Whodeeny

Standing on the edge overlooking Cannon river, I tried to guess Greg's "big surprise". Summer was incredibly hot and muggy this year and I was really more interested in swimming in the lazy river than overlooking it. Both of us had biked down in only cut-offs and laceless tennies, always racing who could get the darker tan by the end of summer. Greg invariably won every year as he worked at a local pig farm, doing who knows what. The river was running slow as molasses, that is until you got to the dam.

"Walk the plank, asshole." Greg stated firmly.

He pulled from his jean cut-offs a few plastic Gladd twist ties. We'd been doing chores earlier hauling garbage and tying the bags and burning them in the local dump. He looped them together and made a long chain. I never really took my brother seriously when he was in his Take-Charge-I'm-One-Whole-Fucking-Year-Older mode, but something about his look of seriousness combined with the methodical approach he was taking to weave and loop these ties together worried me.

"Turn around and put your hands behind your back."

He sounded more like a faux cop from a bad tv show then Greg, my learning disabled older brother. I did, not really concerned, but a sense of snide curiousity was growing inside me as to what he was up to.

At 12 and 13, I was pretty much used to his attempts at bullying and controlling me, but he was not really ever able to pull it off. As I did he used the ties to wrap around my wrists and tie my hands rather well. I was actually impressed. "Impressive Greg, now what? Did you learn how to tie over at Bob's? Now maybe you can tie your shoes."

As I said that Greg punched me in the back, not hard but more of a brotherly watch what you're saying sort of way. Greg and I had always had this love hate brotherly repore. It was complex, admittedly. I wanted to be best friends but he just never was into it. On days he actually wanted to hang out I was usually up for it, because I just never knew how long it was going to be before he would want to again. He marched me on the path poking me in the back with a stick he must have picked up from one of the many trees. as we made it down to the dam overlook I saw a newly constructed diving board. Greg had used the trunk of a fallen tree and had taken and fastened a long plank on top of it. It stretched clear out over the dam, and into the river just beneath the dam where the water crashed and flowed back up causing a deep pool to form. It was pretty sweet. I turned, amazed, at Greg's Big Surprise...

"Walk the plank, asshole." His firm demeanor now holding a bit of good humored smirk.

I tested Greg, wondering just how far he was going to "make me" get out on the board. We were always testing each other. As I walked out, hands still tied I turned around, walking backwards. One to taunt Greg about my own braveness, and two to try to wrangle out of the ties without him noticing, all of which began feeling overwhelming to me...

and then I fell, plunging, my blue shorts a tiny speckle against the white water of the dam.