RE-Group

Vernon King – Staff Sergeant 1942

My Daddy was a risk-taker, and so am I. Vernon King was a card-counting poker player and was also known to bet on a golf game or two. He was a waist gunner in a B-17 over Nazi Germany in WWII who parlayed his share of the King family farm into a construction business in the boom that followed the war. In 1949, I became a part of that boom…the baby boom. I grew up in an area in South Knoxville that Daddy developed and built homes on roads which he named after people on his side of the family. There was King Road of course, Thomas Road, Virgil Drive named for a great-uncle I never knew. We lived on Lindy Road, named after a Great-aunt Lindy. Never knew her either. Actually, I did know more about the Thomas. He was a King cousin who oddly enough was the second husband of Mother’s oldest sister, Dot Tarwater, the Tarwater being her third husband. The Thomas cousin was Aunt Dot’s second husband…I think his name was Huce (I know…lol)…they had a daughter Linda, who was a ‘double’ cousin since she sprang from both sides of the family. It was…after all…the South.

Daddy instructed me in the important art of bluffing. It’s every little girl’s dream, right? His attempt at making me a golfer was a failure, but I did learn a few useful techniques from poker. In closing a deal, know when to shut up, how to effectively use a ‘poker face’, when to walk away (good grief…sounds like Kenny Rogers), and how to recognize opportunity when it happens by. Because he was a community developer and new home builder, I have an inherited love of that process, and the smell of new wood, drywall and paint still draws me as a moth to the flame. Vernon’s poker lessons also paid off later in life when I decided to go into business for myself. If you can’t close the deal, you don’t eat.

I was the first-born of four children and definitely Daddy’s little girl. And in keeping with my special status, I occasionally accompanied him on various adventures in his truck. We went fishing with his friend Ivan who was very patient and helped me hold my rod and position my line to catch a fish. Daddy was nervous and had little patience, so I had a good ‘ol time with Ivan and later took my little fish home to fry. One summer evening, off we went to a minor league baseball game. We had hot dogs and cokes, sang “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” and in the cooler evening, Daddy wrapped me in a blanket with my head poking through a big hole in it. I thought he was very clever to bring such a cozy wrap, but truthfully it was probably the only blanket Mother would let us use. Too much mustard and ketchup goin’ on. I can still remember the smells of the ballpark, see the lights as they flooded the field at dusk, taste the Cracker Jack, and Daddy laughing at my constant,”When’s it gonna’ be over?” Baseball is a sloooowww game for a four year old.

One of my favorite adventures was an early morning trip to pick up Daddy’s crew. We stopped on the way at Holloway’s tiny neighborhood store and picked up a bag of peanuts and an RC Cola. I never mastered the technique of putting the peanuts in the bottle and eating them while taking a swig of cola. I tried once and choked. Daddy laughed and we were off to pick up the men. There was Mr. Ogle who sat on the front seat with me, and Newton who would hop in the back of the truck. It could have been that I took Newton’s spot on the seat, but it seemed to me at the time that there was definitely a pecking order. After all, Daddy called Mr. Ogle “Mister.” I think just plain ‘Newton’ must have indicated that he was a bit of a shady character not deserving of a “Mister” before his name.

At the building site, we all piled out of Daddy’s 1949 green Ford truck, and I proudly carried my little mint green tool box to a spot where I happily pounded away on a piece of two-by-four with my rubber hammer, or collected those “nickels” punched out of the electrical boxes. Then I watched Mr. Ogle mix the ‘mud’ (concrete) in a wheelbarrow, carefully adding the best ratio of water to make a thick paste for laying brick. Then he and Daddy would skillfully lay row after row of perfectly aligned and finished brick. About thirty-five years later, I moved back to Knoxville for a short time and was thinking about possibly buying a home that Vernon had built in 1952. I remarked about how much I admired his brickwork. He laughed and said, “If lightening struck this house, there are enough empty beer cans between these walls to blow this house to kingdom come!” Reality also struck. I didn’t know that in those years he drank on the job. That brickwork was awfully darn perfect for all that. Oddly enough, that very same house was the cause of a childhood reoccurring nightmare.

