You Don't Play Bridge? Well, It's Not Important

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
of the Minneapolis Tribune editorial page staff
published by the StarTribune
date (prob.) Feb 1952

   THERE ARE crosses one must bear which leave permanent scars and make one yearn for the life of a lighthouse keeper on some rockbound and inaccessible reef.
   Mine is a colossal ineptitude at the bridge table, from which prospective participants have been known to scatter like hares before the hounds at my approach.
   You may write this attitude off as complete nonsense. What matters it, in these times of crises, cold war and one dollar hamburger whether one can play bridge? There are, after all, really important things to do.
   I have attempted, as a defense measure, to assume this state of mind. However, one cannot forever go around stoop-shouldered with responsibility just because the war in Korea may become World War III. Man is a social being and is sometimes forced to act like one even when bridge is involved. And my pride, though flattened repeatedly, still survives. When some galoot sitting opposite me, whom I have appraised as no smarter than I, looks at the ceiling and sighs patronizingly when I trump his ace, I long to go home and cry into my pillow. A small thing, really, a mere dagger thrust to the vitals.

   I GAIN a measure of solace, however, from the fact that my partner in life is, herself, as awe-inspiring a blank at bridge as I am. The only time I can play the game comfortably is when she is my partner. Who is she to frown when I am set four tricks? And who am I to point the accusing finger when she, with a bust hand, jumps my bid?
   In a moment of madness last winter--after we had gained delusions of competence by playing, now and again, with a couple about as dumb as we were--we accepted membership in a bridge club. My brother-in-law, curse his iniquitous soul, tendered the invitation. He eased our doubts with assurances that the paramount aim at these once-a-month functions was sociability, that bridge was strictly secondary, and that if we slipped occasionally it didn't matter. "We don't play seriously at all," he said. "It's strictly for fun."

 For him and the others it may have been. For the Guthries it was blood, sweat and fumbleitis. The only times we shined was at the dessert luncheon preceding the fiasco. The wife and I yield to no one when it comes to stashing away groceries, but even the delight of dipping into the cuisine was dulled by thoughts of the approaching ignominy.

   LET ME give quick assurance that our fellows in the bridge club were sound and gracious citizens, with astounding tolerance for our miscues. But they came to play bridge and did not care, overmuch, to mix it with conversation about the weather, and little Joe's recent bout with the mumps.
   They played with rapidity and chilling efficiency. And after a hand had been played they could post-mortem the operation right down to the last trick. The only thing I am reasonably sure of, at the conclusion of each round of play, is that I originally held 13 cards. How many honors? I couldn't say. I am not one to mull over the past.
   Well, demons for punishment that we are, we finished the season out and then resigned, saying that I had come down with a slight case of leprosy. They expressed regret but in their hearts they knew relief. We hold no grudge and if they do, we don't blame them.

   WE DON'T play bridge any more. We have entered new fields. Happily--although it took a bit of doing--we have found two other couples with no more card sense than we have--and we play canasta. At least we call it that. I saw recently where they changed the rules or something but gave the item small heed. I knew none of us would understand.
   We have dessert, too, just like at the bridge club, and approve this practice heartily.


Copyright 2020 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.
 
 

Being Polite Shouldn't Be Hard

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
Of the editorial/opinion page staff
published by the StarTribune
October 31, 1965


  SMALL BUSINESS deserves to survive. If and when we reach the point where the big and brassy restaurant, grocery and gas station chains have buried the small, independent entrepreneur, much charm will have left the American scene.


   If you can't drop in at the corner grocery for a loaf of bread and some conversation, if Joe's hardware and  Nelson's Drug have bowed to a four-acre merchandising complex that has everything but the personal touch, you are going to find shopping less fun and loafing spots less available.
   More and more small operators are knuckling under, shaking their heads at the inevitability of it all, wishing they'd had the foresight to go to work for the gas company instead of trying to buck the system, and bowing resignedly to an unyielding fate.

   YET FATE IS NOT entirely out of their hands. Nobody can precisely pilot his ship of destiny against the present waves of uncertainty, but he can abandon some irrational practices which are washing him toward the economic reefs.
   For one thing, he can be courteous and insist on courtesy by his employees. This is a commodity that costs nothing and which should be expended lavishly. It pays fat returns. But the fellow who fills your gas tank is often brusque and uncommunicative and the clerk who sells you the nails sometimes gives the impression that you've imposed on him.

