So I think I mislead people with my last pulse in which I said, Closed until further notice. Well I will offer all of you a piece of advice. Never...ever...EVER do any project that involves hammering while wearing sandals or no shoes. I dropped a hammer on my big toe. It hurt like a female dog but what made things worse was when I saw all the blood under the nail. I got freaked and poked at it and realized that my nail was smashed. I removed my big toenail with a flat-head screwdriver. It took a little bit to get the bleeding to stop but now my toe is all cleaned up sans nail. I guess this means no more sandals for the summer. I don't want to get infected and have to get my toe lopped off resulting in me not being able to keep balanced.
Now that we got that out of the way....
Gather around kiddies, Uncle Mateo is about to tell you the legend of Ol' One Nut. It all started in the little sleepy town of Wonewoc eons ago. It was a spring afternoon. I remember it being late spring because we were running around the playground after school had let out and we weren't wearing jackets and we were on the playground trying to figure out how many days of school were left.
We were all latch-key children and we had nothing better to do than to play on the playground. Looking back, it wasn't directly after school had dismissed but maybe an hour or so later, just around the time parents would arrive home from work. I didn't live in Wonewoc but my grandmother lived across the street from the school. I was waiting for my mom to arrive so we could begin work in my grandmother's garden.
A group of us had a assembled. There was Jo-Jo, the Incredible Hulk, Jared (who would become One Nut), Nick, the African Dream (not racist because he was born in Africa), and there seems to be a few others whose names escape me because of my old age. I think it is also imperative that I mention that if I was telling these stories orally, I would say "parentheses". (Just for your files)
After the discussion ended about when the school year finished, we involved ourselves in a rollicking game of ball tag. Not the ball tag I was introduced to in high school where a guy would back hand slap your testicles and say "You're it." No this game of ball tag involved a rubber ball thrown at excessive speeds in order to make an indirect object "it". When a person would become "it" and the ball was rolling on the ground, those who were not "it" would hurl boastful insults at the person who was "it". In once such occurrence is when Jared became Ol' One Nut.
I couldn't tell you who became "it" but I remember that Jared jumped on the playground's tire swing to hurl his hyperbole at the person who had been declared "it" by consensus of ball striking their body. Jared jumped on a tire swing similar to this:
I do not know these children and they are not mine. It is paramount that you see what this tire swing looks like for my story to continue. I will wait while you study the photo....OK, Jared ran to the tire swing but didn't sit in it properly. He wrapped his legs around one of the chain link connectors. Jared started with his exultant bellowing but soon that bellowing turned to cries of agony.
Jared was wearing basketball shorts and in those days when Uncle Mateo was a child, basketball shorts rarely exceeded in length below the knees like nowadays. Jared's shorts rode up his leg and his scrotum was attached to the chain link. He screamed and screamed. I still hear his pain all these years later. He couldn't get loose as we stood around in disbelief at his predicament. Soon we began questioning which adult we should get help from. Jared didn't want to get in trouble so with one swift movement he tore himself free. Yes, he tore himself free. When he had secured freedom, the blood flowed along with other things. He grabbed his crotch and took off like a lightning bolt from his home. None of us moved except Jo-Jo. She went closer to examine Jared's remains. She started crying as she picked up the remnants of Jared's testicle. She carried it home. Kiddies, did I fail to mention that Jo-Jo was Jared's younger sister?
Jared was absent from school the next day but Jo-Jo told a remarkable tale. She said that when Jared arrived home he duct taped and bandaged his wounded scrotum but he didn't do a good enough job. When their mother arrived home, she saw a noticeable amount of blood on Jared's shorts. He began crying and Jo-Jo said what had happened and showed her mother the testicle that she had placed in a glass inside the refrigerator. They rushed to the hospital but it was too late.
And that is why I never play on tire swings and how Ol' One Nut got his nickname. Looking back at it, One Nut was a mean nickname for a kid to have in high school but students were kind since One Nuts' surname is Smallwood.
Hmmm...I will have to save the story of a real Wisconsin wedding for another time.
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