The Hollow Men - Episode 14
Another group of Odessa scholars leave to the north and east to continue their education, the tank business keeps expanding, a new employee joins VP Tanks, and Jack Blessing graduates from college.
Last week in Episode 13 of The Hollow Men, Rick and Drew come up with a marketing campaign because VP Tanks isn’t the only game in town, and they help some friends celebrate graduating from college.
If you like to read things from the very beginning feel free to start with The Cold Days of Summer, the first collection of not quite true tales of Texas. Each episode of The Cold Days of Summer and The Hollow Men contains a link to the previous and next episode so you can easily move through the story.
Another goodbye from the Pinkie’s parking lot
The numbers tell you the story of the last 12 months, at least the working part of it, and at times, it seemed like that is all we did. There did seem to be something strange going on. While the price of oil peaked in June, the rig count kept going up and our work buffer increased as well. SouthWestern Tanks now had a three month work buffer and most of the work we closed that summer wouldn't get delivered until the fall. Many people still felt the price of oil would hit $50 by the summer of 1981 and were behaving like it. Energy loans were rampant and business decisions were being made by most companies on the price of oil going up and up. Most companies, but I knew of two that weren't making bets that the price of oil would keep increasing, SouthWestern Tanks and VP Tanks. If you knew Matt at all, you knew his approach to business was all based on cash. As for us, we had learned from the best, Matt and Uncle Bill, we made money by not leveraging our position, by paying our bills, by minimizing the float time between when we paid for a tank and when we got paid for it and by making our money work for us.
We put our scholarship plan in motion. Elizabeth's tuition, books and dorm were all paid for through the VP Tanks Scholarship fund and a $5000 VP Tanks scholarship was established at Odessa College. That one got the name of VP Tanks and our faces in the paper.
Elizabeth worked for us all summer long and often put in as many hours as we did. Bud was working full time at TxDOT all the way until the second week of August. Over the summer they had driven up to Lubbock one weekend for Freshman orientation and in late August it was time for them to leave for Lubbock and their first semester at Texas Tech.
But before we could send Elizabeth and Bud off to Lubbock, we had two more trips to Central Texas, one weekend for Barry's graduation from SouthWest Texas State University and the following weekend for Mark's graduation from UT. Two weekends in a row, we worked until Friday, then drove straight through to central Texas, attended graduation, drank way too much Saturday during the day and into the evening, then managed to get back to Odessa before 11:30 pm Sunday night. The Monday after his graduation Barry was moving to Corpus Christi to start his job with one of the television stations there. Mark was planning to stay in Austin, he had accepted an offer with one of the local offices of a Big 5 accounting firm. From what he told us, he would be traveling quite a bit and working long hours. I wondered how well the long hours would work. Mark might be a little too much like me, he enjoyed his free time.
On the last Wednesday in August Rick and I were keeping with tradition, waiting in the parking lot of the Pinkie's at the intersection of Grandview and University. We were waiting there for awhile. We had arrived just as Pinkie's opened but it was about thirty minutes later that Elizabeth and Bud arrived. James was there as well, as he was the full-time manager of the store. Lyle was there too, but this time he was heading north. He was going to Texas Tech to complete his degree and would be working at the same Pinkies that J.T. had taken me to in May. The final member of the soon to be departed was Robert, Rick's brother. He was leaving for Corpus Christi and Corpus Christi State University. While he didn't have a job there yet, he had plenty of good references and was confident that he would be able to find work there before long. While we waited for Bud and Elizabeth to show up I gave Barry's phone number in Corpus Christi to Robert in case he wanted to talk to a fellow Odessan. In a change of pace, Sue was at the parking lot to say goodbye to Elizabeth and Bud. Over the summer she had taken Elizabeth under her wing and told her all of the things she needed to know about Lubbock and Texas Tech. J.T. was at work in Midland and couldn't break away. Sue had accepted a teaching position at Nimitz Junior High and her and J.T. were renting an apartment just south of the University of Texas – Permian Basin.
When it was time for Lyle, Robert, Bud and Elizabeth to go, I gave Elizabeth a good hug and shook Lyle's hand and Robert's hand. Lyle told me “Take care of James, he's not used to being on his own.” I chuckled at that and promised Lyle I would keep an eye on James.
