Reece Reeder
I was born a long time ago (longer than I care to admit) in Zanzibar. Zanzibar is an island that is part of the country of Tanzania. Tanzania is primarily a country of Christians and Muslims, so, naturally, my parents were there as Southern Buddhist Missionaries.
My parents met on a blind date at TunaLand, which was the very first amusement park in Walla Walla, Washington. They had both migrated from their humble homes to the west coast in order to seek employment on the Tuna boats. What they didn’t understand is that Walla Walla is nowhere near the west coast. My mother was an Eskimo from Wasilla, Alaska, with no discernible job skills. My father, who was from Salcedo, Missouri, had been plying his trade around the Midwest as a bowling ball repairman and professional snooker player. Tuna boats seemed like the logical path to fame and fortune for both of them.
Their meeting at TunaLand was just fate, because on that same night they met the man who would become their long-term spiritual guide through their rather meaningless lives. Their new spiritual guide was a man who called himself LeeOttis Bodhisattva. Mr. Bodhisattva supplied them with some unknown substances and rearranged their spiritual priorities that very evening. The next day he performed a wedding ceremony for them, and by 5:00 p.m. they were on a pickle boat heading for Zanzibar to spread the word.
I had an interesting childhood in Zanzibar. I clearly remember spending a lot of time fighting off angry monkeys for prime space to fleece the tourists from the mainland. I had perfected a sort of Tiny Tim routine that I, and my parents, were very proud of. All the stupid monkeys ever did was hang around and try to look cute. Also, the only kind of candy bar you could buy with your measly tourist money was a Zagnut. That was also, unfortunately, the name of all the sports teams in Zanzibar. Yep, they were all called the Zanzibar Zagnuts. This did create some difficulty because nobody ever knew which Zanzibar Zagnuts team won or lost. As a result, most sporting contests were decided by the ensuing knife fight among the fans in the stands. The side with the most survivors usually took a victory lap. At least the ones who could still walk did that.
My first real job was actually working on the cleanup crew at the local Little League Park. I still have a great knife collection that I accumulated from that job. I probably would have made a career of it, but I eventually got fired because I couldn’t speak Zanzibarian. This also held me back in school. I hope that any person who might be reading this will take into account that I didn’t learn to read and write until I was 21 years old.
Here’s another interesting fact. My mother, as a young woman, was once incarcerated with Sarah Palin’s mother. Sarah’s mother got busted for pistol-whipping two nuns in a drug deal gone bad. My mother was in for pretending to be drunk in Wasilla after 5:00 p.m. It is a law in Wasilla that all citizens must be intoxicated after 5:00 p.m. My mother was pulled over for driving sober at 6:15 p.m. She tried to fake serious intoxication, but she was arrested and charged with DWS after blowing a zero on the breathalyzer. That law in Wasilla, which is still on the books, explains a lot.
My parents were kicked out of Zanzibar when I was 17. We came to America, and I immediately adopted the most American sounding name I heard which was George W. Bush. I then was accepted at Yale, and it took them two years to figure out that I was totally illiterate. That problem was solved when my father, George H.W. Bush, hired a private tutor for me with all the money that he embezzled from the Southern Buddhists, and the rest is history. Now I am a blogger. Oh, and the Federal Government made me change my name to the one I am currently using.
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September 2022
Brain Wreck 