” Grandma says. “Kevin, Kevin, never fall for a woman who spits.”