The KSU Collegian and a ceiling that remembers.

Manhattan, Kansas---Revisiting your past can be tricky. On one hand you have a gage in time when things don’t stay the same. On the other hand you find yourself seeking out something that you can connect with, something that says “I was here.” It’s almost like needing to feel validated in some way.

My friend Leslie had flown in from North Carolina and met up with me in Kansas City for a road trip to our Alma Mater, Kansas State University. Leslie was a journalism student during our days writing for the Kansas State Collegian and Royal Purple Yearbook. We all "lived" in the newsroom. Literally…there was a sofa that many a student napped on between classes. It was home base for many of us and classes were a necessary inconvenience to writing stories for the paper.

Our student publications were a private entity from the university, giving us freedom to write and report as we saw the issues. We published five days a week, took it from tabloid to broadsheet and everything except the plating and printing was student run. We took this role very seriously. We had serious debates over our editorial position. Our "photogs" gave us bold brilliant photographs that we dedicated huge spaces for...as it should be. Our story ideas came with an attitude that was unafraid of fallout. Later in my career I was caught completely by surprise to see that the “real world” I had prepared myself for was actually a bunch of immature adults screaming at each other over the status of tourism in Daytona Beach or brave reporters with sissy editors in the newsroom afraid to ruffle feathers.  It was a huge let down. But I had changed paths and went into advertising not journalism then and had to choke my opinions down and literally learn how to make small talk.

Small talk is actually a learned skill that I begrudgingly needed to master. I'm actually pretty good at it now.

I had transferred to KSU as a junior and immediately got a position working for the paper and yearbook. As a student I  covered several town fires, with my best friend co-reported on the drinking game “Hi Bob” played by watching the The Bob Newhart show on TV...an excellent chance for research gathering I might add, I wrote a story about this brand new craze on TV called "MTV" and in my final role at the paper was a fortunate enough to be given the chance to write a twice weekly personal column on the Opinions Page for my last semester. I usually followed student government and found some way to get under their skin. Little did they know my “deep throat” was none other than their leader, the student body president and secretly a good friend and amazing guy that I recently had the opportunity to reconnect with after 30 years. We didn’t always agree but he did give me heads up on upcoming issues. Between a completely supportive faculty adviser, Dave Adams (RIP), and a core of “Kedzie Hall” friends that had my back, six of whom I have visited on this coast to coast trip, as well as Paul, the most eccentric and "Woodward and Bernstein-like" student Editor. I thrived. Having my life threatened, and becoming a campus “you either hate her or you love her” figure was taken with a grain of salt. I knew it was only college. The final Student council session had all the senators wearing “No Edee Buttons” a laminated button with my picture, a circle and a bar across it. Nice college souvenir I thought.

So when Les and I entered the building of Kedzie Hall, the place that housed the Communications Department and the news room, the last thing I was ready for was another step back in time. But when the door opened to our old news room we literally stood there stunned. How is it possible? There have been hundreds of students in the past 30 years that have come through the ranks of reporters and editors. How is it possible that the newsroom looks the same. The writing room, replaced by computers instead of typewriters was virtually  a walk back in time.  Even the ceiling above us displayed hundreds of signatures that our generation had started with the tradition of signing the ceiling. So many signatures were faded and could not be read. I searched the ceiling. Was I still there? Was there anything that was there to say I had once been there?

Finally I saw it. Clear as it was yesterday. I guess that permanent marker wasn’t lying. I had made a circle with a line through it commemorating the “No Edee” button and it still resides on the ceiling. Later a discussion with a faculty member revealed that during a past building renovation, the school had wanted to put in a new ceiling but the students protested with a “Save the Ceiling” campaign and they prevailed.

I felt like Steve Martin in the movie “The Jerk” when he finds his name in the phone book and screams “I am someone.”

There on the ceiling of the Kansas State Collegian newspaper was my signature from 30 years earlier.

And I walked away not completely sure why I felt validated but certain that I, like many before and after, played a role on this campus.

We were the future, we are the past.

 

Auntie Mae's Parlor

Manhattan, Kansas---There are some jobs that can be so much fun, you can’t believe they are paying you to do it. I felt that way for the first time when I was a city pool lifeguard in my hometown of Newton, Kansas. I also felt that way when I got a job in ”Aggieville,” the area one block from Kansas State University existing mainly to entertain college students. And within Aggieville, there was ONLY one place I wanted to work: Auntie Mae’s Parlor.

