Belting Out an Apology

If you are a bit squeamish, or if you have a bit of a liberal side to you and you consider corporeal punishment abhorrent, you might want to skip this story. 

 

I should probably also warn you that some of the visuals are a bit disturbing too close to a meal; regardless of your political persuasion.

 

Fair warning.

 

 

 

My father believed wholeheartedly in the “spare the rod, spoil the child” school of child rearing.  My brothers and I dug holes, stood on fence tops, scrubbed pots, pulled weeds, and most every other unpleasant thing around for punishment one time or another.    

 

Although, I never recall him actually using a rod if you get right down to it. 

 

Nope, his chosen tool was a leather belt. 

 

 

I have always suspected there were a number of reasons for that.  First and foremost among them was that he always had a leather belt with him; not so often a rod.  And while it shames me some to admit it, my brothers and I were known to give him cause to spank us now and then.

 

But mostly only on those days when the sun came up.

 

 

The routine posture for this activity was pants and shorts pulled down around the ankles, laying forward on our belly and elbows, across the edge of a bed.  That allowed direct and solid connection with rather sensitive parts of our anatomy; with the added bonus of providing Dad with a comfortable position with which to shift his weight from foot to foot to allow for the best follow-through.

 

I recall on one occasion taking some minor solace over the fact that in order for him to spank us in that manner, we got to moon him.

 

But that solace only lasted until the first whack descended on my upturned rump.

 

 

And there was a while in there where I took pride in not making any sound, not crying out, no sobs, not even a whimper.  But truth be told, I think that just encouraged him to be a little more enthusiastic in his application; believing either that he was getting weaker, or more likely, believing that I had built up callouses that he had to work down through.

 

 

Dad wore out a number of belts over the years.  No matter how you cut it cowhide while naturally resistant to burrs, brambles, mountain lion and wolf teeth, is just not up to the level of abuse Dad’s belts took on a daily basis.  Something had to give.  And while common sense would have dictated that the youthful flesh and mind would have been the first to give out, it just wasn’t so in our cases. 

 

That’s probably because common sense and my brothers and I had only a nodding acquaintanceship with each other.

 

 

And while our Dad regularly “tanned” our hides, it wasn’t one of those pleasing mahogany toned shades you see on your basic beach bum.

 

But, none of those sessions did us any real harm.  And to be truthful, I can’t ever recall thinking; “Nope, that looks awful fun and all, but I’m likely to get a spanking, so I’m not gonna do it”.

 

 

In fact, there was only one time when I felt unjustly put upon by a spanking.

 

There I lay, sensitive white parts being made to look a bit like a barber’s pole over something I hadn’t done.

 

No, really.

 

I hadn’t done it.

 

Hard to believe I know, but that’s that way it was. 

 

And believe you me, I was sure talking my fastest to convince Dad that he was striping the wrong rump.

 

I finally succeeded, or he got tired of swinging the belt, I’ve never been sure which, when Dad stops and say: “Huh, I guess you really didn’t do it”.

 

So there I lay, a little misty eyed over the fact that he believed me. 

 

 

Struggling to my feet I turned to face him, figuring that the least I should do was to face him while he apologized.  His apology sounded just like this: “Well then, that was for something I don’t know about yet”.

 

 

And while common sense and I weren’t constant companions, I knew enough not to remind him of that episode the next time I was lying across a bed. 

 

Just wouldn’t have been smart. 

 

No way. 

 

No how.

 

Copyright © 2013 Marty K Vandermolen

Boot Hill

You’ve all seen it. 

Maybe it was the opening scene from “The Magnificent Seven” as Yule Brenner and Steve McQueen climb onto a horse drawn hearse and take a dead man up to the cemetery; or the scene with John Wayne looking down from a lonely pinnacle of rocks into the cemetery as his mother is buried in “The Sons of Katie Elder”; or any number of western movies where the cemetery plays a crucial role.

Boot Hill. 

The name alone whispers visions into the long ago center of your mind and scratches shivers into your bones. 

