Brother Bert Ballard, Brother Jim Suitor, and Me
From Tranquilla II on the Back of Eddy Creek - Lake Barkley -- My ole buddy Bert Ballard (Sept. 30, 1929 - March 25, 2002) is sorely missed. Bert and I were friends from the first day we met and shared a beer at the old Holiday Inn in Bardstown.
Older than me, Bert was that older Brother I always wanted but he also served as a mentor, hunting buddy and sometimes a Father figure. We went through our divorces together and I had the privilege of being able to spend a year of Thursdays with Bert while he was in Hospice care.
I credit the old man with saving my own life when he sternly pointed out to me to never ever take blood in your urine lightly. Bert died from complications of bladder cancer.
Bert dished out some good advice over the years. Some of it hard to take at times. He believed you probably truly only loved one woman ever in your life and that most men had unrequited love in their hearts. He and I shared the belief that you never sit with your back to the door.
That southern gentlemen were always gentlemen, irrespective of the situation. That dogs will almost always die before you do and your heart will be broken by it. That the only good Bourbon was Kentucky Bourbon and to stay away from anything else. He razed me alot about liking Scotch as much as Bourbon but that was okay, because he was my buddy.
Bert and I hunted together for 30-years in Alabama, Kentucky and Georgia and I use the term "hunting" lightly since many years our idea of the sport was to go to the woods and watch and listen and never take a shot. But we always ate and drank well. We always told the same stories so they must have been true.
When Bert finally decided there would be no more chemotherapy, this occurred after his daughter Julie preceded him in death from breast cancer, I decided that I could not allow him to just go gently into the night. So, every Thursday I would trek to Bardstown and in the early stages of the dying process we would go to lunch and for a drive and come back for cocktails around 4 p.m.
We would tell some of the same stories. He would show me his old home place and talk about his childhood and his days as the general manager of the Stephen Foster Story. He would brag on his kids and sometimes cry about the loss of his daughter. Some days we would "plink" with his old .22 or .38 and some days we would just sit quietly and be with each other.
As the time grew nearer I sat down and wrote the following letter. I share it with you because I believe that we owe it to those we love and believe in to tell them that. So many times we forget that life has no guarantees and that the next minute could be our last.
This is what I wrote to my best friend. Maybe in some way it will inspire you to sit down and write a letter to your best friend. I hope so. They are few and far between and are so very precious.
February 8, 2002
My dear Brother Bert,
To simply tell you I am grateful for the shotgun would be an understatement. However, I really don’t like the conditions under which I am having to accept it.
It seems just like yesterday that we met at the Holiday Inn during one of the travel show planning meetings. I recall afterwards we escaped and had a beer with Dawn Ford and some other folks. That was 30-years ago.
The time has flown by. I knew from that day that we would be good friends. I never had any idea that you would end up being my very best friend, confidante, and most dependable hunting buddy.
Ah, the times we have shared. And I guess that is what saddens me. To think that we won’t get to create any more of those memories. But what wonderful memories they are. I will always cherish them. And as long as my mind stays in tact, I will always be able to take them out and recall them with as much fondness as the days and nights we created them.
Some of my earliest memories are of you and Hank Lindsey and me. Working the Cincy travel show, meeting Miss Mississippi, and you guys trying to drop me off with some old broad that was strolling the sidewalk in the wee hours of the morning!
Then there was the days of the go-go girls and the old soul singer in the cabaret that we went to that was a hospital theme. Remember that one? They used bed pans to pass around pretzels. But you may remember she had a voice and moves like a 30-year old.
Hell, she had to be 90 if she was a day.
There was the days of the peanut bar in the old Hilton. The time we got snowed in in Cincy and Cleveland and probably other places that I forget.
There was the Milwaukee trip where we ate raw hamburger, red onion slices, on a piece of bread and drank cold Pabst beer. There were the St. Patty Day parades and the two of us cold as could be bundled up and leaning back to back to hold each other up after a night of drinking.
Then there was the year of being on the wagon. Remember when we carried our root beer wherever we went? Most people didn’t think we could do it. But we did. I recall having to do it to prove to myself that I didn’t have to wake up in a city and not know which city I was in. I got tired of looking for phone books to remind me of the town I had slept in the night before.
