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Not “tha god,” but a god – Ganesh riding a rat.

I like stories. Too much maybe. But why not start with an early one from my own wallet of tales?
If you were a trip-over-his-own-feet eighth grader with unsteady vocals you could demonstrate suicidal stupidity with the bright idea of joining the Speech Team in the Storytelling category where un-godly tall girls and boys in their husky-pants phase go as if the draw of self-destruction was on the drive-in menu featuring grease and salt as pimple eradicators.

That sentence is too long, but I was on a memory roll.

So, what did I learn stepping into storytelling? Not to do that n’more.

To a green eighth grader the junior and senior boys might as well have been Bobby Bell (who was, incidentally, in my freshman dorm). The most playful act by a 200-pounder can (and did) send a squirt ricocheting off walls, somehow having lost his pants before the first bounce.

So, no more storytelling. A switch to comedy (called humorous interp.) let me get even using words and jokes outside the sphere of the joculars.

I didn’t well understand many of my jokes or vocab either, but that’s how we learn. Plus, even if hidden, revenge can be nice. In line with Twain’s observation that profanity provides relief denied to prayer, I’ll add vengeance.

But, what makes a story?

I think, sometimes, with some regularity, a story, tale or humorous account begins with a simple (simpler the better) observation.

The other day, for example, I heard (then replayed to make sure I heard correctly) a personality going by “tha god” rail at length about authoritarianism and the authoritarian playbook. That’s funny. When it comes to authority figures god ranks quite high in most every survey. At or near the top, in fact. But, there it was.

A hierarchically-inclined authoritarian in full complaint about that very thing. Ok. Don’t like it, don’t do it. but if you’re going to do it then ease up on roasting others about it.

Sure, sure, you might say, I miss the point that “tha god” could be metaphorical or an invert. It’s neither. “Tha god” says what is meant same as does “tha idiot.”

To me, funny hearing a position say “except for mine, authority is overrated.”

Observation is awfully important to storytelling and or humor. On past occasions I’d often be unsure if I was witnessing or being served raw material. That’s because life is complex and confusing. Same applies to observation of life.

A good many years ago I was invited by a former girlfriend to be a guest at her wedding. A bit awkward. A bit. For the cost of a card and a toaster there’d be a meal and drinks.

Being me is simple, so I said, “Sure, why not?” It was a nice affair held at a country club. Not from country club stock I was glad to see that side of things and be confirmed in the notion that I had no business country clubbing. My people were more the wiener roast variety.

On that, for one date I took a girl on a day canoe trip where she wrenched her ankle and I ended up hospitalized with a blockage, pretty bold stuff for a 16-year-old. For health reasons we declined future dating.

But back to a later girlfriend’s country club wedding. It was respectable in all regards from church to dinner and bar. All well done and impressive.

One thing, not exactly a minor concern, was the bride wearing white. I’d have expected off-white at the very least, or perhaps a wide dark hem on the gown or a gauzy storm-colored veil. It bothered me, but then I saw light, and all made sense. She’d gone on to become an RN. For a nurse, white was a hundred percent correct, in that day even traditional.

Observation (often as description in the four formal forms) as a category gains, as in gets a kick in the “move it,” force if a theme is involved. Meaning now wouldn’t be the time to broach Petronius again (maybe next) and stay among the weedy reeds of dating sub-ventures.

To my first formal dance I went stag, necessary because I was the affair’s comedic entertainment. Also saved the cost of a corsage and allowed broad insult of an audience of peers at the small price of self-humiliation. Was worth it, plus I lost weight worrying they’d catch on, which they didn’t. I kept the weight loss.

For the second big outing I invited a fine girl (to this day I’d gladly disappoint her again) whose father was a coach and PE instructor. You know what that means. He’d seen, was informed of my threat level. Middling though I was in sport and body, I represented potential danger to his girl.

Did you know a father can deliver an entire textbook of warning in a single long look given while squeezing a hand? It can be done.

Sufficiently warned, I was allowed to depart with his precious. Preferring to begin on an intimate note, I drove our VW. Inside, her formal expanded to all but push me out the driver door. Having skill at one-handed operations, I was, however, up for the challenge of driving despite petticoat blindness until sound (how’d hornets get in here) from the passenger side said NO.

My date escorted to her door, I made a dash home for another vehicle. The Country Squire could, I reasoned, swallow a dozen formal dresses. I’m sure her father was much relieved thinking “This one’s not much, but thankfully dumb enough not to see in advance the VW error. He’ll never in the world be able to work the challenges of a formal dress.”

Entirely true. But who said I had to work alone? I might have received, I needed it, help. But I say let a father’s fears rest in peace secure in not knowing what did or didn’t occur in much the same way I see it now.