It’s the responsibility of every father to A) love, protect, care for and teach their children about life, B) give them the impression that you know all, see all and they will never get away with anything, C) teach them to behave and always be aware of their surroundings and D) in small ways, have fun with them, which they sometimes refer to as torture.

With my son, I would plague him with bizarre nicknames, such as Piotr or Koshkoloshk. By the time I got to the 20th or 30th nickname, he found he’d grown to like some of the earlier ones. Or I might find interesting ways to catch him in a lie. 

Like the time we all went out to dinner at a Greek restaurant, and I knew he was lying about something that had recently happened. He was around 5 or so and after ordering our food, I told him that “I certainly hoped that he was telling the truth, because I have ways of knowing if he’s not.” In fact, I told him “for instance, If you were lying, our food will catch on fire.” At that moment, our Saganaki appetizer arrived. It was fried cheese they set on fire as part of the display. Flames shoot up about six feet.

Worth it to see the look on his face. There were a few lessons like that with him, but no real torture.

My daughter, on the other hand…. well, *she* called it torture. I found it hilarious. See, it mostly stemmed from this thing she has about inanimate objects staring at her. For instance, we had this little green pottery container in the bathroom filled with q-tips. The lid had a little sculpted turtle on it. It sat on a shelf in the bathroom. I eventually noticed that after Theresa was in the bathroom, the lid was rotated away, so the little turtle was facing away from the general direction of the toilet. I would turn it around so it would face the toilet and sure enough, it would be turned away the next she was in there. Interesting. 

Watching an old Doctor Who, there was a scene that took place back stage at a theater, where the Doctor was chasing the bad guy, who picked up a prop horse head and threw it at the Doctor. When the cheap and shoddy horse head prop turned toward the camera, she freaked out because the thing was “looking” at her. I found this particular phobia odd and didn’t really think she was that serious about it, or that it was that bad. Until the eyeball. 

I considered it a bit of a running joke that I’d either turn the turtle in her direction in the bathroom, or one time, I went into her bedroom during the day, and on the high shelf over the bed, I positioned each of her stuffed Rugrat dolls so they’d be peeking over the edge at her. She would move them back with a “very funny, dad!”. So I thought it was really just more of a back and forth joke, honest to god. But then of course, I went too far.

One day, I just thought it’d be hilarious if I drew this giant eyeball and stuck it to her ceiling over her bed. But I’d make sure it was day time when she went in there and saw it, I’d be there too, to get the reaction, but also for comfort if she didn’t like it. Is was quite a good and convincing eyeball. Here’s the thing–something came up during the day, work or whatever and I totally forgot all about it. She never noticed it all day and everything went on like normal, until later that night.

I was watching tv, when suddenly, there’s this blood curdling scream from the other room. Suddenly, I remember. Oh shit. 

Suffice it to say, I was in the dog house, I felt horrible, but she eventually forgave me, and I no longer played anymore eyeball jokes on her. Well, not until she was much older and was far less likely to be traumatized. 

Interesting side note: you know when you’re at an airport or hospital or some restaurant, and you go to the bathroom and there’s that plastic, fold up diaper changing table in there? You ever notice the big koala bear cartoon logo sticker on them? Boy, that thing freaks her out, big time. Still does, to this day. She still feels like it’s “looking at her”.

So listen, if you ever happen to be in one of those bathrooms and are seated in front of the koala, do NOT take a pic with your cell phone and send it to her. Under NO circumstances should you do that. EVER.

Because she really hates it when I do it. 

(Disclaimer: the following excludes any and all Impact people I used to work with. That’s a different blog. This is all about the freelance years. On with the show)

Over the past 30 + years, I have worked on thousands of jobs, with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of art directors. Maybe a thousand but I can’t say for sure. 

The vast majority have been good to work with– and *some* were a genuine pleasure to work with over the years. Sonja Olson, Colleen McTaggart, Jim Fansler, Nikki Baker, Anthony Massa to name a few. I know I’m forgetting some people but there are hundreds to sift through, so forgive me. Wonderful people who are true professionals, know what they’re doing, and they trust me to do my thing. And they make it known they appreciate the effort at the end. That means the world to me.

