My Parents Made Me Paranoid (And I Thank Them)

I was adopted, ancient history, but to say I didn't inherit anything from mom and dad would be a mistake.


I have never touched a public toilet-flusher handle with anything but the bottom of my shoe! As a grown ass man, I'll teeter with one foot in the air trying to flush the things the way dad showed me when I was barely old enough to clear the top of the kiddie urinal. I can probably count on slipping in a puddle of urine when I'm 70 years old and breaking my hip, but for now, dad's legacy has kept my hands herpes free my whole life! And yes, I showed the boy the dance too, but the girl was on her own. I don't know how women flush toilets, but I don't hold hands with them either!


I have never operated a mower barefooted. Nightmarish images of me hobbling back to school after a summer time accident on a bandaged stump kept me from pushing a 22 incher around the yard without shoes. Dad also taught me to flinch when someone wheels by on a mower with the exhaust chute pointed at me just in case that someone rolls over a rock, baby bunny, or box turtle. I always 180 my ass to the mower in that eyeball-saving swish that makes me feel safe, but look touched in the head.


It's a bad enough phobia that I make my son wear shoes when he mows, even though he gets to sit his scrawny ass on a riding mower. Luckily, he doesn't mind, and he needs the extra weight anyway because he is so light that the dead man's switch in the seat sometimes breaks the circuit when he bounces around making my green machine backfire and everyone outside turn their heads towards his general direction.


Also, I won't do a lick of work on Sunday...which I inherited from my dad who'd frown at a neighbour that'd mow his yard on a Sunday morning...or blow leaves. I remember my neighbour who got up one warm and sunny Easter morning to mow while me, my wife and our young children hunted for plastic, candy-filled eggs to the drone of the asshole-go-round-the-yard. I was livid, and the only thing that kept me from putting a .308 round through his engine block was my fear of being someone's bitch underneath the Sheriff's Department.


Of course, I'm averted from doing work around the house most any day, but Sunday is the one day I can loaf, or ditch the family completely guilt free, and someday, when the powers that be let us hunt on that day, I'll keep it holy with that incessant need to get up before dawn, drive 20 miles, pack in 15 pounds of gear to sit on my ass for four hours or walk around with a shotgun all day through briers and yellow jackets for a shot at one stupid bird...yeah, that Sunday thing'll work out even better someday.


I reckon the last fun thing I'll mention is the need to keep every thing that I have ever owned because some day, I might need the botched and broken and worthless piece of decades-stored junk for the parts if nothing else. Wade through the attic, my closet, my garage and you'll see what I mean. Need a screw for your Makita 5007, 7 1/4" circular saw? How about the screws that came with our mini-blinds that I didn't use because they suck (why do I still have them then? I don't know). How about a Gott Water-Cooler with no lid, or a RubberMade Water-Cooler lid with no cooler? I have you covered.


Sometimes I take someone else's junk just to keep my reserve of garbage up for the coming apocalypse when, to fight off hordes of blood-crazed zombies, we'll have to throw thousands of empty shotgun shells at them to stop them--or old hammers, or sledgehammer heads without handles. (I got alot of those.) It might be the weirdest thing I inherited from dad. I don't know how mom put up with it frankly, but thankfully for me, my wife's insane too, keeping potting soil until it turns to dust, and fertilizer until it turns to stone.


Lastly, I inherited a fear of vacations. Not of hitting the road and seeing people and places, but the preparation for the trip. Getting ready to go somewhere drove my mom bonkers, and it was best to let her have her way with the station wagon than to get that rare pop. And now I too become a fist-clenching not-so-silent sufferer that completely understands why rats will eat their young when the nest is a little too crowded. Make your nest a four door sedan for a few hours, with the view of the back glass blocked by a month's worth of supplies, and you better have some Haldol.


SO, I reckon I can thank my parents for all these behaviours that'll probably make it down into the kids' "nurture" DNA strands. Hopefully, like me, they'll be able to drop some as needed. One I dropped was the need to "fix" stuff without actually buying replacement parts--think coat hanger/duct tape--or the desire to "build" stuff out of scrap paper, cardboard, and wood and use it in my home. I'm all for doing it right, with the right parts. And If I need shelves, I'll buy fresh, new planks and make them myself--naturally keeping all the scraps in the crawl space for later because...you just never know.

A Handful of Love

I've taken a handful before
I wasn't afraid
At the time.

Do you know what it's like
To force yourself
To Breathe.