When I shook Bud's hand I pulled him close and whispered to him “If you hurt my sister, I'll hurt you.”
He looked a little surprised at that but said to me very firmly “Sir, you know I would never do that.”
Rick gave Robert a good brotherly hug and managed to slip something into the pocket of Robert's windbreaker without Robert noticing.
After Sue hugged everyone, Elizabeth and Bud got into his car, Lyle got into his car, as did Robert and they all drove off. The four of us, Sue, Rick, James and me, stood in the parking lot and watched them drive away.
“Rick, what did you put in Robert's pocket?”
“Just a little something, he may never need it, but its there if he does.”
“That's it? No details. Come on, business partner, I want the details.”
The look Rick gave me said it was none of my business, but he told us anyway.
“A little cash and a short letter. I told him to look around for a good house in Corpus and that I would be willing to go in on a house with him. He lives in it, and the two of us pay the mortgage.”
“Damn, I never you were such a loving brother.”
“Go to hell, Drew.”
“Been living here all my life, why would I leave?”
Sue interrupted our banter.
“So, what do we do now?”
“Sue, you buy a six-pack of beer from me, that's what you do.”
Rick, James and I laughed as that is what James told Mike Garrett another August day in the Pinkie's parking lot.
“My god, you're all drunks.”
“Not really, we just drink for the taste.”
“Oh, God, I'm so lucky that J.T. asked me out before you did. If he hadn't where would I be now? Living in a trailer park and watching you drink beer from dawn to dusk?”
“Hell, Sue, you don't have to go to a trailer park and see that. All you have to do is come out to our office any day of the week if you want to see Drew drink all day.”
“Thanks, Rick, it's good to know you're my friend. Makes me wonder what you would be like as an enemy.”
Rick and I were both smiling, neither one of us taking any of this seriously. “No, Sue, your life wouldn't be like that, no, not at all. But we do have traditions we must live by. Come with us, we're going to walk inside and buy a six pack of Coors. Then Rick's going to drive, you're going to ride shotgun and we're going to drive around for a bit. It will be all right, really.”
“I can't believe I'm going to do this.”
Really, she wasn't that bad. She didn't drink as fast as Rick or me, so in a sense that was good as it meant another beer for me out of the six-pack as I didn't have to worry about my driving. We decided to let Sue experience the entire tradition so we drove over to The Station and picked up two large pizzas, one pepperoni and one jalapeno. We drove back to Pinkie's, walked inside and had lunch with James and another six pack.
Around 2:00 pm, Rick drove Sue back to her apartment while I drove Sue's car as none of us thought it would be good having one of the newest teachers at Nimitz Junior High risk getting pulled over by the police with the smell of beer and jalapenos on her breath. Once we dropped her off we drove onto work and put in a few hours before we called it a day.
Things change
Things were changing. The price of oil had peaked in June of 1980 at $39.50, dropped to $36.00 for a little bit and stabilized at $38.00. The rig count kept increasing. From September 1980 until April 1981 it had increased by over 700 rigs. Our work buffer had nearly doubled in that same time, from 95 days to 185 days. In other words, if someone called up on a Tuesday in April and bought a tank from us, that tank would be delivered six months later. And, yet, people just kept buying tanks.
With a work buffer so big we started pricing tanks for what we thought they would cost six months out. The price of steel was going up month by month as well and since nearly everything in a tank is made of steel we needed to avoid selling a future tank for today's prices.
It was a guess at best, no one knew what the price of steel would be and we worked with SouthWestern Tanks on future pricing so neither one of us would be hurt too bad. Matt was a little hesitant because if the price of steel didn't go up he might wind up making more profit than he considered decent. We didn't mind, our goal was to not get screwed by rising prices. As the rig count, price of steel and work buffer increased so did our prices.
The market was going crazy, everyone wanted not just a tank, but lots of tanks. We were glad to help satisfy their needs and we missed Elizabeth a lot, so much so in fact that we came to the realization we need to hire a new receptionist. We had run out of relatives to hire so we went to the open market. We placed an ad in the Odessa College career counseling office and waited for the resumes to pour in. We waited quite a while. We had forgotten that Odessa was in a boom cycle and unemployment was low. Three weeks after we placed the ad, we reviewed the resume of our first applicant, Mary Ann Standish. Mary Ann graduated from Odessa High the same year as Elizabeth and had just started at Odessa College. She had been first chair flutist in the band, active in several different clubs and societies and had a good GPA. The resume didn’t really tell us anything we needed to know, but it didn’t disqualify her so we asked her to come in for an interview.
