the end of innocence

 "You should try losing some weight over the summer." she said to me. The "she" in question, was a serious babe, maybe the cutest girl in our sixth grade class. I probably made a joke, because then...as it is now, it was my go to defense mechanism. However, 24 years later I can still remember those words slashing their way into my psyche. It turns out that sixth grade is a very vulnerable time for kids emotionally. I was coming to grips with my appearance and growing ever more self-conscious. I was admittedly a little chunky, I had an affinity for Hostess cupcakes and was a year or two shy of a growth spurt that would allow me to shed my "baby fat". However, I was not so big as to warrant that particular comment from that particular girl. My perception was that I was fat, whether or not that was true is beside the point; perception is reality. I wonder if she remembers saying those words to me? I wonder if she ever thought how those words would echo in my head, and make me worry about whether or not people liked me or thought I was cool? The doubts, insecurities, and self loathing her words put in my head wreaked havoc on my self-confidence, the consequences of which I still deal with at age 36.

"Turn the other cheek." I was brought up in a religious family, and this adage was preached from the pulpit on Sundays. When I was in sixth grade me and my buddies used to walk around downtown Washington, IN after school. We would head to the White Steamer after school, where we would scarf down cheeseburgers prepared on a flat top grill that had been searing ground beef patties and grilled onions the same way for twenty plus years. We'd then walk around, hitting up Tater's music and movies, and The End Zone sporting goods store. We were killing time, not a worry in the world. One day another group of guys, a year or two older than us, was downtown too. In the unfair social hierarchy of the teenage world, these fellas were, to borrow a term from S.E. Hinton, Greasers. My friends and I were Socs.

One of the boys from their group was named Danny. He'd gone to our school a few years back, but moved away. He had apparently moved back to our little town. As they passed us on their bikes, I remarked to my buddy Bruce, "Hey that's Danny Dinosaur". We laughed. In third grade I got in a playground fight with Danny, probably because I called him Danny Dinosaur. This put-down seems comically unoffensive to me now. However, I'm sure the attitude with which I called him this pre-historic insult, was plenty hurtful. I won the fight then, if you can call it winning. When the teachers pulled us apart I was on top and strangling him with both hands.

I'm not sure if on that day downtown, he remembered our fight from third grade or not, but when he heard me say Danny Dinosaur again, it brought back that rage from our playground battle. His group cornered my group and he preceded to punch me twice in the face. The punches didn't hurt, but the sting of embarrassment was a much worse pain. 

I wanted to hit him back, but then I remembered, "Turn the other Cheek". If I could go back and tell my sixth grade self something, I'd tell myself "Hey after Danny throws that first punch... knock his ass out!" I'd warn myself about how not standing up to that bully, would create a ripple effect chipping away and sometimes hacking away at my self confidence. I'd apprise myself that if you don't fight this kid, you'll be scared to go to the movies on the weekends, or to the county fair, or to the 4th of July festival in the park. I'd tell myself that for the rest of your life you'll be constantly battling those feelings of fear that creep up inside you and make you shut down. "Sixth grade Josh, if you don't stand up to this punk now, you'll find that you become afraid to stand up for anything...it will mess you up for life."

Having learned to box, wrestle, and fight since 6th grade, I've decided that I will teach my kids to defend themselves. They will know to never start a fight, but if someone picks a fight...they will by god end it. "Turn the other cheek" is a great idea in theory...but in the real world it doesn't pass muster. In the real world, kids can be cruel. My son is learning this.

The other day my kids were all outside playing. Our house has a trampoline, playset, basketball goal, and a decently sized backyard, all of which create an enticing place for the neighborhood kids to come play. With eight kids playing in our backyard, it looked like recess at the Cecil house. Two of the neighborhood boys, both a year or two older than E, were from my observation, trying to play something. I wasn't sure what it was, but my instincts told me it was nefarious. As I continued to watch them, I noticed that they would run to a corner of our yard, or to the top of the playset, or to the trampoline. Whenever E attempted to join them, they would run away saying, "go away" or "leave us alone". Once I figured out that they were purposefully trying to exclude my son while playing in his yard, I got livid. Confronting the boys I explained that we don't exclude others in our yard, if they were going to continue this behavior they would be asked to leave. 

