Kill Them with Kindness

Scraggly Old Dude

A few years ago, I was late to a doctor's appointment so I did what we all do. I drove like an idiot. As I neared my destination, I turned onto a road with a red traffic light. A beat up, green, Hyundai was waiting at the intersection. There was just enough room for my Honda Ridgeline to fit behind the little, green car. Or so I thought.

When the light changed, the car in front of me pulled into my doctor's parking lot while trailing a plume of dark, grey exhaust. As I got out of my car, I noticed this scraggly, old dude, exiting the banged up Hyundai. He made a beeline right for me.

"You know, it's people like you with their big trucks always getting too close!" he yelled.

My first thought was that a Honda Ridgeline wasn't a big truck. The dude was slightly taller than me by a few inches, but no real threat. He had an impressive beer gut which slowed his progress. When he neared, he smelled of booze and BO. I thought,

"There are tall men, and there are short men, but the Colt 45 made them all equal."

Gun owners are always going on about an armed society being a polite society, but I don't think that's true. People are way more aggressive when they're packing hardware. I didn't have a gun, and my second thought was this guy just might. It was a logical conclusion given his advanced age and gut coupled with his brazen desire to tangle with strangers. So I fell back on a tactic my mother used to say I should employ when I was a kid and about to be pummeled by a bully.

Kill them with kindness.

"I'm very sorry, sir," I said.

"Fuck you!" he yelled.

Okay. It didn't work. I pressed on.

"I should be more considerate."

"It's people like you that drive like assholes."

"Yes, you're right again," I said as I began heading towards the office.

"Don't walk away from me!" the old fart yelled.

"I'm late for my appointment, sir," I explained.

He followed me screaming all sorts of obscenities mixed in with my subpar driving ability. I took the blame for all of it and apologized no less than a half dozen times. It was a long walk. As I neared the door, I held it open for my new, fat friend. He looked at me suspiciously then scooted into the office. His Chubbiness walked up to the receptionist person and started barking at her. I decided I would stand unusually close to my loud companion, well inside the HIPAA zone. The receptionist person informed him that he had an outstanding balance.

"I don't got no insurance," the dude whispered.

This was before Obamacare. The guy was one of the 20 million uninsured people that my rates went up to cover. I'm sure the other 19,999,999 are probably way nicer than this disagreeable person (prick).

"I got a agreement with my doctor," he explained.

"Okay, have a seat," the nurse receptionist person said.

Next was my turn.

"How are you on this beautiful day!" I exclaimed cheerfully.

I finished up my business, topped with a copay then entered the waiting area. The scruffy old douchbag with no medical insurance and I were the only two people in there. I sat right next to him.

"You drive like an asshole," he resumed.

"Yes, I know," I said.

The television displayed a story about flood victims in the south.

"Those poor, unfortunate people," I exclaimed.

"Fuck them! They probably deserve it like you," he blurted.

I forged ahead.

"Imagine losing your house and everything," I said as I made the sign of the cross.

The guy looked down to the ground. If there was a shred of decency inside the deep bowels of this turd’s soul, it was playing solitaire by itself. As he looked up, he muttered,

"I guess, I didn't have to be so loud."

"No, you were right. I drive poorly," I said as I resumed watching the television.

A nurse person dressed in an odd mismatch of multicolored floral patterns suddenly appeared.

"Mr. Fitzpatrick," she called out.

The old guy got up. He looked me over and then followed the nurse. As he walked off, he stopped and turned,

"I guess I'm sorry for swearing and all that," he muttered.

"No, you were right, sir. Have a good day," I answered.

He turned solemnly and left and that was the last I ever saw of him. In the end my mother was right. Killing people with kindness works really well and is actually quite a lot of fun. Anyone can succumb to anger. It takes genuine self-control to kill somebody with kindness. So the next time you run across one of these uptight ass hats who played too much contact sports with an improperly fitting helmet, kill them with kindness.

There are tall men and there are short men, but kindness made the short guy taller.

Editor's Note: Originally posted on January 31, 2017.

Debatable Outcome

The first presidential debate of 2020 last week was best described as Bizarro World’s version of the Ice Capades. History does seem to be playing on a continuous loop. Trump reminded me of Dan Quayle during the vice presidential debates in 1992 when Quayle told Al Gore to inhale after repeatedly asserting,

“My turn!”

Biden was reminiscent of Admiral James Stockdale, Ross Perot’s bewildered running mate, who opened with,

“Who am I? Why am I here?”

Trump was prepped by none other than the former governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie, who advised the President to pants Biden if he strays from the lectern. After the debate, Christie said Trump “was too hot” for his numerous interruptions even though Christie showed Trump how to properly execute a weapons grade wedgie. All the President had to do is let Biden drone on about his 110 page plan Bernie Sanders co-wrote since by the third sentence he would’ve been talking about cockroaches, the blonde hair on his legs and loading spaghetti sauce with forklifts. Trump interrupted him so frequently he never gave Biden a chance to drift to that special place where the former Vice President cavorts with his childhood Pooh Bear.

Biden answered very few questions. Instead, he mostly looked into the camera and told the American people to vote. Admittedly, Biden did assert that he was the leader of his party more forcibly than Trump denounced the Proud Boys, a male-only organization that derives its name from the tune, Proud of You Boy, featured in the animated Disney musical, Aladdin. Like the President, I never heard of the Proud Boys before, and I doubt a group named after a song from a Disney cartoon are much of a real threat.

