The Penultimate Chapter

One day in 1978 at the Blackfoot News, the rumor we had been hearing for some weeks came true.

We were getting a new publisher. He was none other than Mark Brown, son of Drury and Verna Brown. DRB promptly retired and I kind of had a sense it wouldn’t be long for me, either.

David Mark came to us directly from a stint as a Washington, D.C. reporter for The Associated Press. He came to us complete with a wife, children and a ubiquitous . . . um, personal assistant.

Some months prior to Mark’s return to Idaho, I had been named Editor of The Blackfoot News. Young Mr. Brown was obviously envious of me; envy never makes sense, and it didn’t this time.

Long story short, blood is thicker than water. I’m told I wasn’t fired. After more than 30 years to reflect on it, I’d say it was more like this: Because my role as the editor had made me the most prominent member of the News staff, my authority was removed and I was re-assigned as “copy editor.”

I wouldn’t say I have a monumental ego. It’s plenty swollen at times. But hell. After my deep devotion to my job and my newspaper, it hurt my feelings.

Eventually I did what management wanted me to do. I quit in a fit of pique. Can you imagine. If I quit, I don’t get unemployment. And I didn’t get unemployment. Not a dime, after 15 years as a contributor to the fund.

Annette and I had bought rental property in Blackfoot, the 18-unit Avalon Motor Court right downtown. I mistakenly thought the rentals would provide sufficient income. Wrong.

The federal government came along and built brand-new senior housing. Rents were lower for new units than I had been charging for my 40-year-old units. There went a third of my renters.

Then the federal government came along and built brand-new housing for poor folks. There went another third of my renters.

(Annette and I had been divorced in 1977, but that’s a sad side-story with which I might deal here – sometime. Maybe.)

One night I awoke to see flashing blue lights all around the complex. The federal Immigration Police had come to take away the rest of my renters.

So I had 18 units, 17 empty. I lived alone in one unit. Not a good cash-flow situation. So I “sold” the apartments and said goodbye to Blackfoot. (I sold the business by paying a man $10,000 to take over my payments. Such is Idaho, even today.)

After 15 years in Blackfoot, my marketability as a newspaperman had somehow evaporated. The Idaho Falls Post Register and the Idaho State Journal in Pocatello didn’t want anything to do with me. And I really didn’t want to engage with either of them.

What to do?

I persuaded the State of Idaho to send me to a trade school because I am handicapped. The state paid my tuition to learn how to be a commercial cook. I am a straight-A graduate of the ISU Culinary Arts college. Success helped my dour mood quite a bit.

So I went from a sit-down job (writer, good for handicapped) to stand-up work (in restaurants, not especially desirable). But. I learned how to work in bakeries, and it gave me the change I needed.

After Idaho State University, I landed a job in the bakery at the high-end ski resort in Sun Valley. Yippee. Ski bunnies here I come!

I was 37, single, living in a one-bed employee dormitory room, and dreadfully afraid of solitude. After figuring out that I was no dummy, my supervisor put me on the midnight shift.

I was alone from midnight to 8 a.m. in a kitchen that was the size of a small high school, the kitchen that served 11 ski area restaurants.

Wow. I thought being alone that I would go berserk or worse – but that quickly changed. Alone in the bakery, operating a revolving oven the size of a school bus, I immediately began to look at my job as a Godsend, not a curse.

It was January. It was always warm. There were no annoying people around to make noise or requirements of me. There was a phone but it didn’t ring. I ate prime rib, escargot, lobster . . .

Rising bread in vast quantities captured my attention. I learned, oh my how I learned. I got so I counted the revolutions of the Hobart brand mixer for a just-right rise on the french bread, the rye, the dinner rolls.

It was like a huge vacation. On my days off I took my motorcycle on tours of the great Sawtooth Range. I slept on the ground. I went fishing. If I caught a trout, I would eat. If not, I would fast.

I got down to 125 pounds, my lowest since high school. I was also more content than I had been my entire life. Sure, the aftereffects of a failed marriage and the absence of the four children wore heavily on me. But I was all right!

I stayed at Sun Valley for a little over a year. In retrospect, I’ve got fond memories of every salaried job I ever had, but I talk the most about the bakery days.

My supervisor was one Jack Flaherty. Jack worked seven days a week – but on Sundays he would come in later, having gone to Mass that morning. Catholic Mass. I could see Jack wanted to evangelize me, and I should have at least permitted it. But it wasn’t time.

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Word of the week: Colloquial. No, it’s not a synonym for vernacular. Not exactly. It’s from Latin (what isn’t?) colloquium. It means having to do with conversation; conversational or belonging to the words, phrases, idioms characteristic of conversation and informal writing. The label “colloquial” is used as a modifier in most dictionary definitions – and the word does not indicate sub-standard or illiterate language.