Fiction, with a grain of truth. Contains profane and homophobic references, not suitable for all audiences.
July 1966 – Arcola, Saskatchewan
When I was a kid, there was a trickle of water that ran through a pasture north of Arcola. The stream didn’t have a name; it was just a seasonal tributary that eventually meandered into Moose Mountain Creek.
There was a wide spot at a bend in the stream where spring rains had eroded the bank, leaving an oxbow-shaped pool. The brackish body of water, hidden below a shallow cutbank, was our summer swimming hole, aptly named Bare Ball Beach.
The stream was pretty much stagnant by mid-July and, having run through several cow pastures to get there, the water was a disgusting purple-gray colour. The bottom of the pool was lined with deep mud, and dotted with occasional rocks, slippery with pond slime. There was no shelter of any kind, no trees for shade, and not a grain of sand to sit on.
Nobody with any sense would swim at Bare Ball Beach.
Which is where my pre-pubescent friends, Ricky and Clayton, and I were fortunate – not one of us had the sense of a gnat. When the scorching heat of a Saskatchewan summer became intolerable, and there were no adults willing to transport us to Carlyle Lake, we swam at Bare Ball Beach.
Our forward planning being as impaired as our common sense, my friends and I often went to the beach unprepared and on a whim. We never took towels or swimming gear and, knowing that our parents would not have approved, we never told anybody what we were doing.
One or the other of us would complain about the heat and another would say, “Let’s go to The Beach”, whereupon we would strike out on a trail behind the dormant skating rink, through Dempsey’s pasture, along the creek to our secluded swimming hole.
In the shadow of the cutbank, we would shuck off our clothes and set them on rocks to keep them dry. We would slither into the water, with mud oozing through the cracks of our toes, naked as the day we were born.
The creek water was only a few degrees cooler than the scorching summer air, but it was glorious! We would dog-paddle around the pool, splash each other, and revel in the luxury of our mid-continent oasis.
“Watch me do a full moon” Clayton yelled, as he ducked his head under water and exposed Lilly-white buttocks to the sun. Hilarious stuff when you’re ten years old.
For several summers running, Bare Ball Beach was our sanctuary: a respite from the heat, from adults, and from every other care in the world. Then, Brian Jenkins entered our world.
Brian was the second-stupidest kid in Arcola. He was 15 years-old but he faltered two grades below his age in school. Brian was a blockhead, a bully, a braggart, and a mean-minded son-of-a-bitch. The only person stupider or meaner than Brian was Dougie Winston, and both of them were now standing on the bank of the creek.
We hadn’t seen them approach until they were on top of us, side-by-side, two morons with the sun at their backs leering down at us.
“What are you little homos doing out here buck naked? Doing a little corn-holing in the Crick, are ya?”
Brian picked up a dry cowpie and flung it at Ricky, barely missing his semi-submerged torso. Moron #2 thought this was uproariously funny and went in search of more manure pads, as Brian continued to hurl insults and debris at us.
I scrambled out of the water and grabbed our clothes, concerned that one of the geniuses on the bank might decide to steal them and leave us naked in the pasture. By then Dougie was back with a load of manure. Unable to locate any completely dry pads, he was tossing wet clods of cow shit in our direction and giggling like an idiot.
I deposited our clothing in a pile on the far bank, and we all started shoving mucky legs into tighty-whiteies, not much caring how dirty they got. As I squeezed into my underwear, one of the rocket scientists on the opposite bank commented on my pre-pubescent “boyhood”.
Where is your pecker? By God, you’d need a microscope to see that thing! Dougie! Lookit! These perverts have got less pecker than Sandra Woodhouse!
Dougie was having trouble deciding, which was funnier, throwing raw cow shit, or listening to Brian’s petit-pecker comments.
By now, Ricky, Clayton, and I each had a full set of clothes on, not necessarily our own, but we really didn’t care at that point. We wandered back to town on the opposite side of the creek, which saved us from a physical altercation with the morons, but we were pelted with rocks and insults all the way back.
Mr. Hancock, the town manager, was hitching up a mower by the bridge, so we hung around him until Brian and Dougie wandered away to antagonize their next victims.
I avoided contact with Brian and Dougie for a week, but in a town the size of Arcola there is no getting away from anybody. Mom had given me a dollar and a half for a haircut, and I was heading to Mr. Wagner’s Barber Shop. Just as I was about to step up through the open doorway, Brian and Dougie emerged from the alley.
“Hello, my Short-Peckered Friend!”
Brian greeted me and gave me a shove as Dougie stuck out his boot. Dougie’s boot size and his IQ were in perfect harmony, but both were big enough to trip me up. My shoulder slammed into the open door of the barber’s shop.
Mr. Wagner emerged in the doorway, scissors in one hand and a broom in the other.
“What the Hell is going on here”?
Brian and Dougie scuttled back down the alley, and Mr. Wagner helped me inside. He finished up the only other customer in the shop and invited me into his chair.
“What was that all about”?
Mr. Wagner was a long-time family friend, so I felt comfortable telling him the whole story. He listened patiently, then gave me some of the best advice and encouragement I have ever had:
“Brian is an idiot, you aren’t. Other than that worthless piece of garbage he hangs around with, Brian doesn’t have any friends, you have many. Don’t let his poison contaminate you. Shake it off, don’t get bitter, you might even try to forgive the guy. He isn’t worth your time to think about him”.
“Rise above it, let it go”.
Mr. Wagner finished my haircut. When I pulled out my cash, he patted me on the head and told me, “It’s on the house”.
“Thanks Mr. Wagner, I feel better.”
As I made my way to the doorway, Mr. Wagner made one more comment. I don’t know why he chose to give a ten-year-old this advice, but he said:
“About that size thing, it’s not how deep you fish, you know, it’s how you…
… Wiggle Your Worm.
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