Business was booming at The Bud Farm Landscapes in 1979 and the Movie Apocalypse Now was all the rage. We just aquired a new Design Center for homeowner installs and patios. This catches the crew directing the client to the new location and sales staff.
Showing posts with label 1979. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1979. Show all posts
Monday, April 16, 2012
Our office, circa. 1979
Sunday, June 13, 2010
The Cave
Here it is. This is the cave we stayed in back in 1979. I was fresh out of the Army, just back from Germany. Me and Vance had gone up to Red River to visit his friend, Steve Berlin. When we got up there, we went to Steve's apartment. He didn't answer the door and we peeked in through the window. All of Steve's shit was boxed up. We got back in the truck and drove over to Texas Red's (The original, pre-fire one) where Steve worked as a dishwasher. He informed us he'd just gotten evicted and then asked could we help him move all of his shit (which, being a young pot head in 1979, didn't amount to much) up the road to an abandoned gold mine. And this was is. 
We spent the weekend getting drunk and falling down and doing goofy shit. There was another guy there, I forget his name, but he wore genuine glacier glasses. The ones with the leather shields on the side to keep you from going snowblind. I thought they were the shits and ran out and bought me a pair. This was a good 5 years before the style was popular for about 6 months.
Vance later went and lived in the cave for a while.
This had to be in between June 23rd, which is the day I got home from Germany, and July 9th, which is when I turned 21, because I remember not being old enough to drink just then.
These photos were taken just a few weeks ago when I went on a family trip up to Red River. One of the loclas had told me that most of the gold mines had been blown shut for safety reasons back in the 1980s, so I wasn't holding out a lot of hope. Me and the Mrs. drove up Bitter Creek Rd. just to have a gander, and there it was.
We spent the weekend getting drunk and falling down and doing goofy shit. There was another guy there, I forget his name, but he wore genuine glacier glasses. The ones with the leather shields on the side to keep you from going snowblind. I thought they were the shits and ran out and bought me a pair. This was a good 5 years before the style was popular for about 6 months. Vance later went and lived in the cave for a while.
This had to be in between June 23rd, which is the day I got home from Germany, and July 9th, which is when I turned 21, because I remember not being old enough to drink just then.These photos were taken just a few weeks ago when I went on a family trip up to Red River. One of the loclas had told me that most of the gold mines had been blown shut for safety reasons back in the 1980s, so I wasn't holding out a lot of hope. Me and the Mrs. drove up Bitter Creek Rd. just to have a gander, and there it was.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Baked
BAKED. (verb pp)We were going to write a definition of the word here, but this picture just says it so much better.
Rallye Racing Days
The previously posted photo of the Porsche 911 reminded us of our earlier Rallye Racing days. Here's a photo of Vance and I in our NORML-sponsored Opel Kadet -- getting a fair amount of air ourselves.Those were some great days. Note Rick (as Navigator) trying to refold the gas-station roadmap.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Following is a fantasy conversation with an old love -- my first love. The conversation never happened, but I'm including it here because it relates to the next post from me about how and why I wound up in Germany. The name of the woman, "Becky," is changed for reasons that may someday become apparent. Also, the conversation takes place in a rowboat on a lake in Austria. Not that that has anything to do with anything.
“When I was five years old,” he said, “we moved from Canada to Rochester. Total distance less than 300 miles. It might has well have been around the world.” He took a pull on the bottle.
“We were plunked down in the middle of the city, in a heavily Jewish neighborhood. The other kids thought I talked funny. I said ‘zed’ instead of ‘zee’. I said ‘running shoes’ instead of tennis shoes’. People couldn’t understand my accent. That and the fact that my mom and I were Baptists, and my dad was a German. Add to all that a name like Raab-Faber, and I just didn’t fit in. But after a couple of years, I started to make some friends. I learned to speak American. I was feeling comfortable.
“Then, one day when I was in third grade we packed up and moved to another part of town. A fairly suburban sort of area. I was the new kid again. And again, with that name that for some reason no one could ever pronounce. Some of the kids in the neighborhood had dads who’d been in World War II. This was twenty-some years after the war, but there was still a lot of anti-German sentiment. New things to deal with too. Like, I didn’t know how to play football or baseball. It took a couple of years, but eventually I started to fit in, started to feel comfortable, started to make friends. But then…
“In the summer after fifth grade, we moved again. Way out in the suburbs. It was a brand-new subdivision, which should have been a bonus. Most of the kids in my neighborhood had come from the tougher parts of Rochester. A lot of Italian kids. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but it was just different worlds.
“Almost all the kids in my sixth-grade class had grown up together right across from the school. Riding the bus was about the only thing that saved me from daily ass-whoopings. Again, the problem with lack of any sports abilities came up. And the name thing still. I was an outcast. I met a friend there though who was even newer than me. We became inseparable, and in the seventh grade, we began developing reputations as class clowns. In eighth-Grade we were actually popular — somewhat.
