Sharon Creech - Absolutely Normal Chaos

About three tons of food was spread on the table: fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, bread, green beans, squash, biscuits, tomatoes, corn, and peaches. Then for dessert: pecan pie and apple pie and molasses pie. For a family that seems poor as anything (like I said, no electricity and no plumbing and the house looks as if it hasn’t been painted in about two hundred years), they sure have a lot of food on the table. I don’t know how in the world Carl Ray was so skinny when he first came to our house.

Carl Ray had about ten helpings of food, which was a little embarrassing because he made it look like we never feed him.

Everyone kept asking Carl Ray what it was like in “The City” and I kept trying to say it isn’t a city that we live in. Easton is just a little suburb; it’s about ten miles from a big city. But they kept on and on about The City, asking him how many murders he’d seen and how many times he’d been held up by robbers and all that kind of sum and substance. Honestly.

They also kept asking Carl Ray about his car, and I thought he’d tell them about the money and the college education, but you could tell he was saving it for another time, because he looked real embarrassed whenever they mentioned it. They kept saying things like “You sure must make a lot of money in The City,” and “Wow, Carl Ray, you’re gonna be a millionaire,” and on and on. It was as if he didn’t want to tell them about the money.

Uncle Carl Joe didn’t say a word.

Then, about ten thirty, when we had finished eating, everybody got up and Aunt Radene said, “Best turn in; we can chaw on and on tomorrow.” And in about ten minutes everybody was in bed, except for Sue Ann and Sally Lynn, who were doing the dishes. I did ask if I could help, but they said no, so I just went to bed. I was really tired and also feeling really homesick for everybody.

I wonder if Carl Ray felt this way when he came to stay with us. How did he stand it? Everybody’s so nice to him here, and he’s lapping it up like a little dog. And they’re all looking at me as if I’m the strange one, and I can hardly get a word in, not that I would know what to say if I did get the chance. So I don’t say too much—just like Carl Ray at our house. It makes you think, doesn’t it?

It’s a little hard to get used to how primitive this place is. I still haven’t gone to the bathroom. I did walk out to the outhouse.

Oh, Supreme Being! I’d forgotten just how awful that outhouse is. It’s so dark inside. The only light that can get in is a little sunlight from a hole cut high up one wall. But also through that hole come flies and wasps and creepy spiders. There are spiderwebs in all the corners. I don’t even want to mention the smell . Arghhhh. I’ll wait until I am absolutely desperate before I go in there. Maybe Carl Ray was as afraid of our bathroom as I am of his. Maybe he was used to all this back-to-nature sum and substance.

I’m back on the porch swing. I’ve been sitting here most of the day writing letters. Everybody else has been rushing around doing chores, and whenever I ask if I can help, they say, “Naw, you just set awhile.”

I’m getting tired of “setting awhile.”

I think Aunt Radene has the flu.

She did make dinner tonight though. We had fried chicken (again, because it’s Carl Ray’s favorite), gravy, boiled potatoes, corn on the cob, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, and fried peppers. Then for dessert we had chocolate pudding with whipped cream and also cherry Jell-O with bits of peaches inside.

We almost didn’t get the pudding because Aunt Radene dropped it. Arvie Joe was asking Carl Ray if he was sure he hadn’t seen any murders yet in The City, and Carl Ray said, “The only dead body I’ve seen was—” but he didn’t finish because that’s when the pudding slipped out of Aunt Radene’s hands. She doesn’t like to hear about dead people—I can tell.

Then, while Aunt Radene was scooping up the pudding, Arvie Joe asked Carl Ray about his job in the hardware store, so Carl Ray told them about stocking and orders and all that boring quintessence. Arvie Joe said, “They sure must pay you a lot, if you can afford that car.”

Carl Ray looked right at me, and I knew it was a warning, so I didn’t say anything—not until Arvie Joe kept going on about how much money Carl Ray must be earning. Just to participate a little in the conversation, I said, “Well, Carl Ray’s lucky. People keep giving him things—”

Carl Ray gave me a dirty look.

“Like what?” Sally Lynn said.

I was in trouble now. I fished around and fished around. “Well, like a job…” (Carl Ray relaxed a little) “…and a ring…” (Carl Ray gave me the dirty look again).

“A ring?” said Aunt Radene.

I was about to explain that it was the ring from Uncle Carl Joe, but then Uncle Carl Joe said, “A ring? What the blazes for?” Everybody looked at Uncle Carl Joé. I think those were the first words he said to Carl Ray since we arrived. I couldn’t tell if Uncle Carl Joe was pretending he hadn’t given the ring to Carl Ray or if he thought I meant that Carl Ray had been given another ring.

Carl Ray was staring at me. Then I realized that Carl Ray knew that the only way I could have known someone had given that ring to him in the first place was if I had been snooping in his drawers and read that card. I tried to move on. I said, “Oh well, he gave it away anyway.”

“You gave it away?” said Aunt Radene to Carl Ray.

“You gave it away ?” said Lee Bob and Sue Ann.

“What did you go and give the ring away for?” asked Uncle Carl Joe.

But it was about this time that Aunt Radene fainted dead away on the floor (fortunately she missed the pudding mess), and Uncle Carl Joe and Sue Ann and Lee Bob all jumped up and started patting her face and everybody else was crowding around and then they carried her into her bedroom.

Carl Ray stayed in the room with her and the rest of us went back out and ate dessert. Sally Lynn said we could eat the pudding because the floor was “clean enough to eat up off of” and it “wouldn’t hurt us none.” It was good, even though I did find a dog hair in mine, but I didn’t tell anyone.

So then Sue Ann, Sally Lynn, and Brenda Mae did the dishes (I asked if I could help, but they said no) and now everybody’s getting ready for bed and I’m sitting here in the kitchen writing by the kerosene lamp. Aunt Radene is still in bed, but I can hear her voice. She’s talking to Carl Ray, so she must feel a little better.

I sure would like to know why Uncle Carl Joe seems so mad at Carl Ray and why they don’t talk to each other. And I sure would like to know when Carl Ray’s going to tell everybody about the money and the college education. Maybe he wants them all to believe that he is making a ton of money working in a hardware store.

I’m going to the outhouse. I can’t put it off any longer. If I don’t come back, tell Alex I lovvvve him. And my parents too. And Maggie, Dennis, Dougie, and Tommy.

(I survived the outhouse.)

After breakfast, I went with Lee Bob, Sue Ann, and Sally Lynn to the swimming hole. It is the greatest place in the world. You have to climb a big hill out back and then go through some woods and then down a steep hill by way of a narrow path, and at the bottom of this hill is a creek and you follow the creek along for a while and then you come to the swimming hole. It’s not very big, maybe fifteen feet across, but it’s pretty deep in the middle. There are trees hanging over it, so when you float on your back, you can look up and see tons of leaves. All around the edges are old fallen logs. One of these sticks out into the water and Lee Bob dives off it. No one else is brave enough to.