*No, I’m not dying or retiring, I can’t afford to. I’ll be at this another 20 years. Anyway…

But there was one art director…. and I just gotta say it….there was one who actually gave me a present. Two, actually. We had worked together while she was at two or three agencies over the years, and I did a ton of stuff during that time. We’ve only ever spoken on the phone or back and forth on email, like most A.D.’s. We had a good rapport on the projects. One time, we did a very large job with a very lengthy amount of storyboard frames about hundreds of little cartoon characters having adventures in the land of Pop-Tarts. When it was over, she did something unprecedented. She sent me a crate of Pop Tarts as a thank you for all my hard work. It had been years since I’d had Pop -Tarts! 

But what ho, Rick? Surely the agency paid you a handsome sum for all that work! 

Yes they did indeed. And that’s enough. That’s the job and I’m compensated well. But for this art director to go the extra mile was very sweet– unnecessary, but very much appreciated, and for a freelance artist, such a gesture is kinda like winning an award. That’s how rare it is. I work hard at my job and that really meant something to me.

Time passed and she was at a different agency. We worked together again on a massive project, that was at times, exasperating in its complexity but in the end, a really solid set of boards I was pretty happy with, all things being equal, and I even still use some of the frames as portfolio pieces. It also helped that she was, throughout the process, as always, a delight. I don’t say that about just anyone. 

And then, after the project, she did some homework, made some inquiries, and sent me a bottle of my favorite tequila as a thank you. I was gobsmacked!, and humbled.

People are always quick to complain loudly about bad things people do, but very seldom do you hear about the nice things. Considerate things.

But in the world of advertising agencies, positions change, jobs shift, careers alter and there comes a time when situations dictate that you lose touch with people in the business. I haven’t had the opportunity to work with for, I think, 7 or 8 years. Not even sure if she’s still in the profession. Life moves on but I shall always remember the art director who gave me tokens of thanks. I hope our paths cross again someday. 

I shall always remember the one, the only, Emily Hoyne.

“M” is for the Many times you called me “Shit-head”*

“O” is for Other times you called me “Shit-head”**

“T” is for time you Threw my comics out***

“H” is for the Home you gave me****

“E” is for you keeping aunt Emma’s ashes in a shoebox under the bed*****

“R” is for the number of times you called me “Rick-O”******

Put them all together, you get the idea. She’ll never read this but Happy Mother’s Day! I love you and I hope between when writing this and Mother’s Day, I’ll think of something good, or in reality, Linda thinks of something good to give you because I suck at picking out gifts. It’s one of my greater shames. Now, on to the notations from the above list… 

*My very first word was “shit” because this was what I was called as an infant, much to the horror of my grandmother. 

**This did not deter my mother from continuing to call me shit-head for decades to come. In this, she’s fairly consistent. 

***I had this one coming. I literally had an horrifically messy pile of comics in my bedroom at our first apartment in Worth. Mom threatened to throw them out if I didn’t clean it up. I called her bluff. She wasn’t bluffing. I was a bigger little idiot back then. 

****For all mom’s faults–don’t worry, she’s instilled them in me— she did put a roof over my head for many a year and put up with me on that rare occasion when I wasn’t a delight.

*****This was quite the WTF? Moment when I actually discovered the aunt Emma shoe box on the stairs at our town home in Romeoville. Creepy. No idea where she is now. Oh wait, THERE she is, behind you! Makes about as much sense as anything else.

******”Rick-O” was an upgrade from “shit-head”. But then again, most things are. 

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you mother’s–SHUT YOUR MOUTH!–I wuz just talkin’ ’bout Mothers!

Yer DAMN right. 

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, your honor, members of the family. 

I’ve come to you today to clarify the various and alleged murder attempts allegedly perpetrated by my mother, Barbara Julia Nordstrom Lundeen Chatfield against me, and allegedly I, against her. 

I will lay out all the known facts in these scenarios and let God, logic and physics be my judge, jury and executioner. And by all means, you can make up your minds as to who is guilty in each of these scenarios. Each scenario has been called up today to be laid open because my mother has been bringing it up for around 45 years. 

Exhibit A “You hit me in the head with a hammer!” — Barb

This has been an ongoing accusation–like all the others– since the mid ’70’s, when we lived in the apartment in Worth. 