“Then came ninth-grade. We were the young punks in school. We didn’t have any classes together and we hardly knew anybody. Two months into ninth-grade, my friend moved back into the city. I was all alone. But I tried to make the best of it. I was growing my hair long. I actually got to wear some relatively fashionable clothes. I began to think it might be O.K. In fact, Bonnie Abrams, a girl I’d had a crush on in eighth-grade ran into me in the library one day. She seemed really interested in me. She wanted to get together! Wow! I went home that day on top of the world.
“That night my dad asked me how school was going. I said great! He said “Well don’t get too used to it, because we’re probably going to move. A month later, and we moved to Albuquerque. So, now not only was I a freshman in high-school, but I knew absolutely no one. My mom had made me cut my hair before we moved and bought me some ‘nice’ clothes so, now I looked like a major-league geek. The kids in New Mexico didn’t like people from back east and so I was a hopeless case for the first couple of years.
“By the time I was a senior I had made friends though. I hung out with the Freaks at school. We were the school rejects, but we were there for each other. I met my friend Vance and we got along really well. I was really, finally fitting in and things were looking good for me. But guess what?”
“Your dad was going to move again?” Becky responded, fiddling with an oar.
“No. No he wasn’t. My parents were very happy in New Mexico. About three months before graduation, I went downtown and joined the Army.”
“Why?” she asked. I sat back, put his hands in his pockets.
“Because, for all my life, whenever things got comfortable and I started to fit in, we moved. I’ve never learned how to deal with a relationship — friendship or otherwise — all the way through. Never learned how to cast seasons to the wind. Never learned how to progress. When graduation was looming, and we weren’t going anywhere I did to myself what I’d had done to me all my life — I moved.”
“The point being…?”
“I think that…” I paused “I think that when I met you, when we got together, that you made me feel comfortable, made me feel like I fit in, like I belonged with you. Instantly. And those other girls I hit on? Linda and Debbie and Laura and Shannon? They were because I kept expecting our relationship to end somehow and so I had to move on to new relationships. I obviously wasn’t moving anywhere. Not till Uncle Sam said so. But moving was the next logical step in the progression of fitting in.
“That’s why I’m having such a difficult time with this whole leaving thing. This is what comes next, and yet I know that I want to be with you.”
She looked at him and nodded. Something else came to his mind.
“Y’know, before we moved to Dachweiler, I was really heavy into speed. I was partying too much and having trouble staying awake at work. I had been wishing out loud that I had some whites, and this guy I knew turned me on to X-112. That shit Dave makes his Rocket Fuel with? I was getting maybe four hours of sleep a night. Just burnin’ non-stop.
“The barracks we were in were really old. None of the locks worked, so we had hasps on the doors. I had just hung a big old bicycle lock on the door and neglected to tell anyone the combination. We started getting a bunch of flak about room inspections and I rebelled a bit; refused to make my bed, or clean my room. Nobody knew the combination, so nobody could inspect it. We lived in somewhat subhuman conditions in the first place. There was nothing to take any pride in. I had a funky old gray metal bunk, a broken wall locker, my little refrigerator, and a bookshelf I'd made from stolen wood and cinder blocks. The walls were filthy. The whole place was suffering from about thirty years of nineteen-year-old boys living away from home. I had all this energy from the speed, but never applied it towards keeping my ‘A.O. squared away’ as they say.
“One day I just locked the room permanently from the outside and used the window. You know.... that could be analogous of my life if I took the time to work it out. Locked the door and used the window. Huh. That was it. That was about the time that I sort of checked out sanity-wise. Locked that door. Forgot the combination.
“I'd had that dabble with the whites when I was state-side. That was nothing. I was moving headlong into some deep territory, and it started with that X-112 crap, and went on to the Mandraax and the acid and even some heroin. It really fried my brain. It’s days like this. Moments like this with you, when I take that lock off the door and look in that ratty room of my life. It looks like the almighty shit-hammer of Thor came down in it, and I just have to shut the door and lock it again. Some days… some days it’s just a whole lot easier to use the window.
“When I was five years old,” he said, “we moved from Canada to Rochester. Total distance less than 300 miles. It might has well have been around the world.” He took a pull on the bottle.
“We were plunked down in the middle of the city, in a heavily Jewish neighborhood. The other kids thought I talked funny. I said ‘zed’ instead of ‘zee’. I said ‘running shoes’ instead of tennis shoes’. People couldn’t understand my accent. That and the fact that my mom and I were Baptists, and my dad was a German. Add to all that a name like Raab-Faber, and I just didn’t fit in. But after a couple of years, I started to make some friends. I learned to speak American. I was feeling comfortable.
