Shoplifting Days

Just a little while ago I wrote a blog about the trends of Shoplifting being on the rise. That was originally going to be a story of my own childhood, brought to memory by a recent experience with catching shoplifters up to no good. Though I can't go into detail about that short story for good reason, I can tell another story about Shoplifting.

My brother and I once walked into a store with nothing but a gallon size freezer bag full of pennies. Well, there were maybe 3 nickels in there as well, but it was mostly pennies. We'd been saving them for something special after my Mom one a bunch of pennies from a slot machine in Wendover, Nevada one night. We shopped and shopped, trying to find something to spend our pennies on. Finally, we agreed and decided on a hammock, priced at $4 even. We figured we could have hours of fun with it, so we carried it up to the register where the unsuspecting cashier rang it up. When we produced our bag of pennies, I wish I had been looking at his face.

We stood there for a good 30 minutes counting out 400 pennies to pay for our prize. There were more than that in the bag by far, but the cashier was so disgusted with us that he called the Manager out. Then we had another set of hands helping us count the pennies, completely disgusted with us kids. "Next time you have to take them to the bank and cash them in," the Manager said to us. "It's free to do it."

It turned out it wasn't actually free at the only bank we had access to. Our remaining pennies would have to be carried off of the military base we lived on and taken to another bank in order to get the full value of the pennies we proudly carried home with our hammock that day. Money was a rare thing for us kids, we weren't about to cash it all in and end up loosing any of it.

Mom was amazed when we came home with the nylon hammock. Dad helped us set it up on two of the trees out front and we spent hours playing in it. We would hold it closed over us and take turns flipping one another over inside it. We screamed and giggled like wild heathens for hours. We had the best time! We played with that hammock for hours.

The next day we asked if we could have some chips. Mom asked us how much the hammock cost us, and while puzzled as to why she would ask, we told her the cost.

"There were more than $4 worth of pennies in that bag. Why don't you walk down to the store and get something for yourselves. Then you can get what you like!" While it was a kind thing for her to say and quite a generous offer, we hadn't cashed in our pennies yet. "They'll take your pennies," she said, confident in the economy's ever growing need for pennies. (Insert sarcastic grin here). We marched right back down to the store, bag in hand.

We found what we wanted and walked up to the cashier with our heavy bag of pennies and set them on the counter. The chips we picked up were around fifty cents a bag, so we thought for sure that since we were being practical they would take our pennies. The cashier, the same one from the day before, scowled at us.

"My manager said you can't pay with pennies anymore."

"But it's all we have," my brother tried to explain.

"Sorry." The cashier turned his back on us in a huff and pretended to be busy doing something else. We had walked a full mile to get that bag of chips with our own mothers reassurance that they would take our pennies, and here the jerk just turned his back on us.

"I'll go put these back," my brother said, and I followed right behind him. We got back to the chip isle, and rather than put the chips back he put them inside his jacket. He handed me a bag and told me to do the same thing.

"But that's stealing," I said innocently.

"I've done it before. It's no big deal."

Reluctantly, and full of private fear, I put the bag inside my jacket. Then we turned with pennies in hand and walked out of the store.

Years before I had gotten caught stealing a pack of gum. I was around 4 years old at the time I think, and though I knew better and clearly remember the incident, my mother thought I didn't know what I had done and needed to fix it. I remember asking her if I could have the gum and she said no. Then I picked up the pack and stuck it in my pocket later. When she found me blowing bubbles that afternoon, she asked where I got the gum from and I told her. I was brutally honest. "I took them from the store" I told her. She marched me right back to the store and made me hand the pack of gum to the lady cashier and tell her I was sorry that I stole. I was so incredibly embarrassed. And yet, here I was around 4 years later doing the same thing all over again.

Mom didn't find out that time, but the guilt lived on within me. I knew what I had done was wrong. I knew we had the money to pay for the chips, and the cashier wouldn't take it. We should have just left them in the store and forgotten the whole thing. We didn't want to cash in our pennies and have to pay for it to be done, so in the end they went into an old coffee can to await the day they would become dollars.

I never stole anything again. I learned humility the first time and conscience the second time. There won't ever be a third time, though more than once I've nearly starved to death for lack of money and too much honor to steal.

The Bronson File

Eventually I was taken out of my High School and enrolled in the school for "troubled" kids because of my running away as a teenager. I was in the second semester of the 11th grade when this took place. My attendance was terrible, my grades were even worse. I had given up on school, friends, grades and everything in general other than taking care of myself. Some would say I was depressed - but in a secret reality, I was going through withdrawals.



I was put on ritalin against the Doctors orders at the age of four and a half. By the time I was fifteen, I knew that I didn't like how it made me feel. I stopped taking them all together. Mom started counting the pills every day, so I started flushing them down the toilet. I didn't know what withdrawals were, but I felt like wearing black every day. I went through terrible mood swings where I would lash out for no apparent reason. I would often get angry and scream at my parents for the smallest things. I never got away with that, though.



Convinced I was on drugs (when really I had taken myself off of drugs) my parents started taking me to shrinks on the military base. They prescribed Klonopin, Paxil, Prozac and a myriad of other mind and emotion numbing drugs. I refused to take those, too. I flushed them down the toilet every day, right along side the Ritalin.



One night I got into trouble for something. I don't even remember what it was. I was told to go down to my room while my parents discussed the punishment. Wanting desperately to show them exactly what the drugs would do to me if I ever actually took them, I took only one tablet of Klonopin. Even I didn't know what the effects would be. By the time I was to report upstairs for the punishment, my eyes were fully dialated. The suspicions only grew. They had me pegged as being a dope fiend and searched my bedroom that night for any illegal narcotics. The only things they found were the things they were trying to force me into taking. It worked just as I had wanted to. They got off of my case about drugs. They still wanted me to take my prescriptions just before bedtime so nobody saw my dialated eyes, but I still refused. I continued to flush them down each day, or grind them into dust and sprinkle them in the yard. There were a few happy birds flitting around for a while when I did that.



