The Exorcism of Volvo

I believe in the possibility of demons.

I'm a natural skeptic. I hear stories of ghosts, demons, and possession, and I raise an eyebrow. Ouija boards, in my opinion, are bogus. Horoscopes and fortune tellers are so vague and generic that they get it right most of the time.

But something inside me still believes that there is a possibility that the supernatural world is real. That there is validity to some of the paranormal things going on in this world.

A priest once told me that we have a Diocesan Exorcist. One priest is appointed as the exorcist for the entire Diocese, which is a large region, geographically. If another priest is faced with a possessed soul, they call the exorcist, who will come and pray over them, performing rites in an attempt to remove the demonic presence. This happens! The Linda Blair, split pea soup-spewing, spider-walking, head-spinning images of the 70's are still happening today.

It's kind of hard to believe. That being said, I do have a personal story of exorcism. The tale is true, although the demon is questionable.

Foreign Cars are the Devil

Growing up, I was a member of St. Boniface Catholic Church in Farmington, Iowa. It was a quaint church in a town of 750. A few times each week, we'd travel highway 2, through the stoic evergreens of Shimek forest, from Donnellson to Farmington. The town was tired and dilapidated. Once a vibrant river town that took advantage of the commerce that traveled the shallow waters of the Des Moines River, Farmington had begun to dry up when the railroads and highways began etching their way into the rolling hills of Southeast Iowa.

The church was a potpourri of families that lived in and around the dirty little town. Some older couples, tottering in on canes and replaced knees. A nice man named Gerhardt, who was missing one hand, everything from the forearm down. A few of my classmates' families, although none the really cared to associate with me. One woman distinctly stands out in my mind. No one knew how to take her. Her name was Christie.

Christie was around my moms age. Sandy brown hair laid plainly on her head. She was extremely tan, with wrinkly-leather skin pulled across her petite frame. Christie dressed plainly, with white canvas shoes and smudged khaki pants that were too short for her wiry legs. She often wore some type of button down shirt or sweater that seemed as thought someone thrown it out. Christie believed in demons.

The story goes that Christie moved to Iowa from Washington state, to attend the Maharishi School of Enlightenment in Fairfield, Iowa. Something happened while she was there, and she left the school to live in Farmington. Again, I do not know what the incident was, but the Christie I knew was both physically shaken and mentally distraught.

She walked with a timidity that reminded me of a nervous rabbit, arms pulled in tight and eyes nervously glancing back and forth. When she prayed in church, she folded her hands beside her head and laid her cheek against them. Her face was wrought with distress over silent pleas that no one else knew. Every time she spoke, it was with a whispered cadence that sounded as if she was trying to sing, but afraid of how it might sound. The result was a haunting voice that hung in the air like a fog, settling on your memory and turning to dust.

Christie was the point of much pity in our church and my mother made a point to make her welcomed at every opportunity. We had dinner with her, sat with her at church functions, and helped out with things she had trouble handling on her own. That's where this story picks up.

It was a brisk October day, not over 40^o Fahrenheit, when my mother got a call. The voice on the other end was breathy and sing-song. When she hung up, my mom turned to me,

“Christie called. She said she needs her car cleaned. I guess she drove through something.” There was more to the story than this, but my mother wasn't divulging any other details.

“Isn't it a little cold for a car wash?” I asked. I was not looking forward to any part of this mandatory charity event.

“Just go out there and help her.” She commanded with a roll of her eyes. After some cajoling, I got the truth out of her.

“Her car is possessed.”

“What?”

“I guess she drove through...something, and now her car is possessed.”

“WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO ABOUT THAT!?! I don't know how to cleanse demons! I am not an exorcist! Come on, mom!”

My pleas for reason fell on deaf ears. Begrudgingly, I set out to deal with the demonic Volvo.

The Tools of the Trade -- Lime Away and Carpet Cleaner

When I got to Christie's house, she was waiting for me at the door. She led me to the dingy silver Volvo wagon and explained to me the process that I was to follow:

Step 1 - Pour Lime Away pipe cleaner onto floors, seats, and any other surface, until thoroughly soaked with green goop.

Step 2 – Vainly attempt to soak up the verdant, viscous liquid with old towels.

Step 3 – Pray to God that Christie is satisfied before my hands freeze off.

When I opened the driver door, I was greeted with the project already in progress. Christie had unloaded two bottles of Lime Away onto the floor of the car. It seemed that this had happened some time earlier in the day, as the liquid was a semi-frozen slush. As the mid afternoon sun started lowering itself behind the scraggly trees, I began the process of exorcising the demons.

