Fun With Matches (and other short stories)

 How To Set The World On Fire, In Three Easy Steps

 Step one: draft a compatriot.

 In this case, it was Cort Benson. Cort was a bit like me: suggestible, easily distracted, and without a whole lot of impulse control. Of course, when you’re seven years old, you don’t have a whole lot of impulse control.

Cort lived at the edge of the base, like I did. One little neighbourhood road separated our houses from the wide-open prairie. In the winter, the snow howled out of the west, right past the front door. In the summer, like now, the prairie was our playground.

There were lots of other kids to play with, but more often than not, Cort and I found ourselves alone together, doing things that maybe we shouldn’t have been doing, like getting soakers, or even swearing. Cort and I were a team, not that we had any concept of a team. He was the kid I played with the most, until our parents would shout from the front steps to come in for dinner. A team, a pair, a duo. Without impulse control.

 Step two: plan an adventure.

 “Hey, I got something." I could tell from the tone of his voice that this was going to be good. We were beside Cort’s house, in that special place we had discovered that was hidden from any windows in the neighbourhood houses. No windows, no prying eyes. Still, we checked it out; you can’t be too careful when one of us ‘got something’.

Cort took one last look around, then dug into his pocket. He pulled out a small box and slid it open.

“Wow.”

Matches. I looked at Cort, he looked at me, and we realized the possibilities were endless. Didn’t know what they were, but they were endless.

You couldn’t get much more adult than matches, unless it was cigarettes, but cigarettes were far too complicated to even consider. Matches were simple. And they were dangerous, which was the reason Cort and I grinned at each like seven year-old fools.

“What’ll we do?”

And then, those words, that phrase: “Let’s start a fire.”

“Ya!!" You couldn’t have asked for a purer form of joy.

“But…where?”

We said it at the same time: “The slough!”

The prairies are not flat; they’re flat-ish.

Scattered here and there throughout the slow-rolling landscape are sloughs, small depressions filled with water percolating up from aquifers. Out past the road leading to our street, the Big Slough was like an oasis in the wide-open prairie (the Little Slough had dried up the previous year).

The slough was perfect. No right-thinking adult ever just went for a walk to the slough. Kids did that, hanging out, looking for frogs or gophers.

Lighting fires.

 “Hi, Cort. Hi Tommy.”

It was Shelley: neighbour, liar, girl.

“What?”I asked. Why did she think we were doing anything wrong? She made a face and pedaled away, probably to tell on us.

But she didn’t; something in the ditch caught her eye, and she lay down her bike (in the middle of the road, because why not?) and went to take a look, accusation forgotten.

We hadn’t been found out.

Cort and I pushed into the tall grass and headed for the slough. Took a few minutes to get there, our excitement bubbling. This was the best adventure since- well, last week. Matches! Imagine what you could do.

We had chosen the Big Slough because it had a smoking pit, an area of trampled-down grass with a small ring of stone in the center. There were scorch marks and dried-up cigarette butts left behind when some of the older kids had tried smoking, so that was a natural place to set fire to... something.

Step three: combust something

“What’ll we burn?”

“Don’t know. Hey- grass!”

“Ya!!”

Another feature of the prairie is grass. Not the short grab-grass and dandelion mix of the average lawn: this is big-time grass, taller than a seven year-old, blowing in the wind. A sea of grass, great waves of it sweeping across miles and miles of prairie.

Dry, dry grass.

End of July, and it hadn’t rained in weeks. The prairie was a dull, monotonous brown, so dry that the grass hissed when those waves swept across all those endless miles.

 Didn’t take us long, because it was all within easy reach. We tore off a few fistfuls of grass, piled it in the small circle of stone. Looked at it critically.

“Is it enough?”

We added a few more handfuls, grinning like fools with poor impulse control.

Cort pulled out the matches, his eyes shining. “Here goes.”

It took a couple of tries to actually light the match; it was windy, and besides, they were complicated. We squatted to get out of the breeze, and Cort tried again.

Our eyes lit up along with the match. Cort looked at me, I looked at Cort and we both watched as he leaned toward the circle of stone surrounded by dry, dry grass. It caught, really easily, and we knew we didn’t have to worry about the wind blowing it out.

We felt the heat right away, because the little flame became a bigger flame. In fact, we had to stand up because the fire had grown so quickly, especially given all of the grass we had fed it.

Then we stepped back, because it got even bigger. It was exciting, maybe even a little scary, but we had done it! We had set a fire.

Part of the burning pile of grass collapsed, and flames trickled out of the rock circle. We stamped it out, but then it crept around to the other side of the circle and we stamped that out, too.

Then it jumped.

I didn’t think fire could jump, but it did, right in front of us, and right into the tall grass nearby. That’s when Cort’s eyes went wide, because the fired jumped again, spreading outward from the circle of rock. We stared, open mouthed, amazed that something so small could get so big, so quickly.

Didn’t even think; we tore off our shirts and started flailing away at the burning grass. When we looked up, the fire was even bigger, flames twice as tall as the grass that fed it. How did that happen?

The wind was at our backs, pushing it away from us. Out onto the open prairie.

Cort and I did what any seven year-old would do: we turned and ran, away from the slough, away from the fire. Through the tall, dry grass and up onto the road by the edge of the base.

A couple of the older kids had stopped their bikes. “Wow! Tommy! Cort! You should see this!”

We turned and looked at ‘this’. A hundred yards away, a line of flame and smoke stretched across the prairie. Even as we watched, the flames got bigger and the line got longer. You could even hear it, a far-off crackle of burning grass.

 Then we heard the sirens.

 This is how it works on an Air Force base in the middle of the prairies: senior officers cycle through a position called OD, Officer of the Day. The OD is the go-to person for any problems that come up during the day-to-day running of the base. Security concerns, personnel issues. Massive prairie fires.

The OD that day was my father.

Here’s another reality on a base, at least for kids: everyone knows everyone else. Everyone knows the cry-babies, the quiet ones, the kids more… prone to get into trouble. So when Cort and I just stood there, tongues hanging out as we stared at the fire, I felt the two older kids looking at us. Frowning.

Maybe it was the soot on our faces, or the smell of smoke from our clothes. Or maybe it was the fear in our eyes, I don't know. Whatever gave us away, their expressions changed. Even when you’re seven years old, you can read that expression.

Their voices cracked with barely-concealed glee. “Um, are you ever in trouble!”

