My Friendship with Ray Haney
CHAPTER THREE
Not to forget, for how could I, our small town escapades also included stealing away to a local nature preserve, though as kids we never really thought of it as that. Slaughters Pond was a murky, mossy large pool of spring water hidden down off the railroad tracks on heavily forested private property, but we didn’t care, and we never got caught, and since there wasn’t a fence, it was easy to sneak in and venture around during hot humid summer days, when it seemed like we had transported into some steaming, tropical paradise. Too bad the dank pond wasn’t swimmable, but it was a lush habitat for many birds, reptiles and amphibians. We always had tons of — fun, I guess you could call it — shooting a bounty of small songbirds with our BB guns, and finding snakes, turtles and frogs we’d pick up and throw way out in the middle of the pond and laugh as they kerplopped into the water. One day I shot this little sparrow and watched the poor cuss flutter down to my feet, twirling like a fallen leaf, and when it didn’t die, and just squirmed haplessly there, I felt, well, you can imagine, pretty horrible. I never killed another bird or any living being after that, well, except maybe for flies and mosquitos, but they don’t count.
And oh how we loved sneaking out in the wee hours of night to roam stealthily around town like in some Twilight Zone episode, dodging the flunky town cop on the lookout for curfew violators. We’d make our way to the old town cemetery and wander around the creepy grounds, shining our small penlights on the headstones reading aloud faded old epitaphs of long-vanquished residents. Once we tried to break into the ornate stone building that housed the urns containing ashes of the dead, but the windows were barred up, so we contented ourselves checking out more tombstones under the eerie light of the moon until tiring of that, we’d race over to an abandoned old barn that once housed a famous racehorse back in the twenties, and we’d slither through an opening to check out what was in there, mostly old bridles and a broken down buggy, not much memorabilia or anything, but the memory of all of these trespassing adventures was forever lasting because of the simple fact we weren’t supposed to be out and about or entering these musty, mysterious places, especially at one in the morning when, of course, our parents thought we were in bed sound asleep.
There was also this mean and cranky neighbor couple who lived behind the Haney’s, and we delighted endlessly in our devious schemes to torment the redneck hick, Bob Volmer was his name, and his haggard old wife, Marge, I think her name was. Childless and cantankerous, they lived a reclusive anti-social life in a run-down shack, and they hated everyone, especially me and Ray, because we were always trespassing on their land to explore a back forty lot that had woods and a creek where we’d set up a fort and hold secret meetings and pretend we were soldiers or cowboys or characters out of a romantic Mark Twain novel; and where Ray would invariably dig out his hidden Playboy Bunny photos he’d torn out of a magazine somewhere and had hidden in a plastic folder stashed under a pile of rocks and proceed to masturbate; and where we’d sometimes preside over our ragtag band of hangers-on — is that even a word? — they were just a handful of bone-headed buddies who worshipped me and Ray; and then we’d start pretending to be hiding out from the law or enemy soldiers; and next thing we were figuring out some evil stunt to pull on Bob fucking Volmer, who would always come looking for us to run us off his land. We hated him, too, and when he’d had enough, he’d come out of his shithole house and we’d be laughing and mocking him as he emerged, railing at us with arms raised high, and once he came out with a loaded shotgun, blasting a thunderous round into the sky, I swear, and threatened to shoot our asses if we didn’t stop trespassing, goddammit, and leave him the fuck alone once and for all.
You can just imagine all the fun we had and all the shit we got ourselves into during these, our halcyon years.
I liked Ray so much because, for one, I didn’t have a brother, and for two, he was possessed of a manic energy and fierce independence which I admired. He had traits I wanted to emulate. He was inventive and clever, and rife with conspiratorial ideas about how we could rule the world, well, at least our town to start off, and he had a zillion money-making ideas to get rich, mostly fantasies so far as I was concerned, but the fact is, outside of the chump change I managed to earn mowing lawns and delivering newspapers, most of my dough came from little schemes here and there Ray thought up, like the pinball money we got from scrounging up golf balls lost to the course pond and selling them, or washing dogs for fifty cents.
One aspect about Ray that I found a bit troubling, however — but also a bit attractive — was his “bad boy” nature. He was always getting into some sort of scuffle or incident or fight or one thing or another at recess, in the park, at the swimming pool, and in class over his hilarious antics and pratfalls and out-and-out rebellious behavior. All innocent and in good fun, no doubt, until it wasn’t.
