An innocent bystander, perhaps a local deputy sheriff, caught this photo of Jerry Manley, Tim Ghianni and Rob Dollar in the summer of 1981. Or sometime near then. We had just finished our evening's work at the daily newsroom.
“Jerry, Jerry … Jerry….” I said as I sat in the party room in the Memory Care Ward. I didn’t say it loudly – I had gotten in trouble with one old, black-dyed-hair woman a few weeks ago for my volume when talking to my best friend.
I reached over, a foot or so from my chair, and softly shook
my best pal’s right arm. Jerry Manley – my running buddy for 50 years – stirred
slightly from his nod-off state-of-mind and looked at me.
“What?” he asked, sleep, no irritation, in his voice.
“Jerry: just say ‘Elvis!’” I told him. He looked at me in his
attempt to focus and wake up.
“Quick. I’ll tell you why later, but just say ‘Elvis,’” I
said.
He didn’t fully open his eyes.
“Elvis,” he semi-hollered, before nodding off again.
The room, filled with kind folks whose minds have been blown
askew by age and illness, erupted with applause. There even was a cheer of
sorts from a guy I later learned was “Mr. Brown,” who – it turns out – is
Jerry’s roommate, Joe or Bob or Tom Brown or whatever. Maybe John, as in “John Brown’s body lies
a-moldering in the grave …” or whatever.
All eyes in the Memory Ward party room focused on my friend.
“He got it,” said one of two women with guitars who were set
up, with a small amp or two, speakers and microphones in front of the TV where
“Gunsmoke” played silently. Even though the TV was muted, I saw Matt Dillon gun
down an outlaw or someone he just plain didn’t like much. There’s blood on the streets in the town of
Dodge City.
I’d been in the Memory Care Ward for about 45 minutes by the
time of the Elvis incident. The
dietician, who did not know I had a fairly large bag of Lay’s potato chips
jammed into the arm of the Sports Illustrated Titans jacket draped over my arm,
had been glad to see me when she let me through the double-locked secure door separating
the regular nursing home.
“Thanks for coming to visit him,” she said. “He’s right in
there. I love him. I love a man who doesn’t say much.”
She pointed me to the party room, where everyone looked
happy, though some looked downright confused.
Many memories have vanished.
Jerry, for example, can’t remember a good chunk of the most recent 30
years of his life.
“I didn’t know you were coming today,” he had said when I
slid into the chair next to him in the party room. He never knows I’m coming. Heck, he doesn’t
really know the day. Course it really doesn’t matter much to me.
I spend a lot of time laughing with him, reminding him of
the days when we tilted at windmills and often lost. The impossible dream unrealized.
Anyway, back to the Elvis incident.
Jerry was among a score and probably more of his cohorts in
the party room. Two nicely aged women who called themselves “The Senior
Singers” or something like that, were the focus of the eyes, both cloudy and
bright. Though some, like Jerry’s, were mostly closed.
Lovely women, perhaps in their 70s, they play the nursing
home circuit. I assume they get some sort of grant money or stipend. They also
– like me – are rewarded by the fact they are perhaps the youngest people in
the room.
Jerry is the youngster of the clientele, by my guess. And he’s nine days older than me. We used to
celebrate our November 9 and November 18 (1951) birthdays by burning away the
carbon from dusk to dawn, beer and Scots whiskey were our lighter fluids. And,
generally our friends – many of whom were still alive back then – joined
us. But we literally were the last men
standing and the first ones to work at The Clarksville Leaf-Chronicle the next
afternoon.
“Swallow this,” I’d say, proffering a hand with aspirin or
similar potion in it to Jerry as we’d start our days. We’d wash it down with coffee – I drank 40
cups a day back then, down to about 15 cups these days, as age has eaten away
at my general physical stamina.
The two women were singing standards, both country and pop,
and sometimes pausing after a song to ask the crowd if they remembered who sang
it on recordings.
“Oh! Susana” seemed to be among the favorites, as the crowd
sang the chorus. “… Don’t you cry for
me, for I come from Alabama with a banjo on my knee…” or something like that.
The “Theme from Maverick” also was a favorite, if I’m
recalling correctly.
“The Fish Cheer!” was an uplifter for them all, as they
flashed middle fingers into the air. I made that up.
But then there truly was “I Saw the Light!” that had those
who could up on their feet dancing. Mr.
Brown got up by himself, clapped his hands and sang along. Doing some sort of
solo buck-dancing that reminded me of “Deliverance” for some reason.
A couple more songs were about God and mercy as they
apparently gave thanks for the fact their lives are continuing inside this
ward. Hell, I believe they even did “Forever Young,” which may have led to some
later confusion. Or maybe it was “Lay, Lady, Lay.” Yeah, I know that one has
adult themes, but these people are not only adults, they are post-adults, so
they can handle it.
“She’ll Be Comin’ ‘Round The Mountain,” was perhaps the most
popular, for both singing and dancing.
Hell, I even joined on that, trying to get my buddy to join
me on the “She’ll be riding six white horses when she comes” line that always
reminds me of a favorite encounter with a white-horseback-riding blonde in
Marion, Iowa, 48 years ago. She got a saddle for me to use when I rode along.
Long damn time ago.
