About Me — Phil Truman. A native Oklahoman, novel-writer…
By: Phil Truman
Tags: Introduction, Satire, Humor, About Me, Fiction Writing

Most folks call me Phil, I prefer that. My full first and middle are Philip Van which only by my mother used when she was mad at me or wanted to get my attention.

In my writer bios, I like to call myself a humorist, storyteller, and novelist because it sounds cooler than

obnoxious, compulsive talker, and procrastinator.

Somehow, I got five novels published (which I’d love for you to read), several short stories — some of which actually won some prizes — and have written humor columns for various out-of-circulation newspapers and periodicals. Not sure how that relates.

Saying I’m a humorist sounds kind of pretentious, but I do it because it’s easier to type than “someone who tries to write funny things.”

Early Years

Born in a small town in Oklahoma in the spring when the boys were coming home from Europe, I’m technically not a Baby Boomer. I was the fifth of five. My birthday was quite near my oldest sister’s high school graduation, so I was a great embarrassment to her. She eventually got over it.

I seemed to come by the clownish thing naturally, like some of my mother’s drunken brothers — she had six. “Philip Van, stop acting out!” she would say. Only gave me impetus. It fell on my older brothers to chase me down whenever the family was getting ready to go on an outing.

Photo by Camille Couvez on Unsplash

My tactic was to combine impishness with chipmunk-like moves so their laughing would slow them down. Worked for the most part, until I heard that immobilizing screech from my mother — “Philip Van!” That was a warning shot, meaning my next move would determine whether her small hand would connect with my small butt.

School wasn’t much better, except some hands got bigger and some would upgrade to wooden implements. Teachers could do that back then. Made life a whole lot simpler.

Maybe that’s when I took to writing; during those long periods in detention. My one notch up sister — often referred to as Number 4 — got a blank diary book one Christmas. She never used it, so I took it over despite the cover being pink and flowery. No matter. Only Number 4 and I would ever know about it.

I didn’t have the foggiest about journaling, but I had heard about diarying. I wrote most of it in code in case my sister snooped. Trouble was, she couldn’t care less, and I forgot the code.

I moved on to bigger endeavors. Wrote a play in the fifth grade, copying most of it from a TV show I’d seen about pirates. Even tried to produce it. It was an off-Broadway piece, about 1500 miles west in a friend’s basement in Lawrence, Kansas. Never saw the footlights, though. The basement closed before opening night. My friend’s mom had to do the laundry.

Education

I somehow got through high school and went off to college. I’d won no scholarships. I spent two-and-a-half years living up to most of Dean Wormer’s Admonishment (Animal House, 1978):

“Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.”

I say most because I wasn’t fat. Like Dean Wormer, my university notified the draft board that I was ready for them.

That culminated in an invitation from Lyndon Baines Johnson to join the U.S. Army. I spent the next two years of my life getting a real education, fourteen months, and nine days of it on the Korean DMZ. In retrospect, perhaps that was the best educational experience of my life.

I found no ivory towers in the military. The upshot of it all was that the federal government gave me money to go back to school. At last, I earned a scholarship, REALLY earned it, and had matured enough to take advantage of it.