Ghastly Stories

I have some scary stories to write today, having to do with Halloween.  However, when I got to thinking about them, I remembered that only one of them actually has anything to do with Halloween, but I'm going to write about them, anyway.

As you may or may not know, I was married to a secondary school principal for a lot of years.  (That, in itself, is scary enough!)  And although we never had too many problems with property damage due to student mischief, we were always on the alert--especially around Halloween.  Joe knew what to look for since he had done his share of mischief as a kid... 

First Story (Pontiac, IL, mid-1980s):
We were all in our house in the evening.  Joe was still wearing his bike tights, having been on a ride a bit earlier in the day.  It was dark out.  Suddenly, someone pounded on our kitchen window, which was at the back of the house, scaring me and causing our young daughter's eyes to get big as saucers.  Joe launched out the front door on a sprint, chasing down the culprits.  Next thing I knew, he had tackled one of them and had him on the ground, pounding the kid's head into the grass.  The kid was yelling, "Stop!  It's me, Mr. McNary!  It's so-and-so!"  Sure enough, it was a student who thought he would be cute by scaring us--soon to learn that ol' Mr. McNary still had enough youth and strength in him to outrun a junior high kid and beat the tar out of him!  As soon as Joe figured out who it was, he let up.  The kid wasn't hurt, but he sure was startled...and I guess he figured out (and probably passed the word) that it was NOT a good idea to mess around at McNary's house.  (I still get a chuckle out of a man in tights chasing after a teenager...and winning!)

Second Story (Cloverdale, IN, early 1990s):
At 2:00 in the morning, we were fast asleep.  The phone rang.  (When the phone rings in the middle of the night, it's never good news.)  Joe answered.  I listened as he said, "Oh. Okay. Where?"  Then he hung up and rolled over.  I asked, "What was that all about?"  His response:  "Bomb threat at the school."  He didn't get up.  He didn't call the police.  He went back to sleep!  In the morning, school went on as usual.  The telephone company (which was practically in our back yard, and the president of which was Joe's secretary's husband) provided the record of whom had called, and before the day was out, the police arrested the kid who did it. 

Obviously, the would-be bomber was trying to disrupt Old Man McNary's night.  Little did he know that NOTHING comes between Ol' Man McNary and his slumber!  Perhaps the kid thought Joe would get up and go to the school to throw his body between the building and the bomb.  Didn't happen!  Considering all of the serious school happening in the years since then, Joe could have been severely criticized had something bad happened, but in those days, there was more common sense.  I just thought the whole thing was amusing.  Principal-1; Students-0!  Loved it!

Third Story (Cloverdale, IN, late 1980s in a rental home):
Halloween night.  OOOoooooOOOOOh!  Considering that some young student Lochinvar had painted "McNary is a dick" on the road near our house, we were especially alert on this, our first Halloween in Indiana.  The mailbox was on a post at the road, just a few yards from the front door, but there were shrubs that almost hid the front steps--especially in the dark.  That evening, Joe sat on the steps, just observing the trick-or-treaters and handing out some candy, as needed.  At one point, a very noisy clunker of a car drove by, hesitated, and bounced a pumpkin off the mailbox, denting it badly and smashing the pumpkin into bits.  Then it roared off.  Joe didn't say anything when he came in except that he knew who did it.  Cloverdale isn't that big a town.  He had done enough parking lot duty at the end of each school day to be able to recognize who drove what car and how it sounded.  The next day, he did a little detective work, and sure enough had caught the culprit red-handed.  Then end result was that he told the kids responsible that he would not call the police or their parents IF they worked off a punishment.  For the next two Saturdays, there were two kids raking leaves and cleaning up our yard.  No further repercussions.  I was in awe of his ability to handle that kind of stuff.

Joe and I split up probably less than two years after the two Cloverdale stories.  There was no love lost between us when it happened, for a lot of reasons, but these events always reminded me that it wasn't ALL bad.  Sometimes, his deviousness resulted in little victories!

I guess the real message is that you can't con a con!  And we in the education field have to work hard to stay one step ahead of the students.  Joe always could.  I eventually figured it out.

Happy Halloween, y'all.  (And Happy Birthday to my brother who is in Heaven...or wherever he ended up!)