Several things went through my mind. I was eager to climb the corporate ladder and wanted to be a team player as long as I wasn’t asked to do anything unethical. Was this request unethical? And finally, I asked myself: Why doesn’t this wussy just do it himself?
“Ya, no problem, James.”
I got directions from the hotel concierge. The store was walking distance. By that I mean within a mile or two from the hotel.
There I was, comparison shopping sex dolls. I found one that was just right for the cash budget James had given me. I paid for it and as luck would have it, they did not have a large enough bag for my purchase. So, I left the store and tried to hail a cab immediately. Again, luck was not with me. I had to hoof it back to the hotel, in a suit, with a blow-up doll’s picture sprawled across both sides of the box.
It was broad daylight. At each crosswalk, the double-takes, fast glances, and long stares penetrated my psyche.
Someone had the audacity to call out, loudly, “Gonna get your freak on tonight are ya?”
The humiliation!
Halfway back, I suppressed my embarrassment and decided to have fun with my predicament.
When someone’s eyes bulged, I’d look at them and say things like, “She sure got a purdy mouth don’t she?”
I never saw people scurry so fast.
When James opened his door, after several knocks, he stood before me in a towel. The irony didn’t escape me.
“Here it is,” I said handing him the box.
He laughed heartily and said he owed me big-time.
James had lost a mere five dollar bet with a senior officer at a major Chicago financial services company years ago. He had always hounded James to pay up. So, James arranged to have the blowup doll placed in this guy’s office chair holding a five dollar bill in her …hand.
The next night, on a dinner cruise, I finally met the senior management team of this major Chicago financial services company. They all knew me by name even though this was the first time we actually met.
At first they chased me down, laughing and calling me a “Sunnavabitch!”
Then I was made to feel a part of their circle.
Highway to Hell
I spent nearly a decade with some of the most ambitious people I had ever met. It was in the financial services industry. There was a group of us vying to be the next VP in the company before we were 30 years old. You can imagine the personalities.
After a promotion to Marketing Manager, I was rewarded with a road trip to recruit some top-producing, independent financial planners and their organizations. A senior officer drove (I’ll call him “boss man”) along with us three passengers. At 5:00 a.m., coffee opened our eyes. Not by ingestion mind you but by spilling on two of our laps as boss man whipped around another car, doing 90 MPH on the Ohio Turnpike. The screams were deafening. He laughed when he realized our crotches were scalding hot. He proceeded to tell us a story about opening the passenger window on someone in the middle of a car wash just to enjoy their drenching.
We laughed with the boss man. Then, the early morning yawns returned. That’s when boss man crept up on an unsuspecting motorist in the fast lane but not going all that fast. Did I mention the early hour? With a wicked smile, boss man – right on this poor soul’s bumper – laid on the horn. There was a delayed reaction by the driver in front of us. He probably froze with shock. Then, he swerved into the other lane so sharply, I thought he was either going off the road or flipping his car. Fortunately, he recovered. Although I don’t think any of us did before this day would be through.
By the end of the day, we successfully recruited two sizeable new offices of independent financial planners who agreed to license with us. The boss man suggested drinks before the trip home but there were no takers. We already had doubts about making it home alive.
I wish I could say that meant for a boring return trip but it wasn’t.
In a highway traffic jam that slowed us down to about five miles per hour, we found ourselves next to a carful of young women. Boss man put on a friendly conversational voice and actually began chatting with the passengers of this car cruising right next to us.
Then, he deadpanned, “Can I ask a serious question?”
They nodded, yes.
Without hesitation, he raised his butt up and out of the window while he was driving, albeit at a snail’s pace, and asked, “I have an exercise tape called Buns of Steel, tell me, is it working?”
I think we all, in both cars, died right there.
As the day darkened, we all grew silent, traveling steady at about 80 MPH. Then, boss man tapped the two of us riding in the back seat. Once he knew he got our attention, he put his index finger to his lips and then gestured at the guy sleeping in the passenger seat.
My heart lurched out of my chest, stomach lodged in my throat, and I was given a head’s up. Boss man slammed the brakes down – we were on a desolate highway – and screamed like a Banshee! The guy in the passenger seat flailed awake, thinking he’s in the midst of a horrific accident. He braced the windshield with all fours – seat belt holding the rest of him back.
It was too dark to see if he dirtied his pants when he got out. I certainly bent a knee and said my prayers when I reached the safety of home. But I have to admit, I laughed pretty hard that day.
Mamu
I was always an early riser. When I slept in a strange bed, I’d rise even earlier. So it was when I spent the weekend at my mother- and father-in-laws’ house.
Familiar with the layout of the house, I walked into the kitchen to get myself a cup of coffee after retrieving the newspaper out front. Before I sat down, I had to clear a spot to open the paper. The kitchen table sat four but the table was stacked high with books, magazines, archeological stuff and other research. It was typical for the amount of collecting they did. The clutter was extreme.
