The Day I Got a Black Eye

Whoa, it's Monday, and I totally didn't have a blog prepared.  So here's a short story from my youth.  Hopefully Sweet D will stay asleep long enough for me to get it typed out.

I've always been a considerate person.  I was the middle child, with brothers on either side, and I think that, combined with my anxiety disorder, has made me very sensitive to other people.  It also made me terrified of conflict.  Mostly because "conflict" with my older brother usually meant fist fights - which weren't so bad in and of themselves (I knew how to stick up for myself, at least), but my parents' solution to our fighting was to lock us together in the tiny half bath in the hallway until we could hug for twenty seconds (the arbitrary time limit necessary to reflect forgiveness, love, and a willingness to get along in the future).  It was awful.  We'd sit there and stew for upwards of 30 minutes, filling the bathroom with an excessive air of loathing until we could finally agree to endure the "hug of freedom" without biting or pulling each other's hair.

So I (nervously) started Kindergarten.  My teacher was Mrs. Sturm.  I'll remember her name forever (and not because, when we moved back to South Dakota, I ended up going to high school with her daughter), but because of this incident.  There is no warmth in my heart for this woman.

I was in afternoon Kindergarten, so we got to school right when the older kids were finishing lunch.  Everyone was out at recess when we'd get dropped off, and if we got there early, we could run around the school yard for a bit, too, until the bell rang.

One of my first days of Kindergarten (or maybe it was in the middle or the end; I honestly can't remember, but it feels to me like my entire year of Mrs. Sturm was tainted by this moment, so my impression is that it happened early in the year), I got to school early and was playing in the school yard for a few minutes when the bell rang.  I knew we weren't supposed to run, so I was walking quickly to get in line (the rest of my class seemed like they were already lined up, and I was terrified I would get in trouble if I didn't get there soon).  I remember seeing them all lined up against the brick wall, waiting to walk inside in single file, with Mrs. Sturm at the head of the line.

All my little Kindergarten daily hopes were swirling around in my head.  It was going to be such a good day. We were going to make macaroni necklaces or paper bag shoes or some other kind of magic Kindergarten craft.  And mine was going to be perfect.  Just the right shapes.  In all the right colors.

Life was an amazing box of crafts, waiting for me to get in that line.

Then out of no where - everything went black.

I opened my eyes again to find myself on the ground, next to a big kid.  A 5th grader.  She was easily twice my size.  And she was bawling hysterically, holding her knee.

My whole body ached slightly, the wind had been knocked out of me, but after a quick self-check, I seemed mostly fine.  Except my head.  It really hurt.

But this big, huge, athletic, strong, brave 5th grader next to me was sobbing.  The tiny scratch on her knee was starting to bead little red drops of blood.  Since I seemed to be okay, and she was clearly not, I did the only thing I could think of to help.

"Are you okay?"  I asked her meekly.

She looked right in my face - and let loose another wail of wildly over-exaggerated pain.  Then a teacher swooped in to help her stand up.  Odd that no one was helping me up, seeing as how I was only the size of this girl's leg, but I was tough.  I stood up, rubbed my head where it ached, and walked over to my Kindergarten line.

Oh yeah!  Crafts were waiting for me in that line!  It was going to be a good day, in spite of this little set back.  So a gigantic person tried to run me over.  I can get over that!  I was clearly more polite (and tougher) than her.  I could just shake it off and get on with my life. And back to my fantasies of Kindergarten crafts.

I got in the back of the line and waited for us to start walking in.

Then a shadow crossed my face.

I looked up to see a scowling Mrs. Sturm standing in front of me with her arms on her hips.

"Are you hurt?" she asked in a voice that clearly implied she was only asking out of a sense of obligation as my teacher.

"My head -" I started.

"You know the rules.  You're not supposed to run in the school yard.

That's what happens when you run."

Those words have haunted me my entire life.  "That's what happens when you run."

But I wasn't running!  I was walking quickly!  The monstrous, Nordic beast of a 5th grader had been running!  I was just trying to get in line when she came out of nowhere and knocked me out flat!  Why didn't Mrs. Sturm see the truth?!  I would NEVER do something that was against the rules!!

I tried to protest, but she just ignored me and walked to the front of the line to lead us inside for the day.

The daily crafts were tainted by my shame.  I couldn't believe I'd let Mrs. Sturm down like that.  She must have been so disappointed in me.  Even though I didn't run, she thought I had.  My life was essentially over; a teacher was disappointed in me.  I would never be able to outlive this shame.

As the day wore on, my head began to hurt more and more.  I could feel a lump rising right above my eyebrow (hidden conveniently under my stylish bangs), but I didn't dare bring it to Mrs. Sturm's attention - it was my punishment - my cross to bear.

"That's what happens when you run."

After an hour or two, we had a routine bathroom break.  I got a drink of water from the water fountain, wiped my mouth, and with the excess water, I wiped my forehead, which was throbbing by this point.  I must have moved my bangs out of the way right as I walked back into the classroom, because Mrs. Sturm's face contorted as she watched me.

"Oh no..." the breath escaped her.  "Let me see your head."

I lifted up my bangs, showing that the tiny scratch on my cheek was not the only injury I'd sustained in our head-on collision.

"Go straight to the nurse's office.  Now."

I ran down the hall to the nurse, where she examined me quickly, handed me an ice pack and said, "well, that's going to be a black eye.  You should have come in right away so I could have gotten ice on it sooner."

More disappointment.  More shame.  How could I be letting so many people down today?  All the macaroni necklaces in the world couldn't get the foul taste of shame and self-loathing out of the back of my throat.

My eye did turn black, but it wasn't too bad.  It healed, as did the Amazon 5th grader's knee, I assume.  But the sense of failure at letting my teacher down never did.

In high school, Mrs. Sturm would often come to sporting events, because her daughter was a cheerleader.  I remember watching all my other friends from Kindergarten (who'd gone to the same schools with each other since then - where as I moved away for seven years - to Maryland) rush up to her to say hi.  They had such fond memories of her.

But not me.  "That's what happens when you run."  You disappoint your teachers.  You bring down a great 5th grade Viking of a girl.  You get an emotional black eye on your soul that you must bear for all time.

THAT is what happens when you run.

The Day it Smelled Like Broccoli

I always hate writing stories about people who may realize the story is about them (unless they're in my family; then I think they have to just expect and accept it), but sometimes it's hard to pass up a really good anecdote. That being said, names have been changed to protect the (not so) innocent (and if the subject/culprit does ever stumble upon and read this and recognize that the story is about them, no hard feelings - like always, this is just my personal recollection of events; who knows how accurate it really is?)

The summer after my freshman year of high school, I went on one of those everything-has-been-arranged-for-you-including-your-meals group tours of German-speaking Europe. Overall, it was an awesome trip filled with visiting lots of amazing places that I had never heard of and thus did not recognize the significance of our visits to them until years later, at which point I grew frustrated with 15-year old me and my lack of historical knowledge and appreciation. And my drastically limited experience with cinematic artistry, specifically in the form of "The Sound of Music." Salzburg (and a tour of places from the movie) is not overly interesting when you are only vaguely aware that said movie exists. For that one I blame my parents, who never really let us watch any movies (my older brother had ONE nightmare from an episode of Scooby Doo when he was three - consequently, 99% of all television and movies were banned in our house, much to the chagrin of poor Husband, who is left facing the incredibly daunting up-hill battle of making me watch all the "classics" - Ghostbusters, Star Wars, Indiana Jones, among hundreds of others).

I don't know how these kinds of tours are arranged, but I suspect certain companies (specifically a German version of a fast food chain, called Wienerwald) are slipping money under the table to the tour organization in return for a huge commitment to eating at their restaurants. I think we ate Wienerwald for at least 75% of our meals during the 2.5 week tour. It was not especially good food, and in all the time I've lived in Germany since, I've yet to encounter another Wienerwald. Almost as if the pre-arranged tour was to an alternate German-speaking Europe universe in which all the McDonald's are replaced by Wienerwalds.

Regardless, we were not only contractually obligated to consume Wienerwald slop, we were only allowed to eat what they had pre-arranged to serve us. They claimed that, in order to have"that many meals" ready at one time (our group was about 15 people, total), they had to limit our options to "vegetarian" or "generic German meal," but, as defined in our contract, one had to choose whether or not they were vegetarian before embarking on the tour, so our numbers (1 vegetarian, 14 generic German) were sent to all the restaurants weeks in advance of our actually eating there. I suspect they began preparing the food that far in advance, as well. As I learned through my other experiences living in Germany, many Germans are not necessarily opposed to leaving food out for uncomfortably long periods of time, subjecting it to various contaminants we Americans tend to shy away from consuming.

One of our first stops on the tour was Berlin. Shortly after arriving in the city, we were shipped to a large youth hostel-style lodging facility. There we were divided into groups of three to share rooms. Fortunately, I was placed with one of my closest friends at the time (Kay) and another girl from our school. The rooms were minimalistic, though likely not as an attempt at art, and the bathroom was one of the strangest things I'd yet encountered in my life (if you've never been fortunate enough to have utilized a German toilet, you truly don't know what you're missing out on). Not only was the toilet a classic German "shit shelf" toilet, but the tank was high above it on the wall, made of wood, and had a long pull cord hanging from it to flush, which, when pulled, released a torrent of water (necessary to clean the shelf, most likely) that would literally spray the entire room if the lid weren't held down tightly.

