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ANOTHER EXCERPT FROM "CABBAGES AND KINGS" I had no business in Spanish Class. I could barely navigate through English, and Spanish seemed so...well...foreign. I hadn’t even had any Mexican food. I thought that a burrito was a small mule, and that a chimichanga was some rare breed of dog. By the end of the first semester, all that I could boast was one phrase that I could throw around with some assured conviction. “Usted es muy loco in la cabeza!” I tried to imagine certain potential situations when this phrase might be useful. Perhaps I might someday travel to old Mexico, and be stopped by the Federales. They would ask for my papers, seeking some identification and explanation of my presence in their fair land. I, mustering all of the Spanish that I knew, would reply with conviction. “You are very crazy in the head!” It always lost something in the translation. I could think of few situations when this assertion would work in my favor. But, it was the best that I had and I struggled forward as best I could. So, an unwelcome chill rippled down my spine when I was greeted with the news that Mrs. Cozza wanted to see me after school. I had many teachers. Mr. Riggin, running around with closely cropped hair and a whistle around his neck, insisting that people climb ropes and throw balls at one another. Mr. Leader, who breathed life into every historical event, and made it exciting to just be a player on the stage of the world. Mrs. Rupel, who considered me a future Faulkner or Hemingway. I could get away with anything with her if I would simply write her a story or two. But, Mrs. Cozza. Now that was another situation all together. She had been Miss Cody when I first heard of her. You had to be something special to be heard about all the way down in Elementary School. What you heard about Miss Cody was what nightmares were made of. She was a no nonsense, stern, demanding and exacting teacher. A far cry from what we had cut our teeth on. Those soft souls who had read to us while our little heads lay on our desks. No, Miss Cody was something else indeed. By the time I arrived in her Spanish Class, she was Mrs. Cozza. The new domestic station had done little to change her demeanor. Beneath her short cropped bangs lurked what I recognized to be, even in those pre-Jaws days, dark, cold shark eyes. She used them to scan the class each morning, seeking some unwary prey to invite to the blackboard to translate and conjugate some elaborate Spanish sentence. She was even foolish enough to choose me from time to time, but soon gave up that pursuit, finding it to be infinitely more trouble than it was worth. I found her sitting at her desk, dispensing F’s with a sharpened red pencil like a croupier deals cards in Vegas. She glanced up and nodded, directing me to the single chair that sat nearby. For a brief moment, I thought that I might try to save the moment. Perhaps a recitation in the language that she loved to teach. “Usted es muy loco en la cabeza.” Nope. Still not the time or place to use my phrase. Finally, she moved the stack of corrected papers aside and smiled. I had never really seen her do that. It was a smile that included both her mouth and eyes. It transformed her for a moment into something that I hadn’t considered her to be. A human being. “Dale, I really like you,” she said. I glanced around the room, afraid that any moment Allen Funt might burst from the storage cabinet nearby announcing that I should smile since I was on Candid Camera. I nodded foolishly, like a puppy that had somehow escaped having his nose rubbed in a pee stained carpet. “I think your skits are hilarious. You really know how to make people laugh.” I tried to think of something to say. Nothing came. Not in English or Spanish. She slid a record book across her desk, sliding her fingers down the row of names. She stopped at mine. “Dale, you have a D minus in this class.” My eyes dropped. I was sure that I had brought it up to a straight D! “You’re a smart kid,” she continued. “You know, language just isn’t some people’s thing.” She pulled the book back and deposited it in her desk. “There’s no way that you’re going to survive this year in here. I wanted to talk to you about it ahead of time. I don’t want to see you flunk. I think it’s time to seriously consider transferring to another class for the rest of the year. I knew what she meant. There was only one place that you could go this late in the game. Others had done it. Some had done it a lot. You could head for the block building behind the school and add another Ag credit to your educational quiver. I was already taking one Ag class, but that wasn’t a hindrance. Some guys are taking four and five Ag classes a day. Mr. Halstrom was always more than willing to welcome another future farmer. There were hundreds of weeds to identify and slow moving animals to catch and castrate. I had learned from experience earlier in life that it’d take more than a few classes to make a farmer out of me. It wasn’t in my genes. Not even close. It was a strange day indeed when my dad and I had decided to go into the rabbit business. We really didn’t know why we chose such an avocation. We didn’t know anyone in the rabbit business. We didn’t even know anyone who owned a rabbit. But, once the idea was formed, it