The first step was to remove the icy liquid from the floor. I checked the back for an ice scraper. No such luck. I attempted to chisel the corrosive liquid from its hold on the carpeted floor with a pen, but got nowhere. Then I got smart. Requesting a bucket of the hottest water available, I proceeded to besiege the Lime Away with scalding water, thus successfully liquifying the frozen cleaner. Objective completed. As I looked down triumphantly at the floor boards of the vehicle, my mood quickly changed from triumphant to disparaged. While I had melted the frozen muck, the car was now even swampier and, with the sun going down, the potential for another frozen floor was imminent. So I began bailing out.

After the majority of the liquid was removed from the floor, I was able to soak up the remainder with some old towels that Christie had provided. About the time I was finished with that project, Christie came out with a Shop-Vac and a can of carpet cleaner.

“Spray this on the seats. We need to get rid of it all.”

Ignoring the fact that a vacuum would have made the floor job much easier, I tried to think of a response to her request. Finding none that would meet Christie's irregular logic, I sighed and proceeded to coat the seats with an expanding white foam that smelled of old rubber. After vacuuming the upholstery, I returned triumphantly to Christie's door.

“All finished!” I proclaimed with vigor and chattering teeth.

Christie sidled up to the car with some trepidation. She peeked into the backseat, opened the hatchback, and seemed to be satisfied with the job I'd done. But then she sat in the drivers seat.

Immediately, she turned and looked me straight in the eye.

“You need to do the dashboard.”

“Christie, what do you mean? How do I do the dashboard?” I responded reluctantly. The methods used thus far were not utilizing electronics friendly cleaning agents, and this worried me.

She looked around a moment, then reached down for a bottle of Lime Away. Handing me the bottle, she pointed at the electronic panel of dormant meters and lights.

“If I put this stuff on the dash, It could ruin the car. There are electronic controls up there that – ” She cut me off,

“You need to do the dashboard. That's where they are. Please just do the dashboard.” She was adamant, but I realized the implication of this decision. I tried one more time,

“Why don't I just put it on like this?” I squirted the liquid onto one of the towels and began rubbing it into the vinyl.

In a surprisingly quick motion, she snatched the bottle from my hands and pushed me aside. As she sporadically squirted the cleaner onto the control panel, she ordered,

“Like this! You need to do it like this!” then she darted away and disappeared into the darkened doorway of the house. As I assessed the situation, I noticed her silhouette in the kitchen window, watching me as I stood in the frosty dusk. And so I began to dump the remainder of the bottle onto the dashboard.

The green liquid poured into the defrost vents. It seeped into cracks and ran over the edge, dripping onto the steering column. I did my best to mop up the goo, all the while my stomach sank lower and lower with the realization that I may be destroying a perfectly good vehicle. A perfectly good, potentially possessed vehicle, but none-the-less, a perfectly good vehicle.

I finished mopping up the mess I'd made, collected all the empty bottles, rags, buckets, and left them with the vacuum by the front door. Christie didn't come to the door when I knocked, so I closed up the soggy car and drove home, reflecting upon the task I'd just completed.

I don't know if the car was possessed. I don't know what Christie thought she'd caught in the engine of her Swiss-made hatchback. I do know that she had the entire dash replaced a few days later, due to an unknown failure in the electronic systems. But of some things, I can be certain.

Something had affected Christie. Whether it was in her car, in her house, or in her head, something had definitely upset her.

And that is real.

Father Hoenig - A Pastoral Tale

Have you ever met a person that, upon looking back, defies all logic? I'm not saying that the person makes illogical decisions, I am referring to the idea that their very being does not compute in your brain? This is the case with Father Hoenig.

I don't know Father Hoenig's first name. Though he was a priest, I've never attended a service he's officiated. I've come to learn of this priest through a professional relationship.

It was a sweltering hot afternoons in early August. It was late in the day, when the sun starts balking at the earth, sending shadows long but refusing to give up it's tenure of torturous heat. At the shop of Leroy Walljasper, we were all befuddled by some persnickety machine that had been commissioned for repair. As we stood back viewing the machine with a contemplative simmer, a little truck rattled into the drive.

Peculiar Pastor

The truck, if it had to be identified by one make or model, would be a Nissan, although the one remaining bumper, hood, and passenger side door would beg to differ. Most of the body used to reflect a navy blue hue, but it had oxidized to the point that a burnt orange crust overwhelmed any color on the trucks once gleaming hull.

The vehicle paused for a moment, unsure as to whether it would lurch forward from it's clutch or give up life indefinitely. Instead, it coughed to a dilapidated halt under an old hickory tree across the lot. Then, slowly and unsteadily, Father Hoenig tottered into view from behind the rusted out machine.