And we were. Took an hour or so to beat back the flames, teenagers and firefighters and off-duty airmen from all over the base running up and down the fire line as Cort and I stood on the road, watching. Every once in awhile we’d see heads swivel around and look at us; groups of adults, groups of other kids, all looking at us.

No investigation as such; what was there to investigate? A couple of kids hadn’t controlled their impulses.

Much to my surprise, there wasn’t a big-time blowout at home. No belt (which was almost always a threat, rather than a practice), no angry words. In fact, it was pretty quiet, which confused my brother and sisters to no end. They kept looking from me, to my father, to my mother, wondering how much trouble I was in, and who was going to say what, when.

Oh, there were consequences. No movies for a month. That was a big deal, because the base cinema had killer Saturday afternoon matinees. And no more Cort, which was a bit of a relief, because even at seven years old, I knew that sometimes we did things that neither of us would have done without the other. You know, like start prairie fires. 

The look of disappointment on my father’s face stayed with me for a long time, but gradually, the shame of it all faded. The prairie recovered, even turning a fetching shade of green where the fire had burned off all that desiccated grass. I was allowed to play with Cort again, although I had the distinct impression we were always being watched - by everybody - when we were together.

But after awhile, we realized that we hadn’t hurt anyone. It wasn’t as if we had done something really dangerous or anything.

That came later.

A Royal Greeting

I even know the exact date: July 22, 1959. That was the day I connected with Prince Philip.

My parents - everyone's parents- were excited: The Queen was coming! I knew who The Queen was because her picture was hanging on the wall of my Grade 2 classroom at Air Marshall Curtis School. She looked like a nice lady, and she got to wear crowns and stuff, but I was surprised at how much everyone talked about it, almost as if Christmas was coming. They kept saying we would get to see her in person!, and apparently that didn't happen much in a quiet little town in the middle of the Canadian prairies. 

When the big day arrived, my mother spent a long time making sure we were all dressed properly. Wow- this must be really special, because we all looked like we were going to church. My older sister even had that stupid little purse she liked to carry when she got dressed up, the one I liked to hide on her. Hadn't even tried to hide it:  who would have thought we'd get dressed up like this in the middle of the week, in the middle of summer? 

It was a warm day as we headed out, so I got to hang out the car window, although my mother worried that it might mess up my hair too much. The closer we got to downtown, the more people there were on the sidewalks, almost as if they were expecting a parade or something. My father must have been surprised by all the people because he kept cursing under his breath, saying 'hell' a couple of times, and even 'damnation!', so you knew he was upset.

He managed to find some place to park (it might have been on someone's lawn) and we piled out of the car and headed back to the street where people were lining up.  Sure felt like a parade, with everyone chatting and laughing and 'almost giddy', which is what my dad usually said when we were having fun.

Every once in awhile someone would say "Is that them?' and everyone looked down the street before shaking their heads and going back to talking. I knew what people meant by "them", because sometimes my parents said "The Queen and Prince Philip", so I knew this 'Prince Philip' would be with The Queen.  

I managed to squeeze my way to the front of the crowd, where I could sit on the curb with other kids. Sort of fun watching the policemen walking up and down in the middle of the street, being important. Policemen were lucky.

Eventually, I heard a buzz of real excitement, and all the adults were leaning forward and craning their necks. Someone said 'They're coming!' and this time they meant it. I saw headlights, strange considering it was daytime, and then there were cars coming slowly down the street, right in the middle.

The policeman nearby suddenly stood at attention and saluted. I was used to seeing people salute because my father was in the Air Force, but I had never seen a policeman salute. I even saw some old men in the crowd salute, and I wondered if my father would, too. But I couldn't see him because he was at the back of the crowd, probably saying 'damnation' under his breath.

I saw a car, and a lady sitting in the back seat. The car didn't have a roof, and I wondered what would happen if it started to rain; in fact, I looked at the sky to see if there were any rain clouds, but there weren't. Everyone was cheering, and I suddenly realized that the lady was The Queen.

I was confused because she wasn't wearing her crown, or that fancy white dress from the picture, but it was The Queen alright. She smiled and raised her hand and sort-of waved at us. I waved back, and so did the kids around me, and then we were all cheering and yelling because everyone else was cheering and yelling. The Queen kept smiling, and so did the man beside her, except his smile didn't really change much, it seemed stuck to his face. The Queen looked right at us as she drove by, and everyone cheered and waved flags, which I thought was pretty neat. 

A couple of the older kids jumped up and started running behind the car. Seemed like a good idea, so I followed. And because it was so exciting, running down the middle of the street with everyone cheering and yelling, I thought I would yell, too. I didn't know what to yell, so I just started to say 'Hey!' but then I remembered: this was 'The Queen' and she was special, which meant I couldn't just yell 'Hey' at her, it might be illegal or something. So it came out as 'hoy'.

 Don't know why; maybe it sounded royal, and I knew The Queen was royal. That meant I was running behind The Queen's car with a pack of screaming kids, and I was the one yelling "Hoy hoy hoy!" (whatever that meant), probably louder than everyone else. I was good at that.

And that's when I got the man's attention. He slowly turned around to look at the kids running behind the car, and his eyes fixed on me. He had a look on his face that was the same as my father's expression whenever he said 'damnation!", almost as if he had eaten something that didn't taste very good.

I yelled “Hoy hoy hoy!” again. He frowned and said something to the Queen, his eyes still on me. Then they were gone. 

All the kids stopped running (probably because a policeman shouted at us), and I made my way to my parents at the back of the crowd, which was breaking up, just like when a parade was over. They seemed happy with it all, although my father kept muttering about "damn kids" and "pack of delinquents".

I didn't know what delinquents were, but all in all, it had been a pretty good day. Running after The Queen, in the middle of the street, in my Sunday clothes- how could you beat that?

I didn't see the Queen for another few years. When I finally did, I wondered if the man beside her remembered me from the last time.

Aggstiment in Space

“Tommy?"

I had been dreading it, but as soon as my name was called, I grabbed the book and headed for the front of the class. Get it done, get back to what mattered: looking out the window and daydreaming. Probably wasn't much good at book reports anyway, because I wasn't much good at arithmetic, social studies (whatever they were) or speling.

But at least I was prepared- I had actually read the book I was about to report on. Rockets were just about the neatest thing ever invented, and with John Glenn and Alan Shepard and Yuri Gagarin floating around in space all the time, I lived it day and night, pouring over pictures, building models and even reading(!) about anything and everything that could get into orbit.

Which lead me to my first book report, age nine, Grade Four, Jameswood Public School.

