Cope With What?

Remember assemblies? Assemblies were fine in elementary school but I mainly thought of them as a bore. In high school I liked them because they meant getting out of class. As I’m thinking back, it seems like we had a fair amount of assemblies from grades nine to twelve. I don’t know what they were all about. I recall one about investing, one with local political candidates, and of course the annual Remembrance Day ones. I don’t remember what the one featured in this story was about either, if I’m being honest. Nonetheless, today’s story took place at an assembly.

I did not have to be reminded of this story. It’s just one of those moments that stays with you for part of your life. I don’t know why I was reflecting on it recently, but I do know why I remember it. It’s because I remember almost every time in my life I’ve felt scorned. Guilt is a powerful thing. On this particular day, I felt I had been scorned by my friend Otto; a man I still respect as much as I did then.

I believe the assembly was about music. The man talking on stage was holding a microphone and flipping through a powerpoint. I remember him being enthusiastic and the presentation being somewhat captivating.  He reached a point where he spoke about mental health, and about how music can help to maintain it. 

He said: “Stand up if you ever use music to cope.”

Almost everyone in the theatre stood. I was the only one sitting in the direct vicinity. Otto was in the seat directly behind me. Now standing, he kicked the back of my chair. 

“C’mon, Benny.” He sighed.

“What?” I shrugged.

“You don’t use music to cope at all?”

“Cope with what?”

Otto just shook his head. I started to stand begrudgingly, but then the speaker told everyone to sit back down.

How naive. How teenaged. I don’t remember anything else from that day but I have thought about that exchange a lot. I stayed seated because I could not conceive there was situations in my life that I needed to cope with — or I wouldn’t admit it in that auditorium. I also thought that listening to music was not a means to manage difficult circumstances. I was wrong on both counts, and I was stubborn. Otto, along with almost everyone else, knew that the speaker’s question was only superficially interactive; it might as well have been rhetorical. We all have something to deal with, we all do effectively deal with those things eventually, and a large number of us use music to keep us coping. 

As I am now completing a trying chapter of my life — a chapter vastly more recognized than my high school years — I don’t want to forgive myself for being a younger man on that day. I wish I could have grasped the challenges I would face in my life. With that, I could have learned real gratitude much earlier.

You're welcome,

B.F. Greenough, aka,

Chief Hanky, The Stupid Sitter

p.s.   I was, am, and always will be coping. Coping is living, by definition. Also, my connection with music has grown to become deeply personal and spiritual — like everyone's. It just took longer.

Symptoms of a Dragon's Bite

I make a point of excluding stories on this blog that only exist because the subjects of the story were drunk. Although I love telling a handful of famous drunken stories face-to-face, I don’t write them here for a few reasons. First, everyone does ridiculous things when they are drunk; the anecdotes collected here are about the characters and their choices, not the ethanol in their bloodstreams. Second, drunken stories are almost solely enjoyable to listen to when you know the person — their usual boundaries and conduct, and how they subverted them on this occasion. Lastly, stories with drinking or drugs can just be debased and inauthentic. The story below is an exception to this rule. Not because it’s “just so good I had to tell it”, but more because the alcohol isn’t an overwhelming attribute of the story. Also, it was one of my first times drinking ever, so there’s an innocence in that. 

There was a guy at my school who’s parents must have abandoned him for a period, because in grade 9 or 10, because he hosted a series of parties that gathered some notoriety. Multiple weekends in a row, his house was the place to be. No “backyard only” or “stay in the basement” limits either, this was free rein, main floor madness. I might have had gym class with him, but I didn’t know the guy that well. It didn’t matter though, because like the shoe policy at his house, the guest list was pretty lax.

I had missed the first or second party, so when word got out he was continuing his streak, my friend Nick and I assured that we would be there. We covered our bases and split the fee of getting a senior student to buy alcohol for us. I remember it clearly because this was the first time I was paying someone to get booze for me, instead of just bumming some off my older brother or my friends. And apparently my older brother was unavailable because our benefactor ended up being a man whom to this day I still know only as Doug the Dragon. Doug got his moniker because of a less-than-exceptional tattoo on his calf of a dragon coiled up. He asked us what we wanted and we said beer, because that’s what you say. He asked us how much we wanted and we said enough for two of us to drink plus some leftovers. He said he would bring it to the party. That worked for us.