Wind and dust swirling among gravestones and cheap wooden crosses.  The final resting place for those slow on the draw or struck down by the plague.  Here and there, even an old-timer who passed of natural causes.  A place desolate and forlorn.  Outside of town; close enough to be a threat to the unwary, far enough for the burgeoning sensitivities of the gentle folks.   

There really were such places back in the 1800s; out in the west.  Here and there across the west you can find them still.  Outside St George Utah is one in the small ghost-town of Grafton decimated by locusts and Indian raids, and finally abandoned.  Or in what was once gold rich Bode on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, an explosive town that came into its own in the late 1860s and died a quiet death within a few short years. 

Ramshackle and rundown, weed choked and squirrel infested, those cemeteries still host the dead from the Wild West that really was.   

I would know. 

Originally the Livermore Valley was a large cattle ranch begun in 1840.  Back then, with too few Spanish in the area, the beef had no value, but the hides and tallow could be shipped and were worth about $3 a cow.  Then The Gold Rush happened.  And gold miners began to stream through the valley in 1848 and 1849.  Beef became valuable for the meat both for travelers and to drive up to the mining country.  Fortunes were made.  The Livermore Family, the Mendenhalls, Holdeners, MacCleods, and others put down roots in the valley and slowly a cow town was born.

A cow town.  Like Abilene and Dodge City.  Supplies for the ranches, and spirits and girls for the cowboys. 

And out on the western edge of town.  Boot Hill rises some 50 feet above the surrounding terrain.  Out in the middle of the valley.  Miles from the hills, ridges and mountains that define the valley.

Boot Hill stands alone.

I was born in Livermore California in 1958 over a hundred years after Livermore sank down roots, and buried men and women on the hill.  Originally the Mendenhall family cemetery plot, sandwiched between two Mendenhall brothers’ property lines, the cemetery was later named Oak Knoll Cemetery for the gnarled oak trees that shaded the final resting places.  By my time, it had long since been dubbed Boot Hill by locals.

And shortly after I was born, Boot Hill was abandoned to the fates.

Wind blew across the face of the graves.  Tugging and pulling at the wooden crosses.  Rain pelted the earth, causing the dirt to shift and gravestones to lean.  Sun baked color out of wood and stone alike.  Weeds grew to mask the borders and fences of the plots, vines pulled down whatever they could that was standing erect. The gnarled trees continued to twist and deform. Dropping limbs and acorns, and shade.

My brothers and I were naturally drawn to the hill.  Visions of “I’m callin you out” gunfights and Indian raids fed on the fertile imaginations of our young minds.  We went to play, to ride bikes, to run and slide.  We always climbed the hill from the west, cause the eastern side, the side facing towards town, was a sharp steep drop down into the arroyo.  The hill stood directly in the path of the running water and forced it to turn northward.

But best of all was to trap birds, rabbits, and squirrels.

Many a day we three trooped across town to Boot Hill carrying a stick, a long piece of twine, a wooden fruit box, and some seed or fruit.  We would scout out a good hiding place, tucked down behind a leaning marker and set the box up open side to the ground.  Prop one end up on the stick, tie the twine to it, scatter the seed or fruit, then duck back behind the marker to try and patiently wait out some critter’s coming.

A quick yank on the twine and the box would fall; sometimes scaring the critter, once in a while actually catching one.    

Some days, instead of a box trap we carried homemade newspaper kites instead.  Two thin strips of wood, tied together in a cross, with a string running around the “outside edge” to form the shape of a diamond.  Sized so that a full sheet of the “Livermore Hearld and News”, or the “Independent” newspaper could be carefully folded and pasted over the strip all of the way around, forming a diamond shaped skin for the kite.  A bit of string to make the cross piece bow, another for an anchor point; strip of cloth for a tail, and we could soar into the skies over the valley below us. 

We spent a lot of days up on Boot Hill prowling around.  Dreaming up ghost stories and “remembering” gunfights that certainly never happened in our lifetimes, if ever.