Reflecting on this incident now, it breaks my heart. E is such a sweet and innocent goofball of a kid. The interests of these older boys are, I'm sure, quite different than E's. While they've rounded the corner age-wise, where they're probably more into sports and less into Pokemon, E still enjoys the freedom of imaginary play. E doesn't understand that some kids don't think superheroes or Yoda are cool. When those boys attempted to run away from him and not let him be a part of their game, not only were they hurting his self esteem, they were destroying his innocence. He was learning that the world is not always nice, and sometimes kids are mean. 

I was learning that I will not always be able to protect my kids from a world that can often times be cruel. I could see the lightbulb going off in his eyes, illuminating the blissful darkness where the idealistic beliefs of, we're all friends and we can all get along and play together, sleep. It pains me. I don't want his self confidence to erode, and for him to be afraid of older kids, or of trying new things, or not being good enough. I struggle to learn those lessons today, because I did not learn them when I was young. I understand that it is my job as a father to instill that confidence in my kids. They must be brave enough to know, that even though the world around us can be cruel and unfair, they have the ability to live in it and change it for the better.

I'll leave you with one of my favorite poems, "If", by Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you   

    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,   

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

    But make allowance for their doubting too;   

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;   

    If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;   

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

    And treat those two impostors just the same;   

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

    And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

    And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

    To serve your turn long after they are gone,   

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,   

    Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

    If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,   

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,   

    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Ain't that a kick in the nut

The soccer ball was coming right at me, it's greenish-yellowish glow in the dark pentagons had me entranced like a deer gazing into the halogen glow of an oncoming car. The projectile was on course for my my groin, it was to be a direct hit in my boilermaker, my netherlands, the holiest of holies, twig and berries, meat and two veg, bollocks, cojones, the knackers, well...you get the idea. Upon contact I doubled over as the sensation moved from my nuggets and started wrenching my gut. My son, who launched the ball, gleefully exclaimed, "I kicked the ball in your nut!".

"It's plural son...nuts," my inner English teacher forced in reply, "at least for now." 

Lately my son has been obsessed with hitting and getting hit in the nuts. One of his little buddies accidentally kicked him in his...well...little buddies. As young boys often do, they both thought it was hilarious. I'm not sure when getting walloped in baggage claim goes from being funny to being intensely painful. However, seeing another guy taking a shot to the knapsack, or fall a good distance only to land straddling a beam of some sort, will always be a little funny.

"You shouldn't hit people there son." I was attempting to explain this unwritten man rule to the boy.

"Why not?" E asked through a beaming smile.

"When you grow up, it really hurts." I exhaled.

 I'm always amazed at how durable kids are. They seem so fragile that I'm sure I handle mine with too much care sometimes. However accidents do happen. Z bounced off of our trampoline and broke her arm not long ago. I reckon throughout my childhood, youth, and young adult life, I've been dinged in the danglers on many an occasion. It always hurts, sometimes more than others, but always, it hurts. That's part of growing up though, isn't it? Moments of hurt followed by recovery, followed by moving on. 

My father surprised us with a trampoline one summer, bringing it home for no apparent reason. I spent hours and hours practicing tricks and testing the limits of it's elasticity. Naturally, I held many a professional wrestling match against imaginary foes, in fact I was the world heavyweight champion of my imaginary professional wrestling organization. Not bad for a 5th grader. Anyone who has ever watched an episode of America's Funniest Videos knows that trampolines are ripe with comedic potential. Comedy based on, as most comedy is, pain. I once over-rotated on a front flip and as I sprang forward from a failed landing I crashed, throat first against the frame of the trampoline. The speed at which I hit the cold steel caused me to feel like I dislodged my Adam's Apple. I couldn't talk or breath for what seemed like minutes. It hurt, but I recovered and moved on. 

