Steve Gibbs Autobiography

For Sunday, July 7, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,280 words Abio 30: Our road-trip wedding – pt 2 We left off last week with me in Niagara Falls trying to get across the Canadian border back into the United States with Susan’s kids, two unrelated minor children with no ID, and a Toyota van with no license plate. We were driving across country to get married in Pennsylvania. Susan would fly in later. The border guards interviewed us separately, searched my VIN and van, and called Toyota Vallejo. Lastly, they called Susan. Luckily, she vouched for us, and they let us go. We (we, we, we all the way home) ran into a new problem back in Ridgway. We couldn’t find anyone to marry us. First, I called an old high-school friend who had become Pastor John. His religion required us to go through two weeks of solid counseling before he could marry us because Susan was a divorcée. We called another faith and they, too, turned us down. They did not marry divorced people eit...

For Sunday, June 30, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,237 words Abio 29: Our wedding road trip across two countries My loving relationship with Susan grew stronger as time went by. We had so much fun together. She was comfortable in every situation. We could hang out with the homeless or royalty, and she’d treat everyone with equal respect, never talking down to anyone. I came to realize that I could even take her back to rural Ridgway PA, and she would get along with my childhood friends and family without passing judgement or getting beat up for being uppity. I had several California girlfriends and never considered taking any of them to my childhood town. Dana was Hispanic, Dorothy was black, and my childhood friends could be racists at times. Janet, a forceful feminist, would have likely got into a fight as soon as someone whistled at her, or called her Chickee, or complimented her on her shape and beauty. She took no guff. To this day, she and I stil...

For Sunday, June 23, 2024 Dummer Column, Gibbs, 1,214 words Abio 28: Trial by fire The final assignment in my teaching credentialing program at Hayward State was to do a stint of student teaching solo in a real classroom. I was assigned to teach English at Willard Junior High in South Berkeley. I learned something new right away. I learned that my credential training taught me all sorts of educational theories, methodologies, and evaluation techniques, but there was one thing that college did not teach me, didn’t even mention; they never taught me crowd control. How am I going to transfer the joy of reading and the ideas of great thinkers if the students don’t pay attention, don’t want to pay attention, have no interest in anything I say. They just wanted to mess around, talk, yawn, and see what they could get away with. I won’t say all the students, but a lot. I earned their ire. I also earned the ire even of the good students. One girl, perhaps the smartest kid a...

For Sunday, June 16, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,218 words Abio 27: On becoming a teacher Here is another story from my earlier days living in Berkeley and dating Susan. At my phone company job, once AT&T divested and we became Pacific Telephone, the Phone Centers folded and I was transferred to a cubicle in a large office on the second floor. My job was to answer the phone and help customers with problems or address transfers. Also, I was expected to sell, sell, sell. I never was comfortable with hard selling, unless the customer asked about a product or service. Hopes for a promotion dissipated. I felt trapped in a box, but kept doing my best. Things all fell apart one day. I took a call from a little old lady who had Lifeline Service on a fixed income. Lifeline was limited to 30 outgoing calls a month for $2.50. Looking at her account, she only made about a dozen calls a month, all to the same few numbers. She was in desperation. “What is the problem...

For Sunday, June 9, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,186 words Abio 26: An embarrassing life experience Before I move on and share how, when, and where I married Susan, I’d like to share a few more short experiences I had while living in my one-room, converted-from-a-porch Berkeley apartment while Sue and I were dating. Here’s one now. I was once naïve. Born and raised in a rural 99.5-percent white Appalachian small town, I didn’t have much exposure to world cultures and people. Even Penn State was a white out. Then I moved to California, Modesto, and on to Berkeley in the multicultural Bay Area, a melting pot of fine stew. Unlike many, I prefer both the city and the country equally. I lived downtown, but I enjoyed backpacking around the state. One of my early expeditions was to Andrew Molera State Park along the coast of Big Sur. Janet and I had parted, and I had only just met Susan. I went alone to Big Sur with my frame pack strapped to my motorcycle. I hiked the Pi...