At the alternative school I started to run into people I hadn't seen in a few years. I had gone to school with some kids in Jr High that suddenly disappeared, much the way I did in the 11th grade. Of course I had few friends the entire time I lived in Utah, so I was used to spending my time alone. That suddenly changed at my new school. All of the Social Outcast kids banned together. We didn't pick on one another no matter what our ailments were. The kid with Coke Bottle glasses was treated with equal dignity as the girl with head gear (me) and the former Football player, kicked out of his school for trying Steroids. We were all equals, standing on equal turf. Nobody was better than anyone else. I was in heaven.



At Washington High, I was voted "Sweetest Girl" in the school, and my dear friend Trent Heckman was voted "Sweetest Guy" so our photo was taken for the year book. I had friends who talked to me in each class. I had teachers that would treat me like an equal instead of like a plague. I didn't realize for a long time what the core difference was between Washington and Bonneville, but when it dawned on me, it hit like a ton of bricks. We weren't Mormon.



We came from all walks of life. We were a collection of Catholics, Methodist, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim and a variety of other religions. The teachers were as well. We were Military kids, mostly - brought together in the middle of Ogden, Utah because of the simple reason that we were of a different religion.



I've always been a part of the Majority. To have suddenly been thrust into a Minority group because of the church my family went to (or rather, didn't go to) didn't make sense to me. I learned how to cope with it quickly enough though. I made friends all over my school and became one of the most popular kids there. Nobody made fun of me anymore, people asked me for help on English assignments, teachers praised me and my attendance became legendary.



I ended up making friends with a Bronson Babbit after a couple of months. I had known Bronson for a little while in the 7th grade, but like so many I knew, he suddenly disappeared. It turned out that they had moved, and later on was forced to go to Washington like all the rest. He had been a bit of a nerd boy when I knew him before, but I didn't even know who he was when he called out my name in the hallway one day.



"Amanda," he said, "is that you?"



"Yeah, do I know you?"



"It's me. Bronson."



"Bronson who?"



"Bronson Babbit. 7th grade."



He brushed his long hair out of his face, curled his upper lip into a snarling smile, and squinted slightly. Instantly I knew who he was, even with the eye liner and sweat band bracelets.



The very next time I ran away from home after being violently attacked by my mother in the parking lot of the school, I went to Bronson's house. That time I had decided to take my dog Cookie with me. She was such a lovely dog, I couldn't just leave her behind. My parents had threatened to get rid of her if I ran away again. I refused to let anything happen to her. I smuggled her on the city bus by sticking her inside a duffle bag and carrying her like I would a suitcase full of clothes. She never made a sound.



Bronson's family were kind to me. They lived in a small trailer in a Mobile Home court and were fine with me bringing Cookie with me. She got along with Bronson's mother very well and becamse a member of the family very quickly.



The family lived off of Hamburger Helper at almost every meal. They were all fairly heavy set, including Bronson, but their hearts were good and they took care of me. I was free to come and go as I pleased and continued going to school each day. My attendance remained steady, never missing a class.



Finally, and quite suddenly, Bronson's family had to move and I was forced to move on alone. Without anywhere else to go, I finally made the long trek home to my mother and father. I hated no having options.



Cookie was happy to see my mother, but I certainly wasn't. They had cleaned out my room, getting rid of everything I owned except for a mattress on the floor and the clothes I was wearing. I didn't even have a door on my bedroom anymore.



That started another jouney for me - one that would take me over a state border and over 600 miles from home... but that's another story. That's the story of Byron Miller, a story I've never told to another living soul. I'm not proud of it and I did a terrible thing, but I'm ready to tell the truth.



Stay tuned.

The Rabbit Grass Patch

In the beginning of the 6th grade, I was a bit of a loner. That all changed later on in the year, but that's another story.

Rashaad Sampson used to pick on me out in the school yard. I would find a quiet spot in the back corner of the playground when I retired from the Bars and would sit on a very soft patch of grass I called Rabbit Grass, since it felt to me like a bunny's back. Eventually I made a friend though, and Megan McKinley would sit under the same tree with me.

Kristen Osterthalen had written a play that the class would be performing later on that year. Inspired by her and my own desire to write, Megan and I decided to write a play of our own. We would sit in the back of the playground on that patch of Rabbit Grass and write. We would talk for the entire recess about what we wanted to write into our play.

Rashaad found us back there one day and asked what we were doing. Neither of us wanted to answer, so we ignored him for a while. Eventually he was the reason Megan and I developed our own version of sign language. We had hand signals for everything. We even created our own written language thanks to a class assignment that blossomed for us. For years I could read and write fluently in that private language. Though I would struggle with a couple of the letters now, I still have most of the memorized.

Rashaad started picking handfuls of my Rabbit Grass and throwing them at us. He was tired of being ignored. He chanted at us about what big nerds we were to have our own language. He teased us until we couldn't ignore him anymore. Back then I never stood up for myself (some things never change) so Megan did. As I sat there picking my precious grass out of my long hair, Megan stood up and told Rashaad off. She told him that he needed to leave us alone, we weren't bothering him, and surely a kid of 5'10 in the 6th grade had better things to do with his time, like pick apples without a ladder.

What Rashaad didn't know was that secretly I had a crush on him. I had long since forgotten about Mike from the 5th grade after playing Blind Man's Bluff with him. I was far more crushed than I let on.