One evening I escaped Mother’s attention and took off toward the aforementioned house in search of my Daddy. There was another house between our home and the new one he was finishing up. When I arrived, there was a deafening noise and around the corner of the house came a giant bulldozer! It was ten times as big to a three year old. I took off up the driveway and ran all the way from the beginning of the newly troweled concrete sidewalk, up the wet steps and onto the perfectly finished porch. Daddy jumped off the bulldozer and was right behind me…but too late to prevent all those little footprints in his finished concrete. He just scooped me up and held me. I dreamed a bulldozer was chasing me for years after that scare, but Daddy wasn’t there to save me. Some years later I watched him finish a full basement floor. I can still hear the rhythmic “swishhh…swishhh…swishhh” of the trowel as he moved from the far corner of the floor smoothing the concrete, then moving the board he was kneeling on until the entire surface was perfect and glistening. After that I had a new appreciation of the havoc I wreaked all those years ago escaping that bulldozer.

Alcohol was my father’s drug of choice to calm the horrors of WWII. As children we played with his Distinguished Flying Cross without giving a thought to the reasons why he received it. I remember the feel of the metal and ribbons in my hand and smell of the box that it came in. None of us could ever even imagine how much that war affected him. We can never know how he managed to build a life for us and Mother while desperately holding it together with alcohol and later, Valium. But he did. There were times of no drinking at all, then stretches of family turmoil and much upheaval. Mother suffered from her own version of PTSD, and had little ability to sift through his experiences as well as her own and also handle four rambunctious children. Music was our special glue, but even my parents love of singing together and creating those beautiful harmonies eventually wore thin.

Years later on a trip to visit my parents during the 1982 World’s Fair in my hometown, Daddy decided that I should play golf with him and his older brother Reps (another great name!). In order to not waste a game, he made me practice at the driving range until I was able to consistently hit a golf ball off the tee. Then the next day just after daybreak, we were off to the country club with Uncle Reps in tow. Daddy had long since stopped drinking, so he was very impatient and jittery. The first nine holes were exhausting, mostly because I was running all over the course hunting my balls that went in every possible direction but toward the hole. On the second nine it began sprinkling rain, and I wanted to fall on my knees and thank God for it when Vernon said, “It doesn’t rain on the golf course.” Me and my uncle looked at one another, our hopes of a reprieve squelched, as Daddy jumped in the golf cart speeding to the next tee, leaving me and my near-seventy year old uncle running after him. That was vintage Vernon.

I now know that a deficiency of stored glucose was the cause of Daddy’s drinking. In his book Medical Medium, Anthony William explains PTSD thoroughly and with much understanding and compassion. My father was instinctively trying to send sugar or glucose to his brain in order to rectify the chemical imbalance resulting from the trauma he endured in the war. Alcohol provided the quickest route and was therefore speedy relief. I also had that deficiency which caused in me the same craving for alcohol that plagued my Dad. I too was diagnosed with PTSD after my heart bypass surgery and the sorrow of two unsuccessful marriages. But please know that trauma can affect us in seemingly insignificant as well as obviously impactful life events. It’s real and can be devastating. One of the most healing quick tips from Anthony William is to eat fresh fruit, organic as much as possible, and lots and lots of it, instead of the processed sugars we all crave. Abundant fruit in your life will replenish your much needed glucose stores as well as providing nutrients crucial to creating health and a sense of well being. I have found this to be true for myself and people very close to me who have consumed four or more pieces of fresh fruit a day and have literally broken through crippling fear and anxiety that kept them from fully experiencing their life. That is fruit…powwwer! (Big booming voice. lol)

I wish I had that old wrinkled picture of me and my Dad sitting in the front yard in lawn chairs, mine a miniature of his, with our arms and legs folded exactly the same. My 3 year old life was just beginning and I loved my Daddy! I miss just knowing he’s in the world.

And now for your listening pleasure (best with headphones), my brother Barry’s story in song about our Dad, Vernon King and the B-17.

Barry King – “B-17” from the album, almost acceptable. (Purple Garage Records ©2009)
Words, music, vocals and all instruments by Barry King.