Trump erroneously thought the debate would be like one of his midwestern rallies attended by people taking a break from shooting hogs from a helicopter with an AR-15 to convene on the tarmac of the local airport and listen to the President credit his administration with saving Jesus from crucifixion. There was no screaming crowds waving signs of support like,

Combine Harvester Mechanics

for Trump

The President was expecting everyone in the audience to yell and scream in support even though moderator, Chris Wallace, told the audience at the onset to treat the debate like an Amish funeral. Instead of his mostly reserved family in the audience, Trump should’ve handpicked a few of his rally attendees, preferably those who spend Friday nights swinging from a rope tied to the bucket of an excavator as they soar over lukewarm, pea-green pond water.

Trump interjected more times than a Fox opinion anchor plugging their latest book. The President even interrupted Chris Wallace's verbose questions. Wallace seemed like he aspired to the presidency himself instead of settling on the salutatorian of the Sean Hannity Conservatory. Wallace even rolled out the tired old Charlottesville “both sides” quote and made Trump yet again explain himself. Biden thought they were talking about the Joni Mitchell tune and broke into song,

Rows and flows of orange hair

And ice cream castles in Pelosi’s lair

And pony soldiers everywhere

I've looked at clouds that way

Not to be outdone Trump dove in,

But now they only block the gun

They complain and snow everyone

So many things I would have done

But Schiff got in my way

Trump took the next verse too,

I've looked real loud from both sides now

From up and down, and still somehow

It's Russian collusion I recall

I really don't know Putin at all

Biden cleared his throat then crooned,

Moons and Junes and CornPop fears

The racist things I sometimes sneer

As every sniff of shoulder length hair

I've looked at girls that way

Wallace jumped in for the next verse confirming the rumor that he secretly shits in Sean Hannity’s bathroom and doesn’t flush,

But now it's just another show

I leave 'em gagging when I go

And if you dump, don't let them know

Don't give yourself away

Trump grabbed the next verses,

Impeached by clowns from both sides now

From Schumer to Romney, and still somehow

It’s Teflon Don I recall

I really won’t ever go at all

Germs and firms and feeling proud

To say "I love me" right out loud

Dreams and schemes and casino crowds

I've looked at life that way

Biden pointed to himself and belted,

But now old friends say I’m acting strange

They shake their heads, they say I've changed

Well something's lost, but Harris gained

It’s warming more every day

I've looked for life from both sides now

From shut up and clown, and still somehow

It’s all illusion I can’t recall

I really don't know where I am at all

All three brought it home with,

We’ve looked at polls from both sides now

From win and lose, and still somehow

It’s disinformation we recall

We really don't know truth at all

So who won the first presidential debate? Many news outlets were quick to declare Biden the victor mainly because the bar was set so low. Biden's entire campaign was concerned that he was going to excuse himself for the bathroom only to return with his shirttail poking out his fly and toilet paper streaming from his shoe. Biden refused to answer Wallace's question concerning his party's push to get rid of the filibuster and pack the Supreme Court. He responded that whatever position he takes "that'll become the issue." I think it's already an issue since some in his party want to pack the senate by granting statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington DC and pack the country by granting citizenship to millions of undocumented pole vaulters.

Gone was any of the wit Trump unloaded on Hillary in the 2016 debates. Neither candidate delivered a single, notable quip. The most memorable moments in past debates were always those that made us laugh like in 1984 when Ronald Regan responded to concerns that at the age of 73, he was too old to run for president,

"I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponents youth and inexperience."

Or in 1988 when Lloyde Bentsen responded to Dan Quayle's claim that he had as much experience as JFK,

"I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy.”

Since neither candidate entertained us with memorable zingers, I have to declare Chris Wallace the winner. Wallace maintained marginal control wedged between two enormous egos and Biden’s also. His questions were often pointed and nearly as long as either candidate’s answers. Also, his hair looked good.

I’m hoping next time we’ll have less squabbling and more clapback. Maybe then people might get enthusiastic enough to vote for someone other than a third party candidate who is on the ballot in only one state. When a live presidential debate is less interesting than reruns of reality TV, you know it's time to reimagine the process of selecting the leader of the free world.

The Education Bubble

For some time now, I've been engaged in an informal survey of college majors. Whenever I cross paths with a person speaking about upcoming college plans, I always ask them what their major is. Although I've talked with many people, only one was majoring in STEM. He was a recent high school graduate who was spending the summer waiting tables to earn some money before embarking on a four degree in Chemistry. My wife, Christine, congratulated the young man on his stellar choice of study, telling him that her company hires interns each summer in that field. In my day there was never an abundance of students majoring in science and math, but today it's as if there are none. What gives?

Instead of bashing millennials which my generation is fond of doing, I put the blame squarely on the vast number of colleges across the country which are all vying for the billions of dollars doled out by the Department of Education via Title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965. Back when I was in school colleges got money too through government grants made directly to the institutions, and financial aid and Pell Grants issued to the students. The fed gave out money to schools with the caveat that the institutions had to ensure that their dropout rate was kept to a minimum. Back then legislators didn't want young people to become encumbered by a debt for an education they didn't complete. Colleges sought talented students who had the tenacity to get through a four year degree. The carrot and stick policy ensured that federal money gave each party something of value. That was 35 years ago when about 20% of the population earned a college degree.

