Chapter 1: Pool Cues and the Margins of the Universe

This will teach him to leave me the keys to the car. What I've been writing most recently is political pieces nobody reads about how wonderful it is to be a Democrat this week. Now, we have fiction nobody will read about a young man who has noticed that the laws of physics are unreliable.

Sorry. Could be worse.

Here goes:

In late 1972 I was living on cash, hustling nine ball in small-town pool halls and bowling alleys all over. All over the South, anyway. I lived out of my car, a rusty Plymouth with expired Arkansas tags that cops never noticed. I was just a few months out of high school and I had so many twenties I couldn’t keep any sizable fraction of them in my wallet. It couldn’t have been more than six or seven thousand dollars but it weighed a ton and I was always worried somebody would find my shoebox and then I’d have to start all over. The sharks I met all drove Cadillacs and wore custom boots. Not me. You pull up in a 1963 Plymouth Valiant with oxidized paint and rust spots wearing Levis and Chucks, nobody’s going to worry about betting a dollar a ball. You take a custom cue out of a leather case at Big Willie’s in Claxton, Georgia and the locals may all decide to take a crack at you, but they’ll also decide, on the spot, how much they’re willing to lose. They’ll risk something for a chance at being the legend they imagine they’ll be if they take down the out-of-towner in front of their friends, but they decide in advance how much that shot is worth, and they won’t go over it. Thirty bucks? Sure. Great story either way. $200? No. I need to make the truck payment. I dressed like a welder and played with the straightest 18 ounce in the wall rack. Even when I was beating them, they figured I was just on a lucky streak that was about to end. I’d keep going until they offered a check, then it was time to go.

I wasn’t a shark, anyway. I was just good with a cue stick. It’s all straight lines, and straight lines always make sense. Always.

“Time to go” meant time to go another hundred miles down the road to another little town that still had hand-painted Saxon’s pecan log billboards by the roadside and an old-fashioned motel with 24 rooms in a square U around a gravel parking lot. When you won big, you had to leave immediately because as many people as you’d taken all their money from were mad as hell and convinced they’d been cheated. People don’t like accepting the fact that they’ve failed and so cook up some way of convincing themselves they’ve been cheated. They convince their friends or a cop and you’ve got trouble. So I was packed and ready to go every day, even if I thought I’d be going back to the same motel that night. You never know.

I never learned the cons, anyway, no need, and kept moving for that next year or so. I made a good chink of change. I’m not sure how much—I was afraid to count it until after I started spending it.

I’d started playing pool when I was little, when my Dad was still in the Air Force. Three was a recreation area with a pool and a rec room at Keesler in Biloxi for base kids, and they had a kind of summer camp every year. My mom would drop me off. As long as you didn’t cause trouble the counselors didn’t care what you did, and I didn’t like making lanyards. I spent all day from the time she dropped me off right after reveille until dinnertime shooting pool. I was just finishing third grade, but I was tall for my age, and got good at it the way kids too when talent and opportunity match up. My sister’s son has a daughter who was always good at soccer—I mean crazy so. When she got to be third or fourth grade one of her coaches put her on an all-star team and I went to see some of her games in the all-star tournament. In the last game she took a shot at goal from the half-field line, something that should be impossible, and it sailed straight into that net just above the goalie’s fingers without a bounce, like an eight ball rolling slowly into a side pocket. The girls on her team all cheered, but the parents on the sideline all just looked at each other. “Did that really just happen?” I was like that with pool.

The Keesler rec room was supposed to be off limits to kids after 5:00 so the enlisted men who didn’t drink could use it, but the airmen noticed the way I played and would keep me around and make bets with each other about who could beat me. If I stayed too late, Mom would send Dad down to get me. On the way back he’d ask me how I’d shot, and I usually had won. I’d get home and Mom would send me to bed without any supper which was a pain because I’ve never liked being hungry.

