Just remembered something.

[Drunkpup]

We were playing
By Drunkpup.

Since I quit smoking one of the things my daughter, Gwendelyn, and I got into the habit was, going for walks in the woods. Some of my favorite times are shortly after it rains, the earthy textures, crisp air, and the subdued smells of pine and old wood. My daughter seems to enjoy it too because she can splash in the puddles, play in the mud, and generally do anything she wants without fear that I will try to stop her. I believe children are supposed to be dirty and enjoy themselves when they are so young, and not to have worries about image. Running ahead as though she is my lookout, my two and a half year old has more energy than an atom bomb on crack. Often she runs back to tell me what to expect ahead, breathless shouts of incomprehensible noises and laughter. This time after half an hour in the woods she runs back to me and screams, “David!” Sure enough, up ahead I can make out the little boy from my daughters playgroup, dragging his mother in hand.
David I guess in this politically correct world we would term, ‘Learning Disabled’. Pushing three and a half, he can’t really talk that much, still has problems keeping one foot in front of the other, but years ahead in the happiness department. My daughter adores him, when other kids pick on him she fights for him. She helps him walk when he needs it, and brings the odd toy when he cries. I see in her, a lot of heart for a child so young and I envy that.
I look at David’s mass of messy blond hair, the too short legs pumping his normal size body, and the biggest goofiest grin ringed by spit and dirt. It’s at that moment in the woods I was slammed back to my youth, to a time I knew a boy named Chad.
I was 15 years old, living in the country about a hour away from Vancouver, British Columbia. We had moved there from Bristol, a country known as the UK, but in better times remembered as England. For the geographically challenged, just a reminder Vancouver is in Canada. My best friends are: Darren, a dark haired boy tall and gangly he has glasses and a penchant for good grades. Reed, a blonde haired momma’s boy; who was shipped over from the French part of Canada and spoke with an accent. And Chad, he was short, easily 4 inches shorter than Reed. He had the blondest hair that, more likely than not, had never seen a comb that liked him, and a large open smile that could never lie. Chad was, in the term we used then, retarded. Not the Downs syndrome type, but the ‘My mother ate lead or drank too much when she was pregnant type’ (or both). Whatever the cause, we knew that his mother was gone for a long time and his father made no bones about telling the other parents that he told her to take a hike because she was bad news.
Chad was a true child, he always wanted to play, never ran out of energy, and could never tell a lie. His father was one of the nicest men I knew back then. He was always in a good mood, and never ever raised his voice to us or to Chad. When we would come back from a day in the mud, he would take a long hard look, hiding his playful smile, and say, “Wouldn’t be kids if you didn’t play like `em. Now get on in and clean up a little before your parents yell at me.”
For some reason Chad could not talk on the phone, he would turn to stone if the voice that answered was one he didn’t recognize. So, his Dad would call or Chad would walk the mile to my house and get me. Then we would go the rounds and collect the other members of our group. Then we would see what the summer had in store for us, most of the time it would be swimming, or riding our bikes to the corner store (the corner store was seven miles away). But every once and a while we would do something we weren’t supposed to do, like the time we climbed on Mr. Malcherts grain pile. This is something that you shouldn’t do because it breaks the outer crust and can turn to the inner portions of the pile to grain rust or rot. Mr. Malchert ran out yelling at the top of his lungs, we froze in our tracks like deer caught in a headlight, the first one he grabbed was Chad. “What are you doing on the grain?” he bellowed. Chad looked at him with the most open and honest eyes and replied calmly, “We were playing.” Mr. Malchert’s face turned 13 shades of red but then he got himself under control and quieter he said, “Well, get down from there, you shouldn’t be on the grain. You’re just lucky that the weather is nice.” We got down but from then on we knew that Chad would give all the excuses when we got in trouble from then on.
Driving through Mrs. Lee’s fore garden she would come out blue in the face, yelling and cussing. Chad would be calm in the face of the storm and say, “We were playin.” It wasn’t like he was being wise; Chad sadly couldn’t do that on a good day. He was just telling the truth. Even old man Ragsdale couldn’t help but smile when he talked to Chad, he just had that affect on people.
Monday July 2nd 1983, 2 days before 4th of July in America, Chad’s dad said he was going to take us to Seattle, Washington to watch the fireworks. He had borrowed a van, and gave us all a list of stuff to bring. We were going to leave on the 3rd at around 1 o’clock, camp out after the border and then make an early start to Seattle on the 4th. We were all excited, this was my first trip to America and the first time I would ever see a mega-firework-barrage. At about 4 o’clock we said our goodbyes and promised to see each other really early so we could be ready to go. That was the last time I saw Chad.
Chad’s dad was helping his neighbor build a foundation for a family room; they were just finishing up at half past 4. As his neighbor was turning the shovel bucket on the tractor, the hydraulics malfunctioned and the bucket dropped to the ground. Chad was under the shovel, he died instantly.
Darren called me 15 minutes after it happened and I ran the whole way there. Chad wasn’t there anymore; an ambulance had taken him away. His father was sitting in the dirt next to the bucket, his shirt painted on the lower half red. He had cradled his sons head, trying to comfort him, not knowing he was too late. He had tear streaks running down his face; the neck of his shirt was damp. His blonde hair hung in front of his eyes and his body was shaking, I knew he was crying. I was crying too, but I knew his father lost the only person he loved and his entire reason for continuing. Chad had never mentioned relatives, and if they were around they had never visited in the year I had known Chad. I walked over and sat down about three meters from Chad’s dad, and we both cried. My mother came and brought me home an hour later, Chad’s father stayed there the whole night.
It occurs to me now I never knew his fathers name, and I only saw him one more time after that. He sold the house and came by to give me a picture of our gang. We were covered in mud and you could only see our teeth because we had the biggest goofiest smiles on our faces. We were playing.

[crazyrussian]

I must say that that is prob the longest post ever to be writen on shiola

[staticxess]

That was probably the saddest yet
most heartfelt post I have ever read.
Drunkpup you are one cool dude.
Did I mention welcome to Shiola?

[washing up liquid]

man that is so sad, bless ur daughter, i dont know what to say

[donald14624]

You are a very strong person.
Yes, welcome home.

[Drunkpup]

It is strange the things you remember when you least expect them. Even stranger was our group, I think we all hung out because we were different. Me with my west country Bristolian, trying to use casn't in regular communications and not getting things quite right. Reed had a strong french dialect being from the french part of Canada. Darren was way too smart so you know he was hated. Chad just always followed us around and we never really thought about him being slow.

Anywho, thank you all for reading and letting me tell you about this.