Howie: the 'Lost' Idaho Years
We all remember what drove the late Howard ("Howie") Engleman to Idaho in his youth (if not, it can be found in the March archives under Well, That Explains a Lot,) but the reason for his return home was recently discovered through means that I am not at liberty to disclose.
I recall that whenever I would ask how the hell Howie ended up in rural Idaho, he would get quiet and have a sad look on his face. Now I know why. The following is a transcript of those events from three decades ago.
... "Just when was the last time we had a 'Tommy Tucker Day,' anyway Ma?" a young Howard ('Howie') Engelman asked while having a smoke on the front porch of his rooming house in Rosalita, Idaho - a small town some 150 miles from Des Moines. The question was addressed to Gladys Zepplin, who wasn't really his 'Ma' but was the landlady of the boarding house which Howie called 'home' and was a five-minute walk from the canning factory where he worked.
"Well sir, I reckin' it'd be nigh on three years. Yuud just started courtin' Ilsa Braun down to ter the tomater plant 'bout then," recollected 'Ma.' ... Gladys was a big fat jolly 'Grandma'-type who had a big booming laugh and always looked like she had a half a Danish crammed into her mouth. He jolliness was only matched by her wisdom and memory.
"Yep, I reckon you're right," said Howie. "And I reckon it's prit'near time for another," he said. He'd been unaccountedly restless of late.
No one knows or remembers how 'Tommy Tucker Day' got started in Rosalita. Or why it was even named that. There was no one in town with the name of 'Tucker,' - even though Old Man Malcolm was distantly related to the Buffalo 'Tuckers.' But Tommy Tucker Day was a quaint two-hundred-year-old local tradition that seems to have been forgotten during the first and second World Wars - until Howie learned of it and revived it upon arriving in Rosalita in the early 1970s.
A more accurate name for it would be 'Do Whatever You Want That You Would Never Get A Chance to Do Otherwise Within a 24 Hour Period' Day. With the unwritten rule that - do whatever you want - as long as it doesn't hurt anybody.
Howie thought about the last Tommy Tucker Day. As a minimum-wage earning factory worker, he had always dreamed of rolling around in a stack of loose hundred-dollar bills - and the folks at the Rosalita Savings and Loan, upon learning of this had kindly obliged and opened up the vault for him and left him there alone for 15 minutes. As for his new girlfriend, Elsa Braun, she was leery of vaults and underground places without windows but she had always wanted to be Mayor. So the real mayor handed her the official Mayor's Hat and the keys to the City and she was mayor for the day and commenced making proclamations.
As you can see, the whole town got involved with the spirit of Tommy Tucker Day. For those lacking imagination and dreams, there were other spontaneous activities. There were pie-eating contests, parades, three-legged races and soft-ball and picnics of BBQ'd hot dogs, egg-salad sandwiches, watermelons ("Guess the number of seeds inside!" - that was one of the contests and one of Howie's contributions,) free Kentucky Fried Chicken supplied by the local franchise, and apple pie a la mode. All capped off by fireworks at night. In short, it was like the fourth of July but without the political speeches.
But this time around, Howie had another reason for declaring a Tommy Tucker Day (tradition had it that anyone could on-the-spur-of-the-moment proclaim one and the whole town had to observe it.) He and Ilsa had been seeing each other for three years and it was time. If you know what I mean. All day long during the Tommy Tucker festivities, those two kids couldn't take their eyes off each other. And later, while the rest of the town gathered in the ball-park to watch the fireworks, they snuck off on their own to consumate their own personal wishes that are only granted through the grace of the omnipotent Tommy Tucker. Whomever that may be.
They found the pasture in a meadow just outside of town that they both had always gone to on their own whenever they just wanted to be alone and daydream. The one just down from the Johnson's farm, for anyone who may be interested. And there, in a field full of wildflowers and daisies, they lay down a flannel blanket, disrobed and under the stars, with only the cows and fireflies as witnesses, Howard Engleman and Ilsa Braun made hot German potato salad.
It was such an earth-shifting and profoundly beautiful experience that the two instinctively knew that they could never duplicate it again. So from that night on, they remained just very 'close' friends. Soulmates.
Three years later, Ilsa died in a car accident. Hit by a drunk driver while picking up mayonaise and bacon in the Rosalita Valu-Mart. Howie couldn't get over it and decided to come back to London. He muttered something about Purgatory and Hell when I met him at the airport.
He never completely recovered. Never really fell in love again. And he never talked about it. Or at all about that decade in Rosalita. But whenever we were in a grocery store, he would pick up a 10-pound bag of potatoes, smile wistfully and think of Idaho.
