The Hayride

By Jerry Mack Grubbs

“What’s a hayride?” asked Darrell. The entire band room roared with laughter. I felt sorry for Darrell but it did seem pretty stupid that a seventh grader didn’t know what a hayride was. Darrell and I played trumpet in the band. Band separates you in classes just like the world does. The world labels you as rich, average or poor. In band, you are either first, second or third chair. First chair trumpet players have the toughest music. Their part runs up and down the music scale darting like a rabbit being chased by my dog Piston. I wanted to name my dog Killer but something was missing in his gene pool. When he got excited he would bounce up and down like he was attached to an invisible pogo stick. His movements also reminded me of the way a piston goes up and down in an engine. I tried calling him Pogo but Piston is the name that stuck. It didn’t matter because mother didn’t like either name. My brother and I decided he behaved that way because his nap sack had only one you know what hanging in it. Well, you get the idea. First chair trumpet players are the cream of the crop and their music is challenging to play. I was the last of the third chair trumpet players. Our music consisted of boring whole and half notes punctuated with long rest periods. The fact that Darrell sat next to me meant he was the second worst trumpet player in the whole band.

Darrell’s humiliation that day was probably overshadowed by my own brother Bill’s embarrassment of having a brother like me in the band. He was an eight grader and he was the first chair trombonist. At least I didn’t further humiliate my brother by blurting out questions like what’s a hayride. When Mr. Marshall, the band director, told us we were going to have a hayride as our yearend activity, if I hadn’t known what he was talking about I would have at least waited until I got home and asked my mother to spell it out for me. Mother often grew tired of my questions but she never laughed at me even when common sense should have given me the answers. If I had never been on a hayride I think I could have figured out that the word “hayride” meant a ride in the hay. Shucks, by the seventh grade I had already been on several hayrides. I even knew what a roll in the hay was although I had never had that experience.

I decided right then and there I would invite Glenna Butler to go on the hayride with me. Although she was not the dream girl with whom I shared all my secrets, I had been sweet on her since the sixth grade. She was blond, had a pretty face and she lived close by. That living close by stuff was important because the only wheels I owned were attached to a bicycle. Glenna and I both lived on Ann Drive. I lived on Ann Drive from the fourth grade until I left for college and during all that time I never figured out who Ann was. Glenna said she was probably the daughter of the man who made the street. Glenna also said “yes” to my invitation to go on the hayride and I was elated. I think it was the Spearmint gum commercial where the guy jumps into the air and clicks his heels together . . . that’s how I felt. I had been real nervous to ask her because my friend David had gotten the big “no” when he asked Melinda on the hayride. You couldn’t really blame Melinda. David had buckteeth plus he had one of those secrets kids aren’t supposed to keep. I’ll tell you more about my hayride with Glenna later but for now I want to tell you what Mr. Marshall, the band director, taught me the day Darrell asked that stupid question. I have never forgotten the lesson and it had nothing to do with music or band.

Before the laughter had subsided, with poor Darrell wanting to crawl under his chair, Mr. Marshall subdued the class by asking three questions in rapid-fire succession. Before asking the questions he explained that any class members who knew the answers to the questions should raise their hand. With each question, the only hand that went into the air was attached to the long skinny arm of Darrell. I was almost proud of the fact that I was sitting next to this guy. I knew Darrell would not be raising his hand unless he really knew the answers. Forget about the answers, I didn’t even understand the questions. What I didn’t know and most likely none of the class members knew was that Darrell was a math whiz. Mr. Marshall knew this about Darrell and took the opportunity to ask us difficult math questions that he was sure only Darrell would know the answers to. Darrell got emotionally moved to the front of the class that day as far as I was concerned.