When Dad got transferred to Eglin—not too far away and just as hot and humid—there was a pool table at the church Mom took us to, and another one in the base enlisted men’s recreation center, but kids weren’t allowed in there except on weekends and holidays. The church didn’t mind me coming in in the afternoons to play, but I could tell they all thought it was a little odd that a fifth grader wanted to play pool by himself for hours every day. It was in that church basement that I started noticing something odd.

When you get good at something you notice really small details. When I make a certain shot, the same thing happens every time, only it doesn’t. It should, and it usually does, but it doesn’t always. It’s hard to explain, partly because so much of what I think and do is self-taught. Not all of it. But nobody ever showed me anything about playing pool. I don’t know any pool lingo. It’s Greek to me. Well, not exactly. I picked up some stuff from watching the way other people played, over the years, but nobody ever taught me how to play. I can play as well as anybody, but if I make a good shot, I can’t explain to another pool player what I’ve done using language that pool players use. What I know is that things tend to bounce off of flat surfaces at the same angle they came in, and that round things bounce off of other in the direction of a line that connects their respective center points at the moment of impact. In optics, we say “angle of incidence equals angle of refraction.” Much of Newtonian physics is an oversimplification, but it yields some elegant phrases.

What I began noticing in the teen lounge of the First Christian Church of the Disciples of Christ in Ft. Walton Beach was that if I made the exact same shot repeatedly I would occasionally get a variant result. Generally the divergence from experience was minimal, but occasionally it was significant, or at least noticeable. If I’d told anyone else about this experience, they’d have explained that my shooting wasn’t as precise as I thought, that normal shakes and trembles or normal slight differences in pressure or force accounted for it all. No matter how consistent I thought I was, I couldn’t be consistent as I seemed to think, which is probably what you are thinking now.

But I was. I could do the exact same thing in repetition and not be assured of the same result. You don’t believe me but it’s true. The only lesson I took away from that at the time, though, was that I could never bet my life on a pool game, no matter how tempting the prize. I didn’t know it, but this was the first sign I had that the margins of the universe are crumbling. The first I recognized, anyway.

I got in trouble that fall with the church and my observations on the inherently unreliable nature of the laws of physics were suspended. The church janitor, a big black man named Mr. Morris, suspected me of smoking Marlboros while I played pool in the rec room when he wasn’t around, and had been trying to catch me. But what got me was Eddie Finch. He was my Sunday School teacher and my nemises the whole time we lived in Florida.

When I was around thirteen this interest in religion kicked in that I really can’t explain. I started listening to what they wee saying and analyzing it. I was too critical, of course, and too prone to doubt that which was taught to me. But still. This is religion. There are holes everywhere and only fools and those who render themselves intentionally ignorant fail to see them. Eddie Finch was incapable of intentionally render himself anything but was nevertheless a fool and a man of great faith.

Not just a garden-variety fool, but a world class fool. He decided he was a painter for a few years and proudly tried to sell paintings that looked less impressive than the Paint-by-Numbers Indian chief I’d done in the third grade. He had managed to marry an attractive woman, had fathered a daughter, and bought a house on the G.I. Bill before he found Jesus in his mid-thirties with a fervor that surprised his pretty, petite wife Jane, who, even to me, a grammar schooler who knew nothing of the ways of grownups, could see often seemed to be looking at her husband with bewildered dismay. Eddie signed up to be a Sunday school teacher, and, not satisfied with hectoring me and my classmates about burning in Hell for our sinful ways, he also signed up for a prison outreach program. As a result he started bringing recently-released felons to church on Sundays, which had some comical results. One special ex-con, a man named Frank Jones who, like a caricature of who he was, had beady eyes, a broken nose, and a crew cut, joined our church, confessing his faith before the congregation one hot July morning. A few weeks later I heard my parents say with some concern that Frank was moving into the spare room at Eddie and Jane’s house, and a few weeks after that, my parents heard tell that Eddie had co-signed the note on Frank’s new car, a used Cadillac with tail fins. A few weeks after that, of course, Frank disappeared, and surprisingly, Jane disappeared with him, leaving Eddie and little Mamie E. Finch in Ft. Walton Beach while Frank and Jane cruised the United States in a Cadillac that Eddie was paying for.

