From the journal of Flex Malarky, 34, of West Chester, PA:

 

            It seems like only yesterday when I went to the annual Brookline Grade School May Day Fair in my hometown of Havertown, PA.  I was a bald-faced, wiry boy who loved to laugh and play with my buddies.  On this particular Saturday many years ago I arrived at the annual May Day Fair with one of my neighborhood friends, Jay Delluzio.

            We weren’t there for five minutes when we were already stuffing our faces with hot dogs and cotton candy.  Jay dared me to pull Katy Gainster’s pigtails.  Katy was the cutest girl in the sixth grade.  Every boy in my class had the hots for her, myself included.  I had the fastest hands at Brookline.  I knew I could pull Katy’s pigtails and suddenly engage myself in an imaginary conversation with Jay before Katy turned around.  I was about to pull on Katy’s pigtails (actually, it was a French braid that day) when a game caught my eye.

            “Three rings for a $1.00!” cried Mr. Sabatini, my sixth grade teacher.  He was in charge of the Goldfish Toss.  Actually, you toss a ring for a goldfish.  No goldfish tossed here.  Throw a ring on top of a goldfish bowl, and you win yourself a nice little goldfish in a sandwich bag.  Goldfish bowl not included.

            “Let’s play,” Jay said as he licked his sticky fingers.  I agreed and we both handed Mr. Sabatini a dollar bill.  We were each handed three silver rings and wished good luck.

            Jay tossed first.  His first ring bounced off the side of the goldfish bowl and dropped to the pavement.  My first throw wasn’t any better.  Jay’s second missed the bowl entirely.  My second ricocheted off Mr. Sabatini’s left knee. 

            By this time, a crowd had gathered.  Mr. Sabatini had been working the crowd diligently and there were now some kids in line behind Jay and myself.  One of them was Katy Gainster.  Jay’s third toss hit the table, dropped to the pavement and rolled back to him.  “Do I get another shot?” he asked Mr. Sabatini.

            “Cough up another buck,” he smiled.  “And you’ll get three more shots.”

            As Jay was pleading his case (he is now a lawyer in Baltimore), I stepped up to the plate.  I had one ring left.  Suddenly, I heard a whisper in my ear.  “Throw a ringer and I’ll let you be my square dance partner in gym class on Monday,” said the voice.  I whirled around and stood inches away from Katy Gainster!

            “Really?” I asked as my heart thudded violently, pumping blood by the gallons into my eardrums.  With my eyes locked on Katy’s, I threw the ring towards the goldfish bowl.

            “We have a winner!” Mr. Sabatini cried.

            I couldn’t believe it!  I had won!  Katy gave me a quick kiss on the cheek and ran off to her friends.  Jay slapped me on the back as Mr. Sabatini handed me a small plastic bag filled with water and a little goldfish.

            “I’ll name him Ringer,” I said.

            “Yeah, whatever,” said Mr. Sabatini.  “Please move out of the way so some other kids can play.”

            Ringer wasn’t the first pet I ever owned, but he was the best.  Thwart, my hamster, wasn’t very exciting and he didn’t smell all that great.  Pepper, my cat, used to bring home dead birds and mice.  Ringer was only a goldfish, but what a lot of fun he turned out to be!

            I placed him in a bowl when I got home that day.  “My name is Flex,” I said to him.  “What’s your name?”

            “Ringer,” said Ringer.

            “That’s a cool name,” I said.

            “You gave me that name no more than an hour ago,” said Ringer.  “And I think it’s a little dopey, if you ask me.”

            I introduced Ringer to my parents and my two sisters.  “He’s a goldfish,” I explained.

            “Really?” asked my sister, Angela.  She was lounging on the family room sofa, reading the latest issue of Seventeen.  “I thought it was a Bengal tiger.”

            “No, he’s really a goldfish,” I said.  “What do you think, Mom?”

            Mom was sitting at the kitchen table, cutting coupons out of the newspaper.  “Yeah, whatever,” she said without looking at me.  “Shut up and clean your room.”

            Ringer and I had lots of fun!  I placed his bowl on my desk.  I’d sit on my bed and we’d stare at one another for hours! 

I’d take him outside and we’d play basketball.  We’d sit on the patio and play cards…

            “Go fish,” I’d say.

            “I’m going!  I’m going!” cried Ringer.  “Sheesh!  Uh, got any sevens?”

            We’d go skiing, we’d play Atari, and we’d talk sports…

            “And that’s why I think Vince Lombardi is the greatest football coach ever!” I’d say.

            “Who gives a %!#*?” cried Ringer.

            We’d read Mad Magazine together, go hiking together, and eat dinner together…

            “Why do you insist on having me watch you eat fish?” Ringer would gripe.

            “You should try it sometime,” I said as I smacked my lips.

            Everything was great until one morning I woke up and found Ringer floating upside down in his bowl.  I thought he was trying to get some sun on his belly but Dad told me he was stone cold dead and that his soul was seething somewhere in the depths of Fish Hell.  “He can’t be dead!” I cried.  “He’s Ringer!  He’s my goldfish!”

            “Yeah, whatever,” said Dad.  “Shut up and mow the lawn.”

            I called Jay and told him I was going to have a funeral for Ringer.  He said he was busy practicing square dancing with Katy Gainster and never to call him again.  I would have to bury him myself.

            Instead, I poured him into the upstairs toilet bowl.  “Ringer,” I said as a tear rolled down my cheek.  “You were the best goldfish I ever had.  My life will never be the same without you, buddy.”

            “Yeah, yeah,” said Ringer.  “Shut up and flush me already.”