Mary Ann came in on a Wednesday afternoon and it was that morning we realized we knew nothing about interviewing. Time was running out and all we could do was the best we could with what we knew.
She arrived right on time. Rick sat down at his desk. Mary Ann sat down and I pulled my chair over to join them. We asked about her experience. We asked about her plans, what she thought she would be doing one year from now, five years from now. We told her what we did and how we worked. That Rick was often out of the office making calls on customers. I was in the office most of the time, following up on our contractors, estimating new jobs and preparing drawings for new customers.
At the end of 30 minutes she hadn’t run screaming out of the office and neither had we. It seemed like things had gone well. We offered the job right on the spot. Mary Ann was our new office receptionist and would work Monday through Friday from 1:00 to 5:00 pm and on Saturday from 7:00 to 12:00 when there was work for her to do.
After Mary Ann’s first month on the job Rick and I decided she would be the next recipient of a VP Tanks Scholarship. When we told her that, well, we had a loyal employee from that point on.
Somewhere around that same time Mike Garrett showed up at our office close to 5:00 pm one Friday. Rick was on the way back to the office after a few sales calls. I was wrapping up the details for a new tank drawing and was well into my third beer of the afternoon. Mary Ann was telling me about her plans for the weekend when Mike walked in the front door with a six pack in hand.
“Afternoon, Drew.”
“Afternoon, Mike.”
“I brought some beer, thought you might enjoy one or two to end the week.”
He looked at me, at the beer can perfectly balanced at the top of my tilted drafting board, at the two empty cans sitting in the trash can next to my drafting board.
“I can see you’ve started the weekend early.”
“Not really, not much earlier than usual, but you’re free to drink with me. Rick should be here in a few minutes and I’m sure he would enjoy the company. He gets a little annoyed when I start the weekend before him. This way, the two of you can get the weekend started together.”
Mary Ann laughed and I think it was then that Mike first noticed her.
“Hello… I’m...”
“I know who you are, Mike Garret. You know me too, but I guess you don’t remember.”
Mike stared at Mary Ann, trying to figure out the puzzle before him.
“You look familiar, but I can’t quite place you.”
“Think back, maybe five, six years ago. You came over to our house fairly often back then.”
Mike was lost, I’m not sure where or why, but he was lost. I felt just a bit sorry for him.
“Mary Ann, come on now, don’t be mean to Mike. His memory comes and go. Sometimes he doesn’t remember his own name.”
Mike’s eyes gleamed with recognition.
“Mary Ann, Mary Ann… Well, I’ll be damned. Mary Ann Standish? Is that you? Little sister of Faith, Hope and Joy?”
Mary Ann nodded her head.
“My god, I can’t believe this. What are you doing here? With these heathens?”
Just at that point, Rick walked in the front door.
“I resent that. Drew is the heathen. I just try to keep him from drifting too far towards damnation. He is my albatross.”
Mike turned to Rick, pulled a beer off the six pack ring and tossed it to Rick.
“About time you got here, we need to catch up. First on beer, your partner here is on his third.”
With that I drank the last from my can, tossed it into the trash can, walked to the refrigerator, grabbed another Coors, opened it and took a swallow.
“Mike, I must correct you, this is my fourth.”
Rick looked me over, looked at Mary Ann, who has no ability to lie whatsoever and asked me “For the day?”
I answered “For the afternoon, the two this morning don’t count as far as I’m concerned. Don’t forget, I had lunch.”
We all laughed. Mike offered a beer to Mary Ann and she joined in with the rest of us. I ran my mind back through the conversation, realized I had committed a faux pax and decided to correct it.
“Mike, my apologies, you mentioned there were things to catch up on. Beer was one, and now that we all have one in hand, what else did you want to catch up on?”
“Drew, you do have some sense of etiquette and I appreciate it. Mary Ann, catch me up. What the hell are you doing with these degenerates?”
