oh what the heck...

As long as I am confessing things...here is another tidbit about me.

I have swung a pick-ax into another persons skull.

Yup.

I can tell you exactly the sensation that vibrates back up the wooden handle of a pick-ax as the heavy steel collides with a human skull.

We used to do an exercise in writing class. The idea was to write an opening sentence that made the class HAVE to ask more. If no one asked for further explanation, you failed.

I never failed.

Mostly because I have lived a very exciting life for someone who is such a recluse.

We had a huge plot of land that we called the dirt pile. Our parents let us dig to our hearts content in it. I was breaking off dirt clods with the pick-ax. I was preparing the ammo for yet another dirt clod war with my older siblings.

One of my younger brothers wandered out to watch. I warned him to stay back, and kept working.

With a mighty swing I swung the pick-ax over my shoulder and WHAM...right into my brothers skull.

The sensation even to this day, is like nothing I have ever felt before or after. Almost a hum that transmitted through the metal and wood and right up my arms.

That is what made to stop and look behind me, just in time to see my brother keel backwards into the dirt.

There was no blood and it took a second for me to see where he had been hit. Right in this eye brow.

I left him and went screaming for our mother.

"MAMA! COME QUICK! R____ FELL ON THE PICK-AX AND CUT HIS HEAD!!"

You don't think I'm gunna fess up to nearly cleaving in my bro's skull do you? Not a chance. Not a chance.

By the time she got out there it was bleeding and she whisked him off to the ER for stitches.

I put away all the tools, cleaned the yard, and the house and emptied the dishwasher AND folded all the laundry while they were gone. My alibi was iron clad as long as my bro didn't squeal on me.

Apparently getting gorked in the head with a pick-ax will give you amnesia, because he never said a word. And the event went down in history as the version I fabricated.

Which is good because if my mama had known the truth, I would probably still be grounded.