When I got home from school that day I started to tell my Mom all about how Rashaad had thrown grass at me. I was so upset that I started to cry and couldn't get the word "grass" to come out of my mouth through the sobs.

" Rashaad was so mean to me! He.... (sob) was thr... (sob) thr... throwing .... (sob) Grass at me!"

My mother started to laugh at me, to which I cried harder. It wasn't funny at all! He had really hurt my very delicate feelings! Still, she saw humor in there somewhere. Her next remark really blew me away.

"Don't worry, Honey... when he gets to know you better, he'll throw rocks!"

First Date

I was a teen run away.

I started at 16 years old and never really stopped until a few years ago. Finally, after spending almost half of my life running from the monster under the bed, I got tired of it. I ended the pattern with a new approach to life in general. It was a gradual change, I suppose. Though to me it seems to have happened almost over night, almost like I simply... woke up.

The first time I ran away, I was only 15 years old. My parents were coming down on me really hard and accusing me of things I had never even thought of doing. I had been accused of being on drugs since I was 13 years old and didn't even know what marijuana looked like. By the time I was 15 all of my parents friends thought I was sleeping around with anyone and everyone. In reality, I was still a virgin. More than once my mother threatened to take me to the doctors to verify that fact, but my parents never followed through with that threat. I wish they had.

I stayed with a male friend of mine the first time I ran away. He lived just down the street and his mom was out of town for a couple of weeks. I stayed in his room and he slept on the couch during that time. I always thought that was very kind of him. I had a huge crush on him at the time, but that never became an issue. We never so much as held hands. I knew what people would say and think if it became common knowledge, so we did what we had to in order to prevent people from finding out. That was the moment I knew I could trust Steve with my life.

I was working at Wendy's in Roy, Utah at the time. It was easily 3 miles from Steve's house, and I walked to work every single day while I stayed with him. I would work my entire shift, then turn around and walk back down the hill toward my temporary home. For the first time in my life, I felt a taste of freedom and I loved it. I couldn't imagine life any other way, and from that moment on, that was all I wanted. I wanted to have a chance to go to work and go home, to take care of myself, come and go as I pleased and know that I never once had to sacrifice my morals in order to accomplish my day to day life.

One night while working the change window at the Wendy's drive thru, a guy from school came in to the restaurant. He knew that I looked familiar and asked which school I went to. Right off the bat I knew who he was. I was amazed he even looked my direction. The Libby's were popular kids in school, and I was scum in the bottom of the tank of small fish in the big school. When he asked for my phone number and invited me to go play miniature golf, I thought it must be a joke!

We had a glorious time that night. We played miniature golf for the first time in my life. We stayed out until around 9:30 at night and then went over to his cousins house, where we sat in a group of 5, watching a favorite Disney movie. I was tired from work though and ended up falling asleep on the couch, my head leaned back against a very soft pillow. When Andrew woke me up later on to drive me home, I was incredibly embarrassed that I had fallen asleep in the first place.

I kissed Andrew on the cheek and for some reason I expected a call from him the next day. The call didn't come that day or the next. Nor did it come the next week, and by the time I had gone back home to my parents, I had all but forgotten about Andrew. I could only think that perhaps he didn't have fun with me, or he simply didn't like me.

When school started back up, I passed Andrew in the hallway one day. I said hello, he looked in my direction and simply nodded. He didn't say hello, he didn't smile. He didn't even really seem to recognize me at all! I was crushed. I had actually had a lot of fun, and Andrew Libby was my first date.

There's a strange unspoken rule still very much alive in the small town in which I lived. I wasn't a part of the religion, and I wasn't willing to convert. To many people (not all, but many) that was like having a swastika tattooed on my forehead. Andrew Libby found out somehow that I wasn't a member of the same religion, and because of that simple fact, was told not to speak to me again.

Steve remained my best friend for many years. When the world turned its back on me, he was my brother. When things went well for me, he was there to pat me on the back. There were times that Steve was more of a family to me than my own family was. I'll always love Steve for that.

Steve's little brother was another story though... Dan and I were involved in Breaking and Entering a private property. But that's another story.

Blind Mans Bluff

Mike and Travis were twins that had my heart from the day we met. I was in the 5th grade and the brothers had different classes. Mike was in my class while Travis was in the rival 5th grade room. It goes without saying that Mike had my undivided attention. When Mike asked me to 'go out' with him, it was still at the youthful age when kids didn't hold hands. We just called each other boyfriend and girlfriend.

I doted on Mike. He was a bit chunky and short while Travis was tall and lean, but they had identical faces and I adored them both. They were sweet and handsome, kind and genuine. They were also rather popular in class. Both were considered to be the class clowns.

When Valentines Day rolled around, Mike and I had been 'going out' for about two months. He didn't want anyone to know, including his own brother, because I wasn't one of the popular girls. He was afraid it would damage his reputation. I found out on Valentines Day that he also had a crush on another girl in our class.

When the class got done handing out all of the Valentines cards to each of the other students, we all got back in our seats for a fun activity. Mike stayed a little long at Summer Sparks desk, though - and my curiosity got the better of me. I watched as Mike pulled a little black velvet box out of his pocket and set it on her desk before walking away. The teacher asked all of us to take our seats, looking directly at Mike as he did.

Summer opened the little velvet box and her jaw fell open. I had to wait until recess to find out what was inside, but when I found out I was furious. Mike had given her a small silver ring made entirely of entwined hearts. I wanted to slap him across the face!

Patience took hold of me though. I knew I would get my revenge. I just had to wait and be patient.

The following week as we were walking to lunch, I asked Mike if he wanted to play Blind Man's Bluff. He asked what that was and I explained the game.

