Fran lifted his head to peer around and was astonished to spot a regal white-tail buck gingerly step out of the woodlot a hundred yards in front of him to the north. Its massive antlers–sporting ten distinct points encased in purplish shaggy velvet, yet still gloriously polished and jutting well past the animal’s vigilant ears–reflected sunlight from the radiant golden orb now perched halfway down the western horizon. Fran stared admiringly at the majestic creature as it strutted out of sight around the curvature of the cornfield adjacent to him, estimating in his mind the nuances of the shot he would be required to make in order to fell the trophy brute. But then Fran stopped strategizing.
That shot would never happen, and he knew it…….
Tears were streaming down Fran’s face now. He bent down and hastily finished writing as the time machine enveloped him and chauffeured him away…….
………Lenny Mueller wasn’t a naturally nefarious, totally scurrilous asshole; he really wasn’t, I tell ya!!!
Fran had to keep reminding himself of this important fact every time he felt red-hot anger mushrooming within his breast. No, Lenny was just an ordinary man who committed the cardinal mistake so many other people likewise succumb to: He went ahead and bit off way more than he could possibly chew!
But then rather than taking the honorable route and immediately admitting this error in judgment, the stubborn little son-of-a-bitch dug in his heels and refused to acknowledge the obvious. That’s what made Fran so preposterously angry whenever he thought about the subject!
Following the devastating conflagration which consumed his house on August 30th, 1990, Fran Blahnik found himself confronted by a multitude of difficult decisions. But easily the greatest of them was the dilemma he faced with regard to the next living accommodations for him and his young family. Fran did possess an insurance policy to cover the financial losses he suffered as a result of his house burning beyond repair, yet it certainly wasn’t of the overly generous variety. He henceforth needed to be exceedingly careful as he thoughtfully deliberated over what would be the best path to pursue with regard to his family’s future living quarters.
Rebuilding on the same site as before was an obvious decision for him—the proverbial “no-brainer”. Fran loved his serene, oak tree-accented oasis sequestered far out in the rolling countryside of southeastern Minnesota’s non-glaciated region, and he already had a prohibitive amount of financial equity poured into that forty acre chunk of real estate as well. Ergo the difficult decision facing him back in 1990 was not whether to rebuild or where–but how???
Going with a pre-fabricated house definitely merited strong consideration. Those things weren’t nearly as boxy and trailer home mimicking in appearance as their ugly early predecessors—in fact some newer models were fairly chic and irrefutably stylish—and of course the convenience associated with pre-fabs was nonpareil too. Once a building site was suitably prepared—One…..two…..three…..PRESTO!!!!!—and one could then magically have a nice house erected and ready to move into in a mere matter of days.
You certainly couldn’t beat that sublime temporal luxury with a big stick and a cardboard bucket overflowing with fried chicken!!!
In addition, the cost of a top-quality pre-fabricated home was highly competitive relative to the other options available. Fran accordingly thought long and hard about pursuing the pre-fabricated route, yet for reasons forever unknown except to him ultimately decided against it.
He elected instead to pursue the strategy of constructing a house—piece by piece by piece—from the ground up. Somehow the appeal of seeing a large, intrinsically complex house slowly and meticulously morph from a bare chunk of ground eventually won sway over Fran’s train of thinking. And you should know this by now too: Once Fran Blahnik made up his mind about something—ANYTHING!!!—and then stop to consider how intuitively refractory he was and how intransigently the guy’s thought processing mechanism functioned ……well, my older brother’s attitude would never subsequently change come hell or high water or, worse yet–even if a better, more logical alternative apart from one he had personally conjured happened to materialize in the interim.
Of course Fran was still working fulltime at that bantam-sized fiberglass factory in Chatfield, nor could the dude rightfully be described as an expert journeyman carpenter either, hence the business of building his new house would have to be subcontracted to another party. Fran received a fair number of attractive offers covering the construction of a new house for him and his family, including some from reputable contractors boasting extensive resumes and long lists of glowing references. But let’s not forget either that Fran Blahnik didn’t have any money trees flourishing in his back yard and was working with relatively limited funds too, and many of the cost estimates he received were……well, let‘s just say they were a bit on the extravagant side.
By far the cheapest estimate he received?
The one from a certain Lenny Mueller…….
Not only was Mueller’s cost estimate easily the least expensive Fran received, the fellow also benefitted from the natural advantages of being a distant neighbor, a long-time Blahnik family acquaintance, and a fellow parishioner at St. Ignatius Catholic Church in Spring Valley, hence Fran understandably felt that he could trust the overtly religious guy implicitly.
To Fran, the final decision regarding the selection of a housing contractor was not taxing at all; Lenny Mueller’s offer was without question the least pricey out of the multitudes he received, but much more importantly than that–Fran truly believed him to be an honest, upstanding, dependable individual with whom he could easily work. Thus Fran officially committed to Mueller’s “bare bones” offer with full-fledged confidence and zeal and, it should also be pointed out here—minus any reservations whatsoever about the man who would be factoring so hugely into his and his family’s future..
Unfortunately, Fran’s fateful, ill-advised decision that year so long ago resulted in ungodly disaster, to say the least……
Without vigorously disputing the assertion that Mueller at his core may have been a decent human being—in all fairness, he probably was; I think everyone who knew him well could agree to that–the incontrovertible fact remains that Lenny Mueller most definitely was not the solution to the extensive problems facing Fran Blahnik at that critical juncture in the latter’s life. For although Mueller was admittedly an excellent-quality wood craftsman, his expertise lay far more in churning out dinky woodworking wares such as picture frames, petite decorative knick-knacks, and birdhouses—not in constructing full-size houses. And Fran’s architectural plan called for a rather plain yet undeniably large dwelling, not some picayune summer cabin perched atop a toadstool in the middle of a decorative backyard pond.
