Two years earlier, the Principal explained to my dad he couldn’t do anything until there was an actual fight. My broken spirit and glasses didn’t matter. There was nothing he could do. On the ride home Dad never looked away from the road. He said he had taught me what to do my entire life and it was time to do it. You don’t always know what you are going to get when you let the dog off the chain.
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Early Thursday morning, Dad dropped me off. He wouldn’t be back until Monday night. I wouldn’t go back to school until Tuesday. This is great, I thought. Old Man Billy’s farm was all the fun a teenage boy could create. Would I drive the tractor? Cut up trees with a chainsaw? Work in the wood shop? Ride horses along the fence line? See how stocked the feed pond was and do some fishing?
Nope, apparently getting kicked out of school for the third time was not cause for a vacation. Billy walked me out to the chicken coop. This was a commercial coop and it was 66’ X 600.’ The top had been taken off and there was about 4” of chicken poop covering the entire slab. He handed me a flat headed shovel and told me to grab a wheelbarrow from the other barn. After I got back, he pointed up the hill about 75 yards to his “garden,” an area about one and a half times bigger than the chicken coop. Fill the wheelbarrow and spread it evenly across the entire patch. Too much in one area burns the plants, he said.
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Mike and I didn't get along. No particular reason, we just didn’t. Generally, after a fight, respect is earned and friendships are formed. Not with Mike and me. We had fought four times and the tension was always there. Always simmering and ready to boil over at the slightest provocation. So far he had beaten the snot out of me three times. I had won once. Neither of us would back down.
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I shoveled shit and pushed it up the hill. I learned to turn my feet sideways up the hill or I’d slip and fall between the handles of the wheelbarrow, dumping it backwards and its contents down the back of my shirt. After two or three hours of being bathed in crap, you barely notice the smell any more. I learned not to over fill the wheelbarrow. It made everything a hot mess.
When the sun got low, Billy came and inspected my work. He stuck his thumbs in his overalls and nodded his head at my progress. “Ma made us supper. I guess you can knock off for the day. Before you come in you gotta hose off.”
Me: “Like take a shower?”
Billy wrinkling up his face. “Naw. You can’t come in the house like that. Hose off with an actual hose.”
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Me: “I wouldn’t call me that again.”
Mike: “Why? You’re a pizza face.”
Me: “That’s two.”
Mike: “What are you going to do about it, pizza face?”
Me: “That’s three. I don’t have to warn you again.”
Mike, making a song: “Pizza, pizza, pizzzzzza, pizzaface.”
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Billy’s & Margaret seven children had grown and left the farm years ago. But Margaret still cooked for nine. Billy might have worked me like a slave, but as a growing 13 year old I was about to even the score. I could eat. Billy nodded his head again after dinner, “Well Ma, I think it’s the first time in years we won’t be eating leftovers tomorrow. Boy, you better clean that slab off as clean as the plate.”
They didn’t watch TV. I don’t think they owned a TV. My entertainment options after supper were bed or bed. I chose to go to bed.
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Me: “OK. I’m kicking your ass.”
I said it with the same enthusiasm I felt when I was told by Mom that I had to stop watching TV to do the dishes.
I slid my chair back and walked back three desks quickly.
I’m sure he thought nothing would happen and I was going to challenge him to a fight after school. But Mr. Stahlman had left the class unattended.
I took my glasses off and put them on the desk behind me and told him to stand up.
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Sunrise Friday. Shovel, push uphill, spread. Repeat.
Try to eat every last bit of food in their house.
After dinner I boasted I was going to eat all their food.
Billy took me out to the carport. It had three chest freezers. He showed me the first one. It was basically full of pork to the top. The second one contained beef to the brim. The third one had chicken and everything else that needed to be frozen.
I, in fact, had no chance of eating all his food. But I was going to try.
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He laughed and said “Pizza Face” again.
I pushed him out of his desk. As he stood up we started throwing punches with the desk between us.
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Sunrise Saturday & Sunday.
Shovel, push uphill, spread. Repeat.
Eat all the food.
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Our other fights involved some sort of strategy. Not today. We both just stood there in the middle of class winging punches. He fell backwards and I jumped over the desk to finish.
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Finally, Monday I finished clearing off the slab. We spent the afternoon walking around the farm and exploring the barns, looking at all his antique equipment, cars, and motorcycles.
I asked him what he does when he turns over a brood of chickens and I’m not here to clean off the slab.
Billy: “Well, we fire up the bobcat over there and scrape it off and put it in a trailer. Takes about 15 minutes.”
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Five days of shoveling shit put the chain back on the dog and convinced me that getting kicked out of school again was not an option for years.
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