Today federal money is disseminated to academic institutions primarily through financial aid. Colleges are allowed to have as much as 90% of their profits come from federal sources. Initially the restriction on funding from federal sources was much lower. Lobbyists for educational institutions managed to get the limit raised over the years. Federal law requires institutions to provide a quality education, but drop out rate is no longer used as a metric impacting funds. Unconcerned if a student actually graduates, educational institutions now lure in high schoolers with simplified programs which give them little chance of landing a job.

In my informal survey many students told me that they were seeking degrees in anthropology, communications, theology and exercise science. Worse yet there are fields of study which are mostly activities turned into college degrees as in animal rescue, turf and golf course landscape maintenance, puppetry, equine care, fermentation science, bowling industry technology, packaging, poultry science, piano pedagogy and floral auctioneering. One kid was majoring in Canadian Studies. What's to learn about Canada other than their chief exports are Canadian money and Justin Bieber? Another told me that a college counselor asked him what he enjoyed doing. He answered,

"I like to wash my car."

So he's getting a business degree with an emphasis on car detailing. There's always been degrees that are worthless, but back in my day a liberal arts degree would land you a good paying full time job with benefits managing a department store. Today those jobs are mostly part time and filled from the floor. A degree in Communications, often sited as one of the worst college majors, is what you get if you tell your guidance counselor that you hate math. The problem is you can't succeed in this world by avoiding math. Additionally, many institutions let students "make your own major," a policy which vastly expands enrollment while diluting the value of a college degree. Today 30% of the US population gets an undergraduate degree, up fifty percent.

When I was applying to colleges in the early 80's, the brochures for the schools mostly highlighted what the institutions were known for academically, any renown laureates on the faculty, and significant research conducted at the institution. Today high school graduates are recruited by colleges who send unsolicited brochures which espouse the wonderful "campus life" and the many amenities they offer including the views from the dorms and the extensive food programs. The advertisements read more like a country club rather than an academic institution.

During the 2016 presidential election, Bernie Sanders, the socialist senator from Vermont, espoused the idea of making two year community colleges free. Hillary Clinton chimed in and said that all community colleges should offer free tuition paid through increased taxes on the rich. More recently Cardi B told Joe Biden that her fans mostly want a "free college education."

To which he responded,

"By the way, we're going to have, if I get elected president, free college education for four years of college, flat out."

The problem with government subsidies is that federal money drives costs up, not down. Biden's tuition free program applies only to families making less than $125,000 a year which includes undocumented students. Many kids transfer credits from community colleges as a more economical means of obtaining a degree. As federal money rolls in, the cost of college will soar. There is also no restriction on the majors a student can aspire to under the Biden program. As a taxpayer I don't want to indirectly fund some kid's anthropology degree unless I at least get a chance to impart on them parental wisdom at the proper decibel level. I usually start with "a worthless degree is still worthless even if it's free." 

When I was young, my juvenile head didn't need to tap out for me to understand that you can't do much with an easily obtainable degree, but the recruitment effort was vastly different. Today young people are courted by institutions of higher learning offering useless degrees in exchange for massive debt. The education bubble is not going to burst. It will slowly deflate as fewer students sign up for a worthless education offering a phony promise of success.

When it comes to this latest bubble, the education is in front of us not behind.

Editor's Note: Originally posted on August 3, 2017.

Fire House

All the news about the wildfires in California and the blaze Jimmy Kimmel lit in a trashcan on stage during the Emmy’s got me thinking about my childhood experiences with fire. We didn’t have gender reveal pyrotechnics when I was a kid nor did we have large scale forest fires in New England, but our house did almost burn down twice.

We lived in a 1200 square foot ranch located in a working class neighborhood of a town that was historically founded on the principles of gerrymandering. In 1980 when I was in high school our town went bankrupt due to a combination of budgetary mismanagement and grassroots efforts to resist increases in property taxes. The school board had to make some tough decisions to save money so they offered to cut buses or the football team. The townsfolk rallied to save the football team. After the cheese wagons were nixed in favor of preserving the jock's glory days, I walked to school carrying my 20 year old physics book which predicted that “someday men would walk on the moon.”

Red Fire Alarm Box

Our house was located a block down the road from The Station, a nightclub that caught fire in 2003 during a set by the headlining band, Great White. Pyrotechnics set the place ablaze killing a hundred people and injuring many more. I recall that the tragic event was covered by all the national news outlets including CNN. My hometown is best known not as the birthplace of a famous scientist who postulated groundbreaking theories that changed the world, but for the fourth deadliest nightclub fire in the United States. Mediocrity was so inbred in my town that in a competition for avoidable catastrophes, we couldn’t even pull off a bronze.

Years earlier when I was in middle school, two fires occurred in my childhood house, both in the kitchen. Residential smoke alarms were not required by code back then, and we didn’t even own a fire extinguisher. No matter. There was a red fire alarm box affixed to the telephone pole at the head of our driveway. As kids we were told never to touch that box unless, of course, something was on fire.

The red metal box always intrigued me, thermostat level intrigue. The central emergency number, 9-1-1, wasn’t yet nationally adopted. No matter. Having a fire alarm right down our short driveway was like living next door to a firehouse. My friend, who I considered to be brought up wrong, sometimes pulled down the white cover to reveal the business end of the fire alarm, the mysterious metal lever. For me touching that thing was sacrilegious.

