"I Love You, Barney!" Or, "Ree-ray, Woo-man!"

For about a six-month period, I worked a position at Apple Tree Orphanage called "in-home worker." This job consisted, more or less, of being a mentor and chauffeur for a number of kids in the system.

I would pick the kids up in my car and take them to various places and do various things with them, such as pick them up from their foster home or residential treatment facility and drive them to their biological parent's home for a day visit or to a court hearing. I also took them on outings of pleasure, such as trips to amusement parks and playgrounds.

In all, it was a fun job that I thoroughly enjoyed—in spite of its meager pay. I really liked the ability to spend quality time with these kids and act as a mentor to them, oftentimes engaging in fun activities with them. I also enjoyed the freedom of the job: it enabled me to avoid working at a desk and pushing pencils or punching keys all day—the kind of work I utterly loathe, no matter how well it pays.

One of the kids in my roster of clients was a child named Daniel, an adorable eleven-year-old, mixed-race kid with a slight little problem: His file said he had been literally dropped on his head as an infant and had suffered irreversible brain damage from the incident. Despite this little mental quirk, Daniel was possibly the most fun and gratifying child I have ever worked with.

Daniel had messy straight black hair, skin the color of a chocolate chip cookie (without the chips, of course), a perpetual big wide smile, and an enchanting and infectious giggle. He was the physical manifestation of the saying, "Ignorance is bliss," for in his impaired state of mind was the key to unyielding nirvana. This was one happy child who lived forever in the mental age and ecstatic playfulness of about four years old.

Daniel lived in an old house with his grandmother, a couple of aunts, and his father, Daniel, Sr.—hence, everyone called Daniel, Jr., "Little Daniel." The house smelled of the must and moth balls of an old person's home, and the thick curtains were always drawn in the living room. Grandma was the matriarchal leader of the household, taking care of her children and grandchild despite being in her seventies and the children all in their forties and fifties. The aunts did not work and they lounged lazily in the dark house all day, smoking cigarettes and watching trashy daytime talk shows on the large screen TV. The father wandered in and out of the house at times, usually wearing a pair of work overalls spattered with paint, as if he did painting work. Perhaps only one time did I ever notice him acknowledge little Daniel, Jr.'s presence.

***

I recall a couple of times when I came over and Grandma had cooked up a supper of soul food. I indulged in the delicious barbecued ribs, sweet potatoes, greens, and cornbread she whipped up—that is, until the day I helped Daniel brush his teeth.

Daniel's teeth had a greenish tinge to them, and there was always a thick and revolting layer of food and plaque from the gums to about halfway down his teeth. One day I decided to teach Daniel the proper way to brush his teeth, with the hope that I would start him on his way to a lifetime of good dental hygiene habits. As soon as we entered the bathroom, however, my stomach churned and I saw that it would be a hopeless cause. Sensing our presence, a number of little cockroaches crawling all over the toothbrushes in the holder mounted on the wall scurried away into crevices. Ugh!

I realized that if the family couldn't even keep disease-ridden creatures off their toothbrushes, I had little shot of ensuring that Daniel kept his teeth clean. And I never ate another meal at their house again, always making an excuse when offered some food. Seriously, ugh!

***

Little Daniel loved to go for rides in my car. When I first started picking him up and taking him to a playground everyday after school, he would repeat, like a broken record, "Is this yo' car? Where yo' house?" And even one time when we drove past a wandering canine: "Is that yo' dog?"

Daniel was a music connoisseur, of sorts. Although he had absolutely no sense of rhythm, he would love to snap his fingers—out of time—with whatever music was playinhg. A tape I would often play in my car for Daniel was a compilation a friend gave me. One of the songs on the tape was "Stupid Girl" by Garbage. For some reason, Daniel had an affinity for singing along with the chorus, really belching out the words: "Stupid girl, stupid girl ..."

Another song he really enjoyed was Alanis Morisette's "Ironic." When the song got to the part, "It's like pouring rain ..." Daniel would sing along—but in his own interpretation of the lyrics. He would sing, "Ree-ray, woo-man!" I lost it every time he sang those words as he snapped his fingers to his own beat and smiled to himself over his blissful crooning.

***

On Sundays, my job was to accompany Little Daniel and his family (grandmother and aunts, no Daniel, Sr.) to church. Their church was a makeshift one, the congregation held in a standard ranch-style house in the middle of a residential neighborhood, naught a sign or other indication that this home doubled as a chapel.

Rows of chairs were lined up in the living room, at the front of which stood a podium. About twenty or so parishioners tightly packed the modest-sized room. From behind the podium an elderly Caucasian lady with effusive energy delivered sermons of fire and brimstone and mysticism and paranoia. Such pungent words gushed out of this petite old woman who wore thick bi-focal glasses and a simple white dress, her white hair pulled taught into a bun. While her husband sat mute of sound or facial expression behind a small electric organ to the side, Reverend Judy belted out fiery lectures on the impending apocalypse, evoking spontaneous ejaculations of "Amen!" and "That's right!" and "You tell 'em, sister!" from the congregation.

