Madras Shirts

More Madras Pants and Horny Pegs

My first recollection of a madras shirts was from Jr. High, maybe in '65. They ruled for a while. But the first pair of madras pants I ever saw was on Jeff Calder, musta been in 9^th grade, if Carey says so. I thought that was really audacious! But Jeff had already established a reputation best described by that term. Mr. Harlow's 9^th grade biology class was a treat. His humor was wry and dry and unlike most of the teachers, he got a kick out of some of the cut-ups in his classes. Jeff and David Campbell (both often in madras shirts) somehow found out Mr. Harlow's birthday was coming up and baked him a "cake" which they presented in class with curious, not-too-sincere smiles on their faces. You could see the alarms going off in his head but with a great look of bogus decorum he invited them to the front of the class and expounded their merits for about five minutes while, from time to time, almost offhand, asking probing questions about their recipe and methods. The truth about the cake was soon apparent to all— already, it looked like roadkill, not a cake. I can't remember all the ingredients, but ketchup figured heavily. Mr. Harlow insisted that they join him in tasting it, and I believe they all did. I thought the roof would come off the class from the din of howling laughter from the rest of us.

Later, in 1970 or so, just after we graduated, I was back home not too late, but after the usual carousing. I was half-listening to the TV, waiting for the local news station, WTVT Tampa/St.Petersburg to wind up the news so they could get on with my favorite show, Shock Theater. The fishing report with "Salty Sol Fleischman" was droning on when all of a sudden my ears pricked up. Salty Sol was ranting, almost mortified, "I want to let you all know that the report we gave last night of a fresh water snook taken by a Mr. Randy Pego of Lakeland, Florida was evidently a hoax." The camera framed a fuzzy, black and white photo of Jeff and (was it?) Ed Upshaw in some sort of hoaky fishing regalia like southwesters struggling to hold up some tiny, miserable-looking baitfish between them. I almost split in half.

It's the little things, right? I could go on, and on but I'll leave room for the next chronicler. Happy birthday, Jeff. You've come to occupy your own synapse in my tangled web of memories and, it seems, in those of many others. One day a great neurologist will isolate and describe this region of the brain. It's the Calder Nodule. It's that part of the brain that makes your wife say, "What the heck were you chuckling about all by yourself in the middle of the night?"

--Tim Sali