“I’ll tell you, but do you three always talk like this?”
Mike looked at Rick who looked at me. I didn’t have anyone else to look at and was forced to speak.
“Not always, but often. Particularly when we drink.”
“In Drew’s case, all the damn time, because it seems like he is always drinking.”
“You say that like there is something wrong with that. I have long valued the creative inspiration that only a beer in the morning can provide. Today, I have felt quiet inspired.”
Again, we all laughed then listened to how Mary Ann chose to work with a couple of degenerates like Rick and me. Mike liked the story. He liked the story so much that he pretty much showed up every Friday afternoon to hear more stories.
The last week of October Rick took a few days off to drive to Corpus and see Robert. When he got back he told me about the trip.
“Robert is working some crazy hours, I couldn't get used to it. He takes morning classes, then studies or catches a nap, goes to work at 6:00 pm and gets back to his apartment a little after midnight. He's doing all right, but he's busy. We did take time one day to look at houses and found a nice one, in a good neighborhood that's on its way back. We made an offer, should know this week if the owner accepts it.”
Three days later Rick learned that his offer had been accepted. In early December he went back to Corpus and closed on the house and Robert moved in a few days later.
In November I received another death threat from Austin. So did Rick. We both got an invitation to Jack's graduation from UT. The invitation was lovely, with the handwritten note saying “You're better be here or I will track you down and kill you – Jack.” Rick's note read “If you don't get Drew to my graduation not only will I track him down and kill him, I'll kill you.”
The week before Jack's graduation we made our plans. Rick was driving this time and we would stay at Jack's apartment for the weekend. We decided to take things a little easier this time since Mary Ann was on the payroll. Versus working all day Friday we decided to leave for Austin at 12:30 pm Friday afternoon, have Mary Ann cover the phones until 5:00 pm and not worry about working Saturday, even though she offered to come in anyway. A day or two before we left Mike Garrett dropped by our office.
“You boys going to Austin this weekend?”
“Yeah, going to see the new graduate, Jack.”
“Thought you would get an invitation. I did too. I was thinking that we three should ride together. Jack has enough room for all of us. Save a little gas, you know.”
“I know where this is going. You just want to avoid driving so you can drink all the way down to Austin.”
“Rick, you know me too well. Yeah, I figured if I could find a way to avoid driving, well, I might have a beer or two on the way down.”
“We're taking my car and there's plenty of room for you. We plan to leave at 12:30 Friday afternoon, think you can be here by then?”
“Not a problem. Where's the first beer stop?”
“We'll make sure we have plenty of beer for the road here at the office. Then all we have to do is ice it down once we're on the road.”
“Sounds like a plan. See you boys Friday at 12:15.”
Mike was true to his word, he pulled into our parking lot at 12:15. While we wrapped things up, he transferred the beer in our refrigerator to a large ice chest he had brought. He then loaded the ice chest into the back seat of Rick's car and transferred his duffel bag to Rick's trunk. At 12:30 I handed my office keys to Mary Ann.
As we drove past Midland we picked up a large bag of ice and dumped it into the ice chest. Once back in the car, Mike looked at his watch and said “seven minutes to heaven.”
“What's that mean?”
“Properly iced, it only takes seven minutes for a can of Coors to reach proper drinking temperature. I've conducted extensive experiments over the years. Trust me, this is scientific fact.”
A little over seven minutes later Mike reached into the ice chest, pulled out a can of Coors, popped the top, took a long sip and sighed “Absolute perfection.” He passed a can to Rick and one to me.
We arrived in Austin a little after 7:30 pm. As we drove into town we upped our inventory of Coors and Mike added a fifth of Jack Daniels. We felt it was important to come bearing gifts. We knocked on Jack's door and Mark answered it. Apparently, he and Jack had started working their way to a grand evening that afternoon. We brought our stuff in, our gifts were well received and all sat down to a night of beer, Jack Daniels, music and talk. Around 9:00 Jack ordered three large pizzas from Conan's Pizza, their whole wheat pizza crust was surprisingly tasty.