My task during these eccentric services was to help control Little Daniel's behaviors. The poor child could barely sit still during these surely long and boring mornings for him, and it took constant prompts from me to help him maintain some semblance of decorum for the while. For the most part, Little Daniel managed to make it through the sermons with but one or two moments of notable disruption.

I recall one sermon of particular note. Reverend Judy spoke of a mystical phenomenon she experienced, I guess to illustrate the legitimacy of her preternatural powers.

"Beverly," Reverend Judy said to Daniel's grandmother, "you recall the time that fireball entered the church, don't you?"

"Yes, I do, Reverend," Grandma replied.

"It flew in through the window while I was playing 'Amazing Grace' on the organ. It flew in through the window and landed right on the keys of the organ, dancing around on it and pulsating in green, blue, purple, and orange hues. You were there, you saw it."

"Indeed I did, Reverend. I was there. I saw it. Happened just like you say it did."

All eyes—except Little Daniel's, of course—locked firmly on Reverend Judy, many mouths agape.

"And then the fireball shot up to the ceiling, spread out in a circle, and dissipated." A murmur of gasps and amens reverberated through the congregation. "I know it was an angel, the Archangel Gabriel, divine manifestation of the Holy Spirit, come down from heaven to bless this house of the Lord, to show all of you that there are special powers in this body, that I'm a messenger of the Lord to lead my flock to the Truth in a world of lies and deception."

"Mmm-hmm. Happened just like that!" Grandma blurted out. "I witnessed the whole thing."

Reverend Judy glared virulently at the congregation for some time, then continued: 'Tis proof that I have the power of prophesy, to look into the window of the future and see things yet to come. I saw the stock market crash of 1987 and the fall of the Berlin Wall in '89. Now I see another stock market crash in a couple of years, one that will be real bad. You'll see."

"Tell it to us, sister!" a man shouted out. "Show us the Truth!"

"I see the end of the world," Reverend Judy replied in a low, foreboding tone. "Our country will be attacked and dragged into a Third World War, and all will be destroyed in a mass wave of fire." She swept her arm in front of her. "And when this happens, we need to be ready. We need to prepare our souls now for entry into the promised land. We need to cleanse ourselves of any sin so that the pearly gates of heaven will open up and let us in and Christ will await us with open arms. And to get ourselves ready, we need to open our own hearts to others and grow this church and help others receive the Kingdom of God too. So open your hearts, and let's grow our congregation so that we can save as many souls as possible."

And with this, Reverend Judy sat down at the organ and began to play and sing "Amazing Grace," as her husband pressed the donation plate into the hands of a man sitting in the front row.

The money flowed copiously onto the plate, and I even tossed a buck onto it—out of social pressure and politeness. And when the plate passed by Little Daniel's ravenous eyes, he reached in with a smile and helped himself to a fistful of dollars, which I laboriously had to convince him to return.

"Through many dangers, toils and snares
"I have already come;
"Tis Grace that brought me safe thus far
"and Grace will lead me home."

***

One of the things that little Daniel really liked, and often begged for, was my comedic routine in which I'd pretend to bump my head on something. I'd surreptitiously kick my foot against the base of the wall or a large object, making a bumping sound to accentuate the trick. When a wall or object was not available, I took to pretending to pound my fist against my head, reacting with a wavering "Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh ..." vocalization and rotating my head as if in a cartoon daze. These little games would send Daniel into fits of laughter and calls for me to "Do it again! Do it again!" I could keep Daniel in stitches all day long with just a few faux bonks of my head.

He then took to bonking himself in the head with his fist for amusement—but his bonks were real, hard bonks that actually made a thumping sound, unlike the faux bonks I employed. But, he still giggled wildly at his acts at physical humor, even though they had to be painful. I tried to teach him to perform the trick without actually hitting himself, but to no avail.

Another game that Daniel was passionate about involved a small stuffed Barney doll that he often carried around with him. Little Daniel—to my irritation—was crazy about Barney, the annoying purple dinosaur. He liked to kiss Barney and say to the doll, "I love you, Barney!" And he liked to pretend to give other people kisses with his stupid little Barney doll. My response one day was to pretend to faint after Barney kissed me. Daniel thought that this reaction was so funny he would pretend to kiss me with Barney over and over again, until I would beg him to stop. Eventually, Daniel took to kissing himself with Barney and fake fainting, tossing Barney in the air as he did so.

One day when Daniel and I sat in the living room of his house with his grandmother, Daniel spontaneously decided to play his two favorite games. He suddenly bonked himself on the head—hard and loudly—and then play fainted. Immediately after, he picked up Barney, kissed him, and then faux fainted again, tossing Barney into the air. At the sight of this, his Grandma got up from her seat, shook her head in bewilderment, and walked out of the room, saying, "Lord, I just don't know where this boy learns these crazy behaviors."

"Um, I don't know either, ma'am," I replied sheepishly.

I then tried to get Daniel to stop engaging in those "crazy" behaviors—at least in front of his family. But to no avail. When Little Daniel got something stuck in his head, it became anchored there like a broken record.

I can just hear him now: "Ree-ray, woo-man!" ... "Is this yo' car?" ... "I love you, Barney!" ... Bonk! "Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh ..."

********

© 2008 David Lee Cummings