An immaculate version of Father Hoenig's jalopy

He was wearing black dress shoes that had long shirked the title “dress”. They were missing their laces, allowing the tongues to flap wildly as his legs jerked unnaturally out in front of his body. Inside the shoes were fathers naked feet, untethered by socks in the summer heat. He wore navy blue slacks, one leg caught around his knee in the style that LL Cool J made famous in the 80's and 90's. Hoenig's black shirt was unbuttoned but half tucked into his slacks, one shirt tail flapping in the breeze, the other bunched and stretching the cloth across his thin hunched frame. The white priestly collar was sticking out of the neck of his shirt, bouncing with fervor as his shoulders lurched ever closer to the shop.

Father Hoenig's hair was ghostly white, almost as if a wispy milkweed plant had landed on the back of his head and had clung there, ever so meekly, being tousled by the winds of that summer afternoon. One of the man's eyes drooped uselessly to the side, as if it'd jump free of its housing, if the skin surrounding the orb would only relinquish its grasp. I'd later learn that this useless eye was struck blind from complications of diabetes. At the time, however, it was simply one more element of absurdity in a whole collection of flesh and bizarre.

“I've got a mower. It...it...stopped working.” the monsignor said meekly as he approached the group of us who'd been observing his pilgrimage across the gravel. His voice was small and shaky, as if he was still working on shaping them as the passed his lips. They reached us with an upturn, making every word a milquetoast inquisition. As my grandfather questioned the elderly man, the story began to appear, but only in small sections. With a long drag from his cigarette, grandpa said through a puff of smoke,

“Yeah father, we can probably get that running 'gain for ya. Bring it by tomorrow and we'll get to workin' on it.”

“God bless you. Thank you. Thank you...so much. God bless you son, for helping me with my...mower.” Father tottered back across the rocky lot, clambered into his pickup, and sputtered into the distance, leaving naught but a plume of white gravel dust in his wake.

“I hope he realizes that I'm still gonna charge him for the thing. Blessings don't keep the lights on, ya know?”

Mowing the Unmowable

The next day, one of the fellas that helps Father Hoenig around the farm brought by the mower. He dropped it off and, tipping his hat, wished us luck.

As we dug into the machine, we found an incredible mess inside. From the looks of it, the mower had been run against something so hard that it not only stopped the blades from spinning, it actually took the alloy shaft that runs the length of the machine, and turned it into a corkscrew. This made our job immensely more difficult. After a few hours of driving the blades off the shaft with a sledge hammer, we retreated to the office to regroup against the twisted adversary. Grandpa lit a cigarette, grabbed a coke from the pop machine, and grabbed the phone.

“Yeah, this' Leroy. What the hell'd he do to this thing? Well, it's twisted up tighter'n a tax collector.”

Grandpa listened for a few minutes, then let out a chuckle. Shaking his head, he imparted the account.

Father Hoenig had a lot of land that, in recent years, he'd either forgotten about, or chosen not to plant for some reason or another. Whatever the reason, he'd remembered these fields on that particular summer and, upon inspection, decided that they needed to be cleared. The easiest way to do that was to hook on to the hay mower and cut through the ragweed and canadian thistles. It should only take a couple hours with this new mower. He was cleaning up the land pretty well, until he ran up against something, stopping the machine dead in its tracks. Rather than investigate this issue, he backed up the tractor, lifted the mower, and came back to the house. When his farmhands went out to inspect, they found what had stopped the machine so abruptly. It was an old moldboard plow.

A possible equivalent of Father Hoenig's adversary

It's not small. It's not unnoticeable. Even with shoulder high weeds and brush, most people would see a plow from the tractor. Most people with two good eyes. Unfortunately, I don't think father had one good eye.

The plow had done substantial damage to the mower, and the project was not fun. A week later, we'd finally gotten everything back in working order for father. He came back to pick up the cutter, and graciously paid grandpa, with a check as well as a blessing.

Curious, I asked grandpa why he called him 'Father'. Was he really a priest? I'd never heard of a priest who was also a farmer, but then again, I'd never met a character like Father Hoenig.

“Yeah he's a retired priest, lives out by Montrose. Used to be the pastor at St. Joe's out there, till they forced'm to retire. Still says a mass or two every now'n again. I guess it's a site.” Grandpa went on to recount the foibles he'd heard. Stories of Father Hoenig asking the altar servers what part of the mass came next, or speaking so quietly and unintelligibly that no one was sure whether they should sit, stand, sing, or kneel. It wasn't uncommon for Father to be late for mass, or forget to show up at all. For that reason, he hasn't been saying many masses any more, which is fine by him, as it gives him more time to farm.