Then in the late 60’s during a particularly wet rainy year, the arroyo cut far enough into the bank, collapsing shear sheets of hillside.    Old graves on the edge of the hill were exposed.  And Boot Hill was no more.

Oh, Oak Knoll still stands, weathered and trimmed by the rushing waters of the arroyo still some 40 years after the last time I played on it.  But in the late 60s, the graves were removed, the bodies disinterred and relocated to other cemeteries in town.     

I was in Livermore a year back on a beautiful sunny day.  One like those my brothers and I would have spent flying kites, or trapping rabbits.  I stopped and climbed to the top.  The sign there now reads “Oak Knoll Pioneer Memorial Park”. 

It was nice I suppose, but it wasn’t Boot Hill.

And there weren’t any kids playing there either.

Copyright © 2013 Marty K Vandermolen

Be Prepared

Everyone has some unresolved issues.

Perhaps mine have been a little more pronounced; or maybe I have just been more committed (or committable), but some of my issues have been handled rather abruptly.

One of my “hot buttons” was bullying.  Now bullying comes in many forms, and my parentage provided me with tools to combat most of those forms.  My maternal grandfather’s chest was as wide as a plow horse’s, with arms and legs that evoked tree trunks.  My mother was quick, sharp, humorous, and persistent.  My father was strong, tall, quick, sharp, opinionated, and resilient.

Yep, I grew to a rather formidable force, able to hold my own against bullies of the physical or mental persuasion.

 

To me, elitism was one of the more insidious forms of bullying around. Elitism was a “we’re special, and you’re not”, down-the-nose focused, you are beneath us way of bullying people.

 

In the Boy Scout organization, there is a sub group called “The Order of the Arrow” or OA for short.  The  OA was a group that held tremendous promise, but one that I never saw live up to that promise.  Once a year, every Boy Scout troop could elect a candidate to the OA.  That boy had to represent the best of Scouting.  And universally, I would say that each of those boys did.

On gathering into a group however, instead of becoming a force for learning and experience within Scouting; elitism would kick in, and the boys in the OA began to believe their own publicity.  They believed that they were smarter, more capable, and stronger than other scouts.  They believed that they were due specific allowances that others weren’t due.  They began to ignore the remaining troop members in favor of their new exalted association.

I made it my mission to prove to them that they were wrong.

 

One winter, high in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California at a Boy Scout camp named “Diamond-O Scout Reservation” close to Hetch Hetchy and Yosemite valleys, the San Francisco Bay Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America held a winter jamboree. 

A jamboree is an event attended by many Troops, who come together to compete in Scouting and outdoor skills.

As a winter location, Diamond-O was among the best.  High enough for a good layer of snow, broad meadows, steep hills, vast acres of forest, and bounded by Forest Service land on three sides.  A small river ran through the property, ending in a slat damn that created a large swimming hole, the camp during the summer served as a base for forestry and equine activities.

 

The winter I was 17 and the Junior Assistant Scoutmaster of Troop 939, my troop arrived at Diamond-O early Saturday morning.  When we checked in, we asked the OA (they were in charge of the activity) where to set up, they told us to pick out a spot and set up.  After looking over the grounds, we picked a nice level area set back just inside of the tree line that would get good sun during the day, and be reasonably protected from wind during the night.  We began pitching camp.  Half way through one of the OA guys came by to tell us that we had to move because that was where the OA was going to set up. 

 

Some words were exchanged.

 

My Scoutmaster convinced me that we should pull up stakes and move, but on leaving I couldn’t pass up digging at the OA that had gathered.  Being seventeen, that naturally came down to questioning their manhood.  That of course prompted an immediate and vociferous response; one thing led to another until I dropped the challenge for them prove their manliness by meeting the troop down by the swimming hole after the event competitions were over.

During the day, while contending with fire starting, archery, cooking, map and compass and other competitions, the various OA members running each event were busy “trash talking” all of our patrols as they came through the event.  In so doing, the OA effectively spread the word that there had been a challenge to their manliness through the entire camporee.

