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[at-l] 4/28 Maine Yarnin'

Babysitting My Cousin

Randy was hardly what you would call a dumb kid, but then he was a very
gullible one.  Summer weekends usually ended up that we'd somehow find
ourselves together.  On those rare occasions that Uncle Everett and Aunt
Annie would visit us on Sunday, Randy and I would always find ourselves in
some kind of mischief.  My Daddy would always blame me, and his Daddy would
always blame him.  I'd wear a red mark on my butt, and Randy would end up
standing in the corner, snickering that I'd been walloped.  Lucky kid!  I
always thought of Annie Oakley when I heard her name, except Aunt Annie
flashed a blow dryer instead of a .45 in her beauty parlor.

One summer Sunday when I was just nine years old, they all visited us at
our little house in York.  It promised to be a beautiful day, the skies
were blue, and puffy clouds meandered overhead.  The hot sun felt good on
our bare topped bodies, all except for my cousin Debbie, of course.  I once
stupidly offered her one of my bathing suits.  "Shucks, m'am, I'm just a
poor ole country boy, innocent like."  

Bored with hanging out in my hot and messy room, we went to play in my
Daddy's workshop.  That adventure was short lived when he found us playing
with his tools and projects.  No one else wanted to be with us, and Doug,
my older brother, was off somewhere with his friends.  Being three years
younger than me, I was to be Randy's babysitter during the visit.  That was
not a good choice.  We finally persuaded our parents to let us visit down
the road a bit.  We lived in a quiet neighborhood, well, it was quiet by
our standards.  It was filled with children my own age, so it was probably
anything but quiet.  We would run the streets and backyards with our
friends and dogs all through the summer.  There was always something to do,
and if there wasn't, we'd become very creative.

This particular Sunday proved to be a memorable one for my cousin Randy. 
He was smaller than I was, and younger, as I mentioned earlier.  He looked
up to me, you could say.  I am sure by the end of today, however, he had a
different opinion about me.  We made our way through Old Man Mason's
forbidden blackberry patch at the onset of our adventure that hot summer
day.  We didn't have a care in the world, and we knew Old Man Mason
couldn't catch us anyway.  I could never figure out how such a stingy man
couldn't share all those blackberries.  Now that I look back, I think he
must have died of the "stingies."  By the time we left with a belly full of
blackberries, our faces, fingers, and tee shirts were a mess.  There's
nothing like the taste of a blackberry that you're not supposed to pick.

We eventually made our way down the road just past the Pugh's.  There was a
swamp on the right side of the road that was full of frogs and snakes.  We
got some sticks and started poking around.  Pretty soon Randy stepped onto
what he thought to be a solid clump of grass, but he ended up with both
legs in smelly and slimy mud and grass.  He was bawling his head off,
because he knew his mother would get him for sure.  I figured we could take
care of that just around the corner.  There was a nice spring at Mr.
Hough's.  He was a retired mill worker who took real good care of his
place.  For some reason, he always enjoyed having me visit him, and his
wife Renee would always have some cookies and milk waiting for me.  Mr.
Hough always told me the same jokes every time I visited.

I must confess that on this day I fell from the graces of Mr. Hough.  Randy
was afraid to step in the spring, but I assured him that he would be
bleeding and blistered from a spanking if he didn't get that swampy mess
off his clothes.  Phew!  He smelled so bad, and that's saying a lot from
me, a kid who saw a bathtub only once or twice during the summer months. 
We used to be in the river for half of our days during the summer, swimming
and playing.  Soap?  What was soap?  Randy stepped carefully down the steep
slope leading to the spring.  He slipped on something, because he went
under so fast that I couldn't catch him.  Poor kid!  That water so crystal
cold.  Well, he got wet real good.  He was bawling again, and this time,
Mr. Hough came running out of the house.  He wasn't too happy either.  I
didn't think he would recognize me from the back so I just pretended not to
hear him.  He surely didn't know who Randy was, but what he did know was
some dirty urchin was swimming in his drinking water.  

Running as fast as we could manage, we headed further down the road.  One
thing is for sure, Randy got clean in that spring.  We must have run for
the next ten minutes or so.  By the time we reached the next hill, Randy
was almost dry except for his underwear.  That had ended up as a "wedgie". 
He was squirming around really uncomfortable.  I figured we could make it
down the hill to the barn beside Blaisdell's pond.  They used the barn to
store hay and ice.  Randy could always take his clothes off there so they
could dry, and we could mess around in the hay.  

We always enjoyed playing in the hay.  A bunch of us would re-stack the
bales and make tunnels everywhere.  Poor Linwood had to feed the cows from
that hay barn during the winter months, and I can still remember the
cussing and fuming when he'd drop six feet into one of our tunnels while
loading hay into the truck.  

Randy had to go pee.  It was pitiful!  He had had so many problems that
day.  I had a grand idea.  We got up near the fence where the cows were,
and together we took a wiz.  I challenged Randy to a contest right there on
the spot.  We made a wager of my last nickel that he couldn't hit the
fence.  Well, he struggled a bit with his aim, and all of a sudden he
screamed.  He hit the fence all right, and the fence was on.  I could only
imagine what it felt like peeing on an electric fence, but Randy knew
"first hand".  I lost concentration and ended up dribbling on my sneakers. 
Poor Randy bawled all the way home.

I forgot about the incident for many years, and it's sad that I couldn't
cheerfully reflect back on his trying day at the fence.  A bunch of family
was gathered on the back decking a few years ago for a cookout, and we were
talking about our childhood days.  Margie, Randy's wife, started a
conversation about some of the memorable experiences of childhood that
Randy had shared with her.  I could vaguely remember some of the things she
mentioned, but when she retold the event of peeing on the electric fence I
couldn't help but to bust out laughing.  Randy was beginning to retreat to
the corner chair on the deck as she lavishly described the incident.  Mind
you, we're all in the company of a dozen or so other family members. 
Everyone had a grand time and a good laugh.

Well, this was too much.  Marge went on to other things, but my mind was
tracing back to that Sunday at Blaisdell's Pond.  Randy, by this time, had
regained his composure.  At this time I asked Marge a simple question, to
which she gave a simple and direct answer.  

"Marge, how is Randy these days?" I asked.

"Oh, Randy?  He lights up my life." She replied.  "And he's a real
firecracker!"

No more questions.

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