Because this is a small town, so your shame lives right around the corner and offers you free cheese samples at the grocery store. For those of you who missed it. I burned porkchops then the fire department showed up in their flashing lights, fifty pounds of gear and siren sounding glory on a Saturday night.I thought that was the end of things, you know except for the fact that whenever my friend Liv comes over now, my son asks when the firemen are coming. But small potatoes really in the grand scheme of I-pulled-these-innocent-and-helpful-men-away-from-their-families-and-their-dinners-for-nothing-on-a-Saturday-night.

That was until last weekend, when we were at my husband Tex’s company Christmas shindig. We sat ourselves down with his pregnant colleague so I could talk about all things Mom related. This was when I learned that Tex’s pregnant colleague’s husband, whom I was sitting directly next to, was a firefighter. My cheeks burned when I realized that he might have visited my house the previous weekend.

“Ummm” I said, swallowing the giant, flaming sword in my throat “Were you working last weekend? Because if so you came to my house and I am SO SORRY.” And then I willed the earth to open up Old Testament style and swallow me whole.

“Ohhhh!” The off duty firefighter laughed “Pork chops! I heard about you, no I wasn’t working last weekend-that was Steve.” And then it happened. I thought that I had bathed in shame, before but that was just a hint of the shame I experienced upon actually meeting a firefighter off duty.

Suffice to say, it’s an experience that stings the eyes and pretty much everywhere else.

Let’s get down to how I took a shame bath. Flashback to Saturday night, after having lived here for six months, I have made a friend. Liv came to dinner. So I was cooking, zucchini, and porkchops and because I’m crazy and have no respect for tastebuds and complimentary flavours, there was a pot of pumpkin curry going too.

Of course Mini-Tex was having none of this, so he was on my back while I stirred, and cooked and talked with Liv. That’s when it happened; the porkchops burned. And went up like a house on fire, at which point our house started to act like it was on fire. High pitched beeping and shrill shrieks reverberated off of every surface. It seemed like the house itself was screaming. Wanting to protect my two year old son’s ears, I made a beeline for the door. And began swinging it open and closed to disperse some of the smoke. Janie covered her ears “It is so loud!” Unable to understand English over the din, she joined me outside, while Liv tried to figure out how to disable the smoke alarm.

In our brief tenure at this house, this happened once before so I knew that the smoke alarm was somehow tied to my landlord’s phone. I immediately sent her a frantic series of texts along the lines of “nothing is on fire, how do I disable the system without hacking into the wall with an axe?” Unbeknownst to me, my landlord’s phone was in her car, so she didn’t reply.

After a couple of minutes Liv managed to disable the smoke alarm (all the while stirring the remaining dishes so they didn’t burn and opening windows) and we all sat down to dinner, content to laugh about the hilarity of the situation, feeling that it was in the past. This is of course when the firetruck pulled up in front of our house with lights ablazing and a firefighter clothed entirely in his heavy firefighting getup, stepped down from the fire engine.

Embarrassment flooded my being and I wanted to sink into the ground. But before digging my way to China to escape my shame, I had to apologize to the poor men whose Saturday night I had ruined. Because let’s keep in mind that this is a small town. The likelihood that they were on call and that my poor cooking had pulled them away from THEIR family dinners was exceptionally high.

Despite the -25 temperature, I ran outside without a coat. It didn’t matter, the bubbling cauldron of humiliation that was my midsection at that moment kept me warm. “I’m sorry!” I cried “I’m so sorry! There’s no fire! You can go home, I interrupted your dinners for nothing.”

The fireman good naturedly explained that he still had to come in to fill out paperwork and that possibly I should get the security code from my landlord for the next time I was cooking the other white meat.

This was when my shame morphed from a small roiling portion of my midsection to a full on lemon juice like bath. Because the fireman walked into my house and upon hearing that Mini-Tex was excited by the whole situation, the firefighter, still with his fifty plus pounds of gear on, began to play peekaboo with my son.

