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From the Shotgun Reviews Archives
By Troy Brownfield
5.31.02 – The Graduation Story
Note: Portions have been edited from the original version.
Graduation, then. Recently on our message boards, frequent
guest Joe D. noted his own impending graduate status (Congrats, Joe) and
asked if any of us had any good graduation stories. Boy, do we.  | | Shawn Delaney, Terry McCammon, me - 1991 |
Setting the Way-Back Machine: Here's
the deal. It's May of 1991. Webmaster Shawn Delaney and I are seniors at
Terre Haute North High School in Indiana. Shawn sings and plays guitar for
a band called The Ravenous Doorknobs. We frequently hang out with a large
group of guys, including but not limited to, Terry McCammon, Brent Poole,
Mike Timmons, Tim Laitas, Ross Cadick, Eric Higgins, and Ryan Rusk (a
junior at that time). Terry's neighbor is a sophomore named Dave Halpern.
The other members of Shawn's band are long-time friends Jason Renn (bass)
and Mike Acton (drums), and James Schrettenbruner (guitar). At the time,
Shawn was dating a girl from Kokomo named Amy, who now gets another chance
to laugh her ass off at this story. I had recently broken up with my high school
girlfriend of two years, [REDACTED]. Believe it or not, this all plays into
what happens later.
Conceiving the Party: Let's face it. Despite the fact that
Shawn and the gang were in a band, we were "outsiders". We were
part of the great mass of disenfranchised high school students. To extend
that even further, at the beginning of May in '91, the Doorknobs played a
Battle of the Bands where they were the only band to either a) play any
non-novelty originals or b) not devote their set exclusively to hair band
covers. Seriously, when your oeuvre draws inspiration and/or cover material
from Social Distortion, Sonic Youth, and X at a time six months prior to
the Nirvana explosion, people are gonna look at you funny.  | | The Ravenous Doorknobs: Shawn, Jason, and Mike "Action" Acton (R.I.P.) |
Therefore, Terry, who lived with his well-to-do grandparents on the extreme
east side of town, decided to throw a party. This was nothing new for our
immediate circle, who had been conducting precision raids of the Draffone
liquor cabinet for quite some time. This time though, Terry was going for
Big Party with Band, the kind of celebratory function usually reserved for
either the popular or the closing of John Hughes films.
A word about Terry: He's a heavy-set dude with a cherubic face and a mind
that skates close to being the love child of Walt Kelly and David Lynch on
some really serious PCP. Though a gentle soul by nature, a ragingly drunk
Terry could be freakishly strong and nigh-uncontrollable. He once
gorilla-pressed me over his head, laughing like a maniac the whole time.
Today, he's a mild-mannered teacher, father, and husband. On one day in May
in 1991, however, Terry walked up to Shawn and I before school and
presented us with a flier.
The flier had a giant anarchy symbol in the middle . It boldly proclaimed,
"Anarchist Party! Preps, Jocks and Clique Members will be [REDACTED
FOR VIOLENCE]!". NOTE WELL: THIS
WAS 1991. WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN FUNNY ONCE IS NOW LEGALLY ACTIONABLE. After
this was the date (a week prior to graduation after an event called Senior
Honors Night) and Terry's address. We thought the flier was fairly funny.
Obviously, some didn't.
A guy named (can I use real names here? Oh what the hell; it's my life too)
Rick Moseley actually got all shitty about the flier with Terry. Mmmmm.
Wonder if he saw too much of himself in it. Besides, it's funny that a
"renegade" social group would anger anyone by exclusion. A nice
high school role reversal if you ask me. Terry really thought that he'd get
his ass kicked by the guy, but a few choice words from Acton stemmed that
tide.