Now…..so what did Mueller’s “work crew” actually consist of?
Listen closely to this, Reader!!!
Lenny Mueller’s house-building crew consisted of himself, one elderly gentleman who would show up sporadically and unannounced–seemingly just whimsically and always on the spur-of-the-moment–and lastly Mueller’s teen-aged son, and we’re talking mid-teens here too, Reader, not some sturdy, mature, heavily-muscled young adult.
Mueller himself was a severe diabetic, and that chronic medical condition in conjunction with a host of others too numerous to mention in passing prevented the tradesman from intense labor for much of the spring, summer, and fall of 1991.
Long story short, Lenny Mueller had absolutely no business bidding on the construction of a full-sized house during the building season for the year 1991, yet—personally financially desperate for any and all business to support his mammoth Catholic family—he did so anyway. And my brother Fran Blahnik wound up being the unlucky sucker who would up holding the nearly empty bag a sickly Lenny Mueller represented that highly traumatic year.
Because of Mueller’s frequent and extensive absences combined with Fran’s understandable desire to get his new house completed just as rapidly as possible so he could settle his family into it before the next winter arrived, my brother ended up working like a sex-starved dog that year from the time the last remnants of snow melted in the spring until virtually the instant it returned again in the late fall–when the first vanguard flakes swirled ominously and performed clumsy pirouettes in the freezing November air while providing an appropriate opening act for the onrushing featured show otherwise known as winter.
Yet no dog I can personally think of ever had to toil nearly as hard as Fran Blahnik did during that exhausting summer of 1991. He still held down his regular, five-day-a-week workshift as a machinist at the A.F.C. fiberglass manufacturing plant outlying Chatfield, of course, but as soon as he returned to his temporary rented home located just west of Sumner Center Methodist Church in the afternoons he would hurriedly change into grubby clothes and next scramble the three miles over to a nearly abandoned worksite where his brand new house was taking shape with exasperating slowness. And it was there that Fran Blahnik would feverishly slave away until the sun ritualistically set late in the evening, which in mid-summer in southeastern Minnesota is well past 9:30 p.m. Fran religiously followed this impossible-to-maintain routine day after day after day after punishing day.
And Lenny Mueller?
Who?????
Lenny…….????? Who’s he, you ask?!?!?!
Oh, yes, of course, Lenny Mueller–HIM–the “real” virtuoso contractor Fran had enlisted to work hard on completing the project the previous winter.
Meanwhile……Lenny Mueller—battling his nearly constant health issues—was seldom witnessed at the jobsite. One erstwhile Saturday he did recruit a posse of fellow Catholic Knights of Columbus members to drive out from Spring Valley to Fran’s acreage and lend a hand with the leviathan construction project; this altruistic group volunteered their labor to Mueller free of charge, it probably goes without saying……but beyond that feeble and isolated effort by Mueller……
Yet when autumn finally rolled around and the house was virtually complete as an almost direct result of Fran’s singular, herculean labors……guess who showed up on Fran’s front doorstep presenting a bill reflecting aggregate charges commensurate with construction of a full house?????
You guessed it……
None other than the same shameless, unscrupulous, deceitful Lenny Mueller!
Tell me now, Reader: What kind of unctuous asshole would actually have the unmitigated gall to do something so egregiously and clearly wrong as that?!?!
Huh?!?! Anyone you can reference?!?!
Didn’t think so, nor can I…..
Fran—who never in his life sought to avoid a confrontation when he knew he was right in principle—didn’t take Mueller’s outrageous sham and flaunting of ethics lying down. He hired a lawyer and immediately sued Lenny Mueller for breach of contract, and it’s safe to say any judge with half a brain and an ounce of common sense and compassion would have quickly seen the truth behind my older brother’s plain-as-day allegations.
Yet even way back then in the early 1990s, society had taken a ridiculous detour into surreality whereby it was deemed no one should ever be assigned one hundred percent blame for any action, no matter how wrongful or scandalous or obvious their (mis)behavior.….and even if it was clear to the dumbest bystander that such was indeed the case.
In court, Fran ultimately fell victim to such lazy, shortsighted, politically correct, morally uncourageous—Yes, let’s be one hundred percent honest here…..absolutely GUTLESS—reasoning. The judge assigned to Fran’s case rendered a mixed verdict, finding Lenny Mueller culpable of some of the transgressions lodged against him, while exonerating him of myriad others.
In other words, no resounding, clear-cut victory for the very confident and expectant Fran…….
The incomprehensible verdict from that seminal day in court left a permanent, eviscerating scar on Fran Blahnik’s psyche. He completely lost confidence in our American judicial system after the puzzling fiasco; his faith in all levels of government was thereafter shattered as well. The decorated Vietnam veteran became a disillusioned, embittered individual following this compromised verdict at the hands of Lenny Mueller and the kangaroo court system doling out fake “justice” down in languid, Norman Rockwell-themed Preston, Minnesota.
The overriding lesson Fran carried away from his disastrous brush with our much-vaunted American legal system?
Slimy lawyers couldn’t be trusted…….the crooked United States court system couldn’t be trusted…….government at all levels was incompetent and corrupt and couldn’t be trusted……..ultimately—–people in general—even those who appeared friendly and helpful and ingenuous on the surface–were dishonest and could no longer be trusted…….
It was also about this time that cracks began to appear in Fran Blahnik’s psyche, cracks that only grew wider and more frightening with the slow passage of time……
Fred's Soapbox 