After the events were over, the entire camp came down to the stream by the waterhole for the entertainment value.

The full OA group showed up.

So did our full troop, from the youngest 11 year old to the oldest boy.  Even the Scoutmaster joined us.  And while I have to believe his interest was to keep us out of a fight, my hat is off to him, he was Troop 939 tried and true.

 

At 17 I stood over 6 foot, tipping the scales at a solid 185 pounds.  The leader of the OA group was equally as big.

He stomped right up to me, shoved this nose right up to mine and said: “You called us out, what are you going to do now, huh?”

Without flinching I smiled sweetly and said: “We’re gonna take a bath, thought you ladies might like to join us”.  At which point every last boy in the troop stripped down buck naked in the snow and jumped into the ice rimmed creek, singing and scrubbing away. 

There were a number of insults thrown from the stream up to the OA, and plenty of laughter from the other campers.

The OA boys turned a pleasing shade of red.

 

Since they wouldn’t join us, I called the troop to be attention. 

Rather a sight, 28 boys ranging from 11 through 17 (and one Scoutmaster) standing at attention, saluting, buck naked in a river in the middle of a snowy field. 

I mustered my most disdainful look and said; “Well, since you don’t even have the balls of our 11 year olds…maybe you would be willing to have a snowball fight instead.  Tomorrow morning, over at the far end of the field, 8 am.  If you think you’re up to that.”

The OA beat a hasty retreat, vociferously telling us how they were going to kick our asses in the morning.

 

In truth, our teeth had barely quit chattering by the time the campfire program got started that night at 8 pm.  But there is no doubt, the talk of the gathering was that our troop had showed up the OA once and had challenged them again.

There was no way the OA wasn’t going to show for the snowball fight.  And since there were 35 of them, and all of them were 16 to 20 (Explorer Scouts stay around longer).  We were going to have our work cut out for us.

But the Boy Scouts have a motto: “Be Prepared”, and I for one had taken it to heart.

So, after the campfire, we packed the younger boys in bed and the older boys in the troop and I headed out to the war game location to scope the area out and make plans.  The area consisted of a flat space about the length and width of a football field, with one “end” close to the camp proper, and the other “end” abutting a long slope that lead up to the highway.  We figured to meet the OA on the “50 yard line” as it were.

I do believe that we worked until well neigh one in the morning in preparation, but on slipping into my down bag that early morning, I was confident we had the OA once again.

 

Promptly at 8 am the 35 boys of the OA came strolling out to the field, followed closely by most of the rest of the campers.  Each OA member was carrying a couple of snowballs (proving that they had at least heard of the Boy Scout motto I suppose).  The sight that met them was my good friend Eric and myself; standing alone just shy of the middle for the field calmly tossing snowballs up into the air and catching them right-handed.

Our mouths were working too I should admit.  Challenges and taunts, things like “well, it’s about time” and “we figured we had best keep the numbers on our side fair for you” floated across the field to their ears as they approached.

To this day I can see the light leap up in their eyes and remember watching the “group decision” click as they began to rush us.  We stood our ground, for a while, then Eric and I each chucked a snowball at the racing OA crowd, turned tail, and ran for the hill.

If you have never run in show before, believe me when I tell you it is tougher than dry sand.  The boys of the OA group rapidly spread out, from a solid cohesive group into a line of individuals struggling to be in on the kill.

Eric and I struggled through the snow and right up the hill through an open pathway between the trees towards the highway.  One of the OA boys yelled: “Get ‘em before they get to the road” and all increased their efforts.  Further separating their members, and incidentally, keeping them focused straight ahead.

Just as Eric and I were about to reach the road bank, we dropped to our knees, scooped up large armloads of snow balls previously piled there, spun to our feet, and launched ourselves downhill, directly at the loose line of “hounds” that had been baying at our heels, rapidly throwing snowball after snowball.

Surprised?

Yeah, you could say that.  Some of the OA boys stopped dead in their tracks mouths agape; some fell to their knees panting; while the remainder threw their remaining snowballs in our direction, uphill. 