There is a vague memory somewhere in my mind of the time I ran my arm through the window pane of our front door. At the time, I couldn't have been more than 5 or 6. I recall being excited that my favorite cartoon was on, I was purposely overreacting to the news to get a laugh out of the babysitter or a neighbor. I ran to the door, knowing that because it was an old door I would need the extra leverage that pushing against the window pane would give me, to get the door to open. The pane, being equally as old as the door, succumbed to my weight. As the glass shattered my arm went through and got snagged on a shard of glass. I now have a 3 inch scar to remind me of the impatience of my youth. It hurt, but I recovered and moved on.

There is pain sometimes so crippling and intense, one wonders if healing is even possible. My grandfather, Emerson Stevens, who my first son is named after, passed away when I was fairly young. I have scattered memories along a broken timeline of him. In the summers I loved to ride around the fairgrounds with him in an old golf cart, as we delivered cans of soda to volunteers who were helping park cars or direct traffic. He would let me have as many Red Creme Sodas, as I could finish on our excursions. He took me to see, Dick the Bruiser at my first professional wrestling event at that fair. In my grandparents living room, where my family would often gather to eat popcorn and watch the IU Hoosiers play ball, he used to playfully pin me to the ground, using only his corduroy-slip-on-shoe covered feet, wrestling me from his rocking chair.  He used to get a kick out of setting off firecrackers underneath used coffee cans as all the grandchildren screamed and covered their ears. In my mind's eye he was big, strong, and slightly imposing. I always looked up to him. 

As I said, I was young when he passed away and the memories of his passing all run together in a water color painting of hospital visits and a funeral. I do remember being to scared to go into his hospital room one last time to say goodbye. Seeing my family weeping around his bedside was too much for me, I couldn't make sense of it all, and so, fear got the better of me.

I can't say for certain if he was in pain as he was dying, I was too young to remember. But, I do recall the pain my grandmother felt watching her husband's condition deteriorate. Her anguish was palpable even to my young senses. The Sunday after grandpa's death I sat next to grandma in the pew at Second St. Church of Christ. The service was over, and the preacher was making his announcements. As he told the church that Emerson Stevens passed away and explained the details of the funeral and visitation, I began to cry. Next to me, my grandma began sobbing and out of the corner of my eye I could see her shoulders bobbing up and down. I remember she put her arm around me and hugged me close to her, as much for her comfort as mine. She said, "We'll be alright." As much to convince herself as me. 

For months after grandpa was gone, my parents, brother, and I would go to Bloomington to visit and make sure she was doing alright. When we would leave to go home, she would walk out to the driveway to see us off. I can still see her waving goodbye as we pulled away, barely capable of holding back the tears, voice cracking as she pleaded for us to come back soon. It was her pain, seeping out of wounds that life left behind. She was scared of being alone, how could she not be? For over fifty years she had shared her life with the man she loved. That kind of relationship between two people creates a fertile soil for a pain that few will experience. A pain rooted in love and loss. Even considering the pain that grandpa's death caused her, I know grandma wouldn't trade her life with him for anything this world could offer. 

And so, life moves irrevocably forward and it has be twenty-plus years since I last saw my grandfather. 

Grandma will turn 98 this year. She has lived well in the years since she lost her husband. She worked into her 80's, at one point working as an activities director at nursing home helping to care for residents much younger than she. Perhaps to find solace after grandpa's death, she picked up a paintbrush and began to paint vibrant oil paintings. As it turns out, she is an immensely talented artist. She still lives at home by herself, in the house where she and grandpa built a remarkable life and raised a family. 

She hurt, but she recovered, and she moved on. 

below is a link to a news article the Bloomington Herald Times featured on my grandma.

"Home is Where Her Hobbies Are"

Grandma at her home on Moffet Lane.