1985 was dominated by my time working for the City of Port Aransas. I began the year unemployed, suddenly as green as could be as Jeri's Instrument Fitter Helper in the oil refinery. There, I had to build my self-esteem, one teaspoon at a time.
When Little Jimmy got fired, and Dad told me to get my application in NOW, everything changed. I did not have to be so on guard anymore. When you work with several thousand other construction workers, who do not even work for the same company as you, it is every person for themselves.
The City was a comfortable niche, 7 am to 4 pm. One hour lunch in which there was plenty of time to go home, eat, and watch the noon news. Every day at 12:30, on KIII Channel 3, a somber and concerned Michael Landon would appear on our television and say: "Could I ask you a very serious question? Have you ever stopped to think of the financial hardships that would result in the event of your death, or the death of your spouse?" He urged us to call for our Academy Life Insurance Kit now, every single day. We almost knew the pitch, word for word.
I pumped the skid-o-kans out on the beach. There were 6 stalls, 3 per side, and toilets constructed of lumber, with plastic tanks beneath and joined by PVC pipe. I would show up with the laser-blue 1977 Chevy Silverado with a 300-gallon fresh-water tank and a pump, and a trailer with a 600-gallon waste tank and a pump. I would hook up to each building, pump them out, blast them with high-pressure clean water and soap so powerful that it had a flashpoint of 74 degrees. When I applied for this, Dad said this was one of the best jobs in the public works department. No one messes with you. As long as you do what you are supposed to, you have it made.
When Dad told me the position had suddenly opened, I was expected to go for it. I had been driving 56 miles one way each day in Dad's car, which got 11 miles to the gallon at best. This job was on the island, I could walk to it, and it was a good job. There would be no "I don't know, I don't think it is a good fit." Dad walked to work every day, so I could drive to Corpus Christi. This opening was an incredible windfall for me.
On the days I was not cleaning the Skid-o-kans (Monday and Friday), I worked with the rest of the operations team. It was the spring brush-and-solid-waste pickup that the town sponsored. I was working with Gary, who did not have a license; he had lost it after a Driving While Intoxicated arrest. Having a license was required to work for the city. So I, who could barely get a standard transmission to move, had to drive this large dump truck. That was rough, but it should not have been. The reality of driving a heavy truck is that there is no need to increase rpm, which I was doing. I was so freaked out that I told Crockett, my boss, I would be better off not driving one of those. He cautioned me, "Well, Mike, that is the job; we need you to drive those." These were words. I think it would have been action if I weren't doing the job no one else wanted to do.
I will admit. I jumped into the fire a little too quick by starting to date someone from work during the first month. Dee worked on the beach crew, and within days, we were living together. Sometimes I was assigned to an extra beach crew after very heavy-traffic weekends. She filled every corner of my eyes and attention. It was fortunate for me that the pace of any of the work I did was a nice, easy one. I am sure that if I worked in the control room of a nuclear power plant, I just might have accidentally blown a state or two off the map out of mere distraction.
As the weeks passed, I became much more proficient with the equipment. Mosquitos were a serious issue in Port Aransas. Our open drainage ditches were a perfect breeding ground for them. To combat that, we mixed used motor oil with diesel and sprayed the ditches with it. The oil coating prevented air from reaching the larvae, and they would die without ever hatching. I know this sounds absolutely crazy by 21st-century standards, but it was normal and needed back then. Dad drove a tractor, and I stood on a wooden platform on the back, shooting oil into the ditches. The city also sprayed Malathion off the back of a small pickup once a month around the island. It was important to keep your house windows closed on those nights.
An old Ford pickup came into the city's possession, once the Dog Catchers' truck. Luther, our former landlady's son, was the animal control officer on the island. The city just bought him a new truck. I started using that truck for putting up signs, which was becoming another of my primary jobs in town. That truck was a 3 on the column, and something about driving it daily, alone, just made all of this gear stuff suddenly sink in. I then was able to drive any standard, any dump truck, tractor, anything. I had no more problems with these pieces of public works equipment.
I had only met Luthor a couple of times, and because the animal control officer reported to the Port Aransas Police Department, Luthor had this air about him of a wannabe cop. One of the jobs that Dad did regularly was to drive the garage truck on the beach to empty the close to 100 55-gallon steel drums. I accompanied him on a holiday weekend run. We got to one of the skid-o-kans, and there was a bowl of water and a plate of dog food, looking like the Gainesburgers that were popular back then. Dad put his hand out and stopped me from walking. He held his finger to his lips: "SHHHHHHH! Luther Trap. If a dog starts eating or drinking, Luther is going to pop up with a gun and yell, FREEZE!" I laughed. I could so picture him in the role of Roscoe P. Coltrain, Sheriff of Hazzard County from The Dukes of Hazzard.
