Red, White, and Blue
oil on canvas
20" x 24"
This is a painting of Marcus Oliphant. The town of Bloomfield, and everyone else in the world, I suppose, called him "Red".
I got to know Red long after he had come to know me. For years, I only knew Red as the man who would yell my name at basketball games. If you played basketball in Bloomfield, Red knew you. He was like Jack Nicholson at a Lakers game...a celebrity, loved for his antics as much for his accolades, always within earshot of the players and referees.
Red had a practice of coming to the games with his pockets filled to the brim with packs of Big Red chewing gum. He would eagerly hand them out to anyone and everyone who could make the connection between his friendly gesture and nickname. Those packs of gum were like little bricks, and he often threw them. As a freshman in high school, while going through the motions of a pregame warm-up, Red gifted me a pack of gum to the face. As the rest of the team jogged off to the sidelines for a team huddle, I stood dazed mid-court, trying to make sense of the throbbing pain I felt just above my left eye. Upon discovering the red color around my sneakers wasn't blood but instead about five packs of Big Red that had separated themselves from their cellophane upon whacking me in the head, I heard from the bleachers, "Come on LeGrand! It's a good thing this isn't a baseball game!" I looked up to find Red Oliphant standing in his usual spot, about 50 feet away, at the top of the "home side" section. He was probably about 75 years old at that time, but still had one hell of a throwing arm. I imagine he was cheered and applauded by everyone sitting in the vicinity for his accuracy at such a distance. Such was the way of Red Oliphant...you couldn't help but love the guy, even if he just blackened your eye for the entertainment of the entire community. Go Cards!
Red always reminded me of my grandfather. They were the same age, graduated high school together, joined the military, came back to Bloomfield, and became small town legends. Celebrated for their audacity as much as just about anything else, Red and my grandfather were bold, man's man types that managed to be more endearing than they likely ever knew. After my grandfather's death, many people who knew him well described him by saying, "George was George". At first, I thought saying such a thing was as ridiculous as it was rude...an obvious statement to let yourself off the hook for not having a single nice thing to say about a dead man. But now, I'd like to think "George was George" type statements are real testaments to the character of a man. A person so unique unto themself that only their name could serve as an appropriate descriptor.
Every once in a while, there's something to be said for the limitations of our language...and most of those times, it's the name of someone you love.
Here's to Red and George, heroes and grandfathers.