I haven't heard much about Father Hoenig in recent years. I don't know if he's still farming, still driving, or still alive. While I may have depicted him as weak or unstable, I assure you that he was one of the most venerable individuals I met working at Walljasper Construction. He refused to give up, even when it meant pitting himself against 19^th century farm machinery.

To this day, I'm not sure I understand Father Hoenig. He was truly an anomalous entity. But maybe that was what is so intriguing.

Keep on Trucking

There is just something I love about driving a truck.

Please put the above statement in context. I drive a 2008 Toyota Matrix. A gunmetal gray hatchback that gets an average of 34 mpg. I love my car. I love everything about my car. It is the perfect vehicle for my life – living, working, and playing in a midsized metro area.

But when I recently drove my father's 2005 Ford F-150 Lariat quad-cab pickup truck, every logical reason for owning a sub-compact, fuel-efficient Toyota went out the window. The car fulfills every logical need I have for vehicular transportation, but the truck meets a more inherent, philosophical need. If you were to compare the two vehicles:

Toyota Matrix

Compact

Great handling

Easy to get in and out

Fold down seats create additional cargo room

Fuel-efficient

Sits low to the ground – little wind resistance

Ford F-150

It's friggin' huge

Takes corners like a boat

You need a rope to pull yourself into it

Its a truck. It has a bed. What other cargo room do you need?

Fuel? What is fuel? This thing goes through it like water

You'd be closer to the ground riding a giraffe

Every Girl's Crazy 'bout a Pickup Man

It may be a deep-seated masculine impulse, or it may be something I learned growing up in a farming community in Southeast Iowa. Trucks are the gold standard in Lee County and trying to find a Toyota, Honda, Suzuki, or Hyundai dealership within one hundred miles of my old country home is near impossible.

In high school, I would drive my little auction bought 1993 Mazda truck to school, and squeeze into a spot between any variety of giant 1980's Chevy or Ford truck. Mud tire clad, lift kit jacked, PA system blaring, aftermarket Cherry Bomb straight pipe exhaust ripping through the sonic atmosphere, these behemoths of the Central Lee High School parking lot would roll through the rows like prowling lions, daring a smaller car to cross their path. The 454 big-block engines would roar out a warning to the lesser vehicles, lest they be crushed under wheel like the tin cans they were.

My truck? It was a wounded meerkat. Stay out of the way, and I'd be fine. Otherwise my little red rice burner* would be a little red rice cake.

A Truck of a Different Color

The truck got me through high school. In college, my Mazda went kaput and I inherited a 1985 GMC Grand Sierra from my grandfather – a loaner that served me well for the rest of my higher education. At Monmouth College, where the student body is largely comprised of suburban Chicago minds, I encountered a very different vehicular phenomenon.

As the country mouse among city mice, my truck signified a tough agrarian existence. My newly-acquired “farm boy” image was further heightened when I cut the shoulder-length hair I'd sported throughout high school. My summer job working for my grandfather's farm implement sealed the deal, as I proudly wore my WALLJASPER CONSTRUCTION hat throughout the school year. I'd somehow gone from the hippie/punk kid driving a little foreign clunker in high school to the down-home country boy sporting the hulking pickup in college. I cannot really qualify this change in perception as good or bad, but it was certainly an interesting realignment of reality. Over the next few years I wore my agrarian heritage on my sleeve as something that made me stand out at Monmouth.

That old GMC would go on to be featured as a part of the ZBT homecoming float, haul pianos, drums, and more than its fair share of students, and cart all of my personal possessions to my new home in Davenport, Iowa.

But as all things are cyclical, my life would lead me back to a foreign vehicle. The GMC didn't do well for my wallet as I zipped around the Quad Cities on sales calls. So I sent it back to the farm, where it could be free to roam as God intended.

And I bought a Toyota. The more responsible choice.

*I apologize for the potential political incorrectness of the term rice burner as a pejorative synonym for an Asian made vehicle. This term is common vernacular in Southeast Iowa, where an American owned car company was held in much higher regard than any foreign made vehicle.

What I learned this Thanksgiving

Over the last week, Annie and I traveled hundreds of miles to celebrate the holiday of food, football, and family multiple times over.

As we gorged ourselves again and again with turkey, cranberries, potatoes, and stuffing, I took some time to reflect on the season and observe some peculiarities of this national holiday. 