could not be shaken. We began by constructing a Rabbit house to contain the many hutches that would be needed to house our herd...or whatever you call a big bunch of rabbits. This was a monumental undertaking in and of itself since neither one of us had ever really driven a nail before. I suppose in some prehistoric past my dad might have picked up a hammer or something, but not even he could clearly remember the moment or the circumstances. Yet, with wild abandon we began measuring, ordering lumber, and building walls that would be ultimately erected and covered with a high pitched roof. Although it leaned slightly, the project was completed in record time. After all, we surmised, a major tower in Italy had leaned for centuries, and people traveled from all over the world to see it. I must admit that no one to my knowledge ever came to take a picture of our rabbit house, but it was still a landmark of sorts for the Freeman clan. Then, after studying countless magazines on the subject, we began to order purebred rabbits from all over the world. New England Whites from...I guess...New England. Dutch from... Well, you get the idea. Soon they arrived, and after being welcomed and named, they were placed in their new home so that they might get acquainted with each other. Get acquainted they did. Soon our ten rabbits became twenty and then there were forty, and eighty, and then one hundred. It was at that moment, as we unloaded several more hundred pound bags of rabbit pellets from the back of the Nash, that we began to consider exactly what we were going to do with the menagerie. We had begun the venture with a vague idea that we could provide cuddly bunnies to loving children at Easter time. But the bunnies didn’t stay little long enough, and Easter didn’t roll around often enough, and there didn’t appear to be that many loving rabbit seeking children in our part of the world. One hundred and three rabbits. All named, well fed and producing offspring at an alarming rate. A guy that dad worked with, a funny little man by the name of Rand, expressed an interest one day in taking a lot of them off our hands. He made an offer, and dad accepted. The next evening he drove up, took a baseball bat from the trunk of his car, grabbed one by the ears, and hit it in the back of the head. “Mom,” I reported with more than a little anguish. “Mr. Clinton just hit Mr. Mopsy in the back of the head!” Before she could get to him, he had similarly dispatched Minnie, Myrtle, Mazie, Max and kind old Missy Molly. He was just working into the k’s when he was stopped by my mother and told to retreat. “This isn’t going to work,” she told him. “We’re going to have to do something else with them.” He relented, taking his dinner with him. That night, dad found another man who came the following day and trucked them all away. Few questions were asked. But, I believe that they were taken to a wondrous place where they were allowed to live out their lives in serene comfort. A place where any good rabbit would like to end his years. I believe this. I really, really do. Then, with an empty rabbit house, we decided that we needed some other form of livestock. So, we took our trusty hammers, and with new found enthusiasm began the process of remodeling the structure into a tiny barn. When our new guest arrived, he came in the form of a slight, sickly, runt of the litter white calf with big black spots and bigger eyes. We nursed him back to health, feeding him several times daily from a baby bottle. We named him Moo. Why? Because while all other cows cried “Mooooooooo”, he would simply look at you and say in a toneless and matter of fact fashion...”Moo.” A beast of few words. Direct and to the point. Little Mr. Personality. He became a dear friend who loved to be scratched beneath his chin. He would follow us everywhere, romping and playing in the pasture behind our house. He continued to eat and grow as all living creatures are prone to do, and finally it occurred to us that we needed to do something with him. He had outgrown his little barn, and the pasture for that matter. We certainly knew we couldn’t hurt him or anything. So, my dad met someone who agreed to come and take Moo away. I don’t know what happened to him. I suspect that he was taken to a lush green pasture, where he was allowed to live out the remainder of his days in comfort and good health. When I think of him to this day, I still assume that he is there someplace, saying “Moo” and occasionally remembering the boy who loved him and cared for him so faithfully and so well. I believe this. I really, really do. No, there would be no making of Freeman farmers. Mr. Halstrom was a fine teacher, but he had met his match with us. But, the business at hand was simply that. Business. There was the matter of a report card and credits to be confronted. “Well?” Mrs. Cozza leaned back in her chair. “What do you say?” “I’m sure that I can talk to Mr. Halstrom and add another Ag class,” I smiled. It was agreed. I would identify weeds, watch old movies on animal husbandry, learn about topsoil and be absent on the day they slaughtered the hog. It would be one of life’s concessions. One of the necessities that comes our way from time to time. But, I still can’t speak any Spanish. And I’m still not a farmer. |
Copyright ©2001 Dale Freeman. All rights reserved.