I was about to lean over and tell Jerry about that horsey
adventure, when the Senior Singers burst into “Love Me Tender,” the great Elvis
song from the movie of that title.
Afterward, the younger of the two singers said: “Do you know
this was from a movie about the Civil War? It starred a handsome young man from
Memphis. Any guesses who that was? He sang the song, too.”
“Bob Dylan?” one man asked, (I’m telling the truth). I got
up and crossed the room and yelled “No! You crazy old fuck” right in his face.
He spit at me and recited the “Talkin’ John Birch Society Paranoid Blues.”
Nah. Again, sometimes my thoughts are more coarse than I am
in real life, where I portray an old softie.
“Sinatra?” “Paul Anka?”
“Tony Bennett?” “Neil Diamond?” The names of the folks who sang the Great
American Songbook were flowing across the room.
Since I’ve still got too many marbles to be eligible in this
contest, that’s when I got Jerry to spout out “Elvis!” and receive applause for
his mental acumen. I don’t think there were any prizes.
“Hey, man, I’ve got some contraband potato chips in my
jacket,” I said to him after his triumph. “Let’s go back to your room.”
He’d been craving potato chips, and they limit him to a few
on days when they serve a handful with sandwiches for lunch.
Food is not supposed to be sneaked in from “the outside.” At
least that’s what Jerry told me, the first time he requested chips.
We stayed while these quite talented singers finished their
set. “They like this song down in New Orleeeens,” one of them said. “This will
be our last song today.”
“When the Saints Go Marching In!” brought those who could to
their feet to be a part of the number and sing along.
I looked at Jerry and said: “This is a good one for us to
leave on.”
So, with Mr. Brown and the other sweet saints – I really
like these people, which portends well for my future, I suppose – dancing and
singing and clapping the beat, Jerry and I went out in the hallway and to his
room.
“I’ve got these for you,” I said, pulling the chips out of
my sleeve.
“Man, that’s great,” he said, genuine surprise in his voice,
as he grabbed the yellow bag and struggled to tear it open.
For the next 20 minutes, he ate chip after chip.
“NewsNation” cable news channel was on the TV. Normally, Jerry wants cowboy
shows, and I offered to see if “Wagon Train” or “Have Gun, Will Travel” was on.
“I don’t know how to change the remote, but this is OK. I
don’t understand what they are talking about though. What’s AI?”
Now, I can’t explain artificial intelligence. I’m happy
enough with the real stuff as long as I can hang onto it.
“Remember when we tried to piss on Max’s car as he was
driving to work?” I asked, changing the subject as Elon Musk came onto the TV
screen.
He laughed as I told him the story of two stone-cold sober,
35-year-old journalists of some renown standing on the overpass and emptying
our bladders. That was 37 years ago, and
almost no traffic was on Interstate 24 at 3 or 3:30 a.m.
We had decided it was a good idea to salute Max Moss,
perhaps the truest “newspaperman” except me who I’ve known. We just thought
he’d like us to note his passing as he drove from the Moss estate off Fort
Campbell Boulevard down to his wire editor’s job at the Nashville Banner. He’d
been fucked by corporate at the paper in Clarksville, so he took the Banner job
and the hourlong commute.
We didn’t hit anyone with our pitiful drizzle. The little car we aimed at may have been
Max’s Honda, but sometimes, men know, aim is not true. Also, it was 25 feet to
the interstate below. Streams turn to light mist at best.
I should add that Max was beloved and respected by us both.
It was just a 3:30 a.m. “good idea.” At least we were smart enough not to stand
atop the rail.
“I’d guess we had no chance of getting him,” Jerry told me
the other day, after I described the night’s activities. “I sure liked old
Max.”
“I loved him. He was my mentor,” I replied. “He was one of
my favorite people of all time. I loved his wife, Merrily, too.
“She died a year or two ago, Max about a year before her,” I
said.
“I didn’t know that Max was gone,” Jerry said. “Or I didn’t
remember that. He was a great guy.”
“The best boss ever. Remember I nicknamed him ‘The Silver
Hammer?’” I asked Jerry.
He laughed, remembering I’d given Max that name because of
The Beatles’ song “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer.”
Before Max died, I told him of that old “behind-the-back”
nickname, and he approved, although he was more of an Elvis guy than a Beatles
guy. He’d for sure have won the “Love Me Tender” singer question.
The dietician lady came into the room as Jerry was digging
into the chips. She ignored it. Instead, she was there to help roommate Mr.
Brown with some hygiene matters.
I figured she’d say something as Jerry kept crunching.
I told him I’d be back soon with more chips after she left. “You want me to carry that empty bag out of
here? Get rid of the evidence?”
He laughed and tossed the yellow bag across the room.
I needed to get back to my home office, where I’m a
professional author in fast pursuit of bankruptcy.
We walked, arm-over-shoulder down the hallway, where the
dietician met us, near the party room.
She had a glass of Cranapple juice for him.
“Man, I am thirsty,” Jerry said, reaching for the tall,
plastic tumbler.
The dietician let me out the secure door to the “regular”
wing of the nursing home.
“Thank you. Thank you very much for taking care of Jerry. He’s
the best,” I told her.
The door closed behind me and suddenly I was interrupting a
heated game involving aces and jokers and stacks of tiles.
Henry Mancini’s “Moon River” played on the Muzak system.
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