I knew gay-slurring Cinci announcer: What's he like?

(664 words)

I’ve made the decision to use the currently inflammatory word “faggot” without coy deceptions — not because Cincinnati broadcaster Thom Brennamen got into trouble for using it.

Because Winston Churchill did not.

Brennaman is losing lucrative gigs left and right for saying into a hot mic that Kansas City was one of the “fag capitals of the world.”

Silly me. I always dreamed of going to KC for barbecue.

I know I’m diminished by the admission, but the instant I heard his name, my first thought was, “Faggot.”

See, I knew Thom. We tended bar together at The Nickelodeon, the most popular bar in Athens, Ohio, where we both attended Ohio University from 1981-85.

To me he was never just Thom. No was, he “that fag Thom,” or in reference to his fraternity, “Thom the Beta fag.” It was all very juvenile, although I do recall once seeing on a bar chalk board the clever “Thom is ghay.”

If you judged by my friends declarations, the gay population in Athens back in the ’80’s was pushing 60 percent.”

The social world wasn’t so much black or white as it was cool or gay. Everything was one or the other.

Tom Petty was cool (and not just because he spelled Tom without the superfluous “h”). Duran Duran? Gay Gay.

Was Cincinnati gay? It was The Queen City, wasn’t it? The Reds were gay so their famous announcer, Marty Brennaman, had to be. We figured he must have been on some sort of gay sabbatical when he fathered Thom.

What was pure cool? Me and my buddies.

Still are!

About six of us worked at The Nick. Looking back, it was the best job I ever had. We were like kings, deciding who did and did not get served. We picked the tunes, made good tips, drank for free and exhibited a carefree kind of camaraderie that the girls found irresistible.

Well, irresistible at least to the girls who weren’t gay. 

Thom was part of this happy mix. What strikes me most in hindsight is how little an impression this soon-to-be-famous man made. 

We never shared a laugh, engaged a prank or fought over a chick (can I even say “chick” anymore?).

It was like he believed this really cool job with all these really great guys was just a tedious way station towards a future assured to be filled with lucrative network gigs at high-profile events, free golf, lusty babes, etc..

And he was prophetic. That’s exactly how it happened

Sure, his duties would take him to the occasional fag capital, but as long as he didn’t announce the now toxic-pejorative, he needn’t worry. Why would he?

Thom was ghay, but he wasn’t shtupid.

So I say all this and now I surprise myself by saying the dominant emotion I’m now feeling isn’t glee.

It’s pity. It’s forgiveness.

Sure, he was a lousy bartender, a surprisingly colorless co-worker for a man who’d go on to broadcast color sportscasts to millions.

But he seems like a decent man.

I do not believe he should be burned at the stake — especially when no less a grand wordsmith than Winston Churchill wrote about stake-burnings fueled by pyramids of faggots.

It was he who in his excellent 1956 book, “History of the English-Speaking Peoples,” wrote of the execution of Joan of Arc (1412-1431):

“High upon the pyramid of faggots the flames rose toward her and the smoke of doom wreathed and curled.”

Thus in just 64 years the term “pyramid of faggots,” has gone from a description of a bundle of sticks to something that conjures, I guess, a nimble troupe of homosexual acrobats.

Who knows what faggot will mean in 2080?

My point is I don’t think guys like me and Thom were prejudice. We didn’t mean anything by it.

So go ahead and describe us both with an anatomical word whose meaning even time stands powerless to alter.

We’re not prejudiced.

We’re assholes.

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When homesickness hits home

(730 words)

I still remember the departure like it was yesterday.

It was around this time in 1981. I was leaving for my freshman year at Ohio University. My parents were about to experience their first night as empty nesters. 

My buddy’s car had been packed, gassed up, ready to roll. I climbed in and took one last look at the folks, two of the best, most-loving parents any boy could ever hope to have.

They were bawling!

Did I pause to comfort or reassure?

An unfeeling little bastard even then, I told my buddy to floor it. I distinctly remember thinking, “This is the greatest day of my life!”

And it was. The shackles were off. I was embarking on a time of discovery, self-fulfillment and unbroken pursuit of simple human happiness — what kids today call a “gap year.”

Mine’s been a gap life.

Last week the shoe was on the other foot. We took Josie to Saint Vincent where she is studying history. 

If you’re unfamiliar, Saint Vincent is about 4 miles from our home. When the leaves descend we’ll be able to see her dorm room from our back porch.

If you think that’s idyllic, you’re mistaken.

