Kyle Minor - Praying Drunk

So we could of went on like that and everything turned out okay like it does for other families whose daughter wants to wear some makeup or hoop ear rings or a short skirt like many do since we might be in the Last Days before Armageddon and Jesus riding on the white horse to rapture the living and the dead in Christ will rise first. But one day a mimeograft paper comes home from school about the senior trip. Sometimes the senior class goes to Europe but this senior class the note said is a very special one and they the students voted to make theirs a service and missions trip to the poorest most backward country in the world which is right in our backyard Haiti you see on the tv the black people men women children washing up half naked in the rick kitty boats and running from the police and hiding in the bushes the ones who werent able to get away.

Sheilas daddy and me thought there was pros and cons of going to Haiti and not Europe. On the one hand it would be a good cultural uplifting experience to see Paris and London and Big Ben and the Eyeful Tower and that one class a few years back got to go to Omaha Beach where Sheilas granddaddy almost died fighting for our freedom that would be a good thing to see. On the other hand it would be very expensive to ride the airplane over there across the ocean. They have these chicken barbqs to raise money for kids who arent rich like most of the kids but every year I watched those kids sorting dirty t-shirts for the rummage sale and their parents marking notebook paper price sheets for the silent auction items and on the day of the event the same kids and parents up there with the teachers people like or dont like in the clown dunk tank or running the duck pond for the little kids or the ring toss or whatever and all the while you see those rich kids and their parents running around like life is easy and spending the money on the expensive rummage like one year I saw this boob doctor from Palm Beach buy a real nice baby grand piano for his church then strut around like he was the Warren Buffit of charity and filanthropy, and everybody knew that his money was going to pay for some kid not much different from Sheila because of the in adiquacy of some parent like me and Sheilas daddy. Nobody wants to be made to feel that way.

It didnt matter anyway because once Haiti is where the class was going thats where Sheila was bound and determined she was going and I was not one to stand in her way. Her daddy neither. So I just signed the papers. Right away Principle Ratliff called to say there was a special senior trip scholarship fund nobody knew about so we had to keep it quiet but would we like to take advantage of it. This was not the first kindness of your daddys we had seen. I dont want you to think we were poormouthing him. We had money coming in from two jobs but tuition was not cheap at the Good Shepard Academy.

The school sent home all these lists of items to buy. Pack heavy and leave light they said. All those little Haitian kids didnt have toys so we packed some Matchbox cars and bored games and some baby dolls. We bought a pair of cheap underpants for every day the idea being to use them one time and then give them away so some Haitian lady could have a new pair of her own after it got washed. We bought packs of cheese crackers and pop tarts in case a snack was needed because it was dangerous to eat the street food and there wasnt enough at the mission to go around except for regular mealtimes.

You should of seen all those kids lined up at the airport in Miami with all there luggage and backpacks and laughing and horsing around. Me and Sheilas daddy both took the day off work and went down there to see her off. Your daddy was there too with his clipboard playing his role of principle just making sure everyone was accounted for and handing out these little hard candies butterscotches and peppermints and also some caramels to everybody just to make a nice mood. We watched that plane go up in the air through the window by the gate. Sheilas daddy said this was a big turning point in our life because soon she would be gone to college or married or both. I said she would not be our little girl anymore and he said she will always be our little girl. She will never stop being our little girl. He wasnt ashamed his eyes got wet. That wasnt like him. If you ever met him you would see a man with green navy tatoos and a weightlifter and a blackbeard just a big man some would say intimidating. That was part of who he was its true. But he was a daddy foremost and thats what killed him if I get to lay blame.

We knew while they stayed over there we wouldnt here much from the kids. Sheila only got to call us one time for about three minutes the connection was bad and it costed us fifteen dollars. She said it was so lovely the retarded children were lovely and the pregnant girls. Just to here her voice was reasuring. You know thats an island where people are fleeing from danger so you worry about violence and all that. But nothing like that happened where they were. They didnt see anything like that. She felt safe over there and maybe it would of been better if she had got a scare while she was on that senior trip.

She was real quiet when she got home but also somehow lit up like a fire beetle. You know how teen agers are moody and girls especially. We got used to that and tried to be understanding. But when Sheila got back from that trip she like to floated from cloud to cloud even if she was just vacuuming the living room. Twitterpated is what her daddy said. I agreed but there wasnt a single boy calling the house. One day I just came out and asked her and she got shy and wouldnt say very much. But after graduation I knew she was going to William Jennings Bryan College with a full scholarship even room and board then all of a sudden she said she was going to stay home and go part time to the junior college. That was worrisome, her walking away from an opportunity like that. She clammed up about why but we were for sure it was a boy.

Then one Saturday morning the third week of June there was a knock on the front door. I looked through the curtain liked I used to do and it was your daddy. That was weird for the school principle to be at the door after your daughter already graduated. I called everybody to the living room then I let him in. He was wearing a two button shirt and corduroy pants, and I remember thinking that was funny because it was hard to imagine him in anything but a suit and tie and penny loafers. I offered him some tea and we all sat on the couches in the living room to talk. It was small talk for a while and then he said to Sheila would she excuse us for a few minutes. Her face was red flushed the whole time he was there then it got redder when he said that. Her daddy said Sheila you better get on to your room. After she left he said what kind of trouble has my daughter got into.

Your daddy had a real nice way with people. He said you know sometimes its not the children who get into trouble but the adults who might get them into some. He said something has happened but I am not sure exactly what or how much of it. It took him a long time to get into it but the long and short was that one of the missionaries in Haiti was an old school buddy of his from Apalachicola Bible College and maybe thats what blinded him to what must of been going on between this older man and our Sheila. He said this missionary man had wrote a letter saying would your daddy come talk to us about how him and our daughter were in love from only a few days together and then it all made sense to me why Sheila was acting like a lovesick fool and not taking her scholarship and room and board at William Jennings Bryan College.

Right away Sheilas daddy got up and started pacing the room. Principle Ratliff said if it was his daughter he would want to punch somebody in the mouth for being the bearer of bad news but he would refrane because of his love for God. But something we had to consider now that Sheila was eighteen and legally an adult was something could come of it. He asked did we think she was motivated enough to do something rash? Her daddy said he was. Principle Ratliff said that was another matter but he understood well enough because he had a daughter of his own, and here Anna you should know he went on and on about his love for you even then when you was so little he was thinking about when you would be grown and married he would be so proud of you but he wanted it to be somebody your own age or a little older who loved you and you loved. We said that was what we wanted for our daughter too.