When Friday night came, Nick and I were unsurprisingly some of the first people to show up. We had to do that awkward thing of waiting on the couches until people started arriving, plus we had no drinks. Luckily, our friends weren’t far behind and the house filled up before long. Still, at that age, it is essentially a crime to not have a drink in your hand at a party. Nick and I were questioned repeatedly by our increasingly drunk peers to the point where I picked up a discarded bottle with some remnants in the bottom just to appear inconspicuous. Doug the Dragon was late. He was starting to look like a bad choice of supplier until we finally saw him from across the room. We hurried over, paid him, and he handed us a 24 pack of pilsner in bottles. Shit. Nick and I were both biking home, and bottles were heavier and louder than we wanted. That wasn’t our primary concern though — we had some catching up to do. We shoved the case of beer in a corner, put back as many as we could and had a great night. 

Nick ended up leaving earlier than I did. He took his half of the leftover beers; what remained after our binge and what some classmates must have stolen. I didn’t last much longer than him, but when I decided it was time for my ten minute ride home, I was a little more unsteady than I would have liked. That was okay though, it was all downhill. I loaded the 7 bottles into my string-tie backpack and got on my way. It was easy. No problems. Until I had to actually peddle the last section to my house. The delay in reaction time was a real issue as I went to correct a wobble and steered too hard in the opposite direction. I crashed hard into the pavement. My backpack flung over my shoulder, smashing the bottles within, leading to glass cutting through the thin fabric, and ultimately slicing my arms in a couple places. Inebriation symptom #1: instability. 

My primary concerns after the fall were to make sure my bike was alright — it was, and to see how many of my prized pilsners I had left — three. Not great, but I loved that bike so I was happy it was unmarked. I was bleeding rather profusely, but I didn’t feel it at all. I returned the pilsners to the ruined backpack, carried it in my hand for the rest of the bike, and left behind a pile of bloodied glass on the side of the road. Inebriation symptom #2: insensitivity. 

At home, I stowed my bike in the garage, typed in the door code and went upstairs to bed. I responsibly decided to brush my teeth before going to sleep, and it was a good thing I did; it took seeing my arms in the mirror to realize I was still bleeding and some droplets had fallen on the bathroom floor. I cleaned these up, dabbed at my wounds, and made sure to use a flashlight to check my path inside the house. All clean. No problem. Until morning, when I awoke to the paralyzing sound of my father calling my name. I hopped out of bed, and met him at the bottom of the stairs where he was simply pointing at the floor of the foyer, angry. There were a number of dried blood droplets on the carpet. He moved his finger up to the stairs I had just descended to reveal more of the same. I missed all of those the night before. Inebriation symptoms #3&4: anticoagulation and stupidity.

Just walk home, folks.

You’re welcome,

B.F. Greenough, aka,

Chief Hanky, The Bleeding Boozer

"On the day of my grandfather's funeral..."

On the day of my grandfather's funeral, my brother and I got in a street race... kind of.

We called him Bobby -- my granddad on my mother's side. He was a great man. He died when he was 82, and I was 15. That means my brother was 17. I remember it clearly for many reasons, including the event below, and also because it was my first (and so far, only) close family death. I have been lucky in that respect of my life.

As a warning, this story is not as humorous as my others, as you might already see, but don't worry, I'm not recounting all the somber details.

Bobby was cremated. In actuality, the funeral had already happened and it was a powerfully sad gathering. Following it, I believe on a different day altogether, Bobby's ashes were stored in a columbarium. My brother Lucas, myself, my aunts and uncles were all present for the less formal, shorter proceeding in the cemetery. My brother drove the two of us separately, so when the actual storing of the ashes was done, we could depart early from the lingering in the courtyard. 

