The Show across the Street

 “Did you see the show?”

     “Oh, I hardly ever go to the movies.”

     “No!  I’m talking about the show across the street!”

     “No, what show?”  I had backed the old blue ’55 Chev half way out of the driveway when Georgette* accosted me and came around to the left side where I could not get out of the car.  So I rolled down the window.

     Bill, as usual, was at the base of the situation.  Some time ago he had decided he needed to build a “four-place” hangar, a building big enough to house four airplanes.  He had lined up a sponsor, another Bill, a bank president who agreed to provide financing for materials.  Bill was to arrange for the labor and necessary equipment.  They each would own half of the building.

     Our Bill had made several purchases including several used REA poles, some of which were milled into two-inch lumber by a local miller who was trying to get a start, a bunch of used bridge planks from the local county road shop, and brand new roof trusses and tin for the roof and walls.  Somehow, he lined up a local Electrical Company employee to use the company posthole digger to dig the holes for the used REA poles. 

    Bill had researched pole buildings through the Kansas State Extension Service.  Of course, he had bettered the plans some.  The plans called for ringing the perimeter with healthy poles spaced 10 or 12 feet apart.  Of course the doorways had to exceed 30 feet to accommodate an airplane’s wing span.  So Bill decided that he should put a few poles on the inside of the building to support the roof trusses.

    I spent one Saturday running an old Farmhand that used pipes and cables and encaged the old Minneapolis Moline tractor to raise and drop the REA poles into the newly drilled holes.  I was appointed the tractor man because I knew how to handle the Farmhand.  The “ground crew” fastened a chain from the Farmhand “stinger” to the pole just a little above its mid length.

      When I raised it, the pole would be nearly vertical.  I would maneuver the tractor to the appointed hole, dodging the other posts and holes.  If I got it right, I could slowly lower the pole into the hole and the ground crew would only have to remove the chain so I could back away and they could level the pole and dump in enough dirt to hold it in place.  If I didn’t get it just right, the crew used bars to fit the pole into the hole.

   Anyone who has ever run the old Farmhand is scoffing right now at “slowly lower the pole.”  To let the old Farmhand arms down, you jerk out on the control lever and things come down right now.  To stop the descent, shove the handle in to the neutral position and the arms come to a tractor-jarring halt.  Some inventive genius had plumbed a shut off valve such as found in any water supply system into the hydraulic line on this Farmhand.  I could simply crack that valve open by turning the valve’s wheel and control the speed of descent.  It was such a good idea, I modified my old Farmhand similarly.

     As the building progressed, many of the extra interior poles we had installed had to be removed by chainsaw because they were in the way of roof trusses or some other structural component. 

    I missed the installation of the roof trusses, but the Minnie-with-Farmhand came in very handy for that operation.  I also missed one of the two dramatic incidents that happened during hangar construction.  Keith, the shop teacher, was running the tractor (I think), raising trusses into position.  Gary, the music teacher, was one of the monkeys helping position and nail the trusses in place. 

     Keith and Gary mis-communicated and a truss came down while Gary was still checking out the alignment.  The truss hit Gary on the head.  It stunned him, but he had the presence of mind to grab a pole and hang on.  The blood came pouring down.  Crew members raced to get Gary safely to the ground.  Keith had trained as a volunteer EMT.  He administered first aid and Bill rushed Gary to the emergency room where his scalp was stitched back together.  Gary didn’t take part in further hangar construction activities.  A person could still find the indelible proof of Gary’s contribution to the project if he knew where to look in the hangar.

     Once the roof trusses were in place there remained the task of putting on the “skin”, long sheets of galvanized corrugated tin.  It took more than one weekend to get all the roof sheets in place and nailed down with ring shank nails.  Once the roof was done, the walls had to be covered with the same material.

    So it was that we were still hanging tin on the walls in the afternoons after school.  We were in a little bit of a hurry, as Daylight Savings was coming to an end.  Under standard time, we would spend more time getting tools and materials ready, then cleaning them up and putting away, than we would nailing up tin in the shortened evenings.

      This particular afternoon, I had returned home for supper, had eaten and was backing out of the drive to use the last hour of daylight to work on the hangar.  The Goodwife reminds me that she, too, was present.  Was she taking me up to the airport and taking the old Chev somewhere, or was she just out in the pleasant evening seeing me off?  Neither of us can remember, but she was present as Georette approached us with the question, “Did you see the show?”          

