Marty Memories

The overwhelming thing I remember about Marty is the phrase, "Saddle Up". He would announce this when he was ready to go home after a visit. What it meant was: kids stop what you are doing and get ready to go, Paulette get the coats on the kids, Paulette get the baby ready to go, Paulette start saying goodbye to everybody. He did not personally get involved in the "Saddle Up", he was the alpha male, drill Sargent who must be obeyed. I still have a memory of Paulette putting coats on Kathy and Karl all the while the kids not taking their eyes off Marty. Up to then they had been playing nicely with their cousins but this moment was serious. Marty is a very good card player and he liked to win, especially when it was for money. (Very small stakes.) I do not remember which games we played, maybe Pinochle or Foine, but he did not miss a chance to win. For the rest of us they were only games, but Marty, even in joking humor, was serious about winning. He surprised us all one night when he angrily accused Paulette of playing the wrong card and costing him 30 cents. His humor was very funny and usually dry, he did not laugh loud himself but had a wide grin when he saw that someone got the joke. He never told a joke on himself, it was always at someone else's expense. His face lit up when he understood the meaning of a story and others did not get it completely. He competed in everything. He wanted to be a writer like his sister and took a writing course at Wayne State University. He showed me a piece he had written in which he received an A. The teacher had added a comment that it was similar to Beckett's "Waiting for Godot." The submission was original writing from Marty and he took that as a good compliment. Some of the themes covered in his piece were: God, experience, pain, truth, eternity (may be a weak recollection on this) despair and futility. Quite a bit for a young writer. If Marty and Paulette had different opinions it was Marty's that won out. I recall a disagreement about getting an expensive car repair, though I don't know which side claimed what, but they did it Marty's way. He always had an eye for a trim female figure. When we four attended a Ford Detailer's party, held in a basement, the hostess whispered to Pat: "Watch Marty when I walk across the room, his eyes are going to be on my ass." Pat was laughing as she told me that it did happen. This woman had only known Marty for 30 minutes and had him figured out. Getting a check from the government every month, Marty once told me, was his supreme goal. He did not want to work for it like everyone else. Now Marty was not without skills, I witnessed him in action when he was managing a store. Most impressive was his skill at deciding what should be done when somebody came to him with a problem. He multi-tasked with confidence and intelligence and seemed to know all the functions of the store. I would have hired him if I had a store. I know there are other things but I have suddenly run dry, enough for now.