Over the Cruddy River & Through the Cruddy Woods to Grandma's House We Go

For Lynda Barry

I did not want to go to Grandma's house.

Every summer me and my stupid brother got sent away to Nana and Nanu's house for a week. I dunno who's dumb idea it was. I think it was Nana's. I'd have to be away from anyone I knew or could stand. I couldn't even call them. It would be a toll call, and you weren't allowed to make toll calls. But they had a big screen TV Nanu won on The Price Is Right, which was pretty cool, even if you had to sit directly in front of it to get all the colored lights to line up and make a picture.

But this summer we had to spend ANOTHER week at Grandma and Grandpa's house. They didn't even have cool names. They were weird. They ate dandelions and didn't keep their butter in the refrigerator.

"I like soft butter," she said. I thought it might have some weird disease like Mother always warned about, and refused to put it on the graham crackers.

"I don't like milk," I replied. Which I didn't; it made my cereal turn to mush faster than I could possibly eat it. Mother would yell, "NO! NO! NO! You HAVE to put milk on it!" but I wouldn't do it and just eat my cornflakes while she made pouty faces and stomped around the house like the world was going to end.

It was a long way to Grandma's house. Seemed even longer than to Nana's, which was actually longer, but there was more to look at from the backseat of Dad's new K-Car stationwagon. I helped pick the color. Mother didn't like it cuz it showed too much dirt. But I thought blue was prettier. And it matched Dad's eyes so he could look cooler in it.

Nothing but trees and rocks and businesses along the road with hand-painted signs and dirt driveways you had no idea what they did at. One of them was named "The Dick Corporation", which made me giggle and I'd get smacked for it.

I liked to look at the rocks. I kept darting my eyes across their ten, twenty-foot tall surfaces, trying to find caves as we whizzed (that word made me giggle too, and I'd get smacked for it) by real fast. I was going to run away some day, for good. And I was going to live in one of those caves. I just had to pick the right one. I wanted a big one, but not one people could see me in from the backseat of their stationwagons when they drove by. They might rat me out and I'd be right back where I started.

Grandma's house was just past Dead Man's Curve, where Dad said people died after their cars went over the bend cuz they were going too fast or it was too dark and they didn't see it. I leaned over my stupid brother to the window (it was always on HIS side) while he whined "You're on my side of the car! Get over!", but I wanted to see if I could see cars smashed at the bottom of the cliff, rusting away by the side of the crick. But I never saw one. Maybe all the weeds were in the way.

Dad went over that curve once, but he didn't die cuz he wasn't wearing his seatbelt. He said that every time you told him to put on his seatbelt.

Then you had to go through this weird tunnel to the right. Another one of those weird businesses with a dirt road was to the left; you didn't wanna go that way. The tunnel was made from a really, really big metal pipe that was kinda twisty like a screw. It was supposed to only be big enough for one car, but I thought two could go in just fine. It had an official-looking sign on either end that said "Honk Before Entering" so everyone did.

Grandma's house was next to another dirt road, but I know what that business did. It was a junkyard. The tunnel went under a railroad track. The trains would always blow their whistle real loud when they went over it, even though no other train or car could possibly be there. Sometimes big trucks would go up the dirt road to the junkyard. If it was dry, they'd kick up tons of dust that would pour over Grandma's house like it was raining dirt. She coughed a lot.

Everything at Grandma's house had dirt on it. Grandpa built the house a long time ago. The shed where he fixed lawnmowers for a living leaned waaaaay to one side. I didn't want to walk past it. I was afraid it would fall down and crush my head.

But that was the way to the bathroom. It used to be an outhouse, I was told. It was part of an "extension" to the house, where the fire-burning heater also was. The house was so cold in the winter, I used to put a chair right in front of it and put my feet on it, until one day it melted the soles off my shoes and got all stringy and sticky on it and everyone got real mad at me.

They used to have horses. And pigs. And chickens, I was told. But now it's just a big weedy garden with lots of mosquitoes.

Dad had a pet pig. I think that's pretty cool.

