The Sunday evening sermon was well under way. Dad was at the pulpit expounding the finer points of arcane Christian doctrine and I was doodling on the borders of the church bulletin. I ran out of room for more artwork on the bulletin and began to look about for a spare one. My brother, David, saw me eyeing his bulletin and developed a sudden interest in its contents. Before I could reach for it, he snatched up the bulletin and began to pretend to read it. He ignored my scowl. It was then that the swearing and thumping began. A string of the very coarsest expletives assaulted our ears. David and I sat bolt-upright, eyes wide. We looked around at our fellow church-goers. Agatha F. was hurriedly switching off her hearing aid; Thelma N. gasped and gaped, her hands covering her ears; Wilf S. stood to his feet, righteously indignant, and scanned the room for the source of the salty language. My father had fallen silent and was looking behind him at the door on the left side of the stage. The torrent of four letter words and various vulgar biological references were interrupted by intervals of furious banging and bumping. It took only a few moments for all of us to realize that the hub-bub was coming from the stairwell leading from the basement up to the rear of the stage at the front of the sanctuary. My Dad and four deacons converged on the door to the stairwell. Dad got there first, of course, and disappeared from view. Seconds later the deacons followed. I hesitated to do likewise, but curiosity got the better of me. Such ferocious language! I had to know who it was! Maybe someone was possessed! Now that would be interesting! I scampered down the aisle, up on to the stage and into the stairwell. As I did, the bellowed cursing changed to threats of mayhem and death. "I'm gonna kill you!" was repeated several times.
From my vantage point at the top of the stairs, I saw my Dad about a third of the way down standing above the hulking, prostrate form of the irregular church attender, Jake D.. The deacons were crowded up behind my Dad, looking uncertain and uncomfortable. A former CFL defensive lineman, Jake was an enormous man. Nearly four hundred pounds and standing in the mid six-foot range in height, he filled the stairway. It would be cliche, I suppose, to analogize to a beached whale, but, really, this is very much how he appeared. A souvenir of his football days, Jake's knees were quite damaged and had given way as he had attempted to ascend the stairs. The stench of alcohol made it clear that Jake was also very drunk. Under such conditions, there was no way he was ever going to make it to the top of the stairs unaided. His grotesquely bulging torso, flailing arms and purple face made him seem quite alien - and dangerous. Sprawled in the stairway though he was, no one wanted to venture too close to Jake and find themselves caught in his massive, angry clutches.
A bizarre conversation of the sort one will have with the very drunk ensued, concluding with Jake blubbering like a baby and apologizing for his awful behaviour. In his intoxicated state, Jake had taken it into his head that my father was trying to ruin his marriage and now, stretched out in the staircase, his rage spent, he could see how ludicrous such an idea was. There were a series of gruff, conciliatory remarks among the men gathered on the stairs and then the question everyone was thinking was finally voiced: "How are we going to get him out of the stairway?" Someone muttered something unhelpful about a crane. It was clear there was no way to shift Jake except for the men to carry him out. Suit jackets and ties were discarded. Sleeves were rolled up.
"Lift with your legs, dear!" one of the many wives assembled behind me called out.
"I hope they don't drop him," Gerry S. murmured.
Ruth S. looked down with a sour face as the men - her husband among them - grabbed, clutched, and gripped at Jake's thick but slippery legs and arms (he was dressed in ill-fitting shorts, a tank-top and flip-flops). "If they all end up in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, I'm not helping. I'm in high heels for goodness sake! I'm not dressed for it!"
It looked like it was Jake versus the deacons in a five-on-one wrestling match. Jake cursed and made rude, ugly noises as the men shoved, heaved, and dragged his huge bulk to the top of the stairs. It took ten minutes to move him up eight steps. When they all arrived on the landing at the top of the staircase, the panting, sweating men delivered their burden to the floor with a distinct air of accomplishment. I suspect it was the same sort of self-satisfied air they'd of had if they'd got a grand piano up the stairs. Amidst the relieved approbation of their wives, the men nodded at one another, faces set in pleased half-smiles.
"I should go home," Jake slurred, "I gotta' get up." He tried in vain to rise to a sitting posture, his face a blotchy dark-red from the effort. He tried again. And then again. I felt vaguely mortified watching Jake grunting, hissing, and waggling his arms and legs as he lurched up from the floor in the most ungainly fashion, unable to overcome the restrictions of his own grossly-distended belly. Feminine exclamations of "Oh my!" "Goodness!" and "How awful!" accompanied Jake's contortions. Thankfully, the good deacons came to his aid and, after a minute or so of gruesome clutching and hefting, Jake was erect - sort of. He wobbled dangerously and sagged, but remained on his feet. Once acclimated to a standing position, Jake, guided by the deacons, shuffled his ponderous frame out of the church and was returned home.