"You have to walk with your eyes closed and I will guide you by putting my hands on your shoulders and tell you what's coming up. Then you do the same to me. You go first."

"Ok," he said, blindly trusting me. He still didn't know I was aware of the ring he had left on Summer Sparks' desk. He closed his eyes and I stood beside him, my hands on his shoulders.

As we walked slowly to the lunch room, I guided him over rocks and pavement, grass and tree roots. Just as I could tell he was starting to relax and truly trust me, I did something despicable. I walked him straight into a brick wall, nose first.

Mike fell backward, landing like a lead weight, heaped on the ground. He fell with a thud, right on his bottom. His eyes popped open, flooded with tears. He reached both hands up to his face and held his now bleeding nose. For a split second, I felt badly about what I had done. Then the image of the velvet box entered my mind and suddenly remorse didn't exist. I felt justified.

"Oh," I exclaimed with false worry, "are you ok, Mike?" I clasped my hands over my mouth to cover the smile I felt working its way onto my face.

"Whadya do that for?" he asked, stunned. Suddenly I exploded. What good was my revenge if he didn't understand why I had sought it in the first place?

"Why'd you give Summer Sparks a silver ring with hearts all over it?"

Mike's jaw fell slack. He stared up at me, incredulous.

"Are you kidding me?"

"No. I saw the ring. Why did you give Summer a ring and just gave me the same paper Valentine you gave all the other girls in class?"

"My brother won that in a quarter machine. He's going out with Summer. I didn't give it to her, Travis asked me to drop it off at her desk! Travis gave it to her!"

Shame and remorse kicked in full force - and I never sought revenge against anyone ever again.

Big Black Snake

The first snake I ever saw was in the middle of a dirt road tire track. He was black and slimy in my opinion, though I learned much later in life that it wasn't slimy at all. He sat there, sinister and shining in the sun, glinting as though it was encrusted with exquisite jewels.

In mid-pedal, I dumped my bike, jumped several feet backwards, and ran for home like it was chasing me. I could practically feel that forked tongue lapping at my heels as I ran. I stepped high, lifting my knees nearly to my chest. At some point, a blood curdling scream escaped from my mouth as I ran the half mile back to the house. By the time I got there, I had morphed that into screams of "Snake! Snake!"

My mother was waiting outside for me when I rounded the corner and leapt over the ditch in one tremendous bound. As I flew through the air, I suddenly realized that there could be any number of snakes in the grass I was about to land in. Just the week before my mother told me about a snake she had run over with the lawn mower over by the wood shed. My feet landed and I sprang straight back into the air, throwing my body wildly over as much ground as I could cover with each leap. I looked like a cross between a gazelle and a baboon, I'm sure. I was a rather lanky 7 year old.

By the time my mother convinced me to walk back down the road with her to retrieve my bike, I had stopped shaking and the sun had stopped shining. The stars began to peek their heads in the darkening horizon. The crickets chirped, telling of the coming evening. I walked slowly, not wanting to face that snake any more at that time than I had the first time I came nose to nose with it. A rabbit bounced across the path in front of us. The birds flitted from tree to tree and the cows grazed in a near by pasture, occasionally calling to one another. Arkansas in the spring was the most beautiful place I had ever seen.

The snake was long gone by the time we got to where my bike rested in the middle of a small mud puddle. I still laugh at myself and how afraid I was of that little snake. I remained terrified of snakes for many years until one day I was face to face with a pet snake belonging to a boy I liked. So completely bent on impressing this boy, I reached out and gingerly took the snake from his hands. I wrapped it around my neck and over my shoulders the way I had seen him do. Then I smiled my most winning, fetching smile for an awkward girl of 12 years old. I was still terrified, but I was too stupid to show it.

At times I have moments of that same type of stupidity. My judgement lapses and when fear tells me NOT to do something, I challenge myself to do it anyway. I've learned a few tricks for doing this, such as convincing myself that when I reach the number 1 counting backwards from 10 I will attack whatever it is I'm afraid of. I've used this method for saying things that needed to be said and I was afraid of saying. I've used this to pick up snakes, hold spiders and tarantulas, ride glass elevators and climb into a VERY tall roller coaster.

This past weekend I tried to do something along these lines and I failed. I'll try it again the next time the opportunity presents itself - and I'll do it by remembering the big black snake. It's the first time I've failed at this method... and I won't let it happen again.

Camp Thousand Pines

I think I was in the 5th grade when I went to Camp Thousand Pines for the first time. I remember pulling up in the bus and having all the girls in one group, the boys in the other. It had been a hard year in school for me that year, having just lost my best friend, Louise Pritchard, when she moved away. I've never stopped looking for her.

The bus pulled up in one of the most beautiful places I had ever seen. Little cabins were dotted through the woods with a central hall in the dead center of it all. The kids all piled out and began to scatter in multiple directions before one of the teachers bellowed for them all to freeze where they were and reassemble by the bus.

One by one we received cabin assignments. There was a teacher or parent in each cabin, but that didn't stop the girls from giggling and the boys from trying to pull practical jokes on one another at night. Parts of the trip turned out like the practical joke events in the original "Parent Trap" movie.

We went on night hikes. We met the local Native American tribe and they came to teach us how to do the traditional Rain Dance. I discovered my allergic reaction to bees. I had a metal ladder fall on my leg and sprain my ankle and we all took turns in the kitchen preparing a meal for the other kids before taking any food for ourselves. We even learned how to curl our hands and place our lips in the correct position in order to call the squirrels. I can actually still do it.

