The Power of My Pencil: Writing Throughout my Ages

Chapter 1: Pee Pee Power

Mom swished through the TV room where my dad, my brother and I were sprawled on the rug, enthralled with Leave it to Beaver. She shouldered her purse and reviewed her notepaper, announcing that she needed to run to the grocery store for a couple of culinary necessities. She would be right back. 

I scrambled up to join her, because I wanted to go too. After all, I was in first grade that year, and loved to drive with her, loved to shop with her, and loved to hang with her. It would be fun.

“Oh, Bonnie,” Mom protested, “I just have to grab some milk and cottage cheese. Why don’t you stay here?”

“I really want to go with you.”

“I’m in a hurry,” Mom complained.

“But I never get to see you,”  Not true, but a gut-wrencher to any mom.

She relented, like I knew she would. “Ok. But go to the bathroom first.”

I argued, with solid credibility, “I don’t have to.”

“Ok,” she sighed. “Get in the car.”

We rumbled off in the rusty Rambler, me riding shotgun, both of us satisfied with the outcome of our negotiations. We liked to hang together, just the girls without Dad and Brad. We both loved to sing, especially as we drove, and our car choir really was the ultimate. Why wouldn’t any Mom want me to go?

We got to Esco’s and briskly headed to the back of the store, maneuvering toward the dairy department on our lactic mission.

That’s when it hit. I had to pee. Bad.

“Mom?” I mumbled.

“What?”

“I have to go to the bathroom.” Uh oh.

“Bonnie, I asked you to go before we left home. Remember? You told me you didn’t have to.”

“I know. I didn’t have to go then. But I really have to go now.”

“Bonnie, the bathroom is clear on the other side of the store. Listen, let me grab the milk and cheese, and we can head out. Hang on.”

That’s when it let go. Right there in the Dairy Aisle. A gigantic yellow pond, growing around my legs, dripping down my shins into my cotton socks and flooding my laced tennis shoes. A sticky, neon pool on the linoleum, shimmering under the fluorescent lights. 

I wet my pants. Oh man. A huge mistake for a first grader. See, first graders don’t wet their pants. First graders sing with their moms. They help shop. They don’t pee in the grocery store. I was humiliated, and, worse, so was Mom.

Through clenched teeth and tight lips she whispered, “Go get in the car and wait for me.” Her nares flared.

In 1957, you could send a six-year-old kid to the car. It certainly wasn’t locked. There was no Stranger Danger. Just a neighborhood strip mall where bag boys collected shopping carts and neighbors caught up on local gossip. A six-year-old could be banished to the car with no safety concerns and no fear of child-abuse accusations.

“Clean up on the Dairy Aisle,” the loudspeaker broadcasted to the shopping populace. 

Mortified, I turned and drooped through the cereal aisle, little driplets of urine polkadotting the floor in my wake. I sneaked past the gum-snapping checkout girl and slipped out the automatic door. I dejectedly crawled into the backseat of the Rambler because I was no longer worthy to sit in the adult section of the vehicle. Silent tears dripped off my eyelashes. Lots of dripping tonight.

I stewed and beat myself up, trying to decide how to seek redemption. I scrunched back there, miserable. Then I spied a used envelope crumbled on the dusty car floor. I grabbed it, hunted down a pencil stub in the folds of the backseat, and started a first grade apology letter to Mom. Maybe a note of repentance could salve my conscience. And maybe Mom would like me again someday in the distant future if I begged for forgiveness now.

I carefully penned a heartfelt note and left it on the steering wheel. 

Dear Mommy,  

I am sorry for what I did. I live you and want you to live me, two.

Bonnie Jill Tallman

Who could resist such a masterpiece? My mom couldn’t. When she got back to the car, she read my note and melted into tears. I was absolved.

This is how, at an early age, I learned the power of the pencil. Carefully chosen words meticulously crafted by a first grader could drop a mommy to her knees. 

Think of the potential. 

PS My mom still likes me. 

PPS My mom still has the note. 

Stay tuned for Chapter 2: Mystery at Sunset Gulch

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Bucket List: Number 12

My Bucket List is a driving force in my new retirement lifestyle. Developed over my final ten working years, this delineated inventory of unfinished dreams, desires and details, made the departure from my beloved job more palatable. Since retiring, my new freedom accentuated the urgency to attack this checklist with gusto. No time to waste. 