And that was the signal.

All that “Be Prepared” time spent the night before was spent digging fortifications and making snowballs, lining both sides of the gauntlet that Eric and I had just run.  The troop boys popped up behind short protective walls, and started lobbing snowball after snowball after snowball, while the exhausted OA boys either rolled into fetal balls to protect themselves, or futilely tried to scrape up snowballs where they were. 

The rate of fire was entirely lopsided in our troop’s favor.

Eric and I along with two other older boys ran in among the OA crowd, using gravity and speed to knock them off of their feet, heads downhill, vulnerable to the onslaught.

 

Looking back at it nowadays, I suppose a case could be made that we were bullying the OA, but, they were older on average, were stronger on average, there were more of them, and in our minds at least, they had started it by kicking us out of our camp.

 

Copyright © 2013 Marty K Vandermolen

Things that go “BANG” - Part one

Ah, the smell of burnt powder; black powder, smokeless powder, heck, any number of “home concoctions”, and anything available to be had.

If it made noise, caused a concussive force, and left behind a cloud of combusted gasses and smoke; it was a great thing to behold.

Once in a great while, my brothers and I would get our hands on some firecrackers.  Every now and then, something a little bit more impressive.  Each occasion was the greatest of all events as far as we were concerned.  We would carefully hide them from the prying eyes of those who would deprive us of our treasures.  

Those villains were known simply as “Mom” and “Dad”.

You see, Mom and Dad stood united against our so called “indiscriminant” use of explosives.  Not united in reason perhaps, but united in result.

Our mother was worried that we would injure ourselves while playing around with some explosive device or other.  And, as far too few of the devices we detonated had any manufacturing experience or mathematical reasoning involved in their fabrication, there was I must admit some basis for that concern.  Dad on the other hand was far more worried that we would damage something he would  then have to repair or replace.

The upshot though, was that there was no “under adult supervision” involved in our examination of the science of explosions, and our post-graduate investigations into ballistics and aerodynamics as applied to rockets.



Each time Mom and Dad were out of the valley on a trip to buy some new appliance or other home improvement item, my brothers and I would make a bee line for our hidey holes to pull out our explosive stashes.  World War II prisoners of war could have learned a thing or two from us about hiding contraband.  I have seen miniature radios hidden in canteens that couldn’t compare to the ingenious ways we hid our goodies.

We would haul them all out of their various locations (never hide all of anything valuable in a single location) and dump them together on the kitchen table to take inventory.  Then with some figuring as to how soon we might be able to resupply, we would argue and dicker over how many and which we were going to detonate that day.

Selections made, the remainder were returned to their various places of concealment.  This precaution served two purposes.  First, it kept us from a free fall rapid fire exploda-thon that would leave us “boomless” for the foreseeable future.  And second, if we were caught in the act, we could claim that those devices that remained in our possession were our last ones we had and thus save the remainder for future days.



Our adventures included firecrackers, M-80s, smoke bombs, homemade cannons and rocket ships, homemade explosive powders, and the extraordinary potassium metal and sodium metal when we could get them.  

And yes, as mom feared, there are tales to tell of injuries.  Damaged hearing, and numb fingers, stinging eyes, and seared skin.  

And yes, as dad feared, there are tales to tell of damage great and small, known and unknown.



But, the damages were in most cases reasonably limited, and for the most part, some 40 years later, the marks and scars are difficult to find.

While the joys and memories live on.

 

  

Copyright © 2013 Marty Vandermolen

 

Really Big Nocturnal Woodpeckers

Technology, environmentalism, and aesthetics have eliminated untold joy in the world.

Take mercury for instance.  At most environmental temperatures the stuff is a silvery, shiny, heavy liquid.  Amazingly heavy.  Used over the years to stiffen hat brims, help in gold panning, and in light switches.

Fun to play with if you are a kid.  Stuff splits into individual droplets, that roll around on a surface seemingly without leaving any trace.  Push two droplets together and they fuse into one; strike one with a little bit of force, and it splits into dozens.