It was a good, drunk night and we all gave it up around 4:00 am. Whether or not we fell asleep or just passed out doesn't matter too much. All I know is that 10:00 am came to soon. Someone was knocking on the door. I was closest to the door and opened it. Through the peephole I saw Mr. Blessing. I looked around to see if there was anything worth picking up before I opened the door and realized there was little point. The place wasn't too messy, but it was obvious we had been drinking.
“Drew Remington, hell, should have known you would be here.” Mr. Blessing walked in, put his hands on his hips and assessed the situation.
“I figured there would be some drinking here. That's why I didn't bring the wife or Janey over, didn't think they needed to see the low depths that my educated son had fallen into.”
Mark, Mike and Rick were all starting to stir. We heard nothing but snores from behind the closed door to Jack's bedroom. Mark and Rick were moving slow, but Mike was his usual self, awake and seemingly sober in an instant.
“Here's the deal. Jack's ceremony is at 3:00 pm. You guys need to get cleaned up and sober enough to have lunch with my girls. We plan to eat at 12:00 noon. Jack said he wanted to eat at Threadgills so that's where we will be at 11:50. One of you has to get my drunk son awake and at Threadgills by 11:50.”
The whole time he spoke, Mr. Blessing looked at me, not at anyone else.
“I'll get him up Mr. Blessing.”
“Damn right you will, Drew. After all, you're sort of responsible for all of this.” Mr. Blessing slapped me hard on the back.
“I'll know who to blame if you're not there by 11:50.”
“We'll be there, don't worry.”
“I know you will be.” He stopped for a moment, looked at me and said “Sort of funny he graduated before you, isn't it, Mr. Scholar?” With that, Mr. Blessing walked out of the door.
“What was that about?” Mark was often the curious one and had asked the question.
“Drew sort of turned Jack around. Remember when Jack failed the 9th grade? The two of them worked the entire summer to get Jack caught back up and ready. I think Mr. Blessing thinks Drew is responsible for Jack becoming the respectable student. And I also thinks Mr. Blessing gets a kick out of Jack graduating before Drew.”
Rick was right on both counts, at least from my point of view.
I managed to get Jack awake without getting killed and we all managed to get sober and clean enough for Mrs. Blessing and Janey. We even made it to Threadgills before the three of them.
The ceremony went without a hitch and we all yelled loudly when Jack crossed the stage. The December graduation was a lot smaller than the May graduation but it was still a large crowd. I think Jack was impressed by how loud we could be.
Afterwards we went over to the Embassy Suites on Riverside for happy hour. The Blessings were staying there and as a result we all got free drinks and snacks from 5:00 to 7:00 pm. At 7:15 we walked across the parking lot to have dinner at NightHawk's, a local steak restaurant. I had the best chopped steak of my life that night. Jack told us about the management program at HEB. Now that he had his BBA, he expected to move up quickly and thought he would be managing a store within a couple of years. Sounded like a good plan and it was another example of the evolution of Jack Blessing. It was clear the Blessings were proud of Jack. His mother simply shone and while Mr. Blessing never directly said he was proud, you could see it in the way he moved and the way he looked at Jack.
Since the Blessings had paid for lunch at Threadgills I managed to grab the ticket and paid for dinner before Mr. Blessing had a chance. He looked a little angry at first, but once I told him that I still paid protection money to Jack to keep from beating me up he laughed hard and long.
After dinner, the gang went back to Jack's apartment for another night of drinking. This night we stopped right at 2:00 and went off to sleep. The next morning Mr. Blessing showed up at 8:00 am and insisted we all go to breakfast with him. It took a while to get the cotton out of my mouth, but the breakfast was hearty and good and the iced tea helped bring me back to life.
Around 10:30 Jack and I went over to the rent house. Everything looked good. The renters were not there, probably at church, so I just walked around the property. Jack said he came by once a month just to check up on things. On the way back I mentioned to Jack that I was thinking about buying a second house in Austin and I asked if he would be interested in either renting or going in on the second house with me.
“Sounds interesting. I plan to stay in Austin for a while. It would be nice to get out of the apartment. Let's see what we can do. If we find something interesting I could be tempted to go in with you. I don't have a lot of spare cash, but if I lived there I could apply what would have been rent to the mortgage, right?”
