By John Carlson—
For genetic reasons, guys have long been attracted to sharp objects. This is believed to be an ancient throwback to prehistoric days when we were pitching crudely made spears at woolly mammoths, trying to get some meat for our cavewomen’s crudely made lasagna.
Even now, the urge remains strong.
Consider this story about my boyhood buddy, Tim. We were probably 14 or 15 one summer when our folks sent us to Baptist church camp, which was located on Kelleys Island way out in the middle of Lake Erie.
We had some good times there. Of course, this was a matter of necessity, because you weren’t getting off that island to have good times anywhere else for a whole blasted week. Even if you disliked church camp, swimming to the mainland was out of the question, it being too far away and the water swarming with schools of ravenous perch, which would drive swimmers nuts nibbling on their toes and such.
Anyway, this particularly memorable week we shared the camp with some teenage hoodlums from a nearby city. This city, I should explain, was a rough little ship-building and steel-producing port on Erie’s south shore, a place where the sketchy, run-down taverns outnumbered the happily flapping seagulls by about five-to-one.
These tough teenagers were correspondingly brazen young delinquents whose camp tuitions had been paid for by a church. Nobody was operating under the misconception that, after just a week with a bunch of us churchy wimps, these guys would suddenly return home dreaming of auditioning for “Up With People.” Rather, the idea was they would be inspired to follow the example of us wholesome young Baptists who, when we died, were presumably headed up to heaven instead of down to the hot place.
So long story short, Tim and one hoodlum developed an unspoken rivalry over a girl. One afternoon they found themselves surrounded by a small pack of curious onlookers when the tough kid pulled a knife from his pocket and threw it at a tree twenty feet away.
Guess you could say he was trying to make a point (heh-heh). But bouncing off the trunk with a clattering “Doink!” his knife fell harmlessly to the ground.
Then it was Tim’s turn.
Chances are he had never used a knife for anything more dangerous than spreading mayo on a bologna sandwich. Still, he reared back, let the knife fly, and danged if it didn’t stick in the tree trunk with a solid “Boing!!!”
We spectators about fainted.
The hoodlum about fainted.
Tim, especially, about fainted. The rest of the camp week, though, he had the reputation of being nobody to mess with.
That is why I think the new purveyors of recreational axe-throwing here in Muncie should do quite well. Just like every guy wants to be known as a skillful knife thrower, every guy also wants to be known as a skillful axe thrower, and recreational axe throwing offers a fellow the opportunity to hone that skill.
What you might find surprising, however, is lots of women also want to be known as skillful axe throwers. Perhaps it’s to fill some primal, nameless need from their own woolly mammoth days when they were stuck in the kitchen while their hubbies were out cracking jokes and bones and killing tasty things to eat.
Anyway, I know this is true about women because I have seen video confirmation on the Internet. These videos capture ecstatic modern ladies gathered for a night on the town with their husbands and boyfriends, celebrating a particularly great axe throw.
What’s a great axe throw?
For the ladies, it’s usually nailing the target in the lower middle part. This throw invariably results in spasms of uproarious laughter among them, in contrast to the guys’ horrified grimaces. Keeping in mind where the axe would have wound up had the target been a drawing of an actual man, the poor guy’s only hope of protecting his most cherished plumbing would have been a cast iron jockstrap.
And let’s face it … guys are pretty simple individuals, not all that smart or deep. Ninety-nine percent of us would rather be hauled into the emergency room with an axe poking from our forehead than one poking from down, you know, thataway.
By the way, I should note that if you encounter me at one of the axe-throwing establishments, here is a safety tip:
Leave.
This is because I am a true klutz. If there is one guy in the place who won’t manage to get the axe to the target, it’s me. By the same token, if there is one guy who will score a bull’s eye on his own foot, that’s me, too.
On more than one occasion back in my golfing days, while practicing drives on a driving range, I would lose sight of my ball, which always made me feel good. Like I’d wonder, who am I, John Freaking Daly? And just how far did I drive that sucker? Then I’d glance around and discover my ball was six feet behind me.
Yeah, behind me.
Happily, I don’t suppose the techniques employed in throwing an axe and hitting a golf ball are in any way, shape or form similar.
Then again, why take a chance?
A former longtime feature writer and columnist for The Star Press in Muncie, Indiana, John Carlson is a storyteller with an unflagging appreciation for the wonderful people of East Central Indiana and the tales of their lives, be they funny, poignant, inspirational or all three. John’s columns appear on MuncieJournal.com every Friday.