Ahh, Mike Acton. I'd known him since second grade. He's a solid drummer,
could kick just about anybody's ass, and was about the hardest partier I've
ever, EVER met. Andrew W.K. would piss himself if he ever saw Acton in
action. When he liked to party, he didn't just party hard; he partied
somewhere past diamond on the Mohs scale. Best Acton story ever: one night
in college while the guys were playing, Acton smoked up six pipes and
dropped a similar number of hits. He knocked back an entire bottle of
Canadian Club whiskey. After the show, Acton packed another bowl, grabbed
another bottle, and said, "I'm fuckin' ready to party NOW." I
defy anyone outside of the two Keiths to beat that. Mike parties now in
Valhalla, and the halls of the heroic dead ring with metal anthems in his
name.
So, the party was planned. Jason Renn was in charge of procuring libations.
Renn probably equated to the Eddie Haskell of our group, and he loved
playing that role. He knew he was full of shit, but he had the remarkable
ability to schmooze. Apparently, this translated across language barriers,
because Jason was able to cut an admirable swath through the mass of female
foreign exchange students. Renn was the hooch hook-up, and he had a guy
named Tony who worked at Hardee's that would score the bar for our personal
clutch of pals.
Shawn and the guys were set to play, and Mike Timmons asked another band,
ZuZusPetals, to play. There were some moments of drama over who would play
when, but I believe Shawn solved it by offering up the Doorknobs to play
first. His rather simple concept: the party would be too blitzed by the
time they finished to care who was playing second.
Around this time, we had an idea that the party would be pretty big. That
would be an understatement on the order of "Marvel’s going to do well
at the movies . . .”
Senior Honor Night, and The Party Starts: Senior Honor Night
mainly consisted of a bunch of us sitting on the stage and getting awards.
Our graduating class was pretty big (around 500 or so), so the sheer number
of honorees was pretty large. I picked up a few things, the most notable
being something from Indiana State for the full ride that I got, and a
perfect attendance award. That's right; the only year of school that I
never missed a day was my senior year. I thought about cutting one time,
but then I thought that having a perfect attendance award for that year of
all years would be pretty funny.
After the little shindig, we hurried over to Terry's. Mike and Jason were
there, having set up the band's gear in the garage. Terry was busily firing
up the grill or some such. As soon as I got out of my car, Acton offered me
what looked like a Coke. "Here," he said, "tell me how this
is." I took a big glug, and it was almost pure Skol vodka cut by
probably half an ounce of Coke. My eyes got really big, and before I could
say a word, Mike said, "I knew it; too much Coke."
Jason then grabbed me and dragged me into the garage. There were four or
five coolers. Jason opened one, and it was stuffed with things like Mad Dog
20/20 and gin. I said, "Is that one ours?" Jason gestured
broadly. They all were. It seems that Tony got a little sentimental that
some of his best under-21 customers were graduating. I'll tell you right
now; giving that many teenage boys that much liquor is the functional
equivalent of giving the proverbial fox the keys to the henhouse, a bib,
and wetnaps.
Before long, a veritable landslide of people arrived. We expected maybe
thirty total; we got well over a hundred in the first hour. At this point,
I'll have to break off the minute by minute account, and simply hit the
highlights. There's just too . . . much . . .
Highlights:
Shawn and the guys played. I sang lead on "Head On" by The Jesus
and Mary Chain. At least that's what they tell me.
Mike Timmons threw a case of beer into a tree, got a stern environmental
lecture from Shawn's sister, Heather, and broke down sobbing. She told him
it was okay, and he turned and threw a beer can into a pond. Again with the
lecturing and sobbing.
Terry thought it would be a good idea to put both a trash can lid and a
bottle of ketchup into his neighbor's mailbox.
Jason made out with a girl on the hood of his car. So did two other guys.
Same girl. Same car.
Ryan Rusk drank more gin than anyone ever, ever should.
Shawn's girlfriend decided to drive his drunk ass home, but Terry insisted
that he stay like I was going to. Sensing trouble, she put Shawn in the
truck and began to drive away, which is hard when Terry is clinging to your
hood and yelling, "Don't go!"