After a few minutes exploring the room and the most bizarre bathroom I'd yet encountered in my short, sheltered, sanitized American childhood, we were off to eat our first meal at Wienerwald (whose mascot was a fat golden chicken, if I recall correctly. Most likely because of the abundance of free-range, obese chickens in the vast forests of Vienna. Everything about that statement is accurate.)

After we were seated around a long table, the wait staff gruffly brought out our pre-arranged meals (no need for a menu!). The third girl staying in our room (let's call her Sarah) informed our teacher that she had ordered the vegetarian meal, but the restaurant had evidently made a slight oversight. After a brief scuffle with the staff, a revolting mash of over-steamed, soggy vegetables in some weird yellow-ish sauce was dropped in front of the girl. The smell was powerful, which is not an attribute that readily goes with well-prepared food. But Sarah dove right in, pronouncing the food as "great." After fighting to cut off and choke down several bites of my own dry wienerschnitzel, the smell of the vegetarian dish became too much for me, and I forfeited any further attempt at eating. Sarah cleared her plate in record time, however.

Our teacher took us on a brief walk around the city following our meal, but since most of us were suffering from our first case of jet leg, she let us go back to the hostel with the warning that we should try our best to stay up until nighttime, in an attempt to adjust our internal clocks to German time. Off we went, to struggle through the next several hours of exhaustion.

Back in our room, Sarah asked if either of us had to use the bathroom. She said she wanted to shower and would be in there for a while. In retrospect, I feel she lied to us.

After about 20 minutes, a smell started to escape under the door of the bathroom and fill our small hostel room. It was a familiar, powerful smell. Kay and I exchanged looks and laughed. But after another 10 minutes, and it was no longer funny. The smell became all-invasive. It was one of those thick smells; the kind you can feel in the back of your throat.

Kay and I went over to the giant window in the room and attempted to figure it out. Like German toilets, if you've never encountered a German window, you don't know what you're missing. They have weird, detachable hinges on all sides, and, depending on the direction of the handle, you can change which hinges stay attached and which ones release, enabling the window to open at the top or the side. We managed to figure this out after minimal confusion, and swung the window open wide.

It was cold outside, as evenings in June in Berlin so often are (they are typically either way too cold or way too hot - and the lack of air conditioners in the majority of German buildings makes "too cold" the preferred option). The cold air fought a valiant battle with the smell and won. But the room was soon freezing cold.

After another 30 minutes in the bathroom, Sarah emerged (with the last of the smell), and remarked at how cold it was in the room. Kay and I, through chattering teeth and blue lips, explained that we were attempting to stay awake until bedtime, and the cold was helping us. We might have also implied we were warm. We hadn't thought through our excuses, but neither of us wanted to make Sarah feel bad about the horrific odor. With the smell finally dissipated, we closed the window and passed blissfully to sleep, giving in to the exhaustion of jet lag.

The next morning, we were herded onto our pre-arranged tour bus and shipped (literally, by ferry) to Potsdam for a pre-arranged tour of Sanssouci (the Hohenzollern's summer palaces) and Cecilienhof (the palace that hosted the Potsdam Conference after WWII). While walking through the gorgeous gardens and paths that lead around the Sanssouci complex, Kay and I found ourselves walking a few paces behind the majority of the group, including Sarah. We were admiring the lavish palaces when, out of nowhere, our noses were again affronted with the same mind-bogglingly offensive smell from the previous night. But this time, we weren't the only ones who noticed it.

Sarah turned around to us and absent-mindedly remarked, "hmm, that smells just like my broccoli from last night!!"

Also, for anyone interested, Wienerwald is slowly disappearing due to bankruptcy in the 80's, which would explain why I saw many more of them in 1998 than in 2004-6.

The Day I Didn't Go to Nerd Camp

I'm sorry to announce that I don't have a real entry for today. We spent the weekend driving 4 hrs to visit Husband's family for two days, then driving back, in the middle of a storm, in the Ozarks, in the dark, and our GPS tried to murder us (again) by sending us on crazy, non-existent back-roads. Also, my computer died, so I didn't get a chance to write anything while we were there visiting. I'm on Husband's computer now, and a new power adapter has been ordered. Hopefully that will solve the problem (but since the battery died over a month ago, I can't tell if it's the computer or the power adapter that is the current issue).

So here's a quick anecdote from my youth (I apologize in advance for its lack of hilarity).

In 7th grade, we had to do some kind of week-long standardized testing thing. Turns out, the tests thought I was fairly smart. We lived just outside Baltimore at the time, and Johns Hopkins University did some kind of summer program for nerds, and I had met the nerdquirements and received a congratulatory letter of nerdiness and an invitation to attend Nerd Camp. They recruited based on the standardized tests, and the winning nerds were selected to spend a week or so at the University, being nerds (this is only my assumption, since we ended up moving half-way through my 7th grade year, so I didn't get to go to Nerd Camp).

A week or so after receiving my Nerdvitation, I went to see a movie in the theater with some friends. I have no recollection of what the movie was, except that it was boring, and none of us were interested in watching it, so we were goofing off, instead. (In retrospect, I realize now that we were those infuriatingly annoying pre-teens I dislike so much, at the movies, disrupting the show for everyone else. For the other 10 people in the audience that day, you have my heartfelt apologies.)

Someone had peppermint candies, and they handed me one. I dropped it on the floor (still in its wrapper), bent down to get it, and completely forgot that seats in movie theaters fold up when not in use. I went to sit back in my seat and missed it completely, falling onto the sticky, stale popcorn-infested floor. Everyone laughed. (Well, everyone in our group. I imagine the rest of the audience was growing increasingly more frustrated with our disruptions.)

As we were leaving the theater, I was joking around with one of the other girls and talking in a stupid voice (as I am frequently wont to do). Little did I know, a middle-aged couple in front of us could hear me, and had seen my display of intelligence as I fell on the floor of the theater earlier.

The man leaned over to his wife and said in a not-quite-hushed-enough voice, "I feel sorry for the mentally retarded girl." The wife nodded, knowingly.

Take that, Johns Hopkins.

This incident has stuck with me for years. I think it's been good for my sense of self-awareness. It's hard to become too full of oneself when you know in the back of your mind that your public persona can so easily be mistaken as mentally handicapped.

The Day I Was Left Out

As hard as it may be to believe, I used to be a shy kid. It was probably a combination of the anxiety disorder and our family move from South Dakota to Maryland when I was seven years old. I went from a small Catholic school with about 20 kids in each grade to a massive public school with several hundred kids in each grade. It was somewhat overwhelming, and I basically just shut down. Thinking back on second and third grades, I honestly can't remember having friends. My brain, which is clearly trying to shield my fragile third-grade psyche from the devastation of reality is telling me, "of course you had friends!" but I can't, for the life of me, actually name a single one. Looks like that protective wall of false memories has done its job!

As a side note, I would like to mention that I "won" the Good Citizenship Award (like the consolation prize of boring, polite children - "Congratulations, you are the least disagreeable person in our class!") every year from Kindergarten through 5th grade. So I might not have had friends for a couple years, but at least they didn't all completely hate me. Right? (Shh, it's okay, Third-Grade Laura. Of course they liked you! How could they not like you? You ... had such long, straight hair! And ... you smiled quietly a lot! *Stifles self-esteem with false memories*)

Regardless, the point is that I did not have good friends in my third grade class. One incident in particular stands out as evidence that I was, in fact, an outcast (albeit, a friendly, polite, possibly easily forgettable one).

Although the school itself was large, we were assigned a "homeroom," which was our actual class, and in third grade, as far as I remember, no one switched for any classes (advanced math and language arts classes didn't start till 4th grade, I believe). So I'd been in the same "portable" classroom with the same 30 or so kids for at least 6 months at the time of this incident (our student body size had outgrown the actual school, so they set up about a dozen portable, temporary buildings outside the main building, on school grounds, to accommodate the excess children. We were only supposed to be there for a few months, but we ended up staying there the entire year.)

One Spring day, one of the "popular" (used as liberally as possible to refer to a third-grader) girls passed out invitations to her birthday party to every girl in class, except three of us. I don't know if her mom didn't make her invite all the girls, or if she chose not to give three of us invitations, but the selection process was as cruel as it was swift. One moment, we were returning from recess and settling in our seats, and the next, the Chosen Girls were tittering excitedly, as the rejects tried to not only discover what we were missing out on, but how we could have possibly fallen from the good graces of the beautiful, popular, Jessica.

I've always assumed I wasn't invited because I was shy and quiet. Boring people don't make the best party guests. One of the other girls not invited, Rachel, was also incredibly shy and boring. However, Rachel had a twin sister, Alexis, who was also in our class. And Alexis was invited. Rachel was, understandably, much more devastated about her exclusion than I was. We must learn at a young age the cruelty of other women.

It was the third uninvited girl, though, that made the true sting of the shunning felt. Katie. Poor Katie. Literally, Katie was from a lower-class family. I always felt very sorry for her, as all her clothes were old and worn, she often smelled funky, and the other kids were heartless in their teasing of her. Then again, she didn't help her case much by being one of those strange kids. You know the type. The awkward, weird ones who run up to the popular kids and start talking gibberish at them, because they're oblivious to the social hierarchy of school-aged cliques. They're the type who make the other nerd kids cringe, since we know we'll be associated with them, vicariously, simply for being nerds ourselves, even though we don't want anything to do with their type, either. They're giving us all a bad name.