To feel so calm,
And at peace,
To not miss a breath,

So content and rested
That not to take it
feels as good as taking it.

I have felt so at love;
Like a hundred massaging hands
Carrying me overhead.

I've walked not feeling
My feet touch the ground,
And turned my head without a wince.

I've counted my beats
And held my breath out of jealous pride,
Loving the loss of the hold
A small part of me had.
And felt a drum
In the back of my head
Say
Now...

And I breathe,
Feel the life swell my chest,
And feel at that moment
That I own time.
And I exhale,
And I wait again.

No pain, no hurry
Just my drummer
And a warm hand to my face
Like the one I wanted
But never met.

I always love it when I meet me,
But it always takes a handful,
To make me listen,
And count the beats;
Remind me to breathe,
Remind me to see,
Remind me to be
Me.

It only takes a handful.

Deceit

Outwardly you had me when the spotlight hit you and you filled me with a lust, a hungry need to have you to myself and to feel you on my lips then slip you in. Surely when I had you I'd feel what I've felt before with each passing whiff and taste. Call it love, the lust for your life, to become what I wanted with your help and surrender. 

So I took one to me and felt what it was like to have something without taste, without a glimmer of return, only hollow beauty of what I almost had--sadly I turned to take one more, always hopeful I was wrong at first, then trying another sweet taste for myself, but only slighting myself. Mocking myself without pity with the spotlight still on you enticing me back, guiding my hand into your deep, red-filled bowl.

You had me with your spotlight, and courageous colour you flaunted like a flag, glistening wet, as if by my sight, and cooed until I opened my hand, and parted lips to taste, then discovered your lie.

The Why's and Wherefore's

We had worked on these people's addition for a few weeks, and had done all the framing we could do for these people who were habitually changing their minds, and soon, we'd be tearing out what we had just done to redo it in some new formation that these homeowners had pulled right out of their asses. As a matter of fact, the builder they had started with quit (if you asked him) or had been fired (if you asked them) out of frustration. My boss took the job, it was, after all, work.

Anyway, eventually everyone got called away to start a real house somewhere else, but I got left behind with a guy named Tracy, and old man (I'm his age now--shit!) who was one of the slowest and laziest people I have ever met--myself included. And he stood there with the homeowner's wife (the husband was off making millions selling A.L. Williams Ins. during the day) while she praised him on a job well done.

I couldn't take it anymore and got up off my knees where I'd been working and walked over to them and interrupted.

"You know, it was a collaborative effort," I said, and her jaw dropped so fast that at first, I thought that she couldn't believe I had spoken to the all mighty homeowner, but that wasn't it.

"That's a big word!" she gasped at me. And then, for another moment, I wondered if she knew what it meant. "How is it you know a word like that?" she asked me.

I was surprised that she'd be surprised. It never occurred to me that carpenters were expected to be dumbasses. And that's a "syndrome" I've dealt with many times over the years and even named this web log after the notion.

I was reminded again when someone posted a picture of a vanity license plate with pi shown in eight characters and one of my friends thought enough of me to tell me the numbers were indeed pi. And I reckon you couldn't blame this person--everyone knows I dislike math though I consider it a dark art.

But the fact of the matter is, I use math quite a bit when building. Not the pencil to paper kind, but the kind that involves pencil to wood. The kind where what's-his-name's theory about the hypotenuse of a right triangle becomes a rafter in a system whose intervals are guided by a 16 base system--I think. It's all very mathiesque albeit empirical.

I just wish things hadn't changed so I could still brag about having found something that I liked to do for a living so I could say that I don't work for a living. And every now and then I'd get to impress someone who thought every carpenter was a dumbass with a funny one-liner--usually the final invoice!

The Countdown Continues: Greatest Implement Ever Devised*, Part I

In March, 1944, The Allies bombed Berlin in broad daylight for the first time in large numbers. Eccentric British nudist General Wingate started up his guerrillas against the Japanese in Burma and later, in the same month, would be killed in his plane's crash. On the ides of March, the allies started the second attempt to take Monte Cassino, which of course, destroyed an abbey that had stood since 524 AD. A few days later, British Mosquitoes would drop tons of bombs on Hamburg Germany in a "nuisance" raid. And in Massachusetts, in the city of Springfield, a billet of steel was becoming my U.S. Semi-Automatic Rifle, Caliber .30, M1.

This is my rifle, there are many like it, but this one is mine.