We all stood, the ladies and I, in the dim light of the stairwell, giving one another significant glances; some shook their heads; others "tsk-ed"; one remarked, "What a sight!" I wasn't, however, occupied with visions of Jake's naked belly bursting out horribly from his beneath his shirt, or with fresh memories of his torrential cursing, or with the general strangeness of what had just happened. No, as a teen-aged veteran of many hundreds of Sunday evening services, I was suddenly overcome with just one happy thought: There was no way now that the sermon would continue!
From my vantage point at the top of the stairs, I saw my Dad about a third of the way down standing above the hulking, prostrate form of the irregular church attender, Jake D.. The deacons were crowded up behind my Dad, looking uncertain and uncomfortable. A former CFL defensive lineman, Jake was an enormous man. Nearly four hundred pounds and standing in the mid six-foot range in height, he filled the stairway. It would be cliche, I suppose, to analogize to a beached whale, but, really, this is very much how he appeared. A souvenir of his football days, Jake's knees were quite damaged and had given way as he had attempted to ascend the stairs. The stench of alcohol made it clear that Jake was also very drunk. Under such conditions, there was no way he was ever going to make it to the top of the stairs unaided. His grotesquely bulging torso, flailing arms and purple face made him seem quite alien - and dangerous. Sprawled in the stairway though he was, no one wanted to venture too close to Jake and find themselves caught in his massive, angry clutches.
A bizarre conversation of the sort one will have with the very drunk ensued, concluding with Jake blubbering like a baby and apologizing for his awful behaviour. In his intoxicated state, Jake had taken it into his head that my father was trying to ruin his marriage and now, stretched out in the staircase, his rage spent, he could see how ludicrous such an idea was. There were a series of gruff, conciliatory remarks among the men gathered on the stairs and then the question everyone was thinking was finally voiced: "How are we going to get him out of the stairway?" Someone muttered something unhelpful about a crane. It was clear there was no way to shift Jake except for the men to carry him out. Suit jackets and ties were discarded. Sleeves were rolled up.
"Lift with your legs, dear!" one of the many wives assembled behind me called out.
"I hope they don't drop him," Gerry S. murmured.
Ruth S. looked down with a sour face as the men - her husband among them - grabbed, clutched, and gripped at Jake's thick but slippery legs and arms (he was dressed in ill-fitting shorts, a tank-top and flip-flops). "If they all end up in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, I'm not helping. I'm in high heels for goodness sake! I'm not dressed for it!"
It looked like it was Jake versus the deacons in a five-on-one wrestling match. Jake cursed and made rude, ugly noises as the men shoved, heaved, and dragged his huge bulk to the top of the stairs. It took ten minutes to move him up eight steps. When they all arrived on the landing at the top of the staircase, the panting, sweating men delivered their burden to the floor with a distinct air of accomplishment. I suspect it was the same sort of self-satisfied air they'd of had if they'd got a grand piano up the stairs. Amidst the relieved approbation of their wives, the men nodded at one another, faces set in pleased half-smiles.
"I should go home," Jake slurred, "I gotta' get up." He tried in vain to rise to a sitting posture, his face a blotchy dark-red from the effort. He tried again. And then again. I felt vaguely mortified watching Jake grunting, hissing, and waggling his arms and legs as he lurched up from the floor in the most ungainly fashion, unable to overcome the restrictions of his own grossly-distended belly. Feminine exclamations of "Oh my!" "Goodness!" and "How awful!" accompanied Jake's contortions. Thankfully, the good deacons came to his aid and, after a minute or so of gruesome clutching and hefting, Jake was erect - sort of. He wobbled dangerously and sagged, but remained on his feet. Once acclimated to a standing position, Jake, guided by the deacons, shuffled his ponderous frame out of the church and was returned home.
We all stood, the ladies and I, in the dim light of the stairwell, giving one another significant glances; some shook their heads; others "tsk-ed"; one remarked, "What a sight!" I wasn't, however, occupied with visions of Jake's naked belly bursting out horribly from his beneath his shirt, or with fresh memories of his torrential cursing, or with the general strangeness of what had just happened. No, as a teen-aged veteran of many hundreds of Sunday evening services, I was suddenly overcome with just one happy thought: There was no way now that the sermon would continue!