But then Katie committed the single worst-imaginable in-school offense. She pooped her pants. In class. I don't know the circumstances, except that I was sitting next to her and can confirm that, in spite of her denials of the other children's harsh accusations, she did, in fact, poop in her pants. (Bizarrely, I was also sitting next to a boy in 4th grade who peed his pants. Maybe I have some terrible affect on people in my immediate vicinity, causing them to lose control of their bodily functions. But he had asked the teacher for permission to go to the bathroom, and she denied it. After several minutes, he asked again more urgently, and she again denied it. I, personally, think she should have gotten in serious trouble for making the poor guy sit there till he peed his pants, but, as far as I know, nothing ever happened to her.)

So here we were, lumped in the same group of social-rejects with a girl who pooped her pants. In the unrelentingly cruel world of elementary school social politics, evidently, being shy is just as critical a faux pas as defecating on oneself.

The party was on a Saturday, and the following Monday, I showed up for school, relieved because this traumatic exclusion was now behind us. Oh, how naive was I.

As the other girls in class filtered in and took their seats, not only were they excitedly talking about what an incredible time they'd had at Jessica's Birthday Party (or, as it became known, JBP; it was the social event of the YEAR), but each of them seemed to have donned a new necklace, and they were giddily comparing and showing them off to each other. How could it be that they all coincidentally bought strikingly similar necklaces over the weekend without any form of retail coordination?

I sat perfectly still in my desk, trying to eavesdrop to catch some sort of idea as to the origin of these necklaces. Then I began to notice - each necklace had a set of perfectly adorable beads in the shape of birds. All different colors, strung together amid classic, small necklace beads that brought out the shine and ideal form of each avian creation. Never had I longed for something more than to have my own bird-bead necklace. The minuteness of their beaks struck a chord in my third-grade being, calling out to me with undying desire.

All at once, the glistening birds and the snippets of eager over-the-weekend gossip combined in my brain and it dawned on me: the girls had all made these wearable works of art at JBP. And I also deduced that they had made a vow to wear them every day for the duration of the school year.

I could feel my will to live shattering about me as I looked down at my desk, pretending to go over my completed homework from the weekend in an attempt to hide my devastation. My life would never be complete. My soul felt crushed inside my bare-necked body.

Over the next few weeks, fewer and fewer girls still wore their bird necklaces every day, but envy continued to flutter in my heart every time I caught a glimpse of one. Eventually, third grade drew to a close, I was awarded my certificate of "Good Citizenshipness," and I spent the summer recovering from the painful social blows I'd been dealt.

Then fourth grade started. And who was in my class (besides the guy next to me who peed in his pants on the first day)? None other than Jessica. THE Jessica, of JBP infamy.

So I adopted a new life-approach to friends and being social. I got loud. I tried talking to people and laughing and various other tactics of basic human interaction (besides polite smiling, which I, clearly, had a monopoly on). Lo and behold, my new plan worked. As luck (or intricate planning and methodical social-ladder-climbing) would have it, after just a few weeks of fourth grade, I had befriended the one and only Jessica.

After playing together at nearly every recess, eventually the time came when she was obligated to invite me over to play at her house (although, I have to admit, I doubt I would have even tried to be friends with her if I didn't think there was a possibility that I could wriggle my way into her confidences, be invited to her house, and somehow manage to acquire my own bird necklace). My mom dropped me off, and we played normal fourth-grade girl things. After Barbies in her room, we walked around the neighborhood to spy on a boy in our grade who lived down the street. Then we came back to her house, had a snack, and she asked what else I wanted to do.

Ever aware of the rules of etiquette, I politely said, "I don't know, what do you want to do?" while skirting the obvious: make bird necklaces.

She suggested we play Twister.

Obligingly, I went downstairs with her to get out the Twister game, in spite of the cloud of anxiety closing in around me. I hate games of all kinds. It's not a fear of losing; it's more terror that I'll do something wrong. I'm not sure why it flares up so strongly when it comes to games, but I've always hated every single kind of game there is. They all fill me with overpowering anxiety (I actually can't play or even watch most video games; I get too anxious). Not exactly a two-player game, I was relieved when we found a small plastic bin sitting next to the Twister box.

"What's this?" I said, pointing to the box, already knowing in my heart what it was.

"Oh, those are my beads," she said casually. Then, with a stroke of psychic ingenuity, "do you want to make necklaces?"

Yes.

"Oh, sure, I guess." I could barely contain the excitement that tried to burst through face. Play cool, Laura. She'll suspect something if you start screaming about bird beads!

We opened the bin to discover small squares of neatly separated beads. Reds, yellows, blues, greens, some little dice beads... but no birds. No. F---ing. Birds.

I started stringing together random colors in no particular order. What's the point, if not to tie down a bird bead through the little hole that ran through its heart to forever tether it to my neck (and soul)?

Jessica was rambling about something. I couldn't concentrate on her tedium. I was too consumed with the twice-dashed hopes of a young, recently socially-revived fourth-grade girl.

I dug my fingers into the red beads again and stopped suddenly. There she was. Hidden among the scarlets, maroon, and fire engine reds. My very own bird bead. Left over, abandoned for nearly a year after the great fete that was JBP, the one remaining, glorious bird bead.

"You've come to me, Sasha," I whispered under my breath.

"Did you say something?"

"Uh, no," I contemplated stealing Sasha and sliding her secretively into my pocket. But what would Jessica think when I wore the necklace to school and she recognized the rogue, rosey bird, fluttering gently between my collarbones, perfectly flattering my non-existent bust-line?

"Hey, I found this little bird bead. Could I use it?"

"Haha, sure!" Jessica said, barely acknowledging the significance of this forever flightless symbol of my restoration of hope in humanity. "I got those last year for my Birthday Party, haha. I thought we'd used them all. We all made bird necklaces, haha. But I guess you can make one now, too! Haha!"

Laugh it up, Bitch.

I didn't stay friends with Jessica after fourth grade (we were in different fifth grade homerooms, which is practically the same thing as moving to different countries, learning different languages, and being forbidden by our parents to associate with one another, or else). But I believe the bird necklace is still in my closet at my dad's house. I'll have to remember to get it the next time I visit him. I guess the old saying holds true: Make new friends, but keep the old (except Jessica); some are silver, and some... are birds.

Plea for Snow: An Ode to the South Dakota Winter

I was born during the middle of a blizzard on a blustery, early South Dakota morning in January. If you've never experienced a Dakota Blizzard, you have no idea what you're missing. I know blizzards happen in other places (occasionally), but the upper-Midwest really has a monopoly on the concept. It's the only place I've ever heard of that has such bad winter storms that, included among the traditional weather watch/warning system, there is a "Winter Death Warning." A Winter Death Warning is issued by the National Weather Service when the blizzard is bad enough that the roads are designated as "closed" and driving is done at your own risk, because emergency services (like police and ambulances) flat out REFUSE to come and help you if your car gets stuck in the snow. It's their way of legally saying, "look, if you're stupid enough to ignore these weather warnings and road closures and go out there and try to drive in this, we're not going to risk our lives to come help you, and YOU WILL DIE." Now that's a hard-core winter.

In the four years of my high school career, we rarely had real snow days. Not for a lack of snow or terrible weather, but because we South Dakotans know how to manage massive amounts of snow - and drive through it. We did have a handful of late-starts, though, but less for the snow itself, and more for extremely cold weather. There was a rule that said if the wind chill was below -50° F (that's -45.5 Celsius, for those of you wondering), they were required to cancel school, since it was too cold for kids to be walking around outside. How considerate of them! But they rarely followed this rule, much to our chagrin. It would be -54°, and they'd still make us go. A wind chill that low usually means an actual temperature in the -30's. If you've never experienced temperatures that cold, you don't really know what cold means. Speaking of which, the coldest temperature I've ever experienced first had was a wind chill of -64°. Negative. Sixty. Four. I walked outside in that. It was cold. And yes, they did cancel school that day. (By the way, the coldest recorded temperature ever in SD was -58°. I can't even imagine what the wind chill must have been, as wind is also a ubiquitous feature of the South Dakota terrain.)

They also let us out early on multiple occasions when it was clear a blizzard was going to come through and would potentially trap us all at school. It always made for a fun afternoon to try and race home before the weather got too bad to drive. One time, we had such a terrible blizzard, they closed the mall in the middle of the afternoon. I was working there at the time and had to try and venture home in the middle of the blizzard. The regularly-8-minute drive took me over 45 minutes of terror, because, in a real blizzard, you can't see anything but a solid wall of white blowing snow. It doesn't make for the best driving conditions (hence the whole "Winter Death Warning" concept).

Our school itself also made for some interesting wintry experiences. We had an old, worn out heating system that would cut out on a regular basis. On days when it was really cold outside, it didn't take long for the interior of the school to become unbearably cold without a heating system. So the school decided to do something about it, to protect us children. They let us get our coats from our lockers and wear them (which was normally against the dress code). Generous of them. They also made a rule that, if the heaters were out for longer than 2 hours, we could go home (2 hrs being the arbitrarily established time for the heat-less building to become inhabitably cold). Inevitably, the heaters would always kick back on after 1 hour and 45 minutes. But it still takes a good amount of time for a building the size of a high school to get warm again. They let us wear our coats for another hour or so...

One of the most enjoyable parts of a South Dakota winter (to a kid who didn't have to drive in the terrible weather, that is), is that, once it gets cold, it stays cold. That means all the snow that starts falling in late October and through the rest of the winter rarely melts completely. It just keeps accumulating. By late January/February, we usually had around 3-5 feet of snow that is a permanent feature of the landscape. This made for the most awesome snow-fort building of all time. If you've never dug out and spent time in your very own real igloo, you're also missing out on what winter really is. It's amazing how "warm" you can be surrounded entirely by snow!

