Good People

I have a Facebook friend named Melanie.  She's a few years (or more) younger than I am, comes from Oakridge, and has lived in Eugene/Springfield for many, many years.

As I've come to know Melanie better, I can see that a very important part of her life is, in many ways, very similar to a very important part of my life back when I lived in Kellogg. That part of my life was centered on my parents' friendship with a large group of families who congregated at Rose Lake on the Fourth of July, at the Gerry Turnbow house on Thanksgiving, at Bob Turnbow's on Christmas Eve, and at Ted Turnbow's place up the North Fork of the Cd'A River on other occasions.

Back in 2011, Melanie posted pictures of her extended family and friends out at Dexter Lake on the Fourth of July.  From these pictures I could easily tell that Melanie was enjoying her daughters, her grandchildren, her boyfriend, and other friends . I recognized their pleasure in having a few drinks, eating good food, laughing, and dancing.  I know Melanie and her daughter Skye well enough to rest assured that this party involved telling tall tales, rehashing old stories, maybe trying to keep some unpleasant history at arm's length, all in service to what the pictures unmistakably portray:  Melanie's family and friends having a great time and enjoying themselves in the midst of the many, many years that have bonded and will bond this family and their friends together.

I look at Melanie's pictures and I'm reminded the summer of 2010, after the Kellogg High School all-class reunion had ended, and I had some minor car trouble.  My side view mirror quit responding when I moved its lever.  I went up to Robin Aga at Reco's Auto Body Shop for help and Robin ordered a part and got the wrong one delivered to him and so I stayed in Kellogg longer while this minor sanfu worked itself out and, BOOM!, on Thursday evening, all the instruments in my dashboard lost electricity.  Friday I went to Reco's and asked Robin if he did electrical work on cars, and he said that he didn't, but to take it down to Randy (my tent mate at the 1969 National Boy Scout Jamboree) at Reco's Auto Repair.

Robin told me, "Randy's good people."

That was all I needed to hear.  I knew Robin's good people.  I knew his wife, Rhonda (KHS Class of '72) is good people.  I took my car to Randy and he turned it over to Darrell (I could tell Darrell was good people) who repaired it.  Robin left his shop and came down to Randy's shop to put the mirror on down there.  I went to pay Robin.  He doesn't deal with credit cards and told me to mail him the money I owed him when I got back to Eugene.  Darrell's work was perfect.  Everything worked out and it barely cost me 100 bucks.

All of which is to say that when I met Melanie in the fall of 2010 as her ENG 107 instructor, I could tell she was good people; her daughter, Skye, had given me a head start toward knowing this because Skye is good people.  She had been a student of mine earlier.  Everything she wrote in that class class shone with the light of good people.

So when I look at the pictures of Melanie and Skye and Keith and Theya and they are having some drinks and they are dancing and eating and playing with kids, I go back to Kellogg, to my family and to our family's friends.

And I go back to my friends from the Kellogg High School Class of 1972.

In August, we held our 40 year reunion.

It could have been called the good people reunion.

After a Friday night get together on the deck and the yard outside the Longshot Saloon, on Saturday we had a party up the North Fork of the Coeur d'Alene River on the adjoining properties of two of our classmates.

 After forty years, any airs we might have one had upon reuniting had long ago fallen away.  After forty years, we've all been tested and strengthened by loss, failures, and upheaval:  many of us have lost one or both of our parents to death; many of us have suffered broken marriages; we've endured injuries to our children; some have been broken down by the rigors of hard labor;  many have suffered through the uncertainties and difficulties of trying to stay afloat in a world where once secure jobs in mining and logging have all but dried up. 

It all shows in the ways we've aged:  not only have the creases in our faces increased and deepened, not only have we grayed, but we've also matured in our understanding of each other. It's humbling.  No one's a hot shot.  We get it:  life's difficulties rain on everyone without bias.

Knowing this makes us good people.

We don't talk about this much at our reunion.  But, out of unspoken respect and admiration for the ways we have come into our own, we have fun.

This takes me back to Rose Lake and Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve.  I know now that our family's friends always had fun in the midst of difficulties.

It's what good people do.

Load up some coolers with beer.  Get some liquor and wine.  Set out BBQ and other great food on long tables under shelter.  Drink.  Eat.

Dance.

At the Turnbow gatherings, singing happened.  The Turnbow brothers along with George Lyons and Glen Waltman and others sang stuff like "Cockles and Mussles" in harmony and others joined in.

The Kellogg High School Class of '72 likes to dance.

This year two of our classmates, Carol and Ron, formed a band with two of Ron's cousins and they played a great mixture of songs from the sixties and seventies with some contemporary country songs thrown in.

And we danced.

My high school classmates are the only people in the world I dance with and as we get to smiling and laughing and dancing it's the perfect picture of what this little piece I'm writing is all about:

Good people.

When I'm in Eugene, I miss the kinds of get togethers I used to go to in North Idaho.  On Labor Day a few weeks ago, Ed and I dropped in on a couple of Labor Day get togethers.  We couldn't stay long, but there it all was:  coolers full of beer, wine, some booze, and great food on long tables under shelter -- bbq ribs, salads, pizza, baked beans, corn on the cob, pasta, chips, and more.

Ed and I got to enjoy the best part of both of these two get togethers:  shooting the breeze with good people over a few beers.

I liked that.

And I like knowing that Melanie's family gets together quite a bit to celebrate holidays, births, weddings, birthdays, and other occasions.

They do what good people do:  they bring together couples who used to be married, family members who've had some problems,  people who are new to the family, people who are doing great, people who are struggling, in short, people who have endured the heights and depths of social, public, work, and family life, and they enjoy each other.

It reminds me of Kellogg.

It assures me that wherever I am, I know good people.