Once as I rode past the red box on my bike, I envisioned a meteor streaking across the sky then crashing into our neighbor's house. I imagined that I darted for the alarm, pulled down the white cover, then yanked on the elusive lever, summoning the emergency calvary. I was heralded as a hero for my quick thinking which saved my neighbor’s lives. Unfortunately, their house was a total loss.

“Bobby! Dinner,” my mother hollered from the side door that opened to the kitchen.

My mother always called everyone to the table before the meal was ready. She knew we all had to wait our turn to wash hands in the one bathroom of our house. She wanted us clean, relatively, and seated when she was ready to serve. So I wasn’t surprised that as I passed through the kitchen, the large pot of oil on the stove was just coming to a boil.

My oldest sister, the firstborn, was taking her sweet time in the loo as I queued up behind my sister, Jeannine. Jeannine is the middle child while I am the youngest. As the alpha vacated, she pushed past both of us with indifference, broken only momentarily to convey disgust. Jeannine went in next.

“Come on Bobby! I’m just washing my hands,” she called out.

Confident I wasn’t going to see my sister involved in bodily functions on the throne, I entered the bathroom.

“Mom’s making mushy chicken,” Jeannine announced as we washed.

My mother liked to fry chicken except she never left the chicken in the oil long enough to crisp up. The egg and bread formed a soft coating which although mildly tasty probably still contained live bacteria. Jeannine darted from the bathroom. As I entered the kitchen, something was wrong. My oldest sister was seated at the table, tending to her nails with an emery board. My mother was on the phone, her hand to her mouth as she looked out the kitchen window. My father, always last to sit, was in the living room reading the newspaper. Jeannine had stopped in her tracks and was staring at the pot on the stove.

“What’s she doing?” I thought, “Why’s she not sitting at the table?”

I watched Jeanine’s hand rise like the moon. She was pointing at the pot of boiling oil. As the frothy liquid popped and sputtered over the lip, it ignited into a spectacular orange flame. My mother dropped the phone as she screamed for my father. My dad burst into the kitchen still clutching his newspaper. In a move best described as superhuman, my father jettisoned the paper, reached through the flames and spun the knob on the stove. The thick orange glow of the metal burner faded, but this did little to dissuade the grease fire now raging in the pot. Someone brushed past me. It was the alpha receding to her room. As my family was locked in a life and death struggle to save our home, the firstborn's first thought was to return to the safety of her room as if the David Cassidy posters on the wall would save her.

While my father stepped backwards trying to think of his next best move, my mother filled a glass of water from the sink. She ventured to the cauldron on the stove with the glass held aloft. When she dumped the water into the flames, a fireball arose from the pot and spread out over the ceiling. Jeannine and I mentally came to the same conclusion,

"ABANDON SHIP! Every man for himself!"

She bolted for the door with me not too far behind. As I traversed the kitchen, a second fireball belched from the pot. My parents recoiled as I ducked my head. When I reached the threshold, I yelled to Jeannine who had made it to the driveway,

“Pull the fire alarm!”

“No don’t!” my mother shot back.

I turned to my mother in disbelief. The inside of our house looked like the launch pad for a Saturn V rocket at T plus 2 seconds, and she didn’t want to alert emergency services? Best I could come up with in the middle of the chaos was that she probably didn't want the firemen to track mud in her house. My father grabbed the closest thing in reach, my vinyl schoolbag. He beat back the flames which now covered the entire top of the stove. Knowing that my books, pencils and papers were now in peril, I yelled,

“Not my schoolbag!”

The smoldering remains of my education hit the floor with a thud. My dad snatched up the braided area rug which he piled onto the stovetop, adjusting it each time a flame snuck out from underneath. I called to Jeannine who was poised in front of the fire alarm,

“It’s out!”

My father periodically lifted the rug to check on the status of the rest of our lives in that house. Any hint of orange, and he would slam the rug back down. Once he was sure the crisis was over, he hauled my mother’s smoldering mess of a rug outside to the lawn where he hosed it down. As the commotion subsided, I recall hearing the muffled lyrics of a Partridge Family song emanating from my sister's room,

So what am I so afraid of?
I'm afraid that I'm not sure of
a love there is no cure for.

I think I love you.

I'll tell you what I was afraid of. Fried food! The second kitchen fire took place a year later. It wasn’t as ominous of an event as The Great Grease Fire of 1974, but since we never had a family debriefing after the first fire, we were equally unprepared for the second. It was the day after a holiday party. My mother was cleaning up the debris from the previous day's cheer and merriment, which included a large, yellow Tupperware bowl filled to the brim with Cheez doodles. (I have no idea why "doodles" is not capitalized). The large bowl full of orange baked puffs that sort of resemble insect larvae kept getting in my mother's way. Now when I say that this was a large bowl, I mean it was much more than merely big. It was a Fix N Mix Bowl #274 which according to the internet can hold 26 cups of your favorite shit. She kept moving it here and there as she cleaned so eventually she came up with the master class idea to stow the plastic container and all 26 cups of Cheez doodles in, wait for it...

the oven.

Hours later when my mother was preparing to reheat leftovers for dinner, she put the oven on "preheat." Momentarily, a foul oder permeated our tiny home. My father, the house whisperer, noted it first from the living room,

"What's that smell?" he asked aloud.

My dad sniffed in different directions then took two steps then sniffed again. He olfactorily dead reckoned right into the kitchen where he met me trying to retrieve a box of crackers from a high cabinet.