I tried to pick up Dave's sister, who apparently looks a lot like Dave. I
told her I wanted to be a lawyer. This is probably why I always laugh
harder at that line in Swingers when Trent (Vince Vaughn) says, "I
don't know; I could have been out with Sue and told her I was a race car
driver."
Brent told my ex-girlfriend some choice utterances that I'd previously
made, which got me popped upside the head. She probably wouldn't have been
as angry if she hadn't also seriously considered my earlier sarcastic
proposition to go behind the house and make out.
Jason got bored. Uh-oh.
The Sign Thing: So there I was talking to someone when I see a
"Slow Children at Play" sign marching through the trees. *RADIO
EDIT* bursts through the undergrowth and yells, "Look! A sign! And
there's more of them!"
A hasty expedition was made to procure more. I will not identify members of
the raiding party. Suffice it to say that three more signs found their way
into Terry's grandparent's garage. They were a No Left Turn sign and two
Stop signs.
Later that evening, someone apparently had an attack of the heebie-jeebies
regarding whether or not the signs would be discovered. Whoever the genius
was took the booty and tossed them one by one into a retaining pond about a
block from the party. There they sank from the sight of mortal man. If
you're thinking, "Mmmm, not good", bully for you.
Later: I remember Ryan Rusk drinking gin straight from the
bottle, and passing out in the front yard. I remember people starting to
drift away to go home. I remember waking up face-down in the backyard with
a flaming hot dog on my back; apparently, Terry had felt the need to grill
at around 3am and decided that he could cook and wake me up at the same
time.
I believe this is when I began to feel sick. Regardless, I recall kneeling
on the ground next to Dave's sister and talking some more. After that, it
gets kind of fuzzy, until . . .
The Next Day: I woke up. This was not a very wise move. My head
was pounding like the Seven Dwarves were digging for diamonds and the room
had a lazy casual spin to it. I remembered profuse vomiting from the wee
hours, but not much else. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that Ryan
Rusk was asleep in bed next to me.
In bed? When had I gone to bed? HOW had I gone to bed? I was in Terry's
bed? Where the fuck was Terry? My shirt was on the floor, and I was still
wearing my jean shorts, but half of the pair of Hanes underwear that I was
still wearing was missing. How the hell does something like THAT happen?
I stood up much as I imagine a baby giraffe does just after birth and
staggered to the bathroom. Mike Timmons and Terry were crashed out in
Terry's second room (the one with the big-ass TV and a pair of couches).
Further searching yielded that Jason was sleeping outside in his car.
Subsequent detective work revealed that Jason had been the Last Man
Standing. The rest of us had been passed out in the yard when it had begun
to rain at about 5am. Jason woke Terry up enough to get him upstairs on his
own power, then brought up Mike, then me, then Ryan and placed us
accordingly. Deciding that his backseat was more comfortable than the
floor, he racked out in his vintage lima green ride.
As for the underwear, while I was crouching and talking to Dave's sister,
Terry had tried to give me a wedgie. According to witnesses, I was so drunk
that I didn't feel the attempt. The waistband ripped, and the top half came
off in Terry's hand. Later, as the five of us sat watching a bootleg copy
of "Akira" and trying to shake off our wicked collective
hangover, Terry's grandma came in and cheerfully informed us that we
needn't worry about the yard; she and Terry's grandpa had already cleaned
up. The only question she had was about the half-a-pair of underwear laying
amongst the rubble.
Later on, I called my Dad to pick me up. I miserably opened the door to the
backseat and crawled in. Dad, no fool he, yelled,
"ROUGH NIGHT, SON?!"
"Yes, Dad."
"YOU OKAY, SON?!"
"Yes, Dad."
"WE'LL TELL YOUR MOM YOU ATE SOMETHING BAD, OKAY, SON?!"
"Yes, Dad."
