Jockstraps and Skill Saws

 

Jockstraps and Skill Saws

Noel Laflin

9-30-24

 

Coach had just told us the correct way a jock strap should be worn (pouch facing front, just in case you were curious), and that when handed a towel after our communal shower, that one should NOT place it over one's genitals in order to hide one's embarrassment, but rather dry one's face first, instead, and save genital hiding and drying for last.

 

"It's only common sense boys!"

 

Coach made his point by pointing half an index finger at the first twelve-year-old-embarrassed face he saw lined up before him. It was only half a finger as coach was also the wood shop teacher and had had an unfortunate run in with a skill saw a few years earlier.

 

When dutifully instructed on other points of personal hygiene - Right Guard was mentioned, as was the importance of thoroughly drying between the toes, we were told to head in, find a locker, get changed into our band new gym clothes, and report back to the field in five minutes.

 

All was going according to plan until Frankie - small, funny, likable Frankie - put his jock strap on bassackwards, and then proceeded to put on shorts, socks, shoes and lastly, his brand new Sycamore J.H. gym shirt, before huffing it out to the field.

 

I remember the way he kept trying to rearrange things as he ran laps or frowned a bit painfully when it came to jumping jacks.

 

No one bothered to tell him why.

 

Welcome to junior high, I thought.

 

I suppose there were other helpful things learned in other classes that first day of school in 1965, but they have been lost to memory - as lost as any recall as to what my locker combination might have been back then. But I have never forgotten the importance of deodorant, or thoroughly drying between the toes, or where to first place a towel when exiting the shower.

 

However, I haven't been confounded, let alone confused as to the proper placement of a jock strap – pouch forward, as the ghost of a coach would remind me – or the memory of a boy who didn’t listen.

 

But then again I haven't owned one in decades, so give it time.

 

Oh, and on a purely unrelated matter, I have a strange aversion to skill saws, too.

 

Not sure why.

Late Night Visitors

 

Late Night Visitors

Noel Laflin

9-21-24

 

Why a young man with a baby raccoon perched upon his shoulder stood on the platform outside my cabin late one night some fifty-some years ago still makes little sense. But there they waited, a shy boy with a bulky duffle bag in hand, an overstuffed pack on his back, and a curious young raccoon – who now peered at me with very bright eyes (the raccoon, that is) before leaping from its perch (both gracefully and stealthily, I might add), and made herself at home on my cot against the wall.

 

"And you would be?" I prompted the boy ... It was a little past one in the morning by my reckoning, confirmed by a quick glance at my watch.

 

"Andy," he said, a mop of blond hair partially obscuring his face. "And that's Amy," he added, pointing to the raccoon now sound asleep on my bed.

 

And thus, formal introductions had been made as he also said he knew my name already.

 

"Mr. Bergner told me to bunk here as I am going to work at the Nature Center. Late hire, or so I was told.  Just got word today, told to pack my stuff. Mr. Bergner drove down the hill to give me a right back up tonight. I suppose I am kind of a surprise, huh, boss? Anyway, he said you'd most likely still be up, as you are kind of a night owl, always reading - his words. But, hey, I like books, - nature books mostly - and owls, too, by the way. They're really smart!"

 

"And do you have an owl in your pack as well?" I teased, setting down my book next to the sleeping raccoon.

 

"Ah, no, 'cause Mr. Bergner and I (he keeps telling me to just call him Smokey – I don’t know why – he doesn’t really look like a bear) already dropped her off at the nature center. She's in a cage, so she'll be fine till morning. Her wing is still a little busted up since I found her last month. I think a hawk tried to do her in – a territory dispute, no doubt. But it's coming along - the healing I mean.  Her name is Helga, you know, like the witch. I think you'll like her. She'll really love you if you bring her a mouse ..."

 

The boy stopped rambling for a moment, caught his breath and continued, "Some people think I talk too much. Sorry."

 

I just nodded, suddenly understanding Gene’s decision to hire this kid. I still don’t know how he heard about him, but Andy seemed to be some sort of animal whisperer. I guess word traveled. Anyway, we could use just such a lad, hoping he was good with catching squatting rattle snakes, too.  I always hated that task. I bet Andy would just charm them into crawling into a snake bag.