We told ghost stories out by the fire at night, roasted marshmallows over the open flames and enjoyed root beer floats while chatting about life in general. Though it seems as if Camp Thousand Pines has changed a lot since I was last there, my memories of the place before technology, live on just as they were.

Boo Hag - a Ghost Story.

You know how they say some folks are lucky at cards and some are lucky at love? Well, that fit Bobby Hansen to a ‘T’. He was the best poker player in the county, but somehow he couldn’t find himself a bride. Oh, he proposed to several girls, and even got accepted by a few. But they always got cold feet a day or two before the wedding, and it was bye-bye Bobby.

After the third time, Bobby was mighty discouraged, and his Pa felt real sore for him. They worked together in the family grocery store, and Bobby would sometimes sit on top of the pickle barrel and tell his Pa all his woes. And his Pa told him to hang in there, because a nice lady was on her way. Neither of them believed it, but it made both of them feel better to hear it said. Well, the day after their latest talk, the old woman who poled her barge through the swamp to deliver milk and eggs to the grocery store had a long talk with Bobby’s Pa. Seems she had this daughter who was hankering after a husband with a good steady job, and the old woman thought Bobby would do the job nicely. She suggested they introduce the pair at the next dance, and Bobby’s Pa agreed.

The night of the dance, Bobby’s Pa insisted that his son dress in his best. Bobby was dragging his feet a little, remembering all those women who played him false and not wanting to go, but his Pa dragged him out anyway. Well, the moment Bobby clapped eyes on the dark-eyed, red-lipped girl from the swamp, he was head over heels in love. Her eyes sparkled like the sunlight on the bay. Her skin was as creamy as new milk. Her voice was low and sweet.

The pair cuddled and cooed and waltzed the whole night long, and come sunrise Bobby was all for bringing his new love before the visiting priest who delivered his sermons in the grocery store (since there weren’t no church in that vicinity) and getting married right away. Well the girl was willing to get married, but not by a priest.

“Let’s just go to Beaumont and have the judge marry us,” she said to Bobby, and he was so smitten he agreed, though it would have been quicker and easier to just walk a mile down the road to see the priest.

By the next evening they were wed, and Bobby brought his pretty bride to the nice little cottage he rented just down the road from the family grocery. It had a nice front porch with a swing, a big bedroom on the second floor and a big attic with a window that could be made up into a second guestroom should his new mother-in-law care to visit from her home in the swamp.

After fixing him a nice dinner, Bobby’s new bride sat awhile in the rocking chair near their bed while Bobby yawned and watched her fondly. She cuddled under the blanket and knitted and hummed, and Bobby’s eyes grew heavy. He didn’t wake up until early morning, when his new bride crept into bed all hot and sweaty and fell asleep at once. When he asked her where she’d been, she wouldn’t answer him. Bobby was mighty sore that his bride had snuck out on him on their wedding night, but when she got snappish and her eyes blazed like they did when he questioned her, he grew frightened and backed down.

Life took on an odd pattern for Bobby. During the day, everything was perfect. His wife was sweet and pretty and loving. She kept the house sparkling clean and cooked him wonderful meals. But each night she refused to come to bed after supper. Like their wedding night, she sat up singing and rocking and knitting until he was asleep and did not come to bed til just afore dawn. She was always sweaty and cranky when she came to bed, and went to sleep before Bobby could question her.

Bobby was very confused and upset by this behavior, and finally confided in his Pa one morning after opening up the grocery store. Bobby’s Pa was awful worried. The visiting priest had gone on to his next parish, and there was no one they could consult but the local conjure woman. So he sent Bobby to her with a couple of chickens as a gift.

The conjure woman knew all about hoodoo magic and was an excellent herbalist. Local folks went to her when they were sick, on account of the doctor lived nigh on twenty miles away. When she heard Bobby’s story, she told him to pretend to go to sleep that night and watch what his new bride did. Then he was to come back and tell her everything. Bobby agreed.

The next evening, he pretended to fall asleep while his bride rocked and sang in her chair. Then he followed her up to the attic and watched through the crack in the open door as she sat down at the spinning wheel and spun off her skin, leaving only pulsing red muscles and blue veins. She was a terrifying sight and she sprang through the window and flew away into the night. Bobby ran out to the privy and was sick after he saw her. Who, what was this monster he had married? He was still trembling and in shock when his bride, looking like a normal person again, crept into bed at dawn, and he had trouble behaving normally at breakfast.


Part 2: Video created by a Reader
As soon as he could get away, Bobby ran to the home of the conjure woman and told her about the spinning wheel and the terrible skinless creature who flew away from his attic. “A boo-hag,” the conjure woman said at once. “You’ve married a boo-hag.”

“What’s a boo-hag?” asked Bobby. “A Boo Hag is a witch and a shape-shifter,” said the conjure woman. “She lures men into her trap and then delivers them to her Boo-Daddy, who eats their flesh and gnaws their bones. And that’s what she’ll do to you if you don’t get rid of her first.”

The conjure woman told Bobby to get himself some blue paint. As soon as the boo-hag left the house that night, he was to spread blue paint on every window frame and every door frame and make sure it was two coats thick. A boo-hag couldn’t fly through a window or door that was painted blue. And if she didn’t get back into her skin before dawn, she would be trapped without it, and be revealed for the monster she was. So he was to leave one tiny window unpainted, and keep it open a sliver so the boo-hag could squeeze through. Then he was to fill up her skin with salt and pepper, which would burn her up from the inside out. And Bobby promised to do exactly as the conjure woman said.