When it hurts, stop eating

Our Cajun masterpiece

At every meal, I thoroughly enjoyed the food that was prepared. At Annie's mothers house, we started the meal with a delicious crab bisque. At my Aunt's, we had an apple stuffing that was out of this world. At our own apartment, Annie and I made a Cajun spiced turkey that was a huge success at our “Friendsgiving”. I had corn casserole and potatoes of every make, model, and variety. I drank champagne, mulled wine, and an amazing elderberry wine that is made near my hometown. Every place we went, they pulled out all the stops to offer the most impressive cornucopia of Thanksgiving splendor.

I tried everything. I ate more in the past week than I'd eaten the entire month prior. I shoveled in carbs like a Labrador, not realizing I was full until pangs of pain radiated through my stomach, into my chest and up through my arm. It wasn't a heart attack. It was a stomach attack.

This is where the Taoist's have it figured out. The Tao Te Ching explains a principle known as the middle way, which has a very practical application here. 

I enjoyed the food immensely. But, just as I experienced extreme pleasure by overeating, I also multiplied the discomfort that came later. If I'd practiced moderation from the beginning, my initial joy may not have been as extreme, but neither would my anguish. Everything is good in moderation. Well, maybe not everything – Meth, for example. And terrorists. But most everything else.

Even the most well trained dogs don't do what they're told every time

Annie's parents have a German Shepherd named Stella. She is incredibly well trained and mild mannered, even when the excitement of a family gathering is afoot.

Annie and I have Ellie, a Basset Hound who knows how to do the basic commands...when she feels so inclined. But in front of Annie's family, many of whom think that Ellie is a trouble maker and spoiled, she is almost always obstinate. We try so hard to show them that Ellie is a good dog, capable of taking orders and being peaceful, but when this miniature hound gets in front of people, she goes from over-sized wiener dog to giant ham.

The instigator

On Thursday night, Annie's grandmother warmed up a bit of left over turkey for a late night snack. She took her plate of poultry to the living room, sitting it on the coffee table before turning to retrieve her brandy from the kitchen. With grandma less than two steps away from the meaty morsels, Ellie sprang into action. She revved her stumpy legs into a gallop and, in one fluid motion, slid her lower jaw across the plate, raking up half of grandma's turkey. As a fish slides down the gullet of a Pelican, that turkey vanished into her canine maw in one gulp.

I wish I could've reprimanded my pooch for the bird-napping, but I was rolling on the floor at that point. Grandma didn't think it was so funny.

People, like dogs, also fail to be on their best behavior. I am notorious for letting my Iowa charm get the best of me, especially when I'm supposed to be making a good example for Annie's family. Using a ham fisted fork to stab my meat like a Neanderthal, spilling my beverage all over the table linens, or chewing ostensibly loud, pausing only to add a cud filled remark into the conversation - these are but a few of the faux pas of which I've been guilty.

I try. I really do, but like any son-in-law, mishap finds its way to me, every time.

Root for your team, even if your in-laws are against them

I am not a huge football fan. It is my theory that in elementary school, you are either forced into a favorite team by your family, or you arbitrarily select a team based on a mascot, affinity towards a city, or a trading card you got from a box of Raisin Bran.

My team has always been the New England Patriots. Since I was in about second grade – before they achieved infamy as one of the most successful teams in the NFL – I've loved the Patriots. I do not know why exactly, but I think it may have been my love for American revolutionary history.

The Patriots played the Detroit Lions on Thursday. Most of the rest of the men in the house were anti-Patriots, on principle. We watched the game in gross fixation on the television, yelling out things that only some of us understood. I'd add in comments like

“Good yardage!”

“Come on! Break through that line!”

I'm not sure I knew specifically what I was talking about when I said those things, but it fit nicely with the general chatter of the room. The Patriots won the game, and in the end, I had the pride of knowing that not only did my team withstand the jeers of it's opponents, I too withstood the ribbing of my in-laws about my team selection. I may receive even more heckling in years to come, but at least I will stand by my team.

Family may not always be fun, but it's better to tolerate them than to not have them around at all

Sometimes family can be aggravating. Sometime you'd rather they never come back. Some are never satisfied, no matter the hospitality you lay out before them. Others cannot overcome a grudge that has been held for far too long. Others still spin such tales of self indulgent boastfulness that you'd like to slap them back to last Tuesday.

But in the end, it wouldn't be a holiday without them. You'd miss the whine of the irritating children. The passive aggressive comments of one who is never satisfied with your accomplishments or aspirations. The cousin who is always competing with you for superiority.

All of that filial drudgery is worth it, when you are allowed one moment of true joy. Like when you see your two month old niece for the first time – even though you and her mother, your sister, haven't seen each other in almost a year.

That is what Thanksgiving is all about.