After nearly 4 years in Texas (first in the desert of El Paso, and then in the rolling hills of San Antonio), I thought I'd grown accustomed to life without winter. I was nervous to move to a place that has all four seasons (which, I should point out, South Dakota does NOT. It has 9 months of winter and 3 months of summer. It's one of 13 states to have a temperature variance between the coldest and hottest temps of over 170° (SD's record is 178° - it gets well into the -30's every winter and well into the 100's every summer) - not surprisingly, the others are all of the other upper-Midwest states, and California and Alaska). Fall here in south-central Missouri was quite a disappointment. While I was thrilled to see actual trees again, it would appear as if all the trees on the beautiful Ozark hills are the same species - and their leaves all just turn brown. But now I'm geared up and anxious for a real winter. We've been having temps in the 20's and 30's for several weeks now, and still no snow to show for it (though most everyone around us has already had at least flurries).

I'm hoping my wintry reminiscences will prompt Missouri to fulfill my anticipations and bring me some snow in the near future. I'm ready for it. And it would seem as if my South Dakota blood has re-awakened in my eagerness for a real winter. 27° doesn't feel cold to me, anymore. Husband thinks I'm insane, but I know I'm just a true blizzard-born South Dakotan at heart.

The Mystery of Trash

Much like the towel buying incident of my life, for an embarrassingly long time, the mystery of "taking the trash out" seemed to allude me. Like most families, my parents required my brothers and me to complete a list of weekly chores. My chores included helping with laundry, washing dishes many weekday nights, dusting and vacuuming various rooms, and cleaning the bathrooms. I didn't mind most of these, but I loathed cleaning the bathrooms, mainly because we lived in a house with five toilets and three boys. Maybe it was just my family, but the males in our house had a chronic inability to "hit their mark." All five toilet seats in our house suffered from a ubiquitous ring of dried pee.

Nearly every week I protested cleaning the toilets. I'd throw fits, stomping my feet, yelling to my mom about how unfair it was to make me clean the dried pee, when, clearly, I was not one of the culprits. In the time it took me to enact my protestation of the dramatically unfair, I easily could have cleaned all five bathrooms from start to finish. Finally, my mom's threats and demands succeeded, and I would resign myself to my Cinderella-eque fate, mumbling, between bouts of gagging, about the inequalities of life while scrubbing toilets on my hands and knees. The worst part about cleaning the toilets was that, inevitably, the minute I finished restoring one to its sparkling white state, one of the males would have to use it, and would, in true male-destructiveness, get pee on the seat. I assume the reason my mom didn't force them to just wipe down the seat every time after they went was because, like most males, they were not overly good at either remembering to do all those small tasks that greatly simplify the larger chores (rinsing dishes after using them, pushing in chairs, etc), or cleaning in general.

In contrast, my brothers had very few weekly chores. They had a habit of sneaking out of the kitchen on nights when they were supposed to clean the dishes (and some how getting away with it), and, in many cases, when my parents told them to do something, they would cheerily agree to it (as opposed to my overly dramatic refusals, followed by stubborn compliance) and then would simply "forget." For some reason, my parents both never figured out my brothers' schemes to avoid being productive members of our family, nor followed up on the agreed-upon chores and forced completion. In retrospect, I really should have just followed their example, instead of storing up so much resentment.

There was one chore, however, that my parents routinely forced my older brother to do: take out the trash. This was one he couldn't easily shirk and avoid, because it didn't take them long to revisit the kitchen trash can and realize it was still full. My brother hated taking out the trash about as much as I hated cleaning toilets (although, considering it took 2 minutes at the absolute, most stubbornly, slow pace, I don't see how the two are even comparable).

On a semi-weekly basis, my parents would engage my brother in battle over the trash.

"Brian, the trash is full. Go take it out."

Upon hearing this, Brian had two general choices of action: run from the room and pretend he didn't hear them, or begin to throw his own dramatic fit over the cruelties of life. If he chose the first path, he would inevitably end up heading down the second within a matter of minutes.

"But I HATE taking out the trash!!" he would wail.

My parents would insist.

He would stomp his feet and yell about the evils of "taking out the trash."

My parents stood firm.

Finally, realizing his defeat, Brian would sulk his way to the trash can, tie closed the bag, lift it out, and carry it out to the garage. In a matter of seconds, he would return, uninjured, and whistling happily to himself, only to leave the room and return to his video games. One of my parents usually replaced the garbage bag.

I sat through this occurrence countless times, observing his obvious distress, heartfelt protest, eventual crushing defeat, and the thirty seconds of labor required to get the trash bag to the garage. And then he would disappear into the garage.

Recognizing his performance as being remarkably similar to my own toilet-cleaning-induced frenzy, I had the utmost sympathy for him. However, from as far as I could tell, "taking out the trash" involved less than a full minute's worth of effort. To me, this clearly implied there was some devastating step I was missing - and this step obviously took place in the garage, the only place I couldn't witness the tortures of his chore.

This mystery of the required protest to taking out the trash endured in my mind for years. It was only exemplified by the countless jokes on sitcoms about lazy husbands who also dreaded this mandatory task. If so many people hated it so much, it simply had to be more complex than merely taking the trash bag out to the trash can. Surely an entire gender of mankind wouldn't react so violently against carrying a plastic bag twenty feet out to a plastic receptacle. There was something to "taking out the trash" that I was oblivious to. And it must have been absolutely dreadful (like cleaning a weeks' worth of your brothers' dried pee off of five different toilets, while on your hands and knees and breathing in the fumes of week old brother-pee).

For years I was thankful I had avoided this task falling to me. Not only must it have been truly terrible, but I was terrified I wouldn't be able to do it correctly, had it ever fallen to me, since I was blissfully unaware of the dreaded garage-phase of the chore. Had my parents ever asked me (which, fortunately, for my self-esteem, they didn't), I would have had to admit that I simply didn't know how.

In college, we had small trash cans in our dorm rooms, but all we had to do was empty our trash into the large dumpsters outside the dorms. To me, this meant we weren't really "taking the trash out," since it was so easy. Living in a dorm wasn't the same as living in a house. We weren't responsible for our own trash pick-up, and, consequently, we never had to perform the secret step. While living in Germany, I was provided with countless laminated pages on instruction on how to "take out the trash," since they separate and recycle every item of waste into five different colored bags. This was also so different than the traditional American experience, I assumed it was just in its own category of chores.

It wasn't until I got married and we lived in our own house that I ever had to face this dreaded chore on my own. Husband deployed to Iraq just six days after our big church wedding, so I was left in our house alone. Fortunately, we lived on an Army post, so we didn't have to arrange for our own trash pick-up; we were simply given a large trash receptacle and instructed that pick-up was on Wednesday mornings. After discreetly observing our neighbors, I learned that most people kept their receptacles on the side of their house (we didn't have garages - just car ports). Mimicking my neighbors (I'd make a good Stepford wife), I, too, kept my large receptacle by the side of the house. On Tuesday evening, I put my half-full bag of trash into it, wheeled it down to the curb (just as the neighbors had done with their own), went back in the house and restlessly slept, nervous I'd done something wrong, as I hadn't performed the mystery step.

Early Wednesday morning, I heard the garbage truck creaking its way around the neighborhood. I jumped out of bed and ran to the window, peering out between two slats of the terrible, 70's style blinds (ahh, government housing). I held my breath as they neared my house. I felt a cold sweat break out all over my body as they grabbed my trash can, turned it upside down and dumped the contents into the truck, returned it to the curb, and... drove on. I'd done it! I'd taken out the trash!! All by myself!!

Wait. It hit me. That literally was all there was to "taking out the trash." Somehow, in spite of the universal hatred of the chore, it actually only involved taking the trash out. I suddenly felt a stab of hatred toward my brother. All these years I'd pitied him. Thought his torture was similar to my own. Felt genuine camaraderie with him. And, as it turned out, he was just exceedingly lazy. But worse, my parents seemed to think his thirty seconds of work were equal to the weekly hour I spent scrubbing the bodily wastes of my brothers. Clearly, life is not fair.

It's been several years now since my first triumph with the American system of trash removal. I've lived in four houses, dealt with three different trash pick-up services, and, for the most part, have achieved a level of comfort with my ability to successfully "take out the trash."

Although, I do have to admit, Husband and I still regularly get into arguments about what we can and cannot throw away. Just recently, after our move, I called our new trash pick-up service to inquire about getting rid of all our extra boxes (both the empty flattened boxes, and the two dozen or so giant wardrobe boxes full of used packing paper). I was informed that the garbage truck "will not take more than 10 flattened boxes a week." I resigned myself to finding a recycling center in the area, ensuring they would take the large wardrobe boxes full of paper, and making dozens of trips out to them. I figured, within two months, we should be able to get rid of all the boxes.

Husband, however, insisted we just try to throw the boxes out. Start out small. One wardrobe box at a time. The first week, I found myself once again, hunched down by my windowsill, peering out at the garbage truck, holding my breath, sweating profusely, and watching in fear as they pulled up to our house. And there, before my very eyes, I watched them as they... took our trash. Just like we pay them to do. Fascinating!! The next week, Husband put out four large boxes. Again, the anxious wait in the shadows of my curtains. And again, another successful "taking out the trash" incident. By the fourth week of putting out boxes, I was less nervous, but still snuck peeks when I heard the truck rumbling down the street. Eventually, the garbage men (and woman) cleared our garage of boxes (I posted an ad for the empty, flattened boxes on some local website and got rid of them in a matter of hours).