I went home and collapsed in a heap. Later that night, Shawn and I went and
rented movies. We noticed with no small amusement that I STILL couldn't
walk a straight line. Only my bachelor party nine years later would come
close to that cataclysmic degree of personal drunkenness.
The Aftermath: On Monday after the party, the police department's
liaison officer to our high school shook Jason down. Turns out someone
reported the sign escapade and named a bunch of names of guys who were at
the party. I have some theories, and they all involved women scorned.
Anyway, Jason more or less copped to what happened.
Rather than wait to be called, I went down on my own and talked to
Detective Johnson and Dean Shike. I noted that a) I was speaking
voluntarily, b) that I was still a minor, and c) my Dad would shit if they
tried to make me say anything else without contacting him or representation.
I wouldn't answer any of Shike's questions; this wasn't a school issue. I
did allow that I probably knew where the missing signs were, and if they
were returned, then the problem would go away.
Ha ha. Silly me.
Someone, somehow, had already replaced the No Left Turn Sign. Three to go.
That afternoon, Jason, Terry, Shawn and I went diving in the retaining pond
to find those fucking signs. We found a rooftop TV antenna, OTHER street
signs, and a whole bunch of garbage. We did, however, find the Slow Children
sign. We also found that a huge sewer pipe emptied into that pond as well,
explaining the Campbell's Beef Soup consistency of the water. Many were the
showers that were taken.
At that point, we were down two signs. Johnson was making noise about
hurting our graduation. He even called my house and I answered. He asked to
speak to my Dad, who I explained already knew everything. Johnson wanted to
talk to him, and I said that was a bad idea, considering that he'd
questioned his minor son without talking to him first. Somehow, he didn't
speak to my dad.
However, Rusk came through large. While playing basketball that night with
his next door neighbor, Rusk chased a ball into their garage. Laying inside
was . . . a stop sign. They explained that they'd swiped it over Halloween.
Rusk offered them five bucks for it. They accepted. One to go.
By then, *RADIO EDIT* had become so pissed with the ordeal that he went to
the extreme north side of town and stole the final Stop sign needed. We
asked Johnson where he wanted the signs dropped off, and he said that he
wanted us to bring them into school on the day of graduation rehearsal. Was
this guy TRYING to make folk heroes out of us?
That morning, we lined up in the parking lot. Rusk, Shawn, Jason, Terry,
Timmons, Dave, Acton and myself, if I remember correctly. With two men to a
sign, we entered the side-doors and marched the length of the 1500 student
facility to the Dean's office. I don't remember if all the people stopped
and clapped, but some did (and sometimes, that's enough).
When we got to the Dean's office, the receptionist pointedly wouldn't
acknowledge us waiting. I said, "Excuse me?" like four times.
Finally, Jason and I just dropped our sign on the floor. It clattered and
rang like the beginning of Pink Floyd's "Money" turned up to 11.
The other guys followed suit, clanging their signs down into the pile. I
said, "If the detective needs us, we'll be at rehearsal." We
left, smiling.
About two minutes into rehearsal, Dean Shike ascended the stage with a piece
of paper in hand. He began, "I need the following boys in my office .
. ." and it wasn't us. It was done, and the whole thing was never
mentioned again in an official capacity, save in the song and lore of Terre
Haute area bards.
What Did We Learn, Charlie Brown?: A few lessons here:
-Throwing beer cases into trees will hurt the planet.
-If a girl will make out with you on the hood of a car, and then your
buddy, and then his buddy, and then his buddy, she probably isn't the girl
for you.
-Burning hot dogs leave scars, but only small ones.
-Hanes underwear is remarkably stretchable.
-Having a girlfriend to take you home early can be a good thing.
-Trashcan lids do not fit into mailboxes.
-Waking up next to your buddy with clothing missing doesn't mean anything
happened.
-And most importantly, stealing signs is BAD.
And there it is. Party responsibly, kids.
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