Even before I got a job there I knew there was something special about this tiny, basement bar and restaurant…if you can call it a restaurant since the kitchen was about five feet by four feet with a toaster oven and small apartment size refrigerator, never-the-less we still served toasted sandwich baskets including the ever-hated Veggie Sandwich because it was such a pain to make.  But even then, when the drinking age was 18 for 3.2 beer and getting into Auntie Mae's meant you bought a yearly membership and were 21, it was never a pick up joint. It was a meet "up with your friends" place and yes, we mostly knew everybody's name. Regardless I never really told my  conservative Mennonite parents I worked in a bar and emphasized the restaurant part to them...until my Mom visited and I begged the manager to hide the bottles and put books on the shelves.

Now on this road trip,  I had returned and was anxious to see if it was still there. I turned the corner of its location and yes, same name, same logo. I walked down the stairs and it felt like walking out of a time travel booth.  I could almost hear Split Endz blaring on the stereo. I was back at the very place that I had loved so much 30 years ago. It looked the same to me. Dark wood,  low open rafters, a row of booths on one side and the long bar on the other with a small aisle down the center.  Double rails for the waitresses to get to the bar. At the end was the tiny kitchen and bathrooms as well as another set of “staff only” stairs used for emergencies like having a mad ex show up. Behind the stair case that had a landing in the middle to turn you toward another short series of steps to the bottom, was a small area for tables, and sofas. Also the hot spot for playing darts.

When I first got my cocktail waitress position there, I had only been there a few nights, when the manager “Toofi,” told me they had a huge problem with one of the kegs and he needed me to quickly go to another bar and ask to borrow the “Keg Defoamer.” Anxious to make a good impression, I went to “Brothers,” another bar owned by our owner, Charlie Bush. In fact Charlie, a young entrepreneur, owned several bars and one restaurant all located in Aggieville.

The bartender at Brothers told me to sit and enjoy a free beer while he went to look for it. Later he returned and informed me they had just loaned their Keg Defoamer to the “Avalon” and I should try there…next bar, repeat the above story, next bar, repeat the above story, next bar…

I do remember that I refused the beer because I was in a hurry and worried about this important mission. I guess others before me had drank all 5 beers and returned drunk and without the defoamer. I just returned without the defoamer about ready to cry. I had failed.


I took that dreaded walk down the staircase to a staff laughing their heads off.

There is no such thing as a “Keg Defoamer.”

I was fully initiated, Auntie Mae’s Parlor style.

Working there I came to know people I would have never have met on campus and not everyone was in school. There was “Moose,” Nick, Tammi, “Toofi,”  Tracie,  Randy, Teresa, Mel, “Lumpy,” Bill, Donny, as well as other staff from the sister-bars like JT and Kevin.  In Kansas City I reconnected with Tammi for the first time in 30 years.  We both had similar feelings toward our time at Auntie Mae’s. She had married Kevin who had worked in one of the sister locations. The bartender Tracie became one of my best friends and I remained friends with her for many years and was even a bridesmaid in her wedding but had lost track of her in the more recent years.

College friend Leslie made the road trip to Manhattan with me.

There was indeed something special about working there. But what was it?

Walking down those stairs so many memories flooded my mind. This was the first place that had theme parties complete with costumes. I would go on to take this into to my professional career in Advertising and my years working with the American Advertising Federation club in Florida. Ask most people that know me and they have either attended a party or been a part of a show in costume, my favorite: Dress as your favorite Gilligan’s Island character where 100+ people showed up in my backyard coconuts and all. Or the shows to promote advertising dressed as Snap, Crackle and Pop or the Jolly Green Giant complete with green pantyhose. What I had learned is that costumes are huge ice-breakers and people will have more fun when the can get outside of what is normally their comfort zone.

Standing there in Auntie Mae’s I realized for the first time that THIS is where I learned it. There was the Toga Party, where I had sewn Toofi a complete toga out of the deep blue cloth bags from his one and only drink: Crown Royal…and he was well over 6 feet tall and it took A LOT of little blue bags. But then on February 28, 1983 M*A*S*H, closed out the series' eleventh season with a 2½-hour episode and we had decided to all dress in characters and promote it as a place to watch the show. It was standing room only that night, and I remember I did not get to watch the show until years later because I was so busy getting people drinks.