   There is one drug store I keep out of for fear the boss will wait on me. He's a nice enough person but always clerks with a cigar in his face. Some of my best friends smoke cigars but I don't care to be enveloped in fog while getting a bottle of shaving lotion. A friend of mine went forth to buy a color television set the other day and didn't buy one at a certain store because the clerk perfumed the air with cigarette smoke while waiting on him. How unwary can a salesman be?
   My wife and I recently took lodging for the night in a Wisconsin motel and decided to eat at a nearby cafe. It was an unfortunate decision. The food was no good and the service was so bad as to defy belief.
   The lone waitress finally tore herself away from the jukebox long enough to wander over listlessly with menus. We had to ask for water. When you have to ask for water you know you're in the wrong place. You can anticipate no gastronomic delight.

   BUT WHAT MYSTIFIED us more than the indifferent food was the hostile attitude of the waitress. When my wife asked if she could have a glass of iced tea the gal said "no." Not "I'm sorry, we have none" but a cold and unadorned "no."
   Somehow we had spoiled this babe's day. We shall continue to wonder what activates the mind of such a person, but we won't go there again. I predict that the next time we pass that way the  place will be out of business or under new management. And if the proprietor wants to know why he failed I can tell him.
   There's seldom such stupidity in a chain operation. Bigness dulls contact with the customers. The employees haven't much time for jokes and small talk. But the patron usually finds smiles and courtesy--and is made to feel welcome.

Copyright 2020 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.

To Be Smart Isn't an Unmixed Blessing

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
of the Minneapolis Tribune editorial page staff
published by the StarTribune
May 12, 1956


   I WOULD NOT MIND winning $1000,000 merely by supplying a few right answers, as did Lenny Ross, the 10-year-old Californian who hit the big television quiz jackpot a while back.
   With that much booty to draw on, a fellow would be rather well sheltered against the darts and arrows of adversity, but I would not say that Lenny's worries are all behind him, even though he is unquestionably smart. One of the chief reasons he'll have trouble, in fact, is because he is smart. I have had contact with a few intellectuals in my day and have vicarious knowledge of their operations and sufferings.

   SOME FOLKS have a flair for mathematics, others for history, literature, geography or science. They are exceptional in one or two subjects and blanks in others. Not so with the real big brains, as Lenny Ross appears to be. They are good in everything. They have the intellect and also the will to excel. They can skim through history assignments and remember names, dates and places. They can tell you the capitals of all 48 states, what countries border on Switzerland, what the principal products of Madagascar are, and what Grant said to Lee at Appomattox.
   The rest of us read slower, re-read, and retain less. As a lad in school I could while away an hour reading about the Whisky rebellion or the surrender of Cornwallis and, come class time, know only that whisky was intoxicating. And I wasn't sure whether Cornwallis gave up at Yorktown or got clobbered at Manila bay.
   But once the intellectual fastens his mind on a subject it stays there. He is above distractions. The cute little blonde at the desk opposite might as well be in the next county. If there's any daydreaming to be done the smart boy reserves a time for it. It's not while he's attempting to prove that the square of the hypotenuse equals the sum of the squares of the other two sides.

   STILL, to own a big brain isn't an unblemished gift. The intellectual has his weaknesses and must pay the price. Lenny Ross is a stock market expert and may remain one. He can tell you what companies split their stock at a 4 to 1 ratio last year, but 30 years hence will he be able to give the date of his wedding anniversary? Not if he's a typical big dome. The big dome cannot be bothered with such trifles. He is absorbed with larger things.
   They may not be things financial like mergers, articles of incorporation or when to unload those shares of Consolidated Tinfoil. It may be some wrinkle whereby the circle can be squared or invention of a contraption to ease the first olive out of the jar or a way to convert surplus wheat into insulation.
   While his mind is fastened on these big things he comes a cropper on the domestic front. He forgets family birthdays, fails to notice that his wife is wearing a new dress or hat or has been to the beauty parlor for a shearing job. He forgets that Aunt Hortense is arriving on the 5:38. He is not at the station to meet her.
   Such lapses can foul up the domestic machinery faster than failure to meet television payments, and cause a wife to wonder if she wouldn't be happier had she married someone they had passed through grammar school because he outgrew the seats.

   WE YOKELS of only moderate cerebral horsepower are trapped on occasions. We have our domestic lapses and spend bleak periods in the deep-freeze. But they are few by comparison. This is understandable. We have less to think about than does the intellectual. If we remember to pay the rent and taxes and bring home the bread and look busy when the boss is around and put gas in the car and occasionally mow the lawn we figure we're  pulling our weight.
   This still gives us time to remember that Sunday is Mother's Day. And we may not be too harried to realize that next Wednesday is Julia's birthday and that two evenings later the Crabtrees and the Whites are coming for dinner "so don't wander off to another ball game with Joe."
   It may be sour  grapes and it probably is, but I can't manage much jealousy for the fellows whose brains and ambitions give them no rest. They are the boys who blaze the trail of progress. We owe them much. I salute them and am thankful that we have them. But I can't envy them. I'd think they'd get awfully tired doing all that thinking--and spending all that time in the doghouse.