There were the musical rooms on nights when snow and ice was so deep no one could travel, or at least shouldn’t have. Then there was the infamous Indy night when Dawn Ford played room arranger and none of us except you ended up in the proper room!
There were the antics with Brother Jim in Indy and East St. Louis. And yet, we all got out alive, God surely protects children and fools!
There were all the opening nights and your hospitality to all of us all those years. Of course, after the first two times of watching “The Story” I looked forward to just sitting in the office with my Bro. And having a drink and laughing and clowning around as we often did.
There were the AAA tours and the bartending, baggage carrying and always the promoting of our properties and the dances and meals and busses. Through it all you maintained your good humor.
Remember our writers’ tours and you guiding for me? I never told them you weren’t from Lake Barkley. I just told them all they had one of the best damn guides and he happened to be my best friend.
They all seemed okay with that. And you even caught some fish!
Remember those scary houseboat rides at night on Lake Cumberland and Lake Barkley?
And then there were all our hunting trips. I will miss them the most. Alabama and then Georgia and finally Kentucky. All those years of Daddy Paul and Mrs. Reed and Mrs. Nixon. Then Brother Jim had to screw it up killing the largest deer ever taken off their property and not telling them before someone else did!
The years we got deer and the years we didn’t. It never really mattered to me. It was about having time with my best friend that mattered.
I am so grateful you could hunt this year although I know it had to be tiring on you. I will forever be grateful for that though and for Elmer’s stand building abilities.
Some of my friends have never understood that it wasn’t about hunting. It was about being together as friends. Spending timing catching up and laughing and talking and drinking and playing cards and cooking meals and sitting in deer stands watching squirrels.
You have been more than just a friend of mine Bert. You have truly been my best friend.
You hung in there with me through all of it. The good and the bad. You stayed beside me when I went through the Rebecca and Judy thing. You were still there after I screwed them up and had foolishly broken my heart more than once.
You were there when Kay came into the scene and you were there when David and Dad died.
You have been here for the July 4th celebrations and the fireworks. And to think you won’t be here for those is really very difficult for me.
You were more than just a friend to me Bert. You taught me a great deal about marketing and tourism. I thank you for that. You and Bill Knight and Ray Scott took me under your wings and helped me learn from some real professionals. I am appreciative.
You are the big brother I never had. The Father that paid me more attention than my own Dad. You are my running buddy, my hunting buddy, my mentor, my touchstone.
If there was anything I could do other than pray I would. Yet, I must confess that I prayed lots in 1991 and those prayers were answered for eleven more years. God was good to us. I think he understood from my prayers that I just couldn’t stand to loose you then. He comforted me as he comforts you now. Through his grace I shared eleven more years of your friendship. I am so grateful for that.
I pray that there will be a miracle. That something will happen and reverse all this yet I am realistic and I understand the reality. I just don’t want you to suffer and I do want you to know how much I love you.
I will never forget you. Your shotgun will always hang in a special place in my cabin. Every time I look at it will recall our fun times together.
I have told a few people about this but not many. The evening after we buried Weldon Petty I was en route to Chattanooga. I had Weldon and Sue Weller on my mind. I don’t know if I said it out loud or not but I said something to the effect of “Sue if you and Weldon are okay give me a sign that I can’t miss.”
Just about that time I topped Monteagle and was heading down when the biggest, brightest explosion I have ever seen in the sky happened. I thought a plane had blown up. I rushed into Chattanooga and stopped at the Tennessee Patrol station just outside of town to report what I had seen. They had heard about it already. They said no planes had gone down. No explanation.
The news later that night said NASA nor NORAD had an explanation but thought it was probably space junk.
Then it dawned on me that Sue and Weldon probably sat back in Heaven and chuckled to themselves. I am convinced that was a sign from them.
If you can let me know you are okay when you pass over. Don’t scare me. Just comfort me. You don’t have to do explosions. Just an overwhelming feeling of you hugging me will be okay.
Love, peace and grace your younger more handsome Brother,
Darryl
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