I look back at the business that was Auntie Mae’s Parlor and one thing comes to mind. Charlie Bush. The guy at the top had molded relationships with employees and encouraged, if not created, bonding. We could drink on the job, but no one got drunk…because we needed to work hard for Charlie. We could goof around with customers and staff, but everyone did their job…because we needed to work hard for Charlie.  And Charlie would hang with us, usually sitting at the end of the bar with a cocktail and simple smile saying hello to customers and his staff.  Everyone that worked for Charlie in the other establishments would come in on their days off and patronize us and his other businesses. “We” were Charlie’s. Few of us went to Aggie Station, Kites, McKay’s or Mother’s Worry, the competition owned by Mr. Ray. We felt appreciated, and even though I was only 22, I always was treated with respect and like an adult.  And Charlie would reward us with an invitation to go boating with him at Tuttle Creek or bus all his employees to Kansas City for a River Boat party. Tammi and I talked about it when we got together and mutually agreed that any one of us would have done anything for Charlie, not because of employment but because of loyalty.

I never remember Charlie ever correcting or reprimanding one staff member in public. But you never, ever doubted that he was the one who ran the show and if something was wrong it would be corrected behind the scenes.

And then it hit me. Standing there where I had once been a restaurant and bar employee, I had tried to re-create Auntie Mae’s Parlor at The Beach Bucket, the oceanfront restaurant and bar that I was Managing Partner of and only three months ago had resigned. It took this coast to coast trip and a walk down the stairs to Auntie Mae’s to put it all together. THAT’S WHY I was so hurt by the bartender, THAT’S WHY I was so confused by my business partner’s choices, THAT’S WHY I loved the staff there so much. I had a vision. Even more, I had an example that I had seen work. And when it didn’t match the vision of my energetic bar manager, or my experienced restaurateur business partner, I felt defeated. But they didn’t know. I didn’t even know.

Current Live Music poster

Charlie sold the bars. Brother’s Bar and The Avalon above it burned down. But still I have a loyalty toward the Auntie Mae's location and I wanted to meet the current owner. He was in a booth talking to customers.  He seems to have some “Charlie” in him. The bar has had its ups and downs, even closing for a short time. He had brought live music there and has made a name for great bands traveling between Denver and Kansas City doing a stopover to preform. It reminded me of the "Cactus" on the campus of the University of Texas in Austin that I had visited earlier on this trip.  I chatted with him and told stories of the events that occurred there, he told me stories of what it’s like now…amusing me over the rumored history of who Auntie Mae was. I asked him where his merchandising was and he brought down a couple t-shirts to show me. I said, “Yes, I’ll take both. How much?”

He smiled and said, “No cost to you. You’re Family.”

To be treated like that after 30 years summed it all up. The Spirit of Auntie Mae's Parlor lives on.



MASH party and Auntie Mae's Parlor Staff  at the time (plus Charlie top left) . Tammi went as Radar in the bottom right.

Tammi and me after 30 years.

On the wall: Tracie at our Toga Party.

 

Before my time but on the wall: Original opening staff and Charlie...

 



Auntie Mae herself.

Reflections; Day 75

Kansas City, Kansas---I am in my home state of Kansas.  I have driven 8,032 miles and have visited 62 people. When I started on this coast to coast road trip of seeing people from all points of my past, and going to places I’d never seen,  I tried to hold no expectations. I decided the road would lead the way. Since then I have let things “fall into place” and they miraculously have. I have said the words “walk on faith” before, but to live it for this long, everyday has been eye opening.

Sometimes it feels like I might be walking the plank instead.

