Post 50: My heart is broken

     But we had both moved on, the magic had gone, and I took her home early.

     My job on the pipeline involved setting the hook thingie, the caliper, on the pipe, to lift it in place with the side boom. The side boom driver was fairly new, too, and he was slow. This gave me plenty of time to set the caliper on the pipe perfectly.

      Late in the afternoon, the foreman got tired of our slow pace, so he took over the side boom. I saw the caliper was a little crooked, so I reached down to adjust, just like I had been doing all day. Too late. The foreman was already lifting the boom. My glove got caught in the block and tackle, and when it came loose, half an inch of my left thumb stayed in the glove. I walked over to the foreman and told him I had lost a thumb. He started cussing me good, for messing up his safety record!

Well, the net result was, my Oklahoma adventure was over. I was headed home to Arkansas. Little did I realize, as I drove home, how losing that thumb would affect the course of my life – for the better!

      I drove down to see Barbara, at summer school at A&M. As I expected, she was making a big splash. Pretty, personable new girls tend to do that. Well, she was dating the son of the new head football coach, who was making his own splash, and she still had ties to the Air Force dude, but she seemed, in talking with me, to be leaving the door open for us just a little bit, and I suddenly decided I had best go back to school the second summer term, pick up some chemistry. I signed up and went back to Wing a few days to collect my stuff. I wrote Barb. Told her I met her football jock, and he seemed to me to think he was pretty wonderful. Well, she wrote back and turned my words right against me. She told me she had become convinced he was wonderful too, and another thing or two along that same line of thought.

      That bout' slapped me down. Here I was, already paid my tuition money, and I was getting the royal shaft!

      After thinking it over a couple of days, two very hard days, I decided to go to school anyway, as hard as that would be. I never liked to just throw away money.

     My old pals tried to cheer me up. Didn't work. My buddy Sam, a one legged guy, offered to fight him for me since I was thumb incapacitated. I was kinda hard to cheer up, seeing her all cozied up with him every day.

      Barb and I both worked in the cafeteria. One day while we were working, Barbara asked me if I would take her to church that night. I thought a while, maybe a second, and told her I didn't see why not. I saved my celebrating until I got back to the dorm. Things were looking up! I was in a really good mood, right up until I saw them, right out in front of my dorm, hugging and such. I think he brought her over there to put on a show for me.

      Well, that didn't help my mood much, and I was pretty cool to her at church. When I pulled up in front of her dorm, the jock was waiting. He came storming up. I knew I wasn't in good fighting trim, thumb cut off and all. Actually, I have never been a good fighter, thumb or no thumb. Well, I shouldn't have worried. He did all the fighting, with his words, all aimed right at her, right there in front of me. Barbara very nicely listened to everything he had to say, just rant himself out, then, again very nicely, dumped him..

      They say the meek shall inherit the earth. Well, that night I began inheriting the part of it I most wanted, Barbara. I was a little uneasy, as she very nicely went through the process of cutting off the other hopefuls, one at a time. By the time I had learned a little chemistry, (very little) and I was ready to head to St. Paul and my coaching job, we were engaged! I always made sure, when I saw the jock coming through the lunch line, that I had her hugged up as she spooned food on his plate. He always got mad, red as a beet, but he never said anything.  Continued