Hare-Raising Adventures
24^th Publication, November 11, 2002 — January 2, 2003

Well, it has been long since I last wrote. Far too long. And, as is usually the case when I’ve been detained from writing my newsletters, it isn’t because there has been nothing newsworthy and so I’ve been idling away my time. On the contrary, far too much has been happening — so much that until this point, the time to write a newsletter has not presented itself. However, due to the fact that much of importance happened during November and December, I shall write that newsletter, however much it may be out of date now.

In November I suffered the indignity of having a visage-changing operation. Many of you already know of what I speak, and some I’m sure don’t, to your eternal shame, if you have interacted with me in person since November. I had my braces removed. For two long years these bands of metal had been my sole companions... we veritably did everything together — we ate together, brushed our teeth together, and whenever one of us went someplace, the other was sure to go. So I was naturally somewhat melancholy at seeing my braces shorn from my teeth, but I gained solace in that without them life would be simpler. As I had feared, the loss of my braces detracted from my highly cultivated smile of mischievous glee, but apparently I now look a bit older. So I’ve traded one deception for another. I shall mourn the loss of my previous grin, though. May it rest in peace.

However, now I have two other companions to brighten my evenings – my retainers! I entrusted to these two jolly folk the care of my palate, and so far they seem to have done an admirable job in keeping my unruly teeth in line. May they not slack in their duties.

Uncle John and his family came up and celebrated Thanksgiving with Uncle David and our family. As always when our relatives come, the laughter was abated only long enough for the next jest or humorous tale to be told. Many a game was played, and vows were made to play many more come Christmas.

Back in November I had an inspiration — I would copy all our music CDs into the computer. Now, I didn’t realize at the time what a monumental task this would be, for we have at least a hundred CDs around the house. However, I began a slow and steady pace, and have since copied all but the newest and the most worthless CDs into the computer, and can now play them at my leisure. This is particularly nice, since there is a long-standing feud in my family; the lone bastion of truth and light and music which is perpetually assailed by the dark and ignorant hordes of silence. The hordes usually win, and since the CD carousel is in a room which is usually horde territory, I have been forced to retreat to my high tower in the attic to play my music. However, I can only play one CD at a time there, so having all the music on the computer is a great boon.

Late in November, the merry band which forms the Barshingers’ English Acting Troupe (the BEAT for short), suddenly realized as one that our doom was upon us! The Barshinger’s nets had descended upon us, and there was no escape! We wailed, we flailed, we gnashed our teeth, but it was all for naught. The ex-piano teacher (Mrs. Barshinger) and her daughter had no mercy. We were to be subjugated to one of the most heinous, cruel, and unusual punishments ever. We were to participate in a recital. Not just any recital, though, and not just any participation. A drama recital, and we were to — act! This may seem an obvious conclusion to our class, but it struck us poor students all quite unawares. A tremor of latent fear passed through me even as I merely remember it. Many and great were the indignities which we suffered: most wretched clothing, line memorization, teamwork, a bow or curtsy at the end, and worst of all, the crowning ignominy, make-up.

Now, you must understand my position on make-up. Under normal circumstances I despise it, no matter on whom or for what reason. And of course, this was when I didn’t have to endure it myself. After having to be afflicted with some powder or something which was to make my face not look green (or some other lie I was told in a vain attempt to keep me placid), my utter detest and even hatred for the most vile of substances has been mitigated not one iota, but rather increased a hundredfold. I was so desperate to escape that at one point I fled, broke through the crash bars on the exterior doors, and stood out in the light rain, feeling akin to Andy Dufresne in The Shawshank Redemption, reveling in my freedom after such great torment. However, unlike his, my tale was not to end so happily. I was drawn back in, my screams rending the air until, with great finality, the door slammed shut with a clang!