Pee my Pants at Central Lee

“If peeing in your pants is cool, consider me Miles Davis.”

Everyone's peed their pants before right? I'm not talking about diaper clad pant wetting – that's understood. I'm referring to 'old enough to know better', urination in the Levi's, public embarrassment grade leakage. I've had my fair share of societal faux pas, some of which have included public urination, and one in particular has left an indelible mark on my psyche.

In first grade, I was in Mrs. Ekle's class. I remember a few distinct features of that year of my elementary career – Reading A year with Frog and Toad, Andy Peck and I playing with Transformers action figures at recess (that's the original Transformers – none of this Shia Labeouf business), Matt Hobbs contorting himself into yoga positions during our comprehension worksheets, and the beloved afternoon milk breaks.

The milk break was more than just a reprise from academia or a benefit of USDA subsidies to the dairy industry. It was an exercise in civility and control. We lined up, alphabetically, cruelly leaving me to the portion of the line that I'd command for the majority of my career in the Central Lee School system. It seems they were ardent supporters of alphabetic organization, at least in the 90's. This left me taking up the rear my whole stint in Central Lee academia.

On the day which stands out among every other in my first grade experiences, we lined up at the door and, upon reaching relative silence, began our single file trek to the lunch room, where we'd brandish our blue card stock lunch tickets for punching, proceed past the brushed steel coolers until we found the rectangle box of chocolate or white dairy that suited our fancy. Then we'd circle back into the hallway and sit against the wall while we consumes our beverages.

The wall was a free for all. No rules of seating based on last names. No mandates banning free speech, or any speech. It was one of our brief respites from the uber-order that is elementary school life. So we clamored to the mustard yellow wall that stood opposite the cafeteria and attempted to find an open space next to our friends. Fifteen minutes later, as we prepared to deposit our empty cartons in the appropriate waste receptacle, Mrs. Ekle marched before us, obviously furious. In tow was a girl whose full name I honestly cannot recall, but her first name was Mary. She was in tears.

In an egregiously furious tone, Mrs. Ekle brought down the wrath of a mother rhino onto the students before her. As we soon learned, Mary had been ostracized, turned away from the wall by every student she approached. All she wanted was to sit and drink her milk, maybe some small talk. But this had not been afforded her.

I can recall Mary's appearance – ashamedly all to well. Bear in mind the fact that I was not in any way fashionable, popular, or even couth in my elementary days. I do not recount the following memory from the ivory tower of any chic appearance of my own.

Mary was not always the most kempt. She generally had mysterious stains on her obviously second, third, or fourth hand clothing. The odors that exuded her being were not always identifiable, and rarely were they pleasant. Mix this with awkward social conduct and it's clear to see that her classmates, myself included, were not always the most welcoming. I am not at all condoning the behaviors of my first grade self. Kids are mean, and we were probably mean to that girl. I will say that, on this particular day, I was not party to the injustice that befell Mary. I don't know that I would have treated her any differently, but I did not malign her on that occasion.

Upon receiving the brimstone of Mrs. Ekle's disappointment, we all sheepishly stood, resumed our alphabetic chain gang, and shuffled back to the classroom in silence. Our judge, jury, and executioner stood before us and delivered our sentence.

“For the rest of the day, we are all going to work in silence. No one is to utter a word. Take this time to think about the way you treated Mary. Would you like to be left out that way?”

We had about an hour to ruminate on our misdeeds. We pulled out workbooks, drawing paper, and activity pads and commenced the restitution process. About a third of the way through our noiseless trial, the chocolate milk began to make its way through my system and into my underdeveloped bladder.

I raised my hand. Mrs. Ekle, from across the room, shook her head, a somber, silent

“no”.

I sat their for a few more moments, trying to focus on the workbook. Which image was not like the others? I couldn't tell. All I could focus on was the ever growing urge to let loose the torrent of urine that was building. I stood and began to approach the teachers desk. I was stopped in my tracks by the steely glare of a tempestuous tutor. She pointed at my desk, and I returned, growing ever more desperate. I began to dance in my chair. I crossed my legs. That just made it worse. I looked around to see if anyone else could see my panic. I squirmed, vainly attempting to coax the fluid back up into my digestive system. Finally, I could hold it back no longer. The dark stain began to eek through my Ninja Turtles Underoos and make itself evident on my pants. I shrunk into my seat. The other students at the table began to smell that something was amiss. It didn't take long for the entire class to draw the conclusion that I had peed my pants.

As titters and murmurs began to break out across the silent classroom, Mrs. Ekle stood up to reprimand the cacophonous children. As she strolled about the room, she too caught the acrimonious scent of urine on her palate. She found me doggedly close to the underside of my work table, and sent me to the nurses office to get cleaned up.

