Wrestling with a word

Greetings. It is unusually quiet in my life and activities right now. When things get quiet, I start to play with ideas in my mind and that leads me into some odd sort of cognitive process that makes me ask ‘what if?

In the past, I have been known to get a word in my head and then proceed to overuse the word throughout a short stretch of writing simply because it seemed exciting to me. The words are generally pretentious and bloated and do not often come up in everyday speech.
Upon re-reading the piece, I would find that, instead of adding power and excitement to my writing, it would make it read more as an example of a writer who was long on disk space and short on imagination. Hopefully I have caught those passages before publishing and sharing them with others, so that I can maintain at least the smallest illusion of competence.
One such word passed in front of my eyes this morning and it stuck in my mind for several minutes, calling to me, demanding that I use it until all possible facets had been explored.
That word was ‘fastidious’.
Can you imagine a stretch of writing, five or six paragraphs long, with the word fastidious used a dozen times? It brings a smile to your face doesn’t it? You would be saying to yourself “What a hack”?
Then I got to thinking, “can I write a short piece that would legitimately use the word ‘fastidious’ four or five times that would not come off as a laughingstock”?
Now the errant word obsession has become a quest, and we all know that a quest cannot be denied. So in the spirit of the quest, I offer this short piece with what I hope is a legitimate overuse of the word ‘fastidious’ in the hopes that it will answer the question, or else bring a smile to someone’s lips:

THE PROMOTION

Mr. Smith and Mr. Jones both wore that fake smile of concern that they had practiced and nurtured to use to extricate themselves from any appearance of being the bad guys in their decision making process. I had seen it before. If the phony bastards thought I was buying it, they didn’t know with whom they were dealing.
The man sitting to my left in his carefully pressed suit and Rolex watch wore the serene look of a woman who was confident that her sexual powers had given her the victory before the battle had even begun. I hated the fact that his socks didn’t show as he sat with his legs crossed and his hands lay neatly folded on his lap. I hate everything about Tommy Bledsoe.
I looked down at my own lap, and realized that I had forgotten to zip my fly before coming in.
“Jim, please understand,” Mr. Smith was saying, “that we consider you to be a hard working and important part of our organization. We just feel that we need someone who’s overall view of management is—uh—more fastidious—in its overall execution”.
The smile on Tommy’s face said it all. He knew he had won without ever hearing the words.
I felt an overwhelming urge to pull out my Wang and piss all over Tommy Bledsoe’s ‘fastidious’ suit and let them see the true nature of this manipulative and corrupt little faggot and let them know just what a mistake they were making. How could they take away something I had worked for so hard?
It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t decent. It was obvious what the man was, but they didn’t care. Phonies choosing phonies.
“This in no way reflects badly on your record with the company,” Mr. Jones piped in, ever the Parrot, “and as a team player, we know that you will understand that we need to do what we feel is best for the company”.
A thousand responses rushed through my head, but each response circled back to the realization that I was sitting there with my fly open and there was nothing I could say that would not humiliate me even more.
“I understand, sir”, I replied, as calmly and clearly as I could muster as I stood and offered my hand. Mr. Jones shook it limply and continued to smile that phony smile.
I left the room, struggling to maintain a calm exterior, praying not to stumble on my way out. Trying to maintain at least the smallest shred of dignity in my defeat.
As the door closed behind me, I stopped and zipped up and felt the hot flush on my face as I hurried through the anteroom and out into the main hall.

