Mr. Jones Meet Mr. Parkhouse

For as long as I can remember I’ve heard that just before you die, your whole life flashes before you, like a final review before an exam. When I was a kid that concerned me and then I had an experience that I thought would be my last and my life didn’t flash before me. Since then I’ve had more of those last moment experiences than I can count. Every time the same thing happened and it isn’t the events of my life flashing in front of me.

Actually, two things have happened every time I’ve thought I was about to cash out; the first one, though at first unnerving, is actually rather pleasant; time moves into slow motion. I guess that’s what has gotten me through those moments. When things are moving in slow motion I find that I make no mistakes, I make everything I do count and I do it perfectly.

The other thing that happens in those moments is some long forgotten memory flashes in my mind. It doesn’t take my attention away from what is going on, but it’s there, like a breaking news story on a monitor set into the main screen of a CNN news cast.

That happened last night, which is why I’m in the hospital this morning, but don’t worry, I’m fine and I’ll be checking out in a few minutes, in fact my wife is down at the ER admission office taking care of that right now so I have a few minutes to tell you what happened.

I’m a runner. I have been one for over thirty years now. I run at night, always have, ever since my very first run, July 2, 1979. Last night I was on the downhill side of a six mile run, a little over two miles from home, in the middle of a quiet street that probably hadn’t seen a vehicle in an hour or two.

I had let my mind run ahead on a long leash and I guess I was paying about seventy percent attention when suddenly time shifted into slow motion. When that happens there is a loud, very real, click in my head, and I know that I’m about to move into a time segment that could be my last. It’s not a scary thing. I haven’t been scared since I heard my first 122 mm rocket in Vietnam in 1967. I’ve been startled a few times, but not scared. My Buddy, Howard Dirler, told me that it’s OK to be startled, that can save your life, but scared will kill you more often than not. Howard didn’t say much so when he did talk I listened.

Last night, when things went to slow motion, I called back all of my attention and waited to see what would happen next. If you had been watching when that happened you probably wouldn’t have noticed anything out of the ordinary, just an old, gray haired man jogging down the middle of your street. I didn’t break stride or move out of the street, I just waited to see what had prompted the time shift.

I didn’t have to wait long. About four blocks ahead I saw soft blue lights pulsating off the hedges and trees at an intersection, then the headlights of a car. The car crossed the intersection slowly with a Huntsville police car a few feet behind it. The patrolman wasn’t using his siren and there was no sound of backup approaching so I figured it was just a routine traffic stop.

I wondered why things had gone to slow motion and stayed in that mode when I noticed the “breaking news story screen” open in the corner of my mind and I knew that whatever was going on that might lead to my last moments as a human being were about to unfold. I’m six two, normally I run at a shortened stride, easy pace, around ten minutes per mile. I began to move faster and lengthened my stride. There is something unnatural about being late for your last show and I wasn’t going to let that happen. I knocked out two blocks as fast as I’ve run in the last twenty years. Ahead I heard the sound of a police radio; the sound you hear in the background of every emergency scene on TV, at the movies, and in real life.

I knew as sure as I’ve ever known anything that I was about to part of what ever was going on up ahead. I picked up the pace again and knew that my 66 year old body was going about as fast as it could go on flat ground, and frankly, it was a pretty decent clip. With a block to go I glanced at the breaking news story monitor and saw the front page of the Birmingham News, date September 11^th, 1971; thirty-eight years ago.

The headline, stretching from one side of the paper to the other was simply, “Mr. Jones, meet Mr. Parkhouse.” Below the headline was a picture that was half the width of the headline. Two men and a football were the only three things in the picture; Jimmy Jones, one of the men, the USC quarterback, had been in the act of passing the ball to a wide open receiver in the end zone, about a half second before the picture was snapped. The second man in the picture was Robin Parkhouse, Alabama’s left defensive tackle. Parkhouse had released his man, who was now open in the end zone, to take a chance on sacking Jones before he could get the pass away.

Realizing that he wasn’t going to make it if he didn’t leave his feet, about ten feet away from Jones, who had just stopped and set himself to pass, Parkhouse left his feet and launched himself. He hit the quarterback in the center of the chest with such force that the sound was picked up by the TV microphones on the sidelines. The ball, also in the picture, was now on the ground, behind Jones, who was still standing straight but with Robin Parkhouse’s shoulder in his chest. The final score, Alabama 17, USC 10, was a direct result of that play and the headline, “Mr. Jones, meet Mr. Parkhouse,” was branded in the minds of every Alabama fan that had seen that classic game.

I wondered why that old memory had moved into my mind as I swung around the corner and saw the police cruiser, a half a block ahead, pulled to the right side of the road behind a seven or eight year old, nondescript, dark sedan. The Patrolman had just walked to the side of the car when there was a shot and a flash of light from inside the car. The patrolman staggered backwards and collapsed in the middle of the road. The door of the sedan opened and the driver, a tall dark shape in the shadows of the quiet residential street, stepped out, large, chrome, automatic, in his right hand. His focus was on the downed officer, who was struggling to get his weapon out of his holster.

I knew what was about to happen as surely as Robin Parkhouse knew that he had a chance to sack Jimmy Jones if he released the man he was supposed to defend. I was ten feet away and closing, still unnoticed by the gunman, when he stopped beside the policeman, laughed, and raised his weapon for the killing shot.

I screamed, “No!” Aimed myself toward his chest, and left my feet. The breaking news monitor flashed and the picture of Jones and Parkhouse disappeared, replaced by a picture of me, sailing through the air, headed toward what I figured would be end of me. I heard another shot, saw the flash, felt something slam into my left arm, and then I crashed into the shooter’s chest.

On the screen I saw the gun flying away and in real time I heard it hit the pavement. My momentum carried both of us back to the sedan where my weight drove him into the still open door. His head snapped back and hit the corner of the door. He was unconscious when he hit the ground, in fact, at that second I thought he might be dead but I didn’t dwell on it.

I scrambled away from him and moved to the side of the officer. He was hit in the right side of the chest, and though not pleasant, I knew from my experience in Vietnam, that it wasn’t a life threatening wound. I pulled my T-shirt off, folded it into a small squared and pressed it over the wound. Time shifted back to normal mode and I heard a siren and then another. The officer opened his eyes and asked the question that wounded men have asked since the beginning of time, “Mister am I going to make it?”

I looked in his eyes, smiled, and said, “No problem, Officer. In a week, you’ll be as good as new, I guarantee it.” He grinned. “Thanks,” he said.

Maybe my life will flash before me when the real last event rolls out but until then I’m good with the breaking news story monitor and “Mr. Jones, meet Mr. Parkhouse.”