The recital itself went quite well. I bungled one of my lines, but like a skilled juggler managed to salvage it with some shreds of decency left. Those who had the pleasure of seeing my torment were kind enough to claim they didn’t notice, but I know that behind my back they snickered. One of my scenes, an adaptation of the famous scene in which William Tell must shoot an apple from atop his son’s head, involved a real wooden bow and arrow. Now, this prop was entrusted to two of the teenage boys to get to work, which was perhaps not the wisest of ideas. They concluded that it was weak, and might not survive another shot (a test shot had been fired). However, things proceeded, and a target was set up off-stage. During the performance, William shot an arrow, the bow survived, but the arrow went askew. There was a collective gasp from backstage, and I stood for a moment in indecision (parenthetically, I was the evil governor — some have said I was typecast. I have no comment at this time) for that gasp was not planned. However, nothing more ominous was heard, and shortly thereafter Tell’s son came running out with the cloven apple, and the scene progressed. Later on the key witnesses all agreed that the arrow managed to barely miss all of them, and finally lodged in a cloth prop on the floor. I suppose it added a little drama to the drama.

Two weeks after this recital, we planned a party for those poor souls who had actually followed those age-old instructions for those of a thespian nature to break their legs during a performance. Unfortunately, those who did follow the advice were a bit too embarrassed to admit it, and so didn’t show up. Instead, we had a party for the cast of the drama group — those few who had survived the carnage, I being among that number. This went well, though with all the formal stuff that had to be completed, two hours was not felt to be sufficient time to get inebriated — or rather, play many games and such.

However, among the ranks of the actors we found the majority of those noble souls who wished to follow in the way of the Order of the Hexagon. Paul MacDonald and I had written up a 50 question application form which aspirants filled out to the best of their abilities. Though a few had to be regretfully declined admission, most of the applicants were accepted. So far the rules and objectives of the order remain vague, but an order luncheon is being planned for sometime mid-April, and hopefully we shall be able to clarify some of the finer by-laws of our non-profit organization. If any of my loyal (or disloyal, for that matter – I’m not discriminatory) subscribers wish to receive an application to the order, please contact me, and I’ll make sure you get one.

My life in latter November and December was beset with programs of various sorts. In addition to my drama recital, there was also the MAFiA Christmas Program and our church Christmas Program. The MAFiA program may have been the best one of theirs that I have been to (and I’ve been to all of them since the beginning of time... or at least the beginning of the local franchise). Whether that is high praise is for you to determine for yourself. Afterwards, I escaped from the suffocating crush of people by hiding behind the refreshments counter, but the necessary price I had to pay was to help serve the people.

The Church Christmas program was preceded by four or so rehearsals to get the amateurs into some semblance of preparation. The grand new thing this year was a short play put on by the youth of the church. Gabe, being an old hand at directing, was maneuvered into directing it by the machinations of my mother. He didn’t think he would have enough competent actors, so he turned on me. He turned not to me, but on me. Not only did he force me to participate, he made me the lead (he told me at one point he was exacting his revenge on my for the sins of my mother in appointing him director). During the entire course of the skit, I was on stage, and I had an ungodly number of lines to memorize, which I did not do to my satisfaction, but did enough to get by. Apparently it was a big hit with the youngsters, though. I also helped in designing the layout of the bulletins, so I was rather involved with the production.

Life a thief in the night... Christmas came! Suddenly, it was Christmastime, when by all rights and fair play it should have been yet another month away. I was most disappointed at this poor showing, especially since it forced me to play my hand early and go shopping sooner than I expected. The first of the uncles and accompanying families to come was Uncle Peter and Co. He has been spending the past year in exile in England, and was only allowed to return this past fall, and lives in North Carolina, so our sightings of him have been few and far between. Thus his arrival was met with great glee. However, even after he arrived the sightings of him were few and far between, for what time he wasn’t playing Battlefield 142, a computer game of my brother Peter’s, he spent making the rounds to all his various acquaintances up here whom he hadn’t visited in recent times.

Uncle John arrived on Christmas Eve, also bringing his family (why my uncles insist on bringing their families is beyond me...), but we made the best of a bad situation, and invited them to come to the Moravian Church’s children’s love feast service with us. It was a quite splendid affair, though the average age must have been about 50 or so. The person in charge of picking the music did an excellent job in selecting songs for the choir to sing. Two in particular were astoundingly nice.

