Yellow Jackets

Anyone who knows me very well, knows that I don’t like bees, wasps, hornets, or anything that flies and stings. This distain for these creatures of Lucifer began at a very young age. I think the first time was when my brother Steven, his friend Joey, and I were whacking blackberry bushes behind our house. We were blazing a trail through the bushes leading into the forest. Steven was in front, Joey was behind him, as I trailed behind. I was in the middle of showing one of the branches who was boss when suddenly I found myself standing in a swarm of angry Yellow Jackets. Apparently they did not like that Joey had crushed their “Pad” and they were out for revenge. I knew I was in for a good time as soon as I felt 12 simultaneous stings from the tips of my toes to the back of my retinas. I sprinted home screaming as if I was being chased by a pride of hungry lions.

Those Yellow Jackets stung me 13 times. That was nothing compared the damage one Yellow Jacket would inflict two weeks before the start of ninth grade. My friend Jeremy and I were headed to his grandma’s house across town. He was on a faded Huffy his parents bought him in the sixth grade. I, on the other hand, looked like Lance Armstrong riding my older brother’s 21 speed “Sakai” mountain bike. I had full use of his bike as restitution for the blackberry incident, plus he was away with the scouts for the week which automatically also gave me permission to use all of his stuff.

His bike handled like a dream as I sped down the hills, racing around hairpin turns with the greatest of ease. I had my tape player hooked firmly to my fanny pack listening to “Ice, Ice, Baby”. With the wind blowing through my hair and Vanilla Ice blasting over my headphones, I pushed the bike to its limits. As I was enjoying the rush of adrenaline and exhilaration on the hot August afternoon ride, a bug hit me like a bullet in the chest. I looked down to see what had hit me when to my surprise I saw a raging Yellow Jacket lifting it’s stinger into position for his assault. In one fluid motion, I swatted the Yellow Jacket away with both hands.

“Whew… got it.”

With victory written on my face, I reached down just in time to see the handle bars turn 90 degrees.

“Ohh, fiddlesticks!” I profaned.

I snapped my eyes closed and clinched every part in my body bracing for the impact.

I hit the unforgiving pavement with full force. I felt the bare skin of my forearm grind against the hot asphalt. To avoid grinding my left arm off, I relaxed and began doing summersaults. As I wrapped up my Circ’ de sole act, Jeremy raced over to me.

“Are you okay!?!” he shouted.

“Uhhgg” I gasped in a failed attempt to speak while having the wind knocked out of me.

When I finally was able to speak, I told Jeremy that I didn’t think I would be able to finish the ride and that we needed to go back.

“Sorry Brandon, I told my grandma I would be there by five. See ya later, bye.” He said as he grabbed his bike and peddled off into the distance.

As I lay sprawled out across both lanes of traffic on the blind corner, praying a car would come and take me out of my misery, I saw two county workers standing around kicking rocks by a bridge at the bottom of the hill. I gathered myself and limped down to them. As soon as one of the workers saw my condition, he rushed over to assist me.

“Hey buddy, do you need help? I have a first aid kit in my truck. Let me go grab it.”

Just then the other worker shouted, “We don’t have time to play around. Let’s get this wrapped up so we can go home.”

I watched in disbelief as the Good Samaritan strolled away.

I took a moment to assess myself. I had two sprained wrists, a sprained ankle, a one inch gash on my forehead, and a shredded arm from my elbow to wrist. Knowing I was on my own, I started the long trek home.

Two hours later, I arrived back at home. As I stepped on the lawn, my knees buckled. Me and the bike fell to the ground having both sustained heavy damage. After a few moments, I looked down at my fanny pack. My tape player was gone!

“Great! What am I going to listen to MC Hammer on now?!?” I asked in exasperation.

Umm, do you have a car in the shape of a fish tank?

When I was in high school I drove my older bother's truck while he was away on his mission.  I think it was a ’90 Toyota pickup.  It was beautiful and it had a rockin' sound system. I vividly remember driving around in the summer’s heat with the window rolled down bumpin’ Warren G “Regulators”. This was followed up with Erasure, Depeche Mode, Smashing Pumpkins, and Garth Brooks. It was an eclectic mix of music to say the least. 