It wasn’t hard to catch Tommy alone in the parking garage. I sat in my Ford minivan, the smell of stale coffee reeking in my nose, the pile of junk mail that I had never bothered to take into the house or dispose of, staring at me accusingly from the passengers seat, and I waited. Tommy always parked on the sparsely used upper level, taking up three parking spaces, always cautious of the errant nicks and dings of everyday use. His Lexus sat there in its ‘fastidious’ glory, clean and polished and reeking of arrogance and I could see the reflection of the man in every thing he touched. Today I would give him a lesson in ‘fastidious’. I would show him that he couldn’t fuck some body over and get away with it. I would break him and make him squeal.
He came hurrying through the parking garage with an arrogant haste in his prissy stride. He was disgusting in his self-importance.
I got out of the van and moved to intercept him at his car. The weight of the hammer concealed in my belt was comforting as I moved up to him and extended my hand.
“Tommy”, I said. “I just wanted to congratulate you and assure you there were no hard feelings”.
He smiled at me, but his eyes had a look of caution. His confusion gave me even more confidence.
“I’m glad to hear you say that, Jim,” he said, taking my hand with the same repulsive limp grasp of his mentor Mr. Jones. “I know we will work well together”
As her turned to punch in the code on his door lock, I brought the hammer down hard on the back of his head. I was surprised at how quickly he crumbled to the ground, without making a sound. I looked at him for a moment and then I hit him again. It didn’t seem to be enough so I hit him a third time. That gave me a feeling of completeness. One must be fastidious in these sorts of things.
I rolled him over on to his back. His eyes were staring up at the ceiling and there was no sign of movement. I took out my knife, the only thing I had left that had been my father’s, and kneeling down, I stabbed him in the heart. I was surprised that the blade only sank a few inches into him before being stopped by some thing hard, but the damage wasn’t the point. It was the act that mattered. I carefully judged the distance, and stabbed him two more times in a precise and fastidious pattern that would leave no doubt in the minds of those who saw them that this was done by a very fastidious person.
I looked at those unblinking eyes, those eyes that had watched my every move and run scurrying off to report me to the executives and I placed the point of the knife on the left eyeball and shoved. There was a tiny pop and fluid ran down the side of his face. Being a fastidious man, I repeated the action with the right eye, and it gave me great sense of warmth and satisfaction.
I had planned to castrate the little bastard and stuff his balls down his throat and then take that Rolex and shove it up his prissy little ass but the feeling had subsided. Unlike Tommy, I could see the difference between fastidious and excessive.
I drove away from the garage feeling tired but happy. I smiled as I thought of the quandary that would face Mr. Smith and Mr. Jones tomorrow at work. They certainly couldn’t expect me to take the job now. I wouldn’t have it even if they begged.
Besides, they needed someone more—uh, fastidious—than me.

Jim Bronaugh

Grabbing For The Root

DELVING INTO THE FAMILY PAST


Genealogy is a passion to so many these days that I decided to take the plunge and see what all of the excitement was about.

My father’s family history is fairly well documented, mostly filled with Masonic Temples and Secret Societies, so I felt it might be best to hold back that information simply for safety sake.

I decided instead to search into my mother’s side of the family.
Bearing the name of ‘Irish’, I was certain that there would be very little gloss on that vessel. American history being what it is, I knew that immigrants often had their names changed by immigration officials to something that clearly indicated their racial and social position, just to make sure that they didn’t try ‘passing’ amongst decent folk.

After spending many days reading through the hundreds of records posted on the Internet, one fascinating character began to emerge from the mists of time. It is that character that I would like to showcase for you now.

FRANCIS NORSHAM IRISH.

The first mention of F.N. Irish was from a letter of protest written by Col. John Mandy to the Adjutant Generals office concerning the appointment of several young men as Commissioned Officers in the Union army whose sole qualification for command was their acquaintanceship with the young wife of an aged but very powerful General officer who was left unnamed. F.N. Irish was named specifically in this letter and it was pointed out that the young man was even incapable of sitting a horse adequately, yet he was commissioned as a Cavalry officer. It was also stated that the young Lieutenant, whose age was said to be 21 years, was a complainer and undisciplined. No reply to the letter was posted. This was dated as 1862.




THE HERO OF NEW HOPE FERRY

The next official document appears in December of 1863. It is a letter of commendation to F.N. Irish and a declaration of the facts concerning the valiant defense of the crossing at New Hope ferry where-in a small patrol under the command of the above mentioned Lt. Irish held off a much larger force of confederate regulars and successfully protected the right flank of the Grand Army of the Republic during their strategic retreat from the battle of Chippamagwa. There were only three survivors of the battle at the Ferry. Two were the Grimly brothers who deserted their posts and ran, and Lt. Irish, who, after receiving a saber wound and losing his mount, killed a confederate Officer, acquired that officers mount and rode back into the battle.

But information gleaned from a collection of letters and diary entries paints a somewhat different picture of the affair.

Piecing together the story from the letters and diaries, it seems that our young Lt. Irish, who was having difficulty coping with the cold of that late autumn in the field, had managed to severely cut his foot while trying to chop extra wood for his personal fire.
After caring for the Lieutenants foot, one Sergeant Horace Brandywine actually led the defense of the ferry.
According to letters home from the Grimly brothers, they were not deserting their post, but rather were trying to keep ahead of a ‘Crazy’ Confederate Captain who was ‘hell bent to blow their brains out if he caught them’. In their haste to retreat they had inadvertently led the Confederate Officer back through their own camp where Lt. Irish proceeded to shoot the officer in the back and steal his horse. They stated that the young Lt. had a notoriously bad sense of direction, and was actually trying to ride away from the battle when he rode out from the camp.
In the official report it is stated that a much larger Union force, under the command of one Captain Ezra Teague, had just arrived to reinforce the Lieutenants patrol when they spied the young Lieutenant charging single-handed out of the woods towards the enemy forces. The report stated that he was yelling “For Lincoln and the Union”.
There were some eyewitnesses who claimed to only hear the Lieutenant screaming, “Whoa, stop”. These were discounted to the heat of battle.
Defamation of an officer was one of the charges leveled against the two Grimly brothers before they were shot as deserters.
Lieutenant Irish was given a medal for the Saber wound he received and was promoted to the rank of Captain.