I could feel the other kids watching me as I walked to the front. Probably not used to seeing me up there without being in trouble and/or getting the strap, something with which I had entertained the class three times this year. Three times so far. But the school year was almost over, and life would be bliss if I could just get through the last few weeks without a misplaced report card (strap #1) or talking too loudly (straps #2 and #3). Well, 'talking too loudly' was maybe a stretch; it might have been more like talking in the middle of class. To no one in particular.  

"Go ahead." That was Mr. Merrick, he of the dark eyes and even darker scowl, especially when I wandered outside the boundaries of his tightly-controlled rules, something which came quite easily to me. Apparently, I was 'fidgety', but who wouldn't be when there was so much other stuff going on, like the lady walking outside with her funny-looking dog, or Darryl one row over picking at a scab.

You know, other stuff. And it was going on all the time.

"Tommy? Go ahead."

Took a breath. Get it started, get in done. "My book report is on Aggstiment in Space, by Rip Foster." 

Even the author's name was way neat; I had never, ever met someone whose actual name was 'Rip'.

I (ahem) launched right in, pulling Toby and Marilyn and Cort and the rest of the class right into the world of Rip Foster, Planeteer, as he traveled to the asteroid belt and back with the Space Force. I knew I had them hooked; how could they not be interested in space ships and asteroids and battles against the "Consolidation of Peoples Governments", who were the bad guys because their name was sort of like thosedamncommies my father kept talking about.

It felt like a particularly insightful and detailed presentation (all of four minutes long), and when I was finished, I knew I had done it right. There might have been applause, I don't remember; I do remember the expressions of amazement on some of my classmates' faces, probably because I hadn't wandered off in mid-sentence to talk to someone, or wondered aloud when it was time for recess.

And best of all, I hadn't made anything up, not a single thing. I was particularly good at making things up, a source of great friction with my teachers in Grades Two, Three and now Four. Particularly in Grade Four; Mr. Merrick was not what you - or anyone else - would call a happy man, and his expression would get very dark, very quickly if you said something that wasn't exactly true (or as he referred to it, 'told a lie'). He didn't like 'lies', even if they were small, white and inadvertent. Or big, fat and juicy.

So when he said, "I'm impressed, Tommy. That was a good report," I knew I had really done it. To impress Mr. Merrick, he of the hair-trigger and brooding eyes, was... well, impressive.

Then his brow furrowed. "What's the name of the book?"

"Aggstiment in Space, by Rip Foster." You said it like that, the title, then the author.

"Show us." I held it up. It was beautiful hard-cover book, a Christmas present from my parents. The spaceship on the front cover, blasting away at - I paused and spread both covers dramatically - the spaceship on the back. War in space. What could be more exciting than that?

“What's an 'Aggstiment'?"

Trust Mr. Merrick to zero in on the one thing I didn't quite understand about the book. In fact, I had no idea what an Aggstiment was. But I had a theory. "It's the name of one of the spaceships."  Theories were good, I think.

"Really?"

The tone should have warned me. When you're nine years old, you survive another day by learning to pay attention to tone. But I was feeling so good with what I had just done that my tone radar wasn't working properly.

"Ya," I said off-handedly. "One of the spaceships that helps Rip in the battle is called Aggstiment." And because I had read the book, not Mr. Merrick, and because I thought it was a pretty good theory, I added, "They launch it from Cape Canaveral, and they named it for his mother or something."

Sounded plausible enough, even though none of the spaceships had names at all. I could never figure out why that word was even there.

"Uh-huh," he said, dark eyes staring. Dead dark eyes staring. "Just so you know, you pronounce the title like this: Assignment in Space."

Oh. Well, that made more sense; I knew what an assignment was, I just had never seen the word written down. Assignment in Space. Their job was in space; that's what an 'Assignment' was. Not the name of a spaceship named after the hero's mother. Not something that was sort-of made up, and not exactly true.

For those too young or too perfect to have encountered ‘the strap’, it was strip of leather that was slapped, sometimes quite forcefully, across the open palm of your hand. It stung. A lot.

Racing the Red

Grand Forks, North Dakota: now that was exotic.

The concept of a river race from one country to another was sort of cool, especially in the mind of an 11-year old. We would start in Grand Forks, and a week later – give or take a day – we would pull into Winnipeg. We would row two old navy cutters 287 miles down the Red River, ten rowers and one coxswain in each boat (and yes, we all snickered every time we said ‘coxswain’).

The ‘we’ was St. John’s Cathedral Boys School. It was a weekend boarding school, designed to toughen up kids who might be a little loose around the edges, the kind of kid who might fidget in class, and/or who might have borrowed a pint of chocolate milk from the delivery man, although it was mostly his fault because he always left the truck wide open when he made deliveries. Every Friday night, after fidgeting through five days of regular school, I would head off for two more days of morning classes and afternoon torture sessions.

St. John’s prided itself on the many ways it had to strengthen our moral fibre. In the winter, that meant snowshoe races across the open prairie; in the spring and summer, that meant spending long hours in cutters, rowing up and down the Red River as we worked up to the big race in August. So even though I was on summer vacation from my regular school, my ‘other school’ decided it would be fun to race down the Red from Grand Forks to Winnipeg (‘down’ because you were going downstream with the current, even though looking at a map, you’d think you were going ‘up’ the Red. Took me a long time to figure that one out. Coincidentally, that’s when I started to realize there could be different definitions of the same word, like ‘fun’). 

It was a four-hour bus ride to Grand Forks, and we all knew we would be rowing the whole distance back to Winnipeg. There were two crews and two boats, the St. John and the St. Andrew. We all knew each other because we took the same classes, but once you were in your boat, you weren’t friends anymore. We were ‘the St. John’, they were ‘the St. Andrew’ and you had to have a certain sneer in your voice when you said it.

So on a hot August afternoon, we worked the heavy cutters into the muddy waters of the Red River in Grand Forks. We loaded tents, duffel bags, and enough food and water to last the first few days of the race. The headmaster was there, along with a few parents who had driven down from Winnipeg (‘down’ because that’s the way it was on a map: obvious). 

There was nothing fancy about the start, just the headmaster making sure both cutters were pointed in the same general direction before he shouted “You’re off!!”.

Lots of adrenalin in those first few minutes, but we had practiced enough to do it properly, which meant everyone pulling at the same time, in the same rhythm. It was surprising how much speed we built up, especially considering the weight of the cutter. Little by little, we drew away from the St. Andrew. That gave us more energy, and we rowed even harder. Over the first mile or so, we bent to the oars, pulling a bit further ahead on every stroke, almost skimming over the water-

Then we hit a sandbar.

