by W.H. Harrod
~The Rude Engineer
One of the many (Heywood was told) less attractive character traits he developed about the time he reached the third or fourth grade had to do with his insistence upon not being ignored. Heywood never said he had to be the constant center of attention, but he did take offense at being outright ignored. He didn’t think it was asking too much for another individual to respond to his inquiries, especially, if offered politely. That’s what he generally did. He was usually happy to await his turn. He realized he wasn’t the only person who might have a question or even a response at times.
Heywood tried especially hard to be polite when dealing with adults. This proved difficult because adults usually acted as if young people had nothing of value to contribute or were undeserving of a serious response to most questions. But the greatest offense forthcoming from most adults, Heywood believed, was to simply ignore the youthful questioner by acting as if they were not present. This tactic, even at such an early age, really got his hackles up. Heywood needed some kind of response - even an “I’m busy right now!” would work. At the very least, “If you don’t shut up, I’m going to hit you,” would suffice. Never act like a person is not there when they ask you a question, seek directions, or simply say hello with a wave. Especially not saying hello with a wave which is exactly what this next story is about.
Maybe it has not yet been mentioned but during Heywood’s eventful early years, he lived in a small country town. His home was located out towards the edge of town where a, yet to be paved, dusty gravel road ran close by. Running along the other side of the house lay railroad tracks upon which coal-fired locomotives belching black clouds of smoke passed by several times daily. Amazingly, Heywood could not recall a single time he was awakened during the night by the passing of these trains. One of the reasons he didn’t awake, undoubtedly, was because all the crossings were provided with automatically activated flashing lights, backed up by an equally effective clanging bell. That meant the engineer did not have to blow the train whistle.
During those afternoons when Heywood busied himself outside in the yard instead of terrorizing residents in other parts of town, he often awaited the arrival of a particular locomotive usually driven by a particular train engineer who, over time, began to garner much of Heywood’s attention. The reason that Heywood, yet to this day, could provide a description of this engineer was because the engine had an open cab. You could see straight through the open cab to the embankment on the other side of the tracks and as the tracks running past the house lay about eight or ten feet below grade of the adjacent property, the viewer usually looked the guy straight in the eye from not more than thirty to forty feet away.
It must also be noted that growing on the fairly steep embankments facing the railroad tracks from both sides were many small saplings sprouting up from the fertile Kentucky soil. Every few years some specially outfitted railcars would go up and down the line whacking off the saplings as well as any other shrubs trying to reforest the rail bed banks. The reason this is mentioned will become clear later.
It may have been explained earlier, but Heywood was well known around the small town for being quite competent at chucking things, that’s throwing things for any city folk readers. He chucked rocks, baseballs, softballs, walnuts, apples, pears, pumpkins (punkins), and footballs (although there were no organized football teams within fifty miles). Also one does not throw basketballs, they shoot basketballs. Nor did anyone throw tennis balls, probably because no one ever had any. They didn’t have any because nobody played tennis as there were no tennis courts. There was one additional thing Heywood became somewhat adept at throwing – homemade spears.
With the availability of so many young saplings growing on the banks alongside the railroad tracks it was easy to take a small hatchet and fetch five or six, six foot long saplings, to be carved into spear shafts. In less than fifteen minutes a kid could fashion himself an arsenal of prime chucking rods.
Following another incident where the stoned-faced engineer refused to acknowledge Heywood’s enthusiastic greeting as the smoke-belching locomotive passed by Heywood’s house for the millionth time, he got straight to work on his plan. He intended to make sure that the next time the train came by the engineer would finally understand there was a certain young lad waiting for him who would no longer abide his uncivil behavior, especially since the rude train engineer had to have seen the same kid standing in the exact same place waving his poor tired little arm until it felt as if it might drop off simply hoping to receive indication that his loyalty and adulation were appreciated.
The very next afternoon following Heywood’s arrival home from another long and mostly tedious day at school, he made preparations to show this rude train engineer his profound displeasure. His plan was fool proof and simple: either the guy replied to Heywood’s polite gesture in kind or Heywood would throw a spear at him. Even as a young lad he liked to get to the point of the matter, so to speak.
As Heywood recalled, it was a very nice day weather-wise, not too much sun, not too much wind, it was just right. Heywood could visualize his quarry, sitting nonchalantly in the open engine cab, his really neat engineer’s cap pulled down snuggly on his forehead conveying the confident attitude that naturally went along with the job of guiding a one hundred ton piece of smoking black iron along untold miles of track. The engineer’s forearm would usually be resting on the cab window sill, the same forearm Heywood hoped time and again would make even the slightest effort to acknowledge the existence of a kid who held this engineer’s train driving skills to be right up there with the amazing guy who operated the machine that scooped up all the rock at the quarry and put it in a big pile or maybe the lucky guy that drove the asphalt paving machine he would use to turn the gravel road alongside Heywood’s house into a real highway. Things pointed to a good day - a day where he would have closure one way or another.