Once I settled in, sipped my coffee and found a good read, I enjoyed the silence of the wee hours – until a faint rustling noise caught my attention. I raised my head. Then, the hair on my neck felt like it stood straight up. To say I was startled would be an understatement.
Directly across from me was a tiny, frail woman, well into her 90s, with bug-eyed glasses, peering at me through the clutter.
It was “Mamu.”
She had blended in so much, I never noticed her. Yet, she was up before me. Maybe she never went to sleep. Maybe she slept where she sat.
I still wanted to flee!
Before I could make a break for it, she spoke in Langish, alternating sentences between Latvian and English, “Good morning. Jums ir līdz agri līdzīgi man.” So, I heard, “Good morning ....man.”
Good enough. I returned the greeting of the day while I racked my brain for a reason to excuse myself. Unfortunately, my mental powers lay in the nearly full cup of coffee cooling before me.
“When I was a meitene Latvijā ...”
I knew I was trapped.
Twenty minutes went by and I was so confused. My attention span had met its limit 20 times over. I made occasional loud noises hoping to wake another house guest, preferrably my wife so I could slip away.
Mamu’s crackly voice continued. Her head barely cleared the tabletop, blending into the stacks of who-knows-what lying everywhere.
Another 15 minutes dragged by before words I recognized like “jail, freed and fled the valsts,” – well okay; “jail, free and fled” – raised my eyebrows.
Then a strange thing happened. I leaned in.
Not only that, I said, “Repeat that part again.” ...“No, in English.”
TWO HOURS LATER, I was hanging on her every word, whether it was in English or Latvian. It was World War II. Mamu, her husband and four – now five – young daughters were roaming war-torn Europe, homeless. A wagon wheel broke, they missed a boat, it was bombed and sunk. They slept in a farmer’s field and woke to a glow of fire consuming the house they had been invited to sleep in. There was a train they missed, a bomb, and I didn’t need t
o translate the Latvian, I knew what happened next.
Someone walked by me, said, “Mornin’,” and turned on the TV, ending one of the best stories I had ever heard.
Cara-boo
Our daughter was born around Halloween so we nicknamed her Cara-boo, a take on the word caribou. From the get-go, she gave us some scares.
My wife, Becky, had labor pains that began Sunday night and lasted until Tuesday evening. It was difficult to be bed side and watch my wife in such pain as I held her hand. I secretly wished for the old-fashioned days when the daddy-to-be could just pace the waiting room with a pocket full of cigars at the ready.
Although the nurse kept her cool, we knew something serious was happening. The baby’s heart rate plunged. The nurse scrambled to find the doctor but he wasn’t even on the floor. It was the middle of the night. I looked at Becky and could tell she was thinking the worst and on the verge of tears. She had previously had a miscarriage and that was after years of trying to get pregnant. The nurse had to go it alone so she reached inside to tickle the baby’s head. It worked. The baby’s heart rate picked up. I had every intention of writing a wonderful letter to that nurse but regret never following through. She was incredible.
My mom grew restless in the waiting room, seeing similarities to her problem delivery when I was born Cesarean. Back then, only one doctor at the hospital, fresh out of school, was available to do the procedure. Becky’s long and complicated delivery made my mom’s nerves hit the limit. She did what she does in times of crisis and took action. She bolted into the room, startling all of us.
“That’s it! You get the doctor in here right now! It’s time for a…” As Mom shouted more instructions, nurses escorted her back to the waiting area. Becky and I looked at each other and laughed – hard.
After Becky gave birth, I cut the umbilical cord. Then, our daughter was cradled by a completely depleted but glowing new mom. I stopped to think: Prior to that moment, much as I tried, I’d look at Becky and could not imagine her as a mother. Now, I looked at her and couldn’t imagine her anything else. There they were, two beautiful angels, cuddled. Even though the journey was tough, our newborn came into the world perfect, like a porcelain doll. When our son was born a few years later, the delivery went much easier yet he came out looking like he had caught the bad end of a prize-fight.
Being our first child and living far from family and friends, Becky hardly had a support network. Making matters worse, our baby girl was colic. She also caught an infant respiratory virus. One night we drove to the emergency room because her breathing was so labored. Later, she was prescribed an inhaler and medicines for asthma.
All through my childhood, my parents would bark, “you’ll get pneumonia dressed like that.”
In college, too, my friends and I would jokingly bark at each other when someone was slow in shutting the door in winter – “Shut that pneumonia hole will ya.”
Yet, I never knew anyone who actually had pneumonia …until my son came back from the pediatrician with that diagnosis. It wasn’t a big deal and he rebounded quickly. Then, we noticed our first grade daughter, Cara, experiencing a rapid fluttering in her chest. Becky took her immediately to the Urgicare center. Upon arrival, our little girl’s heart rate plummeted and she turned gray. Next, she was rushed by ambulance to Children’s Hospital in downtown Cincinnati. During that time, she was stabilized. At the hospital, it again got scary as her heart rate and oxygen levels plunged to life threatening lows.
