I write in the shadow and spirit of Mark Twain and Bill Shakespeare. My greatest dream and aspiration is that they will laugh with me . . . and not laugh me out of the classroom.
At the age of fifteen and being given the first in a succession of traveling papers by three high schools, and ultimately attending four, I began my odyssey at 5:00 am when the chief of police and my high school principal showed up at our front door and told my mother, “Mrs. Henry, get Don out of town by sunup or else.” (We’ll get into the “or else” a little later.) The sun was still an hour east of the Atlantic shoreline when I was on my way to live with my grandparents in Rensselaer, Indiana. This is in lieu of a territorial prison in West Texas or the United States Marine Corps, which is where my grandfather really wanted to send me. It was in Rensselaer I began writing my autobiography, giving it what I thought was the very profound title, “Diary of A Dumbass.”
Approximately four chapters into it, I returned home from school to find my grandmother standing over the underwear drawer in my bedroom. She had retrieved my grand opus from where it lay hidden under a stack of BVDs. Gripping it in her hand and shaking it in my face, she screamed, “Don Henry—this is a disgrace to our family!”
I replied—but grandma—our family is a disgrace! At this point, she ripped my entire work to pieces.
It was not until I was in a college creative writing class at Indiana University I again began work on my memoirs. This time, I returned home from class to find my wife shaking my even grander opus in her hand, much as my grandmother had. And the same result followed. It seems some people simply cannot handle the truth.
It would be thirty years before I began anew. In the meantime, I had graduated from Indiana University. Lacking the confidence I could earn a living with a degree in English, in spite of encouragement by my Graduate Teaching Assistant and the entire department, I chose the obvious path to financial independence: obtaining a degree in Social Work. Upon graduation, I returned to Texas, where I had lived as a small boy, and later, during my tour, in search of a high school degree.
During the perpetually difficult financial times, I found it difficult to save myself, much less the rest of the world. I found myself thinking it would sound a lot more romantic to be a starving than a social worker, but still lacking confidence, I let myself be coaxed into a career in insurance. In time, I built a successful business in the medical insurance market. For twenty years, it sustained me quite well until recent legislative changes forced me, once again, to reinvent myself.
My metamorphosis on this occasion began with taking chemistry classes at my local community college. Because of wisdom and practical experience—garnered from years in the private market—I fast-tracked a new career by developing two revolutionary products. The first is a pest control product. Specifically, it is a “Cat Food Aphrodisiac,” which (when mixed with Fancy Feast) makes cats absolutely irresistible to mice. The second is a chemical sanitation product, which—when added to raw sewage—makes it smell like perfectly good tacos. I am currently marketing it in border towns along the Rio Grande and all the way to the West Coast. If I land the Tijuana account, it will be an economic boon to Tijuana and all of Mexico, as tourists will literally run for the border. I will be able to retire in luxury and hereafter be known as the “Ron Popeil of Poo.”
In my spare time, in addition to riding my Harley, I teach Shakespeare to death row inmates at the Huntsville State Prison and judge armadillo beauty contests. When not attending Mensa International conventions, I continue working on my autobiography, still entitled (for the time being, anyway) “Diary of a Dumbass.”
The events and experiences that led me to become the person I am today are reflected in the stories and poems that follow. They consist mostly of what I describe as autobiographical fiction. I include the qualifier “fiction” as a disclaimer of sorts to protect the guilty. That would be me, for the most part.
I am certain, in some of this, you will sense an undercurrent of slight regret and remorse, but hopefully, you will find my tales, rhymes, and reflections humorous for the most part. Any positive insights or lessons you might gain would make me that much happier. In the words of a famous clown, I once had the pleasure of knowing, “We are all actors in a grand play. We can choose to be either happy or sad performers. I choose “happy”!” I made that clown a promise I would do my part to make people smile. Again, I hope this does that much for you.
The Bardofthewoods
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