One objective, however, scoffed at me, daring an attempt. The most mockingly simple goal on the list was elusive Number 12:  Actually finish an exercise program that you start. This item was inadvertently suggested by my daughter Megan, who constantly listened to me make rash statements about getting in shape, stretching and exerting. Meg knew my exercise MO. Each month I would chant a new mantra. “I will swim 40 laps everyday.” “I will hike Squaw Peak every other day.” “I will ride my bike with my jogging friend and lap him.” All examples of unattained physical fitness fantasies.

Swim everyday? Yes. I did go to the pool daily for several months before Meg got married in Hawaii. Sadly, I wasn’t breast stroking between lap lanes. I was deepening my bronze tones lounging on a beach chair so that my tangerine-colored mother-of-the-bride dress would pop.

Hike Squaw Peak? Uh huh. This goal was particularly laughable. A serious hiker must carve out time to hike. She must drive there and fight for a parking place. She must acquire proper shoes and hydration equipment. This walker must sweat. Nope. 

Ride your bike and lap your friend? Sure. One time I did accompany my jogging friend on my bike, but languished as he flew past me, twice. Along the course, I chatted with neighbors, picked flowers, and stopped for a latte. The tortoise and the hare. Not good.

Meg’s condemnation of my exercise regime was accurate and sad. I had started and not completed hundreds of programs. Jazzercise, country swing, tennis, yoga, ballroom dancing, golf, jogging, bicycling, Richard Simmons, kick-boxing, line dancing. All started. None finished.

It was time for a change, and retirement granted the opportunity for focus. After harsh self-evaluation, I determined that I was blurting promises with no strategy. To succeed, I needed a systematic approach to conquer Number 12.  A four-step scheme emerged:

1.  Make the exercise goal personal, attainable and realistic. 

2.  Bite off small pieces. 

3.  Have an exact start and finish date. 

4.  Recruit an accountability partner who wouldn’t put up with any guff.

With a plan in place, the search was on for an activity that touched me personally. It must have achievable sub-tasks and a workable timeline. And the most crucial piece to the puzzle was an exercise partner who could handle a whining prima donna.

A commercial for the Breast Cancer 3-Day Walk caught my attention. At the time, I was suffering with a dear friend who had just been diagnosed with this dreaded disease. The timing of the ad and her cancer detection seemed fateful. Walk 60 miles for a worthy reason. This was it. My cause. Attainable. Realistic. Noble. A training regiment that started slow and grew. A clear beginning and ending. Three of the four steps of my stratagem were included. Watch out, Number 12.

I still needed an accountability partner. A stubborn friend who could not be bamboozled or connived by the wily anti-athlete. I needed Becky. Becky was fit and bulldog-tenacious. Let it be known that there was no Number 12 on Becky’s Bucket List because she ALWAYS finished what she started. And Becky had a personal reason to avenge this insidious illness. Breast cancer had sucked away her mother’s young life at age 62. All reasons why I needed Becky to sign on.

After much begging, groveling and bribing, Becky agreed to do the 3-Day Walk with me. She became my accountability savior, a perfect practice partner.

Becky and I followed the 3-Day training schedule to the letter of the law. We strapped on unfashionable fanny packs and developed correct calluses on unmentionable body parts. We purchased SPF 100 lip balm, Glide to protect our delicate armpits, matching shirts, three pairs of expensive walking shoes, and Gatorade with electrolytes. Anything the alumni 3-Day gurus told us to do, we did. We planned to succeed. And I planned to cross off Number 12.

The weekend of the event, Bec and I, surrounded by 1400 of our new best friends, took off at a brisk pace to accomplish a miraculous feat. We walked 20 miles that first day, and slept in a pink bosom-shaped tent in the massive make-shift camp. 

The second day, we hiked the hills of South Phoenix. Becky grew blisters on both feet that bled and dripped. By noon, the medics along the route deemed her feet a travesty and she was exiled back to camp. 

“Meet you at the tent,” Becky ordered. “Finish this. Go!”

Tears of frustration streamed down my face as her anguished stare from the back bus window disappeared down the hill. I wanted to quit. I needed my buddy. But I trudged on alone because my teammate demanded it. 

Back at camp, Becky nursed her wounds, and by the next morning, she got medical clearance to complete the last 20 miles. Feet swaddled in duct tape, Bec limped with me: laughing, crying, singing, whistling, complaining and finishing. 

Sixty miles and 3 days later, an exhilarated Team Bec and Bon crossed the finish line amid a yowling crowd of supporters. And saluting from the sidelines, was Megan armed with an armload of flowers, tears in her eyes and a hand-written sign that simply said, “You finished, Mom.” I did.

Take that, Number 12.