Scholastically deficient — or maybe just disinterested — Ray was street smart and a total wiseass more interested in entertaining people than reading his book report in front of the class. Part of his oddball charm was that he had this weird thing going on with a lazy eye, that when he looked at you, it was all askew and you never knew if he was quite looking at you or what. Later, as he developed his risible charades and uproarious theatrics into semi-polished routines, he would use his weird eye to great effect, somehow enlarging it through a mysterious feat of optic puffery or something, and then he’d twist up his mouth in this perfect imitation of funny guy Marty Feldman and go snorting and cavorting about in a demented frenzy of boisterous histrionics that cracked us all up.
Once, during a lull in Mrs. Parry’s 6th grade class, Ray got a bug up his butt and pulled some riotous stunt that led to an outburst of laughter and disorderly conduct on the part of the whole class, so as soon as Mrs. Parry restored order — “CLASS!! CLASS!! CHILDREN!! ENOUGH!! I will have NONE of this! Take your seats immediately and BE QUIET!” — she summoned Ray to approach and very somberly scolded, “Raymond Haney, how many times do I have to tell you there is no place in my class for such nonsense, do you understand?” She then methodically raised her flabby old arm and lifted it slowly back over her shriveled up apple of a head, and before you knew what was happening, she hauled off and smacked him square across the face with the force of a discus thrower — in front of the whole class! I’ve never heard such stunned silence nor seen Ray skulk like a whooped dog back to his seat.
But his shame didn’t last long, and he always had the last laugh. Later that night, we snuck over to Mrs. Parry’s house over by the water tower, quietly walked up the stairs to her porch, and banged loudly on her door a few times, and then quickly fled, but not before lighting a paper bag full of slimy dog shit on fire and flinging it on her porch step. We dashed away and hid behind a car to watch the scene unfold. The old crone soon emerged, utterly aghast at the sight of the small conflagration on her porch. We could barely contain ourselves as she stomped it out in a demented little dance, first with her orthopedic left foot, then her right, and then, the coup de grâce, smushing it around with both her feet before unleashing a scream of anger and disgust at the realization of all the shit she was drowning in! Like I said, Ray always got the last laugh.
So, you see how Ray was a little firebrand constantly getting into trouble — and therefore getting me into trouble with him — in and out of school — but for the most part, it was innocent fun, until it wasn’t, and through the thick and thin, during the halcyon years, we always found adventures and camaraderie.
Because, you see, I didn’t really have any other close friends besides Ray. Well, there was Danny Combs, by virtue of being my next door neighbor, but he was a wimpy little nerd. And there was this other neighbor I called the Kid, whose real name was Timmy Stubbs, and we had some good times together. And I always really liked Brady Evans, a class act at the top of my list as a great friend, too, but it was Ray who was always there for me, always ready for a good time. And so you can imagine how easily I was sucked into the wacky orbit of Ray Haney’s madcap existence, despite what you might call his questionable pedigree.
You see, Ray came from one of those “other side of the tracks” families that your mom and dad always admonished against hanging out with, which just made you want to hang out with him all the more. Ray and his five siblings were all boys with a wild hair up their asses, all except the youngest, a shy, sweet autistic girl named Becky. They were considered “bad influences” and not exactly looked upon favorably as the town’s brightest progeny, for each one, to varying degrees or another, exhibited obstinate, rebellious, eccentric, quirky, and maladjusted personality traits. In fact, the twin boys, Donnie and Ronnie, bordered on being half-wits. All except sweet little autistic Becky, and to a certain degree, Ray, they were total flunkies in school. You really had to feel sorry for the parents, I’d imagine, ’cause Ray’s siblings were a piece of fucking work, if you ask me.
Now Ray’s parents, well, they just let their kids run wild like a pack of dogs. Never one to instill discipline or ensure quality family time, his parents turned a blind eye to Ray and his siblings and let them have the run of things. No wonder I loved hanging out at Ray’s, ’cause in my house, well, there was a modicum of imposed discipline, like we had to be home for an actual family dinner by 5:30, in bed by 9, that sort of thing.
And Ray’s parents, Walter and Beverly, well, they weren’t exactly considered paragons of the community or model parents, either, but then again, who am I to talk, given my own Dad’s problems with alcohol and Mom’s unceasing struggle to balance a “home life” and her work, because, let’s face it, it was Mom who brought home the bacon in our household, unfortunately, too, at the expense of turning us into latchkey, roustabout kids ourselves. But good kids for the most part, just left to our own vices and devices, though there was always food on the table at regular hours, family game day on occasion, and, for me, a secret allowance for helping out around the house. Imagine that, me, the only boy in a family of nothing but sisters, and I was the one who mainly did all the dishes and cleaning, because I knew Mom would send me to bed with a milk carton of malted milk balls and furtively palm me a five-spot from time to time, which helped pay for all the plates of French Fries at the Uptown Cafe where me and Ray would feed our bellies and then our insatiable pinball habit.
