Oh man! I was in trouble. You see, my mom caught me smoking weed when I was young. My friend here asked me how young, but I’m not gonna say. Anyway, she was pissed. That was hypocritical that she was so angry because I remember going over to my parent’s friend’s house and I was little. I was looking over the table after dinner and thinking to myself, “Surely they could afford more than one cigarette.”
Anyway, going back to me being in trouble. I remember sitting at the top of my stairs and listening to my parents talk. They were deciding whether or not to send me to military school or my uncle’s farm in Kansas. They chose the farm in Kansas. I went there with my older cousin who was in a similar situation.
We got to the farm and, oh man, I’m sure we tested my uncle’s patience. We were definitely wild children. One of our favorite pass times was to fire bottle rockets at each other. Real intelligent, right? I remember my little cousin always following us everywhere. So, like intellectuals that we were, my big cousin and I put an M-80 in a big pile of cow shit. We lit it and ran around to hide behind a tree. We told our little cousin to watch the M-80 and make sure it didn’t go out. We hid behind the tree and we kept hearing a small child’s voice saying “It’s still going. It’s still going. It’s still going,” and there was a loud bang followed by a loud silence, followed by a loud cry or scream or something like that. We looked from behind the tree to see my cousin in smoking cow shit. Man, did we get in trouble. Oh, by the way, an M-80 is basically an eight of a stick of dynamite. Something every child should carry with him.
Our second favorite pass time, after fireworks, was the pick up truck. We used to love to see how fast we could get it going. We had no concept of crashing or rolling the vehicle. Death never came into our thoughts. At a young age, you were allowed to use the truck on the ranch, or to go into town to buy food and supplies. It was a farm thing back then. Anyway, once we were on the farm with the truck, we were using the pick up and the farm tractor. We forgot to put weights on the front of the tractor and we were using an auger to dig post holes. Anyway, we basically popped the clutch on the tractor, did a wheelie and trashed the back of my uncle’s pick up. We pulled away the pick up and the tractor came down, but the auger stuck up in the air like a scorpion tail. The auger finally came down and almost took out my older cousin.
Man, I think I would have been safer at Military school.
One last thing I’ll tell you: one morning, my uncle told us we were going to go and hunt rabbits. He said they were a plague on the farm. Well, me and my older cousins stood up in the back of the pick up truck with 12 gauge shotguns. We drove for what seemed like hours, never saw one rabbit. Finally, a small bunny came out from behind the bushes into the middle of the road and stopped. Someone screamed “rabbit” and we all unloaded our shotguns onto the tiny bunny. We basically vaporized it. We taught that rabbit.
I often wonder what would have happened if I went to military school. I don’t’ think putting a weapon in the hands of a young child is a good idea. But that’s military history, right? That’s a whole other debate.
Love and miss you guys,
B. NIce
P.S. You know, my mom was right to be angry. You see, as kids develop, they should definitely not smoke or do drugs or drink alcohol. Their brains are still developing. Who knows what that can do to you. When you’re an adult, all that stuff is your choice. After being on this planet for 63 years, I have seen that all that stuff is bad for you. I’ve lost many friends to that stuff. They say that what’s happened to me is hereditary, but I’m sure my lifestyle did not help. That was just a little advice from an old man. Love, B. Nice
