Tales of Ponape: Love, Rheum, and Flatulence - April 25, 2007
Mike peered at us from the kitchen. Per usual, he was clad only in a pair of tight white briefs, and was stomping around the house like a malevolent swami. "What statues?" Mike asked loudly, simultaneously announcing his presence with a loud cough.
"We're talking about Easter Island, Mike. Go back to the kitchen." Bryan had recruited me to help him with the report he had due the following day.
"Easter Island? Ha! That's a place for losers. Ponape is the most freaking primo island ever. Do your research report on Ponape." Mike has the ability to relate even the most inane things to himself.
"That's why you've been passed from conqueror to conqueror ever since people decided to start chopping down trees for wood." I only barely knew that was true. At that age I had yet to do any real research on Mike's childhood "paradise."
"No way! We totally fought off everyone who ever attacked us, man!"
"I don't care, Mike. He doesn't even get to choose what to do the report on. Just go back to the kitchen and chew on some more bones."
"You Americans are so freaking wasteful, man." To illustrate his point, Mike stuck a steak bone in his mouth and proceeded to suck out the marrow. The meat from the bone was red and still bleeding when Mike sunk his teeth into it. He insisted that the entire family eat meat this way. In the seventh grade, I became a vegetarian as an act of protest.
"Fucking caveman," Bryan muttered, sneering at Mike and his bone.
"What did he say?" Mike's eyes were wide with shock.
"Nothing. Just leave us alone, Mike." I knew it was my responsibility to ask. I also knew that Mike would never be content to leave anyone alone. Ever. His compulsion to bother people was the same compulsion as the one that drove him to sing Elvis songs at karaoke bars every weekend. He needed to be seen and heard. At that point in my life, I would often stop in the middle of simple daily tasks, and laugh at the great cosmic joke that were it not for karaoke I might very well come from a happy home.
"You know, you guys, I don't have to take this kind of disrespeck." As always, Mike found it impossible to make a hard "t" sound at the end of his words. I wondered if Mike thought standing in the kitchen in a pair of tighty-whiteys, sucking the marrow out of a bone made him look "respeckable." "What the hell do you two think of me anyway?"
"You know that shell you're always carrying around? The one from Ponape?" I asked.
"What about it?" Mike put his hands on his hips and thrust his chest out boldly. I could see the outline of his nut-sack straining against the thin fabric of his underwear, like two chestnuts pressed against a thin plastic bag.
"Put your ear up against it and listen to the sound of the empty space rolling around in the shell. Listen to the sound of nothing. That's what I think of you." Mike threw his bone at me in a sudden rage.
"Maybe one day you'll be evolved enough to make a spear," Bryan snickered. The bone bounced off of my chest, and landed on the open pages of his textbook.
"You guys are raciss." Again, no "t" sounds.
"I prefer to think I just learn from my experiences."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean, BC?"
"I'll put it to you this way, what does 'massaypoonan' mean?"
"It's the Ponapeian word for the shit you get in your eyes when you wake up."
"Okay, Mike. Now what's the Ponapeian word for 'love?'"
"Fuck you, Brandon." I had lured him into a trap. There is no word in Ponapeian for love.
"I win."
"No you don't."
"Admit it. Admit you come from a culture that gives a higher precedence for the crap you get in your eyes when you wake up, than to love. Admit it!"
Mike coughed loudly, and began to prepare a marinade from copious amounts of soy sauce and onion. This was the only way he would have ever admitted defeat, but I could not accept it. I had to make him acknowledge it. It had passed a point with me. I was tired of waking up to find naked body parts drawn on the backs of my homework assignments. I was tired of the constant yelling. I was tired of having things thrown at me, and being made to listen to his rants about Pantera. Just this once, I was going to win.
I ran into the kitchen. "Admit it, Mike! Admit it! Say that I'm right and that you're wrong!" I was shouting. I was almost hysterical.
My jungle-man stepfather hummed as he continued to make his marinade. He ignored me for a full minute as I circled around him, shouting.
"Okay, Brandon." He suddenly turned to me, crossing his arms under his droopy jungle-man boobs. "I admit it. You're right and I'm wrong."
"Ha! I knew it! I knew it! I win! You lose." I jumped up and threw my arms in the air, letting the sweetness of victory saturate my body.
"Just know this... tonight, while you sleep, I'm going to fart in your face."
I paused, halfway into a victory jump. Stuck in a position of fear. "What did you say?"