Copyright 2020 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.

TO LEARN MORE ABOUT LENNY ROSS, GOOGLE:
[what quiz show was Lenny Ross in during the 1950's]

Recommended reading is from the NYT article "The Early Death of a Bedeviled Genius"

Children Won't Grow Up Unless Parents Let Them

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
of the Minneapolis Tribune editorial page staff
published by the StarTribune
 December 8, 1953


   ALL I KNOW about kids is what I've picked up from having had them under foot for 23 years.
   This doesn't qualify me as an expert but I have latched on to one angle of the business which I think has  merit. I pass it along in the hope that it will help dehorn a dilemma.
   You need only to be half bright to recognize an elementary fact if it slugs you over the head long enough. But some of our authorities and investigators of juvenile delinquency either haven't seen it or consider it too trifling to mention in their exhortations against youths' shortcomings.

   WE READ about juvenile dope addiction, gang wars, zip guns and burglary and hear that these are the natural consequences of present-day aversion to warming Percy's pants in the woodshed. We let Percy do too much as he pleases. We don't say "no"--and make it stick--often enough. We don't keep a close enough eye on Percy.
   This may be true. But my conviction is that we often keep too close an eye on him. We shield him too much, suffocate him with protection. I've known cases where Percy got more money to spend than was good for him and was heavily pampered otherwise but who was denied the family car because no kids of 15 had brains enough to drive. Neither could Percy go out with the gang to anything rougher than a taffy pull. Nor could he date the girls. He must wait until he's 18.
   This adds up to no sense. Any child so under the parental thumb will do one of two things. He'll rebel or submit. Either is bad. The rebel is apt to kick over the traces completely, turn vandal, leave home and wind up a bum--or a solid citizen.
   But the non-rebel is lucky to wind up as anything. Here is the saddest apple in the barrel. His parents call all the shots. He comes and goes by their leave or bidding. He goes out one night a week and checks in before midnight with a full report. Mom and Dad never have to worry about Percy.

   THEY DON'T until the time comes when Percy must go it alone. Then they worry plenty. The poor kid gets lost in the traffic. He's unprepared. He's never faced responsibility, never gotten himself out of a jam, never made a decision, never been weaned.
   If mom and pop aren't around to prop him up all he can fall back on is a persecution complex. Everyone has it in for him. He blames misfortune on his wife, his boss, his job or his health--everything and everybody but the fellow he sees while shaving. Sometimes he wakes up. And sometimes he remains little Percy, forever an egomaniac, a misfit and a pest.

   WE FINALLY got smart enough at our house to make the kids do everything for themselves that they could. Operating on this theory may make home unattractive at times but it starts the weaning process early. Homesickness never touched our young ones. They were always eager for scout camp and would just as readily have taken off for Tahiti.
   If they wanted money we suggested that they mow lawns, shovel snow or babysit. When my son turned 15 and wanted to drive the car I told him nothing doing. Then I thought again and decided to be glad he had gumption enough to want to drive. There comes a time when you simply must give Percy his wings and if he's never had any trial hops he'll flop. Tragedy may befall Percy but if you're guided by fear of what might happen, Percy simply won't grow up.
   Given a loose rein, he may start to smoke or shoot craps. He may come in some night smelling of hops or Old Cornhusk. Such things can be disheartening but this is no proof that Percy is going to the dogs. He's just floundering some in testing his wings.

   WHEN you've sold him as well as you can on the merits of upright living, safe driving and honest toil and keeping out of jail--and when you've done your best to set a good example--you've done about all you can. The rest is up to Percy. You can only trust that enough of what he's been told will stick to get him from the dizziness of adolescence to the common sense of maturity.
   You may pay dearly in worry and frustration by unshackling Percy but you won't keep paying forever. After he grows up, Percy will take over for himself.

Copyright 2020 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.
 