But there's nothing to DO at Grandma's house. It was summer so I could go to the dirt road that led to the junkyard. Two ruts really far apart marked it the whole way up the hill and some black smelly stuff bubbled out of it. I wasn't sure what it was. Oil maybe, like on The Beverly Hillbillies. Anyway, if you looked REAL hard, or you poked around in the dirt awhile, there were all these marbles. Green glass ones, like they used to be Coke bottles or something. They were polished real smooth and if you ran them under the spicket, they shone like diamonds.

My stupid brother would come with me to help me find them, but then all he'd do was whine that it was too hot and the mosquitoes were biting him. I told him to go play on the railroad tracks and leave me alone. He did one time, in winter, and the stupid dumbass stuck his tongue to the railroad tracks. I had to go inside and ask Grandma for some tea cuz I was cold. I was freaking out cuz she took her time and had to put sugar and milk in it first. I didn't tell her what it was for. Then I ran to the railroad tracks and dumped it on his tongue. It burned so bad he hit me but DUDE! the tongue came off the tracks before a train came.

He's so dumb.

So we weren't allowed to go to the junkyard. I never really saw it. I kinda wanted to, in case they had something cooler than a cave to hide in. Like a pile of old cars. Maybe that's where all the cars from Dead Man's Curve were. I dunno. My stupid brother went there once, and he got in real trouble. He tried to lie about it, but he was real smelly.

The cat came back with a rabbit it his mouth. Grandpa drowned all the girls at birth, so all there were were boy cats. I thought that was mean, but I never saw it. The rabbit was still alive. It was a baby. It was squealing and crying and everyone was freaking out until the cat went away.

But then it got into a fight with a snake. I thought it was stupid. It was just a gardner snake. It doesn't hurt anyone and I just played with them. But this stupid cat made a big fuss and had a standoff with it like it was a stupid ninja or something.

I didn't want to go to Grandma's house. I had to stay there all week. The bed I had to sleep in with my stupid brother had a white bedspread on it with bumps all over and it was too thin and I was cold except in summer when you had to take it off and fold it, NEATLY, and put it at the bottom of the bed and then remake it in the morning and it was a real pain in the ass.

And it smelled funny. Like old people. Everything at Grandma and Grandpa's and Nana and Nanu's smelled funny. Especially their toilet paper and kleenexes.

OH! HE'S SO STUPID! Like there was this one time we were sled riding over the railroad tracks and down the hill to Grandma's. We had a good backyard for sled riding and it was the only time of year the other neighborhood kids bothered to talk to us. Like they just wanted to USE us, use our yard, cuz we had the BEST backyard for sled riding and they knew it.

But anyways, you had to make it over the railroad tracks, then over a hump, then around a lot of trees, then you'd crash right behind the house and then spend half an hour going back to the top. They had this old sled that was wood with blades on it. It went REAL fast, not like the red plastic one I had at home. SCARY fast. But scary like a rollercoaster, not scary like you were going to get killed or something.

Unless dumbass was driving. I wouldn't let him. But they made me take him with me and he kept crying "It's NOT FAIR! I WANNA DRIVE THE SLED!" which I knew was stupid cuz he's dumb but they made me do it.

Right before he crashed into the tree, I jumped off the sled and let him ride away by himself. He crashed right into it, like I knew he would. He starting screaming cuz he's dumb and crying and he broke his arm. Serves him right.

Grandpa never said anything, except to the TV. He scared me. He leaned waaaaay in towards it, with his lips slightly parted. I thought he may start drooling at any moment, but he didn't, and he was always wearing that gray jumpsuit. I'd just be ignoring him and then all of a sudden he'd start screaming. "YOU FUCKING LIARS YOU GODDAMN THIEVES YOU'RE ALL GOING TO HELL!!!" Then he'd slump back into the chair he never left and be quiet for a while.

I went through their drawers, just to see what was in them, just to pass time. I got busted cuz sometimes I found a really cool stamp and would ask if I could keep it, cuz it was really cool and I didn't have one in my collection.

On the way home, I kept looking for caves. My stupid brother was asleep, so he didn't even try to punch me. And it was my side of the car this time.