And as little as a teaspoon in a bottle, and you can feel the impact energy as you tilt the bottle back and forth.

Great fun.

 

Problem is, very toxic too.  You’ve heard the term “mad hatter”?  Yep, comes from breathing in too much mercury vapor.  Seen pictures of gold miners with no teeth?  That’s cause they used the mercury in their pans to gather the really fine powdery gold, then rinsed the pans and used them to eat stew and beans from.

Nasty stuff.

But a great conductor of electricity.  And the fact that it is a liquid, allowed some bright person to devise an electric switch that could be mounted on the top of a pole, and as the sun dropped, the vial of mercury would tilt and the tilt would allow the mercury to flow to one end, to connect two wires together.

These switches were used on the top of every wooden telephone pole that also mounted a street light.  The mercury switch would automatically turn the light on at dusk, and off when the sun came up.

And take the telephone pole, once a mainstay of every neighborhood.  Used to string telephone wires and power cable along the street and down to each house.  Made of wood, roughly 40 feet long, 12 inches or so in diameter at the bottom, and 6 inches in diameter at the top.  Cross arms to hold the wires apart from each other.  Glass insulators.

Used to post lost pet fliers, and yard sale signs, and to cast cool shadows for hot bare feet to rest in on warm summer days.

Mostly extinct now because people wanted to have less “clutter” in their neighborhoods, and so all those pesky wires have been buried under the street.

But back in my day, spaced three or four to the block, there was a wooden light pole on both sides of the street.  And on at least two of those poles, there was mounted a street light, activated by a mercury switch.

 

One night, after our father had let us spend some time playing with a large pool of mercury (which actually explains a lot about our childhood if you spend some time thinking about it) one of us boys came up with an idea.

If the lights on the poles were controlled by mercury switches, and if mercury flowed from “un-contacted” to “contacted”, then if we could make the top of the pole swing back and forth like a tree in the breeze, we might be able to get the street light to turn off at will.

The challenge had been thrown down.

 

Now, my memory isn’t good enough to tell you how long it took us to figure out how to do it, nor how many things we tried before we were successful, but I can tell you what worked.

We learned that if you used an 8 pound sledge hammer, and whacked the pole as high up as you could reach, as hard as you could, rhythmically, you could, over a number of whacks, get the top of the pole to sway back and forth.  Back and forth far enough, fast enough, to cause the mercury to flow away from the contacts on the switch, shutting the light off.

And wonder of wonders, once the contact was broken, and the light winked out, it turned out that the light had to cool back down before the power could make it work again; a period of a good 10 – 15 minutes depending on the temperature on a particular night.

I am certain that the neighbors jumped up and rushed to their windows that first night, hearing the rhythmic thump, thump, thump of sledge hammer on pole.  But on peering out their curtains, and seeing the wild Vandermolen brothers clustered around a telephone pole, hammers in hand, whacking away gleefully, they either decided it wasn’t a problem, or wasn’t safe enough to venture out.  And so went back to their reading, TV watching, or other tasks.

 

Filled with our new knowledge, we told our friends about how you could shut off a street lamp.  Mostly we were met with “un uhs” and “bet you can’t’s”.  And of course, our pride on the line, we would gather a small group and show off our technique.

I can’t tell you who came up with the idea, but it was bound to happen sooner or later.  And after one thing led to another, I recall one night a large gathering of boys from around town, each with their father’s prized sledgehammer in hand.

We set out to black out an entire section of town.

Knowing that once we exited the immediate neighborhood, populated exclusively by retired folks who preferred watching the “Vandermolen Comedy Channel” to most any other recreational activity, we were likely going to have to contend with a hostile population.  So, we spent some time gathered on the front porch, discussing targets and strategy.

Padding quietly across town and into our targeted area, each boy was stationed leaning up against a telephone pole with a street light.  We had enough boys in the group to target every light pole on a single block, on three successive streets.  Last boy in place was to be the one who started the process rolling.

