Dancing Barefoot

Click here
for more information on this offer!

_{Please note that upgrade offers are not available from sample content.}

Also by Wil Wheaton

Just A Geek

There are five stories, spanning 30 years, in these pages. They originally appeared on my
website, WIL WHEATON DOT NET.

I liked them so much, I intended to include them in
Just A Geek,
but
they didn't fit. So they get to live here, with some wonderful illustrations to keep them
company.

Some of them are funny, one is very sad, one is pretty damn sentimental, but they are all
true. I wrote them shortly after my 30th birthday, as I looked to my past in an attempt to
understand my present, and not fear my future.

I gave birth to this book when I wrote it. By reading it, you give it life. Take good care
of my babies.

Wil Wheaton

Pasadena, CA

April 2003

It's been almost a year since Aunt Val died. Though we were all promised that her house
would remain in the family, it has been sold, and there are many things to be picked up and
moved out.

My dad has asked me to help him pick up a china cabinet that is intended for my mother. I
wonder why he didn't have my younger, stronger brother help out, but I don't ask. I'm always
happy when my dad wants to do things together.

We ride in comfortable silence. I'm lost in thought, wondering what I could talk to my dad
about: baseball? the kids? my family? work? We end up talking about them all and the drive
passes very quickly.

As we drive down Aunt Val's street, it hits me: this is it. I will never make this drive,
this drive that I've made since I was in a car seat, again. I've been asked to help my dad
move furniture, but I'm really here to say goodbye to this house that's been part of my life
since I was a child.

A tremendous sadness consumes me as we back into the driveway.

I exchange polite hellos with Aunt Val's daughter, who is responsible for the sale of the
house, and walk inside.

It's the first time I've been here since her death. The house feels cold and empty. The
furniture is gone, the walls are mostly bare, and Aunt Val's warmth and love is
missing.

Certain things remain strangely untouched: her bookcase, filled to overflowing with
pictures of the family. Children's artwork . . . some of it mine . . . still dominates the
side of the living room, the recliners where my great grandparents spent the last ten years of
their lives opposite. I remember sitting in my Papa's chair while Aunt Val sat next to me,
watching Love Boat and Fantasy Island, thrilled that I was staying up past my bedtime,
watching shows intended for grownups, putting one over on my parents who would often drop my
siblings and me off for the weekend.

I loved those weekends. When we spent time with Aunt Val we were loved. We were the center
of the universe and though she was well into her 70s, she would play with us, walk with us to
the corner store to get snacks, let us stay up late. It was wonderful.

In the living room, the table where Aunt Val would put the artificial tree at Christmas is
gone, though its footprints still mark the carpet. In my mind, I put it back, fill the space
beneath it with gifts, warm the air with the laughter and love of the entire family gathered
around it, singing songs and sipping cider.

I blink and the room is empty again. The warm light of memory is replaced with the harsh
sunlight of the fading afternoon. Aunt Val's dog Missy noses at my hand, asking to go
outside.

I lead her toward the patio doors. Aunt Val's dining room table, where the adults would
sit at reunions and holiday meals, is still there, covered in paperwork and trash. Her
daughter's ashtray overflows. It's a little obscene.

When I was little, Aunt Val would always sit at the card table – the kids table – with us,
and when I was 14 or so I was moved to the adult's table. The next year I begged to be granted
a spot with her at the kids table again.

Missy is impatient. She urges me through the kitchen. I look at the cabinet where my great
grand-parents kept their Sugar Corn Pops cereal. Regardless of the time of day my brother and
sister and I would arrive at her house, we were always hungry for cereal.

Aunt Val was always happy to oblige.

This cabinet, which I couldn't even reach, which held much mystery and wonder, is now
empty, and at my eye level. I am sad that my own children will never get to look up at its
closed door and proclaim themselves starving with a hunger that can only be cured by a trip to
the Honeycomb hideout.

The kitchen counters are littered with dishes and glasses. Notes written in Aunt Val's
handwriting still cling to the refrigerator, surrounded by my cousin Josh's schoolwork.