That night, Bobby lingered over his dinner, looking with sad eyes at the pretty woman sitting opposite him. He knew she was really a monster inside, but it was so nice to have a little wife in his home. He hated like anything to see her go. But he didn’t want to get eaten by a Boo-Daddy, and that was his fate if she stayed. So he went up to their bedroom and pretended to fall asleep while she rocked and sang and knitted. Then he followed her quietly upstairs and put salt and pepper into her skin after her ugly red-muscled blue-veined figure had flown out the window to her Boo-Daddy. He spent the rest of the night painting over every door and window frame with blue paint, leaving only one small unpainted window open in the cellar. He nailed it up so that it would open no further than a crack, just as the conjure woman instructed him. Then he hid himself behind a large chest of drawers up in the attic to wait for the boo-hag.

Just before dawn, the boo-hag came flying up to the attic window. As soon as she touched the blue frame, she gave a shriek of pain and rage. Bobby listened as she flew around the house, testing each window and door and howling like a banshee when it burned her skinless hands. Then she found the little window in the cellar, and he heard the thump as she landed beside it, followed by a painful whimpering sound as she squeezed and squeezed herself through the narrow opening, her skinless red muscles and blue veins tearing painfully against the rough wood.

The boo-hag ran up three flights of stairs into the attic and squeezed and squeezed into her skin as fast as she could. She just barely got it on when the first light of dawn shone over the horizon. And that was when the salt and pepper did their work, burning the boo-hags body from the inside out. With a scream of agony, she flung herself out the attic window. The glass shattered everywhere as she tried to fly away, tearing at the skin to get it off. But it was too late. She exploded into tiny pieces right over the swamp, and the alligators had them a mighty feast of cooked boo-hag for breakfast that morning.

So Bobby was once again without a wife. But bachelorhood looked much better to him after that, and he never went looking for a wife again. ‘Course, after he made a pile of money in oil, the girls started chasing him. But that’s another story!

Cousin Kyle

Kyle, my cousin, was a troubled kid. He was my fathers’ sisters’ son. I don’t know why he was troubled, and I don’t know what he did, but I do remember the summer I met Kyle.

He came to stay with us for a few months. I was so excited to have a new body in the house! “Someone new to play with,” was the first thought in my mind. I didn’t realize that my cousin was 16 and I was 5. He wasn’t interested in playing with me. He wanted to go smoke nasty smelling paper things out behind the bushes. I stayed away from him when he went there. I remembered those bushes all too well. I knew what people did when they went to hide behind bushes.

I wanted to impress my cousin; make him think I would be fun to play with. Maybe then he wouldn’t want to hide behind the bushes with his burning rolls of paper. I loved the swings. I played often on the playground and had calluses that would make a professional gymnast proud. Still, my favorite things at the playground were the swings. I used to lie on them on my stomach and swing back and forth, pretending I was Superman. The day I decided to impress my cousin, I really did impress him, but not the way I had planned.

I took off running toward the swings, arms over my head as if in a diving position. Suddenly, about 2 feet from the swing I was aiming at, I soared into the air. For a split second I felt like I was flying. Then I landed. Not with my stomach making contact with the swing, but rather with my head making a stunning, sickening thud when it contacted with the sand underneath. My legs hung limply over the swing, my butt in the air. I had soared right over the swing completely and landed on my skull on the other side.

Kyle and my brother both came racing over, asking me if I was ok. Once I could get the dirt out of my mouth, I grunted that I was all right. I claimed that it didn’t hurt at all, and even got up to show Kyle the cautious way to do the Superman, forcing back tears the whole time. Kyle marveled at how tough I was not to cry at landing directly on my noggin.

Kyle had to suddenly go home one day. I remember coming in the house with my mom yelling at him. I wanted to stay out of the whole thing, so I tip toed upstairs to my room. On the way I smelled a funny odor coming from the bathroom. It smelled like the funny smell my nose sensed every time Kyle went behind the bushes. I had never smelled it in the house before, except on Kyle’s clothes. I figured that was why mom was mad a Kyle. Years later, I found out I was right. Kyle never came to visit again.

Windy the Pony

The first gift I can really remember ever wanting very badly I had to lobby for night and day. I begged my mom and daad to buy this silly little toy for me! At the time it was the most important thing I could think of. I wished on stars every night, and every morning my wish hadn’t come true yet. I didn’t have my precious toy. Still, every night, I wished on a different star, thinking maybe I had wished on the wrong one the previous night. I don’t know if there was any special reason, like a birthday or Christmas, but one morning I woke up to discover my wish had finally come true.

Mom and Dad had paid attention. They found Windy at a store and brought her home for me. I loved that purple My Little Pony. She had a decorative pattern on her flank depicting wind. I thought she was the most wonderful thing I had ever seen. Then again, I was 3 years old.

I played so much with that pony! I loved her hard plastic purple body and multi-colored flowing mane. She was beautiful in my eyes. I cried inconsolably when I lost her on the playground near the house. I begged for another pony, but to no avail. My mom and dad said that if I lost her, I would lose her again. I never saw her again.

In my youth I had many My Little Pony toys, somewhere nearly numbering 50 to 60, I'm sure. I never saw another “Windy” pony for many years though.

Though I no longer have Windy, at one time I ended up with two of her. When I originally posted this story on my Myspace blog in 2004, two of my biggest fans found my PO Box and mailed me Windy toys they had managed to find somewhere. One even came with the hair brush and accessories that would have been in the box at the time of purchase.

Sadly, the two Windys went the way of the uHaul - but it's not the end of the Windy story. Someday I'll have another. I displayed Windy prominently for as long as I had her. She was always a reminder of simpler days when the only things in the world I wanted were a popsicle and a little purple pony.

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Not long after posting this blog, I got a message from a friend on Twitter... you've got to see the Seranading Unicorn they sent to me! It went so well with this blog that I had to share it with you.