There followed about 15 minutes of frantic pole pounding until your light went out, then running down the street past the other guys banging on poles, until you reached a pole that wasn’t being assaulted, and hammer in hand get back to work.  At one point, after my second or third light winked out, I stood looking back down the block and three full city blocks without any street lights, while behind me I heard a disjointed cacophony of thumps ringing against poles on the street I was on, and on one street either direction.

All told we blacked out 12 city blocks before we heard sirens in the near distance and sprinted through a side yard to the field along the railroad tracks, and thus, around the approaching police and back home.     

That thud, thump, thump, thud coming from all directions in the dark of night is a visceral memory that still springs full to mind now and again; and with each recollection, the joy of wailing on a light pole with a sledge hammer, blacking out the night returns anew.

Copyright © 2013 Marty Vandermolen

Mr. J's Car

There are certain events, memories, times, that change your basic understanding of life.  They often sneak up on you.  They aren’t planned activities like going to the Natural History museum on a field trip, or heading out on vacation with your parents.  No, they are more basic than that.  They just pop up unannounced.

 

One Christmas a few of my friends and I were out roaming the town, tracking down people we knew and signing Christmas carols to them.  You see, I hung out with a number of musically gifted people.  Girls who played violin, viola, flute, and harp; guys who played piano, guitar, horn, and sax’s; choir members and musical actors. They were my “people” in high school.  I was wrapped up in the beauty of musically talented people.

 

I have no idea what they saw in me. 

 

 

So we were out going door to door, my friends singing a few carols, while I hid in back strangling a cat or two.  Then we would beg some cookies, or hot chocolate, and move on down the street.

 

After a couple hours of this as we rounded a blind corner on a rather dark backstreet, one of the violinists pointed at a little MG sitting by the curb and  said; “Hey, isn’t that Mr J’s car?”.

 

Mr. J was the orchestra leader at our high school.  Yep, same sporty car, same driving gloves; even a notebook from our high school on the seat, unquestionable Mr. J’s car parked by the curb right in front of the house on the corner.  We trooped up the walk and started leaning on the doorbell of the house so we could sing Christmas carols to Mr. J.  After a bit of persistent doorbell ringing, Mrs. J opened the front door. 

 

There she stood, fully in the doorway, hair disheveled, bare footed, clutching the top of her robe closed; panic in her eyes.

 

 

Now, Mrs. J was a favored English teacher of several kids in the group.  Problem was, while Mrs. J and Mr. J had the same number of letters in their last names; they weren’t the same letters if you know what I mean.

 

Yep, I had seen that panic’d look before.

 

 

It was usually in the eyes of a rabbit with one leg caught in a trap as I approached; shotgun in hand.

 

One of the girls, Lynn, said: Oh, hi Mrs. J, we want to sing you some Christmas carols, can you get Mr. J to come to the door too?

 

Mrs. J simple said: “……….He’s not here” in a meek and quiet voice.

 

The girl started to object that we had seen his car right at the curb.

 

 

Now to be truthful with you, I had never considered Mr J as anything other than a snobbish dweeb of a teacher.  What other conclusion can you come to of a man who jelled his hair, wore lifts in his shoes, drove a sports car, while wearing driving gloves, in his late 40’s, in sunny California?

 

But seeing Mrs. J standing there, in obvious discomfort, basically unclothed, denying that Mr. J was in her house, it became readily apparent to me at least that there must have been more to the man that I gave him credit for.

 

Being a hormonally charge teenage boy, I had already connected the dots and I cut Lynn off with a “Well, let’s just sing one quick carol to Mrs. J and get going.”

 

 

About the time we got back on the sidewalk headed down the street, a couple of the girls had figured it out as well.  And I guess Mr. J was more attractive than I had thought, cause when they made the connection, their hormones kicked in.  Of course, discretion is something that comes with age, not with hormones, so we all started joking about it and wondering what we could do to let both the teachers know we hadn’t been snookered.

