FUN FRIDAY, OLD MAN INSUALTION STORIES - Stretch & Flex

It was the early 1980’s.? The economy had turned south, and insulation work was scarce and hard to come by.? I and my family were all union insulators.? Thanks to our father Lloyd Brannen we had been taught to do a day’s work, set the pace, be the best.? Despite that, we couldn’t find work in our own insulator’s local in Houston.? Times were tough.

Our Uncle Bill Lee was running a large union insulation job in Jacksonville, Florida. It was early spring and he told me and my brother Hancel he thought the union bench would clear in a few weeks and he could bring us out as travelers.? But we needed money now.

Somehow we heard there was a non-union job in the Tampa, Florida area that needed insulators, and we decided to sneak out there – strictly against union rules - ?and work a few weeks until Uncle Bill could use us in Jacksonville.? Our younger cousin Terry also wanted to come, but he was still in apprenticeship school.? He said F that school, he would quit the union and come with us.? We also told him at the time we didn’t know if he would be able to come to Jacksonville when Bill called, but he was willing to take that chance.

We all headed out in my old beat up Chevy cargo van that had only two bucket seats in the front.? Cousin Terry – we called him ‘Jackson’ – sat in a fold up lawn chair in the back.? Off to Tampa we went.? Between us three, we scraped up enough money to get one motel room for a week until we could get paycheck, and ate crackers, sardines, and Beenie-Weenie’s.

That wait turned into four weeks and things get testy between family when you are working, living, eating, and sleeping together.? This one didn’t clean up his mess.? That one used all the shampoo.? The other one was watching stupid stuff on TV.? Nerves were short and tempers flared.? But one morning, we called Uncle Bill and he told us the bench was clear and we could come, but he couldn’t put cousin Jackson on because he had quit the apprenticeship program back in Houston.? Jackson was mad as hell.? We told him what Bill had said, and that since we were heading north, he was going to have to figure out how to stay and work with no vehicle, or get a bus back to Houston.

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We headed to work that morning down the freeway, and he was in the back on his lawn chair, carping the whole way about how we were abandoning him, that we didn’t push hard enough to get Bill to hire him, etc.? All of a sudden, it hit me and I had had enough!? I slammed on the brakes right in the middle of the freeway and came to a tire-screeching stop; cars were honking and driving around us.? Jackson’s unsecured lawn chair slid forward and crashed into the back on Hancel in the passenger seat.? I turned and yelled to him, “Get the F out!”? He said, “What?”? “Get the F out of my van!? I’ve had enough of your whining and bitching!? You knew what the deal was when you came!? You gave up the apprenticeship, you knew the consequences!” ?Jackson was silent.? “If you’re not getting out, then sit back there and shut the hell up.”? And off we drove, all three of us silent.

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We pulled into the parking lot made of crushed stone and oyster hulls and I backed into a spot.? Other people were pulling in, and those already parked were walking through the parking lot with their lunch kits, heading to the front gate.? The moment I put the van in park, Jackson jumped up out of the chair and snatched the sliding side door open.? He slung it so hard the back end of the door jumped off the track and was hanging sideways.? He ran around the front of the van to my side, opened my door and got up right next to me.

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“You son-of-a-bitch!? You were going to leave me out there on that highway, wasn’t you?”? And he drew back and hit me square on in the face.? My sunglasses went flying with both lenses knocked out, and the fight was on!

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I was in my late twenties, and Jackson was much younger and outweighed me about twenty pounds or so.? I knew I couldn’t stand toe-to-toe with him with youth and weight on his side, so I bailed out my seat and took him straight down to the ground.? We were wrestling around on the ground, punching, rolling around, and cussing the whole time.? All that rock and shell on the ground was tearing our shirts up and dust was flying.? Hancel had come out of the passenger seat and was standing over us saying, “C’mon guys, stop it!? Stop it!”

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I managed to roll behind him and got my arm around his neck and my legs around his midriff, and was choking and squeezing the hell out of him with both.? I asked him if he had enough – he shook his head yes and I let him go.? The fight was over in less than a minute, but a crowd of people had gathered watching the fight.? We both stood up, blood on us and out clothes.? Both our shirts were shredded from the rocks and oyster shells.? My glasses were busted as well as his nice Seiko watch, with the crystal busted out, springs and hands sticking out of the face.

My brother Hancel looked over at all the people gathered around and said deadpan, “Don’t worry about them, they’re just getting warmed up to go to work.”

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Before the day ended, we made up, shook hands, and got a plan to get him back to Houston.? But we sure got a lot of funny looks at work that day!

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That’s the way it is with family sometimes. . .