“Something like that. I would make the down payment and would have the initial equity, but if you pay all or most of the mortgage you would be building up equity. I'm sure we can figure something out. Tell, you what, let me come back in January for a few days and we can look at houses, see what the market is like and decide from there.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Once back at the apartment Mike, Rick and I hung around with everyone until about 2:00 pm and then we hit the road. We pulled into the VP Tanks parking lot a little after 8:45 pm. The building was still standing, Mike's truck and mine were parked. It looked like Mary Ann had managed to keep from burning the place down. Mike grabbed a couple of beers for the road, shook our hands and drove off. Since Mary Ann had my office keys I decided to leave my truck in the parking lot and ride back home with Rick. My plan was to walk over to Rick's house in the morning and ride with him to work.
Monday we were back at work. We sifted through the notes that Mary Ann had written while we were gone, split them and started making calls. Work was good, real good, and money was coming in all the time. As the backlog grew we could project out our costs and revenue for the next few months, which meant we had a real good estimate on what our month to month profit would be.
In January I took three days off, drove to Austin and looked at houses with Jack. Other than the enlightening, somewhat awkward, realization on day two when the realtor thought we were a gay couple looking for a home it was a good, fruitful trip. On Friday I made an offer for a house in the Rosedale neighborhood, near 45th and Sinclair. The neighborhood had a lot of nice homes, mostly built in the 1930's. The one I made an offer on was a little over 1100 square feet. Housing had gone up a bit since I bought the first house so my offer was for $89,000. But the market was moving fast. My offer was accepted by the owner Saturday morning. I closed on the house in February and Jack moved in, started paying the monthly mortgage and making improvements.
Back at VP Tanks we added a third phone line in February because Rick and I were spending more time in the office than before. Whereas in previous months a good amount of our time could be tied up drumming up customers, following up on bids, and checking in on our contractors, we now found we didn't need to spend much time at all on the first two. We had shifted from selling tanks and our company to taking orders. Most of our work could be done from the office and on the phone, talking to customers who called us, who wanted to know how much a certain tank would cost and how long it would take to get it. They might complain about how long it would take to get a tank, but they didn't complain about our prices and more times than not they made a verbal buy on the phone and within a few days we would have another order on paper. Once we had the paper order we scheduled the work.
We had to change one thing in the office – our next three months blackboard became the next six to seventh months blackboard. We needed to keep track of all the deals we had agreed to.
Since we were still effectively a cost plus business, every tank we shipped had profit on it. We were paying ourselves pretty good at this point, and both Rick and I were buying six month and twelve month CD's every month.
We were still having lunch with Matt every week and my Uncle Bill once a month. They kept stressing what they always stressed, don't make today's decisions based on your guesses of what tomorrow will bring and make your money work harder than you do.
Uncle Bill had two new names for the folks who had fallen for Eddie Chiles' line “if you don't have an oil well, get one.” First off there were the “Suitcase Oilmen,” people who just drove into town wanting to invest in the oil industry because that's “where you could make a fortune.” They didn't know anything about the oil industry and didn't intend to learn anything, they just had suitcases of money that they wanted to invest in something, anything to do with the oil industry. He acknowledged that some of them would make some money, but he was confident that most would leave town with their suitcases empty. The second group were the “Tomorrow Men,” the people who made decisions based on the promises of tomorrow and not on the facts of today. He was very confident that the “Tomorrow Men” would wind up broke up when the boom turned sour. He was worried that the madness of the “Suitcase Oilmen” and the “Tomorrow Men” would bring down more than just themselves when the downturn came. West Texas was increasingly more and leveraged. If the downturn was quick, a lot of people would get hurt.
Uncle Bill wasn't all cynicism and doom and gloom. He said he had been keeping an eye on an investing opportunity that he thought would open sometime in 1981 and once it did he was going to recommend we push a lot of money its way.
Author’s note
“Seven minutes to heaven” is a phrase I first heard from Jim Cochran. He strongly believed that a store bought can of Coors needed to be iced for no more than seven minutes to be drinkable. Even today, when I buy beer and if I want to drink one as soon as possible once I get home, I place a can/bottle or two in the freezer and set a timer for seven minutes.
Next week in Episode 15 Budd wants to join the family, and Rick and Drew learn a little more of the mysterious past of Drew’s Dad and his Uncle Bill.