Remembering Karl

Whenever we lose someone close to us, it's natural to go through a period of grief. But as we mourn their death, it's really important that we remember to celebrate their life. Not only does it help to ease the pain, but it reminds us why that person was so important to us in the first place. The smiles, the laughs, the memories......these are the things that will keep that person alive in our hearts forever.

With that being said, I would like to share a few stories and some of my favorite memories of Karl....

I was first introduced to Karl many years ago when I was a teenager. I was best friends with his nephew (Rip) and I would occasionally see Karl at family gatherings. He was very friendly and always had a smile on his face. From the beginning, I felt very comfortable around him.

When I first started to date Tina, she lived at home with Karl and Evelyn. When I would make a phone call to their house, I never really knew what fun awaited me. You see, Karl would always be the one to answer the phone. After he greeted me, I would say, "H Karl, is Tina home?"

"I don't know. Let me check", he would say. And then, I would hear him walk down the hallway and yell, "TINA, ARE YOU HOME?"

In the distance, I would here a faint "yes" from Tina. And then after a few moments, Karl would pick the phone back up and say, "Yep, she's here." And then he would hang up on me. I'd call back and ask why he hung up on me. He would say, "You asked if Tina was here and I answered you. I thought we were done." Of course, this was just Karl being Karl.

Years later, after Tina and I got married, he would often stop by our house. I would sometimes come home from work on Friday to find Karl waiting for me on the back porch. Armed with a 12-pack of Coors Light, he would toss me a cold one and say, "What'd ya know, Shadrack?" (To this day, I still have no idea who Shadrack was.)

Karl and I would sit out there, exchanging stories until the sun went down. Our conversations were animated and lively with no shortage of laughter. I don't know, maybe it had something to do with the beer. But I think it had more to do with two people who genuinely enjoyed each others' company.

Karl could be quite adventurous at times. For instance, about 15 years ago, a bunch of us were hanging out by the pool at my house.  Well, we were all having a good time and when someone got the wise idea to start a diving "competition". Well, not to be outdone by any of us "youngsters", Karl approached the diving board with the confidence of a Gold Medal Olympian. Taking a couple of warm-up bounces for good measure, he finally catapulted off the spring board and flew into Glen Burnie sky. With the bright sun setting behind him, he looked like the Flight of Icarus. Personally, I thought it was quite moving. But Tina didn't think so. She came running out of the house just in time to see her father hit the water with a violent belly-flop.

With steam practically coming out of her ears, she yells, "Ken, what is wrong with you?! My dad is 65 years old!"

Thinking that we were in agreement, I nodded and said, "Yeah, I know, I'm impressed too!" (Not the response she was looking for..)

Karl would sometimes relax by listening to music. He really liked this French singer named Charles Aznavour. I had never heard of the guy. So, I was surprised to see one of his CD's while I was browsing at a local music store. Figuring it would be a nice gift, I bought the CD and gave it to Karl. He absolutely loved it. He immediately put it in his CD player and started to sing along. He knew every word! It made me happy to see him so happy.

Well, no good deed goes unpunished....

As Karl was busy belting out the lyrics to the next song, I hear Tina and Toni upstairs saying, "Oh my God, Not again! Make it stop!" Then, they inform me that, years ago,  Karl used to have a cassette tape of Charles Aznavour. He used to play it over and over to the point where it drove everyone in the house absolutely crazy. So, practicing some tough-love for the over-all good of the family, the sisters hid the cassette. For years, the house was Aznavour-free. And then I come along and kick the hornet's nest....

Along the same lines, Tina and Toni told me about how Karl used to dress up like Elvis and perform family concerts in their basement. He would turn his shirt collar up and drape towels around his neck as he made his way down the steps and into the "arena". He would wipe his brow with the towels and then give them to his "fans" for souvenirs.. The captive audience was treated to his one-of-a-kind renditions of "Burning Love" and other Elvis classics........... I can honestly say that I would have paid good money to see this.

Of course, Karl had occasional hobbies as well. One of the more interesting ones was when he decided to start raising bees. I have no idea what led him to this adventure but he was certainly gung- ho about it. He went out and bought a bunch of bee-keeper equipment including an official bee-keeper suit. It was the most ridiculous looking thing that I've ever seen. He looked like someone on the Haz-Mat team. Anyway, he tells me that he's got several bee hives that are full and he wants me help him "sling" the honey out of them. I had no idea what I was in for, but there was no way that I was gonna miss this. So, I met Karl over in his basement bar room where he had several wooden frames with honeycombs in the middle. He also had a large metal bucket with an attached handle on it. According to Karl, this was called a "slinger". The plan was to put the frames into slinger and turn the handle really fast so the honey would be "slung" out of the frame in into the metal bucket. It sounded simple enough. So, we touched our beer bottles together and (according to Karl) prepared to introduce the world to the KJ Honey Company.

As Karl started to crank the slinger handle, there didn't seem to be a whole lot of honey dropping into the bucket. So, quickly improvising Plan B, Karl decided that we should apply some heat to the honeycombs. He sends me upstairs to get a blow-dryer. I come back down and then Karl proceeds to heat things up with the hair-dryer. Well, it sure did the trick. Before long, the honey was flowing like the Niagara Falls. The faster the honey fell, the faster Karl cranked the handle. Soon, he was slinging it so fast, that honey was overshooting the bucket and splattering onto the walls, ceiling and anything else in it's path. I really hated the idea of shutting don the production line, but something had to be done.

Taking on heavy fire, I shielded my eyes and said, "Whoa, Karl! Slow down! You've got honey going all over the place!"

Frantically working the handle with sweat beading on his brow, he says, "Just stay back and let me work, Ken! I've got this!"

When it was all said and done, the room was an absolute mess. He had turned the place into a human fly-trap. You would stick to anything you touched. As I watched the honey drip off the ceiling,  I asked him how he planned on cleaning up all of this mess. He just said, "Don't worry. I'll take care it." ........I haven't been in that house for many years, but I'll bet that room is still sticky.

As many of you know, Karl's birthday is July 4th. So, during our annual Independence Day party, we would also take some time to celebrate his birthday. Well, one year John bought one of those gag scratch-off lottery tickets and gave it to Karl as part of his birthday gift. Instantly, Karl starts scratching away at the ticket and before long sees that he's a "$10,000 winner". He was absolutely ecstatic! Waving the ticket high above his head, he danced around the table with the grace of a drunken ballerina. Joining in on the celebration, John told him to turn the ticket over and find out where he could pick up his money. Karl squints his eyes to read the back of the ticket and says, "Wait a minute. It says to go to "Yo Momma's House" to claim your prize money. What the hell is this?"

Watching the emotional transition on Karl's face was priceless. Once reality set in and he realized he wasn't getting the $10,000, Karl responded with a barrage of profanities that would have made his old Navy buddies blush, He followed this up by shooting us the moon and affectionately telling us all to kiss his ass!

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I tell these stories because this is the Karl that I want all of you to remember. He was a fun-loving guy who was full of life. And while it was hard to ignore Karl's decline in recent years, it didn't change the person that we all knew and loved.

I'm going to remember the guy who used to wait for me on the back porch after work. I'm going to remember the guy with the big smile and bigger heart who always made me laugh.  And I'll never forget that guy who jumped up from his seat and cheered the loudest when the preacher pronounced Tina and I husband and wife.

In the end, what matters most is how many lives you touch. And Karl certainly touched mine. He wasn't just my father-in-law, he was my friend. Although he has now moved on, he will remain with us through the memories and endless stories that I'm sure we'll be re-telling for years to come. And that's exactly the way Karl would have wanted it......


kw