THE BATTLE OF GETTYSBERG

In an account written by one Billy Ingersall, I learned that a young Captain Irish, being in his words “the poorest damned horseman ever to sit a mount” was thrown from his horse the day before the big battle at Gettysburg and landed astraddle a thick poplar sapling. Within one hour the Lieutenant’s Testicles had swollen to the point where he could not even stand, much less sit a horse. His men propped him up on the side of the road with two canteens and a pouch full of Johnnycake and promised to try to retrieve him when the battle was over.
It was there that he was found by a wagon filled with the wounded heroes from the North Ridge who had been specifically sent to the rear because of their bravery in battle and the seriousness of their wounds. They stopped and loaded Lieutenant Irish on to the wagon and took him along with them.
In a letter of commendation dated 1864, he was named as fallen hero of the battle who had charged into cannon fire and had received severe but unspecified wounds.
He was recommended for a medal. He received a purple heart and the promotion to the rank of Major.

APPOMATTOX

The Appomattox affair had several different versions, both official and private that lead me to a composite view. The official statement said that Major Irish was wounded when he stepped in front of an assassin’s bullet in an effort to protect the life of General Strom Thornton.
Piecing together several private accounts, both concerning the reputation of the Major and the actual account from the place, it seems that Major Irish had the unnerving habit of loading all six chambers of his Navy Colts sidearm instead of leaving the chamber under the hammer empty for safeties sake. He stated several times that he felt he might need that extra round to save his life. The accounts all seem to agree that the Major somehow managed to dislodge his weapon from its holster, causing it to fall to the ground and discharge. He was wounded in the Buttocks. According to the official version, the Major stepped between the General and the assassin, taking the round in his own body. It is stated that the assassin then managed to escape capture.
Young Major Irish received another purple heart and was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.

THE INDIAN RESERVATION

I could find few records of his military duties between the years 1865 to 1871. He seems to have been busy through out the south during the reconstruction period with no real mention of his activities.
The next record of him appears in Newspaper clippings from the spring of 1871 with the announcement of his engagement to the daughter of a very prominent General.
Surprisingly there are official orders from the summer of that same year assigning Lt. colonel F.N. Irish to command the Indian reservation at Branderson, in the western Missouri river valley.
I also found a marriage certificate for the Generals daughter to another man dated 1876. I could find no explanation for the discrepancy.
I did find a registration of marriage between one Col. F.N. Irish, US Army, Ret., and Candice Thompson the youngest daughter of a United States Senator dated 1881. I surmise that his engagement to the Generals daughter had somehow gone awry.
He commanded the post at Branderson between 1871 and 1879.
I gleaned several interesting facts about my ancestor from statements and official records that I found.
It seems that Lt. Colonel Irish managed to save over $100,000.00 dollars from his yearly salary of $1000.00 during that eight-year period when he commanded the reservation. He stated that extreme thrift and good management were all it took to acquire his nest egg.
He was also able to reduce the indigenous population from 69,000 in the fall of 1871 to 41,000 in the spring of 1876. For this excellent effort at introducing the native population into mainstream American life, he was given a Presidential Commendation and was promoted to the rank full Colonel. To highlight his skills as an administrator, it was noted that upon his retirement, only 18,000 Indians could be accounted for on the Branderson reservation. Through incompetence, it was noted, the new commander who had replaced him had managed to lose track of over 23,000 natives immediately upon his arrival and had allowed them to escape.

THE INDUSTRIAL YEARS

It is recorded that Col. F.N. Irish retired from the Army in 1879. In 1880 he founded the F.N. Irish machine works in the upper Ohio valley. There are only the most mundane records of his business activities, mostly Government and military contracts from 1881 until his death in 1904. He had assigned a full partnership in his business to his father in law, the Senator, and that partnership extended to his brother in law, also a U.S Senator, after the father in law passed away in 1892.
Upon his death, F.N. Irish was survived by his wife and five children. His business was sold, in 1915 to a new and upcoming automobile company. Coincidently, his brother in law had lost his seat in the Senate in the election of 1914.

DRAWING MY OWN CONCLUSIONS

After sifting all of these facts out of the volumes of information on the Web, I have come to the conclusion that this whole search has been nothing more than an exercise in self-gratification and the whole thing just made my hand tired. Maybe Genealogy takes a greater sense of the majesty of the past than I can muster.

Jim Bronaugh