“Then, one day when I was in third grade we packed up and moved to another part of town. A fairly suburban sort of area. I was the new kid again. And again, with that name that for some reason no one could ever pronounce. Some of the kids in the neighborhood had dads who’d been in World War II. This was twenty-some years after the war, but there was still a lot of anti-German sentiment. New things to deal with too. Like, I didn’t know how to play football or baseball. It took a couple of years, but eventually I started to fit in, started to feel comfortable, started to make friends. But then…
“In the summer after fifth grade, we moved again. Way out in the suburbs. It was a brand-new subdivision, which should have been a bonus. Most of the kids in my neighborhood had come from the tougher parts of Rochester. A lot of Italian kids. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but it was just different worlds.
“Almost all the kids in my sixth-grade class had grown up together right across from the school. Riding the bus was about the only thing that saved me from daily ass-whoopings. Again, the problem with lack of any sports abilities came up. And the name thing still. I was an outcast. I met a friend there though who was even newer than me. We became inseparable, and in the seventh grade, we began developing reputations as class clowns. In eighth-Grade we were actually popular — somewhat.
“Then came ninth-grade. We were the young punks in school. We didn’t have any classes together and we hardly knew anybody. Two months into ninth-grade, my friend moved back into the city. I was all alone. But I tried to make the best of it. I was growing my hair long. I actually got to wear some relatively fashionable clothes. I began to think it might be O.K. In fact, Bonnie Abrams, a girl I’d had a crush on in eighth-grade ran into me in the library one day. She seemed really interested in me. She wanted to get together! Wow! I went home that day on top of the world.
“That night my dad asked me how school was going. I said great! He said “Well don’t get too used to it, because we’re probably going to move. A month later, and we moved to Albuquerque. So, now not only was I a freshman in high-school, but I knew absolutely no one. My mom had made me cut my hair before we moved and bought me some ‘nice’ clothes so, now I looked like a major-league geek. The kids in New Mexico didn’t like people from back east and so I was a hopeless case for the first couple of years.
“By the time I was a senior I had made friends though. I hung out with the Freaks at school. We were the school rejects, but we were there for each other. I met my friend Vance and we got along really well. I was really, finally fitting in and things were looking good for me. But guess what?”
“Your dad was going to move again?” Becky responded, fiddling with an oar.
“No. No he wasn’t. My parents were very happy in New Mexico. About three months before graduation, I went downtown and joined the Army.”
“Why?” she asked. I sat back, put his hands in his pockets.
“Because, for all my life, whenever things got comfortable and I started to fit in, we moved. I’ve never learned how to deal with a relationship — friendship or otherwise — all the way through. Never learned how to cast seasons to the wind. Never learned how to progress. When graduation was looming, and we weren’t going anywhere I did to myself what I’d had done to me all my life — I moved.”
“The point being…?”
“I think that…” I paused “I think that when I met you, when we got together, that you made me feel comfortable, made me feel like I fit in, like I belonged with you. Instantly. And those other girls I hit on? Linda and Debbie and Laura and Shannon? They were because I kept expecting our relationship to end somehow and so I had to move on to new relationships. I obviously wasn’t moving anywhere. Not till Uncle Sam said so. But moving was the next logical step in the progression of fitting in.
“That’s why I’m having such a difficult time with this whole leaving thing. This is what comes next, and yet I know that I want to be with you.”
She looked at him and nodded. Something else came to his mind.
“Y’know, before we moved to Dachweiler, I was really heavy into speed. I was partying too much and having trouble staying awake at work. I had been wishing out loud that I had some whites, and this guy I knew turned me on to X-112. That shit Dave makes his Rocket Fuel with? I was getting maybe four hours of sleep a night. Just burnin’ non-stop.
“The barracks we were in were really old. None of the locks worked, so we had hasps on the doors. I had just hung a big old bicycle lock on the door and neglected to tell anyone the combination. We started getting a bunch of flak about room inspections and I rebelled a bit; refused to make my bed, or clean my room. Nobody knew the combination, so nobody could inspect it. We lived in somewhat subhuman conditions in the first place. There was nothing to take any pride in. I had a funky old gray metal bunk, a broken wall locker, my little refrigerator, and a bookshelf I'd made from stolen wood and cinder blocks. The walls were filthy. The whole place was suffering from about thirty years of nineteen-year-old boys living away from home. I had all this energy from the speed, but never applied it towards keeping my ‘A.O. squared away’ as they say.
“One day I just locked the room permanently from the outside and used the window. You know.... that could be analogous of my life if I took the time to work it out. Locked the door and used the window. Huh. That was it. That was about the time that I sort of checked out sanity-wise. Locked that door. Forgot the combination.
“I'd had that dabble with the whites when I was state-side. That was nothing. I was moving headlong into some deep territory, and it started with that X-112 crap, and went on to the Mandraax and the acid and even some heroin. It really fried my brain. It’s days like this. Moments like this with you, when I take that lock off the door and look in that ratty room of my life. It looks like the almighty shit-hammer of Thor came down in it, and I just have to shut the door and lock it again. Some days… some days it’s just a whole lot easier to use the window.
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