The scenario: one of the many home improvement projects we tackled together, ending in either non-stop laughter, swearing or both. I do not remember what the actual project was but I was holding the hammer. Mom was kneeling down in the closet, doing whatever the project called for, while I stood behind her and directly over her, looking down, and holding the hammer. Why was I holding the hammer? Was I “helping?” –I don’t know. At this point, she abruptly stood up and rose head first directly into the hammer. 

*I do solemnly swear that it was not my intention to hit her on the head with the hammer, and that she rose up and hit the hammer with her head. In any event, she wasn’t injured, to the best of my know,edge, so it must not have been too bad.

Exhibit A part two:

New evidence was entered into the record on May 4th, 2020, by Ms. Chatfield. But in her new, never before heard statement, she recounts no memory of my above details and enters this account in her own words. “I was standing behind you, you had the hammer and were going to use it. Then you swung it back and hit me. Shithead.”

Your honor, although I have absolutely no memory of this being what happened, I will gladly concede it might have happened as there wasn’t much room to maneuver, I had to generate some power, so I probably swung the hammer back. Not being the most coordinated teenager in the world, there is every possibility I nailed her in the head. Please forgive the pun your honor, but I do contend that it was never my intention to hit her in the head. There was no malice aforethought there. You be the judge, judge.

Exhibit B: “The time you put something in my sandwich for me to choke on.” –Rick

Your honor, every day, my mother made me a sandwich to take to school. Often, they were quite good but one day, while eating, chewing that day’s sandwich, I discovered a foreign article within. An article so foreign, that I almost choked on it. And perhaps I would have, if not for the hyper awareness of my tongue, which could and still can–despite the advancing years– detect when something is not actually food but in fact, non food. In this case, a square, thin piece of plastic, usually used to gather, pinch off, and secure a plastic bag that may hold, for instance, a loaf of bread. Bread, ladies and gentlemen, such as that used to make “sandwiches”. What do you even *call* those plastic things? They’re the alternative to twist ties. Anyway!

My mother contends that the choking hazard was probably on the counter when she was making the sandwich and when she wrapped up said sandwich, the piece of plastic got folded up with it. And then somehow made its way to the center of the sandwich. 

These are all the facts relating to exhibit B, the rest is up to you. 

Exhibit C: “What about the time you stabbed me?!” –Barb

Yes, your honor, this *was* a doozy. I had recently taken a shower. While doing so, I made the mistake of leaving the bottom of the shower curtain outside the confines of the bathtub, resulting in copious amounts of water on the bathroom floor, which I didn’t wipe up. A bit later, I was drying off dishes and was in the midst of grabbing silverware when angry shouts came from the bathroom. My mother had discovered the water and was not happy. She’d told me about this before and I didn’t listen. She came tearing out of the bathroom, raising her hand up high to give me a whack. 

I, realizing what was to come, crossed my arms up in front of me in a defensive posture to ward off the incoming swat from any number of angles. *However*, so practiced was I at going into this defensive position, that I totally failed to remember that my fists were full of silverware. So, when mom swung her hand up, over and down toward me, her swatting hand landed wrist first on one of the steak knives bundled in my fist. Thankfully, for everyone involved, the knife didn’t gouge a main artery. But after that, it was her contention that I stabbed her. I maintain that I was just protecting myself, while she was just impaling her self.

But once again, you be the judge, your honor. 

Keep in mind, whatever ruling you give, will not change either of our stances on what happened as we saw it, but these were the facts in any case. 

Really, good luck. 

Ah, memories. 

Where the hell is Aunt Emma now?

I first was made aware of the Fantastic Four in the mid 1960’s– this was a few years before I started getting any comics. Yes, all my vast knowledge of the world is from sci fi and superheroes on tv. Both live action and animated. As it should be. 

Hanna Barbera did a lot of this genre in the ’60’s but as far as Marvel went, the FF was the only franchise they took on. They utilized all the same talent from their other shows, with great voice acting, musical scores, sound effects and design work. The animation was a bit basic but very fun and you got to see the Thing punch out monsters, moloids, mobsters and Doctor Doom. Another thing it had going for it was that it had the advantage of adapting early FF comic stories from Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. This was huge because of the many positives with the Hanna Barbera shows, memorable stories weren’t one of them. Here, they started with good stories and animated them. They only produced 20 episodes total and ABC ran them for three years straight in reruns. All in all, a solid cartoon of the time. Not sure if it’s available anywhere but probably on YouTube. If you want to see stories based on classic Lee/Kirby FF comics, I’d recommend giving it a look. Interestingly, AT&T/Time-Warner (owners of DC  comics) own the entire Hanna Barbera library, so this original FF cartoon is the *one* piece of Marvel that Disney does not own! 

