Running Away from School - AKA - In the Trees Talking to Birds

If only I were this cute...

I was fortunate enough not to have to grow up with having a terrible last name.  Or at very least, was fortunate enough not to grow up around terribly clever children.  I embraced "Rotten" myself fairly early on and so even if the other kids had though of calling me that, it wasn't an issue for me.  Other than that I was only ever called Otter, but otters are wicked clever and freaking adorable so that's hardly an insult.

Back in grade 5, we had a substitute teacher for French class.  Childhood rules clearly state that no work is to be done while under the supervision of a substitute teacher.  As such, Jeremy was testing out how I responded to being called an otter.  In kind, I tested out how he enjoyed being called Frosty the Snowman.  After a short period of consideration,  he let me know that he'd rather be cool than swim well.  The two of us were at a standstill.  Lesrick decided to try jumping in, but neglected to realize that with a name like Lesrick, he was a bit vulnerable to being called "Lessy-rick".  And by sitting across the desk from him, my shin was vulnerable to a good swift kick.

I was too proud to show weakness and cry, despite feeling like my bone had cracked.  Luckily for me and the poor substitute teacher, the lunch bell rang then and we were able to leave for lunch.

Both feelings and shin bruised, I opted to walk home and play sick for the rest of the day.  Unfortunately, as my mom wasn't expecting me home for lunch, my house was locked and I couldn't get in.  No matter, I went next door to camp out at Aunt Barb's until mom returned.  Wincing in pain from my shin, Aunt Barb believed I was sick, called the school to report my absence, and I spent a relaxing afternoon lying on her couch watching The Flintstones and Out of This World.

An hour or so later, my mom is at the door and looking very serious.  She had arrived home to find teachers looking in our windows and in our backyard.  My homeroom teacher had noticed that I was missing after lunch, causing a school wide lock-down (or what was then known as all grade 5's hang out in the gym with minimal supervision) while the teachers combed through the parks and creeks between my school and my house.

Holy crap was I in trouble.

My mom sent the teachers back their classes and I was due to meet with the principal the next morning.  My fake-sick day turned quickly into a real sick day thinking about the heap of trouble I was in for.

The next day my mom drove me to school and we went to meet with the principal.  She gave me a reaming about how they nearly called the police thinking that I'd been abducted.  They sent teachers combing through the creek just in case I had drowned.  Everyone was worried sick about where I was, and my teacher had been in tears.  At this point, so was I, so my mom calmly turned the discussion around.

Did they check the auto-absentee phone line?  No, they didn't, otherwise they'd have known where I was.

Did they call my emergency contact?  No, they didn't, otherwise Aunt Barb would have told them I was there.

Should they have called the police without checking those two basic first steps?  No.

I had never been so grateful.  I was able to walk out of the principal's office with my head held high and most importantly without detention. 

Back in class, I was a bit of a star.  Everyone was really pleased about the free gym time and wanted to know where I had gone.  My story wasn't that exciting (I didn't tell them that I left because of being kicked in the shin) but apparently the rumours flying around the school were.  The best one, and consequently the only one I remember, was that I had climbed a tree and was talking to some birds. 

The icing on the cake is that while I was missing, Lesrick and Jeremy were bragging that I had run away because they called me Otter.  Both of them got detension, while I did not.

Vomit Stories

Bargain Herold's
Remember "Bargain Harolds"?  I like to think I had somewhat of a role in it's eventual demise.  When I was somewhere in-and-around 10, my mom took Trevor, Sarah and my cousin Amy with her to the Rat Plaza, with Bargain Harolds at the entrance.  As soon as we entered the mall, my stomach turned and I paused to puke while my family carried on ahead of me without notice.  When I was done, I realized that I had ralphed from one end of the Bargain Harolds threshold to the other, completely carpeting their entrance way with my undigested lunch.  I ran to catch up with my mom to tell her what I had done, but didn't make it further than 20 feet before I hurled again.  When I was done my floor pizza, I realized that now I had effectively sealed all the unfortunate Bargain Harolds customer's inside the store with my vomit force field.  I definitely needed my mom to sort this mess out for me, so I caught up and told her I barfed.  Except in my family we weren't allowed to say barf (or puke, or hurl, or yak.  Not sure about vomit force field, though as I just made that one up now) so I had to say 'throw up'.  She stopped in her tracks.  I thought I was in trouble for sure.

