As I sit in my room pondering life, I wonder what happened to all my childhood friends. My best friend lived on a lovely cable channel, Nickelodeon. I speak of course of Douglas Yancey Funnie.
Doug and I shared some great moments. I remember laughing with him as Roger spent all night in Lucky Duck Lake looking for a Nematoad. I remember the late nights spent dreaming of Patti. Oh the tears that were shed when it was rumored that Skeeter was leaving. All in all Doug and I had some great years together. Then sadly one day he moved, to ABC.
Once Doug moved we tried to still hang out, but our schedules were to conflicting, and like all people we both grew and changed into our own separate person. The next few years past and I would sporadically remember my times with the boy on 21 Jumbo Street. Then out of the blue last month Doug befriended me on facebook, we exchanged phone numbers via facebook messaging, (you should never do that on the wall, you don’t know what creepers are out there looking at wall posts), and had a nice long chat about life.
I told him about life the last few years, how I am going to school at Baldwin-Wallace, and how I helped create a troupe of people destined to obtain power throughout the world. He of course was impressed, and had some accomplishments to brag about himself.
He actually skipped college and invested a lot of his money into carrot production. Apparently two years ago, in the shadows of the 9/11 recession, carrot production stock was on the rise. Doug was tipped off on this info from his dog, Porkchop, who had made a small fortune on the bulldog-fighting ring in Mexico. When Porkchop passed away he left all $98.00 to Doug and it was to be invested into Carrot Production.
At first Doug was very hesitant to talk about his friends from back in the day, but I just had to know whatever happened with his relationship with Ms. Patti Mayonnaise. And sure enough the situation ended on a happy tone. They dated for a little bit in junior high but then took a break when she cheated on Doug with his then best friend Skeeter. Doug said that in high-school they lost touch but he remembers always hearing rumors in the locker room about “loose-Patti”. She dropped out of school senior year due to pregnancy. The Father was unknown, it was either Roger Klotz’s, Skunky Beaumont’s, or Mr. Dink’s.
Patti was in a bad place for quite some time. After the baby was born she tried to kill herself at a “Beets” reunion concert. Luckily the cut in her wrist was only three inches deep, and she recovered a year later. She started volunteering at a home for the criminally insane, and on one lucky day she ordered a case of carrots and noticed the return address. Her and Doug have been dating steadily for the last 8 months.
Doug didn’t have much to say about his other friends, though he had just seen many of them at Chalky Studebaker’s funeral. Yes Chalky sadly committed suicide a few months ago. He was in line for first draft pick in the NFL when he was diagnosed with AIDS, thus disqualifying him for the NFL. He was found dead in his bathtub clutching onto a toaster.
The funeral was the first time Doug had seen Skeeter in years. After Doug caught him in bed with Patti and Beebe, (yes a three-way high five to Skeet), in middle school their relationship never recovered. Doug says Skeeter isn’t doing to bad. He owns a farm in Kentucky and reads a lot of Nicholas Sparks. Doug mentioned that he wished things could have been different between them, but just said he feels it is still too soon.
Sadly Doug’s and my conversation came to an end after 4 good hours of discussion. We left each other both feeling that the gap in our souls was filled. He promised he would call in the future, just as soon as he finishes Harry Potter and Deathly Hollows. He said he would need some good Potter chat.