Finally, ‘Twas Christmas morn. I, being cursed with brothers whom generally are not exactly morning people (to use a gentler description than that to which I’m inclined), went about rousting them all out of bed, and fleeing before they could awake fully from their hibernation-like slumber. In my recklessness, I flicked on Mom and Dad’s bedroom light, and said in a cheery fashion, "Rise and shine!" However, I think they forgot who did it by the time they were cognitive enough to do much about it. We all managed to congregate finally — ever so slowly —, and commenced opening our stockings. Later on the rest of my family continued to wake up while I got online and bemoaned having sluggards and sloths for siblings to a sympathetic Postscript (a counselor whom I met at French Creek). Finally, at least an hour later, we all were down in the living room and prepared to open presents.

Many a pleasurable present was unwrapped, but for me, by far the greatest gifts were those from my dearest mother — a pillow and a waste basket. Mom forced me to promise, though, that if I mentioned those two gifts, I would have to supply a caveat that the trash can is made of hand-tooled leather, and can fold up flat for easy transportation when traveling and such. The pillow was one that I had admired when Mom and I went a year and a half ago to a store in New York called Brookstone. It is made of some newfangled synthetic material which was developed by the space program (I’m hoping somewhat indirectly, for I have seen and felt the stuff they used on the outer shell of the shuttles and such, and it was not something I would want to be sleeping on), and basically when you lie on it, you sink into it as far as need be, and when you get up, it slowly regains its original shape. Anyway, being a fellow who is always interested in new and neat things, this was quite an interesting discovery, but I didn’t expect to receive it for Christmas. I think I have gotten fewer instances of a sore neck since using it, though it’s design and density take a bit of time to get used to.

The other relatives had opened their presents at Nana and Poppa’s house, and around noon we all went over there to exchange various inter-extended family presents, which lasted a while due to the great many people there and general confusion. Afterwards we dispersed and the cousins played many a game of cards or boards. Unfortunately one great humiliation I had to endure involved one of my favorite card games (perhaps my most favorite), Egyptian Rat Spit, and my cousin. She had the audacity to challenge me in this game (in which I am one of the better players, if I say so myself) and much to my consternation and great wrath, won each game we played. The game primarily consists of each person putting down a card in alternating order, and when a number appears twice in a row or with other card in-between them (e. g. 7 of spades and then 7 of diamonds, or 10 of clubs, 2 of spades, then 10 of hearts), whoever slaps it first gets all the cards. The goal is to get all the cards. So a game could theoretically go on indefinitely, but usually one person slowly gains all the cards, and eventually wins. In each of our games, however, I would start to gain cards, and then think that I would finally win this game, and then slowly lose them again, only to end up in defeat once more. It was a most nerve-wracking situation, for I wasn’t losing outright – it was always a slow and painful struggle. We have scheduled a rematch at Easter, to see if I am to be truly defeated, or if I merely was having a bad day.

The relatives left the day after Christmas, and we drove to the farm to visit my paternal relatives. Our visit there was not nearly as hectic as previous weeks, though we did get somewhat involved in a board game with my uncles. I watched a most interesting segment on the History channel about the plans of the United States to invade Japan, and part of a segment on the history of war propaganda, as well, though I still have little to no desire to be able to get television at home.

I have mentioned in the past the myriads of my faceless on-line friends, of whom several acquired faces: Karen Hudzinski I met at French Creek, Elisabeth Mallin came to a corn maze expedition I organized, I went to Kiersten Timpe’s drama group, and met her brother, Thor, at various such places. As it turns out, a number of these folk know each other and live about a half an hour away from the farm, and Elisabeth was hosting a New Year’s party at which they would be coming. At one point it even looked like Postscript (whom I mentioned earlier in this letter) would be coming up from North Carolina for the occasion. They found out that I was going to be in the area at the time, and so demanded that I come to the party, with many and cunning threats as to what my demise would be like if I didn’t come. I was a bit leery, for I had only met Karen twice and Elisabeth once, and their other friends not at all, only having spoken to them via

Instant Messenger. I effectively had not spoken with any of their brothers or any of the other folk who were coming to the party. However, their threats were motivating, and logistically it seemed feasible – my family could drop me off on the way home, and then I could take a bus from there right to Bethlehem. It is also nice to actually meet someone you have talked to for six or more months online.