"Something stinks," I announced.

My mother's muffled voice emanated from the bathroom.

"The Cheez doodles!"

"Get your mother the Cheez doodles," my father ordered.

I looked about.

"Where are they?"

My father scanned the kitchen.

"They're in the goddamn stove!" my mother said frantically.

My father and I looked at each other puzzled.

"They're not in the stove," my dad exclaimed with a chuckle.

"You don't cook Cheese doodles," I offered.

"They must be around here someplace."

The door to the bathroom cracked open.

"They’re in the oven!" my encumbered mother screamed through the opening.

My father and I both looked to each other then to the oven. Through the dark, charred flin caked on the glass window in the oven door, I could just make out a faint yellow glow. My father reached for the handle. As he was getting ready to yank it open, he paused then released the handle. He pointed in succession to each of the many knobs and levers on the console above the burners, looking for the one that was set to "Go For the Moon." As my dad reacquired the handle, I stepped back. My father cautiously cracked open the door. A foul vapor poured out from the oven but no flames. Yellow goo was dripping from the grate and pooling at the bottom of the oven. My dad released the door.

"Not too bad," he ascertained.

Before he finished his assessment, the yellow glowing flicker, fanned by a backdraft, ignited. My father saw it right off.

"Oh shit!" my dad shouted.

He reached for the rug I was standing on and pulled it into the air. I fell backwards onto my fundament. Briefly, I thought that this just might be the chance I was waiting for. Maybe, just maybe, I might get to pull the fire alarm. My father swung open the door then proceeded to beat the flaming pile of Cheez doodles with the rug which sent fiery bits of doodle in every direction. They landed on the floor. Some even made it up to the counter. While my father's go-to method of fire suppression did, yet again, suppress the flames, embers were drifted about the kitchen. Although I wasn't going to have any snacks in my lunch this week, at least we weren't going to lose the family home.

Unbeknownst to my dad and I, my mother had exited the john. After seeing the mess my father was making, she armed her favorite cleaning implement, the canister vacuum cleaner. My father hated the sound of that thing, partly because it was loud and partly because my mother loved it so that when she vacuumed it was like a trip on the S.S. Minnow, a three hour tour. He retreated to his chair in the living room and resumed the word jumble in the newspaper as I picked myself up off the floor. Hours passed as my mother vacuumed with delight. She was on her hands and knees working on freeing up the burnt yellow, solidified plastic blob in the oven with a butter knife when I crossed through the kitchen. My mother momentarily stopped scraping.

"Look at the mess your father made!" she bellowed.

I was near the canister which, the best I could tell, was glowing.

"You better change the bag in that thing," I offered, believing that the motor was overheating after three hours of sucking up Cheez doodles.

My mother resumed scraping. I went into the living room to continue my self-study of The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. Actually, I was going to try to tune in the UHF selector on the TV to Channel 56 to watch Speed Racer. After a few minutes of fiddling, I got it.

Go Speed Racer go!

I was just wondering how Trixie learned to fly a helicopter when my dad lowered his newspaper.

"What's that?" he asked while looking up in a seemingly random direction.

"What?"

As my dad rose, he dropped his paper onto his chair. He made his way down the short hallway to the kitchen. I looked through the passageway to see him staring at my mother as she scraped the stove. Returning to my cartoon, I thought,

"Where did she even get a helicopter?"

Picking up the vacuum wand, my father sniffed the end. Recoiling, my dad was satisfied that he had found the source of the miasma. As he inspected the vacuum cleaner, I confidently explained,

"I told her to change the bag. The motor is overheating." 

My father looked down the hallway as I rattled off my expert advice. As his attention shifted to the handle, he adjusted his grip while demonstrating excellent trigger discipline. With a flick of his thumb, the vacuum sprang to life. I looked towards the noise, unsure why my father was powering up a machine he loathed so completely. As I focussed on the canister, he shut it off. I thought I saw for just a moment a flame coming out of the exhaust port. To this day, I recall that it was blue. I half expected the canister to start rolling across the floor then after reaching take off speed, lift skyward. My father looked to the canister then tried the trigger once more.

"What the heck!" he shouted as he abruptly switched off the machine.

He quickly rolled the vacuum to the door then tossed it down the stairs. As it bounced off the concrete steps, the canister broke open revealing a core of smoldering dust, dander and doodles that had burned through the bag. Once it breeched the filter, the compressed air driven by the motor created a low thrust jet engine that fried the inside of the canister.

The opportunity to activate the red fire alarm box at the end of the driveway never presented itself to me again even though we were hardly an accident free family. Back in those days you went to the hospital if you couldn't stop bleeding from an artery. You passed on an emergency room visit for a concussion even if you blacked out. My family depended on a general practitioner who gave you a bottle of orange medicine for every malady with instructions to "finish the bottle." It didn’t work and stained your teeth, but it didn’t kill you either so down the hatch!

After I was on my own on a bright Sunday morning my father choked hard on some steak grizzle. Having worked so memorably well with the grease fire, my mother rolled out her glass of water trick. As my asphyxiating father drank the warm water, the steak lodged even deeper. Eventually, he had to choose either entering a white tunnel to the afterlife or performing the Heimlich maneuver on himself. When they told me the story, I asked my mother if she called 9-1-1. She hadn't.

