Monday, July 16, 2018

Wood Eyes and Hare Lips



It wouldn't be one-hundred per cent honest to say that I haven't had time to author a blog post (I did re-post a link to a vlog just over a week ago) since the first day of June. It would be more correct to say that posting an update seemed an unwise use of the little time I have had between then and now. I traveled, then attended official ceremonies, followed by relocating and starting my new job. I probably should be sleeping now, but I slept this afternoon and am not sleepy at the moment.

I shall now share a rather random memory from my childhood for the purpose of illustrating just what a sensitive and odd child I was. My father sometimes tells jokes to my brother and me that aren't politically correct. He did this even when we were very young. He told us a particular joke during a car trip duing the summer between first and second grades, when I was six years old.  I shall retell the joke here, and I hope no one who reads it is offended. 

Once there was a young man who lost one of his eyes either to disease or injury. He wasn't a wealthy man, and so the prosthetic eye he used for cosmetic purposes was made of wood instead of the more modern acrylic. He had self-esteem issues related to his wooden prosthetic eye.

A friend of the man who wore the wooden prosthetic eye encouraged the man to accompany him to a dance one evening so that the man could meet and socialize with females. The man with the wooden prosthetic eye reluctantly agreed to go with his friend to the dance.

Once the two men entered the hall where the dance was being held, the friend pointed out a woman with a cleft lip and suggested to the man with the wooden prosthetic eye that he should perhaps ask the woman with the cleft lip to dance with him; because she herself possessed a physical defect, she might be less put off by his wooden prosthetic eye and more likely to accept his invitation to dance with her.

The young man with the wooden prosthetic eye approached the woman with the cleft lip. "Would you like to dance with me?" he asked her.

The woman's face lit up.  In excitement she exclaimed, "Would I!?! Would I!?!" (Imagine my father's best imitation of a the speech impediment of a person with a cleft lip.)

"Hare lip! Hare lip!" he responded.

My brother and my dad laughed almost hysterically. My mother said, "John, that's tasteless." I burst into tears.

"Alexis, whatever is the matter?" my mother turned from her seat  to ask me.

"Why did he have to say that to her?" I  cried. "She was just happy someone finally asked her to dance. She wasn't trying to make fun of him. Why did he have to be so mean to her?"

I could see my father shaking his head as he probably simultaneously rolled his eyes. My mother sighed, then said, "Alexis, it was a joke. A stupid joke, but still a joke. You don't need to cry about it."

"But she just wanted to dance with him. And he hurt her feelings!" I wailed.

"It never happened, Alexis," my mom continued.  "There was no man with a wooden eye. There was no lady with a cleft lip. And because there was no man with a woden eye and no lady with a cleft lip, he couldn't have asked her to dance. She couldn't have answered the way Daddy said she did. He couldn't possibly have called her a harelip! It never happened."

"Then why did Daddy say it happened?" I demanded.

"He didn't actually say it happened," my mom explained. "He told a lame joke that he probably heard at scout camp when he was about eleven."

I sniffed, and my mom handed me a tissue. "Are you sure?" I asked her.

"I'm absolutely sure," she answered.

"But it's still sad," I sobbed.

"Lots of things are sad," my dad chimed in. "Life is sad, Alexis. Get over it."

"That'll certainly make her feel better, John,"  my mom muttered.

"It's true!" my dad defended himself.

Even though it was only an hour or so before dinner time, my dad pulled into a roadside drive-in and let us order ice cream, which made my brother Matthew very happy.  For roughly the next five years, if we were traveling by car for any length of time, Matthew would ask, "Dad, can you tell that joke bout the guy with a wooden eye and the lady with a hare lip again?" 

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