And so it was that I uncovered the truth about "taking out the trash." Clearly, the only conclusion to draw is that men are ridiculous. If Husband or Boy ever try to complain about performing this simple duty, I'll be sure to put them on toilet duty for a month. Although, the fact remains that it's still their pee on the toilet.

The Day I Defeated Peer Pressure

In third grade, my school began our lengthy D.A.R.E. (Drug Awareness and Something-that-starts-with-R Education, or something equally as catchy) program. We spent hours in class learning about drugs. Mostly cigarettes (because to us naive 8 year olds, cigarettes were by far the worst drug in existence). We learned how they can give you lung cancer, and how the smoke can be harmful to other people. In my mind, that translated to "only bad people smoke cigarettes."

We also learned about Peer Pressure. This terrified me. To me, this was something that didn't happen until high school - but it was an inevitable horror I was doomed to face. Nameless high school bullies would corner me in the massive, yet deserted hallways between classes, and they would force drugs upon me. Because, to me, drugs were cigarettes, this meant these bullies (usually boys with long, scraggly pony tails and ominous black t-shirts, in my visions) would be literally trying to force cigarettes into my mouth and lighting them, and I would have no choice but to smoke it, or risk never breathing again (as I couldn't logically breathe without smoking if a cigarette were being held to my mouth).

After learning of the dangers lurking in those thin, white tubes, we were sent home with a survey sheet and instructed to ask both our parents the questions, so we could come back to class the next day and discuss the realities of drug abuse in our personal lives. The survey included a few memorable questions, including: "Do you smoke cigarettes?" "Did you ever smoke cigarettes?" "Were you ever negatively affected by Peer Pressure?"

I, being the very straight-arrow, goody-two-shoes little girl that I was, was beyond eager to go home and question my parents on these most intimate details of their youth and early adulthood (it didn't occur to me that my parents could have actually smoked before they were 18, seeing as how that would have been illegal).

I questioned my mom first. But I had the upper-hand through our interrogation, as I knew already that my mom had smoked. She'd told me before that she smoked until she got pregnant with my older brother, and then she'd quit.

Smugly, I asked her, "So, Mom. Have you ever smoked before?"

She calmly gave me her feeble story of knowing the dangers of smoking and quitting when she knew she would be putting her child's health at risk. I wrote down her answers with a feeling of superiority. Clearly, I had never smoked, so I viewed myself as better than her in a way - Peer Pressure hadn't gotten to me. Oh, my poor, simple mother and her misguided cigarette smoking ways. She just wasn't strong enough to stand up to Peer Pressure! (I learned later in life that, more than likely, my mom was the one who pressured her friends to smoke - in high school, nonetheless - as she was a bit of a rebel. She staged walk-outs at college, was out there burning her bra with the best of them, and actually smoked things other than just cigarettes; though, fortunately, our survey didn't ask that, as I believe my innocent little school girl head might have exploded at that prospect.) The rest of her answers were insignificant to me. I already had all the information I needed. My mother had been a smoker.

I waited with such eager anticipation for my dad to come home that night. Finally, after dinner, I got my chance to interview him. Approaching the questions with true curiosity and no bias whatsoever, I asked him the first question, "Dad, have you ever smoked cigarettes?"

"No," was his clear and simple answer.

I was stunned. My father. Had never smoked a cigarette.

"Never?!" I screeched incredulously. "Not a single cigarette? Not even a cigar??"

"No," he said smiling, proud of his lungs' clean bill of health and the studiousness of his youth.

In light of this revelation, my father became a super hero in my mind. He had never smoked anything. In. His. Life. He was invincible. He had stared Peer Pressure in its cold, dead eyes, and he had come out victorious. Nothing could stop him. He was... My Dad.

At that moment, I made a promise to myself. No matter how great the Pressures offered by my Peers, no matter my age, location, or situation, I would not smoke cigarettes (or anything else, for that matter). If My Dad could do it, surely I could, too. I would build on the strength I had inherited from him to say "no" to Peer Pressure, and my lungs, too, would remain smoke free for all time. Together, we were an unstoppable force of Peer Pressure negation.

Years later, while working at a t-shirt printing store in the local mall, my worst fears came to fruition. I worked with a boy around my age who, ironically, had a long, scraggly pony tail, and frequently wore black t-shirts. One day, he told me he was going out for a smoke break. I expected him to be gone shortly after informing me of this, but when I turned around, I noticed he was still there.

"Why don't you come with me? You could borrow a smoke from me." Oh, Peer Pressure, you sly beast, you. Taking on the form of Austin's body, just to try and press your evil wears upon me. Knowing this with the pinnacle of my D.A.R.E. training, I looked him straight in the eyes and, squinting ever so slightly against the glare of his dark temptation, I stated, "I don't smoke."

"What? Sure you do. Everybody smokes. Come on." Trying your best, I see, Peer Pressure. Well it won't work on me!

"No, I don't. I never have. I'm not going to start now." Taking out the big guns now.

And to my absolute surprise (but surely, somewhere in my subconscious, I knew this day would come - I'd dreamt about it since the third grade), Austin actually stepped closer to me, and literally tried to shove a cigarette into my mouth.

I pushed him away, and, in the process, broke his cigarette. He told me I'd have to buy him a new one, and I just laughed at him. Poor, defeated Peer Pressure. One last attempt to get me on your side, but it won't work. I will not contribute to that filthy practice. Austin left to go on his smoke break without further incident.

A year or two later, one evening, when I was home with My Dad, he made some snide, joking comment about me being a "bad kid," implying that he believed I smoked and drank (thus further propagating the wrongly assumed belief that so many people have of me as a pot head). I laughed and informed him that, not only did I not drink, but I had never, not even once in my entire life, smoked anything. All because of that D.A.R.E. survey in third grade, and My Dad's unique ability to defeat Peer Pressure. "No, Dad, I've never smoked anything, because I wanted to grow up and be like you - and you told me in third grade that you'd never smoked. Anything."

My father got a surprised look on his face. "I told you that?" He said while starting to chuckle. "Well, that was a lie."

The sound of your known world crashing around you can truly be defined as a "deafening silence." The room stood still as everything I'd ever known, the very principles upon which I'd based my entire life's ethic shattered with those simple words: "that was a lie." I couldn't breathe. How could he have lied? He was My Dad! He was a super hero! Together we could defeat Peer Pressure! And yet, it had all been an innocent lie to guide a third grader on the right path through life.

That part of the lie, at least, succeeded. And quite well. As of that moment, I was determined to rebuild my life's principles. So everything had been a lie. I had still conquered Peer Pressure, even without My Dad at my side. He may have lied, but I'd inherited the strength and will power, nonetheless. I could continue our saga even in his absence. I made a new vow to myself that I would never smoke anything, not even once, in my entire life, so that when my own children were in third grade and came home with a D.A.R.E. questionnaire about cigarettes and smoking, I could tell them in all honesty that I had, in fact, not ever, not even one little time, ever in my life smoked anything.

I could feel the super powers begin to flush through my veins.

My Brother Doesn't Keep His Promises

I am about five years older than my younger brother. Because of the age difference, we never really fought, but we also didn't have much in common. He, like my older brother, is a very intelligent person, but he has a few social quirks. I'm not sure if it's a result of being so much younger than Brian and I, or if maybe something we did contributed to it (we used to like to throw a blanket over his head and pretend to hold it down over him. Evidently, he was claustrophobic, so we wouldn't actually have to hold it down, and he would just lie in a lump under it and scream. In retrospect, I think we were terrible older siblings), but for whatever reason, he's always been a very independent, relatively quiet person.

He, much like me, suffers from being a "stupid smart person." I once asked him what month was the 8th month (he was at least in junior high at this point), and he not only couldn't tell me off the top of his head, but he had no idea that months had corresponding numbers with which to identify them. He was, however, currently reading Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time." After talking on the phone to someone, if asked what they said immediately upon hanging up, he couldn't tell you if his life depended on it. But he can build a computer from scratch.

He's also always been a very contemplative person. When he was just two years old, he would sit quietly in a chair in a room by himself and think. If you asked what he was doing, he'd calmly reply, "just thinking of something."

Because of his known thoughtful demeanor, it was especially disconcerting one day when he was three years old, sitting calmly and thinking by himself, and turned to me and said, "When I'm 21, I'm going to get an ax and cut your head off."

We hadn't been arguing or fighting (and I don't think we'd started the blanket-torture game yet), and he had stated his intentions so matter-of-factly, I got chills. I remember running to my mom and screaming, "Brett said he's going to cut my head off with an ax!!"

My poor mother sighed. "Where is he going to get an ax? Does he have one now? If not, you're probably safe." I explained that he said he would do it when he was 21 (most likely, he figured he'd have to be 21 - a legal adult - before he could purchase his own head-cutting-off ax; he really had put a lot of thought into this) and she brushed off my urgency, "Well then, you've got a few years left."

My mother might not have been concerned about the future of her children, but she hadn't seen the completely calm, sane, rational look in his eyes when he made his fateful promise. He'd thought out the logistics, and his plan had been set in place. At the innocent young age of three, he set our destinies in stone.

Over the years, I thought on and off about this incident (more off than on), and occasionally counted down the years I had left to live. I didn't really believe he was going to get an ax and cut my head off, but the thought did frequently resurface, just to remind me of its existence.

A year and a half ago, when I was planning a gigantic Thanksgiving feast at our house, a terrifying realization dawned on me. Brett would not only be attending our festivities, but he would be celebrating his 21st birthday just six days prior. I tried to push the thought out of my mind, reassuring myself that he had not only not meant what he said, but surely he'd forgotten it nearly 17 years later. But I hadn't.