Mom - "Where?" 
Me - "Bargain Harolds door"
Mom -"Which one?" 
Me - "Both of them"

Whereas I would have been tempted to run away and pretend that it wasn't my kid that just made a guttural (pun!) statement on the quality of products and services at the store, my mom did the honourable thing and marched back to Bargain Harolds, jumping over the chuck and informed the Manager what had happened.

Manager - "Where?" 
Mom - "Your door"
Manager -"Which one?" 
Mom - "Both of them"

As we all left, my mom and myself quite embarrassed, Trevor, Amy and Sarah all dying of laughter, the unhappy Manager threw some cardboard down on top of my refurbished lunch.

Later, while exiting the Rat Plaza, we noticed that the cardboard had been removed and stacked up next to the mall's candy machine.  That nearly caused us all to puke again.



Doorway Vomit
Here's another quick one that still makes me laugh.  When I was really young, let's say 5, I woke up suddenly in the night and couldn't make it to the bathroom in time to throw up.  My mom had super sonic hearing and always knew when one of us was awake at night.  She came out of her room to see what was wrong.

Me - "I threw up"
Mom - "Where?"
Me - (pointing at her feet) "There."

Luckily for both of us she was wearing her slippers.

The Turtles

As well as frogs and toads, I also raised a host of turtles growing up.

When I was 6, my mom and I went to Big Al's and the turtle tank was right near the front door. I studied the tank for a long time before choosing the tiniest turtle they had. I had saved up my allowance to buy Shelly and I distinctly remember he cost $7.99. Shelly lived on the kitchen counter in a plastic container called "turtle island" that had a bridge and plastic palm tree. He ate a boring diet of turtle pellets peppered with the squashed body of any fly who tried to make our house it's home.

After reading my journal, my grade one teacher Miss Maynard invited Shelly to join my class for show and tell. Always eager for a chance to show off, I happily complied. A week or so later, miss Maynard told me she had some exciting news for me. Her daughter found a little turtle in their backyard and named him Freddy (after Kruger, based on his claws). I was super excited, thinking that she was going to give him to me, after all why would her daughter finding a turtle be exciting for me? Sadly, this was not the case, but it did spark a series of careful backyard inspections and finally the accumulation of another $7.99.

Shelton brought new living accommodations with him, and joined Shelly on the kitchen counter. They got along well, sharing flies and playing with the cat.  Blackie and the turtles had a good dynamic.  Since salmonella didn't seem to be a concern in our house, we used to let the turtles walk around the kitchen floor.  They were zippy little suckers, despite the rumours about them.  Blackie would let them get fairly far away from them, then pounced and smack their shells with his paw to make them retreat into their shells.  Then later, if Blackie got distracted  by something, the turtles would attack his tail.  

When Sheldon reached maturity he starting trying to eat and/or kill Shelly.  Shelly was the size of a small dinner plate at this point so we decided to send him to university. That's not a euphemism for killing him, by the way, we literally took him to the conservation area at U of Guelph and let him free.  Now regarded as an unacceptable threat to biodiversity, at the time we thought we were doing a good thing.


Not too long later, I was playing at Fung-Ying's house when I saw a little turtle in an empty margarine container sitting on their kitchen counter.  I was upset and asked why he was in such a small container. Her brother had bought him for a friend's birthday, who wasn't allowed to keep him.  Thus, a margarine container.  To the delight of both myself and Fung-Ying's mom, Rocky joined Sheldon on my kitchen counter that day.

At this time I'm going to invite you to feel free to stop reading at any point...I have another 5 turtle stories to make my way through...