I’ve gotten ahead of myself. Frank came later. In the summer of 1965, Mr. Morris was trying to bust me smoking in the rec room while I was playing pool while my mother kept the books at the new hotel. The following Sunday, Mr. Finch was teaching us about the passage from Matthew in which God is supposed to have said “This is my son, in whom I am well pleased” following Jesus’ baptism by St. John. What occurred to me is the spurious but attractive kind of idea that seizes fifth grade boys. I had a vague sense that we were supposed to believe in a Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. If the Three were One, as we’d been taught, why would one of them be pleased with the other? Wouldn’t this be an un-Christian kind of smug self-congratulation? Not the way to ask the question of Mr. Finch, of course.

ME: (Hand raised) Mr. Finch?

FINCH: Yes, Henry?

ME: I have a question.

FINCH: Yes?

ME: If Jesus and God are the same person, like they teach us about the Trinity and all, why is God saying that? About being well pleased and all. Isn’t it kind of like talking to Himself? I mean, it just doesn’t make a lot of sense.

FINCH: Now you listen here, young man. I’ve just about had it with your questioning me in class and refusing God’s Word. God has a plan for your life and the sooner you shut up and start following it, the better off you’ll be.

ME: But it doesn’t make sense.

FINCH: It makes all the sense in the world. Now you be quiet.

Sometime later I got summoned to Pastor Leslie’s pastoral study, which I liked. The room, I mean. Full of books. Bibles in Greek and Hebrew. He was a nice guy in some ways but stuck on himself. I don’t remember how I got summoned to the pastoral presence, but knew when I got there I was in trouble because Eddie Finch had complained about me.

After I was seated he lit his pipe and filled the room with a heavy, rich-smelling smoke that pleased me at the time but would horrify me today.

“I hear you have been crossing swords a little bit with Ed Finch,” he said.

“I guess so.”

“He says you challenge his authority,” said Pastor Leslie.

“No, sir. I just ask questions. And I really want to know the answers. I’m not trying to cause trouble or anything.” I had friends who asked clearly stupid questions to make trouble or jokes. In ninth grade science class, after Mr. Spain said we could fill out our science tests in “pencil, pen, or any writing implement you choose,” Louis Bonderant raised his hand and asked Mr. Spain if he could fill out his test in Chap-Stick. I wasn’t that kind of a kid.

“So Leonard tells me he’s been finding cigarette butts in the basement after you play pool there.”

“Leonard?” I asked.

“Mr. Morris. The Negro who takes care of the church,” the pastor said, puffing on his pipe. People used the word “Negro” with no self-consciousness in 1965. That this was true, that there was no self-consciousness of it, seems one of the most improbable facts of my life.

“Oh. Well, I’m surprised,” I said.

“I think we need to think of a way to keep you focused,” said Pastor Leslie, and continued talking. I could not, unfortunately, continue listening. I had too much experience ignoring him to abruptly change course now. Trains leave stations. The Universe expands. People ignore Pastor Leslie. He gave these Godawful sermons that he would repeat on special occasions. He had this sermon about a hunchbacked kid named Zia or Zeah whose hump magically disappears when he meets the Christ Child. It’s basically Amahl and the Night Visitors without a crutch or music. It was awful, and he did it every year at Christmas. Luckily we moved on to South Carolina after I’d heard it three times. Or was it LeJune? Why would we have been at Camp LeJune?

Pastor Leslie eventually asked me a question, and since my mind was wandering in all sorts of non-church directions I had no idea what he was talking about and that was a problem because Pastor Leslie always wanted to be listened to. Telling me something important was his role and being educated was mine and the fact that I didn’t know my lines convinced him that Eddie Finch was on to something.

