Tondeleo: I'm working in the Washington, DC area for a fortnight, so I rang up Doc and let him and Marilyn know I was stateside. I happened to mention that I had a birthday coming up, but I figured he might be just too backwards or country to actually celebrate something as trivial as a friend's birthday.
He said they we're going to be home for the day and to come on down. I got in my rental car and headed down Route 210 towards Western Charles County in Southern Maryland. Doc and Marilyn live about 35 minutes from this rural motorway. It is a world away from Washington DC, and is only an hour and fifteen minutes by car. Of course there is no public transport there.
Imagine my surprise when I knocked on the door and Marilyn greeted me with "SURPRI-I-I-I-ISE, Tondy! It's yer BIRTHDA-A-A-Y! Uncle Doc tol' me so!!!" Then Doc came from a back room and handed me a Wal- Mart bag with the handles tied in a knot and said, "Here, Tondy. It's for your birthday. It'll help ya look like a man, not a sissy baby."
I opened the bag and Doc's gift to me was a Mos
sy Oak brand camouflage shirt like he and most of the men in Nanjemoy and other parts of rural America seem to be so fond of, no, obsessed with. I have no idea why a man would want to look like a tree, and who a man would want to hide from, from the waist up! It's a bit silly, really, isn't it?
You don't want to get in an argument with a rural American about "camo" being silly looking, or not making much sense most of the time. You will probably get your backside whooped. I went to a wedding last Summer with Doc and Marilyn where the Bride's gown was trimmed in camo, the groom was in camo, including a new pair of camo boots, and the minister had on a camo shirt with pictures of white tailed deer hidden in it here and there!
Doc has camouflage shirts, hats, under garments, boots and house shoes, but he wears mostly bib overalls or blue jeans with them. I ask him if he is trying to make it appear as though a pair of trousers with no feet or torso are walking through the woods, and he shakes his head and says I ain't no American.
Marilyn reached behind the couch and pulled out a gift bag with tissue paper (well actually serviettes, or "paper napkins") poking out the top. She had bought a black hat for me, a baseball style hat, with a logo on it. "Happy Birthday, Tondy! Here's a 'merican hat so you can fit in a little better with the boys 'round here. Put it on! It'll fit YOU because it fit me. You got the same size head I got!" I put on the hat and then the shirt, and Marilyn squealed and clapped and Doc shook his head and said now I looked like a Brit trying to hide in the woods. I just can't win with him.
After that he and Marilyn drove me up to Indian Head, to show me the Black Box Theater where they have played, and where he met Duane Mann, whom he thinks is the greatest. "He's a producer or somethin' like that, Tondy. He said me an' Marilyn sound real good."
Then they let me pick where I wanted to eat. In western Charles County there are not too many places that serve the kinds of food I'm accustomed to, and that Doc can afford. I ended up having to choose among the Chinese restaurant, the B&J Carry Out ( a purple and red mom and pop diner with a yellow and red sign out front ) and the Lunch Box.
We ended up at the Lunch Box, where like in most American eateries, they think tea is a cup of hot water with a tea bag laying on the saucer beside it. No milk, either. I put the tea bag into my cup of hot water and added cold milk to it, whilst Doc and Marilyn shook their heads in disgust. Doc paid for his "cheese steak" sub, which is a steak sub, with melted cheese on it, and Marilyn's "BLT" and my bowl of vegetable soup.
When we left, Doc took pictures of me out in front of Chuck's Butcher Shop, which is next to the Lunch Box, and I took a couple of pictures of him, and we went over to see Bruce and Sue Williams and then back to Doc and Marilyn where we ate ice cream and cake and sang some songs. I got to record some more stories and do an hour or so of interviews and then had to go back to my hotel in DC. I told Doc I would make sure I wrote about it on my "blob" as he calls his blog. It was a wonderful 27th birthday. Thanks, Doc and Marilyn!
