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2002-03-03 - 6:24 a.m.

My blundering began when I was seven, or the first faux pas I can remember occurred when I was seven. A whole lot of blundering has gone down since then.

As a first grader I had successfully passed through tap dance and my mother was delighted. So delighted with her little darling she signed me up for ballet. I've never understood why. The woman is, after all, intelligent, and she had to know her little darling was a tomboy and much preferred baseball, cowboys and Indians, kick the can, hide n seek--anything involving rough and tumble, grass stained blue jeans and scraped knees. Maybe the poor demented woman thought ballet would make her heathen daughter more refined and ladylike.

No matter what she was thinking, it didn't work. My Daddy and I were cutting and nailing on a birdhouse in his Tinker Shop one day when I started talking about that silly toe dance class. Not thinking, Dad made the mistake (one mother never let him forget) of saying: "You don't have to take that old crap."

The next Thursday afternoon Mother walked me into the dance studio. Once in the door I broke loose from her grip and made a beeline, knocking dainty little dancers out of the way as I plowed through, for the teacher and, in a loud and authoritative voice, declared: "My Daddy says I don't have to take this old crap."

My poor sainted Mother was so embarrassed she grabbed me by the collar of my little pink dance outfit and hauled me from the studio. She never took me back, nor has she let me forget it. Whenever I stub my toe, trip over a crack in a sidewalk or lurch around in ridiculous shoes, she chides: "Should've stayed in ballet, Billee Jean.”

Walking isn’t my only problem. I'm also a technotard. Machines freak me out, even simple intercom systems. Usually, when I need anything done involving a machine, I have my secretary do it. But one day I needed a student from the annex across campus and--gawd knows why--I decided to make the intercom call myself.

Bad idea.Very bad idea.

The control box has two main control buttons. Talk and All Call. I wanted a young man from a specific classroom and needed to beam into that room. So Talk and the classroom button were the two necessary buttons. I pushed the button and, knowing I'm calling into a lab room and things would be chaotic, I belted out the kid’s name and asked that he be sent to the office. In seconds I could see kids in classrooms near the main administrative area poking their heads out doors, and my secretary was screaming: "You're on All Call. Get OFF!!"

Yes, I was on All Call, and I still had the All Call button depressed when I loudly announced "Ah, shit!" throughout the building. That's when the control box started buzzing and lighting up. Students were in hysterics, and instructors were beeping in for my secretary to get me the hell away from the talk box.

My latest blunder occurred this week. For the past few weeks I’ve been tanning. In summer, I’m brown (and freckled) as a nut, but by this time every year my skin is pale (and freckled), and I need to have my skin in condition for a spring break trip to Nassau. That tropical sun is a killer on virgin skin.

Wednesday I was in a hurry, so I rushed into the salon, peeled off my clothes, put on my swimsuit and flopped down in the bed. Twenty minutes later, I crawled out of the bed and tugged off my swimsuit.. And stared down at myself. I still had my underwear on. This threw me into such a confusion, that I quickly unhooked my bra and threw it on the floor, then ripped my drawers off and kicked them over with the bra. Then I stood in the little tanning room--now nekkid as a jay bird--for several seconds wondering what the hell I was doing, and seriously pondering addled “senior moments.” Eventually I got my wits about me and put my underwear back on, finished dressing, gave my hair a little poof and traipsed through the salon and out the door as if nothing unusual had happened during my relaxing tanning session.

(To be continued.....)

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