In the summer of 1985, a hurricane entered the Gulf of Mexico. Actually, there were a few that year, but this one appeared to be coming for Port Aransas. Working for the city meant we had the responsibility to secure all the town offices and property, leaving no time to care for our own. Danny had its sights set on us, and we scrambled to brace for impact. Incredibly, I found out why we called them "Skid-O-Kans." There were hooks on the end where we hooked up the pumper truck. We hooked up to those and to the hitch of a truck, a backhoe, or a front-end loader, and anything that could pull one, and started driving down the beach, out Avenue G, Cutoff Road, and then onto the Transfer Station. Towing these heavy buildings on the road was a ton of friction on the wooden runners they were built on, so there was so much smoke coming off them en route. We needed to make sure they were not on fire when we got them to the dump.
Next came the nearly 100 steel drums we used for trash cans. If we left those behind, they would get washed into town like giant bomb projectiles smashing people's houses and properties. I was one of many vehicles collecting these. Glenn and I were working on a dump truck. Ramone, an elderly gentleman who ran the transfer station, was on vacation, so we had hired a temp named David to monitor the dump. He was pretty close to being homeless, which in Port A, meant that you lived on the beach more or less. He was incredibly lazy.
Each contingent of people who were bringing loads of barrels to put in the barn was getting out and stacking them. When Glenn and I got there with our second load, after David did not help with the first. Glenn backed into the barn, and David watched us. Glenn looked at me, "Still too many barrels to get, we don't have time to screw around here." With that statement, Glenn pulled the PTO lever on the dump truck (everyone had been unloading them by hand). David, realizing what was happening, started yelling, "Hey! What are you doing? YOU CAN'T DO THIS! HEEEEYYYYYYY!" The barrels were ejected into a giant pile in the barn in front of David. Glenn opened the door. "Make sure you get those all stacked before the next load comes there." The truck rolled forward, the bed came down, and we headed to the beach for another load.
Dad and others were boarding up the Community Center, City Hall, and the Police Department. As members of the Public Works Department, we could ride out the hurricane in City Hall because, allegedly, it could take a hit from a hurricane. The rest of the population would be evacuated. City Hall had not been tested because it had been destroyed by Hurricane Allen in 1980. No, I would evacuate to San Antonio and would be one of the first allowed to return after it was over to clean up.
At the last minute, Danny turned north and made landfall near Grand Chenier, Louisiana. The task to reverse our preparations commenced immediately. What an experience, though, one I will never forget.
As the months passed, I learned to do so many things. I could operate all kinds of equipment and really enjoyed watching problem-solving on this level. Many improvement ideas came from our people and the department. We sandblasted and repainted our trucks and heavy equipment.
Carl was the Director of Public Works. Crockett was the manager of all the staff. Carl was all Texas and very animated. Crocket was quiet and very collected. Much of the time, Carl was loudly complaining about something or actively making a case for it.
One great memory of Carl was on a cold, late December day. It was unusually cold on the island that day. We stayed in all day, detailing all the pickup trucks so they looked showroom-new. We had cleaned every truck as much as they could be cleaned and shone. It was about 3:35 in the afternoon, and we were all just standing around. Carl addressed the unasked question in the room.
"Y'all want to go home, don't you? You are thinking that I am gonna let you go home early because there is nothing to do. Y'all would like that, wouldn't you? Wouldn't you?"
It was clear that Carl was going to go off about something. This was the build-up. "But you know what? Y'all wouldn't even piss on me if I was on fire! You know that? I would be standing here, burnin up, on fire, and Y'all be like, 'Oh no, Carl, I can't, it's 4 o'clock, I have to go home.' You'd leave me there burnin, and nobody would piss on me!" We all had no idea what to say. "You know I'm right!"
Clearly, this was Carl's way of burning enough time to reach 3:45, at which point he told us to "get outta here." When you are the Director of Public Works in a 2000-person town, you have to be careful because everyone has an opinion about what they see. Carl just had a very colorful way to handle things like this.
Glenn eventually got done with the city and started a lawn service. Dee and I continued to work for the Public Works department. Dad had been working there since 1980, the year he arrived in Texas. He had designed his own police car cages and the cruisers when the town could not afford to buy them. He had overseen the Department at times during his tenure and was even the de facto City Manager when people were out of town.
Dad was a solid and highly valued member of Port Aransas and of this department. It was my honor to work with him there.
*NOTE: The Workin' for the C-I-T-Y reference in the title of the chapter is a tribute to a song that was very popular in 1985 by John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band called "Workin' in the C-I-T-Y."
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