She was recovering when I arrived. I don’t know what my little girl was on but she was peppy as all get out. She spoke a million miles per second telling me all the cool things about the place, pointing at this and that, explaining with great exuberance – and then she said, “…And if I click this the nurse comes in,” and the nurse came in.
By the time our son was in school, he had been to the hospital a few times with head injuries. Once, he fell off the top of a jungle-gym right in front of me, breaking his fall with his face. Blood gushed everywhere. As Becky came running across the soccer field and caught sight of all the blood, she nearly fainted. Many parents offered cloths of all sorts to help soak up the mess. Other than a broken nose and some stitches, he was okay. Another time, he stood on a swinging bench thinking he could do a cartwheel across it like a Power Ranger, but he flipped over the back and did a face plant into concrete. Imagine our self-consciousness as parents whose kids were prone to visits to the ER. We figured we had met our quota for a lifetime but as fate would have it, there was one more visit to go.
Our daughter, Cara, was now in elementary school and playing on a softball team. Becky and I set up our lawn chairs and talked with other parents as the kids went through pre-game warm-up drills. The assistant coach had them in a line as he hit balls for them to field. The girl in front of Cara was older, bigger and much better than the rest. The coach hit a liner that screamed off the bat so fast, the girl in front of Cara didn’t want anything to do with it so she ducked to get out of its way. Cara took it straight in the eye and dropped like a sack of potatoes. At least that’s what witnesses said. Becky and I weren’t watching.
“Aww. Looks like someone got hurt,” I said looking up to see what the emergency was.
“Is that Cara?” Becky tried to focus her eyes out on the field.
The coach frantically waved for me to come over. I waved him off as if to say, no worries, she’ll shake it off. I didn’t want to be the parent who runs out on the field because their baby got a boo-boo. I didn’t know the severity. He waved again with a seriousness that couldn’t be denied. Well, it was serious all right, serious enough where Cara spent the rest of the day undergoing medical tests. Fortunately, it didn’t break her eye socket. But she had the best shiner on her eye I had ever seen. The bruising went so deep, it took more than nine months before her skin tone completely returned to normal. She got the black eye in early spring and when she returned to school in the fall, it was still a black eye. As a parent, you couldn’t help but wonder what teachers may have been thinking.
Fortunately, other than our son sticking a plastic bead down his ear canal and a plastic fork into the wall socket, things quieted down.
Scarred for Life
I was home alone with my pre-school daughter and toddler son, Cara and Dominic. It was an unseasonably beautiful day so I took them out to play in the driveway.
Dominic, a wobbly new walker, kept heading toward the lip along the upper edge of the drive where the concrete met gravel in a turnaround I just made. I knew he’d fall if he took one step over the lip. Like a magnet, no matter where I placed him, he drifted over there. My warnings grew sterner until I determined, fine, you’ll learn on your own.
Sure enough, like a drunken sailor, Dominic wandered to the edge again. I waited for him to stumble and fall and he did.
He cried at the top of his lungs so I walked toward him waiving my finger saying, “I told you so,” and then stopped cold.
His little baby-face looked up in horror. I instantly went bug-eyed.
There was a lot of blood.
I didn’t understand how such a small fall could end so badly. I figured he’d plop on his butt and cry but this? He fell face-first onto a sharp piece of gravel – so sharp it went straight through the skin between his upper lip and nose.
There was a lot of blood – and blood curdling screaming.
I tucked him under my arm like a football and ran to the kitchen in our bi-level home. That meant upstairs. My innocent little daughter was in hot pursuit, obviously concerned and confused at what was happening. My voice had a tone of panic as I talked out loud trying to sooth my boy. My girl stood in the kitchen with her baby doll strapped to her front, trying to process the scene.
I turned on the faucet and dunked Dominic’s face into the running water to wash away the blood so I could see how badly he was cut and where. His wailing was deafening. As I held him in the sink, legs flailing upward in the air, I noticed the gawking of neighbors working in t
heir backyards. Their sights were locked on me through the open upper window right over my kitchen sink.
Then, “DADDY-DADDY-DON’T DO BAD THINGS TO DOMINIC! DADDY-DADDY-DON’T DO BAD THINGS TO DOMINIC! DADDY-DADDY-DON’T DO BAD THINGS TO DOMINIC!” over and over and over.
This plea from my horrified little girl pierced all other noise. I knew she was heard, plain as day, across the neighborhood.
There I was with my boy’s head under the faucet water, feet flailing in the air and neighbors gawking in alarm as my daughter’s voice cut through the air with confusion and panic, “DADDY-DADDY-DON’T DO BAD THINGS TO DOMINIC!”
Later, the pediatrician said Dominic was too young for the wound to leave a scar, but he was wrong.
The only question now is whose scar runs deeper.
Elian Gonzalez
Here I Thought I Was Normal: Micro Memoirs of Mischief Page 17