 

That MG was shining in the street light’s soft halo, calling out to us.

 

A quick glance over my shoulder at the car and I said; “Hey, let’s roll Mr. J’s car around the corner and down the block…that way when he comes out, he won’t see it…that will fix him.”

 

That thought almost fixed all of us.

 

The car’s hardtop was on, but the door wasn’t locked, so one of the gals jumped in, popped it out of gear and released the hand brake.  The rest of us started pushing.

 

Problem was, the steering wheel was locked and before we knew it, the car was broadside across the road just this side of that blind corner.  We all stopped to talk about what to do.  Some voted for leaving it right there, some voted for trying to pick up the front end and roll it around the corner with just the rear tires on the ground. 

 

After a while we decided the best thing to do was to just push it back to the curb.

 

No sooner had we done that and set the parking brake than an ambulance, siren screaming and lights flashing, squealed around the corner and flashed off down the street.  Everyone was gaping slack jawed at the receding ambulance. 

 

 

Everyone except me.

 

I was looking at the house where I had caught motion in the front window.  And saw Mr. J’s wide eyed countenance peeking through the gap in the front curtains.

 

I smiled and waved.

 

Copyright © 2013 Marty Vandermolen

 

An Exciting Adventure

I don’t know about you, but as a kid, the worst words I ever heard from a teacher was; “We’re going on an exciting adventure tomorrow”.

Yep, field trips. 

Black days on any calendar as far as I was concerned.

And this is coming from a guy who found creative was to miss school whenever possible.

Planned field trips always set off a long list of activities that I wanted nothing to do with.  No way, no how.

Listening to rules

Notes home from the teacher

Reading rules

Permission slips

Repeating rules

A report to be written about what we saw and learned

Did I mention Rules?

 

 

And let’s be honest, when you are a boy in school, there is no, and I mean absolutely NO good that ever came of communications between home and school.  After-all, if you slipped up, the school might actually find out what your mother’s signature looked like.

 

 

Then came the lunches (all brown bag) all stuffed into a box, and packed under the bus, in a smelly old compartment that last housed the muddy sweat stained football uniforms, jock straps, and fungus filled shoes of some bunch of guys several years older. 

Never thought about it that way, huh? 

Well I did.

I would always hang around, just out on the edge of the class, trying to judge when the very last moment to hand over my lunch would be.  Anything to reduce the possible contamination time. 

Too soon and it got crushed by all of the lunches piled on top of it. 

Too late and the box was stowed and the lunch got crushed by whoever my seat partner was on the bus.

 

 

Roll call came next. 

Some new junior level teacher or parent was assigned that duty. 

Thankfully. 

After-all, they didn’t have reason to recognize my name.  For the longest time I thought my real name was “Ogodknot” cause first day of every class every year when the teacher was calling role and got to my name they clearly called out; “Oh, God, Not Another Vandermolen!”.

And at least the new teacher/parent didn’t have an existing neuroses caused by one of my older brothers.

 

 

Then pile onto the bus.  And sit.  And wait.  And wonder.  While the teachers, guardians, and bus drivers figured out how to get to where we were going. 

A boy can only take so much of that.  Then, a poke to the ribs, or a wet willy to the guy in the seat in front…..

And more listening to rules

 

 

All of this just to go to some natural history museum filled with bugs and critters, or art museum filled with paintings and vases. 

Boys don’t care about art, unless it resembles blood spatter.  And vases? Not even interesting once they resemble blood splatter.

And more listening to rules

 

 

And natural history? 

Who was kidding who here? 

I knew bugs better than any museum display.  I spent more hours than I can possibly count as a boy, bug net in hand, catching and studying every moth, butterfly, mosquito, gnat, cricket, pill bug, tomato worm, ant, snail, squirrel, and raccoon around.  If it walked, crawled, hopped, flew, or oozed it had already received its full share of my attention.

Heck I had personally pulled every conceivable part off of every bug in creation long before I was old enough to go on my first field trip.

 

Copyright © 2013 Marty Vandermolen