For Sunday, June 2, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,338 words Abio 25: Selling phones and meeting Susan “If you can’t speak the language, or are a new refugee, your bill might be $$100 a month If you can speak the language, but you don’t understand our sales techniques, your bill might be $50 a month. If you know the language, and you understand our products and sales methods, your bill might be $12.90” -- Berkeley Bob, multiple award winner for sales competitions and free trips to Hawaii. Ma Bell, AT&T, a beloved monopoly of service and support, got a divorce from herself in the ‘80s. She divested. Things changed. Sales not service took front seat. We became Pacific Bell Telephone. Gone were the Operator days of waking up a random customer at 5 a.m. with Dial a Joke. When we transferred, Janet and I, from Modesto to Berkeley, our jobs changed. Janet delt with service and billing on Shattuck and Rose and I was in sales down on Webster Street in Oakland, separate depa...

For Sunday, May 26, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,289 words Abio 24 – Berkeley in my time Berkeley in my time, 1980. Berkeley, where the nuts hunt the squirrels. Berkeley, where the hairy, multi-colored hippies ruled the day. Berkeley, where they closed Telegraph Avenue to traffic every weekend and held a peddlers’ fair. Blondie’s $1 pizza slices. The Soup Kitchen’s $1 bowl of soup with a hunk of big bread. Persian Bongo Burger’s $1.25 breakfast of two eggs, hash browns, toast, and a glass of OJ. Café Mediterranean gourmet coffee and one of the first unisex bathrooms, which confused my visiting Pennsylvania sister Carol who was looking for the ladies’ room and flat out refused to believe me when I told her everyone used the same facilities. It grossed her out. She refused to use it, and I walked her to People’s Park. For me, having grown up in a rural Appalachian tiny town with one main street and 11 stores, moving to Berkeley was a lot to take in. Living in State...

For Sunday, May 19, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,355 Abio 23 – O what a beautiful day The story of O operators has changed considerably. It looks like the 911 Operators are today’s new O operators, pulling double duty. They don’t just get calls about robberies and murders and other evil, but they also field calls like, “My fried chicken is on fire. What do I do?” and “My neighbor keeps playing the same stupid song over and over, do something.” I’ve already written of the antics and bomb threats that lightened my day as an O operator, but I couldn’t fit them all in; like the time I called 411 in Jamaica and 411 in Anchorage, Alaska simultaneously, and covered my mic. “411. How may I help you? “411. How may I help you? “This is 411. What can I do for you.” “No. I am 411. Who are you? “I am 411 in Anchorage, Alaska. “Anchorage, Alaska! I am from Jamaica.” “Jamaica. How did you get on my line? And what’s the weather like down there?” ...

For Sunday, May 12, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,276 words Abio22 – Guest Editorial: Janet writes about us Janet, my first California girlfriend, has been proofreading my autobiography. I asked her to detail some of the things we did together. It reads so well, I’m running it as she wrote it, with her permission. It’s fun to recall these things. You were the first boyfriend with whom I had a normal, happy relationship. You were my introduction to fun. My first two boyfriends proposed to me; I was happy in this relationship where we loved each other but didn’t want to get married. I don’t know if I told you this or not, but I was first attracted to your postings on the bulletin board at work. “New errors and irregularities: Failing to specify AM or PM to a blind person requesting the time. Referring to a male customer as ‘ma’am’ or a female customer as ‘buddy’ or ‘mac’....” I was delighted and relieved that someone funny worked there, but I didn’t know w...