At the expected time, Heywood looked off to the south taking notice of the plumes of black smoke rising towards the clear blue afternoon sky announcing the arrival of the object of his totally focused mind. Being familiar with the event unfolding before his eyes, he reviewed his plan. He intended to wait patiently for the train’s lead engine, the one that always carried the stuck up engineer, to pass by his usual position approximately thirty feet from the spot where the engineer would be sitting doing one of two things. The first and most important thing the guy should be doing, at least in Heywood’s mind, was returning the wave of a friendly (unless he was constantly ignored) kid. Otherwise, the engineer’s eyes might be bugging out as they took notice of a long pointed object hurtling through the air in his direction. As Heywood reflected upon this event from a place long into the future, he remained stunned at how simple life was back then. Either wave to a kid as any normal person would or live forever with the image of a six foot spear hurtling towards you. Life’s only hard if one makes it hard was Heywood’s motto.
By the time Heywood refocused on the approaching train it looked to be less than a hundred yards away from the target zone. He lifted the missile of retribution, positioning it shoulder high, while he placed his left foot forward just like quarterbacks did as they prepared to throw a football. A mere fifty yards remained until the engine entered the launch zone, directly to Heywood’s front. The potential target could clearly be seen sitting exactly as he always had before - looking straight forward with his arm resting on the cab window sill showing no interest in anything much less a friendly young lad who merely wanted to be taken notice of, just once.
Heywood waited for another half second and let lose the shaft. His timing was perfect. The engine’s open window and the wooden six foot long attention-getting spear arrived at the same precise point in the universe at the exact same instant. He was not sure, but Heywood believed he saw the stuck up engineer’s eyes open about as wide as grapefruits the instant they took notice of a long slender shaft passing by about an inch in front of his nose. Heywood never heard a scream, saw a
ny movement, nor heard the train’s brakes squeal as they would have if the emergency cord was pulled. The whole thing was over in a second. It did take a couple minutes for the trailing train cars to pass by his spot, but they didn’t count.
It was a disappointed young man who slouched towards the edge of the embankment rising above the empty rail bed. Everything was still the same. The guy who drove the train took no notice of the adulating young man who only wanted for the driver of the most amazing piece of machinery in the whole world to acknowledge his existence.
Heywood stood looking down at the empty tracks as he had done hundreds of times before feeling empty and alone in the universe. Would it have been so hard to even raise one finger in acknowledgement of the existence of a little kid? He stared at the opposite bank for a time before coming out of his deep funk to turn away heading for the house and his awaiting supper. That’s when his eyes fixated on a single wood shaft sticking out of the far side embankment. He realized then that he hadn’t really thought about where the spear might end up. Maybe the people in the train cab hadn’t even noticed his gesture of extreme displeasure at the engineer’s snobbery. That idea made him even more depressed.
The following day being Sunday, the day which Heywood usually spent hiding out from his uncle who always tried to get him to a church on the “Lord’s day” as he referred to it, Heywood had little time to think about the disappointing events of the previous day. Life would have to go on like it always had.
That’s what Heywood thought, at least, until he was sitting comfortably in his school seat the following Monday morning. After roll call had been taken, he pulled his math book out of the desk so he could sit dumbfounded with a bunch of kids torturing their brains to add, subtract, multiply, or divide a bunch of numbers. Who really cared if two rabbits, plus two rabbits, divided by two rabbits, equaled two rabbits? He tried to tell the teacher he didn’t really need to go to all the trouble just to get the same two rabbits! She had told him to sit and be quiet, as usual, and he was eager to comply, but then the school principal came into the room and entered into a hushed conversation with the teacher.
Like all the other kids, Heywood tried to ascertain, via their motions, whether something had come up that would disrupt the class, hopefully, allowing him to draw pictures of army tanks or rocket ships instead of having to plod along acting as if he was really paying attention to the teacher’s math for idiots lessons. That’s when he started to get worried. About every ten seconds his teacher and the principal would stop talking and glance in the direction of Heywood’s seat. He knew there was little possibility of one of the other kids sitting in the area being the center of attention. This had something to do with him. Heywood hurriedly tried to recall any unusual events that may have involved his person, but he came up with nothing. Whatever it was, he knew he was innocent.
“Heywood, would you please accompany the principle to the office?” asked his teacher in her most accusatory voice.
To the office? Heywood asked himself. He had only just gotten to his seat. What could he possibly be blamed for in such a short period of time. This had all the markings of a setup. Some of his ratfink little friends were obviously trying to lay the blame for something they did on him. He felt confident he could clear up this little misunderstanding in no time.
