Pandora’s Box
I have been asked to open Pandora’s
Box, but I will harm no one, including myself, in doing so. The contents are
fluid, figuratively, coming and going, sometimes building pressure, forcing the
lid open and spilling out. When that happens I slap the lid closed, slide a
stronger lock through its hasp and wait, because it will happen again and
again. I will search inside my box, on this day, to find some event that I
would change. That is what causes me stress. The box is full of things I would
change; that is the easiest way for an event to get into the box in the first
place. And many of those thing or events I would change are similar, if not the
same, as the things and events locked in the boxes of other people. Everyone
has a box.
I lift the lid and find the
contents are in no particular order. I would not have become addicted to the
Three Stooges, as a third grader, and asked Charlotte to “pick two fingers”
which resulted in me poking her in the eyes, and left me scribbling “I will not
poke others in the eyes” on the chalkboard during every recess for a week. I
would change that action, but will set it aside for now.
I would certainly not have squatted
in the bushes under my friend Teddy’s kitchen window and snickered until I could
hardly breathe as his brother was viciously beaten, by their drunken dad, for
leaving bread crumbs on the butter stick. I have always felt bad about that, as
an adult. I may come back to that.
A definite do-over would be the
incessant brawling in junior high and first two years of high school. It would
be great to have been known as the kind and gentle Steve, rather than the guy who
might pound you into sloppy joe meat because of your shirt color. Lots of guilt
with this one, but those were the pecking order years, so, I will look at that
one later.
The summer I was fourteen I went
into Webb’s woods and shot twenty-one woodpeckers, just because I wanted to,
and because their calls annoyed me. I knew it was wrong, particularly as I
placed them in a straight row and then stared at the bodies. Nature is a
priority with me now, so, I did learn something valuable, but the event
deserves consideration.
In 1962, when in the second grade,
I told Mrs. Alexander I hated her, because she made me take a note, written in
cursive, to my mom, describing how I was a boy of bad behavior in class. I got a
whipping. Mrs. Alexander, who looked every bit of a wrinkly, pasty, eighty
years old, was only our teacher for a few days after I said that to her. She
died before I could say “sorry.” However, I am not sure this event is high on
the priority list for the task currently at hand. It goes back in the box.
In August, 1973, after working
construction jobs for my father, a drinker and womanizer, I went to see him to
collect the money he was saving for me. I was only paid for two weeks of work
after having worked about ten weeks. He walked up the driveway, with flask in
hand, and asked what I wanted. I told him. He became irate, said I was trying
to pull something over on him, that he had paid me what was owed. I said
nothing in return, borrowed gas money from my uncle and drove back to Ohio to
start my sophomore year of college. I had grown out of the brawling and
wickedness that gripped me as a kid. I should have talked to my father, man to
man, about the money and other things muddying up our lives. But, I didn’t. I
will put this on the top of the stack.
Finally, after considerable time
and exhausting review I have come to a decision about the decision I would change, first. The initial decision happened
in July, 1969. It involved me, obviously, a
gun, a dog named Tip and my cousin. I need to first offer a brief back-story.
My parents were divorced in 1965, after my father went to Vietnam, leaving my mother
with five children under eleven years of age, no support financially or
emotionally. Being the oldest and the most likely to make a go of it, I was
handed over to one relative after another to live with. In 1968 I went to live
with my aunt and uncle in Ohio. Cousin Jimmy was my age and we bonded like a
weld bead to a piece of steel, doing everything together. We hunted, trapped,
brawled, explored nature and discovered the delights in dating. Near the top of
what we shared and cared about was Tip. She was a mix of German shorthaired
pointer and blue tick. She was a smart dog. I know everyone’s dog is the
smartest dog ever born, but I will say with surety that it is the truth about
Tip. In May, she had a litter of pups and for several weeks did not join us on
our daily adventures. One morning Jimmy and Bob, our friend from across the
road, went to the power dam to club carp, which would spawn against the rapid
flow at the dam’s bottom. Carping, as we called it, was fun and there were
always hippies at the dam who would take the bludgeoned fish for food. However,
I wanted to go to Five Mile and hunt snakes, so I did not go with them.
Around noon I got my .22 rifle and
started out. To my surprise Tip joined me. She loved to retrieve whatever we
hunted, it came natural to her. I found water snakes immediately, sunning on
the rocky banks. The snakes would slide into the water and surface several
yards away, in the waters of the back bay. That is when I took my shot, almost always deadly with the first
trigger pull. Tip eagerly dove in and brought the dead, or not dead, snake to
shore. I always patted and hugged her and we would search for another victim.
It didn’t take but a couple minutes. The snake slid, I fired and Tip jumped. I
made the decision at that point, as
she was swimming out to the snake, to cross State Rt. 111, a busy county road,
to look along the riverbank. I hesitated, wondering if I should wait for Tip,
but I didn’t. On the river side of the road I saw a couple large snakes right
away, both slid into the water and surfaced after about half a minute. I took
two shots. As I was looking to see if I hit either, I heard a loud thump and
turned in time to see Tip sliding along the road, and a pickup truck coming to
a stop. I screamed her name and ran to her. She was already dead. The driver
touched my shoulder and said, “She just bolted right out in front of me, son. I
am sorry. Can I help you take her to your place?” I was already crying and told
him no. We moved her to the side of the road and I ran home, got on my bike and
peddled the two miles to the power dam to find my cousin.
He was on a path, leaving the dam
area, when I told him. He didn’t believe me, but ran to his bike and rode to
Five Mile, where he found her. She was a medium large dog, but he picked her up
and carried the body home, maybe half a mile, where he placed her on the garage
floor, next to the nearly weaned pups. After a couple hours we buried her in
the woods behind the house.
Although as cousins we remained
close our unbreakable, unbendable friendship was destroyed. We argued and had
fist fights with one another and within three months I moved, to live with my
grandparents, in the same town.
We remained under the strained
relationship for years. It repaired itself and we talked about it nearly every
meeting. We talked about all the good things as well. I told him once, about
five years ago, that if I could I would change that morning, decide to wait for
Tip to swim back to me before crossing the road. He hugged me and we both got
teary, two men in their fifties, bonded again like weld bead on steel. Jimmy
passed away in 2011. It is perhaps time to remove this event from my Pandora’s
Box, because the decision cannot be changed and it needs to be no more than a
sad memory in the middle of a beautiful story.