I know this by the serial number and armory name etched on the rear of the receiver. This rifle has passed through a few hands like all of the American Veteran Rifles, but this one had been under the tender loving care of a friend and fellow Rockingham County Gun Club member. And surprisingly he said yes when I asked him if he'd sell it. It was handed down to him by an even older club member who had purchased it (are you sitting down?) through the government agency created after The War Between the States to promote civilian marksmanship!


By the way, the Civilian Marksmanship Program is alive and well today and, in fact, if you wanted to, you could purchase an old battle ax too--after you fulfill certain obligations. Heck, they'll even mail it to your house. Be warned though, when you get them fresh from the CMP, it's coated in cosmoline, and it will look like it's been to Bataan and back. Not many pristine wall hangers left from the heyday of M1 Garands.


John C. Garand, who invented the thing in the early 1930's, was from Canada, and he wanted a 7mm caliber cartridge, the .276 Pederson, for his auto loading rifle, and even had a working model. But none other than Douglas MacArthur himself decided, for the nation, that the United States would stick with the cartridge we'd been using since 1906: Cartridge, Ball, Caliber .30, Model of 1906. So Garand went back to work and came up with my rifle.


It's an eight shot, honest to goodness "clip" fed, semi-automatic rifle. If you've seen Band of Brothers, you've seen them "in action". The cartridges, held in the clip, are jammed down into the receiver and then the bolt's slid sharply shut, chambering a round thus making you ready for firing. And, when the clip is empty, the follower spring, which pushes the cartridges up to be caught by the bolt, ultimately flings the clip out with a distinctive and satisfying "ping!"

The eight cartridge clip loaded with hunting cartridges.

I won't quote General George S. Patton* who loved the rifle because you've heard it before. And I won't mention the rifle's "flaws" everyone laments because frankly, they won't matter to me and what I'm going to do with this machine, and that's hunt. So far the deer have never shot back so my life doesn't have to depend on the Garand, but even if the deer did (or a sleeper cell of cornfield-raiding Al-Qaeda), I'd feel secure enough carrying this rifle. It will serve very well sitting in a tree or under my burlap poncho, of that I am sure.


I can't say with certainty that this rifle has ever seen combat. When I bought it, it had new wood on it, so if there were any battle scars on its original stock I'll never know. Manufactured in 1944, with just over a year left of hostilities, it would have had to hustle to get to either theater before May 8, 1945 or September 2, 1945. I can only guess and figure it did not. However, in 1951 it received a new barrel at the Springfield Armory so perhaps it made it to Korea for the awful mess that still haunts the world to this day.

Whether or not it's been fired in anger, or if it were a training rifle for its entire time of service doesn't make a difference to me. Again, like the other battle rifles I've hunted with, and plan to hunt with, I want to put to rest that feeling that the rifle I hold now was a killing machine in the hands of soldiers or Marines.


Sure, I plan to kill with the same rifle, but it's not a desperate fight for my life, and I'm not shooting in anger at my fellow man. It's the management of wildlife populations and, perhaps, if given the chance, the eradication of invasive coyotes who, along with feral cats, decimate smaller-sized wildlife populations that I hunt.


At the range, I've used three different loads in the rifle with three different bullet weights and haven't had a single failure to feed or "jam", but then, I'd be shocked if I did--it is, after all, an M1. I have just started tinkering with this rifle and while the load I've worked up is plenty good for taking deer, I still need some practice precisely placing projectiles in paper.

The sights are military "peep" sights that I'm pretty familiar with, but I just need more time at the bench. So like my buddy Bill says, "Shoot more, more often." I'm at the point now that I can hit a 5"x7" card at 200 yards, which surpasses what I feel comfortable with attempting on game using the 1903 Springfield bolt action rifle, but I'm going to work on that too. And what the hell, when shooting at the range, for eight shots, you're feeling and hearing the same thing the greatest generation heard countless times, all the way to the "Ping!"

Walking the Dog

We walk our dog old school...before sunrise and after dark we let her out of the house. We don't know what she does, we don't know where she goes. And we don't even know if she does her business--we just hope so and watch her for the tell tale signs of imminent poopage. One hint of unfinished affairs and she's whisked out the door. That's what they mean when they say, "It takes a village to walk your dog."

Dreamed a Line

The Lights I see

When I close my eyes, 

In the green background,

Are Braille.

And if I could read them,

They'd spell big words like

"Stratosphere"

And big ideas like

"Humankind"