On Day One of this year’s Twelve Days of Christmas series, I wrote about spending the holiday season with the Hall Family while my father worked a craft show. As I wrote, there were several years during which my brother and I stayed with family or friends while our parents worked the shows.
One of those times was in the mid-1980s, when we stayed with our neighbors Karen and Virgil in Lebanon, Missouri. Karen and Virgil were good ole country folks who my parents spent a lot of time with fishing, hunting and partying. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of the fish fries they hosted with dozens of their friends. It was a hard-working, hard-partying, fun group of people.
During this particular holiday season, Dad and Mom were both working Christmas shows in Columbia, Missouri, about two hours away from our house in rural Lebanon. Mom was working the smaller mall, while Dad was working the recently opened Columbia Mall.
A few days after Thanksgiving, we temporarily moved in with Virgil and Karen, who lived next door. Although it was an adjustment, they were like family and treated us like their children for the few weeks we lived there. Both of their sons had graduated from high school and moved out, but Karen had left her son’s room the way it was when he lived there.
That was awesome for my brother and I, as her son had kept a few cool toys and had a TV, radio and, most importantly, an Atari with several games. Up to this point, my brother had and I had only played video games in arcades. For a couple of young boys, this was like the utopia of bedrooms.
When my brother and I weren’t at school, we were in that bedroom playing Demon Attack, Space Invaders, Super Breakout, Realsports Football, Pitfall, Ms. Pacman (Atari’s really bad version of the arcade classic) and E.T. (deservedly considered the worst video game of all time).
The other great thing about staying with Karen and Virgil was Karen’s cooking. We’re talking good, old-fashioned country food. It was during those three weeks that I became addicted to biscuits and gravy. Karen made that breakfast several times, no small feat considering we climbed on the school bus at 6:30 a.m. She’d wake up at 4 a.m., typically have a beer and cigarette (like I said, hard-partying) and cook until we woke up and got ready at 6 a.m.
As great as it was, my brother and I have one scary memory from staying there. A few weeks into our stay, I was in our yard feeding our dog Jody when my brother ran out of the house and toward the fence separating the properties.
“Ernie, Ernie, come quick!” My brother yelled.
“Why, what’s going on?” I responded.
“Virgil’s having a heart attack!” He screamed.
I ran as fast my chubby legs could, arriving in the kitchen to find Virgil on the floor clutching his chest. I’m sure we’d been taught to call 911, but my brother and I froze in fear. Eventually, Virgil mustered enough strength to sit up and ask us to hand him the phone.
Virgil called his mother-in-law and asked for help. About 15 minutes later, Karen screeched into the driveway and rushed into the house. Somehow, Virgil, who’d already had several heart attacks, was still alive.
We jumped in the car as Karen drug her husband into the back seat. I still remember her driving 100 miles an hour on that country road back to Lebanon, where Virgil was rushed into an emergency room.
By that point, he was in full cardiac arrest. I will never forget my brother and I standing outside as doctors worked to revive him while Karen sobbed a few feet away. Virgil survived, but he was in the hospital for several days.
We spent the next several days with Karen’s mom, Hattie, a wonderful lady who treated us like her own. Mom left her show about a week before Christmas, and we drove to Columbia to see Dad for the first time in weeks. As I wrote last year, I ended up spending most of my time away from his booth in the arcade.
As for Karen and Virgil, we saw them almost daily until our family moved to Kansas in 1989. Ironically, Virgil, known in our little world as the “Crappie King” for his fishing prowess, outlived his wife, passing away at age 65 in 2014. Karen succumbed to cancer at age 62 in 2010. I like to think they’re fishing together in Heaven, with a beer in one hand and cigarette in the other.
Part VII: Dad and the Christmas classics
Part VI: Average grades mean you walk to school
Part III: Mortal Kombat and burritos
Ernie, I took over your mom’s cub scout den when Jane and Ernie Sr hit the show circuit so heavy. We also lived next door to Hattie Sanders, and knew everyone you wrote about, played cards out at Karen’s house, and visited daily with Karen’s boys, Jimmy and Randy, as they lived with Hattie. your dad was a real hoot, at the card games, and your mom was so sweet and patient. my son Jonathan played with you and Danny, when you were around, and I think you spent some evenings, and maybe afternoons with us when Hattie was busy. Karen took good care of her mom and Virgil. I can’t remember for sure, but I think Virgil’s final heart attack was out by their pond, fishing.
I have great memories of growing up there. Virgil wouldn’t have wanted to go any other way, if that’s how he went.