So, I was dragged into it. I discovered first hand how disconcerting it can be to be dropped off at someone’s house where you sort of know one person, but all the others are strangers to you, and you have no hope of fleeing, for where could you go? So, there I was, stuck with some strange family to whom I was just as strange as they were to me, and only some girl (namely, Elisabeth) as a sort of go-between. However, Jeremiah, her brother, showed me the rather impressive igloo he made with the products of the previous snowfall, and then we played a bit with his video games, and I practiced my "silent observer" style of interaction. I may have indeed perfected it. I also discovered that while it may be quite easy to talk to people on-line, it somehow is much more difficult in person. This and many other observations I made during the stay.

Due to a slight inconsistency in schedules, I had to arrive on the 30^th instead of the 31^st, and so had an extra day before the party itself. The night of the 30^th Anna and Rachel Thornton, two of the previously faceless myriads of on-line friends, arrived to watch The Count of Monte Cristo. Rachel had told me many times in the past that she doesn’t speak at all in person (and that in fact she usually does not speak much online, either, probably in an attempt to dissuade me from trying to get her to speak, but she unfortunately misgauged my personality, and I merely took it as a challenge to find a way to break through and get her to talk... but anyway—) and she held true to her word, for she managed to spend the entire evening without saying a single word to me, and not more than a paragraph’s worth of words in all, much to my amusement.

Though I did remember to take my camera, I neglected, much to my later disappointment, to take any pictures. However, Anna took several so I think I have pictures of most of the people who attended. Though I didn’t know most of the people there, I did get along rather well with them on my part. They might have other stories to tell.

So all in all, the party was quite a success, from my point of view. I got to meet various friends for the first time, meet other friends again, banter with Mr. Mallin about whether the coca-cola company will be producing their cans with the new designs indefinitely, or whether it is unknown for how long they will produce them. I was in favor of the former, and he of the latter.

The logistics of getting on a bus, going to Harrisburg, getting on another bus, and going to Bethlehem seem relatively simple, but the complications began when the Mallins told that in all their 11 years of living in the tiny town of Greencastle, they never knew of a bus stop. Mr. Mallin called the bus company, and it turns out that the bus stop is a gas station. We then discovered that the bus doesn’t stop, per se, it just swings by and you flag it down. We arrived at the gas station, and found out that there wasn’t even a bus stop — we just had to stand outside and wait for the bus. So, we stood outside in the cold and wind, occasionally waving to the curious drivers who were staring at a girl and a boy standing on the corner of two highways with a small suitcase sitting by them. Mr. Mallin decided that we could stand outside, while he sat in the car. I think that there is some moral here, but I can’t exactly find it. Maybe something about old age and treachery... In any event, we stood, and waited, and stood some more. Time passed. It was five minutes late. It was ten minutes late. It was 30 minutes late.

Finally we communed with Mr. Mallin, and he suggested we wait for another five minutes before we called the company and chewed them out. We waited for a time, and suddenly a bus appeared! But — alas! — it was not a Greyhound bus. However, it stopped for us! We hastily made our way over to it, and the driver replied to our inquiries by informing us that it was going to Harrisburg, and he seemed willing to take me, Greyhound or not. So, I said farewell, and got onto the bus. As I later managed to piece together from various facts, Greyhound and this other bussing service had joined forces and were now one company, or at least allies. The reason for the bus’ half hour tardiness was an accident on a highway. That mystery was solved. And other than a slight mishap in which I almost missed my switch because of poor announcements at the terminal (or whatever bus places are called) and got left in Harrisburg with only a ten dollar bill to my name, the rest of my ride home was uneventful.

That is the tale of November and December, months of great activity and fraught with many perils and possibilities.

–~Snowshoe Hare~–
–~Christopher Green~–