So, yeah, who’s to say if the Haney’s were good or bad parents? But with such a large family, his or mine, how could our parents possibly have given equal love, equal time, equal anything to all? In the case of the ill-prized genetic offspring of Walter and Beverly Haney, well, again, who am I to say, but it seemed that Ray and his siblings, and even the family’s two dogs, four cats, five rabbits, and eventually two horses and a pony all crammed in on their tiny lot abutting Bob Volmer’s overgrown spread, well, they all seemed to be cared for, clothed decently enough, and not lacking in nutritional necessities, per se.
Plus Ray, the oldest of the kids, had exhibited at an early age musical proclivities, actually an extraordinary innate talent for playing the piano, guitar, and trumpet, which he called a “bugle”. He loved the Beatles and I’d spend hours at his house just sitting around while he played his repertoire of songs for me, an enduring image burned in my mind of him perched on his piano bench swaying back and forth, in his cowpoke raiment with that slicked back hair, pounding away at the ivories and singing “Play me some of that rock and roll music, any old way you choose it.” It did seem like he was destined for rock ‘n roll stardom.
And so, in this respect, his parents supported him, and nurtured his talent along, I guess, by buying him all those instruments, while all I had was this stupid little wooden pad with a rubber surface and a couple of drum sticks to bang on that I gave up on long before I advanced to a real drum set, which I know my Mom was happy about, because the last thing she wanted in her household was me banging on drums disturbing what little peace she had in our own frenzied household.
And one day, I’ll never forget, a man showed up to deliver a big box that Ray ripped apart with fervent glee — it was a brand new electric organ his parents had bought for him! Cool! Man, was I impressed! That whole day Ray jammed away, magically able to pound out Beatles songs and other rock and roll tunes with a raw unmatched talent for never having taken a single dipshit lesson. I swear, I don’t think I ever saw Ray or knew of him formally studying music, but he sure could play like he was born for fame and fandom, but the best he could manage, it turned out, was playing “bugle” in the junior high band and staid organ hymnals at his weekly religious services. It seemed like such a waste of talent.
Getting back to the subject of the Haney’s providing for their children’s peaking nutritional needs, Ray, I must now break the news to you, had the most absolute shit diet on earth. I know that sounds strange to say, but by the time we were in the 4th grade, I started noticing something very peculiar about Ray’s eating habits. Frankly, I always wondered how he could have sexually matured faster than me, and how he could have grown bigger and stronger than me with such improper nutrition.
Because . . . Ray Haney’s alimentary anomalies were legendary!
All the boy ever ate, in one form or another, was potatoes, potatoes, and more potatoes! And when I say he only ate spuds, I mean spuds and only spuds: French Fries. Home Fries. Potato Chips. Not once did I ever see him eat anything else: no meat, no vegetables, no fruit that I can think of, no cake or candy, no milk, just potatoes and sodas and sometimes ice cream treats. Not once did I ever witness his mom fix him a decent meal. Such was the extent of his aversion or inability (?) to eat anything else, that his dad once offered him $50 — FIFTY DOLLARS! — to eat a hamburger, which Ray refused to do. It’s all a bit crazy, because you wonder how a kid could grow strong bones and teeth and muscles just eating goddamn fucking potatoes. I always wanted to think maybe Ray had severe food allergies, but more likely he had a whopping eating disorder, don’t you think. Maybe his mom force fed him gummy vitamins or something, who knows.
One day I was over at Ray’s playing Jarts or some stupid yard game when we looked up and there was the big exhaust-spewing boxy Lay’s truck backing up to the Haney porch. Ray excitedly rushed over to help the delivery guy unload — I swear! — TEN BOXES! — of barbecue potato chips! TEN BOXES! Each box containing a dozen bags of crispy, tangy chips. That was his breakfast, lunch and dinner for the next couple of weeks, along with, of course, a constant stream of French Fries and fried potatoes. As you can guess, I ate my share of potatoes, too, while in his company, but strangely enough, given his love of the versatile tuber, I never once saw him eat a baked potato or potato salad, or even my favorites, hush puppies or hash browns. Just French Fries, fried potatoes and potato chips. To this day, if one of my new friends and I get to talking about things, and I bring up Ray Haney’s weird food fetish, no one believes me when I tell the story of his bizarro diet that consisted of 100% fried potato product.
Stay tuned for CHAPTER FOUR!