 

I beckoned him in, gesturing to the second bunk with the lumpy, most likely mouse-filled mattress.

 

"Mice live in all the old mattresses in camp," I told him. It feels like a mini mouse Indy 500 team racing below us most nights. It shouldn't be a problem feeding Helga," I told him.

 

"Cool!" he said, carefully studying the multi stained mattress, anxiously looking for movement within. I figured he probably had a mouse cage hidden in the duffle bag, too.

 

"Did you bring a bed for Amy?" I asked, as he pulled out a faded old sleeping bag and rolled it out.

 

"Nah, she sleeps with me. It's not really a problem, except she snores sometimes. But it's a cute little snore though, so I don't think it will keep you up."

 

"I thought raccoons were nocturnal."

 

"Well, yeah, they should be. But Amy keeps to people hours for now. Maybe it's because she's young still. She thinks I'm her mama, I guess, since I was the one to find her and feed her. Her own mother was hit by a car back home. She was an orphan. I should have named her Oliver or Dodger, but couldn't as she's a girl ..."

 

Amy suddenly woke up at the sound of her name, watching Andy lay out his bed and left mine to join him. She peeled back the sleeping bag's upper half and crawled in. I don’t think she minded the mice below. Maybe they were sleeping as well.  I don’t know.

 

"See?" Andy said. 

 

"I do, I replied, waiting to turn off the light once Andy undressed, threw on a pair of flannel Curious George pajamas, and crawled beneath the covers. He hugged Amy to his chest and said good night.

 

"And thanks for taking us in," he mumbled, before small raccoon snores drifted across the cabin, soon putting us both to sleep.

 

Guilty Delights

 

Guilty Delights

Noel Laflin

9-17-24

 

"So, Daniel, what did you do in San Francisco today?"

 

"Oh, we ran to the Golden Gate Bridge and back," pointing to both he and his elegantly dressed daughter sitting across from us.

 

I looked over his shoulder and out the ship’s dining room window where the famous landmark shimmered in the distant twilight.

 

"Jesus, Daniel, how far is that?"

 

"Approximately twenty kilometers, since we ran all the way across the bridge and back to the ship again."

 

Daniel is from Germany, so of course he measures in kilometers. Turns out father and daughter ran about twelve and a half miles before dinner. I had to go to Google to determine the conversion.

 

No wonder he had the steak, and then politely asked for and inhaled a second one, all sides included.

 

And his beautiful daughter didn't think twice before nearly licking her chicken dinner clean off the plate and then going for a large piece of chocolate cake.

 

I too had the chocolate cake for dessert, but certainly didn't feel like I had earned it.

 

But, I nearly inhaled it anyway, telling myself that guilt is simply an overrated emotion.

Vigils

 

Vigils

Noel Laflin

8-22-24

 

People leave gifts for friends who have passed. We see them along lonely stretches of roads sometimes or off to the sidewalk of a busy city intersection where tragedy struck - makeshift memorials put together as tokens of love, wanting, longing, maybe even a sense of guilt for not having been able to avert a loss.

 

Such is a memorial for a man who took his life beneath an old tree that I pass by frequently. It happened sometime ago, but fresh flowers and volatiles appear all the time.

 

Most of us don't know the circumstances that led to his decision to move on - it happened in the middle of the night. But friends and family continue to honor his memory with new candles, crosses, flowers, a baseball, and a small statue of the Virgin Mary that rests, oh, so naturally, in the bark of the old pepper tree.

 

Someone stole the baseball a few months back, but they didn't dare mess with Mary, apparently, as she was still there as of this morning.

 

Today, a hawk stood guard looking down from an adjoining shady tree.

I am not a praying man much of the time - I am not even a Catholic, but I say a prayer for a peaceful transition and even cross myself nearly every time I go by.

 

Today, I skipped the prayer and genuflecting, and just thanked the hawk instead for taking up the lonely vigil.

 

And I bet that no one messes with him either.