I have had to discard original goals like seeing a friend in Washington State and relatives in Oregon as well as cutting out Yellowstone Park all because of time and budget. I keep thinking of the lines from Robert Frost’s poem Road Less Traveled:

…And be one traveler, long I stood                                                                                                                 And looked down one as far as I could                                                                                                             To where it bent in the undergrowth;       

Then took the other, as just as fair, 
And having perhaps the better claim, 
Because it was grassy and wanted wear; 
…
Oh, I kept the first for another day! 
Yet knowing how way leads on to way, 
I doubted if I should ever come back…       (Thank you Ms. Schmidt, High School English teacher)

The poem goes on to say that taking an unchartered path has made all the difference. But has it?  My life, since I left a long career has been totally unchartered. Some people think it’s weird. Some people think this is cool. Some have even said they are living vicariously. But as the one living it let me fill you in on how hard it’s been.

Never mind. Just take my word. It’s hard.

On this trip, I have a loose route of friends and relatives, but there have been plenty of days that I do not know where I am going to sleep at night. I haven’t talked about that and the worry that goes in to finding a safe place to sleep. I drove 15 hours between California and Utah to get to a major “hub” house (a cousin) just to feel safe and the drive nearly killed me…thank God for my secret weapon, used only twice so far: Red Bull.

And even though I pledged to myself that I would not compare my path in life with the successes in the lives of my friends and family…it’s really impossible to make that little voice shut up. I am so proud of many old friends, but it does yield to a deep reflection of my life and the wasted 26 years at The Orlando Sentinel…or were they?

The real truth is I have hit a wall. I am exhausted at every level.  My house in Florida was hit by a storm and a smashed gate and a zapped dishwasher was the result. My health insurance went up an outrageous $100 a month.  Then in Utah I found out my house was being swarmed by Carpenter Ants. For a day I thought I needed to fly back but my roommates have been amazing even after one poor girl woke up covered in ants. Many phone calls later, it’s being handled.

I write this because this trip has been amazing both socially and geographically. Beyond all my expectations of amazing. But I am not perfect or even close to it. And to not be honest and say traveling alone, for 75 days and counting, has been hard, would be flat out lying. And to say I’m not starting to constantly think of what direction may be next after I return would also be a lie.

In a perfect world, I am a writer. Yet recently a close friend told me he had read my entire blog from start to current and what he got out of it was how good my photos were. Slap.

I mean, thank you.

Several times recently I have just wanted to stop this and drive directly home.

But I know me and I will continue with my goal. I will shake this road weariness knowing how many wonderful things are still ahead of me. And because with no hesitation have I EVER regretted leaving my career and the choices I have made in the past three years…not even for one nano-second I will figure it all out. Err, I mean God already has.

But it is way easier said than done…the walking on faith part. And just like my year of sailing the world,  I know there is a reason that I have wanted to drive coast to coast for 30 years. I know that doing it now is far more meaningful than it would have been straight out of college. I just don’t know what it all means.

Yet.

Fort Hays State University...or was it a movie set?

Hays, Kansas---I sat crying under a huge oak tree on a park bench
in the middle of Fort Hays State University. I was 18 years old and didn’t know what to do. So reminiscent of me in dilemma, I first had a good cry. But soon I heard a voice say, “Can I help you?”

I looked up to see a kind face of a man who looked like he worked there. In one breath I said, “I-want-to-enroll-to-go-to-college-here-but-I-am-supposed-to-find-the-administration-building-and-I’ve-looked-all- over-and-I-can’t-find-it-and-I-don’t-know-what-I-want-to-major-in-and-I-don’t-know-anyone-and-I-can’t-even-find-the-building.”

He smiled and said, “Follow me.”

And then he walked me 20 feet to the Administration building.

The two full years I lived in the Western Kansas town of Hays felt like a dream as I drove into town with the long I-70 drive from Denver behind me. I didn’t really know where I was going but yet I did. A subconscious memory took hold and soon I was on campus for the first time since I left in 1980.

As things passed me, memories that had been buried in time suddenly flooded my mind. It was overwhelming.