Well, ‘hit’ makes it sound like there was a mighty crash and sudden jerk to a stop. But it was more like oozing to a stop.

“Weigh oars!” Everyone out!!”, which seems like a goofy thing to do in the middle of a river, but we knew we were on a sandbar, even if it was (barely) submerged. Everyone went over the side and landed in 3 inches of water (and another 6 inches of mud, or Red River gumbo as we called it). We frantically worked the St. John backwards as the St. Andrew came up on us. Because we had marked out the biggest sandbar in the river, they steered around it, and within seconds they passed us.

It took three or four minutes to pull the cutter off the sandbar, and as we piled back into the boat, we looked for the St. Andrew. Which was no longer there.

The Red meanders; it’s an old river flowing through flat land, which means it loops and twists, which means you can never see more than a couple of hundred yards downstream. By the time we bent to our oars again, the St. Andrew had already gone around the next bend.  And by the time we got to that bend, they were already around the next. And just like that, we were alone on the river, and we were losing the race. 

That first day, we rowed until 6 PM (exactly: this was, after all, a race, and we were honour-bound to stop and start at exact times). 

Setting up camp wasn’t much fun, although it was  a break from the monotony of rowing. Pull onto some flat-ish area on the shore - North Dakota on the left or Minnesota on the right - unroll the big tent, haul out the boxes of food, and eat. We pretty well fell into our sleeping bags, mostly because we were exhausted, but also because we would be getting up at 5:15 AM. 

And ‘getting up’ was a relative term; it was more like moaning and groaning and stumbling around in the dark as we prepared for another day on the river. But every morning, there we were, piling into the cutter as the coxswain stared at his watch. And at 6 AM, the river grey and still and so amazingly peaceful, he would say Ok, stroke’, and we would be off.

Chasing the St. Andrew. 

There is a certain mindlessness to rowing: lean forward, dip, pull back, then repeat, over and over for hours. In unison. A quarter turn of the oar at the end each stroke, so that when they swung back, they didn’t catch air. Try doing that without a mistake for ten hours at a time. Once in awhile someone would lose the rhythm, and there would be a great clatter of wood on wood as the oars tangled. A lot of cursing; I picked up some great phrases that stuck with me for years. If you couldn’t get things straightened out on your own, the coxswain would say “weigh oars”, which meant everyone stopped rowing and rested their oars on the gunwales, the blades horizontal to cut through the wind. Then “Ok, stroke”, and it was pull, lift, lean and dip, ad nauseum/infinitum (we studied Latin at St. John’s).

 Lunch was always a welcome break. We would chose a clear spot on the banks, or even a sandbar if it was dry enough. We didn’t need a fire; that was only for the overnight camp. I loved the lunches: three big metal cans, honey, jam and peanut butter, as much as you wanted, smeared all over bread or hardtack.

It was a short break – exactly an hour – and then we were back on the river, bow pointed down-stream. 

It continued like that for three days; pull, lift, feather, dip. Even though we were facing backwards, we could always tell when we were coming to another bend in the river: the coxswain’s eyes would narrow. Sometimes he stood, sometimes he looked left or right, but we all knew what he was looking for: the St. Andrew. Our excitement would rise along with his, then leak away as he shook his head and settled back into his seat. No St. Andrew, in spite of all those mighty pulls on the oars.

For the most part, we gave it our best. Of course, being 11 years old, you couldn’t give it your best all the time; if you did that, it wouldn’t be your best, it would just be your average (we also studied Logic). Sometimes, if you were tired or maybe not at your ‘best’, you might ease up as bit. As long as you put the oar in the water at the right time, you could actually let the motion of the cutter take it along with the other oars without a lot of effort on your part. The guy behind you would probably/for sure make a comment if you did it too much, but we all did it occasionally.

But not much, because we really did want to catch the St. Andrew. Which didn’t happen until… that morning. 

It started just like any other day. Sliding out onto the quiet river, the first ‘Ok, stroke’exactly at 6, then gradually settling in to another day in paradise.

 By now, we were about halfway through the race. The previous afternoon, the coxswain had pointed out the border marker as we passed it, but it barely registered as we worked the long, heavy oars on the long, heavy trip. Twenty minutes into our day, we were already in that familiar rhythm: pull, lift, lean, over and over (and over and over) again.

And then…

We sensed it right away. The coxswain’s eyes narrowed, and he frowned. Then he leaned forward and whispered hoarsely: “Weigh oars! And quiet!!”

We were coming around a bend in the river, and up on the shore to the left there was a tent. A big tent. And a cutter pulled up on a sandbar. In an instant, we all knew exactly what had happened: the St. Andrew had overslept.

Because were headed down-river, our cutter kept moving with the current. Every single one of us held his breath as we came up to the campsite and then slowly drifted past. All eyes were on the tent flap, all ears strained to hear sounds of anyone stirring. But all we heard was that quiet solitude of people sleeping (or oversleeping), and you’ve never seen such joy in the faces of 10 and 11 year-olds.

Once we drifted far enough downstream, the coxswain leaned forward and spoke in a whisper. “Okay, everyone on the stroke. Quietly.” We began to pull, gingerly, as if any real effort would wake up the losers on shore. The coxswain kept looking backwards, and when we finally slipped around the next bend, he turned to us with a grin. “So let’s move it.” And we did, with all of the excitement and adrenalin of knowing we were once again in first place. 

By the end of the day, pulling with more energy than we had for a long time, we still hadn’t seen any sign of the St. Andrew behind us, even on some relatively long stretches of the Red.

When we finally pulled into shore for the night, we were pretty giddy, and also worried; every one of us asked the coxswain if he had set the alarm(s) for exactly 5:15 AM. He had, and we were up and ready to get underway right at 6. We were within spitting distance of Winnipeg by now, and we were in the lead. Life couldn’t get much sweeter than that. So we pulled and we rowed and we sweated through another hot August day, with no sign of the St. Andrew. 

The very last morning on the river was special: not only were we winning the race, we knew it would all be over by early afternoon. So exactly at 6 AM, we shoved off. An hour later, panic set in.

Just as we were about to slide around a bend, there was a flash of light on the river, way back. It disappeared almost immediately, but we knew what it was: sun reflecting off wet oars. All of a sudden, our semi-leisurely victory glide into Winnipeg had just turned into a real race, the fate of humanity hanging in the balance.