       “What show?”  Across the street, a rather dysfunctional family of four had replaced the folks who had lived there for a long time.  When we moved in, Tim had lost a leg to some kind of infection.  Mandy pushed him around in a wheel chair.  Mandy made an impression on me when she mowed the lawn wearing blue-striped coveralls tucked into shin-high rubber boots, hairnet, and an old cap in the August heat.  Tim died not long after we moved in.  The widow moved soon thereafter and I never really got acquainted with them (a rarity as the Goodwife said I knew all the old ladies, and some of the men, up and down the block as well as across the alley). 

     “What show?”

     “Why, that ******* girl and that ##### boy came running around the garage and they proceeded to have intercourse right there on the lawn!”  

       The ######’s moved in with teenaged son and first grade girl.  They were new to town.  Neither child had many friends.  I had the son in English class, and the girl would come over to visit whenever I was working in the yard.  Neither child did well in school.  I remember trying to teach “Suzie” numbers while we were playing catch one afternoon.  “How many can you catch?  One for one. . . one for two. . . .”

    “Suzie” reciprocated by trying to teach me how to ride a skate board.  I was the poor student in this case.  In another interesting incident “Suzie” took a classmate at school to task for calling her own mother “Gay.”  “Don’t you call your mother gay!  That’s not nice!”  “But that’s her name!  Her name is ‘Gay’!”

      The ******* girl had given birth to an illegitimate daughter only weeks before this day.  The courts handed the infant to the foster system and friends of ours were caring for her.  Of course they fell in love with the baby and sought to adopt her, but the court, in its blind wisdom returned custody of the child to the biological grandparents.  The foster family was heartbroken and suffered some trauma as a result.  God only knows what became of the infant who would now be in her 40’s.

      Somehow “Jerold ####” and “Gladys *****” struck up a friendship, I’m not sure how, because “Gladys” was not in school, but their relationship grew beyond friendship, apparently.

      So the show across the street had upset the Octogenarians who lined the block on that side of the street.  But Georgette lived on our side of the street, and three doors further west.  How had she found out about the show?

      Well, next-door neighbor Trudy apparently saw the initial rush around the front of the ##### garage to the west side adjacent to Trudy’s driveway.  When things went so far as to involve removing some clothing, she had alerted Erna on the far west corner of her side of the street.  Erna communicated with Georgette.  Apparently, the three ladies (with or without Erna’s husband I’m not sure) gathered in Trudy’s window and watched the act to completion.

     And we, poor souls, came out upon the scene a short time after the culprits restored themselves to full dress and removed themselves from the scene of the crime.  Georgette was apparently on her way home from being an eye witness to a crime when we appeared and she reported to us.

     The rest of that day has faded from memory.  I know I went to the airport and related my experience to Bill and whoever else might have been there as we worked.  The story wasn’t over, however.

     Georgette worked at the courthouse.  After further consultation with the other witnesses, she decided that in order to uphold the oath of office she had taken, she must register a complaint with the magistrate, which she did.  The county sheriff investigated.  Why not the city police force, I’m not sure.  The sheriff interviewed all the witnesses.  Were they sure that an act of sexual intercourse in public had taken place, or was it just an injudicious display of affection?

      One witness, Erna, took umbrage at the sheriff’s questioning her judgment, so the story goes.  Erna had been a widow most of her life and had remarried rather late in life.  She had had to work to support her family, and she was a very strong person. 

     After she grew tired of the sheriff’s attempt to get her to say she wasn’t totally sure of what she had seen, she is reported to have exclaimed, “Young man (the sheriff was in his 40’s), I am eighty years old and I know a prick when I see one!”

      And that was the end of the story for the community.  The young couple refrained from further public display.  Both their families left the community in a year or two.  Since both criminals were juveniles, the court record was sealed.

     The public’s interest in prurient affairs is transient, soon replaced by a new scandal. The witnesses to this crime of passion have all gone to the next world where I hope they all are blessed.  I have disinterred the story here for entertainment purposes only.  I can only hope that this disclaimer will free me from any charge of calumny.

     *Many names have been changed to protect the blogger.