Fast forward to the late ’70’s and shield your eyes before the horror that is H.E.R.B.I.E.. Blame the DePatie Freling studio, blame Stan Lee, I don’t care. Whether it was a rights issue or the sublime idiot patrol who was always looking to protect children from every aspect of life including that fact that fire is dangerous, the Human Torch wasn’t in this cartoon. They replaced him with H.E.R.B.I.E. the annoying robot. What do the letters stand for? Well, considering how fast this show died due to the producer’s bad judgement — I don’t care. This was just unfortunate. But not THE most unfortunate FF related animated show to come out of the ’70’s. 

No, that would be 1979’s, Fred and Barney meet The Thing, a one time episode (in which Fred and Barney DO NOT EVEN ACTUALLY MEET THE THING) which spun off into The Thing’s own show. Which lasted for two episodes. All I know about the Thing’s own show…. was that it featured a teenage Benji Grimm… who wore… a Thing Ring…. and when there was trouble…. Benji would yell at the top if his lungs…..

“Thing-Ring, do your thing!” And a bunch of orange rocks would fly in and cover him and then he was the Thing. I take it back, since this was also from HB, Warner’s probably owns this as well. They can keep it.

At this point, I think I *would* like to point a finger at Stan Lee. I defend Stan quite a bit regarding comics history but I’d like to think Stan at least raised a ruckus when some of these ridiculous decisions came down the pike. He may not have had much say but still. We also had years when Avi Arad was stinking up the joint as executive producer giving the green light to a lot of total garbage. 

Moving on. 

1994 saw New World entertainment and Genesis productions put out an all new FF cartoon. This was both the worst and the best of all possible worlds. There were two, 13 ep seasons. The first season made the Thing Ring chant look intelligent. It was utter nonsense. From the mindless theme song to the constant disrespect of the characters to insulting the intelligence of 7 year olds everywhere. It was DOA. Just horrible and silly. But then something amazing happened. 

The powers that be saw they done wrong and totally revamped the show. They got good scripts, started adapting faithful versions of famous Lee and Kirby stories as well as ones from the John Byrne era. The animation was much much better too, with a different studio and they even had the one and only John Buscema –a giant in the comics industry –doing storyboards! The difference between seasons is day and night. They sell the whole package on DVD and I heartily recommend it as the second season alone is more than worth the price. It truly was nearly worthy of the Bruce Timm DC animated series stuff and you don’t get any better than that. That second season was and is one of if not the finest Marvel animated series to ever come out, period. There’ve been a ton of Spider-man and X-men series but none quite as good as season two of the FF. YMMV.

Speaking of not quite as good, starting in 2007, an American/Canadian/French company put forth a new version of the FF, called Fantastic Four, the World’s greatest heroes–with an anime look and feel. Over a span of three and a half years, they put out 27 eps. When the show premiered, I lasted all of ten minutes. The animation wasn’t bad but it’s clear this company knew almost nothing about the FF and desperately wanted to put their stamp on it. The story, personalities and dialog for the characters were aimed at a younger audience. The character designs left a lot to be desired as well. Red, white and blue costumes didn’t really say FF and the Thing just had long, baggy pants and a sloppily painted 4 on his chest. Some defend this as an overlooked, under appreciated cartoon. I would say these people might be into the anime angle and *as* a kind of dumbed down anime in look and feel, I guess that’s fine but there’s little of the actual FF in the mix. I can no more recommend this than I can the HERBIE debacle, just for different reasons. 

I’m certain that the ’90’s cartoon may have been produced in part because of the doomed Roger Corman produced live action film that never saw the light of day. Ditto the 2007 international anime show probably tried to cash in on the Tim Story films from 2005 & ’07, even though the cartoon bore little resemblance to any version of the FF ever. 

Now that Marvel has the movie rights back for the FF, we’ll see if there are any more animated attempts to try and cash in on that. With Disney in charge, I’m at least hopeful, because the thing IS.