For a sweet girl whose most indelible impression is sunny poise, that little dorm room might as well be on Pluto.

She’s feeling homesick while barely leaving home.

Has it ever happened to you? Ever felt that forlornness over the recollection of something that once was and may never be again?

Homesickness is maybe our most poignant emotion.

It’s indicative of heartfelt appreciation for where you’ve been and uncertainty it can be duplicated anyplace else.

I wish I could assure it can and it will.

Ah, life, so full of sweet soulful suffering.

I asked my older brother if he ever felt homesick in Athens. He began attending there in ’79 and the great times I had visiting him assured I’d go there. Never even considered any place else.

To my surprise, this popular accomplished leader — a bartender and ladies’ man — had been homesick. He felt marooned, out of  place, in over his head.

How did he get through it?

He summoned the world’s greatest drinking buddy.

He summoned Dad!

There’s never been a man better suited for that kind rescue mission — cheering up a sad son in a midwestern college with a party school reputation. I close my eyes and can see it now …

“Rachel, the boy needs me in Athens. He’s homesick. I figure I’ll be back in 2 years. That’s a long time, I know, but I think anyone who stays in Athens that long is automatically handed an Inter-personal Communication degree."

I’ve had some well-meaning friends suggest it’ll be to her long-term benefit for us to tell her to tough it out, to in essence change the locks.

To them I respond with, depending on our degree of friendship, varying levels of caustic profanity.

No matter what they teach her at Saint Vincent, she’ll never be in a position of having to lead troops into battle.

She doesn’t need to be tough. She doesn’t need to be calloused. 

She needs to be happy.

That’s Rule No. 1.

I advise her if she starts feeling sad, she can always come home. 

Come home for dinner. Come home for lunch. If you’re in your dorm and you see some particularly entertaining lunatic on “The Price Is Right,” come home and we’ll watch the “Showcase Showdown” together.

Come on down!

The mindset mirrors the musical advice a loving father gives his daughter in the peerless Alan Jackson 2015 song called coincidentally, I guess, “You Can Always Come Home.”

It says, yes, by all means pursue your dreams, find your own path, but if you stumble or lose your way, darlin’, you can always come home.

Homesickness is an interesting word that means the opposite of what it describes.  

I’ve made many mistakes in my life, but today I’m proud to say I raised a child who’s homesick rather than one who’s sick of home.

Many of us are today saying prayers for those left homeless in Alabama, the Bahamas and other places devastated by Hurricane Dorian.

It’s petty, I know, but I’m including prayers that God will provide solace to all those freshman who are struggling to fit in until their hearts catch up with their ambitions..

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Pondering "sober curious" movement after a weekend in Athens, Ohio

(593 words)

I was this weekend the focus of on odd male custom where men who love you most and think you’re going to die in, say, 5 years, gather to engage in the wanton misbehaviors that could kill you in 2 nights.

I survived and made it home where I’m loved by even sober folk.

The weekend reinforces my contention that my popularity with any group surges in direct correlation to how much alcohol they’ve consumed. 

So if you think this blog is off to a slow start, why don’t you stop here for a moment and go take big slug of hootch to loosen up. I’ll wait.

There. You back? Feel better? 

If it puts you at ease, I had one, too.

Okay, I’m lying.

I had two!

Have you heard about the new sober curious movement? It says people are sick of drinking and are thoughtfully considering what it would be like going out without spending the night drinking beer, wine or strong liquor.

Well, I know exactly what that would be like. 

It’d be like staying home!

Really, I’ll not disparage. I can see alternatives to intoxication working for a lot of people, albeit not for people who make their living keeping many of us tipsy.

Excessive drink, I know, is the ruin of many well-intentioned adults. But so is excessive sobriety. As H.L. Mencken once said: “All the great villainies of history, from Abel to the Treaty of Versailles, have been perpetuated by sober men, chiefly by teetotalers.”

I’m curious how different my life would be had I chosen a sober path. For starters, my lawn today would appear tidier because I wouldn’t have spent the weekend in Athens, Ohio, still after all these years the Drinker’s Disneyland. And my life, I believe, would be emptier without all those vital friendships and raucous memories.

Being back in Athens with a dozen old buddies reminds me how essential my time there was to me. It’s where I became who I am.

Times were different — and I tried without success to impose a penalty shot anytime anyone said, “Boy it’s a good thing there weren’t camera phones when we were here!”