Not only did the truck look good and sound good but it also had a rear license plate cover that read, “My name is Brandon and I’d rather be scoring.” The first time my dad read it, he gave me that sharp piercing gaze and demanded in that angry father tone, “Take that off!”

“What do you mean dad?” I said naively.

“Mike Meacham (an adult leader from church) gave it to me because I like basketball.”

That was the last time it was ever mentioned it and the plate cover stayed. The license plate cover did however continue to cause a stir.  I remember on more than one occasion looking through my rear view mirror watching people in the car behind me with their sides splitting. I don’t know what is so funny about making baskets.

Unfortunately, my brothers two years came and went in a flash. He quickly reclaimed the truck leaving me without wheels.

One afternoon, my mom walked into the living room while I was watching TV.

“Brandon, do you want to go out and look for a car?"

I whipped my head 180 degrees with my body still facing forward watching Pickett Fences.

I was so excited at the prospect of climbing behind the wheel of a souped up muscle car my heart nearly burst in my chest. I could just imagine myself out with a beautiful girl in my arm speeding down the interstate.  I hurried and gathered my mix tapes and shot out the door knocking my sister over like a bowling pin hit by a freight train.

“MOVE!” I blasted as she took a plunge disapearing into a giant Juniper bush.  

We soon arrived at an enormous parking lot filled with cars. The cars were sparkling in the afternoon sun. I walked through the mile long rows of beautiful cars with my mouth agape. There were hundreds of cars to choose from. Then I started looking at the sticker prices.

$15,000… $20,000… $25,000…

A greasy man on a flannel suit came over and offered us a helping hand and a yellow stained tooth grin.

“Hiya folks, how are you doing today? Anything in particular you’re looking for?"

“Well, I want something sporty but not too lavish.” I proclaimed.

Dad quickly interjected, “… with no bells or whistles”.

 “How much you lookin to spend”, he inquired.  

 “What’s the cheapest thing you got?”

“Hmmm… let me think…”

“I think we have a car in your price range.”  

We walked across the lot …

 Opps wrong car. Actually, it looked like this-

After all the wheeling and dealing was done, I was headed home in my ’86 Toyota Fish tank.

I had the all treble radio (apparently the previous owner had a custom treble only radio installed) blasting when suddenly the gearshift jumped out of gear. 

Clunk…

I quickly shoved it back in gear.

Clunk…

It popped out of gear again. 

I quickly found that the car wouldn’t stay in gear on its own. Everywhere I drove I had to hold the shifter in gear.

One evening as I was driving out of my neighborhood, I spotted a crazy stalker sitting in his car watching everyone in the neighborhood come and go. I gave a curious glance at him and continued on my way.  As I continued driving, I saw the suspicious man pull out and start following me. I quickly put the pedal to the medal and took off like the Starship Enterprise at warp speed. Well, actually more like a sick cow with terrible arthritis and a bad hip.

The lunatic quickly caught up to me and pulled up in the lane of oncoming traffic. He began starring me down as if I was some sort of arch nemesis of his. Fortunately, after a several minutes of sheer terror, the man turned back around and drove back to his stalking post.  

Later that same night, my friend Wyatt and I were headed downtown. As we were driving, I went to shift gears but the car wouldn’t go into gear anymore. We were stuck on the side of a busy road. 

Wyatt declared, “Wow! If your car had broken down a couple hours earlier you would probably be lying in a ditch right now.”

“Ohh man. That would have sucked.” I chuckled.

 I later found out that my clutch broke. I have heard of them wearing out but I have never heard of one breaking before. Nonetheless I spent the next two weeks after school pulling out the transmission with my hair rolling around in kitty litter and transmission fluid.

Soon after I repaired the clutch I headed up to Rexburg for College. I had been there for a couple of weeks when my car started smoking. I quickly learned that my car another problem. Apparently, radiator fluid was leaking into the motor. Everywhere I drove, the car blasted out white smoke like a Boeing 747 at 40,000 feet. The smoke was so thick that it blocked all visibility in both lanes of traffic.  Since I didn’t have any money to fix it, this was how I drove to school every day. You can imagine all the girls checking me out as I drove around in my smoking fish tank with my treble stereo blasting Hootie and the Blowfish. That car was a chick magnet. Only it repelled girls rather than attracting them.