Christmas Season Can Get Pretty Hectic

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
of the Minneapolis Tribune editorial page staff
published by the StarTribune
December 23, 1954


   MY ONLY quarrel with Christmas is that we're crowding a mite too much into it. The significance of the season gets mired in fun and frivolity and fruitcake--and the frustration which comes with trying to do too much in too little time. The enchantment becomes lost in the welter of entertainment.
   All the comings and goings and social shindigs add up to wear and tear on the body, too. Already I feel about as dead as I ever expect to get and it's still the shank of the evening as far as holiday activity is concerned. And I am not the gay type. I am quite a home body, in fact, a comparative square in the social circle.
   My suggestion would be that the season start earlier, say about mid-October. We could take it more leisurely then and wouldn't have to ram the holiday caper into a couple of weeks.

   THE OLDER I get the more frenzied the pace becomes. The greeting card chore, which I once took in stride, now turns me as green as holly.
   Anyway, add to this all the fancy cooking the season demands, the school and church programs and getting the tree up and the lights strung over the doorway and going out or having relatives, friends and associates in for dinner and soon you begin to creak.
   Things are about as well in hand at our place as they ever are at this stage, which adds up to mild chaos. The Christmas tree has finally been subdued and bedecked, after once crashing to the floor with carnage to colored balls, lights and piano. Every year we are going to get a "small" tree that we can handle and every year we don't. The one now crowding the parlor would accommodate an eagle's nest.
   With the tree crisis resolved, we are trying to skewer in some time to have a few folks in to whom we are socially indebted. I can see no time, save perhaps for a hurried breakfast, and have suggested that the debt ride until February, which would give us a month to rest up. But my wife says it's easier to entertain when evergreens are strewn around to detract the eye from the ink stains on the walls and worn spots in the carpet.

   I WAS talking to a neighbor the other day who already had been worn to a nub by the Yuletide pace. He was driving a couple of friends home to pre-Christmas dinner, he said, when his holiday spirits were buoyed by a blowout on Portland avenue. The car slipped off the jack after he had removed the affected wheel, he reported, and by the time a nearby filling-station attendant had provided succor, one precious hour of a tight social schedule had been consumed and he was fit to eat a reindeer raw.
   After dinner the revelers had an appointment in a suburb to the north for fruitcake and a gift exchange and it was past midnight before our hero had his guests deposited on their doorstep and he and his wife were back home.
   There they were met by the array of dinner dishes on table and sink, which "simply had to be done" (over hubby's stern objections) before bedtime. His wife said she had to devote the morning to getting out the rest of the cards, had a bridge club party in the afternoon, and had to devote a few minutes to planning Junior's birthday party, which unfortunately fell the day after.
   So they did the dishes, my neighbor reported, and sang no carols while they worked. Instead, he said, they snapped at each other like wolves around a fallen moose.

   THIS sort of thing is somehow out of spirit with the season and you can attribute it more to the crowded schedule than to man's frailty. You can attribute it, too, to the fact that people don't come equipped with cast-iron innards. After a dozen or so round of cookies, shortbreads, candy, nuts and other goodies (and for some the added burden of lutefisk), the digestive tract tends to clog and the Christmas ecstasy to sag, especially if you get caught, like me, with a jumpy tooth.
   But don't get the idea that I'm hostile to Christmas. I am for it right down to the finish. By the time I figure out what my wife wants for Christmas, and buy it, my joy will be unconfined.

Copyright 2019 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.

 

8-year-old Awaits Thanksgiving Reunion

(Top row L-R) Bob, Dave, Scott, Todd
(Bottom row L-R) Mike, Paul, Mark, Cary

By SCOTT GUTHRIE
Guest columnist for
Charles M. Guthrie
published by the StarTribune
November 23, 1969


   MOM AND DAD told me and my three brothers they had desided to take the bull by the horns as Gramps would say and have all the foks down here for Thanksgiving. They said it woold be a nitemare with eight boys ruffhousing around nocking vases off the tables and banging up the furniture but blood is thiker than water and you half to do your duty to keep the famly together even if you suffer and get gravy on the carpet.

   ALL THE other seven kids have rote the colum for Gramps and now it is my tern except I should of rote before Boby Shoberg did as I am in secund grade and two years older than him and when he rote he had not even got threw kindeygarden yet and did not no how to spell cat. His brothers had to help him.
   My brothers are not helping me which is lucky for me as they are very dum and woold rather tinker with a motorsickle or play hockey or watch TV cartons than get anything in there head.

   GRAMPS gives a kid a dollar for riting his colum and I gess he will do no better than that for me. We have not talked about money but there is no use trying to raze the prise as he is tight and always holding the line on inflashun. But it is a lot of work for one buck espeshully with no help from my brothers but Dad said not to wory as he woold look it over and get rid of the bugs.
   I could not hurt his feelings and tell him to keep his mits out of it but that is how I feel. He is good at fixing up sick dogs and cats which is his bisness and he sings good in a quartet but is not much on lititure and speling.

