Walla Walla, Washington (with apologies to “Weird Al” Yankovic) Part 1
Way back when, when I was a wee one, probably seven, or possibly even eight, honestly, I’m not even really sure; well anyway, at that point in time I was living with both of my parents and life was… not fantastic, but certainly not awful. I mean, I can’t really call a childhood where my parents routinely and ritualistically beat me at checkers to be a fun childhood, but I suppose it could have been worse. Well anyway, everything changed on this one day in particular when I was carefully, strategically removing the magnetic tape from my parents’ VHS copy of “Hanging Up,” when suddenly I heard this very strange sound emanating from the hallway. I made my way to the hallway and realized that this very strange sound was specifically emanating from the hallway closet that housed all the family board games. My older brother was in the bathroom projectile vomiting, my younger sister was in her bedroom playing “Super Mario 64,” and my parents were in their bedroom with the door locked, with Mom’s slipper on the doorknob, which was the universal sign that they were thoroughly cleaning and dusting the bedroom and that they were not to be disturbed during that time for any reason whatsoever. That left me as the lone figure in the house to deal with this mysterious noise in the board game closet. But like any seven (or eight) year old boy would, I took the initiative and decided that I would rush over and figure out what that sound was. But first I decided that I needed to put some food inside my stomach before I did such a thing, because that seemed a like a job that you shouldn’t do with no food in your stomach. So, I got out the ingredients for my favorite sandwich; marshmallow, peanut butter, banana, turkey breast, bacon, sardines, and white bread; and I built my magnum opus of a sandwich; the marshmallow peanut butter banana turkey bacon sardine sandwich. After finishing my delectable creation, and washing it down with a glass and a half of whole milk that had expired two days ago but still tasted just fine, I returned to the hallway to see about that sound in the hallway. But before I did that I needed to use the bathroom. So I went to the bathroom and knocked on the door. My brother groaned and was like “What?” And then I said, “I gotta use the bathroom!” And my brother was like, “Go away!” And then I went, “No!” And then he was all, “Yes!” And then I went, “Okay,” and I left my brother behind. I didn’t really need to use the bathroom all that badly anyway. Alright, no more fooling around, it was time to open the board game closet in the middle of the hallway to figure out what exactly that sound was. So I reached for the door knob, all slow and dramatic like, and I looked inside the closet, and lo and behold, sandwiched in between my mother’s unopened copy of the game Taboo, and my dad’s really, really, really old copy of the game Tip-It, was a herd of purple cattle stuck in the closet, and that sound that I’d been hearing had been them mooing because they had been trapped inside and they couldn’t get out. Man, I hate when that happens. So the cows burst from the closet and then made themselves at home in the living room, and one started eating the couch, and another started eating the fitness trampoline, and another started eating the fireplace. I figured I should probably go get my parents; it was possible that they would know what to do next, but that slipper on the door meant that I was not to disturb them for any reason, and cows in the living room constituted any reason. So instead I went to my father’s office, grabbed a leather paddle from his spanking suitcase, and I began beating the purple cows with their cousins in paddle form. But the cows did absolutely nothing; refused to even acknowledge I was there. It was at this point that I took note of the cows’ unusual color, and I wondered if maybe the reason they were purple is because these were grape cows, and their milk was grape flavored. So I got out a straw, one that I had been saving for just such an occasion, shoved it into one of the cow’s udders, and began sucking on the straw. And by gum, the milk was indeed grape flavored milk! How scrumptious it tasted! And I was busy enjoying that grape flavored milk, when suddenly I heard another noise coming from the hallway. I turned around, and it was at this point that I saw them; both of my parents, my mother holding a duster, and my father holding a brown paper towel in his left hand, and a can of Lysol in the right hand. I looked right at them. And they simply looked right back at me. Neither one of us said anything for the longest time. Honestly, what would you even say if you were in this position? So I said literally the only thing that I could think of in that moment, “Would either of you like a grape milk enema? I hear it’s mighty rejuvenating!” Well to make a long story short, my parents chased off the purple cattle, and punished me for not disobeying them; every day at precisely 6:07 P.M. for the next five years, I was to do 26 jumping jacks, no more and no less, no matter where I was or what I was doing. And it was on that day that I swore and promised to myself that I would leave home at the earliest possible moment, I would leave and I would never look back! But where, O where, in this strange, crazy, and upside-down world could I possibly go?