So we bent to it, working the oars – hard – under a hot, cloudless sky. The oppressive heat of August still held its grip, but no one wanted to slow down for even a sip of water because slowly, relentlessly, the St. Andrew was gaining on us.

Sunstroke started to hit around noon, and I was one of its first victims. Headache, big-time sweats and nausea. Real nausea, and its consequences, which meant soon enough half of us were rowing and throwing up at the same time. It’s a neat trick if you can pull it off, because with ten oars moving in unison, you can’t just stop mid-stroke to cack. I felt sorry for the coxswain- he saw it all, which couldn’t have been too  pleasant.

Every time the Red straightened enough for us to see up-river, the St. Andrew was closer. We could actually make out some of the individuals, even their coxswain standing up in the back, yelling at them to pull!, just like in Ben Hur only without the chains and drumming.

But while they rowed with determination, we rowed with desperation, and in the end, our desperation triumphed, but not by much. The ‘finish line’ wasn’t a line at all, it was a spot on the muddy banks of the Red River where family and friends had gathered to welcome us back. They clapped and cheered as we glided into shore only a couple of hundred yards ahead of the St. Andrew. We all knew the cheering was for both crews, but that was okay because we could be gracious. We even stood to cheer the St. Andrew as they came in beside us. Good effort guys. Nice try. You gave it your best.

There is not much in life as satisfying as finishing a long, physically gruelling task, and now we were finally, finally done. And it didn’t matter who had won, because both crews had done it together. Even though everyone knew who got there first.

Frost Bites

"Everybody up!!"

Someone groaned; it might have been me.

Saturday morning, 6:30. Still dark of course; that's what happens when you get up at 6:30 AM in February. Not that we had much choice. It was Race Day, although 'race' might have been putting too fine a point on it. More like 'Snowshoe-Through-Waist-Deep-Snow-For-28-Miles-To-Toughen-You-Up' Day, but that didn't quite have the same ring as 'Race Day'.

So lying in a warm bed on a cold morning, in a boarding school dorm waiting to be 'toughened up', was not something you looked forward to. About the only good thing about Race Day was that this was the last of it: after today, there would be no more 12-mile 'training runs' across the wide-open prairie, no more wind so cold that it freezes your eyelids shut.

No more people yelling in your ear at 6:30 on a cold February morning.

"Fifteen minutes to breakfast! Gold team clean-up! Back here at 7:30 for inspection!" Then, in case anyone within screaming distance hadn't heard his voice, "Everybody UP!!"

That was Mr. Caves, and you didn't mess around with him. Some other teachers you could nudge a bit here, fool a bit there. Not Caves; he was always watching with those hawk eyes of his, always able to see right through any weak excuse or sad-sack story a scrawny 12 year-old could throw at him.

Which meant we were all sitting in the mess hall exactly 15 minutes later.

"Inspection! Parkas, mitts, socks, moccasins!"

The teachers yelled because some of us didn't hear all that well. Nothing wrong with our ears: when you're 12 years old, sometimes you don't hear things properly. Put 40 of us together, sometimes you really don't hear things properly. So, inspection was important.

Not that there was much to inspect. We all knew the rules: a couple/three layers under the parkas, no more; a couple of pairs of wool socks, no more; no holes in the tough rawhide moccasins; two pairs of mitts, wool inside, rawhide outside, NO GLOVES. We had been through it a dozen times, and if you wanted to avoid teacher wrath, you followed the rules, unless you didn't need to. So I followed the rules.

Except for the last part.

I wasn't quite sure where my wool mitts were (Davies might have stolen them), but I did have a pretty good pair of leather gloves, which were neater-looking than the mittens anyway. Besides, the big rawhide outer mittens would cover the rule breakage, and I figured that appearing to follow the rules was the same as following the rules. 

At ten minutes to eight, we were on the field, pumping little whale-spouts of breath into the thin, early morning light. Everyone made their last-minute adjustments, especially to the lampwick bindings.

Bindings were tricky. They had to be loose enough so they didn't restrict blood flow to your feet, but tight enough not to slip off mid-stride. Tied properly, the bindings allowed you to lift your heel right off the snowshoe in a natural running motion. Or, as natural as possible given that you were dragging a few pounds of wood and caribou hide.

So everyone checked and re-checked their bindings, although in my case, it might have been a bit more difficult. I had to be careful because I couldn't let any of the teachers see that I had gloves under my mitts.

One of the consequences of breaking the rules.

"Line up!" Again with the yelling. "Form your teams!”

We shuffled into ragged lines. Even though we were all dressed in identical yellow parkas (hoods lined with thick wolverine fur to avoid frost build-up), you knew your team members by the droop of their shoulders. That's what you got for staring at their backs for all those long hours during practice runs.

It was getting brighter by the minute, which was the reason the race started at 8 AM. Off to one side, the Juniors- Grades Five and Six- were staring at us. Weenies: of the three groups racing that day, they had it the easiest. Once we left, they would gather their gear and climb aboard the bus for Lockport, where they started their race. We wouldn't even be in Lockport until noon- if we pushed it. The Juniors raced all of 18 miles; we did that in the afternoon- after racing all morning. Uphill most of the time, I think.

The Seniors, though, were gods. They started their race at 5 AM. Their 50 mile race. By the time we woke up, they had already covered almost ten miles. The Seniors raced from Gimli, on the frozen shores of Lake Winnipeg, across the ice to the mouth of the Red River, then south along the river, past the school, past Selkirk, past Lockport, all the way to Winnipeg.  Fifty miles. On snowshoes. In the dead of winter.  

Like I said, the Seniors were gods.   

"Listen up!!"

We all turned to see the headmaster standing on the hood of a car, which was pretty neat, considering.

"It's a beautiful day for a race." Mr. Wiens would have said that if it had been a howling blizzard. In this case, a 'beautiful day' meant sunny and 12 degrees below zero.

"This is the Intermediate Pritchard Race. The route is as follows: school trail to the hydro lines, hydro lines south to Fort Road, cross-country to Lockport for lunch. From Lockport, follow the west bank of the Red River, not on the ice. You will finish at the Kildonan Park south gate, sometime after 4 PM. Rules are simple: everyone in your team has to cross the finish line if you don't want to be disqualified." He paused, and gave a tight smile. "The winning team, as you know, gets the accolades due them."

Didn't 100% know what 'accolades' were, but I knew it wasn't cash money.

"And no stragglers. Your team stays together, no matter what. No more than 50 yards from trailblazer to last man." 

Mass start, mass confusion.

