Davis and His Muddy Jacket Spill

Okay so the last post was really boring. And the morning post was an April Fool’s joke I hope nobody got.

So let me end your week on a kinder note with my story about David and his mud spill.

His name was David but, to his parents chagrin, we called him Davis. “Hi is Davis there,” I’d ask. “Yes DAVID is here,” answered his parents.

So Davis had this really Liberace-like blue jacket with white fur lining. One day in maybe 3rd grade, Davis decides to jump from the sidewalk to a nearby piece of plywood that was resting still on wet mud. You had snow, but in New Orleans we just had muddy soil.

Naturally, the plywood sails along the mud like an Olympic ice-skater. Davis spills, and now looks like he’s been inside a porta-potty that rolled off a truck and down a hill. I remember Davis’ parents, and they were strict folks. They weren’t happy about the dry-cleaning bill, and I could see Davis’ fear in his eyes.

Flash forward a week later and he’s back wearing his blue Liberace jacket. He acknowledges that his attempts to wash and hide the jacket failed, and his folks were indeed not happy.

Now this is where a potentially forgettable moment becomes a favorite childhood memory. A lot of folks missed “the spill,” and back in the 1970s we weren’t all equipped with smart phones and cameras. So our storytelling is all we had. Despite having been disciplined, Davis’ lights up at the chance to retell what happened. He’s recounting his adventurous spill to the delight of a throng of classmates. We’re all listening intently like Davis was teaching sex ed. Of course me and Mason had seen the spill, but we enjoyed the reenactment equally.

Then Davis, in a moment of exuberance, decides to demonstrate the spill (carefully) for realism. Too real though. He does the exact same spill again. Into the mud. Same jacket.

I’ll bet his parents kicked his ass that night. But it was worth it (for me anyway).

P.S. Normally I’d keep last names hidden to preserve privacy. But I sure would like to find Davis, and don’t think he’d mind me sharing this story. He was David Preuss, and I don’t recognize any of the dozens on Linked-In or Facebook. Hey Davis, where are ya?