“Focus, yes,” he said, filling the room with rich smoke. “Here’s what we’re going to do. Your pool privileges at the church are suspended for this week. Next week I’m going to ask Ed how he felt your Sunday School experience was, and if he thinks it was good, your pool privileges will be reinstated. Thereafter, as long as Mr. Finch thinks Sunday School is going well and Leonard doesn’t find any more cigarette butts, your pool privileges will continue. All right?”

“Ah, Hell.”

“What was that?”

“Oh, well.”

“What do you think of this arrangement, William?” he asked, with a smug look that only a pipe-smoking protestant preacher can have.

“Well, I guess I’m never going to shoot pool again, because Mrs. Leslie comes down to smoke a Marlboro three or four times a day during the week. She always shoos me out, but it always smells like smoke after she’s gone,” I said.

There was an awkward pause.

“You are mistaken,” he said. “My dear wife gave up smoking almost a year ago.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Smoking cigarettes is sinful. Injurious to the body, and so, indirectly, injurious to the soul.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I would know if my dear June were still smoking. I could smell it on her clothes. Plus she would never lie to me,” he said.

“Hmm.” I said. I was forcing him into trouble with his wife. Foolish. Change gears.

“Yes?” he asked, black eyebrows arched.

“Have you noticed how things don’t always work out the same?”

“How so?

“How you do something the same way and get different results some of the time?” oddly, he was completely content to have me redirect the conversation completely.

“Well, Henry, I like to think of this as God’s way of adding nuance to the universe, and of reminding us to be grateful for the world He has created. I repeat some of My most popular sermons from time to time, and I have noticed, as you say, by the differences in the way My flock has reacted to them over the years.” He pulled on his pipe several times in rapid succession to get it burning good again, filling the study with smoke. He formed his bearded lips into an O and blew a perfect smoke ring that descended softly to the floor and then bounced up towards the book cabinets, still turning axially around its own tiny radius. I jumped in surprise. He didn’t notice. “Over the years,” he said, “I’ve come to think of it as another one of God’s many blessings. Small variations in the stresses I give different parts of the sermons, and larger variations in the mood and composition of the individual members of My congregation, yields big differences in reaction. Some years Mrs. Jameson cries when Zeah stands up straight, and sometimes she doesn’t. It’s rewarding either way. You see?”

“Dr. Leslie, I’m sorry, but that’s not right.”

“Mrs. Jameson crying at my Christmas sermon?” he asked.

“No, that makes perfect sense. What doesn’t make sense is what just happened to that smoke ring,” I said. It just wasn’t right. Really.

“How so?”

“It sailed ten or twelve feet from your lips then bounced off the floor without losing its spin. That’s just not right.”

“They all do that,” he said.

“No they don’t. They dissipate a few feet from your mouth and won’t even bounce off of a pool table, much less off a floor with shag carpeting.”

“I would be interested to know how you came to these conclusions, but am more interested in why you think Mrs. Jameson’s reaction to my Christmas sermon makes sense. Perfect sense, I think you said,” he said. I waited, hoping he’d blow another smoke ring, but no.

“If I tell you, will you blow another smoke ring?” I asked.

He deliberated. “Perhaps,” he said. Asshole. Wouldn’t even commit to a smoke ring, and he’s always trying to sell me eternal life. People truly are fractal and resemble themselves at all levels. Nietzsche was right: look more redeemed. I don’t like these things where the Universedoesn’t follow its own rules and wanted to track this one down. Except for the errata I was noticing on the pool table the only examples I’d noticed up to that point were a few times when I thought I could see through my big sister when she came home from college (I never could see through her when she was in high school) and a few occasions when I seemed to be able to see through my own eyelids when half-asleep.

“Okay,” I said. “Mrs, Jameson is an alcoholic, but she keeps it under control by only allowing herself to drink on the weekend. When Christmas Eve falls on a Saturday or Sunday, she’s been drinking by the time she gets to your candlelight service, which is when you preach Zeah, and she cries. If Christmas Eve is on a weekday, she shows up sober and doesn’t cry.”