Six teams strung out across the playing field, all headed for the 'school trail', a narrow path winding through 50 acres of bush. Didn't much matter who got there first; over 28 miles, there wasn't any advantage to leading the charge. Besides, it had snowed heavily over the last few days, and that meant the lead team was always trailblazing-  and that meant they would get tired very quickly.

We got to the trail third, close enough to keep up with the lead team.   

It took about 20 minutes for Lee to puke.

We knew it would happen, because Lee always ate way too much and way too quickly. So when he peeled off the trail and bent over, everyone kept their distance as he cacked into the snow.

"Out of the way!!" That was the team behind us, being dramatic. We sort-of moved over to let them pass, but only sort-of, because this was still a race. Some of the more excitable of them blazed their own trail through new snow beside us.

Team four went past, then 30 seconds later, teams five and six. Which meant all of a sudden, we were team six.

"Jesus, Lee, now we're last."

"Sorry," he said, then belched. You didn't want to be downwind of that.

We got back on the trail- nicely packed down by now- and settled back into rhythm. Head down, one foot in front of the other, brain in neutral. That's how you did it, because you didn't want to even think about the distance you had to travel.

I was particularly good at putting my brain in neutral. 

There are two different kinds of snowshoes. Woodland 'shoes are rounder, shorter, made for tramping through forest and bush. The plains snowshoe is much longer, with an almost lethal-looking business end and a tail out the back. It's made of birch or white ash, and strung with twisted caribou hide. They're made for deep drifting and the wide open prairie. 

Snowshoes are not like cross-country skies. There's no free ride with snowshoes: you earn each step, 28 miles without sliding one inch forward. 

Even though it was the dead of winter, Lockport was like an oasis. We got a meal and a chance to sit for 20 minutes (exactly: this was a race, and we were timed in and out). There was a warm shack if we wanted it, but we all ate outside, because you didn't want to overheat, or in Lee's case, overeat. We might have complained/grumbled/whined a bit, but there was an underlying bubble of excitement to our chatter, because we were halfway through race day.

"Hit the washroom, check your gear."

That reminded me: I had to be careful because of the broken rule. Weird about breaking rules: sometimes the worry you carry around outweighs the benefit of breaking the rule in the first place.

I made sure no one saw that I was wearing gloves underneath the mitts. It was awkward, but I managed to eat with my mitts on, and I found an out-of-the-way spot to retie my bindings. Didn't really look to see what I was doing, because I kept checking for teachers. Anyway, I had tied bindings so often that I could do it even with my oddly stiff fingers. 

When we left Lockport, we were in fourth place. The team that had lead out of the gate (Maunder's team, wouldn't you know) was dead last, having blown out their energy within the first hour of the race.

It was a slog, but we were used to slogs. That's what the four-hour training sessions were for, and the six-hour trainings sessions. And even though it was 28 miles, it was never '28 miles'; it was getting to the next bend in the trail, or crossing the next field, or heading for the next treeline. That's how you did it: you focus on the steps in front of you, then the next few, and so on until there were no more steps.

Wasn't cold, either. Your furnace was going full tilt, and the heavy parka was a shield against the prairie winter. You could look out through the fur-lined hood to the ice, blizzards and sub-zero temperatures, but they were out there, while you were safe and warm behind your armour.

Unless there was a chink someplace. 

We pushed it, and 22 miles into the race, we passed another team. Passing is like a slow-motion dream; you gradually come up from behind, then your trailblazer choses the right spot to veer to the side to start working past them. No words, just the laboured breathing of two teams chugging along side-by-side, and the swish, crunch and creak of the snowshoes.

It took three or four minutes to make the pass. Sure, there was a bit of satisfaction involved, but by that time in the race, you were bone-tired, and all you were thinking about was getting to the finish line and sleeping for a day or two. 

That was all we could manage. We wound up finishing third of six teams,  which to me was... acceptable. Probably anything other than dead last would have been acceptable, and even then, I'm sure I could have come up with some rationale that would make it okay.

So we piled in third, to the cheers (and snickers) of teams one and two. As soon as we slid off our snowshoes, we turned and waited for the fourth place team so that we could cheer them on (and snicker). Teams five and six were still a couple of miles back, so we had time to ourselves. That meant sitting down in a warm shed, finally getting out of our parkas and gear, and hot chocolate.

The snickers could wait. 

I frowned. Wasn't quite sure what I was looking at, but it wasn't supposed to look like that.

My fingers were supposed to be, you know- pink, especially now that I was starting to warm up. But one of them wasn't pink, or any variation thereof. My entire left index finger was sort of off-white, and not a tasteful off-white, more like blue-grey white. Like something dead.

"Holy shit!" Davies was staring at me, or rather my left hand, which I held up in front of me.

"You better show that to someone."

'That', as if it wasn't me. I didn't like the way he said it, the same way I didn't like the little knot of panic in my stomach. The same way I didn't like the look on his face.

It was just plain weird to look at, almost as if it had been spray-painted that ungodly, unnatural, unhealthy colour. Probably would hurt a bit when the warmth started creeping back in, like those little pinpricks when your foot goes to sleep and the blood comes rushing back.

The odd thing was, I couldn't bend it. I sent out the signal and everything, and the other fingers responded, but not the index finger. It wagged a bit, but didn't bend. So to warm it up, I wrapped my other hand around it.

"Holy shit!" That one came from me. Because my finger was cold, really cold, and not normal cold.

"I'm getting Mr. Wiens," Davies said, which was almost... shocking. You never ran and told a teacher anything unless someone was about to lose his life doing something stupid, and even then, it was a judgment call. So the very fact that Davies ran off to get Mr. Wiens - and I was secretly glad he did - said something.

By now a few of the other kids had been drawn by the two 'holy shits', and they clustered around.

"Wow!" "Look at that!" "Neat." "Does it hurt?"

"Boys! Out of the way!"

Mr. Wiens was there, pushing through the knot of excited 12 year-olds. I have to admit that I was kind of excited, too, because we were all looking at this thing we had never seen before.

I could tell from the look on Mr. Wiens' face that he wasn't excited. Always serious, his expression got tighter when he looked at my hand. "Boys!" he said sharply, and the noise dropped instantly.

He took my hand, frowning. "Tommy, what have you done?" He wasn't really expecting an answer; it was a common enough greeting when we saw each other (that's how I learned what 'rhetorical' meant).

"Jacobs, give me your hot chocolate."

