Me and the Lion’s Den

Introduction

I grew up in a small village called Matthews. It is buried somewhere deep in the rural south in the center of the Palmetto Tree State. I will give you a few interesting facts about the village of Matthews before I get to the real story.

The sign on the side of the building reads 257 feet above sea level, population approximately 2,700 people. The number is from the 1990 census. Today in Matthews, in the year 2012, there are only 2,010 natives living there. As the sea level has been rising, the population of Matthews has been dwindling, and by the end of this book, there may be even fewer people.

Matthews is nothing but a one-horse town. The most interesting thing about the town is the railroad cut that runs through the middle of town. Just seeing how fast the train passes from one side of the town to the other is the most exciting thing about this place, day or the night. With these tracks to somewhere, I would rather be anywhere but Matthews.

The train rumbles through the town six or seven times a day, right on past the place where the old depot once stood. There has not been a depot there in more than thirty years, and it was probably shut down for another forty years before it was torn down to the ground. The train does not stop for passengers these days. None disembark, nor are there any to board. It has been that way for more than sixty years now. It is now kind of like a ghost train going through a ghost town. In the 1840s the slaves were paid to dig that train ditch. This train has been rolling through this town for more than 150 years. Three bridges span across the cut. I recall when the two humped bridges being built in 1967 when I was only four years old. They were built to replace the old wooden bridges that were about to fall down. Also paved roads to nowhere crisscross this little country town.

I have lived in Matthews most of my life, forty-six out of forty-eight years. Everybody has to be somewhere. All those years have been filled with so much toil and strife. It was not easy growing up in this small town, and I guess that maybe it could have been worse.

I was taken to church when I was just fourteen days old. My parents must have thought the sooner they got me there, the better off I was going to be. This one particular lady in the church, Miss Thomas said one day, “He always was my favorite.” If people had known, they would have looked at me with a frown. Yes, I was raised Southern Baptist, in a congregation where the preacher once said, “The latch string is always on the outside.”

The people in the congregation are very conservative and do not handle snakes. Fire and brimstone they are taught to beware. They say that love, love, love is supposed to be preached. Then all the sinners will be saved. The church itself is on the west side of the village, and the stained glass windows tell the prettiest stories to be found.

I always wondered what was wrong with me, but as time went on, I realized I was a man. Surely I was not the only one in Matthews who felt that way, but in that little town I dared not mention it to anyone.

I attended kindergarten there, where most of the kids I met went all the way through high school with me. In kindergarten the teachers called their pupils blue birds and red birds. I was a red bird, which meant I was placed in the slower learning half of the class. That was just fine with me. Whether a blue bird or a red bird, everyone played on the same playground—swinging on the same swings, going round and round on the merry-go-round, and playing in the old boat, which we rocked from side to side like a ship on the ocean.

Recalling one day, as I was getting on the seesaw and looking for someone to play with me, a little girl came up and agreed to seesaw with me. Her hair was cut like a boy’s, even though she was a girl. Even at the age of five, I knew there was something different about this girl. Typically, just like I felt there was something different about me. Then I had no idea what it was. I did not think about it anymore, and we just kept on seesawing.

Least about that same time, age five or six, I was walking down the street with my Grand mama and brother to go downtown so Grand mama could pay one of her duns, as she called them. Yet it was just a short walk downtown to the utility office. Now behind the counter was a very nice lady, but she had her own ways and I recognized that even at my young age. Definitely this lady had a short haircut, like a boy, and always dressed in a different way and Grand mama paid her bill, and as they turned to exit of the utility office, I looked at her and said, “Grand mama, she looks like a man.” She just smiled back at me and replied, “Come on, let’s go, boy.” And out the door we went.

Just like the others kids I had attended a small private school out in the middle of a field of cotton. Even it was back in the day when the paddle was the rule. Recalling that, I started going to this school in the third grade and got to the ninth year of school. Really just like the others had made it to the ninth grade. Yet my first experience came along in the summer before I entered the ninth grade. Changing nothing, it did happen, and I did not push that boy. I was shown a thing or two and thought it was more the other way around. The thoughts kept coming back up again and again.

Being brought up in a small town, I believed that those thoughts were sinful. Surely if people found out, they would call me weird. That summer came and went—it was never mentioned again—but the air was never cleared.

Just all the students took physical education, commonly referred to as PE. Oh, and we participated in sports such as volleyball, softball, soccer, and basketball. Even the class usually lasted one hour, after which we all headed to the showers. I, being the shy guy that I was, did not want to jump in the showers with a bunch of naked boys. One day after the other boys had gotten out of the shower and put their clothes back on, my best buddy ran up to me and said, “Guess who caught a hard-on in the shower?” I just didn’t say a word.

During the ninth grade, this guy we will call Allen gave me the nickname Duck because “if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, then it must be a duck.” Allen was not all he was supposed to be either (more on that later). From then on, I kept my mouth shut for years to come. During the years, thoughts kept running through my mind, and I wished they would not have.

I almost failed English in the ninth grade, Even though I always liked my ninth-grade English teacher. Rightly though, I was terrible in English and literature. Thank goodness for the vocabulary tests. I always made grades in the eighties and nineties on those tests, which pulled my overall average up to the passing mark of a D. On the final exam, I was caught cheating. I had to go to school and take another exam during the summer to prove that I could pass. I passed with a D to become a sophomore. With grades like that, I knew I would never be distinguished. I barely made it with a seventy, but I thought the teacher gave me a point or two to pass just to get rid of me.

In 1980, my senior year approached, and after all those years had passed, I still had those thoughts. In May 1981, I walked down the graduation aisle. Some students graduated cum laude, while I just graduated, thank the Lordy. Into the world we were sent. Some thought they were out to save the planet. I would stay in Matthews and years later wonder why. I had figured out who I was and who I wanted to be. Where were the outlets?