Leaping from my chair, I walked with such a hurried pace that it bordered running. With the chance of being stopped for excessive sprinting, I slowed down to a loping walk. I reached the nurses office, explained my accident, and was told to STAND where I was while the nurse found some replacement garments. She disappeared into the bathroom and returned with two items. Handing them to me, she callously said,

'These are the smallest ones I got. They'll have to do. Use the towels in the bathroom to pat yourself dry.”

As I locked the bathroom door, my eyes fell on the brown sandpaper that hung from a dispenser beside the sink. It wasn't inviting in the slightest, but compared to the clammy feeling I was currently experiencing, it was a step up. I disrobed from the navel down, cleaned up as best I could, and slid the oversized, dingy pair of white underoos onto my tiny frame. I then hoisted up a pair of stonewashed jeans that had to be made for a 5^th grade girl. Clutching the baggy waistband to my nipples, I poked my head out of the bathroom,

“What do you want me to do with my...old clothes?”

I was handed a paper grocery sack and with an ill fitting belt strapping the gigantic pants to my torso, I soon was on my way back to my first grade classroom, pee pants in tow. I rebuffed the piteous looks and sneers as best as possible, sighed a monumental sigh of relief upon hearing the final bell, and raced to the bus.

The walk home from the bus stop was one of both dejection and relief. The paper sack hung at my side like a bag of cement, the weight of my shameful urine pulling my arm down and causing my chin to rest on my chest. I dared not make eye contact with the cars that drove by – everyone surely knew what that bag signified. I reached our back door, collapsed into the house and tore away any reminders of that awful incident.

In retrospect, this catastrophic event of my elementary school tenure seems comedic. But somewhere in my soul, the events of that day still shame me. I doubt that anyone else remembers the day I peed my pants in Mrs. Ekle's first grade class, but if they do, I hope they don't hold it against me.

The trials we face as children shape who we are today. How we react to those trials shape how we view the rest of the world.

All names used in this essay are used for comedic purposes only. I mean no defamation and harbor no ill feelings to anyone for the events that occurred. I hope you enjoy my self deprecation as much as I enjoy sharing it!

Pumpkin of Shame

I would like to think that I've always been an ingenuous person. Chalk it up to my time in the Boy Scouts of America, my agrarian heritage, or my tenure in Future Problem Solvers (yes, that is a real program in American schools). I've always looked at problems with a technical eye, and known that there is a solution out there, one that I alone could remedy. This drive for ardent individualism has not always resulted in the most flattering of outcomes.

One October, at an age when I was probably old enough to know better, I decided that I was going to make my own costume for the Halloween season. I don't know why, but I chose to don the visage of one of the holidays' most iconic items – the pumpkin.

It would make sense that any normal child would call upon their parents to help them fashion the costume of their fancy, but not me. I built my costume in the basement, refusing my mother entry into my workshop. I began simply – with a cardboard box. Cutting asymmetrical ellipses into the appropriate faces, I created holes to extrude my appendages and create the main element of my costume. The next step was to decorate it.

I found some pale orange paint that looked to be at least a decade old, a sickly sherbet, and began slapping it onto the box. Emptying the bucket with only 2/3 of the box coated, I was forced to find an alternative source of orange to complete my task. I could have asked for a trip to the hardware store to acquire more paint, but in my attempt to keep this craft project secret, I opted for another solution. I pulled out my trusty Crayola markers, located the orange and went to work. While this seemed like a great option at the time, in retrospect, it makes me blush, even now. The shipping info from the box was still evident under the valencia scribbles, making it look as if I was on my way to FedEx. But this slight imperfection did not phase me. I pulled the black marker from its sheath and added the necessary accents to my creation – vertical stripes, and of course, the appropriate triangles and jagged lines to denote the tell tale jack-o-lantern face.

To cap off my creation, I took a smaller box, lopped off the bottom, magic marker-ed it green, and slapped it on my head. Suiting up in a blaze orange sweatshirt and viridian sweatpants, my costume was complete. I, the cubist pumpkin, was ready for the world! Picasso would be proud.

I cannot imagine my mothers internal reaction to the bizarre attire I'd created, but to her credit, she was supportive of my choice to wear homeless housing as a Halloween habit, and sent me off to my first public engagement – a Halloween dance at the Argyle school gym.