His self-assurance lasted all of one minute or the time it took for him to enter the principal’s office to find the local sheriff waiting to see him. This scared Heywood as he knew the guy kind of had it in for him. At least a couple times a week, his black and white cruiser would slowly pull alongside Heywood as he walked on one of the many gravel roads that led to his home. Usually the sheriff didn’t stop but kept rolling along beside Heywood as he walked.. His questions were always the same. Did Heywood have any throwin’ rocks in his pocket? Did he have any idea as to what happened to another one of Mrs. Cooter’s screeching tom cats? Or did he have anything to do with putting a burning bag full of fresh cow turds on the school principal’s front walk causing him to suffer severe anguish upon attempting to stomp it out in his stocking feet? Just the usual questions you might expect law enforcement officials to ask young country lads most everywhere.
Once seated, Heywood immediately became like the Sphinx. Whatever they wanted out of him, they were going to have to pry it out. He had been on his best behavior lately. They would have to blame whatever had happened on someone else.
“Heywood, did you throw a spear at a train yesterday afternoon?” asked the principal.
Heywood sat stunned. The whole incident had been blown way out of proportion. All he had done was let a very rude train driver know that his snobbery was not appreciated. Heywood doubted that the instrument he employed to express his profound displeasure at the engineer’s rudeness came within twelve inches of the guy’s nose.
“A spear? What kind of a spear?” Heywood inquired, hoping to delay the inquisitors long enough for him to fabricate a plausible story that might direct part of the blame back towards the engineer, where he was sure it belonged.
“Boy, do you remember the butt whoopin’ you got the last time I took you home and told your momma about you sawin’ down that cedar tree in old Mr. Cooper’s side yard right before Christmas and then taking it to his front door and sellin’ it to him to raise money to feed all the hungry dolphins in Kentucky Lake?” interrupted the sheriff.
This was totally unfair. That particular incident occurred over five months back. How long were they going to hold one small mistake over a kid’s head?
“Maybe you’ve forgotten that whoopin’ you got when I took you home that time you and that crazy Basham kid climbed up into Mr. Craddock’s apple tree to steal as many apples as you could stuff in a burlap bag that got so heavy it caused the limb both you idiots were sittin’ on to break. You both fell eight feet to the ground and laid there with the wind knocked out of you while his wife swatted you with a broom. If I hadn’t come by, she might still be flailing away at your backsides to this very day,” added the perturbed law enforcement official.
This brought another thing to mind that Heywood disliked about adults. They remembered everything that kids did. You ask them something about most anything other than what kids do and they can hardly remember. But just bring up some small, insignificant incident concerning a kid, and they can recite it chapter and verse. Heywood had to come up with something. Both of his inquisitors had clammed up and put the ball squarely in his court. He knew he had to think of something fast.
Heywood considered throwing himself upon the mercy of the court, so to speak, until he recalled that the court was on a first name basis with his parents since they found it necessary, so often, to discuss suitable punishments to discourage a certain curious young lad from what they considered to be ill advised and destructive activities. Heywood decided it was time to come clean, to fess up to the wrongs he had done. He needed to straighten up and get with the program. He would change his ways and try to become a model of good behavior. He could do it if he really tried. He knew he could. At least until folks forgot about this, in his mind, insignificant incident.
“Well,” said Heywood, remorse ever so apparent in his tone of voice, “I guess it’s time for me to take my uncle’s advice and give myself to the Lord. He’s always saying he’s my only salvation. My uncle said more than once that there is a devil inside me and only by going to church could I ever expect to get help. So that’s what I’m going to do. You will never have to worry about me again. I’ve seen the light. From now on I’ll be spending my time helping others so you won’t need to be concerned about me anymore.”
Heywood sat quietly, head bowed, eyes concentrating on his feet as he attempted to ascertain if his accusers witnessing this most recent attempt by Heywood to talk himself out of another round of corporal punishment bought his story. After another minute Heywood was almost convinced that things were looking pretty good. Maybe he wasn’t going to get wacked with a board after all.
His inqu
isitors walked to the back of the room to confer regarding Heywood’s miraculous change of attitude. He couldn’t make out what they were saying but he could imagine they were relieved that he would be on his best behavior now that he would be dedicating his life to working for the Big Guy in the sky.
After another thirty seconds his captors turned to face Heywood. Both displayed smiles that obviated their relief regarding his sudden conversion. Heywood tried not to display any confidence regarding his inquisitors buying into his newest attempt to feign contrition.
“Well son,” said the principal, “we did a little inquiring ourselves just now, and you’ll be happy to know that the Big Guy, you just referred to, is very pleased that your heart now belongs to him.”
Heywood’s relief became obvious the moment they voiced those wonderful, nonthreatening words. But, it was short lived.
“Unfortunately for you,” said the smiling principal as the sheriff gleefully handed him a four foot long paddle that always stood in a corner, “he also informed us that whenever we deemed it necessary to provide you with guidance relating to inappropriate public behavior, your rear end still belongs to us.”
Whack, whack, whack!