My stepmother tells me I am going to turn out to be like Jac, my mother’s brother. I wonder if she is right.
My definition of abnormal becomes the opposite of the very wild shenanigans of one of my teen step-sisters. There are many sexual and other acts she does inside and outside the family. These acts of hers become part of my reality, and I definitely need a definition of reality. It’s a reality better than none. Without definitions it would be like going through life like a reindeer, something my father used to say to me and my older brother whenever we act lazy or silly.
I work hard, get my driver’s license, date girls, go to drive-ins and a nearby skating rink, and later drive a brand-new 1966 Starfire Oldsmobile to high school.
One night in 1966 my father and Brenda are gone and I am alone in the house, except for one of my little sisters. My other two sisters were at a girls club. I hear something outside in the lumber yard and retrieve a .22 pistol. It is quiet and dark, the only sound is a lone Whip-poor-will. I look around and find or hear nothing. My dog, Duchess comes up and startles me. I decide no danger exists. Instead of unlocking the pistol normally I squeeze the trigger seconds before easing off on the hammer. A shot rings out and I realize I accidentally shoot my right palm just below my thumb. I go into the house, disbelieving that I could be so careless. I go into the bathroom and wash my hand, as if that helps. My sister, not aware of my injury, yells from the back room, “You better go get them or you are in trouble.” I walk out of the house again, this time holding my arm. Opening the door, I get into the orange and white Chevy pickup and head off to get the girls.
Approaching a light at 5th and Main my whole body seems to pulsate. “I have got to get the girls,” I say to myself. Instead, I turn toward the Lindsey Hospital. Once there I go in and say, quite stupidly, “Is there a doctor in the house?” My father and Brenda arrive in my hospital room, my father glad my accident is not more serious. Brenda, on the other hand, is disappointed I can tell. She is like that. It is all so embarrassing to realize how I exaggerated that night. I do exaggerate too much.
Shortly after this I turn seventeen and hope the next year would be better.
At Cattleman’s steakhouse one night, upstairs dancing with my steady girl, I stop and excuse myself for a breath of fresh air. I go to the mezzanine and look across Highway 81 and toward the Fairlawn Cemetery. My dad’s parents are buried there and I wonder how my life would end. As I stand there I say to myself and in a prayer, “God I know how different I am and feel strange inside. I promise a career of helping people, so let my last years be at peace with myself.” As I leave, a certain peace does surround me, but I put it down to optimistic thinking. I remember that God doesn’t make deals. Or does He? Anyway, just before opening the inside door to the dance floor two other events come to mind. One is the night I follow Brenda to a hotel on 7th Street and how I know that it isn’t to teach Sunday School. Secondly, I think about how Jac shot my dad with a shotgun, almost killing him. It would have killed him, too, but my mom holds down the barrel of the gun. She does this hanging upside-down and jerking the barrel just in time to make most of the blast hit the pickup instead of my dad who quickly drives away. When I was five, my father had come over to the house that day to leave off a Christmas present. My parents are going through another temporary breakup. I say to myself out loud and my girlfriend hears me, “You know, I think too much and I have to keep my mind busy all the time. Awful tiresome.”
“What?” she asks, concerned.
“Nevermind,” I say as we continue to dance.
At her doorstep that night she says, to my surprise, “David, you really don’t think too much.” But she is prejudiced.
My definition of abnormal becomes the opposite of the very wild shenanigans of one of my teen step-sisters. There are many sexual and other acts she does inside and outside the family. These acts of hers become part of my reality, and I definitely need a definition of reality. It’s a reality better than none. Without definitions it would be like going through life like a reindeer, something my father used to say to me and my older brother whenever we act lazy or silly.
I work hard, get my driver’s license, date girls, go to drive-ins and a nearby skating rink, and later drive a brand-new 1966 Starfire Oldsmobile to high school.
One night in 1966 my father and Brenda are gone and I am alone in the house, except for one of my little sisters. My other two sisters were at a girls club. I hear something outside in the lumber yard and retrieve a .22 pistol. It is quiet and dark, the only sound is a lone Whip-poor-will. I look around and find or hear nothing. My dog, Duchess comes up and startles me. I decide no danger exists. Instead of unlocking the pistol normally I squeeze the trigger seconds before easing off on the hammer. A shot rings out and I realize I accidentally shoot my right palm just below my thumb. I go into the house, disbelieving that I could be so careless. I go into the bathroom and wash my hand, as if that helps. My sister, not aware of my injury, yells from the back room, “You better go get them or you are in trouble.” I walk out of the house again, this time holding my arm. Opening the door, I get into the orange and white Chevy pickup and head off to get the girls.
Approaching a light at 5th and Main my whole body seems to pulsate. “I have got to get the girls,” I say to myself. Instead, I turn toward the Lindsey Hospital. Once there I go in and say, quite stupidly, “Is there a doctor in the house?” My father and Brenda arrive in my hospital room, my father glad my accident is not more serious. Brenda, on the other hand, is disappointed I can tell. She is like that. It is all so embarrassing to realize how I exaggerated that night. I do exaggerate too much.
Shortly after this I turn seventeen and hope the next year would be better.
At Cattleman’s steakhouse one night, upstairs dancing with my steady girl, I stop and excuse myself for a breath of fresh air. I go to the mezzanine and look across Highway 81 and toward the Fairlawn Cemetery. My dad’s parents are buried there and I wonder how my life would end. As I stand there I say to myself and in a prayer, “God I know how different I am and feel strange inside. I promise a career of helping people, so let my last years be at peace with myself.” As I leave, a certain peace does surround me, but I put it down to optimistic thinking. I remember that God doesn’t make deals. Or does He? Anyway, just before opening the inside door to the dance floor two other events come to mind. One is the night I follow Brenda to a hotel on 7th Street and how I know that it isn’t to teach Sunday School. Secondly, I think about how Jac shot my dad with a shotgun, almost killing him. It would have killed him, too, but my mom holds down the barrel of the gun. She does this hanging upside-down and jerking the barrel just in time to make most of the blast hit the pickup instead of my dad who quickly drives away. When I was five, my father had come over to the house that day to leave off a Christmas present. My parents are going through another temporary breakup. I say to myself out loud and my girlfriend hears me, “You know, I think too much and I have to keep my mind busy all the time. Awful tiresome.”
“What?” she asks, concerned.
“Nevermind,” I say as we continue to dance.
At her doorstep that night she says, to my surprise, “David, you really don’t think too much.” But she is prejudiced.