I told Husband about my fears. He laughed at me (in retrospect, the logical reaction to have), and told me I was being ridiculous. Of course Brett had forgotten. Such a sympathetic man I married.

We had 17 adults and two kids at our Thanksgiving-fest-o-rama. I figured this was the best protection possible. Even if Brett had remembered, and had been serious, it would be hard to get me alone to cut my head off. He clearly wasn't insane enough to cut my head off in front of 15 other people. Plus, he'd had to fly into town - an ax was blatantly not going to make it through TSA security (he'd only brought carry-on luggage). I made sure we didn't have a ax lying anywhere around our house, and double checked to ensure the neighbors' garages were all closed, in the unlucky scenario that they had axes stowed away.

Thanksgiving evening, after everyone was full of delicious food and drink, and we were sitting around playing Mexican Train Dominoes, my fearless protector thought it would be an appropriate time to reminisce.

"Hey Brett!" Husband called out. "Do you remember telling Laura you were going to get an ax and cut her head off when you were 21?" Brett, maintaining his composure, laughed and simply said, "no."

After recollecting for him the story of his calm 3-year old coolness as he swore to be the purveyor of my demise, we all had a good laugh. Brett claimed not to remember the incident and found it especially humorous that I'd been mildly concerned about his threat for the past 17 years. A good performance, for sure.

The weekend ended without head-chopping-off incident. I saw Brett again once during that year, but didn't bring up the ax-promise, and managed to keep my head secured to my neck through the visit.

When his birthday rolled around again last November, I breathed a sigh of relief. Brett was no longer 21. I was free! He hadn't cut my head off with an ax (not that I ever really thought he would, right?). In my state of jubilation, I excitedly told Husband the good news - my life was no longer at risk!!

Husband greeted my enthusiasm with his infuriating logic, "Yeah, unless he just meant at least 21 years old. Since he didn't specify that it would happen 'during his 21st year,' he feasibly could have meant any time after he turned 21. Guess you're not safe after all."

The Day I Forgot My Library Book

As I've told you before, I have an anxiety disorder. Most people I meet and even know fairly well have no idea, though, because I've had it my entire life, and I've learned how to cope with it very well, and, consequently, hide it from most people. To all but my closest friends and family, I probably come across as a normal, healthy, functional adult. If they could only glimpse into my brain for about five minutes, I think I would have significantly fewer friends.

I think most people who do not suffer from anxiety disorders have a naive understanding of the reality of them (and mind you, I wouldn't say mine is severe, as it has rarely actually affected my life - yes, I avoid many things because of it, but I can't recall a time I couldn't do something I had to because of anxiety. Although I do spend an inordinate amount of time vomiting or pacing, which one could feasibly consider disruptive to a normal life...). For the longest time, Husband would try to rationalize out my anxieties.

"Why are you nervous about going to the vet? You've taken the dogs to the vet multiple times and never had any problems. Is it because it's a new vet?"

"It's partially because it's a new vet. And I've never been to the location before. So I don't know exactly how long it will take me to get there, and since I have a scheduled appointment, it's paramount that I get there in a timely fashion."

"Well, you know it's about 10 minutes away, even with bad traffic. And even if you're late, it's not a big deal. What would happen?"

"They'd yell at me. I'd get in trouble." Ahh, the root of my anxiety - GETTING IN TROUBLE. As I've said before, my biggest fear in life is GETTING IN TROUBLE. This wouldn't be so bad if I weren't convinced that I could get in trouble with any authority figure - and most everyone in my world is an authority figure - parents, teachers, policemen, the vet, doctors, repairmen, truck drivers, drive-thru window order takers, anyone who works at a register in any capacity, motorcyclists, lawyers, park rangers, adults, soldiers, rent-a-cops, waitresses, some children. Did I forget anyone? If I did, you could probably safely put them on the list, too. More than likely, I consider YOU an authority figure in some capacity. Go get yourself a gold star badge and wear it proudly.

Husband has tried repeatedly to tell me that people won't, in fact, yell at me, and, more than likely, they won't even say anything, even on the very rare chance that I WOULD ever be late to anything. But that's just not a risk I'm willing to take.

"Also, the dogs are late on their shots. They're going to yell at me that they're overdue."

He again tries to explain that they won't yell at me. "And if they DO, just leave. You're the customer; they want YOUR money." Besides that fact that most vets would just be glad you're finally taking pet-ownership responsibility and bringing the dogs in, instead of letting them go even longer without getting their shots.

About 30 minutes before I have to leave to get somewhere on time, the real anxiety starts. I can usually put it off for hours or even days beforehand, but at the 30 minute mark, things usually start to get bad. I have to pee every 3 minutes. I can't sit still or concentrate on anything. I start nervously twitching and pacing around the house, checking the clock, literally, every minute to see if it's time to go yet. Sometimes I have to throw up. Unfortunately, I'm not exaggerating for hilarity's sake. I imagine I spend a lot more time throwing up than the average person (with the exception of people with certain eating disorders and most college freshman).

I'm literally nervous about EVERYTHING. Walking makes me nervous. Especially if there are curbs or other objects involved. I have to think ahead and plan my footsteps to make sure I can step up on the curb at the right time and not trip or look otherwise uncoordinated (the irony there is that I'm also a very clumsy person). Calling to order a pizza makes me incredibly nervous. I'll do it if I can't make anyone else around me do it, but if I'm alone, I'd rather go without than make the phone call (I love online ordering, by the way!). My dogs barking makes me nervous. I'm terrified they're going to bother someone else and I'll get in trouble with a neighbor. Going to classes makes me nervous. Not just the first day, or the first week, or for some normal grace period. But every single class, every single time. I'm nervous about getting there on time, remembering which classroom, remembering to have done my homework. Out of four years of college classes, I never once forgot to do my homework, I never once forgot which classroom it was, and I was never late.

And pretty much every other thing you could imagine makes me nervous.

If I gave in to my anxieties, I would have died a long time ago, because I wouldn't have been able to go to the store and get more food, much less work to earn money to get food.

Husband asks me all the time why I can't just get over some of it. Like the college classes. If repetition has taught me anything, it's that I will make it to class on time and be prepared. So why should I continue to be terrified of it?

And that's why it's called an anxiety disorder. If logic could make it go away, it wouldn't be much of a disorder.

I've always been nervous, as long as I can remember. My mom used to joke that I came out of the womb neurotic, because my first baby picture is me with terrible red scratches on my face, one hand digging my nails into my cheeks, the other hand coming into the bottom frame of the picture, ready to scratch the corresponding cheek. I was nervous about being alive.

My mom, who also has an anxiety disorder, though not as bad as mine, recognized this in me from a very young age. And she wanted to discourage it so that I could grow up having a peaceful, normal, not-vomit-filled life.

In first grade, we started weekly class trips to the school library. We'd get to check out a book, take it home for a week, and bring it back the following Wednesday. Things went smoothly for several months, until one dreaded Wednesday morning on the drive to school, while I was checking and re-checking my backpack to make sure I had everything I needed for the day, I realized I had forgotten my library book.

Thrust into a state of absolute, inconsolable panic, I alerted my mom to the situation.

"MOMIFORGOTMYLIBRARYBOOKWEHAVETOGOBACK!!!"

She rationally explained that we couldn't go back to get it, or I'd be late for school.

Oh. Dear. Lord. Two giant rivals - forgetting the library book vs being late. Both would get me in trouble. But which would be worse??

"WEHAVETOWEHAVETOWEHAVETO!!!" I could handle being late. Other people had been late before. Plus, that's really more my mom's fault, anyway. But I'd never seen anyone forget a library book before (in retrospect, I'm sure they had, it was just not a big enough deal for anyone else to have taken notice).

My anxiety-stricken mom saw this as the perfect situation in which to teach me a lesson early in life so I could avoid a similar fate to her own. If she forced me to go to school without my library book, surely I would see that it really wasn't that big of a deal, and I would be able to lose some of the anxiety.

Wrong.

She calmly explained to me that I forgot it, and I would see that it wasn't a big deal. The librarian might tell me I need to be more responsible and remember it next week, but nothing bad would happen. I could simply bring it back next week.

I could see my mom's point, and as I opened my mouth to agree (or protest, it really doesn't matter which), I suddenly realized words were not what was about to escape past my lips.

"PULLOVERI'MGONNABARF!!"

And thus began the vomiting-from-nervousness. The librarian did, in fact, tell me I needed to be more responsible (why, God, why?? I try so hard! How could I have screwed up on such a massive level?!), and that I could simply bring my library book in next week.

Instead of learning my mom's lesson that it really wasn't a big deal, and I wouldn't get in trouble (but to me, it felt like I did get in trouble - disappointment is a form of trouble), I chose the other path - and I never again forgot a library book on library day. To this day, I can't even handle returning movies late. I love Netflix.

The Day a Dog-Monster Ate My Childhood

I've always had a knack for picking just the right name for things. Not only do I have an affinity for naming everything I own, but I've always been good at choosing just the right, most fitting name.

For example, my favorite childhood stuffed animal was a little sherbet-orange colored teddy bear with the most perfect, shiny, jelly-bean-esque nose. I thought long and hard for the ideal name for him. He was such a loyal friend. Always there for me, in the basement, in my room, we'd even go outside together. After much consideration, I decided the perfect name for him would be simple. Catchy. One that really spoke to his true nature both as a bear and as my life-long friend.

I named him Orange Bear.