   DAD SAYS this may be the last time we have everybuddy together and Mom says why, yore fokes look good for a while yet. Dad laffs and says heck, they will live for 20 yrs but it keeps getting harder to get the old man out of a chare. Gramps is jumpy about winter driving and afrade he will skid into the dich. Dad says Gramps may have something their being the driver he is, but as long as Tom is around to drive Dad says it is okay but a year from now Tom may of flew the coop. Tom is Dad's kid brother.
   Dad said it is to bad his old man does not have the zip his mother does as she would be game to take off for Timbukto in a blizard even with the old man at the wheel.
   We have a lot of room now which is nice as their will be 15 hear not counting the dog and us kids will get away by ourself and not be board by Gramps and Dad and Uncle Stan talking politics and telling each other the best way to end the war.

   MY DAD thinks things will work out okay and Uncle Stan says any fool can see we are in trouble but we will save ourself in time. Gramps has gave up hope. He says everything is lousy from baseball to politics.
   Grandma gets sick and tired of Gramps always singing the blues and having all the answers. She says things have been bad before such as the civil war and the depreshun but once we get the war over with and quit throwing all that  money at the moon things will be alright particuly if the young bucks get a haircut and shave.

   MOM SAYS I and my brothers will have to be on our best behavor as it will be a big deal and she needs our help. This means no horsing around unless in the basement. But Dad says it is a good bet the turkey will get nocked on the floor, milk will get spilled in the salid and four or five dishes busted.
   This is all there is and I hope it is one dollar's worth.

Charles M. Guthrie in his chare

Copyright 2019 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.

Thoughts on Not Getting a Dog

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
of the editorial page staff
published by the StarTribune
March 29, 1964


   THERE HASN'T been a dog in the family for 15 years, but we aren't dog haters. My older son has two Scotties and my daughter has a Poodle. The son and daughter now have homes of their own, which is just as well under the circumstances.
   We had a dog for many years, however, and I'd not say unequivocally that I'd never have another. I'm just not the right age for a dog. A young man and and a pooch go well together, and a dog brings comfort and companionship to an oldster. I like to think that several years remain before I'll have to lean on Old Shep in order to get down the street.
   When I advance that far into the shadows I hope I'll be summoned home. The trouble is, I won't be. It will be just my luck to live 20 years longer than I should and have my heirs see the fortune dissipated on nursing-home care.

   ANYWAY, if and when I get old and live in a lonely room, then is when I'll want a dog. Then is when I'll need a friend and it will have to be Old Shep. Until then, though, I hope the fates permit me to be canine-free.
   I was afraid the other day, though, that I'd have a dog in spite of myself. In remembrance of my birthday, this son who has the two Scotties invited us to his place for dinner. His Scotties are mother and son. There was a litter of six and five had been sold.
   "This is a trap," I told my wife. "They're inviting us there for dinner to give me that pup for a birthday present. What'll I do?"
   "Why not accept it? It's old enough by now to be housebroken. It's a registered dog worth at least $100."
   "Not to me it isn't. To me it isn't worth at least two bits."

   "BUT DON'T you know it's stylish to have a dog? One of the reasons we don't circulate in high society is because we're dogless."
   "Well, we had a dog for 13 years and never got within sight of the country club."
   " I know, but that was before dogs were really in. Today the poor have children and the rich have dogs. I was reading in a magazine about dogs having mink sweaters and sable coats, professional dog-walkers and $1,000 funerals. Do you know how much is spent every year for dog and cat food?"
   "Not counting table scraps, you mean?"
   "Definitely not counting table scraps. Only mutts eat table scraps. What is spent annually for dog and cat food totals $550 million, and that is a lot of hamburger--only it isn't hamburger. Hamburger is for the likes of us. It's gourmet stuff."
   "Well," I said, as we pulled up to our son's home, "no dog of mine will get gourmet stuff, mainly because I won't have a dog--I hope. Keep your fingers crossed."

   I IGNORED the two Scotties and concentrated on the grandsons. After we'd eaten a bountiful meal and the birthday cake was brought in, I got my present--a book. Only then did I feel free to mention the subject that had bothered me.
   "You haven't been able to sell the pup, eh?"
   My son looked at me in surprise. "Why, sure! We could have sold him three or four times. Why?"
   "Then why on earth don't you?"
   He grinned at his wife. "She wants to keep him. She thinks he's cute."
   So I'd never even been considered for the dog. For some unaccountable reason, it was quite a let-down.


Copyright 2019 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.