Hot chocolate was one of the few rewards we got for making the trudge, and Jacobs already had his. Jacobs was pretty well first with anything that had to do with food, and had been huddling over his hot chocolate for a few minutes. He handed it over without a word, curious and maybe a bit resentful, but you don't hesitate/equivocate/delay when Mr. Wiens tells you something.

Mr. Wiens put the hot chocolate on the table in front of me, then dipped his finger into it, testing the temperature. Then he grabbed my hand and pushed it into the cup. Which surprised just about everyone. Wow! This was different. My first thought was that I wondered if Jacobs would finish his hot chocolate after my finger had been in it.

Weird thing: I didn't feel anything. Oh, I felt the warmth on my palm -which was a normal colour- but nothing from my finger, knuckles-deep in Jacobs's luke-warm hot chocolate.

"So. What were you wearing?"

You also don't lie to Mr. Wiens, don't skirt the truth. I nodded to the messy pile of clothing stacked beside the bench. A dozen heads turned to look. They all saw the same thing: parka, toque, rawhide mitts- and leather gloves peeking out from underneath. I had been careful not to show the gloves during the race, but once it was over, caution had evaporated as quickly as my attention to detail. So with everyone staring at the leather gloves, I could almost hear a collective 'ooooh'.

It was obvious I had broken a rule, and an important one at that. I knew it was important because the teachers keep repeating it, and they only repeated rules that were... well,  important.

Mr. Wiens shook his head, but otherwise didn't say anything, which was different. He was never shy about telling anyone what they had done wrong, or right, but mostly wrong. And he was never shy about meting out appropriate punishment.

'Punishment' was a big stick, and not a figurative big stick. It was called 'the stretcher", and it was an educational tool of the highest order. Simple enough philosophy: you transgress, you get the stretcher. Instant, effective, painful. "Lean over. Hands on your knees." About three feet long, 4 inches wide, with a handle, which made it easier to grip as you (well, a teacher) gave four or five pretty forceful whacks on the butt. Years later, when I saw a cricket bat for the first time, I wondered how they got their hands on a stretcher.

Great entertainment for everyone watching, but always tinged with a bit of empathy: everyone got the stretcher at least once (except Carson, who was perfect). Some of us got it regularly, maybe once a week, sometimes for nothing more than looking sideways at a teacher. But Mr. Wiens didn't seem interested in punishment, which was odd, and a little worrying.

Everyone stared for about 30 seconds, but when it was clear I wasn't going to get the stretcher, the fringes started drifting away, then the centre started drifting away. They had never seen a grey/white finger before, but now they had, and what else was new? Besides, it was time to go outside to cheer/snicker at the final two teams.

Mr. Wiens pulled my fingers out of the hot chocolate, made a face. Same sick colour. He pursed his lips. "We're going to have to do something about this." I wasn't sure if he was talking about my frozen finger, or was figuring out a particularly creative punishment. Which meant it wasn't over.

We left Jacobs staring at the hot chocolate, a look of indecision on his face.

It wasn't 'over' for the next two months.

The first night was the worst, constant needles of pain shooting up and down the finger as the freezing came out. And pressure, as if someone was squeezing my hand. I would drop off into fitful sleep, and 45 minutes later wake up in pain, look down at my hand, and try not to get sick. Couldn't even see the finger, just sausage-sized blisters where it used to be. I'd stumble out of bed and head for the infirmary, where Mr. Wiens was sleeping on a cot. I only realized later that he was sleeping in the infirmary because he knew what would happen. So when I shuffled in, holding my hand, he sat me down at a table and went to work.

Warning: descriptions ahead of what even mild frostbite can do.

'Going to work' meant heating up the sharp point of a knife and lancing the blisters. And of course, they were so full of... well, what blisters are full of, that we had to wipe down the table after they were lanced. The actual lancing didn't hurt, because the skin was dead. And there was a noticeable lack of pressure afterwards.

But the needles of pain were still there, I guess because the thaw was working deeper into the frozen flesh. So I would head back to bed, toss and turn in a fevered half-sleep, then wake up again, blisters painfully tight. And this after having spent all day racing 28 miles on snowshoes.

It was on the third visit to Mr. Wiens, probably around 4 AM, that it occurred to me why I hadn't been punished. I was amazed by his patience, almost as if he knew this was going to happen. And I realized- he did know, the same way he knew I would learn from the consequences of my actions, the same way he knew I would be thinking about this years later. 

"Wow, neat!"

"Ya, gross!!"

The next morning, they were all clustered around me, looking down at my hand. The blisters were huge, of course, because it had been a couple of hours since they had been lanced.

"Does it hurt?"

"Nah," I said off-handedly, although the needles were still there, but they weren't quite as sharp. In fact, I had actually been able to fall asleep for a couple of hours after the third lancing of the blisters.

"Can we touch 'em?"

"Sure."

Half a dozen fingers poked at the blisters, which I understood because I had already done it a few times. They felt exactly like those skinny party balloons: tight, soft and they gave a bit when you pushed into them.

Like they said, neat. 

'Neat' for about a day. Then the necrotizing set it.

Warning: more gross frostbite descriptions.

Over the next few days, the top layer of skin became darker and darker, until it was almost black. Under the nail, too, although that was more of a dark purple than the black of the skin. The dying skin extended all the way down to the base of the finger, which looked like it had been roasted in a fire.

I didn't lose the finger, but I did lose a lot of skin, and the nail, which was an event in itself when I levered it off in mid-class. The dead skin came off bit by bit over the next few weeks. The 'new' finger underneath was soft and baby-pink and amazingly sensitive to cold (to this day). I felt part reptile, with all the shedding of skin.

The oddest thing was that the finger stopped growing, or at least slowed dramatically. I guess the freezing had gone deep enough to affect the bone. Whatever the reason, my left index finger is the oddball of my finger family, a full half-inch shorter than its counterpart.

Never did get punished, either. The headmaster knew that in this case, corporal punishment would have been redundant: I had already been severely and corporally punished. Besides, he knew that I had learned something about rules and consequences.

And I had: when you break the rules, make sure to properly hide the evidence.

Wily Creatures

It was... convenient having a kid brother, a handy substitute playmate if my real friends weren't around. Or if I felt like pushing around someone who was younger, weaker and dimmer. Wasn't bullying, because he was my brother, and that's what siblings were for. Anyway, I didn't abuse him in a life-altering-then-grow-up-to-become-a-serial-loser way, but more in a guilt-free, I'm-bigger-than-you way that is so empowering to a 13 year-old.

So, yes, I had a dopey kid brother, a convenient third and fourth hand for building forts and toting barges. But, short story shorter: kid brothers can be wily little creatures. 