The year was 2002. It was a lovely day. Linda was working on some project, I was upstairs, the kids were on the front steps, entertaining themselves. Age check: Theresa was 8, Matthew was 5. A bit of time passed and Lin noticed the kids weren’t on the front steps. This sometimes meant they might pop over next door to the neighbor kid’s house. She phoned the neighbors. The kids weren’t there. The rest is a bit of a blur.

High alert. 

Every second counts.

Called the police.

Alerted the neighbors. 

ALL the neighbors.

While a couple neighbors monitored our yard in case they wandered back, I hopped in the van to cover the surrounding streets, while Lin hopped on her bike to cover sidewalks and trails. 

We reasoned they couldn’t be too far if they were strolling on their own and then the dark thoughts started to seep in. 

Keep looking.

It’s hard to remember how much total time had passed since we noticed they had gone missing. I want to say 40 minutes but it might have been half that, the way time passes during something like this. 

And with every minute that passed, I was quietly losing it. 

I don’t know what we would have done, if the black police SUV hadn’t pulled into our driveway at that moment with the kids.

The kids were perfectly fine. A little confused as to what all the ruckus was about, with cop cars, neighbors, us, all standing around stunned like a mushroom cloud had erupted in the distance. 

The kids just wandered over with these very interested “what’s going on?” expressions. They were probably sensing some mix of panic and relief. I said we’d explain in the house. I rested my hands on their heads and steered them toward the safety of the house they wouldn’t be leaving for a 100 years because we were about to become far more over protective than we were before. 

The rest was again a bit of a blur.

I choked out a thank you to the lead officer.

Wordlessly hugged a few neighbors.

Then went in the house and Lin and I did our level best, through tears, and raised voices to explain to our children exactly why we were crying and raising our voices. 

They just thought they’d go for a walk. Not far, maybe a few blocks to the store. They just didn’t think to mention it to us. 

By the end, there were hugs and tears of relief, understanding and exhaustion. Matthew laid on the bed through the talk simply squeezing his lip and nodding through most of it. The enormity of the mishap was still partially lost on him but he knew that he and his sister indeed did something not-right to make both parents get that emotional. 

In the past, we’d thought we’d always been very cognizant of what the kids were up to, where they were and very very seldom ever even had people babysit for us. They were almost never out of our sight. 

We thought we were vigilant.

Then you suddenly find yourself in Limbo, possibly staring at Hell. 

You know the drill. Next chance you get, just hug your kids. 

Admittedly, things have been just about perfect in the world these days, with nary a problem. You just knew the fun couldn’t last.

For you see, the Murder Hornets are coming soon to your town. Originating overseas, the Asian Giant Hornet is about two inches long, mostly surviving by consuming large bugs like wasps and bees. They kill their prey quickly by lopping off their heads, then consume everything. The Murder Hornets, as they were called over in Japan, also carry a neurotoxin in their rather painful sting, and if you get stung multiple times by these orange and black striped bastards, they could indeed kill you. 

They made landfall in Washington state in late 2019 and have been wreaking havoc with the bee colonies there. I believe the cold slows them down but as spring weather advances, so do they. 

I’m really hoping that somebody is more prepared for this than they were the virus. 

Hearing about the Murder Hornets, it occurred to me that it had been quite a while since I heard about the Africanized Killer bees that were hitting the US from the south. So, of course I also had to look that up to check in on that swarm. Turns out, the Killer bees have stayed in the south, as they don’t adapt well to winters. The Killer bees have allegedly also calmed down a bit in their aggression as there have been fewer predators for them here. Is it possible they’ve been downgraded to Manslaughter 2 bees? I’m not sure.

As for stopping the Murder Hornets… even with years of advance notice, to the best of my knowledge, no one did anything to stop them–perhaps it wasn’t possible. So, I’m not sure what can be done against larger, deadlier, cannibalistic Murder Hornets. 

I guess the best case scenario would be if the Murder Hornets head south for better weather, where they’ll encounter–hopefully–greater numbers of the Africanized Killer bees that will make a fight of it, maybe wiping each other out in a climactic battle at the Alamo. Any survivors, we go in and take them out with Raid Wasp & Hornet killer.