            “Ringer!” I cried.  “You’re alive!  Thank goodness!”

            “Damn!” cried Ringer.  “I was hoping you thought I was dead.”

            “But why?”

            “Kid…now don’t take this wrong, but you’re very strange and you’re boring the pants off me.”

            “What pants?”

            “See what I mean?”

            I sat on the edge of the tub, depressed.  “You think I’m boring?” I asked.

            “Kid, I’d rather watch your mother exfoliate dead skin off her crusty feet,” Ringer muttered.

            Needless to say, my cat Pepper had some fresh fillet for dinner that day!

From the unpublished autobiography of Flex Malarky, 34, of West Chester, PA:

 

            I have always been told that I was blessed with a good memory.  I don’t remember who told me that, but it’s true.  I remember almost everything about my childhood.  In fact, I remember the day I was born.  It’s a day I’d like to forget if you’d like to know the truth.  I spent the first night of my life in jail.  And I had to share a cell with a mass murderer.  The guy had killed an entire congregation in a local church.

            The day I was born was a cloudy, breezy day, with a sixty- percent chance of showers, highs in the mid-sixties.  Dad had taken Mom to the hospital early in the morning, and by noon I was on my way out of the womb.  I’m not too sure of the time, actually.  My watch had gotten caught on the ribcage.

            “Push, Mrs. Malarky,” I heard the doc say.  I could see him crouched in front of me.  He looked like a robber wearing a mask and holding salad tongs.  I informed the man that I didn’t want to come out until I could speak to my lawyer.  He said since I wasn’t born yet I couldn’t exercise my rights as an American citizen.  I asked if he went to law school.  He said he passed by it once, but only briefly.  I took out a cigarette and asked if he had a light.  He said 100 watt.  I told him to kiss my sorry little ass.  He stuck the salad fork at me and nailed me square in the tush.  I grabbed hold of my mother’s ribs and swore that if I was coming out, they’d be coming with me.

            “The kid’s got your ribcage hostage,” the doctor informed my mother.

            Mom was busy doing a crossword puzzle.  Dad was sitting beside her, lighting an unfiltered Camel that was dangling in my mother’s mouth.  “You talking to me, doc?” Mom asked.

            “Yes, I’m talking to you,” replied the doctor.  “It seems as if your baby is stuck.”

            “So what do you want from me?” Mom asked.  “I’m doing a crossword puzzle here.”

            I then took the heart and lungs as hostages, too.  The doctor called the press and in an hour, the three local TV stations arrived with cameras and reporters.  A cameraman crouched between my mothers’ legs and set up a camera and light.  Some reporter knelt and held up a microphone.  “We are here, live, at the Chester County Hospital delivery room where a Mrs. Agatha Malarky is having her heart, lungs and ribcage held hostage by her unborn infant.  Mrs. Malarky, how do you feel?”

            Mom looked into the camera and asked, “What’s a three letter word for `run’?”

            “Run,” answered my dad.

            “Ah.”  Mom penciled it in.  “There!  I won!”

            The reporter peered inside and asked, “Little Malarky infant!  What exactly are you trying to accomplish with this pointless undertaking?”

            He banged me in the head with the microphone.  “I ain’t comin’ out ’til I get to talk to my lawyer, ya chump!” I yelled.

            Just then my lawyer, a Mr. Franklin W. Petterstout, Attorney-at-Law, entered.  He was a fat, able man who knew how to put away a good case of Twinkies.  “No one will speak to my client until I do!” he cried.  He bumped the reporter out of the way and knelt.  He looked at my dad and asked, “What’s the kid’s name?”

            “Not sure,” replied my dad.  “What is it?  Boy or girl?”

            Petterstout looked at me.  “Girl,” he said.

            “Hey!” I yelled.  I flipped him my manhood and drew cheers from the press.

            “Without question a girl,” said Petterstout.

            Just then my mom began to push.  “Lemme in there!” the doctor cried.  “Whoa, Mrs. Malarky, you’re pushing too hard!”

            “What?” Mom cried.

            “I said you’re pushing too hard!”

            “What?” Mom cried.  “I can’t hear ya!  My Walkman’s on too loud!”

            Well, Mom pushed me too hard and I was ejected from the launching pad.  The doctor’s reflexes were too slow, and I slipped through his tongs.  Unfortunately, the window was open, and I held my nose as I somersaulted in the air and landed on top of a Volkswagen Beetle.

            “Head’s up!” the doctor cried from the window.

            Minutes later, a police officer walked by and arrested me for indecent exposure.  Dad and the doctor came down and explained to the noble cop that I should only be issued a warning, being born only a few minutes and all.

            “Alright,” he said with hesitation, “but just this once.  If I catch him out here again without a diaper, I’ll haul his smooth ass in.”

            I was taken upstairs to the delivery room where we found my mother filing her nails and cracking her chewing gum.  “What is it?” she yelled.  “Boy or girl?”

            “Boy!” my father cried happily.

            “Oh well,” Mom groaned.  She began to work on a jigsaw puzzle.

            The doctor held me up by my legs and said, “And now, the first breath of life, my friend!”

            The man simply slapped me too hard.  He knocked me clear across the room and out the window, which unfortunately was still open.  I did a rotating summersault (difficulty 2.3) and landed in the same officer who hauled me in for indecent exposure and aggravated assault.

            Dad bailed me out the next morning, and I was taken back to the hospital to undergo psychological treatment.  Mom lectured me for an hour on proper behavior in this world of ours, and Dad grounded me for a week without the use of my rattle.