There we were, rolling around in the snow, the older brother tormenting the younger brother in a good-natured (at least for me), casual kind of way.

"Stop it."

I was getting that a lot. The 'it' he wanted me to stop was tripping him, which I had developed into an art-form. I'd walk up from behind and casually hook my foot in front of him, then push. Down he went, and as he struggled to get up, slightly off-balance, a little nudge would send him over again. So I heard a lot of 'Stop it' that morning.

"Tommy, stop it!"

But it was his own fault: he kept trying to get up in that awkward, dim, little brother kind of way. And down he would go again, almost on his own.

And finally: "I'm telling mom!"

That was an empty threat if there ever was one, and I told him as much. "Go ahead. 'Tom tripped me?' So what?"

I knew I had him; in the whole range of things to 'tell mom', the fact (unproven) that I tripped him was at the bottom of any list of actionable consequence. I knew it, and he knew it. Sort of fun to watch his powerlessness. One more reason to have a kid brother.

But younger siblings can surprise you. Sometimes they develop coping skills, and if you're not careful, they can sneak up and bite you (sometimes literally). So when he stood there twitching those little feral eyes at me, I knew something was going on.

But you know, he was still there, and still willing to be part of the day’s entertainment, so a few seconds later, down he went again, almost on his own free will. 

This time, though, it was different. He got up and shrugged, then headed for the back door. He walked with purpose, which surprised me, because he never really had purpose, in both meanings of the word. Then he stopped, and looked at me with a blank, almost reptilian expression. He got down on his hand and knees, then leaned forward and pressed his face into the snow.

Wha...?

He straightened, his face covered with wet snow. But even from this far away, I could see the smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth.

What to hell?

He stood and shuffled to the back door. Took one last look at me, then started wailing: "Mom! Mom!" Opened the door, and as he disappeared inside, I heard: "Tom pushed my face into the snow. It really hurts!! Mom!"

Well. I was shocked, dumbfounded- and also mightily impressed. Say this about a kid brother; they're handy landing pads when you jump out of a tree, or when you need a subject for experiments, but that doesn't mean they can't teach you a thing or two.

Yes, the whole episode reeked of unfairness, but I got him back over the years, big time. In fact, I'm still paying him back, it ways both subtle and literary.

But I was still mightily impressed.

Leaving An Impression

There we were, tooling along the autobahn outside Zweibrücken in my father’s almost-new 1954 Chevrolet. Not sure where we were headed, but when you’re four years old, you’re pretty well unaware of everything in the universe except eating, playing and elimination.

I think it was a cloudy day, although remembering details like that - literally from another century - is iffy at best. I know for sure I was in the front seat, sitting between my parents. Presumably I was there because my sisters were in the back seat, and that was the way my parents kept us from squabbling. In fairness, we were trying to keep it to a minimum (one of my father’s favourite phrases), because my mother was pregnant and that’s what you did around pregnant mothers, ‘keep it to a minimum’, whatever that meant.

Anyway, we were cruising along, and knowing my father, we were probably following the rules of the road, which on this road wasn’t a long list. Autobahnen were designed for Porches and other cars to zip along at speed, which meant we were getting passed, a lot. My father was an engineer, and he knew all about motion and inertia and the various ‘Laws of Physics’ (again, whatever that meant). So trying to pay attention to those Laws, while still keeping order in the car, meant he had his hands full. For my part, all I was doing – aside from keeping it to a minimum - was trying to sit up straight enough to see over the dashboard.

The dashboard in a ‘54 Chevy isn’t very busy. Speedometer and a couple of gauges over on the left, a glove box on the right. Right in front of me, the dashboard was one long expanse of curved blue sheet metal, blocking my view of the road. That’s what I was trying to look over, to see what was ahead.

Until we came to the dip.

When you’re four years old, you don’t have much if a sense of rhyme or reason, you just take what the world gives you and try to process it. So when the dashboard dipped, and I was able to see the road ahead, I wondered why the truck had pulled over to one side, partially blocking the shoulder. A man was standing beside it, near the front end, looking underneath.

The sight was so unexpected that suddenly everyone in front of us was slowing down. And because they slowed down, my father had to slow down, quickly. He uttered something – probably ‘damnation’ - and the car lurched. And then it was sliding, and there might have been tires screeching, or maybe that was the sound my mother made. The truck was much closer, and then it stopped us.

That’s how I thought of it, that the truck ‘stopped us’. Later in life, after various fender-benders (or even write-offs), you have a much more sophisticated sense of timing, physics and impending doom; when you’re four years old, the truck ‘stopped us’.

And by ‘us’, I mean it stopped the car, not the people inside the car. This being 1955, seatbelts were something that pilots wore when they flew in jets, not what passengers wore when they drove on the autobahn. So everyone in the car slid forward, even my sisters in the back seat. Which meant I slid into that long, smooth expanse of sheet metal right in front of me.

I have a vague sense of the next few minutes, cars stopping on the highway, people milling about. My mother was bent over, holding her face in her hands. Because she was pregnant, and because there was blood, people were worried. Everyone seemed to be talking at the same time, probably a mix of English and German, although it was all the same language to me, not that I could get past guten tag these days.

It turned out that my mother had a cut on her forehead from the broken windshield. An ambulance appeared and patched her up, but otherwise she was okay. She walked around with a bandage over one eye for a few days, but no one was worried about ‘the baby’ (my future kid brother) anymore. 

And much to my surprise, a week later the car was back in the driveway of our PMQ on the base, good as new. Whoever fixed the car had replaced the windshield and done a good job on the bumper and front end; you couldn’t even tell it had been in an accident.

But they missed the dent.

Right in the middle of the long, smooth dashboard, there was a small dent. I remember my father looking at it, frowning, then looking at me. Without prompting, I leaned forward  and put my forehead in the depression. Fit perfectly, which for some reason made me proud. I don’t remember hitting it, but then a whole lot was happening all at once, way too much for a four year-old to process. I vaguely remembered sliding into the dashboard, but it’s not as if I cried or anything; I left that to my sisters.

All I know is that for the next several years, every time we got in the car, my father would look at the dent and mutter ‘we have to do something about that’ and then forget about it. I was glad he never fixed it, because it reminded me of that weird day, with all those people and all that excitement.

Once in awhile, I wonder if hitting my head on the dashboard explains a few things about me. Then I realize that that would be way too cynical.

Tom New, earlier in life

link to Fun With Matches for Kindle