A couple blocks from the cemetery, at a major intersection red light, Lucas and I pulled up beside a worn Volkswagen Golf in my brother's even more worn Subaru Outback hatchback. Lucas and I were wearing suits and ties, and we were talking about Bobby. I believe it was a Sunday morning because traffic was light, but still the red light lasted long enough for tensions to rise. As I looked to my left, past my brother in the driver seat, I could see a couple of youths, perhaps a boy and his girlfriend in the front seats of the Golf. They had a younger sibling in the back seat too. They were visibly amused by us. Presumably our clothes, or our car, or the combination. I told Lucas, and he looked over to them. They made some immature gestures -- the younger sibling in the rear window was equally delinquent, making a face. My brother and I mutually decided they were shit heads, and it was known by all parties we would race off the line.

Green light.

Now, as old as my brother's Subaru may have been, it was a standard transmission while the Golf was not. Also, our fucking grandpa just died, so this was for Bobby. We raced aggressively beside the Golf through the intersection and down the hill on the other side. We were neck and neck until my brother seemingly quit the child's play and we dropped those shits. We pulled in front of them and continued to floor it. I looked back while my brother triumphantly raised a finger in farewell. Fuck 'em.

I miss you Bobby.

You're welcome,

B.F. Greenough, aka,
Chief Hanky, The Mourning Master

Intimidation, Sec. 423 (1)(e)

I have heard some of the dumbest things of my life come from mouths of my friend group, myself included. We seem to be a free gumball-machine of idiotic ideas, that breaks open once there is more than two of us together. The proposition and resultant events told below are no exceptions to this trend. The neat thing about dumb ideas though, is that they have a really great return rate for fantastic stories.  When faced with a moronic opportunity, it's dangerous how much the potential for a great story can tip the scales.  That's why when James suggested one night that we follow other cars on the road for as long as we could, it was hard to see anything but laughs as a payoff.

Have you ever been driving in front of another car and just as you are about to take a turn, the car behind you turns his signal on too? And then he's with you for another turn? And another? You think, "is this guy following me?", and just as it's about to get suspicious, he pulls into a driveway and it's over. Or what about the other way around? You are behind a car and happen to be going where they happen to be going, it seems, at least for a few turns. Then the invasive thought comes: "what would happen if I followed this car all the way to their destination?" This line of thinking seemed to be the origin for James's proposed entertainment one evening. The four of us who heard the idea took little convincing to give it a shot.

Five of us loaded into James's minivan at around 8:30pm on a week night. We left from another friend's house and got onto a main road to find our first "leader". An innocent black sedan. We followed him for six or seven turns until we ended up at his house, where he simply got out of his car and went inside. We realized we weren't noticed. The third attempt would rectify this, because as for our second attempt, all we did was repeatedly turn our blinker on falsely before continuing to follow the driver. We were successful on our sequential attempts because we honked at the victims early in the tailing. I want to remind you, this was incredibly stupid.

There were three successful tailings. The first was the least climatic as once we realized the leader knew we were following him, he performed some quick turns in an unfamiliar neighbourhood and lost us -- good on him. The second and third were stressful events. In the second, the driver sped up to 80km/hr on a city street attempting to evade us. We matched his speed and actually ended up in the next township. He turned onto a side road and performed a U-turn, doubling back on us. As you might imagine, there was much debate happening in the van at this moment. What do we do? James's heart was pumping. "Just wait." His window was down as he yelled at us, but we left ours up. Silence in our car. He stopped to see if we would leave. "Shit, man." We followed him as he got back on the main road, before deciding to let him go. Phew.

Now the third -- incredible. After less than a minute of recognizing the tail, the driver came to a dead stop on a major street -- so we did too. "Whoa." He reversed quickly. "Reverse! Go go go!" We matched him. The road was quiet at this time of night. He came to a stop once more, and exited the vehicle. "Jesus!" someone said in the car. He was screaming at us. There was nervous laughter from all of us. We did nothing. He sped off and we followed once more. He entered a plaza parking lot and actually got behind us. This was very smart, as we were already tense, and now we were actually being followed. So we fled. "Fuck this." He left us be after only a couple turns, and that was the night. "Yeah, we're not doing that again." Good idea. It was ridiculous. A creative way to entertain ourselves, but in all the wrong ways.

I have since learned that what we did that night is called Intimidation, and it is illegal -- to no one's surprise.

You're welcome (and sorry),

B.F. Greenough, aka,
Chief Hanky,  The Dumb Driver