Part I, Chapter One - Got Borned and Off to Panama

Wherein the Narrator is brought into the world.

I was born in a Naval hospital in Connecticut in the middle of winter. Well, any time before May 15th or so is the "middle of winter" in New England. It took two interns and seven nurses three days to yank me out of my Mom and even then I came out ass-first. Frank breach, they call it. I've had a bass-ackward approach to just about everything since then.

My first memories are of snow. Lots and lots and lots of snow. And cold. I can remember thinking that this sucked worse than the dirty diaper I was wearing at the time. This was January 17, 1958. About 3:30 in the afternoon.

My Grams was a right quirky old character. She had lived alone since she and Grandpa Meeker (who I never knew) divorced. She would come to the house to visit and taught me some great lessons about Nature. Even while I was very young she would take me for walks, pausing now and again and telling me to quiet my mind and listen to the sounds around me. That helps me to this day, as Buddhist meditation requires the quiet mind. She also taught me how to pet the bees. I can still do this: Gently use the fingertip to stroke the back of the bee while it collects nectar. Dad saw me out in the field of flowers by our house and swore he wouldn't be the one to take me to the emergency room if I got severely stung. Good ol' Pops.

We moved to the Panama Canal Zone when I was 3 years old. Palm trees, iguanas, coconuts. Santa had to come in a helicopter. We also had fire ants. Big, red, nasty buggers with mandibles like two fishhooks.
A friend of mine and I decided that the best way to get rid of these fire ants was to...light them on fire. We got a bunch of those white-tipped kitchen matches and stuffed them into the hole. When we lit it off, the whole thing exploded into a swarm of the evil critters, and they knew just who to go after. We ran like hell.

We got bored and started lighting the matches and throwing them into a tree bole. Then the tree caught on fire. Some of the other little toddlers and I formed a bucket brigade with a small metal cup somebody found on an outdoor sink. Thinking it was out, we all went back to our homes for a bottle and a nap. And the tree burned to the ground. So my pyromaniacal tendencies were first manifest.

We also had a truck that came around once or twice a week spraying huge white clouds of DDT to control the mosquitoes. We were supposed to go inside when it came around but who cared? Besides, it smelled like cotton candy (lie!) and didn't cause any harmful side effects. Who couldn't use an vestigial twin or superfluous little toe?

In Chapter Two: Back to New England! or A Careful Aside...