Chapter 1 - A Sunday Morning Surprise.
It was August of 1995. Summer in Maine was beginning to wind down. Unlike the coastal towns of Bar Harbor, Damariscotta and Old Orchard Beach, Waterville is the epitome of small town America. It houses a population of about 16,000 people that does their best to quietly go about their business and take it one day at a time. Aside from The Taste of Greater Waterville and a few Parades, summers were pretty low key. In a few short weeks, I would be starting school again. 6th Grade, JR. High School. Their would be homework on the weekends and for the first time in my life I would be old enough to recognize a smoking hot teacher when I saw one.
It was a Sunday morning and church was just getting out. My least favorite place in the world as an 11 year old. Specially during the summer. Normally summer time in our family meant a break from Church, but on this particular day I had to serve as an Acolyte or (Alter boy), meaning I had to actually participate in the service. It was a responsibility that came maybe two times a summer. I still had not been happy about it. What made it even worse was that my Mom and younger Brother decided to stay home. I was rolling out of bed at 8am while my Brother was rolling over to go back to sleep. Lucky prick.
I was not alone though. My Dad also had church duties to attend to. Otherwise he probably would have stayed home as well. Earlier in the morning I thought this would mean that I did not have to walk to and from, but my Dad decided it was a nice morning and we were going to walk. Our house was not very far away but it still pissed me off. Church was over and now I have to fucking walk home.
We had not been walking for very long when I starting hearing a high pitched sound coming from across the street. It was a sound that I had not heard earlier that morning. It instantly grabbed my attention. I looked over in the direction of the sound and could not see anything among'st the tall grass. It did not stop and got progressively louder which finally sparked my Dad's curiosity causing him to look in the same direction.
"What do ya think it is?" I asked. My Dad, who seemed genuinely curious responded
"I dunno... wanna go check it out?" Like me, my Dad needed to hear what could be making such a loud high pitched squeal that was overpowering several passing cars. We both jogged across the street anxious to see what it was. Once across we both stopped at the edge of the tall grass and looked around. At this point the sound had stopped. Had we scared it off? It was then that we heard a small rustle in the bushes. Thankfully trotting in our direction was a little gray kitten just old enough to be away from his mother.
By now we had figured it out. Within the last hour someone with zero decency had dumped a kitten on the side of the road and took off. Those loud squeals we had been hearing were cries for help, and in the little fella's eyes he was looking at it in the form of a very eager 11 that saw the potential of a having a new kitten around the house and a very regretful looking father that all of the sudden looked like he wished he ignored the sound and just kept on walking.
No comments:
Post a Comment