It was at that moment that I melted and became a puddle of mortified goo, as this man, who was missing his dinner because of my mistake, made himself the hightlight of my son’s month.

After a couple more short questions and giving the fireman the proper spelling of my name, he and his firetruck left, with the lights still blazing. Mini-Tex spent the rest of the night talking about the firetruck that was in our front yard. And later, when he woke up that night and the next morning, his first words were “firetruck”.

That whole story would be awful enough, but the thing is, it’s a small town, so the story won’t end there. It will be relived when I see that kind man in the grocery store. He’ll give Mini-Tex an extra specal wave at the parade next week when he recognizes him. And because God loves a good laugh, most likely I’ll meet that kind firefighter at my work. And thanks to my impossible to spell and unique last name, he’ll remember me and likely ask whether I’m planning porkchops for dinner. And I’ll bathe in shame all over again.

But in the grand scheme of things, it’s a good shame bath to have. Splashing metaphorical lemon juice in ones eyes because you’re so mortfied that someone was so kind when you were so stupid-it’s a good problem to have. That’s small town life for you though.

This post is dedicated to Liv, who insisted that I take a brief shame shower and retell the story at work.

Names have been changed to protect the identities of those who didn’t allow the curry to burn.

Also, if you are sitting there thinking “I feel like I’ve read this story before”, it’s because you have. Part two is coming out next week. So I had to repost this because it’s been two years. Here at the Great Unwashed, we pride ourselves on timely responses and follow ups.

Also please wish my mother a “Happy Birthday”. She’s twenty-nine today, which is awkward because I’m thirty-four.

A friend of mine posted this message the other week “Look for people who bring out your magic, not your madness” to which my only response is “What if your magic looks like madness?”

I was having a magical morning; the sun was shining, the air was crisp but not too cold. It was the Three Bears of fall weather for vampires like me who want the sun but need the cold to soothe the burning of their skin. The only weather that is better in my opinion are the minus thirty Celsius days where it’s so bright that you wander around the snow drifts shouting “I’m bliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiind! Bliiiiiiiiiiiiiiind!” before heading back into the house for sunglasses.

I was on the bike. And singing. Because there’s no point in having a weird bike unless you own it by also performing in a one woman musical as you ride down the street. Now before anyone gets too impressed by my physical fitness, I should amend that statement to- I coasted down the street. Although we have a reclining baby seat for infants, my daughter insists on craning her little head up and forward like a tiny, ginger periscope, so to protect her neck, I go an average of ten kilometers an hour.

So I’m singing away and my excellent mood continues all the way to the grocery store where there’s a car cart just sitting out, saying “Take me, I was left out here just for you.” This of course makes me smile wider so that I look like a T-Rex about to devour the metal shopping cart. A happy T-Rex who loves Abba.

Mini-Tex climbs into the front and I pop my baby into the seat in front of the handles. This is where things went awry. Now I had an audience. Specifically my infant. So I am singing to beat the band and kissing her and smiling away, just looking like a crazy person in general, but it’s fine because crazy beats homeless and I got mistaken for a vagrant last year.

I steer my way around the fresh produce section. There’s lots of room, few people, mostly grandmas who are remembering joyful mornings with their little ones like the one I’m having. Still singing so all was eccentric but still well.

Everything was good until the narrow aisle that was closed on one end for renovations, that was when the wheels fell off the eccentric cart and it became a crazy train because I broke into a new loud song just as I was turning the cart. Which would have been fine had I not locked eyes with an uncomfortable looking man who for a second thought I was speaking to him. To make this awkward moment even more cringe worthy, I belted out the lyrics “Hold our your hand darling” at that second.

So I did it. I called a grown man “darling” in the middle of the grocery store and sang to him. He’s probably decided it’s safest to shop at the competing grocery chain and that perhaps he should consider backing the NDP in this coming election because clearly mental health sector is not getting the attention or funding it deserves.

That was my magic. It unfortunately looks like absolute madness. I’m uncertain whether I should be searching for more people to bring this out of me. My gut says “no”.