My parents generation never felt that their emergency rose to a level which required intervention by trained professionals. They treated the fires which could've easily claimed our home or one or more of us as an embarrassment. I know this because my mother put us kids under an explicit gag order not to disclose the fires to our friends, especially the Cheez doodle Syndrome of 1975. She regarded that incident as her fault even though the first time around she poured a glass of water in a pot of boiling oil.

As an adult I sat them down and explained that emergency personnel want you to call them, but it never sunk in. When a ladder my father was on slipped down the house, and he broke his nose on a rung, my mother called a neighbor who rushed over to find my father holding a towel to his face as he bled profusely. The neighbor wisely called emergency services against my father's wishes. When the paramedics arrived he refused to go with them because as he put it,

"I have to take my wife to her hair appointment this afternoon."

He didn't tell me about his accident until I saw him a week later. I was shocked to see my dad so banged up. He said,

"I didn't mess up anything I need. I just broke my face."

Later when we talked, he wondered aloud what the paramedics must have thought of him. He asked,

"You think they thought I was nuts?"

After a long pause, I answered,

"Yes, definitely."

He confided in me that the whole experience alleviated his fear of hospitals. He recalled all the jokes he played on the staff during his brief visit including asking them if he would be able to play the tuba after they fix his nose. They reassured him that he would to which he said,

"Oh good! I never could before."

When I think of how as kids we were unrestrained in car seats for all those years, crossed active train bridges that spanned raging rivers, avoided the groovy drugged out hippies of the 1970's, roamed forests and rivers alone all day long, ventured at night into deep trenches being dug in the streets for sewer pipes, passed on going to the hospital for a concussion and survived our homes catching fire, I wonder if any of it built character or took some away. This is when writers usually proclaim that if they could do it all over again, they wouldn't change a thing. I, for one, would've taken a pass on The Great Grease Fire of 1974.

It still gives me nightmares to this day.

The Boy in the Cotton Mask

Last week our youngest, William, returned to school after a long absence due to the pandemic. Six months ago, the entire student body was pulled from the school to avoid infection. We know more about COVID-19 now than we did back then, but out of an abundance of caution, in our town parents may choose to send their kids back for two days per week or not at all.

Most kids hadn't a chance to say "Good-bye" to their friends or even collect up their belongings when everything closed. At the end of the term the teachers in Willy's school tried to give them closure by hosting a vehicle parade through the school parking lot. They encouraged us to decorate our car, but William wasn't interested. As we drove through the winding route past the teachers and school staff, all waving and smiling with music and bubbles streaming through the air, smiling kids poked through sunroofs and leaned out of windows while clutching balloons and pin wheels. When we neared William's teacher my wife, Christine, said,

"Willy, there's Mr. Thomas."

William sat quietly in the back seat. He didn't smile. He didn't wave. As the line of cars came to a halt, Mr. Thomas approached our vehicle. He called to William.

"Great job Billy!"

William turned towards the window. Mr. Thomas stopped short of our car. At first I thought he was social distancing, but then I realized he was just close enough to see Willy's face. Mr. Thomas dropped his arms to his side. His smile faded. William raised his hand summoning a half-hearted wave as he said,

"Good-bye Mr. Thomas."

I was driving so it was difficult for me to ascertain what was unfolding. I glanced back to see my nine year old stoically bidding farewell to his third grade teacher.

"Cripes Willy! You'll see him next year. It's not like we're moving," I exclaimed.

Christine tapped my arm. My male conflict avoidance system sent out a class five priority alert which told me that this was something beyond my emotional range, and I should shut up and let my wife explain it to me later. Christine gazed out the window as she waved. Unlike William, she smiled but my male mandatory facial feature recognition survival system, which alerts me to when my wife has her hair done, told me that her expression was a mask.

Normally Christine attends Willy's parent/teacher meetings. I did all the secondary school conferences for our oldest son, Aidan. Now it was her turn, but the last time Christine had a work conflict. Being older parents with me older than her, I seem to have lost patience for run on meetings. As I've aged, I've become a get it done kind of guy. The clock is ticking, and before I'm relegated to gumming grits in between shouting at the TV, I'd like to get back to that birdhouse I'm building in the barn. So I had to fill in for my wife and listen to his teacher tell me what William was deficient in. During the meeting Mr. Thomas explained,

"We test Billy on a new math concept, and he gets a 70%. Then we give him a little instruction, and he gets it all right. When we move to another concept, the same thing happens."

I always knew Willy was good at math. What I didn't know was that everyone in his school called him "Billy." Apparently, in first grade William announced that he wanted to be called "Billy" because it was easier to spell. I never dreamt I would hear comments like what Mr. Thomas was about to say,

"He's doing the next grade level in math, and we haven't found the ceiling yet."

I was floored. I was always a good math student, but sometimes the apple falls by the tree then rolls down the hill and drops into a river. We knew math came easy for Willy. I just didn't know how easy it was for him. I was thankful that his school had the resources and desire to push kids like Willy when they exhibit proficiency in a subject. It all came to end though when the pandemic hit.

The online program that was cobbled together after the shutdown didn't include any proficiency enrichment. At first we were just glad that there was something to default to, and Willy quickly learned what was required of him. As the term ended, it was clear that his interest in math had waned. We thought we could make up for the abrupt closure and loss of his friends by keeping Willy busy with fun activities throughout the summer, but he had developed a fear of contracting the virus and was reluctant to leave the house. Eventually, we settled on a routine in which he and I enjoyed a local playground while his brother took a tennis lesson. We especially liked rocketing down plastic slides then touching a support pole to discharge the built up electrons. As the summer wore on, the increased humidity prevented slide shocking so we resorted to following a nearby abandoned trolley line. Eventually, Willy agreed that it was safe to venture to the beach so we carved it up on boogie boards for the rest of the summer.