Still here?  You must be bored.  Or love turtles.  Possibly both.  Alright then, thanks for humouring me.  Carrying on...

Laurie and I were bike riding around the twin ponds one after noon when we saw a turtle near the edge of the water.  We got off our bikes to go check it out.  We were quite familiar with those ponds and as far as we understood, didn't support life outside of perhaps three-eyed Simpson-esque fish.  I'm ashamed to admit this, but I was too scared to pick up the turtle.  It was Laurie who grabbed him.  Despite having had three of my own at this point, this pond-caught turtle frightened me.  It might have had razor sharp teeth or some sort of venom.  But of course, it did not.  In fact, he didn't even see her hand coming because he was nearly blind with a disease contracted by neglect.  All of a sudden, me letting my turtle go in the conservation area doesn't seem that bad, does it?  Thus, "Pebbles" came home with me, and my allowance was diverted into turtle eye medication.  Because, yes, such a thing does exist.

At some point in this disjointed memory (remember the whole point of this blog is because my memory stinks), my Sunday morning habit of pouring through the penny saver and flyers got the better of me, and I bargained with my dad to buy a great big aquarium, complete with three turtles.  I was allowed to keep Stoney, Buddy, Frisky, and Sunshine (at this point I ran out of rock-related names) for the rest of the summer and my dad got the aquarium for his tropical fish afterward.

The story stops being interesting here (if ever it was actually interesting to begin with...).  I had six turtles for one summer, and all six went to post-secondary education in September.  I recall very little else about them, but having that many turtles at once must have been a trying summer for me, as it effectively ended my turtle-keeping.

____
Update: May 13
I just found this You Tube video of how turtles bully cats.  Mine weren't quite this vindictive, but it just goes to show you that turtles aren't pushovers. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFP6kzZJGOs&feature=endscreen&NR=1

We Were Movie Stars

When I was about 9, I was asked to be an extra in "Searching For Bobby Fischer" with Trevor and my friend Kathryn. Her friend's mom was a talent agent and needed a bunch of kids for a scene with a big chess tournament. They were shooting the movie in Toronto, I believe somewhere on the U of T campus.

It was a great experience. There was a good 50 kid extras and in between shoots we were kept in a big room that had unlimited snacks, a courtyard to play in, board games, and a big TV that played "Fern Gully". Sometimes the actors in the movie would come to visit us (so we thought...they might have just wanted to watch Fern Gully, or more likely, to eat). A couple even came to sing songs with us. I think she was Diana from Anne Of Green Gables and he later did "Men in Black" with Will Smith. I'll have to IMDB that later to see if that makes sense.

When we got to the set in the mornings they would send us one by one through wardrobe and make up. We had to bring a couple changes of clothes for them to choose from, and they wanted my blue plaid dress, with my white and pastel glasses, and they French braided my hair each day. I didn't realize it at the time but I personified the geeky chess child.

While shooting, they paired us up at tables with a partner and we were to play chess as fast as we could and use those clicky "your turn" things. My partner was a little Asian girl who also didn't know how to play chess. So we just pretended and made our horsies chase each other. I think at one point our royal families decided to end their battle and have a wedding instead. We got shushed a few times for giggling. Chess players do not giggle.

The audio guys had tiny microphones taped to every few tables or so in order to pick up the ambiance. I recall deciding to keep a microphone for my barbies, and being told that they need to stay taped to the table for the movie instead.
One day we were sat at a table that had one, and we thought that we now had speaking lines in the movie. Each shot of that afternoon we repeated the same serious chess conversation over and over.

There was another scene where we all had to run from the back of the room to the front stage to pat Bobby on the back and congratulate him. Even at the time, I thought that was a weird thing to do, but damn it I was going to run the fastest and get there first. I was quite competitive, you see, plus I really wanted to be on camera.

When the filming was done, we all received a pay cheque. It was the first money I ever made and I was intensely proud of it. I have no idea how much it was for, but I do remember I was allowed to buy a "Fern Gully" VHS with it.