Oh, how I loved Orange Bear. I even loved him after his perfect, shiny, jelly-bean-esque nose fell off and rolled under the water heater, never to be seen again. He was disfigured, and I still loved him. Now that is a true testament to our lasting relationship.

One day, my parents decided to have a picnic for us in our backyard. I'm not entirely sure why, or what purpose it served, but there we were, sitting on a quilt in the middle of our wide-open yard, enjoying the sunny day and each other's company.

At the time, we were living in South Dakota, just outside the city limits of Sioux Falls. We lived in a small development, but right past our street there were huge, loping grassy hills with a vast expanse of nothing but raceway for the terrible South Dakota winds. You could see these plains from our backyard, and it gave the feeling of really being out in the country, not immediately on the other side of a busy highway (like we actually were).

So there we were, minding our own business, in our own backyard, having a joyful picnic. Just my parents, my older brother, me, and, of course, Orange Bear. Suddenly, my dad looked up just in time to see a monstrously-sized black dog bounding toward us. Its hand towel-sized pink tongue lolling sloppily out the side of its mouth between sparkling white, dagger teeth. Its gigantic paws hit the ground with each running step like horse's hooves, pounding the dirt and sending chills down our spines with each deep vibration of the Earth's crust. The bottomless blackness of its murderous eyes cut through our very souls. It was headed directly for us.

In a panic, my mom tried to get us children into the house. "RUUUUUN!!" she'd screamed, convinced this clearly rabid buffalo-sized dog was about to consume her children in one gulp.

But we were frozen on our spots. Minds entirely blank from awe and the impending, undeniable black death that was closing in on us.

Closer and closer the black demon dog from Hell came. In a matter of seconds, he was upon us. I could hear nothing but the deafening pounding from my own heart making my ears throb, and the bone-chilling panting breaths of the dog-monster as it closed in on me.

And in the blink of an eye, it was over. The black dog-monster was past us, running back in the direction he had come from. The direction of Hell.

We all looked at each other as nervous laughter escaped. What a close call! And to think, we were scared of the dog! It just wanted to say hi! And here we were. Everyone was fine and dandy. As good as new! Mom and Dad smiled knowingly at each other - they'd successfully averted a disaster. What good parents they were! Brian and I shared in their joy - what obedient and well-behaved children we must be to have escaped the clutches of such a terrible dog-monster from Hell! I turned to share my joyous relief with Orange Bear. But to my absolute horror, Orange Bear was missing. His spot on the quilt was entirely and infinitely empty.

I started screaming for him, "ORANGE BEAR! ORANGEBEAAAAAR!!" Once again, my dad's keen eyes served us well - he caught a glimpse of orange hanging out of the dog-monsters mouth, just as he turned the corner and was gone from our sights for good.

Devastated and frantic, I screamed at my parents that we had to get Orange Bear back. My life would never be complete again without him. What kind of a life was worth living in an Orange Bear-less world, anyway?

Once again, my parents sprang into action. They calmly and rationally told me that we could go around and ask the neighbors if they know who the black dog belongs to. Clearly, this was not a satisfactory answer to me, as that black demon monster from Hell couldn't belong to a HUMAN. It's from HELL, you guys.

After picking up our picnic paraphernalia, we headed out as a family to track down the dog-monster's owner (or his demonic master of torture and all things death). Fortunately, the first house we stopped at believed they knew where the black dog lived (duh, Hell). We headed over to the house she had pointed to and continued our search and rescue efforts.

A kindly-looking older man opened the door and welcomed us inside. He was pleasant enough (for a Dark Overlord from the Pits of Hell). He told us that he did, in fact own a black dog (Warrior of Satan). But unfortunately, he hadn't seen any stuffed orange bear. The dog had come home not too long ago, and he hadn't noticed that he'd been carrying anything.

The man offered us a drink, and my parents sat down to chat with him pleasantly enough. I, on the other hand, was dying inside. While we were sitting here chatting up this stranger (a possible Dark Overlord), Orange Bear was out there somewhere. Probably being tortured by Satan's minions to reveal all his deepest secrets. The devastation at the realization that I might never see Orange Bear again began to wash over me.

But then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw something that made my heart stop and my blood run cold. A tuft of sherbet-orange colored hair. Sticking out from under the bench of a seat in the next room.

The realization came rushing to me all at once. This man. Was. LYING. He HAD Orange Bear! He was being held prisoner in a wooden bench!! His mouth was probably covered in duct tape, or he'd have screamed for us so we knew he was there. The man was trying to fool us into believing his feeble story by offering my parents coffee. His plan was flawless. Except for Orange Bear's sly attempt at communication. The man must have not seen how Orange Bear squeezed just his one tuft of fur under the cover at the last second. Genius, Orange Bear, simply genius!

I hurriedly whispered to my mom, "There's Orange Bear! I see him!! IN THE BENCH!!" At first she tried to hush me; after all, she was trying to enjoy her bribery coffee and misleading chitchat. But my urgency got through to her. She looked over and recognized Orange Bear's fuzzy butt flare of desperation.

"Um, excuse me," she peeped in quietly, "I hate to be nosy, but my daughter" (thanks for the betrayal, Mom) "thinks she sees her teddy bear over in that bench there. Do you mind if we look?"

Embarrassed, the man stands up and rushes to the bench (all his evil plots unfurling at his feet), throws open the lid, and there, in all his nose-less glory, is Orange Bear. In tact. It looks like we got there just in time to save him before the rigorous torture sessions began.

"Oh dear. My wife must have gotten this from the dog and put it in here without telling me! I'm terribly sorry." A likely story, Mr. Blown-Cover Overlord!! Where is this convenient "wife" of which you speak now?! Oh, she just HAPPENED to run to the store after locking Orange Bear in a dungeon and "forgetting" to tell you? The coincidences are stacking up against you, sir!

As he handed Orange Bear back to me (seemingly reluctantly), I thought I could almost hear his Dark Overlord thoughts drilling through me, "this isn't over yet, girlie. My black Dog-Monster of Doom knows where you live - and we know how to get the answers we want!"

I clutched Orange Bear to me and held him tight. I'd never let him out of my grasp again. At least not till the next best friend stuffed animal came along. But who could possibly replace Orange Bear in the ranks of loyalty and trust? He hadn't even spilled our secrets to the Dark Overlord or his Dog-Monster of Doom. And yet... Blue Panda and Brownie Dog have their good qualities, too... and they both still have their noses.

An Ode to BS

In honor of today being my big brother's 29th birthday, I decided it would be apropos to write about him. Oh, brother...

I believe we had a typical childhood relationship. We're 21 months apart, so close enough to play together all the time and fight like riled up roosters in a cock fight, but far apart in age enough to have some of our own interests. I didn't realize it at the time, but in retrospect, I think I wanted to be just like him. I did everything he did - soccer, swim team, piano lessons, playing in the school band, then marching band (yes, we were dorks), and tech crew in high school (a small disclaimer here: at our school, tech crew was not the thing super dorky kids did - evidently, that's how it is at other schools, but for us, tech and drama seemed to be the cool kids - even the football team captains and cheerleaders tried to get into the drama scene, and all the techies were best friends with the drama kids, etc - or maybe I'm just projecting to try and feel like less of a total loser...).

But my brother was a genius. He never tried at school and always got perfect scores on everything. He had to start taking college-level math outside of our high school by the time he was a sophomore, because he'd already finished all the math our school could provide. I, on the other hand, did every assignment, studied for hours every night (in retrospect I wonder how I even found things to study for hours every night in high school), and made close to perfect grades, but just not quite as good as his. He could play any instrument without learning - just picked it up, messed around on it, and suddenly, he knew how to play the trumpet. Or the saxophone. Or guitar. (Although, he was also known as "the cancer of the band," because he had a terrible work ethic (I later learned it was due to an injustice committed by the director and a resulting lack of desire to try) and would "infect" those who sat in a growing radius around him) I, however, struggled through 14 years of flute lessons and never got above a mediocre skill level. In our parents' eyes, he was flawless - the perfect kid. He'd go out on weekends and get drunk, but they were oblivious to that. I stayed home on weekends and lamely attempted to practice my flute or study more for that up-coming physics test. But to them, he could do no wrong.

Clearly, this made me hate him.

In an irrationally thought out plan to make us get along, my parents decided that, when he got his first car (a beat-up '92 Pontiac LeMans, fondly known as the "LePimp"), he would drive me to school every day. This wouldn't have been too much of an issue if we were normal kids, but, of course, we weren't.

Remember, I have the anxiety disorder. Part of that is a physical inability to be tardy. I am ALWAYS at least 15 min early to everything. Even arbitrarily established timelines for myself - like grocery shopping. I'm always 15 min early to the grocery store. So every morning in high school, I was up 3 hours before school started, with plenty of time to get ready, eat breakfast, study some more, and... wait. Anxiously, I'd sit at the bar in the kitchen, on the verge of vomiting, as the minute hand ticked closer and closer to 7:55 (the time the first bell rang). I'd BEG my mom to go make sure he was awake. By 7:45, I'd be running in and out of the bathroom, dry heaving, while she casually made her way downstairs to try and get him out of bed. FINALLY, he'd come upstairs. At 7:53. AND THEN HE'D WANT TO EAT BREAKFAST.

At this point, I would be having a complete mental and physical breakdown, holding back tears, hyperventilating, shaking uncontrollably, sometimes even throwing up. By the time he got into the car and drove us to school, we inevitably ended up pulling up right as the second bell (the TARDY bell) rang. I'd run frantically to my classroom, choking back sobs and apologizing profusely to my teachers, trying to explain that it wasn't my fault. He, on the other hand, would saunter in casually, likely getting high-fives and pleasant greetings from his teachers, who all also thought he was the greatest thing on Earth.