In the midst of all this ah and amazement of Darrell’s great knowledge, I still wondered why he was sitting next to the worst trumpet player in the band if he was so smart. I actually don’t know if he was better than the worst trumpet player because I never challenged him for his position. That’s how you get ahead in band. You challenge the person in the seat next to you to a musical sword fight. If you play the selected piece better than he does you get to take his chair and he slides down to your old position. I didn’t want to play a trumpet or challenge Darrel for his seat. I didn’t want to be in the band period. But when you live with a mother who is bound and determined to give you all the advantages she didn’t have growing up, you play trumpet, piano, violin and whatever else she makes up her mind that you need to play. At that age you would even play your fist to keep from getting your plate broke. That’s what my dad use to say, “Behave yourself, Mack, or you’ll get your plate broke and starve to death.”

Was that child abuse? Parents could get away with almost anything in those days. They would even teach you how to lie real good and then when they caught you telling a lie later on, they would threaten to break your plate or tan your hide. I’ll give you an example. I figured out who Santa Claus was and when I announced my discovery, my folks said, “You know that Beebe gun you want for Christmas? Well, if you don’t believe in Santa Claus, you won’t get it.” I became reconverted to Santa Claus so fast you would have thought I was attending a save Santa revival. But I can talk about parents teaching their kids to lie and what that leads to later. Right now I need to finish telling you about the hayride.

Darrell, the math whiz, survived that brutal day in the band room when he asked the stupid question about a hayride. And the day of our hayride finally came. It was ridiculous. I knew what a hayride was supposed to be like but this beat all I had ever seen. Well, it beat all I had ever seen with the exception of when I saw those two pigs rolling in the hay. I don’t know why we have to use code words like “rolling in the hay,” or “getting lucky.” It took me until the fifth grade to figure out who Lucky was. How confusing can that be? No wonder I was sitting last chair trumpet player by dumb Darrell. I never called him dumb Darrell out loud. I just paused and gave myself time to think the word “dumb” before I said his name. That was back before I figured out that thinking something bad was almost the same as doing something bad. No matter how big you are on the outside, putting labels on people makes you small on the inside. And you are the one who has to look at what is on the inside. You can’t get away from you.

Our hayride was in a moving van. No open trailer to dangle your feet off of or feel the cool evening breeze blowing in your face. We were crammed inside a stinking moving van. It was dark and hot. Everyone was throwing hay and sneezing like a cat with a feather up its nose. The darkness was okay because I was sitting next to Glenna. I wasn’t just sitting next to her; I was holding her hand. The only other time I had held her hand was in the sixth grade when we went on a tour of the Grand Saline salt mine. While going down an elevator shaft deep into the mine, smashed together like fish in the last shallow waterhole of a dried up lake, they turned out the lights to let us see how dark Hell was going to be like. There in the dark I took Glenna’s hand in mine. While we were supposed to be experiencing what Hell was going to be like, I was in Heaven. When the lights came back on I let go of her hand. We never talked about it but I often thought about that day. I had planned to wait for my dream girl to come along and hold her hand but Glenna got there first.

Yep, Glenna was my first. Well, she was my first if you don’t count cousins. My friend Buddy said, “Cousins don’t count.” That didn’t make any sense to me but his explanation was so complicated I thought my brain was swimming in a mixture of sand and honey. I guess cousins sharing the same blood make holding your cousin’s hand almost the same as holding your own sister’s hand. Yuk. That’s also why you don’t marry your cousin. When cousins marry, one plus one equals two just like everybody else but when they have a baby they only total two and a half people, not three. Buddy said when cousins have babies they produce halfwits. And that is why you count different when counting cousins, one plus one plus one equals two and a half. Anyway, if cousins don’t count, Glenna was my first.

I wanted to finish telling you about my hayride with Glenna but it is getting late and my brain has quit working. My story has waited all these years to be told so I guess it can wait a little longer. Think about this in the mean time. Do you laugh and make fun of others because you think you are smarter than they? Think of Darrell, the math whiz. Do you teach your children to lie? Think about Santa Claus and the Beebe gun. Do you label people and fail to see the harm it causes you? Remember, no matter how big you are on the outside; your actions can make you appear pretty small on the inside. Does any of this make sense to you or am I just a halfwit even thought my mother didn’t marry her cousin? See you later, maybe.