As the school year geared up, we told Willy he would be attending class in person for two days per week and that only six students would be in his class. The other days would be online even though we now know kids for the most part don't spread COVID-19. He was okay with all of that. On the day he was to ride the bus to school, Christine loaded up everything he needed including his lunch into his backpack. Recharged and refreshed from the summer break, Willy and I walked briskly to the end of the driveway to wait for the cheese wagon. He was full of youthful exuberance and happiness. Gone was the boy who solemnly waved to his third grade teacher.

"Dad, did you like fourth grade?" he asked.

I attended Catholic school which was fresh in my mind, having just penned a piece about it last week. Not wanting to spoil the good vibe nor fib to my son, I compromised with,

"Uh, it was alright, I guess."

"I can't wait!" Willy admitted.

We reached the rendezvous drop zone for ole yellow. The sound of the bus rumbling down the road was familiar and comforting. I looked to William. He was smiling as he saw Old Number 22 lumbering towards our position. I imagined he was recalling his secondary school glory days.

"William your mask!" I exclaimed, jarring him back to the present.

Willy squirmed free of his backpack then zipped open a side pocket to reveal his supply of masks. He pulled up his pack then affixed a mask to his face which I adjusted as the bus rolled to a stop. Willy darted forward. He stopped short of the road, turned and through his mask said,

"I love you, Dad."

The sight of his covered face with the idling bus a short distance away filled the empty spaces of my heart. He waved then turned sharply. I was going to yell to him to look both ways, but he paused at the edge of the street and complied with my silent orders. He crossed the road then disappeared behind the bus. The driver looked skyward as she waited for Willy to find a seat. The bus revved up then rolled away. I remained until the sounds of the birds calling to each other replaced the dull rhythm of the engine. I breathed in the cool morning air hopeful for the future. Not so much for mine, but for his. Then I said,

"I love you too, William."

My Middle School Education

For most of my childhood, I was educated in a private school. As busing was being argued in legislative chambers across the country, I avoided having to board the cheese wagon for a lengthy ride to an integrated school. I wore a uniform which identified me as a member of a select group of lucky kids. I was overseen by men and women who were committed to my education. They were so dedicated that they never married. You probably think I was privileged. I would think that too until I tell you that the private school I went to was Catholic. Now you’re likely thinking,

“You poor bastard.”

Some of my classmates were into the whole religious thing. They could recite biblical versus, were altar servers, and knew all the seven sacraments. They used words like “ecumenical” and "liturgical" in meaningful sentences. Not only did they know who the Pope was, they could list them in order all the way back to Saint Peter. I, on the other hand, flunked religion. In a parochial school failing nonsecular instruction draws out the ire of the teaching staff. Back then Catholic schools were still taught mostly by nuns, unmarried, childless women who wore dark clothing. They were called by God to live a lonely, celibate life. Their focus was supposed to be their parish, not their husband nor their kids. That was the theory anyway. In practice, raising children causes you to be more introspective. Having kids enrolls you in an upper level course on patience. When you experience birth, it softens you. Before kids, you sympathize. After, you empathize.

For the first two years of my Catholic education, I didn't say a word in school. I was too scared. All the nuns were old, mean and French in that order. They each had odd things about them like Sister Ahmad, who taught third grade, always asking,

“What did Jesus said?”

None of us kids ever corrected her grammar because we were afraid of her. Sister Ahmad was a thousand years old. She had no qualms with corporal punishment, and we all entered third grade knowing it. Most of the nuns didn’t hit us, but a few were quite adept at sparing with defenseless children. In fact, the only time Sister Ahmad smiled was when she was exercising the devil out of some hapless kid. On the first day of school we lined up in the front of the class as Sister Ahmad read off our names then assigned us a desk. When my name was called, I walked forward. Sister Ahmad noticed that my tie was black with thin red stripes, not the solid dark blue required by the uniform code. She pointed to me and angrily asked,

"Why is your tie like that?"

I froze. Sister Ahmad continued badgering the witness,

"Why don't you have a tie like everyone else?"

I tried to speak, but I could see on her face that it wouldn't matter what I said. She leaned forward then yanked on my tie as she commanded,

"Get the right one!"

Sister Madeline was the fourth grade teacher. She was very tall. She had accidentally lopped off the end of her middle finger with a paper cutter. To punish kids that got out of line she would make them hold her foreshortened digit. She once told this story to us,

A poor boy was very sad. He had to weed a large field. He didn’t think he could do it. A little angel appeared before him and said,

“What’s wrong poor boy?”

“I have to weed this field, and I can’t do it,” the boy said.

The little angel told the boy to weed a small patch which he did because it was easy. When he finished, the little angel said,

“Now do this patch.”

The poor boy weeded it because it was easy too. The little angel had the boy weed patches after patch until the whole field was done.

What’s the moral to the story?

I raised my hand. Sister Madeline called on me,

“Bobby Languedoc thinks he has an answer.”

Now here is where good judgement and youth do not intersect. I said,

“Forget the moral to the story. This kid saw an angel?”