I never ended up watching "Searching For Bobby Fischer", not even to see if you could pick Trevor, Kathryn or I out from the crowd. Who wants to watch a movie about chess anyway?

Neighbourhood kids

Growing up in Brampton was really fun. We had a lot of kids in our street and here are some random recollections of them:

Lindsay and Gregory lived two doors down. Gregory was my age but I was later told that I preferred talking to his mom over him. I used to go ring their door bell and when she answered, I'd say "guess what!" and launch into an epic tale of what I must have considered of monumental importance. Being that I was about 5 at the time, I'm sure it revolved around my cabbage patches or the bugs that I found.

When the they's moved out, Jennifer and Billy moved in. Jennifer was too old to be my friend but she was nice. Billy was a bit tough and intimidating to me. Once when we were all out front, I found a worm the size of a gardner snake and thought he'd be impressed if I showed it to him. Unfortunately for both me and that worm, he reacted by throwing it on the road. I wanted to go get it and put it back under the rock where I found it, but I was too embarrassed by his reaction, so I didn't. Eventually a car came and ran it over. I still feel terrible about that.
Once I saw Jennifer kissing her boyfriend while sitting on the ping pong table. Might seem a silly thing to remember but he was Chinese and it was the first time the concept of interracial dating occurred to me. I think his name was Ozzy and he drove a motorcycle.


I was never particularly close with our neighbour's who lived three doors down. Cristina was a couple years older and Stephanie a couple years younger. I do recall Cristina throwing my cabbage patch doll Angela into the garage. She got a white scratch on her face and I never forgave her for that needless act of violence. I'm sure Angela didn't deserve it.
An embarrassing memory I have of Stephanie is once while we were playing in her room I was so distracted by the clutter that I started cleaning her room for her. When my mom came to collect me for dinner, their mother commented that Steph's room has never been so clean. I said "all you have to do now is vacuum it and you're good to go". Did I EVER get an earful on the walk home on manners!! Mom was sooo embarrassed.
Michael was Sarah's friend since they were the same age. When they were a bit older he would come over to dinner, I think mostly as entertainment. Probably one of the funniest kids I know. He's recently filmed an indie zombie movie with some friends. I can't wait to see it.

Shanna and Cassie lived directly next door. Shanna was a year or two younger than me and Cassie was Sarah's age. Shanna and I used to play swimming lessons on our front lawns, which involved one if us jumping off the porch and running around in crazy circles with the other one following as if we were on a water slide. The game lasted until the eventual fall down, which meant we splashed in the pool. Then we'd switch. I'm laughing out loud as I type this, it's so ridiculous.
My favourite game with them was throwing the ball over the fence. It was exciting not knowing where the ball would launch from.
Once I turned 19 I have Shanna my old ID. Two years later when she was 19 she returned the ID in a thank you card left in our mailbox.

Adam and Ashley lived a few doors down as well. Closer to Sarah's age, I never really played with them, but once Ashley was mad at Sarah and reacted by taking off all her clothes and riding her tricycle home naked. My mom ran after her and dressed her on the sidewalk.
Their uncle Tom lived with them and was a cowboy. At least that's what he told us. We believed him because he had a hat, wore the boots and had a cactus in his room. Thinking about this now, it is incredibly inappropriate that I was ever in his bedroom. My assumption now is that he wasn't entirely of sound mind.

Laurie's family lived down the street; specifically 15 houses away. I was their Kimmy Gibbler and was always over. I often went there in bare feet and thought they were really prissy when they made me put on socks before coming inside. Now I know that my feet must have been filthy and their carpets were quite light. Their house always smelt like "clean"...mine smelt like cigars and crayons.
My family never went out for dinner. McDonald's was a very special treat for us, and very rare at that. The first time I went to Pizza Hut and Swiss Chalet was with Laurie's family. I thought they were rich because they went out for dinner and Laurie and Sarah went to camp all summer. Years later Laurie told me that she thought we were rich because we had so many toys.
Once when I was over for dinner, Laurie's sister Sarah was angry at us for something (probably Nintendo related) and said at the table "you know, Dad says you don't have to have Julie over all the time". Awkward silence. It confused me because I never stayed without being invited. My dad referred to Laurie as his fourth kid so she was at my place as much as I was at hers.