I felt more melancholy than I’ve ever felt in fun circumstances because, indeed, I was the focus of the weekend. Many of my friends came long distances to wish me well. My Parkinson’s diagnosis is bumming my old buddies out. That bums me out. 

I told them I’m fine — and I am — but I realize how upsetting it is when you see something once so vital, so alive — me and you at 19 — showing signs of encroaching mortality. 

Where I once ran naked, I now limp fully clothed.

Still, I should have done something to lift everyone’s spirits, something that would have yielded at least one new story we can tell over and over years from now — and new stories should be the goal of any gathering among old men being stalked by nostalgia.

So next time it’ll be up to me to either swim naked in the hotel pool, pee on a cop’s foot or try and sleep with Miss Benson, that hot history prof, who is by now either 80 or dead — either of which would make a good story.

And that’s another problem I have with the whole sober curious bit.

I mean, really. Where are you going to find a sober guy daring enough to pee on the cop’s foot to liven things up at last call in Athens when the boys are getting bored?

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Black face & "The Legend of Tyrone Stone"

(852 words)

I didn’t start paying attention to the Virginia blackface scandal until I read that one of the minstrels admitted to donning shoe polish to impersonate Michael Jackson, an African-American who at the time was contemplating skin lightening measures that would make him appear more white faced.

So I’d say we’re again nearing peak absurdity on race issues, but every time I say that escalating circumstances make me do an about face.

And with race in America, it’s all about face. 

This madcap trio are rough contemporaries of mine. Gov. Ralph Northam is 59. I’ll be 56 next Friday — go ahead and tell the boss you’re taking the day off to celebrate.

But I gauge past scandals of powerful men through the blurry prism of my own youthful hijinks.

Was the offending episode something I’d done? Did I object when I observed others doing it?

And this was key: was the now-reprehensible act back then funny? Did it make me laugh? I give gargantuan leeway to anything or one that gave me the giggles. I wasn’t PC.

Heck, with casual study habits like mine, I was barely even C.

But I excelled at having raucous fun. I had a crew of like-minded rogues I could rely on to ensure nothing serious was ever allowed to flourish. 

Not once in four years of drunken debauchery did any one of us ever say, “Hey, I have an idea. Let’s put some shoe polish on our faces and entertain ourselves by pretending we’re stereotypical blacks. Who’s game?”

It wouldn’t have been funny. It would have been offensive. We somehow knew without having to have been told that putting shoe polish on our faces was wrong.

Putting shoe polish on our faces would have made us, er, what?

Heels?

That brings us to The Legend of Tyrone Stone.

That became the name of the cement stable boy I stole from the front porch of an affluent South Hills Pittsburgh home that happened to be between our family homes and the Carnegie saloon we’d go to get inebriated when we were back on break.

Bob K. and I saw it first. It looked very similar to the picture I found and posted above. I have no doubt in my mind it was intended to mock blacks. The realization kindled outrage in me before I’d ever become aware so much racial injustice existed.

We thought it was a deliberate racial affront. We thought it was intended to taunt.

We thought it would look better in the beer room at our Ohio University fraternity house!

So one drunken night with Bob behind the wheel of an idling station wagon, I crept across the well-manicured lawn and seized the lawn jockey.

Man, it weighed a ton. A real Kentucky Derby jockey weighs about 114 pounds. This thing felt like it weighed as much as his horse.

But I was trim and motivated and succeeded in our merry mission.

The prize was warmly greeted at his new home where one of the brothers dubbed him Tyrone Stone.

I felt smug about my role in removing an obvious racist symbol from public view and transferring it to a place where fewer racists could mock it.

And that’s the way it was for three days. Then one of the fraternity brothers thought it would be funny to put Tyrone up on the roof.

It took about two days before the brothers showed up. And I mean brothers not in the fraternal sense, but the ethnic kind.

There were three of them; there were about 15 of us.

Yes, we were badly outnumbered.

“We’re here to talk to you about that stable boy on your roof,” said the leader. He spent the next 15 minutes articulating to us why it was offensive, its dark history and the divisiveness we were fostering by displaying it on our roof.

He was righteous. He was genuine. He was persuasive.

Oh, how I wish I could conclude this fable by saying he was Barack Hussein Obama.

But he convinced us we were wrong. We felt bad and apologized for our thoughtlessness. And we were genuinely apologetic. It was more than the realization they could kick our sorry candy asses.

But they were men of real character. They’d forthrightly marched into a forbidding element and with just reasoning prevailed. They were not men to be mocked over skin color.