For a kid to be honest with an adult is always risky, and this one didn’t seem to go well. Pastor Leslie frowned and sat up and pulled on his pipe. He looked into the distance in a troubled way. He blew a smoke ring, but I think it was an absent-minded smoke ring not intended to satisfy me. I followed it with rapt fascination as it bounced first off of a wall , then a glass-fronted book case, then disappeared into the thick cloud of smoke over Pastor Leslie’s head. Damn.

“How can you be sure about this kind of thing?” he asked. Amazingly, the smoke ring came sailing down out of the cloud, having apparently bounced off of the ceiling. Unfortunately, as it sailed towards the floor it hit the toe of his expensive-looking semi-wingtip, which was bouncing all of a sudden, and broke up. Smoke ring entropied, I could answer his question.

“About Mrs. Jameson,” I said. “Her step-son Mark Ralston is a friend of mine,” I said. True. We always played at his house on weekends and my house on the weekend. One Saturday when I was over there she’d been putting out cigarette butts in the front right eye of the electric range in the kitchen under the misapprehension that it was an ashtray.

Pastor Leslie gazed off in the distance some more and pulled pensively on his pipe.

“So will you blow me another smoke ring?” I asked.

“Here’s what we’re going to do,” he responded. “Your pool privileges are suspended for a week.”

“Aah, shit,” I said.

“Mind your tongue,” he said. “I’m going to talk to Mr. Finch next Sunday. If he believes you were appropriately involved with your Sunday School class, then your pool privileges will be reinstated. If your pool privileges are reinstated, it will only be on your word of honor as a gentleman that you will not be smoking inside the church. Agreed?”

“When did I ever claim to be a gentleman?” I asked.

“Agreed?” he asked.

“All right,” I said.

“I’m going to give you something else to occupy your time,” he said. He reached behind his desk and pulled out a Prussian blue book titled “Gospel Parallels.”

“What’s this?” I asked, leafing through it. Each page listed three columns, labeled “Matthew,” “Mark,” and “Luke.”

“It points out the similarities between the three synoptic Gospel narratives,” he said. “Some of the stories in the Gospels appear in all of them, some in two, some in only one. This book is designed to point up the similarities.”

“What’s synoptic mean?” I asked. I was fascinated. Immediately. Completely.

“It’s from the Greek. It means they all look the same,” he said.

“Why Greek?”

“The New Testament was originally written in Greek,” he said.

“Really? Are you sure? Not Hebrew?”

“Quite sure.” He got up to open a window. “Sorry, getting a little stuffy in here,” he said. Putting his pipe aside. “In Palestine in the days of Jesus, they didn’t speak Hebrew, anyway. They spoke a language called Aramaic. Scholars refer to the Aramaic of Jesus’ day as Syriac.”

“There are four Gospels,” I said. “This only has three columns. What happened to John?”

“He’s not synoptic. The Gospel according to St. Johm doesn’t have many narrative details in common with the other Gospels,” he said.

“Why not?” The world that had been opened to me was one would vex me for the rest of my life.

“You will be able to figure this out for yourself in time, Henry. Now I really must be getting to the fellowship hall. Do you understand our agreement?”

“I guess. When Mr. Finch says I can, you’ll let me use the pool table, but until then I read this book.”

“I think it’s in there somewhere. I’ll talk to you next week.” He smiled.

It was a mug’s game, of course. I didn’t ever get to use the church pool table again. Mr. Finch consistently told Pastor Leslie that I interrupted him, or squirmed in my chair, or did something wrong. But that was okay. Eddie Finch’s pain-in-the-assedness led me to the Niceville Poolhall where I reacquainted myself with some friends from Biloxi, and also resulted in weekly conferences with Pastor Leslie about my conduct, and when that was done, about the synoptic Gospels. He was a pompous blowhard, but he really did know Biblical textual criticism.

How did I get here from 1972? I need to go back. Excuse me.