I recall that whenever I would ask how the hell Howie ended up in rural Idaho, he would get quiet and have a sad look on his face. Now I know why. The following is a transcript of those events from three decades ago.
... "Just when was the last time we had a 'Tommy Tucker Day,' anyway Ma?" a young Howard ('Howie') Engelman asked while having a smoke on the front porch of his rooming house in Rosalita, Idaho - a small town some 150 miles from Des Moines. The question was addressed to Gladys Zepplin, who wasn't really his 'Ma' but was the landlady of the boarding house which Howie called 'home' and was a five-minute walk from the canning factory where he worked.
"Well sir, I reckin' it'd be nigh on three years. Yuud just started courtin' Ilsa Braun down to ter the tomater plant 'bout then," recollected 'Ma.' ... Gladys was a big fat jolly 'Grandma'-type who had a big booming laugh and always looked like she had a half a Danish crammed into her mouth. He jolliness was only matched by her wisdom and memory.
"Yep, I reckon you're right," said Howie. "And I reckon it's prit'near time for another," he said. He'd been unaccountedly restless of late.
No one knows or remembers how 'Tommy Tucker Day' got started in Rosalita. Or why it was even named that. There was no one in town with the name of 'Tucker,' - even though Old Man Malcolm was distantly related to the Buffalo 'Tuckers.' But Tommy Tucker Day was a quaint two-hundred-year-old local tradition that seems to have been forgotten during the first and second World Wars - until Howie learned of it and revived it upon arriving in Rosalita in the early 1970s.
A more accurate name for it would be 'Do Whatever You Want That You Would Never Get A Chance to Do Otherwise Within a 24 Hour Period' Day. With the unwritten rule that - do whatever you want - as long as it doesn't hurt anybody.
Howie thought about the last Tommy Tucker Day. As a minimum-wage earning factory worker, he had always dreamed of rolling around in a stack of loose hundred-dollar bills - and the folks at the Rosalita Savings and Loan, upon learning of this had kindly obliged and opened up the vault for him and left him there alone for 15 minutes. As for his new girlfriend, Elsa Braun, she was leery of vaults and underground places without windows but she had always wanted to be Mayor. So the real mayor handed her the official Mayor's Hat and the keys to the City and she was mayor for the day and commenced making proclamations.
As you can see, the whole town got involved with the spirit of Tommy Tucker Day. For those lacking imagination and dreams, there were other spontaneous activities. There were pie-eating contests, parades, three-legged races and soft-ball and picnics of BBQ'd hot dogs, egg-salad sandwiches, watermelons ("Guess the number of seeds inside!" - that was one of the contests and one of Howie's contributions,) free Kentucky Fried Chicken supplied by the local franchise, and apple pie a la mode. All capped off by fireworks at night. In short, it was like the fourth of July but without the political speeches.
But this time around, Howie had another reason for declaring a Tommy Tucker Day (tradition had it that anyone could on-the-spur-of-the-moment proclaim one and the whole town had to observe it.) He and Ilsa had been seeing each other for three years and it was time. If you know what I mean. All day long during the Tommy Tucker festivities, those two kids couldn't take their eyes off each other. And later, while the rest of the town gathered in the ball-park to watch the fireworks, they snuck off on their own to consumate their own personal wishes that are only granted through the grace of the omnipotent Tommy Tucker. Whomever that may be.
They found the pasture in a meadow just outside of town that they both had always gone to on their own whenever they just wanted to be alone and daydream. The one just down from the Johnson's farm, for anyone who may be interested. And there, in a field full of wildflowers and daisies, they lay down a flannel blanket, disrobed and under the stars, with only the cows and fireflies as witnesses, Howard Engleman and Ilsa Braun made hot German potato salad.
It was such an earth-shifting and profoundly beautiful experience that the two instinctively knew that they could never duplicate it again. So from that night on, they remained just very 'close' friends. Soulmates.
Three years later, Ilsa died in a car accident. Hit by a drunk driver while picking up mayonaise and bacon in the Rosalita Valu-Mart. Howie couldn't get over it and decided to come back to London. He muttered something about Purgatory and Hell when I met him at the airport.
He never completely recovered. Never really fell in love again. And he never talked about it. Or at all about that decade in Rosalita. But whenever we were in a grocery store, he would pick up a 10-pound bag of potatoes, smile wistfully and think of Idaho.
posted by Sonny Drysdale at 12:14 PM
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