It’s a goddamned shame it’s still an issue in 21st century America.

Whatever happened to Tyrone Stone?

We took turns smashing the racist symbol to smithereens with empty beer kegs.

And every time I tell a story like that I marvel at the fickleness of life where Brett Kavanaugh and I could lead such parallel lives and one of us wind up on the Supreme Court and the other atop the Tin Lizzy.

Maybe one day we can take one another at face value when we value all faces without the anchor of prejudice.

Until then, the whole ordeal will leave me feeling red-faced.

But we’ll have to save the Elizabeth Warren discussion for some other time. 

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#MeToo: What happened in '85 in Athens, Ohio, when I grabbed a girl's ass

(795 words)

Like most men in this #MeToo year I’ve done some soul-searching about whether I ever mistreated a woman in pursuit of cheap sex.

Did I ever put my hands on a woman in a unwanted way sure to offend? Did I ever grope or otherwise sexually harass a female?

In fact, I did. I once grabbed an unsuspecting young woman’s ass.

I used her. Just not in the way you might think.

First, I must set the scene.

It was 1985 at the Sigma Nu fraternity house in Athens, Ohio, a place my own grandfather once described as the only dwelling he’d visited where he felt compelled to wipe his feet on the way out. So there are some obvious “Animal House” elements to this story.

I can’t remember the sorority or the party theme, but I do remember the girl. Her name was Jenny. She was young, pretty and had really great hair.

So did I!

It was a very long time ago.

I didn’t have any real aspirations of dating her. Many pretty young girls just like Jenny had over the years rejected my advances with reactions ranging from polite indifference to scalding ridicule.

I didn’t mind. It taught me perseverance, a trait I’d need in the next three decades of trying to earn a living as a freelance writer prone to working with editors who’d respond to my literary advances with reactions ranging from polite indifference to scalding ridicule.

So I was just being friendly. 

Up to that point in my young life, I don’t believe I’d ever pawed or groped a girl in any unwanted way. Even then, I knew it was wrong, something Bobcat stalwarts and disgraced serial pigs Roger Ailes and Matt Lauer apparently never learned.

What made me grab Jenny’s ass? The devil didn’t make me do it.

Blame Bob. 

Bob and I had known each other in high school, but didn’t become true buddies until Athens. He’s always been a very funny guy and a world-class prankster. Like so many other friends from those raucous times, I love him very much.

As I was chatting with Jenny, I saw Bob standing near the dance floor about 45-degrees behind Jenny’s blind spot some 20 paces away. Some mix of their positions, my buzz and an eagerness for mischief combined to inspire the restless joker in me.

I motioned for Bob to join us and he began a 3-second stroll across the dance floor.

I said to Jenny, “I’d like you to meet Bob. He’s a great guy, but watch out. He can be a little grabby.”

From that instant, it was like the whole thing had been choreographed. Because, having been warned, Jenny turned to Bob just as he came within arm’s length. As she turned her attention from me, I deftly reached out with my right hand and gave her Bob-side tush a robust toot. 

I’m not saying I would have not grabbed her ass had I been forewarned, but I was totally unprepared for her reaction. It was like she’d been tased. In an infuriated micro-second she turned on Bob.

In my life, I’ve seen Muhammad Ali demolish Joe Frazier, saw Mike Tyson destroy countless forgettable bums and once spent an afternoon watching Sugar Ray Leonard tear a hapless sparring partner to bits. But I’ve never before or since seen a haymaker left delivered to an exposed cheek with such precise fury as the one Jenny landed on Bob.

Had she opted instead to knee poor Bob in the testicles, I’m sure Bob today would be dead and I’d be telling this cautionary tale with just a shade less jocularity. 

For story purposes, it would be great if I could truthfully declare Jenny changed her name to Gloria Allred and on the spot decided to devote her life to championing downtrodden women, but that would be false.

She instead turned on her heels and stormed out the door, taking with her her entire contingent of comely sorority sisters. The party was over, leaving me as the only individual that whole evening to have even a bit of fun.

A few short years after that the Sigma Nus were thrown off campus for poor grades and disreputable behaviors. The charmingly ramshackle Court Street house that holds so many vivid memories for me is now an unassuming university building haunted, perhaps, by the ghosts of ass grabbers past. 

And I’ve never even once since thought of engaging in such despicable behavior against an unsuspecting woman.

Neither has Bob, of course, but that’s something anyone with even a basic appreciation of the powerful consequences of cause-and-effect lessons already knew. 

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