For Sunday, May 5 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,338 Abio 21: Hello, Operator There I stood on California soil engulfed in the departing exhaust of the Greyhound bus, my only home for the last six days. “Modesto Water Wealth Contentment Health.” I crashed with Cheryl my ex and my best friend Alan her husband, Alan until I got my own studio apartment. I became an O operator for AT&T. I know, college grad, I should have done better, but I thought being O was cool and I had fun with it. With 60 women and three guys, one with a lisp, the phone company needed my special skills on the midnight shift, 10-6, to act as the baritone intercepting voice when drunks and perverts called the female operators at 3 a.m. with vulgar requests and salacious profanities. In my lowest register I would say, “Hello, this is the operator. What can I do for you.” I thought I sounded like Batman. I horsed around. I hooked the Godfather Bar to Dial a Prayer. “He...

For Sunday April 28, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,354 words College and Pennsylvania were behind me. I graduated on Saturday, caught a bus on Wednesday, and moved to California. Today’s episode marks the crossover – the end of Pennsylvania memoirs, and the beginning of California memoirs. Expect a more mature me now, because, of course, I’m all grown up, and I’ve learned all my lessons, and I have an English diploma. Stories need hooks to live, just like fishermen. The hooks for my PA Survival Years were these questions, “What kept an intelligent rural hick disinterested in college? What turned him around in those three years after high school? The hooks for the California memoirs will be these: “Who do I think I am now? What influenced me to get here? Did I ever get published with my Berkeley return address? My last day on Penn State campus, I was feeling so happy, I cut into my counselor’s office and said, “I might want to stick around and get my...

For Sunday, April 21, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,313 words For my final summer job, I decided to become an oil-field roughneck in Oklahoma. My Uncle Bill had been taunting me to come out and make some real money. He’d find me a job in no time. I caught a bus to Blanchard, Oklahoma. Uncle Bill was a big-shot tool pusher – in other words he was highly skilled at unsticking the giant Hughes drill bits when they got stuck in rock two miles underground. He could wriggle them free. Aunt Maxine set me up in a bedroom, but I seldom saw my Uncle Bill. He was always too busy to find me a job. Something urgent. He had early-morning helicopter-in-the-yard kind of urgencies. I wandered around Blanchard and met a guy, Rick, my age. I explained how I was seeking summer oilfield work, but my uncle was too busy to help. Rick was bored. He said, “Hell, I’ll take you out to the rigs. Get in.” We hopped into his dusty, dented Ford Capri and drove to the first rig, a...

Sunday, April 14, 2024 1,284 words Abio 18 - Two stories for the price of one Dorm adjustment. Year three, University Park, student dorms, me trying to adjust, my roommate is studying for the ministry. Always noise in the halls. Water fights. Three large connecting buildings that house over a thousand students, most of them three years younger than me. Three cafeteria meals a day. No Gino cooking. Slowly, I got used to the kookiness and busy pace. I was resigning myself for the mere year. Made a few friends. Then the unspeakable happened. Please don’t be too angry with me, but I got a call from Suzie Sunshine, the California artist I met in Ridgway over the summer. We’d hooked up briefly. I’d shown her my log cabin. She was calling me from her home in Rancho Palas Verdes, Southern California. Daddy was a navy admiral. “I’m pregnant,” she said, “and I don’t know what to do.” I couldn’t handle another abortion. I said, “Drive back to State College and we wi...

For Sunday, April 14, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,284 words Dorm adjustment. Year three, University Park, student dorms, me trying to adjust, my roommate is studying for the ministry. Always noise in the halls. Water fights. Three large connecting buildings that house over a thousand students, most of them three years younger than me. Three cafeteria meals a day. No Gino cooking. Slowly, I got used to the kookiness and busy pace. I was resigning myself for the mere year. Made a few friends. Then the unspeakable happened. Please don’t be too angry with me, but I got a call from Suzie Sunshine, the California artist I met in Ridgway over the summer. We’d hooked up briefly. I’d shown her my log cabin. She was calling me from her home in Rancho Palas Verdes, Southern California. Daddy was a navy admiral. “I’m pregnant,” she said, “and I don’t know what to do.” I couldn’t handle another abortion. I said, “Drive back to State College and we will share an a...