Muddin' (Rear View‪)‬

About the time I began to toddle, I also began to develop an unreasonable affinity for mud. Unlike my childhood playmates, who dirtied their hands only in the creation of mud pies and cakes, my main goal was to get as filthy as possible. If the mud wasn't also in my eyebrows and navel, I deemed the effort inadequate. Mud pies, in fact, didn't hold much fascination for me in the first place. I was much more likely to create swamps and bogs, excavating huge quantities of dirt and then filling in the holes with water. This didn't create too much of a stir in the vacant lot next to my house, but when I moved my efforts to the alley behind the garage, the garbage truck broke an axle fording what the driver thought was a simple mud puddle. My father tried to show me the error of my ways with a ping-pong paddle applied vigorously to my scrawny butt, but even he was of the opinion the effort was wasted. Indeed, before my traumatic entry into kindergarten, my obsession with mud was deemed cute, but irksome. By the time I was 12, however, it didn't seem as cute anymore, and when I was 16, my parents sent me to a behavioral therapist to talk about what they called 'Alan's problem." My first session came the same day as the start of the muskrat trapping season. Although I wasn't a trapper, my best friend, Eddie, was, and he always let me carry his wicker pack basket on opening day. When I clumped directly from Turnbull Slough onto the white shag carpet in the new, sterile office of Dr. Scruloose, the good doctor suggested I never come back. In retrospect, I'm glad I didn't take off my muddy hip boots--you can waste a lot of good outside time in the office of a behavioral therapist.