Argyle is a small town that feeds into the same community school as Donnellson. The population of this meager metropolis is well under that of even Donnellson's one thousand citizens, and that includes the farms that fall within the surrounded area. Argyle didn't have much - a gas station, a post office, and a handful of side streets. The one thing that Argyle did have was a little league baseball association that put on the best dances in the county, every month at the old Argyle high school. What was so great about these dances is that they were open to elementary students - 4^th grade through 8^th grade. They were amazingly well attended, with hundreds of students at each dance. And the Halloween dance was one of the most anticipated events of the year.

I entered the dance that night with a bit of trepidation. I was not self conscious, only excited to see my friends, as well as those popular students I wanted so badly to be my friends, and to finally get a non-familial reaction to my cardboard creation.

I was met with a myriad of reactions. The woman who was taking coats and money at the door reviewed my costume with a raised eyebrow, smiled and let me pass without a word. Once I entered the fog filled gym, I fumbled my way to the corner where my friends normally congregated. Along the way I got reactions ranging from laughs and smirks to glares and outright looks of disdain. I brushed them aside and found my friends. That is when I heard,

“What are you wearing?”

“Is that a joke?”

“Ummm...Nice costume?”

As I looked around at the store bought monsters, superheroes, and ghouls, I realized that I was a different sort of frightening. I came dressed as the embarrassing friend in the cardboard box. The comments and looks I'd gotten as I confidently strode across that gym floor suddenly came flooding back, and everyone seemed to be staring straight at me. I was mortified. Desperate to avoid any further scrutiny, I bounced my boxy self back across the crowded room, seeking asylum in the concessions area. While there were fewer of my classmates in this room, the concessions area was tiny, so it seemed even more packed, and the florescent lights focused every detail of my shoddy craftsmanship into stark clarity. At this point, I just wanted to contract my head into my box and turtle my way out of this situation. But my mom wouldn't be back for another two hours – an eternity in elementary time. I determined that the only option was to scrap the carapace of my crappy costume and try to ride out the rest of the dance in my sweatpants. Not flattering by any means, but at least I'd be inconspicuous. It was much easier to shrink into the shadows when your silhouette was not so geometric. Or three foot wide. I rushed to the coat check lady,

“I need to store my...box. With the coats?”

The lady seemed confused. She studied me a moment, then asked,

“Why would you want to do that? The costume contest is in an hour. You have to have a costume to win the prizes! Go back and dance with your little friends!”

I balked. I didn't give a scratch 'n' sniff sticker about her stupid contest. I knew I wasn't going to win squat in this box. I had to think fast to convince this PTA dropout that I had to remove the dreaded pumpkin from vision before it sabotaged the rest of my elementary school career.

“It's just really hot in there...and crowded. I don't want to ruin it before trick-or-treating tomorrow night! Can I please put my boxes in the coat check? PLEASE?”

It may have been exasperation. It may have been pity. Whatever her reason, the woman begrudgingly took my cubist costume and shoved it into the coat room. For good measure, I hollered,

“Careful with that. It's...expensive!”

Then I rejoined my friends. They seemed relieved that I'd ditched the vegetable garb, although I doubt that my pumpkin really degraded any of our chances of making contact with the feminine gender that night. I spent the rest of the night trying to convince people that I was dressed as Pete Stoyanovich, kicker for the Miami Dolphins.

After what seemed like days, my mother arrived and I was relieved of the shame of that dance. When asked why I wasn't wearing the costume I'd worked so hard on, I could only reply,

“Um...I didn't feel like it.”

The next evening was even more difficult than the dance. I knew how people would react when they saw me in the box – the same way those kids had reacted at the dance. That self awareness was brutal. But it was the day of trick-or-treating. There was no time to call an audible on the costume now. And how would I explain it to my mother – that the costume I'd worked so hard on was a scarlet letter, publicly denouncing me as a 4^th grader with horrible taste in costumes? So I did what I had to do. I donned the dreaded decoration once more, and took my walk of shame – my plastic pumpkin pail in one hand, my pride in the other. We walked for blocks, my sister, my mom and I. Every look from the candy patrons we approached seemed to pity, persecute, or propagate the idea that I was a sad little man in a sad little box. The only consolation was that, despite their looks, they did not withhold any sweet delectables from my bucket. So I kept my head down, let my sister do the talking, and collected my bounty.

At the end of the night, I had survived, despite my fears and resignation. I ran into a few classmates, who may have thought nefarious things about my costume, but dared not say anything with our parents present. In the end, I made it home with my candy and my pride. I ate my fill, got ready for bed, and lived to see an new day. And from what I remember, there was little jeering the following day at school.

I can only hope that I am the only one who remembers what I wore that Halloween. Lord knows I've worn worse in recent years. But at least those costumes were bad on purpose.