From the look on her face I thought her habit was going to burst into flame. I was lucky though. Instead of having to clutch her amputated stub of a finger, Sister Madeline resorted to her second go to punishment, rapping you on the head with the stump.

Sister Evangeline was the fifth grade teacher. For some reason, she was always spitting up phlegm even in the summer. If she made a math error on the board and one of us pointed it out, she would say,

“Thank you teacher.”

Sister Evangeline had no need for science so she skipped that subject in favor of extra tutelage in French. My father had a subscription to National Geographic from which I got all my science instruction in grade school. Once Sister Evangaline asked us,

“What causes the tides?”

I had just read an article about how gravitational attraction between the earth and moon resulted in two bulges of water in the ocean moving around the planet. My hand shot up. Sister Evangeline said,

“Bobby Languedoc thinks he has an answer.”

Confidently, I responded, “The moon causes the tides.”

Before I had a chance to elaborate, Sister Evangeline interrupted,

“God causes the tides, not the moon.”

I thought of Galileo when the Inquisition put him under house arrest for stating that the sun and not the earth was the center of the solar system.

“I’m pretty sure it’s the moon,” I issued.

“Who made the moon?” Sister Evangeline asked.

I hesitated as I tried to recall previous issues of National Geographic.

“God made the moon!” she shot back.

I got off easier than Galileo on that exchange. All I had to do is write “God made the moon” on the board a hundred times while my fellow students mocked me.

On another occasion, Sister Evangeline was seated at her desk in the front of the room when she reminded us that Jesus was born on Christmas Day in a manger because there was no room in the inn. I had read a newspaper article that stated that the actual day Jesus was born was likely not in the winter because shepherds didn't tend sheep then. The author suggested that December 25 was chosen as a day of christian celebration to compete with pagan festivities around the winter solstice on the 20th. Quoting the article I noted,

"The Gospel doesn't say anything about the season when Jesus was born."

Sister Evangeline glared at me at length, her face flush with anger. She wheezed audibly as she labored to breathe through ample pent-up loathing. Flinging open a drawer to her desk, she retrieved a green grade book which she flipped open. Snapping up a pencil, she licked the end then peered through her bifocals as she scratched something on the page. She closed the book abruptly then returned it to the drawer which she slammed shut. She paused briefly as she glanced in my direction then said,

"The three wise men brought gold, frankincense and myrrh."

To this day I don't know what Sister Evangeline wrote in that book, but I'm sure it wasn't a praising acknowledgement of my extensive understanding of historical events.

Sister Stellar was the sixth grade teacher. She was short and had a scar on her chin. A classmate of mine once mused that her scar was from a bullwhip accident while under instruction when she was living in the order. Sister Stellar hated when any of us looked to the back of the church during mass. She would point any infraction outright in the middle of the service by yelling,

“Bobby Languedoc is more interested in what’s going on in the BACK of the church.”

The priest conducting mass would frown after Sister Stellar's frequent outbursts which she took as approval, but I was pretty certain he didn’t appreciate the frequency of the disciplinary disruption which was more distracting than some kid glancing over their shoulder towards the choir. You can always tell the Catholics who were confirmed as adults. They’re the parishioners who look about the church during mass. I alway feel compelled to tell them,

“The miracle is happening up at the alter.”

But I never say anything.

Sister Betty Ann taught seventh grade. She was on loan from a parish in Kentucky. She was tasked to venture up here and straighten us yankees out. Every Wednesday morning the whole school went to mass. After each service, Sister Betty Ann sauntered to the front of the church and critiqued our participation by grade. She would call out the fourth grade for not singing loud enough or the sixth grade for not enunciating during the Lord’s Prayer. We were all inadequate sinners not worthy of our station. Once Sister Betty Ann played The Devil Went Down to Georgia for us then asked,

“What's the meaning of this song?”

I raised my hand. Sister Betty Ann said with a twang,

“Bobby Languedoc thinks he has an answer.”

“I don’t know what that song is about, but who taught the devil how to play the fiddle?”

“How would I know that?” Sister Betty Ann exclaimed.

"Wasn't it a sin for Johnny to gamble his soul for a golden fiddle?"

"Yes, it was."

“How come the devil admitted to Johnny that he was a better fiddle player? Doesn’t seem like the type.”

“I don’t know."

"What key did the devil play in?"

"It's just a song."

“What does ‘chicken in a bread pan picken` out dough’ mean?'”

“What?”

"Sister, why do we get presents on Christmas when it's Jesus's birthday?"

“Because, uh...”

"Sister, do you hear God's voice in your head?"

"Yes! I mean no..."

"If God knows everything, does he need to know how to read?"

"Huh?"

By the time I had reached seventh grade, my education was complete. Sure I had a lot to learn, but I no longer feared humiliation. My parents scraped up what little money they had to send three kids to Catholic school, and we heard about the sacrifices they made often. In 1976, my father went on strike from his factory job, and mid year he stopped paying the tuition. The school sent my parents a letter stating that if they didn't resume payment, I wouldn't be allowed to take finals and would have to repeat the sixth grade.

I wore the wrong tie all through middle school receiving admonition from many of the nuns for what they believed was my brazen rule breaking. The truth was my parents were often strapped for cash even in good times. My Catholic education taught me a lot. As my parents cobbled together what they had to get by on a limited budget, I learned to absorb aversion as I stood out from the crowd, not for academic achievement but for my inability to afford conformity.

What better lesson to survive in this world today.