 

She Left Us Something Wonderful

 

She Left Us Something Wonderful

Noel Laflin

8-29-24

My friend Robby took this outstanding shot of a Super Moon rising outside her home in the desert nine years ago. The post came up on my Facebook Memories today and it made me smile so much because it's such a sublime composition of sand, spent yucca blooms, and that glorious full moon as it breaks over the horizon.

 

Robby died a couple of years ago - and there's so many of us that miss her joy of life even as she spent her remaining years battling insidious kidney disease.

 

But she's very much alive in my mind as I once again gaze at what she captured here one night, so many moons ago.

 

"Leave something behind," poets and mystics advice us.

 

Aside from her steadfast friendship and warrior-like determination to beat the odds, Robby also left behind a most exquisite picture.

 

And for starters, that is not a bad something left behind whatsoever.

 

It's just the opposite.

Haunted by Humans

 

Haunted by Humans

Noel Laflin

8-14-24

I finished Markus Zusak’s novel, “The Book Thief” late last night and cried.

Again.

The final chapter brought fresh tears to a story that I have read at least five times over the last dozen years.

Now, some I know never read a book twice.

Some don’t care for books whatsoever.

Too many these days think it’s their moral obligation to ban books.

But I crave a good story – and when it’s good enough I feel no shame in reading it again and again.

I mean, Liesel Meminger read her first stolen book, “The Grave Diggers Handbook” thirteen times according to the narrator.

And the narrator, Death personified, read Liesel’s book thousands of time, or so he tells us.

So five readings is hardly a drop in the bucket.

I recommended the book to a former teacher of mine eleven years ago. I remember telling him that if he couldn’t make time for the book, the movie was still in theaters. It’s nowhere as good as the book, I told him, but it would at least give him the gist of the story.

He was a favorite teacher of mine and I thought it nice to direct him to the story of Liesel, Rudy, Hans, Rosa, Max, Death, and a fine assorted cast of supporting characters.

My former teacher called me a week later to yell at me for making him cry, as he’d just returned from the movie theater.

I remember making the man cry when I was Liesel and Rudy’s age, too.

It was due to a story that I had created about a son and his mother.  The summer school drama assignment was to read the piece to music.

With the lights darkened, the door closed, the summer heat held at bay outside, I choose Percy Faith’s haunting rendition from the movie “Westside Story” and spoke about a death.

Even at fourteen, I knew how to twist the heartstrings and wrangle an A for a final assignment.

“God damn it, Noel, you really know how to turn on the waterworks,” he bellowed, wiping his tears away as he quickly left the classroom, leaving the rest of us in darkness, the needle of the record skipping and skipping as it wanted to return to its resting place or at least play the violins once more.

I reminded him of the incident from forty-five years prior on the day he yelled at me (but in a loving way) regarding “The Book Thief.”

My old mentor would be carried away in the arms of Death a year later.

And then it was my turn to yell (but in a quiet, loving way) and let the waterworks flow.

To quote Death: “I am haunted by humans.”

 

 

 

Blood and Lies

 

Blood and Lies

Noel Laflin

7-22-24

 

When I was fifteen, and the boy I had fallen head over heels with was just shy of sixteen, we exchanged a ring for a watch and pressed bloody fingers together - "Blood brothers for life!," we swore.

 

I would have liked to have sealed the deal with a kiss, but he said he wasn't quite ready to do that again due to a lack of cheap alcohol at hand. So, kissing was off the table (due to sobriety), but the nicking and pressing of flesh was okay, apparently - and as the blade was clean (he held it under the flame of a Zippo just to make sure), and it would be another decade or more before the worry of tainted blood would even be a concern, we were good. We were both young and dumb anyway, so, of course, we were more than good. We were now brothers for fuck sake ... and, consequently, invincible.

 

Afterwards, when I took off my ring (it was silver, encircled with mythical thunderbirds) and put it on his right ring finger, and he, in turn, took off his watch (it even showed the date - how cool is that!) and put it on my left wrist, he leaned in close and whispered, "Kissing may be off the table right now, but lips placed elsewhere ... are still okay, just so you know."

 

I nodded enthusiastically and told him that I'd take the compromise.

 

"Kissing is so overrated," I whispered back.

 

Then I snuck one in when he wasn't looking.

 

I can be such a liar.