This is a long post. 6 hour bus rides can do that to you (PS: I'm in Peru!)

A blog of frogs

I had a host of frogs throughout my childhood. Here are the stories of some of them:

Chuckie, or perhaps it was Ernie: I found Chuckie the toad while biking one day. There were some boys at a playground throwing rocks at him, trying to kill him. I went over there to save him, but I don't remember if there was an altercation of sorts or if the little assholes took off when I approached (they were younger than me), but I collected him and road home one handed. He ended up having a nice set up in the aquarium below the fish. It must have been a terrifying day for that poor guy, first a stoning, then strangulation on a bike, and finally forcible confinement. I tried to make up for it by supplying all the crickets he could eat, but I eventually returned him to wense he came.

Ernie, or perhaps Chuckie: this toad I just found and tried to relocate in my backyard. He likely wasn't impressed as I don't believe I saw him again.

Mr Ed: he existed.  That's all I remember of his life tail.  (<-- that's a pun, not a spelling mistake) (Yes, I know that toads don't have tails, but they did as tadpoles, so my pun is still correct)

Prince: my tiniest toad was a firebelly given to my as a Bday gift from Chris o'flarity. He required a very tropical and warm tank, which I painstakingly outfitted for him. Alas, he too made a break for his original habitat (which was a great deal further away in the tropics somewhere) and his blackened dehydrated body under the bookshelf was found months later.

I had too many frogs to remember their names...or perhaps they didn't hold the same fascination for me.  I know there was at least one "Kermit" in there, so lets assume they were all named Kermit.

Sarah, myself, and possibly a Kermit

Kermit 1 and 2: abducted from the pipe under the foot of my grandma's driveway in St George. These two unwilling buggers were sequestered in my first turtle home (plastic circle, small bridge and palm tree with a lid). Before running out to play one afternoon back in Brampton, I kindly thought they'd like some fresh air and sun so I put them out on the deck to enjoy the afternoon.
Later my mom found their boiled bodies floating in the little turtle river. That is when I learned about the greenhouse effect.

The Albino Kermit's: bought from Big Al's pet store, I decided to bring the ugly little creatures to school. That's where they died.  I think from starvation because I never really figured out how to feed them.

Kermit 3 and 4: when we dug a fish pond for our backyard I really wanted frogs to live there too. Apparently they didn't agree because they , like all the others, left. I was beginning to sense a pattern about the strength of amphibians internal homing devises.

Smiley: Smiley was a lime green tree frog. The kind that needs plants, water, heat lamps, and a very controlled environment. Read: this guy was going no where! He was super cute and very shiny, very enjoyable to look at and poke. But that was the extent of his attraction. He did nothing. Hung glued to the side of the aquarium. Blinked for pleasure.
I later brought him back to the pet store for credit towards my iguana.

More on that another day.

Operator

My nanny was babysitting us while my parents were on vacation and Trevor and I were watching tv in their room. For whatever reason he dared me to call the operator, so not being one to back down from a dare (especially an easy lame one) I did. On the other end of the phone, it sounded like the operator said "hello creature", to which I replied "hello stupid" and hung up the phone. Silly me didn't consider that operators by the nature of their jobs have access to both phones and phone numbers, proven by the fact that she promptly called back. Instead of answering the phone and thwarting her attempt to yell at me, I chose instead to hide behind a chair. Of course my nanny answered the call. She apparently didn't care whether or not the operator had called me a creature...she was pissed.

It was poor timing for a dare as well, as my parents returned that night. Again, that chair was my refuge until dinner when I thought enough time had passed that nanny had forgotten about the call.

She didn't, and it became dinner table conversation.