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| A Sunny Tomorrow |
My mom calls me Fearless Freddie. She says I would go bear hunting with a switch, but I‘m not going to do that. If I caught a bear, he would have to sleep with me in my bed and I think he would take up too much room. Besides that, he would get hair in my bed. Sleeping with his hair in my bed would itch, like my neck does when I get a haircut. I hate getting haircuts. I do a lot of things that make Mom angry. I don‘t mean to make her angry. She thinks I do those things because I am not afraid of anything. Really, I do them because I want to make things nice for her and my dad.
Like the time my dad got a new lawnmower. He was proud of it. I don‘t know who painted it, but they didn‘t do a very good job. It was red all over. Only one color? I thought it would look better with more colors on it, so I painted it.
I used the spray paint I found in the garage. It was a really pretty blue. I ran out of paint before I finished painting the lawnmower, so I got another can. The paint in that can was black.
It wasn‘t as pretty, but it was better than all red. When that paint ran out, I used another one. The paint in that can was yellow. It ran out too, but I didn‘t have any more cans. I stood back and looked at my work. I did a good job. The lawnmower looked much better now that it had more than one color on it. I went in the house and with a big smile on my face said, ―Mom, come see what I did for dad.‖
She came in the garage and looked at the lawnmower. She didn‘t smile but her eyes got real big. She breathed deep one time and said, ―Oh my goodness. I don‘t think your dad is going to like that.
When my dad got home she told him to go out in the garage and see what I did. From the way my mom told him, I was kind of scared. She didn‘t tell him all happy and excited. She told him in that voice she uses when she said, ―Look what your son did. I don‘t know why she calls me Dad‘s son when she is angry with me.
Dad took me out in the garage and I showed him the lawnmower.
He said, ―What did you do?‖ I said, ―I made it pretty for you.
He didn‘t like it. I guess he only likes red. He made me help him clean it with some stinky stuff he called paint remover. I was crying while we were cleaning it. Not because of the stinky stuff, but because my dad was upset with me. See if I ever paint something for him again.
One day my friend, Dustin and I didn・t finish our math work before recess so the teacher made us stay in while the other kids went out to play.
After they left, Dustin said, "I have a whole ball of string in my backpack. Do you want to see it?"
I did. When he got it out to show me he dropped it. It rolled on the floor under a chair. When we tried to get it out, it got tangled around the led of the chair. Then I got a really good idea. I always get really good ideas.
I told Dustin, "We should see how far the string will go around the room under the chairs."
So we started at the first chair and wrapped the string around the chair legs, then we went to the next chair. We did that all around the room except we skipped our chairs. Then, we sat down and finished our math assignment. When the other kids came back, the one that sits in the back pulled out his chair first. All the chairs in the room fell backwards. It made a horrendous crash. It must have scared the teacher because she started breathing real hard and her nose kept puffing out like a horse.
Finally she said, "Go to the principal's office--now!"
I heard her say that, but it didn't sound like her. Her voice sounded like a man's voice. I hope she wasn't sick. The principal called our parents and told them what we did. They didn't think it was a very good way to spend our recess. I tried to tell them it was a spearmint to see how far the string would go, but they said we shouldn't have done it. I couldn't watch TV for a week.
Another time the teacher was reading with some other kids and we were supposed to be doing a worksheet, but it was boring.
Dustin had some more string and he asked me to tie his hands together. I did a really good job. Then the teacher came to our desks to see what we were doing.
When she saw Dustin's hands, she said, ―Go show the principal what you did.
On the way down to the principal‘s office I got to thinking that he might not think I did such a good job so I said, ―Let‘s untie you before we go to see Mr. Bertrand.
When we got into Mr. Bertrand‘s office, he asked why we were there and I said,
―Because we were talking when we should have been doing our worksheet.
He said, ―Well, be quiet and do your work.
On the way back to class I got to thinking the teacher must have liked the way I tied Dustin. Why else would she have sent us to show the principal?
Before we went into the classroom, we stopped and I tied him up again. When we got into the classroom, I told the teacher what the principal had said. She didn‘t like it and went to talk to him. He called us back down to the office and took away Dustin‘s string. Then, he yelled at us for lying to him. I don‘t know why he did that. I didn‘t lie to him. We were talking when we were supposed to be doing our work. We lost our recess.
Sometimes I get curious. One day I was playing in my dad‘s old truck. It was a cool truck. If you push on the middle of the steering wheel the horn would blow. I started wondering how the horn works. So I got a screwdriver and stuck it under the part that made the sound. I pushed real hard and the top just popped off. Suddenly all kinds of springs and other parts started jumping out from inside the steering wheel. I tried to put it all back, but every time I got one spring in, another would pop out. I gathered all the parts up and put them on the seat of the truck real neat so my dad would find them.
The next Saturday when my dad got it his truck, he said, ―What happened to my truck?‖
I said, ―Well, Dad, I got a little curious.‖
I don‘t remember all the words he said, but I know he doesn‘t say those words when Mom is around. He told me to leave his truck alone.
One day I was playing superhero. I put on my cape and went outside to save the world. I thought that every superhero should be able to fly, so I started practicing.
I would stand on something and jump off. The wind would grab my cape and I would fly—for a little ways. I figured that if I kept practicing I could fly farther.
Then, I decided that flying around outside wasn‘t as cool as saving someone from a building or a car. So, I stacked some boxes beside my mom‘s car and jumped through the window that she left open. I heard this horrible scraping sound. When I looked at the door there were scratch marks on it. Then I remembered that I had on my superhero belt buckle. My mom said maybe I needed to be a little older to be a superhero.
When I grow up, I will be a superhero and I‘ll invent lawnmowers with all the colors of the rainbow. Until then, I‘ll just be a little boy with parents who don‘t understand him.
