War Stories

Having taken inspiration from my friend Dan I’ve decided to tell you all a funny, little story from my own past. I assure you that this is all 100% factual except the names of the people I was with. These names have been changed to protect the guilty and to prevent me from being shot.          

On the evening of my 24^th birthday I came home from ‘work’ to find a couple of little bags packed and waiting by the front door. My x-wife ‘Maria,’ my friend ‘Tony’ and his spoiled and temperamental girlfriend ‘Gina’ were also there to greet me. All three were by the door expectantly and impatiently waiting to tell me about my brand spanking new birthday plans. My wife had booked a weekend at our favorite cabin in a small camping village called Cook’s forest. Now, I’ve always loved this place…..in the summer. I’ve never been much of a camper, but we were always able to get this beautiful 4 bedroom, 2 loft cabin with 2 huge fireplaces and a hot tub. There is nothing but deep woods, the sleepy Clarion River and unadulterated nature surrounding the place for miles.         

Not our cabin, but close. Cook's forest.

  

We had never been there before in the winter though, or even made the back country drive at night. Also, my birthday is on Feb. 22 which is a really bad winter month for Pittsburgh and verging on the apocalyptic if you drive north for an hour and a half. As we packed up the car and headed out it was already getting dark, had 3 inches of snow on the ground and more was dropping fast.  The stretch of route 28 which usually took an hour, this time took two.          

By now, it was pitch black (no streetlights) and foggy as hell with blizzard conditions. Every single road sign was covered beneath an inch of ice and 3 inches of snow. So, I got lost. Utterly and hopelessly lost. Lost like Pete Doherty’s soul. Lost like Paris Hilton’s virginity. Lost like Heather Mill’s leg. Really, really lost. Since there are no convenience stores or anything else along that route, I decided to stop at a well lit house to politely ask for directions.          

She may not be pure as the driven snow

  

I pulled into what I believed to be a driveway under all that snow, parked, got out and gently knocked on the door. I was greeted by a Norman Rockwell painting. A 60-ish man wearing a plaid pair of pajamas, slippers and smoking a pipe and his wife who was dressed in the matching outfit, minus the pipe but plus rollers in her blue hair answered the door. They looked flattered and honored that I had chosen them to ask for assistance.          

After the kindly grandmother apologized profusely for not having the foresight to turn on her driveway lights, she explained that it was entirely her fault that I had in fact driven over their lawn and parked in their summer flower bed. After I then apologized just as profusely myself and had finally gotten directions, we were to be on our way. Only problem was, that we were now stuck like the Balloon Boy dad in a lie.          

See, I had a 97 Blazer (all metal) in which the 4-wheel drive had went out on only the week before. So the elderly couple did what anybody in God’s county (Clarion) would do; they threw on some coats and came out to help push. As they began rocking the heavy SUV I began hitting the gas, praying intently that I could gain enough traction to avoid sleeping in a doily covered, plastic entombed, Faberge egg decorated house. As I do, I notice large chucks of mud, grass, frozen begonia, and frozen petunia shooting out from under my tires and covering their clothes, faces and hair. After a two minute struggle, I was finally free! As they came up to say goodbye, they were encrusted and dripping their lawn and garden from every square inch of their bodies. I sheepishly apologized yet again, and drove away.          

   .          

Within a half hour I was hopelessly lost once again, and in the middle of a wretched, white-outed version of hell. I drove for 20 more minutes without seeing one house, store, bar or even another vehicle. When I finally found a dilapidated trailer with lights on I had to stop. Otherwise we were all going to fucking die.          

Now, a quick side note about Tony; his dad was way high up in…..let’s call it the ‘bakers union.’ So he thought he was in the bakers union. He had all the swagger, accent, and attitude of someone in the bakers union, and he had baked some bread…made a pie or two, but he was NOT in the bakers union. At least not yet at that point. Anyway, he loved to bring his guns up to Cook’s forest to ‘practice.’ Also Tony and Gina had been sharing a trip to the bottom of a bottle of SoCo in the backseat and were well on their way to stupid.          

So, I pull up to this rusted out trailer, complete with the requisite two rusted out muscle cars up on blocks in the ‘yard,’ get out and once again gently knock on the door. After waiting for 30 seconds, and as I’m thinking of knocking a little louder, the door explodes outwards. I was quick enough to jump out of the way but slipped a little, recovered my balance in time to see a fucking sawed off shotgun pointed directly at my fucking face. This guy was straight out of Deliverance complete with a beard that would make ZZ Top jealous and about 4 ½ teeth, wearing overalls with patches.          

Close enough to Bubba

  

                                                                                                                                                                   

He says, “Oh, I thought you was a critter,” while still holding the gun steady at my grill. Just as he finally starts to lower it, Tony jumps out of the backseat, barely staying upright on the ice, with his loaded 9 millimeter pointed straight at Bubba the redneck. The only problem was that I was directly between the two psychos with guns. Of course, Bubba’s gun came straight back up at my face. Tony now screams with a slurred, shaky voice, “Put the fucking gun down you fucking freak.” Bubba did not respond, just held his gun unnervingly steady….at my face. Did I say that already?         

The scene then hit pause for between 15 seconds and 2 minutes, I couldn’t possibly say which. This was the first and only time that I’ve ever been between two weapons of bodily mass destruction and I have to admit that my grippers were all aquiver. After the indeterminate period of standoff, Gina bursts from the car like a rocket, almost causing me to drop a load right there. Whether it was to scream at Tony or further threaten Bubba, I’ll never know. As soon as her feet hit the ice she practically did a back flip, slamming her head against the open door jam, and knocking herself unconscious.        

          

I was like the chick in the middle

  

          

Thank Baby Jesus, because both guns came down simultaneously and Bubba even ran into the trailer to get a surprisingly clean dishtowel and a bag to pack with snow. After she came to, befuddled and angry, we determined (even Bubba chimed in with medical advise) that she had a minor concussion (correct) and would need 10 or 15 (turned out to be 7) stitches. With Tony dutifully holding the compress to her head, we drove back to Pittsburgh to spend most of the night in Alleghany General Hospital.          

That was my 24^th (and by far the worst) birthday.