After about six months of this, every single day, my mom finally agreed that the 20 lbs I'd lost through these daily panic attacks was enough. She demanded that he get up earlier and get me to school on time. He seemed willing enough to cooperate.

Little did I know, he had a revenge plan.

As if it wasn't bad enough to be carted around in the LePimp. He had used duct tape to write out "Le PIMP" across the back windshield. He'd torn out the floorboards to re-wire the car so he could string Christmas lights along the doors, windows, hood, and trunk. He built a gigantic sub-woofer box that took up the entire backseat. The key was broken off in the ignition. The passenger side window didn't roll down. The back hatch didn't really close all the way. Everyone in town knew the car. He was proud of it (wearing his "picnic tablecloth" shirts - the most God-awful bright plaid shirts imaginable - the school had a dress code and you had to wear a button up collared shirt - no color requirements, though, unfortunately - to school every day). I was just mortified.

But no. His revenge came swiftly one morning. We got in the car (at 7:40!!), and he pulled out a tape to stick into the tape deck. He had the hint of an evil grimace on his face, as if to say, "she thinks she won. Little does she know." The tape started.

INFORMER! YaknowsaydaddymeSnowmeagonnablame
A LICKY BOOM BOOM DOWN...

Okay, I thought, I can handle a mixed-tape. Is this all he's got??

Snow's Informer came to an end, and I was excitedly curious to hear what came on next. That's really not a bad song. Kind of annoying, and it has a way of getting stuck in your head (an ear worm, as the Germans so graphically describe it) for days on end, but the next song might be catchy enough to prevent it from sticking.

INFORMER! YaknowsaydaddymeSnowmeagonnablame
A LICKY BOOM BOOM DOWN...

Oh no. What's going on? Okay, surely he just made a mistake and put it on there twice. He's not very technology-savvy (a clear attempt at denial, since he is, in fact, the most technology-savvy person I know).

INFORMER! YaknowsaydaddymeSnowmeagonnablame
A LICKY BOOM BOOM DOWN...

Oh dear Lord. Somebody just kill me now.

Yes, he'd done it. He'd made an ENTIRE mixed tape with ONLY Snow's Informer on it. Both sides. So we could listen to it non-stop on the way to and from school, every single day. And as if that weren't bad enough, thanks to the catchy rhythm and my inability to understand any of the words, every second of every day NOT spent in the car was still spent mentally stumbling through the song. A LICKY BOOM BOOM DOWN!!

This went on for months. At least three months. The only song I heard while in a car was Snow's Informer. His revenge had been exacted, and it was sweet indeed.

At some point, we came to an understanding. He woke up a little earlier and got me to school before I was late. And I didn't whine to Mom every day about him. Although we never spoke a single word to each other in the car, we didn't try to kill each other, either.

And finally, for my 16th birthday, my parents got me my own car. Well, technically, they got my mom a car and gave me the old '93 Nissan Altima. My brother was beyond angry about this (the Altima WAS a pretty awesome car, after all), but once again, he came out on top. He got a brand new '00 Jeep Cherokee, exactly how he wanted it, when he graduated from high school, because he was such a genius and dozens of colleges were literally throwing money at him to go to their school. I drove that Altima over 80,000 miles, in spite of it being totaled twice, until 2008. As soon as I had my own car and was able to drive myself to school (on time, no less!), we instantly became friends. It was like there was no reason to hate each other anymore. That was probably the best birthday present I ever got - not because it was a car for my 16th birthday, which is clearly an awesome present, but because it meant the beginning of a real, healthy, adult-like friendship with my brother.

Here we are, years later, still getting along. So Brian, on your birthday, I just have one thing to say to you:

INFORMER! YaknowsaydaddymeSnowmeagonnablame
A LICKY BOOM BOOM DOWN!!!

The Day My Mom Threw Walnuts at the Neighbor Kid

I spent a portion of my childhood living in a small suburb north of Baltimore, MD called Bel Air. My perspective on the town is a little skewed, because we moved there when I was 7 and left when I was 13, so my impressions are probably drastically different than they would be now. But for a kid my age, it was an awesome town. Especially our neighborhood.

There were kids everywhere - so many, in fact, that we started a street hockey league. We had four teams and an actual rotating game schedule, complete with championships, etc. It was awesome. There were always other kids to play with everywhere. It was literally impossible to be bored in that neighborhood. For the most part, I got along with everyone in the neighborhood (probably more out of a fear of confrontation than anything).

With one exception. My next door neighbor, Kevin Konzowski (I changed his name slightly so if he does a google search for his name, he can't find this and get angry all these years later - but he had a good, classical Polish name that started with a K. I've always found that childhood stories are significantly more funny if you remember the kid's name). He was a whiny, chubby little blond kid, a year younger than me. He did musical theater. And I hated him. He did not participate in our street hockey league, and he was an all-around disagreeable child. He was one of those kids that already acts like a lame 40-year old (enforcing rules when it's not his place and tucking his collared shirt into his pleated-front pants, in spite of the considerable gut protesting this fashion decision), even though he was just in third grade.

One day, my good friend Courtney came by the house to show off her awesome new bike. In fourth grade, a new bike was the equivalent of winning several million dollars in the lottery. She was fashionable, stylish, could probably ride faster than any of us, and she was on top of the world. We all envied her and her outrageous fortune. I remember it was teal and white. It probably also had some other colors, and it probably had some other kind of features, but clearly this shows what was mostly important to us.

So there we were, admiring her beautiful new bike as it rested regally on its kickstand. Then, looking over my shoulder, Courtney said, "go away." I could see the glint of blond hair reflecting in her eyes. I spun around and came face to face with my neighborhood arch-nemesis. Kevin.

"This is Courtney's new bike. YOU can't touch it." I said smartly, turning my back on him once more. Courtney and I were fourth graders. It was SO uncool to be seen near a third grader, let alone one as un-hip as Kevin. In retrospect, I would like to think he had no intention of touching the bike in the first place, but was lonely and just wanted to have friends. But I don't believe it. If that were the case, he wouldn't have been Kevin.

I could hear his footsteps growing nearer to me, so I turned back around, on guard, ready to protect the precious new bike. But suddenly he struck! I had no idea a fat little whiny kid could move that fast! He darted past me, and in an attempt merely to touch the bike (explicitly disobeying my one command), he lost his balance and shoved the bike harder than he meant to. And in terrible slow-motion, we watched in horror as the beautiful new bike fell onto its side in the grass.

Too overwhelmed with shock, I stared blankly at Kevin. And that's when he hit me with his second attack.

"You look like a penis."

Again, before I could react (what's that even supposed to mean? How can a person even look like a penis??), he struck again - reaching out his sissy hand and slapping me across the face.

Now, I've never been a confrontational person, and, as I told you before, I've always followed a strict adherence to behavior rules and laws, both real and those invented in my mind on behalf of the unknown and infinite "authority." But Kevin pushed me over the edge. I pulled my arm back, and with all my might, I decked him as hard as I could in the face. He went running home screaming. I'd successfully given my first (and only) black eye.

But that didn't end things with Kevin. Not by a long shot. He spent the rest of the summer taunting me from the relative safety of his backyard fort. I didn't dare ever venture into his yard. But he must have feared the repercussions of coming into my yard, as well. He usually stayed hidden in his fort, but his annoying third-grader taunts would drift across the yards to my friends and I. I'd tell them to just ignore him and try to take my own advice, but the fury was building.

Finally, one day after weeks of unrequited taunting, he'd lost it. He wanted a war, and he was determined to get one. There was a walnut tree in between our yards, and many of the walnuts had fallen off onto the ground. If you've never seen a walnut off a tree, it basically looks like a tennis ball without the white seams.

Kevin's poorly thought out battle plan involved running frantically to the border between our yards, grabbing as many walnuts as he could, and launching them at us while we sat innocently ignoring him in our swing set. Most unfortunately for him, he had relatively good aim that day. He hit me with one on the back of the head, and he hit my friend with one right in the arm, leaving a giant red welt.

Little did he know, we had a secret weapon. And she was just as fed up with him as we were. My mom had been watching from the deck, and when my friend and I started yelling and trying to hold back tears, she'd had enough.

Now a normal mother would have likely gone to Kevin's house, rang the doorbell, and told his parents that he was throwing walnuts at us. But not my mom. Maybe she knew that Kevin's parents wouldn't have done anything even if they had known, or maybe she was really just as sick of that annoying kid as we were. But either way, she stormed down into the yard, grabbed a couple walnuts and began launching them at him while yelling something like, "not so fun to be the target, now is it??"

Luckily for Kevin, my mom has terrible aim. I'm not sure if she hit him (she was also throwing underhand), but I can only hope she did, at least once. He went running into his house screaming once again. But that finally ended the war with Kevin. He stayed inside for the rest of the summer (occasionally we'd catch a glimpse of him playing by himself in his backyard), and avoided us at all cost. And by the next summer, we'd all out-grown the old rivalries.

Years later, I asked my mom if she remembered this. Laughing, she said she did, and she felt bad for it. But then she told me that she'd never heard a word about it from his parents. Surely if your kid comes running into the house crying, screaming about the grown woman next door throwing walnuts at him, you'd want to have words with her, at the very least. But not in this case. Knowing how whiny Kevin was, we can't imagine he didn't tell them what happened. Instead, we like to imagine he did tell them exactly what happened, and his parents were secretly pleased that someone finally gave him what was coming to him.