"Seranading Unicorn"

Uneven Bars

On my way to work this morning I heard a song that reminded me of my childhood. The singer mentioned something about calloused hands and I looked at my own now dainty and feminine hands. They weren't always that way. My nails weren't always long and could never keep a coat of red on their surface. They were once the hands of a tom boy, and then the hands of a gymnast, and finally the hands of a roofer before they became the gentle hands they are today.


Callouses used to line the edges of my palm, just at the base of my fingers. I would spend hours climbing trees as a kid. I thought I was half monkey in all honesty. I wanted to be half horse, graceful and beautiful, but I was never a graceful child, and I couldn't have been farther from beautiful. I would play in the mud and always have mud caked under my nails. Mom would spend long periods of time trying to clean under them with a brush. When I was around 5 years old, she painted my nails pink after my begging her for what seemed like forever. All the other little girls in the neighborhood had their fingers painted pretty colors, I wanted pretty hands too. The first thing I did when she finished was go dig up worms with the boys out in the pumpkin patch.

I used these hands to punch a hole in a glass window once. I've used them many times to defend myself, to place shingles on the roof of many houses, to build towers with blocks and to escape miraculously from impossible situations. They were damaged, worn and bruised most of my life, up until just recently.

I used to play on the uneven bars at school when I was in the 5th grade. The playground was a lonely place for me back then. I didn't have many friends. When I discovered the uneven bars, I saw the things other kids were doing on them and wanted to learn how. Instantly I jumped onto an empty one and tried to swing around it by my legs. I fell, landed in a heap on the ground, brushed the sand out of my hair and tried again. The first time I made it all the way around the bar by hooking one leg over and one leg under I was amazed. I learned how to swing my momentum to get me around more often at at a faster pace. I learned how to stop swinging around and swap legs. Then I learned how to swing around the bar with both legs over the bar and using my knees and hands. The callouses ripped open on my hands and I would be in pain trying to write in class, but it was worth it. The adrenaline pumped in my veins and I felt like I was learning something I could be good at.

It took weeks and months to get to where I could transition my hands from one side of my body to the other. I eventually tried swapping legs in mid swing on a continuous cycle and got quite good at that. Another kid dared me to do the Cherry Drop, so I tried. I fell on my head and again brushed the sand out of my hair with my dry, calloused hands. Then I jumped back up and tried it again. I learned which bars were too close to the ground by smacking my skull a few times on the dirt, but I never forgot those lessons.

The Cherry Drop was a challenge. I would hang upside down on the bar from my knees and swing back and forth. When I felt that I was swinging out widely enough, I would unhook my knees from the bar and flip around. I was supposed to land on my feet, but that took a while to get. Most of the time I landed on my butt. Finally one day I got it. I landed on my feet and felt like I was on top of the world!

I had gotten so good on the uneven bars that other kids began asking me how I did it and what my secret was. Feeling proud of myself for having mastered something so well, I started to push myself harder. I wanted to not only be good at it, but I wanted to be the BEST at it! I worked harder and harder. One day, as I swung around the bars with both knees hooked on, I swapped hands in mid swing. I would put both on my left, then both on my right, then both in the middle. Again I heard a dare. Someone dared me to take both hands off of the bar.

The world whizzed by in a blur as I swung wildly by just my knees. I saw the sky race past, the swings behind me, the sand below me, the brick wall before me, the crowd of kids beyond that, and then the school off in the distance. I grabbed the bar again with both hands and went around once more before stopping. My heart raced. I had done it!

Kids everywhere were asking me how I had done it. I didn't know what to say, other than I had just tried and somehow it worked. Others began trying and several were sent to the Nurses office for head injuries. I just kept on.

Each day I would practice at recess. Kids would come from all over the soccer field, the 4 square and tether ball areas and kick ball practice area way off in the distance just to watch me. I felt like I was on stage. Each day I grew more brave. I would start to swing around and do a complete show, always changing things for the 'performance' and always wanting to push myself just a little farther.

One day I decided to incorporate the Cherry Drop with my routine. The kids all knew not to stand too close to the bars in case I lost hold and went flying out in front. Knowing there was a clear space in front of me, I began flipping backwards around the bar and let go with my hands. I rolled around backwards on the bar using nothing but my knees for a full 12 rotations before I picked up the courage, and when the timing was right, I let go. I launched out in front, soared up into the air, and landed squarely on my feet. The other kids applauded and ooohed and ahhed. I had done something nobody else had been able to do and it was coined the Death Drop.

The Death Drop became my signature move. Other kids wanted to copy it, but they were too afraid. One day a boy came and asked me to teach him the basics on the bars, and so I began to mentor the 6th grader. He was a year older than me in school, but he wanted to learn so I started to teach him. In no time he grew to be quite good and we would give dual performances at school during lunch. Within a few months, he landed a Death Drop and amazed everyone. I couldn't be more proud - my Student had gotten to be as good as I was. In due time, kids started asking him to teach them. Pretty soon we were teaching side by side. We would have anywhere from 5 to 20 kids a day we would work with together. We worked as spotters, making sure they didn't fall. After having learned the hard way myself, I made sure none of them ever got on a bar that was too low to the ground so that they didn't skid to a halt grinding their heads through the sand.

Once or twice we had a kid fall off the bars, but with the other kid there to help me, nobody was hurt. The kids that refused help and wanted to do it all themselves often ended up in the Nurses office by the end of recess. The audience grew, and the school threatened to either add more uneven bars or to remove the ones out there due to the danger and attraction they provided.

I was still the best at what I did. My first student and then co-teacher was very good, but there were certain things I wouldn't teach him. I was selfish. I wanted to be the best at what I did. To some degree there's still that competitive side to me, I want to be the best.

