Devil at My Heels - Louis Zamperini [4]
I tried chewing tobacco—in class. The teacher thought it was gum. “Louis, you spit that out immediately!” I swallowed instead and got sick as a dog.
Most Saturday nights my folks would bundle us kids into the backseat of their old car and drive to San Pedro, to shop at an Italian store. Then we’d visit relatives. I’d sniff the hard, black cigars left lying in the ashtrays and bide my time until I could empty a few wineglasses instead of drink the ginger ale set out for kids.
When I was in the third grade, the principal finally had enough. He put me over his knee and whacked me with the big strap that hung in his office. That afternoon, at home, my parents saw my purple, bruised behind when I changed clothes. “What happened to you, Toots!?” my mom asked, using her affectionate nickname.
“The principal beat me,” I said, like he was a stinker.
“What for?” asked my father.
“He caught me smoking.”
My dad very casually laid me over his knee, pulled down my pants, and spanked me on the same purple spot. I deserved it. I didn’t cry, though. I never cried. I didn’t stop smoking, either.
Soon, I had a reputation as “that tough little kid down the street.” I may have tried to look like an angel, but other parents warned me to stay on my own block and away from their children. I guess I played too rough. I cursed freely. I destroyed property. I ordered kids around. I never used my head, never thought about consequences.
In school, girls were informers who often told on me for my mischief. I had no use for them. But when I wanted their attention, I couldn’t get it. As revenge, I’d take whole cloves of garlic to the classroom and chew on them, then breathe in their direction just to offend them. Some girls got so mad they struck or kicked me. In turn, I’d chase them and pull their hair.
I mostly hurt only myself. Once I fell and landed on a pipe. It punctured my thigh and took a big chunk out of my leg. Another time I jumped on a big piece of bamboo. It cracked and nearly cut off my toe, leaving it to dangle by a piece of skin. My mother held it in place while Mrs. Coburn, a nurse who lived next door, cleaned the wound and stitched it back on with a needle and thread. Then my mother taped it real tight, and miraculously it healed.
When I was still in elementary school I climbed an oil rig just for fun. The wood rungs nailed to the side often cracked in the sun. One came loose, and I fell twelve feet, landing on the corrugated pump-house roof, then bounced into a sump hole ten feet deep and filled with oil. You can’t swim in oil. I sank like a rock until my feet touched a drilling pipe that had long ago disappeared into the black waste. I straddled it, then grabbed it. Fortunately, it was well rusted; my hands held, and I inched my way up until I broke the surface, heaving for air.
After I got out I walked home, covered in gunk. My eyes burned so much I could hardly see. People on my street didn’t recognize me; maybe they thought I was the Creature from the Black Lagoon. Even my mother wasn’t sure it was me. “Toots,” she called. “Is that you?” My dad had just come home from work and had to clean me with a gallon of turpentine and a paintbrush. He started at the top of my head. Boy, that stuff stung. Then he put me in a tub of hot water. I thought my skin would parboil off.
My parents tried hard to change me, but in those days there was no widespread psychology for kids, particularly poor kids, so I was just off and running. All they could do was put up with me. By the time I turned twelve, I was out of control, full of ill will and clever ideas.
I still remember a few.
My friends and I would take long pieces of wire and shove toilet paper into pay-phone coin-return slots. Later we’d come back with a hooked wire and remove the paper—and have enough