Raid Wasp & Hornet killer

A magnificent product, where, from a comfortable distance, you can produce an  immensely potent 13 foot stream of liquid death toward any mass of winged, stingish, malevolent insectoid menace. 

Raid Wasp & Hornet killer. 

From SC Johnson.

Even the simplest operations require more extensive planning. 

Had to go to the bank to deposit a check. The bank doesn’t open until 10am, so the timing worked out fine, as the mail with the check got in at 9:15. Got to the bank’s drive thru at 9:59 and there were already six cars in the three drive thru lanes, awaiting the opening bell.

As I sat third in line, with more cars arriving by the minute, it only then occurred to me that I’ll have a contact contamination risk via the banking cylinder that goes in the pneumatic tube. With at least two cars in front of me, passing the cylinder around like a pitcher of beer on St. Patty’s Day, not to mention where tellers have been, I’d have to be conscious of not touching my face after the transaction. 

So I await my turn, kicking myself for not thinking to bring wipes with me for an immediate wipe down afterward. 

My turn comes, bing bang boom, and I zoom off home, having to scratch the phantom itch on my nose the whole way. 

Arriving home, I grab the spray cleaner and wipe down all the affected bits. 

Mental note: maybe keep a pack of wipes in each car for these drive thru scenarios. 

Only a month or so to go before we flatten the hell out of that curve…hopefully…..

Now full disclosure, my mom was, in her younger days– in my mind, a rather impetuous driver. One might say crazy or irresponsible but we see things very differently as children than we do as adults. I remember seeing my mom eating while driving, doing paperwork while driving, and most worryingly, race trains. At some of the train crossings back in the day, there were no guard posts that lowered. So you could see the train coming and mentally map out the time/speed distance and calculate if you were going to make it across the tracks before the train got there. Let’s just say mom usually calculated correctly and we won’t go into how I reacted when she attempted it. Mostly because the train always seemed to be coming on my side. So it was often an adventure. But again, the eyes of youth. On the side the train was aiming at.

One morning though, she was driving me to school. And to be fair, I don’t think the following was her fault. I don’t know the circumstances as I again, usually walked but this was to my high school. Still a long haul and for whatever reason, she was driving me when suddenly, a car coming the opposite way decided to make a left directly in front of us and WHAM. 

A second later, I was sitting there in the passenger seat with my forearms crossed in front of my face, and when I lowered them, I assessed the situation. The windshield was smashed, mom was seemingly okay and I tried to open my door but it, like the entire front of the car, was accordioned. But hey, I was fine, she was fine. Mom got out her side and I followed. Adrenaline was flowing and I felt fine and I guess the old adage was true, any crash you can walk away from…

Then mom turned to look at me, a look of worry on her face and she said “oh, Rick.” That was an odd thing to say for her and quite sentimental in tone. Very unusual. And right on cue, blood started flowing down in front of my right eye from my forehead. So THAT’S why the windshield was smashed! Something hard hit it alright. My head. 

Still, it only stung a bit. Adrenaline. Mouth hurt a bit too, because it partially knocked into the dash but thank god I’d gotten the braces taken off a few months earlier or that might have been horrific. What followed was my first experience with a local anesthetic and having a very nice Doctor (a specialist in fact) sew me up, while I think I may have rudely pointed out how funny looking he was while all doped up. 

The aftermath of that: I think we started being vigilant about seat belt safety– well I did anyway. And in an effort to reduce the scarring on my forehead, as it healed, I had to apply this medication or salve or whatever it was for a couple weeks. 

But it was blood red! That seems like a flaw in the presentation. While that stuff was on, it looked a fresh wound! After that, mom may have eased up on the road in general, I’m not sure. Probably not. Anyway…

Buckle up, kids and don’t race trains. 

The More You Know…

Night–Car driving around at night, while defiant teens crowd the street

Day now. A little urban town square with a cafe

Me riding a bike

Mike Edsey hanging out a window singing while I ride also singing 

Taking a nap in the cafe with my pillow as Mike talks out his window above

Jim Wilieko joins us at the cafe

Jim has a weird cylinder phone with legs

I go to my official office downtown which is filled with junk, no room

And my laundry’s piled up in the hallway outside the office

I’m consulting a nurse on a body they found in the gall– disease victim

Businessmen in the hall want to talk about this new collaboration on Barbarella?

Make of that what you will.