“The Hardee’s I worked in was torn down but that is the Kwik Trip I worked in where that weirdo came in and flashed me and now it’s a liquor store and oh my god, the Brass Rail is still there but man! it looks so small. The railroad tracks! I forgot about the raidroad, seriously did I hop a train to Salina only to be discovered by the engineer who found out I had midterms and stopped the train and kicked me off a couple miles down the line to walk back and finish the school year?  Wait that's the limestone house next to campus where my first serious boyfriend lived looks exactly the same and there is the pool and fountain in front of the campus..wasn’t that larger? And there are the pillars my boyfriend stood and sang "Three times a lady," to me one night,  how did that song go? He asked me to marry him and I was 19. OH MY GOD I would still be in Hays, Kansas right now.  McMindes Hall, no way! it is still standing and 6^th floor East my first dorm is right there, whoa! Custer Hall is the Police station!?…that was my co-ed dorm with a campus run bar in the basement; wow how we all loved ‘The Back Door’, did they really have belly bust nights where the beer was free until someone had to pee...” my mind was having a hard time processing everything. My mind was my own drive in movie.

In 1980 this was a campus bar. It currently is used for the campus police and is the city's emergency back up location
...my how things change!

This was a reunion with buildings not people. Who knew brick and mortar could leave me shaking. But with each building, it was the memories of the people and the experiences with those people that left me so bewildered. I missed Roger. I missed The Three Musketeers/Bonnie and Debbie. I missed Carol and Deb and Shelly and Big Bird. I missed Doctor. I missed Ron and Betty. I missed Dave Adams (RIP). I even missed Disco; the dance...not a nickname.

So I stopped at the old Kwik Trip and stared at the ceiling remembering how when I worked a shift there in this predominately Catholic town, not knowing I had tried to wipe the dirt off several customers foreheads on Ash Sunday before I got yelled at.

And now it’s a liquor store and there was only one thing possible to buy: Seagram’s Seven.

The memory came hurling back: It was 1979 and my group of girlfriends had found out that a non-college oriented motorcycle bar on the edge of town was having a wet t-shirt contest and the prize was $50. We had our eyes set on a 5 liter collectors bottle of Seagram’s that was in a liquor store’s window shining like a new bicycle before Christmas and tempting us like Sunday fried chicken before you prayed. If only it could be ours we would be the coolest dorm floor in School. The bottle was HUGE. So, making a pack of “All for one and one for all” even Big Bird, the six foot plus Black girlfriend who weighed at least 180 was game.

I did not win the contest but we did.

I still have a torn corner of a $50  bill in my jewelry box back home, a reminder that I didn’t dream up this story. Five college girls in a biker bar in the 70's was not a good idea so beforehand, we had also made an exit strategy of “take the money and run.” With someone getting the car running and waiting at the door, dripping wet we ran for it as soon as my roommate had the cash in her hand.

I don’t remember the week that followed. But to many, we were the coolest dorm room on campus.

The last time I was on campus was the summer between my sophomore and junior year in college. I had a strong bond with Dave Adams, my college advisor who taught at Fort Hays, but in my heart I really wanted to go to Kansas State. After explaining my dilemma with him and asking for his advice. He looked at me with an ornery grin, closed the file he had on me and said, “I can no longer advise you on this matter since I have taken the position of Student Publications Director at Kansas State University.” It became an easy decision to go to KSU.

Back to reality, with a small bottle of Seagram’s Seven and some 7-UP in hand, it was getting late and it had been a long day of driving so I went back to my fancy Days Inn and called an old college boyfriend in Arkansas to talk to someone who could relate to the strange emotions of re-connection that I was having.

The next day I did a photo shoot only to have the campus police pull up to my vehicle to inspect my wrong-way park job. A short conversation later, and a very slow summer day for FHSU campus cops, I had a nice officer letting me on the roof the Observatory Building to take pictures. I had forgotten how beautiful this university of about 7000 students is. The campus seriously looks like a movie set of, well…a perfect college campus.

Recalling some of our pranks, I asked the officer about the students of today. Yes, they are still putting soap in the fountain and they have a full supply of de-foamer at headquarters. No, he doesn’t know if the boy’s dorm still does “panty-raids” on the girls dorm. Yes, there is still a student newspaper; The Leader. As a brand new journalism student I loved being on staff during my years there. It was the heart and soul of student's views and opinions.  He explained that it had been shut down due to the “digital age” but the students protested and they brought the paper version back.

Nothing could have made me more happy and proud of this school. For now, it's not just the buildings, the hearts of today’s students haven’t changed.

 

 

State Crossing: Kansas!

Sights Along the Way: Colorado

 



Colorado Dust Storm



 



Forest Fire in the distance
 

Garden of the gods.

 

 

 

"Look at the Mountains!"