"Tonight, while you sleep, I'm going to fart in your face."
"Fuck you, Mike."
Laughing like a hyena Mike turned to me. "I win. Admit it."
"I'd rather you fart in my face."
I would have... and he did.
Posted by BC Woods at 12:00 AM
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Comments
he is the weirdest man ive ever heard anyone talk about. good story bc. when is your mom going to dump this guy?
Posted by: nick at April 25, 2007 12:51 AM
BC though they don't have a word in Ponape for love, they do have gestures. Face farting is like saying I love you in ponape. In fact it means even more then just words. So he does have a point, and he did win this time.
Tales of Ponape is going to be a classic series...
Posted by: Flp at April 25, 2007 04:15 AM
Jesus BC, I laughed my ass off about the face farting thing. I think a movie about Mike the mad Ponapian should be made.
Posted by: Putter at April 25, 2007 07:53 AM
At least he told you the fart was coming.. he could have been well rude and just done it.. and you would have shockingly woke up to a mouth full of fart. OMG I am laughing so hard. Keep em coming!
Posted by: SlayersAngel at April 25, 2007 09:49 AM
What the hell made/makes this man endearing to your mom???
Posted by: Fjölnir at April 25, 2007 11:54 AM
I agree with Flp write a chronicling of the tales of Ponape. I am in tears laughing and I could see it all play out. Great story.
Posted by: Mike at April 25, 2007 02:42 PM
I don't really have to comment on this one because it's really good, but because it is so good, I will. This is good. : ) haha
Posted by: Wayland at April 25, 2007 03:39 PM
And I thought MY stepdad was a looney bird....
Posted by: M at April 25, 2007 04:19 PM
You step-dad wins arguements the same exact way my 4 year old cousin does.
Posted by: Ashley Squared at April 25, 2007 04:23 PM
Fuck you! He used to stick his tighty whiteys (Which had shit stains in them) on my doorknob while I slept so I would have to touch them to get out of my room in the morning. You had it easy.
BC: Yes, this is my sister, and yes this is true.
Posted by: rachel at April 25, 2007 07:25 PM
That makes me laugh even harder. Hmm... What could be worse shitty draws or smelly gas?
Posted by: SlayersAngel at April 25, 2007 11:08 PM
HAHAHA your sister reads these? Somehow that makes it even funnier! :) Keep up the good work!
Posted by: Ashley at April 26, 2007 12:39 AM
hahahahahaha i cant believe she reads this site.
does she realize she sucks so much?
BC: She does. But she gets angry at me when it all comes crashing home.
Posted by: Anonymous at April 26, 2007 12:58 AM
Ahahaha, you should have wiped your ass on his nose the next time he was asleep. Damn, he got you dude.
Posted by: BigChops at April 26, 2007 10:02 AM
So does that mean you and Rachel get along now? Or is she still a cunt? (God I love that word)
BC: Never
Posted by: ANTHONY at April 26, 2007 10:14 AM
Holy crap!! Mike is sounding crazier and crazier... are you sure he's not severely inbred? I know there's probably all these metapopulations around on the islands but maybe Ponape is the one that didn't get the gene flow.
Posted by: RecurveHawk at April 26, 2007 11:15 AM
All of these stories are starting to sound the same.
Posted by: Anonymous at April 26, 2007 01:06 PM
I don't tend to like a lot of writers, but you're one of the rare ones I do. All of the blissful dysfunction, added into the fact that you're a WA native (I'm near Everett, been here my whole life), puts a smile on my face. I can definitely identify with your cynical outlook on life...it's hard not to be cynical when you've lived here so long.
Posted by: Matt at April 26, 2007 07:48 PM
Everyone has their idiot man-child and yours just happens to be named mike
Posted by: evanescent at April 26, 2007 08:42 PM
Wtf Mike is an ADULT? I read the latest story first and just assumed mike was your much younger little bro or something
Posted by: Jas at April 27, 2007 02:27 AM
I thought the story about the incident with the sword wasn't all that well written, but I think the last few have the spark back.
The other day I said I thought you had the potential to write some huge American novel, but that is based so much on random probabilities it is a dumb point. I will say, however, that unlike anyone I have ever met ever, you have the potential to write something GREAT.
Keep at it--there may even be some pussy in it for you...!
Posted by: Former room mate Kevin at April 27, 2007 02:02 PM
I hope he at least had pants on when he floated that air biscuit.
Posted by: gravyboat at April 30, 2007 09:31 PM
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