Sam and the Stranger

By Jerry Mack Grubbs
 
As I walked back to my office from a nearby park, I passed the Sugarhouse Boys & Girls Club where a group of young boys were playing behind a chain link fence. One of the boys called out, "Hey, what's your name?" I turned to see a rosy-cheeked little boy with a big smile on his face. I said, "My name is Jerry, what's your name?" Before he could respond, another boy about the same age grabbed him and said, "Stop talking to strangers." Ignoring the comment of other boy he said to me, "My name is Sam." Turning back to his friend he said, "He's not a stranger, his name is Jerry." Then calling out to me again Sam asked, "You're not a stranger, are you?" "I am a stranger to you because we don't know each other yet," I said. As I turned and continued to walk down the street, I could hear Sam's friend scolding him for telling a stranger his name.

Strangers are just friends I haven't met yet is a quote attributed to Will Rogers. To view everyone as a potential future friend is certainly a positive outlook on life. A friend is someone we would never intentionally wound. A friend is someone we would stop and allow into slow moving traffic. A friend is someone we would never speak despairingly about. The list could go on and on but I think you understand my train of thought.

Sam had been taught the right message. From behind a chain link fence with his adult supervisor standing nearby, Sam could see the world as a safe place. His playmate focused on the specific rule…don't talk to strangers. Through the safety of the fence, Sam saw a stranger as a possible future friend. His playground buddy saw a stranger as a potential danger regardless of the protective fence. Which of the two boys had the right perspective depends entirely on who the stranger was. It is sad that we live in a world where we need to teach our children to fear strangers. But it is the world we live in and strangers mistreat unsuspecting children every day. But it isn't just strangers who mistreat children. Some children are mistreated by those who should be their greatest protectors.

I grew up thinking that the world was a safe place. I don't remember my parents cautioning me to avoid strangers. We left our home unlocked when we went on vacation and told the neighbors to just toss the mail in on the kitchen floor. We didn't lock our car doors at home or when we went to the store. Our outside storage shed was never locked. Mother tells the story that the only time she recalls having something taken from our home was when my brother and sister (twins) had their baby clothes stolen from the clothesline. Mother simply said, "To steal baby clothes, their need must have been greater than ours." Life went on and we grew up not fearing the world.

As kids, I remember riding our bikes thirty miles to our grandparents home. On those winding backcountry roads we must have passed dozens of those strangers, friends we hadn't met yet. We played in the backwoods for hours on end without being checked up on by worried adults. We were turned loose at the county fair with a few dollars in our pockets to enjoy the rides and experience the thrills until the carnival closed for the night. It never crossed our minds that someone was lurking behind a vehicle or hiding in a darkened corner to reach out and forever destroy our feeling of safety and security.

Sam, my little talkative friend, didn't remind me of myself as a child, but he did remind me of my brother. I was much shyer than my brother but I didn't fear strangers. My fear was of the dark and no one had to teach me that. My imagination could run wild in the dark. At night I wanted to sleep with the light on but my mother always said no. With her helpful suggestions, I gradually gave away my fear of the dark.

I wish that our children didn't have to be taught to fear strangers. I wish that all those fears were just imagined and could be given away as I gave away my fear of the dark. Sadly, that is not the case. There is danger in the world and we have a responsibility to teach our children to be observant of their surroundings and what action they should take when necessary. Our challenge is to teach our children to be safe while at the same time instilling within them that the world itself is not a dangerous place. Danger is not lurking around every dark corner. No boogey men ever grabbed me as I made my way from our home to the outhouse and back again. It wasn't because I outran them. It was because the boogey men only existed in my imagination.

We can't eliminate all the dangerous men in the world but as adults we can make the world a better place by adopting the philosophy of Will Rogers. Imagine a world where every stranger is just a friend we haven't met yet. Imagine a world where children can run barefoot and free all day long without worry that some stranger will harm them. Imagine a world where there are no real boogey men. Until our imagination is reality and all the boogey men are gone, we must vigilantly teach our children of the potential danger of strangers.

The shaping of a child's view of the world is one of our most sacred stewardships. Thank you Sam for that little reminder of what the world was like when I grew up. I miss that world but I can only turn back the pages of time in my memory.