They say that when a house is passed over by a tornado, it can do strange things to the
things inside. They say that sometimes a whole room can be destroyed and the table will still
be set, candlesticks standing, untouched by the violence of the storm. As I look at the
refrigerator, unchanged in nearly a year, I wonder why some things have been left alone, while
others have been completely dismantled. It's like a half-hearted attempt has been made to
honor her memory.

I walk onto the patio. Missy runs after a bird and disappears around the corner of the
house, leaving me alone.

I stand there, knowing that it will be for the last time. I see the backyard through the
eyes of a child, a teenager, an adult, a parent. I look at Aunt Val's pool and remember when I
was so small, riding around it on a Big Wheel seemed to take all day. I remember playing with
my cool Trash Compactor Monster in the shallow end, before I was big enough to brave the deep
end and its mysteries, with my older cousins. I remember being unable to ever successfully
complete a flip off the diving board and reflexively rub my lower back.

I look at the slide, and the sobs which have been threatening since I walked into the
house begin.

In summer of last year, I took my stepkids, Ryan and Nolan, to spend the day with Aunt
Val. The three of us sat with her on the patio, eating hot dogs she'd grilled for us, drinking
punch she'd made. The kids talked eagerly with her about their plans for the rest of the
summer and the upcoming school year. I watched her listen to them, the same way she'd listened
to me say the same things 20 years earlier, happy that they were getting to share in her
unconditional love the way I had.

We went swimming, Nolan and Ryan both doing cannonballs and flips, Aunt Val always giving
them an approving, “Good for you, kiddo!” after each trick.

God, I can hear her voice as I write this.

When they grew tired of diving board tricks, they took to the slide, going head-first, on
their backs, on their knees.

Ryan was sitting at the top of the slide, waiting for Nolan to get out of the landing
area, when he screamed and raced into the water. I immediately knew something was wrong, and
rushed to the water's edge to meet him.

I got him out and saw that he'd been stung by a wasp.

I dried his tears, patched him up with baking soda and some Tylenol, and prepared to spend
the rest of the afternoon inside, watching TV.

Aunt Val wouldn't hear any of that. She picked up a broom and some Raid, and marched out
to the nest of angry wasps, which we now knew was just beneath the upper edge of the slide.
The wasps were pretty pissed and beginning to swarm, but I couldn't stop my 84-year-old great
aunt from wiping them out so the kids could continue to play.

I look at the slide, and remember how scared I was that she'd get stung and would go into
shock. I remember how much fun the kids had with her.

I recall a thought I had back then, watching her battle with those wasps:
Aunt
Val isn't going to be with us forever. Some day I'm going to stand here and she'll be gone
and I'll cry
.

So I cry. I miss her. I miss her. I miss her. I miss her. It's not fair that she died.
It's not fair at all. I miss her. She was in perfect health one day and the next she was gone.
It's not fair and I miss her and I have to say goodbye to this house and that's not fair
either.

The finality of her loss takes hold and refuses to let go. I cry until my sides hurt and
my throat is dry. My cheeks are soaked, my nose is running. It's fitting that as I bid
farewell to the house and person who played such an important part in my childhood, I sob like
a child.

After several minutes, I pull myself together, take a hard look at the backyard, run my
hand along the slide.

“Goodbye,” I say.

I walk back into the house, and I help my dad load the china cabinet into the car. It is
heavy and cuts into my hands as I lift it. I'm nervous about dropping it.

Aunt Val's daughter comes out of the house. I want to scream at her for selling off this
enormous part of my childhood, but I don't. I continue tying down the cabinet, tell her
goodbye and get into the car.

We pull out of the driveway and drive down the street for the last time.

I speak effusively with my dad on the way home. I talk about the kids. I talk about work.
I talk about the Dodgers, and I ask lots of questions about when I was a kid. I want to
cherish this time with him, make the most of it. I don't want to waste any of the time we have
together.

When we get to their house with the china cabinet, my mom asks me how it was being at Aunt
Val's house.

“Tough,” I say.

She understands.

We unload the china cabinet. My dad hugs me tightly and thanks me for helping with him. I
tell them that I love them and I drive home, silent and alone.