Playing Fair and Being Kind

I have been catching a commercial on the TV these past few weeks advertising a show called “Main Street”. The hosts travel the U.S. to various towns to improve the small businesses there. Season 3, the current one, is in a town in Illinois. Alton, Illinois which happents to be the birthplace of Miles Davis. I have been to Alton. In fact I have endured one of my many adventures there. “I spent a few years there one weekend”, as the joke goes. I spent Easter weekend in Alton in 1958. April 6th to be exact. I looked it up. Well, the 6th was Sunday. I arrived on the 5th with a Navy pal from the training center in Great Lakes. Great Lakes, North Chicago, is 60 miles north of Chicago right on Lake Michigan. Alton, Illinois, birthplace of Miles Davis and where I almost died on April 5th, 1958. On April 6th I realized that I was not dead but I wished I was. Not to be over dramatic, I was simply hung over from drinking in the bar in Alton. Small town in 1958.

John Vanvoorish was my Navy buddy who lived there in Alton. We got a ride from a first class petty officer in Great Lakes all the way to Alton. The petty officer was continuing to his home in St. Louis, just across the Mississippi. We arranged to meet on Sunday, later in the evening in East St. Louis, to return to Great Lakes. The driving time from East St. Louis to North Chicago is just about 5 hours or so. We traveled on U. S. Rt. 66. You’ve probably heard of Rt. 66. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCYApJtsyd0

So, John and I took the ride on Rt. 66 and what is now Interstate 55. The road was large and traffic traveled fast. Our petty officer friend got us there on schedule and, as I said, we made plans to meet him in East St. Louis on Sunday night. The first thing John and I did was to dump our awol* bags at his mother’s house in Alton and eat dinner. We met a friend of John’s and went to a local bar to hang with all of his friends, young and old. Things went bad fast in that this was simply a celebration for John and his pals to which I was invited. I was trying hard to be relevant in this crowd of pals. Therefore I had to drink as fast as they did and then when the new man in me surfaced he wanted to increase the risk. I told the others that I could drink more than they to which they invited me to drink a shot of whiskey so I did. It went down smooth and easy. I was now superman in my mind.

Next we stood at the bar and asked the bartender to pour me another shot which he did. He looked at me as he did and his expression said it all. He’d seen me before in many a bar scene. Young, brash, heading for the doorway to hell. He was right. After about a half dozen shots poured and drank I was still not feeling the effects. He kept pouring, John kept paying, and I kept downing the shots. By the twelfth shot I was beginning to feel the effect of the first two or three. On the thirteenth I tipped my head back to down the whiskey. Back went my head, my shoulders, my torso, my skinny butt and all of the rest of me. Flat on my back to the floor, semi-conscious. That was the end of the fun for me.

John and his friends hauled me out of there and I spent the rest of the night hurling out the car windows and being led around to all the other fun places in town with my hands in somebody’s back pockets to keep me from falling over. I was the caboose on a train to misery. That sums up all I remember of the night life in Alton, Illinois.

Early the next morning, which came much too soon, John’s mother woke us to go to church for Easter Sunday services. I was in such bad shape I don’t recall getting dressed but we did arrive at the church and I was wearing some of John’s civvies.

We entered the church and I was led into a meeting hall where there were seated in folding chairs young people; perhaps thiry or forty or so. John and his pal headed straight for the only two chairs left in the general audience. I was not quite steady still and I took a few steps toward the seats. All the while there was a preacher of sorts at a podium very near where I was unsteadily standing. He motioned for me to come toward him and indicated a chair right next to the podium that was facing the audience. I sat down and stared out all the faces staring back at me. I couldn’t see John or his pal but I knew for certain they were happy for me. Or, rather, they were happy they were not me. I knew I looked and smelled like crap. My eyes, I was told later, looked like two piss-holes in a snowbank. My mouth was filled with cotton and my head was split into two, maybe three pieces. I endured. Not my most amazing moment on earth, to be certain. I do remember that when I looked at the audience everyone was staring directly at me and I dimly recall the preacher changing his tone during his delivery. I was certain he was talking about me.

That’s what I did on Easter Sunday in 1958. Later, John and I had dinner with his family and then we got ready to go meet our Navy friend who was to drive us back to Great Lakes. We found him waiting for us at the bus station in East St. Louis. John and I piled our awol bags into the back seat and crawled in after them. Off we went. We traveled along Rt. 66 for about an hour and the car broke down. It was dark by this time. Our Navy friend lifted the hood of his car but there was nothing he could do to make it go. Neither John nor I were of any help. We had to make a plan. We were due back at the base next morning by 0700 (7 A.M.). We were out on the highway, Rt. 66 to be exact, and traffic was busy and moving fast.

John and I left our Navy friend with his car. He was not in jeopardy of being in hot water because he was a senior petty officer. John and I were students at the Navy Training Center and we had to be in school by 0800. We started walking along the highway with our thumbs out trying to hitch a ride which we eventually got. A farmer with a truck stopped and picked us up. He was headed for Chicago to deliver produce. We accepted the ride and slowly made our way toward the shores of Lake Michigan up Rt. 66. After a few more rides and a taxi for the last few miles we arrived late back at the base.

We were in hot water for sure. We had to go to the admin office to turn ourselves in and surrender our liberty cards. John and I both got two weeks of extra duty which consisted of cleaning the galley every night for a few hours after the last meal. We were lucky that was all we got. Still, we were worried all the way back on the highway.

Funny thing is I don’t think I learned anything productive from the punishment. That was the kind of thinking of our society at that time. Conformity rules. That was the lesson. I’m happy I did break the rule. For me that was the lesson. Breaking rules was o.k. as long as I was willing to endure the consequences. Amen to that.
G. M. Goodwin
14 October 2018

*AWOL vs. AOL: awol is “absent without leave. aol is absent over leave. If you leave the base or your ship without permission you are AWOL. If you have permission to leave the base or your ship but are late returning you are AOL.
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