Mom came out to the school one day for Parent - Teacher conferences. I told her there was something I wanted to show her on the playground, so she followed me out there. She was thinking I was going to swing across the jungle gym or go really high in the swings. She was unprepared for what followed.


I went through my very best routine, and she stood back in awe. She had no idea I was able to do all of those tricks on the bars. Finally, in my moment of grandeur, I performed my Grand Finale with the Death Drop.


She screamed.

She yelled and screamed at me. She made me swear I'd never do it again. She threatened to go to the office and ask what they were thinking by allowing me to perform such stunts at recess.

That was the end of my pseudo-career on the bars at school. In two years I transitioned to 7th grade soon and didn't have the bars at recess, or even a recess at all. Lunches were spent from then on eating food alone until we moved to Utah. I had no friends in Jr. High and had a hard time for the first time in my life forming new bonds with total strangers. Nobody liked the little nerd girl with too many freckles, a stick figure for a body and crooked teeth. The other girls had begun to blossom into young ladies and I was still just a kid. I became a wall flower. It was a hard transition to go from being a Bar Celebrity to being nobody in an eager sea of strangers.


As I sat on the grass alone eating my lunch one day, I looked out into the lawn between buildings and saw a kid off in the distance. A crowd gathered around him in a long line. There was a ton of room behind and in front of him, so I watched. I was curious to know what was going on.


The young man suddenly sprang into the air and did a series of back flips and front flips and amazing stunts I'd only ever seen performed on television. He had a full Olympic routine memorized from the looks of it. I completely forgot about my sandwich and went over to watch...


When he finished, the crowd clapped for him. I looked close and knew he was familiar...


The Student had surpassed the Teacher.



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LA Weather Report

As with all things in life, there are drawbacks and positives to warm and cold weather. I prefer to see things in a positive light, however.

Yesterday the weather was perfect - sunny and warm, I drove home at 5pm with the top down on my bright red 1995 Honda Del Sol. The slight breeze in my hair, the wind on my face, I felt warm and comfortable in short sleeves. Here it is March, when the rest of the world is huddling close to their fireplaces to keep warm, and I'm driving home with the top down.

On the days like yesterday I know there is no possibility of going to bed early, though I also knew that was exactly what I needed. I had been up far too late the night before, knowing full well that I had to wake up at 6am to go to work. Going on about 3 hours of sleep, having the top down on my drive home was merely a trick to keep myself awake for the hour drive. Even that failed to work in the end. I nearly fell asleep as I pulled into my own street.

I have only one window in my tiny, upstairs apartment. Nothing separates my bed in the loft from the hot roof of the building but about 2 inches of painted white wood and 2 feet of air. When I climb up into the loft, I have to sit on the edge of the bed and roll onto it's soft surface. I have to be careful not to sit bolt upright in the middle of the night for fear of knocking myself unconscious with a support beam across the ceiling. So, on the very warm days such as yesterday was, I could easily gauge the temperature in my bedroom as being up near 100 degrees, while downstairs was much nearer to 78.

This morning the weather report was something else entirely. People here in Southern California are bundled up in sweaters and coats. They are cranking up the heaters in their cars with the remote buttons as they watch the wind tousle the trees from the safety of their warm homes. I've come to the conclusion that Californians are a spoiled people. While they "suffer" at 58 degrees this morning with a slight marine mist blowing in from the clear ocean views surrounding us, the people in a small town between Glasgow and Edinburgh are freezing away, watching the snow as they walk to the grocery store.

It's a crisp, breath taking 37 degrees over there right now. People are huddled up with their families in front of those fireplaces. The girls are learning to braid by practicing on one anothers hair and positioning flowers here and there amongst the strands. The small boy is sitting in his room reading a good book, warm and safe under the covers his mother so carefully flattened over his bed when he left for school this morning. His father, a big man known the town over as John, wanders into his son's room and speaks to him in a lyrical tune of a voice most Americans wouldn't understand. Then, he picks his boy up, tosses him over his shoulder, and carries him down to the dinner table. The boy giggles the entire way. His sister squeals when she sees the sport and begs to join in, beating her Daddy on the arm as any protective big sister would. The children take their father to the ground, giggling and squealing the whole way. He plays with them like a big Labrador retriever as his lovely flaxen haired bride watches on from the kitchen doorway, smiling to herself.

"Now John, you be easy on them," she says from the doorway.

"Now Louise," he scolds "If you'd like to stick up for them, you can't very well do it from there, can you?!" He grins a wide, mischievous smile at her, and she knows that if she doesn't disappear around the doorway, she would be next! Just as she ducks around the side, he jumps to his feet and begins chasing her through the house, threatening to tickle her until she pees her pants. She squeals louder than her children and heads straight for the stairs, swinging wildly behind her as she goes, hoping to make contact with his head or chest as he snarls.


I remember with fondness, those days I would play on the floor with my own father as my Mom would scold him from the kitchen for playing too rough with us. Dad didn't do it very often, but sometimes he would chase Mom round and round from the kitchen to the living room. Finally they would end up in a balled pile on top of the couch. They would kiss and my brother and I would both "Eww" ourselves out of the room.

What I wouldn't give to have that waiting for me when I went home tonight. I hate being tickled, but I would gladly give up the freedom of NOT being tickled in order to have the man I love being the one chasing me in the first place. He'd catch me half way up the stairs, we would fall in a heap, and he would make me laugh until I hurt. Finally, he would gently kiss me. He'd look deep into my eyes, and me into his, and I would know that I finally had my happy ending. Then - the cat would bite me on the toe as he so often does, wanting to play along.

116 days.